Hay Field Hope

At right: the only full photo I have of the home I lived in from fourth grade through adulthood, on a rare snowy day.
Imagine reading an honest “home for sale” ad: “Abused rental house. Oversized lot with knee-high grass. Interior damage from renter who used family bathroom to bathe goats for showing.” That describes the home my father bought in early 1957, after moving our family from southern California to western Washington. Though it had good “bones” as a brick home, it had suffered neglect. That helped bring the price down to something he could afford, if we lived frugally.

I still remember him attacking the hay-field of a front yard. This was before “weed-wackers” with their spinning cutting lines. All he had was his reel-style gas lawn mower. He’d chew into it a few inches, then retreat. Chew, retreat. My sister and I raked the mess into piles.

Looking back, I wonder how he did it. My mother, an asthmatic, couldn’t help much with the weeds. But Dad wasn’t afraid to take on a challenge when he had a vision of the end result. Eventually, my parents lived there more than twenty years. After their deaths, when I moved home to empty it out and settle the “estate,” the lawn-mowing fell to me. As I pushed that old machine around, I had renewed respect for my dad’s hard work.

I think there’s a lesson here for any of us in facing big challenges. I’m reminded of King David’s advice to his king-in-training son Solomon, charged with building a magnificent temple in Jerusalem. “Be strong and courageous,” David counseled, “and do the work” (1 Chronicles 18:20). David didn’t say, “Wish upon a star” or “Let blessings just drop in your waiting lap.” He said to link faith and deliberate action.

As I think over my life, I realize no goal came easy. Some quarters at college took all the grit I could muster. Then I had jobs that stretched my skills, endurance, and longsuffering. Marriage? More stretching. Pregnancy and childbirth? Well, don’t believe the tabloids that proclaim, “Woman gives birth to 24-pound baby while taking her afternoon nap.” And raising children? Think of paddling a canoe with somebody jumping on board.

God didn’t create us to sit around looking at the grass to be mowed. He also promises help for those intimidating tasks. David continued: “Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you until all the work for the service of the temple of the Lord is finished.” And 1 Corinthians 3:16 says the temple is now us: “Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you?”

Got a long-neglected goal to achieve? A calling from God? What’s your excuse? Remember my dad, diligently hacking away at a suburban hay field because he knew this could be a home to be proud of. And it was.

Pepperoni fun

This week marks the release of a children’s story book titled Family Matters, which includes a fiction I wrote several years ago. I’m glad that my story, “The Big Pepperoni Problem,” will continue to reach kids with the message that being responsible is part of a Christian’s character. The story is about a boy who lost his soccer team pizza sale money in his messy room.

This story was originally published seven years ago in the now-defunct children’s magazine, My Friend. The partner book publishing wing, Pauline Books & Media, asked if they could include it along with other authors' stories in this collection.

Over the years I’ve had more than fifty children’s fiction stories published in twenty-plus Christian kid magazines across the denominational spectrum. One of them became a book about blended families, The Patchwork Family, now out of print but available through used book sellers. That book began as a submission to a contest sponsored by Pockets, a fine children’s magazine published by Upper Room ministries.

Stories for kids represent only about 5% of my writing, but some of my favorite pieces came as a result of letting my inner child come out. These include “Pinkytoes” (about helping), “Backwards Day” (respect), “The Great Garbage Bag Experiment” (friendship), and “Fried Octopus Brains” (comfort zones).

“The Big Pepperoni Problem” grew from the angst my children (along with their mother!) experienced when they faced school fund-raising projects (which included selling overpriced frozen pizzas and cookie dough). I could commiserate, remembering how I struggled to sell “season tickets” to my high school band and orchestra concerts. Nobody wanted to buy those!

The “Pepperoni” story does have an internet presence. Just search my name and the story title. If you do, hope you enjoy it.

I don't live there anymore

My husband pulled to the curb, turned off the motor, and let me just look for a minute. The house where I grew up in a western Washington town was still standing and well-maintained. I noticed an older woman at the kitchen window. I can almost imagine her worried whisper, “Honey, we’ve got strangers parked across the street staring at us. Think we ought to call the police?”

No, I was just wondering if the kitchen still had that very dated gray and blue checkered tile. If the beast of an oil furnace was still there, with a short clothesline across its sunken room for quick-dry laundry. If the hydrangea outside my bedroom window still bloomed. If the fixtures in the main bathroom were still that ghastly green. I wondered how she’d managed to arrange furniture around an awkwardly-placed corner fireplace.

But I didn’t live there any more. My last time in the house was 1979, the year after my parents died, when I emptied it and repainted the blue/pink/mint walls a neutral ivory in preparation for selling it.

My trip back to Memory Lane (actually, 13th Street) came as a result of attending a family funeral “back home”—that of my sister’s 101-year-old mother-in-law. Besides the home where I grew up, I also found the tiny rental where my family lived a few months after moving from southern California. I recalled how our front-loading washing machine galloped all over its laundry room during the spin cycle. Eventually, Mom planned her washing around times my dad was home to sit on it. As my husband drove between that house and the school I attended in third grade, he asked, “Your parents let you walk home alone this far?” How safety concerns have changed!

It was good to see the “old places” again. But one thing the trip “back home” reminded me of was how careful I need to be to not dwell on the past. I’ve experienced “stuckness” at times in my Christian walk, and I know it’s because I fail to turn problems and disappointments over to God, then seek a fresh start in His strength.

Something I read in a book by counselor Jan Silvious, Please Don’t Say You Need Me (Zondervan, 1989), applies so well to anybody’s spiritual walk. Silvious says her counselees often want to go over and over why they felt they were wronged, and get stuck there. Instead, she says, they need to “move on to forgiveness, healing, and the creation of a lifestyle” in which damaging perceptions and behaviors are left behind. The apostle Paul put it more succinctly in a verse I’ve claimed in moving away from hurts of the past: “Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:14). Jesus died to cover the past and to call me into a fresh and growing relationship with Him.

In other words, I don’t live in my “past life” any more. God doesn’t want me to stay stuck in old habits of blame and fear. He has new plans and joys for me if I’m willing to stretch out of comfort zones to discover them.

By the way, about twenty years ago on a family trip to Disneyland, we took a side trip to the suburb where I lived from infancy until third grade. The little two-bedroom was tidy, its front porch still painted brick red. But graffiti filled the neighborhood and my husband was nervous as I dashed out of the car for a quick photo in front of the house (that's photo at the top of this column). I’m thankful I don’t live there any more!

That date with destiny

Widespread mocking of Christians was the saddest result of the recent failed “end-of-world” prediction by an 89-year-old engineer-turned-preacher. The whole media-fueled ridicule reminded me of fears of crippling computer glitches when the century turned over to a new millennium a decade ago.

When I first heard of this person’s claim, I reviewed the Bible’s message about end times. Jesus’ disciples, too, wanted to know a date: “When will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” (Matt. 24:3). He answered in general terms: the coming of imposters, persecution, famines, earthquakes, betrayals, desecrations, deceptive messages of “He’s here,” and signs in the skies. He added that nobody, not even the angels, knows what date God has put on the universal calendar (v. 36). Those who “predict” are going against this very truth.

Instead of quitting our jobs, selling all, and waiting for the bullet train to eternity, we need to consider the counsel given another generation anxious for the world to end. It’s tucked into the letters Paul wrote believers in Thessalonica, who experienced so much persecution that they longed all the more for Heaven. Some were neglecting the daily tasks of going to work or maintaining a home, causing people to scorn Christians.

As that problem persisted, Paul wrote again against idleness. He reminded them that even as he preached among them, he worked day and night to pay for his own expenses (2 Thess. 3:9), probably following his trade as a tentmaker. He was also displeased that those who weren’t “busy” earning a living were becoming “busybodies” (v. 13).

There’s value in being reminded that Heaven has a clock that’s ticking down. Someday, the Lord will come again. For some, it will be like a dreaded pop quiz they didn’t prepare for--except infinitely agonizing. For others, it will a joyful time of fulfilled hope.

One of my dear friends prayed for years for her husband to become a Christian. Instead of badgering him, she treated him with respect and love. One day he agreed to come to church with her and there heard the message about Christ’s coming again. Matt. 24:40 especially pierced his heart: “Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left.” He didn’t want to be the one left, and accepted Christ into his life. Some godly friends in their nineties lived in an assisted living center. On their door was a sign revealing their hope of Jesus’ return: “Perhaps today.”

Both have now died, but the message is the same: Perhaps today. Perhaps not. But keep on doing what God commands: “Warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else. Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (1 Thess. 5:14-18).

Survival of the Floaters

How God builds your faith often comes down to ordinary experiences. Like a college swimming class.

The college I attended required, of all things, passing a swimming proficiency class for graduation. Most people just quickly splash up and down the pool and pass. But I’d never learned to swim, thanks to health issues as a child. I had an irrational fear of any water deeper than my waist.

Thankfully, the test began at the shallow end. When the instructor ordered us to swim, I attempted my best effort at swimming—one that might be described as tortured Dutch windmill.

“Sign up for Swimming 101,” the instructor told me. She means sign up for Faith-Stretch 101, I told myself.

I had only ten weeks to conquer my fears. By the ninth class week, the agony deepened.

“Today you learn to dive off the board,” the swim teacher announced. The board? Does she mean the plank at the deep end off which I will fall to my doom? I will spare you the details of my first straight-in dive to the utter bottom of the pool.

Still alive by the tenth week, I showed up for the final swimming exam. My classmates curled off the diving board like penguins slipping over an ice float for a frolic around the ocean. As they stroked the required three pool lengths, I took my fateful walk to the end of the plank, er, diving board. My life passed in front of me as I tried to remember the “how to dive” lesson. I sucked in a breath and jumped.

Surfacing for the compulsory crawl (aptly named, for me), I managed two more lengths with other “exhibit” swimming strokes. As I finished, the teacher nodded and mumbled something about how I might enjoy Swimming 102. I chose not to hear her. I was too busy thanking God for helping me get through Mission Impossible.

That quarter, I learned something more than treading water, diving, and the crawl. I also experienced how God could grow me by helping me accomplish something I thought was way beyond me. He specializes in “strength” and “protection” (2 Thess. 3:3). Even in this personal battle (small to others, big to me), God was ready to help me.

He’s continued to see me through lots harder things that I never signed up for, but that are a part of life. As a college freshman, I never imagined I’d be orphaned at 31, face joblessness, stay single until 34, or almost get killed by a drunk driver. At times, I’m sure my ability to trust God looked like that tortured Dutch-windmill stroke. But through prayer, trust in the Bible’s promises, and daily dependence on God, I got through it all.

I think that’s why Paul urged the folks at Thessalonica, “Never tire of doing what is right” (3:13). Even if we think we can’t do it, with God we can. And having God’s love and approval is a zillion times more exciting than the instructor’s nod that I passed Swimming 101!

Do me a savor

The gift wafted my way the other morning as I painted the deck at my late mother-in-law’s home that we’re fixing up. As I crawled across the weathered wood, paint pad in hand, I paused and smiled as the scent from her lilac bush came my way. Talk about a fragrance factory! This year it’s probably ten feet tall and just as wide, and heavy with blooms.

I couldn’t help but think of how the Bible describes true followers of Christ as a “fragrance” (“savor” in KJV) –the scent of life among those who believe, the stink of death among those who don’t (2 Cor. 2:15-16).

Paul’s use of a powerful olfactory comparison is even more amazing considering how much attention his culture usually paid to “fragrance.” Though the wealthy had baths and some scents (like myrrh) were expensive enough to be part of a dowry, they didn’t have our culture’s obsession with “clean” and “smelling nice.” If you haven’t thought about it, just stroll down the aisles of cleaners, soaps, shampoos, air fresheners, and candles. Then go to the hardware store and check out the shower heads and bath fixtures. Finally, go to a makeup counter and start counting the perfume brands!

I admit to lighting a fragrant candle at dinner, especially when I’ve cooked fish and broccoli (and you know how those smells linger in a house). But I’ve cut back to almost no perfume use—first out of deference to those who attend my church who have profound chemical sensitivities, and second, realizing I’m bothered at times myself. I was reminded of that the other Sunday when someone squeezed in beside me in the pew and her strong perfume was almost more than I could handle.

As I stroked paint on the deck timber, I thought about the “scent” to which Paul referred—that intangible quality of living for Christ. Even among believers there’s a broad variety of “scents” that mingle when we get together. A quiet, peaceful essence emanates from an older, godly woman who’s passionate about prayer and encouragement. A sense of true caring surrounds another person who quietly goes about doing good. Someone who is humble yet wise spreads another Christ-fragrance—not overwhelming, but definitely there.

I thought of negative scents, too. Some are like the notorious Titan Arum, a huge, fast-growing plant native to Indonesia that blooms for about three days every six or seven years. It emits a stench reportedly like rotting meat or garbage. Its spiritual counterparts are described throughout the Bible, but 2 Timothy 3 has a significant list of spiritual stench that starts out: “lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful….” Of such people, it’s easy to say, “Their attitude stinks.”

Instead, I’d rather focus on Jesus and His love, grace, truth, and hope. He is the lily of the valley, the rose of Sharon, the fragrance I want in my life.

What is your favorite floral fragrance? Some of the most scent-sational of the plant kingdom are roses, orchids, gardenias, night-blooming jasmine, and honeysuckle. Any more nominations?

Lessons from a floral flunkout

I had high hopes for an amaryllis bulb my husband bought before Christmas. I planted the bulb according to instructions, and gave it the water and sunlight recommended. Grudgingly, it sent out its leaves, but never a stem or a bloom. Sadly, I nurtured a floral flunkout. It didn’t even produce one brilliant trumpet flower to cheer our dining table on those gray winter days. So recently I withheld water and let it go dormant, curling up its wilted, yellowed leaves for storage.

I thought of how this plant is like people who plod through life with an attitude of ingratitude. They have so much potential, but they choose to dwell on the negative and never bloom for God.

In saying that, I am aware that when I point my index finger at someone’s neediness, three of my fingers are pointing back at me. I need to regularly examine my heart for ingratitude and confess it to God, asking Him to help me change that behavior: “Who can discern his errors? Forgive my hidden faults. Keep your servant also from willful sins; may they not rule over me” (Psalm 19:12).

In her book Choosing Gratitude (Moody, 2009), Nancy Leigh DeMoss spoke to this issue. She said we are prone to expect a lot from others and life and, no matter how much we get, it’s never enough. She adds: “Needing God but not always wanting God, we expect others to take the place of God in our lives, depending on them to guide our decisions, to love us unconditionally, to provide for us emotionally, physically, socially, totally.” Inevitably, she adds, people will disappoint us. Instead of turning to God, grateful for His faithfulness in meeting our needs, we let “those unfulfilled expectations…turn to resentment that poisons our hearts and relationships” (p. 53).

In other words, we become like a stubborn, bloomless amaryllis. We don’t do what God created us to do: honoring Him in the work place or in raising a family, serving Him in the strength of spiritual gifts, and being His channels of love to the hurting.

I’ll tuck my dead bulb in a shed for another year, and give it another chance next year. That’s what God does for us. He gives us second chances when we’ve gotten muddled in failures and ingratitude. For years I’ve cherished this passage about God’s desire for us to claim fresh starts: “Forget the former things, do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland” (Isaiah 43:18-19).