The Ride

Your righteousness reaches to the skies, O God, you who have done great things. Who, O God, is like you? Though you have made me see troubles, many and bitter,
you will restore my life again….Psalm 71:19-20

     “What if I was on a plane with someone, and it was their time to die?” My boss posed this question one day, half-joking, half-serious. “I don’t think it’s fair that, just because it’s his time, everyone on the plane would have to die.”

     That question reminded me of an old commercial. There was a family on a roller coaster, looking totally frazzled, and when the car arrived back in the unloading zone they were desperately trying to scramble out, but the bar wouldn’t come up and the car began to move forward for another ride. The looks on the faces of the frantic family were wild with panic.

      I remember that commercial, not because of the product it was advertising, but because, at the time it was airing, I completely identified with that family. I felt like my family was trapped on a never-ending roller coaster ride due to someone else’s choices and actions. I was full of self-pity and resentment. I did not want to be on that ride. I thought my children and I did not deserve to be on that ride and I wanted to get off!

     You might be wondering what the question about the plane has to do with that commercial. In both scenarios there is the idea of innocent bystanders being caught up in someone else’s chaos and having to suffer the consequences. That concept strikes us all as a gross injustice.

     But, the truth God has taught me is, if you are on the ride, it is your ride. You cannot be taken on someone else’s ride. You may be riding with others, but each one of you belongs there.

     Would you like to see some scripture I found which backs that up? Proverbs 20:24 says, “A person’s steps are directed by the Lord. How then can anyone understand their own way?” Jeremiah 10:23 states, “Lord, I know that people’s lives are not their own; it is not for them to direct their steps.” Proverbs 19:21 says, “Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.” There are many other verses but, bottom line, God made it plain to me that wherever I found myself, no matter how it appeared I had gotten there, He had directed my steps to that place and desired to reveal himself to me there.

     He showed me that the problem with considering myself to be an innocent bystander was that it allowed me to stand by, placing the blame for my circumstances on someone else. It kept me in a place of bitterness and excused me from asking the important question, what is God trying to show me, to teach me?

     As I embrace this truth, I am learning that I was never trapped; that blame is pointless and that I can trust the God who is in control of my ride, and any who journey with me.

The God Box

Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you. --1 Peter 5:7

I am a worrier by nature.  Both of my daughters frequently thank me, with sarcasm, for passing on that trait to them.  I tend to work myself up into a frenzy by imagining the very worst possible scenarios and then try to calm myself by figuring out how I will handle them if they happen.

 Years ago I attended a weekly support group.  Inevitably, when one of the group members shared that he or she was worrying about something, someone in the group would speak up and say, “Put it in your God Box.” I had never heard of a God Box before, but I deduced that this was just a way of telling the person to stop worrying and trust in God.  As time went on, however, I began to realize that the people in the group were speaking of a literal box.  The idea was to get a box, like a shoe box, and create your own personal “God Box”, as plain or as fancy as you desired; then, you were to take a piece of paper and write whatever was bothering you on the paper.  If you had more than one thing troubling you, you were to write each issue as specifically as possible on a separate piece of paper and deposit it in the box.  This represented letting go of your vain efforts to control whatever was worrying you and releasing the problem to the control of the One who actually had the power to do something about your situation.  Then, whenever you found yourself starting to worry about one of the problems you had placed in the box, you were to stop immediately and remind yourself that it was in the God Box and it belonged to Him now and you could not touch it. I agreed with the notion of surrendering troubles to God but I admit I thought the literal box idea was silly and unnecessary.

I decided that I would practice my own mental form of the God Box.  I was certain it would work just as well. I simply pictured myself putting the thing that was troubling me into an imaginary box. If I was fretting over finances, I put it in the imaginary box.  When I was troubled by a relationship, I conjured up the image of dropping that worry into the box in my mind.  I felt smugly superior to those who felt the need to have a literal prop.  And it worked, for maybe the first hour. Then I was back to worrying as obsessively as ever.

Pride kept me resistant for quite awhile. But one day, when I felt the world was falling apart around me, I decided it might be worth a try.  Since I still wasn’t totally on board, I searched for the smallest box I could find and came up with a ring box.  Then I cut tiny strips of paper and in my smallest writing I wrote my worries on them, folded them, dropped them in the tiny box, snapped it shut and hid it in my nightstand. 

An hour or so passed and I found myself thinking about one of my problems. Suddenly, I remembered placing that piece of paper in the ring box – the GOD box – and I firmly reminded myself that the problem was no longer mine, it was his, and I couldn’t touch it.  Then an amazing thing happened. I suddenly felt a tremendous sense of relief! I truly felt that I had given that problem to God in some kind of a binding way; that the issue was his to handle now, not mine.  I was flooded with a peace I hadn’t experienced in quite awhile. God had everything in his capable hands, I could relax.

I can’t say I was perfect after that, and never worried again. There were many times, especially when things weren’t going the way I wanted, that I would struggle, but at those times the God Box served another purpose.  I would open the ring box (yes, I kept that box as a reminder of how arrogant I had been) and pull out some of the older slips of paper and read them.  Time and again I would be reminded of how faithfully God had dealt with each one of those issues and my trust in his love and power would be restored.

At the start of this New Year, if you struggle with worry like I do, I encourage you to create your own God Box.  Let me know how it works for you.

God Provides

“See, I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared.”  --Exodus 23:20

                I had never been particularly interested in angels. As a matter of fact, I was annoyed with people who seemed to have an obsession with them. You know who I mean, the ones who wear all kinds of angel jewelry and have angel figurines and all kinds of angel paraphernalia in every nook and cranny of their homes and cars. It seemed to me that some were getting dangerously close to forgetting about the biblical relationship between angels and God and were verging on angel worship.  But suddenly I found myself with an almost insatiable need to read anything I considered to be a genuine angel story.

            My husband was only weeks away from losing the battle with cancer.  The Veterans hospital, where we both spent most of our time, had free Guidepost magazines in the chapel. Throughout my husband’s illness I had read every inspirational issue I could get my hands on. The stories gave me hope and encouragement. They reassured me that, despite our bleak circumstances, I could count on the fact that there was a God who cared about and was active in what was happening in people’s lives. I wasn’t expecting a last minute cure, but I needed to hear how he had made himself known in amazing and miraculous ways to people in all kinds of situations.

            Many of the stories I found most encouraging were about angel appearances.  Stories where, just when things seemed hopeless, someone would appear and have exactly what was needed. Then, when the rescued person turned around to say thank you, no one was there. Guideposts had just started a sister magazine, Angels on Earth, so I subscribed.  Billy Graham wrote a book called, Angels: God’s secret agents. I bought it. I went to the library and found other books of stories about angels, written from a Christian perspective, and checked them all out. I was intentionally fortifying myself with concrete evidence of God’s personal concern regarding the needs, large and small, of his children.        

            As I read, I began to notice what I felt were common themes in these stories. As I write about it now, it occurs to me that maybe what stood out to me weren’t necessarily “common themes”, but were simply what God wanted me to notice, so they stuck in my mind. Regardless, it seemed to me that frequently these angels were beautiful and were often dressed all in white. Many times they did not speak, but when they looked at someone it was as if they were able to look inside of you.

            Several days before my husband’s death, I walked into his room and he told me about a new woman doctor that had been making rounds with his regular doctors for the last few days. He said he thought she must be an important visiting physician and he had tried to find out who she was, but no one seemed to know who he was talking about. I asked him to tell me what she looked like because I thought maybe I could do a little detective work for him and find out. I was curious as to the reason he was so interested in finding her.  Then he described her to me. She was very beautiful, he said, with dark shoulder length hair. She was dressed all in white, but she wasn’t wearing a white coat like the other doctors, she had a beautiful white suit. She stood at the end of the semi-circle of the entourage and never said a word, but he said he could tell she was very intelligent, by her face. She listened raptly to what the doctors were saying, but when she turned to look at my husband, he said, it was as if she was looking into his very soul. She had the most beautiful smile he had ever seen.

            As the hairs stood up on my arms, I knew with absolute certainty that he was describing an angel.  I did ask the nurses if they knew of anyone matching this description that had been on rounds in the past few days, but of course they did not. My husband had not been reading angel stories. We hadn’t even discussed my sudden interest in angels. He hadn’t recently become aware of the fact that angels frequently matched the description he had just given me, and for some reason I didn’t feel a need to tell him. I just stored up that treasure in my heart.

            The night my husband died, as I was standing beside him, still holding his hand, I had a sudden picture in my mind of this same angel coming to him at the moment of death. I imagined the surprise of recognition and then understanding he must have felt as he realized why she had been there before and was there now. I imagined him walking away with her, unafraid. Even in that heart-wrenching moment, I smiled with wonder at that picture and was grateful to a God who had prepared me and provided exactly what was needed for us both.

           

Work of Art

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. –Ephesians 2:8-10

                I have a problem and I know I am not alone. Many of us, who have grabbed onto the good news of God’s grace, like a drowning man does a life preserver, are secretly afraid that it really is too good to be true and will be ripped away from us, leaving us with no hope. I know I am not the only one who feels this way because others have shared similar fears with me. For years I shuddered when I heard words like “should”, “must”, “need to”, “ought to”, “duty”, “obligation”, “responsibility”, etc., in relation to what God expects of me.  I mentally put my fingers in my ears and yelled, “Lalalalalala, I can’t hear you!” at the top of my lungs, even though I knew those words and concepts were found in the Bible.

                The pull of what I was taught for so many years – that I was saved by my good works, my obedience; and lost because of my bad deeds or lack of obedience – was so strong that I could barely resist it.  It was like a veil being pulled over my mind, causing me to become confused; making me unable to remember what the good news was and why I believed it to be true. At times I felt ashamed of my inability to hold onto my hope; guilty at finding it illusive. I confess there are portions of scripture I have actually shied away from because I am not certain I can read them without succumbing to hopelessness once more.

                On the other hand, I am sure this secret fear is one of the reasons I still experience such tremendous joy with every new scriptural insight that confirms my faith. Each revelation is greeted with the same excitement a child feels on Christmas morning, because every time it is like opening the greatest of all gifts. You might think I am exaggerating, but I assure you, I am not. Every “Aha!” moment, when I catch a new glimpse of grace in a scripture, especially one that has made me nervous, brings tears to my eyes and a wave of gratitude swells up in my heart.

                There is nothing else on this earth that is more relieving to me than the knowledge that I do not have to be good enough to please God; more than that – that it is impossible for me to please God - which is why Jesus had to come and please God for me, with his obedience and his good works, which he credits to my account. Then, taking all of my failures and sinful acts as his own, he paid the price which God required so that I would not have to. Such good news!

                But, here’s the problem: Deep inside I have known that I need to stop fearing the fact that God wants me to be a better person. I need to stop being afraid that this truth will steal my joy, putting grace in the background and placing the focus back on me instead of Christ. Scripture is clear that God’s purpose for all who are saved is to conform us to the image of his Son (Romans 8:29).  Ephesians 2:8-10 makes it clear that we are not saved by our own good works, so no one has room to brag about what they’ve done; but we are saved to do good works, which God planned in advance for us to do. I know that God desires for me to feel the same joy for what he wants to do with me that I feel about what he did for me. But I struggle.

                There are instances where I can grasp the concept and accept it. For example, we would all probably agree that if we had loved ones enslaved by addictions, we would rejoice with all of hearts over their acceptance of what Jesus did for them, but we would also strongly desire to see their lives transformed; to see them set free from their chains; not so they could be good enough to please God, but simply because we know their lives would be so much better. We would long for their lives to be better.

                It is easier to recognize the need for and the benefit of change in others, but when we are talking about my changing, that is when I quake. Not because I like myself the way I am and don’t think I need to change, quite the opposite!  I know me. I know my weaknesses. I know my selfishness, my unkind thoughts, my impatience, my pride. I know how far I am from being conformed to the image of Jesus even after all these years.  I’m not sure how much evidence there is that God’s purpose for me is being fulfilled.  I feel God’s unmet expectations hanging over me and the panic begins to rise!

                I recently discovered an overlooked verse in the book of Romans that has begun to help me in this area. Those of you, who know me, know that Romans and I have a long-standing relationship. It is the Book that confirmed my belief in the good news of God’s grace. I have taught many classes on it and feel that I know the content, but God’s word is always new and full of surprises!

                Romans 8:1 (This is not the overlooked verse!) begins with the word “Therefore”. I had a teacher who used to say that whenever the Apostle Paul uses the word “Therefore” you need to pay attention to what it is there for.  Paul uses that word a lot, and it is a flag that says, “What I am going to say now is because of, or the logical conclusion of, what I just finished saying. 

                The Book of Romans is actually a letter written by Paul, where he carefully and logically lays out the gospel, step by step.  He did not write it with chapters and introductory headings.  In the portion of the letter immediately preceding Romans 8, Paul had been detailing the futile struggle of all who want so much to do what is right – to please God – but fail, time and time again. Many of us are familiar with the final verses of that section, Romans 7:24-25(first part), “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?  Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!”  Such a heartfelt, desperate plea, followed by the glorious answer!

                Most of us think the section ends there. If we’re reading along we generally mumble our way through what is actually the rest of verse 25, in order to get to Romans 8:1, but this overlooked fragment of a verse is what the “Therefore” is there for!  Let me quote the verses the way they were written, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?  Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!  So, then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus….” 

                Did you catch it? Because of the fact that my mind and body are not in sync; because my mind wants to please God but my body just won’t cooperate, Therefore the condemnation has been removed.  Let me say it another way.  Jesus came to set me free from the fear of trying to be good and failing by removing the condemnation factor. And why did he do that?  Because he understands those of us who will quake at the slightest hint of God’s disapproval and will be afraid to even hope for change.  We are free to take two steps forward and three steps back.  God will not be mad at us.  Our inevitable failures do not surprise him and in fact were the reason he rescued us! He already knows we will fall frequently. But he will continue to love us and work in us both to want to and to do his will, with no condemnation.

                Deep inside, we all know God doesn’t want us to remain unchanged, never being “transformed by the renewing of our minds” (Romans 12:2). We do realize our lives will be better, our relationships will benefit and our peace of mind will be greater the more like Christ we become. I believe the realization that God has no unmet expectations for us because Christ has met them all, and that we can simply surrender ourselves to the process resting securely in his love without fear of condemnation, will set us free to become God’s handiwork, his work of art.

Naughty or Nice

"...for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus."--Romans 6:23

          While humming along with Santa Claus Is Coming to Town the other day, I thought about the words and how they reflect many people's view of God - The people on God's Nice List are blessed and will go to heaven, while the ones on the Naughty List are going to hell.  I lived with that internalilzed belief for many years.  I wanted so badly to be good, for goodness sake, but deep inside I expected a lump of coal.
         
          Thankfully, I was finally shown that everyone who has ever lived, with one significant exception, is on the Naughty List and there is no amount of effort any one of us can put forth that is enough to get us off. The standards for the Nice List are just too high. The good news is, Jesus came and lived up to those standards for us and as a result, all the blessings of heaven and earth, reserved for those on that list, belong to anyone who accepts Jesus' gift.

          For me, the news of that gift has never gotten old; they joy and relief it brings me has never dimmed.  The excitement I feel when I think about it has never gone away.  I can't say that about any of the earthly gifts I have received, no matter how expensive or beautiful they were. Most of them are gone and forgotten. The gift of salvation remains ever new.

          The only time that joy has ever been threatened over the years has been when I have heard or read something that made me feel condemned and guilty again.  At those times I would slide, almost without thinking, into a posture of shame and defeat, and large doses of grace-filled scripture reading would be required to bring me back to a state of gratitude once more.

          I've often thought that the biggest battle Christians fight is the battle to continue to believe in God's grace.  One of the reasons for this is that the philosophies of this world which we live with on a daily basis are completely anti-grace!

          Worldly wisdom says, you have to earn what you get.  God says, "Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation. However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness." (Romans 4:4-5)

          The world says, you get what you pay for. God says, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--" (Ephesians 2:8)

           The wisdom of the world says, "God helps those who help themselves." (Benjamin Franklin in Poor Richard's Almanac)  God says, "You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly." (Romans 5:6)

          The world says, give me what I deserve.  God says, "For the wages of sin is death..." (Romans 6:23) If we got what we truly deserve, we are only deserving of death. The verse goes on to say, "...but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."

          This Christmas season, my prayer for you is that no one can steal your joy as you remember that "Every good and perfect gift comes from above" (James 1:17); not from Santa who knows if you've been bad or good, but from the God who "...so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." (John 3:16)

My Way or the Highway

Let us therefore make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification. –Romans 14:19

               

                Expectations are set ups for disappointment any time of the year, but the time period beginning with Thanksgiving and ending with Christmas is a mine field of feelings waiting to be stepped on.  No other days in the calendar year are so fraught with family tradition and nostalgia. Each of us has a desire to recreate what was or to create what we always wanted and never had. Certain foods, certain days to do certain things at specific times with specific people – these things suddenly are of paramount importance. Normally complacent people become adamantly insistent on having their way.  Compromise is seen as defeat. Relationships are strained, friendships are threatened.  People entrench themselves in their positions and refuse to budge. What should be a joyous time of year becomes a battle zone.

            Why can’t we all just get along? It’s a valid question. It is so perverse to demand our own way at the expense of everyone’s happiness, including our own, yet we do it. Why? Sure, we have experiences which were meaningful to us that we wish to pass down.  We want to share the things that gave us pleasure with our loved ones. We have only noble goals.  But those goals are ruined at the root by selfishness.  This selfishness says the other person is the unreasonable one. This selfishness says that person is ruining my holiday. This selfishness says, “Why do I always have to give in?” This selfishness draws the line in the sand and says,” I will not be moved even if everyone is miserable as a result.”

            So, what is the answer?  Do you just give in and become the righteous martyr? Well, not exactly.  First of all, you recognize that you are not righteous, by any stretch of the imagination. Then, you remember who is, and you run to him and tell him what is going on and how you are feeling about it (because he loves you and is not going to stand there with his arms crossed and foot tapping with a disapproving look on his face!) Then, after you have poured it all out, you ask him to show you what to do and how to do it, graciously and with a loving heart. And he will.

            Have a grace-filled Christmas season!  

                                   

Life is Meant to be Frustrating

I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world. –John 16:33 

                I found something in scripture this week that rocked my world enough that I think I will experience aftershocks from it for a long time. It is in the book of Romans, which is my personal favorite; a book I have taught many times and am teaching now in my Senior High Sunday School Class. I was not expecting to find anything new. I was calmly preparing my lesson on the second half of Romans 8, when I saw it.  It’s in a verse I’ve read so many times; but suddenly my eyes were opened to an entirely new depth of meaning.

            The verse is Romans 8:20 and the hard-hitting truth is found in the first seven words:  “For the creation was subjected to frustration….” I quoted it in my blog, Life Hurts, but apparently I wasn’t paying attention even then.  I have this wonderful Bible that has both Old and New Testament Lexical Aids, which simply means you can look up the Hebrew or Greek words in a verse to see what the words meant in their original language. In this instance, I looked up the word translated as “frustration” – Mataiotes in the Greek. It means “Vanity, futility, meaninglessness, worthlessness. Not the absence of purpose, but the absence of true purpose and meaning.” Verse 20 goes on to say that the creation was subjected to this state by God.  

            Immediately those words brought the book of Ecclesiastes to mind. That book basically begins with the words, “Meaningless! Meaningless...Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” (Eccl.1:2) and then repeats it over and over throughout the remainder of the book. So I looked up the word translated “Meaningless” – Hebell in the Hebrew. And, lo and behold, it means “Vanity, futility, meaninglessness, worthlessness, emptiness.” The same word in the Hebrew!

            Stay with me here, I’m getting to the point. Solomon, who wrote the book of Ecclesiastes (as well as most of Proverbs and the Song of Songs), was given a very special gift by God. In 1 Kings 3, God told Solomon to ask for whatever he wanted, and Solomon asked for a discerning heart. God was pleased with the request and said he would give Solomon “a wise and discerning heart, so that there will never have been anyone like you, nor will there ever be.” (1 Kings 3:12) Then, in 1 Kings 4 it says, “Solomon’s wisdom was greater than the wisdom of all the men of the East, and greater than all the wisdom of Egypt.  He was wiser than any other man…. “ (! Kings 4:30-31)

            While no one seems to have a problem with Proverbs and Song of Songs (except for the racy content), many Christians seem to be uncomfortable with the Book of Ecclesiastes. You’ll have to read it and draw your own conclusions, but I look at this book as Solomon’s Extraordinary Social Experiment. Using the unparalleled wisdom which God gave him, he set about trying out all of the things the world had to offer, and then reported on it.  He dove into all the typical pleasures the world holds dear – He had great wealth and power, he amassed property, built grand houses, planted vineyards, gardens, parks;  He had more than 1000 wives and concubines, he had people to wait on him, hand and foot.  He says, “I denied myself nothing my eyes desired.”  (Eccl. 2:10) He always makes a point of repeating that, during all of this experiment, his wisdom stayed with him, and, in the end, he reported, “Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless….” (Eccl. 2:11) He had the same thing to say about all the oppression, the labor, all the chasing after power and advancement, the quest for knowledge, all riches, all folly and, finally, even wisdom itself (although it was better than folly).

            The conclusion of the experiment was that everything this world has to offer, which seems so dazzling and desirable; which seems so necessary for happiness, is chased after in vain, because, in the end, it never delivers what it appeared to promise and ultimately leaves you empty and unsatisfied. Everything is worthless and without true purpose or meaning. And, why is that? Because God subjected all of the things of this world to that futility, so that when we experience the frustration and dissatisfactions of this world, we will turn to him.

            I have known so many people over the years who have lived as though they believed God was trying to keep them from enjoying the good things in life. As a matter of fact, wasn’t that the original lie Satan told Eve? God was not only trying to keep her from enjoying the luscious fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but he was also trying to hold her back from ultimate fulfillment by keeping her from reaching the level of a god herself. We humans still hold that lie close to our hearts. Many believe they can “have the best of both worlds” not understanding that the only true fulfillment, the only true purpose or meaning that can be found in all of creation, is found in God alone. 

            I can already feel this perspective, that God has intentionally subjected the things of this world to meaninglessness, changing the way I look at my life.  Why would I want to waste my time and resources on what I know God has purposely rendered futile and worthless?  Lord, show me how to stop chasing the wind.