Category Archives: God

Authentic Friend

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I imagine the room is in a church basement. Worn wood, a coffee pot on a table, styrofoam cups, a rows of folding chairs.

Sparsely attended. I cannot see the faces of the other attendees. I know like mine, theirs will be worn, washed of something. Artifice. No room for that here.

I stand and tell them my story. All of it, unadorned, shocking. Only here, in this circle of (imaginary) truth it will not be held against me–my pushy honesty, my tenacious insistence on the whole story. Uncomfortable, impolite. I know. I got it.

Most places now I tell myself, shut up, you know now they don’t wanna hear this.

That is why I return to this picture in my head–a simple circle of truth, where every secret thing is revealed. So no one is shocked when the truth is what it is—

We all
Underestimate
Jesus.

About Pain

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Most people have run across CS Lewis’ quote about pain being God’s megaphone. We are risk averse. We don’t really even like to think about pain.

I dropped a roll of (heavy) butcher paper on my big toe. Dumb, I know. The pain was and is intense, binding.

It derailed my plans for a run. This in itself is a sticky issue. Exercise, especially running is my go-to, no-guilt stress reducer. If I could I would eat a lot of chocolate and drink vodka gimlets, but to paraphrase Tobias Funke–I don’t need the calories.

I guess I didn’t need the run.

The truth is my big toe was already a wounded soldier–bunioned, afflicted with frequent stubs, not helped by my penchant for running barefoot and in Chacos. That poor toe was already punished.

I am not really that fixated on my toe. I am fixated on why?

I know God well enough to trust that my clumsy accident is no accident at all. He has stuff for me in the midst of pain. Things like:

Wound care. I wiki toe breaks. Importune my doctor husband. Follow his advice…

Pain management. I take the ibuprofen with alacrity and gratitude. It just takes the edge off. Same with the ice…

Change plans. No run is a bummer. But this also means a real change in my dazzling and exciting plans to work on the exterior trim of our house. I went from looking forward to tackling the high places to envisioning myself doing most of the yard-and-under edges.

The little things. As I said, I was already neglecting this toe. Now I am not. I am grateful for all the thankless weight-bearing it does and very aware of how much I need my big toes.

Need. I am also going to need more help. My kids will have to be my team–helping with all the not-so-fun cleaning jobs.

Empathy.. Most of all I am aware that my small intense pain is nothing compared to the people I pray for–friends battling cancer, families missing loved ones, prisoners in terrible places, women whose lives have been stolen by…it is too easy to say monster.. Too easy to pile a decade of individual blows–each one vicious and deadly into a lump sum.

I would prefer to separate each into a blow of such force that to minimize or forget is to be less human, less alive.

Let us face these terrible things together, these monstrous griefs.

A Voice from Heaven

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Mark 9:7-10 (NIV)
Then a cloud appeared and enveloped them, and a voice came from the cloud: “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to him!” [8] Suddenly, when they looked around, they no longer saw anyone with them except Jesus. [9] As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus gave them orders not to tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. [10] They kept the matter to themselves, discussing what “rising from the dead” meant.

So the voice of God…

We moderns do not often get to hear God that way–out of the heavens, direct-like. We don’t need to. We have His voice in the Bible and in the wind. His power and purpose in the night sky.

I like the timing of this narrative. The disciples are already awed by Jesus. The voice of the Father is not the emotional center of this story. His injunction is a corroborating authority.

Jesus stands alone.

Through most of the Bible he mutes the physical reality of his deity to do an unbearable job.

Why this story? Why so quiet?

The road of faith is bewilderingly painful. It helps to keep our glimpse of God at the center of our minds and hearts. It helps to know who he really is. It helps a great deal to see him.

Light on the water.

Rise

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Mark 9:9-10 (NIV)
As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus gave them orders not to tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. [10] They kept the matter to themselves, discussing what “rising from the dead” meant.

The worst feeling in the world happens a million times a day for at least a year after you lose someone you love. You wake up thinking (for just a second…bad dream?). No. Death.

Death is a terrible darkness. It robs us of comfort and love and a person who cannot be substituted for anything else.

Gone is gone and there is a whiplash agony when a beloved is gone.

The conditions of human existence for the last 6000 years have ground each of us down in the maw of grief. None have escaped it’s power or devastation.

And yet, here is Jesus speaking of rising from the dead.

Not that I hadn’t happened a couple times…there were a couple old testament resurrections…but…

What did Jesus mean?

They did not understand the impossible yet. Do you?

I don’t, but Jesus’ resurrection spills light and hope and courage all over his followers. They believed in the impossible because Jesus was the impossible.

He’s got this.

…frightened by what?

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he was so frightened he did not know what to say.

So here I am, camping out on the Mark version of Jesus’ transfiguration and I get to the last bit–the parenthetical line notes of the story.

So small, so interesting. How often do we see what happens when people are frightened by dudes talking? No fanfare, really, by description, but Peter’s reaction is well worth contemplating.

When was the last time you were awed into making a goofy suggestion? When was the last time you were struck dumb by power, majesty, splendor, or heck, just light?

Something happens in the event of the transfiguration that cannot simply be replicated through description. A man who was generally unremarkable in appearance is suddenly revealed to be who he has always really been–God Incarnate.

What awes you? For me I think of two things–the hurricanes I have experienced and the births of my children. Nothing like natural childbirth to make a body feel totally out of control and powerless. But there is more than that–there is the face. A child you have waited for is there, real before you. New life miraculous.

Paul says,

then face to face.

One day each of us will see him the way Peter, James, and John did that day. Face to face with the Absolute: who wouldn’t be afraid?

Only his own wee ones, his dearest loves.

Give Me Shelter

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Mark 9:5-6 (NIV)
Peter said to Jesus, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.” [6] (He did not know what to say, they were so frightened.)

I apologize. This is so not theological, but for years and years and years I have pictured brand new outhouses when I read this verse–no actual latrines, just the fresh sheds. They even have moon-shaped cut-outs.

I am positive that was not Peter’s aim. In fact, I suspect he was thinking of the shelters people built for the feast of tabernacles–three little mini-temples.

Oh, the inevitable allure of a church building project!

Three men who are known for their homeless wandering and Peter says–let’s build something!

God is building something, but it is not built, measured, or esteemed on human barometers of success–

It is built on the shelter of God’s heart. Nothing is sure but His love. But that love is shelter enough.

Mark 9–light eternal

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Mark 9:4 (NIV)
And there appeared before them Elijah and Moses, who were talking with Jesus.

Tired. We can feel tired because we are sick, not sleeping well, malnourished. Or perhaps good things–a new baby, a triathlon.

I wonder if we do well gauging spiritual fatigue? Right now my house is “mostly clean”–I need to sweep, fold and put away clothes, unload dishes. But it is not the disaster it can be. Frequently.

Spiritual fatigue can be like the state of a house–disastrous to light mess. Either way we need to first recognize our need.

Jesus stands alone in majesty and power. Why have a pow-wow with E and M? And why not display this extraordinary moment with thousands?

Elijah was a prophet. He is there not just to talk to Jesus but to be rewarded with a glimpse of his savior.. I frequently rest in portions of Elijah’s story because despite his serious status as a hoss he grew weary and despondent. At which point God told him he was not alone and not outmanned.

And Moses represents the enduring presence of the law. Jesus tells us that he came to fulfill not abolish the law. And there is Moses–the law lives and so does the man who wrote it down.

Moses was a shepherd. He trudged through the desert with a bunch of ungrateful whiners. And this point of transfiguration is when Moses takes his first steps in the promised land.

It isn’t over until it is over. Stand in the splendor of heaven even when the clouds roll in darkness against a turbulent sky.

Believe.

The Witness

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It is 3 flipping twenty in the morning and I have written myself out of a paper bag several times recently. But not this time.

This time I give you a picture–our protagonist is at the brink of death when the neighboring Amish descend over the rolling Pennsylvania hillside–their quiet presence ostensibly saving the life of young Harrison Ford.

I am naive to believe in those faux Amish extras. To quote Isaiah:

stop trusting in men

This is the last day of April. Much has happened this month, not much fan fare about the victims of crime and child abuse. Quiet. Too quiet. As I have quipped before–no one wants to be the spokesperson for dysentery relief, too stinky.

I want to say this–I am not sorry I have been a vociferous child advocate. I am only sorry I have failed. My children are not safe. Neither are yours.

When I feel the despair of the freakishly ignored I understand why most victims of child sexual abuse never share their story–it is worse to tell your story and be treated like a freak than keep quiet and attempt to mend alone.

It is as though our children were naturally able to count with their hands but each time they gave us the correct answer we slapped their hands and told them to parrot a wrong answer–like carrot or France.

You might ask yourself how dizzying, confusing, and painful it would be to know that 2 plus 2 is four, not Siberia, but never to be allowed to say.

I don’t have to ask. I know.

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