Cedars of Lebanon

Ps. 92:12-15

The righteous man will flourish like the palm tree, He will grow like a cedar in Lebanon. Planted in the house of the Lord, they will flourish in the courts of our God.  They will still yield fruit in old age; they shall stay fresh and very green, proclaiming, "The Lord is upright; He is my rock,and there is no unrighteousness in Him.  

Lucky.  Blessed.  Call it what you want.

Once a week, I get to meet with a small group of seasoned Christians...men and women who've known our Lord longer than I've been alive, or at least alive in Him.  They are showing me, by their example, as well as within the confines of their words, what it means to love Him for a lifetime.
They have become for me the cedars of Lebanon.  Strong. True. Evergreen.

Right now we're working our way through Romans.  It's slow-going, only because they have so much to say, hear, and learn.  There is a lot to know, and no waning of interest at 60, 70, 80, or pushing 90.

Their strength is revealed in tender ways.  They cannot refer to Jesus' death on the cross without tears in their eyes.  My prayer is that when I reach their ripe old age, I will still be broken and vulnerable when I consider the gift I've been given.

Their knowledge is real and relevant. I don't know if Habakuk comes before or after Malachi, but they do.  There's no pride in their tone;  it's simply a matter of knowing the path and stopping points along the way.  And the knowledge isn't about ordinal position;  it's about the message and where it falls in the grand scheme of things. Context matters, and they are showing me just how much.



The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars;  Yes, the Lord breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon.
Ps. 29:5

Experience is a master teacher.  The men and women in this weekly study group know about studying every day in light of what life brings.  They know about fruits of the spirit because they've been a part of that growth from seedling to sapling to cedar.  They will tell you that the Lord sometimes must break us open, empty us, in order to fill us once again.  He will set us on fire, only to teach us how to persevere.  With a word, with His voice, the Lord spoke us into existence;  they know His voice intimately whether it comes in a gentle whisper or a grievous roar.  They trust the voice that will one day call each of us home, unto Him.

Prayer is a conversation;  reverent dialogue that is deeply personal.  I feel deeply blessed to hear them talk to God.  They tell me what prayer has done, not to change the heart of God, but to change their hearts as well as to lift up the lives of the mothers and fathers, daughters and sons, grandchildren and even grandchildren in their lives. It makes me understand how much I need Him now, and how much I'll need Him then.

Week by week, I bring my wants and needs to our group, and they bring their own as well.  We share a meal, a story, a lesson.  In confidence, we pour out our hearts before each other and before the Lord.  I treasure these cedars...they have shown me the bedrock divinity of God's word in their lives.

Let us resolve...

                  Forgiveness is the fragrance of an iris upon the heel that crushed it.                

                                                                                                 
                                                                                                Mark Twain

The countdown to a new year has begun, and it offers an opportunity to reflect on the year that is soon a part of our past.  It was a year of celebrations for me, for the most part.  I decided to use four questions for reflection, and perhaps these will be useful to you as well.

         Have I submitted?

         I started the year with an ongoing struggle to find a church home.  It has not been an easy journey.  For years I found worship to be meaningful and relevant in the Protestant community, but life got in the way, and I wandered to the Catholic church.  There were many things I learned in that setting, but at the end of the day, there were too many conflicts within myself that I could not reconcile, and I returned to a nondenominational church in my neighborhood.  I have found a church home that gives me just enough "uncomfortability" to know and understand that God can continue to mold me and shape me into the believer He wants me to be, yet a firm foundation in beliefs that are assuredly in agreement with who He is.  It has required me to submit to His authority, rather than using my own GPS, but this waystation of the cross is where I belong.

       Have I emptied myself?

       Learning to live in my own skin has not been easy for me.  I squirm and balk at being told what to do, how to do it, when, and why.  Yet I think God's encouragement to me has been to trust Him, and I have not had to try so hard to do that.  I think that's what happens when you learn that He is who He says He is.  I seek His will often, not always, and must empty my own longings and urges in order to be filled with His longings and plans for me.  He has filled my life to overflowing, and I am grateful.

      Have I prayed?

      An attitude of gratitude is hard to sustain when life gets in the way, when sin gets in the way, when I get in the way, but with each day, I have a brand new chance to get it right.  Praying puts me in the right posture, the right frame of mind, to see and seek His face.  Spending time in His word does that as well. Sometimes my prayers are pretty sloppy one-word tomes, but I know that He listens and cares nonetheless.  I love to listen to my grandchildren pray, and they have taught me a lot in their simple conversations with our Saviour.  They have an unshakeable understanding that when they pray, they are actually talking to God, and I get humbled every time they say, "Amen."  Oh that my faith would stay simple, child-like, unspoiled, unfettered.

     Have I served?

     I seek those opportunities...not wanting to be useless, irrelevant, archaic.  I know that I miss and dismiss many moments when I could point someone to who He is instead of who I am...I am working on that.

    So 2014 is nearly upon us...and so is the opportunity to forgive.  What I love about Mark Twain's quote is the fact that it makes clear that forgiveness frees us from unspeakable burdens.  The scent of the iris, when stepped on, remains on the heel of the one who misstepped.  It gives me hope...that those whom I have hurt can forgive me, and that forgiveness will free us from carrying that grief into a new year. My prayer for each of you whom I love...

   Dear Father,  We look to you and thank you with full hearts, for You are the one who rules, sovereign and supreme.  May we look to you for light and find a clear path.  May we look to you for shelter, and find protection in your word.  May we look to you for provision, confident that our every need will be met according to your will.  May we look to you for wisdom, as the world is so full of shadows and your truth is obscured.  May we pray for and with each other, and on behalf of those who are helpless and forlorn.  May we keep our minds, hearts, and every sense focused on you,  mindful of your extravagant grace.  Amen.

The First Noel

Parking lots are filled to overflowing…

Noisy shoppers hustle lines to jockey for position…

Misshapen cookies are baked, sprinkled, devoured…

It is Christmas.

Carols on the radio remind me of the first Noel…

My random ponderings make me wonder what a Noel is…

I can not find a meaning for the word Noel in the dictionary.  I mean, I know we think of Noel as synonymous with Christmas, but its’ Latin roots say the word actually means birthday. It was a French surname long before it became associated with Christmas day.  That’s fine with me…it just makes me think of that city, that manger, that mother, that child.

Mary and Joseph were on a mission…get to Bethlehem in time.  I think of the terrain of the Middle East, and realize it could not have been an easy journey.  Painful, back-breaking steps for a mother in the final days of pregnancy, perhaps even early labor.

Turned away from comfort at the inn, offered merely the same protection given to livestock in a rustic desert dwelling.

Sometime in mid December...December 25th has become the declared date but scholars persist in debating the exact day, hour, moment...when a sovereign, omnipotent God brought a helpless babe into the world, our world. 

Jesus was born to a mother whom he desperately needed.  She birthed her Immanuel, nurtured him, fed him, cared for him.  He needed her.  This is the first time I’ve thought of Jesus as being needy.  Mary and her husband, Joseph, charged with meeting all of the needs of the Prince of Peace,  King of Kings, Lord of Lords.  That’s kind of overwhelming to me.  The world, you and me, Mary and Joseph…we were given this gift in the form of a helpless infant.    

The story of Jesus’s birth awakens every sense in me…I can picture the stable, and a weary couple trying to find a place to rest.  I can smell the wet straw, the animal sweat, the earthy scent of a stable floor.  I can hear the silence of the night, a canopy of stars shining overhead, soundless and bright.  I can taste the salt of Mary’s tears as she must have wept, in worry and then in painful gratitude as Jesus was born.  And I can hold Him…I can imagine the feel of Jesus, wrapped in rough cloth and pressed tight against my chest, resting in my arms.  Any mother who has known childbirth knows what it is like to hold an infant seconds after birth.  Nothing matches a mother's love. And yet...here is a babe who will one day surrender His life for his mother, for my mother, for your mother, for me...

How precious is that scene to me…that first Christmas, the first Noel.

The baby who needed his mother will become the Saviour of the world.  

But for now, let us be still.  Let us imagine the manger, no crib for a bed, the little Lord Jesus laying down his sweet head.  Let us wonder about the stars in the sky as they looked down where he lay...let us behold the little Lord Jesus asleep on the hay.  

Let us hold Him, let us love Him...

Oh come, let us adore Him. 

this girl

Photography by Tim Burkhalter

This girl.

This girl with the name I didn’t like, because right or wrong , teachers make decisions about names and those names carry a stereotype that may take a lifetime to undo. 

Ashlynn. 

I argued with Christi about names when she was pregnant .

I told her that little girls named Ashlynn were bratty, self-righteous, and difficult to manage.  I’d taught three or four Ashlynns over the years and each one was a little pistol. 

I quickly learned that I had no say in the matter—she and Ryan were going to choose their new daughter’s name, and I’d best hush.  My opinion was not valid.  

They were absolutely right.

As it turns out, our Ashlynn has given me a completely new experience.  For the past eight years, I have had the privilege of being her grandma, and I would not trade that for any Claire, Kimberly, or Gabriella.  Ashlynn is perfectly content to be who she is, and how I have come to love that little girl.

She was an easy infant—never one to fuss or draw attention to herself.  We made several trips up to Omaha to see her after she was born.  Each visit was too brief…she was growing up so fast.

She has what can only be called “baby blues” and they work their magic on a pretty regular basis. 

She has a heart for others—when she was in kindergarten there were some students with special needs in her class, and she became the perfect helper and friend.  She reminds me a lot of her mom in that regard.

You don’t have to ask her twice to do something helpful.  She’ll give up her seat, her coat, her book, her game, her turn…she’s just made that way.  She’s a compassionate little girl—don’t tell her a sad story or you’ll have her in tears. 

She’s got a great memory…I usually make up bedtime stories for her, and I pretty much forget the plot once the story’s been told.  Not Ashlynn…she’ll remind me of all the details.  I’ve come up with quite a few versions of The Elves and the Shoemaker; some are quite goofy and those are her favorites.

She’s developed a funny little home business—she offers spa treatments for tired and weary travelers, and has a little kit of lotions, scrubs, and files at the ready.  Her rates are very reasonable. Though I’ve tried offering kisses instead of dollar bills, it rarely works that way.

I took her to get her own little spa treatment—a pedicure at a local salon.  The proprietor fixed her a little Shirley Temple and gave her the royal treatment.  She smiled from start to finish.  

She has a special place in her heart for her new cousin, Canyon.  Watching her with this little one, I am filled with pride.  She'll be such a good mother someday.  

We celebrated her birthday on Saturday.  Eight years old.  She wanted a fifties’ party  and she wanted to get it right.  She asked me what I wore in 1855.  Once I steered her to the correct century, she was nevertheless disappointed at my answer:  “Diapers!”

 

Christi found a pair of skintight black leggings, along with a Pink Ladies jacket, and Michelle fixed Ashlynn’s hair in a fancy “beehive” hairdo.  Along with twenty of her closest friends, Ashlynn hula-hooped her way through the afternoon.  It was a joy to watch her hug each of her friends, as they raced all over the park in their poodle skirts. 

This girl.  This Ashlynn.

She has erased all other versions of the name.

This girl has captured my heart for always. 

Photography by Tim Burkhalter

She’s the one and only Ashlynn.

fiftyeight

fiftyeight

the things I know have become me…

            your heart pressed close

            the purple light of iris bloomed

            the scent of rain on hot rock

            the rush of river over stone

            wind threading through a grove.

I have known one year after another.

but I will never know anything sweeter than…

           

            your trust

            your approach

            your gaze

            your hand

            in mine.

so grace becomes both phrase and metaphor.

hear me when I thank You and you and you for this life.

Red lines

http://fc06.deviantart.net/fs70/i/2010/234/3/3/Red_lines_by_Paralleladigm.png

Red lines.

Chicken scratch?  Line segments? Parameters?

Moral absolutes?

We need black and white.  In a world full of shades of grey, it’s important that we have values that cannot be broken. We need concrete ethics.  I’ve been thinking about the words of our President over these last few hours, wondering why it has been so hard for him to make a decision that he can live with, and wondering why there is so much debate. 

Inhumanity to man knows no political border, and people are killing each other all over this globe, using poisonous gas along with a whole lot of other lethal methods.  So what makes Syria different than the holocausts in Africa, or the genocide in Asia, or fill-in-the-blank with any number of countries, rulers, or despots who have inflicted evil personally or allowed it within their sphere of influence?

We have an intuition inside each of us, whether we believe in God or not.  It’s part of the human psyche that has been explored ad infinitum and ad nauseum.  I think the part that gets to me is the idea that moral standards without moral actions, sanctions, or responses kind of negate the absolutes.  What good are absolutes, if we never really take action for or against good or evil?  If we never protect what we cherish and value?  

Some of us hold to moral principles “just because” and that works, at least until the s@#$ hits the fan. Some of us hold to moral principles because of our religious upbringing.  Our ethics and moral values don’t have to be connected to God.  But if they're not, it takes a pretty strong character to maintain one's own personal belief system, and you'd be hard pressed to convince me to follow you while you make up your morality along the way. 

It just so happens that my morals are firmly attached to my belief in God.  I know that morals are invisible, and that good and evil actions are very evident in our world.  Belief in God is no insurance policy against evil...just look at the many evil incidents in history promulgated by religious beliefs.  Lots of those evil incidents happen really close to heart and home.  Rest assured I've read Matthew 7:4: Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own? While most of us view the actions in Syria as intrinsically bad, as immoral, most of us are reluctant to act.  Actions mean that we are vulnerable.  What if our actions lead to more immorality, brutality, evil?  That's all  kind of scary.

We can bomb Syria, but there’s bound to be collateral damage, and none of us want that on our collective conscience.  How can we call our actions moral if we in fact make a decision that harms innocent people? Bombing Syria might mean that the perpetrators of these gaseous bombings harm even more innocent people, within or outside their borders, and none of us like that idea much, either.

I think it’s a pretty sure thing that most of us don’t have a clue what’s really going on in Syria.  We have had very little influence in that part of the world, either good or bad.  So do we create moral sanctions when we’ve had little to do with creating moral standards? What is our role?  I admit to being pretty confused.   

I do know that absolutes bind us together…they reinforce our humanity.  Humanity next door, across the street, or across the globe.  So do we not protect the innocent, whereever and whoever they are? 

If you listen to any conversation on the street today, you’ll hear the word “absolutely” a jillion times, and yet, there are very few topics that deserve that kind of respect from us.  We’ve made most of those tricky ten commandments pretty negotiable. We absolutely abhor murder…but the red line is really greasy after that.   

I need my faith.  I need the absolutes that it provides for me.  I don’t want to decide whether this man dies and that man lives.  I don't want relativism to be our moral standard.  I want to look at the ten commandments and use those as my moral compass.  If a planned action or event defies those commandments, I think we have to search long and hard for the justification.  Based on what I know about the Middle East right now,  I have more questions than answers. 

So when a politician goes around wagging the red line jargon, I think we should all stop and listen, pause and discuss, get involved and get smart.  We should be spending quite a bit of time on our knees, in prayer for our nation, the nation of Syria, and for our leaders.  At the end of the day, we have absolutely no business drawing a red line unless we’re willing to use our own blood to do so.

Justice

I would not wish death on anyone. 

However…

On November 5, 2009, we were going about our daily lives…educating children at a small elementary school at Fort Hood.  It was a half-day, so for the most part our students had been dismissed, but we still had about 80 children in after-school daycare, and all of our staff and their children were still on campus.  We received the alert warning to commence lockdown procedures just after noon.  We could hear loudspeakers in the neighborhood outside as we locked down, and all of us took our positions in emergency locations.  There was a lot of confusion about what was happening…despite the lockdown there were parents trying to get into the school building to pick up their children from daycare, but we weren’t allowed to release anyone, much less answer the front door. 

Many of our staffmembers were getting updates from others outside of school who were on post, and we began to hear about a shooting. Based upon the news there was fear that the shooter was in our school neighborhood.  The hours dragged on, and plans were put in place to feed the children with us, as well as the staff.  The emergency plan worked well, and we did as we were told. We followed protocol pretty much to the letter.

Eventually we were given permission to leave, at nearly 8:00 that night.  Our students were frightened and confused, and we had a storm of anxious parents trying to get to their children.  There was a lot of hugging, anxiety, and relief as parents were reunited with their kids.  It took hours to drive off post that night, and as we arrived home the news began to reveal what had happened all afternoon while we were hiding out in our school building.

One of “our own”…a military soldier and officer…murdered 13 people in cold blood, and injured thirty more.  If you know anything about tragedy, you know that equates to thousands of individuals who were affected by the massacre.  It took a long time, it seemed, for the media to finally classify the act as terrorism.  No one who was on post that day bought the lie that it was a case of workplace violence.  This was clearly pre-meditated, and the cruel execution of innocent people created a thick cloud of anger and grief over the post.

This was a place already affected by enormous tragedy.  With over 100,000 troops deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan, you could not ask a community to give more than they were already giving.

And yet.  We saw military families reaching out to one another as only they know how to do…offering comfort, solace, and an opportunity to share shock, bitterness, and anger over this act of violence.

The shooter’s last words were “Allahu Akbar…” which translates to “god is great…” 

I don’t want to know anything about his god.  His words are blasphemous to believers of every faith.

I think peaceful Muslims worldwide would agree that nothing about his proclamation brought glory or honor to God.  As a Christian, today I would say, “God is great…”, not because a man is going to die, but because justice was served.  The price of thirteen murders is a death sentence---it is called punishment.  While no one rejoices that a man is going to die, there is certainly a great amount of relief that a man who was found guilty through a thorough and fair legal proceeding is going to find that retribution is fatal and final. 

So be it.

The day after the shootings, most of our students came to school.  I credit their parents with this act of courage.  They could have kept their children at home to hide out for the day, but they didn’t.  They brought them back to us.  We had a safe, secure, and solid school day, and they had a chance to talk with their teachers.  We were briefed before school on how to handle the emotions and difficulties many of our kids would be carrying through the doors.  We were asked to give our children a voice, but to allow them to be innocent of the brutal details.  There were soldiers with machine guns at our school entrance, but our message to our children over and over was clear:  we’re going to take care of you. 

The murderer on post that day is no martyr.   I hope we all forget his name, his cause, his fury. 

Let’s remember every single person who gave their lives that day, and all those injured as well.  Let’s honor every person who stood in harm’s way to prevent further injury.  Let’s keep our first responders continually in our prayers.  And let’s be grateful that a jury found the shooter guilty as charged, and sentenced him to

an unmarked grave.

http://www.theyhavenames.com/heroes/forthoodshootingvictims.html