Tag: God’s Faithfulness

emmaus or bust

The Road to Emmaus, artwork by Daniel Bonnell

C. S. Lewis identified many of us as “ordinary privates in the huge army of the bereaved, slogging along and making the best of a bad job.”

Today is a struggle job for me. I went through my prayers this morning with monotone indifference. The reading of the Word was like a dried up fountain. I’m very close to tears and want very much to be left alone.

Very little is working out the way Sandy and I hoped (expected?) 333 days ago. I am slogging through sludge in heavy boots and an overfilled backpack. If I didn’t feel the need to preserve an iota of dignity I’d be tempted to throw my head back and scream. I’ll restrain myself.

When I left the house this morning I said barely ten words to Sandy, telling her, “Headed to the library. I love you.” How I longed for some quiet and introspection. I need to process; I need to think; I need to write.

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Before heading out I grabbed the recent Plough Quarterly that arrived in yesterday’s mail and have it open before me now. The theme for the issue is, “PAIN & PASSION.” What a coincidence.

One of the opening articles features a Dominican order of Sisters who offer palliative care to dying patients in NYC. Here’s what got me: the older Sisters advise the newbies that (1) their ministry is just that; it requires they first attend to their own souls in Christ before they can love and offer mercy to their patients. And, (2), never forget that all their patients are terminal; the Sisters are there to lovingly prepare them for the next world.

Those same pieces of advice will do good for me today, if I pay heed. I can’t rise above this unless I receive the love of Jesus and trust him, first and foremost; and next I must resign to the dictum, once again, that I am not made for this world.

A page over, a pastor who lost his 22-year old to an aggressive form of lymphoma cancer wrote about his desperate search for solace against the backdrop of stupefying loss:

It was a tremendous relief to realize that we [he and his wife] are not strong people; we are plain, ordinary people. And if we need to cry, then cry. If we need to grieve, then grieve. Do it hard and deeply, and then move on.

Randall Gauger, In Search of Solace

That’s good counsel. I think I’ll cry.

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I’ve spent some time this week with three people: N. T. Wright and a pair of disgruntled disciples on the road away from Jerusalem. Wright captures their mood with,

“They had been traveling up a road they thought was leading to freedom, and it turned out to be a cul-de-sac.”

N. T. Wright, The Challenge of Jesus

The thing is, the Emmaus Road disciples were having their debate in the early evening hours of Easter! They’d heard rumors about a Missing Body and certain women having visions, but instead of staying back and investigating they slogged their way home.

Jesus had already risen. The apex of redemptive history has just happened. The Blessed Hope of Mankind is alive! And they are grousing about how nothing has worked out the way it was promised.

About here is where I need to do some Soul Talk. I don’t mind that you’re here, but if you’ll excuse me: Soul, why are you downcast? Why are you in turmoil? Has Jesus not Risen?

Bring me your sorrow, and watch for the sunrise of the resurrection. Yes, truly there comes always a resurrection – a morning when hope is reborn and life finds new beginning. Wait for it as tulip bulbs anticipate the spring. The rarest blooms are enhanced by the coldness of winter…Your God is your maker. He is your defender. And He is mighty to save. Yes, He is not only mighty to save from sin, but He is mighty to save from despair, from sorrow, from disappointment, from regret, from remorse, from self-castigation, and from the hot, blinding tears of rebellion against fateful circumstances.

Francis J. Roberts, Come Away, My Beloved

These two, perhaps husband and wife (I think so), mourned the loss of hope. But, just then, a Man joined them in their walk of sorrow. Jesus was a Stranger to them but he gave both something they could carry the rest of their way home. The Resurrected One granted them their own resurrection. Did not our hearts burn within us?

I’m on the struggle bus today but I’ll be fine. My heart will live to burn again another day. Today I cry; tonight I’ll still be His. He’s resurrected my tired bones before and he’ll do it 10,000 more times before I get home. What I have is terminal; what he has is eternal.

Amen.

faithfully trusting when the assignment is hard

Should anyone’s life illustrate the maxim, “If God brought you to it, he’ll bring you through it” it’s Joseph. Very much against his will Joseph was “brought down to Egypt.” But it would not be the end of the story. Faithful Joseph, as you know, went from the pits to a palace and became the vice-ruler in Egypt!

I’ve been thinking about Joseph a lot these days. His brothers contemplated murdering him, and then they settled for the lesser crime of trafficking him into slavery. By the providence of God he finds himself in a rather favorable arrangement. That all blows up when his sex-starved employer’s wife falsely accuses him of attempted rape.

All this and Joseph is still only 17 years old.

His employer explodes and throws him in prison. Even still, Joseph conducts himself in such a way that impresses the warden and is given special privileges. If he thought his good conduct might gain him an early release, however, Joseph, now in his 20s, had another thing coming. Literally.

This is the life of young Joseph. Misunderstanding. Betrayal. Mistreatment. Injustice. One thing after another, and still more after that. Thirteen l o n g years.

All of it, every last bit of it, was intended to get Joseph next to the ruler of Egypt where he could be positioned to do greater good in the world. Talk about earning a promotion!

Could you handle that assignment?

After all he had to endure, Joseph grabbed hold of his God and clung to him for dear life. There are quite a few sterling moments to draw out of his testimony, but I want to highlight just this one:

Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I had a dream, and there is no one who can interpret it. But I have heard about you, that you can interpret dreams.” Joseph replied to Pharaoh, “It is not within my power, but God will speak concerning the welfare of Pharaoh.”

What startles me about this is that Joseph, in spite of everything, still believed God was all-powerful and he was motivated to do good. There doesn’t seem to be a shred of bitterness in him. Joseph still believed there was a divine plan at work and God was using his story of faith to bless others.

Fellow struggler, trust God down there in your Egypt. There is a way forward even though you wake up to the same thing day after day. You think this is it, this is all, just grit your teeth and bear it. I assure you there’s a plan in the mind of God and it is good.

One thing you don’t see Joseph doing — quite remarkably — is playing the victim. He shows us if we can thrive in and rise to the level of excellence in our adversity, by the grace of God, we will be overcomers. It may take 13 years (Joseph) or 20 years (Jacob) or 25 years (Abraham & Sarah) or 40 years (Moses), or however long, but you won’t find a better alternative than to

TRUST

GOD’S

PLAN.

I must hasten. In studying the travails of Joseph I want to leave you with two immutable truths:

1. it’s always right to do good even if you don’t see a reward for it

I get it; everything about this makes you want to scream. Where’s the justice? The equity? You wonder why you have to smile and take it. Do right though the stars fall, I once heard. Keep your hand to the plow, Jesus said. Don’t do right for right’s sake, Paul said, do right for Jesus’s sake.

To that end I read this aloud from my prayer book this morning:

I would serve in imitation of you, who poured out your life for me. I would serve knowing that your Spirit is ever at work in the lives of those I serve, ever calling, ever drawing, ever seeking to soften hearts encased in fear and disappointment and anger and idolatry. So let my kindnesses and sacrifice fall like warm shafts of sunlight on icy ground.

I cannot know the end of another person’s story… So let me be content to minister regardless of visible outcomes, trusting that the small mercies I extend will be woven into the larger theme of redemption at work in the lives of others, as you woo them to yourself…

Every Moment Holy, Vol. 1, p. 158

2. God’s favor will find you even in your darkest trial

Okay. If we’re being honest, none of us is going to be a ruler over a nation. We probably won’t get our story published; this post won’t go viral. But is that what it’s about anyway? Could we (hear me out) say amen to God even if we knew nothing would change?

I leave you with this. At the end of his grave injustices, Joseph got married and raised a family. I beg you to read about that here. The names of those two boys, Manasseh and Ephraim, tell quite a story. Your homework is to study their meanings. What I’ll say about it is this: Joseph married an Egyptian bride, but their sons bore Hebrew names.

That tells me Joseph wanted to remember his journey. None of it was a mistake. Not a single year was wasted. Even in Egypt, Joseph’s God was faithful, his trials were necessary, and the outcome was favorable. I have a feeling if Joseph never got out of that prison, never sat on a throne, never had a family, he’d still say

“It’s not me, it’s God.”

Joseph lived to be 110. He learned to love Egypt but his hope was in the home country. He wanted to go home. That’s all that matters in the end. When you’re finished with me in Egypt, Lord, take me home.

Hey, beloved of God, if he brought you to it he’ll bring you through it. He gave you the assignment; he must be pretty certain you will come through to the other side to tell your story. And what a story you’ll have.

Selah.

music to our ears

What’s the most surprising thing you’ve learned about God?

Jesus told a story that is clearly about God the Father. In the story there are two villains, a younger brother and an elder. While the older brother stews in his self righteousness the younger son repents of his many reproaches and heads back with tail tucked. In the story we are surprised to find the Father running to meet him.

Imagine: God, with robe gathered, feet flying, running!

There’s another place in the sacred text where I’m caught off guard by God. We know about his communication skills but how many knew God could sing?

In Lewis’s The Magician’s Nephew, we find Aslan singing the world of Narnia into being:

In the darkness something was happening at last. A voice had begun to sing…Sometimes it seemed to come from all directions at once…One moment there had been nothing but darkness; next moment a thousand, thousand points of light leaped out – single stars, constellations, and planets, brighter and bigger than any in our world…All the time the Voice went on singing…The Voice rose and rose, till all the air was shaking with it. And just as it swelled to the mightiest and most glorious sound it had yet produced, the sun arose.

—C.S. Lewis, The Magician’s Nephew (New York: Collier), pp. 98-99.

I am in a season right now where my most challenging obstacle is not disability. I confess it’s gotten the better of me on those especially trying days, but God faithfully meets me in his Word and whispers, “I’m for you, child; stay the course. Trust that I’m up to something good here.” Those words quiet me.

God doesn’t just speak, however. Sometimes he sings. Elihu told Job of a God who “gives songs in the night.” I know of such a God. I’ve heard his night songs echoing softly in my mind when I thought I was out of my mind, lost and forgotten.

The Almighty has been singing a long time. Twenty-five centuries ago Zephaniah, great-great grandson of Hezekiah, said, while God “quiets” us by his love (‘ahava’, e.g., Song of Songs 2:4), he also anthems over us and silences the roar inside our hearts.

The LORD your God is among you;
He is mighty to save.
He will rejoice over you with gladness;
He will quiet you with His love;
He will rejoice over you with singing.

Zephaniah 3:17

The Hebrew text reads, “he exults over you with loud singing.” Great peals of thunder ring out from the bellows of God’s voice when soothing words won’t do. The NLT fashions it, “He will rejoice over you with joyful songs.”

How very cool is that? When we are cowed by the dissonance of our skewed culture, our Heavenly Father starts singing, and when he sings all the noise fades into the background.

The people God sings over are so beleaguered they want to quit. They’re flat-out exhausted from battling the insufferable. All they can hear are the “slurs and taunts of Moab”; the “pure speech” of Zion’s completely drowned out. God’s whispers do them little good; they need him to SHOUT his love in their ears.

That’s the beauty of Zephaniah 3:17. The word we get isn’t “lullaby”; of course there’s a time when a lullaby is appropriate. I love when the Holy Spirit quietly sings over me, calming me with his sweet reveries.

But sometimes we need reveille! Life can get so messed up we need a victory song. We need God to ROAR with assurance that all this is under Aslan’s massive paw. That’s the idea in this text. Sometimes he quiets us with love, sometimes he rejuvenates us with a victory chorus.

God is so happy in the love he bears to his people that he breaks the eternal silence, and sun and moon and stars with astonishment hear God chanting a hymn of joy.

—Charles Spurgeon

The older I get, the quieter I get. And the quieter I am, the better I’m positioned to hear the still, small Voice, so familiar, so intimate. But there are times I need an anthem, not a sonnet. God’s playlist always seems to give me just what I need in any given moment.

How about you? Are you greatly bothered by the noise in your life? Can you hear your Father in heaven sing over you? Or is the tumult drowning out the truth you need to hear? I pray the Lord of the Dance surprises you with his playlist in coming days. May God grace you with his joyous reveille and surround you with songs of deliverance.

Selah, indeed.