jelly fish sting

Have you ever been stung by a Jelly Fish? Well, this weekend was a first for me. My family and I were at the beach, all swimming together, when the worst instant pain I have ever felt hit my leg. I was up to my neck in water, when all of a sudden it felt like a branding iron hit the back of my leg and was just left there. I started screaming and immediately left to get out of the water, the back of my leg began to swell instantly and turned purple and red, whelped up and hurt like crazy.
My immediate thought was that I needed someone to pee on my leg, to help with the hurt. I had seen on Survivor that doing that was supposed to help and because we were on the beach with no quick fixes to ease the harsh pain, I looked at the boys in my family and asked them to pee on my leg. I know, it sounds gross, but when you are hurting like that, you will do ANYTHING to get relief-and I mean anything.
While I have 4 boys in my family, none of them at that moment had to go to the bathroom. I am thinking “you have got to be kidding me!” Limping back to my chair, my husband grabbed a bottle of water, handed it to my eldest son and told him to go with me and pee on my leg. We arrived at the bathrooms, only to find there was NO family bathroom. I can’t go in the men’s room. He can’t go in the ladies room. Dilemna….hmmmm….what to do? I am dying and looking for any available solution. So, we head into a deserted parking deck, where I hope he can help me.
I lean up against the wall and tell my son to hurry up because I can’t stand the pain- just do it. To which he looks at me and says “Mom, I just can’t pee on you.” After fussing with him for a few seconds and trying to explain that it is okay, we finally decided for him to go in the bathroom, pee in the bottle and we would pour it on my leg. (probably a better plan anyway!) And yes, I think I am relieved to know my son can’t and won’t pee on his mother, even when given the chance to!
Minutes later, I am standing on the edge of the beach and he is pouring that on my leg. It didn’t stop the pain, but it did help a little. (I later discovered that HOT water is much better. Wish I had known that BEFORE I had urine poured on me!) I called a friend and asked her to look up what you could do for a sting and that is when I learned that hot water seemed to be the recommended treatment. But I am on the beach-no HOT water. I finally found a tide pool that had been heated by the sun, sat in that, took some pain reliever and found some more relief. But I can’t tell you, how quickly that pain came and stayed. How I would have done anything to relieve it. It was crazy.
While processing all of those crazy events, the Lord was clear to reveal truth to my heart. Standing in the midst of the ocean, minding my own business, I got stung. It is so easy to be caught in the drift of life, doing your own thing and to be stung-not on the surface, but deep down, underneath-where no one can see. And for that hurt to be so deep that you would be willing to do anything to find relief. The drift is a crazy a place…where deep hurt and pain can make you choose to do things you would never dream of.
Not in a million years would I have ever thought I would have begged my guys to pee on me. But the things you will do to find relief from the sting that is found in the moments of drifting is crazy. I am living proof of this. For many of us, we have been drifting and we have been stung. The pain from that may lie deep under the surface, but the reality is we have chosen some crazy things to try to get relief from the sting of that pain.
However, the remedy isn’t what we think. It isn’t what the world tells us. And though we try it, it doesn’t fix the pain.
I don’t know what has stung you or what you have done to try to bring relief to that pain. Maybe you didn’t even realize you were drifting and got stung. Maybe you have tried some crazy remedies and are looking not for relief but a way to make it go away totally. If that is true…get out of the water. Stop the drift. Don’t listen to the crazy remedies this life tells us about and know that JESUS alone fixes us from the inside out. STOP the drift…so you don’t get stung. And then run to the HEALER of all.
So, yes…I am sure you are all laughing that I got stung and peed on, but mine was just a jelly fish sting issue. Where have you drifted, gotten stung and tried a crazy relief idea that didn’t work because you chose something other than Jesus?
ALL FOR YOU

We got up today and just on a random whim decided to take the boys to the beach. My youngest had been asking all summer to go and so we took him to play in the sand and waves. When we got to the beach there was a beautiful sandcastle right in front of where we chose to sit. The tide was coming in and it threatened to destroy the cool sand edifice and my boys decided to make it their mission to build a HUGE wall around the sandcastle in order to protect it, keeping it from being destroyed. For the better part of an hour, they worked and built. It was funny to see them work so hard to protect a castle that wasn’t even theirs. As I sat watching, I was proud of their efforts, but knew in the end it would be futile. The tide would take it.

That got me to thinking…

So many of us are like my boys. Trying to defend a KINGDOME, a castle bound for destruction because it is made of sand. We work hard to build walls, protect our “stuff” and to work diligently to spend our lives shielding the “beautiful edifices”. But it is inevitable. We can spend our days doing that, but IT IS COMING DOWN. We work so hard to put our money in purses with holes, build houses made of sand and invest in what will never last. We are just making castles out of sand and trying to protect it from the tide.

The wise man builds upon the rock. The catch to that passage of Scripture is that the wise man HEARS and ACTS, building his house on the rock so that when the rains come, it is not swept away.

Matt 7:24-27

24 "Therefore everyone who hears these words of Mine, and acts upon them, may be compared to a wise man, who built his house upon the rock.

25 "And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and burst against that house; and {yet} it did not fall, for it had been founded upon the rock.

26 "And everyone who hears these words of Mine, and does not act upon them, will be like a foolish man, who built his house upon the sand.

27 "And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and burst against that house; and it fell, and great was its fall."

The key to not being swept away is THREE FOLD.

HEARING, ACTING and WHERE YOU BUILD. So, the question for us is three fold.

Have you heard the Words of the Lord? Have you acted on them? And where are you building, sand or rock? Perhaps we are just building on sand and trying to build walls around what will inevitably fall? Perhaps we have heard, but haven’t acted?

This afternoon was a good word picture of what building in the wrong place, not listening to the Lord or acting on His Words can do for us.

ALL FOR YOU

parenting

I was in the grocery store today and got REALLY frustrated with a Mom that was in front of me in line. She had a small 2 year old with her that she continually called to come to her. The little girl continually ran from the Mother. The Mom stood in line and talked about how bad the little girl was and how she never comes when she calls. She called and fussed the entire time, until the sentence she dropped absolutely stunned me.
Let me first preface this by saying, my thoughts were-quit yelling at the girl to come and GO GET HER. Quit griping about how she isn’t doing what you said and DISCIPLINE her. The little girl needed a spanking and a reminder of who she was to obey-NOT HERSELF!
It was in the midst of those thoughts that the Mom blurted out, “come here, or I am not giving you a quarter.” Oh Man, I almost scolded the Mom. Now, she was trying to bribe the little girl to obey. No wonder the little girl was rotten; the Mom was doing a horrible job of parenting.
We don’t teach our children to obey because there is reward. We teach them to obey out of honor, respect and love. What happens when we tell them to get out of the street because a truck is coming and there is no “reward”-no quarter waiting to get them to move? This young girl totally disregarded the Mom because she didn’t care about the reward and knew there would be no discipline, consequently giving her no respect, love or honor.
My greater concern is that by parenting this way, we give our children a wrong view of God as well. That we only have to obey when it benefits us. That we can disregard His voice and there be no discipline. The young girl needed discipline so she could learn to love and honor. Without it, she will be rotten, for sure, but she will also end up never understanding the joy of obedience.
After the woman left, (by the way she told the girl to listen to her 12 times on the way out the door.) the girl checking me out talked of how that woman was going to have a hard time with that little girl if she acted like that at 2. I agreed. But more than that, I thought if she acts like this at 2, what is she going to bribe her with at 15?
Delayed obedience is Disobedience. We don’t bribe, count or reward such, we discipline, so that our children will know the joys of obeying out of love and honor to a heavenly Father that will discipline because He loves.
ALL FOR YOU