Lessons from the Road

I went to a wedding this past weekend and it was wonderful! I would characterize it as a blessing and a challenge. It was a blessing because in talking to others, and through what was said about the couple in private conversations, and in the speeches at the reception, really emphasized how much God has done in their lives and how he has honored them for honoring Him in their lives. I was also overjoyed to make so many new friends at the wedding! I think it’s a real testament to the quality of people who surround this couple. I felt not only myself being blessed by the conversations and new friendships but many others around me as well. It was a challenge insofar as seeing the good things God has done, challenged and inspired me to reaffirm that yes, I want God to use me in his way not in my own. No matter what it takes, I do want to become the person He wants me to be, even if it doesn’t look like what I want, even if it’s the worst case scenario. I whole-heartedly say with the Prophet Isaiah, “Here am I. Send me!” Even if the sending in painful.

I had a lot of time in the car afterwards to think and pray about the encouragement I experienced. It was such a blessing to be able to open up and say, “Lord, I don’t like feeling the pain, I don’t like where I am, but I accept your will, help me to want it, help me to trust you, help me to desire You more.” It was probably the most honest I’ve been with the Lord in a long time, and it was much-needed.

Now I know this is a mountain top experience, and I may come down a bit off this high, but I think times like this are to learn lessons to hold on to in the valleys. Holding onto them like markers as in Hinds’ Feet on High Places. I want to implement these lessons in my life:

-God is at work, and will continue to do amazing things in people’s lives
-His will is not just good, it is best
-We must ever desire Him more and His glory
-We must love better
-It is good to want God’s will in your life and be molded to be more like Him
-Even though I struggle with the pain and circumstances of my life, I can be honest with God about that and ask Him to help me trust Him

It’s ok not to be  happy, and you can take that emotion, or however you feel, and lay it at the Lord’s feet. I realized I have been judging myself for not feeling happier about my circumstances, but I can be completely honest with God about how I feel, and it’s ok to ask Him to help my trust Him, to help me adjust my attitude. I know these things to be true, but sometimes it is difficult to put them into action. I feel a deep thirst reawakened in my soul for God. I think it may have dried up in the process of my own prayer: ” Lord, do whatever it takes to make me be the person you want me to be” being answered. No, these difficulties are not the result of God leaving me on the shelf, but they are the rough grindstone, the refining fire, fasting in the desert which removes those parts of us, those desires, false idols, or even just rough edges which need be removed. It is the transformation which Paul talks about in Romans 12 – and it is painful but gloriously beautiful!

“Therefore I begin to think, my Lord, you purposefully allow us to be brought into contact with the bad and evil things that you want changed. Perhaps that is the very reason why we are here in this world, where sin and sorrow and suffering and evil abound, so that we may let you teach us to react to them, that out of them we can create lovely qualities to live forever. That is the only really satisfactory way of dealing  with evil, not simply binding it so that it cannot work harm, but whenever possible overcoming it with good”

At last he spoke. “You have learned well, Grace and Glory. Now I will add one thing more. It was these lessons which you have learned which enabled me to change you from limping, crippled Much-Afraid into Grace and Glory with hinds’ feet. Now you are able to run, leaping on the mountains and able to follow me wherever I go, so that we need never be parted again.

“So remember this; as long as you are willing to be Acceptance-with-Joy and Bearing-in-Love, you can never again become crippled, and you will be able to go wherever I lead you. You will be able to go down into the Valley of the world to work with me there, for that is where the evil and sorrowful and ugly things are which need to be overcome.”

-Conversation between Grace and Glory and the King, Hinds’ Feet on High Places

Lord, I surrender all to you.

Take these hands and lift them up
For I have not the strength to praise You near enough
See I have nothing, I have nothing without You

Take my voice and pour it out
Let it sing the songs of mercy I have found
For I have nothing, I have nothing without You

All my soul needs
Is all Your love to cover me
So all the world will see
That I have nothing without You

Take my body and build it up
May it be broken as an offering of love
For I have nothing, I have nothing without You

All my soul needs
Is all Your love to cover me
So all the world will see
That I have nothing
But I love You

With all my heart
With all my soul
With all my mind
With all the strength that I can find

Take my time here on this earth
And let it glorify all that You are worth
For I am nothing,
I am nothing without You

-Bebo Norman, Nothing Without You

Seeing through a Glass Darkly

Call me sentimental, but I have a lot to be thankful for. I’ve come to a new appreciation of what I have. Recently, I’ve been asked a few times how my family is handling the situation, as if they might not be behind me, or might be disappointed in me.  Thinking about it now, my family has always been behind me. It never even occurred to me that it could be otherwise. I am so grateful to have my family’s support no matter what, they have taught what unconditional love is. I know I’m young and I’m only beginning to learn this lesson, but I really have a rich and full life. There are so many people in my life whom I love, and who love me in return, this means so much more than having a wealth or physical strength. I know that what I see now is now all there is to see. God truly blesses through people.

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
-The Apostle Paul, 1 Corinthians 13:12

Love we can’t Escape

Sometimes when you’re hurting, all the reason in the world doesn’t matter.  I’m pretty mechanistic myself, I am intrigued by how  things work. The myriad signals in the cell which can malfunction and lead to cancer are fascinating, but that doesn’t really matter if it takes away someone you love.  Sometimes instead of the how or the why, we just need a hug.  Being in pain can make you want to withdraw. Our society prizes self-sufficiency, and we pat ourselves on the back for trying to make it on our own. Most of all, we really do need love, all kinds of love.

That’s why I keep going back to God. No matter how bad life gets, His love never fails.

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.
What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:

“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
-The Apostle Paul, Romans 8:28-39

No matter what happens, nothing can separate us from the love of God. Paul says that death can’t, which seems intuitive; why should death pose a barrier to its conqueror? Paul also says life cannot separate us from the love of God. Sometimes life is worse than death. When we experience tragedy, or live in sorrow and can’t bear it any longer, we often ask for death, like Job:

“Why did I not perish at birth, and die as I came from the womb? [...] Oh, that I might have my request, that God would grant what I hope for, that God would be willing to crush me, to let loose his hand and cut me off!” -Job,  Job 3:11; 6:8-7

Life is more troublesome than death, in death we seek an end to strife, but even life cannot separate us from God. All the struggle, the turmoil cannot separate us. This is the more profound statement. No matter what happens to you, though your flesh is mangled, your emotions a wreck, or your spirit broken, God is there. Think of your worst moment, your darkest hour, even that cannot separate you from the love of God. Sometimes we cry “God where are you? Why have you left me? Why is this happening to me?” Yet, He is there. I don’t comprehend it, but when no one else understands your pain, He is right there, with you every moment, though you don’t feel it. The pain can’t remove you from His love, nor the faults you find within yourself, your anger, depression, all that is wretched in you. Most importantly: you cannot separate yourself from God’s love. Oh yes, you can reject Him. He will not force His love on you, but if you want His love, you are not great enough to prevent it. You cannot do something so bad that He wouldn’t want you, you are not so loathsome to be beyond His love.

Bitter Thorn, Blessed Thorn

The apostle Paul was a man utterly devoted to God. You might expect such a spiritual giant, who spread the gospel to much of the non-Jewish world and wrote a good chunk of the New Testament, to have a deep, personal strength to carry himself through the trials he faced (prison, flogging, stoning, and being shipwrecked, to name a few). However, his own account of himself showed it was not strength, but weakness and suffering which characterized his walk with the Lord:

To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

-The Apostle Paul, 2 Corinthians 12:7-10

Whether Paul’s thorn was physical or spiritual in nature, it impacted him deeply; it drew Paul closer to God. He called on God three times to have his thorn removed. That was time well spent  crying out in anguish to the Father who wants to hear us. Yes,  He wants us as we are: broken, despairing, screaming and wailing in our pain and frustration. He does not desire our suffering, but He desires our honest selves. It is good to long for the end of suffering; the whole world is waiting for restoration from the Fall. Paul pleaded with God for removal of his torment. However, sometimes God in all His wisdom, doesn’t remove the thorn.

The response isn’t a simple “no.”

God replied that He would meet Paul’s needs. He spoke of sufficiency and power which would not belong to Paul. This brings us to another purpose of the thorn: it taught Paul humility. Paul learned to boast about his weaknesses. It is not false humility, but the act of rejoicing in true weakness, in dependence on God, which Paul exemplifies. Weakness is a reminder that it is not our strength which counts, but God’s.  His power is made perfect in weakness. The power of the almighty God is shown through our trusting in His strength, rather than our own.

It’s humiliating to admit weakness, to ask for help, to abandon solidarity… but it is only the illusion of solidarity which is abandoned. Perhaps this explains Paul’s closeness with God, his devotion was a sign of the recognition of his great need. What a testament if we could rejoice that God’s power is made known in our weakness. He must increase and we must diminish. All we can do is ask for grace, like Paul, to bear the thorn.

So why call it a blessed thorn? It is indeed a thorn; pain is part of the Fall, but God redeems pain and uses it for good. We owe God a debt of thanks for using the pain, for bringing His blessing in spite of the curse. So I will boast with Paul, not in the greatness of my thorn, but in the greatness of my God who uses the thorn.