The Delicate Balance of Spring

This morning as I rode into work, I noticed the beautiful signs of spring.  The buds of new life breaking forth from the crust of winter on the trees.  The fresh sprigs of green grass breaking through the hard surface of the ground.  Dandelions and tulips breaking forth from bulbs buried deep under the ground.  The fresh white blooms of pears and dogwoods dotting the landscapes, perfectly pushing past the wintry gray of a season soon to end. 

For many spring represents new birth, rejuvenation, new life.  We are surrounded on all sides by fresh and new.  It seems to bring hope and renewal and with it, many find that their spirits are lifted and they feel a sense of encouragement that has been missing all winter.  AND YET, as encouraging as all of the new life seems to be, there are many who dread the beginning of spring, because with it comes stuffed heads, runny noses, headaches, scratchy throats and itchy runny eyes.  At my home, I love the spring, but my family suffers all around me with the pain of spring.  Allergies affect so many people as pollen begins to blanket the world, many suffer from reactions to the necessities of growth all around them.  It is certainly a delicate balance between the joy and pain of spring.

The same is true in our spiritual lives.  As we go through seasons of growth and new life in the kingdom of God, we struggle with the pain of the growth.  With every struggle comes strength and so just as the dandelion must break through the crusty ground to beautify the landscape, so we must struggle to break through the old man, our sinful nature, or even our old way of thinking.  As we struggle to break forth, there is pain in the struggle but the joy of spring lies just beyond.  As a baby struggles to be born, it causes pain to the mother, but once having received that new baby in her arms, she would never regret the pain of the moment.  We are the same.  Once you experience God's best for you, the pain of getting there will pale in comparison to the glory of His reality in your life.

I once heard it said that "Pain is inevitable. . . Growth is optional."  We're all going to struggle.  We're  all going to go through painful circumstances.  But we choose whether we grow from them.  I choose to embrace the new life of His presence and spring forward into God's best for me.  "If any man is in Christ, He's a NEW creation.  Old things are passed away and all things become new." 

Enjoy the warmth of the coming days.  Notice God's handiwork all around.  Enjoy the growth that is taking place.  Recognize that some of us may be suffering through (with red noses and watery eyes) but soon we'll all be basking in the sunshine of His greatness as His best in played out all around us.  God best to each of you!  -- RP

Restoration - Rebuilding on the Broken Pieces of Yesterday

Why is it that we have such a hard time believing that God is capable of restoring or bringing back what once was?  Why do we have such a tough time believing that God is able to take the broken pieces of yesterday and rebuild something even greater than what once stood on the heap of ruin?

In the 30th chapter of Jeremiah, the prophet, as he watches his once proud and great nation be led into captivity and the once great inpenetrable walls of his great city, Jerusalem, torn down and destroyed, begans to speak the words of the Lord to His people.  He tells them that because of their failure, their sin, they will experience pain and punishment, but it will only last so long.  The day would come when he would bring back out of captivity this great nation and he would restore health to them and he would heal all their wounds, and because she had been an outcast, God would bring her back.  Then in verse 18, he says ". . .The city shall be built upon its own mound. . ."

 Years later, Nehemiah is a cup bearer in the palace of a Persian king.  The king notices that Nehemiah is not his normal happy self.  Rather, he seems disturbed, discouraged, downcast, beaten up.  The king calls him in and asks, why Nehemiah is so low in spirit.  Nehemiah explains to the king that the capital city of his homeland lies in ruins and has no walls to protect it.  With the blessing of the king, Nehemiah returns and begins an amazing restoration project, that Jeremiah had prophesied would come to pass years before.  Nehemiah goes and he rebuilds the walls of the city in an amazing feat, but what fascinates me is the fact that he used the broken down burned out pieces of the previous wall to rebuild the wall that stands to this day. 

Isn't it just like God to take the discarded pieces of a broken life and allow it to become a blessing that touches future generations?  When he chooses to restore, he doesn't do it halfway.  Rather He takes the pieces of our greatest failures and disappointments and builds again on what was destroyed.  Have you ever considered that Peter, God's man with the kingdom keys, when he fell into sin and returned to his fisherman's lifestyle, was found by Jesus?  And when He found him, he doesn't punish Peter but rather reassures his love for Peter and puts him back on the job.  From Jesus-denier to Pentecost preacher within 50 days.  But what I love most, is the fact that God allows Peter a second chance to proclaim his knowledge of Christ.  Where he once denied he even knew the man, 50 days later, he proclaims him both Lord and Christ and when others felt the same conviction that he felt 50 days earlier, he knew exactly what they needed to do to find exactly what he had found - the restoring hand of Jesus Christ. 

Paul in his second letter to the church at Corinth, says "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God."  I've often wondered why it seems that I bump into people all the time who have struggled or are fighting battles that I've already fought.  I believe that Jesus rebuilds with the broken pieces of our life so that when he, having put us back together, brings broken people to us, we are then able to follow His lead and offer the same restoration and comfort and healing that he once gave to us. 

Nehemiah never forgot what it was like to rebuild walls out of broken pieces that lasted.  Peter never forgot what it was like to be restored as a fisher of men.  And I don't ever want to forget what it feels like to experience the forgiveness of God and find His hand of restoration taking the broken pieces of yesterday's failures and building a future that will, in faith, touch the lives of others to come.

May God bless you all!  I hope to not be so long between postings.  It's time for me to get started doing what God's gifted me to do more often and I hope that it will be a blessing to each of your lives.

Let it Snow!

As I sit today, looking out of this window, observing once again the majestic handiwork of our Amazing God, the wonderful snow that is falling brought to remembrance some promises from God's Word for me.  When I consider my own handiwork, and all the mistakes I've made in life, I could find myself battling through fits of depression and worthlessness.  After all, left to my own devices, I am, AT BEST, an utter and complete failure.  Paul even says in 1 Corintihians 15, that if our hope is only in this life, then we are of all men most miserable.  The best that I have to offer is somehow inadequate.  The Bible tells us that there is none good but God AND yet we are expected to go on to perfection.  If, on my own, I can not even measure up to the standard of "good", how can perfection be expected out of me?  Well, here's the hope - wait for it - you aren't expected to do it on your own - HE provides the help.

We bring to Him our stained, wretched, refuse of a life and He puts together the perfect recipe to make something beautiful out of it.  Have you ever watched someone make a cake?  Not one pretty ingredient out of the bunch - flour, eggs, vanilla, milk, cocoa, sugar (ok I'll give you that sugar can be pretty but I think it's only because we filter it through our sweet sensor).  Nothing pretty in the bunch.  And yet the amazing compilation a master baker can create will simply stupify our minds.

Jesus says "Come to me, all who labor and are heavily burdened down and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn of me - for my yoke is easy - my burden is light."

God says - "Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool."

Maybe you were perfect, never carried a heavy load, never had need of the cleansing power of God.  But I have and I did.  There's something amazing about the presence of God that allows us to go from scarlet to snow.  Our ability to be made white as snow comes from his willingness at Calvary to be made red like crimson.  Oh the blood of Jesus - Oh the blood of Jesus - Oh the blood of Jesus - that washes white as snow.  If you've never needed redemption, then you may not understand but for those who've lived imperfect lives -- you know -- there's nothing like turning it all over to Jesus and allowing the master to make something beautiful out of it.

And so when I see the snow, as I do right now, it serves as a reminder - that though I once was stained so deep, His blood has washed me clean and when He sees me, He sees what I see out my front window a blanket of white, where sins stains once were.  So --- I guess I need the reminder this morning - and maybe you do too - so I say "LET IT SNOW, LET IT SNOW, LET IT SNOW!" 

There's a song I love that's out right now, by a group called Pocket Full of Rocks (if you can believe that) that says "You can come as you are - with all your broken pieces - all your shameful scars - the pain you hold in your heart - Give it all to Jesus - for you can come as you are. . ."  If you are looking for redemption, if you are looking for peace of mind - you can come just like you are and find a Savior whose arms are open wide waiting to heal your brokenness and to give you a clean slate.

After all - that's why He came - why He was born - why He died - why He rose again - He knew that our best efforts weren't good enough ............... but His best effort was!

God bless you all - love all of you - just in case I don't write again before then - MERRY CHRISTMAS!  Celebrate the JOY of knowing HIM this season and all year through! ---- RP

Breaking Forth

Today - I began to think about the amazing presence of God.  Have you ever considered how truly amazing it is that the same God who created the universe, who spoke the world into existence, who called light out of darkness, who brought order out of chaos, who took nothing and made everything - that very same God comes to take up residence within the life of every believer?  This is absolutely amazing to me considering the amazing power of God and the frailty of humanity.  How are we able to contain the awesomeness of the presence of God?

Ironically enough, God was concerned about the same thing.  As Moses was about to go the top of Mount Sinai, God and he had a conversation.  He told Moses that he should set a boundary, a stopping point at the base of the mountain because should the people break through and ascend the mountain, the presence of God would break forth and the people would die.  After Moses descended the mountain with the law of God, to protect the people, God chose to house His amazing presence inside the tabernacle behind a thick curtain or veil allowing only one person, the high priest, access to His awesome power.  Hundreds of years go by and God's presence remained hidden, veiled, limited to only a few and yet man longed for intimacy with God, and God desired relationship with man.  Man did everything he could to get good enough, to somehow become holy enough to be worthy of God's presence, inventing laws and modifications of God's laws to insure that man remained "holy" in an effort to deserve the presence of God.  Religious groups were formed; Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, and those were just the ones in Israel.  And no matter how hard they tried, they could not attain intimacy on their own - and God's presence remained veiled.

Then something amazing happened. . . this guy, an amazing sinless guy, one who had not been contaminated by the sin of this world, one who had actually come to the earth in the form of sinful man and had remained sinless, died on an awful instrument of torture - the cross.  And as he died, as he breathed his last breath, the veil, the 12 inch thick curtain, that had hidden the presence of God for so long was torn from top to bottom.  We were brought nigh unto God  by the blood of Christ, thus allowing all of us access to the presence of God, the very thing that God warned Moses would kill those who broke through to God and allowed His presence to break forth in their lives.

So why was I thinking about this today?  I think it just hit me - that my best attempts to be good enough, to be holy enough for God is an exercise in futility.  Although, I'm endeavoring to please God with my life and honestly desiring to make him happy, God's presence at work in my life is not contingent upon my ability to be good.  When He saved me from the clutches of sin, He supplied me with His Spirit, something so powerful that it gives me the ability to live a pleasing life for Him.  He proved that once and for all man's best attempts to get to Him were insufficient, but when the fulness of time had come, nothing could stop Him from breaking forth to us.  There was nothing we could do to get to Him, so He pursued us.  He came breaking thru every barrier to give you what you need to overcome every obstacle you face.

So today, I encourage you to allow the presence of God to break forth in your life and discover the greatness of a relationship, a relationship that He desires to have with you so much, that nothing, including religious tradition, could keep him from having with you.  God bless you - let's discover the nature of His amazing presence working in our life!

Hanging on to the Dream

Imagine you are one of 12 sons and a few daughters thrown in for good measure.  A big family with a great heritage, and a few really strange happenings as well.  Your family has big plans for the future and since birth you seem to have your Dad's favor.  When everyone else got K-Mart, you got Armani.  When your brothers ate Happy Meals, you got Steak.  While others worked the fields, you lay protected at home.  And your brothers grow angrier and angrier.  Now imagine that you've been sleeping, while they've been tending cattle and you walk into the kitchen, stretch your lanky arms out and with a big yawn say, "What ya'll been doing?"  Well with grunts and groans they inform you of what they think of your question and as they prepare to get back to work, you pipe up with, "Hey guys - I have a dream."

That's pretty much the story from the Bible of a man named Joseph.  Joseph shares his dream with his brothers (which probably wasn't the smartest thing he ever did), and explained how in his dream they were all going to be bowing down to him someday.  Well if they weren't angry enough, they certainly were boiling now.  Your dreams and your clothes and your preferred status put you in position few would want to be - in the crosshairs of 10 angry men.  They place him in a pit, fake his death, sell him into slavery aboard a transport to Egypt and are done with his dreams. . . or so they thought.

Joseph always amazed me - if anyone could have been fed up with God's dream in his life it was him.  Sold into slavery wasn't bad enough.  He digs out of the pit only to end up in prison accused of attempted rape.  Forgotten in prison, he still held on to the dream.  Finally the call from Pharoah comes and all of Joseph's dreaming and waiting pays off.  He is elevated to second in command of all Egypt and when famine hits, his brothers come and bow before him, fulfilling the dream he'd had so long ago as just a young teenager. 

God is great in that He births dreams within us, plans that He has for us that He gives us a glimpse of as we live our life for Him.  The only problem is that most of the time He doesn't reveal His schedule and how it relates to the dream.  He also doesn't share with us what it will take to bring that dream to reality.  He knows that if He showed us the complete picture, many would drop out of the dream fulfillment process and take an easier road BUT they would never fulfill the GREAT destiny that God had planned for them.  I wonder if Joseph would have so readily embraced the dream if he knew the price.  Nevertheless, if he does not embrace the dream of God, Israel as a nation probably dies of starvation before they ever become more than a single family. 

Habakkuk 2:3 says - "For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry."

Just because it hasn't happened yet, doesn't mean that God has forgotten or you had a bad pizza.  It just means that the dream He's working on your behalf is not quite ready.  Like an amazing recipe, with all the ingredients, if one is missing, the completed product won't be as good.  So let the dream come to pass.  Don't give up, Don't give in.  Even if the path of the dream takes you through the pits and even into prison - it won't last forever - it is for an appointed time - God did not lie - wait for it - it will surely come!

I know it's been awhile.  I've been in a bit of desert place but I'm confident that He is bringing me out and through it all, the report of the Lord remains GREAT.  God bless you all - my wife keeps singing this song and so I close with its words - "Dream a dream if you dare to, dream a dream if you care to, dream a dream and prepare to see what the Father will do for you to make your dream come true. . ." Today I encourage you to hold on to your dream - the fulfillment is on the way!  Love you all!

The High Cost of Freedom

Today, I am profoundly afraid that many of my generation and those younger than I have lost touch with the true cost of Freedom. Freedom has been drilled into us as our birthright, our God-given right to live within the confines of Freedom. We take for granted the freedoms that we enjoy and we forget that their are so many who are not so fortunate. We walk through life assuming that so much of what we enjoy will always remain, even as each day those same freedoms are infringed on more and more. We no longer are truly appreciative nor respectful of the freedom that we have come to know and love. And when a generation loses touch with the value of it's freedom, can it truly be said that they still value it's cost.


Freedom is not, was not, and never will be FREE. It carries a steep price. I know that is cliche and yet because we have not for the most part been forced to step up to the check-out stand and foot the bill, we lessen it's true cost. Oh, we read about it in our history books, even as the intellectuals of our day, question their validity. Yes, we see books about it in our bookstores, alongside liberal interpretations of hatred spun at our men and women who are forced into impossible situations but serve the cause of freedom none-the-less. You see, my fear is that in our desire as a nation to remain politically correct and to promote freedom in every corner of our globe, there are some who use those freedoms to denigrate the price it took to purchase them. I fear that the country that we have become is a far cry from the beacon of liberty that our forefathers envisioned when they sat down and wrote the now famous words, "We the people of the United States. . .". We must now remind the next generation, our children, our children's children of the true cost of freedom, less they have a country that has returned to the shackles of servitude that our forefathers fought to free us from.

I'm reminded of the Children of Israel, having been delivered from the shackles of Egypt. They had a paid a great price in Egypt and yet, had grown to be a great nation. Upon leaving Egypt, with quite a display of the power of God, Moses insisted that they build memorials, altars really made of stone, as constant reminders to generations that would follow of what it took for them to be free of Egypt. Moses went on to say in Deuteronomy, referring to the laws of God and the history of the people of Israel, that parents were to constantly keep these things before their children's eyes. They should talk about them when they were in the street and when they got up in the morning and when they went to bed at night - less they forgot the Lord and His hand that had delivered them.

We are a nation of memorials. We have statues and buildings and sculptures in honor of the price that men and women paid for freedom. And unfortunately many times, because we've seen them so often, our familiarity breeds apathy and we fail to recognize or promote the true cost of freedom. Let this serve as a clarion call, a reminder to all of my generation, that when we see a memorial - that we stop and remember the cost of our fellow citizens to purchase the freedom that we so gladly and readily enjoy.

And as great as our political and personal freedom is - it pales in comparison to our spiritual freedom. Spiritually the Bible tells us that we were all dead in our sin. It tells that the just reward of our sin was death. It tells us that all of us are sinners and so therefore no matter who we are, we were shackled and enslaved to our sinful nature - and yet there was one who willing to pay the price of freedom - to set you and I free from spiritual death and eternal hell. It was a price that all of us were responsible for and yet He paid it on our behalf. When the cry that shook heaven and Earth from the top of Golgotha came from the soul of Jesus Christ, "IT IS FINISHED", the transaction was complete, the bill paid. He took upon himself the sin of humanity and was willing to do it because your freedom and my freedom was worth the price. Today, you can be free. You can live free from the sin of this world. Not because you have the power to do so, but simply because He paid the price for your freedom. That's why Paul could write, "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away and behold all things have become new." Thank God that He was willing to pay the price for you & I.

I close once again with the words of a Gaither Vocal Band song, titled "Let Freedom Ring":

Deep within the heart has always known that there was freedom
Somehow breathed into the very soul alive
The prisoner, the powerless, the saved have always known it
There’s something that keeps reaching for the sky

Even life begins because a baby fights for freedom
And songs we love to sing have freedom’s theme
Some have walked through fire and flood to find a place of freedom
And some faced hell itself for freedom’s dream

Let freedom ring wherever minds know what it means to be in chains
Let freedom ring wherever hearts know pain
Let freedom echo through the lonely streets where prisons have no key
We can be free and we can sing --- let freedom ring

God built freedom into every fiber of creation
And He meant for us to all be free and whole
When my Lord bought freedom with the blood of His redemption
His cross stamped pardon on my very soul

I’ll sing it out with every breath, I’ll let the whole world hear it
This hallelujah anthem of the free
That iron bars and heavy chains can never hold us captive
The Son has made us free and free indeed

Let freedom ring down through the ages from a hill called Calvary
Let freedom ring wherever hearts know pain
Let freedom echo through the lonely streets where prisons have no key
You can be free and you can sing let freedom ring

Let freedom echo through the lonely streets where prisons have no key
You can be free and you can sing let freedom ring

You can be free and you can sing --- let freedom ring --- let freedom ring

This Independence Day, take the time to remember the price of freedom. Thank God for men and women who have laid down their very life for our Independence. But more importantly breath a prayer of thanks, that there was a man who carried on His shoulders a cross that was weighed down by the sin of an entire race of people and He was willing to do it to break the chains of the curse of sin ONCE AND FOR ALL. . . If you haven't done so, find your Freedom in Christ Jesus today - and if you have, celebrate the fact that Jesus paid the price that you might be free.

Love everyone - Happy Independence Day - pass it on to your kids that freedom is not free - thank someone who paid the price - and pray everyday that God will continue to bless America! -- RP
(Re-published from July 2009)

Thanking God for an AMAZING Dad!

Last year, at about this time, I wrote my first blog entry.  (Feel free to take a look back if you'd like.)  The subject of my first entry was my hero, My Dad.  Over the last year, my opinion of my hero has been supersized.  My Dad is now a SUPERHero!

Superheroes don't come along everyday.  They aren't a dime-a-dozen.  They can't be found on every street corner.  The essence of heroism is an undefined quality that is not present in every person you see.  Few, when given opportunity to pay the price of heroism, do so.  It's a costly road - but my Dad is now a Superhero.

When I was growing up, there was nobody bigger than my Dad.  No one was stronger than my Dad.  No one was faster than my Dad.  No one was able to leap tall buildings with a single bound like my Dad.  But as great as my Dad was when I was a boy, he has risen to a stature in my eyes that few have ever gotten too.  That's right - Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, Peter Parker, Tony Stark and Clyde Pavie.

Over the last year I've watched my Dad go from being a mild-mannered mechanic who loved his family and gave His best to God, to possessing a strength that supersedes muscular capabilities.  Over the last year, my Dad has watched his beloved wife be crippled by an insidious disease and when he could have been angry, frustrated, even mad at God, He has remained ever faithful.  When he's received news that would have rocked the core of nearly every other person I know, He has stood with tear-filled eyes and a faith-filled heart and in the face of the negative, remained a force for the positive.  As my mom's physical faculties continue to fail and as she's gone from being a strong independent woman to completely dependent for every moment, my Dad has become the care-giver, the bath-giver, the body-lifter, the nurse, the doctor, the whatever-my-wife-needs-to-sustain-her-life-for-the-next-moment provider.  When he needs a break, he won't take one.  When he should get away, he remains a constant at his post.  When others would walk away, he remains as faithful as the ticks of a clock.

While my mom has walked through this horrible time with this horrible disease, there have been three constants.  1)  Jesus Christ who is always with us.  2)  3 Sons who love her and have done the best we can for her.  3)  Clyde Pavie, an amazing husband, a wonderful father, and newly introduced SUPERHERO who continues to amaze me.  Dad - I was always proud of the way you provided for our family.  But now, your strength and your courage have left me humbled and completely in awe.  You are my SUPERHERO - the most Jesus-like man I've ever met.  I love you and I'm thankful to not only call you my hero - I'm thankful to call you MY DAD! ~ RP