Word Therapy

Getting Dirty in All the Right Ways

The book of Amos is a strong section of scripture that has been making me think.

 

This book is set during a time when Israel was, yet again, engaged in a way of living that did not properly honor the One true God who had shown himself good and worthy of their undefiled worship. 

God calls Amos, a shepherd and farmer to be a prophetic voice during this time period. 

In Chapter 7, Amaziah, the priest of Bethel (a very important holy man at a very significant worship site), gets pretty frustrated with Amos and what he is saying.

 

Amos has been called to speak out against the spiritual malpractice that was happening amongst the people of God, and over and over in this book he is calling out the oppression of the poor and marginalized, the miscarriage of justice, and the false worship masquerading under a banner of nationalistic, wealth-drunk power that has taken over the people of God.

 

Check out this dialogue between Amaziah and Amos in verses 10-17:

 

Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent a message to Jeroboam king of Israel.  “Amos is raising a conspiracy against you in the very heart of Israel. The land cannot hear all his words. For this is what Amos is saying:

“Jeroboam will die by the sword,

And Israel will surely go into exile,

Away from their native land”

 

Then Amaziah said to Amos, “Get out, you seer! Go back to the land of Judah. Earn your bread there and do your prophesying there. Don’t prophesy anymore at Bethel, because this is the king’s sanctuary and the temple of the kingdom”

Amos answered Amaziah, “I was neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore fig trees. But the LORD took me from tending the flock and said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’ Now then, hear the word of the LORD.

You say,

‘Do not prophesy against Israel,

And stop preaching against the descendants of Isaac’

“Therefore this is what the LORD says:

“Your wife will become a prostitute in the city,

And your sons and daughters will fall by the sword.

Your land will be measured and divided up,

And you yourself will die in a pagan country.

And Israel will surely go into exile,

Away from their native land”

 

 

What is happening here? 

 

First of all, Amos is dear to my heart as a man who unassumingly was just living his life as an agrarian guy. Tending sheep and trees. There is something so foundational about understanding the heart of God that can come from time spent working the ground of the natural world that He has created. 

 

I think of other examples in scripture of folks who were just doing their “regular” jobs and God interrupted their plans and called them into something He was doing. Moses, Rahab, The Samaritan woman.

 

Lesson: Don’t discount the mundane or “non-spiritual” work you are engaged in, because very often, this is the training ground for a watershed moment in your life when God will put his finger on you and call you to do something that feels outside of your pay grade. Trust that the spiritual formation happening in your everyday faithfulness to tend the corner of the earth you’ve been entrusted with, is working in often imperceptible ways to prepare you for things you cannot imagine coming down the pike.

 

 

We would be remiss if we didn’t pay attention to WHY God is so frustrated in this book, and thus why He has called Amos to speak out. While we are talking about this, it’s also important to notice a word that sets the tone for chapter 5: Lament. This is not a self-righteous tirade, rather its a cry from the guts about the spirit-level sadness and anguish brought about by the sinfulness of humanity.

 

In Chapter 5, Amos outlines several things that have brought Israel into this place of judgment, and they fall into 2 buckets:

 

• Injustice

 

• False Worship

 

 

Injustice

The injustices named are many, but they are primarily concerned with economic manipulation that upholds some while leaving others high and dry. Making money and providing for your needs is not bad; but God has something to say about it when we do so at the expense of someone else’s ability to live and flourish. In the Kingdom of God, throughout scripture, we see over and over that God has an expectation that it’s incumbent upon those of us who have much, to be concerned with the plight of those who have little.

 

Justice in the legal system is also highlighted here: “There are those who oppress the innocent and take bribes and deprive the poor of justice in the courts. Therefore the prudent keep quiet in such times, for the times are evil.”

 

At first, this verse threw me for a loop. Is God saying that we should be quiet when the “times are evil”? No, I don’t think so. I think this verse is descriptive of what was occurring, rather than prescriptive as a mandate for all time. This society had gotten so far from being able to discern and deliver justice, that people had simply stopped contending for it because it was a lost cause.

 

Lesson: Speak up for what’s right in order that those who cannot speak for themselves are not left without an advocate because everything is so far gone down the road of unrighteousness. 

 

False Worship

“I hate, I despise your religious festivals; your assemblies are a stench to me. 

Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them.

Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them.

Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps.

But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!

 

Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the wilderness, people of Israel?

You have lifted up the shrine of your king, the pedestal of your idols, the star of your god—which you made for yourselves.

Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Damascus,” says the LORD, whose name is God Almighty.

 

This is a tough section to read. It is not very encouraging. But one thing I’ve learned, is that if we want to move forward in hope, we have to first reckon with what is wrong. There’s this tendency toward toxic positivity and spiritual bypassing that can often lead us to only look forward in an attempt to move on and disengage from negativity. This attitude has certainly crept into the church.

 

With that in mind, I think there are some parallels between the people of Israel and the Church of our day (at least in America).

We push forward with worship services that are crafted in the image of the gods we’ve built. I know I’ve often wanted a worship service that scratches my itch for more knowledge, some kind of emotional experience, or at a minimum, a comfortable environment that makes going to church on Sunday an easy choice amidst a plethora of other options. 

 

I think it’s easy to attempt to worship God in a way that is all about us; and the real problem in Amos 5 is that, when we do that, we are turning a blind eye to the injustices that are rampant in the lives of people God loves all around us.

 

And if you’ve read this far, prepare to be offended;

The line “You have lifted up the shrine of your king” brings to mind this article that denotes just how far we’ve fallen as the church in our mixing of nationalism, political idolatry, and church.

 

I’m not a prophet, I don’t know how this plays out, but something is wrong with this picture.

 

I just wonder, if Jesus were to show up in the flesh to many of our churches, what would he make of our obsession with political power, the wedding of MAGA to the faith that was once for all entrusted to God’s holy people?

 

It’s not too late to course correct, as the book of Amos ends with a promise. God’s people will continue to be stubborn and go their own way in the streams of injustice and false worship, but God promises to purify them and then “They will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them. They will plant vineyards and drink their wine; they will make gardens and eat their fruit. I will plant Israel in their own land, never again to be uprooted from the land I have given them”-Amos 9: 14-15

 

Lesson: We get to choose if we will forsake our idols and be planted by the Lord

 

It’s not easy. I am the WORST at finding myself chasing idols.

 

“Man's nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols.”― John Calvin

 

It’s only by a lifestyle of ongoing confession and repentance (being willing to have my mind changed) that I can have any hope of moving forward in the life that God desires for me, a part of his Church. Our churches at large, can embrace truth, lament, confession, and repentance as we seek to be planted by the Lord in the promised land described by Farmer & Prophet Amos. 

 

I’m ready for digging.

Imposter Syndrome: The Sinister Sidekick of Affirmation Addiction & Perfectionism

My friend and I have this thing.  It’s a phrase I swear my husband coined somewhere around the year 2003 when he first noticed it in me, but maybe it’s not original to him.  Maybe you have it too. It’s called Imposter Syndrome.

 

You see, for years, I’ve labored under the illusion that I’m some sort of elaborate, unwitting trickster.  I feel like every time I display any level of competency at anything, I’m completely bamboozling whomever seems to be showing confidence in me.  It showed up first when I was in nursing school.  I was able to retain what I was learning fairly easily, so I didn’t have to put in the endless hours of study that many of my peers did.  So when I received good grades, and was reviewed by my instructors and nurses mentoring me, I was floored when they said that I showed good prioritization skills, competency, and generally a good grasp on what nursing requires. I thought I had performed well enough, on the spot, to trick them into thinking I knew what I was doing. I kept waiting for they day that I would forget everything I knew and be exposed for the fraud that I surely was.

Thankfully for my patients, as I look back, I see that I wasn’t actually incompetent, rather I was experiencing a tremendous amount of self-doubt as a result of perfectionism and unrealistic expectations.

 

Perfectionism can show up so many different ways.  Maybe you’re a neat freak (let me tell you, I WISH SO BAD that’s how my perfectionism presented itself, but alas, no. My house and car will quickly reveal that to you).  Maybe perfectionism shows up in your self-talk.  You never feel good enough.  You never do enough. You fail way more than her. You really should get some self discipline and lose that extra weight.  You really should meal plan better.  Maybe it shows up in your motherhood?  Excessively researching EVERY method, parenting style, opinion, latest news about every decision you have to make for your child.  Exhausting. I did that, and I almost drove myself crazy. I felt like the weight of the entirety of my child’s future was on my shoulders as I struggled to choose the best vaccination schedule, sleep training method, discipline methods, the list goes on.

 

Now that I’ve gotten to know myself better (thank you 30s, great friends, prayer buddies, and an excellent therapist!) I am starting to realize that all this striving for perfection, striving to make the best decisions, perform at the highest level all the time, comes from this deep-seated craving for other peoples’ approval.  I’m not sure when this started or why I seem to need it so bad.

 

The problems with this approval addiction are multi-faceted, but I want to hone in on one: Imposter Syndrome. Like I mentioned before, I see this going back in me a long time.  I think as we go through childhood, being accepted by peers, receiving the praise of teachers and parents, being spotlighted for anything where we stand out, feels good yes?

 

But then, as we move through life into adulthood this can create massive problems.  If our self-worth starts to ride on what other people think of us, if our major life decisions are weighed on the scales of community or familial approval, we become slaves to affirmation in a way that will handicap forward progress in the way we are bent toward.  

 

So then we run around, pursuing this and that, looking for people to tell us that we are on the right track, being successful.  And as we do that, we know that we aren’t being true to our most deep desires.  Even if we are doing something we feel truly called to, our need for a pat on the back to affirm our competency undermines our ability to self-evaluate and see that yes, we are in fact doing this thing well.

We build our house upon what others tell us in their performance reviews of us.  We don’t have the clear-headedness that allows us to look at what we are working toward, see that we’ve given solid effort and maybe even had good results, and then feel satisfied. Rather, we fret about whether it’s “good enough” and wait desperately for someone to come along and say that we’ve succeeded, whether that’s through an award, a string of compliments, a review at work, or, in our 21st century context, an increase in Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook followers.

 

Meanwhile we drive ourselves to places of stress and anxiety that God never envisioned for us when he built these gifts into us.  If we could only see the way He smiles over us when we walk in our callings.  I guarantee that then we wouldn’t need the fleeting comments of others to continue propping us up.

 

So, sing your songs because you love to sing. Write your words because you have something to say. Pursue that degree because you feel that the world has a need and you have a specific way you’ve been called to meet it.  Start that non-profit that feels inconsequential now but has the potential to shake up your corner of the globe. 

 

Don’t let doubt and perfection and feeling like you’re a fraud stop you for one more day from doing the thing that has been burning in some corner of your heart.

Bigger Than Fear

Fear. Worry. Anxiety. Or, the more upwardly mobile, socially acceptable forms of these things: Stress.  Catastrophic Thinking, as my counselor calls it; projecting the worst case scenario onto any of your own future circumstances, reassuring yourself that it’s going to be bad-really bad- and there’s never going to be enough time, enough energy, enough resources, enough money, to meet the crushing demands.

 

Our society seems to thrive on fear.  We talk of “healthy fear”.  As in, I want to give my kids a healthy fear of traffic.  This is absolutely valid, and I speak as an experienced mother of a boy who seemed to want to meet a car grill-to-face for the first five years of life.

 

But what about the kind of fear that becomes unhealthy? The kind that stems from a deep place of wanting to control all of the external circumstances that are within our reach?  This kind of fear shows up in all kinds of ways.

 

It manifests it’s ugliness in our relationships.  If I fear losing control of my sought-after orderly environment, I sacrifice time spent with people in order to clean, re-organize, and keep things exactly as I feel I need them, in order to have inner peace.  Or worse, I become angry and mean, bossing everyone around in order to conform them to my agenda that will deliver my result of a well-ordered environment.

 

It can manifest itself in how we view people who are different than us.  If “they” have a reputation for having a bad seed among them, then I can’t let any of “them” close to me in case they threaten my way of life or my safety.  Nevermind the fact that at any given time I could be living next door to a serial killer or a child-pornographer or a lying thief, all of whom appear to share my way of life, and never be the wiser.  “Those other people” have a much higher likelihood of bringing harm to me than the people who look like me, talk like me, and live like me.  So I let fear determine my response to “them”.  Build a wall, register the wrongly-religious, screen by race, pretend I don’t see them and walk right past to my group of friends who validate my boxed-in existence.

 

The last thing I read before going to bed last night was about this horrible shooting in the airport at Fort Lauderdale.  Most of the victims were on their way to various vacations, and they looked like they could be my parents or grandparents.  So far there has been no motive, no cause identified.  This leaves us feeling frantic doesn’t it? At least if there is a motive we can punish and try to prevent the same sick motive from grabbing a gun in the future.  But if there’s nothing? We are left unknowing.  Always wondering where and when the next random killer might pop up. Will it happen on my next trip? Maybe when I’m at the mall with my kids?  Maybe when we are at a well-attended event or festival?

 

There is no worldly antidote for this kind of fear. There are not enough preventions, not enough legislation, not enough mental health care, not enough safe-guards.

So if we can’t protect ourselves from terror and tragedy, what do we do?  Hunker down? Buy more guns? Medicate the anxiety away?  Attempt a national purge of anyone and anything that may threaten?

 

Or what if we all come to terms with the fact that we were never created to live in crippling fear?  We have a good God who sees that our world is broken, and for a time is being ravaged by evil, but he offers a way through it all, even in the midst of the most crazy, terrifying things happening. And make no mistake, someday he will abolish all evil. He is patiently waiting though now, for all who would turn from their own path and come to Him.

 

Whether or not we like to think about it, we all have a shelf life.  Most of us would like to exit earth in our sleep, in old age, as painless as possible, but we don’t have that as a guarantee.   The thought of suffering or dying in a scary way is very disturbing to me.  That’s why when I read this psalm this morning I was so thankful for the reminder that, no matter what happens, death really can’t even touch me.  Fear has no hold of me.  In the midst of this very unsafe world, I’m actually 100% safe.

 

Surely the righteous will never be shaken;

    they will be remembered forever.

 

They will have no fear of bad news;

    their hearts are steadfast, trusting in the Lord.

 

Their hearts are secure, they will have no fear;

    in the end they will look in triumph on their foes.

 

They have freely scattered their gifts to the poor,

    their righteousness endures forever;

    their horn will be lifted high in honor.

 

The wicked will see and be vexed,

    they will gnash their teeth and waste away;

    the longings of the wicked will come to nothing.

 

Psalm 112: 6-10 (emphasis mine)

Changing it Up

Hi friends.

Instead of writing my daily grantidotes, I'm going to take you over to this great site that I contribute to called Seasoned with Salt. One of my posts is up today, and I hope you'll take a minute to read it to hear my thoughts on our often confusing, tragic world, and how we can have hope.

Stay awhile and check out some of the other posts from the other writers! There are so many great things to read.  Have a warm, cozy evening, and if you're geographically near to me, then bundle up because tomorrow's nighttime low is a whopping TWO degrees!!

The Sustaining Promise of Hope

 

Grantidotes Day 11

Day 11 in my Advent Gratitude Challenge

 

You guys, I’m telling you, this thing about looking for the things to be thankful for seems to be really working.  I started this whole challenge because I recognized that I had developed an attitude that was dominated more and more by complaining and discontent.  Since I’ve been intentionally looking for and pondering what exactly my specific 3 things of thanks will be each day, I have noticed a huge shift in my overall mood.

 

For starters, I seem to be more prone to crying over just about anything good or feels-y.

 

So my #1 for tonight is our Rooted celebration and all that it entailed.

 

Tonight we had dinner at our church with about 300 other people, as a celebration of the culmination of a 10 week group experience we have been a part of called Rooted.  The Rooted experience aims to connect individuals to God, to the church, and to their purpose.

 

At one point in the evening all of our church pastors were on the stage to read something to us.  I was overwhelmed with gratitude looking at all of them.  They all have such distinct, important roles to play, and the hearts that they intersect with and the lives that they speak into cannot be easily quantified.  I have no doubt that marriages are still intact, parents are still giving it their best every day, and people are walking around this world differently because of the work of our team of pastors.

 

I’m so, incredibly thankful to be the beneficiary of their leadership and to be a part of such a great church, thanks to the work of these and many others.  

 

And I really love that my friend Kaye is up there bravely following her calling into pastoral ministry.  She has been a huge shaping influence in my life the past few years and I’m so thankful that God brought us together as friends.

2. 

I’m thankful we have great local shopping options. Hooked on Toys has a bazillion gift ideas for Christmas. I got all the stuff for the stockings there today, including these yo-yos.  I learned a couple of weeks ago that a friend of mine is a former professional yo-yoist ( I honestly didn’t even know that was a thing ), and he tells me these will be just fine as starter yo-yos for the boys.  I mean, if they can use them for more than one hour without getting them into complete knots that’s a good start right??

3.

I’m thankful for authors who read their own books on the Audible app.  Yesterday I used one of my subscription credits to put 1000 Gifts onto my Audible account, and I was so glad to hear Ann Voskamp’s voice begin reading it.  I have read her book before, but I’ve been wanting to read it again, and lately I’m finding myself with more time to listen than to actually sit down and look at the pages.  Enter Audible.

I sat in the parking lot of the church, before going in for our big dinner, and after I had run around town all afternoon trying to get as much shopping done as I could, and I listened to the first chapter.

I sat there and cried as she narrated a very tragic beginning to her story.  Words are so powerful. A story shapes not just the one living it, but the one hearing it second-hand. I’m thankful that we have so many formats available to us for hearing stories that bend and mold our hearts.

So what are you thankful for today? What is centering your heart around gratitude rather than stress and discontent in this busy season?

Feel free to share in the comments section below, or on Facebook or Instagram!

 

Grantidotes Days 8 & 9

A two-fer again.  Lots going on this time of year so it’s efficient to consolidate posts yes?

Days 8 & 9 of my Advent gratitude challenge.

Things have been uneventful other than the SNOW (!) but I’ve been loving looking for things all day to be thankful for.  It’s so interesting how your mind cannot park on the negatives for too long when you are fully aware that you need to write about things you appreciate in just a few hours.

 

Yesterday:

1.

White lights.  

I’m putting up way more lights than usual this year, and I’m including many strings of white lights.  Ever since I married Kevin I’ve adapted to colored lights on the tree and outside, but I’m working some white ones back in.

I’m leaving them up until late February for two reasons.  First off, it’s totally legit per the Anglican/Lutheran/Methodist church calendar, in observance of the season of Epiphany.

Secondly, January and February are rough for me, as I know they are for many people.  Christmas is over, the days are still short, we often get blanketed under a relentless layer of low, thick, suffocating fog, and I just struggle.  Every  year I go on the offensive, and this year, the white lights are another way I’m upping my game!  

2.

Snow.

My kids have been asking for a daily weather report for weeks now, getting their hopes high when there was even a hint of a chance of snow.  The weather finally delivered and now we have the White to our Christmas. Sledding, wet clothes and boots everywhere, bags of snow clothes packed daily for school, remembering to slow down around all those corners on our windy road, it’s all par for the course in winter here, and I’m glad we’ve finally hit that phase of the season.

3.

2nd Generation Friendship.

These two girls are the cutest ever when they play together.  They steal each others’ toys constantly, but it’s still adorable.  The little blondie’s mom is one of my very best friends from high school.  One of those friends who, we can go months without talking and it’s like we never missed a day.  Such history together. We’ve grown and changed so much as individuals and I love that we are still such good friends.  At one point during dinner last night, neither of our husbands were in sight and we looked around at our collective 6 kids and Rachel said “Can you even imagine us catching a glimpse of our life now, back during the dog days of summer?”. (context: dog days of summer were some of the laziest, most wonderful days ever where Rachel and I lived in her parents pool and I slept on their couch about 5 out of 7 nights of the week. We were young and carefree and had no idea that some day we would be herding 6 kids around!)

 

Today:

 

1.

The first sun after the first snow.

It’s amazing every time.  When every branch is laden with snow and the hills are all painted white and the sky turns blue and the sun lights it all up (you’d better have your sun glasses!) it’s so stunning.  It doesnt’ last long, so I always marvel at the sight.  Just an hour or two of that sun is enough to melt the south and east facing slopes back to their usual brown, but that first look of the morning is just *WOW*

2.

Psalm 23.

I love this picture that I took behind my Grandma’s house. I had it made into a canvas and I ordered this little wooden sign to go near it.  Most days I just breeze right by it, but sometimes I pause long enough to see the words, see the scene, and remember that God cares so deeply for us and wants to bring us to places of peace and rest.  I remember that He is my protector, my vindicator, my eternal place of shelter.  That last line: Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

Forever is a long time.  Often I scurry around here acting as if everything is an emergency and I forget that we are here such a very, very short time.  When I’m reminded that I’ll be with Jesus forever, all the sudden everything relaxes a little bit.  I see people as the importance rather than my agenda or my own wants.  The dust on every surface doesn’t seem nearly as menacing and my laundry pile doesn’t mock me nearly as loud, and that strained relationship doesn’t attack my mind as much when I remember that I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

3.

This boy.

He is such a good big brother. I’m so thankful for the way that he sees people.  He has some kind of rare intuition about people and the state of their hearts.  He sometimes tells me about the kids at school who are lonely or picked on, and I love that about him. He’s reading like crazy now, and it’s just really a bittersweet thing for me to watch him go from little boy to full-on big kid.

Grantidotes Day 7

Day 7 of my challenge to myself to find three things to be grateful for this Advent season.

1.

I'm so thankful to be part of an incredible church.  It's just a group of people, but I do love them so.  It's so encouraging to have a place each week, where we go and see familiar faces, catch up with friends, hear stories of hope, check in with those we know are struggling, and most importantly, worship Jesus together.  It's really wonderful..  I'm so thankful for the freedom we enjoy here, to gather and worship without fear of violence or police involvement.

2.

I'm thankful for our local indoor market in the wintertime.  What a great place to go for lunch and looking around! We were planning to stay for Santa's helicopter arrival, but due to the wind, the helicopter was canceled.  We decided that staying for a "regular" Santa delivery (I think he ended up arriving in a fire truck) wasn't worth the wait and crowd, so the boys went to see Moana at the theater with Kevin.

3.  

I'm thankful for our Rooted group. Over the past 10 weeks we've been part of a small group, going through an experiential study together, on what it means to follow Jesus both in our own lives and as part of a larger group.  It's been great getting to know the people in our group, and this time has been very special. Tonight was our last group get together and we are going to miss our people!

 

What are you thankful for today?

Love > Fear

This month has straight up worn me out. 

When I started Write 31 days, I decided to jump in on the first day, with no game-plan, no outline, no prewritten material. I shot from the hip on making my decision and setting my topic (which I've done a fairly poor job at sticking to), and I've written straight from the gut many days, while on other days I've put stuff up that just felt rote and dry but for the sake of sticking to my guns I've tried to write something nearly every day.

This month has been full of things.

• Political turmoil
• Family transition
• New small group & an intense discipleship experience to go with it
• Trying to catch up from the summer when the kids home and I shoved everything to "later" for 3 months
• Jumping back into a bit of paid photography after a really long hiatus
• And of course trying to come up with something daily to write about here

What's on my mind today though, is the subject of love.  I am going to rip right off of my Instagram post, what I felt compelled to share after listening to my audio-bible app while I drifted in and out of a much desired nap that didn't come to fruition thanks to a toddler who is nap-striking today.

Love is on my mind today. So often my thirst for comfort, my love of being right, my quest for my will to be done in my life causes me to fall short of loving well.
Thank God that He first loved us and gently leads us ever increasingly into the path of love.
Let our love be big and our fear be gone.
•

“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 
Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 

This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

 
No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 
If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. 

Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them. This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus. 

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. We love because he first loved us. Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 
And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.”
‭‭1 John‬ ‭4:7-21‬ ‭NIV

 

What I want to talk about mostly pertains to my friends who are Christians.

You guys, we seem to forget that public dialogue is seen by anyone who wants to take a passing glance.  In the past few days, weeks, months, I've seen (and unfortunately been a part of) conversations where being right trumped being kind; where being superior trumped being humble; where being loud ruled over being gracious.

We seem to fall into one of two errors on the regular.  Either we completely slide down the slippery slope of hyper-grace to the extent that we conveniently dismiss truth for the sake of feelings, reputation, fear of offense, or understandable compassion, OR we go in the opposite direction and declare ourselves the morality police, the political party recruiters (assuming that there is ONE right way to vote if you're a Christian), or the self-appointed prophets sent by the Lord himself to publicly blast anyone we deem has fallen outside of orthodoxy.

Are we really that sure of ourselves?

I know I'm not. Just when I think I have theology nailed down in a certain area, something comes along, maybe a new understanding of context in the original Scripture, maybe a word from a preacher that shines a light on a truth that hadn't been plain to me before, and I find myself back in the tense arc of mystery and certainty. 

While we are clamoring to point fingers at who is right and who is wrong and who has the best interpretation on this issue and who has the absolute worst interpretation on that issue, we are shredding and ripping ourselves, the very Church Jesus gave his life for, to pieces.

Maybe it's because we are Americans. We are an incredibly individualistic culture and perhaps that has translated into the church. But when I read the bible, I see a lot of talk about One Body.  But then I go on Facebook and it seems like we don't believe that One Body is the goal.  To be sure, much of the time this is unintentional. In the pursuit of preserving doctrine, our way of life, our freedom, our way of doing it "right", we forget the primacy of what God requires of us.

"He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God." Micah 6:8

Of course in doing all of this we can't move away from the fact that we are to be different; set apart; holy; salt and light; sojourners.

 Beloved, I beseech you as sojourners and pilgrims, to abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul; 1 Peter 2:11

But perhaps in our quest for holiness, we should pour ourselves out in a local unit of believers, and within that, be a part of a group who can warn us when we are in error, and point us to truth when we stray.   We should of course look to the Holy Spirit in all things, and seek to obey Him as He has revealed to us the way we should go, primarily through the words of Scripture.

If we would all humbly submit to this, maybe we wouldn't feel such a tug to rush to Facebook to cut each other down and police the lives of strangers.

I don't know, I'm still figuring the whole thing out, but I just keep seeing these themes of Holiness, Love, Mercy, Grace, Justice when I read the bible.  Pride is in there quite a bit too, but there is nothing good to be said about it.

John, in his final epistles at the end of his life had much to say. He spent an extraordinary amount of time talking about love and what that looks like.  I'm going to be re-reading that one a lot in the coming days. 

 

Hope for the Next Generation

October 9th, 2016. Day 9 of the Write 31 Days Challenge.

 

Well, yesterday I ventured out onto the very fragile limb of the political tree…and now I’ve gotten that (mostly) out of my system.  

 

Today I’m back to just regular old blogging, about life, lessons learned, raising up kids, getting to know Jesus better, and what that looks like in the daily details and realities.

 

I’m trying to circle back to the theme I set out to write within when I started this 31 day writing project.  I’m trying to find the silver lining, the lessons that can be gleaned from the less than savory parts of life.

 

Tonight I’m going to focus on hope.  I’m looking back over the past couple of days, and I’m seeing a pattern.  While our country is in a complete uproar about the upcoming election, I am seeing hope that is reaching into the next generation.  

 

Yesterday, my son asked about Haiti again. We’ve been talking about Haiti so much in recent days on account of the Hurricane that swept through last week, smearing water and destruction over an already fragile island-scape of people.  I told him that the latest death toll was pushing 1000.  His eyes got big as he said “But Michael is okay right?”. Michael is the boy we sponsor in Haiti, and while initially we thought we had received word that he and his school were doing well, we found out later that his school was not one of the ones in the favorable report from the sponsorship organization.

So, we are still waiting.  Michael likes to play soccer. His favorite food is rice and beans. He dreams of becoming an artist someday.  He is the same age as our oldest son Milo.  Milo also loves art and was instantly inspired to follow in the footsteps of a girl from Sunday school, who created artwork and sold it, donating her proceeds to the purchase of water filters for people living in areas without access to clean water.

 

This led to Milo spending most of his day yesterday creating paintings from watercolors, and the occasional dusty, richly smudged piece done in oil pastels.  He amassed 11 or 12 pieces throughout the day, and is planning to sell them for $5 each, with 100% of the proceeds going to Haiti.  He specifically wants to give his donation toward emergency housing funding.

 

This gives me so much hope.  We are CLAMORING as a nation for hope.  We are looking to a person in an oval office to provide us with a future and a hope.  

 

I want to remind us all that we already have One who has given us a future and a hope.  Not only that, in his Divine creative love, he has wired creativity into each of us, specifically to be used to create beauty and enhance human flourishing.

 

So, when my 8 year old wants to use his Saturday to create art to raise money for children thousands of miles away who are suffering? I know that the imago Dei stamped in each of us has the creative potential to alleviate suffering and bring Jesus to this broken world, no matter who is currently seated in earthly high places.

 

This is the kind of resilient, sustaining, persevering hope that we need.  The hope of childlike faith, called out, put into action, engaged in a way that loves and serves those around us.

What's It All For Anyway?

 

October 3, 2016

Today I sat down and did something I don’t typically do. I read the actual newspaper. Not the news app on my phone, but the printed paper that gets delivered to our house. One of my favorite sections of the paper has always been the one covering major life events; births, marriages, anniversaries, deaths.

 

Today the copy I was reading (it was from Friday I think) had an exceptionally large section of obituaries.  When I was younger, I found these boring, but I realized that something has changed in me when I got tears in my eyes as I read a few of them.

 

I read about vibrant young lives, full of potential, hope, and energy.  But all the stories had a similar thread.  Those days were gone. They were over.  Each person written about had gradually faded until they were gone from this earth.

One man sounded remarkably similar to one of my sons in his early years.  And then there was a picture of him in the paper noting his death.  And the obvious hit me in a fresh new way.

 

We are all going to die.

 

100% of us.  You too.

 

If you’re like me you have the uncanny ability to spend most of your days completely NOT thinking about your own mortality. It’s uncomfortable, it’s scary, it’s something that *most* people don’t dwell on.

 

As I thought about it, it made me realize that if I could keep that truth in front of me every day, I would live a lot differently. 

 

I would linger with someone when I’m tempted to rush off.

 

I would treasure the moments that feel boring and normal, knowing that they are the real stuff of life.

 

I would worry way less about getting my to-do list done and take more walks outside or throw a football with my boys more.

 

Mostly though, I would talk a lot more about Jesus and the hope that can be found in him. It’s for everybody, but I really believe that even though we live in America where it seems like everyone has an understanding of “God” ( I mean, it’s on our money right? Doesn’t that make us a “Christian Nation” by default?), there are a whole lot of people who really haven’t encountered the God of the bible.  Not the politically expedient, pocket-God who you pull like a lever on a slot machine when you need a prayer-delivery of help, provision, or answers.  No, I mean the God who loves us all so much that He made a way for every single person on the planet to be in relationship with Him and experience forgiveness and peace.  Turning from a life of rebellion, pride and autonomy, to one of following, humility, and peaceful dependence.

 

That’s what I would give my life for every day if I had the very real reality of death in the forefront of my mind.

 

I might need to read those obituaries more often.

 

Harvest; Then & Now

The following is a post I wrote 3 years ago after a very successful pear harvest.  This year we did not have as successful of a harvest, picking the lowest volume on our Anjous that we have in 10 years here.  My feelings about God's hand in all of it have not changed.  It was good to look back and read this and remember Who is in charge.

Earlier this morning I was reading and came across this in Deuteronomy, and it confirmed my desire to re-post this old blog post:

"When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you. Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you on this day. Otherwise when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery." Deuteronomy 8: 10-14

Never forget where everything comes from.

 

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This morning I “randomly” felt like reading the book of Daniel.  I have probably only read it once, and don’t consider myself really familiar with this particular book.

As I read it, I found that it was not random at all.  The past couple days, as we have completed pear harvest, I have been reminded of God’s sovereignty and continually called back to humility, as I ponder how well this year went.  It’s easy to slip into a mindset of patting each other on the back for adhering to the best farming practices, investing and spending money wisely, thinking ahead with careful forethought about the coming years, and very quickly we elevate our role in this whole deal.

Did we create the trees? Did we determine the weather patterns? Did we craft the scientific minds who labor to produce food safe treatments to rid the crops of pests? 

No. No. & No.

Many people suffered loss to hail.  We did not.  Many people suffered damage from wind.  We did not.  We drove past many orchards infested with mites. Ours was not.  Many people struggled, and continue to struggle, to find an adequate labor force to pick their fruit.  We had a lean crew for 5 days and then, bam- all the help we needed showed up right at our front door.

It turned out to be the 2^nd largest crop we’ve ever had.   

Not one detail of the year escaped His sovereign hand.  Daniel 4:35 says: ‘ He does as he pleases with the powers of heaven and the peoples of the earth. No one can hold back his hand or say to him: “What have you done?” ‘  

When I ponder these attributes of God, He makes me nervous.  It’s easy to read those things and think of Him as some cruel dictator who runs us all around like puppets on a string.

However, that could not be further from the truth.  His mercy is spread across the pages of Scripture.  Even in the Old Testament, where God often has the reputation of being unkind, unmerciful, and pretty detached from humankind.  

But, as I read the first part of Daniel, and the story of King Nebuchadnezzar, it was very evident that God is not lacking mercy.  King Nebuchadnezzar was an idolatrous king who spurned the one true God.  At one point he ordered three men to be thrown into a fiery furnace because they did not worship the giant golden statue that he had cast of his own image.  They remained faithful to the one true God.  Those guys were saved from the flames, even though they were thrown into them full on, and the guys that had to throw them down into the furnace died because the heat was raging.  Nebuchadnezzar even SAW 4 men, not 3, walking around in the midst of the flames of the furnace.  The fourth was described by Nebuchadnezzar as looking like a “son of the gods”.  He was convinced after they emerged alive from the flames, that the God they worshipped must be the true God, and even declared a decree that no one could speak against this God.  However, he himself still did not bend his knee to this “Most High God” in worship and submission.

 

Maybe God would be done trying to get to Nebuchadnezzar after that?  Wouldn’t your patience have run out?  You just gave the guy an OBVIOUS sign.

But no.  The God of the Universe, in his mercy, allows King Nebuchadnezzar to go as crazy as a wild animal (literally), have his Kingdom removed from him, and live in the woods in complete insanity.  Immediately before Nebuchadnezzar is sent on his mental health exile, he is walking around on the roof of his royal palace, overlooking Babylon and congratulating himself for the empire he’s built.  In his words he built by his “mighty power and for the glory of my majesty”.  That’s when God took him out. Proverbs 16:18 says “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall”.

The real clincher here, is that King Nebuchadnezzar actually knew this was coming if he didn’t repent and worship God.  He had a dream that mapped all of this out for him, brought in an interpreter of dreams named Daniel, and knew EXACTLY what he was in for if he didn’t get off of his self-appointed throne.  He persisted in his ways.

At the end of his time spent living in the woods acting like an animal, his sanity is given back to him.  King Nebuchadnezzar says this: “Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise and exalt and glorify the King of heaven, because everything he does is right and all his ways are just.  And those who walk in pride, he is able to humble”. (emphasis mine)

 

God will give us ample opportunity to acknowledge him, worship him, and glorify him.  It’s not that we have a lack of opportunity.  We are just prone to worship ourselves instead.  We want all the power, all the glory, all the authority over our own lives.  In America we call this success, autonomy, choice, etc.  And in most cases this pursuit of our self and our glory is highly esteemed.  It’s a path to despair and ruin, no matter how fantastic those fleeting moments of glory and fame feel.

The good news is, we have a patient God who gives us so many chances to turn and acknowledge Him, and glorify Him as the provider of everything on this planet, and every breath in our lungs.  You just read that sentence because God literally gave you that last breath.  He could take your life at any second.  The fact that you’re reading right this moment is evidence of His mercy toward you.

God’s existence and glorification are not contingent upon our intellectual assessment of whether or not He is real, or if He deserves to be worshipped.  He is on the throne either way.  God does not need us to praise Him.  In Luke chapter 19 verse 40, Jesus responds to some Pharisees who want Him to silence his disciples for praising Him with reckless abandon.  Jesus’ response? “I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”  It is our privilege to be invited into a relationship with God, not the other way around.

How do we turn and worship Him? How do we even encounter the presence of an eternal, Holy God?  The cross.  Our debt of sin, self righteousness, and all-out rebellion was atoned for at the Cross by the God-man, Jesus Christ, who never sinned. He sacrificed his perfect life, once, for ALL people.  No one is excluded.  The only exclusion is for those who will not humbly receive.

All of this came from me thinking about pear harvest?  Yes.  Because I am the first in line to want to take the credit that God is due.  It’s a continual journey that I’m on, to recognize that I’m not the one running the show here.

Whether or not we have a fantastic crop, or if we get completely wiped out by hail, God is good.  His plans are perfect.  He is in control of it all, and he simply asks for our trust, and that we would keep our eyes fixed on the eternal rather than the temporal.  Because when we are able to do that (though it’s incredibly difficult and I struggle with it all the time), things like fame, glory, wealth, and even comfort, seem like not that big of a deal.

 

So now is the test.  The pears are off of the tree, if the market is steady this year, we stand to receive a good return.   Will we use the returns to make much of ourselves?  Or will we use the returns to seek God and see what He would have us do.  There is a whole planet full of people he loves.  I can’t imagine that he’s given us so much, just for us to use on ourselves.  

Oh God let us be faithful in this.  The temptation for “more” is ever-present, and oh so subtle.

All the Glory to the loving, eternal, sovereign, creator God of the Universe.