An Injustice

He was despised and rejected--
a man of sorrows, acquainted with the deepest grief.
We turned our backs on Him and looked the other way.
He was despised, and we did not care.

Yet it was our weaknesses He carried;
It was our sorrows that weighed Him down.
And we thought His troubles were a punishment from God,
a punishment for His own sins!
But He was pierced for our rebellion,
crushed for our sins.
He was beaten so we could be whole.
He was whipped so we could be healed.
All of us, like sheep, have strayed away.
We have left God's paths to follow our own.
Yet the Lord laid on Him the sins of us all.
He was oppressed and treated harshly, yet He never said a word.
He was led like a lamb to the slaughter.
And as a sheep is silent before the shearers, He did not open His mouth.
Unjustly condemned, He was led away.
No one cared that He died without descendants,
that His life was cut short in midstream.
But He was struck down for the rebellion of my people. 
He had done no wrong and had never deceived anyone.
But He was buried like a criminal;
He was put in a  rich man's grave.

But it was the Lord's good plan to crush Him
and cause Him grief.
Yet when His life is made an offering for sin,
He will have many descendants.
He will enjoy a long life,
and the Lord's good plan will prosper in His hands.
When He sees all that is accomplished by His anguish,
He will be satisfied.
And because of His experience,
My righteous servant will make it possible
for many to be counted righteous,
for He will bear all their sins.
I will give Him the honors of a victorious soldier,
because He exposed Himself to death.
He was counted among the rebels.
He bore the sins of many and interceded for rebels.

And every time I read it, I am stunned all over again.
We looked the other way from Him,
turning our backs on His suffering--
but He was counted among us to intercede for us.
He is acquainted with the deepest sorrows... but they are our sorrows.
Our sin, our rebellion, our sickness,
our straying, our sorrow, our path.
His piercing, His crushing, His beating,
His whipping, His oppression, His slaughter,
His silence, His criminal burial.
The Lord's good plan.
Our righteousness: His work.
He is satisfied with the results of His anguish,
when He sees the accomplishment of it.
Our Hero -- better than a soldier.
His intercession saves us.

While I looked the other way, He did it.
While I turned my back, He interceded.
While I rebelled, He suffered.
While I strayed, He was crushed.
And doesn't it humble me?
And doesn't it exalt Him?
Shall He not have His reward?

Phenomenally Bright: Can Barely Write Three Words

Through the encouragement of a friend
who is a speech language pathologist,
we decided to have our son tested for a learning disability.
We are nearly done with the process.

The test results have been surprising in several ways.
His strengths are 'phenomenal', according to the psychologist.
In fact, in the reading vocabulary results from one test,
they put him down as being age equivalent to a 48 year old.
He had a greater than 99.9% score.
I wonder if that is a typo.
He is ten.
He has the writing abilities of a six year old.
In academic knowledge, they say he is twenty, and a college freshman.
But he processes slowly.

It has been nerve-wracking for me as a homeschooling mom
to allow them to measure his education.
I don't have a school I can blame for academic failure.
On the psychoeducational report, and the special services report,
under relevant background information,
it is noted that he is home schooled and always has been.
There is a federal checklist they have to go down
to determine if he is eligible for services.
Does the child have a demonstrated need? Yes.
Is the low output due to low intelligence? No.
Is the low output due to inadequate instruction?
I felt like I was holding my breath as they went over this question with me.
Has it been enough?
Am I failing him miserably?
I didn't realize I was going to have to sit there
with a school administrator, a psychologist,
and a special education provider
and hear the answer to this question.
They told me they saw no evidence that he had been inadequately instructed.
That he had a very broad knowledge base.
Their educations between them probably add up to more than my age.
And they said the need was not due to lack of instruction.

The psychologist told me, "He has the mind of an engineer".
I knew that.
He draws intricate drawings with gears and levers and closeups of the details.
He can look at an object, spin it mentally, and draw it from multiple angles.
When he was two and a half,
he drew his first recognizable drawing: a many-windowed Jeep.
My other children scribbled.
As a still very small child,
he was drawing three dimensional vehicles in 3/4 view.
But he still writes letters and numbers backward.
I taught him to crochet a chain when he was seven.
He woke up early and crocheted a mitten.
With a thumb.
No pattern.
No skill beyond that simple chain had been taught to him.
Was it beautiful? No.
But it was functional.

He told them that he usually thinks of things in colors.
His mind makes different connections than the average person.
I feel my job as his mom
is to make sure he has the basic skills he needs
to allow his gifts to operate.

Why the 'areas of weakness', as the psychologist refers to them?
Because he pulled himself to standing at six months old
and started cruising the furniture within the week
and slipped and twirled in slow motion
just out of reach and too fast to catch
and hit the side of his head on the corner of the coffee table
and screamed like we had never heard him scream 
and while I held him and rocked and didn't know what to do 
his dad said, "What's wrong with his head?"
and I yelled, "There's nothing wrong with his head! 
What do you mean 'what's wrong with his head?'!"
and I looked at his head, and his skull was dented in
and we called my mom to ask for prayer
and grabbed the diaper bag and ran to the car 
to make the half hour drive to the emergency room
while he cried beside me in the backseat
and I cried too
and I prayed
and fifteen minutes in he stopped crying
and the amateur doctor questioned us closely
wanting to know when he really hit his head
because the CT scan showed 'an old injury'
and he said it would be swollen if it was new
and it wasn't swollen
but it was red
and they said he was fine 
and we knew the Lord had given him to us
but the dent took over four years to grow out?

Or is it because 
every time he had immunizations he spiked a fever of over 105 
and got double ear infections 
and that one time had a seizure but I didn't know it was a seizure
and thought he was being a freak 
and if I had known I would have brought him to the hospital
and reported an adverse event
and probably chewed out his doctor
but I hadn't done any research at that point and didn't know any better
and why didn't I look into it more before he was injected?

Or maybe when he tripped and fell in the fire ring 
and hit his head on the rock 
and I dragged him up the stairs to the bathroom 
to wash the blood away
and his knees buckled and I caught him
and he was so dazed he couldn't answer straight questions
and I watched him with worry to see if he was brain damaged
he was really brain damaged?
But that doesn't even make any sense 
because he already had trouble writing years before that
and I think I was a slow processor and probably still am
and it's more likely it was the vaccines.
And the dented head.
And I was vaccinated, too.
So maybe the slow processing is both genetic and environmental.
Both my fault and not my fault.

But what if he was brilliant in every single area
and I couldn't teach him anything,
and he was an insufferable ass
to everyone he met his entire life?
Weaknesses can be mercies.
Paul said, "that I should not be exalted overmuch,
there was given to me a thorn in the flesh,
a messenger of Satan to buffet me,
that I should not be exalted overmuch."
God's strength is made perfect in weakness.
His grace is sufficient for us.
His power is made perfect in weakness.
It was when Jesus needed water that He impacted the Samaritans.
In getting help He gave it.
In asking He offered Himself.

We're in a new community,
and we've met several people through this we would not have met,
and I have been praying
and wondering how to be a part of the community.
Maybe this is our introduction.

One Measly Tomato

A few days ago, I uprooted two tomato plants.
They had no fruit.
Not one tomato.
I was tired of cultivating them.
Two others were saved by one measly tomato each.
But one measly tomato holds the future of tomatoes.
Fruit.
The promise of more fruit.
The hope of bigger crops.
One piece of fruit holds the hope of hundreds of future plants.
Thousands.
Millions.
Because fruit is the means of reproduction for a plant.
It's a formula for life and repetition.
It's a spark of fire that could keep the species warm.
As I yanked those worthless plants out, I prayed,
"Lord, help me to have fruit."
Even a little bit makes the time and effort spent worth something.

Defined By Five

"He repented," I said, explaining a change of heart and mind. "Do you know what 'repented' means, Silas?"
"Yes," he said. "It means you threw your sins away."
Well... yeah. 
It does.
It's when you throw that garbage out, isn't it?

The Borrowed Line

"So I think this paper, which the Old Man of the Moon said he borrowed," the king said, "this written line torn from the Book of Fortune is 'the borrowed line' you seek."

"Of course," Minli said, and excitement bubbled inside of her, "it must be!" But her excitement popped as she looked at the carefully preserved page and remembered how the king had had it on his person, carefully and preciously kept in the pouch around his neck. It seemed impossible that he would give her such a cherished treasure.

"It was only after much study that my great-great-grandfather was able to decipher the words," the king said. "And that is when he realized that the words changed according to the situation at the time. From then on, whenever a King of the City of Bright Moonlight has had a problem, he consults the paper."

"And it tells you what to do?" Minli asked.

"Yes." ...And with that, the king looked down at the line. As he read, a startled expression came across his face.

"What does it say?" Minli asked.

"It says," the king said slowly, "'You only lose what you cling to.'"

The king's words seemed to hang in the air. All was silent except for the soft rustling of the page in the gentle breeze. Minli, unable to speak, watched it flutter as if it were waving at her.

"So it seems your request," the king said, "deserves consideration. The line tells me as much. Let me think."

Minli looked at the king, quiet but puzzled.

"For generations, my family has prized this paper; we have honored it... It has been passed on and studied and cherished and revered. It has been valued above gold or jade... we guard and protect this written line so dearly that the rulers of the City of Bright Moonlight carry it at all times, not daring to let it out of their possession... We have clung to it, always afraid of losing it," the king said. "But if I choose to release it, there is no loss... And perhaps it was never meant for us to cling to..."

"You only lose what you cling to," the king repeated to himself. He glanced again at the paper and then looked at Minli. A serene expression settled on his face and then he quietly smiled and said, "So, by choosing to give you the line, I do not lose it."

~from Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, by Grace Lin

Reading aloud to my children,
I was reminded again of a truth I need reminding of.
"Whoever desires to save his life will lose it, 
but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. 
For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, 
and loses his own soul?"

There was something else He said, too, that came to mind.
"Provide yourselves money bags which do not grow old,
a treasure in the heavens that does not fail,
where no thief approaches nor moth destroys.
For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."

The other day I was reading
about a terrible judgment the Lord passed on Israel.
It was frightening.
He described such utter devastation, and He told them why.
"...Your hands are covered with the blood of innocent victims.
Wash yourselves and be clean!
Get your sins out of My sight.
Give up your evil ways.
Learn to do good.
Seek justice.
Help the oppressed. 
Defend the cause of orphans.
Fight for the rights of widows.
'Come now, let's settle this,' says the Lord.
'Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white as snow.
Though they are red like crimson, I will make them as white as wool.
If you will only obey Me, you will have plenty to eat..."

I read an article yesterday with this headline:
Banks Were The Worst Place To Keep Your Savings This Year.
The conclusion of the article was this:
"Going forward, in a twisted world of inflation,
massive government deficits
and interest rate manipulation by the Federal Reserve,
it may be extremely challenging for any asset class
to provide a positive real rate of return
to either investors or bank depositors."
What an opportunity.

I see advice everywhere on how to survive by clinging.
By stockpiling.
By building a bigger barn.
But that advice will end in ruin.
In devastation.
And the Lord has said before that if we will obey Him in this,
we will eat.

Faster

Derailed.

 

Then those men, when they had seen the miracle that Jesus performed, 
said, 'This is truly that prophet that should come into the world.'
When Jesus therefore perceived 
that they would come and take Him by force, to make Him a king, 
He departed again to a mountain Himself alone.
John 6:14,15

Many years ago, a teacher of mine said something
that I have thought about many times over the years.
He said, "If the devil can't get in front of you and slow you down,
he will get behind you and push you faster."
And haven't you seen that?

Because I am a Woman

I am not supposed to love the smell
of orange cleaner on my floors
if I mopped them myself.
It is beneath me,
because I am a woman,
and domesticity enslaves me.
If my husband mops the floors,
or a legal alien in an apron mops my floors,
and I pay her/it/him for it,
I am allowed to enjoy it.

If I plan a meal and buy the food,
and prepare it,
and set it on the table
the ideal thing to do,
if I am a real woman,
is to resent the effort spent.
Because I am a woman,
and feeding people is beneath me.

I am not supposed to like sitting down to nurse a baby,
because the breasts that baby needs
and the womb it came out of
are the symbols of my servitude,
of my lesser pay.
Because I am a woman,
and nursing a baby is beneath me.
Paying someone to give it a bottle empowers me.
If the baby needs me,
it makes me smaller
than if no one needs me,
because I do a job that any man could do.

I was not supposed to like it
when a man wanted to make a home for me,
and asked me if he could keep me forever,
and buy me dresses,
and would I raise his children for him?
He wouldn't have asked if I was a man,
and that should anger me.
I should only like it if he offers to use me and throw me away,
because I am a woman,
and marriage fetters me.

I am not supposed to walk around barefoot,
because bare feet show my poverty.
I am supposed to wear high-heeled shoes,
so he can't sit down and take my feet in his hands
and rub the soreness out of them,
because I am a woman,
and my happiness is dependent on shoes and a power suit
and money.

I ought to feel guilty
when a butterfly in my stomach takes flight
as I pin clothes on a line
and a breeze blows on them.
Bad woman.

I should be embarrassed that I planned to cook for them,
instead of getting a job
and using my paycheck to buy them some frozen chemicals.
Or telling them to get a job and buy their own chemicals.
It's medieval for me to do it.

Every Shaking Knee

How great is the goodness 
You have stored up for those who fear You.
You lavish it on those who come to You for protection,
blessing them before the watching world.
You hide them in the shelter of Your presence, 
safe from those who conspire against them. 
You shelter them in Your presence, 
far from accusing tongues. 
Praise the LORD, 
for He has shown me the wonders of His unfailing love. 
He kept me safe when my city was under attack.  
In panic I cried out, "I am cut off from the LORD!" 
But You heard my cry for mercy 
and answered my call for help. 
Love the LORD, all you godly ones! 
For the LORD protects those who are loyal to Him, 
but He harshly punishes the arrogant. 
So be strong and courageous, 
all you who put your hope in the LORD!  
~Psalm 31:19-24

I love the Psalms. 
They seem written for every kind of panic.
Every kind of fear the righteous face.
Every shaking knee and constricted breath.
And this is the one my eyes fell on this morning.

For Fresh Water

Earlier this year my husband bought me a rainbarrel.
Rainbarrels rely on rain.
There hasn't been as much rain this summer as we normally get,
and much of the time my rainbarrel has been empty.
But what is beginning to dawn on me,
as we have now had the third rain that ought to have filled it,
and I have gone out hoping for water,
only to have less than I should have had,
is that my rainbarrel has a leak.
At first, there was the incredible heat, and I thought it all evaporated.
Then there was an inch of rain in 20 minutes,
and I thought, surely that barrel is full now.
But strangely, it wasn't.
At least, it wasn't for long.
But this last weekend, there was a long soaking rain,
a beautiful misty green rain, and I smiled to myself about my rainbarrel.
I had noticed two wet lines leading to the drain in my driveway
for the last two days, but mentally looked over it.
They were still there this morning.
I put my watering can under the spout to fill it,
and noticed the water pressure was not acting like it was a full barrel.
Weird. Must have debris in the spout.
But when I went for the fourth can, and had to tip it, I knew for certain:
it's leaking.
It can't hold water like it should.

O, for a spring.
For a source of water independent of my efforts.
For fresh water, that doesn't smell rank when I use it.
For water that really can wash, and nourish.
For living water.
I went inside this morning and looked up this passage in Jeremiah 2:
"My people have committed two sins: 
they have turned away from Me, the spring of fresh water, 
and they have dug cisterns, cracked cisterns that can hold no water at all."
What a stupid thing to do.

If my property had a spring, I might engineer an irrigation system.
But what kind of fool would abandon spring water for a stagnant cistern?
And especially for an empty one?
When I was a little girl, I visited people who had an empty swimming pool.
There was a dark, murky bit of green algae water in the deep end.
It was so horrible looking to me, that I still have bad dreams about it.
Unnatural.
Some of the cisterns we saw in Israel reminded me of that swimming pool.

No sane person would ever ask me for a drink
if I was sitting next to my rainbarrel with a cup.
In fact, many people post warnings on them
to keep others from trying to drink it.
Stagnant water is poison.
That's why places in the world without fresh water sources
have so much misery.
We wash our hands after handling the water.

A woman of Samaria came to draw water. 
Jesus said to her, Give me to drink. 
(For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) 
Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, 
How do you, being a Jew, ask a drink of me, who am a woman of Samaria? 
For the Jews do not associate with Samaritans. 
Jesus answered and said to her, If you knew the gift of God, 
and who it is that says to you, Give Me to drink, 
you would have asked of Him, and He would have given you living water.
...Jesus answered and said to her, 
Whoever drinks of this water shall thirst again, 
but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst, 
but the water that I shall give him shall be in him 
a well of water springing up into everlasting life.
~ John 4:7-14

If the water you're drinking stinks, and evaporates, and runs out,
it may be water -- but it isn't living water.
Perhaps it's time to return to the Source,
and abandon that broken cistern.

In The Midst and During

I was reading last night from Psalm 138:

In the day when I cried out, You answered me,
and made me bold with strength in my soul...
Though the Lord is on high, yet He regards the lowly;
but the proud He knows from afar.
Though I walk in the midst of trouble, 
You will revive me;
You will stretch out Your hand
against the wrath of my enemies,
and Your right hand will save me.
The Lord will perfect that which concerns me;
Your mercy, O Lord, endures forever;
do not forsake the works of Your hands.

And then this morning, I was reading from 2 Chronicles 15.
These are the words of Azariah;
it says the Spirit of God came upon him,
and he gave this message to King Asa:

"The Lord will stay with you, as long as you stay with Him.
Whenever you seek Him, you will find Him.
But if you abandon Him, He will abandon you.
For a long time, Israel was without the true God,
without a priest to teach them,
and without the Law to instruct them.
But whenever they were in trouble 
and turned to the Lord, the God of Israel,
and sought Him out, they found Him.
During those dark times, it was not safe to travel.
Problems troubled the people of every land.
Nation fought against nation, and city against city,
for God was troubling them with every kind of problem.
But as for you, be strong and courageous,
for your work will be rewarded." 

Though I walk in the midst of trouble...
I don't want to walk in the midst of trouble.
I don't want to live in dark times, unsafe times, wrathful times.
Don't we all just want to live quiet and peaceful lives?
But though we walk in the midst of trouble,
He will revive us.
He will stretch out His hand against the wrath of our enemies and save us.

Revive. Do you know what it means?
To live again. To return to life.
Let's set our faces toward His salvation:
to live again, to see His justice though we walk in the midst of trouble.
Jesus is the salvation of His right hand.
Jesus is the resurrection and the life.
He is our future and our hope, though trouble is our present.
Though the wrath of the enemy is our present lot,
He will perfect that which concerns us,
and He will not forsake the works of His hands.

For All The Grace I Have Not Tasted Yet

My sister and I were praying together today,
and as she prayed, she was thanking the Lord for hard things:
for awkward times, and heartaches.
She thanked Him because those hurts impart compassion.
They limit judgment, and increase care.
I was already thinking about sharing this poem I read this morning,
but her prayer tied in with the part of this poem that most spoke to me.
Maybe it will also speak to you:

My heart is resting, O my God,
I will give thanks and sing;
My heart is at the secret source 
Of every precious thing.
Now the frail vessel Thou hast made 
No hand but Thine shall fill;
For the waters of the earth have failed,
And I am thirsty still.

I thirst for springs of heavenly life,
And here all day they rise;
I seek the treasure of Thy love,
And close at hand it lies.
And a new song is in my mouth
To long-loved music set:
"Glory to Thee for all the grace
I have not tasted yet;

"Glory to Thee for strength withheld,
For want and weakness known;
And the fear that sends me to Thy breast
For what is most my own."
I have a heritage of joy
That yet I must not see;
But the hand that bled to make it mine
Is keeping it for me.

My heart is resting, O my God,
My heart is in Thy care;
I hear the voice of joy and health
Resounding everywhere.
"Thou art my portion," saith my soul,
Ten thousand voices say,
And the music of their glad Amen
Will never die away.
~Anne Laetitia Waring

For the grace I have not tasted;
for strength withheld;
for intimate acquaintance with want, and with weakness;
and for fears that drive me to You:
Thank You.
Wow.
Yeah.

Before I was afflicted I went astray: but now I keep Thy word.
Thou art good, and doest good; teach me Thy statutes.
I know, O LORD, that Thy judgments are right, 
and that Thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me.
Let, I pray Thee, Thy merciful kindness be for my comfort, 
according to Thy word to Thy servant. 
Let Thy tender mercies come to me, that I may live... 
~ From Psalm 119:67-77

Keeping My Brother

Our church assembles in a small building.
There are two joined rooms upstairs where the younger children meet,
and one bigger room downstairs,
and an outhouse.
Five minutes into worship this morning,
my five-year-old nephew came downstairs.
He looked around the room, spotted me and made a beeline for me --
pushing right through a row of people, instead of going around.
I assumed he needed to be taken out to the outhouse,
and his mom was upstairs, and his daddy was up front,
so I reached out my hand and took his
and started walking toward the back with him.

But he was just trying to ask me a question.
I leaned over so I could hear better.
"Is Aliyah okay?"
I made him repeat it, because I hadn't heard well.
When I did understand, I got a little alarmed.
She is my four-year-old niece.
Both her parents were leading worship, too.

"Isn't she upstairs?"
"No."
"Where is she?"
He pointed to the back row, and there she was, sitting with another family.
I'm sure her parents knew where she was.
But her teacher upstairs, who had expected to see her, didn't know.
And she cared.
"Yes, she looks okay."
He ran back upstairs to deliver the news.

Our 'service' was interrupted because of concern over one member.
Because we are family.
And when a member of your family is not where they ought to be,
family members grow worried.
Where is your brother?
Is someone missing who ought to be there?
Cain said, "Am I my brother's keeper?"
But we say, "Is Aliyah okay?"
Is she safe?
Is she wandering outside when she should be together with family?
Do you care? Do you check?
Or is the form of the service of more importance than the members of it?

Maybe a brother has fallen among thieves,
and lies bleeding on the road to Jerusalem.
He was coming from worship.
But he slipped when an enemy assaulted him,
and he can't get himself up.
His wounds have grown infected.
He has nothing left.
And he isn't even decently dressed anymore.
He curses to himself and wishes he was dead.
He's tried to yell for help, but the smell drives them all away.
They are headed to prayer,
and don't want to dirty their hands with his blood and pus.
The naked need is revolting.
Have a little pride, man.
How can you lay there so nakedly needy?
Wash your filth away, so you can enter His courts with praise.

But he cannot rise from the dust.
Which traveler will you be?
One of those who skirt around him?
Or one who is willing to reach out and be bloodied?
To get his dirt on you in the effort to wash his dirt from him?
Are you wearing an outer garment you could cover his nakedness with?
Is there water in your canteen?
Give him a drink.
He can't walk for the beatings.
Wrestle him onto your donkey.
Let your feet grow sore and blistered for awhile.
It will slow you down.
It will delay your business.
It will cost you your traveling money.
You may be in greater danger of being attacked yourself,
walking on your feet instead of riding in your saddle.
But that's a brother bleeding there.
He can't pay you for your help.

You've managed to bring him to an inn,
where you spend your evening giving the man a bath.
You've only got one bedroll -- you give it to him.
He can't feed himself, so you feed him like a baby.
He doesn't even notice you, he's so damaged.
You dig into your savings to pay the innkeeper,
to persuade a fellow human to be kind.

Jesus said that they would know we are His by our love for one another.
A love that washes feet.
A love that bandages wounds.
A love that looks for the wanderer, even if it has to interrupt service.
That applies the hot compresses and releases the infections,
and reaches out beyond its own class to heal.

Without Satisfaction

I have been cleaning up messes around here,
and came across a scrap of paper
with a quote by James Fennimore Cooper
written in my husband's handwriting:

"We look upon blessings without satisfaction
and consider trifling evils as matters of great account."
~from The Pathfinder

Morning Glories Glory in the Morning

I planted morning glories this year.
Dark purple ones.
Early last week, when I was watering in the evening,
I noticed the first one had bloomed.
And I had missed it.
You see, I leave my window blinds closed most of the summer.
They are old windows, and they seep heat into the house.
And we live on a crowded street, and I grew up in the country.
I like my privacy.

I could look at the spent blossoms, and say,
"God doesn't let me see the beauty
that everyone else gets from their morning glories...
To me, they are just shriveled husks."
Or I could open my blinds in the morning, and look out at their glory.
This morning I remembered to look out.
And I, too, got to enjoy the beauty of my morning glories.
Have you looked out the window lately?
Or are you sitting inside with your blinds down,
claiming the beauty has passed you by?

Thank You, Father, for morning glories in the morning.

To See You

You are:
the Father to the fatherless.
You set the lonely in families;
You hate divorce;
You comfort the depressed.
You call things that are not into being.
You touch lepers
and lead the blind by the hand.
You raise the dead
and give to the poor.
You eat with sinners.
You accept the worship of prostitutes and tax collectors.
You hold children in Your hands and bless them;
You defend mothers and children against Your own disciples.
You undress Yourself, wrap Yourself in a towel,
and kneel at the dirty feet of Your inferiors to wash them:
You say You love them.
You stop Your business
to attend to the prayers and the needs of women,
children, slaves and their masters,
people unfit to come to the temple for uncleanness,
Gentiles and Pharisees.
You are steadfast in doing Your Father's will
though it cost You:
You please the Father well.
You came to ransom many.
You let Yourself be touched,
fed, wept on, grasped at,
pressed, crowded, interrupted,
intruded upon, cried at.
You hear men slander You;
laugh at You; plot against You;
attribute evil to You.
You are mocked, whipped, beaten, torn at and pierced.
All these things You allowed.
You drank them all.

You said, "If you have seen Me, you have seen the Father."
I want to see You.
I want to worship You in spirit and in truth.

The Breakfast On The Table

 My oldest son has been making oatmeal
for breakfast on weekdays for several months.
This week he taught my oldest daughter to do it, so they can take turns.
Yesterday was her first time doing it alone (but under his observation).
We were at the end of the oatmeal jar yesterday,
with just enough for what we needed.
When the oatmeal was done,
Silas came running in to tell me it was breakfast time.
"It's breakfast! But there's no more oatmeal!" he said.
"Is the oatmeal we have cooked?" I asked.
"Yes. But there's no more for tomorrow."
"Is there enough for today?"
He nodded.
"Then that is enough. Because we pray, 'Give us today our daily bread.'
Today, there is enough. God has given us what we need."

I was amused that in one so young,
he would look at lack,
instead of the meal sitting there waiting to be eaten.
I knew He would provide more oats for our appetites,
but all he could see was the empty jar.
He just needed to eat thankfully the breakfast on the table.

A More Mechanical Question

This morning I read to my children from Matthew 24.
It is not one of my favorite passages.
There, at the end, is the warning to watch,
and the precautionary story about the two servants.
The one, found doing what his lord had asked, is promoted.
The other, beating his fellow servants, partying with a wild crowd,
is unexpectedly exposed by his lord,
who "will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites.
There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."

The pertinent question to me is,
"How do I take the part of the good servant?
How do I avoid the part of the evil servant?"
But my children had a more mechanical question.
"Which way?" one blurted out.
Silas, the youngest, wide-eyed, took his hand
and drew a line from the top of his head down.
But Talia said knowingly, "Nuh-uh."
She demonstrated a cut straight across the torso.

Engineering Peace

My ten-year-old son was telling me his dreams and plans today.
He would like to be a military engineer, he said.
He and his cousin have been planning a project for the military.
They want to engineer a flower bomb.
"What is a flower bomb?"
"Instead of exploding like a regular bomb,
a flower bomb will explode with seeds of flowers.
We want to make it as big as a hydrogen bomb,
but it will plant flowers."

And He shall judge among the nations, 
and shall rebuke many people; 
and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, 
and their spears into pruning-hooks. 
Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, 
neither shall they learn war any more.
Isaiah 2:4

Perhaps my son has a future career with the Lord of Hosts,
beating atomic bombs into flower bombs.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus.

Of Intercourse and Offspring

We are two.
Different from each other.
Different families.
Different ages.
Different dreams.
Different bodies.

We come together.
Union.
Communion.
Corresponding to.
Bound together.
Intercourse.

God breathed life into the man.
The sharing of breath.
Worship: to kiss; to prostrate oneself in homage.
The combining of lives.
The union of bodies dedicated to one another.
Heaven and earth.
Male and female.

The birth of a child --
like me, like him.
They are me.
They are him.
They are us.
I am in them.
Their dad is in them.
They are in us.
We are one.

Blasphemy?
Mystery.

To Your Advantage

"It is to your advantage that I go away;
for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you,
but if I depart, I will send Him to you."
~John 16:7

It seems so against reason.
But reading through John 14-17 again,
and focusing in on what concerns Jesus clues us in a little.
Jesus's concern in His teaching and prayer
is to bring us into fellowship with Himself and His Father.
To invite us to abide.
To cause us to abide -- to live with and in Himself.
While He remained, He kept them in His Father's name.
While the Holy Spirit remains, He will keep us in Jesus's name.

He prayed, "Sanctify them in Your truth. Your word is truth."
He had already told them, "When the Spirit of truth has come,
He will guide you into all truth."

How could it be to our advantage not to have Jesus with us?
Because the Holy Spirit's ministry is to unite us to Christ --
to be the medium through which we abide in Him;
to keep us;
to sanctify us in truth;
to make us one with Christ, who is one with the Father;
to unite each of us to each other.
Christ took that which is the Father's and made it ours.
The Holy Spirit takes from the Son and makes it ours.
Eternal life.
Union with the Father.
Sanctification.
The favor of God.
The love they share.

"As the Father has loved Me, I love you. Abide in My love."

The Father's love raised Him from the dead and made Him alive again.
Christ is our Resurrection and Life.
Jesus's love raises us from the dead and makes us alive.

Breathe in us, Holy Spirit, the life of Christ.
Be our unity, be our love.
Be our sanctification.
Hold us in the love of Christ, and the favor of God.