SIGNS OF LABOR

If winter's cold is getting you down, imagine yourself back in summertime... when instead of mittens or stout snow gloves I was wearing...garden gloves.

My  garden gloves were a mess—torn, somewhat mended with duct tape, definitely ready for the trash after years of grubbing out weeds. I guess my sister-in-law noticed when she stopped by one day while I was down-on-my-knees wrestling with rose-bed weeds. Soon after, here came her practical, loving gift: new gloves.

I purposely chose the word “wrestling,” as my “knee-level” gardening stance regularly reminds me of another implication of “on-your-knees”: that of earnest prayer. Prayer doesn't need a certain body posture. But I've experienced how the “down-on-the-knees” posture helps adjust my heart-attitude when I'm wrestling with heart-wrenching prayer needs.

That's also the word translators chose (from the Greek pale) for the earnest prayers of one of the leaders of an early New Testament church located in today's nation of Turkey. The word is tucked away in Paul's letter to the church in Colossae (near today's modern city of Honaz in southwest Turkey*).

Epaphras, who is one of you and a servant of Christ Jesus, sends greetings. He is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured. (Colossians 4:12 NIV)

Even though Paul had never been to the city (see Colossians 2:1), he had once hoped to come there in person to encourage the Colossian believers. Christianity had been planted there through the ministry of Colossian resident Epaphras, converted during a trip to Ephesus (about 100 miles away). Now, years later, this new church had adapted some heresies into their faith platform, including a descent into legalism and Gnosticism. Epaphras knew he needed help to lead this congregation, so made the long trip to Rome to consult with Paul, now a prisoner on house arrest.

In response to Epaphras' concern, Paul wrote this pastoral letter, full of doctrine and theological correction. It ended with extensive “final greetings” that revealed his appreciation for those who were carrying on the Colossian ministry. Ten names dot the final ten verses—quiet reminders of believers who put on their “work gloves” to serve that church.

I wonder if, at this point, Paul felt something like worn-out work gloves. He'd traveled thousands of miles, enduring beatings, stonings, and persecutions. Yet, stranded in Rome as a prisoner, he realized he'd probably have to give up hopes of “hands-on” ministry in Colossae. He had to turn it over to “new gloves,” new leaders who had to confront the false legalistic teachings and affirm the Gospel message of faith in Christ.

Or, to continue the analogy: it was a situation of “out with the old rules/rituals and weird Gnostic ideas” and “in with the new life-giving Gospel.” Crusty, dirty, worn-out religious ideas OUT, the fresh, working-gloves faith in Jesus, IN!

*See map here: Honaz,Denizli, Türkiye - Bing Maps

**For a little more on the Colossian heresy, go here: 

Whatis the Colossian Heresy?

NESTED

My son-in-law was helping trim up a fir tree when he came upon an abandoned bird nest. How small, how meticulously put together with twigs and mud. What a builder, probably a swallow (known as a restless bird, always flitting about) or a sparrow (symbolizing utter loneliness in Psalm 102:7). Both birds (common to us!) also flew in and out of the Bible's tabernacle and the temple

Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young—a place near your altar, O LORD Almighty, my King and my God.(Psalm 84:3)

Remembering this verse, I thought of how this home, where I've lived for nearly 42 years, became the “nest” for two little ones who grew up to be responsible, loving adults. Especially through their dad's final illness, and my new journey without him, I have appreciated their love and support.

But that little nest said more to me. Though no longer needed in my yard's fir tree, it was a “history” of where the bird parents raised their family, teaching those hungry hatchlings over and over, over and over. Showed them how to fly, find food, and make their own way in the world. Released them from the nest. How much a picture of human parenting! (Well, I didn't teach my kids to fly but driver's ed was equally scary!)

Swedish hymn-writer Carolina Sandell Berg noted these things in lyrics for her tender, enduring hymn:

Children of the heavenly Father safely in His bosom gather

Nestling bird nor star in heaven such a refuge e'er was given.

One phrase in Psalm 84:3 always makes me pause: “a place near your altar, O LORD Almighty.” Both the ancient tabernacle and temple, given their size and construction, couldn't keep out the birds. Thus many nested in places they deemed safe. Probably their chosen “safe place” was atop a wall or in a niche—not on a hot altar where sacrifices were burned. But who's to say the birds didn't fly down at night to inspect things—even altars--when all was calm and the ashes cool?

And could that also be a picture of human home life at night? When my son and daughter were younger, we tucked them into bed with stories and prayer. Yes, the “family altar” of seeking God. How touching to hear them pray for their own needs, other family members and their friends. Under-girding their prayers: the trust in the Lord Almighty, their King, their God. Now they do the same with their children.

“Nested” near HIS altar. Our King and our God. There's no better place to be.

"WELL"-DONE

Sometimes I have to push my chin back up to close my mouth over the dating-life excesses of our media-fueled, love-weary culture. I'm not talking only about the “bachelor” or “bachelorette” television episodes (which I never bothered to watch) which (assuming by their previews) were likely grounded heavily in sensuality. A few years before that, one television show featured a woman “choosing” to date one of three men hidden behind a barrier. All she had to go on were their voices and answers to some inane questions. When her choice was revealed, her reaction was...well, let the audience decide.

Maybe the problem was the media in charge. Not the Master.

One of the most faith-challenging romance stories of the Bible gives a more God-dependent perspective on man/woman match-ups. Flip to Genesis 24, about the unlikely “romance” of Abraham's old-age miracle offspring, Isaac. Abraham's wife Sarah had died. Isaac was an aging bachelor, with no wife in sight. Before Abraham died, he wanted to check that box for his son. Most important, he wanted Isaac's wife to come from his own family line—days and days of camel-travel away.

No internet. No smart phone. No easy way to check things out beforehand. And no, Isaac wouldn't go along. No way would Abraham risk losing his son to unknown wilderness travel and wife-shopping.

And so Abraham's old, devoted servant left. No jet airplanes in those days. No nice highways. Instead, camels plodding over wilderness and sand, both left feet forward and down. Both right feet forward and down. Over and over. About 3.5 miles an hour. A journey of some 300 miles to Mesopotamia where Abraham's kin originated. Even more tricky, Abraham wanted a woman from his clan of the many living back there.

You probably recall the rest of the story. After nine to ten days of weary travel, the entourage stopped at a well to water the animals. The servant put out one of those risky “fleece” prayers, asking for a miracle sign. (That's not typically how God works.) He asked for a lovely virgin to offer him and his camels water—no easy job for those humped H20 guzzlers. Out came a beauty queen who just happened to be single, from the right clan, and happy to help the weary travelers. Imagine her surprise when the servant honored her with jewelry and asked to meet her family!

Where am I going with this? To the servant's statement of amazement; “I being in the way, the LORD led me to the house of my master's brethren” (Genesis 24:27 KJV). In our times, “in the way” implies something negative, like you're not needed or impeding a project. But here in King James grammar-era, “in the way” meant that as he was progressing on his way in need of a miracle, God showed up. The rest of the story involved some conversations with the young lady's family and her eagerness to get on her way to meet her future husband. Sight unseen!

This story of God-at-work may be interpreted by some as showing “prayer-answers-on-demand.” But God doesn't always work that way. His ways are higher than our ways. Our call is to be “in [or "on"] the way,” trusting God to lead us to answers or solutions, or even to closed doors when something is not right. Or maybe “not yet”--coming as slow as camels, right feet/left feet/repeat over endless sands, the destination in His timing.

REMINDED TO PRAY

If your “New Year Resolutions” include something about your prayer life, you might resonate with this idea: a home-made personalized prayer notebook. I wrote about this simple tool in my blog a dozen years ago. When I shared about it at subsequent women’s retreats, the half-dozen or so “prayer notebooks” I’d assembled (from thrift store finds) quickly disappeared from my speaker’s “book table.”

That experience suggested that this very simple, homemade plan for “remembering to pray” seemed to hit a felt need. Nothing fancy, truly homemade, my “prayer notebook” consists of a small six-ring planner (4 1/2x7”) with homemade dividers for each day of the week. It’s small enough to fit in the pocket of my Bible cover. 

Thanks to an era when purse-size planners (or more) were trendy for the organized woman, these little "planners" are now often found in thrift stores. My “version” had tabs for each day of the week, with pages (and photos) for folks I pray for, and a sticky note to update their prayer needs. On the tabbed divider facing the first page on that section I wrote down other reminders, like character qualities to pray to grow in my children and grandchildren. In the back are two more tabs. One, to help with private worship, is a growing alphabetical list of the praise-worthy names and character of God. The other is a list I call my “Jordan stones,” to remember times of extraordinary help and comfort from God.

My blog columns about the “prayer notebook” are all back there in the online “blog history”—accessible via the list at the right of this.  Go to the 2010 tab and find Sept. 27, 2010 (here’s the link: Jeanne Zornes: September 2010 ), then scroll up (that’s how they place the subsequent blogs). The blogs suggest things that may or may not work for you. But if something does help you in your prayer life, I will be grateful.

These days, when I sit down for my “quiet time,” I often find the lyrics or tunes to hymns running through my heart. One that frequently comes to me is “My Jesus, I love thee, I know Thou art mine.” If you have hymns in your spiritual heritage, the rest of this hymn’s words may come to you. You may not realize that the words—which include “for Thee all the follies of sin I resign”-- came from the heart of a teenager. Oh, that more of us, whatever our age, would be challenged by his example of expressing love to Jesus!  I wrote about  the young poet and the hymn here: Jeanne Zornes: JUST PTL (Psalm 146). His attitude of humility and expectation is what I desire, too, in seeking to love and trust Jesus.

Anything here helpful to you? I’d love feedback in the comments section below. Scripture tells us to “encourage one another” and this is one way that can happen.

HUMBLE

It was a year when I was speaking at numerous women's retreats, and this one would be memorable. Not because my driving instructions were so vague that I started down a lonely road that only got worse—and with no place to turn around, I had to gingerly back up for hundreds of feet. Finally I got to the real retreat site (which was a right turn at a certain tree, and I had gone left), where dinner was being served. Coming into the busy, buzzing dining hall, I noticed one empty seat, and decided to sit there.

I introduced myself to the woman on my right, sitting quietly amidst the retreaters' chatter. She said her name was Dagmar, and her name and accent led to our next conversation thread about her roots in Germany. My paternal great grandparents had come from Germany. I guessed her to be mid to late sixties, Now a single woman, she was working as a maid for one of the large motels in a nearby Bavaria-themed tourist town. She had two adult children, a son in Washington and a daughter in California.

When the retreat ended, she said she wanted to keep in touch and pray for me. She also gave me a fabric heart she had made during the retreat's craft time. She asked that it remind me to please pray for her adult children. So we exchanged addresses. Once or twice a year she'd write or call me, reminding me of her prayers and asking what else to pray for. She later moved from our area, but sought me out when she passed through our town en route to see her son, who lived in a rural area about an hour's drive north. Later, no longer driving, she asked if I'd meet her at the town's bus station for a little visit when she had a layover between bus schedules. Her letters grew less frequent, then finally stopped. My last letter to her, about a year ago, was returned by the woman who had moved into her apartment. She had no idea where Dagmar moved to.

The end of April I saw Dagmar's name in the local newspaper's death notices. There would no service. Nothing said about burial. She was 88 (she would have been 89 on July 21). Though  perhaps not celebrated at death like most, she was surely known and cherished by the Lord whom she served through prayers and witness in her everyday life.

I was reminded of famous words woven into a web by the fictional Charlotte the spider in a 1952 children's book by E.B. White. Charlotte used every bit of her spider ability to reach out to a humble pig named Wilbur, She wove in her web above his pen these uplifting adjectives: “some pig,” “terrific,” “radiant,” and “humble.” The mystery words stunned his community, and saved him from becoming bacon.

“Some pig” didn't fit Dagmar, although the other words, plus “some special lady” would. Something else she said one time pierced my heart. She remarked that she was surprised when we first met how I sat by her and started a conversation. Her experience in other retreats was that “the speaker” hung out with the organizers. They didn't sit with “ordinary folks” like her. Ouch.

So, Dagmar, I celebrate you. The Lord smiled on your humble, praying life. See you at the table—God's table—in Glory.

=========

In thinking about godly women, I remembered a blog I wrote some years ago. You might enjoy reviewing its comparisons:

Jeanne Zornes: A Tale of Three Women

CLOUDED THINKING

I was cloud-watching that brilliant sunny day as I waited for my husband to finish his errand. As this cloud floated by, a name came to mind: “Elijah.” One of the mega-events of this Old Testament man's mega-prophetic life concerned a cloud....and on that hangs a lesson.

Here's the backstory out of 1 Kings 17-18. A bunch of bad kings had come to the throne, and now decadent King Ahab and his even worse wife Jezebel were in charge. In thundered the prophet Elijah, who told the royal duo they'd pay for their sins with an extended drought on their land. Elijah went into obscurity for a while (stories than included Raven Restaurant and a widow's miracle), and when he emerged he was ready to take on Ahab. The stage was Mount Carmel, where he faced the priests of Baal, the religion of Ahab's decadent wife Jezebel. With a miracle fire igniting a water-drenched altar, Elijah won the showdown. The people who'd once chanted “Hail, Baal,” now shouted, “The Lord—He is the God!”

After, ah, eliminating Baal's priest collection, Elijah left the scene, ending up on a Mt. Carmel viewpoint looking out over the sea. He curled up into a ball to pray. He'd experienced the 3 D's of disappointment: a dry brook, a depleted cupboard, and a dead boy. Each time God had intervened with miracles. Now Elijah prayed for rain for the parched land.

“Go check the sky above the sea,” he told his servant. That happened six times. Nothing. The seventh time, the servant said he saw a cloud the size of a man's hand rising from the sea.

That was good enough for Elijah. With miraculous speed, the cloudy wisp became a stormy black sky. Then came the wind and horrific rain. The drought was over.

There's more to the story, of course, but that tiny “promise cloud” in Elijah's story encouraged me. No, I'm not comparing myself with Elijah. But there have been times I prayed desperately for negative situations. When I saw no progress, God seemed to be saying, “Wait on My time.” The answer to one situation happened like a clap of thunder and then a horrific downpour—so swift and tumultuous came the answer, in a way I never imagined.

About that time in my scripture reading, I was in Psalms, and these verses in Psalm 26 were like crashing thunder:

Vindicate me, O Lord, for I have led a blameless life; I have trusted in the Lord without wavering. Test me, O Lord, and try me, examine my heart and my mind, for your love is ever before me, and I walk continually in your truth.

The rest of the psalm talks about hanging out with people who share your faith, “proclaiming aloud your praise and telling of all your wonderful deeds” (v. 7).

We may not be Elijahs, ordained to condemn unrighteousness in spectacular ways. But we can be like him in waiting prayerfully on God to do the impossible. Even when the answer seems as fragile and unlikely as a little cloud drifting across the sky.

Feeling besieged? Hopeless? Spiritually dry? Keep praying. God has His timing for umbrellas, for laughing in the rain.

LOW, LOW, LOW (Psalm 142)

"God, can you hear me?" These satellite disks made me grateful that

prayer doesn't need such technology to access heaven!

(Part of an ongoing series on the 48 psalms commended for study during times of "feeling down," from pastor/counselor David Seamand's' book "Healing for Damaged Emotions.")

What do you say to God when you’re so spiritually and emotionally low that you don’t know what to say?  Welcome to Psalm 142, introduced by this note: “A maskil of David. When he was in the cave. A prayer.” A “maskil” is some sort of musical term. But the words “the cave” are an important clue. Psalm 57 (identified as a “miktam,” another music term) also says it’s for “when he [David] had fled form Saul into the cave.” That despairing time in David’s life is recorded in 1 Samuel 21-22. David had risen to be a hero in Saul’s royal court because of his military prowess and musical skills. But Saul had come to hate the man who’d succeed him instead of his own son Jonathan, and tried to kill David. In his escape, David ended up in an enemy town that wanted nothing to do with him. After all, he’d killed their hero giant, Goliath! On the run again, he ended up in a desert cave—homeless, hungry and friendless.  Was this how God treated His faithful followers?

GUT-WRENCHING PRAYING

As I read this psalm, I’m also hearing the despair of Psalms 42-43:

Why are you downcast, O my soul?

Why so disturbed within me? (42:5b, 11a; 43:5a)

Utterly alone in the wilderness, no doubt afraid to show his face outside, David faced hopelessness—and told God about it. Only imagination can describe his tone of voice—whether a hoarse whisper in the echoes of the cave, or bold shouts. But his despair spew in honest, hard words.

I cry aloud to the LORD, I lift up my voice to the LORD for mercy. I pour out my complaint before him; before him I tell my trouble. (vv. 1-2)

What’s the lesson here? That God can take it! We don’t have to crawl into Heaven’s throne room and say in a meek voice, “Any chance we could talk?” David complains from his tortured heart, “God, you know the mess I’m in. Evil men are out there, wanting to snare me. Everywhere I look, there’s no out. I’m cornered. Nobody cares about my life” (my paraphrase of vv. 3-5).

DARING TO HOPE

Maybe you’ve said something like this: “I’m in desperate need!” You’ve just quoted verse 6. Life couldn’t be any bleaker, and David wanted God to know it (as if He didn’t already). The soldiers Saul dispatched to find and kill David planned to thoroughly carry out their orders. “Rescue me from those who pursue me,” David cried, “for they are too strong for me” (v. 6b).

We may not be listening from a cave for the sounds of approaching hooves, but life can sometimes be “too strong” for us. A broken relationship, job loss, disaster, financial hardship, a loved one’s death, false accusation, wayward children—all of these and more can make us feel like David, ready to curl up in a cave and give up. But Psalm 142 isn’t just about despair. It’s about looking up to God when you’re down:

Set me free from my prison, that I may praise your name.

Then the righteous will gather about me because of your goodness to me. (v. 7)

David knew God was capable of turning things around. If God didn’t, then He had lied in having David anointed as the next king. But stuck in a blind alley, David knew his impossible “rescue” could do only one thing: bring glory to God.  That’s a big change from the “glory” that came to a lad who slew a giant, then grew to a strapping young man who outclassed all of Saul’s other warriors.

“Low, low, low” isn’t God’s “forever” plan for His own. We may have to go through those “dark caves of crying” at some time in this fallen world. But someday our Redeemer will come. The righteous will gather about HIM, and—like the end of this psalm says--praise Him because of His goodness to us.

Rock on!

This super-size rocker has been a longtime

fixture outside a furniture store in Moscow, Idaho

I’m a big fan of rocking chairs—well, maybe not this big. But the soothing action of rockers takes me back to my childhood and sitting in the lap of my dad for story time in his spring-action platform rocker. When I started my first job three hours’ drive from home, and needed to assemble furniture basics, I could hardly wait to buy my own rocker.  My bed was third-hand. My ancient hand-me-down couch had wires poking through the frame. My passed-on dining set was, well, plastic and cheap. But in that first year I added a colonial style wooden rocker to my household.  When things got tough at work or in relationships, it was my “place to go” to read scripture and talk with my Heavenly Father.

More than a decade later, when I married and had babies, that rocker was moved to the nursery. Motherhood gave me a special appreciation for Psalm 131:

My heart is not proud, O LORD, my eyes are not haughty;

I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me.

But I have stilled and quieted my soul; like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me.

O Israel, put your hope in the LORD, both now and forevermore.

When my two older grandsons visit and take their naps at our home, the three-year-old still likes Nana to rock him. I ask what he wants me to sing, and it’s always “Mary had a little lamb.”  I follow up with “Jesus loves me” and some other Sunday school songs until he’s mellow enough to place in the portable playpen where he takes naps here. (His brother rates the crib in the guest room.)  As I cover him and whisper, “Nana loves you,” I’m taken back to those stretching times of trust when, quiet before God in my earthly rocker, I sought the spiritual strength to keep my hope in Him. When things in my life were going haywire, I wanted to be still and quiet before Him.

My mother died in 1978 when I was barely thirty, so memories of her are becoming more precious. One memory, captured by camera in an era when photos were rare and expensive, shows her as a newborn in 1919, propped up in an old rocker. I knew she was born in a log cabin in eastern Montana, the firstborn of a Norwegian immigrant and his wife, whose childhood polio left her with one leg shorter than the other. The family lived in poverty, tilling the land he'd homesteaded. I don’t know the story of that old rocker. Because my grandfather (who died when I was a few months old) had trained in carpentry in Norway, it’s possible he even crafted it.

I realize rockers have no inherent spiritual quality. But when I sit in my current favorite rocker, my heart waiting for the whispers of my Heavenly Father, I know He is there for me. I am stilled and quieted before Him, listening, and learning.

Grasping at hope

I love looking at the tiny, trusting hands of my new grandson, James, now four months old.  These tiny, intricate hands curl around an adult finger with such faith and trust. Right now, his favorite game is “push-ups,” going from sitting in my lap to standing in it.  I know better than to trust just his grip to pull him up, so I hold his hand as he holds mine.

This tender imagery came to mind as I prepared last week’s blog review of Carol Kent’s new devotional book, He Holds My Hand.  In autographing it, she referenced Psalm 63:8, “I stay close to you; your right hand upholds me.”

The psalm’s inscription says David wrote it while in the desert of Judah, probably referring to the years he fled the murderous intentions of King Saul. He’s hungry, hunted, and hopeful.  He thinks of God day and night:

On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. (v. 6)

In recent months I’ve experienced those “night-watch” God times.  I value a good night of sleep, but frequently I wake up around 2 or 3 a.m. with a compulsion to pray for someone who has verbally bullied me. My greatest desire is to see this person become whole in Christ. In praying, I sometimes feel like a little child (or even a baby) putting my weak but trusting hand in God’s.  At such times, other “hand” scriptures bring me comfort, like this one in Isaiah 41:13:

For I am the LORD, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, "Do not fear; I will help you.”

Or this, in Psalm 37:23:

The LORD delights in the ways of the man whose steps he has made firm; through he stumble, he will not fall, for the LORD upholds him with his hand.

At times in those middle-of-the-night prayers, my posture is uplifted hands, my way of releasing to God my frustration and deep concern for this person. That’s the way it should be. When I reach up, God is reaching down to me.  And that brings comfort and hope.

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.

Think tank: "true"

Blue columbine grow in a little triangle flowerbed of perennials my son planted for me several years ago. Oh, his creative touch with lavender, lupine and other flowers bringing a dead corner to life every spring. Though columbine come in many colors, I’m glad he chose blue, my favorite hue. It’s soothing and also connected with loyalty or constancy, as in “true blue.”  Maybe that’s why I pay extra attention with I come across “true” in the Bible as in the sense of real, ideal, genuine, manifest, uncompromised.. John called Jesus “the true God and eternal life” (1 John 5:20). Many passages in Revelation use “true” in describing God’s attributes. Then there’s Philippians 4:8, urging us to think about whatever is true.

It’s true that Paul wrote these words while a prisoner in Rome. But instead of complaining, he sought God’s true purposes in his situation and found the joy that throbs through this epistle. He gave struggling believers some “think tank” homework—to think  (meditate) on God’s praiseworthy attributes, starting with “true.” He knew it would change their outlooks and lives.

 

The “think tank” assignments follow Paul’s practical advice about surviving hard times: *Rejoice in the Lord always.  Long ago I had a car with a bumper sticker that said, “Praise the Lord Anyway!” One day a hefty teen guy was helping me carry out a big load of groceries. You guessed it: a glass jar rolled out and almost broke. Noticing my bumper sticker, he rolled his eyes and said, “Praise the Lord, anyway.”  I don’t think that’s quite what Paul had in mind! Instead, it is a mindset for life that says even when I can’t understand what’s happening, I rejoice in God who sees far ahead and helps me.

*Let your gentleness be evident to all.  I hope I’m not the lady who blusters about so much that people wish she wasn’t around. A “gentle and quiet spirit” (1 Peter 3:4) has been on my “remember-to-practice” list for a long time. I’m glad Paul added, “The Lord is near.” He sees every speck of behavior, good or bad.

*Do not be anxious about anything. Oh, this one stings. Can’t I just be “concerned”? But carnal concern slops over into sinful anxiety quite easily.

*In everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. Those with high anxiety are apt to be those who obey the “pray over problems” a lot.  They stay anxious because God doesn’t answer their prayers promptly enough or in the way they want. They forget the “thanksgiving” part, which would say, “God, this is big in my life. I don’t see a solution, but thank You that You already have a better answer in mind. Thank you that some day I’ll look back and see Your wisdom.  I praise you that it’s not all about me and my worry-prayers but about You being a wise, gracious and loving God.”

Living and praying God’s way, Paul said, results in true peace. It’s not that push-back-in- the-recliner for a sigh-filled “end of day,” but a spiritual peace that “transcends all understanding.” It will also “guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus” (v. 7).  Now, that’s “beyond understanding.” 

Next: “honest”

Garlands of grace

A series inspired by sights of Kauai.
Abundant in Hawaii, the fragrant plumeria blossom is popular for picking and stringing into floral garlands called leis. Here on the mainland, I’ve noticed some graduates wearing leis at commencement exercises. On celebration days in Hawaii, statues of historical figures are often draped several deep with leis. I remember being given a lei many years ago. As it was lowered onto my shoulders, I felt very honored.

Best known in Hawaiian and Samoan culture, leis share with other cultures, even from ancient times, the idea of a garland signifying honor and celebration.  Two verses in Proverbs are worth considering:

Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction and do not forsake your mother’s teaching. They will be a garland to grace your head and a chain to adorn your neck. (Proverbs 1:8-9, NIV)

Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom, though it cost all you have, get understanding. Esteem her, and she will exalt you; embrace her, and she will honor you.  She will set a garland of grace on your head and present you with a crown of splendor. (Proverbs 4:7-9, NIV)

These verses presume that a parent’s advice and life example are worthy of emulating, and walking in their footsteps will bring honor and moral beauty to a young person. When parents are unable to fulfill their spiritual training role (because of distance, their own failures, or death), God can use other parent-figures to do that. I was reminded of that truth in recent weeks when two older friends died.  Lorna, a pastor’s wife, was 76, her abilities eroded her last few years by dementia. But beginning with my young adult years, she lived out before me the character worthy of God’s garland. At her funeral, many mentioned her steadfast, accepting love, and her wisdom.

Lorraine, at prayer in 2013 (then in her mid-nineties)

The other friend, Lorraine, died at 97, full of years and loved by her huge family and many friends. I met her when she came from Michigan to Washington state to visit her daughter, who lives in my town and is a close friend.  I am blessed by how her godly character lives on through that daughter. A few years ago while visiting her aging mother in Michigan, my friend quietly took a photo of her mother at prayer. Eyes closed, hand raised, her mother was absorbed in her extended daily prayer time on behalf of family and friends around the world. My friend keeps that photo by her kitchen sink.  Oh, that all of us had such a visual reminder of faithfulness! 

One more thing about plumeria: their perfume, like the “fragrance of life” that should emanate from us as Christ-lovers:

But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him. (2 Corinthians 2:14)

Extra-large was extra-wrong

My local store had put away most of its
swim suits to make room for fall attire,
but imagine this in leopard print.

All I wanted was a peach-colored shirt to go with a scarf my daughter had brought back for me from China. And I had found one, but the wrong size.

The store’s catalog clerk happily punched in the numbers to special-order one for me, and about a week later I found a phone message that it had come in.  Rushing to the store, I claimed the package and went back home.

Opening it, I found, not the medium-size peach shirt, but a women’s XXL bathing suit in jungle print so amazing and bold that I was certain I could hear lions and rhinos in the background.

Of course, I exchanged it (I provided the store clerks with their laugh of the day).  My husband asked why I didn’t keep it, as my very modest swimming suit is thirty years old. There was this issue of “swimming” in a very generously-proportioned swim suit.

Sometimes, I think, we are guilty of generously-proportioned praying that reeks of “Self.”  Like this:

For mySELF Lord, if You don’t mind, I’d like a perfect body [no more shopping in the gnormous sizes section], impeccable health [make me a pain-free zone], a Harvard I.Q., and a stress-free job that allows me to buy my move-in-ready dream house with cash.    

I know this goes against “name-it-claim-it” teaching.  But I wonder if we often reduce God to a prayer-order catalogue. We tend to advertise Christ as the One who takes away our pain and sorrow as we fill out the order form with grand requests for the way we’d like life to happen.

A prime example of that was the Zebedee brothers. Two Gospel accounts (Matt. 20:20-28 and Mark 10:35-45) recount a conversation in which they (or, in one version, their pushy mother) asked for high honors in Christ’s kingdom.  Jesus asked if they were ready to drink the cup He was to drink—and He didn’t mean orange soda. He meant giving one’s life for another, as He would soon do at Calvary. Serving others. Being willing to be last, not first.

The believer who serves is often one who’s had to learn the hard lessons that we don’t pray for a perfect life. Ease does not build spiritual muscle.  Fame doesn’t guarantee faithfulness. God knows exactly what is our best “fit.” When we place an order by prayer, we ask, “Not my will, but thine.” Often, what He brings our way is lots better than what we imagined.

Maybe with the exception of wrong-size swimsuits.

Hang-ups and Hanging-Ups

When the weather turns warmer, I choose my clothesline over the dryer.  This saves electricity, plus “hanging time” is also “thinking time.” That day, as I snapped clothespins onto towels and shirts, the word “hang-ups” came to mind with its double meaning for laundry and troubled minds. Before I could think too much about troubled people I care about, I was distracted by the brilliant chorus of various birds in nearby trees. I thought of the old song, “His eye is on the sparrow,” affirming God’s incomprehensible watch-care. He cares even more than I can imagine for the loved ones whose problems can easily discourage me.

The song enjoyed renewed fame when actress-singer Ethel Walters, who rose from poverty to entertainment fame, used its title for her 1951 autobiography. But the song was originally written in 1905 by a New York pastor’s wife named Civilla Martin. The Martins had become friends with the Doolittles, an older couple who’d long battled illnesses. Mrs. Doolittle had been bedridden for twenty years, and her husband used a wheelchair to get to work. Yet the couple was known for bringing inspiration and cheer to those around them. On one visit with the Doolittles, Pastor Martin asked the secret of their hope. Mrs. Doolittle, alluding to Jesus’ illustration about God’s omniscience via care of bird life, remarked simply, “His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.”

Her simple yet profound reply gripped the Martins. Civilla went home and wrote the lyrics, and the next day mailed them to prolific hymnist Charles Gabriel, who wrote the tune. (See last week's blog for Gabriel's story.)

The song refers to these verses:

“Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not of more value than they?” (Matthew 6:26)

“Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? And one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.  But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.  Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows” (Matthew 10:29-31)

 

Civilla expressed the same theme in a song she wrote a year earlier: “God Will Take Care of You.” But the simple words of “His Eye Is on the Sparrow” are what came to me that laundry morning as I hung up socks and shirts. Why should I feel discouraged? Why should the shadows come...When Jesus is my portion, My constant friend is He: His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.”

 

When I snapped the clothespin on the last sock, I went back in the house to other chores.  Inside, I couldn’t hear the birds sing anymore. But my heart replayed the much-needed reminder they provided that day--that nothing, even what I pray about with feeble faith, is outside the loving watch-care of God. 

The Keeping Room

Grooooan....sigh....ohhhh......There, you have the audio of me reacting to yet another crisis in the lives of people for whom I’d prayed for years.  I had become weary of praying for them in what seemed a never-ending negative drama.  There, I admitted it. How many times had I come to their names on my prayer list with a sense of gloom? Was God listening to how I thought things could be “fixed”?  Would things ever change for the better for them?  If I quit praying, would things go from bad to worse to terrible?

I actually thought those things—as if the world turned on my prayer life!  Talk about spiritual arrogance. Yet I really cared about these people and wanted to see God-pleasing changes in their lives—changes that would bring them a future and a hope (Jeremiah 29:11).  Would I be a spiritual slacker if I quit praying for them?

As I pondered these questions, I  came across some notes from reading Virelle Kidder’s book, Donkeys Still Talk (NavPress, 2004). The title of her book references Balaam’s talking donkey when Balaam resisted God’s instructions. Virelle had struggled with praying over loved ones’ needs that weighed heavily on her heart.  One day, she asked herself, “Why can I not carry those I love into the sanctuary of God’s power and love, lay them down at Jesus’ feet, and then leave in His divine safekeeping my broken dreams and the lives of those closest to me?”  And that is what she did, starting a page in her journal titled, “The Keeping Room.”  As she wrote names there, she prayed:

Lord, here is one I love and You love.  I leave him in Your keeping, asking that Your best be done in his life. I release him to You with great thanks and praise for all You will do, even if I am not privileged to see it. Keep him, Lord, in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.  (p. 149)
Virelle admitted that, despite that prayer of surrender, she sometimes wanted to peek through the keyhole and see what God was doing. But surrender meant letting God be God.

Yes, it is right to pray for others.  It is wrong to pray to the point of fretting.  It is right to take our most frustrating situations to God. It is wrong to keep grabbing them back, as doing so implies that God is incapable of handling them.  We need more of the holy abandon Paul articulated when he wrote, “I am not ashamed, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard ["keep"--KJV] what I have entrusted to him for that day” (2 Timothy 1:12 NIV).

These were part of Paul’s “last words,” written to his protégé Timothy as the seasoned apostle realized he’d probably be executed by the Romans.  But he was not ashamed of the dramatic U-turn his life took in submitting to Christ. He was confident that God would take care of the spiritual children he’d leave behind when his life was taken.  In other words, Paul affirmed that he wasn’t the only person through whom God could work in advancing the Gospel.

I think that’s the big message behind a “keeping room.”  When we get discouraged or in a dither over praying for people with stubborn problems, God may need us to back off and allow Him to handle these loved ones with His wisdom and compassion.  Our prayers will move from “God, change them,” to “God, thank You that You love them infinitely more than I do.  I thank You for the way You are working in their troubled lives. I trust You for an outcome that glorifies You.”

Power check

 
My son is an electrical engineer for our local hydroelectric power company. As a techno-ignoramus myself, I have no idea where he got the genes for that. When the power goes out somewhere, he’s one of the go-to guys for figuring out how to sleuth out bad parts and reroute things so that somebody can cook dinner, a factory keep running, and the traffic lights keep sanity on our streets.

 “Power” is a password for our times: Power Point, Power Suit, Power Presentations. But “spiritual power”? We’re told of it in Jesus’ last words before ascending into heaven:

You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. (Acts 1:8)

And it happened, just as He said. After ten days of intense prayer and waiting, the Holy Spirit empowered them in a dramatic way, sending them out to the streets to preach about Jesus (Acts 2). From then on, the New Testament is dotted with accounts and admonitions using words for “power” (dunamis, related to our English word for dynamite; and exousia, related to the idea of authority). The church age came in with divine strength and authority to preach Christ.

But we don’t always live as people of power. I appreciate the insight offered by Ruth Myers in her little book, The Satisfied Heart (Waterbrook, 1999). Her faith led her to a Christian college, where she met and married a great Christian man. They went to the mission field, had two great kids.  Then came a "power crisis." Her husband died of cancer, leaving her with two small children (almost 5 and 6). She saturated herself in Scriptures as she trusted God for the next step, and the next, and the next. In a chapter titled “His Love Liberates Me,” Ruth talked about even born-again Christians becoming aware of bondage to their backgrounds, resentments toward others, unbiblical goals, bad attitudes, wrong desires, emotions and certain ways of thinking. She noted:

But the more we know God and experience His love, the more free we become.  The longer we go to His Word and let His Holy Spirit teach us, the more liberation we experience.  More and more our personality is freed up to become as loving and beautiful as God designed it to be. (p. 166)

In other words, the power flows as it should, in abundance, and with power comes hope. “Hope” isn’t some out-there thing, but a tried-and-true provision of God. Ruth models that in writings that are soaked with scripture, revealing her lifelong, disciplined study of God’s Word. As Paul pointed out in his letter to the Romans: For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. (15:4)

Paul really seemed to push “hope,” as later in that chapter he adds:

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (15:13)

 So there it is: “hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” We can’t measure it like my son and his co-workers do the “zaps” that flow through our electrical lines. (Yes, I know that’s a primitive explanation, but I’m not a scientist.)  But our spiritual lives go dead without it.

Prayer power

A railroad track skirts one edge of the nature trail park where we like to walk. Sometimes, a train rumbles past, and my husband starts counting aloud the number of cars behind the engines. The more cars behind, the greater the engine power needed up front.

My first thought was of the energy I need for the busy days when I have lots on my to-do list, including the privilege of caring for a busy, curious toddler grandson. As a friend of mine likes to say, “I’m not complaining, just explaining.” I also thought about the prayer burdens so many of us carry. Historians tell us that the great Protestant reformer Martin Luther practiced long prayer before each day.  He reportedly said, “If I fail to spend two hours in prayer each morning, the devil gets the victory through the day.” 

Two hours! I'm no "Luther." But I do find time drags when I get bogged down praying for people with difficult issues. Yet, when I simply sit and praise God for who He is and thank Him for what He has done and is going to do, time passes without my thinking of it. The power of praise and adoration was also a favorite topic of Nazi concentration camp survivor and inspirational writer/speaker Corrie ten Boom. She wrote, “Be sure you remain covered with a canopy of praise.  It is like a tent over and around you. Satan has no entrance as long as you pin down the sides by praying, and thank God for His wonderful promises.”(1)

Admonitions to praise God go way, way back.  In her book Karen! Karen!, author/speaker Karen Mains quoted from a translation of one of the Dead Sea Scrolls, giving instructions for those living in the long-ago hermetic desert community: 
As long as I live, it shall be a rule engraved on my tongue to bring praise like fruit for an offering and my lips as a sacrificial gift.
As the scroll continues, it instructs adherents to recite the Ten Commandments morning and evening, and bless God's name continually as the day progresses, not just before meals. From life's daily rhythms, the writer moved to harder things:
When fear and terror come, and there is only anguish and distress, I will still bless and thank Him for His wondrous deeds, and meditate upon His power, and lean upon His mercies all day long. For I know that in His hand is justice for all that live, and all His works are true. So when trouble comes, or salvation,  I praise Him just the same.(2)

To borrow the train analogy, if I have enough “engines” of praise up front, it’s easier to pull the loads (“problems”) behind. Praise also reminds me that it's not all about "me pulling the load," but turning these concerns and "impossibilities" over to God. He's the Engineer and the source of Power,  not me!

(1)Corrie ten Boom, Her Story (New York: Inspiration Press, 1995), p. 446.
(2) Karen Mains, Karen! Karen! (Wheaton: Tyndale, 1979), pp. 148-49.

Barbed-wire people

Barbed wire for a Valentine's Day blog? Yes, because
we all know people who have barriers against trusting Christ.

I have a page of names in my prayer notebook under the title “Salvation.” Some names were put there 35 years ago! Sometimes I get discouraged, wondering if they will ever recognize the poverty of life apart from a relationship with Christ Jesus. But I fall back on the truth that God is eternal and never gives up, even on these people who have erected spiritual barbed wire fences around themselves, thinking they can keep Him out of their lives.

Sometimes we hear the phrase “the Hound of Heaven” in connection with salvation. The name comes from a 182-line Christian poem by Englishman Francis Thompson (1839-1907). (By the way, the poem influenced J.R.R. Tolkien, known recently through extravagant movies retelling his “Lord of the Rings” stories.) The phrase comes from the image of a hound ceaselessly (“with all deliberate speed”) chasing a hare, like God follows a fleeing soul by His divine grace.  I find that image helpful in praying for the unsaved—that, as it were, the “chase” will eventually cause them to pay attention to the God who loves them more than they can ever imagine, even in their rejection of Him.

 I’m also encouraged to persevere in praying because of stories from lives of people of prayer, like George Mueller. In the 1800s, this man established many orphanages in London.  He was legendary for praying in the daily necessities for feeding and clothing the orphans. Mike wagons or bakery wagons would break down right in front of the orphanages, just in time to feed them breakfast. He lived to be 91, with seventy of those years in vigorous service for God. He once said he could count 50,000 specific answered prayers in his lifetime.

One time, somebody asked, “Have you ever prayed for something you have not received?”  Mueller replied, “Sixty-seven years ago I began praying for fifteen men.  Two of them have not been saved.”  There are various versions of the “end of the story,” but the prevailing account is that one became a Christian at Mueller’s funeral, and the other a few years later.

And so, every time I turn to that “salvation” page or think of these people, I pray. I also remember the images in Revelation 5:8 and 8:3, which tells of “golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints,” offered before God. He never throws prayers away, but keeps them in heavenly storage for answers in His way, His time, and to His glory. Even the prayers for those “barbed-wire” people.

Walking down Prayer Lane

 

Early winter--trail near a river

When life is hard, our natural tendency is to tell God, “I don’t like this problem. Take it away. Make everything all okay, right now!” But I have learned that God’s way is not to take us out of our problems, but to lead us through them as He shapes our character. At my life's lowest point--orphaned as a single 31-year-old--I chose to submit to God's wisdom and trustworthiness. Grieving, worn out physically, I clung tenaciously to promises of His faithfulness as I set about to read the Bible through in a recent translation new to me. Isaiah 30:20-21 was among passages that spoke especially to me:

Although the LORD gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them.  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.”

I saw this work out in my life as God led me to caring, godly people. They were the real-flesh “teachers” who helped me perceive the changes I needed to make and the hope I needed to embrace.  But there was also that hard-to-describe sense of God right beside me, offering either a “don’t do that” or “go ahead” as I walked in faith to an unknown future.

Years later, in reading Edith Schaeffer’s book Common Sense Christian Living (Nelson, 1983), I realized I was discovering what 1 Thessalonians 5:17 calls “praying without ceasing.”  Here’s how Schaeffer described it:

It seems to me that this command [pray without ceasing] means we are to be constantly so conscious of God’s existence and so aware of His presence, that there is a very short gap between a sudden need of speaking to the Lord, and our actually speaking to Him.  I feel it means that we are walking so close to the reality of His being with us that we naturally talk to Him (in our minds, of course) when we are in the dentist’s chair, in the waiting room of a doctor’s or lawyer’s office, out on a tractor, waiting for a plane or bus, talking to someone who has just had a shock.  Whether it is a brief time of prayer or a long, long one, the atmosphere of the normality of talking to God is what I feel is meant by the command to “pray continually.” (pp. 210-211)

An old hymn goes, “He walks with me and He talks with me.” That doesn’t happen when our minds are cluttered with the “junk” of modern life. Even if we can’t get away to a little-used park trail, we need to find that serene space that is our “Prayer Lane,” and where we can hear God say, “This is the way, walk in it.”