March 30, 2022 6:00 am
In this broadcast, Lisa-Jo Baker depicts how to be comfortable in the “middle years” of your life. She describes coming to terms with her own sense of beauty and accepting her body after birthing 3 kids. Jean Daly joins the conversation. (Part 2 of 2)
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That's focusonthefamily.com slash careers. And he says in Matthew 11 28, come to me and I will give you rest. And the operative word, I used to always think it was rest, yeah that's what I want.
Yeah give me some rest. Right, the operative word is come, come. And that is a choice that each one of us must make is to stop and turn and face him and that's when everything changes. Well that's Kim Meador and she's with us again on this best of 2021 episode of Focus on the Family and thanks for joining us.
Your host is Focus President and author Jim Daly and I'm John Fuller. John, I truly believe the only solution to the crisis in the world is spiritual revival and I'm kind of excited about where everything's at. I know there's negativity and there are things we need to be concerned about but do you think God's caught off guard?
Do you think he didn't understand where this would be? I think he totally gets it and it's working for his purposes because that's what the Word of God says not what I feel what I think. And even when we don't feel like it's working for good, it is because Jesus said so. And we're equipped to offer hope and joy and love to a hurting world and that's what he's calling us to do. And we've invited Kim back. If you missed it yesterday, get the download, get the app on your phone because it was really typical great Kim Meador content and she's so capable of connecting the normal stories of what we see and experience in this life to God's fingerprint and what he's doing right alongside us. Yeah, she has an amazing ability to share stories and insights and Kim's latest book is called Revival Rising and we're actually gonna bundle an audio download of both parts of our conversation with Kim and some additional content as well.
Call for your copy of Revival Rising and that audio download. Our number is 800 the letter A and the word family. And Kim and her husband Troy founded Crystal Peaks Youth Ranch in Oregon.
They take on injured horses and hurting children and have a terrific ministry. And we'll link over to that as well in the episode notes. Kim, it's great to have you back at Focus.
Thank you so much. I so love your stories and my wife Jean is an animal lover and the way you connect you know God's creation to our journeys and your observations are so powerful. In fact in the book it's filled with that kind of you know power of observation what God's doing and what you see in nature etc. And I want to start right there because the stories there's so many we can't cover it all and people need to get a flavor and a taste of what you experience walking with the Lord. But you have a Fox story I think where you were in Alaska and the Fox I don't know what it was doing but how did the Lord speak to you through that experience with a Fox? Oh my goodness I love how the Lord uses everything.
He's talking all the time and if we don't think so it's because we're not paying attention. Recently my husband and I were gifted a trip to Alaska and we were fishing up on the Aleutian chain in wild wild wild land that you can only get there by a plane at low tide when the weather's good and there's not beach debris. You land on the Bering Sea beach and fish fly fish this unnamed river that pours out into a wild ocean. And even an inexperienced fly fisherman like myself was catching the the outer reaches of believability. And finally I just thought I must go down this wild beach and just worship God. And so I set my gear aside and just wanted to run and skip and laugh and do cartwheels and was singing and worshipping and crying as just worshipping with this mighty ocean and the grass blowing in the wind and down this black dark sandy beach and then suddenly realized I was not alone. And all that stopped and there's that super heightened awareness of all your little hackles up and and realized all this time I was being followed and I finally saw my little visitor popped his head up and it was a little red fox and I thought you've got to be kidding me a fox is following me. I don't think he's ever seen a person before and so I wanted to invite him so I just sat down on the beach and didn't look at him and he kind of came over and was about 20 yards away and just really alert like what are you who are you what are you doing and and then as canines do he started kind of throwing his chin in the air and I've never been around a fox before so I just did the same thing. Finally he gets up and he starts to circle me and as he goes behind me in an action of complete invitation I didn't turn around I'm inviting you to come and and be my friend and all I did was hold my cell phone up over my shoulder and I watched as this little daring Fox came up behind me and explored all along my back and then took a couple steps away and sat down okay you're part of my pack now and I it was such an astounding encounter I didn't ever want to leave I didn't ever want to break this amazing moment and had to be obedient and return and in the days that followed I shared with my beloved friend Judy this encounter and she just laughed in her sweet wise Judy way and she said isn't that like the Holy Spirit he shadows us throughout our life waiting for that intentional invitation and then he comes as a child many know my story that I had a face-to-face with Jesus Christ the day that my dad murdered my mom and took his own life I knew that Jesus was with me a year later I received him as my Lord and Savior officially but I didn't even know about the Holy Spirit and much later in my life as I started reading God's Word and learning about him I was told that he was someone to be afraid of you can't trust him because he might make you do something hard or scary or Lord forbid embarrassing you can't trust him but that's absolutely not what God's Word says as a matter of fact it says you want him invite him in and I'm thinking in in acts 10 where Cornelius who was a god-fearing man he he loved God he prayed he gave sacrifices and gifts to the poor but he didn't have the Holy Spirit until he slowed down and stopped and invited the Holy Spirit to come and that's when Peter came in and everything changed and that for so many years of my life I was doing things through my own understanding and my own will and my own strength because I didn't know him and he wanted to come in and he wanted me to want him to come in and just like that little Fox it wasn't until there was that intentional invitation that the infilling of the Spirit of Heaven came into this life bringing everything that he is love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness self control to such degree again that flooding that when we're flooded with him he's what comes out into the world around us and that's what he desires for everyone who calls him the Lord of their life Kim and that is so good folks that's the gospel right there I mean that's what it's all about and again if you're not experienced that kind of vibrancy do exactly that pray every day do the right things but start with that prayer Lord I want to invite you in to today to my today yes to do your will through me I mean that's an exciting way to get up out of bed every day and get the day started Kim another thing that separates us from God is obviously it's in the word is sin separates us from the Father and that disobedience why is it dangerous to let you know the little things slide I love that Jesus spoke in parables using things that we see and understand to illustrate things that we don't see and are trying to understand and recently again Alaska is one of my my hallowed grounds and where I go as often as I can afford and we had been fishing in the Gulf of Alaska a dear friend and I and we had caught halibut and salmon and now we had come into the shallow waters to catch rockfish and all that gear is different halibut rods are like fishing with a two by four and basically cable because they're big fish hundreds of pounds they're Giants and they're so so powerful and we had stowed all that gear and now we're fishing with these ridiculous teeny tiny little like pink plasti Barbie doll rods little hooks tiny hooks tiny line and you're catching rockfish like popcorn it's so fun and the guide said you know don't let your gear touch the bottom we're only in 30 feet it's very rocky you'll get stuck he just said that and all of a sudden I'm stuck and I was embarrassed I don't want to be the dumb lady in the back of the boat who wasn't listening to the guy and finally in this Hercules and I don't want to break anything but I really want this to come free and I pull really hard and it pops up and it was like yes success and then it starts swimming away this was not a rock this was a giant giant fish the heaviest fish I'd ever felt on any tackle of any kind and and I said oh I looked at the guide and he turned around and saw this ridiculous pink plastic Barbie rod bent into the water and he just puts the boat in reverse and said ah let's go get it and so I'm knowing that this is the equivalent of fishing with a twig and a thread tied to a pine needle this fish can break all that in a moment he doesn't know he's caught yet and so my challenge is to keep him thinking he's in charge and I'm just gonna annoy you until I can feel you turn and stop swimming away and start swimming toward and that's exactly what we did and it took about 30 minutes we could feel him coming up everyone on the boat is standing behind me nobody's talking no one's even breathing we're just all let us see it God let us see it and finally it gives and as it rises up it breaks the surface of the water and the guide just comes undone and he said are you kidding me this is amazing you just caught a giant halibut on that gear that shouldn't have worked but it did nice job and what rose next to the boat was a five foot long probably a hundred and fifty to two hundred pound fish that still didn't know was caught how many pound line 25 pound line you can break it in your own hands and it's lolling in the ocean next to the boat one strategic gaff strike would have landed it in my freezer and I would be eating halibut steak for the next six months and the point of the story is this that's exactly how sin works Satan is patient and this little thing oh it's not the boss of you you can break this anytime you want to that show that website that book those friends that place that addiction whatever it is it's tiny that gossip those harsh words that snarkiness or that sarcasm yeah you can break that anytime you want and then the enemy just keeps pulling pulling pulling pulling until we don't even realize we're following him away from the only one who can redeem us deeper and deeper into darker and darker waters that ultimately lead to spiritual death that's what I saw that day and it's such a reminder that every time I feel that pull uh-uh no don't go that way don't go that way and that's a choice that we all make that can don't let a frustrating thought become a frustrating word don't be led by that little hook away from God's best this is what he's calling for each one of us to choose every day it's so easy to fail in that way well conviction and encouragement both from Kim meter today on focus on the family and we're going to encourage you to get a copy of her great book revival rising we're actually bundling that with the audio download of our two-part broadcast as you've heard it here that'll have additional content as well and it's available to you when you call 800 the letter a in the word family or click the link in the episode notes Kim I don't want to let the fish off the hook on that story because there is a side to that I want to make sure people here and that is I believe the understanding that God knows this world he knows what pulls us away he knows how that hook is set and that's what's so amazing about God's grace his forgiveness and even though those decoys are there that the the enemy of our spirit is trying to lure us into that kind of water when those mistakes are made God is there to say come with me come back to me come this direction let me get you out of that situation but it requires us to embrace him and to be humble and to admit that we were wrong and that but the Lord's heart I mean it gives me tears thinking about he is all for us in this life he's not against us apart from Jesus Christ we are all like that fish hook after hook after hook being led away into darkness toward the enemy's gaff strike of death and because of who Jesus Christ is and what he did on the cross for all mankind every single one of us when we're caught and we're being drug down into the depths that lead to death every single one of us can cry out to God we can cry out to Jesus Christ and say Jesus I need you I don't even know you and I need you and I'm asking you to come today and forgive me of my sins forgive me of this darkness that my choices have led me to I chose this and now I'm seeing where it leads and I can't fix it and so I'm asking you to come into my heart and be my Lord will you come now and rescue Jesus yeah and so often Kim and I've seen this in people I know there's a sense that they have to get their act together they've got to clean up the house before the Lord can enter the house and that's really not what God is asking you to do not at all he's saying let me come in and help you right right Jesus went down the back streets and the lonely roads and the abandoned seashores looking for the hurt and the lost in the broken and he says in Matthew 11 28 come to me come to me he doesn't say fix that first and then come come to me and I will give you rest and the operative word I used to always think it was rest yeah that's what I want give me some rest right the operative word is come come and that is a choice that each one of us must make is to stop and turn and face him and that's when everything changes yeah it's so true and Kim there's an epidemic of discontent in our society today many people feel like they're maybe in the wrong circumstance of life that you know life has just dealt them a horrible blow or maybe several and they're discontent with their situation basically you face similar feelings after a failed rescue attempt in some cold seawater it's a powerful story and I was hoping we would have time to get to this and I'm glad we have but describe what that encounter was about the sea you came upon something I know it's rough to even talk about this but I think it's so illustrates what the points that we're making here it does it does my husband and I have a ministry where we take people fishing for free it's not a business it's just a gift that we love to give people that are serving the Lord hard and we had finished the season and we're down to the last two days and my husband and I were fishing alone and it was a huge day huge tide huge surf huge wind and huge waves no bar on Oregon was passable you'd be killed you'd be killed and so we were fishing slightly upriver in ocean tidewater and it was 4 15 in the afternoon and that's when I sensed the Holy Spirit saying it's time to leave now leave now right now you must go return to the harbor at once go and I shared that with Troy and we reeled up our gear quickly and he put the main down and we started to stream down the river on this very very turbulent day and as we rounded this great bend where the river widens and it's maybe a mile long of a straight stretch that just turns into a wind tunnel and the waves were big and in the distance I could see something that I just couldn't make sense of it was shapes and colors in the water and I couldn't make sense of what I was seeing and I pointed at it and Troy nodded and we started to go that direction and as we approached he shut the engine down and we just let it drift in the wind and I couldn't understand what I was seeing and then it moved and it was a man in the water and he was almost unconscious and I just shouted sir sir I've got you I've got you you're gonna be okay everything's gonna be okay and I grabbed a salmon net and I'm laying on the side of the boat and I got him and as I'm guiding him through the wreckage and floating debris that's when I can see reams of yellow nylon rope in the water and it's around his legs and that rope is connected to the boat and the boat just went underwater he has seconds to live and I it was I could hear the Holy Spirit shouting get the rope off him and it was like being electrocuted it was like Jesus help Jesus help and as I'm drawing him through the wreckage with this net I said I've got you you're okay you're gonna be okay and his head rocked back and I heard him whisper but he's not what what and I look through the wreckage and I look straight down and I'm drawing him right into another man who I didn't see who is in the water and he's already passed away and I just screamed for Troy and he just went right over the rail and I took my man to the back of the boat and at this point he's he's unconscious now he's leaving this life and and I grabbed him by the shoulders of his life jacket and I'm yelling at him help me help me and he can't he's unconscious and Jesus I'm praying in words that I know and words that I don't and begging the Holy Spirit to help and as only he can the one who commands the waves sent a particularly large set that just crushed into the back of the boat and slammed us into the transom I'm standing on an offshore motor mount in seawater being crushed by waves but the way was big enough to lift this man who was heavy to a position where I could get him in the boat only Jesus can do that and through a series of supernatural events we were not drawn out to see where we all would have died we were able to get these men back to the marina and all of our efforts of mouth-to-mouth and CPR and chest compressions and first responders came and all of their efforts failed for the one man who had already died and the other man was rushed to the hospital and in the aftermath we received a call the next day and it was a number we didn't know so Troy put it on speaker and we heard this thin emotional voice say hi you don't know me but I'm the man that you pulled from the river yesterday and I'm alive today because you stopped thank you so much for saving my life and he said I don't even know your name can we just meet so I can say thank you and give you a hug and in minutes we were on the dock in one of the most profound embraces of my life and what we learned in the aftermath and the whole point of the story was this that a healthy man dies in under an hour at water that temperature these men were both 72 and they had been in the water almost two hours and during that time not one not two but three boats passed them and didn't stop and this is the point of this encounter and what I believe the Lord is saying to everyone who calls themselves by Jesus Christ beautiful name beloved there are men and women and children in the water all around you every day and will you slow down and will you allow him to work through you to become that life ring of hope and draw them into the refuge and the rescue that is the love of God will you reach for them and they're in their worst time of need and just shouting I've got you I've got you everything's gonna be okay and draw them into the rescue boat of God the Father's love and the redemption of Jesus Christ this is the Great Commission and this is what it looks like from heaven it is my Commission and it is your Commission man that is so powerful and what a great picture of what we're called to do I mean words seem inadequate to even wrap up right here but this is what we're trying to do every day I mean this is it and whether it's that broken marriage or that preborn baby who may or may not get a chance at this life because of a decision man we're trying to stay in the gap right and jump in the ocean and pull them to safety so Kim thank you so much Wow what a place to end what a great book revival rising I think you could feel it I think you know what Kim is trying to express and that's for us to be there be present and be ready to rescue God bless you Kim thank you so much and that'll bring this focus on the family conversation with Kim meter to a close today Kim's passion for Jesus is contagious and I'm sure her message helped so many people cast off their fear and brought about a revival in their own hearts you know here at focus on the family we want to help you grow in your relationship with the Lord that's what it's all about when you have a strong healthy connection with him you can connect better with those you love we have lots of resources to help you in fact Kim's book revival rising is a great place to start you can get that through focus on the family and when you do all the proceeds go right back into ministry giving families hope every day yeah we hear from thousands of people reaching out to focus on the family for help through phone mail and email and we never want to turn anyone away but we need your help to accomplish that especially here as we're heading toward Christmas and the end of the year God can use your support to provide scripture based resources and programs to save and strengthen families when you give a gift of any amount today we'll send you a copy of Kim's book revival rising and the audio download of this conversation with her as our way of saying thank you join the support team donate as you can and get your copy of Kim's book revival rising all the details are in the episode notes well next time we'll have another best of 2021 focus on the family broadcast with Jody burnt helping you learn how to better pray for your children and I would say to that parent first of all you're not alone God knows exactly how you feel he's watched us make the dumbest decisions walk the wildest paths and he loves your child more than you do on behalf of Jim Daly and the entire team thanks for joining us today for focus on the family I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we once more help you and your family thrive in Christ
Whisper: medium.en / 2023-05-14 04:47:03 / 2023-05-14 04:56:35 / 10