Have you been asking God what He is going to do? He will never tell you. God does not tell you what He is going to do; He reveals to you Who He is. -Oswald Chambers
This blog is in response to another person’s post, now deleted. The post made me stop and consider. It was about shameful behavior currently being exposed in a well-known ministry in the U.S.. “This should be strictly a private matter,” they said. This person felt strongly that reading any reports, even with solid evidence of ungodly choices, was participating in gossip and exploiting someone’s weaknesses and giving way to our own salacious desire for a titillating story. It was a type of abuse in itself. It can be. For many, it probably is. I want to agree entirely with the writer. I truly do. Maybe they are right, but maybe something else is happening here. Something bigger.
My reaction to this exposure is much the same as finding out a much-loved, seemingly strong, healthy family member was in the hospital, in a coma, and dying from necrotizing fasciitis. I DO NOT WANT TO SEE THIS! I DO NOT WANT TO HEAR THIS! OH, GOD, MAKE IT GO AWAY!
Our son-in-love and his wife were both in denial about how seriously ill he was. He delayed going to the emergency room at the hospital until the pain was agonizing. “Necrotizing” means dying. His leg was filled with dead and dying tissue -corruption- that was exposed by emergency surgery that left an open wound the length of his leg and buttocks. By that evening, he was in critical condition, in a coma, with multiple organ failure. Privately, the team of doctors gave him 0% chance of survival.
When thousands of people joined to pray for him, the Lord showed us that the church (including many denominations and expressions in North America) has also been in denial about harboring hidden corruption. This may not just be about the particular organization in that horrible article this week. So many are infected. Was there a less painful way to expose this, or is the Lord allowing it to shock us and shake us into waking up to the reality of the situation? Is this the stern, no-nonsense grace of a caring Father?
For decades, many vulnerable people have been sexually, emotionally, financially, and spiritually abused by those misusing power. Too many times we have looked away to spare them (and ourselves) embarrassment –and potential institutional chaos. This is no longer a private problem between a few people. My heart is broken for the woman involved, (and yes, I agree her behavior has been a lot like that of many victims of abuse and exploitation that I have known.) Perhaps God is serious about exposing what we don’t want to see because it’s time to stop closing our ears to the cries of people who have been used to bolster power-hungry egos.
This is a systemic problem. It’s OUR problem. It’s not just about the abuse; it’s about the cover-up.
In our own story, Abba asked us to pray for the state of the church in our country with the same desperate passion we felt as we prayed for our loved one. I don’t want to look at what has been exposed recently in people who I have admired and trusted. I am dismayed. I am shocked. I feel sick. But I can’t look away. Now the question is: how does the Lord want us to respond?
We don’t want to see this stuff exposed and published, especially where those who do not love Jesus can use it to mock us. This generation of the young, however, like the boy Samuel who watched Eli’s sons defile the tabernacle with vile behavior, see what’s going on. They know. They are staying away in droves.
We may not want to see it, but now we have, and it requires a response. It’s time to stop pretending that all is well. It’s time to cry out together with passion for a deep healing touch to the Body of Christ in North America.
Before the crisis in our family happened, our son-in-love told the Lord he was willing to do whatever it takes to serve Him, including laying down his life. He crashed on Palm Sunday. On Good Friday the family was brought in to say goodbye. Hundreds gathered at the hospital and in the church building to pray that day. On Easter morning, he briefly opened his eyes. On Pentecost Sunday, he walked into church without amputation, with 100% oxygen saturation, with the kidney function of a teenager, with a keen quick mind, and with the assurance that he was deeply loved. We saw a miracle.
Why did he and his family and friends, and eventually the thousands who followed the story on social media, go through that painful time? I believe it was training for such a time as this. We need to stop looking away, pretending this is not serious or not our problem. It’s time to get on our faces and cry out in our exposed corporate shame for deep cleansing, healing, repentance, and restoration.
Kyrie eleison. Christe eleison. Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy.
Don’t worry about having the right words; worry more about having the right heart. It’s not eloquence he seeks, just honesty.
Max Lucado
I remember, as a child, listening to two women disagree about the proper way to do something in church. Both believed that if something was worth doing, it was worth doing well. Both believed there was a right and wrong way to do things. Both believed their way was the right way. Voices were rising, but not in praise. Finally one said, “Well, we’ll just pray about that and see who God listens to.” She stomped off.
That scenario stuck with me. Even as a child I knew something was off. I didn’t know how to pray properly. In fact, nothing scared me off praying with other people more than being told I was doing it wrong by those who seemed to be in God’s favour. (I wrote about that here in Praying Naked).
Today I was reading this passage in the fourth chapter of Philippians. Amusingly (to me anyway), it comes right after the Apostle Paul urges two women, Euodia and Syntyche, to make more of an effort to be of the same mind as the Lord and get along with each other. Immediately I the memory of the two “prayer warriors” from my childhood.
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!
Let your gentleness be evident to all.
The Lord is near.
Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (verses 4 to 7)
I’ve been in a lot of religious settings in my life. Sadly, I’ve witnessed a lot of broken hearts in the wake of “doing things right” when right was defined by a person or institution whose need to be right surpassed the need to be gentle and extend love and grace to those who didn’t measure up to their standards. Even the disciples argued amongst themselves about who Jesus liked best and who would be greatest in the kingdom.
Servants, slaves, and employees may jostle for positions of greater trust and authority through superior performance. It’s their way of trying to earn security by being the most useful and therefore most valued asset. There’s a reason why Jesus told them, before he was crucified and rose again, that he considered them friends. Their position was secure because he loved them. That’s it. It’s all based on love. And he asked them to love one other as he and the Father love.
I am so painfully aware of the number of wounded believers rejected or left behind or still scrambling desperately for approval by those who determine themselves to be most loved. Somedays it feels like grief. Someday I just want to weep, but I am reminded that I am guilty myself of turning this whole prayer thing into some sort of me-first competition too.
There is so much more to this one-anothering thing than we think. All I know is that we are urged to be one in the Spirit. Unity is not to be found in our efforts or methods. Unity is found in God. God is love. He cannot love us any less than he already does, nor can he love us any more than he already does.
I am loved. You are loved. Let’s start praying together by rejoicing in that fact.
Sometimes I just want to sit on a bench, gaze up into the clouds, watch the birds fly overhead, and feel the contentment of a comfortable place in the sun. I don’t feel like moving.
Then again, sometimes a holy discontent stirs in my soul. I’ve had a taste of God’s glory. I want more.
I want more wisdom, more understanding, more ability to extend grace and love the people who disturb my comfort. Mostly I want a closer relationship with the Lover of my soul. I want to see the hearts of this next generation healed of disappointment and anxiety and deeply stirred by the profound reality of the power of the goodness of God.
But then I stop. I consider the cost. The act of saying yes to God in the past has led to exciting starts, wonderful endings, and utterly terrifying middles. It’s easier to pray that I might rise up and soar on the wind of the Holy Spirit before I remember my fear of heights.
It’s been ten years since our son-in-love was miraculously healed of flesh-eating disease and sepsis that caused the team of doctors treating him to privately admit he had a 0% chance of survival. One of them (the whiz guy, the Dr. House of the hospital) said “If that guy lives, it will be the biggest f____ing miracle I’ve ever seen.” As we learned later, that doctor shared, in his vernacular, his poor prognosis for our daughter’s beloved young husband with his colleagues. He got to see that miracle.
Our son-in-love lived. Last night we had dinner and celebrated the birthdays of our granddaughter, his mother, and my husband. It was the tenth anniversary of the party that was ruined when an ambulance raced him to the hospital.
We are all so grateful for the miracle that spared his limbs, organs, mind, and well, his life, really. Three little kids, one of them a new baby at the time, have known a good daddy. He’s been so precious to all of us and we’ve enjoyed every day of the past ten years with him in our lives. We learned so much about God’s faithfulness and the power of unified prayer and positioning ourselves in thankfulness. But there is a tinge of pain that lingers. We remember the tears and sleepless nights and exhaustion when everything looked so bad.
Last night we all joked and laughed together in the living room. Surrounded by birthday wrap and decorations I said, “If only we could have seen this day ten years ago! We would have sailed through those weeks much more easily.”
Before the events of those days, I heard a voice in a dream saying: “Those who are afraid to pray, ‘Thy will be done,’ do not comprehend my love.”
I also remember our son-in-law praying, “Whatever it takes,” and his willingness to lay his life down in the days before friends surrounding his comatose body prayed day and night. They inspired thousands of others on every continent (yes, including Antarctica) to pray for a man they didn’t even know to be healed and rise up. I remember God showing us this was how we are to pray for a critically ill body of believers in this country to be healed and rise up to be everything they are called to be.
You may have noticed, if you look around, we are not there yet. Moving forward means saying together, as one, “whatever it takes.” Moving forward means giving God our courageous yes.
Yes, Lord. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
When I was a child, I used to have a secret place where I would go to talk to Jesus. I told him things that weren’t safe to say out loud where someone might hear. I didn’t know that was praying. I thought praying was when people recited rhymes at meal times or before bed or stood on a platform and shouted at God in King James English as if he were as hard as hearing as some of the folk in the pews (who some of us thought may have been as old as King James).
I talked to Jesus because he was someone who loved the little children. I could be very open and honest with him. Somehow, I had picked up the notion that God the Father was angry and disappointed with me like so many other people in my life. I couldn’t let him see the confusion and pain in my heart. It seemed ungrateful –and perhaps dangerous.
I’m realizing, all these years later, even though I have learned that God the Father is not who I thought he was and is loving and kind and inviting, I still don’t feel comfortable praying out loud in front of people. When someone asks, “Does anyone want to close in prayer?” I’m already avoiding eye contact.
You see, when I pray, I am very aware the moment requires total transparency. I call it praying naked. It comes from a time when the Holy Spirit spoke to me while I was in the bathtub. He’s not dismayed by my many imperfections in body and soul. Other people on the other hand…
Someone, who I’m sure meant well, once told me she had heard me pray a few good prayers in an intercessor’s group we belonged to. Then she suggested I listen to some of the more well-seasoned women’s prayers to see how it was done. I didn’t know I was being graded. Suddenly I was back in Jr. High.
It was the last day of the dreaded “Extemporaneous Speech Unit” in English class. I could no longer hide behind Big Bob or make an emergency trip to the restroom. I rose. I faced the class. I pulled the topic from the hat. I spoke. I tried to be humorous. My joke fell flat. Sigh. The teacher asked me to explain it. Sigh. I did. She still didn’t get it. Sigh. Neither did the other students. Sigh. The students were invited to submit their evaluations. Can you die from humiliation?
People who know me now, can tell you I have no trouble talking about almost any topic. That’s probably because I am an introvert who learned to function as an extrovert to avoid the humiliations of youth. It’s a skill I needed when I became a singer and later a teacher. But performing can be exhausting.
Some good friends have helped me learn to pray together with them. They don’t judge. They don’t hide their weaknesses. They encourage. They challenge. They support. They give me freedom to be myself. How beautifully precious they are.
I walked down by the lake thinking about this. I love how clear the water is here. Its transparency reminds me of the hope that someday I can feel less self-conscious when praying out loud in public. I hope for unity in spirit with fellow believers who will be safe, where judgment is replaced by encouragement, where we are recognized by our love for each other, and where our focus when we pray is on God and not ourselves.
I appreciate the candour expressed in the Psalms of the Sons of Korah. In Psalm 84 they are experiencing the glory of the Lord and the beauty of being in his presence and going from strength to strength. In Psalm 85 they recognize that a distance has crept into their relationship with God. They are again falling back into the old default position of relating to him as an angry God. They cry out for revival, a fanning of embers that seem to be slowly losing their fire.
I’ve been there. Have you? As I’ve been meditating on this Psalm, I believe I am beginning to see a kind of map for renewing the desire to get back to the place of passionate love for the Lover of our souls. It looks like this:
-Worship God by choosing to focus on who he is and remembering what he has done.
-Assess the current state of your relationship and tell him how you feel. Honestly.
-Ask for what you need.
-Listen to his heart and pay attention to his many ways of communicating insight.
-Learn from his advice and seek ways to let it change you.
-Declare the outcome of what he has shown you.
Here it is in Psalm 85:
Worship and Remember
You, Lord, showed favor to your land; you restored the fortunes of Jacob. You forgave the iniquity of your people and covered all their sins. You set aside all your wrath and turned from your fierce anger. (verses 1 to 3 NASB)
Assess and tell him how you feel
Restore us again, God our Savior, and put away your displeasure toward us. Will you be angry with us forever? Will you prolong your anger through all generations? (verses 4 and 5)
Ask
Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you? Show us your unfailing love, Lord, and grant us your salvation. (verses 6 and 7)
Listen
I will listen to what God the Lord says; he promises peace to his people, his faithful servants— but let them not turn to folly. Surely his salvation is near those who fear him, that his glory may dwell in our land. (verses 8 and 9)
Learn
Love and faithfulness meet together; righteousness and peace kiss each other. Faithfulness springs forth from the earth, and righteousness looks down from heaven. (verses 10 and 11)
Declare
The Lord will indeed give what is good, and our land will yield its harvest. Righteousness goes before him and prepares the way for his steps. (verses 12 and 13)
I wondered what was meant by the psalmists use of the metaphor of righteousness and peace kissing each other. (verse 10) That lead me to do a word study.
The word translated kiss here is nashaq. This kind of kiss means a great deal more than romance or affection. We have difficulty understanding this kind of kiss in that culture. It’s not a western custom. The Bible describes the kiss of restoration of relationship when Esau kissed Jacob. The word nashaq is used for the public mark of authority Pharoah granted Joseph to prepare the land for coming famine (Genesis 41:40). We read it again when Israel gave his final blessing to his sons and grandsons. It is used when Aaron went out to meet his younger brother, Moses, as a sign of recognition of, and submission to, his calling (Exodus 4:27). It is used when describing the prophets who refused to kiss an idol and refused to give Baal any acknowledgment of authority or influence in their lives.
A nashaq kiss can symbolize a fastening to someone. It can indicate a restoration of order in relationships. Sometimes it was symbolic of a formal equipping with authority that could include power or weapons. This authority is publicly conferred upon the person receiving the kiss.
When love and faithfulness meet, righteousness and peace kiss each other. They form a bond which is mutually empowering. Righteousness that comes from God the Father through Jesus Christ makes peace possible. The peace that Jesus gives is beyond understanding, but it enables righteousness to replace shame and guilt. Both, together, give us a place and a standing in the family of God, not by anything we have accomplished, but by God’s grace.
Faith-fullness (which also comes from God) gives us a means to receive and something to offer back to our heavenly Father. His response, his ‘anah (explained here), to our prayer made in faith that he will hear and answer, is the righteousness of Christ which came down from heaven. When we are born again, it is Christ’s in which we live and move and have our being. It is his righteousness which went before and prepared his steps and now goes before and prepares our steps toward greater intimacy with our Creator.
Because of God’s response to our earnest cries for his unfailing love to revive us again, we can declare with confidence, “The Lord will indeed give what is good, and our land will yield its harvest!”
I don’t know about you, but I have some talkin’ to do with the Lord. If you want to join me in worshipping, expressing, asking, listening, learning, and declaring restoration and revival for your own heart, for your family, for your household of faith, for your community or city, for your country and for the world, you are welcome.
I am thankful for Facebook. There. I said it. (I’ll skip the ubiquitous qualifying note here because this is about what I am thankful for.) Today I am simply thankful for the “Memories” feature. I keep a journal, but not like my dear aunt who kept daily records of weather, newsworthy events, and activities that included extended family members. Someone needed to keep track of my adventurous Grandmother’s whereabouts.
I write in my journal about ideas, dreams and visions, observations, questions, word studies, encouraging sayings, potential projects, scripture passages that catch my attention, prayers, and concerns (aka obsessive worries). Some days I write nothing. The blank page may be the consequence of busyness or idleness – or worries on repeat. It may be because I am avoiding processing something that messes with my theology or reveals lies I have told myself. Consistent with my meandering ways, my journal is like a disorganized collection of sticky notes inside a cover. Sometimes I post these thoughts somewhere in a gesture meant to ask readers, “Do you know what I mean? Am I the only one?”
Facebook Memories organizes my random posts by date. I can see where I was on the journey in mid-July from year to year. It allows me to check progress and notice patterns. I am surprised by how often the same topics appear around the same time of year. What truly surprised me this week was how often I have faced serious challenges (aka utterly terrifying Oh God Oh God Oh God days) in mid-July. It’s like my personal Tish B’av, the traditional time of disastrous occurrences in Jewish history.
Stories from the past fourteen years that showed up in Memories this week:
My friend’s child was killed when a tire blew on their vehicle while the family was on vacation.
In the midst of helping my father downsize for his reluctant move to an assisted living suite, I received word that my husband was extremely ill with a pancreas that was digesting itself and he would need to be flown to another city for emergency surgery.
A friend of a friend lay dying in hospital from sepsis. He wasn’t expected to make it through the night.
My daughter-in-law posted a photo of muddy belongings removed from their flood-ravaged house and piled in the street for removal by dump truck.
I was making the rounds between radioactive claustrophobia-inducing scans and specialist surgeons and anesthetists in different cities finding out that the “little tumour in my tummy” was going to be much more complicated to remove than I was first told.
I was recovering from surgery on my toe which, bizarrely, was more handicapping and painful than the cancer symptoms at that moment.
My friend’s child’s heart stopped on the operating table while undergoing surgery for severe lung infection in a country on the other side of the world. Doctors revived him, but his prognosis was very poor.
My two precious grandchildren and their equally precious parents parted for their new home on other side of the continent. I did not know how long it would be before I would see them again.
We spent a traumatic day in yet another hospital watching my husband’s younger brother suffocate to death from lung cancer.
My friend was in constant agony after an accident five years earlier. After begging him for help, a surgeon was willing to try one more thing.
I was in the fourth month of a five-month long “atypical” headache. It left me unable to travel or do much of anything but learn to moan quietly.
Injury to my knees and arthritis in multiple joints made it difficult to live in our house with stairs or tend the garden or go for hikes in the mountain forests I loved. We knew we needed to move, but I couldn’t work longer than ten minutes at a time to downsize and prepare the house for sale. The task felt overwhelming.
As I looked back, this part of Psalm 34 came to mind: “The Lord is close to all whose hearts are crushed by pain, and he is always ready to restore the repentant one. Even when bad things happen to the good and godly ones, the Lord will save them and not let them be defeated by what they face.”
July may be my traditional disaster month, but it is also the month of learning dependence on God and watching him come through for me — and the people I love. Remembering how God came to our rescue after the event is so much easier than feeling the shock and pain of the moment when bad news plops itself on the doorstep.
Sometimes answers to prayer come quickly. Sometimes it takes so long it feels like God’s whereabouts are unknown and I can’t call my aunt to tell me where he is now. Sometimes the challenge itself is an answer to prayer because we’ve gained skills and the ability to endure through perseverance and deeper faith in God’s faithfulness. Sometimes the situation is the means to open our eyes to how God sees us and his confidence in us. Sometimes challenges result in better definitions of success than we assumed before.
The friend of a friend with sepsis, the child on life-support, and the woman with severe back pain were all healed within days. My husband’s dire condition suddenly improved and he didn’t need surgery after all. The problem never came back.
With a lot of work and help from people who demonstrated practical love, our son’s family’s house was restored to better than new condition within two years.
The tumour in my gut (and other places the cancer had spread to) were removed without complication and there has been no progression for five years. The toe is still attached and doing its job. The doctor prescribed a medication that successfully prevents the headaches from starting.
Our grandchildren and their mother visited us this week after 941 days of separation.
Many wonderful friends stepped in to help us move. We sold our house before it was even listed to a couple who will continue to fill it with songs of praise to a good, good Father.
A man I met from a country where Christians face death from persecutors daily said, “You Christians in North America sing about the joy of being with Jesus and meeting him in Paradise, but none of you seem to be willing to go there. We rejoice for those who now know what eternal life looks like from a higher place. My father, my friend’s son, and my brother-in-law were trusting Christ to be their saviour. I believe they are all happy and healed in the presence of the Lord. I’ve learned that God heals the broken-hearted and grants peace.
The life of a Jesus-follower is not always easy. He said we could expect the same kind of reception he had. We can also expect the teaching and discipline of a good Father who knows the difference between love and indulgence. If we want Jesus’ peace that passes understanding, there will be times we have to relinquish the right to understand.
I’m facing challenges again in this month of July, 2022. For the sake of privacy of others involved I will just say this much: I agree with Paul’s prayer for myself, for my loved ones, and for you: “… I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 1:5 – 6 NIV)
Yet when holy lovers of God cry outfrom all their troubles
The Lord is close to all whose hearts are crushed by pain,
and he is always ready to restore the repentant one.
Even when bad things happen to the good and godly ones,
the Lord will save them and not let them be defeated
“But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,bless those who curse you, pray for those who are abusive to you.”
Jesus Christ (Luke 6:27, 28)
What if what is missing in the lives of people who hate you, who want to see you silenced, cancelled, dismissed is an experience of grace? What if people who don’t deserve it (like all of us) experience the goodness of God through the blessings of those they shun?
What if we prayed for and not against all the people Jesus loved so much that he gave his life to reconcile them to their creator?
What if those of us who know what it means to have been loved by the Lover of our souls while we were still far from him come out and demonstrate? What if we come alongside our haters in radical demonstrations of the love he has poured out for us?
Feels counterintuitive, doesn’t it? It would take a radical shift in our first-reaction mindsets.
But what if Christians believed Jesus? How would culture shift?
Charis: Subject to Change 