The Legacy of Babel

Sometimes I do that church girl thing where I sing lyrics and raise my hands and swear I realllllly mean what I'm singing when the band is playing songs like

You're all I want, You're all I need, You're everything, everything...

You are the source of life, I can't be left behind, no one else will do...

In Christ alone, my hope is found...

You are the only one I need, I bow all of me at your feet...

And I go home, and I get on Pinterest and I start looking at pictures of glamorous models wearing flowy, oversized shirts with print leggings and $200 boots.  I get on SteepandCheap and I think my Awesome Quotient would definitely improve if I bought Columbia and Marmot (even though I probably spend -.3% of my year hiking).  I click away without buying anything, thinking I've won an antimaterialism victory and should probably be given a badge of honor.

I hang out with my small group, and I really hope that they think I'm well-read and well-spoken and spiritually mature.  Sometimes I toss in a C.S. Lewis reference to seal the deal.  I try not to mention allllllll the wonderful things I'm involved in because, well, THAT wouldn't be humble. 

Prone to wander, Lord I feel it.

As humans, we're born with hearts that wander.  We're hungry.  We want stuff.  I don't just mean stuff, as in the latest and greatest iThing.  I mean we want to be thought of as important.  We want to succeed.  We want our kids to behave in public so people don't know we struggle with disciplining them with consistency at home.  We want husbands who earn "enough" or have a sense of style, or work out or are "good enough" for our _______________ (parents, college reunions, coworkers' Christmas parties, etc.). 

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

So I resisted the urge to buy the Black Diamond rock climbing harness (that I might use once a year).  Yay wallet.  You've lived to see another day of not being emptied by woeful materialistic impulse.  But as soon as I think that's my victory, I've tricked myself into thinking the symptom is the problem.  Spending money on stuff isn't the evil to be avoided here.   

See, the thing is, I live under the legacy of Babel. 

We are a species of intellect and spirit and ambition, and those things require an object.  I mean, when's the last time you heard about milk cows protesting the unfair advantage that organic cows have and fighting for equal grazing rights?  Or about a grizzly bear carefully removing the meat from the salmon so he could stuff it and post it on the mantle in his cave to show off to his bear buddies.  It just doesn't happen. 

This isn't something that emerged with social media.  James, the first New Testament book written, by the guy whose name we used for the book even says

"What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you?  Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?  You desire and do not have, so you murder.  You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel."

We are passionate people, and rightly so.  We are sensory and relational and spiritual and dynamic.  We are chasers and supporters and builders.  But to what end?  We have the capability of pouring out heart, soul and paint on a canvas to communicate something that authors try desperately their whole lives to say.  We start clubs, form bands, rally behind organizations.  But to what end? 

This is the legacy of Babel - the appetite of the human heart for glory, the chasing after the wind. 

Augustine said "You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you."

Lewis said "It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."

The trouble, see, is not the appetite itself, but the object we set before it. The people of Babel were content with setting the whole of their desire on raising a tower to make themselves famous.  The failure of Babel to choose something worthy of their affection became their downfall.  Mortar and stone crumble to ruin.  Cars are wrecked into twisted, mangled heaps of metal.  Even the finest paintings set under lock and key can be stolen or destroyed in a fire.  To willfully ignore the finitude of what is tangible is to consciously choose a life of settling.  

When I set my heart on dance or Instagram or literacy, I will be disappointed, for the object of my passions is exhaustible and finite.  When I set my heart on the One who is the all-powerful, glorious, wholly incomprehensible Creator, Sustainer, Rescuer of the world, there will never be a moment that will be wasted, not a second of regret.  Your passions are only as grand as the object they pursue. 

So, dear heart, who loves to desire and pursue and create, how exhaustible is the object of your affections?  Do you honestly think you can do better than a wild, passionate God who rages over injustice yet dispels fear?  One who sees that the finch is fed and the rainbow always appears with its promise in ROY G. BIV order?  One who knows what you want, but gives what you need?  This One only could captivate our hearts for an eternity.

Little Miss Sunshine    

Why you hate Christmas

                                                                                 All is calm,

All is bright.

I should say not.  Not in the slightest.  There's nothing about Christmas that is calm and bright.  Well, maybe bright in a few places, but most certainly not calm.  That's why secretly you don't like Christmas.  You think it's supposed to be all silent night and calm and bright and peace on earth and mercy mild.  No wonder you don't like it.  You eat more than you should.  You have to hang out with people you may or may not like.  You have to show up to work Christmas parties that have the potential to be awkward and boring.  You probably have to clean your house.  Traffic is crazy because everyone's Aunt Mathilda from Milwaukee is in town and lost on the freeway.  Your neighbor has better Christmas lights.  Your neighbor's kid is getting the Gismopieceofcrap 2500 and your kid is only getting the 2450.  You have to decide with your significant whoever whose family you're spending time with when, and who you'll offend if you don't. 

On top of all that, you've got all this Christmas music trying to convince you it's the most wonderful time of the year and that your life should be calm and bright, not to mention in order.  Everyone should be getting along and enjoy spending time together.  You should have a beautiful Christmas photo and letter that you send out to your 200 closest friends heralding all your accomplishments this year.  You should be holly and jolly - whatever that means. 

All this is about the Baby, right, the one born in a manger, which really wasn't a feed trough and laid on hay that was fresh and practically sterilized.  He was lulled to sleep by angels' songs, greeted by jolly, grandfathery shepherds and thrown a baby shower by wise men who were there the night he was born. 

Ha. 

Well, I have some good news, and some bad news.  The bad news is, if you celebrate that kind of Christmas, you will probably do your best to convince yourself it's not a miserable holiday, and you just might succeed.  You might do such a good job of tricking yourself that you just love the holiday stress  bustle and spending more money than you have gift giving that you just have yourself a miserable little Christmas every year.  That is bad news, indeed.

The good news is, the real Christmas is a great deal less calm, peaceful and most wonderful time of the yearish.  In fact, aside from the fact that the Messiah was coming, it was really quite a mess. 

Four hundred years of silence between God and His people. 

An oppressive Roman rule.

A (probably teenage) mom who wasn't married yet, but claimed that she hadn't slept with her fiancee, that the child was really the Son of God because an angel told her so.

The condemnation of a whole town, not just on her, but on all the people she loved (talk about starting off on the wrong foot with the inlaws). 

Lots of traffic on the roads because of the Roman decree to be registered.

All the inns are booked, sorry, there's a barn/cave/nasty hole out back, sleep in that.

Giving birth to a baby without sisters or a mother or probably even a midwife, just a carpenter husband and a donkey or two.

Dirty, smelly, redneck shepherds scared out of their socks by a "heavenly host" (a whole flipping lot of supernatural warrior dudes - not girly angels with folded hands and long, flowy hair) telling them to go to Bethlehem because after 400 agonizing years, God has literally broken the silence with the Word, Immanuel, God with us.

A bunch of redneck shepherds showing up to the delivery room/barn/cave/nasty hole asking a lot of questions and probably making a lot of ruckus, and adding to it by exuberantly shushing each other.

A bunch of some of the best storytellers scrambling through hill and dale to spread the greatest story ever told.

More questions than answers about how this tiny, hungry God/baby was supposed to be the Savior of the world.

That's the real Christmas.  God showing up to carry out a rescue that the best tactical operations team couldn't have dreamed up.  Instead of just speaking from heaven and commanding everyone's obedience, let's send someone in.  Not an angel, let's send Jesus.  No, We won't send Him on a flaming chariot coming in from the sky, we'll have Him start from scratch, as a baby.  Let's have Him be born to someone who isn't married yet so they don't think He's just a normal kid.  We'll arrange it so everyone's welcome.  There will be shepherds and kings (but they'll come later) and grownups and kids.  He won't be what they're expecting.  What they want is someone to save them from the Romans, someone to show up and lead a rebellion.  What I'm going to do is save them from their brokenness, save them from the inside out. 

Now that's a Merry Christmas.

May your days be full of real Christmas, and may all your Christmases be a color appropriate for the climate in which you live,

Little Miss Sunshine

Once Upon a Blind Date

Once upon a time, I had a job.  At that job, there was a student teacher intern.  That student teacher intern had a boyfriend.  Her boyfriend had a friend, and that friend was tired of being single.  (And the green grass grows all around, all around, and the green grass grows all around... Barney singalong, anyone?)  So this friend of the boyfriend if he knew anyone he could set him up with, and the boyfriend said, "Yes, her name is Little Miss Sunshine".

Spring turned into summer (but since summer in Phoenix doesn't end til October, it was still summer), and nothing had happened.  The boyfriend of the student teacher intern who worked at the school where I worked last year brought it up again at the end of the summer.  He had asked me about it in the spring, and I said "Sure, why not?".  He asked me again in the summer; and I said "Sure, why not?.  (It's how I get roped into most of my adventures.)  So he gave away my number...    

Fast forward a few days - he texted me.  I thought he was super funny and a little ridiculous.  We were scheduled to go on a double date with the friends next Wednesday, but he asked if I wanted to get coffee on the Friday before as kind of a pre-date.  I said, you guessed it, "Sure, why not?".

Well, we did get coffee, but I'll tell you right now, it wasn't love at first sight.  That sounds harsh and rude, but I say it as a sort of caution to those who would say that you should really "click" (whatever that means) on the first date.  (I used to be one of those people.)  

So we drank some coffee.  We talked about stuff.  It was fun.  Pretty general first date stuff.  (Side note: first dates are socially wacky between differing backgrounds/expectations and nerves and first impressions.)  Afterwards I was talking to my mom explaining my "on the fence" dilemma.  I mean, shouldn't I just be head over heels, love at first sight, walking on clouds, and all that other stuff people say?  Always, but especially at moments like these, I am thankful for a reasonable, level-headed, smart mother.  She told me straight away I was being ridiculous and that of course I should go on a second date, and probably a third and fourth before I even thought about making some kind of "decision".  

We already had the second date scheduled, so we went dancing on Wednesday.  If you know ANYTHING about me, you know dancing is right up there with breathing on the list of life essentials.  As it happens, the man could dance.  That was in his favor... a lot.  He asked me on a third date that night.  I said yes.  He kept that song on repeat.  He would ask me out, and I would say yes.  In fact, it's still happening.  And let me tell you, this guy is a good date planner.  

About date 7 he decided he was tired of just taking me on dates, so he asked me to be his girlfriend.  This time, it wasn't "Sure, why not?".  This required a yes.  And I gave it to him.  

I've lost count of what number date we're on.  What I haven't lost track of is how considerate and sweet he is, the way he loves adventure, or the priority he puts on prayer.  He likes to read, he can fix anything, and he's taller than me when I'm in heels.

It's ironic, in a way.  Ever since I was little, I've tried to plan out (read: control) my life.  I remember writing "life plans" that included living on a farm with my three best friends and raising all kinds of livestock and doing craft projects.  (I was a weird kid, ok?)  In high school, it was all about the SAT.  What score could I get?  What schools could I get into?  What major should I choose?  It's funny because at each lifestage, there are a different set of questions.  It's not as if you wake up one morning and think, "Gee, I'm all out of questions.".  In respect to guys, it's usually been the same way.  I pick one I like and then set to figuring out what I can do to get them to notice me.  Ha.

This one wasn't like that, and it kind of freaked me out.  We met on a blind date, so I already felt behind in the scoping out/mulling over/stalking process!  The funny thing is, it just happened.  Out of the blue, in from left field, the dark horse in the race - I didn't plan it, couldn't have written it, wasn't trying to make it work.  I don't know what's going to happen or where we'll be in five years.  And I think that's ok.  That's what I get for having Type A tendencies - a lesson in God's providence.

So... once upon a blind date, I met a guy, who knows a guy, who dates a girl who I worked with last year.  And the rest is history.



Much love,

Little Miss Sunshine

Ballerinas, bouquets and a Navy Seal named Grace

When I hear the word "grace", I think of little girls named Grace, pink tutus pirouetting around a stage, bouquets of feathery double camellias.  I think of being a grac(e)ious host, or of a graceful falcon turning effortlessly on the wind.  I think of Grace Kelly - a woman who truly fits her name.  Even the way the word sounds when we say it connotes a delicate beauty. 

Well, let me tell you - there's another side of grace that often goes unspoken.  I get it, we like ballerina-pink-rosy-nice grace.  We appreciate the warmth of a gracious host.  We hope to have grace extended to us when we miss a deadline or err in our calculations.  Heaven knows churches like to talk about the grace of God that covers our failures and mistakes (and even our "on purposes"), and we like how that feels.  That's all well and good, and I should say hosts ought to be gracious and ballerinas to be graceful and churches ought to talk about the grace of God. 

But.

What of the giver of grace?

Are we naïve enough to think that grace given freely comes at no cost to the giver?  That the gracious host hasn't been preparing dinner all afternoon, cleaned house and spent money on the candles that smell like October?  We just think all of that appeared and fell into place the moment we walked in the door?

From the time I was two or three until the time I was twelve, I took ballet.  (I blame this early encounter for my preoccupation with dance.) By took, I mean I went to class several hours a week and worked.  And worked.  And worked.  We jete - ed, we turned, we arabesque-ed.  Again and again and again.  We stretched, we planked, we took account for the angle and curve of every finger and toe.  We internalized every beat of music and turned it into movement.  Only after hours of drill did we turn to the choreography, to the dancing itself.  Only after months of choreography did we take to the stage for our end of year recital.  Only then were we graceful. 

The year I took pointe, I learned more about the difficulty of grace than ever before.  Wearing pointe shoes is like taking a wooden box, disguising it with pretty pink silk, stuffing the end with foam and then cramming your toes in and tying it on tightly.  Within a week, my feet were blistered, red and sore.  This was not effortless grace.  This was not the glamor and glory I'd seen on stage watching The Nutcracker at Christmas.  This was excruciating. 

Grace is excruciating.  Literally.  See that little second syllable there?  Cruc?  It means cross.  Excruciating.  What excruciating really means is pain so intense it feels like  you're being crucified.  Jesus was crucified for grace.  Suddenly, grace doesn't look so pink anymore.  Grace doesn't seem so soft anymore.  Grace seems more like a Navy Seal than a three year old with pigtails.   

This grace, which comes to us freely was not acquired for us freely. 

Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.  Go and learn what this means "I desire mercy, and not sacrifice." For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners. - Matthew 9:12-13

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.  For one will scarcely die for a righteous person - though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die- but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. - Romans 5:6-8

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience… and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind… for by grace you have been saved through faith.  And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God.  - Ephesians 2:1-3, 8

Let's be honest, friends.  We were in pretty dire straits.  I mean, look at those words used to describe us - sick, sinners, weak, ungodly, children of wrath.  I don't know about you, but that's not usually how I answer the question, "What are 7 words you would use to describe yourself?". 

Not only were we in a mess, but we were incapable of getting out of it.  As a generalization, we aren't a people too used to feeling helpless.  We have resources, networks, insurance policies.  We are rarely without recourse, or so it seems.  But all those words?  There was no undoing them.  There was no "figure it out" or "do better next time".  The only ransom was the death of a perfect life.  I fear we become accustomed to Christianese - of course Jesus "died for our sins".  Of course, as if it were a simple thing. 

When's the last time you heard of someone dying for someone else?  Sure, it happens now and then.  When's the last time you heard of someone dying for someone that had never heard of them?  Well, that's kind of weird.  OK, when's the last time you heard of someone dying for someone who belonged to an enemy who didn't even acknowledge them?  That enemy was me and you.  And that someone was Jesus.  And that death he died?  It wasn't a "put down your old dog with a needle and some chemicals" kind of death.  It was as though the Son of God was an insect specimen ruthlessly tacked on a board with pins to die for the world to see.  Excruciating.  Cruc.  Cross. 

Jesus didn't come to die so we could color eggs at Easter.  Jesus didn't come so we could go window shopping and drive around looking at lights on Christmas Eve or eat monkey bread at Christmas breakfast.  Jesus came so that grace, like a Navy Seal, could accomplish the most extraordinary rescue mission the world has ever known.  He came to pay the ransom for a people held helplessly captive and set them free forever. 

Don't forget that grace has grit.

Love,

Little Miss Sunshine

Marriage Matters

 

I was thinking this morning as I was cutting cantaloupe.  (I love cantaloupe.)  I was thinking about marriage.  When's the last time you heard a little kid playing on the playground holler that he wants to be a super duper awesome…. Husband?  Yeah, I've never heard that, and you know how much time I spend with kids.  Now, I haven't read Piper on marriage or Real Marriage by Driscoll or any of that.  Sheesh, I'm not even married, but it seems to me as an innocent bystander to the institution of marriage, IT'S PRETTY FLIPPING IMPORTANT.

Let's not even pull out the big guns yet.  Let's just talk about romance.  Choosing to stick with someone til death do you part, forsaking all others and toughing it out through sickness and health, feast and famine, laundry and dishes - now that's romantic.  Shakespeare didn't write Sonnet 116 because we're supposed to just date people forever.

it is an ever-fixed mark 

That looks on tempests and is never shaken...

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, 

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

Pasted from <http://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/116.html>

Do we love fairytales because the prince rescues the princess from the dragon/villain/evil step-whoever/magic spell and takes her out to dinner?  NO!  We love it because they ride off into the sunset (however she manages that in her poofy princess dress), and they live happily ever after.  They don't live happily ever after because that was the last of the dragons or because the princess never burns the toast or because the prince never ever tracks mud into the palace.  They live happily ever after because they're together, they're committed, they're in for the long haul.

What about kids?  Think it's better if they have two married parents living at home?  Think it's better if they can enter adulthood without 12 suitcases of relational baggage from a divorce or a dysfunctional unmarried parents scenario?  Now, I get it.  Stuff happens.  People make the best out of the situations they have, but we're talking ideal situations here.  Practically speaking, it's just easier.  Coordinating who goes to whose house and who picks up whom when and for what holiday and who pays for gymnastics and baseball...  I had a student last year who switched houses EVERY DAY.  Let's just say she had a hard time keeping track of her homework. 

OK, big gun time.  Marriage is a picture of Christ and His Church.  God set it up as a sort of earthly analogy of the closeness we experience with Christ and the kind of sacrificial love that exists between Christ and His Church.  What do you think it says about the Church when our divorce rate is the same as everyone else's?  What are you saying about Christ with your marriage?  It's not just this thing that started out romantically, ended up with a few kids and a mortgage and is now this habit you'll probably maintain for a while. 

*brief hiatus for frustrated explosion*

MARRIAGE IS HARD.  I get it.  Life is easier if you just date people or cheat on people for other people or remain the eternal bachelor because you love drinking out of the milk jug.  Sometimes you lose sight of Ephesians 5 - "walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us… a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife… let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband."  That's HARD.  It's natural to love yourself the most and hand out your leftovers to whoever's standing closest.  Loving someone as yourself is a supernatural crazy kind of love.  It's easy to lose the vision of marriage somewhere between making dinner and golf with the guy.  You get busy choosing paint colors for the living room or buying socks for the kids or doing dishes or figuring out where you're going to spend Christmas. 

But what if, aside from you walking with Jesus, your marriage is the most important thing you ever do?  Oh sure, your career is important.  Making that quota is of real long term value.  *Here's a tissue for my sarcasm splatter.*  Being on that non-profit committee is so great.  You racking up hours at the gym is super duper self-discipline.  I get it, we need to do stuff with our lives.  Big stuff.  Little stuff.  Middle stuff.  But shouldn't looking like Jesus and loving like Jesus be our first and main thing?  I'm not saying you can't love Jesus and be Committee Chairperson Extraordinaire, but if you think that takes precedent over your marriage because it's obviously more charitable and philanthropic, you've lost the vision of marriage. 

Sure, I'm not married, so for me, looking like and loving like Jesus is not going to look like nurturing a marriage.  (Sometimes I get frustrated because I'm not sure how to properly affirm and uphold the institution of marriage while simultaneously affirming the role of single people in the Church.)  But good heavens, married people, your marriages are important - not just because it's cheaper to be married or because it means you have someone to go to the movies with.  They're important because you're the picture people see of Christ and the Church!  I almost feel like buying some pompoms and being your personal cheer squad.  In no other relationship will you have the opportunity to show off God's grace and patience quite like the way you do in marriage. 

What would have to change for us to start hearing the veneration of marriage on the playground?  Married people, I think it starts with you.  You have to start believing your marriages matter, that the promise you made that day you walked down an aisle is STILL the most important promise you've ever made.  It's not just important to you.  It's important to culture, social norms, the Church, kids, single people, the economy.  We have to start talking about marriage like it's a good thing - not a rut, not a habit, not something to try when you hit 30 - but a good thing that's good for people.    

Do you get it yet?  Geez louise, I sure hope so.  Know that I'm on my knees for you and in your corner, but not even a fraction of the way Jesus is interceding for you. 

Go be awesome and married,

Little Miss Sunshine

If You Really Loved Me...

 

If you really loved me, you would let me eat that whole bag of cotton candy.  It starts simply enough when we're little.  We want the whole bag of cotton candy (I speak from personal experience).  We want to do what we want when we want.  The habit grows with us.  If our parents really loved us, they wouldn't give us a curfew, or make us stay home from certain parties.  We equate love with the other person doing what we want.  

As adults, we see straight through this faulty logic.  Love means doing what's best for the other person.  We never use conditional, leveraging in our  love.  We never say things like "if you really loved me, you wouldn't be such a slob" or "if you really loved me, you wouldn't mind watching what I want to watch".

 

It's bad enough that we do this with each other, holding affection hostage until we get what we want, or employing the cold shoulder, or whatever other weight we can throw around.  

I wish I could say that we just need to retrain our interpersonal habits and read some good books on the topic and everything would be fixed.  Just throw a little Five Love Languages or Dr. Phil on the problem, and it'll clear everything up. 

But it doesn't stop there.  I wish it did.  We not only do it with each other, we do it with God Himself.  We get uppity and entitled with the Alpha and Omega, the Word made flesh, the maker of butterfly wings and thunderstorms.  We want what we want when we want it.  Why? 

Well, for one, we deserve it.  We maintain long lists of why we deserve things from God.  He owes us because we do things for Him.  We led that Boyscout troop.  We fed the homeless that one time.  We go to church every Sunday, sometimes even when we're on vacation in Iowa.  We ____________.  Insert your own list of why God owes you stuff.

Let's not gloss over the fact that this God we barter and try to leverage with is the God who sent His Son.  To die.  To be spit on.  To be tried unfairly.  To be smacked and whipped within an inch of His life.  By us.  The people He wanted to show His love to.  Do we really have the gall to ask God to prove His love?  Can we really be audacious enough to ask for our own way when we were the ones being rescued at such great cost?

For another thing, God loves us, and love means the other person serving us and giving us what we want.  Forget all that stuff the Bible has to say about love being patient and kind and keeping no record of wrongs.  We prefer the version of love where we get to eat the whole dang bag of cotton candy. 

Warning: this is about to get up close and sticky.

God's version of love is a little different than ours.  It isn't tainted or marred or riddled with hidden motives.  His love never fails.  His love seeks our good.  That last sentence can be a little misleading.  Sometimes our version of "our good" can be different from God's version of "our good". 

God, if you really loved me, my parents wouldn't have gotten a divorce.

God, if you really loved me, I wouldn't have gotten laid off.

God, if you really loved me, I wouldn't feel so alone right now.

God, if you really loved me, my kids would be following You.

God, if you really loved me, my life would be easier.

Surely it can't be for our good that we lose jobs or people we love.  Surely it can't be for our good that sometimes we have to endure pain that seems like it doesn't have a stopping point.  Surely it can't be for our good that sometimes we go through seasons of being alone or waiting or heartrending struggle. 

It depends. 

Does this sound like a kind of love worth clinging to?

~ He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.  - Psalm 147

~ The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.  The Lord is good to all, and his mercy is over all that he has made. - Psalm 145

~ He is my steadfast love and my fortress, my stronghold and my deliverer, my shield and he in whom I take refuge - Psalm 144

~ Behold, to the Lord your God belong heaven and heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it.  Yet the Lord set his heart in love on your fathers - Deuteronomy 10

~ fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.  - Isaiah 41

God never promises that life will be "fine" in following Him.  In fact, He pretty much guarantees it's going to suck sometimes.  I don't think He used those words, but He does talk about it a lot - Matthew 5, John 16, not to mention all that stuff He says about "taking up crosses".  What He does promise is His Spirit, His love and His sustaining presence. 

Sometimes we think we have God figured out.  We aren't the first people to make this mistake.  Ha, read the book of Job if you want evidence of that one.  We think He operates in a certain way, something formulaic, systematic.  Hello, have you ever seen a 2 year old?  Well, God created those.  He also created quantum physics and the Grand Canyon and light particles that don't behave like particles or waves so we had to imagine some kind of weird combo theory. 

Tame is not a word that is synonymous with God.  He is a grand God with a grand, intense love that pursues people in crazy ways.  Sometimes in my small view of who He is, I wish He would give me what I want when I want it.  Then I remember I didn't design Plutonium atoms.  God did.  Maybe He has this timing thing figured out.  Maybe even though I can't understand why all the time, I can trust the One who causes or allows all things and who always keeps His promises. 

Hang in there, kiddo.  You know who loves you.

Little Miss Sunshine

How to Earn Love

Really, what I want is to be loved.  I want to be pursued and chased and valued.  I want to get that poprocks-in-your-stomach kind of feeling.  I want to be wanted.  (Thanks, Hunter Hayes.)  I want someone to want to know what makes me tick. 

So here's the plan.

I'm just sort of working it out, so I'm open to suggestions.  I've got the grown up job, so that's good.  It might be even better that it's working with kids in a change the world/impact the next generation way.  I think that's extra points.  I'm at church almost every week.  I just got promoted to foyer hostess on the hospitality committee.  Last week at our college/career gathering, I met 12 new people.  Surely helping lead that small group is helping make my case.  I mean, what else could God want?  I put my dishes in the dishwasher.  I'm not out kicking children or committing fraud.  Maybe it's enough to be loved.

Of course, that's all rubbish. 

Never ever ever ever will you ever catch God saying "I will love you if _____________".  And yet… somehow… I get the idea that He will love me if.  If I kick the habit. If I volunteer.  If I go to church.  If I don't drink, smoke, cuss, or chew.  If I don't - you finish the sentence.  I treat love as if it's a paycheck.  If I do this for You, God, then You will owe me love.  I treat love as if it's a prenuptial agreement.  You will love me unless I _______, and then it's back to square one and I'm left with nothing.  But that's my idea of love.  I try to make love fair. 

God's love is never fair. 

(Right after the golden calf fiasco) Behold, to the LORD you God belong heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it.  Yet the LORD set His heart in love on your fathers and chose their offspring after them, you above all peoples, as you are this day. Deuteronomy 10:14-15 (emphasis mine)

But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. Psalm 86:15

For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life.  For God did not send His Son in to the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through Him. John 3:16-17

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ… so that in the coming ages He might show the immeasurable riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. Ephesians 2:4-7

God's love is not a paycheck.  It is not a transaction.  It would not add up, reconcile in a checkbook register, or be approved if it were a bank loan.  I cannot out run it, out smart it, or out sin it.  I got it when I didn't deserve it, so what in the big wide world makes me think I need to earn it now?  

The light dawns and the lie becomes clear.  Love is a gift, and it has always been.  Love is the richest, fullest, brightest gift, and God's is unending.

Suddenly that rush of realization about God's love spills over into how I understand human love.  So we must be careful.  The strychnine in the well poisons not only the well, but the lemonade in the pitcher and the flowers in the vase and even the cherry jello.  A crooked view of God's love - a view that love is earned or deserved or - perish the thought -  transacted - bleeds into all our other loves. 

Not "maybe if I'm funny and don't ask too much of them and send them cards on their birthdays then my friends will love me".  Quite the other way around.  Because they love me I will be funnier and ask things of them and send them cards in the mail. 

Not "maybe if I take out the trash and keep my room clean and am the biggest fan then my family will love me".  That's quite an upside down approach.  Their love makes me the biggest trash emptier/room cleaner/ fan.

Not "maybe if I look pretty and don't talk too much or just enough and have the sweetest attitude then Mr. Wonderful will love me".  Rubbish.  The love of Mr. Wonderful itself will make me pretty and will bid me talk or not and will encourage an attitude of sweetness.

That's the power of love.  It transforms things.  Love turns scars into stories of grace.  It makes peace out of conflict and action out of apathy.  It brings light to darkness and hope to despair.  

Love is a costly gift, but the greatest one.

Little Miss Sunshine

Identity Crisis

When people ask me who I am, I like to have a kind of go-to list of things to pull from.  I'm a teacher, so I belong to that office supply/bookish/lamination-loving group of people called teachers.  I'm a first-born, so I give myself permission to be a little more bossy and fine with being in charge than the average human.  I'm an athlete, so I can identify when other athletes talk about hitting a wall or pulling a quad.  Of course, there's plenty of room for improvement- I wouldn't mind adding "successful gardener" or "avid language learner" to my list of identifiers, but I like to have a few things on hand for easy access. 

There are few questions whose answers can reveal more about a person than

Who/what are you

and

Who is God

The way you answer those questions gives away what you think is important.  If you [Heaven forbid] say "I'm a brunette" or "I'm a waitress", it is immediately apparent the things you find most important are your hair and your job.  (It wouldn't make any difference, by the way, if you said "I'm the blonde by which all other blondes are measured" or "I'm the Surgeon General".) 

But that's what you do, not who you are.  If Ronald Reagan and Channing Tatum are both in the movie business, does that make them the same person?  Consequently, if you are suddenly unable to make that sandwich or perform that surgery, what does that make you?  A nothing?  Now you're identity-less?  That might sound a little dramatic, but what if your identity is being supermom and your kids grow up and move out?  What if you're all about being that awesome husband or wife and the unthinkable happens and you lose that person?

I have two grandmas with severe memory loss.  In their day, they were matriarchs.  They were the ones planning menus for family reunions, never forgetting to send cards for birthdays and anniversaries.  Do they do the same things they always have?  No, but we didn't take away their names and fingerprints just because they can't do the things they used to do.

What about the stuff you have?  I know all you hipster antimaterialism-ists would raise a defensive ruckus saying you aren't attached to your stuff/you shop at thrift stores/music and art are so much more important than Fossil watches, etc. etc.  Great, not everyone is attached to buying brand names.  But don't you feel good when you get over 20 likes on Instagram?  Are you aiming at having 1,000 followers on Pinterest?  Things you have aren't always smaller than a breadbox.  Sometimes they're the size of a reputation or a Twitter feed. 

I haven't mentioned the second question.  Who is God?  What if your answer to that question shed some light on the first question?  Let's posit that there is a God who is all powerful, perfect - you know, all the stuff you have to be to qualify to be God.  Let's also posit that He created everything.  Even if we stopped right there, that helps us with our first question.  It says, "I am not an accident; I am an 'on purpose'".  If you are an 'on-purpose', it would make sense that you have some sort of purpose. 

Who and what and why you are now becomes dependent on something, rather a Someone outside yourself.  This isn't just any someone like Taylor Swift or Napoleon, as great as they are in their own right.  This is an all great, all good God.  Apart from just existing (which would be enough), and creating you (that's a bonus) this great, good God took your record of messy lies, failure, anger, depression, ungratefulness and put that on Jesus so that you could have His clean record.  Not a fair trade, to say the least.  You don't even have to live with an identity of your own record anymore.  You might have to live with a few of the consequences, of course, but it doesn't own you.

But can you deal with that?  Can you unclench those hands hanging onto your rather forgettable identity and cling to the identity you're being handed?  Can you bear to cling to grace - something you didn't manufacture or build with your own two hands?  Something that could even be termed as a -gasp- handout?  Let me tell you from personal experience, it's to your advantage to let go of finding your identity in being a scholar/athlete/multitasker/artist/lemur whisperer.  You will lose games, get an 89.4, drop the spinning plates, choose the wrong color and miscommunicate with the monkey - or you'll forever live in fear of doing so.  Someone unchangeable, unshakeable and wholly sufficient is where you want to hang your identity. 

When you do that, who you are no longer tries to lean on what you have or what you do.  Your identity is now safe from, well, you.

Love you,

Little Miss Sunshine