When Love says, “Not Yet”

All Sorts

–The ‘already’s and ‘not yet’s of the Gospel–

I read an article this week by Tim Keller [If you haven’t encountered his books, do look up some reviews. He’s a pastor in NYC making inroads for the Gospel in a tough place and doing lots of thinking and writing in the process, books and articles arguing for the relevance of the Gospel. The Reason for God is one in my collection, waiting for a long sea voyage in order to get read!! ] Anyway, in a long article entitled: “The Centrality of the Gospel”* he talked about the ‘already’s and the ‘not yet’s of the Gospel and how a thorough understanding of the Gospel in its present and future implications will impact the individual and nurture the church.

Can I whet your appetite with an example? With regard to doctrinal distinctives he says (and I very much needed to hear) this:

‘The “already” of the New Testament makes us bold in our proclamation. We can most definitely be sure of the central doctrines that support the gospel. But the “not yet” requires charity and humility in nonessential beliefs. That is, we must be moderate about what we teach except when it comes to the cross, grace, and sin. In our views, especially our opinions on issues that Christians cannot agree on, we must be less unbending and triumphalistic (believing we have arrived intellectually). It also means that our discernment of God’s call and will for us and others must not be propagated with overweening assurance that our insight cannot be wrong. (Unlike pragmatists, we must be willing to die for our belief in the gospel; unlike moralists, we must keep in mind that not every one of our beliefs is worth fighting to the death for.)’

How does that set with you? I want to argue. But I have been meditating on the traits of the ‘wisdom from above’ this week and I find that it’s meek, “pure, peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.” (James 3:17,18) What’s more, ‘a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace’. I had occasion to need a peacemaker this week. I need these sorts of reminders to keep the Gospel central and operate in spiritual wisdom!

Tim Keller goes so far as to conclude that:

‘All problems, personal or social, come from a failure to apply the gospel in a radical way, a failure to get “in line with the truth of the gospel” (Gal. 2:14). All pathologies in the church and all its ineffectiveness come from a failure to let the gospel be expressed in a radical way. If the gospel is expounded and applied in its fullness in any church, that church will begin to look very unique. People will find in it both moral conviction yet compassion and flexibility.’*

Wow! The article goes on to describe the power of the gospel as it applies to a host of areas in sharp contrast to either a merely ‘religious’/moral or a relativistic/hedonistic approach to life.

But it was that concept of the ‘already’s and ‘not yet’s of the Gospel that grabbed me. I’m reading I Samuel these days. Saul’s been rejected as king for running ahead of God on his own steam instead of obeying. God has searched out a ‘man after his own heart’, David of course, and sent Samuel to confirm his choice by anointing him to be King of Israel. He’s come straight from the sheep pasture. And presumably, gone right back there to wait God’s timing on this amazing turn of events! Chosen, but not yet crowned.

Next thing you know, Saul’s tormented by a bad spirit and someone suggests he find a musician to soothe him. Turns out that David, the shepherd boy, is also a skilled musician (lots of practice time with his lyre in the hills) noted for his valor, prudence and ‘good presence’. He is recommended to the king with the observation that: ‘the Lord is with him.’ (I Sam.16) And so the king-to-be, already selected and anointed, becomes armor-bearer and part-time musician to the king-who-is-but’s-been-rejected. Not yet, David, not yet.

Well, you know the story. Next thing recorded is he’s running back and forth from sheep pen to battle front delivering baguettes and cheese to his brothers and getting the latest news for his dad. Pretty humble position for a king. And yet, he is the anointed king; it’s already been declared. But first the training. This is the ‘not yet’ of God’s timing in David’s life. Pretty soon, he takes the tricks of his trade—smooth stones and a sling—and uses them in a new context; what’s the difference between a lion, a bear, and an uncircumcised Philistine if God’s calling the shots? David sees none. His training as a shepherd stands him in good stead and next thing you know he’s put in charge of Saul’s men of war (and his dad’s got to find another shepherd for his flocks).

Already anointed, but not yet king. The story goes on for a long while yet. This training to rule is no quick process. And that makes me ponder the ‘not yet’s of the Gospel. Believers are called “A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR GOD’S OWN POSSESSION” (I Pet.2:9) but in the next breath referred to as: ‘sojourners and exiles’. Our kingdom hasn’t come yet.

We are said to be ‘seated in the heavenly places with Christ’ having been ‘raised up together, and made [to] sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus’ but it’s a reality that will come to fullness “in the ages to come” (Eph.2:6,7).

On the one hand we’re called sons of God, joint heirs with Christ and given eternal life! On the other we ‘groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies’ (Rom.8:23) and the fact is we must part with these earthly bodies in order to be with the Lord, “knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord.” (II Cor 5:6).

So we’re given God’s own Spirit to indwell these makeshift tents as a guarantee of the life to come (IICor.5:5). Like David, we’re ‘anointed’ so to speak, appointed as ambassadors, invited to speak in Jesus’ name, with His authority. These things are true and yet we find ourselves for the most part subject to the physical laws of nature, decay and corruption, waiting for the ‘not yet’ of future glory that is to be revealed in us (Rom.8:18). Could it be we are in training?

David was. Had his been an instant coronation think of the Psalms we’d be without–those ones that give us hope when the world is harsh and our circumstances unintelligible, the ones that remind us that the enemy will not win, that God is indeed good, that He is a refuge we can trust no matter what…the ones that contain words Jesus Himself uttered from the Cross: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me.”

The Gospel fully comprehended in its ‘already’s and ‘not yet’s will transform the way we live and what we hope for. It is enough in sickness or in health, for richer or poorer but the really good news is that nothing, not even death, will part us from the King of life in this world or the next, and we shall reign with Him. It’s already true, but not yet fully realized. There’s an order to things, a victory that’s won but some mopping up to do first.

 â€œFor as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.  But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.”
I Cor.15:22ff

There were folks in the church in Corinth who lost sight of the significance of the resurrection. They claimed life was about ‘now’ and denied that there would be anything more. Paul had to set them straight. Christ died for our sins, and was buried, and was raised, making the power of the Gospel effective beyond this lifetime. In fact he said, “If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.” I Cor.15:19 After all, the gospel isn’t only for unbelievers, to turn them into happy healthy church folk in the here and now. It is the good news ‘by which we are being saved.’ Christ not only died for the unbeliever’s sin and restoration to fellowship with God. He lives so the believer can start living an eternal quality of life in the here and now, triumphant in the midst of pain and suffering and death, knowing the ‘fellowship of His sufferings’.

Maybe our generation, at least in the Western world, is not so very different than the Corinthians. Hoping and planning for comfort in the here and now is after all a pretty obsessive priority in our culture, even our Christian culture. Larry Crabb in his recent book, God’s Love Letters to You, in reflecting on Colossians says that when we place our hopes in experiencing satisfaction in the here and now, we are actually “shifting away from the hope held out in the gospel”, disfiguring the Christian life and blurring and discounting what Jesus accomplished in His death and resurrection. He is in us as our HOPE of glory, not our ‘opportunity to experience glory now.’ (95). He suggests that God might well be saying to us: “You are not alive in this world in order to experience Me or to enjoy the blessings of a comfortable life. If that were My purpose, I’d have brought you into My Presence in heaven the moment you were forgiven and adopted into My family.”

“Your purpose until you die is to reveal a new attitude toward suffering and a new agenda in prayer that flows out of your new purpose in life that makes sense only if you claim your new hope of resurrection…”(74)

Tim Keller concurs with this perspective when he says: “The cross shows us, however, that God redeemed us through suffering. God suffered not that we might not suffer but that in our suffering we could become like him.”

I don’t much fancy this suffering stuff, but Paul called it a fellowship and expected it to make Him like Jesus (Phil.3:10). He told Timothy it was a fact of life: “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” II Tim.3:12. And the Hebrews 11 folk who had their share of it were commended for their faith and said to be ones ‘of whom the world was not worthy’. Could be it’s part of the process of preparing us to reign?

“The saying is trustworthy, for: If we have died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us; if we are faithless, he remains faithful– for he cannot deny himself.” II Tim.2: 11-13

So we live between what’s been accomplished already and what’s not yet come. We rejoice in the grace we’ve already been shown, the grace that is sufficient still and the grace that will yet be revealed when Christ returns. “When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” I Cor.15:54,55. And that’s News worth getting excited about!

–LS

“For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens…so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.” (II Cor. 5:1-5)

—————————–

Tim Keller quotes are taken from his article “The Centrality of the Gospel”
Copyright Š 2000 by Timothy Keller, Š 2009 by Redeemer City to City, available in its entirety at: redeemercitytocity.com

Larry Crabb quotes are taken from God’s Love Letters to You (Thomas Nelson, 2010)  For a review of this book see my blog: “A Few Good Books”

Dreaming Big

All Sorts, BOOKS

 I’m reviving an old habit this week, thanks to the faith-boosting writing of Paul Miller in A Praying Life. I’ve pulled out my old prayer-request notebook and have been browsing through the entries…It’s one of those old-fashioned, pocket-size, 6-ring binders. Mine’s got custom pages, mostly hand-cut, color-coded into three main divisions: Family, The Body, and The World. Just about everything I pray about fits under one of those. Then there’s another section for writing out prayers and prayer promises straight from Scripture. Who wouldn’t want Colossians 1:9-10 prayed for them consistently?!

“We ask God to give you a complete understanding of what he wants to do in your lives, and we ask Him to make you wise with spiritual wisdom…we also pray that you will be strengthened with his glorious power so that you will have all the patience and endurance you need…May you be filled with joy, always thanking the Father who has enabled you to share the inheritance that belongs to God’s holy people, who live in the light…”

Some of praying requires dreaming big, asking for the sky! Seeing beyond the present to a future that is altogether different and praying that direction. That’s what praying from the Word spurs me on to do.
I’ve been reading in particular the Family requests. Lots of long-term things for all of us, character qualities to sharpen, bents of heart to bless, habits to shake. There’s a lot of watching and waiting involved in these things…

The catch is, the details–the events that happen on the way to the dream being fulfilled. They don’t always (often? ever?) look like I imagined they would/should. And sometimes that makes me think I’m on the wrong track, shooting for the wrong dream. But after all, every story has a plot and is built around some sort of conflict or suspense (or it wouldn’t be a story!). I just have to remember I’m not the Author of the story! So, I’m back on the written page, working on a fresh index card system, penning my suggestions for how the story line might go, submitting my requests for plot adjustments and waiting in the wings to see how it will all play out in the hands of the Master Playwright.

Habakkuk knew the feeling. His people were about to be taken captive by the meanest guys around, and God was allowing it, orchestrating it even…Sounded like crazy talk but he stood on the frontlines watching to see what would transpire, confident that his hopes were well placed in the God of his salvation and his strength. Here’s what he said, and how God answered:

Habakkuk: “I will take my stand at my watch post and station myself on the tower, and look out to see what he will say to me…”

The Lord: “Write the vision; make it plain on tablets,…for still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay….but the righteous shall live by his faith.” (2:1-4)

And that’s why I’m putting pen to paper, so I will keep my vision clear and my faith unclouded to watch as the story of our lives unfolds.

————————–

I’m keeping this post short so that I can tell you more about Paul Miller’s book: A Praying Life. Here’s an excerpt of my thoughts, taken from my own review at: thestackofdawn.blogspot.com.

“Here it is, a book for Christians “struggling with life, who pray badly yet long to connect with their heavenly Father.” I’ve collected lots of book on prayer over the course of my guilt-ridden life, driven to do something about my substandard ‘prayer life’. I’ve started in to read the classics by the ‘famous’ Christians who knew how to pray and could lay out the ‘doctrine’ of it thoroughly and without a loophole. And I’ve read some ‘loopier’ modern ones– that imply that God is always talking to me and if I’ll just learn to tune in, I can ask anything I want and voila! I’ll have the answers I’m seeking. It’s just that easy. But buying books on prayer is kinda like buying art books—it’s easier to spend the money collecting the books than the time learning to draw. Prayer comes down to that, spending time talking, and listening, and being conscious of God’s responses as they’re woven into my days.

“What’s neat about this book is that it’s not only inviting to read because it’s built on the real life experience of the author (and his family), but it also makes you want to pray, to stop reading and start in, right now! Life-as-is becomes the starting point for coming like a dependent child to a Father who cares intimately about everything and desires to meet my needs. It’s not so much a matter of discipline once I recognize my utter need for God’s intervention in my days. Prayerlessness implies that I’m trusting in something else—my money, ability, spouse, fate?…to get me through without God. Anxiety is the tell-tale sign of my misplaced confidence. The circumstances of life are better seen as an invitation to talk to my Father about everything….”

To continue reading and sample some choice excerpts please see my book review blog: A Few Good Books, here. I hope you’ll be inspired to take a fresh look with me at the best habit ever, a praying life.

–LS

Our Plentiful Redemption

All Sorts

Lots of time for wind-swept, driftwood filled meditations this week. We’ve been on a sailing trip, just Jim and I. I’ve been thinking how life is a lot like a sailing trip… We head out with dreamy-eyed visions of sunny skies, perfect breezes, scenic seascapes and blissful relaxation. That is after all why we take sailing trips isn’t it? Would we embark if we knew the skies would turn grey and begin to spit and the wide ocean be stirred up to pitch us about? Maybe. But why? What’s the draw?

Can’t the captain guarantee us such things? No. He only promises to stick with me come wind come weather, to pilot me safe to the destination he has in mind. He’s got the charts. He knows the perils. We’ll be in this thing together, for better or for worse. Whether it be grilled pork chops on deck in a calm harbor as the day settles around us or canned soup by dim cabin light long after night fall and a long day of navigating. We’re together.

Will it be scintillating sunshine and fresh steady breezes or stifling heat as we languish in the doldrums? Or maybe rainy squalls that drive me below deck to ride it out in closed-eye concentration of mind over matter. It’s ok; we’re in this thing together. It’s a bonding thing. I am my beloveds and he is mine. He takes me on adventures I could never know without him.

And somehow, in the enduring of the not-so-pleasant, and the mildly terrifying and the humdrum our capacity for the joy of the sunny moment, the blissful leisure and the breathtaking vistas is enhanced! Don’t you find it so?

It seems to me life is like that. On this side of the grave, given a sin-fractured world, an enemy scheming sabotage and even our own natures bent on betrayal of our best interests…what hope is there of endless bliss? And yet I find myself incorrigibly aiming for it. And then I’m shocked and affronted when trouble comes. Why? Does the captain owe me a fair-weather sail guarantee? Do voyages come with guarantees? Does life?

I always have to come back to my real hope, the one that won’t disappoint, that Good News that was the ticket for the journey in the first place. When I push back from circumstances and think objectively I see a disconcerting trend of thought that speaks of hope as a future thing, an inheritance that isn’t fully realized yet, but guarded in the here and now by faith in my Captain….

“…born again to a living hope…to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you.” (I Pet.1:3,4)

“Fix your hope completely on the grace yet to come at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” (I Pet.1:13)

“For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees?” (Rom 8:24)

Is this really where my hopes are set so that in the meantime I can weather wind and seas and delight in tranquil respites but not cling to them, demand them, or live for them?

The real hope is yet ahead—the hope alone that guarantees complete satisfaction. In the meantime, some winds, maybe rain, some tough moments to endure. “With endurance a joy will develop that frees you to appreciate the pleasure of life’s blessings without requiring from them a satisfaction they cannot provide.” (Crabb,101)

But my captain is with me and in real life He has the power to guarantee me a safe haven at journey’s end. Isn’t this after all the heart of the Gospel, the good news that God is with us, forever! He’s made a way, forgiven our sins, brought us near. And now we’re in this thing called life on earth together.

I have a tendency to think of Him as a resource for my comfort here and now but this is missing the point. He’s with me, yes, but not so everything will be just perfect and I’ll sail sweetly home without a snag. There’s this matter of redemption that has nothing to do (yet) with my physical body and everything to do with my character—the soul of who I am and who I live for. God takes the everyday everythings of life ‘as is’ and redeems them for the purpose of reshaping me for His glory. It’s all there just beyond that comforting verse about all things working together for good… “to those who are called according to His purpose.” (Rom.8:28ff) If my purpose in life is about sunny skies, idyllic anchorages and ceaseless ease I’ve embarked on the wrong cruise! This one’s about becoming conformed to the image of God’s Son—whatever it takes!

So while I do know I’m in good hands I don’t know what all my days will hold of pain and pleasure. And they seldom come unmixed.

Take for example this trip. There I was smack dab in the middle of these musings and the dinghy motor wouldn’t start. Here we were anchored in a spacious bay on an idyllic summer’s morning, (now fast morphing into afternoon), fresh and free, ready to zip across to the far shore and explore the little village of Heriot Bay, and our spritely little motor refuses to chug, will scarcely cough or hiccup, listless to the endless arm-tiring tugs of the captain…. An hour passes, and more. The spark plugs, the gas line, the inner workings are all laid bare as the dinghy takes on the look of a mechanic’s work bench. Still no spark, the odd back-fire, no go. And we sit in the bay bereft of power to putt about as the sun rises high and hot. Is God in this moment? Doesn’t feel like it. But He is with us yet, soothing our frustrations, fueling our energies to tinker and to serve with patience. Jim’s arm is weary. His problem solving ideas spent. I dispense screwdrivers and ratchets, sandpaper and a rag, eventually the whole tool box. I offer water, a cool cloth, sunscreen and Gatorade, an orange too for energy, and I pray… Does the motor then just have to start? In my kind of story line, yes. In real life, no. We row the mile and a half to ‘town’ (or rather, my captain does!) with sweat, blisters, and patience. Life is like that sometimes. But its purpose is not trivial.

“The Lord knows the days of the blameless, and their inheritance will be forever.” I think there’s a timing thing we don’t quite get. The here and now seems so large, so present, so all-important. Preserving life and health and happiness starts to look like everything. But it’s a miniscule blip on an endless horizon.

It’s not about our comfort but our conformity to Jesus’ image. This is a part of the redemption going on. It won’t be complete till our bodies are included—“we eagerly wait for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved.” (Rom.8:23)– but in the meantime it seems God’s got designs for our characters that are often best accomplished using circumstance. And through thick and thin He is with us, redeeming every moment for our best good. And that’s a plentiful redemption we can count on!

“Hope in the Lord for with the Lord is steadfast love, and with Him is plentiful redemption.” (Ps.130:7)

—LS

P.S. “Rest in the LORD and wait patiently for Him”…commit your way to Him; delight in Him. Now trust that He will bring it to pass… Don’t fret. Nothing good comes of it. (Ps.37)

Here I raise my Ebenezer

All Sorts

Well, since summer has been late to show its warm and sunny face I’ve had some extra time to shuffle papers and sort books and all those indoor organizing kinds of things that really must be done but somehow get put off… I have a closet full of books and papers from seemingly countless years of homeschooling. Considering that I have only one pupil remaining, and two years of instruction to go, it would seem that we don’t need ALL these books. And really, how many samples of handwriting, and weekly schedules and daily assignments do we need to keep? Let’s see, 5 kids X 12 years X 36 weeks X 5 subjects = A massive amount of ‘memorabilia’! Must I keep it all to prove we did something, learned something, and maybe had a little fun doing it?!

Why are some people pack rats anyway? Yes I treasure those forays into creative writing. I love the essays on sundry topics from pranks played on Mom to sailing mishaps to inventive reporting of mundane life experiences… They’re ‘keepers’. I love the artwork (and the doodles) which seem to multiply in proportion to the quantity of paper made available and the ‘dry’ness of the topic at hand… But really, where’s the limit?

So I had me a look at this business of being a ‘pack-rat’ and I found the proper terminology is “compulsive hoarding”… and what’s more, there is a specific syndrome called: Bibliomania – “a disorder involving the collecting or hoarding of books to the point where social relations or health are damaged.” Oh my. Well, my health isn’t in jeopardy yet (though I do seem to have a sore throat and snuffles today… and I did miss a social opportunity to go sailing on this otherwise splendidly sunny and breezy day in order to deal with books…) Hmm. As for the treatment? Anti-depressants and/or psychotherapy can be helpful.

I’m not into drugs, so bring on the psychotherapy! Just so happens I was reading a book (surprise!) and this quote jumped out at me:

“Your preoccupation with satisfaction is the corruption beneath your compulsions” (God’s Love Letters to You–Crabb, 86) 



Huh, what? Read that again… OK, so stretching the context (which I may or may not get back to), I got to thinking about my ‘preoccupation with satisfaction’, even re-worded it… my demand for perfection–to get it right, do it all. In terms of homeschooling, to use every resource to its fullest potential, to learn everything thoroughly, to cover all the bases… and to drive my kids crazy with my edits and demands for more and better and my “it’s-never-quite-good-enough”-ness. Gulp. So I save the books because we’re not quite through with them. So much good content. Wonderful presentation (or not). We could do this… We should go through this one…one day we’ll come back to this… Meanwhile my students have graduated with varying degrees of burn-out, feelings of failure, and a toxic mix of guilt and relief that THAT’s OVER WITH! And me, I hang onto the books and dream…and the papers that verify we learned something through all that!

Ha! Really, given a different personality this job would be a happy picnic. Picking up paper after paper full of memories of small people I got to live and learn with. Small people who were so very clever and such good writers. Each with his/her own angle on the world. Each a challenge and reward all its own. Small people who filled my days with meaning and my life with their delights…Were I not living for perfection, this would be enough, wouldn’t it?!

Why does a book unused have to be a sad thing? Maybe it was a lesson learned (namely, this is not for you; leave it!). A dog learns that lesson. Can’t I? And does a completed book have to feel so bittersweet? Do I really want them all still to be in 4th grade so we can read-aloud together and learn cursive just a little better… What if life is not about hitting perfection today but about lots of ordinary days where we give what we’ve got to the task at hand and celebrate the accompanying grace, in whatever measure it’s bestowed.

What if the process of living and learning and walking it all out by faith is what matters, not the product at all! Maybe the string of such days well lived is all the product that’s expected on my end. Otherwise, at which stage in this process of growing up can one be said to be ‘complete’. And which test will show it so that I can say ‘Whew, that’s done’. If I’m looking for perfection now, there’ll be no rest, no satisfaction, no commendations forthcoming. Only compulsions.

The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. Gal.5:6

I sometimes fault my students on working as if ‘getting it over with’ is the whole objective, rather than focusing on learning and enjoying the process. Hmm… seems I haven’t taken that too well to heart myself? Lifetime is an unending process; I may as well get used to the open-endedness of it and start recognizing the glory of each stage, as plenty good enough and cause for celebration! [Sorry kids; your mom’s a slow learner]

So we all ‘with unveiled face’ are called to turn from bondage to books or rules or any good thing that makes us think we can better ourselves…we’re called to turn to Jesus, who ministers to us His righteousness, by His own Spirit, as we look and live. This is how we are changed ‘from one degree of glory to another’ until we behold His likeness and are completed in the ‘twinkling of an eye’—graduated. And life as we’ve always hoped and dreamed it would be commences. That will be glory.

In the meantime? Books and papers serve as reminders of the trail of grace we’ve traveled. I began reading I Samuel this week. After all the ‘doing it their own way’ and resultant bondage of Judges, at last there is one who hears from God and begins to free the Israelites to enjoy their inheritance and to realize what a privilege it is to have God as their King. They toss their idols, confess their sin and decide to serve only the LORD. But watch out! It’s not over. Their oppressors rally intent on keeping them in bondage. They call on Samuel: “Do not cease to cry out to the LORD our God for us!” He does. God answers by thunder and the enemy is routed in confusion. And the next thing Samuel does is to set up a stone by way of reminder. He names it Ebenezer, ‘stone of help’ for he said, “Till now the LORD has helped us.”(I Sam.7:12) The territory lost to the enemy is restored and peace reigns…

Yes! I so want that. None of this bondage to stuff or guilt or ‘if only’ or ‘one day…’ or any such thing. Just a calling out to God that routes the enemy and restores the freedom that is my birthright, and the setting up of landmarks that remind me of His faithfulness.  Maybe that’s what this week is about, sorting and sifting through all these years of homeschooling fallout for a ‘stone’ that will cause me no regret, no anguish of heart, only rejoicing at all the way the Lord has led us and will lead us still–until we stand before Him at the commencement exercises to hear the words: “Well done thou good and faith-filled student. Enter into the joy of your Lord”. Let the wedding feast begin!

P1020591

I close with these original lyrics to the familiar hymn: Come, Thou Fount
by Robert Robinson (1758)

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace;
Streams of mercy, never ceasing,
Call for songs of loudest praise….

Sorrowing I shall be in spirit,
Till released from flesh and sin,
Yet from what I do inherit,
Here Thy praises I’ll begin;

Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Here by Thy great help I’ve come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.



–LS

Not for Keeps

All Sorts

Listen to this sound reasoning. (I’m still reading in Judges)  Here the Ammonites are, itching to go to war against Israel to reclaim some lost territory, and Jephthah runs them through a short history lesson, reminding them of their defeat many years before and concluding with these words… “Will you not take what your god Chemosh gives you? Likewise, whatever the LORD our God has given us, we will possess.” (Judges 11:24) I like that! 

I’ve been thinking lately that contentment is the very safest place to be, contentment with whatever the Lord chooses to provide. After all, He knows me better than I know me. He loves me better too. He knows the desires of my heart when I’m not sure I even know what I want. And He’s committed to my best good all my days. What He gives me I’ll possess. And in truth, we have inherited a FORTUNE! We are of all people most fortunate:

And who is like your people Israel, the one nation on earth whom God went to redeem to be his people, making for yourself a name for great and awesome things, in driving out nations before your people whom you redeemed from Egypt? And you made your people Israel to be your people forever, and you, O LORD, became their God. I Chr.17:21,22

For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the LORD our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? Deut.4:7

The tricky part is when the possession is not ‘for keeps’. Few things are in this lifetime. We had a pastor years back who always reminded us to hold everything God gives in an open hand. Receive it with gratitude, enjoy it to the full, but don’t demand that it be yours for keeps. We are managers. God is the rightful owner. He would hold out his hand with an open palm to illustrate.

I’m holding out mine this morning… returning a gift I’ve enjoyed immensely for 8 years—a gift that has opened up my world to endless retreats and vistas, to unforgettable moments with God in His creation, enabling me to get beyond the self-conscious insecurity of being ‘out there’ alone and to enjoy the quiet– listening for God’s still small voice and giving no thought to my ‘alone-ness’. What a gift. What a Gift-giver! His was more than the gift of a mere dog; in giving me Louie He has taken my heart on a journey to Himself with every trail we’ve walked together. This has been a sweet season of fellowship with the Giver Himself.

And now, I must trust Him for the next leg of my journey. Today is but a bend in the trail I cannot see beyond. But mine is the Good Shepherd—he never grows old or debilitated, never changes, never fails.

He is the God who sees. Jehovah-jireh, which I’ve always understood to mean God Provides, literally means “Jehovah SEES”. He ‘looks after’ what concerns me. He takes note of everything—whether Abraham about to sacrifice his only son,(Gen.22:14) or Ishmael’s mother-to-be banished to the desert, (Gen.16:13,14)…or little old me bereft of my hiking companion and feeling that my big wide world has suddenly become restricted territory, my most delightful freedom lost…

I am reminding myself today of God’s good Hand—

For the LORD God is a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly. Ps.84:11

If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him! (Mt.7:11) This is not talking about hiking companions but the ultimate Companion, the person of the Holy Spirit himself, mine for the asking, mine forever. How a dog’s death pales in comparison to the privilege of being in the care of such a One…

My God shall supply all Your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. (Phil.4:19) It’s not about my needs for my pleasure, but my needs for His service. What new direction does God intend to turn me. What’s beyond this bend in the trail? I can’t say; but His supply will be there.

Oh, fear the LORD, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack! The young lions suffer want and hunger; but those who seek the LORD lack no good thing. Ps. 34:9,10 Well, that covers just about everything. What more could I want? Should I want more?

So…as I vacuum up last dog hairs, and collect my thoughts and all the dog things—the brush, the leash, the blanket, the memories…I will hope through the tears for good things yet to come, for new seasons, new growth, new trails with my Good Shepherd. And I will thank Him for all his good gifts–the forever ones and the ones that are so very sweet, but not for keeps. He is my Father. He knows what’s best.

“How precious is your steadfast love, O God!
The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
They feast on the abundance of your house,
and you give them drink from the river of your delights.
For with you is the fountain of life;
in your light do we see light.” (Ps. 36:7-9)



–LS


“So she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, “You are a God of seeing,” for she said, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.” (Gen.16:13)