The costliest gift

It never fails: November to December we’re bombarded with ads to buy buy buy. Then comes January with articles about how to climb out of debt. While the world focuses on shopping bills, credit cards and interest fees, little is said about another debt that often grows to almost unbearable proportions. The problem is its personal cost: of admitting breaking trust with someone and asking for that person's forgiveness. It isn't enough to toss a few cents' worth of half-hearted "sorry" at it and consider it "paid." The only lasting solution is to invite Heaven’s debt counselor, the Lord Jesus, into the mess. 

Recently I had the sweet, humbling experience of someone coming to me and admitting a wrongdoing, asking for my forgiveness. This person had falsely accused me, wounding me to the point of tears. I spent a lot of time in prayer about it. Because of Christ’s work in my heart, I sought to “positionally” forgive them. Finally, the face-to-face encounter made real His love for both of us. 

But such forgiveness-events don’t often happen in our broken world. Those who've wrestled with relational transparency may find help in an online article, “Forgiveness: The Possible Impossibility” http://www.wordtruth.net/PDG/Forgiveness.pdf  . One especially meaningful section, on page 7, concerned how to ask for forgiveness. The wrong way includes padding a request for forgiveness with an excuse, like “I was having a bad day,”  “I can’t help myself when I get mad,” or “I was upset because my boyfriend dumped me.” 

The right way, according to the article, involves taking personal responsibility, naming specific sins, showing repentance, announcing Christ-honoring intentions for the future, and asking for forgiveness.  For example, the article suggests:

“I recognize that I have sinned against the Lord and you by (name the specific sins).  It is my intention never again to repeat this offense against you or anyone else.  I repent and will change by doing the following. (Explain your specific plan for change.) I have asked the Lord to forgive me, and I want you to know that I desire your forgiveness as well.  Will you please forgive me?” 

If possible, this should be done in person. This may mean writing out the apology and reading it to the other person. If in-person contact isn’t possible, phone the person. Third choice: by personal letter. Last (and less preferred) choice: e-mail or texting, especially if the wrongdoing occurred via e-mail or texts.

Paul wrote the Romans, “Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another….Love does no harm to its neighbor” (Romans 13:8, 10). It’s the best gift possible.

The quiet story of "Silent Night"

I have a special fondness for the Christmas hymn, “Silent Night,” because its author had the surname “Mohr”—the same as my paternal grandmother, whom I never met. She died when my father was 12.I knew its origin had something to do with a broken-down organ.  Here it is—and more:

Picture yourself in Salzburg, Austria….yes, that beautiful city and the nearby breathtaking alps featured in the award-winning film, The Sound of Music, whose plot took place in World War 2.  Go back another hundred-plus years, to 1818, to a little hamlet about 15 miles north of Salzburg in the Tyrolean Alps named Obendorf. It consisted of one winding street lined with quaint cottages and shops. That year, young Josef Mohr arrived to become assistant priest at the newly-erected Church of St. Nicholas. Mohr soon made many friends, including the village schoolmaster and church organist, Franz Gruber. One day as they talked they lamented the existence of “the perfect Christmas hymn” in German.

We bought this child-friendly creche the first year
of our marriage.  Now grandchildren can play
with it as they learn the story of Jesus' birth

That particular year, a group of traveling players had arrived just before Christmas to put on a Nativity play at Mohr’s church. But the organ needed repair, so they moved the performance to the home of a local shop owner. A broken-down organ also complicated Mohr’s plans for Christmas services. How could they sing traditional carols without a booming organ to lead the way?
Mohr attended the play and was moved by its simplicity and beauty. As he walked home, he stopped at a favorite viewpoint overlooking Obendorf. Inspired by sparkling stars of that crisp night, he hurried home, lit a candle, and began writing the words to a Christmas poem. The next morning he took it to his friend Gruber, asking, “See if you can write a melody for these.” Gruber read the poem and reportedly replied, “Friend Mohr, you have it—the right song—God be praised.”

The organ couldn’t be repaired in time for Christmas, so Gruber wrote the music for guitar accompaniment. At the midnight Christmas eve service, Gruber played his guitar and sang bass. Mohr sang tenor. A young girls’ choir from the village harmonized the last two lines of each stanza.

Gruber and Mohr never intended for their carol to become famous. But when the organ builder came after the holidays to fix the organ, he heard the song being sung. He liked it, got a copy and took it to his home about eight miles away. Soon it was included in concerts throughout Austria and Germany, billed as a “Tyrolean Folk Song of unknown origin.”

Two decades after its first performance, it was performed in the United States by a group of Austrian singers. It would soon be translated into English and several other languages.

War again engulfed the world, this time what became known as World War I.  One of the officers fighting for the Germans, Walter Kirchhoff, had been a tenor with the Berlin Opera. In 1914, on a clear-cold Christmas eve night, when the shooting had stopped, Officer Kirchhoff felt moved to step forward and sing “Silent Night”—first in German, then in English. His trained voice carried far on that crisp night. The British knew the song and sang back.
Gradually, the troops crawled forward into No Man’s Land for a brief Christmas truce. Soldiers who wrote home about it said things like, “You won’t believe this. It was like a waking dream.”

Yes, a silent, holy night.

                               

Hooray for Vitamin C-olate

The genetic code my dad passed onto me includes chocolate as a diet staple. He was basically a conservative guy—went to church, didn’t smoke, didn’t drink, didn’t swear,  and endured a  ballroom dancing lesson sometime in the mid-1960s only because my mom answered the phone to a caller who announced a contest and asked her, “When did Columbus discover America?”  Without thinking, she said, “1492.” To which the caller said, “Congratulations! You are today’s winner of a night of free ballroom dance lessons at our Tacoma studio!”  Neither of my parents grew up with dancing in their value system, but somehow my mother convinced my dad to give it a try. I think he obliged her the lesson and that was the end of that.

Otherwise, Dad was content to just come home and put up his feet after a long day in a mill that produced corrugated cardboard boxes.  As a “technical director” in charge of quality control, he walked and walked all day in that stinky environment.  At one point, his flat feet got so painful that he invested in “corrugated” shoes.  That’s right, soles like the edge of a large-tooth saw.

But I digress from one of his best known traits, and that was an affection for chocolate.  If I tied an apron on my skinny little teenage body and broke out the mixing bowl to make him chocolate chip cookies, I could have asked him for the moon.  A significant part of the “results” would be missing before I washed up.  Another notable fact of Dad’s chocolate-love was his not-so-secret stash of chocolate chips.  We had the regular “bag” in the cupboard with flour and sugar.  But he hid another—to make sure there was always available snacking stock—in a reach-around corner of the cupboard that held pots and pans.  We knew it was there, but also that it was verboten to his offspring.  Sometime during the evening, maybe during a television commercial, if Dad got up from his red tapestry rocker with its telltale squeaks, and headed for the kitchen, we knew he was after his Vitamin Chocolate.  Just a little handful kept him going.

 Thus the other day, when cleaning off my desk, I came across a “glory be!” article whose headline proclaimed, “Chocolate is brain food. Who knew?”  Published originally last March in The Washington Post, it cited a long-range study of cognitive abilities of 1,000 people in New York State.  Goal of the study: the relationship between blood pressure and brain performance.  Among the variables they traced as possible risk factors were participants’ eating habits.  This research stretched over forty years as the participants aged.  Behold, the study found “significant positive associations” between chocolate intake and cognitive performance.  This translated to better  abilities for everyday tasks, like remembering a phone number or shopping list, or doing two things at once (like talking while driving).

The researchers were quick to add that their results aren’t conclusive.  They also failed to include variables such as how much chocolate and how often.

But it was enough for me to honor my dad and carry on the tradition.  And I hereby reveal my weakness: a modest bowl of chocolate chips with those little round oats we feed children (unsweetened, by the way). I figure the “O’s” cancel out the negatives of the brown nugget. 

Don’t tell my son and wife, but I’ve been known to sneak a bit of the family “concoction” into a snack bowl for my grandboys when they come to play.  Heavy on the "oats," of course.

Fun aside, I'm reminded of the best thing to crave: knowing God. Psalm 34:8 has long been a favorite: "Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him."

Meet Sweet (Potato) Adelaide

Whoa! That was my reaction when our garden-growing friend stopped by and rolled this monster sweet potato out of a plastic bag.  That’s a one-foot ruler next to it. Something this amazing needed a name. I decided on Adelaide, as in “Sweet Adelaide.” (The name is German for “noble, kind.”) A week or so later, I decided to bake it.  I’m glad I started early, as it took three hours at 350 degrees before I could easily poke a knife into it, telling me it was “done.” I wondered if it thought it was a turkey!

If sweet potatoes could talk, it probably would have said, “Ouch, this is hot!  Get me out of here! My original hardened condition can’t stand the heat!” And isn’t that how we react to spiritual fires?

Early in my Christian walk I struggled with James 1:2-4.  Being a Christian should shield you from all of life’s bad things, right?  Wrong.

Count it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.  Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

If we lived in a fairy-tale world, where dashing princes come and rescue beautiful captive lasses to take them off to marriage and a grand castle, we wouldn’t need this verse. But we live in a fallen world that is waiting for its Prince of Peace, who is preparing us for the ultimate joy of life forever with Him.  In the meantime, the sin nature needs some “cooking,” as it were, to break down the mean and demanding fibers of the sin-character that won’t work in His kingdom

James wasn’t the only one to share this advice:
Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you.  But rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the spirit of glory and of God rests on you. (1 Peter 4:13-14 emphasis added)
The words I bold-faced were a “wow” for me because they helped me recognize that Satan’s tools include negative talk or bullying from someone.  Count that joy? Yes, with Jesus, all things are possible.

In the meantime, anybody for a serving of tender Adelaide? Fully cooked, it’s a great source of healthy vitamins.

Ever been invited to a Pity Party?

Aren’t pity parties a barrel of fun?  If you’re invited, no question what to bring for a gift: a multipack of tissues.  Seriously, about the only person who enjoys a pity party is the host.  Author Shelly Beach made similar observations in her book I recently read, It is Well With My Soul (Discovery House, 2012). Beach, an articulate author and speaker, survived a brain bleed that should have killed her.  As she continues to live with chronic illness, she offers spiritual guidance for others whose lives and/or health are not perfect.

In an introduction to her chapter on the “victim mentality” she tells about dreading to receive calls from someone who was a chronic complainer.  “Caller I.D.” helped Beach screen her calls, but she couldn’t totally escape this woman who blamed her ailing parents for her problems. Beach observed: “She fails to see that she casts the glare of ingratitude and unforgiveness like high beam headlights. [She] sees everything through the spirit she projects, and her negative attitude can make people reluctant to approach her.”

Beach continues: “I should know.  For many years I wrapped myself in ingratitude and unforgiveness like my favorite winter coat.  They were my protection and insulation against my deficits, faults, and sins.  During the time I was blind to my negativity, others steered around me to escape the poison of my attitude.”

Gratitude, she says, “must be fed by our awareness of what we’ve been given and who we are.  When we don’t allow gratitude and forgiveness to guide us through hurt, loss, and conflict, we become trapped in a self-centered, victim mentality.”

For Beach, answering the call to show gratitude has required working through some pretty tough personal stuff, including long-ago sexual abuse against her and her family. 

What broke the shackles of her own “victim” mentality?

*Seeing her heart as God saw it.

*Letting the Holy Spirit show her the Bible’s truths about her life and attitude.  She remarked: “Scripture taught me that I had to take responsibility for my life and stop blaming God and others for family problems, bumpy friendships, job hassles, and the pain in my life” (p.130).

*Learning how gratitude moves our focus from ourselves to others, freeing us from chains of the past so we can serve out of gratitude for what God has given us.

I once heard it said that the person who organizes a pity party will have a very small guest list.  And maybe a large number of “sorry” RSVPs from people who have something better to do. 

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.

If trees could preach

After a long, dry and smoky summer, we’re delighting in the colorful turn of seasons to autumn. Within days of our first truly cold night, trees and bushes around here were spiking fall’s neon colors. That includes my neighbor’s tree.  As I enjoy seeing it turn to a glowing orange, I realize it soon will drop its dying leaves to the ground for raking and disposal.  The term “death to self”  came to mind because of some recent personal devotional reading of an old classic: Humility by Andrew Murray  (1828-1917), a South African writer, teacher and pastor, also known for his book, With Christ in the School of Prayer.

Reflecting on my last couple years of relational and spiritual challenges, I affirmed with Murray how “humility” isn’t high on a typical believer’s “want” list.  We gladly receive God’s gifts of life, sustenance, purpose, comfort, maybe even fame.  But if He calls us to let go of them, that’s another matter. It’s hard to see His purposes in loss, in the shedding of what is familiar.  Yet Murray says:

Accept with gratitude everything that God allows from within or without, from friend or enemy, in nature or in grace, to remind you of your need of humbling, and to help you to it. Believe humility to indeed be the mother-virtue, your very first duty before God, and the one perpetual safeguard of the soul.  (Whitaker House, 1982, p. 90)

Some people confuse “dying to self” with “death of self.” They’re not the same.  “God treasures your divinely created self,” writes Christian author Jan Johnson, “He doesn’t want to obliterate the part of you that makes you uniquely you. God works within you and reshapes you into the person your renewed-in-Christ self is meant to be: not selfish with what you own, not concerned about how circumstances affect only you, and not crabby when others seem to get what you want. “ *

 Murray concluded his book with this poem:

Oh, to be emptier, lowlier,

Mean, unnoticed, and unknown,

And to God a vessel holier,

Filled with Christ, and Christ alone!

 Or, as the apostle Paul said it to his pastor- protégé  Timothy: “The saying is trustworthy, for: If we have died with him, we will also live with him” (2 Timothy 2:11 ESV).

*“Dying to Self and Discovering So Much More,” By Jan Johnson, Decision Magazine (August 25, 2011), accessible at: https://billygraham.org/decision-magazine/september-2011/dying-to-self-and-discovering-so-much-more/

Some ripe, some not

My winterizing chores include “the last rites” at of the small tomato patch on a sunny side of our garage. It’s my husband’s attempt at farming, and he pampers the soil to grow the best tomatoes he knows how. But when the nights chill in October, and the leaves start withering, I know I add “tomatoes” to my yardwork chores.  It’s too bad, as some of our biggest tomatoes are struggling to redden, and there are dozens of tiny ones that will never make it. After I pick the “possibilities,” I feel badly about pulling up the rest.

I guess it’s my personality to offer second and third chances, hoping people will lift their hearts fully to the Sun of Righteousness, the Lord Jesus.  When that doesn’t happen, I grieve, and have to reconcile myself to an imperfect world.  Even as I pulled those tomatoes, I thought of the many still-unanswered prayers. I just don’t understand,  I mused, then halfway remembered a little-known hymn with those opening words. I’d learned of it another time of uncertainty and trial.

Searching through the indexes of several hymnals, I found it in a small hymn collection gifted to me forty years ago by classmates at then-Multnomah School of the Bible in Portland.  It was their way of thanking me for playing piano in morning worship sessions that year. Within a year and a half, both my parents would die, and that paperback hymnal become part of God’s “comfort kit” as I worked through my grief. That hymn begins:

I am not skilled to understand/What God has willed, /What God has planned, /I only know at His right hand /Is One who is my Savior.

I never gave much thought to the author of the lyrics except to surmise that this person must have also had a great sadness that they had to leave in God’s hands.  A few clicks on the computer mouse brought me to her story. The author, Dora Greenwell (1821-1882), in the language of the late 1800s, was especially concerned with “idiots” and “imbeciles.”  Today we’d call them people with severe physical, emotional and mental disabilities. She visited asylums for these people, lifted spirits of society’s “lowest,” and raised money to help them. One biographer spoke of her personality as “rippling sunshine.” 

 She was born into a wealthy family but her father’s financial troubles and death sent the family into poverty. She moved in with a brother who was a vicar and devoted herself to the less fortunate. One friend said of her, “Her life was hid in Christ in God, but it was also wonderfully transparent to all who knew her...She had a wonderful knack of making one happy in her presence.”

Frail in health, she supported herself as a writer. She wrote essays mostly about women’s education and suffrage and the slave trade, and published biographies about French priest Jean-Baptiste Henri Lacordaire and American Quaker John Woolman. Her book The Patience of Hope was published when she was 39.  (I was 48 when my book on patience was published!) Her poetry had a style similar to that of Christina Rossetti.  In 1873 she wrote eight “Songs of Salvation,” which included “I Am Not Skilled To Understand.” Prolific Gospel musician William J. Kirkpatrick set it to music.

The last verse goes: Yes, living, dying let me bring/My strength, my solace from this spring;/That He who lives to be my King/Once died to be my Savior.

It was just the message I needed that day: to leave with Jesus the problems that only He can solve.

Spoon squabble

"How come Zion has two spoons?”  my four-year-old grandson Josiah complained one recent lunch

about his  2 1/2-year-old brother’s “place setting.” When they eat at Nana’s house, they have “assigned” child sets. Josiah’s is a sectioned toddler plate that looks like a barn and has “fat-handle,” child-friendly knife/fork/spoon. Zion is using a family “heirloom” set from his dad’s babyhood,  a “Peter Rabbit” plate with Peter Rabbit child-size spoon and fork. Plus—and this is where the problem came in—I got him a toddler bent-handle spoon.  Still ambidextrous, he finds eating applesauce a challenge with either hand.  The bent spoon helps.  Thus, “spoon number 2.” 

The so-called “inequity” in place settings had never been brought up—until that day.

Deciding to solve the problem himself, Josiah took Zion’s Peter Rabbit spoon and put it by his plate. I reprimanded him and put it back by Zion’s plate. Josiah grabbed it again.  We had war on our hands.
Just then—I am telling the truth—I recalled another “sibling rivalry” that merited a discussion in the New Testament. 

The setting was the Sea of Galilee, after Jesus’ resurrection. Any appearance after His death and resurrection was awesome anyway, and this morning Jesus showed up on shore and performed a miracle for the up-until-then empty-netted fisherman, Peter and John among them. By the time they dragged the bulging net to shore, Jesus had built a fire to cook some for breakfast.  (I like this detail. Jesus knew practical skills like starting a fire without matches!)

After breakfast, Jesus had a penetrating conversation with Peter about how much Peter loved Him. After all, before Jesus’ crucifixion, Peter denied Him three times. Then Jesus predicted Peter’s death scenario: “When you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go” (John 21:18). He wasn’t suggesting Peter would fade away in a nursing home, but that he’d have a difficult, helpless death that would glorify God.  Tradition says that Peter died of crucifixion, upside-down, the opposite of Christ’s death.

After that stunning revelation, Peter pointed at John. “Lord, what about him?”  In other words, if I have to die in misery, shouldn’t John, too? Jesus replied, “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you?  You must follow me”(21:22).

Historians say John died in extreme old age on a prison island.  But the lesson of this passage isn’t who-dies-how, but that living according to Jesus’ plan has no place for entitlement.  We can’t demand that Jesus give us a certain life that’s full of the things we want.  Health, education, employment, nice housing, a nice car, marriage, family, or even public recognition are not “givens” of the Christian life. Demanding them from God is the sin of coveting. We’re simply to trust and obey. Do our best with what God has given us. 

The rest of the spoon story? We’re back to “normal.” And Zion still makes a mess of eating applesauce, even with the bent spoon.  Someday….

One Mighty "Mighty Fortress"!

Among our valley's significant rock formations is "Castlerock,"

which  from some angles looks like a fortress with lookouts.

For the "mighty" in health, it's a popular hiking spot.

This Sunday will mark the quincentenary of a pivotal hammering. On the last day of October, in 1517, a monk named Martin Luther nailed a list of his 95 disagreements with church teachings on the cathedral door in Wittenberg, Germany.  Among them: the selling of “indulgences” to supposedly pardon peoples’ sins when all it did was pad the church coffers. His own personal struggle over receiving God’s forgiveness led Luther to see in a new light the scripture from Habakkuk and quoted in Romans, “The just shall live by faith.”  His life threatened, Luther went into protective custody at a sympathizer’s castle for a year where he began translating the Bible from Greek into German.

He also composed a hymn book. This was radical for days when “church music” consisted of Latin chants by priests. The most enduring of his hymns is “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God,” based on Psalm 46, “God is our refuge and strength.” Today known as the national hymn of Germany, it’s been translated into almost every known language. Its translation to English rhyme, by the way, was particularly troublesome because the original German was so vivid. There were at least 80 translations to English; the one most popular in America was done in 1852 by a Harvard professor.

The hymn reflects Luther’s awareness of spiritual battle. Often when he faced difficulty and danger, it’s said he’d often resort to singing this song. Not surprisingly, Luther was a musician, too. As a youth, he sang in a boy’s choir. He played flute and lute (a type of guitar), often helping lead congregational singing. He wrote in the foreword of one book:

Next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world.  It controls our thoughts, minds, heart, and spirits….A person who…does not regard music as a marvelous creation of God…does not deserve to be called a human being; he should be permitted to hear nothing but the braying of asses and the grunting of hogs.”

Another Luther quote on music: “If any man despises music, as all fanatics do, for him I have no liking; for music is a gift and grace of God, not an invention of men.  Thus it drives out the devil and makes people cheerful.  Then one forgets all wrath, impurity, and other devices.”

Also, “The Devil, the originator of sorrowful anxieties and restless troubles, flees before the sound of music almost as before the Word of God.”

In a preface to a hymn  collection, he wrote that God is “praised and honored, and we are made better and stronger in faith, when His holy Word is impressed on our hearts by sweet music.”

One historian said that, by giving the German people both the Bible in their own language and a German hymnbook, Luther enabled the people to listen to God through His Word and respond back to Him in their songs.  As Luther’s passion ignited the fires, congregational singing spread through the churches. Scholars believe some 25,000 hymns were written in just Germany in the first hundred years of the Reformation.

As an aside, Luther had passion for more than scriptural truth and song. No longer a Catholic monk, he became concerned about the plight of some local young nuns, virtually imprisoned in terrible conditions in a nearby convent. Twelve nuns were smuggled out of there in heavy barrels used to ship herring. He found suitable mates for all but one, Katherine Con Bora. He’d resisted the idea of marrying himself, thinking he’d probably die a heretic’s death. But eventually he married her himself.  She was 26 and he, 41. They had six children, four of whom lived to adulthood.

Time for time-out

Having little ones (aka grandchildren) in the house has returned us to sometimes needing to “correct” misbehavior. With their parents’ okay we’re using “time out” as we did for their then-little dad (and his sister). Usually “time out” was enforced in the offender’s room (“on your bed, no books or toys!”) or isolation in a bare corner, the timer ticking typically for ten minutes. 

Sometimes I wish there was a way to enforce “time out” for misbehaving adult tongues. When I’ve been a victim of vile or angry words, verses from scripture throb with special meaning for me.  

Do not be quickly provoked in your spirit, for anger resides in the lap of fools. (Ecclesiastes 7:9)

The heart of the righteous weighs its answers, but the mouth of the wicked gushes evil. (Proverbs 15:28)

Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. (James 1:19-20)

One day I answered the phone to a barrage of angry words. Remembering counsel regarding this person’s issues, I didn’t attempt to set the person straight. Instead, I thanked them for calling and hung up. Shaking and upset, I realized I needed a “God-time-out” for spiritual encouragement. Within seconds, this thought crossed my mind, “Take it to the Lord in prayer.”  I did—and later, thinking about that phrase, recalled how it came from a beloved hymn, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus.”

Few realize that this tender hymn that almost didn’t reach publication.  Its author was Joseph Scriven, who immigrated from Ireland to Canada in the mid-1850s. His fiancé accidentally drowned the night before his wedding.  After that, he pursued an extremely frugal lifestyle of giving and serving. When his mother fell ill in far-off Dublin, he scribbled off a poem to encourage her. A friend chanced to see a copy on scratch paper at Scriven’s home. He was impressed, but Scriven just said with typical modesty, “The Lord and I did it between us.” It was later published in a small collection of poems, and set to music by a leading musician of the day. Well-known gospel musician Ira Sankey discovered the hymn in 1875 and included it in his own hymnbook. Scriven died himself of accidental drowning, like his fiancée, in 1886. The hymn’s text is inscribed on his gravestone in Port Hope, Ontario. I like the irony of his resting place!  I’m glad it’s “Hope,” not “Cape Disappointment,” as we have in my state where the Columbia empties into the Pacific Ocean.

It’s just like the Lord to take something so simple and use it to bring hope and power to a believer’s life! All its verses speak comfort, but for me, the third was especially poignant:

Are we weak and heavy laden, Cumbered with a load of care?

Precious Savior, still our refuge—Take it to the Lord in prayer.
Do thy friends despise, forsake thee?  Take it to the Lord in prayer;
In His arms He’ll take and shield thee—Thou wilt find a solace there.

Feeling sluggish

It’s a day I’d rather be attacking my chores, but instead I’m slogging through things with a drippy nose and a haze over my mind.  Between allergies (thanks, ragweed and weeks of smoke) and not enough sleep (waking up at 4 a.m.), I identify with the energy of a slug.  I admit that slugs get to where they want to go, though it takes a long time. And their presence isn’t exactly welcomed by most gardeners.

“Sluggishness” is no modern malady. Proverbs makes several references to the issues that keep a person from reaching his or her God-potential.

Proverbs 6:6-8 contrasts the “sluggard” with busy, think-ahead ants who prepare for the future that will come all too soon. “When will you rise from your sleep?” the writer asks the “sluggard.” Well, my “druthers” would have been rising at 6 a.m., but I’m aware of people who have real issues with wanting to get up. They have no compelling goals for each day or the future. One of my study Bibles comments in the margin: “As he waits and does nothing, opportunities slip away, and without notice his poverty and need overwhelm him.” 

 Some other observations of a “sluggard”:

He’s annoying to be around (Proverbs 10:26).

He wants everything given to him (13:4).

He imagines impassible obstacles (15:19).

He lets opportunity pass him by (20:4).

He craves things but won’t work for them (21:25).

He allows unfounded fear to makes situations seem worse than they really are (26:13).

He lacks inertia and a get-going attitude (26:14).

He waits for others to do things for him (26:15 and 19:24).

He thinks he knows it all—but doesn’t (26:16).

Well, enough whippings by a strand of cold spaghetti. I really do have goals for today. Every day, it seems, my “to do” list exceeds my hours. Today, now that the allergy meds have slowed down the nose faucet, I’m up and about and ready to go, though not at 100%.  Yes, an hour’s nap this afternoon will be very welcome.  But I will have prepared ahead for dinner, with the meat thawing and a menu in mind. (No, not fried slugs.  I’ll leave that delicacy to weird people.)

Well affixed

Mona Lisa, move over.  “Bob the Tomato” enjoys prominent display at the Zornes art gallery, aka refrigerator door.  “Bob,” from a Christian cartoon series featuring vegetables and fruits, was delivered with great flourish to our house about a year ago by its artist, grandson Josiah. Never mind that “Bob” (Josiah calls it Bob the “ToTAto”) has a mere hint of red crayon instead of the intense red of the edible real thing. Bob is a winning piece of art in its creator’s eyes. Recently, after 4-year-old Josiah removed “Bob” to show a visitor, I noticed “Bob” was re-affixed with extra security. You can never have too many decorative magnets to hold up a pre-schooler’s art—or at least Josiah must think so. 

While I chucked over Josiah’s extra-magnetic-security “affixing” of “Bob the Tomato,” something from the Bible clicked in my heart about the word “affix” and its relative “fix,” in the sense of “securing” something. I found it in Hebrews 12:2 (NIV): Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.  Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.

This verse reminds me how I need to keep Jesus—and especially His suffering and victory—front and center on my spiritual perspective. Especially this past year, in the midst of bewildering spiritual challenges, I’ve realized how hard and how necessary it is to “not grow weary and lose heart.” Through adversity, He disciplines and “grows” me.

No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful.  Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. (v. 11)

“Fixing my eyes” requires that I guard against the busyness of life (like those random magnets) which could cover up:

*The “skull”—the grotesque, skeleton-like hill in Jerusalem where Jesus was nailed to the cross for my sins as part of the “sins of the world.” I don’t need to confine that remembrance to the season of Lent.

*The “scowls” and “scorn” of sinners who had no idea how much He loved them. As part of my spiritual training, He’s allowed me to experience “scowls” and “scorn” from  troubled people I’ve tried to reach out to—though certainly what I experience is a speck compared to the burden He carried.

*The “sweetness” of knowing, through faith, the Author and Perfecter of my faith who helped me to understand and have a relationship with God.

By the way, speaking of  “sweet,” our little “Bob the Tomato” artist (in contrast to many preschoolers) enjoys eating real tomatoes, especially the walnut-size “Sweet One Hundreds” from our tomato patch.

Sent God-mail lately?

Early in my writing career, before the internet, old-fashioned mail connected me to the publishing industry. Yes, I once put manuscripts to editors in a box like this, flipped up the flag, and waited.  If they returned as “rejected,” I also hoped they wouldn’t have coffee stains, meaning tedious retyping. A common writer’s joke concerned how many cobwebs would adorn a mailbox before an overworked editor responded.  Now, my computer translates keystrokes to words, corrects my spelling, and zips a submission in seconds to a publishing house. What a world!

Recently, picking up the usual bills and flyers, I realized how busy my local spiders had been. A what-if occurred to me. What if, instead of receiving this type of mail, I was charged with sending love notes to God? What would I say? Right away, this phrase came to mind: “Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.”  I found it at the beginning of Psalm 107, and behold: it’s a chorus that threads throughout the psalm.

This psalm opens “Book V” of the Psalms, and it’s believed to include those collected after the Jews returned to their land.  Bible scholars say this psalm specifically mentions hurting and at-risk populations: refugees (4-7), prisoners (10-16), the sick (19-22), and victims (seamen, 23-32). These people didn’t have the soft life of a roof over their heads, a grocery store down the road, and decent medical care. Life for them was tough. Yet when they cried out to God, He heard them.

The last image, of seamen in a horrific storm (vv. 23-30) is terrifying, something like a Moby Dick drama or worst. Yet, when life crashes in around us, there couldn’t be a better metaphor.  I have several friends on the wild waves of serious illness.  They’re waiting for that time when they’ll be guided to a haven (v. 30), when they can “give thanks to the LORD for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for men.”

 The key here is “his unfailing love.” No matter what trial assaults us, God’s unfailing love is there. Who of us hasn’t felt tossed around violently by life’s cruel storms? Yet, through it all is God’s unfailing love.

What does this have to do with a cobwebbed mailbox?  Maybe that there ought to be “thank you” notes to God going out regularly-- a box full of praises for God’s unfailibng love, headed to heaven via journaling, prayer, or public testimony.  I know I could improve on that area of my spiritual life! “Whoever is wise,” ends the psalm (v. 43), “let him heed these things and consider the great love of the Lord.”

Speaking of thanksgivings....

Oh, the awe of holding a newborn!  James, my son’s third son and our fourth grandchild, made his entrance a week ago.  Yes, it’s now “my three sons” at their household—bringing a smile to us “oldies” who remember the popular sit-com (1960-72) by that name featuring a fictional widower (starring Fred MacMurray) and three sons.  I always liked the perky housekeeper hired to keep things going! So, James, welcome as you grow up with brothers just 2 ½ and 4 years older.  I pray that as you grow up, you will embrace your heritage of faith.  “Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom” (James 3:13 NIV).

Fleeting vs. forever

My neighbor was right-on about the cactus on her front porch railing. Its spectacular blooms would last a day. I was there with a camera the morning they opened, and I wasn’t disappointed. Who would guess that such beauty could emerge from such unfriendly, thorny plants?

I thought of the Bible’s similar observation about transient things in 1 Peter 1:24-25, quoting Isaiah 40:6-8:

All men are like grass and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever.

It’s easy to pluck out these verses and go no further. But the context says a lot more. In the preceding verses, Peter says being “born again” in Jesus means we have “imperishable” seed within us. Then, after quoting Isaiah, he continues:

And this is the word that was preached to you.  Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind.  Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good. (1 Peter 1:25b-2:3)

In other words, bloom for Jesus for all you’re worth!  If your life contains any of the negative characteristics he listed, something’s not right between you and Jesus. It’s a pretty grim list, too. Eugene Peterson paraphrased it this way: “So clean house! Make a clean sweep of malice and pretense, envy and hurtful talk.”  Ouch! All of those are like cactus thorns!

Need a soul boost? Go back and read the entire first chapter of 1 Peter that ends with the verses quoted above. It seems that Peter is so overwhelmed by the Lord’s gracious redemptive work in his life that he can’t contain himself.  His faith flowers forth, and not just for a day!

The Decay Squad

I could have bought my husband a really nice new recliner—not the type seen here!-- for the check I had to write at the dentist’s office recently. Tagged onto my routine cleaning was re-doing an old (30-year-old?) filling that had cracked and was showing decay around the edges. Sure enough, by the time the dentist blasted it out, there was more decay underneath. What I couldn’t see or feel, he discovered and repaired.

I thought of a verse that addressed some difficult situations I found myself in lately: “Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently” (Galatians 6:1).

It’s tricky, it really is.  One of those situations involved someone’s willful plunge into adultery and a spurning of pastoral counsel. The other involved other types of willful behavior that bring shame to the name of Jesus. Neither wanted to hear or heed godly wisdom.

In frustration, I did what I need to do every time: go to scripture for guidance in praying. This time it came from Psalm 19.  After layering one splendid analogy after another to describe God’s Word, David concluded:

By them is your servant warned; in keeping them there is great reward.

Who can discern his errors?  Forgive my hidden thoughts.

Keep your servant also from willful sins; may they not rule over me.

Then I will be blameless, innocent of the great transgression. (Psalm 19:12-13)

My dentist’s trained eye and his X-ray machine helped to see what I certainly couldn’t. They discerned the “errors” of my dental habits and aging process that threatened a helpful part of my body.  (Yes, teeth are good.)

 Oh, there’s the teeth-cleaning part, too.  When my hygienist scrapes, grinds, picks, and polishes my “ivories,” she’s keeping decay from ruling over me. Oh yes, I get the “reminders” of flossing and such, and my “willful” sin is not doing it daily. (There, I confessed.)

I’m grateful for my dental team (though, without insurance, every visit has an extra “ouch”).  I’m also grateful for my Bible, which, like a toothbrush and floss getting into the dental crannies, encourages and exhorts me toward a God-honoring life.

Pollution solution

For several weeks this summer, multiple fires in our northern neighbor, Canada, funneled choking smoke over the Pacific Northwest. Several times, my town had smoke pollution so bad it was the worst in the nation, at times rivaling infamous smoggy cities around the world.  As an asthmatic, I stayed inside a lot for health’s sake. Then one night I awoke to the faint sound of rain drops. I looked out, opened a window and breathed in that pungent fresh-rain smell, rejoicing that at least for a while our skies would be clear.

My Bible reading those smoggy days included the book of James, so I perked up when I read this:

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world, (James 1:27 NIV).

The word for “polluted” in Greek is “aspilos,” which also described the unspotted, unstained lamb offered in Old Testament sacrifices.  Here, it means “free from all defilement in the sight of God.” In our times, when so much media assaults our ears and eyes, we need to be particularly careful of the values we might be taking in.  The latest internet site or game, movie or television show may not, and does not, have to be a “must see” for a Christian who holds values at variance with what the screen portrays.

The book of James unites belief and practice.  His emphasis is “believe and do”:

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourself.  Do what it says. (James 1:22)

He particularly pressed down on misuse of the tongue. Besides swearing or foul language, this included any negative communication that didn’t honor God and His purposes.  James said bluntly that the person with an uncontrolled tongue has worthless religion (1:26).

But he turned to the “do,” and that was to share Christ’s love and compassion with those who in the First Century were utterly helpless.  There was no Social Security, Medicaid or welfare type program as a safety net for families in need. In those days, when a husband or father died, unless the extended family could step in to help, children and mothers were left in terrible shape. Thus, James’ reminder for the church (as energized by compassionate Christians) to step up, looking after these orphans and widows “in their distress.”

For years my church and others have quietly done just that, especially reaching out to very needy widows or single moms through food distribution, financial counseling, and other aid. The social concern advocated in James is also one reason I’ve sewn hundreds of baby blankets that I donate to hospitals to give newborns from impoverished families.

After a week or so of marvelously blue skies, some local fires returned haze to our skies. But I’d breathed enough unhealthy air earlier to remind me of this pure, refreshing truth: we have a sinless Savior, whose example leads the way to real life.