Bringing Faith to Life
Archive for February, 2014
Just Reward
0The snow is melting taking the evidence of all my hard work with it. Soon, the path I shoveled so Silver could get to the fence will be gone. The piles around the drive that I heaved so my husband could get to work and my daughter could get to school – gone. The swath I cut so my mailman could get to the box and the UPS delivery guy could get to the porch – gone. Even the sharp corner of snow on the street, piled high by the plows, that I removed to help turners come ’round the bend will soon be gone. All gone.
Nothing left. Vanished. But for the smile of the post man, the quicker step from Mr. UPS, the sigh of relief from daughter, the on time arrival of husband, and the paws that continue to find their way. Traffic will give it no further thought.
It was nothing, really. And now it is.
“Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” ~ (2 Corinthians 4:16-18)
Three’s not a crowd, it’s just right
0“Oh, but it’s your passion, Wendy.” Well, yes, I do like to exercise and be outdoors and eat healthy foods and generally take care of my body. But that’s not actually the point. Don’t lump me with those ‘world’s biggest loser’ fans or those ‘organic everything’ fanatics or those ‘Xtreme sports’ folk. I am really just a regular soul.
The thing is, that soul is in a body. The two are right there together. Like Siamese twins, never separated at birth. One feeds the other. One comforts the other. One supplies the other. One supports the other. And the One and then the Other are reversible. Like a jacket you can wear either way, inside out or outside in. Either way works. Not meant to be separated.
Nothing, for me, is strictly a mind issue. Nothing is simply a work of the spirit. Nothing is ever just about the body. The three come with me wherever I go, whatever I do. When I’m still and thinking or out and moving. When I am sad and crying or happy and rejoicing. When a problem needs solving or a lesson needs teaching. I bring the whole kit and kaboodle.
So, of course when my husband said, “Let’s grill burgers,” I was undaunted by the many inches of snow remaining between back door and grill. The forecast said warming and a bit of sun. Well then, shovel I will. Can’t get quite to the wood slats, still a bit of ice under that snow. Could be slippery. But somehow, knowing the sun will enter in with its diligence to do its part, the shoveling will not be for naught. That hope inspires, strengthens and makes sense. We’re a team, me and the sun.
I’ll tell you a secret: I love shoveling and have since a very young age. Sealed the deal that night when my dad and I cleared away the 4 or 5 inches together. He proclaimed us done, for after all, it wasn’t a “snerious snow.” Next morning, the 26 inches piled on our deck spoke otherwise. So we plowed through that, too.
I shoveled and the sun did the rest.Nope, I don’t do it for the exercise. Not the calorie burn or the upper body strengthening. Not even for the sense of accomplishment. I suppose you could call it a passion, but to me, making a path just seems a reasonable way to go through life. I do my part. The sun does its part. And my husband pitches in.
A three in one effort that brings us to dinner.
What runs through the center?
011 years
In the beginning, we agreed.
Then there was the smallest ripple of discontent.
A mere, “Aw come on.” And so we did.
But we didn’t. Agree, that is.
There was the tap, “Look at it this way.”
Which led to the shoulder shake, “You have to admit…”
which resulted in the back turn
where after came the word toss
followed closely by the paper airplane propaganda.
We sneered and shot withering glances
which now fell quite short across the broad expanse.
So we threw stones
that were answered by cannon;
Our artillery barrage
was met by sniper fire.
We’re exposed. Take cover!
We retreat and regroup in our caves
across the crevasse,
a huge canyon now between us.
Sad, we say. We didn’t want this, we say.
We are a people who love, we tell ourselves.
Love rains down into our canyon, cuts through rock and stone to shape cliffs and ledges, gouging cracks into crevices into streams of unhindered flow to the bottom where it runs and tumbles and gurgles and plays.
Clear and sweet and icy cold.
I am thirsty.
Dare I risk a sip, standing on its banks?
So exposed. So naked.
I would be so close –
so close I could see them,
perhaps even hear them.
What then?
In the beginning, God came from a great distance, down a great chasm, into a wide ravine and turned water to wine. Drink, all who are thirsty.
That’s good wine, we agreed.
You Have the Right to Remain Silent
311 years
Hang out… Listen… Walk in the truth. That’s what I heard in a sermon yesterday. The preacher is a young guy. Heck, Tim’s hardly even a thirty something. He’s a kid! And he’s got this nailed. Because he lives in the land of young people and he’s always looking around.
He told us that these days people don’t come to faith by listening like they used to. They used to go: to hear a message, to listen, then believe and make a commitment. Now, Tim said (actually he said people who study this are saying) people come to faith by talking. Easy enough. All we need to do is listen.
Yes! These people need someone to talk to, someone who will hear their side, someone who will listen to their stories, empathize in the difficulties, nod and smile, and put an arm around a shoulder. And remain silent. Unless and until Jesus shares words we’re meant to speak. We’re admonished to be quick to listen and slow to speak, not because we’re not meant to use our words but because words, absent of Christ, indict us.
Mid afternoon Sunday I am driving with my daughter to a soccer team meeting scheduled in a room at a library near her Sunday evening indoor soccer game. The team has arranged this location as a convenience for busy people to attend. We arrive and pull into an entrance way shared between the library parking lot on the right and a church parking lot on the left. Straight ahead is this sign: “CHURCH LOT NOT OPEN TO SOCCER PARKING.”
It stops me cold. I was lucky not to get rear-ended. There are no soccer fields in sight. Simply trees, a library, snow and a mostly empty church parking lot. (Fortunately, there was ample parking at the library.) Yet, the message reads clearly: Soccer players and their families are not welcome here.
Now I am certain that is NOT the message intended by the people who erected the sign. I do not know them. I’ve never been to their church. But as a church-going Christian and a soccermom I understand the battle for parking that goes on on Sundays. Sunday morning soccer games thrive in our area. Spectators come in droves. But the church needs this space for their parishioners on Sundays; please park elsewhere.
They know what they mean to say, but do they know what this means when soccer families read it? My daughter did immediately. She said, “Oh Mom, you have to take a picture of that.” She gets the message. And so do I. This is the message that can underlie our church-speak if we’re not careful. If we don’t hear from Christ first about whether to speak and what to say, our anger can come right out of our mouths. And while it can sound very right to us, it can, to those looking and listening with very discerning eyes and ears, sound very wrong.
To them that sign reads: “You should be in church on Sunday.” Or even, “If soccer is more important to you than church on a Sunday morning, you are not welcome here.”
That permanent green and white sign, erected with forethought and some significant expense, greets everyone who drives to the library, many of whom are soccer families, some of whom are struggling with the challenge that soccer on Sundays has created for their best intentions to get to church on a Sunday. Do we know how we sound?
This morning, the words of Joe Friday came to me (Yes, from Dragnet; I am very much older than Pastor Tim). Every week, Joe nailed the crook, and he would read the suspect his Miranda rights. In the United States, the Miranda warning is required by law to prevent a suspect from compelled self-incrimination (a violation of the 5th amendment). It states:
- You have the right to remain silent when questioned.
- Anything you say or do may be used against you in a court of law.
- You have the right to consult an attorney before speaking to the police and to have an attorney present during questioning now or in the future.
- If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you before any questioning, if you wish.
Usually, Joe ended with. “Do you understand your rights?” And the suspect usually said, “I want a lawyer.”
Because, of course, Joe Friday always got his man. And when you’re guilty, you know you need a lawyer. You have the right to counsel. An advocate who will speak with you, and if necessary, for you.
We have the right to remain silent. And in this silence to call on our counselor who will surely offer wise advice. Perhaps, to sit quietly. Perhaps, to say what you need. Perhaps, to go and be with them wherever they are, even on a Sunday morning. And when the time is right, to introduce them to the Friend who came with you.
The Binary System: A Simple Guidance System
111 years
Life would be so much simpler if everything were worth one point. Every good deed (+1). Every wrong word (-1). Every worship attendance (+1). Every devotional time (+1). Every evil thought (-1). Every angry “take that” response (-1). Every exasperated “it’s about time” (-1). Every “I can’t believe he…” (-1). Every “he can’t be trusted” (-1). Every…
Well, maybe it wouldn’t be simpler, but it would be much easier to quantify and see where we stand.
A book came out in 1992 called, Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus, by John Gray. Now it has the subtitle:”The Classic Guide to Understanding the Opposite Sex.” I found it quite insightful about the different approaches men and women used as life strategies. Really quite telling about the dichotomy of the sexes. I remember reading it along with my friend Chris and she and I dumb-founded our husbands when we were in full agreement that yes, everything (they did for us) was worth one point. That was our operating principle. You get one point for giving the kids a bath. One for the dozen roses. One for nice jewelry and one for not leaving the toilet lid up. The guys had trouble with our math.
But I wonder how it works in the economy of God. It really doesn’t seem fair that “big sins,” you know the really heinous ones like murder and adultery and stealing, are in the same category with little white lies I told just to protect her feelings, and the minor theft of the office notepads that I needed to do mostly (okay, some) office work in my home office, and playing the online solitaire games and keeping up with Facebook and twitter? – that was simply a healthy distraction in my 14 hour work day over my 70 hour work week. Okay, these are transgressions, but really quite small. Give ’em a (-1), but then shouldn’t the big ones be (-100)?
Well, no. Break one – you break ’em all, according to the Bible. Everything is worth a point. Just like Chris and I agreed and applied to our husbands. Maybe we got this idea from the Big Guy. Our guys probably were just slower to get the message :). The thing is, the +1/-1 system seems like really good news if we’re guilty of “big stuff” and only receive -1’s . It’s a bit harder to swallow if we think we’ve been pretty good this year. Which is tricky because self-evaluation can be a very slippery business, especially when there’s a comparison group for validation. Hey – that’s just good science, right? Compared to the norm, I deserve the A grade.
But God doesn’t compare to the norm. Probably guffaws at the whole idea of a bell curve and a standard distribution when it comes to human behavior. We are the ones who get tangled up in the statistics. He has made it very simple. Everything is worth one point. I’m here at the Center; come to Me.
And Christ, the Binary King, graciously evens the scales when we look His way, nod in His direction, and ask His forgiveness. Look, nod and ask, all three. A ‘leaning in’ or an ‘intending to’ doesn’t get it. But the moment we voice it, we’re level at 0. New game.
We find this hard to believe because the earthly equation operates so differently: you count more. you count less. you don’t count at all.
Even if we do count by ones, we can bury ourselves by forgetting to pay attention to the signs. Was that + or -? Guess wrong and that’s a big shift in binary zone. No, we’re meant to attend to the details. Evaluating and decision-making are essential. Do we trust this? find this authoritative? does this sound right? speak truth? seem real?
But what a wise God to give us the binary system. If, in each decision, we keep checking with Him, keep confirming we have the right sign, we’re only ever one unit from center. Even when we commit the biggest mistake or are guilty of the biggest sin.
Middling has Potential and Not Just for Monkeys
011 years
I think I may be a terminal moderate. I’m not sure whether this is good or bad.
I’m in the middle of:
- Eat only organic, antioxidant, cleanse …. Fast food’s fine
- Ace the hardest question …. Do only what you have to
- Use it till it dies …. Aw, toss it
- Olympic downhill …. Couch it, fireside in the lodge
- GPS, latest tech …. Still breathing, okay — Go!
- Proclaim …. Deny
I’m more of a:
— Read the label, now the next one, fix it if you can, try the Nastar course, monitor your own pulse, seek what’s true — kind of gal. Jumping in at either end makes halfway seem a long ways off.
It’s fun to be a monkey in the middle. Did you ever play that game? Where the job of the two players on the outside was to keep the “monkey” in the middle from getting the ball. They’d toss it high overhead or run past and hand it off. The harder the monkey works to get the ball, the harder the players – let’s call them zookeepers – had to work to avoid him. If the ball was intercepted the zookeeper at fault was in the middle and the game began again.
https://blog.gungroo.com/5-outdoor-games-for-kids/
Fun. Unless the monkey just stood in the middle. No sport to that. Yes, the fun is in the effort and the winning and then the exchange of positions. In fact, when I started my practices with this game I would have a mutiny on my hands if I stopped the play before everyone had the chance to be a monkey.
Today, we even get bogged down in aggravated debate about whether we’re descended from monkeys. For the record, I would much rather be a monkey than a zookeeper. Never was very good at making sure the doors are locked and the light is off. I’m more a middling kind of gal. Like to hang in the center and invite my friends. It’s more fun when you have 2 or 3 in there with you. Then you have a barrel full of monkeys (a fun game, too) and you can extend your reach. Not so surprising if you suppose that Jesus actually said,
For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” (Matt 18:20)
Seems right. I find I act very differently when I am in the large outside ring instead of a small inner circle. I’m kinder and gentler in there. I guess I try harder there. Because it’s important to me to get along with the ones I am close to and because we have a job to do: we gotta get that ball!
It’s about the common objective and the game plan. Wouldn’t it be cool of we could link up end to end and transmit the same, perfectly reproducible, identical in intensity, unaltered in frequency, never diminished message from the first monkey to the last? Now THAT would be a cool strategy. Hard, yes. Impossible, nearly, but no. Our nerve cells do it everyday as a matter of design; it’s called an action potential.
Ah, but all I hear is “who needs a middle man.” Hey, somebody’s got to chase the ball. And why would monkey want a ball anyway? Maybe because they would be tempted not to share a banana. No action potential there.
Post-it note promptings
0Sometimes I feel like God speaks to me in sticky notes. At times when there is so much to say, there are so many ideas to consider, or there’s no time to write it all down, I scribble the gist of it on sticky notes. On these occasions, my paper or my journal page or my notebook is covered in little flapping leaflets. Each with a gem of a message sent just to me, just then. Don’t want to lose those!
But I just found out something cool. The inventor of sticky (aka post-it) notes, Arthur Fry, conceived of them when he needed a book mark in his hymnal. Fry sang in his church choir, and he used slips of paper to mark the pages of his work book. When the book was opened, the makeshift bookmarks often moved around or fell out altogether. So a small paper with adhesive that stuck, but not permanently, was perfect to solve the problem. Read more here.
What a cool notion: temporary adhesion to the page God wants you to sing. Make a note. Use it. Remove and press on.
I have to confess, I also use them to make note of the worldly things that invade when I am trying to stay focused on God. Bits that are meant to be considered later but shouldn’t be forgotten. Kind of a low tech download to storage.
Hey, there’s only so much room, and one thought at a time is challenging. When they come spinning in at warp speed, isn’t just like God to provide the technology?
Keep Calm
and
Sticky Note on
Wouldn’t you know…someone has already thought of it?Gotcha! not
011 years
I turn to write on the board and I hear it behind me.
The scampering of feet, shuffling of desks, of papers, of books.
Looking over my shoulder, nothing is amiss.
Every student in his place. Every desk in its space.
The smiles of sweetness greet me. “Yes, Dr. LeBolt?”
I shake my head in wonder. Could I have been mistaken?
I return to my writing and it begins again.
the scampering, the shuffling, but now the giggles begin.
I whirl. Gotcha!
They sit, smiling sweetly, each face at a place, hands folded, bodies erect and alert. “Yes, Dr. LeBolt?”
Am I making this up?
Gotta get more sleep. I return to my writing. There…it…is…again. I cock my head to peer over my right shoulder.
Nothing but sweet smiles. Expectant.
I draw in my breath. Turn BACK. My arm is poised to write.
Silence.
Implement touches board…(scamper)…whiiiiirrrllll!
nope…Every face. Every place. Everything perfect. I give up!
I turn back to begin again.
I am no longer exasperated. In fact, I am smiling. Can’t stop smiling.
In my best script I form the letters on the board. Slowly. Carefully. With great love and care my hand travels, connecting letter after letter to shape the question I want to ask.
Perhaps the sliding and shuffling continues. There may even be hammering and sawing. I suppose that was a great explosion off in the distance.
I do not know. I do not turn back. I keep on.
God, is that you? I write.
Then, I keep writing. Why do I seek to catch God in the act of constructing my life?
What if we’re dying and we don’t even know it?
0It’s just an introductory song to get us going on a Sunday morning. High energy.
I was broken and you healed me…
I was dying and you gave me life,
Yeah, that ole God is always helping us out in our troubles. It was just killing me, we say. I was dying out there, we say. I was at the end of my rope, we say. We are masters at hyperbole. Scary though, how overstatement can dull reality. People who are really broken and truly near death are not so casual. When we’re out of options, God isn’t. That’s the moment when “I was dying and you gave me life” has meaning. If you’ve had one of those moments, you know it.
But I’m looking around at all sorts of people who are dying. Not just the we’re-all-gonna-die some-day dying, but people who are absolutely gasping for air in their daily lives. They are swimming as fast as they can. Running as far as they’re able. Applying brain power and will power. Exerting all the force they can muster. They’re breathing hard, but they’re getting life done, by golly.
The scary thing is, they don’t know they’re dying. They think this is a stage or a season or a diligence that needs doing. Giving up this way of life is unthinkable. That would just kill them.
But God through Jesus says there’s life after death. And I don’t think He just has the eternal in mind. The death He’s referring to may feel very much like what we call life. When we give it up, that is invite in all the options, consider possibilities that “would just kill us” to engage, the new is right there.
The only sure death is to stick with what’s killing us. And that truth is obscured by the advice darkness gives to “just keep your heads down and your nose to the grindstone.” Darkness knows that looking up and giving up invites in the breeze of new.
Hey, God may not mean for us to stop doing what we’re doing. He may just be trying to get our attention. “Lookie! You’re alive after all!” Now, let’s get this moving in my direction.
And that’s just the beginning.
Forward vs Foreword
0Got a spelling lesson today. I’d never realized that the front matter of a book, the introductory pitch, written by some famous or inspirational person to get you to read what’s coming, is not a “forward” but a “foreword.” It’s not a ready-set-go. It’s a word that goes before. A preparation for what’s coming.
It hit me in the face when the woman who kindly said she would write the foreword for the book I have written sent me a first draft….before reading the book. She’s like that. A get-it-done type. She played forward (leading the attack on the other team’s goal) on the soccer field, a star striker throughout her high school, college and pro careers. Now she has many years under her belt at the helm of a nearby college soccer program. She is still a forward. (She even drives that way, but let’s not discuss that.)
I had thought these were the same word. They are not. I have misunderstood my assignment. God isn’t asking me to drive harder and harder or faster and faster to accumulate billable hours, to be effective and efficient, to seek opportunity and close every deal on the run. Not so fast!
He didn’t mean for me to be forward; He meant
“I am your foreword. I am the word spoken before your life: the “fore” “word.” And because I know you, your talents, your work, your heart, the demands of your life, I can speak authoritatively about the story you are. I can invite people to read you.”
Go figure. A simple little difference in spelling: forward/foreword. How many times have I read it, yet never noticed? Not until I thought about what someone might say did it even get my attention. It is funny, the order we humans do things: write the book, then write the foreword.
But what a heavenly notion…that after God knew all there was about me, He wrote-spoke the front matter to my life, my fore-word. I thought it was just a direction and a shove…forward! Onward! Full speed ahead! Instead, it was God saying what He already knew about my life. Here world, read this. You’re gonna love it!
What a great writing assignment that would be: “write the foreword for your own life in 500 words or less.” Check your work. Spelling counts. Go!