My Own Tilt-A-Whirl

               Every morning I wake up and find myself on the same merry-go-round.  My hands gripping the bars, my feet planted firmly, my eyes closed and my head dizzy from spinning.  Is this my choice?  Have I stepped on willingly – thinking this would desensitize me?  Was I drug onto this platform beyond my will?  Did God pick me up and place me here?  Did I cause all of this somehow?

                I smiled when I heard someone say that answering the questions will not bring the healing that you seek.  Relief.   My God does not rely on my asking the right question, to finally give the right answer, in order to unlock the cure.

                The “answer” to all of the “whys” stands in the center of history.  All of my history, my entire existence, is incarnate in this one place. The cross stands, with the god-man, Jesus Christ, heaving for another gasp of life-giving air, the very air He created.  He spoke my name on that self-sacrificing moment of redemption.  He knew I would be given a gift – and He intended to keep it until that day.  The day I would fall into His embrace.  When it will finally be finished.

                It is not a spinning world that I cannot control that has me in its clutches.  No.  There is a campaign of stealth that has been released upon my very soul.  Did God really say?  An overt operation to entice me into becoming a double agent.  To be caught in my own game – making no impact one way or the other.  To live in a “no man’s land”.  No ground gained.  No lives saved.  No rescues made. Lukewarm.

                But when I awake from this spinning stupor, and I am reminded by the Captain of my soul of the battle that I am in, an emboldening truth begins to course through my veins.  I look down and see my sword,  bloodied from the past days’ fight.  It bears the evidence of what is truly at stake, what really matters.

                “For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?” Mk.8:36   “But the Lord God helps me; therefore I have not been disgraced; therefore I have set my face like flint, and I know that I shall not be put to shame.” Is. 50:7   My rock, the rock of my salvation.  My name forever etched in His hands.  He closes them in a fist – holding me – keeping me from the terror of the night and the arrow that flies by day. 

My sin.  Yes, my sin.  But oh!  This sin is not forever.  It is not my master any longer.  I am reminded of Who has become sin for me.  Sin for me.  Why?  Why, me?  Didn’t you know Lord?  Know that I would run after so many other lovers?  Try so many other drugs to fill my veins, drugs that promised a faster and more lasting serenity?  Why?

                All for love.  Love that wooed me while yet an enemy.  Love that took me by the hand and led me to the same lesson over and over again.  Love that waited while I sold myself for another cheap lie.  Love that ran to me the moment I faced Him again in my shame.  Love, love that will never let me go.  Therefore, I will never be put to shame.  Not for us, but for Your glory, Lord.  

 So, today, I fall back and let go of the merry-go-round.  I am waiting to feel my back hit the hard dusty ground.  But, it never comes.  I fall, but I am caught.  I am lifted up. I see clearly.  The dust filled air, full of lies, is clearing.  My feet are strengthened.  My hand grips the blade ever tighter.  I am compelled by a power not my own.  I run.  I run again, not afraid to fall this time.  He speaks to me in a gentle voice that buoys me up when I need Him.  And oh, how I need Him.  Every hour I need Him.

                 ~Your Fellow Sojourner

I need Thee every hour, most gracious Lord;

No tender voice like Thine can peace afford.

Refrain:

I need Thee, oh, I need Thee;

Every hour I need Thee;

Oh, bless me now, my Savior,

I come to Thee.

I need Thee every hour, stay Thou nearby;

Temptations lose their pow’r when Thou art nigh.

I need Thee every hour, in joy or pain;

Come quickly and abide, or life is vain.

I need Thee every hour; teach me Thy will;

And Thy rich promises in me fulfill.

I need Thee every hour, most Holy One;

Oh, make me Thine indeed, Thou blessed Son.

~Annie S. Hawks

Living With Myself

            I remember the moment I first realized that I was not a freak of nature, but that God had created me the way I was, on purpose.  It was a liberating thing to read about one’s self, identifying with the detailed description of my “makeup”.  It set me on a journey.  A journey to understand more about myself and other people.

            As a new wife and a new teacher, I was reading all I could about learning styles. I came upon a book by Cynthia Tobias about the unique way people learn.  The author was giving people “permission” to be who God had created them to be and to learn more about how “fearfully and wonderfully” God had made them, particularly in their minds. 

            Now, it has been some time since I have read and studied learning styles, personalities, and left versus right brain tendencies, but I have not forgotten the basics.  I am being reminded as of late, just how incredible our Creator God is when it comes to the height of His creation, people. 

So often, we take the information we learn about ourselves and others and assign labels - good and bad.  Labels say, “I have checked this person out and have decided that this is the most significant thing about this person – no need to get to know him for yourself, it has already been done.”  We all do it- giving labels to people.  She is an addict.  He is a bum.  That child is a future felon.  She is snooty. He is a genius.  She is perfect.  Those people are ignorant and simple minded.  The labels have no end.  Man even searches for “cures” to help those who have been labeled by society in a negative way.  Take this pill.  Take this course.  Believe this mantra.   Follow this person.  Remake yourself. 

 God has labels too.  His labeling machine has very different words however.  Lost.  Found.  Sinner.  Redeemed.  Heavenly.  Earthly.  Faithful.  Idolater.  Sick.  Healed.   Empty.  Abundant.   These labels comfort me and discomfort me.

            God has come throughout history to those who have been labeled and gives them a different label- His label.  Scripture tells about the “erasing” that God’s labels do when He replaces the lies of this world with the truth. Just ask Gideon, David, Paul, Mary, Moses, Ruth, or Rahab. “The old is gone, the new has come.”

            I couldn’t find where I fit in to this culture’s accepted lists in many areas of my life.  In fact, it only got worse.  I became more and more “unacceptable”.   But as I find the culture increasingly scratching it’s head at me, I see more and more of the creative genius of my God.

 I smile at how “crazy” my brain works sometimes.  My mind randomly and abstractly processes information.  It is a beautiful dance of color and passion.  I can be having a serious conversation with someone and a song from my childhood will go dancing through my head and I will remember a story surrounding the song and share it in the conversation.  Or, I will be making dinner and a quote from a book will come to my mind that I must find and read it before I can even concentrate on the rest of the meal. It all makes perfect sense to me. 

 Now, do not get me wrong, there is much to be said for self-control and dying to one’s self.  These godly traits will always supersede my interesting brain J  God has given us the ability to make choices that align with His will and His word.  He brings order, clarity, and discipline into our lives.  But, I find that He is teaching me that the way He has made me fits into His grand design for this world and its people.

  He derives much glory from the way that He has knitted me together, even from the time I was in my mother’s womb.  I am His creation, made in His image - these labels I will gladly wear!  He is the potter, I am the clay.  He will mold me according to His will, and it will be amazing. 

So, as I grow older, and hopefully less foolish, I am trying to see people without any labels, except one.  People – a unique creation of God in need of seeing themselves the way God sees them.

                                                                                  ~Your Fellow Sojourner

  Watch the way one young man "sees" himself.

A New Handshake

I learned a new hand shake on Sunday.  No need to speak the other person’s language to show friendship with a hand shake.  Laughter, and trying to learn the new way of saying “hello” crossed all cultural and language barriers.  I could not understand his name and so his cousin finally just gave up and said, Zacchaeus .  I said, “You mean like in the Bible?”   “Yes!”  I had just met the Guatemalan Zachaeus – cool!   It was an example of how God has been bringing a passage of Scripture to life for me.

                 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne.  Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.  And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left.  Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.  For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me,  I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’  Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?  And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?  And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’  And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’ Matthew 25:31-40

                When I heard this read recently, I cried.  Why?  Because I was thankful – overwhelmingly thankful.  Not because someone has treated me with kindness or that I am in need like those in this passage, but because I am privileged to give.  Having eyes that see need and hands that give without thought and feet that travel to those who are “the least” is a gift.  I cried because I have been a recipient of this gift to give.  Just as we cannot come to God on our own, He must call, and just as we cannot do anything on our own but must rely on the One True Vine, we cannot give without seeing like Jesus sees – He gives us sight, His sight.

The more weighty reason for my tears was another realization.  In serving and giving to those who are helpless , I am serving Jesus.  He is leading me and giving me opportunity to serve Him, Him.  The One who gave up all to come and save me – the helpless one.  Giving up, He gave to me.  Now I give back to Him what has already come from Him!  What a joy!       

“ Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.  Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.  Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,  who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,  but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.  And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”(Philippians 2:3-8 ESV)

But where is the glory in all of this?  What is the point in it all?  In all of this giving and serving and dying to self?  The point is that it is worship.  Yes, worship.  I am a worshiper.  Worshipping is in our makeup, our DNA.  We will worship something or someone.  The One who made me to worship has given me a way to worship Him through this gift of giving.

”Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name,  so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,  and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. “(Philippians 2:9-11 ESV)

And so, as I hugged Guatemalan Zachaeus goodbye, I was smiling from ear to ear.  He came to my house – mine!  And I received him joyfully with a new handshake and pistachios.  I had experienced the gift again. 

”And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today.”  So he hurried and came down and received him joyfully.”(Luke 19:5-6 ESV)

                                                                 ~Your Fellow Sojourner