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Zephaniah 3:20

God will save the lame and gather the outcast; I will give them praise and fame in every land where they have been put to shame. When I restore your fortunes before your eyes says the Lord.

What are your fortunes? As I reflect upon what my fortunes are and what I hold dear to my heart, it becomes quite clear. God, my family, children, grandchildren, parents and my siblings along with my closest friends.

Alot of times these “fortune” relationships become broken and we within ourselves cannot repair the damage. We can do all we can to try and fix the relationship by learning what not to do and seeking God for what we need to change within ourselves. Applying what he gives us and do the best we can going forward. Sometimes this is not enough. We as humans struggle with forgiveness and cut people totally out of our lives, or we hold them at bay never really forgiving them and don’t give the person a chance to get close again. By not allowing the person to try and make the change that needs to be made within the relationship to restore a relationship of love and companionship. The relationship becomes an artificial relationship at best.

I recall a time when I told one of my prize fortunes that I would even go to counseling with them. I was told no, go get my own counselor. This is all well and good, I suppose, if you don’t want the relationship restored. With that being said, counselors who don’t recommend family counseling, stay away from. You want restoration not division. Some counselors break more relationships up just to make one’s life seem to appear so much better. God doesn’t work that way, it’s always a two-way street. His word says he works it out for all of our good. If one gets better with making the other party an outcast, my friends that is not restoration but division. But there are counselors who offer up family counseling which I did go to. It was totally Christian based and a wonderful counseling center. My counselor being a woman and I don’t want to be bias here, but women should go to women counselors and men to men counselors. And another thing, if you are a Christian, go to a Christian counselor. Feeling the pain of this broken relationship with my prize fortune was devastation. Nothing I could do within myself to restore the brokenness in the relationship. You can’t be good enough, nice enough or do enough to repair the “prize fortunes” relationship. As the old saying goes, if I could go back 10 or 20 years ago, I would do things different. But in reality, we can’t, we can’t change the past. What’s done is done. All we can do is move forward, reaching for a better way of doing things and looking forward to a brighter future for the relationship.

We must turn it over to the master to repair and restore the relationship. It may not happen right away and again it could take a long time for the relationship to be restored. God has to do his work in us and others. We as humans have a work to do ourselves. We are to seek God and his ways of doing things, make the changes when we learn something about ourselves that we can change. Ask God to help us in our weaknesses and our strengths. We have to pray for the relationship, casting all our cares upon the Lord for he cares for us. He wants us to lean upon him and not our own understanding. Give him our broken hearts and our cares. Pray, don’t pick it back up thinking we can make it happen in our timing and our way of doing things, leave it with him and let him do his majestic, supernatural work. If the person has put up the road sign, stop – do not enter, trust me you are not getting in. But, with God all things are possible, so we have hope for the restoration.

God will in his time work things out for all of our good. My prayer for you is that you bring your most prize fortunes to the master and trust him to do his magnificent work. Trust the process and move forward. Let go and let God.

God be with you and yours.



Daphne Pendley

Luke 7:36-50

A Pharisee named Simon ask Jesus to come and eat with him at his home.

There was a woman who learned that Jesus was setting for supper at the Pharisees House. This woman brought with her an alabaster jar of ointment and stood behind Jesus at his feet, weeping, and then began to wash his feet with her tears, and swiped his feet with her hair and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment.

The Pharisee said to himself, if he had been a prophet, he would have known who was touching him. A sinner woman.

Jesus Speaks to Simon

He tells him the story of a creditor who has two debtors. One owing a debt of 500 denarii and the other owing 50 denarii. When both had no money to repay the debt, he freely forgave them both of their debts. He asks the question to Simon, tell me which one of them will love him more? Simon’s reply was, I suppose whom he forgave most. Jesus said, you chose right.

Jesus turns to the woman, but he speaks to Simon.

Simon, you gave me no water for my feet, but she has washed my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair, she has not ceased to kiss my feet and she has anointed my feet with ointment. I say to you her sins which are many, are forgiven. For she has loved much. He who is forgiven little loves little.

Jesus is wanting the Pharisee to understand what is happening here. Thats why he had turned and spoke to Simon and not the woman.

Do you think the Pharisee saw his own sins? Do you think he thought that we get into heaven by works? Or by our own self-righteousness? God forbid. Do you think Simon loved much?

1st John 1:18 says, if we say we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. 1st John 1:10 – If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and His word is not in us.

Jesus Speaks to the Woman. Your faith has saved you. Go in peace.

This woman knows exactly who she is and what she has done and where she has been. No one needed to point out her past or her sins to her. Just like the woman at the well, she knew everything that she had ever done.

Point is, no one has to point out to us what we have or haven’t done, we all know within ourselves better than anyone else of our past.

The woman knew that Jesus was the Messiah. It was her faith that saved her. She came to Jesus broken and with a contrite spirit (Ps: 34:18, Isa 66:2, Ps: 51:17) Her heart was broken. This woman could not stop weeping and washing the masters’ feet with her tears and kissing his feet. The woman never speaks but only weeps, but Jesus knew her heart. Sometimes in our prayers we can’t even speak, our hearts and our lives get so broken, and sometimes we don’t even know what to pray, but our hearts do. Just like the sinner woman, he sees our hearts and forgives us and sends us on our way in peace. He puts us back into right standing with him.

My favorite part in this passage is that Jesus points out to Simon that her sins are many, but she loves much. The woman is a reflection of the one who owed the most debt in the story that Jesus told to Simon. Jesus tells Simon which one do you think loved the creditor the most? The one who owed the most debt. This woman also, owed a debt that she could not pay, but she is the one who loved much.

Jesus paid our debt that we could not pay, he did what we could not do. He went to the cross for us all and paid the price it took for the remission of sin. He did it for not just one person but for all mankind. So, we could have access to the father and have forgiveness of sins, Jesus’ forever being our advocate. We as born-again Christians get to enter into the throne room at any time, forever having access to the father. Hebrews 4:16 Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in our time of need. Do you need help? Do you need saving?

The woman came that day BROKEN, she received her forgiveness because she believed and went on her way in peace.

Jesus is always there waiting with arms wide open; he’ll give you a peace that surpasses all understanding and fill you with his spirit, the living water, where you will never thirst again.

As the song says: It is no secret what God can do, with arms wide open he’ll start a new, it is no secret what God can do. Just ask, you will not be disappointed.

Ref:

Ephesians 2:8-10

Romans 5:1

1st John 1:5-10

1st Peter 4:8

Arthur

Are you a woman at the well? I know I am. I am like the woman who Jesus met at the well.
A woman who had been married several times and a woman who was currently with a man that she wasn’t married too.

This well is called Jacobs Well, which is counted as a Christian Holy site. In Johns gospel the well seems to hint at a deeper reading. Jesus as the Bridegroom of Israel who comes to reunite the divided tribes through a spiritual union with him, the long-awaited Messiah.

The woman at the well was a Samaritan woman. During that time era the Jews did not mix with the Samaritan people. This woman being married many times was considered a vile sinner.

Jesus speaks to her regardless of her past and her social standing. Jesus says to her. “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water that I shall give him will become in him a well of water springing up into eternal life. So, the woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will never thirst, nor come here to draw.
The woman believed what Jesus was saying to her.

That day, Jesus goes on to tell her everything that she ever did. He told her to go call her husband, she tells the Lord, I have no husband. Jesus says you are right in saying, I have no husband, for you have had five husbands, and he whom you now have is not your husband.

Jesus had filled this woman with living water, she was so excited that she left her water pot. That day, she was so filled and so happy that she went into the city and told the men, come see a man who told me all things I ever did. John 4:28-29. She, being a vile woman of the city carried the message to men. Many believed in him because of the word of the woman who testified.

Note: This woman carried the message. John 4:39

When we think we have really messed up and there is no way that the Lord could ever use us. This story reflects one of the greatest stories, showing Gods love and mercy for us. It doesn’t matter where we have been or how messed up, we have become. Jesus can still use us to carry a message and testify of all that he does for us.
Jesus meets us at the well. He doesn’t care what we have done, he wants us all to be united with him. He meets us exactly where we are and fills us with his spirit. There is not one that he wants lost.
This song comes to my mind – It is no secret what God can do. What he’ll do for others he’ll do for you, with arms wide open he will start anew. It is no secret what God can do.

Stay tuned for more on Women who meet their Jesus at the Well.

John 4:13-14
Whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.

Author: Daphne Pendley

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