Category Archives: Serving

So you think you can cheer

It’s #FiveMinuteFriday and a holiday weekend. Wishing you all a blessed time spent with family and friends. Today’s word prompt is CHEER!

I can still remember…even though it has been over 40 years (yikes!). Our little country school was still a K-12 but was soon to be redistricted and we would all go our separate ways like so many other smaller schools around the county. We had pride, Skibo pride, to be sure. If you don’t know what a Skibo is you can read my short post about Sammy the Skibo here.

I was never athletic, always wanted to be but it seems I was born with two left feet. I could never even master a forward roll so I sure couldn’t be one of those cute cheerleaders jumping up and down, never winded, doing cartwheels and splits like they came out of the womb trained to do so. I was a klutz with a capital K.

Luckily for all of us other girls, we had the most amazing gym teacher ever. Always wanting to include and encourage, she decided we needed a Pom Pom Squad. This wasn’t just a cheering section in the bleachers during the basketball game, this was the real deal: We would get matching outfits and real pom poms! Say what?!

Our mothers and the home economic class went to work making our red corduroy jumpers with shorts. Did I say we were the cutest Pom Pom Squad ever? When the pom poms came in, if memory serves me correctly, we excitedly gathered around all of the big boxes and began to grab our set and shake them into perfection. Never had red and white coordinated so well together as they did in that set of tissue paper on a stick. For once, junior high rocked.

But if we thought all of that was great, we were about to be blown away at our first game when the Real Cheerleaders sat down on the bleachers so the Pom Pom Squad could do their routine.

cheer

We were terrible, of that I am certain but the crowd went wild. (Our parents were there!) And all of a sudden a little blonde-haired pre-teen felt like she could someday be standing in front of the masses at an Indiana University basketball game, leading them in cheers for another great red and white.

Mrs. Yeagley thought we could do anything and she made us feel as if we were somebody. She taught us to hold our head up high, even if the forward roll wasn’t our cup of tea. It was okay, we were all different and that was the way God had made us. Yet we all had something to contribute, we all had something to CHEER about in our own, sometime clumsy, way. And she gave us that outlet to shine, even if only for a moment.

Who can you cheer on today? Who can you come along beside and whisper in their ear that they are worthwhile in the Kingdom? That they matter not only to you but to the God who created them and put them here on this earth?

“So encourage each other and build each other up, just as you are already doing.” 1 Thessalonians 5:11 NLT

To cheer is to love, to encourage, to help along in whatever way is needed at the time. A soft-spoken word, a loving touch, a prayer prayed, a card sent, a hug given. You might not hear the crowd roaring back from the bleachers but your loving Father will be cheering you on just the same.

For the Kingdom

sharing with dance with jesus, grace and truth, faith filled friday

Don’t miss a thing

It’s #FiveMinuteFriday and the word prompt is miss. You can read other takes on this word in which we are to write for five minutes with little editing, just for the love of writing. Be blessed!

This weekend, I am away on another Revival By Design trip for a seminar somewhere in the great state of Tennessee. A reprieve from endless hotels, we are blessed to be with friends and staying with their friends. Confused much? The point isn’t the WHO but the HOW. This hostess with the mostest doesn’t miss a thing.

This home truly looks like something from Southern Living magazine, with a touch of a coastal theme. Gorgeous is the word for the entire property. You will just have to envision it; I didn’t ask permission to share!

Some just have a knack for hosting…they are born that way. They know how to serve and make everything just right for the guest. The coffee bar is set up for you to use when YOU get up and want coffee. Some in our party, like me, need/want coffee before 6:00 a.m. Others in our party chose to have breakfast at 10:30. That’s brunch, people!

But this doesn’t frustrate a true hostess or servant. They can accommodate everyone because they live to please and want each guest in their home to feel at home. From the carefully placed guest towels with all the extras in case you have forgotten something, to the carafe of filtered water and matching glasses, not Styrofoam (which I am perfectly fine with!), and the list goes on, a perfect hostess makes her guest comfortable and wanting nothing.

“Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross!” Philippians 2:6-8 NIV

The scripture says Jesus made Himself nothing by taking on the very nature of a servant. His greatest service was our salvation! He gave of Himself, completely, so that we would have eternal life, conquering death, hell and the grave.

But the verse right before this is what I don’t want us to miss:

“In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus…”

Don't miss a thing

What was that mindset? He made Himself nothing and became a servant to those around Him.

In our everyday relationships, we can afford no less! We cannot become caught up in office gossip, assembly line slice and dice or any other kind of ridicule where we tear down those we were called to serve. Just as my hostess didn’t miss anything in the details of our stay, the food, the supplies, the amenities, she also didn’t miss true hospitality. Her southern smile would warm any weary heart. When you walked into her home you wanted to stay, you wanted to leave your worries and cares outside the door and REST.

This is also our Savior. He offers US rest from the world, forgives us and then fills us with His spirit so we are like Him. Then it is our duty as servants to go out into the world, our everyday world, and BE like Him. If we spend time with Him then He begins to “rub off on us” and we do reflect His personality. We become as servants; touching, blessing, lifting burdens from the shoulders of others, offering to pray, actually praying and anything else we can do to let them know that Jesus came to save.

My sweet hostess didn’t miss a thing this weekend; she planned everything around her guests. Jesus has done the same for us, He wants to give us all we need for a victorious life here but intended for us to share this Truth and realize it isn’t all about us but it is all about those who do not know Him.

Let’s make sure they don’t miss a thing!

For the kingdom