Symbols

Deuteronomy 6: 1 – 8

What do these three items have in common? that was the very question I was asking myself as I was looking around my bedroom earlier today. I am a very visual person and like to have visual reminders all around me and around our home. Eight years ago when we purchased our first home we had walked through it and prayed over every room in the house asking God to bless the use of each room.

You see my husband and I knew on paper it didn’t make sense for us to be able to get a home loan but through much prayer and I believe because of my faithfulness in serving God in the very home we were trying to purchase, our home used to be the preschool I taught in for sixteen years of the eighteen it was opened, God had honored my service to Him by allowing what seemed impossible to be possible! So what do the three items above symbolize to me?

The first item is the Holy Bible, it is a visual reminder to always pray and to sew Gods word into my heart, how many time in the very bedroom that once was where my desk sat when it was a preschool is the very room that I prayed to God that if Martha, the owner of the preschool ever went to sell this house she would offer it to me first, and she did, the first time the timing wasn’t right but the second time is when we got serious and gave it to God to open the doors that needed to be open in order to get this very house!! and that He did, as a promise to God when we got this house we would open it up to serving others, it has been a meeting place for Bible study, a place for friends to gather and a place of comfort for those in need.

The book on the stand is a visual reminder and also written by one of my very favorite Christian authors Max Lucado, throughout our home we have a beach house type theme, my husband and I find peace and rest near the water and the beach has always been one of our favorite spots, this past May we went to North Carolina and spent several days at a lake house, my husband would kayak in the early morning and then again in the early evening, in the evenings I would go down to the dock with him and sit and read and or write while he would take the kayak out on an evening excursion, when we left North Carolina we headed to South Carolina and stayed at an Air B&B on the marsh just one mile from Folly Beach, a completely different setting than the lake but just as beautiful, the marsh has its own set of sights and sounds, in the evenings we would sit on the screened-in porch and listen to those sounds it was very relaxing. As I said I am very visual so we have two memory jars filled with thing from both of those trips, which brings me back to Max Lucado’s book in the picture above the title and cover of the said book brings me peace and reminds me to just breathe.

Lastly, we have the turtle in the picture, the turtle is a symbol of us and a turtle was the very first gift my husband gave me for Christmas twenty-nine years ago when we first started dating, it is something that represents a marriage of twenty-eight years and counting. We have visited a turtle sanctuary and hospital, have seen sea turtle nest up close and personal and have a love for these beautiful creatures. My family lives in Florida near the Emerald Coast and the turtle above is one I purchased to help with turtle rescue and survival in that area. The Emerald Coast has become more commercialized and with thousands upon thousands of tourist a year coming to the beaches of South Walton along with the hurricanes that have hit this area especially hurricane Michael, the turtles need help protecting their nesting areas. 

So how does this all tie into Deuteronomy 6:8, it says;” Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.” This scripture was talking about the ten commandments that were just read to the Israelites in chapter 5 when God gave Moses the ten commandments. Webster’s dictionary’s second definition of Symbols is this  ” a thing that represents or stands for something else, especially a material object representing something abstract.” and this is what represents the above picture. There are visual symbols all around us of God in nature and in our everyday life. Don’t forget to stop and reflect on God for He is everywhere.