LIFE GIVING AS A SPIRITUAL CHOICE
Many of the principles taken from “The Five Aspects of Woman” a study by Barbara Mouser.
This March, “Victoria” magazine devoted their whole publication to Tea. That motivated me to visit the Tea Museum while I was in England this April with one of my close British friends. We had so much fun as we learned the history of tea from the early days of tea trading with China and India. We saw hundreds of teacups and teapots. Do you know the background of tea?
Legend credits an ancient Chinese Emperor with the discovery of tea. While traveling, he always had his servant boil his water over an open fire. One day, some leaves blew into the boiling water and a new fragrance filled the air. The emperor was intrigued with the delightful aroma and as he drank this new discovery, he found it very refreshing. He ordered his servants to bring more leaves back to the palace and a new ceremony of tea-time spread through out the land.
Queen Victoria popularized tea- time in England when she would take time out of her busy day to refresh herself with a child or sometimes with a head of State over a cup of afternoon tea. Someone has said, “There are few hours in the day more agreeable than the hour devoted to afternoon tea.” Much of the hospitality in my home takes place over a cup of tea and many of my friendships have been deepened sharing tea times together. Tea takes time and that’s part of the joy---because relationships are primarily built in two’s. You can’t hurry it. It forces us to slow down and be refreshed.
Jesus, who we all love so much, taught us that we could learn so many spiritual truths from the physical things of our daily lives. Just think about what He taught us about bread, gardening or sheep. So, I thought, “What spiritual truths can we learn from tea cups?” We all know that teacups have a purpose. As women, the teacups represent our lives and that God made us with a purpose as we learned. If you were in my Bible Study, I would have you bring a teacup from home that would tell a little bit about your life and then I would explain the word---Infusion. Infusion is the seeping of one substance into another giving new life. We pray that as we place the teabag of God’s Word into the teacups of our lives, we will experience infusion---that we will be refreshed and changed. Just as we are refreshed as we drink our tea, we are refreshed as we draw up strength for all of our needs from God’s Word.
To be a truly feminine woman, we need to understand that we are lifegivers. In Genesis 3:20, Adam changed Woman’s name to Eve because she was to become the mother of all living things. Life giving is stamped on the nature of a woman whether or not we ever have children. We not only give physical life, but spiritual life, intellectual life and cultural life. The holidays we plan, the music we play, the candles we light, the scrapbooks we keep, the meals we prepare, the words we say all give life. A mother’s womb is the first home of every child. What goes on in the womb? Life, shelter, food, protection, warmth, coziness. These should be qualities of a life-giving woman and a life giving home. Although our biology is not our destiny, it is reflective of the spirit of femininity. To create life is to create warmth and beauty.
All women are life-givers. All through history, and in all of our daily living, we see women giving life to others. God intends life giving to be a dominant theme in every woman’s life. Think about this, “Lifegivers lift the level of civilization above mere existence.” American history tells us that the men who went westward without their wives were basically uncivilized. The men became miners, ranchers trappers, etc. and they would work hard, meet at an annual rendezvous, where they would barter for their necessities and spend the rest of their earnings on liquor and immorality. Everything changed after the 1860’s and the passing of the Homestead Act. Dedicated teachers, nurses and mothers brought manners and morals, music and culture, celebration and food to nourish the body and soul. Life was brought to the Plains of the United States. Yes, life-givers lift the level of civilization above mere existence. They create warmth and bring beauty into everyday life.
One of the single women in my Bible Study wrote about the pain, the prospects, the principles and practices of life giving in her daily life. She invites other women to live in her home. She leads Bible Studies that give life, she enjoys decorating her home and making it a lovely and safe place for others to come. She gives spiritual life through her teaching, intellectual life through her lectures on gender issues. She invites people over for life-giving meals. She gives comfort and encouragement as she counsels others.
Here is the way another one of the women in my Bible Study expressed what life-giving meant to her. “Being a life-giver is not just giving birth. It is nurturing, teaching, encouraging, comforting and healing. It’s putting aside the laundry to read a book to your child. It’s setting the table with the china and best linens to celebrate a child’s good report card. It’s saying “yes” to baby-sitting for a friend’s child who just needs a break. It’s as simple as remembering to water your plants once a week. It’s having a home where your family feels warm, safe and sheltered. Instead of thinking that I am only reading a book to Emily or coloring with Jesse or making Bruce’s favorite bread, I am now thinking with each task that I do that I am giving life.”
We see life-givers all over the Bible. When God decided that Israel needed a great leader and deliverer, He chose 5 life-giving women to give Moses life. Two courageous women were commanded by Pharaoh to kill all the Jewish male babies as they were born. These midwives feared the Lord more than they feared the King and they saved Moses’ life. His mother Jochabed could have given into self -pity and depression, but instead she ruled over her attitudes and her circumstances. She made a basket. Mirium, his sister, was also faithful in watching over her baby brother. And the Bible says that the Pharaoh’s daughter was moved to compassion because she heard the baby crying. She was moved with the tenderness of a life-giver.
How do we give life? We first need to have life to give it and where do we get life. Jesus is our Life-giver. He gives us spiritual life as we believe in Him and receive His gift of eternal life. In Acts 3:11, Jesus is called the Author of Life. Jesus came to give us life and to give it to us more abundantly.
We give life as we are filled by the life of Jesus---by His Holy Spirit. Being filled by the Holy Spirit is all about Jesus Christ living His life through me. The Holy Spirit is only released as we obey God. The Holy Spirit can only fill empty hearts. If the cups of our lives are filled with our plans, pride and self-effort or worry, there is no room left for him to fill us. Jesus Christ must become our life and our purpose for loving and life-giving. When we spend time with Him in the Word and prayer, He can reshape our personalities around His, so we too can give life and love the way He did.
Life-giving is a choice. Jesus chose to give us life, when in the Garden of Gethsemane, He said, “Nevertheless, not My will, but Thine by done.” He walked all the way to the Cross giving life. He even gave spiritual life to the thief on the Cross. It wasn’t easy for Jesus and it isn’t easy for us.
So much of what we do in our families and in our ministries is a secret with God and most of our loving efforts often go unnoticed and unappreciated; but if we do each deed with a purpose to glorify God and to give life to those in our lives, God will continue to pour his life into us. The nametags in our Bible Study are teapots to remind us that God pours out His love and His life into the teacups of our lives.
Recently a friend said, “Life-giving was easy for you, because you are such a natural mother and life-giver.” I am a natural life-giver, so are you. We all are, because life-giving is stamped on our natures. But, often we will give life to everyone except those to whom God has given us. I was not a natural mother when I first had children, and sometimes I thought that my children got in the way of my purpose in life of knowing Christ and making Him known. They seemed to be an “interruption” to the more important things in life. It seemed more exciting to give life out side of my home than inside my home and to give life to big people instead of little people. But God showed me that to really please Him, I needed to give life to the precious children that He gave me. He taught me how to be a supernatural mother. And another woman took Titus 2:3,4 seriously and she helped teach me how to best love, teach, discipline and train my children in the Lord. Mothering became one of the greatest joys of my life. And when each of us surrender our lives to Him in this area of life-giving, He promises to pour His very life into us, so that we can give life to others through what we do naturally and what we do supernaturally.
With all this life-giving, life-givers become weary. Sometimes we only have a cup of pain and exhaustion to give to the Lord. Hurts have drained our lives and we have given and given and no one seems to notice or our good works are misunderstood. Brent Curtis, a psychologist once said that we can never be healed emotionally or give life to others unless we look at our own sin and the other person’s pain. Usually we just look at our pain and the other person’s sin, particularly in our relationships with our husbands. This drains our ability to give life.
So, what do we do when we feel we have no life to give and no strength to keep going? Like Mary, many of us have had a “sword” pass through our hearts because of our life-giving. We really want to be loving lifegivers to those who need us, but we are simply out of strength. Apart from the resurrection itself, the greatest gift that God has for weary life-givers is renewal in Jesus' life and love. The pain of childbirth and all of child-rearing and spiritual life giving draws us back to the Source of life and love and wisdom without which we flounder hopelessly in our inadequacy.
Weary Life-givers in the Bible often met Jesus at the well. Water is a biblical and universal symbol of life. In art and in the Bible, we so often see women at wells with jars. If you are going to pour out your life for others, you first have to receive life. Every woman has a cup. As we walk through our day, we should be continually holding our cups up to God to have them filled by Him. One of the most important conversations in the Bible was of Jesus with the Samaritan woman. She had sought to fill her cup by having multiple relationships with men. Jesus told her that He could fill her cup with living water. In John 4, Jesus says, “Everyone who drinks of the water I give shall never thirst again. The water I give shall become a well of water springing up to eternal life.” Jesus not only promised to fill her cup with eternal life, but that there would be enough to overflow into the lives of others.
Running to Jesus is the ultimate answer to every woman’s water problem. We need to go to Jesus with our empty, broken teacup lives and wait long enough for Him to fill us with His life. Jesus is our Life and He offers all women His life. In His Spirit and in His Word are streams of Living Water. Hosea 6:3 says, “Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord, for as certain as the break of dawn He comes to us. He will come to us …like the spring rains that water the earth.”
Two thousand years before, the pre-incarnate Christ found an Egyptian woman at a well. Hagar had a difficult relationship with her mistress, Sarah, and she decided to run away. Haven’t we all wanted to run away sometimes? Hagar was rebellious and oppressed, but Jesus spoke with her and asked her a question, “Where have you come from and where are you going?” He is still asking you that question, because He wants you to come to Him with your cup filled with the truth of what is going on in your heart. Hagar had run away from her problem and Jesus allowed her to pour out her heart to Him and then He told her to return to Sarah and submit to her. Can you imagine how difficult that must have been? But God also gave her a promise about having a son who would produce a great Nation and God also gave her a Name---“You are the Living God Who Sees.” God meets women in their struggle for life. God does not tell us something difficult to do without strengthening us and giving us exactly what we need to continue giving life. We need His promise and His Name to continue giving life.
14 years later Hagar was sent away by Abraham. How would you have felt if you had been disappointed by the godliest people on the face of the earth? Abraham had given her some water, but the water ran out and she couldn’t bear to see her son die, so she placed him under one bush and she sat under another bush where she cried her heart out. The Angel of the Lord said to her, “What is the matter Hagar. Do not be afraid….” When she opened her eyes, she saw a well. I am a crier, and I believe there is a time for all of to cry out
to the Lord and then there is a time to stop crying so that we can see the well of water that He has provided for us. Gen. 21 says that God heard, God saw, God called Hagar by name, God told her what to do, and God opened her eyes. Because Hagar met the Angel of the Lord at the well, He gave her water so that she could give her son a drink. We will never have life to give to our families and to others until we have first received life from the Lord. The well was there all the time, BUT GOD opens the eyes of all those who call upon Him. We need to go with our cup of questions, pain, worry and fear, so that He can fill our cups with his presence, His love and His life. We need to go to the well as we read God’s Word, as we pour out our hearts to Him and as we pray. We need to pray that the Holy Spirit will saturate our emotions so that our eyes can see the water for our needy spirits.
One day, my family walked down the Grand Canyon in the morning. The Ranger told us that we should not hike up again until 3:00 o’clock in the afternoon when the sun was beginning to set. My family was too eager to get back up to the top of the Canyon, so we began to climb at high noon in 113-degree weather. After ½ mile, I was out of water, and the water station was still a mile away and I was completely out of strength. Kind people offered me their water and I finally inched to the next water stations. Water renewed my strength. The next day, I was reading my Bible in Psalm 42, “As a deer pants for water, so my soul pants for You in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water.” I just cried and wrote out my prayer to the Lord: “Lord, I have experienced the dryness of life without you---seeking to be filled in all the wrong places. And then I drank of Your Living Water and have known streams of inner water and the joy of being in your presence---of seeking to be filled by You. But I cannot continue on yesterday’s drink. I need to be filled by your Word each day and I want You to help me, Lord, to always thirst after You! I know there is no other way for me to give life to others.”
We all fail. Those we love disappoint us and we disappoint them by our selfish ways and hurtful words. Our words will always give life or they will give death. But we can begin again to be wise women who build our homes rather than tearing them down. We need to be life-givers. Life-giving is at the heart of who we are as women. We have the opportunity to give, nurture, teach, train, encourage, beautify or heal. This is part of God’s beautiful and sacred gift to us as women lifegivers. We will all influence at least 100 people in our lifetime. Can you imagine how different our lives will be if we intentionally give life to those God brings into our lives. Jesus Christ is always waiting to give life to women who are waiting by His well to be filled with His love and life.
“Lord, I pray that You will fill our cups with Your Life so that our cups will run over in worship to You and life-giving to others. How we love You Lord.”
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