Learning Along The Way

Why is Good Friday Good?

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Four years ago I wrote a post with this title.  You might be interested to look back at it here.

This is still a question that resonates within me; a question that you may wonder about as well. There is so much more to say than what I shared before.

Why is Good Friday Good?  How is the excruciating, violent, prolonged suffering of One man good?  Isn’t it morbid to focus on the blood and gore that Jesus of Nazareth went through?  Isn’t this annual tradition just a little out dated in the era? I am no theologian, or Bible scholar or historian.  I know people who are.  I have listened to them, read their writings and mulled over all the implications on my life, on your life, on all our lives.  I have come to one conclusion.

mattandalliweddingAug2012 138Before Christ got to the Cross there was Love.  Love poured out to His followers in many ways: teaching, compassionate acts, healing, bread and wine, washing filthy feet, and most of all: prayer.

So much love demonstrated to them. For us. To us.

The lyrics from Stuart Townend’s song that I posted four years ago still bring me to tears. How deep the Father’s Love for us, how vast beyond all measure…

Why is Good Friday Good?

Because of Love.

Of willing sacrifice.

Of suffering that I, that you, that we, will never have to endure in eternity future.

We are not without suffering here; the momentary “light affliction” that we go through in this very real 24/7 life we are living presently does have physical, emotional and sometimes spiritual suffering.  But our eternity future has been secured by the extreme suffering Christ endured for us.  We deserve separation from God because we broken, imperfect humans fall short of His holiness and perfection and miss the mark completely. But God…

Because of Love. Because of the willing sacrifice that Jesus Christ offered for our sin payment. Because of all the brutality He endured, His excruciating physical, emotional and spiritual pain.

We are free.

That’s why Good Friday is Good.

No matter how hard it is right this minute to deal with the pain your body is experiencing, Christ knows your pain and loves you in it.

No matter how dark the emotional fog of depression is right this minute, Christ knows your deep emotional pain and loves you in it.

No matter the wayward husband, the wayward child, the addiction, the shame, no matter.

He loves you right in it.

His death on the Cross over 2000 years ago wasn’t just a point in history to be remembered by theologians, Bible scholars and historians.  His death makes all the difference for me. And it can make all the difference for you, too.

It’s still foolishness to those who don’t believe. To those who claim His sacrificial payment by faith in Jesus Christ, there is somber reflection on Good Friday and rejoicing and celebration at the remembrance of His resurrection this Sunday.

The question isn’t why.  The question is Will you let the Love that motivated Good Friday be Good for you too?

Today I am linking up with Faith Barista over here.

 

Step Out

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candle darknessAs you begin this weekend, a time for rest and relaxation, a time to regroup from the week’s stress and obligation, I hope you will set aside the weight and simply be.

Rest.

As you take time to regroup remember God’s at work whether you see Him or not.

He is still on His throne and all you need to do is carry the Light of His Presence in you wherever you go.

Imago Dei

The Image of God that you bear as His child.

Step out with His Light and in His strength!

Learning to Wait

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I’m not sure if anyone has ever asked this question in a poll of popular opinion: “What are your thoughts about having to wait?”, but I’d like to imagine that universally people don’t like it.

We are born learning to wait. Crying for food or clean diapers, as an infant we have to wait. Birthdays, summer vacation, Christmas: frustrate a child who must learn to wait. Babies take 9 months to develop prior to birth. Farmers plant crops and wait for them to spout and grow.

Of course if you live in a heavily populated area you might have this view daily:

traffic in mountain viewLearning to wait is a skill that is imposed in the order of the universe.  Some things are easier to wait for or through; others seem to demand far more skill at the game of waiting.

Young moms can’t wait until a child sleeps through the night; is potty trained; starts Kindergarten so the moms can have time to themselves again.  I heard these words when I was in those early physically demanding years of parenting: “treasure these times. They go by so fast.” I smiled and said thank you while thinking “easy for you to say; you’re not the one getting up at 2:00 AM or changing diapers…”

But now I’m the one saying the same thing to young moms. And since my memory is still mostly intact, I remember what I thought so I imagine they smile at me through similar, barely tolerant, thoughts.

How can we learn to wait well in the season we’re living?

By slowing down. Learning to see. To hear. To appreciate what is.

I mentioned I am reading a great book by Jeff Goins, “The In-Between: Embracing the Tension Between Now and the Next Big Thing.”  I find I am highlighting a lot of quotable statements and phrases of Jeff’s. Good authors are noteworthy. They make you think, reflect and hopefully germinate seeds of growth and change.  One of the many great things is this:

“we were made to wait, to long for things unseen.  This is the place from which dreams and desires come. It’s a place of trust–and we find it not in the resolution, but in the incompletion.”

I ponder and ponder his statement: we were made to wait. I think if we were made to wait it would be easier to do, like breathing. But waiting is a discipline; a learned skill.  Anything we learn we must go through the cycle of learning: practice, make mistakes, adjust, try again, repeat.

Is it possible to be free of the challenge that waiting brings? Do we have to simply muddle through? Is there a source of help to get better at waiting? Yes I think it’s possible.  Have I arrived there yet? No way!

Like so many things in life, waiting well is skill learned through process of trial/practice/error.  The critical piece is what we do with the error.  Grace or guilt? Gain wisdom or grow bitter?

Wait isn’t on the list of spiritual disciplines directly but it’s implied. Learning to wait is part of our spiritual development. Patience is in the list of fruit of the Spirit of God.  Psalm 46:10 says “Be still and know that I am God.”

Learning to wait is God’s idea.  What we do in response to His idea can be our personal measure of our own spiritual maturity; not to judge others but to see where we are still growing.

I am learning to wait well. I don’t wait well yet. Process.  How about you?

 

 

A Great Habit is Hard to Start

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It’s that time of year! Lots of posts about resolutions and reforms. New habits to develop in place of habits that haven’t helped all that much last year. I have started and stopped my share of resolutions believe me! But I am here to tell you it is possible to make lasting changes!  It all happens one choice at a time. One moment at a time.

You’ve heard this before so I’m not going to reiterate the process of change but I do want to share the most incredible great habit I have finally formed and have seen the long term benefits from: daily Bible reading for 365 consecutive days.

I am having the most amazing experience this year. But I need to back up a tad to give you some perspective.  In 2011 I challenged myself to do something I had never accomplished. I had started and stopped countless times, but that time I was going to finish. I had called myself a Christian for 30 years and had never read the Bible all the way through front to back Genesis to Revelation. I know I know what kind of person hops around and cherry picks the books to read out of the whole Book? Apparently I’m not alone. Lots of people start a daily Bible reading plan and stop part way through.  Three years ago I said, I’m doing this and with the help of a great app You Version I was able to read the Bible all the way through. I got jazzed about completing something as daunting as that was since I had started and stopped too many times to count. My enthusiasm carried me into the next year and I did it again! Two years in a row!

Well last year I hemmed and hawed during the first week of January; was I going to simply read the Bible through again? Wouldn’t that be boring to just do the same thing? Then I saw that You Version had a Bible reading plan called Reading God’s Story: the Chronological Bible. I decided I was going read that plan to change it up.

Well since I took the whole week to decide if and then what I was going to do, I am still finishing the chronological Bible. But, this year our former church is reading through the Bible in a year together, so I chose a different plan and started on Jan 1. So here is where the amazing experience comes in.

Right now I am reading the last book of the Bible in my last year’s plan while reading the first book of the Bible in this year’s plan. The beginning and the end. The Alpha and the Omega. Our pastor Tim encourages us to read the Bible looking for Jesus whether we’re in Genesis or Leviticus or Psalms or the minor prophets. Look for Jesus and His influence. He’s there throughout the book.

As I am reading the promise to Abraham I read of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. It’s an amazing trajectory from beginning to end but I have to say, the last book is as exciting now as reading C.S.Lewis’ The Last Battle in Chronicles of Narnia. I guess what I am trying to say is the Book is full of adventure, intrigue, Mystery, suspense and Love. You should read it!

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30 Days of Giving #20: Rhythm

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Gloucester Cathedral doorAs a little girl it took me a long time to spell this word correctly. In the logic side of my brain there are no vowels in the word rhythm. Unless you learned the “and sometimes y” rule of spelling.

It’s a great word really: rhythm; not a new word to our language at all.  If you know your ancient languages, Greek precedes Latin in history and both languages have definitions that English has absorbed.  The Greek language gave us the word rhythm from their word rhythmos which means measured flow or movement; Latin said rhythmus meant “movement in time”.

Think music. As I write this my percussionist hubster is packing his drumstick bag into our suitcase in the next room.  We fly to Florida tomorrow where he is attending his alma mater’s marching band reunion for the first time since he graduated from UF (in the previous century).

He is all about rhythm.  Tapping foot, thumping fingers, trilling tongue; rhythm is always happening.  I think his mother must have the patience of Job because both Colin and his next younger brother are percussionists so drumming and banging went on in their home all the time.  Thankfully for her, they are both gifted musically, so they actually made music not just noise.

The Greek word rhythmos doesn’t stop at music.  Listen to these further definitions: arrangement, order, form, shape.

Think seasons. There is an arrangement, an order to the seasons; spring: full of anticipation of new growth; summer: showing off signs full fruit & flower; fall: arms full of abundance and colors change while temperatures cool; winter: blanketed with gray or white to rest from growing.

We expect seasons.  We need the order of seasons.  We look for and live by the rhythm of the seasons.  How many times have you heard someone comment on the out of sync display of Christmas merchandise in mid-October?  This jars the rhythm that we have come to expect and need.

But the Greeks didn’t stop with music or seasons in their definition of rhythmos: they also used the word to identify “soul disposition”.  Now here is a definition of rhythm that can use some exploring!

What is the disposition of a soul?  How does a soul demonstrate rhythm? How does one practice soul rhythms?

I, by no means, have this thought through all the way or clearly understood or even developed within me, but there are lots of people who have gone before us who’ve pondered and shared what they learned as they practiced soul rhythms.  I have gone through seasons of reading books by authors who lived hundreds of years ago, gleaning what I could from their experiences.

My #1 all time favorite read of this nature is Practicing the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence. In the thin book, a collection of letters compiled by a friend, Brother Lawrence told of his deepening journey of faith through the rhythms of his daily life.

What are your current rhythms of daily life?  Do they bring you through awareness of your need for rest, re-creation, growth, giving out, work, renewal?  Is your soul full or starved? Do you feel abundance or stretched thin over too many responsibilities?

spiritual disciplinesThese two are on my shortlist to read. They each have wisdom to offer to help with my soul rhythm.  I want to get in sync with what God is doing and not miss a beat.

How about you?

Mystery

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Mystery.

Life is not completely any one thing. Life is aspects of variety: tangible 3D stuff paired with intangible, illusive, unexplainable mystery.

Some are uncomfortable with the unknown, the Mystery. They fear that which is unexplainable with their senses, denying existence.

Others are completely bored with the rational, concrete, clearly defined and confined.

I think life is in between.

That’s where I want to live and work. In between. Being respectful of both sides and yet living in the tension between the two extremes. I think that is where I meet with God the best. In between.

I love to walk barefoot on the shore. Not the loose sand beyond the reach of repeated pounding waves but the vulnerable and exposed two times a day shore of low tide. It’s saturated sand is cold packed yet soft; if you stand still you start to settle into it like slow moving quicksand. Along the shore of low tide are the hidden from view finds: sea glass and heart shaped rocks that are my treasures.

Walking in silence, listening to the call of birds, the lapping of waves before the turn of the tide, gives my heart freedom to speak from deep to deep. I see the vast gray blue of the water in early light and see the connection of tangible and intangible. God is vast as the sea is vast.

The metaphors come with each new wave along the shore. The gifts from the sea are His love gifts to me; treasures I seek in time spent alone with Him, walking in His creation, crying, laughing, sighing, reflecting. Alert to His whispers, listening deep, listening long.

The rhythm of the waves lapping as the tide changes gives me a connection; my internal rhythm starts to keep pace with the ebb and flow of the waves. Without looking I know when to step out of the way of an incoming wave threatening to wet my bare feet.
I don’t mind getting wet, but the listening trains my movement, my dance along the shore with Him.

The cool of the sand that never sees enough light to dry is somehow comforting to my steps. I stop to gaze at the collection of tumbled items and my feet start to settle into the sand saturated by ocean left behind; it oozes up between my toes. The rocks and shells mixed together make finding gifts a challenge. Another metaphor emerges: treasures from Him must be sought, sifting through the distractions, softening the gaze to see past the myriad of clutter to find the one piece of sustenance to take away from the shore, the reminder of His love. A piece of glass, the uniquely heart- shaped rock are the tangible treasures that speak of the Mystery that is relationship with the One Who created all things.

What’s one thing that helps you connect with The Mystery?

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Morning View

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This is the view out our front window at 7:00 AM.  The somewhat pixel-y photo was taken with my phone camera.  At the time, I was struck by the quality of the light and the abundance of the jasmine and geraniums in bloom outside.

Then as I looked again, I started to notice the items outside: the ladder, the bicycle flag, the galvanized planter, the arrangement of pots on the sill.  The ladder was really used to paint many walls over many years by my grandfather.  It was in his garage and after he went on to be with the Lord, I asked my Dad for it. He was worried that it was not sturdy enough; “Don’t you want a newer metal ladder?” No, I had a plan.  That was 15 years ago before garden art was trendy. I saw something else: a way to remember and honor my grandfather and create something of beauty. But I digress.

Each of those items outside has a story attached.  After my Mom passed away, my dear friend Melissa took care of our plants and pets for a time while we were away.  I came home to a lovely vignette of potted plants that she had potted and arranged to bless me.  That was 6 years ago.  The view still blesses me.

I am currently reading a book about seeing.  Not how we see like a science book but what we perceive as we see the everyday.  It’s called Windows of the Soul, by Ken Gire.  It was published in 1996.  Not a new book, but new to me.  As is his premise: the circumstances of life are never just about what you see.

Perspective is everything.  But shifting our perspective can be hard.  Sometimes it takes the eyes and perspective of another to help us see what is; to see the same circumstance from a different view.

There have been many who have helped me see differently.  I need that; seeing differently.  Through much adjusting and much practice my morning view takes in far more than what I see in front of me.  But that adjusting and practice has taken time and effort.  A new way of seeing is the result of long term investment.

Are you in need of a new view?  Invest in your growth and personal development.  Time, focus, prayer are all tools that you have access to right now.

The one thing that may be missing: an encouraging voice and another set of eyes.  A voice to cheer you on, to see what is without the perspective that may be holding you back from seeing all that there is about you.

You need a coach.

Sitting with an Empty Chair

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Nearing the end of the first full week of Lent, I am blessed and challenged by this thought:

In the practice of Solitude is God’s invitation to “come sit with Me”.

Solitude does take practice.  It is noisy in the world.  I make it noisy by adding commitments and tasks that take up my time for solitude.  I excuse away the call to “Come away by yourself and rest” because I am busy doing things…for Jesus right?

He doesn’t need me to do anything.  He wants me to be with Him.  Simply be.

Alone with Him. In Solitude. *sigh* The Creator and Sustainer of Life wants me to be with Him.  That is all.  Just be.

I am blessed and challenged.

The challenge comes in the letting go of my routine, my to do list, my false source and sense of value.  The challenge is to accept that time alone with God, just hanging out with Him, is of primary value.

That Solitude is valuable.  That Solitude, time apart from the world, is valuable to God.

Solitude takes practice.  For me, years of practice. (I am a slow learner).  I first came in contact with the idea of spending time alone with God without an agenda, without my never ending prayer request list, 5 years after I began walking with Christ.  In 1986.  This idea of just meeting with Jesus came through the form of a tiny booklet, My Heart Christ’s Home, by Robert Boyd Munger.  It is an allegory using the illustration of your life and heart as Christ’s new home based on the Truth that Christ lives in us when we have accepted Him as Savior and Lord.

If you’ve never read it, I highly recommend it!

This empty chair is symbolic for me.  There is another one, to the right of it, where I sit.  Every morning when I am home, I get up, get my coffee and sit in my chair to have coffee with Jesus.  My google calendar says that “Coffee with Jesus” as a marked off hour at the beginning of each day.  I love my time sitting with an empty chair.  Just hanging out with Jesus is getting easier; not always asking “please fix this broken relationship” or “please change me in this attitude” but simply enjoying the silence and focusing on the reality of His Presence.

Solitude takes practice.  This season of Lent is the perfect time to practice slowing down, making space in your day, your mind, your heart, to be alone with Jesus.

Are you avoiding this?  What is keeping you from sitting?

Hush.  Listen well. The Chair is not Empty.

 

How Noisy is Your Life?

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Today was an opportunity to deepen community and connect with a group of women in a different setting; my home.  This group meets weekly at our church down in the “dungeon” of the church’s basement where the “Student Ministries” meet.  Rather bleak visually.  But the upside of that is there is not a lot to distract me from the women: two rectangle tables and the chairs we need for our group.  Not much on the walls to look at, not much clutter in the room itself.  So the point of our gathering is to discuss what we’ve studied in the past week.

Today’s gathering was a bit more open and social.  It was nice to hear from the women about interests and experiences.  At one point one of them asked a question for each of us: “What do you collect?”

Now this was a great question to learn about each other.  What do we find value in?  What is cute?

So here’s one of mine…

How does this relate to this week of Lent for me?

I have been pondering what keeps me from experiencing solitude.  This morning my little book asked me to consider this question: “What is the greatest source of “noise” in your life?”  I realized between the topic of what do I collect and what is the greatest source of noise (think distraction) the answer came in the prayer in Mornings with Tozer

“Dear Lord, Help me make the transition from wanting more and more “things” to being satisfied–and overjoyed–with only Your presence in my life.”

My stuff is the greatest source of “noise”.  Cleaning, organizing, maintaining, decluttering, yada, yada, yada.

The things of my life distract me from enjoying just being.  Just peacefully being with God.

My life is too noisy.  It’s time to do some purging!

 

“I Want to be Alone”

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I have reflected on solitude before many times. I have written down some of those reflections; you can read a reflective post from last May here.

This week began with the good intention of blogging about my journey through this season of Lent daily.  As I typed the words “good intention” I heard in my head the saying “The road to Hell is paved with good intentions” so I had to stop and research (google it) the origin of the quote.  We can thank Bernard of Clairvaux, the earliest known speaker of the saying that wags a proverbial finger in my direction.  Can you say: easily distracted?  Or “squirrel” in the Disney-speak from “Up”?

This picture is a perfect example.  I looked through my photos for an image that was peaceful.  Or at least reminded me of feeling peaceful. This was taken in Dec. of 2009 at Hume Lake. Seeing the picture reminded me of that Christmas with our sons still at home. Then I had to look at the rest of the photos in that folder.

Yes. I am easily distracted.  I allow my circumstances to distract me from my plan. When I do purpose to be alone my inner life is a battle between ideas and on what to focus my competing thoughts.  It is hard to get still in my body and then still in my head.

When I do finally settle down to quiet my mind and focus on God, another battle starts.  Competing ideas, items for a to do list, calendar obligations all bubble to the front of my thoughts.

Thankfully being still is a discipline, something that is learned.  Not something that comes naturally.

Whew! That’s a relief.  Because stillness is learned that means I am capable of learning how to be still; internally as well as externally.

The challenge is both out and in. But I’ve heard that anything worth having is worth working for (another saying to google–your turn!)

Tonight I am sitting still.

Tomorrow I will start by being still…and focusing on One image.  Like this photo…

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