Blessed with Life

Dana Gresh: Hey, wherever you are right now, I want you to pause for a second. Take a breath. Go ahead, fill your lungs, and then exhale. Now do this. Find your pulse. Feel your heartbeat. It's pretty amazing, isn't it? We have been given the gift of life. And that's what we're talking about on today's episode of Revive Our Hearts Weekend. If you're hearing this or reading the transcript on our website, you are alive. And while that's probably not news to you, does the miracle of life ever get lost in your busy calendar, your stress-filled situations, or your ongoing to-do list? I'm Dana Gresh, and I'm so glad you've joined me for this episode of Revive Our Hearts Weekend. November is a time we tend to focus on thankfulness, hence the important holiday coming up. And this month we want to take you deeper into that theme here on the weekends as we focus on different aspects of blessings. Blessed with life, by family, by trials, and blessed to bless. Today we're honing in on the truth that life is a gift. And if you haven't thought about that lately or if life feels like anything but a gift right now, I think, I hope you'll come away with a different perspective. We're about to hear encouragement from Mary Kassian, biblical truth from Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, and Erin Davis, and powerful testimonies from Ryan and Bethany Bomberger. First up is a wise woman full of biblical insight, also my friend, Mary Kassian. We have a lot to be grateful for in life, and Mary's helping us discover why our gratitude as believers goes richer and deeper than the gratitude of the world.
Mary Kassian and Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: I think people that don't know Jesus miss out on the fullness of gratitude because they have hearts perhaps that are grateful for a sunset or grateful for their gratitude socks. But if their hearts are grateful but not grateful to God, they're not being grateful in the right sort of way. And that's for a Christian where gratitude is markedly different. Gratitude is always linked to God, who's the giver of all good things.
Dana Gresh: Mhm. Yeah.
Mary Kassian and Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: James 1:17 says every generous act, every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of Lights. So when I see that sunset, when I see the autumn leaves changing, when I'm able to enjoy something, my heart ought to recognize that that is from God. That is a gift from God. And even when I'm going through hard times, we can recognize that those times also God is with us. And that is a gift from God.
Dana Gresh: Mhm. Yeah. Mhm.
Mary Kassian and Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Christians ought to be the most grateful people because we have the most to be grateful for. And what is the ultimate object of our gratitude is God. And who God is. He's good. He's all powerful. He He reigns. He's He's holy. He's wise. And when I look at a sunset, I know I just snapped a picture of my husband and I were driving just um on the highway the other day, and there was just this this sunset and the sky was crimson and and was like this this spotlight of red in the middle of this gold and yellow sky. It was And And the the fields of harvest all alongside. It was breathtaking. It was breathtaking. And my cry at that moment was not, oh, I'm so grateful for the scenery. My cry at that moment was, I am so grateful, God, that you are so creative.
Dana Gresh: Mhm. Mhm.
Mary Kassian and Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: You are an artist. This is spectacular. So are gratitude being, you know, directed toward him and, oh, he's he's happy. He's merciful. There are so many things about God that that are spectacular and that we can be grateful for.
Dana Gresh: Mhm. You know what word is rising up in my heart that I feel like I need to say?
Mary Kassian and Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Mhm. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.
Dana Gresh: Hallelujah. Oh, it just As you were saying that, I just felt it in me. Like I wanted it to come out. And you know, I think there have been times in my life where I would hear a conversation like this and tune out and be like, those kooky women. What? And what I have learned is that the more I'm in the word and the more I'm in the presence of other women like you who speak the language of gratitude, the language of praise, the language of thanks, the more it makes sense to me and the more it naturally pops out of me. You know, I love gardening. I have dahlias and gladiolas and roses and and marvel every year to just grow something new that I've never grown before. And when it blooms, I burst into praise. It's a miracle to me every time. I don't think I was always like that, but I direct my thanks to God. Lord, thank you for that beautiful dinner plate dahlia that is brightening my day. What a wonderful God you are. You must have been feeling very cheerful when you made that bright yellow color. You know, I just that's how I That's how I talk when I'm walking through my flower beds. And um that is a I guess would sound a little crazy to some people.
Mary Kassian and Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Well, I think that Christians's perception on gratitude is so much different because the word of God moves gratitude away from a me-centered focus to a God-centered focus. It's not just, oh, I'm happy about this because this this serves me. This is about me. This is about my happiness, my joy, about me feeling comfortable, about me being in a place where, you know, I'm feeling it. I'm feeling good. This is more gratitude for who God is, what God does. It's about him. And a lifestyle of gratitude involves the discipline of meditating on the attributes of God and giving him thanks and praise. And you know what, Dana, just the fact that you look at your flowers and the flowers evoke praise to God. And I look at the sunset and I'm driving and that evokes It just stirs up in my spirit this praise and this adoration of the God who is so creative. That just shows that the Holy Spirit is at work in our hearts and in our lives because that is a mark directing the praise to God and all of creation speaking his name and calling out to us through the beauty and through through what's going on and and pointing us towards God. That's why he created those things.
Dana Gresh: Yes. And every time we notice the beauty of life, our praise goes beyond that to our creator. Good words from Mary Kassian. Now what happens when we stop noticing the wonder of life? I mean, it's easy for us to lose our sense of awe for the very things that should capture our attention, like how your beating heart is what's keeping you alive or how delightful it is to taste the food you eat. And ultimately, this awe should direct our gaze to the Lord. But we get bogged down in this fallen world. We get caught up in the temporary. We're people easily distracted and we forget that life all around us is a wonder itself given to us by a good and gracious father. Nancy's here to help us get a better perspective by taking us to the story of the Queen of Sheba in 1 Kings chapter 10.
Mary Kassian and Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: I read a John Piper interview yesterday about an issue that he says is quote an epidemic among human beings in general. And that is the tragic loss of wonder and amazement. He said we are so easily bored with glorious reality. We go to visit the magnificent Rockies or Alps or Himalayas. And for a day or two, we're breathless with amazement. But by the end of the week, we're sitting in front of the television in our chalet on top of the mountain, watching pitiful human cinematic efforts to create amazement. He said it's the great tragic effect of the fall, superficiality in a world of wonder. Easy boredom. Loving something for two, three repetitions, and then after that, ho-hum. He went on to say we need to reverse a superficial mindset and replace it with a deeply joyful mind, ready to discover wonders and be amazed everywhere we look. And he said we need to set ourselves on a conscious quest to cultivate a spiritual mind that is fully alert to the glories of God. When I read that interview, I thought of the Queen of Sheba, who was fully alert to the glories of Solomon's kingdom, to the wonder of it all. She had no breath left in her. She was speechless. She was overwhelmed. She was on this kind of intentional quest, this conscious quest, her mind fully alert to what she was seeing. The psalmist had that same kind of mindset. Psalm 111, for example, verse two says, great are the works of the Lord, studied by all who delight in them. Full of splendor and majesty is his work. There's a sense of wonder, a sense of awe. I love those places in the Psalms. You see some in Job. You see it in other places of scripture where it talks about the wonders of the Lord. And then it mentions rain. I mean, how is rain one of the wonders of the Lord? But as you go and study what it takes for rain, how it develops, and how it comes on the earth and the and how it ties in with everything else in the creation, it is wonderful. But we don't stop and ponder and study and meditate on and delight in the works of the Lord so often because we're moving too fast and I'm preaching to myself here when I say this. It would take our breath away if we would stop to look at and ponder the amazing wisdom and works of God. Now we know that Solomon had his inconsistencies and his faults and flaws. Over time, the more wealth and wives he amassed, the more his weaknesses began to show up. So he was an imperfect, flawed human being. But as we pursue Christ, we will never find him to be less than the reports we've heard of him. He is greater than anything we've heard or thought. His luster will never tarnish or fade. It only gets more beautiful. He will never disappoint. And when one day we see the king, capital K, face to face, we will be awestruck. We will say as the Queen of Sheba did in Solomon's presence, the half was not told us. We didn't dream how wonderful you are. Your wisdom, your beauty, your glory surpassed any report that we had ever heard. Well, verse eight of chapter 10, the Queen of Sheba continues and she says, happy are your men. Happy are your servants. She'd been watching them. She had seen that they were happy people serving the king of Israel, King Solomon. Happy are your servants who continually stand before you and hear your wisdom. His employees were happy. That word means blessed. Well, Solomon's employees were happy. They were blessed. They would have said this is the greatest place ever to work. But not only were the employees happy, the general population was happy. 1 Kings 4:20 says Judah and Israel were as many as the sand by the sea. They ate and drank and were happy. This was a golden era for Solomon's kingdom. The people were happy. And the Queen of Sheba noticed this. It must have been different than where she came from because she pointed it out as something unusual. It seems that she almost envied those who had the privilege of living or serving near this amazing king. And hearing his wisdom day after day. They may have taken it for granted, but she didn't. She was thrilled to hear this and she recognized the blessing it was to be near this king. Those who recognized the greatness of our king, King Jesus, and his wisdom consider his servants to be in an enviable position. Great joy is the inevitable byproduct of being one of the king's servants, of being in his presence daily, of listening to his words and wisdom. That should make us happy. And it will make us happy. Psalm 65:4 blessed, same word, happy is the one you choose and bring near to dwell in your courts. We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house, the holiness of your temple. It's sweet. It's satisfying. It fills you up. It blesses you. And if you've been a child of God any length of time and you've known what it is to soak in his word, to soak in his presence, to be with his people, you know that even though at times there are tears, there are hard things, there are hard places We talk a lot about that on Revive Our Hearts, but there's also joy. There's happiness to be in the presence of the Lord and with his people.
Dana Gresh: Mhm. We are blessed. This life is a blessing from God. It's dangerous to forget that truth. The pro-life and pro-choice conversation in our society is evidence of that because it's a conversation we shouldn't even have to have. All life, every life is precious, which takes us to a topic I love, babies. Have you ever held a newborn? Mhm. My children have been making grandbabies for me these last four years and I have been holding newborns. And every time I do, I am reminded babies are such a blessing. Ryan and Bethany Bomberger are passionate about new life and all life. You're about to hear why, followed by a word from Erin Davis on the pro-life posture we find in scripture.
Ryan Bomberger: My pro-life story starts when I began. I am literally the 1% that is used 100% of the time to justify abortion. My birth mom experienced the horror and the violence of rape. Yet she was courageous enough not only to give me life, she gave me the incredible gift of adoption. So when we talk about the issue of life, often times the conversation inevitably gets to that question, well, what about rape? I'm the tangible example of that. You know, the circumstances of our conception never change the condition of our worth. We're all created by God. Whether we were humanly planned or not, we're all still part of his divine plan. And so my pro-life story is that many say that I should have been aborted. But God saw otherwise. And I am just grateful to my courageous birth mom because I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't be married to this amazing woman. I wouldn't have the four incredible kiddos that I have and I wouldn't be able to live out this God-given purpose.
Dana Gresh: I love what you just said about your birth mom, called her courageous.
Ryan Bomberger: Yeah. Yeah.
Dana Gresh: And I think it is a brave thing for a woman to think beyond her own life, beyond her own wants, desires, needs, and plans, and to think selflessly about that baby growing in her womb. That is just such a brave choice. Bethany, what's your pro-life story?
Bethany Bomberger and Erin Davis: So I feel like I have many, but the most defining, profound one is my own personal story of transformation. And I grew up in church and had a career, had gotten my master's degree. And somewhere in my 20s, found myself really struggling with life's disappointments, things I thought were going to come to fruition that hadn't. And during that season, I just really became very selfish and walked away from the Lord and embraced my misery and depression and found myself in really an abusive relationship and found myself pregnant. And it was interesting because I had many, many colleagues who said just abort. Just Nobody will even know. You know, the biological father encouraged me, offered funds and said, you know, just quietly go get an abortion and we'll move on with our lives. And in the deepest part of my soul, I knew that I couldn't do that in good conscience. And I ended up going to get my very first ultrasound. And I feel like it's really personal that it ended up being a Saturday morning, February 14th, 2004. And it was Valentine's Day. I was by myself. The place was empty. I was the only one there. And it felt very just cold. And I laid there and I had that ultrasound and I looked up at the screen and I saw this little piece of rice blinking. You know, it was very early, so there weren't parts to see other than um this little thing that was blinking that was a big thing because it was my daughter's heart. And in that moment, it was defining for me because I honestly felt this embrace of the Holy Spirit. And it was like God just picking me up, taking that baby's heart, my heart, and just enveloping them both of those in his heart. And I went home that night by myself and I opened up an old journal that I had found. And in the margin of that journal was Psalm 34:5. And it said, I sought the Lord. He delivered me from all my fears. Those that look to him will be radiant and their faces will never be covered with shame. And that night I decided shame was not going to be my portion. It was not going to be my testimony. It was not going to be my daughter's story.
Dana Gresh: Ryan and Bethany Bomberger, they're with the Radiance Foundation. You want to check that out online. You will be encouraged today. And Bethany is also the author of a book called Pro-Life Kids. If you have grandkids or children in your house, you want to check that out. Erin.
Bethany Bomberger and Erin Davis: Usually this is where I say it's time to get grounded in God's word, but today I'm going to say it's time to stay grounded in God's word. I'm so grateful Bethany took us to the Psalms. And when I was trying to decide where I wanted to teach from for this segment, I had a little difficulty because frankly I could go to Genesis to get a pro-life ethos. I could go to the Psalms. I could go to the Gospels. I could go to Revelation. But where I want us to park for just a few minutes this morning is John chapter 10. In John chapter 10, we find a verse that I feel like is the stake in the ground for why Jesus's followers are pro-life. Because truly to follow Jesus and to obey his word is to believe that human life matters. And we do see it all over our Bibles from Genesis all the way to the end. In Genesis, God spoke all of life into creation. God is a life-giving God. And in Revelation, we read about the realities of the eternal, beautiful, breathtaking eternal life that God has in store for those of us who love him. He is a life-giving God, but perhaps the most pro-life verse in the whole Bible is John 10:10. As promised, I'm going to read it to you. John 10:10 says this, the thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I that I there is Jesus. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. This is a really important juxtaposition as we consider pro-life or pro-choice as those as it's framed in our culture. All of us who bear God's image, all of humanity from the littlest to the biggest, from the most able-bodied to the least able-bodied, all of humanity We have a relentless enemy. And his name is Satan. It is mission is singular. Satan is focused on death. You want to be mad at somebody about this issue? Don't be mad at the people who don't think like you do. They are deceived. You want to be mad at somebody? You be mad at Satan, whose mission is to kill and destroy. He is focused on death all the time. I hate him and I'm mad at him for the ways he has destroyed people's lives with this idea that life is anything other than a gift. All of us who bear God's image, which is all of us, all of humanity, the other side of that coin, if you flip it over, all of us have a savior, Jesus. He has a name, too. And you want to run to somebody, you run to him because he came to earth and he was laser focused on one mission, too. He still is. As laser focused as Satan is on death, Jesus is laser focused on the mission to give us life. Why am I pro-life? I'm pro-life because I have life in my lungs today. I'm pro-life because my sweet Elisha is in basketball practice right now, fully healthy. But I'm really pro-life because of the humongous price that Jesus paid so that I could have life. I was dead. I was dead in my trespasses and sin. Death was my only option because of my rebellion. But Jesus went to the cross so that I could have life. And what John 10:10 tells us is he didn't just go to the cross so we could have any old life. Jesus went to the cross so that we could have abundant, full, joy-filled life. To be a follower of Jesus is to celebrate life.
Dana Gresh: Life is a gift and it's worth celebrating. Erin Davis has been helping us see how life is a blessing because of Christ. I mean, Jesus came to this earth to live and die so that we would have abundant life. You know, there's a certain verse in Psalm 119 that's springing to mind. The psalmist says, give me life through your word. We find abundant life as we open our Bibles. And that's why we've made the wonder of the word our calendar theme this coming year. We want to cultivate a renewed love for scripture and the daily encouragements from Nancy are going to help us do that. This 2027 calendar also features stunning artwork by Sierra Deer King, who is just such a precious friend of Revive Our Hearts. If you haven't heard her story, you've got to tune in Monday. We'll be hearing from her on the daily program. You can listen anywhere you catch Revive Our Hearts, including at our website reviveourhearts.com or through the Revive Our Hearts app. Well, we've seen how we're blessed with life. Next week we're going to take a look at the blessing of family. Whether you have an amazing family or not so great family relationships, whether God has added to your family through giving birth or through adoption, there will be something for you. I hope you'll join us next time. Thanks for listening today. I'm Dana Gresh inviting you back for Revive Our Hearts Weekend. This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.