Prepare To Be Amazed!

I have been out bargain shopping again and look what I bought this week for 10 cents!  When I saw this package at the store, I didn't know what I would do with it, but when I got home much to my surprise there were already 3 cards in it and all I had to do was embellish them. Imagine my amazement to realize I had purchased 3 cards all for the low, low price of 3 cents each!   Yes, it's the little things in life people!

Don't you just love it when we are amazed by God?  I mean something that you knew only the God of the universe could orchestrate?  I have heard some call these "God Sightings".

Scripture tells us of several people who were amazed by God.  Some examples are: The people who heard the shepherds account of the angels visiting them were "amazed". (Luke 2:18).  People were "amazed" when Jesus preached in the temple as a child about His wisdom and understanding (Luke 2:47).   When Christ calmed the sea in Mark 6:51, the scripture said the disciples were "completely amazed".  I mean knock down, jaw dropping amazed!  When Jesus appears to the disciples in the upper room after his resurrection, Luke 24:41 says:  "And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, "Do you have anything to eat?"    Was Jesus really hungry?  I don't think so, but how would they know He was really alive?  He ate with them!  In fact the word "amazed" is used over 51 times in scripture.

I wanted to share a time when as a young woman I was totally amazed by God.  I hadn't been a Christian very long, so I did not know scriptures very well.  My grandmother was dying from cancer and she lived 700 miles away.  This was when my children were little so there were school issues, money issues, and time off work to consider and work out.  I debated about returning and prayed about what I should do.  I wanted to be there at the end, but I also knew that my mother would need me after she died.  I was reading in Romans 8:38, 39 one morning these words:  "For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."(NIV) There was my "God sighting"...nothing could take Grandma from me, because of her faith in Christ, I would see and be with her for an eternity. I became totally at peace with waiting.  You might think that would be the end of the story (as Paul Harvey used to say) but as we were sitting at her funeral, guess which passage the pastor chose?  Romans 8:38,39!  I was totally amazed and the peace which came over me was incredible.   God not only comforted me beforehand, He was comforting me at the funeral with the same passage!  I bet you thought Romans 8 was written for you also, didn't you? To this day, whenever I hear anyone quote from Romans 8 a big smile comes to my face.

My mentoring suggestion today would be, look for those "God Sightings" in your life.  Sometimes we get too busy to slow down and notice them.  It doesn't even have to be gigantic ones, it can be the little things in life!