Dear patient readers,

This story has a little age on it....but its message is truly timeless.  Need it today.

Paraclete

            Floyd is the Latin scholar in our family; he has to be since he’s the only one who ever studied Latin at all.  It is a dead language after all.  But now that I think about it, paraclete is probably a Greek word and that’s all Greek to him just like it is to me.  So much for our linguistically-challenged family.

            I chose the name of this chapter for a reason, and just like it wasn’t for language study, it’s also not about a pair-a-cleats for my favorite softball player.  In fact, those cleats are a good example of the exact opposite of what I mean.

            Tonight I arrived at home a few minutes after Floyd’s arrival; this fact alone will forever remain a mystery because I left the office first and he thinks I drive too fast.  Whatever the reasons, he beat me home. 

            I found him in his office (affectionately named “The Abyss” for its unique filing and storage systems.  That, by the way, is wife-code for “disaster area!”) He quietly told me he had quite a bit of pain in his side and back.  Floyd has some mostly-dormant medical problems that we don’t think about too much except when something like this happens.  So, seeing his face, hearing his voice, and considering all factors set off my alarms. 

            One of those alarms was for his comfort, well-being and longevity. (It’s another long story, but he knows he’s not allowed to go to heaven until we’ve celebrated our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary and, at this writing that’s fourteen-plus years ahead.)  I should just go ahead and tell you that I’m not a very good nurse.  I’m too crisp, quick, noisy, and I tend to become much too cool, calm and distant.  These bad tendencies are worse when Floyd feels bad because I’m just plan scared something really bad is wrong and I might lose him.  I have this strong opinion that heaven just needs to wait a while before he shows up at the pearly gates!

            Tonight, God gently guided my heart when I took a deep breath and shot up a quickie prayer for help.  His guidance was found in that non-Latin, non-athletic Greek word, “paraclete.”

            Most of what I know is that this Greek word in the Bible’s New Testament is often used to refer to God, the Holy Spirit who was sent to us folks who remain on this earth after Jesus went back to heaven.  He was sent as a helper, and as a “paraclete”…one called alongside to help us.  I’ve certainly needed His help a few zillion times in my life, some of which I even recognized as needing His help! 

            Tonight He whispered His name into my thoughts: Paraclete.  I took a breath to think about that and realized it was the antidote to my poverty-stricken bedside skills.  I’m a bit of a literalist: if you tell me to walk about fifteen steps to a goal, I will walk fifteen steps and stop regardless of whether I reached the goal.  I’m going to follow the instructions to the letter.  Well, that’s most of the time anyway.

            This tendency served me well tonight because when my kind Helper whispered “Paraclete, I heard “called alongside” and I simply sat down beside my wonderful husband.  I stayed there talking to him about nothing and everything until his pain eased.  I gave him lots of unsolicited advice on his Freecell game.  I talked about my mom, who was in a medical crisis of her own at the time.  He talked about things at work and about the West Wing episodes we missed recently.  The main thing I did was simply to stay…alongside…until he had some relief.

            Just this once, I know I did the right thing, the best thing for him and didn’t run over his discomfort with my pair-a-cleats of cool activity and efficiency.  Maybe I understand just a little more about the gentle helpfulness of God, the Holy Spirit, who is my very own helper, called alongside.

Heart Language

In the airport recently, I stood near a large family who was busily talking among themselves handling the details of piles of luggage, small children, transportation…all the things you talk about at 1 a.m. at baggage claim. I’m just guessing they were talking about these things because of the hour and the location; I couldn't understand a word because they weren't speaking English!

I couldn’t help them with their Louisville logistics because I didn’t speak their language at all. (Turns out it was Portuguese.) But I was helpless because I didn’t know their words, their style of communication in their heart language. 

Communication barriers exist in other dimensions too. What if I wanted to communicate with words to someone in a biker gang? A woman who has paid her way in life using the one tool we all possess? A person who is homeless? What if the message they need to hear is life-changing and soul-saving and eternal? Where is the heart language to reach these? 

Will I pull out my tattered tract with four easy steps to God? Will I sing an old hymn that is embroidered with insider churchy language? Will I invite to my church for Sunday morning?

Paul wandered into Athens without being an Athenian…just an educated Jew. He didn’t exactly speak Athenian idol culture! But his heart, his love for Christ and these people took him outside his own normal, and into theirs, when he spoke to them about their many gods, and then especially about their “unknown god.” This was the one they created in case they had missed one in their vast collection of idols. Then he brought the conversation from “unknown god” to the God who can be known. All this because he took the time to find their cultural language to reach them. 

A wise old Rabbi, finding himself and others like him to be unwelcome refugees from the Nazis, described their situation to the hostile Japanese authorities: “The Nazis hate us because we are not Aryans; we are Asians. Like you we are an Asian people. You come from the northeast tip of Asia; we come from the southwest tip of Asia. The Nazis hate all Asians and plan to wipe all Asians from the face of the earth. Now it is us that they pursue. Later it will be you.” When he spoke a “language” they could understand, they granted the needed visas. 

What if I had persisted in speaking English help to the travelers last night? Futile exercise for sure. What if Paul had lectured the Athenians on Jewish law and culture? What if the old rabbi in Japan had told the Japanese authorities that they were children of Abraham and demanded special privileges based on that?

Challenging is the journey to learn to speak the heart and culture language of the next person God brings across my path.

Human.

Totally God, totally human. I get it about the theology of this and the downstream importance of it all. At least I grasp some of it....God and human at the same time actually makes my brain hurt. But it's true anyway. And so important.

On this day, celebrating the day before His birth, I'm thinking about the humanity of the God-man. Thinking about what babies do that has to be cleaned up, thinking about temptations to lie, disrespect parents, ugly temptations toward unclean thoughts. Temptations to be lazy, to be mean to his siblings. His humanity embraced all this and more.

I can almost understand His coming to earth to live and die...but taking on all the ugliness of sin's trash in the world...in my heart and soul?

I'm amazed at this part. But I'm finding comfort on this day in the fact that He "gets it" with struggles against temptations. He understands that fight better than I do...probably because He never nearly drowned in it like, uh, some people do.  OK, OK....like me. Like I nearly drown.

His humanity, the love that took on our struggles so we could know,  "He has been tempted in every way, just as we are--yet He did not sin." * Every way. Every single ugly way I'm tempted: He was too. When I'm on the thorny jungle trail of temptation, He's right beside me, elbow to elbow, saying, "This way. Come this way. I've been here before. I know the way and I'll help you."

This is Christ our King and Priest who empathizes with our weaknesses, who understands that we are made of dust and prone to sin. This gentle shepherd is the one who provides the escape route...because of His love. His kingly robes are comfortable with the soil of my weaknesses. His priestly role is not ceremonial...He rolls up his sleeves and helps with my work of living.

I'm leaning hard on His love and patience with this work He's doing in me, in His way, in His time, in the safety of His complete plan.

*Hebrews 4:15

Desires

Desires of my heart. If I delight myself in the Lord then He will give me the desires of my heart. 

Hmm…what if that means if I delight myself in Him, and still want those new croc boots, then He will give them to me? What about the cruise in the Med? Where did I get those desires in my heart?

Or if I’m delighting myself in Him, they will change, so He knows that and feels safe saying He will give them to me? Pondering these things.  Maybe I need to look at the verse in real life instead of just the version that’s sprouted in my lil’ brain.

Psalms 37:4 - Delight yourself in the LORD; And He will give you the desires of your heart. NAS

Psalms 37:4 -  Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He will give you the desires and secret petitions of your heart. AMP

Psalms 37:4 -  Take delight in the Lord, and He will give you your heart's desires. NCV

Even after looking at those I still have this little question mark in my mind: what if it means that if I delight myself in Him, He will GIVE me desires in my heart, as in plant them there? Not the desires that were there at the beginning of this project (you know, the croc boots!) but the ones He planted?

Let’s take it a little farther down the road and brainstorm about what desires He would plant, if He were the one doing the planting. (Exit croc boots….)

Top on the list might be a desire to truly love every person I meet. To have a heart full of compassion and forgiveness.

Ranking pretty high would be a love of truth and a desire to both know truth, His truth, and to communicate only truth in all my dealings.

What if my heart’s desire included all the fruits of the Spirit? If that’s what my heart wanted most of all? (Boots? What boots??)

What if this verse is all about God planting His desires in the soil of my heart, and then tending them so they grow?

This is becoming a prayer: Oh Father! Plant Your desires in my heart! I want my heart to be filled with wanting what You want more than any desire for anything else. Let me desire the things that please You, that make Your heart smile…

In this mode, do those boots even show up on the chart of heart desires?  Didn’t think so. 

Go!

This is not about answering the call to be a missionary to Africa, so you can relax.

It's about waiting around for the right words, the right plan, the best program, the newest acronym, the full understanding of the situation. Or it's about NOT waiting around for those things.

Now you've read my number one hindrance  to prayer described above: waiting for the right or best or newest way to "do prayer."

Instead, God's message to me these days is, "Go! Start talking to Me. Spit it out. Tell me everything in your heart. Tell me all the confusion, all the paths you see, all the scary stuff, all the frustrations. Tell it in your words, with your heart, with your whole self engaged. Just. Talk. To. Me."

So, I'm walking away from the acronyms, the tried-and-true formulas, the specified patterns for prayer, and even from the prayers in the book that really are nice to read aloud. And will GO running into the safe place where my Father is and tell Him everything. All of it. Without organizing anything. Refusing to try to make my words fit anything. Understanding that it's me He loves, not my clever words. I'm stopping the hesitancy to say anything before I'm sure I understand His will so I can ask "according to His will."

I'm stopping all these so I can run like the wind as I GO straight toward the One who knows all my tangles anyway, and who will listen and help me untangle, and who will answer the real needs of my life, whether I manage to be articulate or not.  Come to think of it, I'm dropping that articulate thing too. I'll just GO to my Father and rest there, trusting Him with all of it.

Potato Chip Christians

Potato Chip Christians

            Potato chips sit in my kitchen and call me to munch and crunch.  Chocolate ice cream shouts my name from the freezer, offering sweet delights.  Sometimes I yield to the siren call of these treats, munching my way into gluttony and its resulting dullness.  Carrying around the “ghosts of munchies past” is a tiring and awkward, and then there are the costs of lost productivity from the sugar-high stupor.  These results should be reason enough to avoid these toxic taste treats.  Another problem is revealed by closer inspection.

            The earliest memory any of us have in this area is our mothers chiding, “Don’t eat that now; it’s too close to supper and you won’t be hungry if you eat that now.  Put it down, I said!”

            The child’s mind is puzzled by the absurdity of abandoning the luxuries of cookies, sodas and chips in anticipation of those veggies, fruits, and proteins.  Who needs nutrition anyway?  And, doesn’t vitamin C stand for cookies? What kid in her right mind would choose peas over ice cream? What kid would pick corn instead of corn chips?

            Another group of folks, older and supposedly wiser, are known for the same unwise behaviors in another realm. (Some of them also cling to the “Vitamin C for Cookies” philosophy.)

            These quasi-adult Christians stuff their soul-faces with TV sodas, movie ice cream, cheap novel chips, and magazine popcorn.  They have the strange idea that these imitation soul-foods are nutritious, helpful, and healthy so they pack them in, hours at a time. 

           

            Fake foods like this mask hunger by covering the hungry spot in their souls, just like the kids covered the hungry spot in their physical stomachs with junk food.  Spiritual junk food junkies gobble their way to deficiencies of faith, strength, joy, and Word-food.  They are spiritually dull, never experiencing the vibrant, crisp reality of health in Christ.  Everything is blurry, limp, lukewarm, and tired in their faith and their lives of faith.

            Just like the kids who weren’t hungry at supper time, these adult kids arrive at the table of Sunday morning’s Bible preaching with no hunger, no desire for real food, and they’re bored with it all, complaining that the preacher is too dull, too long-winded, too funny/humorless/old/young/tall/short/fat/thin…and on and on. 

            The real problem is not the sermon, though some are certainly better than others.  The real problem is the condition of the hearers. 

He who is full loathes honey, but to the hungry even what is bitter tastes sweet.  Prov. 27:7  NIV

No sermon tastes good to the soul that is stuffed with spiritual junk food.  That soul will refuse the fine food and go away starved, and blind to its own condition.  Just as children cannot appreciate the nutritional value in peas and carrots, these adults are blinded to the spiritual food in scripture and preaching because they have indulged in fake food for six days and arrive at the real supper table without hunger.

The person who arrives at the Sunday table with sharp hunger pangs will find food in even the bitterest of sermons.  Hunger creates an appetite that will appreciate food, regardless of the seasoning, presentation, or recipes involved in preparation.  The hungry human wants food, for his stomach, and for his soul.   

Children have mothers to monitor the junk food situation.  Adults need to govern their own spiritual junk food intake. A week filled with TV shows, soap operas, sports events, magazines, cheap novels, endless phone calls, movies, and music will produce a Sunday morning pew-sitter who feels no hunger at all and, as a result is unable to eat at the table of food prepared for him.  

Jesus himself said, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.”  KJV

A modern paraphrase of this verse, Matthew 5:6, says, “You’re blessed when you've worked up a good appetite for God. He's food and drink in the best meal you'll ever eat.”  (The Message)

Most of us try to arrive hungry for a good meal.  We don’t fill up on junk food of any kind because we want to savor each bite of the food prepared by a kind hostess.  We don’t eat cake, cookies, ice cream, chips, popcorn, or sodas en route. 

So why do we prepare for Sunday morning’s meal by gobbling baskets of spiritual junk food?  We arrive at the finest meal so dull and lethargic from the junk that we are unable to eat from the table prepared for us.  And then we gripe that we are never fed spiritually! 

The blame rests squarely on us, the spiritual junk food junkies.  If we arrived hungry, unaffected by the movies, magazines, sports, TV, and music, we would find the Sunday Supper Table full of nutrition from God’s Word and we would leave “fed with the finest of the wheat,” and satisfied with “honey out of the rock.” (Psalm 81:16 KJV) 836

PT for for Every Pain

PT for Everything

I’m the girl that sits in meetings Googling acronyms to help myself hack through the acronym jungle. Acronyms are like weeds in today’s world, so I’ll just go ahead and decode this one for you right now and save you the trouble: PT means physical therapy in this conversation. 

Physical therapy is what you get after you hurt your knee/shoulder/elbow/ankle for the fifth time and a doctor thinks you need help in making it healthy and useful again. And incidentally, useful without so much pain.

Physical therapists prescribe movements, exercises, hot, cold, various analgesics, and limits on all of these…with the goal of getting you back to pain-free use of the limb or body part you’ve offended so badly.  Physical therapy requires lots of repetitions of seemingly mundane movements, all designed to help you.

I've heard these therapists sometimes use devices of various kinds to stretch, smooth, and relax the hurt places. Only these hurt sometimes too. It takes a little bit of faith to let someone hurt you to try to make you not hurt.  I guess pain just IS sometimes.

Pain happens to more than just elbows and knees though.  Physical pain is not the only pain that shows up in life, sad to say. I think I’d rather stick to knees and shoulders and all that. Pain comes with loss and the greatest loss is death.  Death of friendships. Loss of jobs. Death of dreams and plans. And the physical death of loved ones, family members.  Family is a broad range, but when that death hits close to home with a parent, child, or spouse, the pain is almost unmanageable. Unmanageable pain like the shoulder that’s pulled all out of normal and hurts no matter what you do for it. Hurts so that’s nearly all you can think about. That kind of pain.

PT for this kind of loss is available; like the PT for the body, it’s painful on the way but it brings good results.  Like PT for the shoulder, it requires deliberate, diligent action on your part, even when it hurts.

Did your most precious grandparent just die? Thank God for giving you that person. Thank Him for all the good times you had with him or her. Thank Him for the example set for you and your family. Thank Him for the sweet, sweet memories. And go ahead and list all those memories in your thanks!

Is it your spouse that died? Thank God extravagantly for the good gift of marriage. (No marriage is perfect, OK? That’s a “given.”) But marriage itself is good, almost magical the way two hearts are joined as one. Thank Him for the good times; thank Him for the times that weren’t so good, but motivated you to seek the Lord, thus knowing Him better. Thank Him for the companionship, for the fun, for the challenges met together.

Your child? Such grief at the death of a child. Everything is out of order in this one. But were you blessed to have this son or daughter for a week? Thank God for that. A year? Thank Him! Some people never have the blessing of a new life created from theirs. Did you enjoy the blessing of your child for a few decades? Such great grace from Father God to share these kiddos with us! Thank Him! Thank him for the sweetness, the wonder of every stage of your child’s life that you were privileged to enjoy. List them, and thank Him for all of them. Thank Him for all you learned, for how you grew in your faith just by having this child in your life for a season. Be generous, abundant in your thanks to God for the privilege of parenthood.

I’m convinced that giving thanks is the PT for a grieving, broken heart. Yes, it hurts and brings more tears, even when you thought there couldn’t possibly be any more tears. And then it hurts again the next time. But it also heals and brings peace to a heart that’s nearly sick with grief.  Give thanks in the midst of all grief, all loss. Thank God for His great grace, for His love, kindness, and generosity to you. Thank Him that He is sovereign ruler over all. Thank Him for the hope of heaven and the presence of Jesus our Savior. Give thanks, always. In all things.

1 Thessalonians 5:18 Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.