Category Archive

From Max Lucado’s book Traveling Light (Nashville: W Publishing Group, 2001):

“Do you feel a need for affirmation? Does your self-esteem need attention? You don’t need to drop names or show off. You need only pause at the base of the cross and be reminded of this: The maker of the stars would rather die for you than live without you. And that is a fact. So if you need to brag, brag about that.”

Lucado echoes the apostle Paul in Galatians 6:14 where he says “But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”

To be honest, such boasting is totally and completely unthinkable! How dare I boast that the God who made the stars should love me so very much? That’s akin to saying that Bill Gates is my best friend or that the king of Spain chats with me online every day. Yes, the Bible makes it very very clear that God’s love really is that big, but it’s really not something I can believe easily, especially since human love can’t and won’t and doesn’t fill every need.

It seems audacious to boast of God loving me so much He didn’t want to live without me. So much He would give up His very life for me. It really seems much more humble to boast about my own petty accomplishments. Deep in my heart, I realize they’re petty. In fact, that’s part of why we boast, isn’t it: to raise ourselves off of the dirt floor where the superiority of others has cast us? And so we boast, feeling that others view us as inferior, trying to give ourselves an “ego boost” (sounds like an add-in at a smoothie shop: “I’ll take an immunity boost, an energy boost, and an ego boost in mine, please.”).

Reading Lucado’s words, I realize that I’ve never really understood Paul’s ability to boast in the cross before. What kind of boasting is that? Doesn’t it sound a bit heartless to the rest of the world to tell about something that they don’t have and might never be able to obtain–a love like that? And if they could obtain it, wouldn’t it make my possession of such love less significant? I’ve wondered about how in the world the apostle John could have the presumption to call himself “the disciple Jesus loved”–didn’t that cheapen the relationship the others had with Jesus? Wasn’t that a slap in the face to them and their relationships with Him? And if I were to boast in such love, I would be sure to find out very quickly that someone else has more of His love to boast about.

And so I boast about everything else but the one true possession I have that gives value to my little life, the thing that God has reiterated over and over that no one will ever be able to take from me, the thing that He has promised is mine forever, the one thing that He has given me permission to boast about. Why don’t I boast about it?

I have to believe it first.

Some old thoughts that it’s time to post now:

You met me, and we talked. You started to see that here was a shoulder for you, an ear for you. And maybe some of the things I said made good sense. But it wasn’t enough. It never is. At some point, marginal utility began to decrease. Somewhere in our friendship journey, you began to realize I can’t solve all of your problems–not that you really expected me to, but we all do to some extent. I don’t have that magic wand I need to grant the deepest wishes of your heart. My status went from “fairy godmother” to “normal human” and might be proceeding on to “annoying nag” (if it hasn’t gotten there yet) or “basketcase” or “mindless drudge” or . . . *shudder* “nemesis.” You got tired of me. And you met someone else. Someone else with a shoulder and an ear.

Maybe that’s all part of moving on. Yes, I’m sure it is. I know it is because I’ve done it, too. But no one is ever enough. No one has the magic wand. Magic went out of the world with the elves, Tolkien says. Magic never existed, logic says. Only God works miracles, the Bible says. And somehow I want to move past trying to find my “fairy godmother” and figure out what this thing called friendship really is. Because I have had friends–a special few–who have shed their Superman costumes and become mere humans, but they didn’t leave. They didn’t take their shoulders and go home since I stopped seeming to need them. In fact, they remained themselves. They stayed. When I went back, tired of looking for fairy godmothers, they were still there. I’m wondering now how they did it. How they managed to stay the same and treat me the same all that time. That’s how I want to be. I want to learn that skill because somehow we moved from being merely ears and shoulders to being friends.

I have no wand. I’m sorry. I fervently wish I did. I have no solutions manual. I’m sorry. I almost wish I did (but solutions manuals are not half as much fun as magic wands would be, and solutions manuals are very real and must be dealt with periodically, and no one really seems to like to deal with them very much, esp. since you’re usually only allowed to look at the solutions AFTER the problems have been figured out!). I just have the same things I’ve always had: a shoulder and an ear and an offer of friendship.
And right now you’re getting tired of me always being there, never leaving. You might be feeling like there’s more of me in your life than there is of you anymore. I’m so sorry. I don’t want that! I don’t want another me–there’s more than enough of me as it is. I spend time with you because I enjoy your company. I ask how you’re doing because I care. I ask what you’re doing and thinking about things because what you do and think matters to me, makes a difference in my life, helps me understand who YOU are, not who I want you to be. I don’t want you to be anything else but you. I don’t want you to stop being you–EVER!!!!! I don’t want you to like music just because I like it. I don’t want you to laugh at things just because I laugh at them. I don’t want you to say things just because you think that’s what I want to hear. I want to hear you. And yeah, I ask questions trying to help you refine what it is you really think and maybe to find out what else could be thought. And yeah, I sound like a broken record as I continually point you to the only answer I know and to the One Who knows the answers to the things we are really asking. And yeah, I’m tired and sad that I’ve cramped your style so very badly. I’m sorry.

But I know Someone (yeah, you knew it would get around to Him) Who dares to assert that He IS enough. He has said it so many times and in so many ways that a lifetime is not sufficient to catalogue them all. And, I confess, I would rather you had a magic wand to solve all my troubles because He seems to insist that I go through them much more often than I want to and usually when I am not feeling at all brave nor energetic. Still He insists. And I find that I want to be near Him–but sometimes I am afraid that He will think I’m around too much or too nosey or too demanding or too childish . . . . Then I get up close enough to touch Him and find that He hasn’t changed and seems to like me for exactly who I am (whoever that may be!). And more than I want to be your friend, more than I want you to be my friend, I want you to be near Him and know His friendship–that safe, gentle, fun friendship that is always glad to see you and accepts you for who you are–that friendship that makes it easy for you to be yourself in that place. I want to know His friendship that way, and I want you to know it, too.

From: elijah@brookside.net
To: undisclosed recipients
Subject: news update (or not so news)

Dear praying friends,

Thank you for keeping my whereabouts a secret all these months. You have put up with the inconvenience of having no return address at which to contact me; and for those of you who had been getting my e-mail updates, I have a special thank you for your patience and puttin gup with my bad spallings and infrequent contact. The internet connection at the particular brook where God has chosen for me to reside has been patchy at best. Some days I have spent all day typing a letter only to have the computer freeze up before I could hit “send.” The fact that any lights in the wilderness would be suspect also limits the times I have to work on my correspondence: a computer screen emits more light than a low campfire does!

I greatly appreciate your prayers. I realize that by now many of you must have my letters memorized: nothing much changes for me in this desert place where God has placed me. I try to make my life a bit more exciting by relating the incidents I have had with the ravens (whom I have finally named–thank you to all those who sent in suggestions). But basically my prayer letters have all boiled down to the same things: I’m here at a brook being fed by ravens; Jezebel and Ahab are still looking for me to kill me; and there’s still going to be no rain. I wish with all my heart that my message could be different, but it’s not going to change.

However, even though the major things have not changed, the smaller details of my life have been adjusting. First, as the famine is getting worse, I have been noticing that my brook is shrinking–almost by the day, it seems. Also, the ravens–Hustle and Bustle and Sneeze, I’ve named them (if you want to know how I finally settled on those names, you’ll have to ask me sometime when this is all over. You can try to e-mail me, and I will send you the story if I can . . . you know the drill: running for one’s life makes leisure time a tad sporadic–kinda like my internet connection). Anyway, the ravens have been becoming a bit edgy lately, too. One of them even began trying to share my meal with me the other day. He flew off when I threw the meat on the fire–guess he wasn’t too keen on sampling my culinary skills. Now that I think of it, that was the night I set off the fire alarm. Guess he has a bit more than just a bird-brain after all.

I am writing to let you know that nothing has changed. And perhaps I am writing to tell you that life really isn’t any easier when you’re a prophet than it is when you’re not one. I know that each morning you get up and wonder when the rain will come and where the food will come from until then. I just want you to know that I understand the pressure you are facing and that I don’t have the answers right now any more than you do. So, as you are continuing to wait and wonder with me, take courage that God is looking out for you as He is for me–and be glad you’re not wrestling Sneeze for your breakfast.

We may not know what to do next when the brooks dry up, but I am hanging onto the fact that God does. But waiting till He shows the next step is still a challenge–even for me.

Hang in there!
Elijah

It’s late. I should be in bed. But before I go to bed, I need to touch base with HIM, and I don’t feel ready to talk to HIM just yet.

[On a side note, talking with Jesus is just like talking with others who know and love me in that sometimes I don't want to do it because I'm trying to be ok and don't want to deal with not really being ok at the moment because then I won't be ok. On the other hand, talking with Jesus is not like talking with anyone else because He already knows that and already knows what is bothering me and knows exactly what to do or say to make me comfortable in His presence.]

So here I sit at my computer, hoping for something . . . hopeful? Not that everything is depressing, just a drab shade of dreary.

And then I run across her blog and her account of nannying her “small fry” as she calls them. She writes so simply that it’s like being there and like being part of a children’s story–you know the kind? the ones that tell about a day at the park or a day of shopping. And suddenly, I remember just a little of the wonder of being a little kid. I smile. The sun comes out (yes, even at midnight). That was part of my something.

And I can thank Him for things again: thanking Him is like re-enjoying the things that have happened today; it’s like going back to exclaim over the gifts He gave me that I already unwrapped and got excited over. It’s a little like having Christmas or a birthday party in a quiet way.

“Thanks,” my heart says, “for a foot massage today–I didn’t know how much I needed it.
“for Langston Hughes’ poem about rainbows.
“for a piano and the desire to play it.
“for getting things done.
“for the chance to discuss literature–to actually TALK about it and about what it says and means and about the people in it and what we learn from them . . . I love literature!
“for giving me a love for literature. =)
“for extra hours at work and the chance to learn more job skills.
“for the chance to discuss my grading policy–sorta. and for someone taking the time to give and take reasons rather than getting frustrated and not wanting to listen. and for the clarity that came because of the discussion.
“for my car.
“for a tank of gas.
“for another time of sorta getting lost to smile about.
“for someone carrying my HEAVY backpack.
“for someone else remembering that we’d talked about exercising together.
“for blessing someone I have prayed for.
“for replies to e-mails sent long ago and forgotten about.
“for Charles Dickens and A TALE OF TWO CITIES.
“for Grandma’s wonderful cooking.
“for family Bible-sharing time.
“for working unseen by me to do wonderful things that You will show me later.
“for stories about small fry and how much fun they are.
Thanks.”

Now I think I can finish getting ready for bed.

Oh, God of dust and rainbows, help us see
That without dust the rainbow would not be.

by Langston Hughes

Abba is the dad you can go to for anything at any time. That’s God’s Father name to remind us to be little kids as we come to Him rather than the big complicated adults we try to be for those that come to rely on us. And I am learning to come to Him as a little child–with everything, for everything.
But someone, a dear friend who considers himself “crusty” and “bizarre” and “peculiar” [which, by the way, has a good connotation to my Sunday School kids!] and a host of other words I need to look up before I try to use them: this dear friend reminded me of another side of God–the nKoko side. Apparently “nKoko” is a word from an African tribal language that means “gentle grandfather.” And, for as much as I need an Abba Father, I need a nKoko, too.
What is a nKoko like? well, he’s gentle–he somehow manages to speak truth in a way that’s not at all harsh but makes you think to yourself “yes, that’s what I have known all along but was on the verge of forgetting.” And he’s a grandfather–taking outrageous delight in His grandchildren. To Him they are celebrities, though not in a “show-them-off” paparazzi kind of way. He’s just delighted to see them when they arrive. And they like to see Him because they feel comfortable around Him, even though they couldn’t explain why if they tried. But somehow He gives them the feeling that everything is going to be ok and that they are ok just as they are.
Now, I know that no earthly grandfather is exactly this way anymore than any earthly father is the perfect Abba. But every once in a while someone or something makes us feel this way, reminding us that it is possible to feel this way. And it makes us long for God down deep in our soul.
No, I don’t know the Hebrew or Greek name for God that corresponds to this simple African name, but I know that anything good has its roots in God’s nature, so someday I’ll find where in the Bible this term has its equivalent. Until then, I’ll think of God as my Heavenly nKoko as well as my Abba Father.
And I’ll thank God for the “crusty, peculiar, bug-loving German” who reminded me of this side of God.

I stand still staring
At you. They call you
My reflection. They say you
Show me myself. Is it true?
I wait here wondering:
Do you move as I do
Or do I move to match you?
Do you mirror me or are you my cue?
I linger now longing
To be free from this view.
It was fun when novelty was new,
But now I’ve lost who is who
Am I me or am I you?

I’m currently reading Isaac Asimov’s I, ROBOT (the book upon which Will Smith’s sci-fi thriller was loosely based). It’s a frame-tale of robot stories held together by the reminisces of aging robot psychologist Susan Calvin. I do find it funny to read of things that have dates on them such as 2008 and to think of all that Asimov predicted that hasn’t happened–nor is likely to happen. Still, I have to applaud him for his ability to weave a story and for the fact that many of the ideas he came up with still exist in modern science fiction: “positronic brains,” for example, are still part of many sci-fi stories, movies, and television shows.

The stories he tells are easy to connect with. I am moved as I read about Robbie, an early nurserymaid robot that could not talk but served his young charge Gloria with a dedication that looked more like love and friendship than enforced servitude. Speedy amuses me as he responds to situations he can’t handle by quoting snatches of Gilbert and Sullivan operas–now there’s a robot I could like! (maybe I should try his technique!) Then there’s QT-1, or “Cutie” for short, the robot whose dedication to reason begins where Descartes began (”I think, therefore I am”) and develops an entire religious cult based on false presuppositions. Wow! What a comment on pre-suppositions and the way we interpret facts through their lenses (reminds me of my college class with Mr. Janke in which we examined presuppositions and the way that they make us see the facts!). I love the two scientists that end up field-testing the newest robot models and finding themselves the victims of the major quirks each robot has–they make me laugh! But Herbie is the one that I pity the most: Herbie the mind-reading robot.

WARNING: THE FOLLOWING IS A RESPONSE TO THE STORY AND WILL UNDOUBTEDLY GIVE AWAY ITS MORE SURPRISING ASPECTS. SHOULD YOU WISH TO READ THE STORY UN-SPOILED, STOP READING NOW, GET A COPY OF I, ROBOT AND READ “LIAR” BEFORE CONTINUING TO READ THIS POST!!!

The First Law of Robotics ingrained into each robot states “a robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow him to come to harm.” But what is the definition of “harm”? Such a small word! Since Herbie can read minds, he can see the things that will hurt the humans around him at an emotional level, so he does his best to protect them from being hurt. The clues are all there, and as I read, I begin to piece together what he is doing: telling them what they want to hear. The trouble is that they do not want to hear the truth in its entirety, and when two people with conflicting desires about the truth of one item are asking him for an answer, he can say nothing without hurting one or the other. Caught, stuck, pinned between conflicting desires of humanity, he lies to them. He is betrayed by his very purpose–serving humanity–and by his very attempts to protect the humans around him. And I can empathize. There come times when I know that I can’t win. No, I do not lie; I try so very hard to recognize the truth and to speak it in the right time and the right way. But which is better: to speak what I know will hurt when I could swallow it even though it’s true? or to swallow it even if it hurts? Perhaps I am setting up a false dilemma. All I know is that I saw myself in Herbie’s pretending that he could not do math well so as to allow the brilliant human mathematician to continue to believe in his own superiority; I saw myself in Herbie’s willingness to be the confidante of the humans around him; and I see myself caught in the same net he was caught in.

My empathy raises a very good question, a question I have had without knowing exactly how to name it: how are we to be “harmless as doves” to those around us? Each day, with each action, I have the potential to hurt someone around me. Sometimes an action that helps one person seems to mortally wound another. As a Christian, how am I to navigate these waters? How can I lead my life as the person I am to be when who I am might stifle who another person is?

I guess the obvious answer is that I was not put here on this earth to please everyone, just One–Jesus Christ my Maker, Master, and Savior. But how am I to judge success at this task without seeing it through the eyes of others? I guess I am seeing that, as Donovan and Powell (the field-test scientists) learned, field tests don’t usually go the way that the laboratory tests did–things look different in real life than they do in theory. I guess I can see myself in other robots, too: like Speedy, I don’t know how to function when duty and self-preservation balance each other out, neither being more important than the other (maybe I ought to start quoting English comic opera more often!); like Dave I short out under pressure and revert to something a little less stressful (like typing on the computer at odd hours of the night–*sheepish grin*); and like Herbie I can’t handle the thought of hurting those around me–and someone is always getting hurt.

Robbie had it easy: he lived to please just one person, and it worked out just fine for him. Cutie reasoned through the facts and came to some very wrong conclusions, then just lived by the rules and procedures, quite willing to not have to understand their purpose; he lived quite happily, blissfully ignorant. But God has not called me to live ignorantly; He has called me to the truth. So, how am I to fulfil my function in this crazy world of danger, duty, unexpected dilemmas, and fragile humans? Is it an impossibility?

I look stubbornly undecided
I’m the one who
            came first
            made the first blunders
            tested everyone’s patience
            made you decide
                        you’d never
                        be like
                        me
If it hadn’t been me, you’d
Be that lonely, stubborn one
At the front.

You find much to criticize
You say I
            worry too much
            am too nosy
            don’t understand
                        sometimes you
                        won’t talk to
                        me
But somehow you
Seem reassured that I
Can read between the lines.

You compare yourself to me
You see in me my
            faults
            blunders
            incongruities
            hypocrisies
                        you point
                        them out to
                        me
Why do you somehow
Think you lose
In the comparison?

You’re hard of hearing
Sometimes even my best words
            cut like swords
            tear you up
            criticize
                        even when I
                        want to soothe
                        you
You have helped me learn to speak more often
The good that others may not see in you
The you I know and love

You’ll pass me up—in height and stature
I want to
            Make You Stronger
            Build You UP
            Cheer For You
            Help You See
                        You’re So Very
                        Different From
                        Me
And different is good
I need you in my life as you
Need me.

I’ll gladly be the First
Prouder of
            who you are and
            who you’ll be
Than of what I am

A friend of mine posted a link to this article on his blog. It’s sad to read about the difficulties this man is going through–so much opposition, so much rejection, and the media seems to be trying to capitalize on the rejection all the while baffled at the calm he exudes. I don’t usually talk very politically, but I do thank God for this man He has allowed to be our President through these last two terms, terms filled with large and difficult decisions. I understand a little better how to pray for him now.

The Black Hole
the blog of my voice of common sense since high school

is no more. *sigh*

I miss that voice!

We talk about one side of a coin or another, but I rarely think about the coin itself–the coin that manages to be both at the same time (it is the coin, after all!). A link from a link from an e-mail from a friend (if that’s not complicated, I don’t know what is) speaks quite eloquently to the difficulty of living life as the coin itself: keeping one’s eyes open to the truth yet keeping one’s heart open to others (and to God). I have felt that same difficulty myself, and Oswald Chambers in My Utmost for His Highest comments on the difficulty of being that coin when he says, “Jesus Christ never trusted human nature, yet He was never cynical, never suspicious, because He trusted absolutely in what He could do for human nature” (Utmost June 24th). In another place, he reiterates that Christ trusted in the transforming power of God’s grace in a life. I suppose that it is this grace which helps us to be a coin and not just one side of it. But I know that I do not really know how it works. I am cynical and suspicious sometimes; I am clueless and naive at other times. But I truly have seen God’s power in my life bringing those sides into better balance. Maybe someday . . .

“Men are not mass-produced robots and God is not Henry Ford. Men are individuals.”

~ a friend =)

see the entire post

A friend of mine who writes poetry managed to put into words the indescribable–how it feels to know a certain type of pain and the hope of not forgetting. I couldn’t have said it better.

poem

“Criticism is a part of the ordinary faculty of man: but in the spiritual domain nothing is accomplished by criticism. The effect of criticism is a dividing up of the powers of the one criticized; the Holy Ghost is the only One in the true position to criticize, [sic] He alone is able to show what is wrong without hurting and wounding. It is impossible to enter into communion with God when you are in a critical temper; it makes you hard and vindictive and cruel, and leaves you with the flattering unction that you are a superior person. . . . Beware of anything that puts you in the superior person’s place.”

~Oswald Chambers. “The Uncritical Temper” June 17 My Utmost For His Highest

Chambers goes on to explain that we have no reason to feel superior because of the flaws we have in ourselves and because of the circumstances in the lives of others that we do not know about. I want that uncritical spirit he speaks of! Criticism sends back razor-edged fingers into my own heart saying “you’re just like that person!” and I begin to despair of myself.

I appreciate Chambers’ statement about criticism dividing up the powers of the one being criticized–that’s often how I feel when criticized, especially when I then begin to criticize myself to try to determine the amount of truth in the criticism and what to do about it. I begin to feel heavier and heavier in spirit as though I am carrying a weight that is unbearable yet inexorable. It is almost impossible for me to imagine Jesus Christ’s Holy Spirit being able to criticize me without wounding me; yet I have felt and heard His gentleness in my own life over and over again. And with His “Chriticism” comes the power and joy of knowing what to do in that moment to begin to change–no burden, no weight, just a certain peaceful energy. I’d like to help the Holy Spirit give that to others.

As I logged onto Yahoo, an article caught my eye: an article on burning books. How many kids haven’t wished at some point to burn a text book at the end of a school year? There have been some that I have though about setting ablaze, but a certain respect for the written word has prevented me–even from burning those that perhaps ought to have been burned for content’s sake.

I can understand the point that this man is making–fewer people are reading books. There is something to be said for the act of picking up a book and getting caught up in it. There is something to be said for the portability of the printed page and skills acquired in reading those printed pages that are not picked up by scanning a screen. His point–that not reading books is akin to setting them ablaze–is valid. Ray Bradbury, in his book Fahrenheit 451, made a similar statement, going further to say that reading the printed page fosters a freedom of thought that nothing else does. In today’s day of computers and the transient nature of the information they link us to, how are we to know if we have the thoughts as the authors originally thought them? The printed page provides an objectivity to knowledge that our world is quickly forgetting. I can’t say that I disagree with his message.

I also appreciate his method of protest. He is damaging no one’s property but his own, and he is planning on going about his protest with full attention to the law and to the safety of those around him. Moreover, while burning books may seem to be excessive, it is in no way a slam on our country (as flag-burning is) nor a vicious personal attack. It effectively draws attention to his message. . . . and his business. He made some sales, didn’t he?

I have to admit that the thoughts of his burning books that are antiques and that are old classics, especially hard to find ones, brings a little knot to my throat. And if I were there, I’d probably succumb to the impulse to rescue a book from the pyre, even if it means that book will be relegated to my own dusty shelves.

I hope he chooses the common trash to burn first as he continues his protest. Maybe the good stuff might have a better chance of survival.

The door shut with a dense “boom” leaving all the chaos of the room next door behind. For a soundproof room, the air didn’t have a sense of being smothered in cotton balls. Rather, it seemed to her that the door had let her out into an open place rather than enclosing her within four walls. As she looked about her, all she could see was a meadow stretching in every direction, alpine wildflowers spattering it with riotous color. She shook her head to clear it of the haggling, shouting, clamoring confusion she had left behind the door–it was her career: she had chosen it, but sometimes it made her tired. This place was so peaceful. If only she could soak it all up; she’d be ok. Maybe.

But maybe not. Then she turned and saw him. An elderly man in a hammock sipping lemonade. That’s who she had really come to see. He waved in greeting and patted the hammock beside him, inviting her to come over and sit down.

So she did. And they talked. And when the sound of her cell phone pulled her back through the door into the swirling chaos of the life she had chosen, the smell of windblown flowers remained with her. But even better, his voice spoke peace in her heart.

And she smiled.

Come boldly . . .

His office phone rings. “Excuse me, gentlemen, I need to take this call.”

“Dad?” a voice crackles on the other end of the line. “I don’t have very good reception, but can you still hear me?”

“Yes”

“Oh, good,” she sighs, then laughs, “I feel like a bad Verizon commercial! I should get money for this somehow!”

He smiles, too at the joke–an old standing one between the two of them. “Where are you?”

“I’m driving home from work, and I need to talk. Do you have a minute, or is this a bad time?”

He does not even glance at the gentlemen waiting his return to the meeting, “I’m listening.”

“Dad, I’m stuck! I don’t know what to do exactly–no matter what I choose I’ll be wrong, and I HATE that fact!”

He lets her talk, listening to her rambling until she reaches her destination.

“Gotta go, Dad. I know my phone reception is bad, but thanks for listening. You were awfully quiet, though. You will tell me what you think, won’t you?”

“Don’t worry about it, sweetie. We’re in this together, as always. When the time comes, you’ll know exactly what to do. Talk to me some more about it tonight, ok?”

A sigh of relief on the other end of the line. “Ok. Dad, I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Click.

He returns attention to the meeting. “Gentlemen, that was my daughter. Thank you for you patience. Let’s proceed with . . . “

His words are interrupted by the telephone again.

“Dad? It’s me again. I just hit a bird with my car! It’ so nasty! Why didn’t they fly away before I got there? I even slowed down . . .”

Come boldly . . .

I love rain–the gentle, steady, sonorous kind I can relax into.

Rain is one of the most delicious sounds in the world.

A friend of mine commented that society needs another Charles Dickens to show us oursleves here in America, holding a mirror to our faces so that we can see our hypocritical inconsistencies, yet doing it in a way that sells enough copies to make a difference. I wonder . . .

In an age when more people watch the movie than read the book, would such books be read? Would books the length of Dickens’s be best-sellers? I guess there’s hope since his books today are still read and loved by many. (the fact that major bookstores still stock them is a clue)

Who would listen to such stuff? True, Dickens’s works still ring true with a majority of those that read and understand them, but would people be more likely to read such criticism of American follies and shrug them off as “true for you but not for me”?

Who would write such a book? Dickens wrote with biting wit yet a great heart of compassion. Somehow, he even seemed to pity what was pitiable in his villains (his description of Fagin’s last night before execution reveals this pity for Fagin without giving Fagin any loophole for escape from what he so justly deserved). The only people he had no pity for were the conceited and pompous hypocrites that grew fat from preying on others and never had the humanity to fear their just reward. Infusing such compassion into such brutal honesty is not a walk in the park. Who could do it? Only a person who is convinced that there truly is a right and a wrong. Only a person who sees that everyone, deep inside, knows that right and wrong exist and suspect where they stand in relation to them. Only a person who cares about people and can care about them while showing them themselves. Is there such a person in today’s world of postmodern compromise?

I went into the morning church service expectant: I was hoping that some of the questions I have been asking God had been answered. And I was not disappointed. It was like today’s sermon on faith and the great faith demonstrated by the Gentile woman in Matthew 15:21-28 was the next step in a journey I’ve been on lately to a greater understanding of how faith works. Yet by the end of the sermon, I had three more questions for God (one of which is something like this: “God, what is my third question?” I can’t quite figure out what to ask but know that I do have a question).

Why is it that the answer to a question just brings up more questions?

Someone once said, “God gave us music so that we might pray without words.” I wholeheartedly agree. Strangely enough for a verivore, many times I find myself at a loss for words to express to God my heart or my requests. Often music helps there. I can’t count the number of times hearing someone’s arrangement of a hymn has reminded me of the truths expressed in the words of the hymn and enabled me to pray them to God or has arrested my thoughts from their wild career down paths of discouragement and falsehood (don’t we all tell oursleves lies about ourselves and God?), bringing me back to the truths I need to hear and hold onto–”hang my soul on” as Elisabeth Elliot says.  I am grateful to those who use their musical abilities to help others “pray without words.”

“I have a dream,” Martin Luther King, Jr. proclaimed to the United States—those listening to his message at the time and those who have listened throughout the years since he spoke it.  Thomas Edison dared to dream that he could produce a light-bulb, and his invention has enlightened millions. Dreams—visions of what could be—change the future when they are acted upon. Everybody is a dreamer.

“What happens to a dream deferred?” the speaker in one Langston Hughes poem wonders. As empowering as dreaming can be, the hard cold world of reality impels us to get up in the morning and put one foot in front of the other till we sink back into bed exhausted and wondering if what we dream could really exist anywhere besides our own imaginations. After days and days of slogging through life, the dreams begin to lose their luster and fade away like the early morning mist when the sun comes out. Everybody has to live in reality . . . sooner or later.

But some of us dream dreams that keep coming back. Some of us act on those dreams even when we can’t see them. Some of us actually make the world a better place as our dreams are realized. In many ways, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream has come true. Thomas Edison’s did. Still, some dreams are too good to be true. We call them fairy tales and try not to live in the world of fantasy because “happily ever after” just doesn’t happen so completely in real life. Or does it? The part of us that can’t help dreaming is the part of us that can’t help wishing that things really did turn out perfectly after all. And that’s the part of us that keep on hoping even after all hope is gone.

Hope: it’s what the truest dreams are called. And God has a lot to say about hope. He promises a day when “happily ever after” will come true—completely. His promises seem too good to be possible; they’re not just possible, they’re true. They’re the things that whisper hope even when the lights of life seem to have dimmed and nothing seems possible anymore. Someday life will be more wonderful than we’ve imagined it could be. God invites us to dream His dream with Him—it’s the one that all other dreams can only echo. Come dream the best dream of all.

It’s ok to be a starry-eyed dreamer. I am.

Everyone knows that faith is believing; it’s also been shown many times that believing something is true can help us to make it happen. One of Hollywood’s favorite themes is “believe in yourself and anything can happen.” Take the movie Space Jam, for instance. The theme song is “I Believe I Can Fly” 

I believe I can fly
I believe I can touch the sky
I think about it every night and day
Spread my wings and fly away
I believe I can soar
I see me running through that open door
I believe I can fly . . .

 
I do enjoy the movie—it’s just plain fun, the kind that makes me sit back and marvel at the creativity of the movie-makers. And the song’s message is true, too: when we believe that nothing is possible, nothing is possible; when we believe that we can achieve our dreams, we succeed.

Sometimes.

But we humans weren’t made for flying, and no matter how hard we believe otherwise, gravity still conquers. And as we finish the movie and head back into reality, we know that the things which took place in the movie were pretend (very pretend, especially since over half of the movie takes place in the Looney Toons cartoon world!): people in real life can’t just stretch to get what they want from across the room! And in real life, no matter how much we believe in our dreams, we still run into problems bigger than we are that thwart our dreams and crumble them into dust. For every “feel-good-about-believing-in-yourself” story, there’s a story about someone whose hopes were dashed beyond repair by the unexpected and inexorable.

Faith isn’t about believing that we can bend the laws of reality, it’s about trusting the laws of reality. Airplanes can conquer gravity because they use the principles of aerodynamics to leave the ground. In fact, the whole concept of “believability” in writing fiction comes from the fact that we know life is ruled by laws and principles of cause and effect.

In Space Jam, the “impossible” was possible not because the characters just believed their way to it but because the laws of the cartoon world allowed for them stretching across the room (and other such strange antics).

Therefore, when I talk about faith, I’m not talking about believing my way out of circumstances or bending the laws of reality through my determination. I’m talking about believing in ALL the laws and principles of the universe, including the ones that I can’t see and can’t test in a laboratory. I’m talking about believing in the God that made those laws and that is big enough to do things that seem to defy those laws—things like parting a sea and walking on water and stilling a storm with a word. And if He is big enough to change the course of nature in THIS reality—if He is big enough to heal the blind with a touch and raise the dead with a word—then He is big enough to trust with the details of my poor little life and even my most insignificant dreams.

I don’t believe in “faith”. I believe in Him. I trust Him.

“Even though it is easy to fall into a rut of negativism, as a believer I have no excuse. Our God is on the throne, and nothing escapes or surprises Him.”

–Michael Miller, missionary to Bolivia (e-mail November 17, 2006, <m.miller@baptistpioneermission.org&gt

Sometimes our ideas of what faith is get as scrambled as the title of this post. We hear about faith in ourselves or faith in mankind or faith in our friends, and sometimes just plain faith by itself (on rye, hold the mustard?). Sometimes it seems elusive and we try to hold onto it as though it’s a good luck charm that we can put in our pockets to ward off disaster. But how to define what it really is? how to describe it? that’s not so easy! There’s an indefinable quality to faith just as there is to breathing–we breathe without thinking about what the action is: we just do it.

However, for some of us, exercising faith is like learning to ice-skate: it takes work and effort and perhaps can be done better if we understand what it is that we are trying to do (besides merely staying upright) and how that is best to be accomplished.

A friend of mine has been scrutinizing faith lately and God has been putting that puzzle together a little more for him. Take the time to read and ponder his thoughts and the verses God has given him about faith (the Word and Faith).

Here’s a thought on faith that I’m currently pondering:

“Faith is deliberate confidence in the character of God whose ways you may not understand at the time.” –Oswald Chambers (qtd in NBBC Alumni Update for November 13, 2006)

II Timothy 1:12 supports this concept, too: knowing God unscrambles our faith

Do I know Him? Do you?

A response to “Which is Stronger, Manfluence or Godfluence?”

A recent pair of articles I ran across on another blogger’s site—Parallel Divergence—set me thinking about the question of God. Is there a God, or did man just make him up? Which God is the real one? Here are some thoughts I’ve gathered over the years.

To even ask the question about whether there is a God or not means that there is something or someONE beyond mankind and his tiny frame of existence. We can’t help but look at the stars and think that there must be more to life than the humdrum nature of things; the Hubble Telescope image serves to broaden, though not entirely delineate, the vastness of it all. And how many poems have been written on the subject of life’s fleeting nature and the desire to live forever? Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18, to quote just one of the many: (lines 11-14)

“Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st;
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.”

To long for something outside ourselves and better than ourselves, to long for eternity, means that we humans, be we men or women, are not the end-all and be-all of everything. To live as though we are produces (and has produced since the beginning of time) nothing but misery and confusion. [Like another blogger said, “Manfluence” is responsible for the world’s heartache.] Then, when we are in the middle of the trouble and turmoil that humans have created, we shake our fists at “Heaven” and wonder how a good and loving God could allow something so horrible. Yet the very notion that God might have the right to interfere in our lives disturbs us. So basically, if there is a God, we want Him to interfere in everyone else’s lives, just not ours. And we only want Him to do the jobs that are too big for us to do on our own—like stop earthquakes and prevent attacks from rabid, man-eating lions. Maybe we need superheroes. But read any comic book today or look at the stories of the Greek gods and goddesses, and you see that superheroes have the same problems we do, just on a grander scale: they’re too human to help us with the things that really tear our world apart—“manfluence.” The gods and goddesses of Greek and Roman myth acted like overgrown humans, leaving mere mortals to suffer from their poor decisions.

It’s really our own human nature, our own selfishness, that tears our world apart, whether on a small scale—like the words we say to hurt those nearest and dearest to us—or on a grand scale—like the destruction wreaked by Hitler on the Jewish people. Therefore the “just-follow-your-heart” philosophy that sounds so good on the Disney channel does not work in real life. Many times, following our hearts leads to pain in our lives or in the lives of others. Believing in myself brings no hope at all; there has to be something bigger than me and better than me that makes sense of life and saves me from myself.

This hope is what makes the Bible so unique. It is different from all other sacred writings in four ways:

~ First, it was written by God through human mouthpieces: no one man can take credit for the things that its pages contain and no one man (besides Jesus, the God-man—God Himself Who became human, too, to show us what God is like up-close-and-personal) can take credit for it. The events it contains and the prophecies that were fulfilled over the thousands of years between its first book and its last book could not have been orchestrated by just one person, unless that person was powerful enough to control time and space without violating any man’s free will.

~ Second, the stories it tells do not paint people in the light that humans usually paint themselves: it tells of human failings and shortcomings—even the great heroes whose lives it chronicles did wrong things that hurt those around them and had far-reaching results. Humans tend to gloss over those things when they write. Only Jesus Christ is different because He is God and is not subject to human sins; He lived for 33 years on earth and never sinned. Even those who say He is not God cannot point a finger at Him for wrongdoing—even Islam looks to Him as a good man and a great prophet (though not as great as Mohammed).

~ Third, only the Bible offers a solution for humanity’s problems that is outside of man himself. All other religions either offer lists of rules to curb humanity’s baser passions or try to justify those baser passions by saying that they are acceptable no matter who they hurt. Neither way actually deals with the problem of “manfluence.” Only the Bible offers a solution that really works. Man-made religions exploit man for the use of other men; only God in the person of Jesus Christ gives unconditionally and totally.

~ Finally, the Bible is the only book that tells mankind how to have fellowship with the God that is big enough to create a universe that will stimulate our minds and make us wonder about things outside ourselves (We would not be content with a tiny universe any more than we are content with our tiny lives). Thousands of people have experienced the life-giving power that God offers through the gift of Himself. God does not just give us a list of rules to make us fit for Heaven; instead, He shows us how all of our attempts to be good enough fall short of our goal of reaching Him, and then He makes a way for us to reach Him by giving of Himself. He makes it easy enough for anyone, be they small or great, to contact Him and know Him. And He does the work for us that we cannot do—He makes us whole inside and makes our hearts new.

This is the message of the Bible; this is a hope that is not about man-made religion; this is bigger and more mind-boggling than the images from the Hubble Telescope, awesome though those images are. We will understand the mysteries of the universe much sooner than we will grasp the love of God. Just as the universe is bigger than the earth, God Himself is bigger than mankind’s imagination. In fact, He said as much: “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:9 We can’t be content with a God we can completely understand any more than we can be content with a universe painted on the ceiling. We don’t need a man-made God; we were made for more than that.

A comment to my previous post “easy” got me thinking.

Yes, it’s true that sometimes Christians make it hard for others to want to believe in God, but people typically don’t need someone else to make them not want to do things. There are many reasons I don’t want to do things, and few of them really have to do with other people: I don’t want to exercise because it seems like too much work, and I don’t want to try bungee jumping because it looks like a foolish thing to do. However, I didn’t want to try eating sushi until I met someone who liked it and made me think it would be good to try. I tried it (not sashimi–raw fish, but sushi) and found it good. And my family made me want to exercise again by doing it themselves and encouraging me to join them. Suddenly exercising looked a lot more inviting when my sister was challenging me to do more push-ups or my cousin was running out ahead of the pack. More often, other people make me want to do things that they are doing and finding fun.

Usually, people make decisions based on deeper reasons than mere dislike for someone else: usually they are motivated by things like fear, jealousy, power, and desire. Ultimately, people won’t become Christians because they don’t want to become Christians, not because someone else ruined it for them. They’re afraid of the unknowns of Christianity; they are jealous of God’s claims upon the lives of His creation; they don’t want to give up control of their lives; they’re too caught up in what other things they want to take time to think about spiritual things; . . . the list is endless. Often they need others to help them want to know God.

Christians were first called by this title in an ancient city that recognized their likeness to Christ Himself. He is God’s revelation of Himself to mankind. And as the most wonderful man of all, He made many people want to draw closer to God. After His death and resurrection, Christ returned to Heaven leaving His followers on earth to reveal Him to the watching world and to each other. The title “Christian” was first given to them by those who had not believed in Christ yet but could see the resemblance between the Christians and Christ Himself.

I do have to admit that there have been some people who have made me not want to know God more: their lives have not met up with the God they have preached and their teaching has turned out to be false in some ways. Wading through the things they have taught me and figuring out what to keep and what to throw away has been challenging, especially at first when the urge was to throw it all away! But there have been many more people who have made me want to know Christ more, who have taught me truth and lived that truth, who have encouraged me by being like the Christ they are named for.

The more I practice committing things to God, the more I realize that He takes everything I have to deal with, the more I understand that all my victories come from Him. I remember from a college message by Tim Jordan this question: What can you give God that He doesn’t already have or can’t make? Essentially, is there anything I can do to impress God? Nope. Instead, I am learning to bring Him everything, especially the things that are dark inside of me so that His light can heal those dark places and turn them into good.

Revelation speaks of people casting crowns at Christ’s feet; I am only just starting to understand that impulse. Yes, God will be giving me the crown that He enabled me to win. But how wonderful to have something worthy to give to Him, something grand and beautiful and perfect. I can hardly wait!

“Have you lost your small glass gaming spheres?”
–Spock to Leonard Nemoy in I AM SPOCK

This quotation came to mind quite randomly at the beginning of the Sunday morning service this week, and it occured to me that if I just give God my marbles they won’t be lost. It’s back to that lovely word “commit” that is found in Psalm 37:5 and II Timothy 1:12b. I’m learning to commit everything to God, to offer them to Him in childlike faith as children bring things to their parents and leave them in Daddy’s capable hands. Committing in the Bible brings with it the word picture of depositing something in a bank, the safest bank in the world because God keeps (guards, protects, tends) those things that I give Him better than I ever could.

Lately committing things to God has felt a bit like playing with a wooden paddle-ball toy (you know, those that have a rubber ball attached by means of elastic to the paddle?)–I bat the ball towards God only to find it’s still attached to my mind. I guess that giving God my marbles–my problems, concerns, desires, excitement, plans, everything!–is something that I will learn over and over and over again. When I am able to do it, what a relief! It’s like a sigh of contentment and release.

No, I haven’t lost my small glass gaming spheres–I’ve committed them, I think. If not, I’ll do it . . . as soon as I find them =)

“The Christian is a person who makes it easy for others to believe in God.”
– Robert Murray M’Cheyne

qtd in NBBC Alumni Update for August 21, 2006

Grace is a gift, not a loan.

So, why do we treat it like a loan? We treat it like a Visa card: “it’s everywhere you want to be” unless your account isn’t paid up. With Visa (and every other creadit card for that matter–”What do you have in YOUR wallet?”) there’s always a catch, and credit card companies are only nice to you when you keep your nose clean. If you don’t they like you a lot–just like we like chicken: served diced and fried.

Is grace anything like that? If it is, we’d better keep our noses VERY clean; we have a creditor with an infinite record-keeping ability and infinite resources for collecting what is owed. If it’s not, why do we treat grace like a loan? and what is the right way to handle it?

Grace is a gift, not a loan.

Psalm 150:1
Praise ye the LORD. Praise God in His sanctuary: praise Him in the firmament of His power.”

Somehow I got roped into teaching a 4-week children’s class on music. I’ll actually be teaching only the first 2 weeks, but those weeks will lay the foundation for the rest of the class. It promises to be a very “stretching” experience for me =) The theme for the course is Psalm 150.

As I began reading the psalm to plan for the class, the word “sanctuary” stood out to me. To be honest, the first thing that comes to mind when I hear the word “sanctuary” isn’t a church auditorium but some fugitive calling out theatrically “I demand sanctuary!” So I decided I had better look up the word to see if these two concepts truly are connected.

Thanks to www.blueletterbible.com, www.etymonline.com, and Jason’s AJAX program, I had my answer. The Hebrew and Greek words translated “sanctuary” mean something set apart and separated for God. They have also been translated “dedicated” and “holy”; in fact, the Greek word for “sanctuary” is a form of the word usually translated “holy.” In the Old Testament, the sanctuary was in the temple or tabernacle, the place where people came to meet with God. But in the New Testament, the church and the individual human heart become God’s dwelling place. God’s presence resides in us and with us at all times.

But how did it come to mean a place of safety? In medieval times, the church became a place of safety. No fighting was to take place in it, and fugitives from the law could claim its protection if being pursued by the law. I suppose it was the same idea as the cities of refuge that were established in the land of Israel, often places that had large communities of Levites (the tribe chosen by God as His servants to minister in the temple).As I was pondering the concept of finding sanctuary in God’s house, Psalm 84:3 came to mind.

Psalm 84:3
“Yea, the sparrow hath found an house, and the swallow a nest for herself where she may lay her young, even Thine altars, O LORD of hosts, my King and my God.”

Thinking of the sparrows and swallows nesting on the awesome and terrible altars of the sacred temple creates a funny mental picture for me. How could they dare such a thing? Seems almost too . . . common? The next verse in the psalm says that those who dwell in God’s house will praise God continually (”still be praising” uses a verb tense that means a repeated continual action). So, God’s house is a place which, although awe-inspiring in its sacredness and separateness, is still a place of refuge for even small, weak, and oblivious creatures–creatures who have no sense of propriety. They really don’t know any better than to build their homes inside God’s temple. And He welcomes them! No wonder they praise Him!

God, for some reason, I’m having trouble dwelling in Your house. I’m trying to bear things on my own that I shouldn’t try to bear alone but still feel obligated to carry. Only You can make my heart fit to be Your sanctuary. I desperately need to find my way home. Home! Help me make my home in You as You make Yours in me.

Pastor Steve is preaching a series on Haggai, and his message Last Sunday sent me back into Haggai to explore some of the things that God spoke to me about during the message. Here’s one of the cool things I found:

Haggai 2:7
And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the LORD of hosts.The “desire of all nations” is Jesus. He is that ultimate desire that will be fulfilled. As God promised here to fill the temple with His glory, He promises in the New Testament to fill the church with His fullness and, even more wonderful, to fill His people. This verse in Haggai connects with Ephesians 3:16-19 which gives the process of being filled with God’s fullness:

I need to be
1) Strengthened by the Holy Spirit so that
2) Christ can dwell in our hearts through faith, giving us a
3) Solid foundation in love from which we may gain
4) New levels of understanding Christ’s love in order to be
5) Filled with God’s fullness.

It’s really funny to look back over my week and review the questions I asked God and the answers He gave. He answers them so quietly that I often miss the connections until I go back later to read what I’ve written down. For example, I wrote about needing to understand and know His love more in this entry I’ve just shared from Tuesday; on Friday, I was reading in John 11 and was struck by the love Christ had for three individuals—Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. I’ve read that passage many times, but this time it almost surprised me at the individual love He had for them, so much that He wept with Mary over her brother’s death. It’s easier for me to think of and comprehend God’s love for a group of people. That Jesus had special individuals that He was close to when He walked this earth was oddly comforting. Hmm . . . .

Thanks for reading. Please feel free to leave your own tidbit of what God said to you this week.

I Thought 

A thought from my conversations with God this week.

v. 3 "Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?"

This particular recording of Jesus and the Pharisees' talk about divorce comes shortly after Peter's questions about forgiveness and the parable Jesus told of the servant who had been forgiven much yet would not forgive another servant even a little. The question the Pharisees ask seems to connect back to that parable because the Pharisees wanted divorce rather than having to forgive their wives for their imperfections.

v. 8 "He [Jesus] saith unto them, 'Moses because of the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the beginning it was not so.'"

They were asking about the law, a law which permitted divorce. Jesus took them back to the original plan before the law was given: a "one flesh" relationship between husband and wife means a commitment and means that they would have to forgive each other. Hardness of heart: lack of forgiveness leads to disposable relationships and to other sins, too, at times.

God, I see that very same hardness in my own heart, too—maintaining right relationships is difficult at times, and so often I'm ready to throw in the towel. You have been working on this in my heart, and I give myself to You to continue this work in me. Thank You for Your commitment to me. You do not give up on me; instead, You extend mercy, grace, and love. Please continue to work out the hard places to make my heart alive, not scarred and hard.

Please feel free to leave your own tidbit of what God said to you this week.

Catching up on a friend's blog the other day, I re-read one of my favorite of hers (incidentally one of her favorites, too): "Can you go with me?" As she captures the experience of helping a little child go somewhere he's scared to go alone, I'm reminded of my own times I've wished for another's hand, someone older and bigger and more adult. But I'm the adult now. I'm also reminded of a verse I recently re-discovered.

Psalm 73:23
Nevertheless I am continually with Thee: Thou hast holden me by my right hand.

And somehow it's a comforting mental picture to see myself as I really am—a child. I'm the original Peter Pan, and I don't have to grow up when it comes to my relationship with God. Please note that I did not say that I don't have to grow; somehow in God's rules there's a difference between growing and growing up. No matter how much I grow I still need to be a little child as I approach my Abba Father. And I can always gain comfort in knowing that He's holding my hand through everything. That confidence a child experiences when Daddy is holding his hand walking him through the new place or the group of imposing people, that same confidence is always mine . . . always.

But it's my own secret.

I think I've found the true fountain of youth. Ponce de Leon missed it, poor guy.

I read and wrote down every day this week. I've been reading in Galatians (because of last week's theme for the family workshop). It's tough to choose what to share because it all ran together this week–each day built a bit on the previous day's reading.
Two verses were a special blessing to me on Thursday

Gal 4:6 "And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, 'Abba, Father.'"
God has given me Himself as well as the privilege of calling him "Daddy."

Gal 4:9a "But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God"
I am known of God. I'm secure because He knows me.

My response to those verses:
God, today there's a lot of uncertainty in my life and my prayers. And, as usual, I'm a little afraid that things have changed between You and me because things have changed in my circumstances. Help me to rest in the fact that I am known of You and that Your Spirit is in my heart crying "Daddy, Daddy!" to you still. And help me to be content to be a child. Right now I'm feeling like I ought to know it all and be the perfect Christian, quite grown up. Like when I was little and convinced I was Superman, I'm ready to leap off my perch and try to fly on my own. But that's not how things work! Please help me to just be content to be known of You. Help me focus on You and love You today. I realize I don't know how. But I want to!

Again, for these posts, I'm simply sharing something God shared with me this week and my response to Him. Please feel free to leave your own tidbit of what God said to you this week.

When I first arrived in St. Louis and began living at my aunt and uncle's house, one of the family routines that was new to me was their weekly habit of sharing from their own personal Bible reading. On Saturday nights, sharing time includes telling how many days of the week we read God's Word, how many days we wrote down a thought and response to it, and then sharing one thought and response from the week. At first I thought it would be a stressful time each week of feeling like I hadn't been good enough because I hadn't read each day; soon I realized my mistake. No matter how many days I read or didn't read, I was encouraged for what I had read and what I had to share that night. Sooner than later I began to enjoy those Saturday times and to read more diligently on my own. Incorporating this sharing time into my 5^th/6^th grade classroom had the same effect on my students, encouraging them to read more on their own and acknowledging that God could speak, would speak, and was indeed speaking to them.

Now that I am back in California for the summer, I miss that sharing time. So I will begin tonight posting the things I would have shared had I been in St. Louis each Saturday night. Please feel free to add your comments (I really enjoy and learn from them) and to add your own sharing from what God has said to you during your walk with Him each week. The "rules" are simple–tell how many days you read, how many you wrote down, and share one (or more–sometimes we find ways to share more than one!). The things that God says to us are not always confined to His Word alone, but they all correspond to the truths He relates in His Word.

God does speak today. God does speak to individuals. He gives His Spirit to each of His children to guide them into truth and to teach them what He is saying to them. May you hear His voice each day as you follow Him and His Word.

"Let a man set his heart only on doing the will of God and he is instantly free. No one can hinder him." — A. W. Tozer

qtd in NBBC Alumni Update for June 5, 2006

yes, but how does one go about keeping one's heart at the right setting? I find that my settings are broken and keep moving, like a radio whose knobs are bumped just off of the station's frequency, mixing the station's broadcast with static or other nearby stations.

Thoughts on “Death, Be Not Proud” by John Donne

John Donne wrote in the 1600’s, over 400 years ago, but his themes are still pertinent to today. With poetry (as with all literature) it’s important for us to find how what the pot has said relates to us in our lives. Donne was trash talking Death, that big bad ugly force that all mankind is afraid of—and rightly so (a healthy respect for death is part of being a normal human being). But Donne had found a relationship with the God of the universe, and a relationship with Him puts Death in His place: Jesus Christ God’s Son defeated Death once and for all when He died on the cross, and for all those who have received Him as their Savior from sin, Death becomes no more than a release to greater life and rest in the presence of God. Unfortunately, those who reject the life that Christ offers will spend their eternity in the very arms of this horrible creature Death.

Here’s my paraphrase of Donne’s poem. Please feel free to add your own.

Death, don’t think you’re all that just because some people have called you big, bad, and ugly—you’re not. Just look at all your so-called victories: those you thought you defeated didn’t really die, and you can’t really defeat me, either. I enjoy what Rest and Sleep do for me; they’re just imitating you, so I’m sure I’ll enjoy the rest you’ll bring me when my time comes. In fact, the best men that have ever lived have gone with you and found freedom from life’s stresses and limitations—so much for your scary reputation! In fact, you don’t even call the shots but have to wait for some catastrophe to give you your marching orders. You might be more powerful than mankind, but you take orders from us, not the other way around. You can’t even show your face in civilized company but have to hang out with those other well-known thugs Poison, War, and Sickness. Besides, we really don’t need you to make us sleep—sleeping pills, warm milk, or boring reading can put us to sleep, too, and bring us the rest we need to help us face life, not leave it forever. What do you have to brag about? When you put us to sleep, we will wake up in eternity where you have no power over us anymore. And without your power, where are you? Death, your time too will come.

I was reminded today of this poem and how much I love it! this copy from http://www.bartleby.com/105/72.html retains Donne’s spelling, so if it seems too challenging, check out the simplified version at http://cs1.mcm.edu/~rayb/hs10.htm but note the typo in the last few lines =)

John Donne

72. “Death be not proud, though some have called thee”

DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think’st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee, 5
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell, 10
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell’st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

I Corinthians 15:54

So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.

I can hardly wait.

by Jean S. Pigott 1876
Jesus, I am resting, resting,
In the joy of what Thou art;
I am finding out the greatness
Of Thy loving heart.
Thou hast bid me gaze upon Thee,
And Thy beauty fills my soul,
For by Thy transforming power,
Thou hast made me whole.

Refrain

Jesus, I am resting, resting,
In the joy of what Thou art;
I am finding out the greatness
Of Thy loving heart.

O, how great Thy loving kindness,
Vaster, broader than the sea!
O, how marvelous Thy goodness,
Lavished all on me!
Yes, I rest in Thee, Belovèd,
Know what wealth of grace is Thine,
Know Thy certainty of promise,
And have made it mine.

Refrain

Simply trusting Thee, Lord Jesus,
I behold Thee as Thou art,
And Thy love, so pure, so changeless,
Satisfies my heart;
Satisfies its deepest longings,
Meets, supplies its every need,
Compasseth me round with blessings:
Thine is love indeed!

Refrain

Ever lift Thy face upon me
As I work and wait for Thee;
Resting ’neath Thy smile, Lord Jesus,
Earth’s dark shadows flee.
Brightness of my Father’s glory,
Sunshine of my Father’s face,
Keep me ever trusting, resting,
Fill me with Thy grace.

Refrain

copied from http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/j/i/jiamrest.htm 

"When I was young I was sure of everything; in a few years, having been mistaken a thousand times, I was not half so sure of most things as I was before; at present, I am hardly sure of anything but what God has revealed to me." - John Wesley

qtd in NBBC ALUMNI UPDATE FOR MAY 1, 2006