Author Archives: Karla Jo Wasion

I love Jesus and His Church. His Word is Truth, His heart is good, and His return is sure.

The Gift of Wilderness

Things feel dry right now. Uncomfortable. I’m both grieving and storming heaven for things, for something to break. I’m tired and trying to figure out what it looks like to let God strengthen me. And for some time now I’ve been dissatisfied with my place in life. Frustrated at the lack of forward movement, and the years that keep disappearing while I wonder what I have to show for them.

I’ve been in need of perspective, and today it floated down through the book of Numbers. I know, right?

The nutshell version is that God rescued this hoard of Israelites from the grip of Egypt, and then led them into the desert. Took them the long way instead of the shortcut, so they wouldn’t have to battle an enemy. He knew they would have gotten scared as rabbits and hightailed it back to Egypt, back to slavery. Back to what was familiar.

The wilderness was overlooked as the gift it was meant to be. A place of safety, provision, and even rest. A place where they could learn to know their God and to worship Him in a hard place. He met their hunger with manna, and their thirst with water from a rock. They had so much opportunity to witness His goodness and His power, but they wished for something else. Something more. They wanted to be in a different place. So they complained and voiced their fears, and God called it all unbelief. And what could have been a temporary season became the rest of their lives, as they wandered in their wilderness until an entire generation died.

Perspective. Am I overlooking the gift that this season is meant to be?

I can still long for His promise, while trusting the manna and the water He provides in the wilderness. I can choose to know Him deeper in this place, and to be thankful for His presence with me here.

The wilderness holds miracles and the power of God, the leading of God, and the love of God that draws us into the desert so we can know Him there, worship Him there, and trust Him there.

I don’t want to miss that because I’m longing for something else.

It’s Life or Death

Quiet time with Jesus this morning was fast and furious. Some days it’s slow, quiet, and contemplative. Not today. A few days ago I felt led to return to the book of Genesis. It’s a well read, well underlined, highlighted, circled book in my bible, but I was sure that God would say something fresh from it. I was not wrong. Let’s get to it.

 The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. (Genesis 2:9)

A planting from God in the center of man’s world, from the very beginning. Adam, and all who would come after him would continually be confronted with a choice—life or death, and the loving command of God to choose life.

“This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to Him.” (Deuteronomy 30:19-20)

“The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you—they are full of the Spirit and life.” (John 6:63)

From one end of the Bible to the other runs a continual theme. Choose God’s way and live, or choose our own way and find death.

“There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death” (Proverbs 14:12)

After four hundred years of silence between the prophet Malachi and the Gospels, God spoke the same refrain. Choose life or choose death.

“For God so loved the world that he gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)

“Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” (John 14:6)

But the choice before us isn’t only about heaven or hell. Every day we face small decisions that either breathe life into something or slowly choke it out.

Choosing spiritual apathy will bring death to zeal and passion. But if we will choose the pursuit of God, and zeal for His house, it will bring life to our souls and life to the Church.

Choosing offense and bitterness suffocates forgiveness and restoration—and eventually the relationship itself. But choosing God’s way of grace, mercy, and forgiveness brings life back into our own hearts and breathes new life into relationships that were being threatened with death.

Every time we choose our own way over God’s way, death comes to something. In the center of our existence the choice has been planted, and we must decide the way we will choose to walk. Life, or death.

Jesus or the world. Our own flesh and emotions or obedience to God. Offense that leads to a bitter heart, or forgiveness that heals and restores. The pull of apathy or the call to a “one thing” heart posture, a continual pursuit of the heart and ways of God, and a zeal for Him and His house, the Church.

Choose you this day…

Questions to ask and things to ponder:

  • In the abundance of choices that I make every day, how many of them bring death instead of life?
  • In the big picture of how I live my life, am I choosing life?
  • How can I begin to speak and/or pray life over the people I love?

How, Or If?

Zechariah asked the angel, “How can I be sure of this? I am an old man and my wife is well along in years.”

The angel said to him, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to tell you this good news. And now you will be silent and not able to speak until the day this happens, because you did not believe my words, which will come true at their appointed time.” – Luke 1:18-20

Someone else asked a similar question, with a very different outcome.

When Gabriel showed up to tell Mary that she would conceive a child, she responded with “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?” (Luke 1:34) Instead of making her mute, Gabriel explained that it would be by the Holy Spirit.

So, what’s the difference between Zechariah and Mary?

When Zechariah asked “how can I be sure of this?”, it was a dead giveaway that he needed proof, because he didn’t believe what Gabriel was telling him.

Mary’s question arose not from doubt or unbelief, but from a place of wondering how God was going to accomplish this.

As with most things, it’s a matter of the heart. Zechariah’s contained unbelief, while Mary’s did not.

There is a big difference between wondering how God will do what He said He would do, and wondering if He will do what He said He would do.

Do you have a how in your heart, or an if?

The Prayer

“Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah saw him, he was startled and was gripped with fear. But the angel said to him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John. He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord.” – Luke 1:11-15

Couple of things.

The number of times people were filled with fear when an angel showed up makes me think a lot of us have the wrong idea about angels. They come from another realm, a realm in which they battle demons and stand before the throne of God, waiting to be dispatched as His messengers. I don’t think they’re soft and effiminate looking, playing a harp. But that’s just my opinion. Feel free to have your own.

“… your prayer has been heard.” There are a few possibilities here as to what the angel meant by “your prayer.”

  • Zechariah, even in his old age, was still praying for a son;
  • The angel was referring to prayers that had once been prayed, but are prayed no longer;
  • Or, the “prayer” in question wasn’t for a son at all, but was the prayer Zechariah was praying in his role as a priest. Very likely a prayer for Israel’s redeemer to come.

If it was the first one, well, good on Zechariah for sticking with it.

If the second, what hope that should give us, to know that prayers we once prayed are still before the Lord. Still awaiting His answer. Not dead and forgotten in the heavens, even if so in our heart.

And if it’s the last one, that would mean that God was actually answering two prayers at the same time. Because surely Zechariah had, at one time, prayed for a son. And surely, as a priest, he would have offered up prayers for Israel’s redeemer, the Messiah to make the oh so long awaited appearance. John the Baptist, as we know, was the forerunner to the Messiah. The herald of the redemption that was about to draw nigh.

This entire scene feels otherworldly and full of mystery. After 400 years of silence, a heavenly messenger appears to an aging priest as he prays at the altar in the holy place—and with that, the shift begins. A crack forms in the darkness, and light starts to break through. An ancient prophecy is awakening, and soon the whole world will feel its impact.

More than just words on a page, the Scriptures draw us into the mystery of God’s redeeming plan for creation—into His very heart—inviting us to stand in awe of His power, His wisdom, and His absolute Godness.

It’s Not Random

Once when Zechariah’s division was on duty and he was serving as priest before God, he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to go into the temple of the Lord and burn incense. And when the time for the burning of incense came, all the assembled worshipers were praying outside. – Luke 1:8-10

Remember, Zechariah’s name means “God remembered” and that means that the time had come for God to fulfill something. In this case, an angel was sent to Zechariah to announce that he and Elizabeth were going to have a child. The one crying out in the wilderness (Isaiah 40:3) was going to be conceived in a barren woman who was too old to have children, by her husband, an old man himself.

Let’s zoom in on five words – “he was chosen by lot… “. In our culture today, that would mean it was a random selection. Luck, really. But in their culture, it was understood that in the casting of lots, God was choosing.

“The lot is cast into the lap,
    but its every decision is from the Lord.” – Proverbs 16:33

I think we can easily get pulled into a culture that believes in luck, coincidences, and chance; a culture that does not acknowledge the sovereignty of God. But we are not of this world and their culture is not ours. Ours is a Kingdom culture and in this culture, we know that He stands sovereign over the affairs of His creation.

We are not chosen by chance, nor do we stumble into “lucky breaks.” What may appear random is, in truth, directed by God’s hand and in accordance with His divine will in the unfolding of His divine plans and purposes. Perhaps this realization can mark the beginning of a holy reverence for Him—the awareness that He rules and reigns over every detail of your life. He has left nothing to chance for you.

Lord, help us see You rightly. May we fully surrender ourselves to You, the Master of all creation.

He Will Remember What He Has Not Forgotten

In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron. Both of them were righteous in the sight of God, observing all the Lord’s commands and decrees blamelessly. But they were childless because Elizabeth was not able to conceive, and they were both very old. – Luke 1:5-7

This is my “short devos based on a couple of verses” phase, in case you wondered. Which I’m sure you didn’t, but one never knows and I think it’s always better to be safe than sorry. I’m pretty throughtful like that.

I like how Luke connects this new covenant beginning with the old covenant, don’t you? He made sure we knew that the priest, Zechariah, was from the division of Abijah. When King David was on the throne, he divided the priesthood into divisions, and Abijah was the eighth divison. He also let us know that both Zechariah and Elizabeth were descendants of Aaron.

Old to new. Seamless. Covenant flowing into covenant.

But do you know the Hebrew meaning of the name Zechariah?

זְכַרְיָה – “Yahweh has remembered”

The Hebrew doesn’t imply that He forgot a thing and then remembered it. It means the time came for His promise, or His prophecy to be fulfilled.

He remembered Zechariah and Elizabeth would bring forth the “voice of one crying out in the wilderness” from Isaiah 40:3.

And now it was time.

There are things I’ve been waiting on, things promised in His Word; things my heart longs to see fulfilled. Somedays, those feel like forgotten things. Like heaven has moved on while my faith filled prayers are in a corner gathering dust.

Today, I am reminded that my Father never forgets and the day will come when He will remember. Because it will be time.

Take heart today, my friend. God has not forgotten, and when it’s time, He will remember. Keep praying.

Where Is My Investment? Where Is Yours?

Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught. – Luke 1:1-4

Luke addresses Theophilus as “most excellent”, indicating he could have been a high ranking Roman official. We really don’t know much about him, but Luke wrote not one, but two letters to him – the gospel of Luke, and the book of Acts. Clearly, Theophilus is a man that Luke was invested in on a spiritual level. He wrote to him so that Theophilus could have an assurance of the truth he had been taught. Perhaps doubts or confusion had been expressed, which is understandable, since Luke addresses the fact that many people have given their account of what had taken place. No doubt there were false stories, conflicting stories, and even deceiving stories, humanity being what it is and all.

I am intrigued, because I don’t think Luke wrote these historical accounts to this man in the hopes that they would someday become part of the holy scriptures. Apart from being called by God, perhaps without even realizing it, to write what would become two books of the bible, I believe Luke was genuinely attempting to disciple Theophilus to be able to walk in truth.

Luke was a physician. A man of science, if you will. And it is with that mind that he undertook this task to lay out the events that had taken place starting from the birth of the Christ, through His death and resurrection, and then the formation of His Church. He would have been thorough, methodical, and given to the gathering of as much proof as possible. Funny how God did that. Brought in a man who had not been one of the disciples, a man of science, to authenticate and document things of the Spirit.

Naturally, I have questions.

Who am I investing in? Who is benefitting from my own eyewitness testimony of God’s power?

We can all shout about what’s going on in the world around us today. We can tell anyone who will listen how horrible/great we think our government is or how we think the Church is failing by either taking too much or too little a stand in the political arena.

Anyone can do that.

But how many of us are quietly investing in someone else’s walk with Christ? Are we speaking more about what God has done and is doing in our own lives and in the world around us than we are about what the government is or isn’t doing wrong, or right?

We are called to endure. To keep going. To keep speaking the truth of salvation, the good news that we can be saved from our sin and from the wrath that will come. I can only speak for me, but I don’t think getting worked up over the latest political issue is enduring. It’s getting distracted by what we think is at stake, from what is actually at stake. Nothing this government, or this world, does is eternal. Souls are eternal. People are eternal, and they will be eternal in one of two places. With God, or without Him. God’s desire is that they be with Him.

Is that my desire? Is it yours? Where is the bulk of our investment of this life God has given to us?