Sometimes the best way through the valley is through the valley.
That’s where the feast is kept.
Even when I walk
through the darkest valley,
I will not be afraid,
for you are close beside me.
Your rod and your staff
protect and comfort me.
You prepare a feast for me
in the presence of my enemies.
(Psalm 23: 4,5 New Living version)
According to the calendar spring has arrived. According the robins spring has arrived. According to the crocus spring has arrived.
According the wind whipping huge flakes of snow around the door and shoving icy cold down our necks, the calendar, robins and croci are all delusional.
Sometimes the faith life feels like this. We see the finger of God poking into our winters with the promise of spring. We see healings and restorations and resurrections of dreams. The truth is evident and we rejoice and sing and invest in the future. We buy cucumber and swiss chard seeds (or squish hard seeds as my granddaughter calls them.) Then we step out into the garden to plant them only to find ourselves shin-deep in snow.
The truth is spring has arrived. The truth is winter is still hanging on -at least in this part of the world. So we buy our seeds and start them inside the house, because even though winter has still not received the message that its days are over, we know that its days are over. Even though the worst blizzards on the prairies seem to strike in the spring, the days will turn warmer, the grass will turn green and the flowers will bloom, eventually. Summer is coming and summer has never failed us yet.
We know that God’s will will be done on earth as it is in heaven, because even though the enemy of our souls has not accepted his inevitable demise and he roars in like a spring blizzard, his days of stealing, killing and destroying are numbered. We know because God has never failed us yet. His loving kindness is everlasting.
Besides, He promised.
And God is good.
Wakey, wakey!
I saw these guys on my walk in the woods yesterday.
Crocus flowers, or pasque flowers as they are sometimes called, fascinate me. As forerunners they are the first to demonstrate the change in season by the prophetic act of blooming before any of the other wild flowers in the Rockies.
I read this recently: Hope is hearing the music of the future; faith is being able to dance to it today.
The crocus reveals, as it folds back its furry purple robes, a heart of gold. It’s mere presence between patches of dust-weary snow in the mountain meadows sings to me songs of stepping into destiny by faith.
Come out of your caves! Don’t let your past define who you are today!
Open to the light! Let it dispel all the dark fear that keeps you from letting anyone see your heart! You are beautiful!
Wakey! Wakey! Even Solomon…
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This song kept playing in my head all night and woke me in the morning.
One line stood out in particular: Thy precious blood shall never lose its power, ’til all the ransomed church of God be saved to sin no more.
In contrast to the on-line ugliness seen this past week in attacks directed at a well-known pastor/teacher and author whose son died tragically, I have seen the beauty of thousands of people coming together to pray for a man many of them have never met. I have seen leaders from other fellowships with differing doctrines lay down their right to be right and pray together toward the same purpose. I’ve seen folks from many varieties and styles of prayer and worship of Jesus Christ respond eagerly to prayer bulletins on social media.
I have seen people offer to care for our grandchildren, clean the house, buy groceries, help with paper work and banking, give massages, fix the tires, pick people up from the airport, host out-of-town family in their homes -and more. I have heard from people who have never said more than a one sentence prayer who say they have woken in the night with an urge to pray. I have never experienced such a practical out-pouring of love, but more than that I have never seen so many people moved to overcome differences, reconcile relationships and minister not only to our family, but to each other. It amazes me. I can honestly say, “Look how they love one another!”
I paced and wept and cried out for the life of our son-in-love at that moment when teary-eyed nurses invited immediate family for a brief visit before another surgery on “John.” We knew they did not hold out much hope for him. Strangely as I prayed and walked the halls the phrase that kept popping up, unbidden, in my mind was: “The deeds of the flesh must die.” I didn’t understand it then and I didn’t want to hear it. I realize now this trying time is not about punishment or God being angry with John. The Lord knew he would be okay. This is about a bigger picture.
John has required many blood and platelet transfusions; he has almost needed a fountain of donated blood to keep him going. As I watched another bag dripping life into him today, and with this song still in my head, I was struck by the symbolism.
Finally John is starting to gain consciousness and even make jokes with us, although it is difficult for him to communicate. He is still surrounded by machines and a room full of skilled care-givers who watch the numbers and tend his needs. He can do nothing for himself -not even breathe- but I think the Lord is using him even in his helpless state to teach us.
It is the blood of Christ freely shed for us that gives us life. It is the light of Christ’s love that reveals corruption in the body, the underlying dis-ease of lack of love that spreads like killer bacteria and keeps the church from being what God intended. It is the kind adjudication of God that filters out lies and shows us where we need to change and be renewed. It is the sharp sword of the Word of God that is able to excise and remove necrotic tissue without damaging the healthy tissue and it is Holy Spirit who breathes new life into us.
Christ is returning for a spotless bride. He is revealing and cleansing not because he intends judgmental condemnation, but because he loves us and wants us to be well.
For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.
For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.
But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do.
But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.
Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience,kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.
(Galatians 5:13-23)
Abba, in your church, be glorified.
Our son-in-love, who has been unconscious, but for a few moments, for nineteen days woke long enough to communicate with nods, smiles and grimaces for a short time yesterday. Our daughter’s heart was encouraged when he made a kissing gesture toward her.
His faithful friend, on the other side of the bed asked if he could have one too. “John” made a kissy face and rolled his eyes toward him.
We go on. We continue to pray for complete healing after flesh-eating disease and sepsis ravaged his body. Some of the medical staff have encouraged his day-and-night companions to continue to pray as they say it is only by the miracles they have seen so far that he is alive. At least one of them is not an atheist anymore.
We go on praying and trusting. We have a kiss -no, two kisses, to build a dream on.
I remember my affliction and my wandering,
the bitterness and the gall.
I well remember them,
and my soul is downcast within me.
Yet this I call to mind
and therefore I have hope:
Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him.”
The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him,
to the one who seeks him;
it is good to wait quietly
for the salvation of the Lord.
(Lamentations 3:19-26)
Remembering the Future
I was looking forward to this journey to my Father’s house on the Alberta side of the Rockies. Usually the mountain views are stunning, but instead I drove through fog for nearly four hours. I could see very little beyond the verge by the highway most of the time. Sometimes the fog would lift for a moment only to re-form and descend again. I stopped near some cabins, closed for the season, to take a break from the tension of driving in poor visibility and found a beautiful stream. When I descended the Kootenay Parkway the clouds vanished.
My little granddaughter said to me today, “Nana, lift me up, cause I need to put my dolly on the high shelf.”
I said I would put dolly up there for her if she wanted.
She said, “No. This is my job cause she’s my dolly and I want to make sure she is safe on the high shelf, so will you be my alligator and lift me up so I can do it myself?”
“Your alligator?” I asked.
“Yeah, like the alligator in the hobsible when you get in and the doors close and up you go.”
I placed my hands under her arms and lifted her up above my head. She set her dolly on the high shelf of honour where she would be raised above the threat of the marauding toddler sibling and his friends.
Sometimes the Lord gives us responsibilities for those he places in our care. We know our assignment is to seek their well-being, to protect them from potential harm and to raise them up to be who they are meant to be. This can be a daunting task, an overwhelmingly difficult task when often we feel so out of control.
I was asking the Lord how I should pray for the people he has placed in my heart when I feel so inadequate, when I am so aware of my own short-comings.
Then, as he often does, He sent a child to show me the way.
Abba, will you be my alligator and lift me up so I can do my part and bring my loved ones into your presence where they will be visible to the ones who would threaten them, but still be out harm’s reach? I recognize that you are the one who has made everything possible, yet you give me the privilege of working with you with my little bit of mustard seed-sized faith clutched in my pudgy hand. Thank you.
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Colossians 3:1
For in the day of trouble he will keep me safe in his dwelling; he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent and set me high upon a rock. (Psalm 27:5)
A prayer for the prayers.
Photos: Sunflowers on Eager Hill
May the God of hope fill you with joy and peace in your faith, that by the power of the Holy Spirit, your whole life and outlook may be radiant with hope. Romans 15:13
Love knows no limit to its endurance,
no end to its trust,
no fading of its hope;
it can outlast anything.
It is, in fact, the one thing that still stands
when all else has fallen.
(1 Corinthians 13: 7,8)
Charis: Subject to Change 