It's Already Been Brought'n!

Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you. Isaiah 60:1

So, this has been a strange month for me. My grandfather died and funerals always make me re-evaluate my own life. Then my brother and his wife had a baby, the first grandbaby of the brood, and new life always makes me reflect inwardly. And smack dab between both bookend events, I helped chaperone a ski trip with the high school kids at church. Nothing like an out of control snowboarder almost rocketing you off an icy cliff to make you stop and think.

So anyway, I think God's been reading my blog. Or perhaps it's the whole omniscience thing. Either way, God seems to know what I've been thinking. Because if you've read my recent blog Chica Fuerte, you know I've been a big chicken when it comes to letting go and trusting in God's will for my life. Sure, I've committed myself to God, but I still hold back certain parts of my life from Him, the parts that scare me to give up.

Anyway, I am not sure if it was the funeral, or the baby, or something that happened during my mountaintop flirtations with death - I can't remember the specific moment that sparked the confidence - but walking back to the dorms at that camp, under a beautiful blue sky with just a few puffy white clouds, I very much recall smiling and telling God to BRING. IT. ON.

Seriously. For real. Several times. Outloud!

I imagine God is cracking his knuckles like a pianist warming up.

I am excited.

Grandpa H

Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all the earth: make a loud noise, and rejoice, and sing praise.
Psalm 98:4

My Grandpa Harrison died last week. At the funeral, the preacher talked about my grandpa's love for music, especially playing violin and harmonica. The preacher said that in both his musical life and his spiritual life, my grandfather made a joyful noise unto the Lord. He also mentioned something I didn't know - that my grandfather had not always been a Christian. He said that when my grandparents married, there were lots of explosive arguments between the two about their beliefs. But eventually God wore him down.

I found that somewhat funny, because throughout my life my grandfather was the one person in my family that consistantly tried to preach to me. I assumed he grew up with the faith. I was annoyed by his persistance. I didn't want to listen.

Grandpa suffered from Alzheimer's and dementia for the last few years of his life, so he never knew about my relationship with God. But I guess now he does. And I bet he's probably sighing at my stubbornness and thinking, "FINALLY!" Or perhaps more likely, he's snickering and thinking, "She gets it from me!"

Chica Fuerte

“I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me as you have said.”
Luke 1:38

Mary was one brave mother. Arguably one of history’s most courageous heroines. I can’t imagine my own magnitude of fear at trying to convince my parents I was still their good, sweet, virginal daughter, despite my quickly growing belly; earnestly trying to explain in the face of my dad’s arched eyebrow that I was the selected host for the immaculate conception of the world’s coming Savior.

Even if the angels had forewarned me of the events that would transpire as they did Mary, I suspect the first time I saw those two blue lines appear on the E.P.T. dipstick, my heart would arrest in anticipation of the truckload of vapors that would be required to restore my mother’s consciousness after hearing the news.

But Mary told God to bring it on.

I wish I had that kind of faith.

I was watching a sitcom a few weeks ago in which one of the characters was attempting to corner his girlfriend into agreeing with him, manipulatively boxing her in by asking, “You do want me to be happy, don’t you?” Her coy response was, “Sure...as long as it doesn’t affect me negatively in any way.” To some extent, this describes my current relationship with God’s will: "God, not my will, but your will...as long as it doesn't affect me negatively in any way..."

Blech.

Dressing on the Side

Ok, so the more I read my stories, the more I realize that I am really weird. I look at everything that happens in the world from the aspect of an allegory, and sometimes they are quite a stretch. I could probably come up with a metaphor relating God to pudding if I tried. Hmm…something about the proof being in the pudding….

Anyway, my latest attempt comes courtesy of the Jason’s Deli salad bar. As I was concocting my meal, I realized that sometimes when we don’t know or don’t want to accept the truth about God’s character, we try to make a personalized “God salad”. We take a little bit of this, a little bit of that, a sprinkle of this, a spoonful of that - all according to our individual tastes.

But unlike a salad, we can’t pick and choose when it comes to God’s truth. As much as I’d like to have a certain delectable ingredient on my God salad, if it is not an option, I’m out of luck. And even if a few specific aspects of Christianity leave a bad taste in my mouth, I have to accept them anyway. Because when you choose God from the menu, there's a NO SUBSTITUTIONS rule. Hebrews 13:8 says that God is the same yesterday, today and forever. He never changes. And we surely can’t change Him. So if we enjoy picking and choosing and having ourselves some options, I guess we should get it all out of our system in appropriate ways, like when foraging at the salad bar.

I am quite aware that Caesar salads are not what Jesus was referring to when he said in Matthew 22:21, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and give to God what is God’s”. But hey, it works.

You Spin Me Right Round, Baby

So, today in Sunday school we talked about the Old Testament "cycle of judges" - basically, the repetitive cause/effect events of Israel’s history. The promises began with a blessing from God, but then Israel became lazy and disobedient. To shake them up and remove their focus from themselves and back on to God, He sent foreign invaders to come take over. In fear, Israel cried out to God, begging to be rescued. So, God raised up a deliverer. In response, Israel became obedient and God continued to bless them. Over time, as the memory of God’s faithfulness began to fade from the minds of the new generations, the cycle repeated itself. I think this pattern is similar to the one many of us follow in our own walks.

When I was younger, situations would happen to me that I didn’t like. They were not life or death issues, but they left me somewhere between disgruntled and annoyed. And they would happen so frequently I quickly learned how to avoid blame and play victim. I attributed my bad luck to the stars being lined up against me. I suspected being born under a bad sign. I blamed fate. I called it April Luck. Friends and family picked up the phrase and would call out “April Luck!” when a string of bad things happened to them. I growled at them but secretly enjoyed the notoriety.

I thought that if there was indeed a God, He allowed these things to happen, and therefore it was obvious He despised me. And now that I know a little more about God, I think He was responsible for some of these problems. But I don’t think it was because He hated me. I think God puts these obstacles in our path just as He did with Israel - with the purpose of reshifting our focus back on Him.

It sounds nice enough in black and white, but when I am stuck in the thick of a continuous loop of drama, to me it feels sort of like a skipping record. And often, like the needle, I don’t really deal with the problem. I just hop-skip-jump the bump and continue on my way. And while it certainly feels like freedom for a moment, it is fleeting. I never truly get anywhere. Because in a mere rotation of 360 degrees, I am once again back to where I started, facing that same obstacle. Eventually, it becomes exhausting.

At the time, I didn’t understand this. And I changed nothing, so nothing changed. Or as the old adage says, “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.” And what I “got” was more head-on collisions with April Luck.

But now that I have God, I am trying to learn from my sufferings. Instead of asking WHY (i.e.: "Why me?”) I am trying to remember to ask WHAT, (i.e.: “What are you trying to teach me?”) My hope is that one day after loads of practice, my instincts will be honed enough that I actively face all these obstacles right as they come. Then perhaps I will finally be able to move past the breaking point and play out a little more of my song.

One-Two-Punch

To make a fighter, you gotta strip ‘em down to bare wood. You can’t just tell ‘em, “Forget everything ya know.” You gotta make ‘em forget it in their bones. Make ‘em so tired they only listen to you, only hear your voice, only do what you say and nothing else …Then you gotta show ‘em all over again, over and over and over, til they think they were born that way. Morgan Freeman, Million Dollar Baby

I spent much of my childhood as a pretty sad puppy and I hated God for many years because I thought it was His fault for abandoning me. But I now realize He’s been with me all along. It was me that was running away. I ran for almost 27 years before I finally stopped. But even then, it was a mess.

When I was first considering becoming a Christian, I began to have anxiety attacks. I asked one of the pastors, “If being a Christian is so good, then why do I feel like crap?” He said that I was probably just reacting fearfully to the idea of giving up control to God. I definitely struggle with letting go. God has tried to reach me and teach me numerous times throughout my life, but I was stubborn and rejected all the attempts. I fought them tooth and nail. I wanted to be, as William E. Henley emoted, “the captain of my fate and the master of my soul”.

So, like the coach in the movie, God had to bring me back to the beginning and strip me down to bare wood. He had to make me forget all I thought I knew, forget it down to my bones. And when that breaking process began, my life seemingly turned to crap. Everything was horrible. It was a T.K.O. I saw a T-shirt once that said "Before you can cry 'Abba', you must first cry 'Uncle'". And so I did. Finally, stubbornly, grudgingly - I threw in the towel and surrendered.

And now that I have God as my coach, He is building me back up. He is teaching me to only listen to Him, to only hear His voice, to only do what He says and nothing else. And then He shows me these things all over again, over and over; because frankly, I can be extremely dense and I need all the practice I can get.