DAY 34 – COUNTING TO ASCENSION – for May 19

POPPING BACK TO POTATO MASHER PARABLES….

During the first 29 years of collecting I never imagined potato mashers being something God could use, but that just proves his resourcefulness. I’ve learned that God uses everything that’s ever happened to us for his good if we are willing to let him. He even redeems the bad things that happen and uses it to allow us to help others for His glory. 

God uses visuals to teach. Remember what God said to Moses, “What is that in your hand?” And then God used what Moses had – which was his walking stick – as an object lesson. 

Jesus also used the mundane to teach. One of my favorites is in Matthew 11:28-30, where his invitation to his hearers was, “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart; and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” 

His hearers would have understood immediately what he was offering, because they knew what a yoke was and the way it was used. They saw it as a visual before them in their everyday life. They knew that a stronger, older ox was always yoked with a younger, inexperienced one so the stronger one could bear the greater strain of the burden they pulled, and be a teacher to the inexperienced younger one. Isn’t it wonderful to know that once you have accepted Him as Savior, Jesus is right there in the yoke with you - bearing the greater part of the burden? 


More than once someone has said to me, “God will not give you more than you can handle.” And I tell them, “He has given me more than I could handle multiple times – but He will never give me more than He can handle" – and I find peace in knowing that. Max Lucado says, “Sometimes He calms the storm. Sometimes He calms His child in the storm.” I know from experience that sometimes you just have to hold on for dear life and know He is there because His Word declares He is, though you can’t feel His presence at all. Our walk is a journey of faith, not of feeling, and that’s good, because feelings are very often unreliable. They can’t be trusted.