For crying in the sink, Part 2

“Oh, for crying in the sink!”  Though my dad’s been gone nearly forty years (he would have been 101 this year) I can still almost hear his “sinking” expression of frustration when doing home repairs, especially on the family washer and dryer. Never from him did I hear cursing, forms of "hell" or crude derivatives of deity terms that amounted to taking the Lord's name in vain. He was different from many of his era.

Sadly, today I hear foul language in common conversation far too much.  Even from the church pulpit I've heard people use slang terms incorporating God's Name (think: OMG and its relatives). I cringe to hear it.

As for Dad's silly saying, I grew up assuming it went with the image of a frustrated, bawling person leaning over the bathroom sink while copious tears went down the drain. Then recently, wondering if I might be wrong, I researched both library and internet sources for possible origins. One source thought it might be a modified oath, vaguely changing the words “Christ’s” and “sake.” But swearing and taking the Lord’s name in vain just weren’t in my dad’s spiritual DNA.

Still, it’s interesting to me that a blog I wrote about the phrase (July 17, 2010) became the fourth most frequently accessed entry in the eight years I’ve written this column. If the readers were searching for origins of idioms, I’m afraid they didn’t find an answer, as that blog discussed the different types of human tears.

Sometimes I wonder: do we make too much fun of tears? When I read psalms and other Old Testament passages, I keep running across leaders of those times crying a lot.

 “All day long I flood my bed with weeping and drench my couch with tears.” (David, Psalm 6:6)

“Hear my prayer, O Lord, listen to my cry for help; be not deaf to my weeping.” (David, Psalm 39:12)

“My tears have been my food day and night.”(“Sons of Korah,” Psalm 42:3)

Jeremiah and Lamentations drip copiously as the author weeps over his nation’s poor choices,

These folks weren’t crying in the sink.  They were crying before God.
Sometimes I do that, too. I am so bewildered, hurt, frustrated or grieving that there seems no other appropriate response. But I don’t stay there.  I remember another promise:

Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him. (Psalm 126)

This psalm is subtitled “A song of ascents” and was one that pilgrims sang as they “ascended” through the hills to Jerusalem. It recalled the miraculous return of a remnant of Jews after a long captivity in Babylon. God sees our tears, but He sees beyond our tears, too.

Crying in the sink?  No--in this case, crying with the saints. And that can be a good thing.

Timely thoughts....

I first wore this watch as a freshly-minted high school graduate, having moved up from cheap watches to my first “dress watch,” a gift from my parents. I remember going to the jewelry store with my dad so he could be sure it was exactly what I wanted. That was more than fifty years ago, and when it recently stopped working, we took it to the only man in our area who works on fine watches like this.  He’s semi-retired, working out of his home, but takes to his workbench decades of expertise. We’re thankful for him!

So why talk about an old watch when Christmas is just around the corner?  Maybe because the phrase “the time came” in the Christmas story made me think twice:

While they [Joseph and Mary] were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. (Luke 2:6-7a)

When “the time came” for our daughter to have her first baby, my husband could hardly wait for the news of the birth. That call came just a day before the official “due date” (how often had I said, “Babies come when they want, not when they’re due”?).  Of course, we hurried across the state (a half-day trip) to meet little Eleanor. When I walked into the bright, welcoming “birthing suite” where she was born, I couldn’t help but think about how multiple millions of women have experienced the birth process in far less sterile and welcoming circumstances. Mary was one. I can only imagine Mary’s mother’s angst as her very pregnant daughter climbed on a lumbering donkey to make an arduous trip to Bethlehem with Joseph for the capricious “census” the Romans had ordered up. That wasn’t Mamma’s Plan A, but it was God’s Plan Perfect.

In a filthy stable, far from home, Jesus was born, and all the predictions about a Messiah’s birth collided with celestial perfection. Born of a virgin. In Bethlehem. Announced by an ecstatic praise performance by untold numbers of angels. All in God’s right timing, to a discouraged nation suffocating under Roman oppression—a pagan culture that unwittingly provided the roads and common language to help spread the message Jesus would bring. 

Jesus’ birth wasn’t the only “perfect timing” of God’s plan for us. Fast-forward three decades or so to Jesus, gathering His disciples around Him for hard teachings about the end of “time” as we know it. They were ready for the world’s mess to be cleaned up and Jesus to reign. (Things haven’t changed much!)  But He had a different message, telling them to be like servants on the alert for their master’s unexpected return home:

You also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him. (Luke 12:40)

That had to be a “scratch-your-head” comment. He stood or sat before them, delivering this strange message about a “coming back.”

Increasingly, that’s what I think about at Christmas—not the manger-infant, but the mighty, invincible God who says He will return to this planet for a final judging and reward time that will blow our minds apart.  A new heavens and a new earth. New purpose, new roles, new relationships. Purity restored.

In the meantime, I wind my repaired watch every morning, to keep the day's seconds and minutes ticking along.  I try to remember: Christ's second coming could be today. Am I ready?  "Be patient and stand firm," James, the Lord's earthly brother, wrote, "because the Lord's coming is near" (James 3:9). Nearer now, most certainly, than when he wrote!

River of delights

Over the years, probably millions of photos have been snapped at this spot in the Tumwater Canyon in Washington’s Cascade mountains. Even though I’ve taken several of my own, every time this view communicates something to me in a different, worshipful way. Just days before, three dear older friends died. This being autumn, the season of dying, the brilliance of dying leaves and the shush of the waterfall came together to remind me of the cycle of life and the plan of God in all.

A few days later, this river scene returned in my memory as I read Psalm 36:

They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights.  For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light. (Psalm 36:8-9)

The river of delights.”  “The fountain of life.”  “Light.” All these gifts of knowing God are ours, revealed in God’s creation and articulated in scriptures. And the Psalms articulate them so well.

Do we prize them as we should?

In a collection of essays compiled by Judith Couchman, titled One Holy Passion (Waterbrook, 1998) there is an amazing story told by Anne Wilcox about a dissident Soviet Jew who sought to leave Russia for freedom in Israel. His wife was able to leave, but he was detained and finally imprisoned. Through long years of Russian prisons and work camps he lost all his possessions except a miniature copy of Psalms. Once, when he refused to give it to authorities, he was punished with 130 days in solitary confinement.

Twelve years after he bid goodbye to his wife, saying he’d see her soon in Jerusalem, he was allowed to leave the prison. But as he started to walk away to guards to those who’d take him to Jerusalem, the guards tried one last time to confiscate his copy of Psalms.  As Wilcox retells it, he “threw himself face down in the snow and refused to walk on to freedom without it.  Those words had kept him alive during imprisonment.  He would not go on to freedom without them” (“Words of Life, Words of Delight,” p. 67).

Are the psalms for you a “river of delights”?

Which has been meaningful to you lately?  I’ve love to hear from readers in the comments area.

Jammed up

On either side of this pile of tree debris, a mountain river danced over rocks. The conglomeration, however, had disrupted flow so much that the river seriously eroded the bank close to the area’s highway. Wildfires visit this area yearly, meaning dead trees that could add to fire danger must be felled and removed. I wondered if floods and landslides had dumped some of these into the river where they locked and created a jam.

The Old Testament’s King David didn’t enjoy forests like those where I live in central Washington, but he apparently had some experience with hard rains and flash floods. In Psalm 124, he reflects on a close call with his enemies, comparing it to a violent water event:

If the Lord had not been on our side when men attacked us, they would have swallowed us alive; the flood would have engulfed us, the torrent would have swept over us, the raging waters would have swept us away. (124:2-5)

The actual crisis is left undescribed. With enemies ready to pounce and destroy, David’s warriors might have run out of food or weapons. Maybe they were considerably outnumbered. Somehow, in this impossible situation, they escaped a devastating battle. And David gave glory to God:

Our help is in the name of the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. (v. 8)

 In presenting Christ to non-believers, we rightly emphasize the love of God and His wonderful plan for our lives. But our walk as Christians requires combat boots. Satan is always about, wanting to “steal and kill and destroy” (John 10:10). For now, the stage for life is a broken earth, not a perfect heaven. We’re people “in process” under God’s wise instruction.  Paul Billheimer, whose book Don’t Waste Your Sorrows (CLC/Bethany, 1977, p. 44) considers the role of trials, observed:

If God’s net purpose in saving an individual is just to get him to heaven, He would probably take him to glory immediately.  But God wants to prepare him for rulership in an infinite universe that demands character.  Progress in sanctification, in the development of God-like character and agape love, is impossible without tribulation and chastisement.

 So yes, in our life’s journey, we’ll likely encounter stubborn, clogging logjams disguised as difficult circumstances and problem people. They’re not there to stop us, but to remind us that “our help is in the name of the LORD!”

Just passin' through

I have a weakness of wanting to photograph beautiful places—at least, according to my definition of “beautiful.”  So when my husband recently decided we needed a “date-drive” to see the fall colors, I made sure I took along my little digital camera. Sometimes a setting brings a scripture to mind and I have to ask him to stop.  So it was with this bend of a river in the Eastern Cascades of Washington state.  The prophet Isaiah didn’t have the privilege of beautiful mountain scenery, as I do, but what he wrote in chapter 43 certainly fit what I saw:

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;

And then when you pass through the rivers,

They will not sweep over you. (v. 2)

For months, I have had that verse on a sticky note on the upper ledge of my desk. Isaiah had in mind the crossing of the Red Sea as the Hebrews escaped enslavement in Egypt. You don’t need Hollywood’s technical team “holding back the water” to realize this miracle (Exodus 14) had to be of God. It was also a demonstration of God’s love for people who had lived under unbearable treatment by Egyptians. I didn’t face, as did the Hebrews, slaughter coming up behind me. But in navigating life’s unknowns and hard places, I’ve known times when I had to go forward in raw faith for God’s provision and intervention.  

This photo doesn’t show what’s around the next bend, and that’s part of His wisdom. Faith means a step-by-step dependence on God, trusting His love and protection.

After you finish reading this blog, open your Bible to beginning of Isaiah 43.  If you haven’t already, take a highlighter to the verses that speak to your heart. Don’t leave out verse 4.  Its truths about God’s character are marked in my Bible with a red asterisk:

…you are precious and honored in my sight…I love you.

This way, that way?

A rural road about thirty miles away has more kinks that a snake with a tummy ache.  Directional signs abound to warn drivers of tight curves. One is such a hairpin that it merits two signs, pointing at each other.  The right one warns drivers coming up, the left ones, drivers going down. I always smile when I see the two seemingly contradictory arrows.

I wonder if the signs might symbolize something far more serious in spiritual terms. Jesus declared that He was the one-way-only sign:  “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).

Problem is, people have switched some signs on life’s route.

Some say, “All religions lead to God.”  (Hmm, Jesus said He was the only way.)

Or, “If I’m good enough, without any of the really bad sins, God should let me into heaven.”  (Sorry, I’ve read Romans 3:23: “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God”).

I’ve heard, “I’ve figured out my own type of religion.”  Hmmm.  “There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death” (Proverbs 14:12).

 

The day I took this photo, road crews were out removing overhanging branches that could break and snarl traffic when the snows come.  Flaggers stood at appropriate distances to direct one-way traffic as just-cut debris was loaded onto trucks. I’m glad they were there! For some reason, I thought of another scriptural “go-this-way” passage—one that encouraged me to keep trusting God when life’s challenges left me confused and doubting.  Isaiah wrote it to his nation to remind the people of God’s compassion and desire that they follow only Him. The principles of God’s trustworthiness encouraged me, too:

Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, ‘This is the way; walk in it.’ (Isaiah 30:21)

Through this, God reminded me that He is my “lead car” or flagger in life’s inevitable interruptions and detours. He is the Way, the only safe way.

Like the stars forever

This is my “Daniel 12:2-3” plant. Through spring and summer, I water a pitiful collection of chopped-off stems in my front-door planter, hoping petunias will cover them over.  But by fall, those dead sticks have pushed out leaves and buds. By late October I’m treated to an explosion of color. Like stars in profusion picked up by powerful telescopes, they spill out of the planter in happy brilliance.  It’s quite a sight.

So what’s this about Daniel 12?  Here are the verses:
Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.  Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever.

The book of Daniel is a mix of biography and prophecy. What encouragement to read of a godly man who refused to compromise his faith, even as he lived under the authority of corrupt kings and civil authorities!  And what an awesome exercise to work through the predictions of world history that have happened, and will yet happen.

This particular “end-times” prophecy is the Bible’s first mention of “everlasting life,” though a few other Old Testament passages referred to a “resurrection.”  For the most part, the afterlife was given shadowy terms, like “Sheol.” But David caught a vision of something more-and-better in one of his psalms:

For you will not leave my soul in Sheol, nor will you allow Your Holy One to see corruption.  You will show me the path of life; in your presence is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.(Psalm 16:10-11)

Isaiah, whose prophecies reach far forward to a Messiah, wrote:

He will swallow up death forever,
And the Lord GOD will wipe away tears from all faces. (Isaiah 25:8)

“Fullness of joy”! My exploding bush says it in a plant-sort-of-way. “Pleasures forevermore”—oh, to anticipate it. But it’s not a given for everyone. I wonder if Daniel looked around at his fellow exiles and idolatrous neighbors and grieved for the spiritual deadness he saw—those destined for eternal “shame and everlasting contempt.”

I’d rather be on the bright side of eternal life, shining for Jesus Christ! How about you?

Golden hope

I only have to look across the street to know that the summer is past, and the winter is coming.  Half a year ago, my neighbor’s tree burst into a froth of pink to herald spring. With autumn, it’s a bristle of orange leaves, having dropped its pesky little knobs of crabapples. We’ve watched its turns of the seasons for decades. Recently, that blast of orange said something else to me:

For everything there is a season,

A time for every purpose under heaven:

A time to be born, and a time to die.

If you’re like me, you’ve heard those couplets from Ecclesiastes 3 many times. They’ve become timeworn in overuse and their context forgotten.  Kind of like First Corinthians 13, the “Love Chapter,” often recited amidst candles and flowers at weddings without a nod to its context of spiritual unruliness.

The traditional author, King Solomon, through acclaimed as “wise,” also made poor choices in amassing wives and wealth. In this passage I’m hearing a sigh that what the world calls “happiness” won’t last forever.

But the Bible doesn’t end at Ecclesiastes.  It ends at Revelation.  With Christ returning again!  And with, for those who have died, a time to be raised to eternal life.

As I write this, we’re anticipating a call to announce that grandchild number three, a little girl expected by our daughter and husband, has arrived. A time to be born!  But within this past week, three older people I cared about experienced that “time to die.” I’m grateful that all of them lived fully for Jesus. One, aware that death would come soon as her kidneys failed, even called in her social friends and asked them plainly, “Will I see you in Heaven?  Have you accepted Jesus?”

Is that a question you can answer in the affirmative?

Double illumination

Because my husband was once part of an international layman’s Bible distribution ministry, we tend to check drawers for Bibles when we rent a room at motels. We weren’t disappointed during a recent overnight stay. But there was something else in the drawer: a “light stick” for emergencies. That made sense for a remote facility where winds or heavy snow could take down the power grid for a time.

I’m not quite sure of the chemistry behind them, but they apparently glow enough to help you find your way around.  The good side is they don’t rely on batteries. The bad: they’re disposable.  One used, they must be tossed, never to light up again. As soon as I saw the light-stick, I thought of one of my first Bible memory verses.  Perhaps you already guessed:

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path. (Psalm 119:105)

Written before electric lights, flashlights, or even chemical light wands, the Bible has many references to light. Among them:

The commands of the Lord are radiant, giving light to the eyes. (Psalm 19:8)
The entrance of your words gives light; it gives understanding to the simple. (Psalm 119:130)
For these commands are a lamp, their teaching is a light, and the corrections of discipline are the way to life. (Proverbs 6:23)

Jesus called Himself “the Light of the World” (John 8:12). The apostle John, his understanding of spiritual truths shaped by the Light of Jesus, made frequently used the analogy:

This is the message we have heard from Him and declare to you: God is light and in Him there is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:5)

Here’s an idea.  Take your Bible and a highlighter (the waxy type, sold in bookstores, doesn’t bleed through thin paper). Highlight all the references to “light” in the book of 1 John. Then go over to Revelation 22:5, which is the vision of Heaven John received:

There will be no more night.  They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light.

 It’s hard for me to wrap my mind around that.  I won’t need my Bible in heaven!  All confusion and mysteries will be past, and what is now just a shadow will be fully known in the blazing, glorious presence of God Himself!

PERSONAL NOTE:
This week our family experienced a special "light": the birth of a granddaughter named "Eleanor," which coincidently means "light."  What a joy to hold this little one born to our daughter and husband, marvel at God's creative power in the womb, and anticipate what's ahead.  She's our third "grand" after two boys, now 3 1/2 and 22 months, born to our son and wife.  Because I married later in life, it's an extraordinary privilege to live to "grandparent" and influence another generation.

Reflections on reflections

Fiction writers sometimes revert to the “mirror trick” in describing a charter’s physical characteristics. They will have that person look into a glass or water mirror, their inner thoughts adding the details that help us “see” him or her.  Like this (go ahead and snicker at my  feeble fiction skills):
As Harold buzzed the stubble off his chin, he leaned into the bathroom mirror wondered why he hadn’t noticed the puffy bags under his eyes before.  He ran a brush through his thinning hair and groaned over how many were gray.  And those hairs hanging out his ears made him think of a dried-out tassel on a withered ear of corn.

The Bible had some thoughts about reflections, too.  Proverbs 27:10 says,

As water reflects a face, so a man’s heart reflects the man.

That verse came to mind recently when my husband and I traveled up the picturesque Methow Valley in central Washington state.  We passed by beautiful Patterson Lake, whose placid early-morning waters mirrored the shoreline trees.  Parts of the lake were a perfect reflection; others had already been stirred, probably by fishermen, blurring and shortening the reflection.

I thought of how when we reflect and love and peace of Jesus, it’s evident in our faces.  We’re approachable.  I have several friends like that—and how I enjoy being with them! But I have other friends who are plagued by anxiety or disappointment. The “peace of Christ that passes all understanding” (Philippians 4:7) seems to have been drained from them. It’s hard to describe, but you just know.

It may seem strange to think that God is in the face-lift business and we lift our faces to Him—but He is. The apostle Paul picked up on that heart-to-face connection when he said those in relationship with Christ “with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory [and] are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory” (2 Corinthians 3:18).

At times my “reflection” properties are in need of improvement, like those stirred lake waters that were no longer mirrors.  Thankfully, God is on the other side of the mirror.  He sees the exterior (like the morning chin stubble on our fiction model “Harold”) but He also sees deep within us to who we can become in Him.

Now, that’s worth reflecting on!

View from the top

It’s not the top of the world, but Sun Mountain above Central Washington’s picturesque Methow Valley is certainly a splendid setting.  As a winding road ascends, signs warn drivers to watch for wandering mule deer. These critters think they have priority on the road (and some, sadly, lose to a car). En route are scenic pullouts fully worthy of... WOW!

Normally, the rates at the Sun Mountain lodge are way beyond our budget.  But for a limited off-season time, they offered drastic reductions as a “community appreciation” for help in last year’s wildfires. Besides, it offered a memorable way to celebrate our 35^th wedding anniversary—in a “jacuzzi bridal suite,” no less!  The location was so peaceful, leaving me in renewed awe of the amazing landscape of this planet that God designed. 

A lot of people in reading through a Bible wonder if anything good can come out of the Old Testament books of Chronicles.  There’s a lot of gory, king-conquering, king-failing history in the books.  But there are also the fingerprints of God’s help and mercy.  Into that context was dropped this observation:

For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him. (2 Chronicles 16:9)

 Because it describes God’s character, this verse can stand by itself as well as in the narrative of foolish King Asa’s actions. (This was a king who had bad counselors and turned away from God.)  I know how it lifted me years ago as a single, when I wondered if God was aware of the challenges and troubles I faced.  Of course, God doesn’t have an “eye” as we would think of on humans. But the image provided for me that sense of larger watch-care when I went through things that were bigger and scarier than I’d ever encountered.

 Seeing the panorama of mountain beauty did something else for me.  It reminded me to seek the “high view” toward others who aren’t quite at the point of “hearts...fully committed to him.” I think the writer of Proverbs had that same sense when he wrote:

A man’s wisdom gives him patience; it is to his glory to overlook an offense. (Proverbs 19:11)
A wise person has selective vision. That person’s eyes may range to and fro, finding those who offend or oppose, but their heart of love forgives.

And that, as 2 Chronicles 16:9 says, is a strong, “love” response. It takes the high road, and looks down with mercy and love on all the daily-ness and struggles of life’s valleys.

Can you see why I loved the view?  And why it reminded me of God’s loving eye on me, wherever in life’s journey He takes me?

The tongue and the tree

Ashy gray sadness pervades in areas scorched by wildfire. This hill, with so many evergreens stripped to black splinters, was part of last year’s “Carlton Complex” fires that took the lives of three fire fighters, left another severely burned, and churned through a quarter of a million acres.  The acreage amounted to three-fourths of all fire loss in my state that summer.

Fire is so ruthless, so devastating, so unpredictable. I thought of James 3:5-6

Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark.  The tongue is also a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body.  It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and it itself set on fire by hell.

Powerful words! But how many of us have experienced the fury of an angry person and the stabbing pain of their negative words?  How many of us have been guilty of doing that? 

One mark of spiritual maturity is the ability to control one’s words.  Paul urged:

Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.  Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. (Ephesians 4:31)

Even deeper, a mark of maturity is reacting to the fire of angry words with the cool spirit of someone controlled by “Living Water.” None of us will escape the fury of someone’s anger. But I am challenged and encouraged by the advice that James gave later in the same chapter.  The best “fire extinguisher” possible is the wisdom of God, seen in a heart that is:

....first of all pure; then peace loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.” (James 3:17)

The firefighter’s mascot, “Smokey the Bear,” famously said, “Only YOU can prevent forest fires.” Maybe we need to amend that to: “Only YOU, with the help of Christ, can fight angry tongue fires with His ‘living water’ of a peaceful, forgiving spirit.”

Fruity duty

A custom of the past still exists at my local county fair, with Grange-sponsored fruit and vegetable displays in the floral and horticulture barn.  I’m not sure of the judging criteria, but each display must illustrate some sort of theme. This year, it was “carnival.”  As I compared the various displays, I thought of how the blessing of food wasn’t taken for granted in ancient times. Our mega-size farms with dinosaur-size planting and harvesting machines were unheard of and undreamed in Bible times.

Farming also took on spiritual meaning with the prophet Hosea.  He’s best known for marrying, at God’s command, an unfaithful woman and using that sorrowful experience to illustrate Israel’s spiritual promiscuity and God’s longing for restoration. His three children’s names were part of the prophecy.

Jezreel, the first-born son, meant “scattered,” for the Israelites would be dispersed from the land.
Lo-Ruhamah, the daughter’s name, meant “Not loved.”
Lo-Ammi, the second daughter, meant “Not my people.”

Hosea’s prophecy condemns relying on anyone or anything other than God for the guiding and sustaining of life. Near the end, he uses some farm imagery that still speaks clearly:

Sow for yourselves righteousness, reap the fruit of unfailing love, and break up your unplowed ground; for it is time to seek the Lord, until he comes and showers righteousness on you. (Hosea 10:12)

At some point in my life, I wrote three references in the margin opposite this verse:

*2 Corinthians 7:10: “Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death.”
*2 Corinthians 9:6: “Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly well also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously.”
*Galatians 6:7-9: “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked.  A man reaps what he sows.” The verses go on to connect the sinful nature reaping destruction, and pleasing God’s spirit as reaping eternal life.

In ancient cultures, farming was a constant battle of digging out rocks, pulling weeds, and protecting a crop from predators.  Such farming was also a perfect metaphor for living a life pleasing to God.  The spiritual “crop” of a God-centered life doesn’t happen if the inner life is neglected.  From time to time, hardship and hard-to-love people combine to help us break up that “unplowed ground” that isn’t being fruitful for God. 

It may sound strange to say this, but sometimes we need to sit still before God, repent of our weak spiritual areas, and say, “Turn over my soil, Lord.  It’s hard-packed and resistant from persistent sin. Break it up and press your seeds of truth into it.  Help me grow spiritually. Remind me that I’m on display for You.”

Slow-mo's

About the fastest things at my local county fair are the horses and little kids dragging their parents to the carnival rides.  I’m used to seeing the cows, pigs, goats, sheep, bunnies, chickens and other fowl as youngsters bring their pets to show and hopefully receive ribbons. But I wasn’t prepared for the critters fenced under some shady trees near the commercial exhibits this year. 

Yes, turtles. Huge, slow-moving turtles.  I neglected to ask the nearby people—presumably care-takers—why these were at the fair.  My best guess was for small-fry discovery, as some of the bigger (and noisier) animals can be scary and intimidating.

Not turtles. God’s creation reflects who He is in numberless ways.  And I wonder if He placed turtles among us to slow us down, especially those of us who live in this high-paced technical age where speed is a prized commodity.

Internet too slow?  Our company will give you blazing fast speeds.
Get there quicker in our brand of car with all its horsepower.
Fly to Europe in a couple hours.
Skip the shopping trip.  Place your online grocery order for delivery.
Lonely? Try our speed-dating service.

But God sometimes works r e a l   s l o w.  This was especially painful for early Christians who wanted the promise of a new kingdom with a righteous ruler—God Himself—as soon as possible.  Life with persecution was already near the edge of “unbearable.”  Jesus’ follower Peter knew the temper of spiritual times well, writing:

But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.  The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. (2 Peter 8:9)

Lest early Christians think they could relax their fervor for Christ a bit, Peter added:

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare. (v. 10)

When God’s ready, history won’t move at the pace of a turtle. It will happen in the blink of an eye. That’s why we’re to “make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him” (v. 14).

Does that awe you, inspire you, and fire you up?

Glamour in the pen

Whee—pink leopard fashion shirt!  I couldn’t help but stop and smile when I passed by this goat at our local county fair.  I’m presuming this pet-cover helped keep a just-washed animal cleaner for imminent judging. But the animal’s woebegone attitude triggered my imagination. If animals could talk “human-talk,” I wonder what this one would have said. Maybe something of the animal version of: “I’d rather be in jeans with bleach holes.”J

Smiles aside, our culture’s move toward clothing for pets (such as Halloween costumes for Fifi and Fido, usually on 90% off clearance by January) lands in my “that’s incredible” file.  I’ll admit that our ancient cat (now 17 or 18 years old—he was a rescue cat) in earlier years suffered the indignity of being garbed with Cabbage Patch doll clothes.  Alas, he was so portly that they were a poor fit, and as soon as he could, he escaped from his modeling career to the great outdoors where he could freely wear his one-and-only fur coat.

Do clothes make the person?  The fashion world would have us believe that.  But another type of clothing--the inside-type--does communicate a lot about us to people around us. 

The apostle Paul wrote that God’s chosen people—“holy and dearly loved”—should have these clothing choices: compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, and the ability to bear with others and forgive each other.  Finally, like a coat over all, “put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity” (Colossians 3:14).

Peter had a similar clothes shopping list: “Clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble’” (1 Peter 5:5, part of it quoting Proverbs 3:34).

Paul wrote the Romans, “Clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 13:14).  Simple and basic.   But how profound!

Did you catch something about the “clothes” mentioned in those passages?  They’re about heart-conditions that undergo the wear-and-tear of relationships.  How the world sees “Christian-dress” has a lot to do with how we treat people.  No Christian-wear is flimsy. It needs to stand up to a lot of people-and-trials-wear-and-tear. But remember: the label says, “Inspected by John 3:16.”

No clouded perspective

Are you, like me, sometimes overwhelmed by natural beauty? One such time for me came recently as I noticed a cloud back-lit by the sun. I thought of this line:
He makes the clouds His chariot.
My concordance later helped me fix its address: Psalm 104:3. In his paraphrase. Eugene Peterson offers this poetic version:
You…made a chariot out of the clouds and took off on wind-wings.
One of the “ministries”—if I might use that word—of creation may be to help us unclutter our minds. The day I noticed this remarkable cloud formation, my mind was swirling with the usual “to-do” stuff plus clouded with concern for problems facing people I care about. I looked up, and there it was: God’s reminder of His power, His brilliance, His grandeur, far, far greater than a clump of water vapor in the sky.

Blame it on having been an English major in college! But I believe that all of us, within our hearts, have that quiet longing for something pure and magnificent.  And that, of course, is the spirit of God who created us and all that surrounds us.

One of the old hymns that steps back in awe of creation is “For the Beauty of the Earth.” One day when he was about 29 years old, Folliott Pierpoint looked across the spring beauty of his home area of Bath, England. Situated on the banks of the Avon River, rimmed by an amphitheater of hills and blessed by warm springs (hence the name, Bath), the area is well-known for its beauty. But that spring day, Pierpoint, a Cambridge-educated teacher, couldn’t control himself. The sight inspired the hymn that begins:

For the beauty of the earth; For the beauty of the skies;
For the love which from our birth/Over and around us lies:
Christ our God, to Thee we raise/This our sacrifice of praise.
Originally eight stanzas, it was used in the Anglican church for communion services. Coming over the Atlantic, it was often used for Thanksgiving, an American holiday.

It’s an ironic truth that the more we have, the less thankful we tend to be. This hymn reminds us to just stop and look around at what God has entrusted to us in His amazing creation.

There’s one more thing: that light behind the clouds took me to one more event.  Christ left in a cloud (Acts 1:10)—and I wonder, did it gleam with the glory He once came from?  He will come again in a cloud, “with great power and great glory” (Luke 21:27).

Clouds got your attention?  Use that moment to praise God for His creative beauty and eternal plan!

Toot-n-Scoot!

He’s Gonna Toot and I’m Gonna Scoot!  I couldn’t help but think of that book title by Christian humorist Barbara Johnson as I wandered an old cemetery in Roslyn, a sleepy town in central Washington state.  Just a few days earlier, we’d enjoyed a brief visit from the minister who married us 35 years earlier. Now 83, he told of visiting another cemetery where he buried his wife just last year. This weekend would have been their 56th wedding anniversary. A son and a grandson are buried there, too.  As his daughter helped him leave flowers, he said he thought how people better watch out when these loved ones experience resurrection and zoom out of their graves!  He was referring to the apostle Paul’s letter to the ancient Thessalonians, who were confused about death and heaven:
According to the Lord’s own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep.  For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.  After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.  And so we will be with the LORD forever. (1 Thessalonians 4:15-17).

Two sisters, almost 3 and 2 years old.

Once a booming coal mining town that grew to more than 4,000 in the 1920s, today it has about 900 year-round residents.  Its name made news when three movies were filmed there, including “Northern Exposure.”  To work the early mines, immigrants came from throughout the world. But stories of poverty, disasters (45 perished in an 1892 mine explosion) and epidemics are told through the crumbling headstones over 19 acres of cemetery. Many are for infants and small children. I recalled how some of the most poignant scenes of Jesus’ earthly ministry involved common people bringing their children to Him for blessing. He said, “Do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these” (Matthew 9:14). Like a shepherd who went to great pains to find his lost sheep, Jesus said God the Father “is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost” (Matthew 18:11).

The Roslyn cemetery’s most distinctive feature is ethnic segregation. Twenty-six sections, like jig-saw puzzle pieces, divide the 19 acres of woods and hills.  Many family plots are surrounded by ornate iron fences, probably to keep foraging cattle and wildlife out.  Ethnic customs were also behind having some plots being raised above the earth, rimmed or covered with concrete, supposedly to protect “consecrated” grounds.  Many cemetery sections were labeled as burial places for those of Eastern European background. One huge section was for African Americans.  Again, I thought of Paul’s reminder about the snare of prejudice, that:

There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:28).  

A baby who died in 1903, not even a year old.
Artificial flowers abound on the graves.

Heavily littered with dead needles from the many ponderosa pines there,  the cemetery was a sobering, sad place. But I was taken back to the “Toot” and “Scoot” image that Barbara Johnson gave us in her humorous book about God’s final plan.  I recalled her story: of losing one son in the Vietnam War, another son to a drunk driver, and being estranged from a third son for many years. Her “Spatula Ministries” (alluding to being shocked to a splotch on the ceiling over family problems), borne of her own trials, helped many find God’s purpose and hope in life’s most difficult experiences. Those hard times aren’t forever. The best is yet ahead.  Paul also wrote, “I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14).  Did you catch that—“called me heavenward”?  What an exciting moment it will be when “toot- and-scoot” happens—not only in Roslyn but everywhere around the world!

All dolled up and nowhere to go

 Cars were parked up and down the block as I arrived at an estate sale that had advertised fabric. I’m always watching for inexpensive flannel to sew baby blankets donated to hospitals for needy families. The two long tables stacked with material didn’t have what I used, but as I moved on through the yard I was astonished by hundreds of dolls and doll paraphernalia. It went on and on....The same was true of ceramic and glass trinkets burdening other tables. Going inside, it got worse. Multiple sets of dishes and other knickknacks were meticulously organized and priced.

I’m thankful that my community has two groups (one benefiting a local non-profit agency) that hire out to conduct estate sales. They relieve survivors of an often oppressive burden in breaking down a household. I handled that task after my parents died.  It was a long and difficult process requiring, in my case, seven yard sales. The most challenging items to sell were my mother’s tea-cup and salt-and-pepper-shaker collections

That recent day, as I inched around heaped tables, I asked one of the helpers if this was one of the bigger sales they had handled.  He nodded and replied, “There’s another sale next week. We haven’t even started in on the basement.”

Convicted of my own “piles,” I came home and loaded a box for the local thrift store!      But I couldn’t get the heaps of dolls out of my mind.  How long had that person collected them?  Did she play with them? Or were they boxed away because she didn’t know what to do with all of them?

Walking past so many dolls, I thought of a girl in Haiti we have sponsored for years through a compassion ministry. Sometimes we sent extra (above sponsor fees for her schooling) for her to buy herself something. Months later we’d get a translated thank-you note indicating she used the extra gift to buy food for her family.  One time she admitted she bought a doll.  ONE doll.

I’ve had recent encounters with real-life hoarders, and it is sad and frustrating. But this estate sale’s piles of dolls astounded me.  I thought of Ecclesiastes 5:10-11, which says, “Those who love money [or what money buys—my add-on] will never have enough.  How absurd to think that wealth brings true happiness. The more you have, the more people come to help you spend it.  So what is the advantage of wealth—except perhaps to watch it run through your fingers!” (NLT). 

This person didn’t live in a wealthy neighborhood. Most of it is smaller “starter homes” that are a half century or so old. But her compulsion to collect dolls and other trinkets was apparently big in her life.

In contrast, the apostle Paul held loosely onto “things.” It was the only way to live as an underfunded traveling evangelist in days when your feet or a boat got you places. “Godliness with contentment is great gain,” he counseled his protégé, Timothy.  “For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content” (1 Timothy 6:7-8 NKJV).

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.

Let's sing the second verse!

Sometimes, snatches of scripture or phrases from a hymn will come to me when I least expect them. It happened again recently when we picnicked with friends at a public park by the Methow River in Central Washington state. There’s nothing like a river, roaring over worn rocks on its way to a mightier water—in our case, the Columbia. I snapped a photo of the sight as I vaguely recalled a classic hymn that mentioned “streams of living water.” I found the verse, “You give them drink from the river of your delights,” in Psalm 36:8a.

 

The hymn I vaguely recalled was “Glorious Things of Thee are Spoken,” whose author also penned “Amazing Grace” in recounting his conversion. His name, of course, John Newton. His devout, praying mother died when he was very young. Growing up, he plunged into the life of an infidel, ending up running a slave ship and being temporarily enslaved himself.  Wonderfully, through God’s amazing grace (and as the answer to his mother’s prayers), he became a Christian and went into the ministry in England. He also wrote hundreds of hymns, some still sung three hundred years later.  Besides the two I just mentioned, there’s “How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds.” I can’t sing that one without choking up.

My church’s worship style has changed to “contemporary,” but for those of us who grew up with the old hymns, there’s also a “hymn sing” two Sunday evenings a month in our church’s chapel.  Hymnals are passed out, and requests taken with the inevitable question, “Which verses?”  Often the answer is “1, 3 and 4.”  Poor verse 2!

Let’s hear it for verse 2 of Newton’s “Glorious Things of Thee are Spoken,” sung to the majestic music composed by Newton’s contemporary Franz Haydn. Even as I type its words, I’m envisioning a river like the one we saw at the Methow Valley, bursting out of the mountains and proclaiming, “I’m part of the workmanship of God!”  I’m also reminded of the lyric’s analogy to “living water,” the Lord Jesus Christ, who nurtures and refreshes us along a journey on this planet.

See, the streams of living waters,

Springing from eternal Love,
Well supply thy sons and daughters,
And all fear of want remove.
Who can faint while such a river
Ever flows their thirst to assuage?
Grace which like the Lord, the Giver,
Never fails from age to age!
 
Remember, a man who once lived an utterly wicked life wrote this hymn. If the “old” John Newton could turn to God, we should never give up praying for those who still need to taste of the Living Water.

Bed of thorns

Imagine three sets of robber-masked eyes staring at you from a nest next to your back-yard fence. It happened to me one morning, working in the back yard, when I sensed our cat unusually nervous. Following his gaze, I was shocked to see three raccoons just feet away in this half-hidden perch on the roof of a ramshackle shed. I grabbed the garden horse and aimed it at them, yelling “shoo!” as they reluctantly turned and left. Then, remembering reading how such critters despise urine smell, I sprayed the nest with household ammonia.

We live toward the edge of our little town, with a large undeveloped, junky lot on the other side of our fence.  Our trees disguise the “view,” but they also provide an up-and-down staircase for local raccoons searching for berries or the small bowl of dry cat food we once left outside. (Not any more!) After drenching the tree-needle-padded “nest” with ammonia, I stacked it with prickly dead tree branches and thorny branches pruned from our roses. These, I hoped, would put the perch into their “don’t-visit” list.

 I was reminded of my “prickle-the-nest” incident while recently reading J.I. Packer’s Knowing God. In chapter 16 about God’s “goodness and severity,” Packer said we need to appreciate the discipline God chooses to put in our lives. Too many people, he said, look at God as a celestial Santa Claus who supplies happy times and gifts on demand. But such attitudes trifle with God. God may, Packer said, put “thorns in your bed…to awaken you from the sleep or spiritual death—and to make you rise up to seek his mercy.”  For believers, such “bed-thorns” may be part of God’s discipline “to keep you from falling into the somnolence of complacency and to ensure that you ‘continue in his goodness’ by letting your sense of need bring you back constantly in self-abasement and faith to seek his face” (Knowing God, IVP, 1973, p. 166).

When our life’s “nest” settles into a comfortable spot, and we find thorns in the way, there may be a spiritual reason. Packer pointed to two scriptures for “why.” Hebrews 12:5, reminds us not to make light of the Lord’s discipline. And second, Psalm 119:71 takes us to the higher ground of thanking God for correction:  “It was good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn your decrees” (Psalm 119:71).

Early one morning this spring, I again saw a backyard raccoon--one that looked to be twice the size of our cat. When he saw me, the 'coon scampered up the tree and away. Thankfully, our cat was inside this time. I checked the condition of the “nest” and found it needing a new supply of “prickles.”

I'd like to have prickle-free living, but I also want God to shape my life. Sometimes that brings temporary discomfort until I move on to His much-better plan