Cockfighting and Amazing Grace

“God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.” Ephesians 2:8-9 (NLT)


I can still remember the excitement of getting to miss church so we could go visit my “Grandpa on the mountain.” Because there were usually surprises along the way. 

An old service station at the bottom of the mountain where we would get root beers in glass bottles; a flea market where there were puppies for sale; the feeling that we were going to fall off the mountain as my dad drove way too close to the side. 



But always, as we started down the dirt drive towards the old house, my excitement turned to nervousness.

Pictures of my Grandpa in his youth showed a tall, handsome, slightly arrogant looking man. But after years working in the coal mines, his looks and health prematurely withered. 

He and my grandmother had divorced back before divorce was accepted as the norm. Both of them had bad tempers, but my Grandpa‘s violent temper was legendary. 

Did he really beat his brother with a tire iron? You know he used to run moonshine, didn’t you? So you mean he uses those pretty roosters in fights? Does he really hit them with his cane? 

I can barely remember him looking for the perfect stump to find fiddling worms for a fishing trip with my dad. Somewhere along the line, he started using a cane to walk.

More vivid are the memories of him angrily shaking his cane, demanding someone bring him “this or that” as he coughed and gasped for air. Somewhere along the line, an oxygen tank appeared along with a folded up napkin he kept in his hand for when the coughing fits hit.

And then came the appearance of an old Bible…

When they brought in the hospital bed, the old Bible and him became inseparable. He desperately clung to it, holding it tightly to his chest. Sometimes he would shake it at us while trying to tell us something very important that I could never quite understand. 

And I remember being angry. 

How dare you, I thought. How dare you try to act like you’re good now. Now that you are dying do you think you just get to grab a Bible and it will magically wipe out all the bad things you’ve done all your life? No, Grandpa, it doesn’t work like that. You haven’t done anything good. You don’t get to just go to heaven after all that stuff. 

A couple of weeks ago, my pastor started a series of sermons on grace. How grace isn’t earned and we can’t lose it.  None of us deserve it.  It is God’s free and amazing gift to us. Tweet this!

He became emotional as he reminded us of the criminal who hung on a cross beside our Savior. About the saving grace our Lord extended to him, just moments before He died. How he wasn’t required to jump off the cross and make amends to all those he had wronged, go serve the poor and minister to the needy in order to be granted access to heaven.

My years of self righteousness melted away and in its place sprung up humility and gratefulness. And I marveled in the wonder I felt knowing that the only requirement from God was to accept His amazing gift of grace, which is wholly sufficient.  Tweet this!


Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.” And Jesus replied, “I assure you, today you will be with me in paradise.” Luke 23:42-43 (NLT)

But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. Romans 5:8 (NLT)

For “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” Romans 10:13 (NIV)

Nosebleeds and Mocha Frappuccinos

 “Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation.  The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.”  Matthew 26:41

“I got to eat a popsicle today, mom,” said my youngest child, proudly showing me her slightly stained pink tongue.   

“Oh, that’s nice, honey.  Why?” I asked. 

“Because the nurse said it would help with my nosebleed.”  

My eldest had them occasionally as a young child but she hasn’t had any in a couple of years.  But my youngest child…poor thing.  She got the worst of it. 

Last year, she had them so severely and so frequently she made daily trips to the school nurse’s office.  Sometimes twice a day.  

Exasperated, I took her to an ENT whose diagnosis was weak blood vessels.  His suggested treatment was a chewable daily allergy medicine (to help prevent them) and Afrin nose spray (to help stop one already in progress). 

After several weeks with no nosebleeds, my first thought was “Hooray!” closely followed by second thought which was “Well, THAT information sure would have been helpful about a year ago.”

In our desperation, we’d tried all sorts of things over the years to prevent/stop them. 

• A humidifier. 
• Liberal application of nasal lubricant. 
• Short nails to ward off accidental scraping of the inside of her nose.  
• Pinching the bridge of her nose for 5 minutes straight (no peeking!). 
• “Crazy lips” -  a small piece of wet paper towel, folded to fit between her top lip and gum.

And though some of these things may have helped, nothing came close to helping as quickly and completely as our ENT’s suggestions. 

So, after almost six months of being virtually nosebleed-free, we had become complacent. 

"Nosebleeds?  That’s a thing of the past," I thought as I happily checked “None” on the school’s medical conditions form.  Goodbye humidifier.  So long emergency stashes of Afrin bottles.   

I surprised my sweet hubby with his second love this morning:  a mocha frappuccino.   Since I never just drop by his office and since our strict needs-only budget doesn’t allow for such luxuries, I knew this would be a real treat for him. 

The need to reconnect with him felt almost overwhelming.

I couldn't put my finger on it, either, because we haven’t been fighting.  Actually, things have been running surprisingly smooth at our house lately.

 

We say pleasant enough “good mornings” as we get ourselves and the kids ready for the day.  We ask how each other’s day was in the evenings and do a decent job listening to each other.  We’ve eaten more dinners together around the table than not lately. 

But in the evenings, after the kids go to bed, which is the only real time we have to connect with each other on a deeper level…well, we just hadn’t been.   And that's when I realize what is happening...we have become complacent and have been, ever so slightly, drifting apart. 

And it is neither of our faults and both of our faults at the same time. 

And God reminds me that our marriage is susceptible to the same kind of sneak attack we experienced with our youngest's recent nosebleed.  He reminds me that complacency will lead us and our relationship down a path that we've been too many times before.  Click to Tweet!

And I'm thankful for this wake up call. 

For the Great Physician's diagnosis that our marriage is weak right now.  And for His suggested treatment of making the time to meet each other's most important needs.   

 “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”  Ephesians 6:10-12 (ESV)

“So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.”  Revelation 3:16 (ESV)

“Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:”  I Peter 5:8 KJV