Nerd Alert

There is no shortage of tragedy splattered across the headlines these days.  It can get overwhelming at times, can't it?  Most days I don't bother to watch the evening news because I know all that will greet me is one depressing segment after another.  I don't want to bury my head in the sand and ignore it all, but neither do I want to drown in a black hole of sadness.  There was one headline in particular, however, that struck a peculiar chord of sadness within me:  "The Death of Reading Is Threatening the Soul," by Philip Yancey in this week's Washington Post.  Yancey laments our culture's growing inability to sit and read anything of length thanks to the internet and every other source of digital media which competes for our attention.  Gone are the days when he would sit and read three books a week, he says.  Gone are the days when reading and words and books are what nourished our souls and kept our imaginations alive.   

Now, I'm in no way saying the death of a human being I read about in headlines is on the same playing field as the death of reading.  Do not think me so callous or ridiculous, dear reader.  Read this with the light-hearted tone I intend.  But from a reader and lover of words, I found Yancey's article disheartening, only because I know it rings all too true in my own life, as I see myself less and less inclined to devour books like I did as a child or teenager. 

My friend and co-worker, Jill, and I have established a habit in recent years of keeping a tally of random knowledge.  Our inaugural year consisted of counting the number of Cheez-It boxes I consumed in 12 months. (The total was 26.  I love Cheez-Its, in case you didn't know.)  Jill has a particularly unusual natural hair color, which gets her a lot of compliments.  So we kept a tally of the number of times she got complimented in a year.  Also 26.  This past year we decided to keep track of the number of books we read.  We managed to read 66 books in 12 months between the two of us. 

Maybe death isn't knocking on our doorstep just yet when it comes to reading. 

I am convinced heaven is going to have a spectacular library based on the words of John 21:25, one of my favorite Bible verses, “Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.”

I love how John phrases that – “I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.” Written with just a touch of whimsy, a subtle child-like wonder to his expression. 

But until I get to heaven and can run my fingers along the spines of its countless books, I’ll settle for earth’s libraries, some of my very favorite places on this planet. 

Case in point: can I make this one small, possibly pathetic (depending on whom you ask), confession? I have always loved libraries, even as a child, but my first memory actually crying over one was when I was in college. The local library near the university was undergoing renovations, which meant the entire collection of books had temporarily migrated to an empty store on the outskirts of town. The temporary place was depressing and I recall going there only once. The renovations finally wrapped up and the collection returned to its rightful place. I remember the very first time I set foot in the new library. I walked up the stairs and quietly stood in the open space of the second floor. I felt the tears gathering in my eyes. I couldn’t help myself, I was so overwhelmed. I slowly looked over the new shelves, the neatly ordered books, and smelled the air that is distinctly “library.”

Yes, I own this t-shirt and wear it proudly.

Bliss. 

That is not the last time I have shed a teardrop or two over libraries. I did it this past fall when I walked into the Teton Public Library in Jackson, Wyoming. Same reaction. Walked in, took it all in and felt involuntary tears spring up again. I do it nearly every time I visit the Vanderbilt mansion in Asheville, North Carolina. The Biltmore library is like a scene straight out of Beauty and the Beast. You know, when the Beast flings open the doors of his cavernous library and Belle walks in to see floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, with ladders that lead to more shelves, and balconies that lead to more books. I daydream about having a library like that someday. (Although, that means I probably need to marry someone insanely wealthy. I do not know exactly what those odds are, but I'm keeping my hopes in check.)

Oh, and the Thompson Library on Ohio State University’s campus? There is a reason it is ranked one of the top college libraries in the nation. Their grand reading room - it just makes me want to stand in wonder.  Make a visit when you can.

What can I say? I love words, so why would I not love the places and the people that are keepers of words? It is what stops me from moving into another apartment in another part of the city. Well, one of the reasons at least. I love where I live in general, but a huge selling point for me is that it is across the street from the public library. I probably go there at least once a week, either to return books, pick up new ones or check out movies, use the computer (I live sans internet at my apartment, thus why I go to the library to use theirs), and generally just enjoy the quiet hum that is the public library.  And it's free - what's not to love?   

So, to all you book lovers and non-book lovers: read. And read some more. And read again and again and again until you feel like you're going to go cross-eyed.  Read everything you can get your hands on.  But read deeply and slowly.  Read the classics.  Read the things that stretch your brain and require you to do more than just skim.  Fill your mind to the brim until it overflows.  Park yourself in a chair or flat on your bed and linger over the pages for an hour or two, not just a minute or two.  Hold the books in your hands.  Not Kindles, not Nooks, not iPads, not whatever other e-reader there might be.  Hold the real deal.  Fight the urge to become victim to the decline of reading.  Books are the treasure chests of the world, so do not relent until you have found the buried gold.  And then when you do, start the hunt all over again.

And I won't judge you if you maybe shed a tear or two over a good story.  Or a library.   

Church People Are a Pain

Church people are a pain, you know that?

And by “church people,” I mean those folks who regularly go to church, are committed and involved in the congregation, speak the insider “Christianese” language, and generally act like they always know what is best and have a certain air of self-righteousness to them.

They complain about insignificant points and often make the most inane comments.

“Whose bright idea was it to schedule all of these events on the same night? Don’t they know this puts a lot of competing things in one evening?”

“Why do we need a fog machine for worship? It’s so distracting and such a waste of money.”

“This is too many transitions for these 4-year olds, moving from one group to the next. Why couldn’t the children’s minister have designed the schedule differently?”

“I really think they should have handled that missions trip differently.”

“Why wasn’t I asked to be a part of the conversation before they just up and moved my small group’s location?”

“Why haven’t I ever been invited to join the Advisory Team?”

“I would hardly call that a sermon."

“Is it really necessary to spend that much money on a new building?”

“These people drive me crazy.”

You can picture people from your own church saying these things, can’t you?

But you know what is even more annoying, painful and embarrassing?

I am the one who said all of these things.

I am that church person.

I am that church person who walks through the doors every week and acts like I’ve got a monopoly on how to run a church. I act like I know how my pastor should preach his sermons, and that I know better than he does as to what the needs of the church body are. I act like I know how to lead a small group better than anyone else, and I act like I know how to teach the Bible better than anyone else.

I am that church person who walks through the doors every week and expects the people walking through the doors next to me to be less broken than what they are.

But you want to know the real reason why church people are a pain?

Because people are in pain.

The people filling the rows in my church don’t pass through the doors every Sunday, sit down and suddenly become perfect people. They walk through the doors and they bring with them their past circumstances, their current hurts, their future fears, their jumbled schedules, their beeping cell phones, their crying children, their disgruntled spouses, and the general brokenness of their lives.  Jon Bloom said in a recent post titled "Love the One You're With," referring to the church, "This mess rarely looks glorious to us up close. It looks like a lot of sin and a lot of blood, sweat, and tears invested into a lot of futility. It often looks like something we’d rather escape than join."

And I somehow – to my shame and dismay – expect them to leave all of that behind and be the kind of people who make perfect decisions every time, while simultaneously exempting myself from that expectation.

There is no distinction between the people outside the walls of the church and the people inside the walls of the church. Yes, I should expect a different level of behavior and lifestyle of those who know Christ. For those who have been exposed to the Word of God and have made a conscious decision to commit their hearts to Christ, yes, it is reasonable for me to expect differently of them.

But it is not reasonable of me to forget they are sinners nonetheless. They were sinners before they walked into church, and they are sinners after they walk into church.

And I am chief among them.

Yet somehow I forget that fact every.single.Sunday it seems (and most days in between). In my pride and my self-righteousness, I keep expecting the Bride of Christ to be perfect this side of heaven, with perfect people, a perfect pastor, perfect small group, and perfect worship.    

But this is the very reason why Christ died for His Bride - because she is imperfect and fallen and completely hopeless without Him.   

And in my foolishness I keep expecting it to get easier.

I have gone to church since I came out of the womb, and now thirty-plus years into this thing, I am discovering that belonging to a church may, in fact, be one of the hardest things I have ever done in life.

Church people are messy because people are messy, period. We spend our days wishing the people we call our “church family” would be different than what they are, wishing they looked more like what we want them to, instead of praying they would look more like God wants them to, and that is primarily his Son.  Somewhere along the way we got this whole church thing backwards, making it more about ourselves than about Jesus.

This Bride - this Bride is what I have been both called to be a part of and called to love.  We must not walk away from the church when it gets difficult or complicated or messy.  Bloom goes on to say, "Jesus did not design the church to be a place where our dreams come true. Actually, it’s where many of our dreams are disappointed and die. And this is more of a grace to us than we likely realize, because our dreams are often much more selfish than we discern."

My dreams for my church are much more selfish than I discern.  Just re-reading all of the opening comments reminds me of this truth.  

Eugene Peterson gives the necessary kick in the pants in his book The Wisdom of Each Other: a Conversation Between Spiritual Friends:

The church is not a natural community composed of people with common interests; it is a supernatural community.  And the super in that word does not mean that it exceeds your expectations; it is other than your expectations, and much of the other is invisible to you as yet.  I'm sorry if I'm sounding a bit sharp-tongued on this, but I don't want you getting off on the wrong foot in this church business.  Trust me, there's a lot more going on than you will ever have in common with anyone there.  Go back to the company of those seventy or eighty people on Sunday, listen believingly to Scriptures read and preached, offer your prayers, receive Jesus in the sacrament, and bless your neighbors.  And wait for the Kingdom.  It's the Holy Spirit's style to fashion holy lives among the inept.  

Holy lives from the inept.  That's God's aim for the church.

And we would do well to remember that we are among the inept.  But by the grace of God, he's making all of us "church people" holy.
________

Note: Bloom's article truly is worth the read if you have ever remotely struggled with being part of a church.  Be sure to read it in its entirety.  Keith Welton also has an excellent article titled "Every Good Church is Messy," which is also worth the read.

The Last Laugh

Twelve days ago I sat by my friend’s bedside and fervently prayed death would come swiftly. The doctor has told her she has weeks, maybe months, to live. That evening made me question if that window had shrunk to days. She passed in and out of sleep, occasionally moaning in pain, while I sat by her bedside and wept silent, ugly tears of overwhelming sadness and grief.

And I thought, “My God, my God, it is not supposed to be like this.”

Between the moans of pain, she asked me to read out loud to her some verses from a prayer guide I had recently written. Our pastor is on sabbatical for a couple of months, so I decided to write a day-by-day prayer guide for the people in our church, a way to collectively gather everyone around a series of common prayers. She had a printed copy on the table next to her bed, so I picked it up, flipped to the first page and began reading the passage on the very first day, Psalm 126:2-3 (ESV):

“Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy; then they said among the nations, ‘The LORD has done great things for them." The LORD has done great things for us; we are glad.’”

My mouth was nearly filled with laughter, but not because I thought the moment was funny like I find Tim Hawkins funny. It felt like a cruel and insensitive joke. I was forced to declare out loud with my mouth words which felt so very contrary to what I was experiencing in that moment. They seemed almost absurd to me, outlandish in some way. Our mouths are filled with laughter? Our tongues are filled with shouts of joy? We are glad?

I was watching my friend suffer, and my mouth was not filled with laughter. I was not glad, and I was not shouting for joy.

I eventually left her bedside hours later, and I found myself wanting to sprint down the seemingly endless hallway, desperate to escape the sadness still going on behind me. I climbed into my car, and wept like I had not wept in quite some time. The kind of weeping where you think you might be on the verge of hyperventilating. The kind of weeping where it hurts to breathe. The kind of weeping where you feel like your eyes are going to pop out of your head. The kind of weeping where you really just need a towel to wipe your nose because a tissue will not be sufficient. The kind of weeping where a low-grade headache settles in and lurks at the base of your skull. I sat hunched over the steering wheel, sobbing into the darkness and the silence of the empty car, shoulders shaking, eyes so blurry I probably should not have turned on the ignition and driven anywhere. I woke up the next morning looking like I had something akin to a hangover, complete with puffy and swollen eyes, tinged red at the edges.

My mouth was not filled with laughter because my heart was filled with pain.

I’m not alone in these sentiments. All of humanity lives stretched between moments like that. We live stretched between cancer and cures, healthy babies and miscarriages, suicide and life, laughter and heartache, mountaintop-joy and valley-like sorrow.

I have a friend who is announcing her against-all-odds pregnancy, while on the other hand I have a friend who just weeks ago stood over the grave of her aunt who committed suicide. I have a friend who is celebrating a dream job, while on the other hand I have church family grieving over the loss of their mom and wife who lost the battle to cancer. I have a family member who doesn’t know why there is a mass the size of a tennis ball in his belly, who was told by three doctors he would never be able to have children again – only to flash a picture of an ultrasound showing he and his wife are expecting. I have a friend who received stunning news that her barely 40-year old friend and mom of four kids has an aggressive form of cancer, while on the other hand my grandmother celebrates her eighty-sixth birthday in just a few months, practically healthy as a horse.

When I sat by the bedside of my friend, I wanted to give into the sadness, to let it have its way with me.

But after I had a good cry and after I somehow managed to drive home safely, I stood in my apartment, arms stretched toward the heavens, and declared out loud:

Jesus, I believe you are the God of life – even in the midst of death.

And there’s only one reason why I can make that claim: because my God is the God who overcame death.

“Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. 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?’ The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:51-57 ESV).

Oh death, I feel the prick of your sting. And so do my friends and the people I love.

But only for a moment.

Thanks be to God, who has given us victory over death through our Lord Jesus Christ.  Satan thought he had the last laugh on that day over two thousand years ago when my Savior hung on the cross, blood pouring from his hands and feet.  Death seemed the victor that day.

It may not always feel like it, but Psalm 126 is true. Maybe not here, now, in these moments. But there will come a day when there will be no more cancer, no more miscarriages, no more famine, no more war, and no more death.

And there will come a day when our mouths will be filled with laughter, our tongues will shout with joy, and we will be glad. Always and for all eternity.

Because for those who are in Christ? We get the last laugh.

The joke's on you, Satan.

To Myrt

Myrt and me at an Ohio State men's basketball game

We were practically friends at first sight. Nine years ago this past January, I walked into a women’s Bible study being held at the local church I had only recently started attending. She had snow-white hair, cropped short, and she walked up to me and grabbed me by the arm and exclaimed, “You’re a DG? I’m a Pi Phi!” I had an old sweatshirt from college on with a Delta Gamma logo and she spotted it from a mile away. Myrt and I have been friends ever since.

And what a sweet friendship it has been. Some days Myrt makes me laugh so hard I cry, and she’s not even trying to be funny, which makes her even funnier. She’s feisty, full of grit and gumption. She uses the word “golly” a lot, which I adore. She will talk politics to anyone who is willing to listen, and she will not be the least bit afraid to tell you exactly what she thinks about Democrats. She has traveled the world and has collected no shortage of stories and adventures from far-off lands. And she loathes the color orange. So much so I found her one Sunday, years ago, standing in the church lobby with a plastic bag in her hands and some orange lilies sticking out the top of the sack. These poor flowers had somehow managed to bloom in her yard, and she simply was not going to have that, so she ripped them out of the ground - bulbs, dirt and all - stuck them in a bag and brought them to church to give away. 

Somewhere along the way, after a few adventures around the world, she went on a blind date and met a man named Paul. And not just any man – the love of her life. The rest is history. People want to talk about relationships goals, or use the hashtag on social media #relationshipgoals. I suppose if I had Facebook or Instagram, I would post a picture of Myrt and Paul, and simply write in the caption #relationshipgoals. You can’t find a marriage any better than theirs, and I’m not sure you can find a woman who adores her husband more than Myrt adores Paul.

Two years ago this past December, Paul passed away. Myrt was already cranky about turning 80 nearly four years ago and still being alive. She had always said she never wanted to live long enough to see that age, mainly because if you’re 80 years old, you’ve probably lived a pretty good life, and so she figured there was nothing more worth sticking around for. And then when Paul died, not only was she unhappy she was still alive past that age, she was now still here without Paul. I have no doubt she has shared a few choice words with God over this fact.

And in the months and years since Paul died, I’ve often heard Myrt say, “I just don’t know why I’m here. I just don’t know what my purpose is.” And it always broke my heart. I wanted to grab her by the shoulders and talk some sense in her, to explain to her all the reasons why.

So, Myrt, can I tell you why God has kept you around here on this big blue marble called Planet Earth?

You are still here because there is a girl who has got an occasional thick head and hard heart, and she needed someone like you to talk some sense into her.

That girl is me.

I needed you tell me to stop over-thinking life, and to stop making it way more complicated than it needed to be. I needed to sit with you over dinners at the Village and show me what it looked like to love the same man year after year, decade after decade. I needed you to remind me when I wanted to have a pity party that life was not all that bad, and to stop dwelling on all that was going wrong and focus instead on all that was going right. I needed your jokes and your sense of humor. I needed to witness your feistiness and your attitude. I needed the gift of friendship and conversations shared over rice bowls at Bibibop. I needed time with you at Ohio State basketball games, sitting in the car two hours before the game starts, chatting about life and sororities and whether the Buckeyes are going to be any good this year in football or not.  

I needed your no-nonsense attitude that made faith so black and white – either I trust God or I don’t, either I believe he is good or I don’t. I needed your example of what it looked like to live as a single person well into her thirties, and still find there was so much to do even without a man by her side. I need you to tell me to stop taking myself so seriously. I needed to laugh with you as you yelled at “Alexa” to turn the lights off or the music down.  I needed you and your big mouth to tattle on me to Paul, to tell him I had asked you in the wake of a break-up, "How do you know you have found the one you are supposed to marry?"  Because I also needed Paul to come and tell me, "The Holy Spirit will let you know that you know that you know."  I needed your homemade birthday and greeting cards to brighten my day. I needed your example.  Some days, I just needed your hugs and your hand in mine. 

Alexanne, Myrt and me at the dedication
of a wing of our church, in honor of Myrt
and Paul.

Most days, though, I really just needed time with you.

But when we stood underneath the branches of the tree at church last summer, the one just outside the kitchen door, when you said you wanted to walk around the building and pray for all that would happen within the walls of our church?

That is when I knew I needed you most.

Because I was ready to bail on my church family, to walk away, to call it day and say, “I just can’t do this anymore.” I was full of bitterness and resentment, and my hard heart and my thick head were winning that day. And yet there you stood. There you stood by that tree, a tree you remembered being planted decades before, long before our church became what it is today. You stood there, recounting the many seasons of life you had witnessed during your time as a member of this church, and all the other previous versions of it. The years past and the tree grew, you along with it. You and Paul had made a decision this church was your family, and come hell or high water, this is where you would stay.

As I stood there underneath that tree, fighting back tears and fighting back an equal amount of anger and frustration, I watched you. I listened as I heard the resolve in your voice – you made a choice to stay all those years ago. You made a choice to weather the storms and the changes and the growth. Because in your mind, what other choice was there?

And in that moment, with you standing next to me, held up by your walker, the sun shining down from above, I thought to myself, “Jesus, help me to be like that. Help me to be like this woman standing beside me, and make me like this tree standing before me. Rooted and established. Confident. Steadfast. Ever-hopeful.  Help me to sink roots here. Help me to dig deep. Help me to hold on, to fight tooth and nail to follow you. Because if she can do it – if Myrt, at 80-something years old can choose to put her trust in you above her own personal preferences – then I can do it too. Because this church is my family. And you don’t just walk out on family.”

Myrt, I know you are ready to go home to Jesus and be reunited with Paul. I know. You tell me so often. You always said you wanted to die five minutes after Paul, just long enough to tidy up the place and be on your way. I know you are less than happy that you haven't gotten your way.  Your life has been one well-lived, and I’m honored to call you friend and “Queen.” Your friendship has been a prized possession.

But for purely selfish motives, I want you here, with me, just a little while longer. 

I’m not ready for Jesus to take you just yet.

But when that day does come – and it surely will eventually, whether I want it to or not – I want you to know this:

You had a purpose, and your life had a meaning.

Because you spoke purpose and meaning into mine.

The Sword That Pierces

Here we stand on this Saturday, suspended between the aftermath of the cross and the anticipation of the resurrection. We stand between the darkness of death and the light of life. Hanging ever so carefully on this precipice of utter despair. We who stand on this side of that gap know exactly how the story ends.

But for the men and women of Jesus’ day, all seemed lost on the singular day that stood between the cross and the empty grave. For the disciples and Jesus’ mother and all those who followed him, how long did those hours stretch in between? How deep did the despair go? What moments did they replay in their minds a hundred times over, reliving their moments of betrayal, reliving their moments of unbearable grief? We spend so much of the Easter season looking to the cross of Christ and him crucified – as we rightly should – but this year, my thoughts seem to bend relentlessly to Mary.

Because it is there at the foot of the cross of Christ where stood a woman who suffered the pangs of birthing the only begotten Son, who wrapped that same child in swaddling clothes, who brushed dirt off the knees of the Son of Man, and who one day would stand beneath the gaze of her son, the Son of God, and watch as he suffered the agony of the crucifixion.

But Mary knew that day would come. It did not catch her by surprise. She had been warned. They had all been warned, but she had been warned long before many of the others.

After the birth of Jesus, and after the proper time of purification according to the Old Testament Law, the family of Mary and Joseph went up to Jerusalem to the temple in order to dedicate the Christ child. It was there in the temple where they encountered Simeon, the man who had been waiting to witness the Lord Jesus with his own eyes. Simeon took the child in his arms, and said, "Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel” (Luke 2:29-32, ESV).

And then Simeon turns to Mary directly and curiously addresses her alone, not Joseph, and says, “Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed" (Luke 2:34-35).

The sword in this instance referred to a long Thracian javelin, the same kind David used to cut off the head of Goliath, the giant Philistine, in 1 Samuel 17.

The same kind that would pierce the side of Jesus Christ.

“So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who had been crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water” (John 19:32-34).

And a sword will pierce through your own soul also.

She had been warned.

I can’t help but wonder if those prophetic words of Simeon echoed through her mind as she stood gazing up at her son, hanging there on the cross, his arms stretched wide, his breath growing more and more shallow, his blood dripping to the gravel below.

And then that sword. That awful sword the soldier thrust into her son. How quickly did the years rewind in her mind? How deeply did the pain run through her heart in that very moment?  How quickly did Simeon’s face appear in her mind’s eye, and how loudly could she hear him say, “And a sword will pierce your own soul too”?

Her soul and his side, each pierced in their own way.

But neither Mary nor Christ will be the only ones pierced.

We find our own souls pierced when we encounter the cross of Christ and the Word of God.

How can we not be?

“Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God…” (Ephesians 6:13-17).

The sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

The sword which pierces.

“For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” (Hebrews 4:12).

The prophecy in Luke meets the fulfillment in Jesus in the book of John which meets the present reality and truth in Hebrews.

United by one thing: the Word.

The Word made flesh, who made his dwelling among us (John 1:14), who hung on the cross, who was pierced in the side.

He’s the same Word who turns and pierces our own souls.

So tomorrow – we will celebrate the fact that the sword in the side of our Savior didn’t have the final word.

But may we find our souls pierced time and again with the weight of God’s Word, the sword that is sharpest of all.

The Art of Neighboring

Neighboring can be a curious endeavor. You know, it’s the act of getting to know the people who live around you in your neighborhood. Or in my case with an apartment, it’s a matter of getting to know the people who live above and below and across and beside.

But long before I lived in my current apartment, I had lived in a variety of other locales and settings. I lived 18 years in the middle of a hay field with coyotes and bunny rabbits as my neighbors before moving to mid-Missouri where I acquired 50 sorority women for neighbors. I spent four years living in a sorority house, and in those four years, I had 7 different roommates. I generally didn’t care who I roomed with, so I always got the roommates that nobody else wanted to room with. Trust me, there are no shortage of stories from those years.

I eventually spent some time living in Kenya on a couple of short-terms stints, and that maybe resulted in the first time I had geckos for neighbors. In grad school, I lived next to an elderly gentleman who, quite frankly, just seemed so cranky that I never really bothered to interact with him much.

But I tell you what. Nothing beats the string of neighbors I’ve had in the nearly three years since I moved into my current apartment.

My first conscious memory of a neighbor was of the guy who lived above me. I’m not really sure what it is about the apartment above me, but two things seem to occur relative to that space: 1) nobody ever stays long, and 2) whoever does live there usually has a knack for making a fair amount of noise. I soon learned this particular neighbor was in possession of a particular Christmas decoration. Which played some sort of jingle. On loop.

I wanted to lose my mind. It was like listening to “This Is the Song That Doesn’t End” by Lamp Chop’s.

Christmas eventually came and went, and the tenant moved on along with his decorations. There’s blank space in my memory as to who lived there immediately after him, but eventually a couple moved in.

And let’s just say I was very aware of their love life. Very. So much so there were some nights I used ear plugs or put my headphones in and I still couldn’t drown them out. I was losing sleep because of these people.

I wanted to lose my mind all over again. Some days I would nearly be on the verge of tears out of frustration. And I wasn’t sure what exactly to do about it – I mean, what are my options? Go up to their apartment, knock on the door, introduce myself and say, “Hi, would you mind not having sex all.the.time?!” Yeah, because that’s not at all awkward. I eventually learned in a roundabout way from the maintenance guy the couple got evicted (I’m assuming for reasons other than just having sex all the time).

Then for a brief time a girl moved in, who I did actually get to meet at one point. Very kind. She was fairly quiet and really was only there maybe a few months. I usually wasn’t too aware of her, but I was usually fairly aware of her cat. Yes, her cat. Her cat got what my brother calls “the zoomies.” The zoomies are what happens when an animal acts as if they got injected with a shot of Red Bull and then run around like a bat out of Hades. So, I would often hear this cat zipping around from one side of the apartment to the other, bounding around for patches of time.

And then before too long, she also moved on, and then I got my present neighbor. Who I learned in no time was a fan of classic rock. And by fan, I mean he actually plays the guitar and sings the same songs over and over again. And by playing the guitar, I mean he plugs his electric or bass guitar into an amp, and occasionally throws the bongo drums in for good measure. I have never heard “Proud Mary” so much before in my life. And I swear he played “Don’t Stop Believing” the other night with an instrument (I'm not sure if it was his own voice somewhere up in the falsetto range or if it was an actual instrument) that sounded very much like a kazoo. At 11:00 at night. This past weekend’s repertoire included a duet with a girl, who also doubled as a trumpet player.

I came home from church one Sunday here a couple of weeks ago, and really just wanted to study and get some reading done. In silence. But Mr. Don’t Stop Believing was rocking out on his guitar and didn’t appear to be stopping any time soon. After it went on for awhile, I decided I couldn’t handle it anymore, so I thought I’d sit in my car and enjoy the silence of the parking lot. So much for that idea. I could hear him playing from the parking lot. So then I thought I’d drive down to a nearby park, thinking I would find some solitude.

Alas, it was not meant to be.

I drive down to the park, attempting to find the farthest corner I can, away from the crowds. I park my car, roll the windows down, shut the engine off. And what do I hear?

Bagpipes.

Bagpipes!

The world was conspiring against me and my pursuit of silence.

But when I really stop and think about it – my priority should be to form intentional relationships with my neighbors, to become familiar with them and not merely acquaint them with the many noises they make. I need to take time to meet them, learn their names, learn their stories. (Thank you to the book Art of Neighboring for reminding me and encouraging me and convicting me about the necessity of this.) And not with the ulterior motive of coaxing them to live the life of a mime so long as they live above me. My neighbors are people at the end of the day. 

And people matter. 

In all their noisy glory.

Shoot the Bird

God is a God who provides. He has provided innumerable blessings for his children – breath, life, freedom, discipline, health, riches – both physical and spiritual – his Word, his Son, his Spirit. The list is never ending.

But have you ever stopped to think about the one thing he will not provide for?

Sin.

God will never make a provision for sin. 

Never. Not once.

Maybe I should clarify – God will never make a provision for the entrance into sin. He most certainly makes a provision for the way out of sin, and he most certainly makes a provision for the consequences of sin. But he will never ever make a provision for the entrance into sin.

Let me give you an example.

Years ago, I sat around a table with a group of women, and listened as one of the women shared the story of her marriage and subsequent divorce. She had gotten caught up with a man who was psychologically manipulative, sometimes downright demeaning, and harmful in more ways than one. As the story unfolded, she explained how she found herself slowly and seemingly randomly buying small things here and there, things she wouldn’t normally buy or didn’t need to buy. She would buy a brand new coffee maker and stick it in her closet, tucked away. She would buy other small appliances and things and stash them somewhere, unused. Eventually the marriage would come to blows and they divorced.

Everyone sitting around the table was listening intently as this woman went on to explain how grateful she was that God had so faithfully provided for her. She reflected on the time leading up to the divorce, and realized that those somewhat subconscious acts of buying the coffee maker and other items were in fact God’s provision, proof he had cared for her and had made a way for her to get out of the situation.

At the time, I couldn’t place my finger on it, but something about the story felt off. So very off. It nagged me and bothered me, and I always wondered if I should have said something in the moment, but I’m not sure what I would have said anyway.

And then it dawned on me:

She believed God had made a provision for her divorce.

She believed that all those little signs along the way had, in fact, been God paving the path for her to get out of her marriage.

Look, please hear and understand the heart behind this – this is not a commentary on what merits divorce and what does not. There was probably a lot to my friend's story of which I didn't have all the details.  I know there are a lot of divorced people out there, and I know my own family has been deeply and profoundly marked by divorce. I am not writing with the intent to condemn those who have been divorced. That’s not what this is about.  It's merely an example to illustrate a larger truth.

But you do need to hear and understand this – God will never make a provision for your sin or my sin, no matter how we spin it, no matter how we want to dress it up and parade it around. My friend could say all day long how God had provided for her by prompting her to do something as simple as buying a coffee maker so she could have her own ready-made set of appliances after getting a divorce, but she’s fooling herself. That most certainly was not God making a way for her.

What God does provide is a way of escape. 

He will never provide a way in, but he will always provide a way out.

“No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13, ESV).

I realize now what I should have said in that moment to my friend:

Shoot the bird.

Here’s what I mean by that. (A beloved friend, Jill, shared this illustration with me years ago, who heard it from somebody, who probably heard it from somebody. So, unfortunately, I can’t cite the original source, but may the impact be powerful nevertheless.)

A woman walks into her pastor’s office and plops herself into a chair across from him while he sits at his desk. She begins pouring out all the things that are wrong in her marriage, how unhappy she is, how they’ve been miserable for so long. She said she had been praying about it all, and explains how she had this vision, one she felt was from God. It was of a bird taking flight, its wings spread wide, catching the wind and soaring. She felt like that was God telling her to take flight, that it was okay to leave her husband. She turned to the pastor and asked him what she should do in light of this vision.

His response?

Shoot the bird.

Shoot the bird.

He was effectively saying, “You can call that bird whatever you want, and believe it is some marvelous sign from above, but it most certainly is not proof of God’s permission for you to disobey him and sin. He has provided you a way of escape and that is to shoot.the.bird.”

Friends, we have got to be willing to shoot the bird.

We cannot for one second buy the delusion that God is going to make a way for our poor choices, ones we consciously know are in direct opposition to the boundaries and limitations he has set for us, ones he has made abundantly clear through the truth of his Word.

We have got to be willing to put a bullet in the bird that swoops in and tries to convince us it is okay to live contrary to what we know God has already revealed to us. We have got to be willing to send a few feathers flying and take the means of escape he has provided, whatever that way may be.

God sent his one and only Son, Jesus Christ, to the cross on Calvary and pulled the trigger on the consequences of sin. He most certainly has provided both a way out of sin and a way for the redemption of sin.

But take heed, he never has and never will provide a way into sin.

Be willing to shoot the bird when the time comes.

I'll Live to Tell About It

I am not well versed in the ways of Apple products, given the fact I own a Compaq (a company which doesn’t even exist anymore) laptop computer which will turn fourteen years old this year. Yes, you read that right - 14 years. The poor thing is maybe one step away from a needing a hand-crank to turn it on. If one year in human years equals seven years in dog years, then let’s suppose one year in human years equals 10 years in technology years. With that being the case, that means my laptop is, in fact, 140 years old. Sounds ‘bout right.

But rumor has it that Apple has this pretty cool feature called FaceTime. This is total hearsay on my part, as I also happen to have a 50-year old Android phone (remember, 1 human year = 10 technology years), so I’m assuming a lot when I say FaceTime is “cool”.  Nevertheless, notice that it’s called FaceTime. Not TextTime or SpeakTime or ChatTime. The central point to the tool is you get to lay eyes on someone’s face.

Faces matter. When you listen to the radio, don’t you always imagine the face of the deejay looking a certain way based on the way his voice sounds? And when you’re missing someone special, aren’t you picturing his or her face in your mind? Isn’t that what makes long-distance relationships so hard, the fact that you don’t get to see that significant other face to face on a regular basis? When you’ve got a friend who is trying to set you up with someone on a date, isn’t the first thing you want to see is a picture of the mystery person’s face? We love faces. They are how we identify people. They are how we detect emotions and thoughts, based on facial expressions. They are how we can tell siblings and parents and who belongs to whom, based on similar facial characteristics.  Faces matter.

Both apostles John and Paul said emphasize this several times in their letters to the churches and people of the New Testament:

“But since we were torn away from you, brothers, for a short time, in person not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face…” (1 Thessalonians 2:17, ESV) 

“…as we pray most earnestly night and day that we may see you face to face and supply what is lacking in your faith?” (1 Thessalonians 3:10, ESV) 

“Though I have much to write to you, I would rather not use paper and ink. Instead I hope to come to you and talk face to face, so that our joy may be complete.” (2 John 1:12, ESV) 

“I hope to see you soon, and we will talk face to face. Peace be to you. The friends greet you. Greet the friends, every one of them.” (3 John 1:14, ESV)

Face time. It’s what is most critical in cultivating and sustaining relationships.

When I think about heaven, you know what I think about most? I think about seeing the face of God. If there’s anyone I want to FaceTime with, it’s God. You may have had someone ask you before, “What do you think we’ll do in heaven?” or “What do you think heaven will look like?” Some people picture harps and clouds and angels and an eternity of sunshine and rainbows. I think when we get to heaven we’ll be so busy looking at the face of God that we won’t be able to take our eyes off him. We’ll be so captivated by his beauty, his glory, his majesty – harps and clouds will hardly be what fill our minds.

But why is that significant? Why is seeing the face of God going to matter?

When the people of the Old Testament wanted to encounter God, they were always told they could not see the face of God and live to tell about it. To witness him as he was would leave them stone cold dead. He was too much for them to take in, so he would veil his glory in such a way that they would only catch what amounts to a shadow of God. When Moses asked to see the glory of God, God responded by saying in Exodus 33:19-23 (ESV):

"I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name 'The LORD.' And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But, he said, you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live. And the LORD said, "Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen."

You can’t see his face and live to tell about it. Not back then anyway.

But there’s going to come a day – a sweet, beautiful, overwhelming, breathtaking day – when I’ll get to see the face of my God. Revelation 22:3-4 proclaims, “No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads.”

I’ll see his face.

And live to tell about it.

I’ll see him face to face, as he is, in all his glory, and then spend all eternity proclaiming, “I have seen the face of God.”

I long for that day – when I get to see God face to face. To encounter this God, to have a never-ending session of FaceTime with him – when that day comes, that’s when I’ll realize that his face is the only face that ever mattered.

I Thought I Knew

So what do I know of you / who spoke me into motion? / Where have I even stood / but the shore along your ocean? / Are you fire? Are you fury? / Are you sacred? Are you beautiful? / So what do I know? What do I know of Holy? / I guess I thought that I had figured you out / I knew all the stories and I learned to talk about / How you were mighty to save / Those were only empty words on a page / Then I caught a glimpse of who you might be / The slightest hint of you brought me down to my knees… – Addison Road, “What Do I Know of Holy?”

I’ve had a startling revelation several times here lately, and each time it’s like I’m realizing it for the first time. I grew up in the church and made a decision to embrace Jesus as my Savior when I was just a teenager. I’ve heard about him for 32 years and have been following in his footsteps for nearly 19 of those 32 years.

And with each passing day, over and over and over again, one thing is becoming strikingly and unsettlingly clear:

I know absolutely nothing about this God I profess to believe in.

With the passing of time, I’m becoming convinced the longer I seek after him, I somehow come to know less about him.

It’s certainly not because he is revealing less – no, certainly not.

It’s because he’s revealing so much more – and in the revealing more, I’m finding he’s nothing like I thought he was. I spend my days feeling like David when he wrote Psalm 139:6, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.”

The longer I follow God, the more out of reach he becomes - in this raw, majestic, infinite, unfathomable, too wonderful, unattainable, lofty kind of way.

But I was doing such a splendid job of convincing myself the other way for so very long, convinced I was making some headway in acquiring knowledge of him.

Oh, how I thought I knew Him.

I thought I knew what it meant to follow him.
I thought I knew his Word.
I thought I knew he loved me.
I thought I knew his peace.
I thought I knew what his presence felt like.
I thought I knew his strength and his power.

I thought I had him figured out.

But it turns out I know nothing.

I know nothing of this God and his love.
I know nothing of this God and his grace.

The more I come to learn about him and spend time in his presence, the more absurd and outlandish he becomes to me, in the most humbling of ways.

Because, if I’m honest, what I think I know about Him are, in fact, the fractured and broken pieces of a God I have made up. Pascal said, “God made man in his image and man returned the favor.” I have returned the favor a hundred-fold over, day in and day out, for years, if not decades. I have this image of a God who is perpetually disappointed with me and perpetually upset with me, a God who is quick to anger and slow to love, instead of slow to anger and quick to love. I got “his anger is but for a moment” and “his favor is for a lifetime” all mixed up (Psalm 30:5), and instead have come to believe his favor lasts for a moment and his anger for a lifetime. That’s the God I know.

And it’s all wrong, this picture I have of him. It’s messed up and broken. This image I have of him that I carry around is heavy and burdensome. Didn’t he say his yoke was easy and his burden light? Then why is this image I carry around of him so heavy?

Because I’m carrying around the wrong image.

I’m buckling underneath the weight of a God I have created for myself, one that does not even remotely resemble the true character of God.

You ever feel a little stunned when you think about how little you know Jesus? Especially those who have walked with him awhile, has it occurred to you that you know only about one iota more about him than what you started out knowing? We get so full of ourselves, thinking we know so much when we know so little. My God, how could we be so arrogant?

Somehow, someway, I have to do the hard work of unraveling all of these twisted and broken images I have of him in my head, these false pictures of who I think he is. The Jews wanted a savior, one to save them from Roman rule. But Jesus wasn’t a Savior like they thought of a Savior. They wanted a king to extend his hand and wield his power on their behalf. But Jesus wasn’t a King like they thought of a King. They wanted a political leader, one to usurp earthly kingdoms and establish his own rule and kingdom. But Jesus wasn’t a ruler like they thought of a ruler. They wanted a prince, one who would brandish his sword and spill the blood of their enemies. But Jesus wasn’t a Prince like they thought of a prince.

And he’s not God like I think of God.

“’For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declares the LORD. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts,’” wrote the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 55:8-9.

He’s not God like we think of God.

And with each passing moment, I find that he unravels all that I thought I knew about him, replacing all those wrong images with the right ones, ones where he grows bigger and bigger, and I grow smaller and smaller.

In C.S. Lewis’ classic children’s work, Prince Caspian, he captures a tender moment between Lucy, the young girl who first entered the magical land of Narnia in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and Aslan, the Jesus-like Lion of the story. Lucy and her siblings are returning to Narnia after having been away for quite some time, but they have yet to encounter the great Aslan they had met in the first book. Just as Lucy was the first to enter Narnia, she, too, would be the first to encounter Aslan on their return trip:

For he was there: the huge Lion, shining white in the moonlight, with his huge black shadow underneath him…[Lucy] never stopped to think whether he was friendly or not. She rushed to him. She felt her heart would burst if she lost a moment. And the next thing she knew was that she was kissing him and putting her arms as far around his neck as she could and burying her face in the beautiful rich silkiness of his mane.

“Aslan, Aslan. Dear Aslan,” sobbed Lucy. “At last.”

The great beast rolled over on his side so that Lucy fell, half sitting and half lying between his front paws. He bent forward and just touched her nose with his tongue. His warm breath came all round her. She gazed up into the large wise face.

“Welcome, child,” he said.

“Aslan,” said Lucy, “you’re bigger.”

“That is because you are older, little one,” answered he.

“Not because you are?”

“I am not. But every you grow, you will find me bigger.”

Every year you grow, you will find Him, the True Lion, bigger.

And you will find yourself smaller.

And perhaps in Him becoming bigger and us becoming smaller, perhaps in knowing nothing, we realize one thing:

That’s all we need to know.

My Mad Money Savings Plan

I love saving money.  I like spending it, too, usually on travel, but I love saving it even more so.  If you ask my family, they would say I am a tight-wad.  If you ask me, I'm merely frugal and generally choose not to spend my money on things that most other people spend their money on.  I'm not much of a shopper, so I don't enjoy spending money on clothes, or shoes, or purses, or things like that.  I quit buying books for the most part, and instead make extensive use of the public library.  I'm not a coffee drinker, so I'm not kissing my dollars goodbye every day on a mocha latte.  Heck, I'm not even a good gift-giver, so I don't even really spend that much money on buying things for other people.  I'm just not a fan usually of buying "stuff".  When you live in 350 feet square feet, there really isn't space to acquire much "stuff".

But traveling?  There's my weakness.  Overseas, domestic, fly, drive, spring, summer, fall, winter - wherever, whenever, whatever mode of transportation is most efficient.

About a year ago, when I began planning a return trip to Jackson Hole, Wyoming, I took a look at how much I planned on spending versus how much I needed to save.  I figured if I saved my tax return, the money I made from house/pet-sitting, and any extra money I had from mileage reimbursement from work, I could save a tidy sum.  I would, of course, save some money from my regular paycheck in addition to all of that, but I knew I would need to still set aside a few extra dollars. 

It is at this point I got a little bit of a hare-brained idea. I asked myself, "I wonder how much I could save if I didn't spend any $1 bills I got back in change?"  That's a bit of a strange idea, I realize. But I decided to give it a whirl and see what happened. 

So, the deal was anytime I paid cash for something (which is what I do for all day-to-day spending) and got $1 bills in return, I would set those aside in a jar in my closet.  I started in late December 2015, and by mid-January 2016, I had saved about $80, all in one dollar bills.  By May, I had almost hit the $400 mark. 

After awhile it became a game of sorts, a self-imposed challenge.  I occasionally would need $1s to catch the bus around town, and I thought the bus driver was going to have to pry the bills out of my hand, I hated parting with the ones so much.  I would sometimes intentionally pay for a purchase with a certain amount of $10s or $20s just so I could get more dollar bills back in change.  I was now on a mission.  And I just kept watching the amount slowly grow.  As I got a certain amount set aside, I'd run to the bank and deposit it into my travel account.  Fifty dollars here, forty dollars there, maybe a hundred dollars on the rare occasion.  It would maybe take me a month or two, but I'd eventually getting around to saving a small sum.  I would jot down how much money I deposited and when, so I at least had a basic ledger to track my savings.  

I was loving my new plan and was having a ton of fun with the game.  Maybe it was a long, slow way of saving money, but it was working for me. 

Do you know how much money I saved by the time I went to Jackson last September?

Almost $600.

Think about that  - $600 in less than 10 months!  Just by not spending one dollar bills!

I was gone for two weeks and that amount paid for all of my meals and souvenir money.  It was a fabulous way to just slowly and methodically set money aside and then use that money to splurge on travel plans.

The game continues to this day.  As I save up a certain amount of $1 bills, I deposit them into my travel account.  Save, deposit, save, deposit.  Watch it add up. 

But what about you?  What's your mad money savings plan?  Maybe give my $1 bill challenge a try, and see if you can save $700 in one dollar bills in 12 months.