Christmas Greetings From The Levellies

The Day of God

Is never past.

One who is

Cannot have been.

He

Always is.

He is

The Creator.

He is

The Speaker.

He is

The Rescuer.

He is

The Son who died.

In

The flesh once.

In

The Spirit always.

In the now

Which never becomes a past.

 

-                       Kevin

 

 

Some have pedestals

On which they place

Their heroes

So they can gaze,

Amazed

At the wonder

Of a life well-lived. 

I prefer to walk

By Your side,

Learning from You –

My dearest Hero –

Holding Your hand,

Cherishing Your heart,

Asking God to help me

Live like You. 

 

-                       Jeanette

Dew Grace

            We went though a dry spell last year.  I thought it was pretty bad here, but eventually we did get some rain and the grass came back and we had a small measure of harvest.  In October, when I went out to Portland, Oregon, the city known for roses and rain, I found that they had suffered rainlessness longer than we had and there was no green grass. 

            It’s a hard thing to go without moisture in this world, and it’s even more difficult in the spiritual realm.  What we need is some Dew Grace. 

            While we were in the middle of our drought I was preaching through Isaiah 26 one Sunday evening.  I got to verse 19 where it talks about dew coming to those who sit in the dust.  Out of the blue, as can often happen in the middle of a message, I started to talk about the fact that we need this Dew Grace from God in our own lives. 

            I know it’s not a theological term out of any systematic theology, but I think there is such a thing which we might call Dew Grace.  It is the grace that comes out of nowhere.  It comes after emptiness and loss and is unexpected.  It’s one thing to have the good grace of God that you know about from the scriptures.  We need that and ask for it.  It’s another thing to have Dew Grace made up on the spot for our need. 

            God is able to do things we have never seen before.  He is not limited by our world, nor has He exhausted Himself by what He has already done.  Everything He does gives promise flowing streams to come.  His dew is greater than all our oceans.    

Dead End

            Nobody likes a dead end.  It doesn’t go anywhere.  We want a thoroughfare that will get us places. 

            Jesus, the Way, didn’t like dead ends, either.  Many people have wondered why Jesus, as He did in Luke 5:14, would order people not to say anything about the miracle he had just performed.  Recently, I think I finally came to an understanding of one possible reason why He might have done that. 

            It is so easy to be arrested by a remarkable occurrence.  We see a striking sunrise and just stand there sometimes until the colors fade.  A healing miracle, such as the cleansing of leprosy, would be a sunrise that would never set for the person on the receiving end.  It would be so easy just to stand still and exclaim over and over, “I’m clean!  I’m clean!”  It would be easy to marvel at the right to reenter society, rather than to reenter it. 

            Jesus never wanted anyone to be stuck in what He had done for them.  He wanted them to use what had been restored in every day life to be a help and testimony to others.  I was once in a church building that had a display of crutches and medical graces on the wall.  The people were healed, I knew that from the display, but I didn’t know what they had done for Jesus as a result of being healed.  In fact it was more a testimony to the former bondage than the present freedom. 

            Whenever Jesus does something for you, be thankful for it, but then give the Glory to God and get on about the life that Jesus has now liberated you to lead. 

More Than A Story

            If you’ve grown up in the church, as I did, you know the many miracle stories of Jesus.  I think one that most impressed me as a child was the one about Jesus walking on the water (see John 6:16-21).  I tried to imagine myself walking across the surface of a swimming pool once when I was a child, but even my imagination couldn’t stuff myself into that story. 

            This is one of a handful of nature miracles Jesus performed where He demonstrated His deity through His control of natural forces which even now have never been tamed by man.  Indian fakirs have walked over hot coals and beds of nails, but none have ever walked on the surface of the water.  That was an accomplishment for Jesus alone. 

            So, where do we come in?  Something that Jesus did centuries ago makes for a “good story”, but hardly anything else to so many people.  The scriptures make no claim that we will be able to duplicate this.  If we can’t do it, what could the application be? 

            That comes in putting ourselves in the position of the disciples.  They were in a boat that was having a hard time making it to land.  They were so discombobulated that Matthew tells us they thought Jesus was a ghost when they saw him on the water.  They didn’t ask Him for anything, but they could have.  What they might have requested are things we can request.  They make a good three-part prayer for the next time you’re in a storm of any kind: 

• Jesus, get in my boat. 
• Still my storm. 
• Bring me to shore

            This is more than a story because Jesus is more than the storm.  Is He in your boat or are you willing to let him walk on by? 

Twins

            I grew up with a twin. 

            I can remember one fellow at our church telling me that the only way he could tell the twins apart was by their glasses.  They probably never did get the same glasses, but they used to keep lists of clothing they had which was identical and would sometimes consult one another by phone when they wanted to dress alike for church and on other occasions.  They not only were twins, but they played the parts of twins.  Even so, I never had any problem telling them apart.  One of them was my mother. 

            Most people have a hard time telling identical twins apart.  Sometimes, even if they’re not identical, I have a hard time remembering which name goes with the taller one.  Of course, it gets much simpler if one is a boy and the other is a girl.  The problem is that we tend to see them as a unit rather than as individuals.  Once, a few years ago, I was out at a restaurant in Portland (where the twins live) with my mother, and someone my mother didn’t know called her by my aunt’s name. 

            There was a pair of twins in my high school, and I only learned to distinguish them after one of them was in a play I was in.  Getting to know one personally was what made the difference. 

            God can always tell us apart.  He always deals with us as individuals.  He always values us. But, in a way, He’d like to make twins out of us.  It’s His intention that we grow to resemble our brother, Jesus.  We’ll know we’ve made it when no one can tell us apart.  Now, there would be a set of twins! 

 

Happy Mother’s Day to the twins:  Bernita Fae Bever Levellie and Bertha Mae Bever Hunt.

Books on Lulu

I now have 16 books available through www.lulu.com

The titles are: 

The Principles of Existence  Genesis 1 - 3
FAQ - Habakkuk The Prophet Who Prayed
Jesus Annotated
Comments on the book of Revelation
Worship:  A Primer
Fellowship
What Makes It Southern  Southern Gospel Music
Films
Hickory Hog And The Christmas Rascal
Hickory Hog Christmas Tales volumes 2 through 4
The Search For Hickory Hog
The Christmas Season
Christmas Poems
The Book Of Opinions and Observations

Books can be searched for under my name, Kevin Don Levellie or by title. 

Rabbit Savior

            I was a rabbit savior. 

            “Jolly’s got something,” Jeanette yelled down the hall.  I couldn’t make out what he had, but I could see the little feet dangling down from his mouth.  So, I decided to try and get predator and prey out of the house as a unit.  Then, I found out it was alive. 

            I heard a little cry and finally got a good look.  It was a rabbit.  Jolly dropped it and it started to hop all around the house.  I was trying to herd it into a box when it jumped or fell down from the top of the basement steps down to the concrete floor below.  I figured I’d be scraping up a dead rabbit in my box.  Was I wrong. 

            That rabbit was running all over the basement.  So was I, for a while.  I finally cornered him up against some boxes where I could reach down, grab him by the scruff of the neck and put him in the box.  Having had my exercise for the day, I carried him upstairs and outside.  I made sure no cats were out. 

            I let him down, and he was as spry and active as ever.  He didn’t even hop with a limp.  Just a little guy, really.  A baby.  And I saved him.  I kept him from the jaws of the cat. 

            So, where does he want to go?  Out into the field to be away from our house of horrors?  Burrowing down into a place of safety?  Off home for a cup of chamomile tea?   

            No!  He wanted to get back into our house.  I had to point him away and haven’t seen him since, so I’m pretty sure he stayed saved, at least from our cats. 

            How many of us, though, like the rabbit, are freed from the jaws of Satan and then want to go back into his house?   Let us fly to freedom and not look back.