Tent Camping with Jesus

Do not fear.

Oh, I know - those words are a whole lot easier to write than to live.

But God didn't say, "Do not fear when your problems are small." He didn't qualify His instructions; they are the same, no matter the size of the obstacle we're facing. Whether your difficulty is the size of a molehill, a mountain, or an exploding volcano, His directions are the same: Do. Not. Fear.

He didn't say it would be easy. Unfortunately, fear is usually my first response to a scary problem. My stomach tightens, my body shakes... I'm often literally worried sick. But I'm working on that, because I know that fear is a choice. Jesus wouldn't tell us not to do something if we didn't have a say in the matter.

So how do we make the faith choice and keep the terrifying thoughts away? Maybe it helps to remember the choice that He made... to live in our world with us... to "pitch his tent in our neighborhood" (Max Lucado), so to speak. It helps me to picture Jesus just next door... when in reality, He is even closer than that; He lives within our hearts. 

Whatever issue you're dealing with then, He is facing the same... and He's not worried. He knows He can't be beat.

"These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world." 

(John 16:33 NKJV)

The Evil Intent of Envy

I entered the little shop, welcomed by the bells that banged on the door even before the cheery greetings of the people inside reached my ears. It was the first meeting of a new knitting group that was to come together weekly for a couple of hours to knit winter wear for homeless kids. Eager to join in a worthy cause as well as enjoy the company of people with a similar passion, I was excited to begin.

 

The first step was to select a pattern from the pile of samples on the table and then pick a yarn to knit with. And that’s where the trouble began.

 

I don’t make decisions easily. Ask my kids, and they will laugh and say, I don’t make decisions, period. I leave that task to an app on my phone, the Random Number Generator. I list the options to be decided between alphabetically in my mind, and then make the selection based on which numbered item on the list was the app’s choice. My rule is that if I ask the app to make the decision for me, then there is no second guessing the outcome. the decision is final.

 

The rule doesn’t say anything about second wishing, however. I do that all the time. Maybe even every time.

 

You see, I never travel anywhere alone. Everywhere I go, an uninvited guest accompanies me. His name is Envy, and for the most part, he is a silent companion. His eyes are his most distinguishing feature, not for their beauty but rather for their roving. They are never focused on what’s in front of me, but instead on that which is in front of my neighbor, whether it be at a table in a restaurant, in the bag of a friend on a shopping excursion, or in the hands of the knitter beside me. He never speaks until I have committed to a choice. And then he simply points at that which is in front of another, nudges me, and whispers, “Don’t you wish you had picked that?” Smiling, his duty now done, he leaves me alone and now dissatisfied, discontent having eroded my earlier joy.

 

Such was the situation I found myself in yesterday. Amazingly I had been able to pick a pattern from the stack in front of me. I chose a pair of fingerless mitts with an interesting stitch pattern worked into the body of the work. I would need to pick a solid color of yarn so the design would be visible in the knitted garment, and picked a bright shade of teal, one of my favorites. I eagerly bought a new circular needle I’d been advised to try and began casting on the required number of stitches, full of happy expectation.

 

Until the nudge that caused me to look at the two ladies seated next to me… and then I gasped in dismay. They had each chosen a simple ribbed hat pattern and were working with variegated yarns of the most beautiful rainbow colors. I felt the nudge of Envy and heard his whisper in my ear, Why hadn’t I chosen to do that?! Suddenly the joy in my current project vanished, and all I could think of was hurrying up and finishing it so I could work on what they were doing instead.

 

Thankfully I was able to eventually shake it off, and I did enjoy a couple of hours knitting new friendships with my heart rather than what I held in my hands, the form, fashion and color of which I eventually realized mattered not at all. The end result of the day was satisfaction with having spent those hours well, regardless of what project I would eventually finish and dump into the donation bin at the end of our time together.

 

My eyes were suddenly open to the purpose behind Envy’s, which is to distract me from what’s really important in whatever activity I’m engaged in by trying to focus my attention on insignificant details associated with the event. The realization that that what I’m doing with my heart is ever so much more important than what I’m doing with my hands at any given time sandbags my joy against the flood of discontent that Envy hopes to send my way.

 

 "Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have..."

(Hebrews 13:5 NKJV)

Happy Ever-Afters

“So much for my happy ending…”, a recent Facebook post began.

I knew the girl, but not her story, yet I could relate to her disappointment. I’m a huge fan of happy endings in movies, in books…and especially in life. But things don’t always work out that way. Loved ones die despite the best medical science can offer, relationships sometimes end on an unpleasant note, and doors slam shut on even the best-laid plans.

Too often we are then consumed with sorrow and loss over our lot in life. While grief is understandable and even to be expected, lingering depression over any situation is self-destructive and defeating. Yet once pulled into its web, it clings to us and seems to resist our best efforts to shake ourselves free.

Perhaps the problem is with our perspective. When such events occur our natural feeling to think that our lives are over and done, and mentally we close the book on our future and set it down. We give up hope for happiness and fulfillment because that which we longed for failed to come to pass.

Yet if we haven’t experienced a happy ending in a situation, perhaps it’s because we’ve not yet reached its end. As long as there’s breath in our bodies, our stories continue on. Each day brings a turning of the page as a new chapter unfolds before us, filled with characters and plot lines written in Heaven, but not yet experienced on earth. Opportunities for joy await us if we will bravely step into the future that lies ahead.

To a large degree we write our own happy endings. We can’t dictate the hand we are dealt, but we can choose how to play it. Life is simply a progression of choices we make that lead us in one direction or another. We can’t win if we fold. Better yet to turn another card and see what we can make of the next card in the deck.

Unlike a card game, however, life is not a game of chance. Every detail has already been scribed by the hand of a loving Father Who wrote and therefore sees our story in its entirety, while we simply struggle on, page by page. I’ve given up on many a book I’ve been reading because I didn’t understand or appreciate where the author was leading me. Yet there are some writers that I will stick with no matter what because I know from past experience that the story will come together in the end. Even more do I trust the Author of Life as He pens around even the difficult spots in my life to bring events to a happy conclusion, as He promises in His Word to do.

Sometimes we have to fight to bring those happy endings to pass. As if in illustration of this point, I came home from work last night to find that our puppy had shredded the bestseller I was currently reading. While relieved that for once it hadn’t come from the library, I was yet horrified at the thought of not being able to see how the story ended! The cover was torn into a million little bits scattered over the living room floor, the back ripped off, pages torn out. Quickly I gathered up the latter and examined the ruined remains. To my relief, while battered and chewed, the pages were still readable, and while the last page was temporarily missing, I located it in the litter around me and found that with a little tape it could be salvaged.

Some days end with our hopes and dreams similarly lying in scattered disarray about our feet. We have to dig through the wreckage of broken pieces to find what can be salvaged…a place to begin again from, a hope to build on. When we bring that remnant to God and place it at His feet, we find over time that He somehow is able to make all things work together for our good.

As the year draws to a close it’s a good time to consider that the story of our lives could well be doing the same. God wrote our beginning when He created us in our mother’s womb, and He had a plot line in mind before we were even born. But He allows us to chose the ending, a decision that will largely determine how things work out in the middle. He pre-wrote one possibility when He sent His Son to die for our sins, reconcile us to Himself and make Heaven available once more upon accepting Jesus’ sacrifice on our behalf. Rejecting that offer, we can choose to continue to go our own way and accept the consequences that follow. No matter what dark turns our stories may have taken, a positive outcome is always within the realm of possibility.

Recently a young mother came through my check-out lane in the grocery store with her two little girls, the older of which was tickling the younger one seated in the front of the cart. Their delighted laughter filled the air and caught the attention of all of us standing near. I mentioned to the mother how great it would be to bottle up that happiness and offer it to a world so stressed and miserable and in desperate need of the same. And that is exactly what God has done in the gift of His Son.

On and on their laughter went, rolling waves of joy that absolutely arrested us, giving us no choice but to stop all our busyness for a minute and smile. As I did so, I heard His voice whisper in my ear, “That’s what Heaven sounds like.“ A happy ending, indeed.

May we similarly stop for a moment as the year draws to a close and let this thought tickle  our imaginations: The happy ever-afters we so long for could be just one choice away.

“being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
(Philippians 1:6 NIV)

Whispered Warnings

He looked to be about fourteen or fifteen years old, so I was surprised to learn later that he was a legal adult. His maturity level didn’t match his physical age, however, self-control and respect for authority being two characteristics whose absence in his emotional make-up were what spearheaded the events of the day.

The police officer on duty that day felt that this young man had entered the grocery store carrying an item that was inappropriate for a shopping trip, so he politely asked the boy to leave the premises. That simple request unleashed a torrent of anger and verbal abuse as the young man insisted on his right to be there. He stubbornly and vociferously challenged the officer’s authority in asking him to leave.

The store hires the security detail to be an unobtrusive presence in the facility, to deter shoplifting, and to handle any altercations that might arise in the parking lot or on the property. Yet the boy had picked what is surely the busiest spot in the whole store to create his scene – the middle of the wide aisle in front of the checkout lanes. By the time the situation had escalated enough to attract my attention from where I worked at a nearby cash register, the teen had thrown himself down on the floor, crossed his arms and legs in front of him and continued to rage at the injustice he felt was being done to him.

The police officer at that point could have reacted in a variety of ways. With the boy still screaming at him and an interested shopping public watching their every move, he refused to be pulled into a verbal shouting match or an exhibition of force. Instead he simply leaned down over the boy and began to whisper into his ear. The young man had to be quiet to hear what he was saying. For the longest time the officer talked to him, surely encouraging him to rethink his actions and to simply leave the store before his choices led to consequences he’d later regret. With much more consideration than was being afforded him, he gave the youth every opportunity to remove himself from a situation that was rapidly getting out of hand while there was still time to do so. In the end the boy chose not to heed the advice he’d been offered, so the handcuffs came off the officer’s belt and were clamped around his wrists. He was helped off the floor and led to a back room to await the arrival of another cruiser that would transport him to police headquarters downtown.

While the physical action was over in a matter of minutes, the mental image of the police officer leaning over the boy and quietly talking to him stayed with me for days. Instead of shouting in return or using any available means of force to subdue him, the officer simply talked quietly to him and offered the boy a choice.

And isn’t that exactly what God does with us? At one time or another we’ve probably all been in that boy’s shoes spiritually, questioning God’s authority to ask us to behave in a certain way. Sometimes we simply act as we please and then scream at God like an angry and rebellious teenager when our desires are thwarted, He denies a request, or refuses to allow our disobedience to continue. He exhibits the self-control we lack, neither shouting at us in return nor knocking us to our senses. Rather, He simply bends near, whispering His warnings into our ears, hoping His love reaches our hearts and changes our actions.

There’s a biblical progression from “ear” to “hear” to “heart” (Romans 10:17) that sometimes requires more time to achieve than we’re willing to give. Yet God is patient, simply talking to us repeatedly in that still small voice, laying before us our choices and encouraging us to make the right ones while we still have the opportunity to do so. For there will be a time when it will be too late.

Some time later I saw the boy again as he was being escorted to the waiting patrol car. No longer loud and defiant, he walked out of the building with his head down, perhaps regretting the actions he no longer had the power to change, his fiancé weeping behind him as she followed him out of the store.

Perhaps the warning God whispers to us today is simply this: don’t leave this world the same way.

“This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life…” 

(Deuteronomy 30:19 NIV)

Love Letters

I’d finally reached the end of a late-night shift made even longer by the need to do my own grocery shopping at the end of it, and headed out to the far corner of the parking lot where I’d left my car many hours earlier. Wearily I popped open the trunk and loaded the grocery bags into the back of the vehicle, slamming the lid down when I was through. My eyes lifted to the back window of the car and then I literally jumped in surprise! The words “Love you” were written across the glass in white shoe polish! Alone in the dark with nobody but God to see or hear me, I suddenly smiled and even laughed out loud as the midnight sunlight of a friend’s thoughtfulness broke through the gloomy fog surrounding me. Happy once more, I began texting my thanks to her almost before even closing the car door.

It got me to thinking about what messages we spell out with the letters we’ve been given.

Just days earlier my son had purchased a Samsung Galaxy Tab and invited me to play the Words With Friends application, which is the game of Scrabble in tablet form. I was to start the game off and waited expectantly for the seven letters I would be given to work with to pop up on the screen. When they did so my eyebrows rose in surprise, as spelled out perfectly in the middle of the group of tiles was a four-letter word that I wouldn’t let come out of my mouth, much less set down on a game board!

I wish I could say that I didn’t first tally up the points I could’ve accumulated from using it before discarding the notion completely. And suddenly it occurred to me that we do the exactly the same thing in life. Almost unconsciously we weigh our options in delivering our messages. Too often we exaggerate the details slightly to make a better story, lower our standards slightly to raise our standing in someone‘s sight… in short, ignore our convictions somewhat in order to score a little higher in the game of life. There’s a ten-letter word for that, and it’s spelled compromise. God would so much rather that we choose to play well than that we come out on top.

Choices matter in the area of communication because we carry the words we’ve been given around with us. They have the power to bless us or curse us for years after they’ve been delivered. I was grateful that the rain had stopped long enough for me to see message on my car before it got washed away, and I carefully parked it in the garage when I got home to preserve its presence for as long as I could. The next day as I drove around town I would smile all over again each time I looked in the rear-view mirror and saw love beaming back at me from the back window. I’ve tucked similar messages in the pages of my journal to bless me all over again when I look back on them at some later date. But too often we carry the destructive messages that have been communicated to us around with us as well, reliving the hurt of those moments each time we look back in time.

It’s amazing to consider that we can make a difference in this world, one word at a time. So it’s important what words we choose to use. As I was considering my options in the opening word of my game with my son, I realized that I held another letter in my hand that would change the four-letter word I wouldn’t say into a five-letter word that I could play. One letter made the unacceptable suddenly acceptable.

One sacrifice did the same for me spiritually. And now the life that Jesus gave on my behalf influences the choices I make towards others…especially in the area of verbal communication. I have received love; surely now I ought to give love away. Suddenly the message on my car that was originally just a kind thought from a friend became a directive from God.

Yet surely we can go beyond simply being verbally kind to one another. There’s no greater way to spell out a message of blessing than to tell somebody about the love of God that has made hope and help and Heaven available to them once more.

My friend told me later that she almost changed her mind about writing on my car because she thought I might be angry. And sometimes we are hesitant to share what’s in our hearts for that very reason. We fear rejection. Yet we never know who may desperately need to receive a “love you” message from God at any moment in time.

One letter. One Life. One Love.
Pass it on.

“’Woe to me!’ I cried. ‘I am ruined! For I am man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.’ Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. With it he touched my mouth and said, ‘See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.’”
(Isaiah 6:5-6 NIV)