The God Who is not Superman

It's that moment when you're falling....the bottom's dropped out and your fingers try to grab onto anything close, but every ledge, every fire escape, rushes by too fast. The street below gets bigger and bigger. Any minute, you're going to hit bottom.

And then it happens....

You feel strong hands under your shoulders and behind your knees, the ground stops rushing up and you're swept instead into midair...safe at last.

Who else could it be? Superman.

Oh, I do like that moment....the feeling of rescue. The fear as it drains away and you wrap grateful arms around his neck. 

What is is about that guy, anyway? I'm pretty sure it's not the cape. It's not the muscles or that cute curl in the middle of his forehead. In fact, I'm pretty sure I know why the Man of Steel appeals so much, at least to me.


It's that in giving in to Superman, I'm admitting a secret vulnerability.
I mean really.
When was the last time any of us had to be rescued from anything? 
In general, we are capable, intelligent, and self-sufficient.  I don't fall off buildings. Bad guys don't chase me. No one needs to rescue me. Not really.

And a good thing too. Because Superman isn't real. I know that. *shrug*

But here's the rub. 
Sometimes I still feel like I need rescue. 

Everybody seems to be calling my name at once. The washer breaks on the same day as it snows 15 inches. Three of our children all get the flu at the same time and we don't have insurance. Somebody hits the only car we own. Somebody we love betrays. Somebody we love dies. 

I'm not falling off a bridge, but it sure feels like it. Superman may be fiction, but my feelings are real. I'm hanging alone at the end of my rope. I've done everything I know to do and I'm still going down for the third time. No man, super or not, is coming to help.
There's only one thing to do--and I cry out:

Rescue me, Oh Lord, 
Make haste to help me...
Free me from the snare they have set for me... 
Come quickly and answer me. 
Do not turn away from me or I will die...
Psalm 40, 31,143

And He does. God rescues.
Not like Superman. Not with cape and tights. But like God. 
The God Who is not Superman. 

And there's a big difference.

This is what God's rescue looks like:
When I prove my holiness among you, I will gather you from all foreign lands; and I will pour clean water upon you and cleanse you from your impurities, and I will give you a new spirit, says the Lord. --Ezekiel 36:23-26

He just doesn't fold us into His arms, carry us to safety, and then fly off to the next crisis.
God completes the job. He makes us holy.
He doesn't pat us on the head and let us straighten our skirt and go our way. He cleans us from the inside out.
He doesn't give us a pert little salute. He gives us a new spirit.

He has to and, better yet, He wants to.
Like Moses who had to take off his shoes before he could approach God in the burning bush, like the Israelites who had to believe God before they could enter the promised land, we have to be prepared. God's rescue isn't a one-step process.
He wants to reclaim all of us, inside and out, and that takes time.

That's real rescue. 
God plucks us out of danger by showing us our sin and guiding us to the firm ground of repentence.
God takes us to high ground by gifting us with faith and hope.
God puts out his hand, helping us stand every day in growing the fruit of His Spirit--kindness, meekness, self-control, and all the rest.

And, when He is done, He brings and keeps us near, made new in confidence in Him, leaning on His shoulder, depending on the only sure rescue there ever was and ever will be.
And there it is, the fear draining away as you wrap grateful arms around His neck...
Do not be afraid. I have ransomed you. I have called you by name. You are Mine.--Isaiah 43:1

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Picking Up Sticks

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Sometimes, I just don't know what to do next. 

I mean, the instruction book for life is pretty plain--worship God, repent, pray, hope, help others, look for heaven.

But sometimes, it's not enough.

I worship but God still seems far away. I repent but the list of my sins grows. I hope but it fades in the face of living. I help others but what I do rarely seems to have any lasting effect for either them or me. As for looking for heaven--well, I can barely manage earth.  Sometimes, it's just not working for me.

Then I realize that it doesn't matter.

It doesn't.
My disappointment, after all, is all about my feelings. I get dissatisfied because as much as I pray, as much as I hope, as much as I love God and understand what He's done both for me and the ones I love, there's still a huge gap between God's best and my reality.
A crevasse. A desert. A black hole. And it's not going away.

I can't create the heaven I want on the earth I'm given. And in the end, there's only one thing to do.
Pick up sticks.

That's right. Pick up sticks.
In those days, Elijah the prophet went to Zarephath. As he arrived at the entrance to the city, a widow was gathering sticks there; he called out to her, "Please bring me a small cupful of water to drink." She left to get it, and he called out after her, "Please bring along a bit of bread." She answered, "As the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked; there is only a handful of flour in my jar and a little oil in my jug. Just now, I was collecting a couple of sticks to go in to prepare something for myself and my son. When we have eaten it, we shall die." 
--1Kings17
  
This woman knows she is dying. The country has lived through years of drought and she has no more food. She has enough left for one more meal for her and her son and along comes Elijah.

Elijah said to her, "Do not be afraid. Go and do as you propose. But first make a little cake and bring it to me. Then you can prepare something for yourself and your son." --1Kings 17

What? "Oh, by the way," he says, "You're dying anyway. You might as well give me some of your last meal. It won't make any difference in the end."
Thanks a lot, bud.

I can't imagine she was thrilled with what Elijah, who spoke for God, told her to do, and sometimes, neither am I. Giving him that little she had left was not going to solve anything.
But she does it.
She goes and gathers the sticks, builds the fire, bakes the bread, gives some to Elijah, and then something happens--
She left and did as Elijah had said. She was able to eat for a year, and he and her son as well; the jar of flour did not go empty, nor the jug of oil run dry.--1Kings 17

She has enough. Just like that. Not enough just for that day or that week, but for a year. Enough until the drought ended, until her season of starvation was over.
That's what God does. He provides enough. When we finally come to the place where we have nothing left and know we're going to die without Him, He brings enough.

I wonder what would have happened if she didn't gather the wood, didn't make the fire, didn't bake the bread and share it with Elijah? I don't know for sure, but I suspect we wouldn't be reading about her today. She would likely have died, and her son, too. Starved for the lack of doing the one thing that was left for her to do. Because, when she did that, the only thing she could, God did the rest. God did what she could not.

And that's what I have to do.
What I can.
No matter how things look. No matter how I feel. 
Because that is when God shows up with flour and oil that never run out. 
That is where I find the cup that, in spite of circumstances, overflows.

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No matter what else is going on, no matter how hard or sad life gets, no matter how many things there are that I want to change and can't, there is always one thing left that I CAN do. And that is all God asks of me--to do what I can so that He can do what I can't. As long as there is one more thing for me to do, God is waiting for me to do it.

So, excuse me please. I'm needing God and I still have some sticks to pick up.

Let it Bleed

Ouchies.
Everybody gets them.

And what is our first reaction? "Quick! Put pressure on it! Get a bandage! Stop the bleeding!"
And, indeed, that reaction is often the appropriate one.
But not always.

Sometimes, when the hurt is shallow, an irritating scrape or narrow cut, wisdom says to leave it open to the air, even to let it bleed awhile and let it close on its own.
That's messy. And it takes time.
But it cleans out the wound and lets a scab form naturally

and, if we don't pick it off (admit it...you do, too), it heals properly. It may leave a scar, but that is all.

But this is not a first aid lesson.
Well, come to think of it, maybe it is.
It's the psalms.
The psalms, with their in-your-face wounding, their constant oozing emotions. The psalms, weak and unapologetic. They are the child hanging on our legs, the weeping widow, the forsaken friend, the disappointed lover. They are tears running unwiped down cheeks. They are unabashed, aching loneliness.
The psalms bleed.

God says, in essence, "Yes, you're hurting. I know it. I've been there. Hurt awhile. You'll be OK."
And I'm starting to understand why.
There is an opportunity in the process of hurting, one that cannot be improved upon by binding up. And we have a name for it.
Compassion.

Compassion is the place where we meet one another in an icky place that we can't fix. Compassion is the hand we hold through pain. It is the ear that listens without interrupting. It is finding a rock willing to accept our beating of it.
It gets messy. Oh, yes.
And this is a hard place to be. No sane person enjoys watching another suffer.
It is our first reaction to rescue someone in trouble. But not always the right one.
And sometimes, we have no choice.
I'm thinking of sickness, or the process of childbirth, or mourning. There is no way out of these except through them to whatever end they bring.

Did you ever see a meat tenderizer?

Nasty thing, isn't it? But oh, the result! Well, that's us. We need tenderizing. We need to experience compassion that feels to us like being beaten along with the person suffering. Compassion allows us to suffer along with someone else. And yes--that is a privilege.

So, in the end, we fix what we can, but look out for the times when we can't, when we are borne along the waves with another, anticipating the comfort waiting for us both at a distance, someplace at the end. It makes us tender. And eventually, it heals.

So, when the occasion calls for it, don't struggle and flail:  Let it bleed.

God is a father who rocks us through our struggles, a mother who carries us beyond our pain...Many people are forgiving. A few are just. But compassionate people are rarer still. The people who simply stand by when we hurt--not trying to talk us out of it, not trying to convince us we're wrong, not demanding that we pretend to be something else--are rare...it is compassion that we ourselves must develop if we are ever to be worth anything to anyone at all--besides ourselves.
--Sr. Joan Chittister, the Psalms, Meditations for Every Day of the Year
 

Not Made to be Alone-Communion by Design

I don't know about you, but I don't want to be alone. 

It's scary and, well, lonely.
Fortunately, God says I don't have to be.
Remember that I will be with you always, until the end of time.--Matthew 28:20

In fact, He's been with us from the beginning of time, too. He was there, in Eden--
And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.--Genesis 3:8

And not only in Eden, but at other times with other men:
Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his time, and God walked with Noah.--Genesis 6:10
And the Lord spoke to Abram.--Genesis 12:1
Moses used to take a tent and pitch it outside the camp and pitch it some distance away, calling it the 'tent of meeting'. Anyone inquiring of the Lord would go to the tent of meeting outside the camp. --Exodus 33:7

God wants to LIVE with men, to be intimately present to everyone. So, regardless of the continual sin of man, He literally moved in with us.
First, He settled into the Holy of Holies, the innermost chamber of the Israelites' desert tabernacle:
A cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.--Exodus 40-34

Then, later, He did the same in Solomon's temple:
When Solomon finished praying, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offerings, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple.--2Chronicles 7:1

And although between each encounter there was some kind of separation--the sin of Adam and Eve, the flood, times of idolatry and slavery, even outright destruction, God could not leave it alone. He could not leave US alone.
And He came again, this time into Herod's temple.
When the time came for the purification rites required by the Law of Moses, Joseph and Mary took him to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord.--Luke 2:22

Jesus came. God returned to the temple, but not in cloud or flame like before. He came like a child. 

And He wasn't done yet.
He did more.
And in Him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.--Ephesians 2:22

That's it. God's last stop. Us.
When Christ came as a man, He made a way men could be sanctified, a way we could join to Him.
Don't feel like a suitable habitation for the living God?
Think again.

God's original plan for His first tabernacle came in three parts--
First, a courtyard designated for sacrifice. A place of blood and moaning, a place of washing and preparation and repentance. A place of intense feeling. A place that looked and smelled and tasted and sounded constantly, full of suffering, supplication, and promised relief.
Second, a Holy Place designated for prayer. A place that housed sweet smells rather than visceral ones, new bread rather than raw meat and offal. A place that offered low, comforting light rather than the harsh, punishing, unrelenting sun.
Third, a Most Holy Place in which the God's Very Presence dwelt. A place of glory. A place of communion. A place of awe.

That was the first temple. But now that the temple has relocated from structures made of wood and animal skins, gold and silver, does it really look any different?
Not really.
First, God's current temple has a courtyard of flesh and blood. A place intense with feeling--easily hurt and constantly in need. A place that sees, hears, touches, tastes, and smells. A place unrelentingly tainted. A place that pulses with constant blood.
Second, God's current temple has a Holy Place, a soul that stills the outer courtyard's cacophony and prepares itself. A place that quiets, still tasting and touching and seeing, but in contemplation and anticipation. A place where we taste the Living Bread, see the Light of the World, and where we pray.
Third, God's current temple also has a Most Holy Place, a spirit that communes with God.  A place of sweet fellowship and complete knowing. A place of both perfect rest and unremitting awe.

And that's it. 
Emmanuel--God with us.
Living in you and me. Three in one. God and man. Not perfected yet, but a perfect design.
We were not made to be alone. Ever.
Christ in you, the hope of glory.--Colossians 1:27

God Has Free Will, Too

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God gave me free will--a very good thing--at least I think so.
Why? Why is free will a good thing? What does it let me do?
Well, free will allows me to choose without being forced. In essence, free will allows me to do exactly as I want to do. I like that.

Here's what free will sounds like:
"I want vanilla, not chocolate."
"I want to marry Bob, not Tom."
"I want to go to Tahiti, not Atlanta."
"I want to sleep late, not go to church."

See?
The goal of free will, from my point of view, is to figure out, then act on, what I really want. From God's point of view, however, free will is a bit different. God wants me to want what He wants.
I am the vine and you are the branches. Whoever abides in Me and I in him, he it is who bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.--John 15:5
Therefore, do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.--Ephesians 5:17
I am in my Father and you are in Me and I am in you.--John 14:20 

Until I do, however--until I want what God wants, He will not stop me from making my own choices and, in the meantime, I make some pretty crummy ones. And, while I'm making these crummy choices, God is what?  He's patient. He's long-suffering. Remember what its' like when our own kids insist on doing what we know will lead to a crash-and-burn? Like that. It happens to everybody.

In the process, though, I've spent a lot of time saying No to God. 
While I'm saying No, however, I forget that  He can say No to me, too. I don't like that very much.
When I say No to God, I expect Him to be OK with that. He gave me free will, right? Well, God has free will, too. That's why it's a relationship. God will love me, but He will do it the way He wants, not the way I want.*

He did it to Paul, right?
Three times I pleaded to take [the thorn in my flesh] away from me. But He replied, "My grace is sufficient for you."-2Corinthians 12:8-9
Translation: I am not going to love you that way. I am going to love you with myself instead, with my very own presence. You will keep your thorn, but you will come to know me intimately.*

Not a bad deal when you think of it. God told Paul No to something small, but Yes to something much bigger. It's like asking for a scooter and getting a Lamborghini instead.

God said No to Jesus in the garden, too. Jesus wished for the cup to pass from Him, that horrible cup of pain, but God said No. Instead, He perfected all mankind through that suffering and made it the source of salvation for everyone.

He does the same thing for us. If Mother does not get well, if we don't get the job, if the godly husband I want is still not showing up, God is saying No, but it's OK. God always has a Yes to go with it. Don't see God's Yes in your life? Look around for Him. His hand is out, full of blessing. If not satisfaction, then comfort. If not health, then holiness. We so rarely ask for the eternal gifts, and these are His best ones.

*Henry Cloud and Jim Townsend, Boundaries, 1992, Zondervan

Where did they put Him?

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Sometimes, I can't find Jesus. 
Oh, He's out there all right. He might even be in here, in my heart.
But I can't feel Him. I can't see Him, and I can't hear Him..
Where did He go?
Like Mary Magdalene, I wonder where they put my Lord.
They have taken my Lord away and I don't know where they have put Him.--John 20:13

Go and find Him, my friends tell me.
He's right here. All the time.
Pray.  He'll come.
Ask and you shall receive.
Seek and you shall find.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's not working.

Still, I remember. He was here just the other day.. I can still smell Him. We put Him in this tomb with our own hands.
I left Him in this place. I know I did. And He's gone. Just plain gone.
I am beyond sad. It's like every light in the world has gone out.
Tenacity does not bring Him. Trying harder does not bring Him.
 
I must be looking in the wrong place. 
Maybe I need to open my vision, to look in another place.
What was it that He said? Don't look for my dead body.
Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?--John 20:15-16
He is not here; He is risen, just as He said.--Matthew 28:6 

I'm alive! He tells me.
No, you're not. I saw You. You were dead. Dead. And I felt like I was, too.
I still do.
Desolate. Alone. Back to the same place all my former sins consigned me. The same lonely darkness I started in.
Everything was wonderful while You were here, but now...what happened to the sweet, bright hope You brought us? When I can't find You, I can't find the hope anymore, either.

Then, there it was...that smell. Nard. Can it be?
I look up and see an stranger. No. Not You. A gardener.
"Where have they laid Him?" I want to take hold and shake the man.
But he can't help.
I might as well go home. You're not here. You've gone. Forever.

"Mary..."--John 20:16

What? Where are You?
Do not touch me now...John 20:17

It's You. It is You. You've never gone, never.
It was me. I let you go. How could I ever have done that?
Never stop calling my name. I never want to lose you again. I don't need to touch You. I just need to trust You.
You're alive...forever.
I will never leave you nor forsake you.--Deuteronomy 31:6
Of course.

Fixing My Ouchies

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I have an infection.
How do I know? Because it hurts.
It's red and icky and swollen. Just looking, anyone can tell that something is definitely wrong.
I've tried to clean it out and de-infect it, but nothing's worked so today, I'm going to the doctor. I'm sure the doc will know what to do and afterwards, it will stop hurting.
Simple.

Nobody likes hurt.
Nobody likes it, but nobody escapes it. We all get hurt.
And some of our biggest wounds are the ones that don't show.
It's harder to show a doctor an infected heart than an infected finger. But it hurts just as much, maybe more. And just as when I don't get my infected finger cleaned out and healed, my emotional infection left untended will spread and get worse. Much worse.

We all know what physical infections look like when they're not tended. Nasty. But what do emotional hurts look like when neglected? They have repercussions, too. Like anger, and bitterness, and isolation.
OK--so when we go to a doctor, they ask us for symptoms of our physical malady. How about our other hurts? How about those symptoms? 
Who or what makes me consistently mad?
Or, what inexplicable outburst took me and everyone around me by surprise?
Who just always irritates me?
What kind of book or movie or remark always puts me in a bad mood?
Why do I pick on a particular person or behavior or habit?
When did I stop going to church?
Or hanging out with friends?
What makes me just want to hole up at home and avoid everyone?
What place or person or subject do I want to avoid no matter what?

I know that, if I don't get my finger healed up, the affected area will get bigger and eventually, I'll either get blood poisoning and die, or I'll catch it in time and it'll heal, but will leave a scar. Well, I have non-physical scars, too. And they are not without consequences.

Ironically, a physical scar won't hurt like the wound did. It might twinge a little once in awhile, but the constant, throbbing pain is gone. Someone can touch it, and I don't jump anymore. I know that a doc can probably help me with my physical hurt. But I have to get help with my other hurts, too. And just like my physical ones, I have to admit I hurt in the first place.

There's no shame in hurting. Jesus did, too.
During the days of Jesus' life on earth, He offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save Him from death...--Hebrews 5:7a

Loud cries and tears. Jesus was not shy about telling God about His hurts. And what did God do?
...and He was heard because of His reverent submission.--Hebrews :7b

Jesus humbled Himself to admit there was something wrong and then accepted God's healing when He did. I have to do the same thing.
God wants to do for me exactly what I want the doc to do for my infected finger:
He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.--Psalm 147:3

But I have to admit that I need it. I have to look at the warning signs--the pain, the tenderness, the inability to engage in normal activities, and realize that I need to let God bind my wounds. I need to let the scar form if it must, and wear it as a sign that I've come through safe, after all.
We're pretty good at saying that God is the Great Physician. Now we have to act like it.

But I Don't Wanna Give it Away!

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Bind the sacrifice with cords, even unto the horns of the altar.--Psalm 118:27 (KJV)

Whenever the ancient Hebrews offered the best of their flock or herd to God, they tied it to the altar still alive, kicking and struggling. Once there, the shepherd bent back the animal's head and slit its throat with his own hands. Then, hands red with its blood, he watched it die.

Yuck.
I'm glad we don't have to do that anymore.

Not so fast.
Actually, I'm thinking that we do.
Think not that I am come to destroy the law and the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. --Matthew 5:17

The New Covenant Jesus introduced changed the old one, but did not put it away. We can eat pork now, but we must eat it to God's glory. We do not have to abandon disobedient children beyond the city gate, but we do have to abandon them to Christ. We don't have to slaughter our animals in church, but we do have to kill what is not godly in ourselves.

We are no longer required to kill a sheep, but we still have to raise the knife.

What do we have to kill now?
Put to death, therefore, everything that belongs to your earthly nature...--Colossians 3:5

Great. My earthly nature. Isn't that just about everything?
Well, yes, it is. Everything, at least, that doesn't resemble God.

This is going to hurt.
Well, yes again. It will hurt. That's what sacrifices do.
Do you really think that those Hebrew shepherds didn't look at those spotless lambs they kept having to bring to the temple and wonder whether they would be able to feed their family on what they had left over? Of course, they did. And so do we.

What are we supposed to give? Time, talent, and treasure, isn't it?
So what does that look like? Warning:  Some of this may sound familiar...

Time:  If I spend an hour or two praying or reading and studying my Bible, who will do my other work?
Talent: If I fix the church's computers, who will fix mine? If I take someone else's mom to the grocery store, will someone take mine? If I adopt this child, will my others suffer?
Treasure: If I give ten percent, or even more, what will happen to saving for a rainy day? If I ever need something, who will meet my need?

Remember, we have to bind up the sacrifice while it's still alive, not wait until we don't care anymore, until it's become comfortably surplus. When it finally goes up in smoke as incense, we need to watch it rise with some regret.

It's true that we are not to be foolish in this--there are limits. We are not usually called to give away all of our earthly attachments and possessions, but that does not mean we are not to give away any of them.

In the end, what I bind to the altar is concern for myself.
My comfort, my pleasure, my affection, my habits.
That's right. My hesitance to offer real sacrifice points to lack of faith, lack of trust in God. Every time we cling to something, we uncover an instance of unbelief.
We say that we believe that God has our back, but when we can't let go of something, whether it's material or human or emotional, that is the single thing we most desperately need to lay down. 
I'm sorry, but we have to kill it. 
"But I don't know what I'd do without it...." Exactly.
We don't know what we'd do without that thing or person or feeling. But God does.

Raise the knife against it, my friend. Raise the knife to it and trust God that, if you are not to kill it after all, He will stay your hand. He's done it before.

But Did He WANT To?

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Jesus saved us.
It's true, and most of us already know that.
But He was not just God--He was man, too, and I don't know about you, but I don't always want to do what I'm supposed to do.
It occurs to me today that maybe He didn't either.

I will not reject anyone who comes to me because I came down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of the one who sent me and this is the will of the one who sent me--that I should not lose anything of what he gave me, but that I should raise it in the last day.--John 6:37-38

Is it possible that Jesus, as  man, was not always crazy about saving us?
That He did not always want to have mercy on the impenitent, on the ungrateful, on the clueless?
That unwillingness was one of the temptations to which He was subjected when He took on flesh?

Was Jesus sometimes tempted to let us have exactly what we deserve rather than to do as He was commanded? Did He sometimes have to grit His teeth to heal another ungrateful petitioner? To preach to yet another unhearing crowd?
And if He did, is it any wonder that I often feel the same?

I do not always want to love, want to forgive, want to extend my hand in kind patience. Today, I find solace in the possibility that Jesus, human like me, might sometimes have felt the same way. Jesus may have saved us, not because He always wanted to, but simply because His Father commanded Him to.

There is glory in this obedience, I think--to do what we do not want to do, what may not even make sense, simply because our Father in heaven has commanded it.
And, in the process, know that even Jesus did the same.

My Real True Love

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This is the irony of age--that I have spent  a whole lifetime caring for and satisfying a body that slowly falls apart. 
And I can't do a thing about it.

Let's face it.
I love myself. More than I love anyone else and more than anyone loves me.
I am my own best friend.
But my affection is misplaced. I am also my own betrayer.

My hands hold tight to what does not last.
The man who loves his life will lose it...--John 12:25
My head trusts my own reason above all others.
For the wisdom of the world is foolishness in God's sight.--1Corinthians 3:19
My heart leads me to destruction.
The heart is deceitful above all things.--Jeremiah 17:9

So what do I do with this body, this life--or what is left of it?
How do I focus on what does not crumble to dust?
How do I live in blood and bone and skin, emotion and thought, but disdain its rule over me?

There is only one way I know--
I must live not to find satisfaction in indulgence, but joy in denial.
I cannot become like Christ and, at the same time, pamper my flesh. I have to go past it, through it.
This is life's purpose, its real journey.
If I can do this, then I will still die, but I will not die with my body. I will live with my Lord.

Wearing Two Faces

Photo: findyourselflove.blogspot.com

Oh, God--you and your contradictions...
You tell me that life will be hard, but I will be glad.
You take away my sin, but not before you show me its full squalor.
You make me rich, but in the process, humble me down to the ground.

Because of you, I wear two faces--
One that knows your joy, and the other that knows myself and this world.

Who are you, anyway, that you must do this?

Father, Teacher, Brother, Friend, Lord, Christ, Redeemer...
Everything.

Somewhere, somehow, you must be enough.
You do not breathe your own Spirit into a handful of dust, then blow it apart, consigning it to random winds.
You, who ignite the spark of life and carefully lay out the order of the worlds, do not abandon your work to sad entropy.

I cannot make myself happy by leaning into days that flash by, swirling into time's tempest.
There is only You.
Satisfy me with your unfailing love that I may sing for joy and be glad all my days.--Psalm 90:14

Fighting My Way Out

Photo credit: www.123rf.com

I can't do it.
I can't.
I can't change my feelings.
Or can I?

 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.--2Corinthians 10:5

Every argument--like when someone hurts me and I simmer in my own pique.
Every pretension--like when I let myself become victim to something..anything.

Offenses hurt.
They niggle their way inside and won't leave.
They interfere with my life in Christ.

But (I say) they are FEELINGS...I can't change my FEELINGS!
Yes, I can.
Yes, I can.

But I have to knock them out.
I have to grab them by the neck, give them a hard left hook, and put them onto the mat.
I have to demolish them.

Oswald Chambers said that only moral choices turn our legal innocence, which Christ bought on the cross, into holy character.*
What does that mean?
It means that we have to give every un-Christlike thought, word, action, or emotion the heave-ho, no matter what it takes. 
And they will not go politely.

Change an action by deliberately doing something different.
Change a word by deliberately saying something different.
Change a thought or emotion by deliberately thinking something different.

If I want to think: "Oh, he (or she) is so mean. How could he do such a thing?",
think instead "God gave me this husband (son, sister, boss, dad...). He may have hurt my feelings today, but made me happy yesterday and consistently does this good thing (fill in the blank). I hurt today, but God has my back. I'm ok." And give him a hug.
Can't do it?
Yes, you can.

I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.--Phillipians 2:13
Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things.--Phillipians 2:8
When you're hurt? Yes.
When you're mad? Yes.
Put on those Everlasts (read--everlasting life) and change the way you feel.

*My Utmost for His Highest, September 8

Closed-circuit Love

God is love.
Yes, most of us have heard this already.
Whoever does not love does not know God because God is love.--John 4:8

So, what does God's love look like?
The Bible provides a whole list:
Love is patient, kind, not envious, not boastful, not proud, not rude or self-seeking, not easily angered.  --1 Corinthians 13:4-5 paraphrased
There's more, but you get the idea. 
Then, if I am all of those things, I am loving like God does.
Well....no.  Not really.
That's like saying that if I am brown and shaggy, bark and wag my tail, I am a dog.

The problem with looking at love this way is that we are doing so backwards.
Love does not come from anything we do. Nothing.  
We cannot manufacture love.
Love comes from God and only from God.
We contribute nothing other then receiving and exercising it.

I can love my husband and children because God gave me His love.
I can love my friends because God gave me His love.
I can love my enemies for the same reason.
It is all the same thing, from the same place, for the same purpose.

And how do we recognize it?
God's kind of love is completely free of self-interest.
In God's world, self-love doesn't exist.
God's love looks out, not in.
Ever.
It comes from God and goes back to Him, a closed circuit.
And when we love like God, we are with Him.
We are His creation, part of His family.
Because of this, when we love, we enjoy heaven on earth.

Who Are You Looking At?

Do you ever wonder how God wants us to pray? I do.
I am not satisfied with most prayer. 
It seems self-serving, not God-serving.
It sometimes sounds whiny, like "This is what I want, God. Would you help me out and give it to me, please?"
Prayer can also sound like the person praying has too little faith to even know what, or more importantly, who to ask. Like "I am so overwhelmed, God. Please help me. Please bail me out. Don't let me suffer like this."

I know that God tells us to ask for things.
And I also know that He understands when we get in so deep we can't see the way out.
But when these prayers of rescue or favor-granting become our standard fare, when our daily prayers consist of fearful flailing and endless lists of I-wants, I am sure we are not in the place God wants us.

To confirm that, I look at John 17:
After Jesus said this, He looked toward heaven and prayed...--John 17:1
He looked toward heaven, not toward His concerns on earth.

Glorify your Son so that your Son may glorify You.--John 17:2
He asked only for what would benefit His Father, not Himself.

I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me.--John 17:9
Jesus confined His prayers to what His Father had already indicated as concerning Him.

May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.--John 17:21
He prayed for the success of the plan His Father put in motion through Him.

Jesus does not once here pray for His own concerns--His coming suffering, His earthly friends and family, or His own strength. He trusts God for all of these.

If I pray for a thing, then my goal is clearly the thing, not God.
If I pray for a relationship, I am more interested in the relationship than in God.

I cannot even pray for new motivations, or emotions, or will. Those are my part.  God will not control me. I must control myself and dealing with my own will and emotion and motivation is how I do it. My obedience in emotional self-control is what I bring to the party.

And we wonder why our prayer is not answered.
God does not give His favors to relative strangers looking for a new toy.
Proper prayer, however, God always answers, and we find it in those rare moments when our will intersects with His own.

Prayer is answered from a place of union with God only.

Cries in Ramah

It's nearly Christmas.
We are not supposed to be crying.
But we do.
Horrible things happen and we do.

Sometimes, we cannot muster up the requisite Christian joy.
But for those times, God gives us hope.
Hope: the gift God gives when we believe, in spite of circumstance, that He loves us.

"Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage.  Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are.--Augustine of Hippo

So, if there is no joy for the moment, hope bears us up. And later, joy will come.

On earth you will have many trials and sorrows, but take heart! I have over come the world.--John 16:32-33 

Waaaaa!

What do you cry about?
Be honest.
Sadness, loneliness, loss, physical pain, emotional hurt?
More often then not, this is the audio to that:  "Me. Me. Me."
Even empathy for someone else transfers from our own remembered pain.
Our tears are almost always all about us.
I do it, too.

We begin at birth with a cry of outrage when life smacks us with cold and discomfort, and we wail at its first assaults.
And they keep coming.
And, when they seem too much, we cry.

Did Jesus cry at birth?
He felt the pain and cold, too, but did He cry?
He wept later, but in very specific circumstances--over the sins of His people, and again at Lazarus' grave.  He wept for the death of people he loved. In no recorded instance did He cry over personal loneliness, insult, betrayal, or desertion.
Not like we do.
Jesus' flesh felt every body blow as deeply as our does, but He did not cry over them.
Why not?

Think about Him at His weakest moment--in the garden, sweating blood in an agony of anticipated suffering.
"Let this cup pass", He begged, but it would not.
He had come to the end of His human resources, but He did not cry.
I cry because I do not master my flesh.
Jesus, Master of all things, did.

He felt every pain, every hurt, as deeply as I do, but He did not give in to them.
Why not?  What was the difference?
He knew Himself.
He knew His Father.
He had already won.
I am supposed to know this, too, and in this knowledge, self-pity has no place.

Can I hold His kind of mastery over myself all the time?  No.
But in this, like in all things, Christ says,
"Follow Me."
"Be holy."
"My yoke is easy."

From the very first ones, all of my tears have been selfish.
Yes, tears sometimes come as a release, too, and I will still shed these, but I have no real reason to cry. Not ever.  Not really.
My Savior lives. He loves and cares for me.
What could I possibly cry about in the face of that?

Beyond the Bandaid

I am concerned about my son.
No--that's not right.
Just say it.
I'm worried about him.

Never mind why.  The reason doesn't much matter because he's a grown man and I can't do much about it.
But that doesn't stop the love.  Or the worry.

In fact, his maturity increases the concern because my ability to influence his situation decreases with his increasing age.
Unlike when he scraped his knee falling off a bike or when little Jimmy took a poke at him on the playground, I can't kiss away his hurt.
I can't fix it.
And parents are fixers.

So what do I do?  God has some advice:
This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.  Choose life, so that you and your children may live...Deuteronomy 30:19a

I want life and blessings for my children, but I can't get them by fixing their hurts and problems.  I do it by choosing God.

Can I bring my sons practical help?  Sure.  In fact, I should.
But that help is only a bandaid in the larger scheme of things.

My choosing God, however--walking with Him before my children and the world--gives God the opportunity He craves to do what only He can do.

How do I know this?  He told me:
Listen to His voice and hold fast to Him, for the Lord is your life.--Deuteronomy 30:19b

Choosing God first will probably alter the kind of bandaid I apply to my son's owie.
Choosing God first may open the wound farther so He can clean it out properly.
But choosing God brings real healing and everlasting life.
And that is what a mother ultimately wants for her sons.

Look In My Eyes

It happened again.  When will I learn?  Just when I trust, just when I relax into a relationship or circumstance, BANG!  The thing goes bad somehow. Thoughtlessness, carelessness, ill will, or just plain bad luck brings it all down in an instant.  I hate this part.  I really do.

Then God reminds me that this all happens because I let it.
Listen to me.  Who are you that fear mortal men? Awake as in days gone by. Do not fear the reproach of men. Clothe yourselves in strength, O arm of the Lord.--from Isaiah 51: 1-16

I am the arm of the Lord.
Not in the sense of administering His punishment or judgement, but in that He provides the strength with which I face my life in this world, whatever that life brings.
I am He who comforts you.  The cowering prisoners will soon be set free.  The ransomed of the Lord will return.--from Isaiah 51:1-16
Is anything too hard for the Lord?--Genesis 18:14


God is already acting on my behalf and I do not see it.
You come to the help of those who gladly do right, who remember your ways.-Isaiah 64:5
All nations will be blessed because you obeyed me.--Genesis 22:18


When we want our children to listen to us, we gently turn their face to ours and say to them, "Look in my eyes."
What does God say?
Listen to me.--Isaiah 51: 1
Effectively, He says, "Look in my eyes."
Remember what I have already done.
Remember what I have promised.
As I have done, so will I continue to do.

See, I am doing a new thing!  Now it springs up.  Do you not perceive it?  I am making a way in the desert.--Isaiah 43:18-19

Life does seem like a desert sometimes, but God has already redeemed it.  Neither man nor circumstance can harm me in any real way if I have believed God.  He has already shown me, and bids me remember.  I must remember how He strengthens my arm.

This strength is what belief looks like.
Hurt, misfortune, intentional harm.
When I look into His eyes, it all fades.

Annoyed and Overwhelmed

Emotional words bear layers of meaning.  Take 'annoyed' for example.  When I am annoyed, I experience irritation--a rough, edgy state because I must deal with a trivial situation or unreasonable person.  That is the first layer.  The second layer, however, is realizing that my annoyance always begins with a feeling of selfish superiority, a state in which I believe myself too wise or too important to deal with that person or circumstance.  Once I know that, also know that I am not only annoyed, I am in sin.
Therefore:
      Annoyed = Selfish Pride

So, too, are the layers of declaring that I am overwhelmed.  What is overwhelmed, anyway?  Strictly speaking, being overwhelmed means being swept away, like the damage wreaked by a tornado or tsunami.  But when we say we are overwhelmed, we are rarely truly defeated, and never dead. Why, then, do we say we are overwhelmed?

Maybe the answer lies in the second layer of feeling here, too.  Jesus illustrated this second layer when he met a man feeling overwhelmed by his son's epileptic-type seizures.

"How long has he been like this?" Jesus asked.
"From childhood...If you can do anything, have pity on us and help us!"
"If you can?  Everything is possible to him who believes."
"I do believe.  Help me with my unbelief!"--Mark 9:21-24

We believe, but like that father, our belief is incomplete.
Jesus said the man felt overwhelmed because he lacked belief. He would say the same to us.
Therefore:
     Overwhelmed = Unbelief


Belief is God's gift to us...His gift and His promise, and the key to heaven.
You are my witness and my servant whom I have chosen so that you know and believe me and understand that I am He.--Isaiah 43:10

That is the grace of it.  We flail around in sin, like when we feel annoyed or overwhelmed, but God is always so close, so close.  If I concentrate, I can usually feel His sweet breath--and feel Him push aside my own pride, my own agenda and desire.  It is then I reach out to Him, where there is no reason to be annoyed and no room for being overwhelmed.

Reaching In

God's most frequent admonition for us is to believe.  "Come to me," He says.  "Know me."  "Trust me."  And we do for a little while, but then the days come when we do not.  Heavy, dark days.  Lonely days.  Days when we know He has died and been buried and we don't know what to do next.  We heard that He had risen from the grave, but we haven't seen Him.

He has instructions for these times:
Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.--John 14:27
Do not worry about your life--Matthew 6:25
Cast your cares on the Lord.--Psalm 55:22

We try, but the sadness persists.

That is when our sweet Lord offers us His side.
Put your finger here.  Reach out your hand and put it into my side.  Stop doubting and believe.--John 20:27

He is real.  He had died and risen.  He has rescued us from death.  No matter how we feel, we must know that His wound  has bled real blood so that we can know peace, so that we can be free.  And when, on some days, the knowledge of these is not enough, we can reach our hand into His side, feel His pulse, and know, really know.

 He does not shrink back from our touch.  We cannot shrink from His.
I am with you always, to the very end of the age.--Matthew 28:20