A couple of weeks ago, two of our dearest friends, Aaron and Cory Lynne Myers, drove in with their girls, Elli Kate and
Ana Beth, to watch our oldest graduate from high school. Their presence was a special gift, and it made my heart happy to see them seated happily alongside family members, right where they belong. These two came on the scene when Hunter still slept on Toy Story bedding, you see, and they have played a big part in his
becoming the tender-hearted, Jesus-chasing young man that he is today.
After commencement, our families went to Zio’s in Bricktown to eat high-calorie
foods and catch up. While we waited for
a table, we ventured down the steep steps to the Riverwalk. Because our kids are old enough to walk
without help, the Sanders family followed theirs, and it gave me a lot of joy to watch
Aaron and Cory with the girls. All
smiles, they were patient and loving.
Walking slowly so that Elli Kate could navigate the steps herself
without falling, Aaron and Cory made a sincere effort to experience their
surroundings from their daughters’ perspectives.
Following Elli Kate’s curious gaze and pointing finger, Cory Lynne expressed wonder
at every discovery as if she, too, were seeing the ducks and flowers for the
first time. Aaron, a man’s man, hugged
his youngest up cheek to cheek and whispered with excitement, “Look! A boat!”
Ana Beth’s soft gasp and wide-eyed response melted my heart.
I blinked back tears for a few moments.
Then I got to thinking about what it means to be a parent,
not a biological parent, but a spiritual parent. We evangelicals have been accused in the past
of winning souls and then leaving our spiritual babies out on the rocks to die
like the Spartans did. Though I tend to
agree on some levels, I think that particular metaphor is a little
extreme.
We are not mean, lazy, or apathetic. We truly want to help new believers
grow. Many of us just don’t know
how.
Perhaps eager to impress our new brothers and sisters in
Christ, we give them big bites of meat to chew before they’re ready, sometimes before
we’ve even figured out how to swallow and digest it ourselves. Siblings excited at the prospect of a new
playmate and running buddy, we prop them up and expect them to walk before they’ve
even had a chance to crawl.
We forget what it’s like to be baby Christians, to crave—to need—spiritual
milk and take our first tentative steps of faith. Maybe we need to slow down like Aaron and
Cory did and make a sincere effort to see things with fresh perspective. Maybe it’s time to throw off pretense and
point out the simple wonders of this life we have in Christ.
“God is your Daddy now, and He loves you more than you can imagine!”
“You are forgiven! Your heart is clean.”
“You’re free! You don’t have to sin anymore.”
“You have a purpose!”
“You don’t have to be afraid!”
What would you add?
Remember, when we teach, we learn, too, and there’s no shame
in being brand new.
I am not a roller coaster girl! Some people live for the thrill of riding
them. Not me. I do enjoy the initial tickle in my belly and
the pounding of my heart. I don’t even
mind the strange urge to laugh and scream at the same time on the first drop,
but that’s where the happiness ends for me.
I hate the feeling of being out of control.
There are a few roller coasters I will ride, though. I actually like the Wildfire at Silver Dollar
City. Maybe it’s because I can see the
whole thing from the railing, or maybe it’s because the ride is smooth and the heavy
metal harnesses fasten tightly with a very loud click. Then again, maybe I like it because no one,
to my knowledge (and please don’t correct me if I’m wrong!), has ever fallen from
it to their untimely death.
Yep, now that I think about it, I’m pretty sure that’s why I
like it.
The Wildfire is safe, at least in my estimation, safe and
familiar. I know where the dips and twists are.
I know where it speeds up and slows down. I even know where to smile for the
camera. I own the hoodie, for goodness
sake! Given the chance to ride the
Wildfire again, I will say “yes” without reservation.
I thought about the Wildfire this morning during my quiet
time. There I was, reading through
Galatians, minding my own business, when the Lord began to talk to me, not in a
casual, “Let’s chat” kind of way, but in a tummy tickling, “Are you ready for
this?” kind of way that caused my heart to pound a little. It’s the kind of thing I pray for, hope for,
yearn for more than anything else.
It was awesome!
So, what did I do?
How did I respond? I shut my
Bible and stopped praying. I stopped
listening. I reminded myself that I had
a bed to make, makeup to put on, and a teenage son to wake (I’m good at making lists
when I need to), but the truth is I was scared, scared to hear what God had to
say, scared that it would be too big for me to process, scared that it would be
too much for me to handle on my own.
And, of course, it always is. At some point, though, we (meaning me) must learn to rest
in the fact that God loves us and is in complete control even when we are not. Though
we may not be able to see all the twists and turns and dips that lie ahead, we can
let go and walk in faith, knowing that nothing comes into our lives unless He
allows it. We can feel confident in the
fact that His grace is sufficient.
I wish I could tell you that I immediately prayed, confessed
my lack of faith, and felt better about everything or that I reopened my Bible,
at least.
I wish I could.
After all, what the Lord has in mind for me may not be big, awful,
or scary at all. It could be something
happy and exciting, something that I would choose for myself. Actually, I think that it is, but I could
always be wrong. What He has in mind could
be the kind of long and difficult ride that draws a large Facebook following
and stirs prayer warriors to action, and that’s why it’s taken me an entire day
to come to a place of peace and surrender.
I don’t know what lies ahead. The ride ahead may or may not be a smooth
one, but I know this. My Heavenly Father
is big and strong and holds me firmly in His grip. He has never let me fall.
Will I join Him on this ride, whatever it is? “Yes,” without reservation.
Todd gets home from Spain today and just in time. The soft T-shirt he sleeps in—the one he left
behind at my request—has lost its scent, and I am desperate for the sweetness
of morning snuggles.
The world is scary.
People are mean. Bad things
happen.
However, none of that matters much when I’m buried in Todd’s warmth,
breathing him in and listening to his heartbeat. For twenty-five years, my husband’s presence
has worked a chamomile effect on my anxious heart, helping me accept the things
that aren’t and rejoice in the blessings that are.
But he’s not here. His
shirt is—a very poor substitute for the real thing—and I’m feeling grumpy and
sad.
I know I’m not the only one.
Everywhere I look, it seems that people are ticked off about one thing
or another, each other, mostly, and Christians, in particular. At least that’s the case on my social media feeds.
I guess it’s no wonder.
Christians aren’t perfect. We do make
a lot of mistakes, and we often let people down.
We know that we fall short.
That’s why, with the Spirit’s help, we lay our hearts in God’s hands on
a daily basis to be transformed into something new. We want to get over our “humanness.” We want
to stop irritating and disappointing other people (and ourselves) and become a
more accurate reflection of our Savior as much as other people want us to.
The problem is this.
This whole transformation process we are in? This noisy and painfully public rebuild? It isn’t scheduled for completion this side of
Heaven. Only when we join the Father there
will He finish the work He began in us at the point of our salvation. Only then will we be perfect.
If you are longing for the real thing, I’m afraid you’ll just
have to befriend Him yourself. My
brothers and sisters and I, by our own admission, are very poor substitutes.
“Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and
opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.” Revelation 3:20
Over spring break, my family and I loaded up the car and headed
east. As we drove, a funny thing
happened. We ended up farther and
farther away from home. Siri told us
so, but we would have figured it out anyway.
Half-way through our trip, hills and then mountains began to
appear. Trees got taller and more dense,
forming an archway over our path from time to time. Finally, prairie grass and red dirt behind
us, we knew for sure that we had reached our destination when we hit sandy
Virginia Beach.
For seven days, we lived a new reality and were able to put
aside the cares and concerns that had weighed so heavily on us back home. As often happens when I’m on vacation, God cupped
my face in his hands and held me calmly until he had my full attention. We talked about a lot of things that I’d forgotten
to tell Him—things He already knew—and He helped me finalize some weighty decisions
with peace and confidence.
Once I calmed, He let go and held my gaze. For the rest of the week, He talked, and I
listened. I was reminded how good it
feels to be the daughter of a Father like Him and how free it feels to rest in
the fact that He loves me. It’s such a
relief to know that tomorrow is not mine to conquer and all I have to do is
trust and obey.
Now that I’m back home, though, I’m struggling to maintain
the calm and connection I felt on vacation.
Why? Well, it’s not because the
Father left me. That’s for sure. I find that when I force myself to stop worrying,
fussing, mulling, and choosing, He’s right there waiting for me to notice Him,
ready to remind me of His love and sovereignty.
I’m struggling because, somewhere along the way back home,
as the mountains melted into prairie and the trees slipped back into the earth,
I picked up the worries and habits I’d left behind like a stack of waiting
bills and junk mail and allowed them to overcome me.
That’s what happens when you live in the middle, you see, when
you turn your eyes on what is seen rather than what is unseen, when you focus
on vain do’s and don’ts and anxious what if’s instead of claiming and living in
the victory God has already provided through the blood of Jesus Christ.
The Enemy lives in the middle, and He baits and distracts those
who choose to camp along the fence-line between light and darkness, poking,
prodding, and wounding those who concentrate on avoiding evil and staying “clean
enough” rather than pursuing the Lord with abandon.
Why do you suppose the Father has called us to holiness? For His sake?
To a certain degree, I suppose.
It does bring Him glory, and He is the King of Kings. But it’s also for our good, something else for
which the Bible says He works all things together.
When you pursue holiness, leaving the temporal, permissible,
and disputable behind you, a funny thing happens. The darkness falls away. Care by care, worry by worry, fear by fear,
it fades until all that is left is beauty, calm, and peace. That’s what the Father wants for us. That’s what salvation from sin and self through
Jesus offers.
So, where are you today? Are you longing to feel God’s touch and hear
the lullaby of His powerful voice once again? Pull up camp and pursue holiness. The Father will help us get there.
Why do we have so much trouble trusting God? I think it has a lot to do with the fact that
we have all, at some point, been let down by someone we love and who was
supposed to love us back, whether they ever made that promise or not. Personal experience makes it difficult to
imagine the perfect love of God, so we approach our relationship with Him much
as we approach other relationships, with hesitation, doubts, and our defenses
up.
Most of us tend to gauge God’s love for us by our
blessings. When our health is good,
money is coming in, and our loved ones are safe, we are sure of God’s love for
us. We rest. We trust.
We feel close to Him.
But when our health wanes, money problems come, or our loved
ones suffer, we are shaken. Hurt,
disillusioned, and fearful, we pull back much as we would if a friend or mate
had let us down. Assuming the stance of
a martyr, we continue on, but with caution.
Our joy gone and our egos wounded, our obedience becomes an act of duty
rather than a love gift.
Besides the fact that this behavior encourages similar
behavior in other believers, there are two major problems with this kind of self-righteous response to the trials that we face.
First, it robs God of the glory He deserves. It makes us look and feel like the hero when
nothing could be farther from the Truth.
Though we are sinful by nature and deserve nothing from God, the Father gave
us everything in Jesus, making it possible for us to be reconciled to Him and
share in the inheritance of His Son.
In return, God deserves anything He asks of us. Anything.
To guard our pain as if God has been cruel and lick our wounds as if He is
unwilling to heal and sustain is to suggest
otherwise.
Second, it makes God out to be a liar when He never actually
promised to do what we were expecting of Him.
If He had promised, He would have followed through (Romans 9:6).
Brothers and sisters, we must be extremely careful when
reading Scripture not to claim promises intended for others as our own. For instance, the fact that God promised and
gave Abraham a son doesn’t mean that everyone who wants a son will get one. The
fact that God preserved David’s life in the wilderness does not mean that he will
spare your life if your death better serves the purpose of His will.
When we claim promises not intended for us,
we set ourselves up for hurt, disappointment, and confusion and make vulnerable
our own faith. Such action on our part
does not obligate God any more than Lois Lane’s putting herself in danger
obligates Superman.
The Holy Spirit speaks to us through Scripture. We know that.
Sometimes, He does deliver specific, personal messages to us through God's promise to another individual, but such revelations must be received
with careful discernment and awareness of our own emotional state, personal
desires, and tendency to hear what we want to hear. Continued prayer and Bible study are the only
way to confirm an actual word from God.
The Bible does contain some promises that are for all
followers of Christ, however. Here are just a
few.
·
In this life, you will face trials of many kinds
(James 1:2).
·
God’s grace and power will sustain you (2
Corinthians 12:9).
·
God will supply all your needs (Philippians
4:19).
·
God will work everything together for your good
and His glory (Romans 8:28).
·
When you draw near to God, He will draw near to you
(James 4:8).
·
If you confess your sin, He will forgive it (1
John 1:9).
·
God will never leave you or forsake you (Hebrews
13:5).
If you have given your heart to Jesus, you can cling to these
promises without reservation in all circumstances, but don’t ever put words in God’s
mouth and don't expect Him to do things the way you would. Remember, He sees the big picture. We don't.
Believe me, I know it’s difficult to trust when loved ones
that you can see, hear, and touch let you down on a regular basis, but the Father
loves you perfectly. He is faithful (1
Corinthians 1:9), and you can trust Him.
My seventh-grade students are in the middle of a research
project on the 1960’s. For bell work one
day, I asked them whether they had ever felt that they had been born in the
wrong decade. The discussion that
followed was very interesting. Almost
all of them felt that they had been born in the wrong decade and named the
50’s, 60’s, and 80’s as the alternates they pined for.
One girl said with a sigh, “I wish I had been born in any
other decade but this one. When my mom
and grandma were little, they could go outside and play and talk to the
neighbors without worrying about being taken.
These days, everyone is scared.
We have to stay inside so we don’t get stolen. Neighbors don’t know each other very well,
and you have to arrange a playdate to get to see other kids instead of everyone
just going outside to play with the other kids that are already out there. Everyone spends their day staring at some
screen and not really enjoying themselves.
It seems like the whole world is depressed and scared.”
Without hesitation, the rest of her class agreed, nodding
their heads and mumbling, “Mmm-hmmm.”
It made me sad, but I had to agree. It does seem that most people are depressed
and scared these days. I’m not sure why
that is, but I find myself getting caught up in it, too. Fear, anxiety, disillusionment, and
skepticism together create an undertow that’s difficult to resist. Take away the life-line of regular
face-to-face (or even ear-to-ear) interaction with other human beings –other Christians
in particular—and the pull to give up and give in to despair can be
overwhelming. Walk away from regular Bible
study and prayer, and you are sunk.
Once submerged, it’s difficult to see. Fumbling for a foothold and struggling for
fresh air, you reach for something to grasp, a feeling, an experience, a mood,
anything that resembles the peace and joy that you felt when you trusted God
and rested in His peace. Underneath the
surface, we take hold of things that have no root—emotion, false doctrine,
shallow religious experience, human wisdom—hoping they will anchor us and make
us feel better, but they don’t.
Discouraged, we sink deeper.
If this is where you are today, take heart. You aren’t really drowning!
What you are experiencing is just an illusion, a trick of
the enemy. Like Gilligan in the Lagoon, you are only knee deep. Stand up, take the reed
from your lips, and fill your aching lungs, child of God. Discover for yourself that Jesus Christ has
always been and will continue to be your firm foundation. Our Rescuer once and forevermore, He offers deep
and abiding peace in the midst of pain and trouble to those who believe in what
they have not seen and choose to stand firm in His truth.
“…For everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory
that has overcome the world, even our faith.
Who is it that overcomes the world?
Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.” 1 John 5:4-5
We may get a snow day tomorrow! What are the chances? Well, it depends on whom you ask. One
television station makes it sound like we will.
Another makes it sound like we won’t.
I’m secretly hoping for a break
after the busy weekend that we just had, so I choose to believe the meteorologist
that says we’re looking at three to six inches by noon Tuesday.
We all do it, channel flip until we find the forecast we’re
hoping for. It’s a harmless game, really. Ultimately, the weather’s going to do what
the weather’s going to do. All we can
do is take a guess, hope for the best (whatever that means to us), and wait and
see.
Sadly, that’s how many people approach eternity. Misreading the urgency of the situation, they
theology flip, looking for a doctrine or religion that fits their agenda. Most land on the one that feels best to them,
one that offers a glimmer of hope without requiring much in return. It’s a dangerous game and a needless one.
The Bible is very clear when it comes to salvation and life
after death. There is no guesswork involved.
Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one
comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). Those who give their hearts to Jesus now, trusting
Him for their salvation, can count on spending eternity in Heaven. Those who don’t can count on spending eternity
in Hell. Either way, sooner or later, every knee will
bow and confess that Jesus Christ is Lord (Philippians 2:9-11).
There is no alternate forecast on this one, friends. Just you wait and see.
