Happy Mother’s Day 2022!

I want to throw some confetti for all the women in the house today!

I love confetti!

When I think of confetti, I think of JOY, CELEBRATION, HAPPINESS!

The definition of Confetti

Small bits of paper, usually colored, thrown or dropped from a height to enhance the Joy and happiness of a festive event, as a parade, wedding, or New Year’s Eve party.

We immediately think of confetti in terms of celebration - we are celebrating something wonderful in our life!

But do you know what confetti is?

paper - shredded paper! Not even a full sheet of paper! It is torn from a full sheet of discarded paper…. Paper that has been recycled, re-purposed

I heard a lady named Maghon Taylor on a podcast share about her small business…

She owns a company called “All she Wrote Notes” and She is a hand letterer or does calligraphy as a profession - her company has partnered with national retailers such as Neiman Marcus, West Elm, Pottery Barn, Anthropologie and Swoozies

This is what she said….

I mess up writing all day - misspell something….. a letter or word and it doesn’t look beautiful

I started turning all of my mistakes into confetti…..

I take the scrap paper and I run it through the shredder and it makes the most beautiful confetti that you have ever seen

Then she said this….

You can turn your mess, your mistakes and the hard parts of your life into confetti -

If you look at confetti, that is what it is - it is the scrap paper - the cast away - it is trash -

It is just re-packaged - and now it has a really cool job and living a beautiful life

Can you relate?

Look at these beautiful bright colors -

and maybe you are sitting here thinking BRIGHT COLORS, JOY, CELEBRATION, HAPPINESS - those are words that do NOT describe my life -

I want to propose to you because Satan has tried to take, to steal, to rob the very color out of your life - the joy out of your life but before this message is over, my prayer is that you will leave with new perspective that your brokenness is your very joy!

Ecclesiastes 3:11
Amplified Bible

11 He has made everything beautiful and appropriate in its time. He has also planted eternity [a sense of divine purpose] in the human heart [a mysterious longing which nothing under the sun can satisfy, except God]—yet man cannot find out (comprehend, grasp) what God has done (His overall plan) from the beginning to the end.

A song that I love called:
YOU MAKE BEAUTIFUL THINGS

The lyrics say this:

All this pain
I wonder if I'll ever find my way
I wonder if my life could really change, at all
All this earth
Could all that is lost ever be found?
Could a garden come out from this ground, at all?
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust

Genesis 2:7
Amplified Bible
7 then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being

I think confetti represents who God is and the Gospel message -

We were made for beauty - we long for beauty - another word for profound beauty is the glory of God!

Romans 3:23 says that we have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God

we really screwed this whole thing up and He sent His one and only son to rescue us!

Turn to your neighbor and say - “sinner? Me too”

Sin shatters beauty - sin eradicates the glory of God!

I am not sure how you view the Bible, but I see it as a biography of really screwed up, messed up people - like when I want to use an example… it is impossible for me to pick one when there are so many….

So I figured one of the reasons you come to church is to increase your Bible knowledge so get ready for a quick course in Theology 101 - are you ready?

Here are a few Mess ups of the Bible:

The Apostle Paul - used to be called Saul…. a ruthlessly intent on stopping the growth of Christianity at any cost by putting them in prison, destroying churches and even overseeing their murders. That is until God revealed Himself to Saul on the road to Damascus and his life would forever be changed and transformed

Tamar - left her family at a young age to marry into the family of Judah. In these times, a woman’s value was determined by her offspring, but she was unable to conceive with her first husband so she married his brother - he refused to conceive with Tamar so Tamar then married a third brother and was still unable to conceive.
Faced with fear of being childless and destitute, she set out for justice. Dressed as a prostitute, she coerced her father-in-law, Judah, to have sex with her and she bore twin sons. One of the sons was the ancestor of King David - a direct lineage to Christ.

Simon Peter - he denied even knowing Jesus not just one time but 3 times - let alone being a disciple who shared the last Supper with Jesus…. Jesus forgave Peter and reaffirmed his faith and Peter continued to share the Good News until his death
Jonah - God told him to go to Nineveh and preach repentance and Jonah told God NO and ran away - while finding himself in the belly of a large fish, he repented and begged God to save him. The Lord listened and he went on to Nineveh to spread God’s message to the Ninevites - they repented and God Did not destroy them
Adam, the first man, was a blame shifter who couldn’t resist peer pressure
Eve, the first woman, couldn't control her appetite
Cain, the first born human being, murdered his brother
Noah, the last righteous man on earth at the time, was a drunk who slept in the nude
Abraham, the forefather of faith, let other men walk off with his wife on 2 different occasions
Sarah, the most gorgeous woman by popular opinion, let her husband sleep with another woman and then hated her for it.
Lot, who lost his father early in life, had a serious problem with choosing the wrong company
Job, supposedly a contemporary of Abraham and the epitome of faith, suffered from the nagging of a faithless wife
Isaac - who was nearly killed by his father, talked to his wife into concealing their marriage
Rebekah - the first “mail order bride” turned out to be a rather manipulative wife
Jacob - who out wrestled God, was pretty much a pathological deceiver
Rachel - who wrote the book on love at first sight, was a nomadic kleptomaniac
Reuben, the pride and firstborn of Jacob, was a pervert who slept with his father’s concubine
Moses, the humblest man on the face of the earth had a very serious problem with his temper
Aaron - who watched Jehovah triumph over Pharaoh, formed an abominable idol during an apparent episode of attention deficit disorder or perhaps colossal amnesia
Miriam - the songwriter, had sibling jealousy and a greed for power
Samson, who put Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jesse Ventura to shame, was hopelessly enmeshed with a disloyal wife—and ended up taking his own life. (Judges 16)
Eli, who ruled over Israel, was a hopelessly incapable father who lost his sons to immorality—and to an untimely death. (1 Samuel 2, 4)
Saul, the first and powerful king of Israel, was apparently a psychotic with manic bursts of anger, episodes of deep depression and traces of paranoia, too. He committed suicide. (1 Samuel 16, 18, 19, 31)
David, the friend of God, concealed his adultery with a murder. (2 Samuel 11)
Solomon, the wisest man in the world, was arguably the world’s greatest sex addict with 1,000 sexual partners. (1 Kings 11)
Hosea, an incredibly forgiving man, grappled with the pain of a wife who could be described as a nymphomaniac.
The prophets, even as they spoke for God, struggled with impurity, depression, unfaithful spouses and broken families.

So, what Is your story? I think you are sitting in good company but maybe Embarrassment, shame, insecurity, sorrow have you in a prison

My life story is trauma, brokenness, abuse, hurt, deep pain... you can’t see that anymore because He has redeemed it!

We were made for beauty
Sin eradicates beauty

BUT

[(Beauty + sin) + the gospel] = confetti

Psalm 103:9-18 The Message (MSG)

6-18 God makes everything come out right;
he puts victims back on their feet.
He doesn’t treat us as our sins deserve,
nor pay us back in full for our wrongs.
As high as heaven is over the earth,
so strong is his love to those who fear him.
And as far as sunrise is from sunset,
he has separated us from our sins.

He has turned all of my brokenness into an unshakable confidence that I know to whom I belong which defines who I am!

YOU ARE not a mess anymore, YOU ARE confetti!

God has a plan for you that is far greater than you can imagine

Oh you could just keep going on like you have been - feeling like a fraud, hiding

But…. You were not made to live small or depressed or oppressed or anxious - you were made to be confetti!

You are broken AND he wants to redeem your beauty

How do you find the confetti popper that is living on the very inside of you?

You need to know who you are!

Who is creating your Identity? Other people? Yourself? Your circumstances? Your feelings? OR THE WORD OF GOD?

Is the confetti popper on the inside of you OR are you chasing an external confetti popper?

You are IMAGO DEI which means that YOU are made in the image of God

YOU ARE

Loved - DEEPLY AND UNCONDITIONAL
Known - YOUR HAIRS HAVE BEEN COUNTED
Chosen - YOU ARE HERE TODAY!
Seen - HE SEES YOU - HAVE YOU FELT HIM TODAY - because HE has HIS EYE on you!
Accepted - NOTHING CAN SEPARATE YOU FROM THE LOVE OF GOD

The confetti popper is in your hand - you control it…. I can’t make you pull the trigger - I can’t tell you to put your pain, your mistakes, your secrets through the paper shredder and allow the love of God, the Grace of God to heal it all - I can’t do it for you! Today you are going to have to muster up your own courage to trust God, to surrender to His Will and plan!

You were made to Bear the Image of God - you are an Image Bearer!

PLEASE STAND TO YOUR FEET

As you leave here today, you are going to receive a confetti package…..

This is yours to keep - I pray that today, this week, this month…. You will begin to think about your life - you will hear the words of your savior speak to you and say -

Jeremiah 1:5
5 I chose you before I formed you in the womb;
I set you apart before you were born.

Psalm 139:16
Christian Standard Bible
16 Your eyes saw me when I was formless;
all my days were written in your book and planned
before a single one of them began.

Jeremiah 29:11
New International Version
11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

Let me tell you about my confetti package and what I do with it….

I pour it over my head and let it drip all the way to my toes - because I am not supposed to standing here today - the enemy put a bullseye on my life as a child and did everything he could to take me out - I should be shredded discarded pieces of papers that amount to nothing but trash…..

But there is a song that I love to sing that causes my internal confetti popper to go off that says….

I've got a river of life flowing out of me!
Makes the lame to walk, and the blind to see.
Opens prison doors, sets the captives free!
I've got a river of life flowing out of me!

Or Isaiah 61 says it like this: (This will be my ending prayer - I will pray Scripture over them)

61 The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,
because the Lord has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim freedom for the captives
and release from darkness for the prisoners,
2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor
and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,
3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion—

to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of joy
instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair.

They will be called oaks of righteousness,
a planting of the Lord
for the display of his splendor.

That is another way of saying confetti!

4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins
and restore the places long devastated;
they will renew the ruined cities
that have been devastated for generations.