Safety Sweet Safety

Romans 5:12-19

¹²When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. Adam’s sin brought death, so death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned. ¹³Yes, people sinned even before the law was given. But it was not counted as sin because there was not yet any law to break. ¹⁴Still, everyone died—from the time of Adam to the time of Moses—even those who did not disobey an explicit commandment of God, as Adam did. Now Adam is a symbol, a representation of Christ, who was yet to come. ¹⁵But there is a great difference between Adam’s sin and God’s gracious gift. For the sin of this one man, Adam, brought death to many. But even greater is God’s wonderful grace and his gift of forgiveness to many through this other man, Jesus Christ. ¹⁶And the result of God’s gracious gift is very different from the result of that one man’s sin. For Adam’s sin led to condemnation, but God’s free gift leads to our being made right with God, even though we are guilty of many sins. ¹⁷For the sin of this one man, Adam, caused death to rule over many. But even greater is God’s wonderful grace and his gift of righteousness, for all who receive it will live in triumph over sin and death through this one man, Jesus Christ. ¹⁸Yes, Adam’s one sin brings condemnation for everyone, but Christ’s one act of righteousness brings a right relationship with God and new life for everyone. ¹⁹Because one person disobeyed God, many became sinners. But because one other person obeyed God, many will be made righteous. (NLT)

I know that usually the saying goes, “Home Sweet Home”, but an experience this week made me rethink that saying. When we think of home, what comes to mind? Peace, comfort, love, happiness, contentment, safety, etc., etc. Or at least that’s what we should be thinking when we think about home. Not everyone can say that, but it is my hope that even if you are not able to say those words when speaking about your home that you will hear what God is saying to you today about making your home in Him!

We recently moved to a new community. When we were looking for a house to buy, we seemed to have to search high and low. At one house, there was a cat hanging around in the back yard. She is black with white paws and a white chest. Since we were here for a while when we first looked at the house, came back to look at it a second time, and then came back a third time with the inspector after putting an offer in on the house, my three children spent a lot of time with this cute, sweet, tame cat. They lovingly nicknamed her Mittens with the T’s literally pronounced as Mitt-tens.

My youngest daughter is six years old and really had no concept of what moving entails. She regularly commented on people’s furnishings, and at this house, she said, “Yay, let’s get this house. It has Mittens.” We had to explain to her that the cat probably belongs to the owners of the house and will probably go with them when they move out. She said, “Yea, but maybe she’ll still be here when we move in.” I told her that I doubt it, but maybe she’s right. This stopped an argument and gave her the satisfaction of enjoying spending time with her new-found friend.

Well, God knew what we needed as Mittens was still here after we moved in. I thought maybe the people had left her here because they couldn’t take her where they were moving to. Later that first week after moving in, we discovered that she was a neighborhood cat that had been left by another family when they moved away from the neighborhood. As a matter of fact, there were several water bowls in many of the neighbors’ yards so everyone was kind of taking care of her. But God knew that she needed us as much as we needed her!

We bought her a dish and some food and quickly set into a routine of feeding her at set times. She is always out there waiting when it is time to eat. Last weekend there was a cold front that moved through and it got extremely cold outside. My hubby has never liked animals so bringing her in was not an option. I thought about fixing a box for her with a towel in it so she could get some warmth, but since we are working on fixing up the house, I ran out of steam and just didn’t get it done. So I prayed as I went to sleep that God would protect her and help her stay warm for the night. She had been sleeping by our crawl space door because there was a crack toward the bottom where heat was escaping. It wasn’t a lot of heat, but it was warm, and she seemed satisfied with that. That night, she kept warm by the crawl space.

A couple of days ago, Mittens was acting skittish around us when my son discovered that she had a sore on her foot. Further investigation led us to discover that one of her claws had actually been torn out. We are not sure how it happened, but we tried to take care of it. My youngest daughter, the one who is six, decided to touch the open wound so I applied antibiotic ointment on it via a bandage. Of course, she shook her paw until it came off and wanted nothing to do with me or my three children for quite a while.

Later that day as dinner-time approached, my oldest daughter, who is thirteen and aspiring to become a veterinarian, decided it was time to fix her a box. She found an old blanket that her Nanna had given her. It was fittingly an ASPCA blanket that had a cat and a dog on it. She put the blanket in a box and laid it on its side. We then introduced Mittens to the box. At first she wanted nothing to do with it, but as we put the blanket over her while I held her, she started to get interested in it. We took the blanket off of her, set it in the box and then set Mittens in the box. Amazingly she took to it! That is where she has been sleeping since then. My husband has even started to care about the cat and commented that maybe we should get something a little more permanent for her than a cardboard box.

Yesterday, I was actually getting ready to leave to run some errands when I heard a siren down the highway. I looked out our dining room window to see Mittens running full-force toward our house through the neighbor’s yard. She got even with the gate to our back yard and made a bee-line for the gate and back yard. She turned the corner, arrived at the tree outside our back door and slowed down. She trotted over to her box and sat down in it. It was then that God showed me that she recognized her safe place, her home, with us!

And through that, God reminded me that He tells us in Proverbs 18:10, “The name of the Lord is a strong fortress; the godly run to him and are safe.” Some versions of this verse say “the righteous run to him”. He quickly reminded me that our safety is found in Him when we run to him. Our natural tendency when we sin is to run away from and hide from God as Adam and Eve did in Genesis 3:6-8

⁶The woman was convinced. She saw that the tree was beautiful and its fruit looked delicious, and she wanted the wisdom it would give her. So she took some of the fruit and ate it. Then she gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it, too. ⁷At that moment their eyes were opened, and they suddenly felt shame at their nakedness. So they sewed fig leaves together to cover themselves. ⁸When the cool evening breezes were blowing, the man and his wife heard the Lord God walking about in the garden. So they hid from the Lord God among the trees. (NLT)

Not only did Adam and Eve hide from God, but we do the same thing when we try to avoid going to God when we know we have messed up. Isaiah 53:6 describes us all as sheep that have strayed, but He laid all of our sins on His Son. In Isaiah 64:6, our own righteousness is likened to “filthy rags”, a term used to describe menstrual rags good for nothing but to be thrown away, and yet He provides us with a righteousness that is not our own through Jesus Christ. We do not deserve this grace, but he freely gives it to us. (Acts 15:9-11, Acts 20:32, Romans 5:12-19 above, and many others!)

Today and every day, let’s all run to Him and make our home in the safety He provides us: Safety, Sweet Safety!

In His Grace!