HE ALONE--MY ROCK

"Saddlerock"--the most famous rock above my valley.
It reminds me of the desolate terrain where David hid.

The contemporary worship song “In Christ Alone” has been been wafting through my mind lately. Here's an online presentation to bring it to mind, if you're not familiar with it: Bing Videos* (full link below).

The most recent “come-to-mind” occasion surfaced as I read Psalm 62, which Bible scholars think may have been related to David's unsought “alone” time in the desert during his son Absalom's attempt to usurp the throne.

My soul finds rest in God alone, My salvation comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; He is my fortress, I will never be shaken.(vv. 1-2)

The next verses talk about enemies who want to topple a man. Surely this fit the situation of a king being pushed from his throne. But David, in his “aloneness,” found the holy aspect of “alone” in making God alone his hope:

Find rest O my soul, in God alone; my hope is from him, He alone is my rock and my salvation, He is my mighty rock, my refuge, I trust in him at all times, O people; Pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge. (vv. 5-8)

Quiz time: go through this psalm and mark every time the words “only” and “alone” are mentioned. There are times when worship communities or “small groups”--as good as they are in spiritual nurture--aren't enough to get us close to God's heart. He often speaks in the quiet, silent pauses. Surely that was the case of the Old Testament prophet Elijah, who ran for his life from a treacherous royal couple, ending up in a desolate place. There, alone, cut off from human contact, he waited for God's next nudge. And waited. Finally came that holy moment, after a mysterious spiritual pause in ministry, when God revealed the prophet's next task (1 Kings 16-17).

This Bible story grips me, because I'm prone to believe the cliché, “If it's supposed to be, it's up to me.” But when I shift the emphasis to “in Christ alone,” I learn to seek His path. I learn God is in the pauses as well as the actions. Instead of charging down an unknown path, I go forward carefully, keeping my eyes on Him, “the Author and Perfecter of Faith.”

Jesus was never in a hurry. He included solitude and silence—rest in the Father--in His daily rhythms. For get-it-done personalities like mine, such reminders are important—no, more than that, absolutely necessary—to keep focused on His unfolding will for my life.

Video link: 

https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=%22In+thee+alone%22%2Bhymn&mid=537489326122024E7DC5537489326122024E7DC5&FORM=VIRE

HEAVENLY-MINDED OR EARTHLY GOOD?

Hope fills my prayers. Hope... that the situations and people that I pray for will find transformation in Jesus Christ. Hope and Biblical assurance.... that God hears those prayers with unimaginable compassion for the people, places and problems that came to this planet He created.

I think C.S. Lewis captured this well—and as I re-read his words, I'm reminded that he made a 180-degree turn from atheism to faith in God. He wrote in Mere Christianity:

“Hope is one of the theological virtues. This means that a continual looking forward to the eternal world is not (as some modern people think) a form of escapism or wishful thinking, but one of the things a Christian is meant to do. It does not mean that we are to leave the present world as it is.

“If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next. Apostles themselves, who set on foot the conversion of the Roman Empire, the great men who built up the Middle Ages, the English Evangelicals who abolished the Slave Trade, all left their mark on Earth, precisely because their minds were occupied with Heaven. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this.”

The apostle Paul was so burdened about people becoming Christ-followers that he imagined himself as miserable as a woman in labor. (Not that he had personal experience in that!) He wrote the church in Galatia, “My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you” (Galatians 4:9).

He didn't live Sunday-to-Sunday. He lived today-to-promised-eternity and heavenly citizenship, eagerly waiting for Jesus, “who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like His glorious body” (Phil 3:21).

Writing in old, old age, reflecting on what he'd learned personally from Jesus, the apostle John wrote: “Now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2).

With those words, he thumbed in time to the last pages of history. What encouragement to know the outcome!

I've heard of people who like to start a mystery or who-done-it book, but take a peek at the last chapter to see how it will turn out. That takes the mental exercise out of it! But we don't have to wonder about the incidents and characters, the clue-plants and distractions that are parcel to who-done-its. We know already Who-done-it! The sinless One who visited planet earth, taught, suffered, died, rose, returned to the Father...and is coming again!

Prime-pickin'

This photo bothers me! Taken in a farming area about thirty miles from our home, it shows how the quest for the “perfect” (and prime-market-price) apple means that apples that don’t measure up are simply dropped to the ground to rot.  Such waste!  You have to understand that my husband and I absorbed the Depression-era thriftiness of our parents.  Gleaning goes along with habits like fixing-up, shopping sales, couponing,  checking second-hand sources (thrift stores, want ads, yard sales),  and making-do with less.

I thought of all the applesauce those rejected apples could make! Or apple desserts. Apple juice.  Apple leather.  But complete use of food resources doesn’t happen.

Could there be a spiritual lesson here?  I quickly rejected the idea that God only takes the cream of the crop, so to say, to join Him in Heaven.  Two verses verify His desire for us, His created beings:

This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth (1 Tim. 2:3-4).

The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance (2 Pet. 3:9).

Unlike those “prime-pickers,” God doesn’t look for perfection to in order to bring us into His family. As Jesus hung in agony on the cross, He accepted the confession of a filthy, miserable thief who hung on the cross next to Him.  He encountered an immoral woman at a Samaritan well and offered her Living Water, Himself, which she eagerly accepted. But, Jesus had harsh words for the Pharisees, who counted on pedigree and keeping long lists of religious rules for so-called favor with God.

I’m sorry, but I have a hard time with people who claim, “I prayed the salvation prayer in Miss Percival’s first grade Sunday school,” but they aren't living out that faith.  Twenty-some or more years later they’re like apple saplings that withered up and never produced fruit.  The apostle Paul explained the need of true change, too:

 At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived, and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures.  We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we have done [remember the phony faith of the Pharisees!] but because of his mercy.(Titus 3:3-5a,comment added)

What does this look like in real life? Paul’s list (Titus 3:1-2) included:

*Subject to rulers and authorities

*Obedient
*Ready to do whatever is good
*Slandering no one
*Peaceable and considerate
*Showing true humility toward men (and women)

If such qualities were apples, they’d go in the “prime market” picking bag right away! 

 P.S. Need another standard for prime-market spiritual fruit?  Try Colossians 1:10-12.

Scraps

The tattooed young man giving his testimony at my church didn’t try to hide the messy details. He grew up in a dysfunctional home. Got into substance abuse. Sold drugs. Fathered a child with his girlfriend. He ended up in prison....where he found a Bible and started reading it. Ended up trusting Christ to turn his life around. Able now to say, “Jesus saved me.  I’m headed in the right direction.”  I’d rather hear that, than this, which I've also heard from a young adult: “I grew up going to church. I hate my life.  I hate my mom/dad. God hasn’t been fair to me. I pray and nothing happens. Just leave me alone.”

The first person is holding out the ragged scraps of his life, saying, “Jesus, use these as you wish.”  The second person is clutching rotted rags, unwilling to let God trim and rearrange to craft “a new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

My ministry “hobby” involves scraps of flannel or soft cotton, which I find at yard sales or thrift stores or am given. I cut them into five-inch squares, which I sew together, seven rows across and seven down.  These create a "patchwork" side to go with a one-yard piece of soft backing fabric. With batting between, the sides are joined with yarn ties at each square and stitching around the edges. Two hours later a new baby blanket emerges, destined with others for a local hospital to be distributed to babies born to needy families. In the last five years, I have sewn and given away more than 600. 

Redeemed-scraps-turned-blankets finished and delivered in July

Six hundred? Gasp. My initial “big goal” was fifty.  But when God calls you to a task, He will carry you through it until He pronounces it “done” or sees that you need to take a break (which is now my situation). So what does this have to do with the ragged scraps of a human life? It's this: God wastes nothing.  Those who come to God, sadly holding the scraps of their lives, can experience Jesus as Redeemer. He is a Master at trimming and fitting those scraps into something new, beautiful, and useful in His kingdom. It may hurt and cut and prick at times, but it's all part of His master pattern.  For unique beauty, and service for Him.