Joyful worshipper or critical consumer?

                              Just a little food for weekend thought--
     Since tomorrow's Sunday, I found some words from C.S. Lewis mighty thought-provoking when it comes to our attitude about church.  How do we, well shoot, how do I,  approach worship?  Do I drive to church expectant and excited about what God has for me?  Do we walk in the doors of church as if we were being ushered into the throne room of heaven...filled with awe at this unspeakable privilege?  And enjoying this high and holy privilege with a bunch of people we love--wow!  
     Are we joyfully wanting to praise and glorify our Savior or are we petulantly waiting to be entertained and engaged?
      It's so easy to fall into the trap of insisting that my needs be met, that my notions and opinions about everything from the music to the style of worship to the length of the message must be fulfilled to the fullest extent.  Tragically,  our often prideful insistence on "having it my way or the highway" has one of two outcomes: either restless and relentless church shopping (because we assume there's some mythical, perfect church out there somewhere that will meet all our exacting, rigorous standards).  Or sitting in church but with our minds a thousand miles away....inwardly complaining about the temperature or the sound system or the meandering message
     Geez, that's just so terribly wrong.  And sadly, we're the ones who miss out on all God has for us, on all He longs to say to us, on all the ways He wants to equip, encourage, and strengthen us for the coming week.  But how often do we forfeit all that supernatural manna with our inward negative chatter or our preoccupation with all the detritus of life (ever go through your to-do list in your head?).
     So here's what Lewis wrote: "What He [God] wants of the layman in church is an attitude which may, indeed, be critical in the sense of rejecting what is false or unhelpful, but which is wholly uncritical in the sense that it does not appraise--does not waste time in thinking about what it rejects, but lays itself open in uncommenting, humble receptivity to any nourishment that is going...This attitude, especially during sermons, creates the condition...in which platitudes can become really audible to a human soul."
     Once again, it's so often about our attitude, isn't it?  And no one controls my attitude but me, myself and I!  I can't control the circumstances around me, but I sure as shooting can control my attitude and response to those circumstances.  We have the choice to come to church as joyful worshippers and grateful receivers of all that God has for us...or as preoccupied attenders and endlessly critical consumers.  The path of blessing or cursing.  And we choose.
     Once again, our Lord never compels.  Never insists.  He leaves it up to us whether or not we will come to Him with humble love, grateful praise, and teachable spirits.  O Father, help us to choose wisely and rightly this Sunday...and every day.  Might we "Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise.  Give thanks to Him, bless His name."  (Psalm 100:4)  Might we choose blessing and life this Sunday and everyday by choosing You.
     To God be the glory.
   
   

No more death

          I have loved reading the prayers of Scotty Smith, and in particular one I just read yesterday--"A Prayer about No More Death."  Amen to that.  The older I've gotten, the more loved ones I've lost, the more painful partings I've endured, the more suffering and defeat and failure and tears I've experienced and witnessed, well, it all just makes me long for that glorious day when faith will become sight.  And when death has not only been defeated but will be utterly destroyed, removed, and wiped away even from our vocabulary.  No more broken bones, broken hearts, broken dreams, broken spirits, broken bodies, broken relationships, broken environments...no more broken anything.   Only whole and healthy and happy and holy...one day...one day.
     But until then, we live in a world where brokenness, exhaustion, separation, and sickness are still a reality, though all tempered by our hope--our certain, but nonetheless not-yet-fulfilled, hope--that Christ has already won the victory over sin and death.  He will one day make all things new, perfect, permanent, and completely death-proof.  How great will that be?!
     So here's Smith's prayer.  May it encourage your heart over this Labor Day weekend and remind you that no matter where you might be right now, Christ has already defeated death and secured our ultimate victory.  And in the meantime "We can do all things through Him who strengthens us." (Phil 4:13)  Right?  Right!

     "Dear Jesus, I've never longed for the day of 'no more death' more so than today.  It's a source of immeasurable comfort to know this promise is trustworthy and true, for your death was the death of death, Jesus.  Indeed, Jesus, you are making all things new.  Your resurrection is the guarantee and first fruits of a whole new order.  Decay and death, in every form, will be gone forever.  Hasten that day, Jesus; hasten that day.  No more picking out caskets for loved one.  No more compost piles of yesterday's bouquets.  No more walking to divorce court with broken friends.  No more death of innocence.  No more life-robbing cancers.  No more burying of unrealized dreams.  No more environmental disasters.  No longer the heartache of 'putting down' a beloved pet.
     Jesus, this is the first day in nearly 16 years I wake up minus a faithful friend.  The void is great and the tears are many.  Luther had it right: some of the greatest companions you give us in life are our pets.  I never dreamed a Yorkshire terrier could have been such a declaration of Your glory.
     A part of me is embarrassed for feeling so sad. The other part says, 'Go for it.  Let yourself go.  Grieve the loss; grieve the ugliness of death that you might advocate for the promise of life--resurrection life--eternal life.'  Surely that's the way of the gospel, Jesus.
     So as You wipe away my tears, please fuel my hope and focus my gaze.  Death is defeated but not yet annihilated.  Decay will be no more, but not yet.  Send us forth as your people, Jesus, into the valley of the shadow of death with a glimpse of the first sunrise in the new heaven and new earth.  It's supposed to feel like hurt and hope at the same time.
     You will make the written saying true: 'Death has been swallowed up in victory.'  'Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?' (I Cor.15:54-55)  You are the grave robber, Jesus.  Our labors in You are not in vain.  In Your trustworthy and triumphant name I pray.  Amen."

     All I can say is Amen!  Lord, even as we grieve whatever sorrow, separation, or suffering death's curse has wrought in our lives, might You "fuel our hope and focus our gaze" upon our glorious Grave Robber, the Lord Jesus.  Whether we're missing a faithful old friend--

Or dealing with broken bones or broken health--  (just remembering!)

Or whatever our loss, keep us tethered to the promise of Your Word, Lord.  We praise the One Who will one day wipe away every single tear and will make ALL things new.  In Him we place our certain hope.
     To God be the glory.
   

Sydney speaks

     The Sydney necklace.   Thank You, Jesus.
     I had to run home and change today, because I forgot to put on a very important piece of jewelry: my Sydney necklace--named for a very special young woman.  Today is the second anniversary of her homecoming.
      "God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." (I John 5:11)
     Two years ago on this day, Sydney Boone Gaylord, went home to be with the Lord and met her beloved Bridegroom, the Lord Jesus, face to face for the first time.  Sydney was a greatly loved wife, mother of three, and daughter of two of the finest people I know. While we may remember this day and weep, I imagine there is some serious celebrating going on in heaven.  O give us eyes to see, Father.
      Sydney's earthly life may have ended with a brain tumor, but I cannot help but think of the words from Hebrews 11:4--"he being dead still speaks."  Yes, yes, Sydney's life doesn't just still speak--her life sings!  I can still remember nearly every detail of her funeral...and the last song we sang: "O Happy Day."  Because for Sydney, it was the happiest of days when she would finally meet her Savior face to face.  Sydney wanted to be buried in white--her wedding dress to meet her glorious Bridegroom on her ultimate and perfect wedding day.

     "Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out,
Hallelujah!
For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns.
Let us rejoice and exult and give Him the glory,
for the marriage supper of the Lamb has come,
and His Bride has made herself ready,
it was granted to her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure--for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints." (Rev.19:6-8)

     Sydney's love for the Lord, her enthusiasm, her love of worship, her appreciation for all things colorful, her great love for her family and friends, but most of all her undiluted adoration of, and joy in, her Savior, O how they speak,...and sing...and glorify the Lord.  What a reminder--it's not the length of life, it's the level of love for God and others.  It's not about the number of years we might live but about the Name of the Lord Jesus and His greatness in our lives.  And it's about enjoying joyous eternal life, not about experiencing copious days of life.
      O Jesus, help us to live--truly live and savor--each day that You choose to give us...all by Your grace, all to Your glory. None of us is guaranteed tomorrow.  Nor do we have yesterday.  We have only today, this very day,  this moment, to live fully and freely to the praise of Your glory.
      Might we make much of You, Lord, each and every day, so that on that great and glorious day when we, too, meet our beloved Bridegroom face to face, we will be ready to sing and laugh and dance in the streets of heaven.  With Sydney.  And with so many beloved family and friends who, even though, dead, still speak.  For in reality, they live--truly LIVE!  
     It will be one happy, happy day...after day...after day...after day....and on into eternity with Jesus.
     To God be the glory.

Mourning into dancing

     Okay I lied--one more thing!  And such a seemingly little thing...but really, aren't all those "little things" ultimately the big things that give our lives satisfaction, joy, and meaning?
      All those small moments...when we suddenly recognize the commonplace as infused with the holy and the eternal.  We slow down for a moment and see, truly see, the wonder of the first leaves of fall or the warmth of a sunny August day.  The happy wag of a dog's tail or the quick, open smile of a child.  The sweet fragrance of flowers as we walk past or the comforting mug of hot tea in the predawn darkness.  The ordinary, but extraordinary, moments of life: playing a card game, folding laundry, sharing a laugh, eating frozen yogurt, going to the grocery store, singing along to a favorite song.  All "small things" that we sometimes need to see with fresh eyes.  Eyes opened by gratitude.
     Here was my small thing today--Target in the sunshine.  Yep, that's it.
      I realized this afternoon--I don't need a trip to Paris or a fancy car or spa vacation or a home makeover.  Nope, none of those will bring us lasting satisfaction.  If that's what we're chasing after, we'll find ourselves endlessly striving and searching and, in the end, empty.
     But this afternoon, I ran over to Target to pick up a few things for our youngest child who was home sick.  I bet you know the feeling--just going through the motions of shopping and buying and lugging out bags of groceries while clicking off in my mind all the items remaining on my lengthy to-do list.
     And then, wham, it hit me.  What was I doing and feeling at this moment last year?  I stood in the parking lot, suddenly stunned, and looked about me. What a gloriously sunny August day!   How had I failed to notice earlier?  And here I was with the freedom of being able to go to Target to get what my family needed.  I wasn't in a hospital room, cut off from the rest of the world.  I wasn't looking out a window, wondering what all those people outside were so busy rushing about and doing.  I wasn't listening to beeping buzzing machines and watching life-sustaining monitors.
     No, here I was, one year later, walking in the sun, free to go to Target or my children's schools or the bank or the dry cleaners.  Such freedom!  Such beauty--even in a parking lot--with the sun shining strong and clear.  And if you had seen me just then, you would have glimpsed a happy smile mingled with tears of amazement at the goodness and grace of God.
     But here's why I share this--because perhaps someone reading this is right where we were one year ago.  Maybe there's someone who feels stuck in the heart of darkness or confusion or fear or even despair today, and you cannot imagine ever walking out in the light of happiness again.  This afternoon, it hit me so plainly--I need to tell you from personal experience that you will come out on the other side.  Whatever you might be enduring today will not last forever.  It might feel like it will.  You might be certain you'll never smile or laugh or sing or savor life again...but you will.  You will.
     I couldn't have dreamed as I stood staring out that window in Janie's ICU room a year earlier that on that same day, one year later, I'd be walking out of Target in the sunshine, feeling unabated joy.  I couldn't have begun to imagine how radically different life would feel only one year later.  But that's the nature of life--ebbs and flows.  Lows and highs.  Burdens and blessings.  Darkness and light.  Storms and sunshine.
     This life consists of both for all of us.  We will never experience only sunny days and smooth sailing.  None of us gets a pass on hardship, sorrow, and difficulty.  Nope, we'll all face storms.  But we face them with Jesus.  He's with us in the midst of the crashing waves.  He's with us in that tempest-tossed boat, and He will carry us through to the other side.
     And truth be told, without the sorrows, the celebrations would never be half so glorious.  Without the rain, the sun would scorch the earth.  And if we didn't experience the darkness, we could never appreciate the brightness and wonder of the light.  No, life consists of both...and God uses both.  Often His choicest lessons are in the dark.
       But the dawn will always always always follow the darkness.  When you can't see the way ahead, sometimes you just have to choose by faith to keep walking, keep rowing, and keep trusting that God will somehow get you through to the other side...knowing that one day, some day, you will again find joy and laughter and peace.
       Whatever kind of storm you might be enduring right now will not last forever.  "Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes in the morning." (Ps.30:5)  And "You have turned for me my mourning into dancing;  You have loosed my sackcloth and clothed me with gladness, that my glory may sing Your praise and not be silent.  O Lord my God, I will give thanks to You forever!" (Ps.30:11-12)
     And for all of us, no matter our storms, heaven is ahead--joy and glory unimaginable!  So surely we can hang in there just a little bit longer for that glorious dawn.
     Simple message, but maybe one person out there needs reminding--whatever it is, it will not last forever.  Joy's on the horizon.  One fine day you will suddenly find yourself marveling at the simple gift of sunshine or laughter or music...or even shopping at Target!  And when you do, remember to thank the One who turned your mourning into dancing.  'Cause that's Who He is--the God of Resurrection.
      To God be all the glory.

Remembering one more time...and rejoicing!

     
     One more time to remember and rejoice in our great and good God for all He has done this past year.
     This will probably be one of the last times I'll write extensively about Janie's accident, for as Paul says, "But one thing I do: forgetting what is behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." (Phil.3:13-14)
     But I never want to forget.  Never.  For in remembering, in recalling "Hitherto hath the Lord helped us" (I Sam 7), we are filled with inexpressible gratitude at the undeserved goodness and grace of God.  So thank You, Lord, for how far You have brought us in one year.  "I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God." (Isa.61:10)
     I thought I would do this primarily through pictures.  Here's where we were on this day, one year ago:

      Unconscious.  Unresponsive.  Unable to do one thing for herself.  Much like all of us apart from the grace of God in sending us the Lord Jesus to redeem and save us from our sins.  O thank You, Lord Jesus, "For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly...but God shows His love for us in that while we still sinners, Christ died for us." (Rom.5:6,8)
      We remember those stones from Cane River that my dear brother, Britt, brought us that first long weekend of the accident.  And so we prayed and prayed that, as Jesus did with Lazarus in rolling away the stone from his tomb and raising Lazarus from the dead, God would roll away the stone and awaken Janie and bring her back to us.  These stones sat on a little ledge in her room in ICU--

  And over those often hard, dark days and weeks, God sent dear friends to love us, help us, pray for us, care for us.  O what a gift the Body of Christ is!!!  Thank You, Lord!  Friends and family like Russ and Creecy.  Here's one of my favorite pictures. Janie's fever had spiked to nearly 104, and Creecy and Russ began praying and fanning--and, as always lifted our spirits.

          And my wonderful brother and sister-in-law, Rich and Marilyn.  This was right before Janie was about to be transferred from the excellent hospital in Greenville (Thank You, Lord, for her incredible care there!  And thank You for all the amazing nurses and doctors!) to Chapel Hill.  Here they were preparing to move her while she was still unconscious, had a high fever, and was on a ventilator, etc. A tall and delicate order.  But they did an outstanding job. Whew--

    And that Carolina Air Care was a beautiful sight--headed home to Chapel Hill!  Praise God!  We now love the ECU Pirates...but we will be Tar Heels till the day we die!  This transport was amazing--it is essentially a fully loaded traveling ICU.  Remarkable.
     Another picture I loved--Mary Norris and Matt with me in the hospital when Janie was struggling with a high fever and some kind of infection that required us all to essentially wear haze-mat suits when we were in the ICU.  Miraculous the way God could give us joy and laughter even in such a hard and frightening time. Another gift--thank You, Father--You are our joy and peace even in the darkness--

     After waiting and praying and hoping, God in His mercy and sovereign power began to awaken our girl after two long weeks.  I'll never forget seeing that first thumbs up when the nurses asked her if she could give a thumbs up in response to questions asked of her.  It's become my all-time favorite symbol.  Thumbs up towards heaven--to our Maker and Redeemer and Restorer and Reviver!  And thumbs up to the treasure of friendship and family--the Body of Christ!--

          Sweet friends greeting us shortly after we arrived in Chapel Hill!

     Mary Norris, Matt and Peter after Janie woke up, and the doctors' were able to remove her breathing tube and take her off the ventilator!  Praise God who give us lungs to breathe!  Have you thanked Him for being able to take that breath...and the next one...and the next?

     Sweet Tessa and Janie right after Janie had returned to us!  That was one sweet reunion.  Thumbs up, of course, to the Lord!  Yes, God can do the impossible--might we never forget it.
     And then Stephen Mares--our incredible principal at Broughton High School came by for a visit with Janie--wearing his purple Broughton tie, of course!  Thank You, Lord, for the gift of excellent schools and teachers!

     And my brothers, Britt and Rich, my sister-in-law, Alice, and their son, Will.  Thank You Lord for the gift of family!

     My sisters Jane and Mary Norris were there constantly too, but I don't seem to have any pictures of them--rats!  But praise God for them!!  By the way, there's nothing like sisters!  Another gift--thank You, Father!  And then there were more friends--

     One of my favorite pictures and memories.  Many of Janie's dearest friends from Broughton!  And Courtney, their amazing Young Life leader.  And all the girls from the wreck--Madeleine, Grace, Tessa and Janie.  O Father, thank You for saving each of them and for the gift of their friendship.  "Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to His power at work within us." (Eph.3:20)  And more friends--

     Lunches with dear friends!!  Lord, thank You for the gift of friendship (am I a broken record) and for the gift of FOOD!  A few weeks earlier, all food tasted a bit like sawdust...now it tasted like JOY!  Almost everything seemed as divine and delicious as chocolate...and that's really saying something.

      Janie with her brother, Richard!  Thumbs up to our good God!

     And with all her brothers--a happy visit!  And then we went outside to the Starbucks in the hospital and sipped our drinks on a sun-drenched September day--so so glorious!  O might none of us ever take such seemingly small moments for granted.  The gift of tea and milkshakes, warm sun, laughter, and siblings.
   

      On her last day, they replaced Janie's cast with a Carolina blue one, of course.

    And then it was finally time to go home.  We took a picture of Janie holding her Cane River rocks that had been with us from the very beginning.  May we never forget: God still rolls away stones.  He can in your life, too.  He has the power to do the impossible--

     When we arrived home, there were signs everywhere, put up by wonderful friends who had prayed and helped and done everything else under the sun.  Have I said, thank You Lord for friends and family?!

     The visits from friends continued unabated throughout Janie and Tessa's recovery.  Okay, okay you already know the drill--praise God from Whom all blessings flow (like friends and family!)--

     If by some miracle you are still reading this, I better stop since this has gone on and on... Sorry.  But suffice it to say, what a journey.  What an opportunity to discover that God will never ever leave us nor forsake us, no matter how deep the pit or how dark the road.  He is with us, always, even when we can't see Him or feel Him.  He is there.  And He can do the impossible.
    And so, thank You, Father, for Your goodness and grace. Thank You for saving these girls.  Thank You for the gift of children and family and friends.  Thank You for doctors and nurses and amazing medical care.  Thank You for all the ways You provide for us every single day--with air and food and sun and rain and hope and joy and peace.  Thank You for all the daily, common treasures of everyday life that we so often take for granted.  You are relentlessly good.
    And thank You for allowing these girls to graduate from Broughton.  Thank You for so many wonderful young folks graduating--2013, what a class! Just a few pictures from one happy graduation--

     Father, thank You for allowing even the hardest things in our lives...for the way You use them for our greater good and Your greater glory. When we cannot see or understand what Your hand is doing, help us to trust in Your heart.  In Your love.  In Your grace.  In Your power. In Your plan.  And in Your Son, our Savior.
      And so we praise the Lord for August 24th and all He has done through these four girls.  Might they be a testimony to God's greatness and glory...and might we all!  For we each of us have a story--our own unique story--that our Heavenly Father is writing. A story of redemption.  A story of grace.  A story of rolling away stones in the hardest, darkest of places.  Thank You Lord that You are still rolling away all kinds of stones in all kinds of lives...for You are always at work...even in the dark.  And You are still writing...

     To God, and God alone, be all the glory.



 

On this day, counting...

         Beginning day 4 of no internet, no emails, no TV, no home phone.  A brief thunderstorm a few days back knocked us back to the stone age, technologically speaking.  And AT&T has, so far, not been able to fix it, nor been too terribly receptive to our pleas.  (“No,” I want to respond to AT&T, “this is not a medical emergency  that requires we have our internet restored asap, but it’s a teenager emergency and a cranky parent emergency and doesn’t that count?”  Apparently not.  Good heavens, what if Downton Abbey finally starts back up again with a new episode and we don’t have internet/TV/phone?  I just can’t even go there.)  

Add to that a few frustrations with wedding planning, some disruption and mess due to repairs and repainting, more mess in the house from all the college packing for two children.  And add: still missing Moses.  And add: still mourning this relentless growing up, heading off to college and emptying of our nest...  Well, suffice it to say, I awoke feeling a teeny bit worn and weary.  

But then the strangest thing--right as I walked into the kitchen this morning, the Lord seemed to whisper to me two different phrases: “As your days, so shall your strength be.” (Deut.33:25)  And “Count it all joy.” (James 1:2)

I had just read a brief devotion to one of the boys the other day based on that wonderful verse, “As your days, so shall your strength be.”  O thank You for that reminder, Father.  

If we awake to a day with much to do and little energy to do it--God has the energy available to us that formed the heavens and the earth and created the giraffes and the oak trees. He maintains the orbit of the planets and the pull of gravitation.  Our Lord who has infinite and always readily available strength will surely energize us to do all this day calls for us to do.  

If we awaken filled with sorrow and sadness, we have a Savior who knows our every tear.  He was “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief...Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.” (Isa.53:3-4)  He will carry those burdens of sorrow and grief for us this day.  Might we hand our load to our gracious Burden-Bearer.

If this day finds us empty of joy and dead to hope, He is the God of resurrection.  He works best in a graveyard.  “I am the resurrection and the life.  Whoever believes in Me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who believes in Me shall never die.  Do you believe this?” (John 11:25-26)  Yes, Lord, we believe.  Help Thou our unbelief.  You who raised the dead, You who were raised from the dead and now sit on the throne of heaven, can You not raise our deadened spirits, revive our moribund hopes, and renew our flagging hearts?  Yes, yes, He can and He will!  He promises that “as your day” of defeat or discouragement or even despair goes, “so shall your strength be” sufficient to revive and renew and resurrect. 

And if we awaken to a day of frustrations and petty annoyances that seem to be stealing our joy, well then, His strength is sufficient for this day’s struggles...for we are to “Count it ALL joy.”  

Seriously, all those things that were snatching my peace and joy, could I not turn them around and count them all joy?  Each one, when you really dig down below the exasperation, are each a blessing.  Thank You, Father, for a home  to live in--sure, a home that has rotten wood and weeds and non-working internet--but it’s our home filled with sweet memories and people we adore.  And weddings--sure, planning can lead to some conflict and stress, but keep your focus on the joy of two dearly loved young folks brought brought together by our gracious, good Father.  It’s about the love and the treasure of living this adventure of life together--with one another and with our glorious Lord.  And children growing up and going away?  Well, count it ALL joy.  The joy of the remarkable, utterly undeserved privilege of cooperating with God in creating and raising unique and wonderful eternal souls.  They may be leaving our house...but never our hearts.  

So today, on this one year anniversary of Janie’s accident, I’m thankful that “As your days, so shall your strength be.”  From desperate days in ICU’s to dark days of struggle or sorrow to delightful days of sunshine and weddings to every kind of day in between, He’s got the strength and love and hope and wisdom and peace and provision for whatever our day holds.  

On this day of August 24th, I count it ALL joy. Every moment in that struggle in the hospital, every dear friend and family member who prayed so fervently and helped  so diligently, every doctor and every nurse, every whispered prayer, every tear of sorrow and every laugh of relief, every quiet moment in the middle of the night when Jesus stayed up with Janie and with us, keeping us company, every high and every low, every moment of sinking despair and every moment of soaring hope...every single bit of it, I count and count and count the staggering blessings that God wrought out of seeming tragedy.  

And I keep on counting--wedding, home, dog, children, college, weeds, mess... ALL from Him.  ALL for joy.  ALL by His grace.  ALL for His glory.  Maybe we won’t see or understand this side of heaven when it comes to every sorrow in our lives...but one glorious day we will.  And then our counting will have only just begun.  

To God--our infinite Source of strength and our boundless Source of joy--be all the glory.

Undulation...and redemption

        Okay, it's not the weekend, but still, here's a little food for non-weekend thought from C.S. Lewis:
  (From one of my favorites of all of Lewis' writings--The Screwtape Letters.  This is written from the point of view of Screwtape, a senior devil, writing to a "junior tempter," Wormwood, about how to woo and win for hell a human assigned to him.)

     "Humans are amphibians--half spirit and half animal...As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time.  This means that while their spirit can be directed to an eternal object, their bodies, passions, and imaginations are in continual change, for to be in time means to change.  Their nearest approach to constancy, therefore, is undulation--the repeated return to a level from which they repeatedly fall back, a series of troughs and peaks.  If you had watched your patient carefully you would have seen this undulation in every department of his life--his interest in work, his affection for his friends, his physical appetites, all go up and down.  As long as he lives on earth periods of emotional and bodily richness and liveliness will alternate with periods of numbness and poverty...
     Now it may surprise you to learn that in the Enemy's [remember--the Enemy from Screwtape's vantage point is God!] efforts to get permanent possession of a soul, He relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks; some of His special favorites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else.  The reason is this.  To us [meaning satan and devils] a human is primarily food; our aim is the absorption of it's will into ours, the increase of our own area of selfhood at it's expense.  But the obedience the Enemy [God!] demands of men is quite a different thing.  One must face the fact that all the talk about His love for men, and His service being perfect freedom, is not (as one would gladly believe) mere propaganda, but an appalling truth.  He really does want to fill the universe with a lot of loathsome little replicas of Himself--creatures whose life, on its miniature scale, will be qualitatively like His own, not because He has absorbed them but because their wills freely conform to His.  We want cattle who can finally become food; He wants servants who can finally become sons.  We want to suck in, He wants to give out.  We are empty and would be filled; He is full and flows over."

     Just in case you, like me, needed the reminder that this temporal life truly is one consisting of "troughs and peaks" and that whatever season we are going through at the moment will not last forever.
     Just a few examples:  Peak--preparing your children for college with all the excitement, joy, and opportunities college will give them!  Trough--returning to a much quieter home and grieving that your children are growing up and life is inexorably changing.
     Peak--summer vacation!  No schedules, hot weather, beach, mountains, children home from school, family vacations.  Trough--end of summer vacation and a return to schedules with everyone going every which way, and all the frenzy and chaos of preparing for school.
      Peak--beloved child getting married!  Joy, joy, joy!  Trough--planning the wedding and feeling overwhelmed at times with all the details.  Peak--but also the fun and excitement and privilege of planning the wedding!  Trough--being told you cannot invite so many people to the wedding and not being able to include all your friends.
     Peak--sweet Moses.  Trough--missing Moses.
     Peak--getting a lot accomplished, including completely catching up on all the laundry.  Yahoo! Trough--the sudden appearance of more dirty clothes, seemingly within moments of "catching up" on the laundry. Feeling you will never ever get everything done that you need to get done.  Peak--realizing it's not the end of the world if you don't get it all done!  Double peak--determining to put loving and enjoying God and loving the people He has graciously placed in your life as your preeminent priority... and discovering a joy far deeper than getting everything done!
     I don't know about you, but I tend to forget about the law of undulation.  And I tend to assume, especially in the midst of life's troughs, that whatever I'm enduring at the moment will go on forever... that my momentary feelings of discouragement or defeat or even despair will last forever.
     But they won't.  Never do.  Eventually a peak is coming.  And God uses those peaks, but especially those troughs (hard as they are), for our greater good and His greater glory.  As Lewis puts it, because "He wants servants who can finally become sons."  Our Heavenly Father wants beloved sons--emptied of our selfishness and pride--so we can be filled to overflowing with Himself.
     So if you are in the midst of a peak right now, rejoice in the goodness of God and give Him the praise!  But if you are enduring a trough--take heart!  It will not last forever, and God is working and moving and using even the hardest and deepest of troughs to transform us into the men and women He's called us to be. Making servants into sons.  Transforming our weaknesses into strengths.  Turning our mourning into rejoicing.  And filling our emptiness with His fullness of joy and peace and hope and power.  It's the story of redemption painted all over the law of undulation...from peak to trough...all the way to heaven.
     To God--the Author of time and undulation and redemption--be all the glory.
     

Lift off!

      Somehow, someway this is all going to fit into half of a tiny dorm room. O, and this doesn't include the chair, the side table for the bed (which we forgot--back to Target), the lamp, the mattress pad.... Not entirely sure how all this will fit unless we can find that shrinker machine from the movie, "Honey, I shrunk the Kids."
      But we're claiming His promise--"Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine..." (Eph.3:20)  Aren't you thankful He cares about the big and the small and everything in between?  Including emotional mamas.
 

       Arrived!  Everyone was incredibly annoyed that I was snapping pictures.  They will be even more annoyed that I am posting these pictures.  Ha!  Better be nicer to mom!
     And incredibly--because God is so good--the pouring rain held off long enough to get everything inside...and everything actually fit inside.  Wow--who would have thought?  We loved her roommate and suitemates and parents and room...and it was all pretty exciting and crazy and surreal all at the same time.
     Every now and then, even in the midst of the frenzy, I would think back in my mind to where we were exactly one year and a week ago.  And I would smile (and try not to cry) and whisper to my sweet Savior--thank You, Lord.  Thank You for Your grace and Your love and Your strength through every storm.  The words to "Cornerstone" kept running through my head:
My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus' blood and righteousness
I dare not trust the sweetest frame
But wholly trust in Jesus' name

Christ alone, Cornerstone
Weak made strong in the Savior's love
Through the storm
He is Lord, Lord of all

When darkness seems to hide His face
I rest on His unchanging grace
In every high and stormy gale
My anchor holds within the veil

Christ alone, Cornerstone
Weak made strong in the Savior's love
Through the storm
He is Lord, Lord of all
     And He was and He is and He always will be.  O might that be our hope and our strength and our song--He makes the weak strong in His love through every high and stormy low of our lives--and He is Lord of all.  We will all go through stormy gales...but in Him, our anchor will hold.
   

      After all that packing and unpacking, it was time for lunch.  Food--always a joyous time for the Fountain clan.  We may not have many gifts in our family, but dang, we love to eat...and we are mighty good at it too.  I am so proud.  And thankful--thank You for the gift of taste, Lord, and for the gift of delicious food.  Especially chocolate (always have to include that).

      Thank You, also, Lord, that other families have more useful talents than the Fountain's aptitude for eating.  The wonderful Jones family came to expend their giftedness at decorating and organizing and constructing (yes, that is a power drill in the hands of an orthopedic surgeon.  Only the best for our girl!).  Thank heaven for the Jones and their tools, since we didn't think to bring so much as a single nail, hammer, tape measure...nada.
      But we did have some chocolate.  So really, we were well prepared.
      And  again, I couldn't help but praise God seeing Tessa and Janie together.  One year later, wow.            Praise God from Whom all blessings flow.

     And finally, it was time to go home.  But not before one visit to Time Out with Dad...who explained to Janie that Time Out was open 24 hours a day and had incredible chicken biscuits (anyone familiar with Chapel Hill will know this extraordinarily valuable information, but Richard needed to know that Janie knew, because, well, that's just something you must know).
     As we left, I shouted out, "I love you!  Salt and light--make a difference!"
     And my heart whispered after her--O Lord, help her, teach her, that You are our Cornerstone--our Rock that never fails and our Refuge--through all of life's ups and downs,  joys and sorrows, from birth to launch to lift off.
     O Lord, we worship You, our Strength in weakness and our Song throughout gladness and gales.  You are Lord of them all and will be in them all with us.  Keep us praising and clinging to You, Father.
 To God be the glory.

Launching--Salt and Light!

     Getting closer to launch!
     Tessa, Ann Archer, and Janie (with a few of their siblings) all preparing to head off to college tomorrow!  Hard to believe the day is almost here.  Thank You, Father.  We do not take it for granted, not after last year.  Another blessing of the accident--God removed the blinders from our eyes that so often in the past might have caused us to miss the extravagant, but seemingly ordinary treasures He showers upon us.  School (and the simple privilege of being able to attend), regular schedules (rather than 24 hour vigils in ICU where night and day blend together),  football games, eating dinner as a family, laughing with friends, smelling (yeah, silly, but smells of all kinds--from smokey fires to freshly cut grass to roasting chicken--are marvelous!  You can't smell much of anything in the hospital), doing the laundry or cooking a meal for your loved ones...and on and on.  So many daily blessings--how on earth could we have missed them?
     So thank You Father for the privilege of sending our children out into this world.  Last night, a few families got together and challenged these girls--walk with Christ!  So many great comments:
    Don't hide your light under a bushel in college.  Be salt and light for Christ in a dark world.
     Every day put on the full armor of God, for you are daily entering into battle in enemy-occupied territory.
     Your professors are just regular folks too--don't be intimidated and get to know them.
     Remember you can't stand still in your faith--forget trying to sit on the fence, for you're always either advancing or retreating.
     Be open to God's new challenges and opportunities and don't be afraid to step out in faith, even when you're out of your comfort zone.
    Adults and older siblings all shared--what a great night!  Thank You, Lord, for good food, great friends, and glorious fellowship!
     But as I thought about the evening, I realized every challenge, every bit of advice applies not only to college students but to every one of us.  We all must daily put on our armor so we can walk through the minefields of life, secure in our Savior.  We all must daily be advancing in our faith--no fence-sitting, no retreat, no surrender!  We all should be ready to step out in obedience and faith when and wherever God calls us.  Sure, it's scary...but it's also the safest, most joyous place to be: in the center of God's will.
     And we all need to be salt and light in this world--it's why we're here.  "You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost it, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet.  You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.  Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven." (Mt.5:13-16)
     O Lord Jesus, make us salty!  Salt is a preservative and and helps prevent decay.  Decay of culture, decay of hope, decay of hearts--we can be that salt.  And salt adds flavor and zest, just as we can be the salt that brings joy and light and life into our world.  And salt makes us thirsty--O might we thirst for the Living Water, Lord, and encourage that thirst in others.  Help us make them thirsty to find You, the ultimate and joyous satisfaction of all their heart's thirstiness.
     So as we've hollered out to all of our children for over 20 years whenever they've left the house--whether for school or for sports or for any event--
    "Salt and light--make a difference!"
     O Lord, may it be so for our college students...and all our students....and all their parents...and every single one of us.  Make us salty, Lord!  Make us shine brightly with Your Light.  And might we make a difference for eternity for You.  To God be the glory.

Preparing to launch

     One of God's delicate masterpieces preparing to launch.  Here today and gone tomorrow.  Yet robed in splendor.
     "Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on.  Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing.  Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?  And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life...Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble." (Mt.6:25-27,34)
     Trying to remember this as we prepare to launch two of our children into college.
     We're packing up Janie this week for her freshman year, and if the North Hills Target has run out of merchandise, well, you know who to blame.  I'm quite sure we've bought one of everything--and I mean everything--in the store.  If they sold kitchen sinks, I'm betting we would have purchased one of those as well...and all the cleaning products to go along with it...and a few picture frames to go over the sink.  Our debit card is smoking.
     But in addition to expending vast sums of money on pop-up laundry bags, duvet covers, and hanging shelves, it's also just plain stressful and bittersweet sending your children off to college.  The bottom line?  I simply do not like change of any kind.  I want my children to stay home and not grow up and leave us.  I want my dog to be back under the kitchen table.  I want my memory to stop deteriorating and my hair to cease graying.   I want my friends and family not to suffer losses...of any kind whatsoever.  Here's a great idea: let's just all agree to maintain the status quo...out into the far distant future.
     Unfortunately, this option does not seem to be available to any of us.  Life means change...but God is in the midst of the change and challenges us to embrace it all.  He wants us to walk with Him through this crazy, ever-changing adventure of life.  Trusting that He is not only with us and beside us and behind us...but He is also just up ahead of us in whatever that unknown future holds for us and our loved ones.  He's already there in the future...and if He's already there, well then, that's where we want to go too!
     And so we launch our children into the big, wide world, trusting our Father has them and loves them infinitely more than we do.  We release our loved ones, our friends, our hopes, our dogs, our dreams, our futures into His nail-scarred, omnipotent hands.  We pray--and in our better moments, we know--He has them all.  And His ways and plans are always best.
     So back to Target.  I'm thinking of contacting Guinness to see if we've broken the world's record for the most trips.  I think we have a good shot at it.   But I'm choosing to place my trust in God's Word by refusing to be anxious for tomorrow. If God's got the birds and the butterflies, He's certainly got us...and our college students.
     Almost ready for launch...after a few more visits to Target.  But God will be there too.
     To God be the glory.
   

When you fall off the joy wagon...

     Fell off the wagon yesterday--the joy wagon.  The faith wagon.  And it wasn't pretty, though I guess it'd been a long time coming.
     It's been a challenging, tough summer.  The tragic deaths of several children of friends left many of us reeling in sorrow and bewilderment.  Ever since nearly losing Janie, it seems that I feel the pain of loss for others far more deeply and personally.  I'm thankful in a way, for I long to be able to rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep.  That's what we are called to do, and I praise God for the gift of strong feelings and of being fully alive--to the joys and the sorrows.  But it makes the pain harder, more searing, and I feel it's weight far more than I ever did before.
     And then there were all the other lesser, but still difficult, losses: the death of sweet old Moses and the huge void our family feels without him.  The wreck in Kenya that injured our son, Richard, and several others on their mission trip.  Add to that all the anxieties that accident dredged up for us--though, again, we praise God for saving them all.
     And finally, it's been a tough summer of golf for one of our boys.  He has worked so hard,  tried and tried and never given up...even when the results don't seem to come.  What an example he has been to me of refusing to give in to discouragement and frustration.  I think I would have.  He hasn't.  Thank You, Father, that You choose to teach us through our children.  And thank You for his indomitable spirit that keeps on trying and trusting.
     Seriously, how else would we ever learn what it means to persevere unless we have difficulties and long, hard, challenges to slog through?  I know I'd prefer for my loved ones to tip-toe through the tulips and dance along happy, care-free, pain-free, and successful paths.  But then they'd have the staying power of mushrooms rather than mighty oak trees.  Praise You, Father, that You know so much better and You love so much deeper and greater.  You won't allow us to settle for fleeting happiness when You want us to enjoy the infinite and eternal joys of holiness.
     So all this is to say, I fell off the wagon yesterday.  Quite simply I told the Lord I was angry with Him.  I didn't feel His peace.  I didn't understand His plan.  I doubted His love.  And, by the way, I was tired and grumpy and sad and frustrated and overwhelmed with all I had to do. So there.
     Guess what?  He didn't strike me down dead for my extraordinary lack of gratitude.  He could have.  He should have.  But He didn't.  Because He simply never ever gives up on us.  Never leaves us when we fall.  Never forsakes us when we fail.  Never ignores us when we whine.
     Instead, He loves and teaches and encourages and empowers and renews through His Spirit and His Word.  He lifts up our weary gaze to His glorious throne.  He reminds us of His never-failing grace.  And He speaks to our discouraged hearts and breathes in renewed hope and strength and, yes, joy.
     Here's what I read in yesterday's Daily Light: "The Lord will not cast off forever.  Though He causes grief, yet He will show compassion." (Lam.3:31-32)  And "'Do not fear...' says the Lord, 'for I am with you....I will not make a complete end of you.  I will rightly correct you.'" (Jer.46:28) And "'With a little wrath I hid My face from you for a moment, but with everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you,' says the Lord, your Redeemer.  'For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed, but My kindness shall not depart from you, nor shall My covenant of peace be removed,' says the Lord, who has mercy on you.  'O you afflicted one, tossed with the tempest and not comforted, behold, I will lay your stones with colorful gems, and lay your foundations with sapphires.'" (Isa.54:7-8)
     That's our God and there is none other.
     He is the Redeemer and Restorer and Reviver of our weary souls.
     And He is our Burden-Bearer...every single burden, every sin, every sorrow.  He has borne them all and will bear them all...from the cross to your present moment of weakness or pain or frustration...and all the way into eternity.  
     Anybody else need a little reminding today?  Might the balm of His Word restore your hope.  Might the power of His Spirit strengthen your heart.  And might the contemplation of His mercy, grace, and love revive your spirit.
    As Ann Voskamp says, "The answer to anxiety is the adoration of Christ."  O come let us adore Him...and find ourselves back on the wagon of faith and joy!  To God be the glory.

Dogs, babies, chocolate...and other graces!

                                A little food for weekend thought:

     One of my favorite pictures of Moses--with precious Huntley (dressed up for trick-or-treatin'!) the son of dear, dear friends, Jessica and Hunt:

     Thank You Lord, again, for sweet, old Moses.  Moses--another example of one of the common gifts of God's grace in our lives.  Not a day--well, probably not an hour--goes by that we don't think of Moses and miss him.  But there are waaaaay more smiles now rather than tears.  Another reason for thanks to the Lord.  Grace.
     And then, just today, sweet Jessica and Huntley came by for a visit.  Huntley--grace, grace, grace!  What a joy an almost two year old is!  (And dear friends like Jessica?--grace squared!).  But our visitors came by with, as Jessica put it, "Some chocolate therapy."  O yes, more grace!  I put that fine therapy (I'm feeling better already) on the counter.  I realized after their visit that our chocolate therapy sat right in front of one of our favorite platters sitting on our kitchen counter--

"Be kind and compassionate to one another..." (Eph.4:32)

Pretty appropriate, huh?  Thank You, Lord, for the grace gifts of friendship, kindness, and compassion.  Thank You for friends who love us and care for us--even when we don't deserve it.  But that's the essence of grace isn't it?--God's undeserved, unearned favor showered upon us.  

     And thank You, Lord, that You allow us to share abroad to others that kindness and compassion which You poured out upon us so extravagantly in Jesus Christ.  

So in light of such amazing grace, a quote from Bob Goff that Janie just shared with me:

"Love dissipates fear; hope patches the holes in our dreams; grace won't fix our mistakes, it just won't memorize them."  

And one of my very favorites from G.K. Chesterton: 

“You say grace before meals. All right.  But I say grace before the concert and the opera.  And grace before the play and pantomime.  And grace before I open a book. And grace before sketching, painting, swimming fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing.  and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.”  G.K.Chesterton

O Lord, help us to live by grace.  "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that no one can boast." (Eph.2:8-9)

It's all by grace and through grace--whether friendship or beloved pets or chocolate cake or good books...or "swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing."  

So we simply say, thank You, Father.  To God--the God of all grace--be the glory. 

“

Savoring...but making war!

     Okay, in light of my picture from yesterday of what is undoubtedly some of the world's finest chocolate cake,  I'm a wee bit convicted after just reading Philippians 3:17-21.  In particular, verse 19 describes those who are "enemies of the cross" in this way: "their god is their belly [O mercy!], and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things."  Now, praise God I'm not glorying in my shame, and the Lord knows I'm not an enemy of of the cross of Christ.  But still, I do love me some chocolate...and, well, food in general.  I may be a crummy cook, but I enjoy cooking...and especially eating.
     So this phrase worried me until I looked it up in the NIV where it's translated "their god is their appetite."  Meaning all kinds of appetites--our appetites for sex or food or money or status or success or appearance or whatever we place before our hunger and appetite for God.  God created food and drink and sex and dogs and nature.  These are wonderful gifts from our Creator and Giver of all good gifts.
     But when we mistakenly...no, when we sinfully give over the ultimate precedence and preoccupation of our lives to the gifts--rather than the Giver--the gifts become distorted and destructive and twisted.  And, boy, how easy is it to give in to our appetites--because we're sinners!
     John Piper says that "preferring anything over Jesus is the essence of sin and we must fight it."  And so we must wage war!  He goes on to say "I hear so many Christians murmuring about their imperfections and their failures and their addictions and their short-comings, and I see so little war!...Why am I this way?  Make WAR!"
     On this sun-drenched August morning, I'm still savoring the memory of an anniversary dinner with my husband.  I still give all my thanks and praise to the Savior who graciously gave me this husband and that dinner...and that chocolate cake!  I rejoice in the gifts and say thank You thank You thank You Father!
     But at the same time, I humbly ask God to enable me to ruthlessly make WAR against my selfishness and my desire to have things my way.  And I wage war against those appetites that threaten to diminish my love for my Savior and my savoring of His beauty, His grace, His all-sufficiency.   Only the Lord can truly and ultimately satisfy our souls and fill those empty holes of longing that humanity has, since the fall, looked to fill with the infinitely lesser and empty things of this world.  Yet, all the while,  the infinitely Greater and more Glorious Creator is ready and waiting to fill and fill and fill to overflowing abundance all those empty God-shaped holes with Himself. With His perfect, all-satisfying, all-sufficient, all-glorious I Am.
     Help us, Father, to make war against our appetites when they threaten to steal our love and devotion for You.  Keep us continually grateful for the gifts...but devoted to the Giver.  Help us to savor the gifts but direct all the praise and thanksgiving to the Savior.  To God be the glory.

   

Marriage...and chocolate cake

     Sometimes there's just nothing quite like chocolate cake.
     Mt. Airy Chocolate Souflee cake from Crooks Corner in Chapel Hill, to be exact.  With fresh whipped cream.  O my, O my.  Surely God said, after He created chocolate, "And it was extraordinarily good!"
     Richard and I are here in good old Chapel Hill, celebrating our 26th wedding anniversary.  Hard to believe--26 years ago this very day.  Thank You, Father, the Giver of all good gifts.  Thank You for the gift of marriage and of children and of walking with You every single day in this crazy, challenging adventure of life.  Thank You for the good times and the hard times and the stretching times and the exasperating times and the joyous times...and all the times in between.  And thank You for the gift of friends and family to encourage us in, and along, this journey of life together.
     I love the words of Scotty Smith: "Oh, that more of us would live as partners in the gospel, as cosabaoteurs of the kingdom of darkness, rather than frittering our years away on less noble pursuits and passions.  There are so many different story lines clamoring for our marriages--so many distractions and seductions.  A marriage, just like singleness, is too precious a gift to spend on pettiness and non intentional living.  Bring more gospel sanity to our marriages, Jesus.  Rescue us, resuscitate us, refresh us."
     Lord, make our marriages count.  Make our relationships count.  Make our lives count for eternity.  And that requires refusing to live only for ourselves and instead living for You.  Not indulging our selfish desires, but seeking first and foremost to love and serve You and those You have graciously put in our lives.  "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." (Phil.2:3-5)   Whew, I have a long way to go in this department...but praise God I have a Savior who will go with me as long as it takes to become like Jesus and love unconditionally and unselfishly and graciously.
     So here's to 26 years of marriage...with my husband and with my Savior.  O Lord, thank You for forgiveness and grace, the fertilizers of love.  And, of course, thank You for Mt.Airy Chocolate Souflee Cake.  God is so so good.
    To God be the glory.
   

Peace in the darkness

      Another friend has lost a beloved child.  Tears seem inadequate.  Sorrow seems too pale a word to describe what her family must surely be feeling right now...what we are all feeling.  No parent should ever, ever have to bury their child.  I've gone to bed praying and awakened in the morning praying for this family and other dear families who have lost loved ones in recent months.  In light of this, I hope you'll forgive me for sharing some recent thoughts on the subject of facing life's storms.  Sorry it's a bit long:

        I love this definition of peace: “Peace is the calm assurance that whatever God is doing is best.”  In other words, supernatural peace is knowing that the Lord is not only in complete control but that whatever  He is doing is the ultimate best, even if at that moment we cannot possibly see how.

And so we pray and pray for our heart’s desire, but then we have to be willing to trust God with the results, because sometimes the miraculous healing or intervention comes.  But sometimes it doesn’t.  Sometimes God’s perfect plan is to allow someone we love to go on home to heaven. Sometimes His plan is to allow what from our perspective seems like a crushing disappointment or an utterly unfair outcome or even a tragedy.  At those hard, perplexing places in our lives, we want to cry out, “Why, God?  Don’t you care?  Don’t you love me?  Don’t you hear our prayers?” 

But He does.  He always does.  The difference is we don’t have all the facts...God does.  We can’t peer into eternity and see how whatever we are enduring will ultimately be used for far greater good and in far greater ways than we, with our limited vision, can ever begin to imagine.  

I’ll never forget hearing someone who had lost a baby say: “God’s will is what we would always choose if we knew what God knows.”   Peace is knowing and trusting that God’s will is what we’d choose if we knew all the facts.  When we’re chafing against God’s plans and ways, it really means we think we know better than Almighty God what’s best for us or for those we love. And that’s when we forfeit our peace.

I clearly remember one particular drive back from the Greenville hospital with the Andrews. I had one of those moments where I sort of hit a wall. Janie was still unconscious and her prognosis looked grim at best.  Yet we were talking about the extraordinary ways God was using this accident in the lives of so many high schoolers and other folks.  We had heard stories of people giving their lives to Christ as their Savior. Stories of people recommitting their lives to Christ.  All kinds of remarkable stories.

We were incredibly thankful that God was using this to affect so many for eternity.  But suddenly this mama’s heart broke, and I couldn’t help but cry out, “Yes, yes, I am so grateful God is using this so mightily.  But did it have to be our daughter?  Did God have to use our child as the sacrificial lamb?  Why does it have to be Janie who sacrifices her life, her future for all these other people?”  

I’m just being honest here.  I didn’t feel this way often. Much of the time, we trusted in God’s plans and ways--even in this hard place.  We felt a supernatural peace that God was in control and would use this for our ultimate good and His greater glory--even if we couldn’t imagine how. But every now and then, the emotions of sorrow and fear just bubbled up and overwhelmed our hearts.

Later that night, however, as I lay in bed, God gently spoke to my heart.  My daughter wasn’t the sacrificial lamb.  God’s Son was. He was the sacrifice.  He died, that she might live. Truly live.  For God so loved you, God so loved me, God so loved all of us that He gave His only begotten, beloved, sinless Son that any and all who choose to believe in Him by faith might pass from death to life and have eternal, abundant life forever. Jesus cried out on the cross, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me” so that we need never feel forsaken.

As I contemplated what God had sacrificed for me, for us, it didn’t necessarily make the pain go away, but it put everything back into perspective.  My Heavenly Father reminded me that He knew exactly what it felt like to see a beloved child suffer, and He fully understood our pain.  We have a loving Father who enters with us into our pain, weeping with us, holding us, comforting us, and encouraging us.  

The Lord reassured my anxious heart that everything, absolutely everything, that happens to us in this life first passes through His powerful, sovereign hands.  If our God of perfect love and goodness allowed it, then we can know His purposes spring out of His infinite love for us and His desire to use it for our ultimate blessing. 

We have the unbreakable promise that no matter what we will ever go through, our Savior will never leave us nor forsake us. Even at the darkest, scariest moments in that ICU room--even when one doctor told us that Janie, if she survived, would likely be either in a vegetative state or in a wheelchair and on a feeding tube for the rest of her life--God was clearly there.  We could feel His presence.  We had some very low moments, but our feet were always on solid ground, never on sinking sand.

We experienced firsthand the great truth that Corrie ten Boom’s sister, Betsie, declared as she lay dying in a Nazi concentration camp: “We must tell them what we have learned here.  We must tell them that there is no pit so deep that He is not deeper still.  They will listen to us, Corrie, because we have been here.”  

We’ve recently had several wonderful friends who have lost precious children.  I cannot comprehend such losses.  Such pain.  But God can.  

We don’t have all the answers on this side of heaven.  God saved Daniel from the lion’s den but he allowed Stephen to be stoned to death.  There are countless miraculous stories of God supernaturally delivering His children...but then permitting someone like the great German theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, to be hanged just weeks before the end of WW II.  

I’ve long since given up trying to understand the why’s.  God doesn’t have to tell us why.  It’s enough to know that He is sovereign and that He is both perfectly good and completely powerful.  In those gaps where we don’t understand, He simply calls us to trust Him who loves us infinitely, and in doing so, we experience His perfect peace.

 I loved these words by Melody Green from her book, No Compromise, about the life and death of her husband, Keith Green.  Keith was an amazingly gifted Christian singer who, at the age of 28, was killed in a small plane crash, along with two of his young children.  His wife, Melody, who was pregnant at the time, was left behind along with their youngest one-year old child. 

      This is what Melody Green wrote: "With God's help, we can eventually come out on the other side of the storm.  Then we can become vessels of grace and understanding to others who are in their season of crisis and pain.  Some cuts are deep enough to mark us forever.  But after seasons and times of healing and restoration by God, we don't have to be controlled by our wounds.  Even with healing, we may always be marked by them to the greater good of our souls. Our injuries can be our biggest windows into aspects of God's character we might not have known any other way.  I know my losses deposited something deep into my spirit.  Yes, I would have rather read a book to receive what God gave to me in those darkest of times--but some pearls are only discovered when the field looks like an impossible wasteland.  He is the God of the impossible.  The God who tells us where to dig for the treasure.  The God of great and tender mercies.  And I love Him with all my heart." 

If anyone is reading this who has suffered such an unspeakable loss, please know you are loved, not just by us, your dear friends and family, but by the One who made you and loves you more than you can ever begin to imagine.  I recently read this from Ann Voskamp: “Faith is this unwavering trust in the heart of God in the hurt of here.  Unwavering trust all the time though I don’t understand all the time.”  Amen.  

We cannot understand the tragic loss of an innocent child.  We never will this side of heaven.  But in those mystifying gaps, might we choose, by faith, to trust the heart of God even when we question what His hand might be doing.  It is enough that He knows.  He is still and forever in control.  And He is somehow, someway bringing resurrection life and light even out of the blackest, bleakest darkness in our lives.  

Until then, we weep with those who weep.  So many tears, so much pain, so much sorrow.  O help them, Lord Jesus, as only You can. Might You, the God of all comfort, wrap them in Your tender, strong embrace so that they feel and know Your loving, gracious, healing presence as never before.

And help us, Father, even in the darkness and pain, to choose to rejoice that those whom we love and miss so desperately are at this moment--at this very moment--with You and enjoying wonders and glories and infinite joy that we cannot begin to fathom.  And one day--one glorious day--we will see them again, and we will rejoice together.  In perfection.  In our true home.

     Until that day, we simply say thank You, Father, for the certain hope and joyous promise of heaven.  To God be the glory.