by Elizabeth | Jun 18, 2013 | Learning Story
I don’t pretend to be a creative writer, but a friend once told me, “the battle for the soul is fought in metaphor.” Here is my clumsy attempt to process two of the last seven days.
In the dimmed lights of the pre-op room, the rising volume of my husband’s snoring, still uncompelling despite the huge heart swell of love one feels in such moments. Jangled.
Flashing through the memories of the past two days…
The sudden jolt of a smoothly moving week abruptly changing direction.
Tuesday night…The rush to the ER with my husband groaning from severe abdominal cramps.
An astonishingly quick diagnosis by CT-scan of “partial small bowel obstruction.”
The surgeon outlining the plan. “This usually resolves on its own, but we’re going to keep you overnight and probably through tomorrow.”
My husband phoning his PA then the OR to cancel Wednesday’s surgery, the first time ever in 21 years he’s done that.
Wednesday. The worst day. The only change from worse to miserable. Pouring the contents of my dear husband’s stomach from the plastic pink basin into the handicapped toilet.
Tension clenching my body, offering my feeble attempts to assuage the misery.
An NG tube starting to look like a good thing.
That evening, the surgeon pronouncing the updated plan. “If he does not miraculously improve overnight, I’m going to take him in tomorrow and have a look around.” (His tightened jaw revealed more concern than the seemingly casual statement.)
Warmth rising from heated concrete as I headed toward my car, the gentle glow of the sun-setting sky.
One of my husband’s partners driving by, pulling over, asking me what’s going on.
Narrating the last 48 hours to the kind-eyed hand surgeon. Thoughts of the terrifying unknown zoomed randomly around in my mind like the beam of a laser pointer handled by a 3-year-old.
I moved on toward my car, settled in the driver’s seat, flung my head back and let the tears rush. My mind went to the scary. A prayer formed. “Bring me back and keep me sane.”
After cycling that process several times, somewhat calmed, I started the car toward home.
A short way down the side road of the complex, I saw them. The tall skinny sunflowers, like a group of lanky yellow-haired schoolgirls, spreading their faces in broad freckled smiles, beckoning me to rest in their friendly glow.
Approaching, I saw their sweet companions, open-armed cornstalks gesturing grace, leafy greens bowing in praise. Round purple flowers and merry fat plants joined in an early summer country dance, thankful and full and flowing.
Then I saw the sign — The Sacred Garden.
What no eye has seen; nor ear heard, nor heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him — I Cor. 2:9
by Elizabeth | May 30, 2013 | Learning Story
“O Lord my God, in you do I take refuge;
save me from all my pursuers and deliver me,
lest like a lion they tear my soul apart,
rending it in pieces, with none to deliver.”
Ps.7:1
“For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are – yet he did not sin.” Heb. 4:15
The sturdy and worn black Bible this morning opened to a woman wired with anxiety, wrought up by responsibilities not hers to carry alone.
First, it spoke the words about Jesus, a high priest who not only knows her weaknesses, but feels deep compassion with her. (How reassuring that good news was to this poor woman!).
And then, it made the woman wonder – was Jesus ever tempted by anxiety? Tempted to take on too much responsibility for the world’s happiness? She thought about the temptation in the wilderness. She thought about his life as God in flesh. Yes, it is possible, she supposed. And then she remembered – the Bible would not proclaim this so confidently if it weren’t true.
Already, the body unwinding, settling into the hope.
Then, the Word unfolded one of its strange Psalms, the ones a little perplexing for us to understand.
The woman reacted…
Yes, I need to take refuge in God. For what do I need to take refuge?
Anxiety. Does anxiety seem like a pursuer that might like a lion tear my soul apart? Yup. That’s exactly how it feels.
The Word asked, “Then, is it possible, given the entirety of my history and message, that you can rest in this hope too?”
Oh, man. “Rending it in pieces, with none to deliver.” Yes, that is how sin operates on the soul. That is how giving into the temptation to believe that it’s all up to me will leave me.
May that woman and all women and any men who feel deep anxiety know that the good news of the gospel is true for all of us today. He knows our hearts. He knows how easily we fall into the trap of thinking we’re all there is. And he knows the wired and weary soul that desperately needs his rest.
Thanks be to God!
by Elizabeth | May 28, 2013 | Learning Story
When we buy into the belief that we can somehow prevent God from working, we end up like Sysiphus, eternally trying to push back the weight of guilt and shame.
“I’m afraid that because I was disobedient, God’s plan was thwarted.”
“I just don’t want to take the wrong job and prevent God from working in my life.”
“If we don’t take action when we have an opportunity, we hinder God’s work.”
“If we allow the Spirit to work in us, God can do great things.”
Having been one of the many Christians weighed down by the false theology that undergirds statements like these, I get pretty riled up when I hear the non-gospel taught. For here we are, freed from bondage to self, yet hunched over like Sisyphus trying to push up that huge hunk of guilt and blame that I’m pretty sure – that’s just an expression – I’m absolutely sure – Jesus already died for.
The gospel of grace exposes the problem with such statements. Though they may appear “Christian,” when defaced, they turn out to be only humanism in disguise. In the scenarios described above, we humans take our place at the center of the world, preventing or hindering, by our own actions, God’s redeeming work in and through us. In this line of thinking, redemption depends on our obedience (not Jesus’), on our doing the right thing (not Jesus’ finished work on the Cross). Whether we make a bad decision after seeking God’s will or rebel outright, according to this pseudo-gospel, we have the power to derail God’s plan.
Think about this. Can our failures or our sin truly prevent God from working His will of redemption? Let’s just take a quick read of some Bible heroes who went pretty miserably astray.
How about Sarai, who, in a fit of lost faith in God’s promise, demanded that her husband Abram sleep with her servant Hagar to produce the awaited heir? Painful consequences, yes. God’s plan of redemption through Abraham and Sarah derailed? No. (Read this great story in Genesis 16).
David: What about that whole Bathsheba and Uriah incident? David had a good soldier killed and married the guy’s wife. Catastrophic fallout for his family, yes. But if you think this disastrous move miscarried God’s plan for Jesus’ birth, well, check out those tedious genealogies sometime. (Read this amazing account in 2 Samuel 11, and to see how David’s heart was redeemed, read Psalm 51).
Or, there’s Peter. He denied Jesus three times. Did his cowardice stall the spread of the gospel? I would argue no. Days after Peter’s denial, in a typical gospel reversal, Jesus offers his impetuous disciple three chances to affirm his love, and each time calls him to “feed his sheep.” Peter did just that, preaching a fiery sermon on the day of Pentecost and courageously continuing to proclaim the gospel until the day he was crucified upside down for doing so.(Read this beautiful story in .
Please don’t hear what I’m not saying. Our sin, our selfishness, our foolishness, can and does harm us and others. It grieves God. But what we must always remember is that God is sovereign, and our power NEVER trumps his. His glory will reign, in our lives and in the cosmos, which he has redeemed and will one day perfect. Take heart, and bow before the One whose redemption plan you cannot foil.
“I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2).
by Elizabeth | May 22, 2013 | Learning Story
In view of Pentecost, I’ve spent much of the week reviewing confusing verses about the Spirit. I found an excellent sermon by John Piper on being filled with the Spirit. You can read the entirety I’ve clipped in the last portion, which deals with the question of “how” we obey this command of Scripture.
“Be filled with the Spirit.” Eph. 5:13
“The most important text in Paul’s writings to show this is Romans 15:13, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.” Notice that it is in or by believing that we are filled with joy and peace. And it is by the Spirit that we abound in hope. When we put those two halves of the verse together, what we see is that through our faith (our believing) the Spirit fills us with his hope and thus with his joy and peace. And, of course since hope is such an essential part of being filled with joy by the Spirit, what we have to believe is that God is, as Paul says, the God of hope. We have to rivet our faith on all that he has done and said to give us hope.
Nobody stays full of the Spirit all the time—no one is always totally joyful and submissive to God and empowered for service. But this should still be our aim, our goal, our great longing. “As a hart pants for the flowing streams, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God” (Psalm 42:1, 2). But in order to slake that thirst, we must fight the fight of faith. We must preach to our souls a sermon of hope:
Why are you downcast, O my soul, and why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God. For I shall again praise him. He is my help and my God. (Psalm 42:5, 11; 43:5)
We must set before our own soul the banquet of promises that God has made to us and feed our faith to the full. Then it may be said of us as it was of Stephen and Barnabas: “They were filled with faith and with the Holy Spirit.””
by Elizabeth | May 15, 2013 | Mission, Parenting
If you see a graduate looking this disoriented, you might want to call a doctor:-)!
With our eldest daughter just graduated from college and our youngest son graduating from high school in two weeks, I want to write some new thoughts about graduation, I really do. But the fact is, I have to figure out how to print return address labels for his invitations, go to the post office to get the “additional postage required” because I didn’t know the invitations we ordered were an “odd-size,” and buy more laundry detergent, because our household is again filled with kids who have laundry (and do it themselves). So, for today, I’m bringing back a post I wrote two years ago, when our youngest daughter graduated from high school. I think these things still pertain. But next time I want to write about the parents’ disorientation:-)!
“Human experience includes those dangerous and difficult times of dislocation and disorientation when the sky does fall and the world does come to an end.” Walter Brueggemann, on the Psalms
I was reading this great Brueggemann quote this morning, and it hit me. My daughter (and every other senior) is disoriented. Please don’t hear what I’m not saying — it’s not like she’s doing crazy things like wrapping the school up with caution tape or lying around the house all day watching old episodes of Make it or Break It. It’s just that she, and every other senior, has arrived at one of those times when a world has come to an end.
I’ve been focusing on how disorienting it is for me to have my third of four graduate from high school, but this morning I decided to turn the tables and think about what the seniors are wondering. Here are five questions of disorientation for graduates**:
1. Who am I now that I’m not…the class clown, the All-A student, the “most-likely-to-be-tardy,” the state wrestling champ…?
2. Will anyone here miss me? Will they remember me?
3. How will they get along without me? Who can fill my shoes in the part I played in this world?
4. Who will be my new friends along the next part of the journey?
5. Will I even make it on the next part of the journey?
** Caution — I don’t highly recommend sitting down with your graduate and saying, “Now, honey, I know you’re really struggling with some hard questions. Let’s talk about them.” (I read all about it on the Living Story blog.) (I write this only because it’s something I might do:).
I’m thinking — Reading the Psalms, which are all about disorientation and re-orientation, prayer, understanding and good conversation may be ways to walk well with a graduate (or anyone in transition). Letting someone know we’re listening to their hearts, remembering how those questions were answered for us or them in the past could be very helpful in these days. What do you think?
by Elizabeth | May 10, 2013 | Learning Story
I have the great privilege of teaching on Galatians 2 this Sunday. It’s a convoluted chapter in some ways, and I admit, I had to read it about 5 times to break down what Paul was saying. (I also needed to read the background of what was going on, because Galatians, after all, is a letter written in response to the Galatians’ movement toward doing things that they thought would make them right, and the author, Paul, is answering certain accusations against him that they already know about.
After studying the passage, I reread part of Martin Luther’s commentary on Galatians, and came again to this. “Passive righteousness” is the heavy-duty term for the reality that Christ in his death and resurrection made us right with God, something we could never do for ourselves. I love the fact that Luther says it is a “mystery” that we cannot ever completely understand it — because I find myself teaching it sometimes and thinking, “but wait, how can this be…does this even make sense?” And I guess the answer is, that in our limited, fallen way of thinking, it really doesn’t. But enough from me, listen to how well Luther talks about our human tendency to want to be right, and the problems that raises:
“2. The need for Christian righteousness
This “passive” righteousness is a mystery that the world cannot understand. Indeed,
Christians never completely understand it themselves, and thus do not take advantage
of it when they are troubled and tempted. So we have to constantly teach it, repeat it,
and work it out in practice. Anyone who does not understand this righteousness or
cherish it in the heart and conscience will continually be buffeted by fears and
depression. Nothing gives peace like this passive righteousness.
For human beings by nature, when they get near either danger or death itself, will of
necessity examine their own worthiness. We defend ourselves before all threats by
recounting our good deeds and moral efforts. But then the remembrance of sins and
flaws inevitably comes to mind, and this tears us apart, and we think, “How many
errors and sins and wrongs I have done! Please God, let me live so I can fix and amend
them.” We become obsessed with our active righteousness and are terrified by its
imperfections. But the real evil is that we trust our own power to be righteous and will
not lift up our eyes to see what Christ has done for us… So the troubled conscience
has no cure for its desperation and feeling of unworthiness unless it takes hold of the
forgiveness of sins by grace, offered free of charge in Jesus Christ, which is this
passive or Christian righteousness… If I tried to fulfill the law myself, I could not trust in
what I had accomplished, neither could it stand up to the judgment of God. So…I rest
only upon the righteousness of Christ… which I do not produce but receive, God the
Father freely giving it to us through Jesus Christ.
