Remember...and rejoice

          Seven years ago today, this is where we were.
          Four precious girls from Broughton high school were in a wreck on August 24, and praise God none of them were killed.  Our daughter suffered a traumatic brain injury while her dear friend, Tessa, was badly hurt with multiple broken bones.  Janie was unconscious and in a coma, and for two long weeks, she was utterly unresponsive and unable to be awakened by anyone or anything.
            I've shared about all this earlier on the blog, so I won't go into it.  But as I sat in church today, I was reminded afresh of why we have to recall the great things God has done.  Why we have to remember who our Lord is and rehearse what He has done.
          The psalmist in Psalm 77 expresses it so beautifully.  The writer is in a desperate, dark place, but by an act of the will, he tells himself to think back on his mighty God and recall what great things his God has done:
        "In the day of my trouble, I seek the Lord; in the night my hand is stretched out without wearying; my soul refuses to be comforted...I said, 'Let me remember my song in the night; let me meditate in my heart. Then my spirit made a diligent search; Will the Lord spurn forever, and never again be favorable?...Then I said, 'I will appeal to this, to the years of the right hand of the Most High.' I will remember the deeds of the Lord; yes I will remember your wonders of old. I will ponder all your work and meditate on your holy deeds. Your way, O God, is holy. What god is great like our God? You are the God who works wonders; You have made known your might among the peoples." (Ps.77:2,6-7,10-14)  Oh my, that's some an awfully stuff!
        The psalmist is exhorting himself--and us--to remember and rehearse who God is and what He has done.  Remember His goodness, His grace, His forgiveness, His power, His love.  Remember how He saved us. Remember how our sins enslaved us, rendering us helpless and hopeless. We need to remember our chains...and then, because of our mighty and glorious Savior, we need to remember our chains are gone.
        Remember how we were just as powerless and unable to free ourselves as our daughter was when she was unconscious and on that ventilator.  Not her nurses, not her doctors, not her parents, not her siblings, not her friends, no one and nothing could save and awaken our daughter.  Only God could do that.
           Only God.
           Only God could come to this earth and live the perfect sinless life we could not live.
           Only God could go to the cross, bearing not His sins but ours.
           Only God could suffer the punishment that our sins demanded.
           Only God could die the death that we deserved.
           Only God could take our sins and in exchange give us Jesus' perfect righteousness.
           Only God could rise from the dead and thereby give us His new resurrection life.
           Only God could take our old dead bones and make them dance with glorious life...replace our sorrow with rejoicing...exchange our hopelessness with purpose and joy.  Because Jesus didn't come to make bad people good, but to make dead people alive.
          And only God could--one happy, happy day--awaken our daughter out of her coma and restore her back to life.  Bring her back to us--laughing, talking, singing, walking, living, and worshipping.  To us, it literally felt like our God had brought her from death back to life.
          But we have to remember.  We don't want to forget that dark and desperate time.  We don't want to forget how the Lord's presence truly sustained us day after day, giving us His hope and strength. We don't want to forget His priceless gift of friends and family all during that time.  We don't want to forget how God gave us wonderful doctors and nurses and therapists.  We don't want to forget God's amazing grace, His goodness, His love, His power--all when we had none of our own.               And we don't ever want to forget how our mighty Lord restored Janie back to life.  Because that's what He does...as it's been said, "God works best in a graveyard."  In the graveyards of despair or disease or divorce or defeat or desperation.  We all have them...but our God is greater.  Greater even than death.  Greater even than whatever darkness you might be enduring right now.
          So today, right now, please choose to remember.  Remember who your glorious God is--the Maker of heaven and earth. The Alpha and Omega.  The tender Good Shepherd.  The powerful Lion of Judah.  The Savior, Redeemer and Friend.  Read His Word and recount out loud who He is and what He has done.  And remember what He has done in your life.  The countless times He encouraged you when you were in a pit...or sustained you in a time of deep need...or brought a friend along at just the right time...or rescued you from terrible peril...or saved you from sins.  Oh glorious, amazing grace that saved a wretch like me, and you.
          Only God could do that--and will do that--all the way till He brings us to our glorious, eternal Home.  But we have to choose to remember and recall so that we be reminded that He who is forever faithful, will do it again and again and again.
          Remembering will fuel your faith in the only One who is worthy.  And remembering will fill you with rejoicing.

          So on this day, our family remembers...and rejoices.  Yes, Lord, "You are the God who works wonders; You have made known your might among the peoples."  We praise You for who you are and what You have done...and we trust You with our future all the way till You take us Home.  And in the meantime, Father, keep us trusting and rejoicing in You.

           To God be all the glory.

Bits and pieces

       "When they had all had enough to eat, He said to His disciples, 'Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted.'" (John 6:12)
         I've often thought about that.  Here was the Maker, Creator and Sustainer of the universe.  He had just blessed and broken a few tiny fish and a couple of rolls and miraculously produced enough food to feed and satisfy thousands.  With a word, with a mere breath, He could have instantly created a sumptuous feast for anyone and everyone. Yet the Almighty One commands His disciples to go around and gather up the leftovers. Gather the tiny bits and pieces, maybe even from the ground.  He could make brand new beautiful rolls and fish. Why worry about those crummy, little leftovers?
         Because He's the Good Shepherd.  The Bread of Life. The Way, the Truth, and the Life.  The Light of the World.  The Lamb of God who came to take away the sin of the world.  The Savior and Redeemer who never gives up on us, who never leaves us, who never forsakes us, who never stops loving us. 
       And nothing--absolutely nothing--is wasted with our Lord.  Not our challenges, not our joys, not our weaknesses, not our strengths, not our greatest sorrows or our deepest shame, not one moment of any of our lives.  He sees and knows and cares about each moment and He uses every single one of them for our ultimate good and His glory.  There is nothing about your life or mine that is insignificant to Him, and He can take our tiniest fragments and mega-multiply them!
         This I know by faith...but sometime-well, actually, oftentimes--in the nitty gritty of life, the disappointments and heartaches, I forget. But His Word reveals to us and reminds us that the King of glory is sovereign.  He is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all--good.  He makes no mistakes and wastes no moments. Not in your life nor in mine.
         And He tells us to gather the leftover pieces...for He will somehow, someway use them all for our good and His glory.  Hand Him your weak little bits of energy.  Your tiny fragments of faith.  Your teeny stores of love.  Your nearly nonexistent snippets of patience.  Your minuscule scraps of hope.  Give those bits and pieces to Him...then watch what He will do with them.  He who crafted the stars and formed the mountains with a word will multiply and magnify.  He'll revive and renew.  He'll sustain and strengthen.  He will take our too littles and not enoughs and transform them into occasions for His glory and goodness to be experienced and revealed in our lives.
         I don't know what your bits and pieces might be today.  But we all have them--and Jesus wastes not one of them.  He tells us to gather those broken fragments and place them in His nail-scared, omnipotent hands.  If He can turn a few rolls and a couple of sardine-sized fish into a feast for thousands, imagine what He can do with our teeny tiny pitiful leftovers.  He is the God who "is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine according to His power that is at work within us..." (Eph.3:20)  Not us, but Him.  And He gets all the glory.
           Today, hand Him your too littles and too lates.  Trust Him. Obey Him.  Wait on Him.  Praise Him, even with those leftovers and fragments. He will always be more than enough.
           To God be the glory.
 

Thoughts on Prayer, Part 2

        Clearly I have given in to the doldrums of summer.  I'd planned to quickly follow up that last post ("A few thoughts on Prayer, Part 1") with some wonderful suggestions for prayer from John Piper.  But then here we are...several weeks later.  Where, oh where, has the summer gone?? 
        If ever there's proof that I need a schedule to coral my laziness and tendency to waste time, well, here it is.  Sigh.  I do love summer with it's exploding beauty, languid timeline, and simple joys like--

(Oh yes--when God created the Dairy Queen butterscotch dip ice cream cone, He surely said, "It is mighty good!")
         But there comes a time when you've gotta take yourself by the scruff of the neck and say, "Okay. Enough! Time to get back on track!"  That time is now. 
         So even while dreaming of that ridiculously delicious ice cream cone, I wanted to share John Piper's suggestions for how to pray for the soul (yours as well as those you love)--

"1. The first thing my soul needs is an inclination to God and His Word. Without that, nothing else will happen of any value in my life. I must want to know God and read his Word and draw near to Him. Where does that "want to" come from? It comes from God. So Psalm 119:36 teaches us to pray, "Incline my heart to Your testimonies and not to gain."

2. Next I need to have the eyes of my heart opened, so that when my inclination leads me to the Word I see what is really there and not just my own ideas. Who opens the eyes of the heart? God does. So Psalm 119:18 teaches us to pray, "Open my eyes, that I may behold wonderful things from Your law."

3. Then I need for my heart to be enlightened with these "wonders." I need to perceive glory in them and not just interesting facts. Who enlightens the heart? God does. So Ephesians 1:18 teaches us to pray "That the eyes of your heart may be enlightened."

4. Then I am concerned that my heart is fragmented and that parts of it might remain in the dark while other parts are enlightened. So I long for my heart to be united for God. Where does that wholeness and unity come from? From God. So Psalm 86:11 teaches us to pray, "O Lord, I will walk in Your truth; unite my heart to fear Your name."

5. What I really want from all this engagement with the Word of God and the work of His Spirit in answer to my prayers is that my heart will be satisfied with God and not with the world. Where does that satisfaction come from? It comes from God. So Psalm 90:14 teaches us to pray, “Satisfy us in the morning with Thy steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.”

6.But I don’t want my happiness to be fragile or weak, but to be strong and durable in the face of the worst adversities. I want to be strong in joy, and persevering during the dark seasons. Where does that strength and durability come from? It comes from God. So Ephesians 3:16 teaches us to pray, ‘[That] God would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man.’

7. I do not want my strength in Christ to simply be fruitful for me, but for others. Clearly, ‘it is more blessed to give than to receive’ (Acts 20:35). So I want to produce good deeds and works of love for others, so that the glory of God will be seen in my life, and others will taste and see that the Lord is good. Who produces these good deeds? God does. So Colossians 1:10 teaches us to pray, "That [we] will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord . . . bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.”

8. Finally, lest the ultimate aim of it all be missed, I pray day after day—as a kind of banner flying over all my prayers—‘Hallowed be Thy name’ (Mt. 6:9).  Lord, cause Your name to be known and feared and loved and cherished and admired and praised and trusted because of my life and my ministry.

All this I pray "in Jesus' name," because God gives these things to my soul only because Jesus died for me and removed the wrath of God so that the Father might "freely give me all things" (Romans 8:32).

Lord, teach us to pray, from beginning to end, in a biblical way with a biblical view of how You act in the world. Show us Yourself and how You work so that we might pray as we ought. And teach us to pray as we ought so that we might see how You work.”

        Good stuff! May Piper's words (which are all just based on God's perfect Word) encourage and reinvigorate our prayer lives.  (Because I, for one, know that I need all the help I can get!)
         Thank You, Father, for summer, for forgiveness, for fresh starts, for the gift of prayer, and for the unfathomable joy of knowing that You--the Almighty God of heaven and earth--still delight to hear from us and speak to us.  Amazing, amazing grace.  Teach us to pray, Father.  Help us to pray.  Or perhaps we begin by simply and humbly admitting and asking--please give us a will and a desire to pray.   We love You, Abba. 
          To God be the glory.