Blog

Movin’ On

IT IS SAID; 'If one is going to write about anything, then one should write about what one knows something about'. Now I don't know if that's the exact quote or even the right quote or who said it, but it seems to be true enough. Well... we know about moving.
Sharon and I have been married for over thirty-seven years and we have officially,  moved thirty-eight times. This does not count the many months spent living in and out of  vans, cars, old buses and broken down motor homes, staying in countless motels, hotels, camps, churches and other peoples homes. At one time we lived a seven year stretch in a motor home, completely without brick & mortar home or apartment, staying in Wal Mart and restaurant parking lots, rest areas, turn outs and wide spots, truck stops and a few camp grounds. (Most camp grounds cost money, so we only used as last resort.) During our time in the motor home we lived all across North America; Alaska to Florida, New York to California and slept across much of Canada. We have traversed hundreds of thousands of miles, in the Lord's service, hardly spending more than a few days in any one place.
Moving is something we know something about.

RECENTLY WE MOVED... AGAIN. You would think that with as much moving as we have done, moving would get easier. Wrong. Moving has gotten harder and we have come to dread it as one dreads contracting a cold. But in our life and ministry moving is as inevitable as the yearly virus and something, similarly, to be endured looking forward to its conclusion. Although all the boxes are not as yet unpacked and the paperwork, demanded by various insurance companies and Government agencies still incomplete, we have moved and now reside in an apartment we hope to live in for a while.

THE GOOD THING ABOUT MOVING, this time for us, is being close to some of our children and GRANDCHILDREN. Did I say GRANDCHILDREN? Due to ministry demands, we have not been been able to live near our family for some years. Three of our GRANDCHILDREN and their parents have congregated in the Salem area of Oregon and another son in the Portland area. That's three sons, two wonderful daughter-in-laws and three GRANDCHILDREN all in one area. Pretty cool and worth moving for. So we moved again.

MOVING, THOUGH AT TIMES DIFFICULT, HAS BEEN USED BY GOD IN OUR LIVES.
This latest move has put us near our family, and we are truly blessed. Through the years of moving we have been allowed to declare the Word of God in thousands of churches and to hundreds of thousands of His people. We have friends all over the world, for which we are truly grateful. We have seen and experienced the working of God in many and astounding ways. God has certainly blessed us in giving us such experience in the act of moving.

CONSIDER HOW GOD HAS USED MOVING IN THE PAST: When God was preparing to move Israel out of Egypt, He demonstrated His glory through the plagues of Moses. Then He demonstrated His glory again by moving Israel though the Red Sea as on dry land. Then He demonstrated His discipline by moving Israel to take laps around     Mt.Sinai for forty years. Then it was His glory again as He moved Israel across the Jordan and into the Promised Land, conquering the mighty fortress city of Jericho, fighting on behalf of His people, even causing the sun to stop in the sky. All this while moving.

OF COURSE ALL THIS moving was pointing toward the GREAT MOVING DAY when Jesus moved out of Heaven and to His mother's womb. He moved from there and into the light of the world, as humans do, and after a life of moving around the land of Israel, teaching uncomfortable truth and doing really good, He was finally rejected and killed and moved into a tomb. We thought He would remain there in decay and out of our faces, but He wouldn't stay in that tomb and MOVED OUT on the third day. Then He moved back to heaven to make a place for His friends to live.
THOSE WHO WITNESSED ALL THIS MOVING, the ones Jesus chose to tell the world 
about His move out of the tomb sat in Jerusalem. They had been told to wait a while for their baptism in the Spirit. They received their baptism and Him Who came to dwell in them. Many who were there, the Day the Spirit moved to Earth returned to their homes believing, but the witnesses of the Resurrection Move would not go out. They had been commanded to go out to all the Earth and to every creature with the Good News, but they stayed in Jerusalem.The Keys to the Kingdom where turned and Gentiles believed too, but still they would not move. Jerusalem was religiously comfortable.
SO GOD RAISED UP SOME WHO WOULD GO, and so they started moving out. Not without argument and grumbling and fear and foreboding. It is hard to move. One then another... finally they were going out.Then God made Jerusalem so uncomfortable, nigh uninhabitable, that they all moved out. They went out to all the world to tell the world about the move of Jesus Christ out of that old tomb and out of this world to Heaven. About the forgiveness of our sins and justification before God by His Grace alone through Faith alone. THIS IS REALLY REALLY GOOD NEWS!
They told all who would listen about how God so loved the world that He moved His Only Begotten Son from Heaven to Earth, that whoever would believe on him would be moved from the power of darkness into the kingdom of the son of His love, Jesus Christ.
And they told of the one final move; when Jesus will come back to earth to move us into the place He has prepared, in The Father's House, there to live with Him forever.

SO NOW WE WAIT. We who have grown weary of moving from house to house and place to place. Even we long for that GREAT MOVING DAY and the BLESSED HOPE, THE GLORIOUS APPEARING OF OUR GREAT GOD AND SAVIOR JESUS CHRIST. THE ONE FINAL MOVE WHEN HE COMES BACK TO GET US AND MOVES US TO HEAVEN, FOREVER.
"And everyone who has this hope before him, purifies himself as Christ is pure."
1 John 3:3



                       PEOPLE GET READY
                       FOR THE DAY OF MOVING
                       YOU DON'T NEED NO U HAUL
                       YOU'LL TAKE NOTHING BUT YOUR LIFE
                       AND DEEDS DONE IN THE SPIRIT
                       TESTED BY THE FIRE
                       YOU'LL NEED NOTHING THERE
                       SAVE WORDS OF PRAISE
                       THEY'LL BURST FROM YOUR NEW LIPS
                       ASCRIBING GLORY TO THE ONE WHO MOVED YOU HOME
                       THE NEW CHORUS OF THANKSGIVING
                       SPAWNED NOW NOT BY FAITH
                       BY SIGHT OF THE GLORIOUS ONE

                                                                                   j.jason

We would like to thank each of you for your prayerful and financial support throughout 2011. As we are into the new year, we need to provide you with an updated address for any and all communication for Wordsower. We are now located in Salem, Oregon and our mailing address is as follows: