Groaning inwardly… waiting eagerly

I grow weary of waiting to be more than I am…to overcome weaknesses of personality, of upbringing, of an underlying shortness of faith (for want of a better way to put it).   Will I go to my grave frustrated at my feeble prayer life, for instance?  Will I be forever fearful of the unknown, the “what if”s of life?  Or will I grow out of these things?

“When I grow up…”

When does that time come when we have grown into all the things we had imagined we’d be?  During the busy intense years of family life one can safely hold to dreams  that will be fulfilled when there is more time and leisure to pursue them.  If this intense pace ever slows, by reason of health  or changes of place or occupation there comes an uncomfortable season of reckoning…What exactly am I becoming?  Where is the prayer warrior I dreamed a Grandma would naturally be?  Where the seasoned confident woman who rises to meet her lot in life with a mature faith that doesn’t bow any longer to guilt and fear.

Guilt over being less than I should be lingers like a gray cloud over my now graying head.  I shrug it off at the best of times and try to dissect it at the worst of times.  A sense that I am not ‘enough’ to be worthy of the Kingdom of God dogs my days.  I do not do ‘enough’, pray ‘enough’, contribute ‘enough’…Nor is it for want of time to pursue these ideals!  That has become obvious in my present context of relatively uninterrupted leisure.  Then what is lacking? Do I just need to ‘do more’, set better goals, establish more concise lists, get organized, shun distractions and be more sober-minded?! 

When I air this sense of guilt, my husband reminds me of the verse I know well, (in my head):  There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. My response: ‘Yes, but…’ as I continue to imagine my life as one glaring sin of omission.   How is this not condemnable?  Inexcusable?

My real problem is not an inadequate prayer life, though that is an issue I wish I could resolve.  My problem is unbelief that takes the form of an inner resistance to walking by faith.  I want a system to live by, a clear-cut rule of rights and wrongs, a schedule I can keep, a list that once prayed through is ‘enough’.  I want to ‘do righteousness’ on my own steam and then to know I have done it!  But the Gospel talks of a faith that rests all on what Christ has already done.  It speaks of a life that is  a walk of faith as long as we live in these bodies, a life that calls us to defy and deny the allure of the seen, felt and heard wherever it contradicts what God has said.  Here the accuser of the brethren has no place.  Who can curse the one God has blessed?  Who dares judge the tottering one when God has said He will make him stand?

It occurred to me lately that God is not expecting me to be fearless and confident in and of myself (or to pray without ceasing by my sheer effort) but to believe that He is all I need in the face of things I fear and things that undo me.  He has intentionally not chosen the strong and able, the ‘all-together’ confident ones, the movers and shakers of this world ‘so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.’  (I Cor.1:29)  It is the weak ones who have the potential to best reflect His power.  It is the humble that receive grace to be all He intends. He is not asking for my strength, but for my faith. Meanwhile He works in me to will and to do according to His good pleasure in His good time…

I’m slated to lie on an operating table in a couple week’s time and have surgery on the muscles surrounding my right eye.  When the office called  confirming the appointment my nerves were set a' jangle.  All the worst-case-scenarios flitted through my mind, now riddled with doubt.  Was this really a good idea or should I just ‘leave well enough alone’ and live with things as they are—with eye strain and un-remediated vision issues?  Or should I trust myself to the knife of a skilled surgeon and the hope that congenital defect can be resolved for the better. I had made the decision, trusting this was God’s provision and direction for me; now to stand unshaken in faith.

This is perhaps not so very unlike the life of faith I am called to live.  I have trusted myself to a skilled Surgeon.  He has me under the knife.  He intends to create the image of His Son in me.  The old heart has been replaced with a new one, my spirit has been given the life of His Spirit, he’s renewing my mind with truth and cleaning out old habits and thought patterns that don’t fit anymore…And one day, in the blink of an eye, it will be done.  I’ll rise from the table that is this lifetime, transformed into a new make and model that will never again face fear or cringe in guilt.  I will be ‘like unto his glorious body’, righteous through and through.

I’m looking forward to that hope.  And I’m learning to listen to His Word and His Spirit as they show me ‘this is the way; walk in it’.  And I’m thankful for this forgiveness in which I stand by faith, freed from ‘everything from which you could not be freed by the law of Moses’. (Acts 13:39). I do believe He is at work in my days; Lord, I believe, help my unbelief!

--LS 
Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel…which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.  I Cor.15:1,2

For we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.
Gal 5:5

If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. I Cor1:19

And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.  Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. Rom.8:23-26

Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven. I Cor.15:49

We know that when he appears we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is. I Jn.3:2

But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,  who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. Phil.3:20,21

Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen. Gal.6:18

Loose-ends

Loose ends. The term comes from the old days of sailing ships and their multitudinous rigging ropes. Each end had to be tightly bound to prevent it unraveling. I'm a little like a rigging rope; I unravel easily.

Give me predictability, a plan, a steady routine and I hum along through days and weeks and months. Make a sudden move and I jump (ask Jim how many times I've squealed when he's come up silently behind me in the kitchen in the quiet of a pre-breakfast morning.) Ask me to make an unexpected move on short notice and I am overwhelmed at all the minor details required to transition smoothly. And smoothly is the ideal, right?

Loose ends proliferate in my mind. What will unravel if I don't attend to it? I hate lose ends. The unexpected makes me uneasy. I haven't had a chance to prepare for it. I prefer that everything be tickety-boo, (Don't know this expression? Danny Kay will help. Have a listen here! ) (with perhaps a blue-bird on my shoulder too?)  But Life doesn't seem to come in such a tidy package.

My mother-in-law (the greatest cheerleader a wife could hope for) is dying. These many miles away we 'watch' and wonder how long and are poised to travel. Death always seems so unexpected even though it's one thing in life that is assured.

For that matter, life itself is a series of loose ends. Growing up is that—for both child and parent. What will the future hold? Parenting is not an occupation with a tidy job description. Just do this and that and results are guaranteed. Child 4 of 5 is moving out next week. Did we see it coming? Well, yes. Was I expecting it? Well, yes. But am I ready? No. Shouldn't there be a ceremony of some sort? Should it be a celebration or a teary-eyed farewell? Both, I think. But it will pass without fanfare. We may not even be here to wave…

Whether it's a tiff or a task, a birth or a death, or all the growing up in between, I long for the peace of resolution, completion and closure. The uncertainty of the unknown plagues me like a canker sore at holiday time. Makes me edgy and, well, at a loss to know what to do next—'at loose ends' you might say! Leaves me not knowing what to do with expectations. Do I postpone hope or nourish it at risk of disappointment?

Unanswered prayer is another loose end I've been staring in the face this week. Praying without fainting on the one hand, and on the other, resting in faith that my prayers have been heard (even when I can't see the end results!) I don't find this an easy balance. But I'm pretty sure that redoubling my efforts, fueled by doubt as to whether I've been heard, is not the solution. There is no peace here. One could argue from the case of the persistent widow petitioning the unjust judge, but my petitions sometimes seem more like the odious sound of a dripping faucet, the likeness of a quarreling wife never pacified, (Prov.27:15) nagging reminder that her will has not yet been done.

Must I have all the answers before I can rest? Must I know 'the rest of the story' before I will trust? Life is too long a process to be lived in this suspended animation of holding my breath till I can see all the outcomes. Or of living beneath guilt, that I am to blame for hopes gone awry, and therefore must do something, or at least pray harder?!

As a related aside, I read this helpful word from John Piper this week in response to a mother who was feeling the guilt of her child's suicide:

"If you spend your time trying to figure out whether you should be feeling guilty, you'll always come up with an ambiguity. Just relax and feel guilty, and then deal with it the only way that you'll be able to deal with it at the judgment day, because I promise you at the judgment day you'll feel guilty….And if you don't have a solution for that issue now, you may not then. So let's just relax. We're guilty as charged. And now I repent."
[eds:John Piper, Justin Taylor,Stand: A Call for the Endurance of the Saints, Crossway Books, 2008,p.138]

But this whole pressure of wanting loose ends resolved and prayers dramatically answered (now), has come to a head this week. I have been wrestling for assurances instead of resting in the ones already given. Fixation with present loose-ends distorts my perception of God's overarching purposes and unremitting vigilance to fulfill them.

Unresting, unhasting, and silent as light,
Nor wanting, nor wasting, thou rulest in might;
(from Immortal, Invisible God only Wise—Walter Smith, 1876)

I've had to step back, repent, and ask for fresh faith to see His ways as I ought. If I insist on loose ends all being properly tied up before I am at peace… well I am not going to know much rest. It is not to the one who has no loose ends in view that God promises rest, but to the one who knows who is in charge of all those frizzled ends!

They have not known my ways, they will not enter my rest… He said.

We are in fact the flock in His pasture, the sheep of His hand. (Ps.95:7,10-11) The desert walk was a long trudge for the children of Israel. It got hot. Sometimes hunger and thirst set in. The end in sight for the parent generation was death! But for their children, the promised land. For both parents and children the directive was to follow the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night and learn to trust God to care for all the loose ends, all the details in between. He longed for them to know His ways and experience His rest.

I have to come back to this story and specifically this Psalm 95 again and again, and I pray often David's prayer: " Show me your ways, O LORD, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long." Ps.25:4,5 This was, incidentally, the verse inscribed on a prominent plaque in my mother-in-law's home. I read it many times. It continues to be my own prayer…

And He hears, and answers. What have I seen this week of His ways?

• Firstly He asks that I hold on to faith. The righteous must live by it. There's no alternative. We do not and will not see the whole story God is orchestrating until this life's chapter is closed. Habakkuk's testimony beckons me to do the same. In the face of impending disaster—the enemy invading, he writes (and I paraphrase):

I will stand at my watchpost and look out to see what God will say—there is an appointed time—it comes—if it seems slow, wait for it. In the meantime, "The righteous shall live by his faith." Don't count on idols. "The Lord is in His holy temple, let all the earth keep silence before Him." (Hab.2:1-4; 18-20) There's no way around the necessity of faith. We do not need a 'sign' of His presence and provision. We need to count on it, come what may.

• Another reminder. This life may seem to be a riot of loose ends but the things that matter most are forever secured. Jesus finished His mission (Jn.19:30) My sin debt has been cancelled. I am somehow declared forgiven and therefore perfect, while yet in the process of having my loose ends bound up… "because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy." Heb.10:14 What a paradox.

He invites me to revel in this place of grace, to firmly take my stand by faith that I am His, as is, by grace alone. Not because I scrambled to tie up the loose ends of my unrighteousness into an acceptable offering, but because of His mercy.

• Lastly, there is this: He found me before I knew to seek Him. He shows Himself to those who have not asked. Ultimately, 'it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy." (Rom.9:16) And that is the other 'way of God' I've been reminded of this week—His sovereignty. Have you read Romans 10 and 11 lately? Here is the marvel of the Gentiles being grafted into the family tree of Israel, being brought into fellowship with God. In the meantime God's own people, the Jews' are hardened against their Saviour and Messiah. But only for a time. It's part of a bigger plan of redemption that reaches to you and me.

God's purposes run far beyond the circumstances we behold on any given month or year! They are eternal. We are the clay and He is the potter. It's not our place to question why one heart is hardened--one pot designed for 'dishonorable use', while another is fashioned for honorable use. He works in everything to show the riches of His glory', not ours. Everything is from Him, through Him and to Him. No loose ends excluded! Every strand will be woven for His eternal glory. (Rom.11:36)

In these things I only scratch the surface of God's ways. Ultimately they are so far above ours as to be inscrutable, past finding out! (Rom.11:33) Mercifully, we are given glimpses, and this assurance--He is the alpha and omega (the beginning and the end). And in between? We are asked to present the loose ends of our lives to Him for His use, as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable though frayed around the edges! (Rom.12:1-2)

Knowing I am in His hands for His purposes I can take a deep breath (and let it out!) and pack, and travel unexpectedly, and parent and pray and walk in a frazzled world, by faith that in every 'loose end' He is at work.

The ways of the LORD are right; the righteous walk in them, but the rebellious stumble in them.Hos.14:9

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Be encouraged with me as you consider these verses that point to the great end of all loose ends—

The end of all things is near. Therefore be clear minded and self-controlled so that you can pray. (I Pet.4:7)

But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness. We have come to share in Christ if we hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first. (Heb.3:13,14)

He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful. (I Cor.1:8,9)

Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord's coming. See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop and how patient he is for the autumn and spring rains. You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord's coming is near. (James 5:7,8)

Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. (I Cor 15:24)

His kingdom will have no end. (Luke 1:33)

And I hope you won't think it irreverent or impertinent if I tack on this carefree song from my childhood—Zip-a-dee-doo-day, Zip-a-dee-ay—there's plenty of sunshine heading our way!! It's the truth; it's actual. Everything is 'satisfactual' after all!

--LS

"I will meditate on your precepts, and fix my eyes on your ways…" Ps.119:15

Aliens No Longer

I spent the last two days largely alone. I thought I liked being alone but this was different. Waking alone, eating alone, wiling away a sunny day alone, spending the evening alone, hitting the hay alone… None of these are things I haven't done alone before but this felt different, like a foreshadowing of lonely days to come--of an empty nest, of noone needing me, of endless discretionary time to manage, yet without a clear objective. But this post is not about garnering sympathetic advice for a case of pre-empty nest syndrome. Something else caught my attention in my aloneness. Just this, that I never feel entirely alone, and that's what makes being by myself tolerable and even enjoyable. The knowing that God is very much with me, always, makes all the difference. At least it has in the past.

But this time there was a difference. Rather than luxuriating in some time to myself, and sweet opportunity for fellowship with my Father, I found this niggling sense of shame going on in the backdrop of my mind—even reinforced with Scripture—like: "Love your neighbor as yourself". Hmm… do you? What would that look like? Nevermind, you're clearly too selfish. Look at so and so, what he did for that other widow lady… why don't you ever do things like that? You're so selfish—should be ashamed of yourself. How can you pretend to be walking in fellowship with the Father when you're obviously bringing no credit to His Kingdom? What are you doing anyway?! Nothing but your own business, thinking about your own household, enjoying yourself when other people are lonely…

OK, so it looks like accusation when I spell it all out here, certainly condemnation. Unfortunately I didn't take time to spell it out while it was going on and it certainly wasn't THIS obvious, just a subtle undertow of my being 'bad', disobedient to the Word, and therefore presumptuous to pretend that I could just walk through the day in happy fellowship with the Father. This dull nagging undertow squelched my enthusiasm for being alone. (After all, being completely alone is more like the definition of hell than of serenity!) Mind you, there was no particular aspect of disobedience or any obvious action that I was balking at taking. Just a sense of my not measuring up and therefore not having a right to enjoy the Father's fellowship. Bummer.

The day passed productively in other respects. Got all sorts of bookwork done and all manner of weeds whacked! And before 'lights out' I made these points in my prayer journal:

1) Maybe I don't like being alone that much after all, but this day has given me greater empathy for some sisters in Christ who live this way much of the time.

2) Yes, I've been feeling guilty about my lonely neighbor. What would loving her as myself look like, Lord? Yes, I'm selfish besides, but selfish can get lonely.

3) I truly don't want to live in disobedience (can't stand this alienated feeling!) no matter whether it's due to fear or indecision or plain old selfishness. Show me what to do, not merely to assuage guilt but to love as You love me, because it's what I'm designed for!

And so the day ended. No brilliant insights. No clear-cut strategy for loving my neighbor better. Nothing to show I was heard, but I was. Strike one for my wily foe.

I found myself in Ephesians the following morning, ironically, praying for my kids to realize who they are and whose they are and to learn to walk in a manner worthy of their calling. Ha! I see in retrospect that the prayer time was as much for me as for them! Here clearly drawn out is the antidote to accusations of unworthiness. I paraphrase:

You WERE dead in sin, walking like the rest of the world, following the prince of the power of the air
(who currently works in the disobedient),
living according to your own passions--
your mental and physical desires,
"by nature children of wrath".

BUT GOD MADE YOU ALIVE, seated you in the heavenlies! You've been saved from death and its lifestyle
as a gift from God,
created afresh for good works
that God prepared ahead of time for you to walk in… (Eph.2)

The passage goes on reminding the Ephesians (and me) where they've come from—once enemies, strangers, outsiders to God's covenant—but that they are now RECONCILED, fellow citizens with the saints, members of the household of God, part of the 'holy temple' God is building to dwell in!

There's not a hint of accusation, or of implication that these believers are sub-standard Christians and ought to be ashamed of themselves. They are 'called out' ones, chosen ones, alive, reconciled, belonging to God's own household! Any word to the contrary is nothing more than a delusion from the prince of this world preying on the child who feels unworthy, for whatever reason. So this is where I stand. Selfish? Yes. Unloving at times? That too. But reconciled to God and seated in the heavenlies, very much alive, without cause to hang my head or avoid His gaze. I am no longer a child deserving His wrath. Strike two for my accuser.

Then comes that glorious prayer! (I paraphrase):

 Strengthen their inner beings with power through Your Spirit so that Christ may dwell in their hearts by faith,
so that being rooted and grounded in this incredible love they may comprehend this vast love of Christ's for them and may know it even though it is beyond comprehension.
Why? So they'll be filled up with God Himself. (Eph.3:16ff)

And all this is asked of the God who 'is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us' to His own glory throughout all generations. That includes my generation and beyond! Amen!!

When Paul resumes his letter he addresses the living out of this magnificent calling as God's own child, urging the Ephesians to 'walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which [they've] been called'. It's not a matter for heroics on their part, mind you, but of humility and gentleness and patience, extending love to fellow believers, supplying their part as joints in a Body that is gifted and directed by Christ Himself.

It seems likely to me that the church at Ephesus hadn't yet 'arrived' (any more than I have) at the pinnacle of a 'worthy walk' because Paul goes on to say 'you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds.' He takes pains to explain that for the unbeliever this is a necessary default, but not so the believer! The unbeliever's understanding is 'darkened'. He is actually 'alienated from the life of God!' His ignorance stems from a calloused heart, unwilling to respond to God's grace, given over instead to satisfying his impulses. For a believer to live like this is to live a lie. He may walk in a way unworthy of his calling but he has nevertheless been called, reconciled, brought into God's family. It makes no sense to continue living the old way, brainwashed by deceitful desires (desires that promise what they can't deliver) when there is a new 'birthday suit' to be put on, one that resembles God's beautiful righteousness and holiness (Eph.4:24). There are many particulars of what this new suit will look like (and how to put it on; first, a renewing of the mind) but they can be summed up in: "Therefore be imitators of God, as dearly loved children. And walk in love, as Christ loved us…"(5:1,2)

Here's a glimmer of Strike Three… we are dearly loved. It is natural as children to want to imitate our Dad. And when we fail, when we walk as if we belonged to darkness, when we feel we have been 'alienated from the life of God', it is not so. (If our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart and knows all things--I Jn.3:19) God is in fact jealous for our friendship. He's given us His own Spirit to be with us forever so that we can have this kind of relationship! I read it this morning, in James. "He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us" (James 4:5) He even supplies the grace when we are ready to admit our failure. "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble." And the steps to take: Submit yourselves therefore to God (shortcomings and all). Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. (Aha! Strike Three!) "Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you…" (James 4:6-8)

So whether the accusations coming at us are justified or groundless, the solution is in drawing near to our greatest Ally. He's committed to our welfare and nothing can separate us from such love. Such are the things one learns in aloneness.

"Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God; and whatever we ask we receive from him, because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him. And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ ( We're no longer aliens!) and love one another ( We begin to act like dearly loved children!) Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God, and God in him. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit whom he has given us."
(I Jn.3:21-24)

--LS

"He will give you another Helper, to be with you forever." John 14:16

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love.” John 15:9

Awake, O sleeper,
and arise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you! Eph.5:14

My Last-born Treasure

Well, it's been quite a week…may have started with a sag in hormones, but a bunch of things conspired to exacerbate the situation… Being the time of year that homeschoolers assess what's been accomplished (and what's been missed) in terms of academics, I was in this mode well before Rachel requested to see Micah's old writings. Oh boy. That was like opening a kettle of fish.

You see, Micah, our firstborn, was a prophet in his day. His portfolio, tucked carefully away in my closet, holds candid exposés of life as he experienced and perceived it in the Skelton household. The hurts and injustices, inconsistencies and hypocrisy are skillfully outlined in the form of essays and plays, written too accurately to miss or brush aside. There I am in all my glory (not!) trying to manage a household of jostling students who also happened to be my flesh and blood and bear my imperfections… The age comes when one's offspring are more apt to 'rise up and call you blessed' but this was not that age. The assessment I got was honest. And convicting. God's arrow to arrest us in our steps and help us to begin adding grace to the running of our household. But change takes time…Micah left the nest with his own custom baggage. This is not easy to face as a Mom, who wants only to live to bless her children, to love them well, to prepare them for their futures with good things… But the kettle was opened.

Add to this the feelings of nostalgia and regret that inevitably accompany digging through old school books. I had a phone call from a younger homeschool mom in the midst of this, asking for advice and recommendations and I was having a little dig-about to see what I could share… So many books we've waded through together. So many good memories. And always, so much left undone.

This would all be manageable if it were all history, but the writing of our history is not yet complete. You see, Rachel has yet one more critical year of school to finish, and I am VERY aware of this fact given the time of year we are at…Just a few more weeks of this year and then just o-n-e m-o-r-e y-e-a-r in which to teach her all she needs to know before we wave goodbye and she flies off to Bible school…Talk about pressure. And all these good books, so much potential learning, so much to cover, so much to think about…How are we gonna do it?! Too much to bear.

And then came Monday morning at breakfast over our customary Monday-cream-of-wheat. Rachel hadn't yet joined us. I opened my mouth to put in words the pressure I was feeling and the restless night and tortured waking thoughts, and well, the dam broke…I took my toast and tea and retreated to unload my heart...

'To you, O Lord, I call
my rock, be not deaf to me,
lest, if you be silent to me,
I become like those who go down to the pit.

Hear the voice of my pleas for mercy,
When I cry to you for help,
When I lift up my hands
Toward your most holy sanctuary…' Ps.28:1,2

And this is where Rachel found me when she popped her head in to ask what to do with my cold bowl of cream of wheat! Weird, seeing Mom with a blanket over her head all curled up in a ball…praying… for Rachel, for us, for the years locusts have nibbled on, for mercy, for forgiveness, for strength and wisdom, for HELP!

To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul…let me not be put to shame; Indeed none who wait for you shall be put to shame (Ps.25:1-3)

"Who is the man who fears the LORD? Him will he instruct in the way that he should choose. His soul shall abide in well-being, and his offspring shall inherit the land…" Ps.25:12,13

Praying for Rachel. My fearfully and wonderfully made last-born—this delightful child that undoes any sense of competence that I may have gained with the previous five children…delightfully herself, and so very different than her mother in many ways. She is my dreamer, a visionary that can see teddy bears as potential companions for orphans or old folks if I could just help her get an Organization rolling…She dances along with visions of sugarplums --the potential of all that could be, while I, pre-occupied with the fine print, run into barricades! She composes fiction like it’s the most natural thing in the world while I labor to ferret out facts and put them in order. She doodles in bears of every describable pose and occupation, while I look for models to painstakingly copy. We are different.

She loves to be celebrated; I prefer to be inconspicuous. She thrives on anticipation of 'exciting' things to come; I on the rhythm of the commonplace. And she knows how to SMILE and to HUG and to quiver with delight! "Are you excited Mom?!!" How many times have I tried to explain that excitement throws me off balance. I'm happy in a quiet way. I try not to look too far ahead, on purpose, so that today's business is not sabotaged with the emotional energy of anticipation… Makes no sense to a dreamer. So here we are in my 'old age' trying to figure each other out. Daily companions. Teacher and student. Mother and daughter. Improbable friends for a season of my life that might otherwise be bland and predictable…

And into this difficult day comes an essay by Rachel, inspired by her brother's of yesteryear perhaps… to be read aloud to Mom… You should know that Rachel's been reading Our Town, the play by Thornton Wilder. Do you know it? It's an extraordinary piece studied by generations of high schoolers for its unusually ordinary theme—the preciousness of everyday life. There is no particular plot. It takes place in a little-known small town where generations have lived and married and died without fanfare. And it poignantly reminds the reader how precious is each moment and detail of ordinary life. Sometimes only in the loss of a thing, or of life itself do we realize what we have had…

“Good-by, Good-by, world. Good-by, Grover's Corners... Mama and Papa. Good-by to clocks ticking... and Mama's sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths...and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you're too wonderful for anybody to realize you.”

"Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it -- every, every minute?” ( from Our Town, Thornton Wilder)

So given that backdrop, here's Rachel to read me her daily piece of writing…

"As she walks out with her teddy bear tucked beneath her arm—the last thing in the house she had found hiding in the closet, she pauses at her room, remembering… [a host of words followed that evoked the return of my tears] …She's leaving this place, leaving for college. Her child-ness is gone. She's grown up. She smiles at her teddy bear."

Oh my! I escape to vent my tears only to hear a knock at the door instead and here's that young mom in need of some good books and homeschooling advice! Oh my! What treasure I've been entrusted with. It can't be time to wave the flag of surrender. Still there is a task at hand. Still a treasure to enjoy, and experience to share.

"Wait for the Lord; be strong and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord…(Ps.27:14)

"Indeed, none who wait for you shall be put to shame." (Ps.25:3)

The week began like that. But one and another little thing have lifted my perspective back to waiting in anticipation of how God will see us through. One sweet conversation was part of that. Rachel shared with me her 'take' on how to be happy, no matter what comes… She watches morning by morning as we swallow our 'happy pills' (Vitamin D). She'll have none of it, just laughs that it's a mere placebo effect that makes us think we've braved the gloomy winter months on account of Vitamin D. Not her. At the start of 2011, she says, she decided she was going to be happy, no matter what the weather. And she has done it. Every morning she comes down to breakfast smartly dressed in her new 'business style' skirts and tops, her hair neatly put up in a girlish swirl. She eats, clears dishes and gets right to her school work. You wouldn't know she doesn't enjoy school. She just gets down to it. 'If you always wish for the weekends you'll waste your life just wishing for them,' she says. The same goes for the days that look 'fierce and scary'… you don't have to worry about them till they come. "I believe Grace will come when you most need it, not now just worrying about it." And she compared it to not needing the ticket for the plane a year ahead, only when it's actually time to board…

I wished I had recorded her words, just got the snatches she wrote down later. But there was something she said about smiling (she's always smiling!). She said something to the effect that 'I just go through the day thinking that everyone is smiling at me'! Well if that won't make a person happy! I think there's something to that. Maybe everyone's not smiling, but the One who matters most of all IS smiling when He watches us. That is something to live by! And maybe I'll learn to smile through my days yet with this Treasure under my roof. Bless you Rachel. You are God's gift to me!

There were other things that lifted my spirits…a vigorous tandem ride, getting out to weed the garden, taking time to paint and draw, reading Words of encouragement, the advice and loan of books by a friend, repenting, and putting action to good intention…but I will close with the words of a hymn that filled my thoughts one morning and turned my heart from hesitant 'unworthiness' to joy. It goes like this:

Arise, my soul, arise! Shake off thy guilty fears;
The bleeding Sacrifice In my behalf appears.
Before the throne my Surety stands; My name is written on His hands…

He ever lives above, For me to intercede;
His all redeeming love, His precious blood to plead;
His blood atoned for all our race, And sprinkles now the throne of grace…

[I had been reading Leviticus 10 and thereabouts. What a graphic picture is this laying one's hand on the head of the animal that is to be killed because of your sin, and then having its blood splashed on the altar. So serious, this sin. 'without shedding of blood there is no remission' of it!]

Five bleeding wounds He bears, Received on Calvary;
They pour effectual prayers, They strongly plead for me;
"Forgive him, O forgive," they cry, "Nor let that ransomed sinner die!"

The Father hears Him pray, His dear Anointed One;
He cannot turn away The presence of his Son;
His Spirit answers to the blood, And tells me I am born of God…

My God is reconciled, His pardoning voice I hear;
He owns me for His child, I can no longer fear;
With confidence I know draw nigh, And "Father, Abba, Father" cry…

If you haven't heard Twila Paris' rendition of this on her Sanctuary CD, don't miss it. Jim has posted it here.

May its message haunt you with hope as it has me!

"Blessed be the LORD! For He has heard the voice of my pleas for mercy.
The LORD is my strength and my shield; in him my heart trusts, and I am helped;  My heart exults,  And with my song I give thanks to Him." (Ps.28:6,7)

--LS

Peace and Quiet

The older I get, the more I value it—peace and quiet.  Not just a literal quietness but a calm unruffled-ness, an absence of strife… but what is a mother to do?  The kids may get older, the tensions subtler, (or at least not over blocks and toys), but the concerns of a mother only get larger and the necessity of a peaceful heart more pronounced.  I may have been able to quell the conflict of two toddlers forcibly, and even to enforce a measure of peace and quiet in my household but I cannot enforce it in my own heart!


What is a mother to do?

Is it really a mother’s ‘job’ to worry, as a friend jokingly suggested this week?  Is it really inevitable as long as we are living and breathing that we as mothers should bear the quiet strain of anxiety (legitimized as ‘concern’) for our children’s welfare, or our aging parents, or any number of other relationships under our jurisdiction!  What of the peace that defies understanding?


And guilt, that insidious slithering fellow that insinuates itself into my consciousness and strangles peace and contentment… must I live with it?  Whether it be a vague consciousness that I just haven’t ‘measured up’ as a mom and that the kids are suffering for it, or that I ‘really should be doing more’ in one way or another… it strangles peace and puts a damper on joy.  Can I not be freed of it?  Is there no sure-fire formula?  I asked these things of a friend older than I, whom I know lives with these would-be peace-robbers, anxiety and guilt.  Her answer surprised and disturbed me.  A sigh, a resigned shaking of the head, and a ‘not in this lifetime; that’s what Heaven is for’.

Not to be too hard on her, having caught her off guard perhaps and in a moment of weakness, still, this is not an answer I’m willing to settle for.  I want, if not a ‘formula’, at least a strategy, for recognizing and deflecting those things that rob me of peace.  It’s got to entail more than turning down the sub-woofers and background noise in my environment!  (Though there’s a great analogy there waiting to be milled.)

The Word of God invites me to lay hold on a quality of life unlike any that I can naturally know—eternal and abundant.  It promises the unfathomable peace of God will guard my mind as I turn anxiety into prayer and thanksgiving (Phil 4:6,7). I know this verse. My mind can rattle it off.  But my heart is prone to actually turn prayer into an act of worry, like a dog gnawing on a bone till his gums bleed.  I intend to bring my worries and leave them but in the process of opening the ‘can of worms’ I am overcome with the tangle of them and want only to quickly close the can, putting them out of my mind, and go do something else!  Have you had this experience?

This is where I have found it so valuable to be a part of a bigger Body.  There are a few of us women who get together every weekend that we can to enjoy a hike and pray together.  There is something very encouraging about hearing someone else bring your requests to God that makes believing not seem so impossible after all.  Their faith for your situation is a great uplift.   Another outcome of praying with these women has been to learn by example the art of praising God and thanking him as a precursor to presenting requests.  The focus changes.  My ‘can of worms’ is not so big or so bad in light of a great and awesome God who is over all, through all and in all!  And little by little this stronghold of faithlessness in prayer is being torn down, displaced by praise and worship.

I stumbled upon another great help in overcoming my propensity to anxiety and guilt with the coming of this new year.  The idea kept popping up (in blog-land anyway) of choosing a word to be your word for the year.  It could be anything—like, “Yes”, as a reminder to say yes to God and opportunities He would provide.  Someone else chose, “No”, needing to refine their priorities.  I didn’t pay too much attention, as I wasn’t sure I could ever settle on one magic word anyway.  But then tentatively I began to consider the word: “HIS” as one that would do me good to remember all year.  I’m His (referring to God, of course).  His problem.  His work in progress.  His to take care of.  His beloved.  Just, His.  Now I can’t even find in my chaotic journal scribblings the day when that word began to percolate peace into my soul, but it has been a concrete reminder that I’m not in charge of my life (or anybody else’s lives!).  It is a freeing thing to be the slave of a good master.  You are then His responsibility.  Everything you need is His problem, not your own.  There is great peace in knowing this and keeping it at the forefront of my thoughts.

I am working my way through a practical book designed to promote spiritual growth and especially the putting of Scriptural truth in practice.  Being of a bent toward accumulating knowledge at the expense of acting on it, this has been helpful to me.  Each short reading is accompanied by an ‘experiment’, something to put into daily practice.  Today’s reading talks about becoming ‘a person of joy and peace’:

 “The secret to this peace, as great apprentices of Jesus have long known, is being abandoned to God.  Since God is love and is so great, I live beyond harm in his hands.  There is nothing that can happen to me that will not turn out for my good.  Nothing.  Because of this, ‘Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.’ (Is.26:3)” (Renovation of the Heart in Daily Practice, p.94)

“Peace and joy are based on confidence in God (faith).  In this confidence, I can abandon myself to God, even die to myself.  As I do these things, striving will cease [sounds like peace to me!] and joy will naturally flow.” (Renovation, p.94)  And this hints at one other implication of surrendering my autonomy to God.  My interests must be for HIS will to be done, not necessarily my own.  I can’t assume that what I want for those I love is precisely what He wants.  For instance, am I prepared to forfeit my desires for their happiness, if trial or loss is part of God’s will for their best good.  Hmm…there is great peace in aligning my desires with God’s and freely welcoming His will to be done in the things that concern me.  On this count I am definitely a work in progress—His work!

What then is a mother to do when she longs for peace and quiet in the throbbing ‘woof’ of life?  I think Paul sums it up pretty well here:

“Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.  What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.”


A song I’m listening to today has these lyrics:

“Oh let Your will be done in me
In Your love I will abide
Oh I long for nothing else as long
As You are glorified”
(Altrogge, ‘As Long as You are Glorified’)

There’s peace to be had in such a declaration.  Enjoy the rest of the song here [Click HERE]—a challenge to trust God no matter what the circumstance. He’s always worthy.

Thanks for letting me share my thoughts with you.

--LS
“Grace to you and peace from God our Father.” (Col.1:2)

Renovation of the Heart in Daily Practice: Experiments in Spiritual Transformation is by Dallas Willard & Jan Johnson, NavPress,2006,185pp.