Category Archives: grief

Private Resurrection

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Mark 5:39-43 (NIV)
He went in and said to them, “Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep.” [40] But they laughed at him. After he put them all out, he took the child’s father and mother and the disciples who were with him, and went in where the child was. [41] He took her by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum!” (which means, “Little girl, I say to you, get up!”). [42] Immediately the girl stood up and walked around (she was twelve years old). At this they were completely astonished. [43] He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this, and told them to give her something to eat.

Unwise to laugh at Jesus.

He knows when we are dead and when we are merely sleeping, and I imagine he could have pointed out people around him who were already dead–who failed to absorbed eternal life.

He tells the girl to rise and although we know she has been dead for at least a few hours she gets up restored.

Her healing is complete. Then he gives her an additional gift–privacy. She will not have to go through any ritual purity, public scrutiny or unwanted celebrity.

She gets to live again, whole.

Jesus both restores and loves those he resurrects.

A Parable of Faith

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My kids are practicing French, handwriting, and shooting the breeze. They are quoting Patrick Warburton, who could read tax law and be funny. They remind me of my father, who was a military helicopter pilot.

He used to take the back roads. He would head down some narrow country road with a mysterious look on his face. Where are you going? We would ask.

I know a short cut. He would tell us.
He had marked the roads as he flew over the countryside.

I think of this when I ask God, why?

He sees beyond the horizon, the big picture, the answers to all my why?s

Waiting.

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Mark 5:21-29 (NIV)
When Jesus had again crossed over by boat to the other side of the lake, a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the lake. [22] Then one of the synagogue rulers, named Jairus, came there. Seeing Jesus, he fell at his feet [23] and pleaded earnestly with him, “My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live.” [24] So Jesus went with him. A large crowd followed and pressed around him. [25] And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. [26] She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse. [27] When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, [28] because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” [29] Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.

Jesus from afar. He is not constrained by cement walls, ordinary time, peer pressure, or the weather.

This can be hard to understand in a crisis. We want instant relief from grief or illness, and sometimes we get pain, loneliness, waiting.

This story works best if you don’t know the ending. Jairus was desperate. We know he wouldn’t have risked himself if he had another option. It must have been excruciating to wait. You can almost see the words in a bubble–

c’mon, my daughter is dying!

But Jesus is in no hurry. In fact there is no mention of him ever hurrying. The waiting is part of the story….

For all of us.

Holy handbags, Robin!!!

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Tonight I sang loud and off-key to God. There may have been some dancing around too. One of my children eyed me with a bit of alarm. Notable only because you would think they all would.

I also washed my purse today.

Not seeing the connection? Well, first let me explain that I am not a Gucci/baby Louie gal. My purses are cheap, washable, frequently seconded to me.

They are the receptacles of diapers (new), hair bands, gum (also new), keys, money, action figures, snacks, beverages, electronics, random papers.

Crumbs, a lot of crumbs…

I have been feeling itchy because I knew that my current purse avatar was the victim of a public bathroom floor incident that I will not shock you by explaining.

Just trust me: unhygienic.

So I feel good. Brownie crumbs evacuated, wallet transplanted. Purse clicking noisily in a midnight wash.

Cleaner.

I am aware that the God I trust and love is holy. Really clean.

I have a few kids who are well versed in superhero lore. So I was thinking about how a good comic book superhero needs an Achilles heel. And that led to thoughts of the only real superhero.

No Achilles heel–wait! There is a weakness. Not in him, us. We are his weakness. We are his mortal heel.

And he lets himself bleed out in holiness to bath us in his eternity.

That is clean. That is holy.

So I worship–messy and loud. Because he has rescued me. Once and for all eternity.

The closest you get to f…

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Mark 5:9 (NIV)
Then Jesus asked him, “What is your name?” “My name is Legion,” he replied, “for we are many.”

Huh. Like Jesus didn’t already know his name.

Jesus knew his name.
Jesus still knows his name.
Jesus knew all of his names.
Jesus knew their names.
Jesus knew them before they were shadowy inhabitants of a man in a graveyard.
Jesus knew when they were light.
Jesus knows this story.
He knows it all.
He is the eternal God incarnate.

So why ask the guy’s name?

I read today that Nokia was going to begin selling 3D kits to customers to “print” phone cases.

I saw a picture today of a small USB drive with a TB memory.

This is a story about before and after.

This is when and how the world changes.

God, the Poet asks the question because he knows the answer but we don’t. The guy doesn’t. The Legion has an idea. They know they are dealing with Eternity, Fire, and Change.

They are about to be kicked out.

But the question to ponder before we look further is–how did they get in?

Who let them in to the man’s messed up heart?

He did. Once called different names–pride, lust, ambition, lies. They walked in through the door….

And gradually took over.

Father’s Day in the graveyard

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This is one of my favorite stories.

I know too many people like this guy. In fact I know a couple who make him look like a boy scout.

Mark 5:1-5 (NIV)
They went across the lake to the region of the Gerasenes. [2] When Jesus got out of the boat, a man with an evil spirit came from the tombs to meet him. [3] This man lived in the tombs, and no one could bind him any more, not even with a chain. [4] For he had often been chained hand and foot, but he tore the chains apart and broke the irons on his feet. No one was strong enough to subdue him. [5] Night and day among the tombs and in the hills he would cry out and cut himself with stones.

Read his symptoms carefully–loud, violent, scary, self-harming. Just like the rest of us, this man has a story, and not a fun one. Abused and neglected? Maybe? Into violent games? Maybe? Dangerous to others? Definitely.

No hope. No national mental health initiatives to save him.

There are 2000 reasons why he has chains and lives in the graveyard.

Now imagine you find out he has a little baby with him out there…

Would you worry? Would you call for help? Send him cloth diapers? Try to intervene?

What would you do for the child?

The Strong Man’s House

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Some memories are picture clear. It is a day in late October and we are traveling in the van with my in laws to the Aransas wildlife refuge. I am attempting to school a known pedophile on the need for repentance.

We have reported the abuse. We lock doors at night to make the children feel safer. We are waiting and terribly broken.

The pedophile is merely annoyed. Sullen. We are discussing the human heart as though it were a house. A house Jesus could walk through, clean, excavate.

I remember this whenever I read

Mark 3:25-30 (NIV)
If a house is divided against itself, that house cannot stand. [26] And if Satan opposes himself and is divided, he cannot stand; his end has come. [27] In fact, no one can enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man. Then he can rob his house. [28] I tell you the truth, all the sins and blasphemies of men will be forgiven them. [29] But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; he is guilty of an eternal sin.” [30] He said this because they were saying, “He has an evil spirit.”

… because Charles is the one who taught me…about the strong man’s house.

This parable can and will go either way. Either the strong man is hell plundered by Jesus or He is the strong man robbed on the cross.

Which is it?

You can guess my opinion. I put my money on Jesus.

But for years I lived in that divided house, torn by my adopted children’s violence and anger.

Don’t wanna go back. Don’t wanna live that way no more.

Divided house; broken heart.

Jyoti Singh Pandey

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I stand in honor of this young woman and her grieving family. Like many mothers all over the world I grieve with them and all Indians who are dismayed and outraged that any woman or girl anywhere in the world is in danger–on a bus, on the street, at a party, in a police station, in a hospital.

We who are not Indian should take careful note–the way we react to protect the vulnerable in our culture can, will, and should define us.

Forever.
In honor of her death we all must do better.

Her family is in my prayers
I pray for justice.

The cowboy and the judge

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Mark 2:1-12 (NIV)
A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. [2] They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them. [3] Some men came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. [4] Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on. [5] When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” [6] Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, [7] “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” [8] Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, “Why are you thinking these things? [9] Which is easier: to say to this paralyzed man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your mat and walk’? [10] But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.” So he said to the man, [11] “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.” [12] He got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”

I love this story and I especially love the way it is portrayed in the movie The Miracle Maker, so I have been somewhat puzzled by why I could not finish this story. I have talked about it numerous times. It is not that complicated.

This is a story about waiting with or without hope. It is a story about faith and urgency. It is a story about love, value and forgiveness. And it is a story about willfully refusing to see.

Someone I love has a prominent tattoo on his chest. He likes to go shirtless a lot so it is easy to see. It says,

only God can judge me

His tattoo is true, but somehow incomplete. What it is missing is any understanding of love, fear, and holiness.

Love carries the man to Jesus
Love pushes through the crowd
Love punches through the roof
Love lowers the mat
Love forgives the man his sins
Love heals the man on the mat
Love never fails
But…
When love shows his power and his judgment.
You better duck.

Because the guy who crushed the gates of hell and death for us?
He don’t play, cowboy, he sure don’t play.