“Watching and waiting,
looking above,
echoes of mercy,
whispers of love.”
(from Blessed Assurance by Fanny Crosby)
My husband said, “Let’s go!” So we went.
I wasn’t expecting it at all, but he said he could take a few days off and unseasonably warm weather on the left half of the continent made a road trip in February feasible. We looked at a map and determined the closest place with sandal-worthy temperatures was Northern California.
The first thing I saw when we got out of the car after two and a half days of driving was a tree in bloom.
A few days before we left I kept hearing and seeing the word “adapt” in a dream. Frankly, I started bracing myself for another challenge. What now, I thought. I realized instead, as I was looking for sandals and summer clothes to quickly toss in a suitcase, that “adapt” this time meant adapting to a pleasant surprise.
We’re home now, after a wonderful ten days in a different world with sun and palm trees and spring flowers. There is ice on the sidewalk here and work piles up again. It will be another three months before my plum tree is in bloom, but I feel like I had a foretaste of what is to come.
He does that, my Abba God. It’s a kind of now and not yet gift. He allows us to experience a taste of what He has planned, a remembrance of the future. And it gives us hope.
Not until we have become humble and teachable, standing in awe of God’s holiness and sovereignty, acknowledging our own littleness, distrusting our own thoughts, and willing to have our minds turned upside down, can divine wisdom become ours.
-J.I. Packer
As a singing teacher I sometimes noticed that students who found change most difficult were those who had received notoriety too soon. They clung to style or technique that had earned them trophies in the past. It’s one of the reasons why child prodigies often have difficulty finding their way in the adult world. It’s hard to let go of success.
Spiritual growth requires a teachable attitude – also known as meekness. There is a line from an old hymn playing in my head this morning:
“I will cling to the old rugged cross ’til my trophies at last I lay down,
I will cling to the old rugged cross, and exchange it someday for a crown.”
Sometimes trophies can become heavy burdens as we journey on this path. Sometimes we need to lay them down so we can move on.
There is a strain of loneliness infecting many Christians which only the presence of God can cure. –A.W. Tozer
I don’t remember where I heard this said about people in the arts who venture into the public eye, but it stuck with me: Artists want to be noticed, musicians want to be heard, actors want to be loved, and writers want desperately to be understood.
It takes a certain amount of courage to venture into a field that exposes one’s inner thoughts and then depends upon the approval of strangers to make a living. I suppose the same could be said for other fields requiring vulnerability, from stripping to politics to scientific research. Even accountants and morticians need approval to keep their jobs. But some people have a greater drive to make connections. Some people are more acutely aware of loneliness.
Writers strive to find a dozen ways to phrase a thought hoping to find the one that brings a response to the question, “Do you know what I mean?” Ya know?
Yet even the most successful artistic people in the world can have a profound sense of loneliness. Sometimes a success backfires and arouses jealousy. Have you noticed how the critics are drawn like moths to the flame of a book or article that gains popular approval?
I absolutely love how Lara Merz responded to an interview question about how to handle negative reviews: “I would say try not to take things too personally, especially if the reviewer is someone you are not in relationship with. There is something about honesty from a loved one or deep friend who cares about who you are, and who you are becoming that is often worth taking heed to, but strangers are trickier because we know nothing of who they are, how healthy they are and the why the book was pushing buttons. Buttons get pushed for many reasons and most of them have very little to do with what pushed the buttons, but rather why there are buttons there in the first place.”
For approval junkies like me criticism can be devastating, because I have buttons. The truth is we all have buttons. Until we are perfectly healed and know we are deeply loved by God we are all offendable and will take off (or bite back) when we feel threatened. Maybe that’s the definition of maturity – having fewer and fewer buttons.
The healing strength of approval and connection that comes from friends and spouses is beautiful but in a way tasting that love can create an even greater awareness of loneliness. Sometimes we find ourselves tempted to compromise on values to maintain those connections. A lot of people use service to the needy as a means to overcome loneliness, hoping dependency on the care-giver will create a strong bond. And I hate to break this to those of you who are in search of the perfect mate. It is possible to be profoundly lonely in even the very best marriage.
There comes a time when we have to admit that our most loyal fans, our closest friends and even our faithful lover do not understand us. When we accidentally touch one of their buttons they will also fly away emotionally. My point is that there is only one reliable source of approval, and that is from the One who created us to be who we are and notices, hears, loves and understands perfectly.
There are some who are called to walk closely with the Lord. Part of their training necessarily involves rejection, and it will occur again and again until they understand that God is jealous for their attention, their love. They cannot give unselfish love until they have received unselfish love from the only One capable of giving it and who heals their hearts.
If you find yourself in a lonely place, pay attention to the quiet. It’s Jesus calling.
I will extol the Lord at all times; his praise will always be on my lips. I will glory in the Lord; let the afflicted hear and rejoice. Glorify the Lord with me; let us exalt his name together.
I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame. This poor man called, and the Lord heard him; he saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, and he delivers them.
Do you remember the story of the ant and the grasshopper? It’s a fable by Aesop about an ant who worked hard storing up provision for the winter and a grasshopper who danced the summer away. It is a tale meant to teach a moral, and it does. Don’t waste the good times because hard times are a-coming. I wonder if we can say the same about not wasting hard times?
My husband pointed out that today is mid-winter, halfway point between winter solstice and the vernal equinox. (I’ve never heard of a play titled “A Mid-winter Night’s Dream” have you?) Obviously the hay is not growing much in these fields near our home and the snow is a bit deep for dancing. Since I am not fond of winter sports and in my lifetime have broken three bones slipping on the ice, I have to work on my attitude toward winter.
The blue-tinged snow and mountains are pretty, I’ll grant you that. In an effort to be always thankful I have also noticed that winter also tends to be the most productive time in my life as far as getting caught up with paperwork, writing, studying, sewing, mending, and inside house repairs are concerned. It’s a time for planning gardens and perusing seed catalogues. It’s a time of waiting and preparing for prosperity. Apparently the Hebrew word for waiting has at its root a picture of braiding a rope. Farmers, fishermen, artisans, and folk festival musicians all need time to get their acts together. Sitting by the fire braiding rope is a good picture of this.
We have been taught to think that we must use good times to prepare for hard times, but I wonder if hard times are not there to help us prepare for good times. Prosperity can be even more difficult to manage well than want. Some, like the ant, live in fear and cannot allow themselves to dance when the evenings are warm. Others, like the grasshopper, accomplish nothing more with their abundance than spending it on their own pleasure. Very few who find themselves with abundance in the form of power know how to handle it wisely — thus the expression, “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
I believe the Lord prepares his most trustworthy servants with long seasons of harsh winter to get them to the place where they don’t need sunshine and flowers to live in a place of contented joy. They will not be dependent on ideal circumstances to allay their fears or give them freedom to dance.
For those trained by adversity to trust in God, every day is a beautiful day.
The hope in the heart of the believer is not a wish to win the lottery or that our team wins. Hope for the follower of Jesus Christ is an expectation that he is true to his word, that what we have seen and have come to believe about who he is and his promises to us is being accomplished. It’s an actual substance we can see by faith.
Hope is joyous anticipation that the promise of cake in the oven will be fulfilled in the mouth — maybe with a little ice cream on the side.
I love ideas. I love to think about ideas. I love to read about ideas and discuss ideas.
Someone asked me once, “Why do you have to ask so many questions? Why can’t you just have faith?”
She was not a thinker. She was a doer, the kind that hates sitting still. Sometimes when I saw her running in circles to meet commitments I would be tempted to ask, “What were you thinking?”
So here we were, one of us stuck in theory without experience and the other in practice without aforethought, both lobbing civil little incendiaries over the fence when we perchanced to have tea. We could have been good friends, but we weren’t because we failed to bless each other for our differing strengths and we both became rather defensive. Alas. She passed away before I realized my error.
Lately I am realizing that a lot of the annoyances that crop up in my life are actually sent by the One who is motivating me to work out the things he has been teaching me. An obvious example of this occurs when people pray for patience. We make jokes about it. What follows is often an opportunity to work out the patience He already placed in them.
I love watching kids do this so naturally. My youngest grandsons have watched very few superhero movies. They have only to sit on the couch in front of Netflix long enough to grasp the premise and they are leaping from the furniture putting theory into practice. The next viewing is merely for the purpose of refining identity. Theirs is a world of potential, rapidly becoming reality.
Can I admit I also loathe exercise that goes nowhere? I would a thousand times rather hike in the woods, or turn dirt in a garden than ride a stationary bike that doesn’t progress an inch after 23 minutes of sweaty effort (the length of time it takes to watch a renovation show with the commercials fast-forwarded). I joined a gym and forced myself to go religiously. One day I woke up and realized I didn’t have to go that day because I had double pneumonia. I rejoiced. When having pneumonia seems like a much more pleasant prospect than grinding through a circle of exercise devices you know you really hate it and need to find a better way to work out.
Some of us need more prodding to get off the couch than little kids with towels tied around their necks and this week, although I protested loudly, the prodding made me put some things I have been thinking about into practice. I recognize the necessity of these circumstances and that the exercise is actually taking me somewhere. I may be getting to the point where I can consider it a joy when confronted by various trials. Maybe. There is a time to hear, and a time to do. It’s time to do.
Have done, then, with impurity and every other evil which touches the lives of others, and humbly accept the message that God has sown in your hearts, and which can save your souls. Don’t I beg you, only hear the message, but put it into practice; otherwise you are merely deluding yourselves. The man who simply hears and does nothing about it is like a man catching the reflection of his own face in a mirror. He sees himself, it is true, but he goes on with whatever he was doing without the slightest recollection of what sort of person he saw in the mirror. But the man who looks into the perfect mirror of God’s law, the law of liberty (or freedom), and makes a habit of so doing, is not the man who sees and forgets. He puts that law into practice and he wins true happiness. (James 1:21-25 Phillips)
Charis: Subject to Change 