Anyone who has spent time with a toddler knows about free will. One of the first words nearly all of us learn to say is NO.
Someone pointed out to me this morning that Jesus never preached about grace. It’s as if, for him, grace was a given. He demonstrated grace and lived the Father’s love, but his verbal message to us over and over was “You must have faith. Faith is your part.”
Faith is what engages grace.
I wanted to give my little granddaughter a frozen strawberry yogurt on a stick as a treat. She loves strawberry yogurt. It was very hot and I knew she would enjoy what I had prepared for her.
But she is 18 months old. She has free will. A parent learns quickly that you can pick up a child and take them where they do not want to go, but you cannot make them eat, or sleep, or use the potty or give grandma a hug. You can cajole, entice, plead, reward, punish and otherwise manipulate them, but you cannot make them do any one of these things – nor do it for them. They have a will.
Love does not permit me to shove a treat down her throat.
I had a yogurtsicle (and a warm wash cloth to help with the consequences of her inexperience). I also had a lot of love and hugs for her, which she did not earn, that I wanted to lavish on her, but in order to receive it she had to turn and respond to me.
I think this is a picture of our relationship with God. He has infinite grace and love to offer us, and we have the ability to say no. If we did not have the ability to say no, we would not have the ability to say yes.
I want a relationship with my granddaughter. I love her simply because she is my granddaughter. She doesn’t need to do anything to earn that love. I will love her even if she doesn’t turn around, but she will miss everything I have for her if she doesn’t make the choice to come to me.
God has so much love, so much grace, so much goodness waiting for us. He only wants us to respond to him. Trusting him enough to turn around from our ability to say no and acting upon our ability to say yes is called faith. It’s essential. Love does not permit him to shove his goodness down our throats. It is written, And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. (Hebrews 11:6)
It’s all about relationship. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. (James 4:8)
I saw a bumper sticker once that said: He who dies with the most toys wins.
Ha!
We are part owners of a house, still partially under water, and not covered by insurance with an “act of God clause”, that is tagged “no entry.” That’s not a good sign.
We we also spent the weekend with some of our grandchildren, a daughter and son and our son-in-love who doctors gave a 0% chance of survival to just this spring. As we sat in the shade of the house (because our big shade tree blew over in a sudden micro-burst storm last summer) watching the children laughing as they played around the little inflatable swimming pool, I felt tremendous joy. Shade trees, houses, baubles? It all pales in comparison to life. It pales even more compared to eternal life in Christ.
Baubles
Don’t love the world’s ways. Don’t love the world’s goods. Love of the world squeezes out love for the Father. Practically everything that goes on in the world—wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important—has nothing to do with the Father. It just isolates you from him. The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out—but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity. (1 John 2:15-17 Msg)
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses,
so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
For the sake of Christ, then,
I am content with weaknesses,
insults,
hardships,
persecutions,
and calamities.
For when I am weak,
then I am strong.
(2 Corinthians 12:9,10)
“When I look at the clues that indicate the nature of Jesus – born in a barn, questionable parents, spotty ancestry, common name, misdirected announcement, unattractive looks, reared in a bad neighborhood, owning nothing, surrounding himself with unattractive co-workers, and dying a shameful death – I find his whole approach unable to fit into the methods that automatically come to mind when I think about “winning the world.” His whole approach could easily be described as nonthreatening or nonmanipulative. He seemed to lead with weakness in each step of life. He had nothing in the world and everything in God and the Spirit.”
I woke up with a song in my head. I’ve learned to pay attention to the seemingly random songs in my head, particularly if the music comes unbidden, is insistent, and like this one, is a song I don’t know very well. God speaks to people in different ways and for me it is often through music.
The song is “Don’t Stop Thinkin’ about Tomorrow.” That single line kept going through my head. I had to look it up. It’s by Fleetwood Mac from the 70’s. That’s why I didn’t remember it. In the 70’s I was a sleep-deprived young mother just trying to get to bed before my babies woke up. Who had time to listen to anything but nursery ditties?
If you wake up and don’t want to smile If it takes just a little while Open your eyes and look at the day You’ll see things in a different way
Don’t stop, thinking about tomorrow Don’t stop, it’ll soon be here It’ll be, better than before Yesterday’s gone, yesterday’s gone
Why not think about times to come And not about the things that you’ve done If your life was bad to you Just think what tomorrow will do
Don’t stop, thinking about tomorrow Don’t stop, it’ll soon be here It’ll be, better than before Yesterday’s gone, yesterday’s gone
All I want is to see you smile If it takes just a little while I know you don’t believe that it’s true I never meant any harm to you
Don’t stop, thinking about tomorrow Don’t stop, it’ll soon be here It’ll be, better than before Yesterday’s gone, yesterday’s gone
-Christine McVie
I’ve been thinking about loss. My son and my daughter-in-love and my granddaughter and my grandson are grieving the loss of all their belongings but for a car and three days worth of clothes. My heart ached for my granddaughter when she told me the thing she would miss the most was her treasure box which included some baby clothes and photos and precious little things wrapped in beautiful memories like the tissue paper scrunched around them. We often sat on her bedroom floor going through the box together.
My grandson said he would miss his games, especially his first computer game, which apparently is no longer made. And all his Lego. I’ve spent hours on the floor snapping Lego together with him -and quite a few more hours pushing wrong buttons as he tried to explain the proper way to play a wii game. The children have a beautiful attitude about losing all their toys and games and books -and the computer and the wii- but it still hurts.
My daughter-in-love has lost all the family photos lovingly and creatively displayed in scrapbooks she spent hours making. She is also a fine teacher who has lost her personal stash of teaching aids built up over years of teaching special-needs students.
My son is a fine hobby carpenter. He built my beautiful kitchen for me. Now all of his tools lie under flood water mixed with sewage — irretrievable, and uninsured because they were lost to “an act of God.” (Man, I hate bad theology!)
It’s so hard to see your children and grandchildren suffer, especially when on a retirement income it is impossible for us to do much to help them. It’s so easy to take up a cause for someone else and give into resentment, but trusting the Lord to take care of my needs means trusting him to take care the people I love as well, and thanking the Him for His faithfulness and for solutions to their problems that we cannot yet see. It means not only hearing the music of the future, but being able to dance to it today.
The reason I chose to post these flowers (“painted with light” on my computer using my photo as a template) is because it reminds me of all the things I planted in that spot that I eventually had to dig up and throw out because they died. My neighbours can grow luscious hydrangeas and dramatic astilbes. I can’t seem to. I despaired of ever growing a pretty shrub in that shady corner of the garden.
Then this mock orange showed up one spring. I never planted it. I think the previous owner may have, but it never flourished because I kept planting other things too close to that spot. When that place in the garden was empty it suddenly shot up, covered in white blossoms.
I believe God has something better in mind for my family -and for all the people in High River and other places in Alberta where faithful, diligent folk have seen the work of their hands swept away by flood waters. So, since yesterday is gone, I will choose to think about tomorrow, and give God room to do what he wants to do, which is always better than our own designs. My prayer is simply, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. I trust You, Lord.”
Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
Garden of Gethsemane, Jerusalem
Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
I learned a new word today. Well, new to me. It’s probably been around for a long time. Montivagant. It means “wandering over mountains and hills.”
I’ve often spent seasons of my life as a montivagant seeker –sometimes up and sometimes down.
This life is full of mountains and valleys. Followers of Jesus Christ know he often leads us through unexpected downs on the way to brilliant ups. The beauty of this journey is not just the prize at the end. It’s realizing Who walks with us.
God is good, all the time, no matter what.
Hard times may well be the plight of the righteous— they may often seem overwhelmed— but the Eternal rescues the righteous from what oppresses them.
“And you, because of my blood covenant with you, I’ll release your prisoners from their hopeless cells. Come home, hope-filled prisoners! This very day I’m declaring a double bonus— everything you lost returned twice-over!”
If I let them my anxious thoughts will spin out of control so fast they become a blur like a ride at the West Edmonton Mall. So many conflicting what-ifs cry out for attention it’s like standing at that point of ultimate cacophony where the music of multiple amusements collide -and then a roller coaster thunders overhead. Some people enjoy that kind of atmosphere. I guess I’ve become a country girl.
I need to remind myself, when anxious thoughts begin to multiply, that I can stop and choose to think differently.
I tell myself, “Self? Self! Don’t be hard-hearted, remember and give thanks for all the grace that has brought us safe this far.”
And there has been so much grace! That’s why I chose Charis as a pen name. It is Greek for grace.
The great thing about impossible situations is that we know that we have no way to wriggle out of the problem ourselves, so when the Lord answers with power and provision and peace beyond anything we could muster, we cannot take credit. To God alone be glory.
God is creative and not reactive and none of the things that grab us and try to shake the peace out of us cause him the least concern. He IS peace. And he promises his peace to those who will take refuge in him.
And since that peace comes in the middle of crazy circumstances and not necessarily in relief from them, we may even learn to enjoy the ride.
The voice of the Lord is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the Lord thunders over the mighty waters. The voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the Lord is majestic.
The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; the Lord is enthroned as King forever. The Lord gives strength to his people; the Lord blesses his people with peace.
In the dream I was walking through a parting of the earth like the parting of the sea. It looked like the Hollywood telling of the story of the crossing of the sea, with Charlton Heston presenting a younger and more confident Moses than the hesitant, speech-impaired fellow the Bible describes. In my dream the walls on either side of the path were not made of water but of flying rocks and dirt blown about by some amazing force.
I heard, “Don’t look around. Keep you eyes on the path. Keep going.”
“What’s happening?” I asked.
I heard, “I’m moving heaven and earth for you.”
These past few months have felt like we are walking a narrow path with crises flinging boulders and sandstorms all around our heads. It’s so easy to be distracted by circumstances that could make us panic. I have found that God usually does not answer “why” -especially as that question often comes with a whine that demands He explain Himself. He does answer “what” though, as in “What do you want me to see? What are you trying to show me about Yourself that I haven’t known before?”
He is showing me levels of love and faithfulness deeper than I had imagined.
So today as we walk through another crisis in our family and see aerial photos of our son and daughter-in-love and grandchildrens’ home and workplace and school and entire community under water, and we are cut off from each other because of broken infrastructure in this part of the world, we praise the God who is faithful, who walks through every trial with us, the loving Father who is moving heaven and earth to get His church to the place where he wants us to be. We are learning to trust Him no matter what, to walk by faith and not by sight, and to rest in his love whether waiting for waters to go down or shovelling mud –because he is still good.
This song by Jenn Johnson has meant so much to me lately. It reminds me not to look to the left or to the right, but to keep my eyes and ears focused on my Saviour, my good Shepherd who says, “This is the way.”
Keep your eyes on the path. This is going to be good.
When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you.
(Isaiah 43:2)
The Jordan River
The day started yesterday with a call for help from a friend with a flooded basement. It ended with a call from my son who let me know he and his family had escaped from High River, Alberta, which is now under water, and finally making contact with my brother who is trapped in his home near the edge of the raging Cougar Creek in Canmore, Alberta. His wife and our elderly father are on the other side of the washed out TransCanada Highway.
Our daughter also called. She and her family are caught on the other side of washed-out roads and are not sure how to get home.
I am in Alberta visiting another son and family, watching news reports of submerged towns and washed-out highways, and realizing my husband is on the other side of the Continental divide -and a lot of missing asphalt. I have no idea how or when I can get home.
We live in a land-locked place at high elevation, one of the least-likely places in the world to flood, or so you would think.
But the rains came down.
We are thankful that so far we know of no loss of life, although one person is missing from my son’s neighbourhood and we pray for her. The loss of property and damage is tremendous though. Some of that property, like the property in Canmore, was very expensive. My brother was musing about a property’s value if that property has been mostly swept away, as some of the lots on his street have been.
Can we ever really say we own anything?
That’s the thought I am left with this morning. How much of our time and energy and focus is spent on things which can be swept away?
Sometimes I think that God, in His mercy, shakes us up so we will not settle on foundations that can be swept away. In the light of eternity how trivial wood and plaster and paint on a patch of grass seem.
The message I hear in my heart today is: Don’t settle. There is a much firmer foundation available to you.
So as the children’s song says,”So build your life on the Lord Jesus Christ and the blessings will come down.”
Charis: Subject to Change 