Order’s Up! A One Course Meal

This article originally appeared on Deliberate Women (deliberateowmen.org) July 3, 2015 

written by, Mia Koehne 

“Don’t dish it out if you can’t take it!” Have you ever heard that or some variation of this sentiment before, or better yet has anyone ever said that to you? I don't really have a problem with "taking it", but please don’t fact check this with my husband. In my defense, I only use the pouty lip as a tool of self expression and creativity, not weakness.

I’ve learned over the years though life experiences (and the music industry) to grow a pretty thick skin and not take critique and opinions too personally. As a friend once said to me “let it roll, like water off the back of a duck.” So when things come at me, I repeat the words “water off the back of a duck, water off the back of the duck” and then I tend to waddle on.

What I do have a more difficult time with is this “You can take it, but you can’t dish it out!” This reversal of the old saying in my life is referring to GRACE.

I can take all the grace people are willing to give, but when it comes to extending that grace to others when they repeatedly irritate me, repeatedly say the rudest things and continually get under my skin, finding the grace in those situations tends to come a bit more slowly. Those are the times when I need to dig a little deeper and dish out what has so generously been served to me.

Do I do this perfectly every time? No, but ironically that’s when I need His grace even more in order to extend it. It’s a never ending cycle. Dish it up and serve it out.

Are you anything like me? Do you struggle to show grace to the people that need it most. Not the ones where it comes easily, but to the ones that challenge you, push your buttons, take more than they give….you know, the ones that down right get on your LAST nerve?

The reality is that there are times when I am THAT person. There are times when YOU are that person too. In those times, I am glad that people chose to show me grace so that I could learn to show grace to others.

May I challenge you today, to serve grace. Set it out on a beautiful platter and enjoy the feast. Your preparation of this main course may just teach someone else how to cook, how to dish it out and how to take it in

Orders Up!

Love you in Him, Mia

God has nothing left for me

There are things that I know and there are times when these things that I know hit me in such a profound way that it changes me completely. I sing songs like "In Christ Alone" where I belt out the lyric "The wrath of God was satisfied." I read the Word of God which says "There is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" I rejoice because my faith lies in the resurrection and the truth that Jesus died for my sins and rose that I might live with Him eternally. That's good stuff.

But, this past Sunday when the Pastor was preaching he said these words "If Jesus took the punishment of the world and received the FULL wrath of God at Calvary, Is there any wrath left for my sin?' The answer is NO, there is nothing left for me. So, now when I sing these words... "Till on that cross as Jesus died, The wrath of God was satisfied. For every sin on Him was laid; Here in the death of Christ I live." ...I sing them reminded of the depth of His love and the completeness of Christ's Gospel. God has no wrath left for me for I am in Christ Jesus!

There is a special joy in being part of a Sunday church worship team, especially when you do multiple services. We open up the service with music, we worship, we get to listen to the Pastor preach and then we get to do it all over again, but the second time, we lead the worship from a place of having been preached the Word of God and the words we sing take on a new meaning!

This past Sunday when I sand the song "Man of Sorrows" in the second service, my heart fluttered and my eyes welled as I sang the truth of God's wrath being fulfilled with a deeper understanding and renewed passion. If it were up to me, we would have done five more services, listened his sermon five more times and sang the songs with a new passion every time.



"There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh,could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you." Romans 8:1-11

*In Christ Alone by Stuart Townend and Keith Getty

The importance of realizing that God's wrath has been satisfied in light of this song LINK