Just a thought by coppi

Just a thought by coppi – written in 2015

A light house does not blow fog horns but it only shines.  

When I read the above I thought of our walk as Christians.  Does our life reflect the light  of Jesus.  St Mark 4:21: and he said unto them, is a candle brought to be put under a bushel, or under a bed? And not to be set on a candlestick?  A candle beams its flickering light so we may find our way in the dark as does the Lighthouse.  As Christians we should let our light shine & walk in the light of Christ.  We need not blow fog horns but just shine & let the Holy Spirit beam through us.  Proverbs 20:27 The spirit of man is the candle of the Lord……i grew up in a very legalistic religion & if we did have a little light, it was totally blown out with dos & don’ts & lots of fear. 1 John 4:7: Beloved, let us love one another; for love is of God….10: herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us & sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 1 John 4 is filled with scriptures of love.  The pendulum swings both ways but should be in balance.  I guess my desire is not to be a fog horn but a flickering light for our Lord.

Just a thought by coppi

“Some nations boast of their chariots and horses, but we boast in the name of the Lord our God. Those nations will fall down and collapse, but we will rise up and stand firm.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭20:7-8‬ ‭NLT‬‬

It’s hard for me to listen to the news today.  I wonder if our country, the USA, will ever be the same because of all the changes being made that go against the Word of God.  As my dear mother would say “If you take God out of the Country, it will fall into corruption”.  King David was faced with the same problems, but he said “I will not trust in chariots and horses but I will trust in God.”  Many of the prophets and men of God in the Bible trusted God when all around them was corruption – people going their own way worshipping idols, immorality was rampant, and  the thundering of evil spread through the land.  But, they trusted and stood firm in God’s word.  Good and evil was and/is in our world – always has been.  “But God!”  In 2 Kings 6:17 when Elisha servant was filled with fear when he saw the evil forces surrounding their camp,  Elisha prayed, “Open his eyes, LORD, so that he may see.” Then the LORD opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.  Victory came because of Elisha’s trust and faith in God.  God’s horses and chariots are different from the world’s – they are filled with fire, the mighty forces of our Lord.  He will prevail – we must stand firm and trust in Him.  “Lord open my eyes so I may see your chariots of fire”.

Just a thought from Coppi

In Isaiah 6:1-6, Isaiah’s encounter with the living God speaks to the truth of transformation through experience. In response to seeing “the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up” and hearing the Seraphim calling to one another, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory,” Isaiah’s natural response was, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” And upon declaring the truth of his depravity a seraphim touches his lips with a burning coal and says, “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” Isaiah was transformed through experiencing God.  Craig Denison 9/27/21

“Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” And you forgave the guilt of my sin.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭32:5‬ ‭NIV‬‬”00

Honesty and having a contrite spirit is what God wants from me/us.  In the above scriptures, it wasn’t until Isaiah and David admitted their sin and came to God openly and confessed truthfully their wrongs did God remove the guilt they were hiding.  God already knows what we have tried to cover up, but what He wants from us is a feeling of regret and sorrow for our sins or offenses; especially for our own actions; apologetic.  Of course, through my long life I have done shameful actions and like David “When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy on me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer. Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord.” And you forgave the guilt of my sin.” Ps 32:3-5.   Do not carry a bundle of guilt around, go to God with a honest heart and talk to him about the guilt you are carrying.  He will answer you/I and the freedom you/I will have when we are transformed through experiencing the presence of God is a welcoming and wonderful experience.

When all is not, God is—“I AM WHO I AM.” When all is lost, God remains— “I WILL BE WHO I WILL BE.” The LORD, alone, is God.

Kethoser (Aniu) Kevichusa September 3,2020

“Unhappy is he who depends on success to be happy. For such a person, the end of a successful career is the end of the line. His destiny is to die of bitterness or to search for more success in other careers and to go on living from success to success until he falls dead.” — Alex Dias Ribeiro

“A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.” C. S. Lewis 

Enough said.  

Great thoughts by great people…..just a thought by coppi

“Your sun shall no more go down, nor your moon withdraw itself; for the Lord will be your everlasting light, and your days of mourning shall be ended.”

Isaiah 60:2

The Lord is everlasting and faithful.  Trust Him.

Just a thought by coppi

Written in 2022

If the grass on the other side looks greener it’s probably AstroTurf!

So many times in my life, I thought the grass was greener on the other side – I had the “if,only”.  If only I had that car, house, diamond, etc that would be what makes me happy.  I was in “a way out” class in Dallas, Tx & remember vividly the teacher calling me out in front of the class.  She would hang a string with a car on the end of it & say “are you happy” now, then she would hang another string on my neck with a beautiful home, big diamond, etc & voice the same thing….when she finished I had so many “wants” hanging around my neck that I was weighted down.  Her point was if you don’t deal with the core of pain, you will weight yourself down with wants.  There is nothing wrong with having blessings in life, I did & do, but my problem was the blessings had me & I seemed to want to pile on more thinking that would ceased the pain inside.  It never did.  In that class, we had to dig deep within & find the core issue of what was causing the pain that caused us to act out.  “A human doing, not a human being”.  “God is passionately committed to the kind of woman I will become not to what I do.  He is the one who speaks to storms & they have to obey.  He is the one who brings order from chaos.  No matter how out of control my storms may feel right now.” Shelia Walsh

That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth;

And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.  (Philippians 2:10-11)

Years ago while living in Dallas, TX, we were good friends with a couple who worked in the same office as my deceased husband.  Ken, the husband, knew I was a follower of Christ, and would constantly bombard me with questions he had regarding the Bible.  He was an atheist and would let me know many times in our frequent visits.  Truly, I did not enjoy being with him that much, but I did like his wife.  As time moved on, and as sometimes life will do is throw us a lemon; it did in Ken’s life.  He was diagnosed with the big “C”, cancer.  He let us know up front not to sneak around afraid to confront him with his illness, but to act normal around him.  And, me, not to spout any of my religious beliefs in his presence.  I never did before or after, his problem was he knew my beliefs, which annoyed him.  As many who have cancer, they succumb to the angry cells eating up the good ones – their life here is taken from them. Ken did.  At the end of his journey with cancer,  He was in the hospital with all his family gathered around him, when I got a call from his wife asking me to come be with them,  and would I pray for Ken.  I went.  I entered his room where he was fighting like a tiger to stay alive. He knew who I was and I don’t know if he was glad to see me or not, but I walked over to his bed; he finally gave up his fight, and relaxed.  All i said was the name of Jesus several times, and noted Ken’s life here on earth was over.  I left his room – his family all rushed inside to be with him.  I do not claim to know God’s ways, and I know I am just a-sojourner  here on earth.  I know something about the Bible as I try to read it daily, but God is the mighty force of earth and humanity; and me, as I said, I am a sojourner , trusting God.

(I Kings: 19: 11-13)

Silence alludes me.  I try.  I get up early daily.  I have plans to sit in my recliner and be still and allow silence to engulf me.  Maybe I am still for thirty seconds before my accumulated thoughts start drifting in. You have to do this – did you do that, and before long I am doing and not being.  My dear friend, Stan Carter, would get up at 4:00 A.M. daily,  grab a blanket, wrap it around him, head out to their screened-in-porch, close his eyes, and mediate in silence.  Whenever I visited him and his wife, I was so impressed with his consistency and desire to be in God’s presence, I would say to myself – “When I get home I am going to do this”.  Stan would say to me “Coppi, when you start the mornings being in the presence of God, you will be amazed how smoothly the day goes by”.  Stan is in heaven now, and I am still working on being still and silent in God’s presence.  Winston Churchill’s famous saying ““never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in……”.  Is my mantra as I preserve to be with God in silence.

I have done a painting expressing solidarity – a tree all alone on a mountain top reaching out to God in silence.  It’s done in pastels with many colors which are examples of the many ways we are pulled from being alone with God in silence.

Enthusiasm – “It is a word that is built deeply into the victorious spirit of humans.  Enthusiasm literally means “full of God”.  God will help you overcome all difficulties, all tragedies, all sorrows, all headaches, all defeats, & will give victory”.  Norman Vincent Peale.

Prayer makes the darken’d cloud withdraw; Prayer climbs the ladder Jacob saw; Gives exercise to faith & love; Brings every blessing from above.

Look up today, oh parched plant, & open thy leaves & flowers for a heavenly watering.

When I read, I will place my journal besides me, & when I come across something that makes my heart sing, I will jot it down in my journal.   Many times I have come back to these quotes to lift my spirits.  As you note, I share many in my “just a thoughts”.  Being full of God does help when darkness comes; prayer will move the hand of God; & opening your parched soul for a heavenly blessing is needed.  In the Antique world the saying “if it makes your heart sing” buy it…..whenever I read something in the Bible or a book, etc & my heart sings, I believe it is mine……sent from above as a heavenly watering for my soul.

“I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭27‬:‭13‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Just a thought by coppi

Just a thought by coppi

“For out of the insignificant comes the extraordinary.  I am grateful to the one true God who lifted me out of the depths of an ordinary life into an extraordinary depth of understanding about my own worth & value”

When I read the above, I thought of the song “He raised me up” by Josh Groban.  He Jesus, raised me up to more than I could ever be.  I remember Standish, my deceased husband would often sing this song when he was asked to give talks at various organizations.  He sung it with such a compelling feeling, and then He would say “Jesus did this for me”…..yes, Standish, He did it for you, me and many, many others.  He is a God of loves & wants the very best for us.  “Live out of the bag God gave you & you can be everything God wants you to be” – quote: MaxLucado

Just a thought by coppi

Just a thought by coppi

I don’t know why there is sadness in this world.  However, I have learned that there are several things that can help us survive.  Friendship & prayer.  And, live by the sayings of Jesus Christ & become like that wise man who built his house upon the rock.  You can have an inner security, strength, & courage that defies all the storms of life.

Friendship, prayer, a personal relationship with Jesus & reading the Bible have been my source of survival in this journey of life.

Just a thought by coppi