Of Eggs and Lambs and Waiting for Easter

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I almost missed what the preacher said, right there in the middle of the music and the Lord’s Supper and my fingers already moving to play the next notes. “We don’t know how broken we are. And we don’t know how loved we are.”  It wasn’t until the next day that it sank in deep enough to feel…right through into the Humpty-Dumpty heart of me.

Here in the middle of Lent, with the cross set before us, we are taking time to face our own sin. Our self-indulgence, our lack of love, our pride, our vain ambition for things that are passing away. And maybe the worst part of our sorrow, in the most honest quiet moments, is the dim realization that no matter how much we can look at our brokenness, God sees more. Not just a matter of what we can know, but a matter of moral capacity…how much we are able to fathom, to feel, to bear in our spirits. He is the only One who understands just how diseased we are– the bone-deep fragility of men and women afflicted with sin. We are without excuse, without remedy, without hope even on our best days, although most of us have learned to cover up nicely, or at least distract ourselves from what we cannot put together again.

The Prophet Isaiah puts it out there in livestock terms: “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way…” (Isaiah 53:6) We may not have much personal experience with sheep, but anyone who has ever tried to shepherd a group of more than five children on an outing can grasp the general idea. I think it’s safe to assume that sheep are never fully aware of their path, or where it is leading them, or just how dangerous it is for them to be out there alone. I heard someone say once that “It’s not that sheep are stupid…it’s just that they are completely defenseless.” Indeed.

I have no defenses against the selfishness and death that eat away at my life, nor any defense in the face of the standards that I can’t measure up to. But Isaiah finishes his thought...”and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”  My sin-disease and personal culpability laid fully on Someone Else big enough to bear both– on Jesus, the One Isaiah said was “like a lamb that is led to the slaughter.” (Isaiah 53:7)

In this middle-gray land of March, halfway between death and life, there is also time to hear the Love that calls us. And isn’t that what we all need here, when we are looking death in the face?…To see beyond its wretched ugliness and finality, into the eyes of the Beloved One, who carries our death on His own shoulders, lays it into the ground, and leaves it there? “Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering…” (Isaiah 53:4) Here in the middle of Lent, the only way we will even be able to face the rubble inside, is if we can also see Love’s glorious broken body standing in the middle of it.  “But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed.” (Isaiah 53:5)

And I have no defense against Love like this.

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“We are His portion and He is our prize,
Drawn to redemption by the grace in His eyes–
If grace is an ocean, we’re all sinking.
So heaven meets earth like an unforeseen kiss,
And my heart turns violently inside of my chest.
I don’t have time to maintain these regrets
when I think about the way
He loves us…
Oh how He loves us.”
(How He Loves, John Mark McMillan)

~~~~~~~

“Forty days, I am reflecting on my cross, my sins….Looking hard for release from this messy body of death. And there is Jesus. Jesus with a crown of thorns. Jesus bent low, God carrying my rotting mess, Grace doing what I cannot do, and I cannot ascend to God but He will descend to me….

Jesus will have to do everything. He will have to accomplish it all. I am ashes and I am dust and I am in dire need and Lent has given me clear eyes to see my sin and I am the one broken under all this skin.” (Ann VosKamp)

 

 

Take Heart

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As the sun warms and life quickens, here in early Spring…as the icy hold of death is cracked loose, slips away like a dark dream in the face of bright dawn arising…as we turn our faces toward Resurrection Day, there is this Word for all those holding onto hope:

“Look up into the heavens. Who created all the stars? He brings them out like an army, one after another, calling each by its name. Because of His great power and incomparable strength, not a single one is missing….how can you say the Lord does not see your troubles?…how can you say God ignores your rights? Have you never heard? Have you never understood? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of all the earth. He never grows weak or weary. No one can measure the depths of His understanding….He will feed His flock like a shepherd. He will carry the lambs in His arms, holding them close to His heart. He will gently lead the mother sheep with their young.” (Isaiah 40:26-28, 11)

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“Courage is what is elemental to living — composed of two parts fierce hope, and one part wild believing.
It’s hope that can create a quake that cracks all despair.
It’s hope that stands in your dark with a lamp lit with prayers.
And it isn’t the likelihood of your hope that sustains you, but the object of your hope that sustains you.
We lay our hope, full and tender, into the depths of Him.”
(Ann Voskamp)

~~~~~~~

“All this pain
I wonder if I’ll ever find my way
I wonder if my life could really change at all
All this earth
Could all that is lost ever be found
Could a garden come up from this ground at all
You make beautiful things
You make beautiful things out of the dust”
(Beautiful Things, Gungor)

The Biggest Question of All

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It’s the question we all are all asking inside, when we are standing by a grave. Whether it is the resting place of a dream we were holding onto, or saying goodbye to a season of life, or the wrenching physical loss of someone we love. We are all wondering “Where is God?” Our minds can inform us of the fact of His presence, but what we really want to know is if He cares how we feel. Is He near when I need Him? Will He help me? And even when Faith steps up to proclaim the promise, “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him…” (Romans 8:28), we can’t help but wonder how soon that good is going to surface.

God knows us to the core, and so He plays out a story for us– lets us see the two sisters Mary and Martha ask the same questions, as they watch their brother die and wrap him for burial, and Jesus still does not come to rescue them. They grieve and wonder about the One who said He loved them. But some productive wrestling can happen in the dark, when it is just your heart and those big questions, and by the time Jesus finally shows up the sisters are holding onto faith with all their might. Martha can say “…if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.” (John 11:21) We can hear her faint wild glimmer of hope that death may not be the end of the story, regardless of everything she understands. And Mary comes running when Jesus calls for her, not ashamed to bare her heart to Him because she trusts His love. We watch Mary and Martha and find the answers to our own questions in living color.

Where is God when we stand at a graveside? Does He really care how we feel? He listens to our hearts, enters into our story. He comes when we call, and stands beside us, weeping with our broken hearts.

Is He near when I need Him? Will He help me? He calls out and does the impossible right before our eyes. Relationships beyond hope get second chances. New opportunities rise out of dreams laid to rest. Comfort and peace lift up the aching heart. And Martha and Mary’s brother walks out of his tomb in front of the assembled mourners– a story none of them will likely forget. Jesus does not do what they want Him to do, or even what they could reasonably expect Him to do, and it is easy for us to get bogged down there in our own frustration and confusion. This is where our perspectives and emotions wrestle with faith, and we get to decide whether we will trust in what we can understand… or believe what God says. I am glad the sisters’ story tells us the “Why?” of it– God’s larger purpose at work in their story. “…it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it.” (verse 4) But I see how their relationship with Jesus is what makes them trust that He knows best. They know Him and His love for them, even when they don’t understand what He does.

Jesus tells Martha “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in Me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in Me will never die.” (verses 25-26)  It is the answer to her questions– the message of her story that speaks to all of us if we will be still and listen. There could be no better answer to the graveside questions than this: Death is no longer the end we have always feared, because God has come to rescue us.

Here at the beginning of our preparation for Easter, we can understand how Jesus “was deeply moved in spirit and troubled.” (verse 33). This is the crux of the matter, the very reason He has taken flesh and stepped down into our story. Jesus is facing our Curse, seeing it in all its strength and oppression; He is seeing it affect the people He loves and weeping for their sorrow; He is standing up in anger and doing something about it, because we can’t. This is only a skirmish, a foretaste, but the climax of the story is coming when Jesus will walk out of His own tomb and overcome Sin and Death once and for all. This is the larger purpose He is working out in the world, that stretches over all our smaller stories.

The question He asks of Martha (and any of us who stand by a grave) is ” Do you believe this?” (verse 26)

~~~~~~~

“Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him….The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears them; he delivers them from all their troubles. The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”
(Psalm 34:8,17-18)

~~~~~~~

“Because He lives
I can face tomorrow
Because He lives
Every fear is gone
I know He holds my life, my future, in His hands

Amen, Amen
I’m alive, I’m alive
Because He lives
Amen, Amen
Let my song join the one that never ends”
(Because He Lives– Amen, Matt Maher)

The Best Choices in Life

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Most of the women I know feel overwhelmed by all the choices in the modern world– too many options, too many expectations on them, too many voices telling them what they need in order to be successful (or beautiful, or healthy, or good). It’s ironic how paralyzed, even trapped, we can feel under the weight of so much freedom.

And oddly enough, it is the example of a couple women from thousands of years ago that shows us the way out. We first meet Mary and her sister Martha when Jesus comes to town, and like any good Middle Eastern family, their home is open to the rabbi and his disciples. But it’s the choices they make that interest us. One does what she is expected to do, what she was taught to do, to serve the guests. She is a good girl. One quietly steps out of the box at the prompting of her heart, and I wonder if she could even put a name to whatever drew her to sit at Rabbi Jesus’ feet, that day? (Is this a sudden daring for her?… Or has she been quietly pushing against custom for years, much to her sister’s dismay?)

Martha’s gift of hospitality was welcomed by tired hungry travelers, and would not even have come under question except for her own questioning. She compares herself, like we do, and finds herself both more and less than her sister (like we do). Martha is bold in her own way, to ask the Rabbi to judge between them, though she feels sure the respected Teacher will land on the side of convention.

Instead, Jesus looked at the two women as unique individuals, saw right into their hearts and pointed out how their choices were shaping them. In a move that surprised all of them, Jesus seized the teachable moment and clearly invited women to become students at His feet along with the men, welcomed them as equals and said that the dishes can wait. So can dinner, for that matter, because the housework will need to be done again tomorrow, but Jesus is here right now. And even the customs and expectations of the world around you can’t compare to the value of knowing God personally. Jesus’ answer to Martha is that women are indeed free to choose how they will spend their lives, and should be careful to choose well.

So we talk about choosing well in our own lives, and whether those choices leave us “worried and upset about many things”  or whether they invest in Forever and “will not be taken away.” (Luke 10:41-42) And it’s not a matter of whether we prefer working with our hands or sitting still, or even a matter of whether it is better to serve or to learn. What divides through all the many options we have is the question of what voices we are listening to– where we are getting our identity, what influences are shaping our lives– and whether we are learning from the Teacher Jesus and following after our Master. Any voices but His will leave us scrambled and harried inside, no matter what good things we are doing. He said to the two sisters, “There is only one thing worth being concerned about. Mary has discovered it….” (Luke 10:42) And then to all of His followers,“Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” (Matthew 11:29)

But it is just as difficult for us as it was for Mary and Martha to step outside of what our culture calls “normal.” We get pushed by the urgency of what needs to be done right now, feel we must keep pace with the rush. And it is so natural to react to the intensity of emotion in the moment. Checking tangible, measurable tasks off our To-do lists is very satisfying. It feels good to gain others’ approval and admiration… to fit in and measure up to the standard of what “everybody is doing,” despite what our mothers told us all those years ago. Resisting all these natural currents so that we can make better choices takes courage, and focus, and a certain amount of self-discipline.

Or maybe, like in Mary’s case, it’s just a matter of becoming hungry enough that you will do whatever it takes to really Live. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” (Matthew 5:6)

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“One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek Him in His temple.” (Psalm 27:4)

~~~~~~~

“Hungry I come to You for I know You satisfy
I am empty but I know Your love does not run dry
So I wait for You… so I wait for You…
I’m falling on my knees offering all of me
Jesus, You’re all this heart is living for.”
(Hungry,Kathryn Scott)

What To Wear Today

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The problem with finding my purpose in the roles I play and the work I do, is the way those things can drastically shift. Maybe gradually, as one season of time fades into another. Maybe unexpectedly, when the world you know takes a swift ugly turn. So that one day it is quite possible to wake up and feel that life has lost all meaning, and what in the world are you supposed to do with yourself in the time that stretches ahead?

Fortunately God’s Plans are so much larger than my circumstances. And there is this paradox that flies in the face of reason, that the more we seek for purpose in what life itself presents to us, the less likely we are to find it. Jesus put it rather cryptically: “If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for My sake, you will save it.” (Luke 9:24) He says everything that grabs your senses and sensibilities on this earth is nowhere near big enough to fit who you really are, and isn’t going to last anyway. John boldly declared that reality, challenging the young Believers to make their lives count in ways that matter: “For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions…..And this world is fading away, along with everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever.” (1 John 2:16-17) We can let go of these changing roles and tasks (even when they are pulled away before we are quite ready), and be reassured that our true Purpose remains. The Wise King actually landed in the same place, close to three thousand years ago, in the closing lines of his journal: “Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the duty of all mankind.” (Ecclesiastes 12:13)

Paul explains it this way: “we have not stopped praying for you….so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please Him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God” (Colossians 1:9-10). He talks about how we should go about living that out as if he were some spiritual fashion consultant. “Since God chose you to be the holy people He loves, you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. Make allowance for each other’s faults, and forgive anyone who offends you. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony.” (Colossians 3:12-14) This is an everyday Purpose that suits Christ-followers of all ages, in every season of life, regardless of situation. I can slip on these qualities in the morning when I get dressed, and wear them in the everyday moments of this day, let them guide my words and choices, whatever comes. Paul spares no pity for our anxiety over jobs, or whether we feel liked and needed. He starts with our identity and worth, and leads us on from there. “So if you’re serious about living this new resurrection life with Christ, act like it. Pursue the things over which Christ presides. Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ—that’s where the action is. See things from His perspective.” (Colossians 3:1-2)

On days when I feel aimless and  wondering what purpose I serve on this earth, I can look up and remember the overall Plan…that I am created to be God’s image-bearer, and that is the most important thing I will ever do. Jesus has even given me a living example of what that looks like. If I go into this day wearing the character qualities He gives me, to face the particular circumstances of my life, it is enough.

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“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” (Colossians 3:16-17)

Mirror, Mirror

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When we begin to talk about purpose, the waters get murky rather quickly. Women start talking about children being grown and out of the house, or not having children at all; about being divorced, or whether their husband comes to church; about pleasing others, and serving the people they love; about finding a job they like better, or keeping track of everyone’s schedules at home, or the ministries they are involved in. It’s fairly clear that for us, our sense of identity and purpose springs from our relationships with others and the work that we do.

No wonder we feel pulled every which way by people’s expectations and emotions, and wear ourselves out trying to do everything we see on Pinterest and Facebook. In this comparison game, it looks like just about everyone out there is accomplishing more and living bigger and brighter than we are, doing more for their families and earning more approval because of it. Bring up the question of purpose in life, then, and right away women feel either frustrated and overwhelmed, or just downright confused.

But what if our purpose is much simpler than all of that– and much less subject to changes of circumstance? When we look back to the Beginning of everything we know, to find answers, we find God there already, exercising vast power and intellect and creative design to bring everything into existence. We even catch a glimpse of His personality in what He makes and how He goes about it… the order and complexity of His process…the harmony and cooperation between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit… and the variety and detail and beauty of the results. And with each stage of creation, God names it and tells its purpose– what He has in mind for it. It’s like a parent, attaching labels to the world for a toddler, so she can begin to understand what she is seeing and experiencing. At the climax of the story, God fashions the centerpiece for this world He has made: humanity. And once again, with the name, He speaks of purpose. “Let us make mankind in Our image, in Our likeness, so that they may rule over…all the creatures that move along the ground.” (Genesis 1:26)

The word used for image is the same one that will be used later to speak of idols. And just as the rock and clay carved by man’s hands was meant to reflect the image of some super-powerful being, so our clay was fashioned by God’s hands to reflect His own likeness. Our first purpose was to be a mirror that reflected God’s glorious Person. The eternal souls breathed into us, and what we call personality– our intellect, creativity, free will, full range of emotion, understanding of morality, humor, love, compassion, appreciation for beauty, verbal skills– all these are only shadow reflections of an infinite incomprehensible Personality. Every human that was ever born, in all our individual differences, reflect and express different aspects of one great Creator.

This is a purpose that doesn’t end, or change, regardless of our roles or duties in life. Sin dampens it, dims and mars it– but once we are made whole and straight in Jesus Christ, we are freed to become who we were created to be, to live as a unique mirror to His likeness. We can hardly blame the Church-Planter Paul for breaking into praise and worship so often in his letters to the early believers, as he told them about what God had done through Christ, and how great His purposes for us. He taught them that the fitting response was to “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!” (Philippians 4:4)

Figuring out how to reflect God’s image within our particular relationships and circumstances is what gets tricky, and will take a lifetime of learning from Him. So this is our faith-journey, to run the race we have been given– in this family, in this body, in this job, in this time and place, with these strengths and weaknesses, amid the consequences of our own choices and the choices of those around us. Here and now, to spend time with Him and learn Who He Is, so we can reflect His image well. This is our purpose and immense privilege on this earth.

And no one can take it away from us, not even our own failures, because He will use every last thing (good, bad, ugly, sad, or wonderful as it is) to accomplish His purpose in us.

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“I pray for you constantly, asking God, the glorious Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, to give you spiritual wisdom and insight so that you might grow in your knowledge of God.  I pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope he has given to those He called—His holy people who are His rich and glorious inheritance.” (Ephesians 1:16-18)

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“The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become – because He made us. He invented us. He invented all the different people that you and I were intended to be. . .It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own.” (C.S. Lewis)

 

 

The Right Hat for a New Year

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One woman can wear way too many hats sometimes. And in the week-in-week-out of life sometimes your goals can be reduced to learning how to juggle better…just finding balance…maybe squeezing out time for yourself amid the barrage of constant needs. Surely this is not what we were made for? Or could it be that this strangling urgency that drives us is a noose of our own making? And yet Jesus is whispering, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28) It can leave a woman wondering about her purpose in life, and how to find space to pursue the most important things.  Maybe at some point, what we need is a complete makeover. Not just renovation, but a tearing down and refocusing on what is True. A calling to something stronger, quieter.

Deep down, I do know this– that I am more than wife/mother/daughter/sister, more than the things I can and cannot do. At the end of the day, I will still be what I was in the beginning: made by God’s hands and God’s heart, adopted into His family, and loved completely. So I take an old picture frame and make PEACE to hang on my wall, a visual reminder of what God is saying to me, these last couple months: “Be still, and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:10) 

Often finding our true purpose isn’t something we can grow into gradually. We pursue the things we value most, and we are good at building strongholds to protect our own interests. Sometimes the chance to live new and strong only comes after peeling away layer after layer of myself, and my ideas, like a messy and painful intervention. But the pruning is all part of the process. As the author of the book of Hebrews pointed out about God’s perspective on the things of this world: not only are they temporary, but they need to be battered and broken down “so that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.” (Hebrews 12:27) If I want the eternal that God is building for me, then I have to be willing to let go of the things I hold onto, no matter how it grieves.

Here at the beginning of the year, there is something fresh and new stirring– a Breath in the middle of us. And women sit around a dining room table late at night over cups of tea, choosing their one word for the coming year– strong beautiful words that peel the layers of hats right off, and get beneath everything we Do, to find who we Are before the Lover of our souls. And we talk about our purpose in life, and the voices that pull us in different directions, and we are all hungry for the same thing: to know God more deeply, and understand His ways, to be able to hear His voice above the clamor, to let go of our own trying-hard and rest in His care and provision. When we start living intentionally, “seeking first the Kingdom of God” (Matthew 6:33), we are finally able to find our true purpose in life, to throw open the doors to God’s plans for us.

It’s a good way to start the year– not with goals and resolutions, but with heart-searching. Jeremiah the prophet wrote down the promises God spoke to His people: “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” (Jeremiah 29:13) This we can count on. Because this is what He made us for.

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“I cry out to God Most High, to God who will fulfill his purpose for me.” Psalm 57:2

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“Oh, I’ve heard a thousand stories of what they think You’re like,
But I’ve heard the tender whisper of love in the dead of night;
And You tell me that you’re pleased,
And that I’m never alone.
You’re a Good, Good Father–
It’s who You are, it’s who You are, it’s who You are.
And I’m loved by You–
It’s who I am, it’s who I am, it’s who I am.”
(Good Good Father, Anthony Brown and Pat Barrett)

Forward

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Just this sweet reminder from the pen of Amy Carmichael– over a century old, but so very comforting to us at the beginning of a new year:

“Thou knewest me before I was;
I am all open unto Thee;
And yet Thou lovest me, because–
Thou, my Lord, lovest me.

I may not fear, for to the end
Thou lovest. Who save only Thee,
The sinner’s Saviour and his Friend,
Would set his love on me?

And on Thee now my heart is set;
Thy name is music unto me.
O help me never to forget
That I am loved by Thee.”

Amen and let us walk boldly on, into whatever may come.

All These Impossible Things

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Every year when I read the Christmas Story from Luke’s account, I linger over this one sentence that seems so oddly placed: “For nothing shall be impossible with God.” (Luke 1:37) That the angel should give such a sweeping pronouncement in the middle of back-to-back baby announcements seems oddly dramatic. But for these women whose lives are about to be abruptly re-written, it is not only a clarion call of restoration for the world, but an assurance straight to their hearts.

To the older woman married for years, already resigned to life as it is, her dreams wrestled into silence years ago, the Word of the Lord comes. To the young woman still in her father’s house with her whole life out in front of her, the Word of the Lord comes. To each the impossible message from the Lord is given– intimate, unexpected, and marvelous. To each the terrifying challenge is given to reach out and grow into new places. I can’t help but think that the angel laughed at the ridiculous joy of his news. The Almighty One stoops to enter the ordinary, the everyday blood and body of a woman…and there are no more barriers between the holy and the mundane, between what is possible and what is not. God will Himself accomplish His purposes in hearts that are willing, and our lives will no longer be limited to what we can see and touch and make sense of. “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” (Isaiah 43:19) Something new in the ordinary endless dust of our Everyday.

To us also, the angel’s message comes at Christmas for all the impossible circumstances we live with. For the bad habits we are trying hard to break; for the complicated relationships that we keep trying to fix; for the ways we cope and cover up and distract from what really matters; for the fragility of these bodies and spirits, and the dark fears that creep at night; for all these, the joyful song blows on the wind: Nothing shall be impossible from now on, because your Maker has come! In all the hard rocky ways we limp through this world, and the griefs that weigh heavy, still there is this announcement that everything can change. And we sing, “Joy to the world, the Lord has come. Let earth receive her King!” We may not see the fulfillment of His plans just yet, but the Almighty One sees us and has come to help, and nothing is truly impossible any more.

Nothing shall be impossible because He is at work, and who can stop Him? Nothing shall be impossible….“for those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God.” (Romans 8:14) Nothing shall be impossible…. for “in all things God works for the good of those who love him.” (Romans 8:28) Nothing shall be impossible….for “he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies.” (Romans 8:11) Nothing shall be impossible….“for we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.” (Romans 8:32)

For all our impossible things, a Savior was born on a night long ago in Bethlehem. “O come, let us adore Him, Christ the Lord.”

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“The high and lofty one who lives in eternity, the Holy One, says this: “I live in the high and holy place with those whose spirits are contrite and humble. I restore the crushed spirit of the humble and revive the courage of those with repentant hearts.” (Isaiah 57:15)

~~~~~~~

“There is no place I can go
Where you don’t already know
How to reach right down and pull me out
I need you…

There is no fight left
On the inside
But maybe that’s where I should be
I’ve given up tryin’
I’m giving it all to you.”
(No Fight Left, JJ Heller)

Promises, Promises

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I keep hearing the deejays say on the radio that “It’s the most wonderful time of the year.”  But that’s all they are promising, and given the news headlines, I wonder if they are trying to convince us, or themselves. And it’s only a few days into December, and already moms are looking a little wild-eyed at the shopping and the decorating and the parties of Christmas. The calendar promises a regular holiday whirlwind that might distract from the real-life reports from the doctor, and the daily work pressures, and the loneliness; but we all know how those sit on our hearts, at the end of the day.

To be honest, some years it is hard to get excited about the season, and some years it feels like I am decorating this evergreen tree by faith, stepping out into Celebration when my heart hasn’t quite caught up yet. But I do it anyway. Because the only promise that matters was fulfilled right before our eyes on Christmas: the Babe is born into our dirt and noise, and He will save us from our sin.

It’s the oldest promise in the Book, the one that comes right after Adam and Eve wrecked the world, and veiled in the figurative language of prophecy. And weren’t all the generations since, just building their lives on faith? From Sarah who birthed her promised son at the ripe old age of ninety and laughed at the sheer ridiculous wonder of it, right down to Anna who spent her solitary life camped out on the doorstep of the House of the Lord, praying and waiting for the Anointed One.

Isaiah sings out the promise most clearly: “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given…. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6) The angel messenger carries the promise to a young girl in her parents’ home, “…the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God.” (Luke 1:35) And the angel armies in the skies above Bethlehem pick up the refrain, shouting it to the hilltops: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom His favor rests.” (Luke 2:14)

We too lift our voices at Christmas, put up our trees to remember the promise, and we light them in full hope of God’s faithfulness.  “For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so through him the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God.” (2 Corinthians 1:20)

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“And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.  ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” (Revelation 21:3-4)

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“Meanwhile, this grand primeval promise, “The seed of the woman shall bruise the head of the serpent,” would stand out as a beacon-light to all mankind on their way, burning brighter and brighter, first in the promise to Shem, next in that to Abraham, then in the prophecy of Jacob, and so on through the types of the Law to the promises of the Prophets, till in the fullness of time “the Sun of Righteousness” arose “with healing under His wings!” (Alfred Edersheim, Old Testament History)