Words about faith, life, love, and the journey
Every now and then, something jars my memory, and I’m lost in grief all over again. I’m working on sorting through paperwork at my desk, and the sound of my neighbor’s big dog barking triggers the phantom sound of my sweet Dalmatian barking at the bunnies outside. I hear the sound echo in my ears. For a split second, I thought he was still here.
I miss you, sweet doggy boy.
I’ve been thinking a lot about obedience lately, thanks to my daily Bible readings. A recent reading in 1 Samuel has my head — and my heart — all tied up in knots.
Much is written about King David, but the only thing we Christians think of when we remember King Saul is his demented soul at the end of his reign. We remember that he was paranoid and that he intended to kill David.
I think, though, that a little bit of Saul resides in each one of us. I call it “misguided obedience.” It’s when we tack our own will onto God’s orders. It happens when we think we know what’s best for us despite what God tells us. We delude ourselves into thinking we are walking in obedience, when actually we are twisting the Lord’s will to our own purposes.
We aren’t alone in this sin — we people of faith have been deluding ourselves ever since Adam and Eve second-guessed God and ate fruit from the tree that God had said was not good for them.
In 1 Samuel 15, God decided that he would use Saul and his army to punish the Amalekite nation for the way it had treated Israel. He told Saul to go into that country and to utterly destory everything there, including all the men, women, children…even babies, all the way down to the livestock.
Ouch. That is a tough order to follow. Babies?
Saul took 210,000 men and followed God’s orders…to a point. He put everyone to the sword (apparently even the babies) except King Agag. But he diverged from God’s plan when it came to destroying the livestock the Amalekites had owned. He and his men spared the good stuff — the healthy animals.
(If I had been Saul, I would have had harder time obeying when it came to killing the innocent babies than I would have killing the animals.) Saul even had what he thought was a good reason for not completely obeying God: he intended to use the perfect livestock as burnt offerings to the Lord.
But listen to what Samuel said in response to Saul’s excuse:
13 When Samuel reached him, Saul said, “The LORD bless you! I have carried out the LORD’s instructions.”
14 But Samuel said, “What then is this bleating of sheep in my ears? What is this lowing of cattle that I hear?”
15 Saul answered, “The soldiers brought them from the Amalekites; they spared the best of the sheep and cattle to sacrifice to the LORD your God, but we totally destroyed the rest.”
16 “Stop!” Samuel said to Saul. “Let me tell you what the LORD said to me last night.”
“Tell me,” Saul replied.17 Samuel said, “Although you were once small in your own eyes, did you not become the head of the tribes of Israel? The LORD anointed you king over Israel. 18 And he sent you on a mission, saying, ‘Go and completely destroy those wicked people, the Amalekites; make war on them until you have wiped them out.’ 19 Why did you not obey the LORD ? Why did you pounce on the plunder and do evil in the eyes of the LORD ?”
20 “But I did obey the LORD,” Saul said. “I went on the mission the LORD assigned me. I completely destroyed the Amalekites and brought back Agag their king. 21 The soldiers took sheep and cattle from the plunder, the best of what was devoted to God, in order to sacrifice them to the LORD your God at Gilgal.”
22 But Samuel replied:
“Does the LORD delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices
as much as in obeying the voice of the LORD ?
To obey is better than sacrifice,
and to heed is better than the fat of rams.23 For rebellion is like the sin of divination,
and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.
Because you have rejected the word of the LORD,
he has rejected you as king.”
To obey is better than sacrifice.
By not completely obeying God, Saul was in fact rebelling.
When you and I do not completely obey Christ, aren’t we doing the same thing? Jesus himself stressed the importance of obedience and linked it to love in the book of John, chapter 14:
21Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him.”
22Then Judas (not Judas Iscariot) said, “But, Lord, why do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?”
23Jesus replied, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24He who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.
What, then, does Christ command?
That will be the subject of another post! For now, the phrase
To obey is better than sacrifice
is on my mind and in my heart. The reasons for my disobedience is not material. My myriad excuses are simply rebellions dressed up in disguise.
Four hundred eighth graders in Dallas returned to school over their summer break this week to retake the math portion of the TAKS test. Apparently the state was concerned because too many of the students received a “commended” score.
This is another example of a world where up is down and down is up.
Too many students do well on a test, and the administration automatically assumes cheating was somehow involved. Only this time, they didn’t implicate the students in the cheating. Well, who else? Did the teachers stay behind and secretly change answers on the answer sheets? Most of America’s school children are being taught in a system that assumes failure. What does that say about the quality of education? (The teachers themselves are, on the whole, outstanding. The system in which they are forced to work…with all the emphasis on standardized, multiple choice tests rather than well-thought-out arguments in the later years or memorization work in the early years…requires that they are just as trapped as their students.)
I recently attended an outstanding parent practicum of Classical Conversations. The next one in Texas will be held in July in San Antonio. I strongly urge all parents, whether they are homeschoolers or not, to attend one of these free 3-day practicums. The information you learn will change the way you think about education in America. It will cause you to question your own learning and might lead you to conclude, as I did, that most of the political and economic problems in this country today are directly the result of the inadequate education our current leaders received in schools.
I consider myself one of those who was inadequately educated. Like Leigh Burton, the founder of Classical Conversations, states in her book, An Echo in Celebration, I have a college degree. I graduated with a 4.0 average. Yet I can only speak one language. I couldn’t tell you the names of the constellations or even the names of the countries in South America. When it comes to political upheaval in other parts of the world, I am hard-pressed to find them on a map. I find it extremely difficult to debate anyone on any topic without breaking out in a cold sweat. Sometimes I even suffer panic attacks when a good debater challenges me on my statements because I get so flustered. I always assumed it was because I just wasn’t a debater. Come to find out, it means I am undereducated. Debate skills come naturally to a few, but rhetorical skills can actually be taught to everyone. They weren’t taught to me. I had 28 separate teachers throughout high school that taught me different subjects — yet I did not achieve a rhetorical understanding of any of them, nor do I remember much of what I supposedly learned. I was not taught how to train my brain.
Neither were our leaders. We are now faced with an entire generation of leaders in our governments and our businesses whose members were not taught to think on their feet. They were not taught the tools of learning. Is it any wonder, then, that they do such incredibly dumb things such as these?
I could go on and on here. I’m not just criticizing the current administration. I could bring up examples from the Bush years and the Clinton years, the Reagan years and the Carter ones…all the way back to the 1950s.
As a nation, we have no common sense anymore because common sense is extinct. It is not being taught in public schools, and public schools are now where most of our kids spend about 1,440 hours each year. Education is now viewed as an entitlement rather than a privilege. Parents rely on our schools to baby-sit their kids. That is an ugly truth.
When Ft. Worth schools temporarily shut down in an effort to contain the swine flu, parents got mad. Why? Not because their children missed a week or so of learning, but because they had to find daycare.
Today I had one of those “Huh?” moments while reading about the events leading up to the crowning of Israel’s first king, Saul. God’s people grumbled and complained and kept begging for a king, so God finally said, “Okay.” It reminds me of the times that my dad gave in and let me have my way. If I had a fit, his answer was always no. But I quickly learned that if I gracefully accepted his initial “No,” he usually relented later and would agree to let me do whatever it was that I had asked. To this day, I can see him stand in my doorway, arms crossed and head tilted to the side as he sighed deeply and said,
You can do (whatever)…against my better judgment.”
So even though God knows that a king is NOT what is best for Israel, he’s giving in and letting them have one. He chose a man who stood head and shoulders above the rest. Saul was merely going about his business, looking high and low for his father’s lost donkeys, when Samuel the prophet befriended him and honored him at a huge feast. Can you imagine the bewilderment Saul must have felt upon hearing these words:
Then Samuel took a flask of oil and poured it on Saul’s head and kissed him, saying, “Has not the LORD anointed you leader over his inheritance? (from 1 Samuel 10)
Samuel then went on to tell Saul a few prophesies. First, he said that Saul would meet two men near Rachel’s tomb who would tell him that his father’s donkeys had been found. (Remember…we’re going from found donkeys to ruler of Israel, literally overnight!) Then Samuel told him that as he went on his way, he’d meet up with three men. One would be carrying three young goats, one would be carrying three loaves of bread, and another would carry a flask of wine. Samuel told him to accept the bread they would offer him. Finally, Samuel predicted that Saul would come upon prophets and that he himself would become a changed person and would begin prophesying. He instructed Saul to go ahead of him to Gilgal and to do whatever the Lord led him to do.
So Saul went on his way, and, I’m sure to his utter amazement, everything happened the way Samuel said it would happen. When he met with the prophets, the Bible says:
As Saul turned to leave Samuel, God changed Saul’s heart, and all these signs were fulfilled that day. When they arrived at Gibeah, a procession of prophets met him; the Spirit of God came upon him in power, and he joined in their prophesying.
Saul saw his uncle shortly after this, but he did not say anything about what had happened. Maybe his mind was whirling. Maybe God stilled his lips so that he would not say. When Samuel arrived, he assembled the Israelites by tribes and clans in order to select a king (against God’s better judgment). The tribe of Benjamin was selected…and then the clan of Matri.
What happened next is when I hit the Huh? factor in this story.
Finally Saul son of Kish was chosen. But when they looked for him, he was not to be found. So they inquired further of the LORD, “Has the man come here yet?”
And the LORD said, “Yes, he has hidden himself among the baggage.”
Huh?
Saul, the chosen one, the one who had already been anointed, who had already had the Spirit of God come upon him, who had already prophesied, the one who stood head and shoulders above everyone else, went into hiding! He was afraid!
There are times that I despise myself when my fears strangle me. How is it that one such as me, one who has been saved by grace and is a daughter of the king, could still be shackled with panic and fear? I never realized until today that Saul was just like me in that regard. There have been times that I have wanted to crawl into bed and hide under the covers because I was afraid. I have always felt so weak and…damaged…because of my phobic tendencies. But this passage gives me hope! Everyone faces fears and hides away for a time. Even kings. Even moms.
I recently became the director of a local Classical Conversations group. CC is a homeschooling model and method and functions like a co-op, only with more academics and a focus on the classical model of education (about which I’ll be writing much more later when I have had time to assimilate!) I attended a three-day seminar and training last week and found myself feeling a little like Saul.
What on earth have I taken on? Is the Lord SURE I am the one for this position? Me? The one who is phobic and anxiety-prone? The one who knew absolutely nothing about classical education until about six months ago and is now totally passionate about it? I had a mini-panic attack at the end of the second day that woke me up from sleep.
But now I am reminded of Saul, and of David, and of all those Biblical examples of flawed people working out their faith in real ways. Sometimes they ran away before they got it right. Sometimes they hid. Now I don’t feel so bad about covering up with a blanket and hiding in a book for half the night. Saul’s anxiety must have been sky high, to go from donkey-searcher-outer to king! Kinda makes my anxiety about going from homeschool mom to CC director pale in comparison…and I’m realizing that it’s not necessarily wimpy to hide for a little while. God knows where I am, and, like he did with Saul, he’ll direct others to drag me out when it’s time for me to do the tasks he’s set before me.
One of the most difficult things about having a husband who travels is figuring out what’s for dinner. I know it seems a trivial concern, but to me the question of What’s for Dinner is indeed a big deal.
Rather than having food issues, I guess you could say I have Non Food issues. If there was a way to fill up my family the way I fill up my car with gasoline, I’d do it. It’s not that I don’t enjoy cooking — it’s just that I don’t enjoy food. Except perhaps for Dove dark chocolate, I am content to fill up on whatever so long as it is suitably bland and tomato-free and dairy-free and pecan-free and carrot and sweet potato-free….you see my problem. It’s not so much that I am a picky eater as it is that those foods make me feel nasty.
I think I must be the only person on the planet who takes her daughter to Baskin Robbins and doesn’t get something for herself. I can’t eat ice cream. I love the flavor…but as soon as I swallow, it feels like it’s going to come back up. Instant heartburn. TMI, I know.
So, back to the meal-planning angst of this evening. I didn’t. Frozen waffles for her. Almonds for me. Yum yum.
Add my food sensitivities to my daughter’s pickiness, and you get some very small parameters for meals. I have been down the “you must eat whatever I’m eating” street, and it is not pleasant. She gags the whole time, which ruins my appetite as well as hers, and neither one of us ends up eating anything. So, I refuse to make mealtimes battle times. If she doesn’t want what I’m fixing, she can cook something else for herself. But then there’s no shared experience, and cooking for one is so NOT fun.
I blame myself. I always fed her bland food because that’s the way I like it. She came back from camp exclaiming over the grilled chicken they served. Grilled chicken? Can this be the same child? The very same one who wouldn’t touch a chicken unless it was properly breaded and fried to a crisp? Apparently, she liked the chicken because it was very peppery.
She gets up while it is still dark;
she provides food for her family
-from Proverbs 31
That is so not me! The Proverbs 31 woman is somehow erased from my DNA. I wish I could find her somewhere. Is it wrong to wish the Lord had molded you a bit differently on the inside?
Lord, you made me. You know me. You renew me each and every day. I can only pray that my weaknesses in this regard will somehow be made strong in You and will somehow glorify you. Maybe not here and now. But someday I’ll stand confident and know What’s for Dinner without feeling so inadequate.
Forgive the weirdness of this post. I miss my husband who will be gone this week on our 14th wedding anniversary. I miss his strength carrying me through on days like today when I don’t feel myself. I’m tired and out of sorts after a whirlwind homeschooling conference and am now embroiled in a very busy VBS at church. My stomach isn’t feeling great and has been yucky for the past couple of days…which ramps up my anxiety level, on a scale of 1 to 10, to about a 50. Tonight I skipped dinner because every time I eat I feel sick. I know that’s not healthy and is not advisable for my 90 pound frame. I also know that the Lord heals me and will give me the strength I need to bring the story alive tomorrow for our 277 kids at VBS. What a blessing and a privilege to share the message: Fear Not! God is Powerful!
Now if I can only listen to what I preach!
This morning my daughter and I spent a couple of hours with a kind neighbor who has a glass jewelry-making business. She offered to let us come create some pieces of our own. The colors of the glass that we broke into shards and then placed in a design have hidden attributes. The extreme heat of the kiln transforms the glass into completely different hues. In fact, a couple of my pink pieces came out looking golden, but the overall effect was beautiful. Tomorrow they will be polished and ready after another stint through the fire.
Maybe it’s the extreme Texas heat, but I’ve been thinking about what it is like to walk through the fire. In order to achieve perfection, the glass jewelry we’re making has to pass through tremendous temperatures (upwards of 1300 degrees F) at least twice. The heat causes the glass to melt together in unique formations and also gives the top clear glass a polished sheen.
Isn’t that the way God designed our lives? He shapes us a little here and a little there. Sometimes he scores us and breaks off that which isn’t quite perfect. He cracks our hearts and re-makes them to help us become the telios (perfect) people he commands us to be. The whole Bible is a story of the ways God has shaped and re-shaped His people. Over and over again we read of the people repenting of their sins and turning back to him, only to be lured away again with the next big thing.
I’m once again delving into Scot McKnight’s book The Blue Parakeet. Today I don’t have much of a quarrel with his argument that the Bible is to be read as a Story. Not as a jigsaw puzzle. Not as someone who tries to understand the mind of God (because who ever could anyway?). What I may still quibble with him is that he continues to insist that the Bible is to be applied in our day in our way.
I believe those could be dangerous words. In Revelation 2, I read today:
“But I also have a message for the rest of you in Thyatira who have not followed this false teaching (`deeper truths,’ as they call them—depths of Satan, actually). I will ask nothing more of you except that you hold tightly to what you have until I come.
Again, in Jude, another warning:
Dear friends, I had been eagerly planning to write to you about the salvation we all share. But now I find that I must write about something else, urging you to defend the faith that God has entrusted once for all time to his holy people. I say this because some ungodly people have wormed their way into your churches, saying that God’s marvelous grace allows us to live immoral lives.
Please know I am not in any way trying to say that the writer of Blue Parakeet is one of these false teachers. I am simply saying that I will endeavor to truly TEST EVERYTHING. I have found nothing so far that urges us to live immoral lives in McKnight’s book — except, perhaps, that some could take his assertion that we should take the Story of the Bible and apply it “in our day for our day.” Some people who believe that homosexuality is not sinful but is simply a state of being (which is what “our day”’s culture constantly bombards us with in television and other media) could then feel free to live however they choose because they say those old mores don’t apply to today’s world. The same could be said about those who engage in the “swinger” lifestyle.
McKnight also quotes a passage from Leviticus 25 about God’s command to not charge interest and then compares it to our modern day life in which interest is ingrained in everything we do. He uses this passage as an example of something that God said that applied back then but no longer applies now. “That was then, and this is now,” is how he interprets this passage:
‘If one of your countrymen becomes poor and is unable to support himself among you, help him as you would an alien or a temporary resident, so he can continue to live among you. Do not take interest of any kind from him, but fear your God, so that your countryman may continue to live among you. You must not lend him money at interest or sell him food at a profit.
He writes that in today’s world we don’t take the time to find out whether or not our mortgage company is a “brother” or not. He goes on to say,
…Until we learn to read the Bible as Story, we will not know how to get anything out of the Bible for daily living. We will not become aware how we can so easily dispense with what the Bible says about interest. And, unless we read the Bible as Story, we might be tempted to make “that was then” into “it’s also now.” But it isn’t. Times have changed. God spoke in Moses’ day in Moses’ ways (about interest), and he spoke in Jesus’ days in Jesus’ ways…And he speaks in our days in our ways — and it is our responsibility to live out what the Bible says in our days.”
Again, the warning bells are clanging in my head. For one thing, nothing in the Leviticus passage commands God’s people to not PAY interest but instead instructs them to not CHARGE interest. My husband and I follow that command. Although we pay interest on our mortgage, we do not charge interest to those who may borrow items from us. This is intentional on our part because we want to show love to our neighbors. The Lord indeed speaks to me NOW through that passage about interest.
Ack! Sounds a bit like itching ears want to hear (from 2Timothy):
3For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 4They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. 5But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.
And that is what I am trying to do…keep my head.
So today it seems, again, that The Blue Parakeet is a bit out of tune. To be fair, I have only completed about 20% of it and am just getting started. I’ll write more posts when something else grabs me.
Lord, I pray for discernment through the power of the Holy Spirit, to teach me, to counsel me — on how to apply your Words to my life. As I struggle through this book that my church leadership put out for us to read and discuss, please give me a teachable — but wise — heart. You created me, Father, and you are continuously shaping me and molding me and heating me and cooling me just as I did today to make jewelry. I ask you to protect me and my church. Do not let men chip away at your truths or turn our individual colors into ones you have not fashioned. For we are YOUR workmanship.
It may be that I am the only Red Parakeet in a Blue Parakeet fan club!
It is fascinating to watch God weave the events of our lives so that “coincidences” pop up all over the place. Mind you, I don’t believe in coincidences because, in my mind, our omnipresent Creator already knows every thought before we think it and every action before we move.
You know what I am going to say
even before I say it, Lord .
You go before me and follow me.
You place your hand of blessing on my head.
I can never escape from your Spirit!
I can never get away from your presence!
If I go up to heaven, you are there;
if I go down to the grave, you are there.
If I ride the wings of the morning,
if I dwell by the farthest oceans,
even there your hand will guide me,
and your strength will support me.
–from Psalm 139
Lately I’ve been wrestling in my mind over how to live out my faith. I alternate between being disgusted with my materialistic Lexus and praising God for his provision. My husband and I have had discussions about what constitutes a tithe — does it have to go to the church, or are all charitable donations considered tithes in the Lord’s eyes? Why is it that so many in America who claim to be Christians don’t attend church? Somehow something about my bubble life doesn’t seem to resonate with Jesus’ commandments to love my neighbors. I love my family, yes. If I learned of a neighbor in need, I would reach out to help — but that’s kinda difficult when my neighbors and I don’t see each other except to wave as we drive by on our way to another destination or errand.
The Blue Parakeet is a newish book about reading the Bible that my church book club is currently reading. I’m more of a fiction kind of gal, but with an intriguing title like that, I decided to get the book, dig in, and see what all the fuss was about.
And I discovered pretty quickly that the one fussing is me.
This book is going to be difficult to read. It is also going to be intriguing because it addresses so many of the questions I’ve been wrestling with. I am deeply concerned about its premises on several levels.
For starters, the author writes that it is impossible for modern-day Christians to fully literally obey the Bible in today’s world. He writes that we all pick and choose what we focus on. He’s right — at least in my church, we skip over the part where Paul writes that women should have their hair covered and think of that as a “that was then, this was now” kind of thing. Well, some homosexual believers say the same thing about the teachings about them. Isn’t it hypocritical of me to hold up one thing as TRUE while dismissing the other as something that doesn’t apply anymore?
In fact, if I’m honest here, I have to say that I have always had a tendency to “weigh” the words of Jesus more heavily than those of Paul or Peter or John or Luke. Many times Paul wrote commands such as this one, in 1 Timothy 2,
I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent.
And yet we have Jesus doing the exact opposite of what Paul “permits.” He appeared directly to Mary Magdalene and then commanded her to go and TELL his brothers a message from him, the Lord, in John 20:
She turned to leave and saw someone standing there. It was Jesus, but she didn’t recognize him. “Dear woman, why are you crying?” Jesus asked her. “Who are you looking for?”
She thought he was the gardener. “Sir,” she said, “if you have taken him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will go and get him.”
“Mary!” Jesus said.
She turned to him and cried out, “Rabboni!” (which is Hebrew for “Teacher”).
“Don’t cling to me,” Jesus said, “for I haven’t yet ascended to the Father. But go find my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
Mary Magdalene found the disciples and told them, “I have seen the Lord!” Then she gave them his message.
In that instance, Mary provided information to the disciples. Isn’t that teaching?
It’s safe to say that reading this Blue Parakeet book is opening up many skeletons that I have firmly shoved into the dark closets of my mind, the ones labeled “DANGER! Don’t Open!” There are some topics that feel scary to tackle, such as apparent contradictions. If I question these things openly, does that mean I question the bedrock of my faith, that Jesus is the Son of God, born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, died on a cross for my sins and rose again on the third day, ascended to heaven? No, I still believe that truth.
The way I reconcile in my own mind the apparent difference between Paul’s teaching and Jesus’ teaching is that Paul was a man, and Jesus is God. Of course I will believe Jesus over Paul. But when I do this, I am, as the author asserts, picking and choosing what to believe.
How about the one about the rich young man who wanted to get into heaven? Apparently this was an outstanding young man who had followed all the commandments. He wanted to know what else he needed to do in order to receive eternal life. Jesus told him:
Jesus told him, “If you want to be perfect, go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” (Matthew 19)
Notice the order of the steps he had to take. Before he could follow Jesus, he had to sell his possessions and give the money to the poor.
That is not the way we do things in our church. Most of us are not homeless, and if we are, it is not by choice. Why do we Christians not live our lives in this way? Why do we increase our standard of living to match (or exceed) our income? I’m including myself in this question because that’s definitely the story of my life. When we moved to Texas, we found that for the exact same amount of money as our Florida house sold for, we could buy nearly double the house here. We COULD have bought the same sized home for nearly half the amount, but chose the bigger house instead. Why did I do that? It’s clear that at that moment in time, I had three choices:
Now, if we had chosen door number 2, where would we be today? Where would we be living? I don’t know. It would be a scary proposition to find myself homeless and without STUFF, by choice.
Suffice it to say, this is one of those passages that we Americans tend to gloss over. We don’t strive to be perfect, do we? In fact, in The Blue Parakeet, the author goes so far as to say it is impossible to do such a thing in a modern world.
But just think about it. What if fifty Christian families sold everything and gave it all to the poor in YOUR community. What would happen next? How then would they follow Jesus when He himself is bodily in heaven? Would they begin a walking tour, telling everyone the good news, just as Jesus did? How would such a tour be financed? What would the impact be on our world today if we did indeed step into the past and do just as Jesus said we needed to do in order to be perfect? The author says it is impossible. I disagree. “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!”
Who said anything about being perfect?
Um, our King did. Look at what he commands in Matthew 5:
If you are kind only to your friends, how are you different from anyone else? Even pagans do that. But you are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.
Maybe we can wiggle out of this by focusing on the word perfect. In the above verses, the Greek word is teleios, which means the utmost of human integrity and virtue; being brought to its end without needing anything else to achieve its completion. We are to be finished. Sort of like sending a young woman off to finishing school for some polishing…only much more. Jesus used the same word teleios when he spoke to the young man. And when the young man who had many possessions walked away, shaking his head in defeat, Jesus told his disciples that it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Apparently the rich young man just gave up. He was on his way, but he wasn’t teleios.
Does the fact that I have not sold all my possessions and given them to the poor mean that I am not entering into the Kingdom of Heaven? Is Christianity as we know it totally messed up?
The author of The Blue Parakeet wrote about our differing interpretations of the Bible, and about what we pick and choose to focus on as:
What we decide is our way for our day.
My warning antennae just went up on high alert. I have been reading in Judges and have been seeing what happens when a group of people begin to do what seems right in their own eyes.
Rape. Murder. Demolishing entire villages in order to capture the virgins. Forcefully giving the virgins as wives to a tribe so they can be made to have children that will continue on the tribe. Stealing young women from another village to take away as wives.
Holy Spirit, I pray for wisdom to know what it is that you want me to do in my lifelong quest to follow Jesus. Do I take Jesus’ words literally? Do I pick and choose?
Paul Coleman has written a song that beautifully captures my angst about these matters. It’s called Last Night In America. These lyrics capture my heart:
I’m afraid to turn my TV on
And I’m hoping what they said is wrong
Can I just live my lifetime here and then move on?
I’ve had a million conversations about
Who is right and who is wrong
And how would Jesus want for us to carry on
I’m praying for God’s will but secretly wanting
Riches and blessings to pour in my hands
Is this my last night in America?My tendency is to run away
And try to keep my family safe
But tell me how to hide away from all this hate?
The dominos that we see fall
Were set in motion long ago
Fear became a flower and the garden grows
I’m seeing the irony, the battle inside of me
You brought me peace now I’m at war with the world
Tell me is there some way out
Tell me that I’m not alone
Show me the mystery oh cornerstone
Is this my last night in America?Is this my last night in America?
Or is it my last moment anywhere?
Our breath is a vapor that’s lost in the air
Is this my last night in America?Well I’ve read about a God of war
And painted blood from door to door
Canonized in scripture and in black and white
And I’ve read about my Jesus Christ
And I’ve received His sacrifice
But is it turn the other cheek or is it stand and fight?
‘Cause I’m just a simple pilgrim I’m not a man with wisdom
What do I do when there’s a thief at my door?
Do I resist him or in silence assist him?What seemed right isn’t clear anymore
Is it the fall of a nation or the great tribulation
The eve of invasion or the book of revelation
Well I’ll wear my freedom as an invitation
To the God of creation who’s keeping the score
Is this my last night in America?
My brother called me today and asked why it’s been over three weeks since my last blog. I actually did write a blog last week but ended up deleting it. I’ve been having some pain (sometimes severe) in my left hand which makes typing undesirable. But my daily Bible readings have given me endless ideas on scriptures I need to write about. Hopefully my hand pain will subside soon so that I can write more often again.
Last night I dreamed about idols. Not the American singers, but the kind that people used to make and worship. It’s not really a surprise — my readings in Judges show over and over how the Israelites absorbed foreign gods into their daily lives. One step at a time, they forgot who God really is and turned to worship statues.
But this morning’s reading of Judges 19 twisted my stomach.
Judges 19 tells the tale of what happens when a people have no form of government. In a nutshell, a Levite goes to Bethlehem to get a second wife. After several months, they argue, and the 2nd wife goes home to her family. The man follows his 2nd Wife and “speaks to her heart,” convincing her to return to his household. After a few days with her family, they begin a return journey home. As night falls, they reach the village of Gibeah, where there is no inn. An old man offers to let them stay in his home overnight.
Gibeah had some of the baddest Bad Guys around. The kind that demanded sex from anyone at any time. They pounded on the door of the house and demanded that the old man hand over the young man so they could have sex with him. Trying to protect his guest, the old man instead offers up his own virgin daughter as well as the 2nd Wife traveling with her husband.
What does this husband do? The one who followed her and convinced her by speaking to her heart? He grabbed hold of her and literally forced or pushed her out the door into the hands of those thugs.
The thugs had their way and raped her and abused her all night long. She staggered to the doorway of the old man’s house and fell down dead.
To show his shock and outrage at what had been done, the man cut his 2nd wife’s body into twelve pieces (ugh!) and sent them to the 12 tribes in order to call together a council to discuss what had happened.
To be sure, there is nothing under the sun that happens that has not already happened in some time or place. We hear stories like that one today and are deeply disturbed. What bothers me the most about this passage is that the husband forced his wife out the door. He threw her to the wolves. I just can’t fathom that kind of heartless self preservation. My own husband would protect me or die trying — and I would do the same for him.
Then the husband presented his case to the other tribes — conveniently leaving out the fact that they originally wanted HIM for sex and that he forced her out into their hands. This led to a huge war and almost a decimation of the tribe of Benjamin.
This kind of senseless violence is what happens when a people have no leaders.
In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes.
Whatever seemed right in their own eyes. Doesn’t that clearly describe the way of our world today? Instead of there being a clear Right and Wrong, our political parties are paralyzed arguing over Left and Right. Our President does whatever he deems right, seemingly without regard to the Constitution (empathy matters more than rule of law) and without regard for the Bible as the only inspired word of God (his speech in Cairo referred to the Koran as “inspired.”) Society teachers our teenagers that truth is relative and that right and wrong are a matter of opinion.
I totally disagree. As for me and my house, we serve the Lord. We live under the Kingship of Jesus, and his commandment to us is to love one another. From 1 John 3:
We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sisters in need but shows no compassion—how can God’s love be in that person?
Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions. Our actions will show that we belong to the truth, so we will be confident when we stand before God. Even if we feel guilty, God is greater than our feelings, and he knows everything.
The Levite who thrust his wife out into the arms of the thugs did indeed show the truth of his love by his actions — his love for himself, that is. His actions did not demonstrate his love for his wife.
This is my prayer: that I will PROVE my love by my actions and not just by the words I write or speak. And the Lord is faithful to answer this prayer. If I am ever caught in a crisis where it is my life or the life of my friend or family member…please Lord, give me the strength to abandon myself without even a second thought. As Jesus did.
Psalm 148
Praise the Lord !
Praise the Lord from the heavens!
Praise him from the skies!
2 Praise him, all his angels!
Praise him, all the armies of heaven!
3 Praise him, sun and moon!
Praise him, all you twinkling stars!
4 Praise him, skies above!
Praise him, vapors high above the clouds!
5 Let every created thing give praise to the Lord ,
for he issued his command, and they came into being.
6 He set them in place forever and ever.
His decree will never be revoked.
7 Praise the Lord from the earth,
you creatures of the ocean depths,
8 fire and hail, snow and clouds,s
wind and weather that obey him,
9 mountains and all hills,
fruit trees and all cedars,
10 wild animals and all livestock,
small scurrying animals and birds,
11 kings of the earth and all people,
rulers and judges of the earth,
12 young men and young women,
old men and children.
13 Let them all praise the name of the Lord .
For his name is very great;
his glory towers over the earth and heaven!
14 He has made his people strong,
honoring his faithful ones—
the people of Israel who are close to him.
Praise the Lord !
What more can I say? Our vacation was glorious. If there had been a way to consume the tropical, flowery scents around us, I would have eaten until I burst. As it was, I stood on the shore, taking in the majestic scene as far as my eye could see, and I shivered with awe. It was our last evening, and I expected that I would feel sad about leaving. Instead, I told my daughter that this was one of those moments that we try to take a picture with our hearts. I will engrave that sunset on my memory — may it ever serve as a reminder of the glory, majesty, creativity and splendor of the Creator!
Yet….
Every single day in that paradise had storms. Tropical raindrops are bigger and wetter than the ones that usually fall on us in North Texas. Even the rain smells like salt. Salt water is corrosive, and residents must be very vigilant to keep rust at bay. Everywhere on the carefully maintained resort was evidence of past furies; Hurricane Charley devastated the region in 2004 with such force that the shape of the coast itself changed, and a new island was born. The peaceful lushness of the island is bought with a price.
Just as my peace with our Lord was bought with a price.
To experience myself the way God made me to be, I must also endure storms that make my legs grow heavy and whip my hair into my eyes so that I cannot see clearly. Then, at those moments of helplessness, I find that the Lord is right there leading me through. He does not shield me from the furies of the world, but He never leaves me alone.
I was highly anxious about making this trip. Planes are not my favorite modes of transportation. I was so weary from the noise of travel that I wished my husband would turn off the radio once we got into a car. I craved silence. Instead I got the heavy pounding of fat raindrops on the roof. We traveled through such a heavy wall of rain that light literally could not penetrate. There were islands just offshore that our eyes could not see due to the rain. My eyes traveled the horizon, looking for waterspouts and other such anxious monsters. But we persevered. My husband kept driving. We kept trusting. And the reward we received was this:
Whatever storm may be pounding you, rest assured that it will pass by. I’m left with a peaceful realization that the storms the Lord is allowing in my life are shaping me, just as Hurricane Charlie shaped the coastline of Captiva. To my Creator I am an expanse of sand just waiting to be made into something that glorifies Him.
We are leaving for vacation in a few days. Aside from the usual anxiety over the airplane ride, I am tasting tiny tidbits of bittersweet fruit. My daughter’s “only child” status has never seriously bothered her….until the last few months or so. We tried to find a homeschool friend to go with us, but at her age, most parents aren’t too keen on their kids flying halfway across the country with people who aren’t family. I don’t blame them; I wouldn’t let my child go on vacation with someone else, either! But, for her sake, we asked three friends. The answer for each one was no.
Then the day before yesterday I overheard her telling a younger friend that since no other children could come with her, she’s going to take a “fairy friend.” My heart shattered; its pieces clattered around and around in a swirling mess. I blame myself for the fact that she has no sister or brother. As many times as I remind myself that the LORD is in control, I shovel hot coals on my head and still shoulder the blame, playing the IF ONLY game. IF ONLY I wasn’t so afraid of throwing up, I would have eaten more and stayed hydrated. IF ONLY I didn’t have intense panic attacks, I would have tried again. Two episodes of intense nausea and marathon panic attacks that ended up in nightmarishly painful miscarriages were as much as I thought I could handle. But what if God wanted me to try again? What if I have denied Him the chance to work another miracle in me because I gave in to the fear?
I wonder if I will ever get over this anxiety affliction or if it will be to me a thorn in my side. I don’t know what purpose God had in taking my babies, and it is so difficult to let it go. Most of the time I don’t dwell on it. But today…thinking about my ten-year-old inventing an imaginary playmate because she doesn’t have a sibling to share in the joy….
And now…for something completely different….
This is a photo of an ovarian cyst. It’s not mine, but it is exactly like the image I saw today while lying sprawled quite uncomfortably on the examination table. I have been having cramps pretty much all the time and passed it off as anxiety, but then some abnormal bleeding showed up. So I went to the doctor. I nearly came up off the table during the very embarrassing exam because the pain was so severe.
The sonogram showed that my cyst is filled with fluid. It has no blood flow.
There is no treatment at the stage in the game unless it does not go away on its own or gets significantly larger. I have to say, it is disconcerting to walk around knowing I have a 4-cm balloon on the side of my ovary that could rupture (causing severe pain) at any moment. But it is also comforting to know that I am in the LORD’s hands. My doctor is a good one. I guess I can look at this as an opportunity for the Lord to heal me spontaneously of the cyst and the associated pain and bleeding. Like the woman with the 12-year bleeding disorder, if I could just touch His robe!
For a moment there, lying on the sonogram table wondering about this sudden change in my health, I got a little shaky. Nobody wants a cancer diagnosis! I was almost giddy when the doctor told me there was no evidence of blood flow inside the cyst or of tissue inside; it had all the markings of a benign growth that he felt would go away on its own. Phew! For a brief moment, I had a glimpse of my mortality on this earth.
(it didn’t help matters that the kiosk lady at the mall tried to sell me anti-aging cream!)
It’s interesting that my daily Bible reading from YouVersion spoke explicitly about life and death, from Deuteronomy 30:
This command I am giving you today is not too difficult for you to understand, and it is not beyond your reach.12 It is not kept in heaven, so distant that you must ask, `Who will go up to heaven and bring it down so we can hear it and obey?’13 It is not kept beyond the sea, so far away that you must ask, `Who will cross the sea to bring it to us so we can hear it and obey?’14 No, the message is very close at hand; it is on your lips and in your heart so that you can obey it.
15 “Now listen! Today I am giving you a choice between life and death, between prosperity and disaster.16 For I command you this day to love the Lord your God and to keep his commands, decrees, and regulations by walking in his ways. If you do this, you will live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you and the land you are about to enter and occupy.
The message is very close at hand. It is on my lips and in my heart. That’s a truth that most people (including me!) forget! God’s message is not trapped in a black hole somewhere out in space. The Holy Spirit brings it to my heart and to my lips, giving me the ump I need to get up and obey it, and to embrace those things that I cannot change. This verse gives me great comfort…that one day when I see my Lord, his promise that I will “live and multiply” will be complete, and the “mish mash” of my heart will be glued together again.
