Raising our Ebenezer

     Happy almost New Year!  Sorry yesterday was so long, but just one more thought on Ebenezer and remembering as we prepare to launch into 2013.
     I Samuel 7 recounts the story behind the Ebenezer stone.  I'm telling you, the Bible is full of great stuff!  But a bit of background leading up to the events of chapter 7:  the Israelites have forgotten God, forgotten His faithfulness, and started to wander spiritually.  Sound like anybody you know sometimes?  As a result of their pride and unfaithfulness, they have suffered a disastrous defeat by their enemies, the Philistines.  That defeat, which also ultimately resulted in the deaths of their prophet Eli and his sons, as well as the devastating capture of the Ark of the Covenant, occurred at a place named Ebenezer.   What a horrific disaster for the nation.
      But here they are in I Samuel 7,  and the prophet Samuel tells them to repent, to return to the Lord and to remember His past faithfulness to them.  They do, and then God gives them a resounding victory over the Philistines.  As a result of all this, v.12 tell us: "Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen and called the name of it Ebenezer, saying, 'Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.'"
     How I love that!  As I mentioned yesterday, Ebenezer means "stone of help," and it was a stone of remembrance to help jog faulty memories of God's forever faithfulness in the past.  But Samuel named their stone of remembrance for the very place where Israel had suffered her most disastrous defeat!  It as if he was reminding the Israelites both of their past folly and failure, but also of God's amazing grace and goodness and forgiveness even in the face of all their mess-ups!
      His grace shines brightest in the darkness of our sin.  His power is made perfect in our weakness. (2Cor.12:9)  O how I thank Him for His grace and forgiveness for all my sin... but also for His power and love and restoration and redemption that is manifested even more strongly in our weakness and failure.
      No one is beyond His power to forgive and redeem.  No situation is hopeless with Him.  He can take our Ebenezer's of defeat and turn them into Ebenezer's of joy.  Because they are our Ebenezer of remembering Him who paid it all for us on the cross--took our sin and gave us His righteousness.  Isn't that just how God works: He takes ALL things--sorrow and gladness, tragedy and triumph, weakness and strength--and works them for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purposes. (Rom.5:8)
      And so we raise our Ebenezer and remember, at the close of this old year, "Hitherto hath the Lord helped us," and far into the distant horizon of forever, we know and trust He will help us till we reach our heavenly home.  He will help us, love us, sustain us, strengthen us, hold us, encourage us, guide us in the new year ahead.
     How I love the words to the beautiful hymn, "Come Thou Fount."  May they be our prayer in 2113:

Come Thou Fount of every blessing

Tune my heart to sing Thy grace

Streams of mercy never ceasing

Call for songs of loudest praise

Teach me some melodious sonnet

Sung by flaming tongues above

I'll praise the mount I'm fixed upon it

Mount of Thy redeeming love.

Here I raise my Ebenezer

Hither by Thy help I come

And I hope by Thy good pleasure

Safely to arrive at home

Jesus sought me when a stranger

Wondering from the fold of God

He, to rescue me from danger

Interposed His precious blood.

O to grace how great a debtor

Daily I'm constrained to be!

Let Thy goodness like a fetter, 

Bind my wandering heart to Thee.

Prone to wander, Lord I feel it,

Prone to leave the God i love

Here's my heart, Lord, take and seal it,

Seal it for Thy courts above.

     I'll never sing this song the same way again--for now I will be raising my Ebenezer in my heart--and remember and know "hither by Thy help I come."  All by His help.  All by His grace.  All for His glory.

    Yes, Lord, that is me--prone to wander, prone to leave the God I love--but take my heart and seal it, seal it throughout this coming year and bind it to Yours until that day You take me home.  

     Might this be our prayer as we walk with Him daily in the 8,760 hours of this year ahead that He is giving us.  One day at a time.  One hour at a time.  One minute at a time.  To God be the glory.

Hitherto!

     Our Ebenezer.
     Ebenezer means "stone of help," and a very dear friend, Beth Page, gave us this one when Janie was in the ICU at the hospital in Greenville.  At that point, things were still pretty dire.  Still in a coma.  Still no evidence of when or if or how she might ever wake up.  Still battling fevers and lung problems. Still no earthly idea what the future would hold or look like for her or for us.
      But the words on our Ebenezer said it all: "Hitherto hath the Lord helped us." (I Sam.7:12)  For He had--every step of the way.  Helped us, sustained us, encouraged us, provided for us.  Sent us dear friends and family who took incredible care of us and kept us going and even laughing.  Sent us amazing nurses and doctors and hospital staff who cared for Janie in every way imaginable.  And just kept sending us Himself.  Relentlessly sending us Himself.
     Yes, He helped us and helped us and helped us in too many ways to recount.  Thank You, Father. Might we never forget.
     And that is what an Ebenezer is all about.  It's a stone of remembrance--a marker to help remember God's faithfulness in the past. Don't we all need them?  We tend to forget so quickly, and when we forget, we tend to grow discouraged or disgruntled.  We begin to fret and worry or even panic.  Because we forget who God is, what He has done, and what He can do.  It's why we have to keep reminding ourselves of His faithfulness to us in the past.  It's why we have to keep thanking Him for His gifts in the present.  It's why we have to keep going to Him in His Word to hear what He has to say to us for each new day before us.
     And when we remember and thank Him for His faithfulness, His grace, His goodness, His gifts, well, then, we find ourselves able to breathe again.  It's as if those talons of fear or doubt or sorrow loosen their fierce grip on our hearts, and we suddenly find ourselves able to breathe deeply into His love for us.  Remembering releases the pain... and gratitude grows the trust.
     Just yesterday I read these words from the great  Charles Spurgeon on this very verse.  God is something, isn't He?  Hope they encourage you as much as they did me:
     
     "The word "hitherto" seems like a hand pointing in the direction of the past. Twenty years or seventy, and yet, "hitherto the Lord hath helped!" Through poverty, through wealth, through sickness, through health, at home, abroad, on the land, on the sea, in honour, in dishonour, in perplexity, in joy, in trial, in triumph, in prayer, in temptation, "hitherto hath the Lord helped us!" We delight to look down a long avenue of trees. It is delightful to gaze from end to end of the long vista, a sort of verdant temple, with its branching pillars and its arches of leaves; even so look down the long aisles of your years, at the green boughs of mercy overhead, and the strong pillars of lovingkindness and faithfulness which bear up your joys. Are there no birds in yonder branches singing? Surely there must be many, and they all sing of mercy received "hitherto."
      But the word also points forward. For when a man gets up to a certain mark and writes "hitherto," he is not yet at the end, there is still a distance to be traversed. More trials, more joys; more temptations, more triumphs; more prayers, more answers; more toils, more strength; more fights, more victories; and then come sickness, old age, disease, death. Is it over now? No! there is more yet-awakening in Jesus' likeness, thrones, harps, songs, psalms, white raiment, the face of Jesus, the society of saints, the glory of God, the fulness of eternity, the infinity of bliss. O be of good courage, believer, and with grateful confidence raise thy "Ebenezer," for--
     He who hath helped thee hitherto will help thee all thy journey through.
     When read in heaven's light how glorious and marvellous a prospect will thy "hitherto" unfold to thy grateful eye!"

     Good stuff!  Raise your Ebenezer and remember... and in remembering, be thankful for the past and trusting for the future.  On the cusp of this new year, remember:  He who has helped us hitherto will not fail us now... or ever.
     To our forever and ever faithful God be all the glory.

Remembering

     Well, the New Year is almost upon us.  Hard to believe, isn't it, that another year has come and gone?  And for many of us, what a year it has been.  Full of great joys but also great sorrows.  A year of challenges we could not have imagined... but also a year of graces we had not anticipated.  We have experienced God's relentless strength in the hardest of times as well as His utterly undeserved mercy and favor.
     So much of our year has been shaped by Janie's accident, and you know what, I think that is a good thing.  Because I never want to forget.  I never want to forget God's tender but powerful presence in that ICU with us.  I never want to forget those moments in the middle of the night when all was darkness save the lights of machines keeping her alive, and all was quiet save the constant beep and buzz and occasional alarm of ventilator and myriad monitors.  Because God was in that room.  So real, so palpably present, I felt I could reach out and touch Him.
     But I didn't need to... because He continually had His arms wrapped around me... and around our daughter... and around my husband... and around our family... and around all who entered that room.  He was there.  He was real.  And He was powerful and awesome and big... and yet so gentle, so sustaining, so constant.  No, I don't ever want to forget.
     Nor do I want to forget the miracle He wrought in Janie's healing.  From hopeless to "prisoners of hope."  From still and helpless and unconscious and unable to do one thing in this world for herself... to walking and talking and laughing and eating and going to school and celebrating Christmas with all our family.  From death to life.
     That's what God can do.  That is the God we serve.  May we never ever forget that He can do the impossible.  And that He is the God who rolls away stones.  Stones not only of sickness, but stones of addiction and depression and exhaustion and separation and desperation.  He can heal relationships as well as bodies and souls.
     And in those hard moments where the healing does not come in this life... well, then He is still more than enough.  He is the One who came and entered our hard, dark world and who fully knows and understands all our sorrows and fears and unmet desires.  He is with us in them... right there.  Just as He was with us in that ICU.  And He is moving and redeeming even when we cannot see evidence of it.  Just as He was healing Janie in His own good time... even as she slept unconscious and unaware.
     She had her healing on this side of heaven.  We will all have times where that healing, that ultimate restoration may not come till the other side.  But in that gap, we trust.  That is our faith.  That even when we cannot see or feel or understand...  God does. God is there.  God is working.  God has a plan.  And somehow, someway, it will all be ultimately glorious.
      We can know and believe that... because after the horror of the cross came the joy of the empty tomb.  The stone was rolled away, and we serve a resurrected Lord.  From the absolute worst the world could ever imagine, God brought the joyous best we could never begin to dream even in our wildest dreams.
     So wherever you are right now--whether in the storm or the calm or the gap between, remember His faithfulness to you in the past. Stop and recount those blessings, those times of help, those gifts of His sustaining presence.  And then choose to trust Him with the future.  He has totally got it.  Totally.
     Hope you don't mind if I continue on this theme a bit more the next day or two.  As my family often complains, I never seem to be at a lack for words!  Sorry.  But there's an Ebenezer we to discuss, Lord wiling.  Till then, to God be the glory... for all He has done, for all He is doing, and for all He will do.

Preach the gospel

     I can't remember where on earth I first heard this, but I was reminded today that we need to preach the gospel to ourselves every single day.  When it comes to hearing the gospel, there's such a temptation for believers to think, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know all that.  I'm already saved.  Been there.  Done that. Tell me something I don't know."  We think we're ready to move on, but we should never leave behind a life-changing amazement, wonder, and gratitude in and for the gospel.  
     As C.J. Mahaney writes, "the first and most important thing you can do--always--is simply to make sure the gospel is at the very center of your life... What is it that can make the gospel of God and His grace more deeply and consistently amazing to us?  In our busy lives, how can we more often be gripped by gratitude and enflamed by passion for the Savior... and cast off lukewarmness and dullness in our spiritual experience?  For me, grace is never more amazing than when I'm looking intensely at the cross, and I believe the same will be true for every child of God. There's nothing more overpowering and captivating to the soul than to climb Calvary's mountain with childlike attentiveness and wonder, with all the distractions and wrong assumptions cleared away."
     It's all about the cross.  That's the essence of the gospel. And the gospel is the essence of joyful lives.
     Isn't it so easy, however, to get off-track?  We desire to do better and be better--nothing wrong with that... unless it's striving.  Striving in our strength.  Assuming that somehow it's all up to me to become a better person, a more worthy child of God.  And before we know it, we're discouraged and frustrated and exhausted.  Not to mention generally unpleasant to be around, I'm sure.
     Because the simple truth is: it's not up to us.  It's all up to Christ.  It's ALL about what HE did for us on the cross and about daily accepting the glorious truth of His atoning work to save us from our sin and from ourselves and from our impossible standards.  We simply cannot earn it or deserve it or try harder for it.  Nor can our children nor any of our loved ones.  And when we try to measure them by our unattainable standards, they will fall as absolutely flat as we do.  What a burden to place upon those we love.
     But when we cease striving and instead preach the gospel to ourselves, we're reminded that it's His grace that saves us and sustains us and enables us.  His grace frees us from ourselves.  His grace saves us not only from our enslavement to sin but our enslavement to performance.  And in the freedom of recognizing that we can never "measure up," but that Christ paid the price we could never ever pay, we are freed to love Him more fully, obey Him more gratefully, and serve Him more joyously.
     Maybe you didn't need reminding... but I did.  I do... every single day.
     When I fail and feel like a failure, I can say, "Ahh, but for this we have Jesus."  When I mess up with my children or struggle with some frustrating habit... "but for this we have Jesus."  When I forget His grace or His mercy or His goodness and start to feel entitled or demanding, I stop and recall the scandalous gospel: Jesus, Almighty Glorious God, died on a cross for my sin, my selfishness, my pride, my greed, my envy.  And all that hateful, ugliness has been fully paid for and dealt with by my sinless Savior.  How can I live with anything other than overwhelming gratitude for the grace that has been bestowed upon me?  
     Preach the gospel to yourself today.  And while you're at it, remind yourself that the same gospel saves and frees those you love.  Might the glory of His grace overwhelm us this day... and every day.
    To God be the glory.
   
   

One more look back

Amidst the mayhem of trying to clean up today, just thought I'd include a few happy memories from Christmas Day at my sister-in-law and brother's house:

     A few good men... looking terribly handsome in their red vests!  (The crowns were from the group kazoo play-along.  You cannot imagine what Christmas carols sound like when played by a bunch of kazoos.  Well actually, don't even try to imagine it.)
     And then, of course, there's another exceptionally good looking fellow in a red Christmas sweater.  His adoring sisters are beside him:

     Can't leave out the God-is-good-dessert-table.  Seriously, if you could have seen all the cakes and cookies and pies, you'd be saying the same thing--"Praise God!"

     And have to include just one shot of a few of the kazoo players (we were gathered in a big circle).  If you notice a confused look on some of the faces, that would be due to... uh... confusion.  We may not have produced beautiful music, but we had a blast!

      It's just good to remember the blessings.  Thank You, Lord Jesus.  You are the whole reason for the celebration.  You are the Source and Joy of our songs.  Forgive us for so quickly forgetting You in our relentless quest to get it all done... or now, to get it all cleaned up!
     "Out of the ivory palaces, into a world of woe, only His great, eternal love made my Savior go."  (Henry Barraclough)  Happy birthday, Lord Jesus.  Help us to take the wonder and joy of Your coming  at Bethlehem with us into the coming year.  We don't know what the next 12 months will hold, but as long as You hold this world together, well then, we know You will hold us together as well.  Not somehow, but triumphantly.   To God be the glory.

A new perspective

     Whew.
     That just about sums it up.  Whew.
     For the first time in several days, I'm actually relaxed and sitting quietly with Moses, both of us enjoying a little quiet time with the Lord.  He's a very spiritual dog.  Right now, the rain pours down outside, and Moses happily lolls on his back, all four feet up in the air.  His favorite, most relaxed position.  It's as if he realizes life has suddenly calmed down, the pressure seems to have evaporated, and he can finally exhale along with the rest of us.
     I really love Christmas, and for most of the glorious Advent season, I felt joy and wonder and gratitude.  Even in the midst of much travail and tragedy in the world, God kept reminding me that He is our hope and that such sorrow is why He came.  That darkness is why He sent His indefatigable Light.
     But the last couple of days--that final push to the finish line--I suddenly recognized how far behind I was and life shifted into warp speed.  I'm not a Star Trekkie, but that moment when the Enterprise suddenly zipped into overdrive and zoomed past all the stars, well, that pretty much reflected my final exhausting push in the hours before Christmas.  Doesn't lead to unassailable joy, that's for sure.   Forgive me, Father.
    There's so much build up to Christmas that when the glorious day is finally and suddenly over, you feel somewhat dazed.  Maybe even a bit empty.  Yesterday was so much fun for us--all our extended family together to celebrate.  Lots of eating (praise God), lots of laughing and talking, lots of kazoo playing (a relatively new family tradition that I won't explain right now), and lots of singing accompanied by my amazing niece's violin playing.  Thank You, Lord, for the gift of Christmas spent with those we love.
     But, well, then there's the day after... when all I seem to see is mess and piles and dirty clothes and empty boxes and food and more food.  And obscene amounts of Christmas decorations that all need to be put away.  Mercy, how on earth will we ever get it all done?  Just thinking about this Herculean task makes me want to go take a nap.  Actually, just contemplating it makes me want to cry.  Good grief.
     So, that's why old Moses and I decided it was time to take a break and go talk to the Lord about it.  And as always, He changes everything.
     "If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God.  Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.  For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God." (Col.3:1-3)
     Time to stop looking around and start looking up.
     Time to remember it's not about all the stuff but all about the Savior.
     Time to ask God to give me His heavenly perspective rather than my earth-bound view.  For that makes all the difference.  My world may be a chaotic mess... but He is still in complete control, reigning on high, and redeeming and restoring the world and His people.  Where we see problems... He sees potential.  Where we feel weak... then He is strong.  And when we get to the end of ourselves and our strength and our joy... well, then that's when He can really begin to go to work and do the supernatural in our hearts and in our hopes.   I think He just loves to take utter messes and make impossibly beautiful music.
     So, for everyone struggling with a "day after..." mentality, why don't you take a few minutes to allow God to give you an attitude adjustment.  There's nothing like trading in your moribund perspective for His heavenly one.  He's waiting and ready.  To God be the glory.
   

Begun

     Waiting.  Waiting for the coming of the Messiah.  Almost here.
     Well, waiting... but working like a Trojan while waiting.  I was way behind this year.  As opposed to all the other years when I had it all together... yeah, right.  But, I must say, this year has been particularly disorganized.  I know we have a good excuse, but still, that inner Type A just keeps shouting, "Come on!  Get it done!  Who are you forgetting!  Hurry!"
      And so, finally, I sit before the tree, faithful old Moses at my feet, and I read the familiar, beautiful old words once again: "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth."  Once again, I'm awed by the wonder of it all: God moved into our neighborhood.  Our messy, disorganized, sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes joyful neighborhood.
      He now lives here.  The Sovereign Almighty Lord.  Right here.  With us.  And He's never moving out of the neighborhood.  Even when I have a crummy attitude or am ungrateful or undeserving or utterly unbecoming.  He's staying right here.  I know.... because when He moved in on Christmas, He made it a permanent, done deal at Calvary.  Thank You thank You thank You, Lord Jesus.
     So Merry Christmas.  Just thought I'd include something beautiful I read from the book, Touching Wonder by John Blasé:
        "I AM.  I am the Mighty One.  Even though I AM beyond time, I have been and will be in all times: tomorrow, the now, even long ago.
     Humans have been shouting their question for millennia: Why in God's name won't You show up?  They say it when the moment seems to demand a force to do good: If you are God, then do something. But to show up in those moments would be to come in your name, not Mine.  My ways are not your ways.
     It was no different on the night in question.  The weary world pleaded for power.  I chose weakness.
     I had shaped Mary in her mother's womb, fashioned her from nothing into something.  I had crafted her frame so as to support the weight of her life.  Her days had been prepared before she lived even one.  I had gone before her, been behind, and on all sides.  I am the Mighty One.  And I was with her then as she writhe Love to live.
     She was brave.  Only Joseph by her side, a cramped place to give birth, noise everywhere.  And more.  As she screamed out in pain, the Deceiver stood ready to devour My Son.  The heavens shook with war.  Michael and his angels reeled.  Mighty One, do something!
     I AM.
     I had given My word: You'll give birth to your babies in pain. Mary held fast to hers: Let it be to me.   And so it was.
     Joseph thought Mary pushed.  The truth is, she shook and rocked on exhausted knees as I held her by My strong right arm and the brightness grew until she could bear no more.  Time pulled eternity from the womb of a girl, and bloodstained Love spilled on the hay.
     Bravely done, My child.  It is only just beginning."

     Thank You, Father, for sending the Son.  It has begun.  Your invasion of enemy-occupied territory by Love.  To God be the glory.