I am a singer, songwriter, wife, mother, Jesus follower. I send out a 2-minute read every Tuesday about Jesus and life in God.
Manna Fuel
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Hi Friends, As the pastor shared from Exodus 32, painting the picture of the Israelites waiting nervously for Moses to return from his journey up the mountain, I began to see the scene in ways I hadn’t before. Here they are, in the middle of the wilderness. It has been weeks with no sign of their leader. Fear takes hold. They are distraught that God may have abandoned them. Left them for dead in the middle of this wasteland. They wake up in the morning, collect manna for the day’s nourishment, and complain to Aaron at how long it’s been. Where is Moses? Where is God? What kind of deliverance is this? They squint worriedly up at the mountain, mindlessly picking bits of daily bread from their teeth. Aaron has an idea. Bring me all the gold from your earrings. He melts it down, begins to make the golden calf. The people work to gather gold, melt, and carve the image. Idolatry fueled by calories wrought from heaven-sent miracle bread that has literally fallen from the sky while they’re sleeping. It can look so ridiculous to us on the outside. How could they doubt? How could they grumble? And yet, it’s at this point in the story that I’m exceedingly aware that I do this often. Taking breath into my lungs. Living under a sky painted with glorious color. Standing on a rock hurling through space, the origins of which even the most brilliant scientists can’t explain away. I think back to parts of my own story in God. Times of confusion in my life where He’s so tenderly made clear to me every step to take after the last. Evidences of not alone and never in want, and yet I so easily grumble, lose heart, or make an idol of some other support in my life. I’m making it my ambition to see the manna of God in my daily life. To remember the miracles that seem small and happen so regularly that I take them for granted. I want to gather up the miracles like they gathered up the manna. To take note of them and be sustained by them. And to be grateful. Thank you, God, for all these evidences of Your love. Help me not to forget them. – Anna |
Anna Blanc
I am a singer, songwriter, wife, mother, Jesus follower. I send out a 2-minute read every Tuesday about Jesus and life in God.
Hi Friends, Last night I stepped out onto the back deck. To be honest, I was escaping the thunderous noise (oh the noise!) of three boys who felt bedtime looming and were attempting to squeeze just a few more minutes of play out the day. I stepped out into what has been one of the first warm evenings of the year, heard the birds singing in the forest beyond our yard, and I had what felt like an involuntary reaction. It felt like when the doctor hits your knee just right and you get surprised...
Hi Friends, I’ll never forget it. I showed up for class in college, slid into my seat, and noticed the girl on my left had a large smudge on her forehead. She was an acquaintance, and in my earnestness to be a “real friend”, I pointed it out. “You have something on your forehead”, I said, gesturing to her as if wiping at my face. “It’s Ash Wednesday,” she said, turning in her seat. Whoops! Neither my husband nor I grew up in churches that followed the church calendar or included liturgy. So...
Hi Friends, Last week we talked about finding every last bit of our ordinary lives in the grand storyline of God. This week, let’s look at how we help one another do just that. When Eugene Peterson counseled pastors on how to help their parishioners find themselves in God’s story, he said, “Listening is the first step. It is the precondition for… making the transition from what a person perceives as alienation and experiences as a jumble of unrelated irrelevancies to a sense of coherence and...