A Reason to Give Thanks

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So here you are, feeling despondent. Maybe you’re still not married. Maybe you’re still living with your folks. Maybe the hope for the child you’ve been longing for seems as barren as your womb.

Here’s a reason to give thanks: you are alive today and God is still God.

God is still the master at making impossibilities into realities. God is also second to none when it comes to perfect timing.

I look at it this way. Either God will make your dreams and desires come true, or He will give you something better.

The older you get, the more you fully understand that the best gift God gives to His children is God Himself. And the more mature you are, the less you long for anything else other than His presence.

So think about that. Let God be enough and be content with what you already have. Give thanks for it all. Then you will see God in everything else.

More Snow, Snow, Snow

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“‘Come. Sit down. Let’s argue this out.’
    This is God’s Message:
‘If your sins are blood-red,
    they’ll be snow-white.
If they’re red like crimson,
    they’ll be like wool.'” (Isaiah 1:18-19)

Well, apparently Middle Tennessee is catching up on all that snow we were supposed to get this year (according to the famed Farmer’s Almanac). Ok, it’s still not that much by New York or Boston standards, but snow is snow. And Nashvillians still can’t drive in it. Not that they can drive in any other kind of weather.

At the risk of sounding like an old fart, I can remember back when it used to REALLY snow. There was that one time when I was a freshman at Briarcrest High School when Memphis got 13 inches of snow. 13 inches! Again, that’s a light dusting for places like Minneapolis, but for us folks down South, that’s a big deal.

I also remember the Great Ice Storm of ’94 when I was a student at Union University and people lost power for a couple of weeks. Thankfully, the campus shared the same power grid as the nearby hospital, so we only went without power for a few hours.

This time, it’s nowhere near as dramatic as that. Still, even with only an inch or two on the ground, it is rather pretty. Even at night, there’s still enough light reflecting off the snow for me to be able to see out the front door when ordinarily I wouldn’t be able to see much beyond the glow of the streetlights.

I’m thinking how snow covers up so much ugliness and makes everything beautiful again. I wonder if that was what Isaiah was thinking when he penned the words about how “though your sins are as scarlet, they shall be white as snow.”

I’m hoping with all this Arctic (for Middle Tennessee) weather we’ve been having that there will be less bugs next summer. I wonder what the Farmer’s Almanac has to say about that?

 

Ruminating on Last Sunday’s Sermon

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I’ve been ruminating on last Sunday’s sermon (hence the title of this post). Two points come to mind that really got my attention.

First of all, seeing as how marriage is so vital to society, it’s interesting how most people will spend far more time planning on the wedding day to the neglect of preparing for a good marriage. The wedding, as beautiful as it is, takes all of an hour, while the marriage is supposed to last a lifetime.

I’m convinced that if you won’t mind having a less than stellar wedding if you have good marriage, and it won’t matter that you had the perfect wedding ceremony if your marriage turns out to be a bust. So yes, do plan for a beautiful wedding, but be sure to plan just as much for a good and godly marriage (which won’t happen by chance; you have to be intentional and proactive about it).

Also, the Bible calls husbands to love their wives with the agape kind of love. That love goes both ways. Here’s what that means.

It means that the husband loves his own wife regardless of whether she ever loves him back that way– or at all, whether she is grateful or not, whether she receives it or not. I’m not saying it’s easy. I am saying that’s the biblical standard.

To love your spouse like Christ loved the Church (also the biblical standard) isn’t easy. In fact, it’s humanly impossible to do on a consistent basis, day in and day out. That’s why Christ at the center is essential for any marriage to work.

I’m not married. I’m not even close at this point. But for me I know that if I want a godly wife, I HAVE to be intentional RIGHT NOW about developing a godly character. I can’t wait until my wedding night to start getting ready. I have to BE ready.

 

Snow! Snow! Snow!

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snow

It really won’t be long before we’ll all be there with snow. Or in this case, a wintry mix of freezing rain, sleet and a bit o’ snow thrown in for good measure.

Snow is safer to drive in. Ice? Not so much. Especially when you have a rear-wheel drive as I do. But it’s pretty to look at.

I stayed home all day. I used the excuse of snow to catch up on my movies, starting off with a Peter Sellers movie, The Revenge of the Pink Panther, and ending with an old Hitchcock favorite, Spellbound.

Tomorrow’s forecast looks to be more of the same, since the temperature will most likely be dropping and all that slushy mix will only freeze over and become more treacherous to drive in. And according to the most reliable weather source available, my smart phone, the temperature is supposed to drop to -8 at some point between Wednesday night and early Thursday morning. Brrr.

I won’t have to set my alarm for some ridiculous pre-dawn hour. That’s always a plus.

I’m sure by the time it’s all over, I’ll have a case of cabin fever and will be willing to even set that blasted alarm clock if it means me getting out of the house.

But one thing I’ve learned is to make the best of wherever God has you and learn to see the good in every situation. That means counting blessings and finding joy in hidden places. Even in the middle of Winter (the arrival of actual snowy, icy weather as opposed to the general season of winter running from December to March).

So here’s to being inside when it’s cold outside. Too many people don’t have warm places to stay when it gets frigid outside. I don’t ever want to take for granted what so many go without. So thank you God for a warm house and a warm bed and a warm cat.

 

 

A Lenten Prayer That Pretty Much Works Year Round

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“The Jewish people have a beautiful prayer form, a kind of litany to which the response is always “Dayenu!” (It would have been enough!).

They list, one by one, the mirabilia Dei, the wonderful works of God for their people and themselves, and after each one, shout out DAYENU! As if to say, ‘How much is it going to take for us to know that God is with us?!’ It builds satisfaction instead of feeding dissatisfaction.

If we begin our day with any notion of scarcity, not-enoughness, victimhood, or ‘I deserve,’ I promise you the day will not be good—for you or for those around you. Nor will God be glorified.

Maybe we all should begin our days with a litany of satisfaction, abundance, and enoughness. God, you have given me another day of totally gratuitous life: my health, my eyes, my ears, my mind, my taste, my family, my freedom, my education, clean water, more than enough food, a roof over my head, a warm bed and blanket, friends, sunshine, a beating heart, and your eternal love and guidance.

To any one of these we must say, ‘And this is more than enough!'” (Father Richard Rohr).

I think I need to print this out or at least have it handy on one of my mobile devices so I can pull it out as a reminder when I fall prey to the entitlement/victim mindset and start feeling sorry for myself (which is far more often than I’d like!)

The prayer that my friend me comes to mind: “Abba Father, I come to you with empty hands. If all I have is you and the next breath, that will be enough.”

If you pray that prayer, anything extra at the end of the day will be like icing on the cake. Or to put it another way, it’s all grace.

 

 

Surprise!

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As much fun as surprise parties are, they can be quite taxing. I don’t necessarily mean the physical work that goes into one, but the task of keeping it a secret and constantly worrying that someone will slip up and accidentally reveal the top secret info to the wrong people.

It’s hard to come up continually with creative explanations for what you’re doing so as not to spoil the surprise.

The party in question was a surprise celebration of my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary. That’s a big deal in an age when more marriages fail than succeed.

As the guests arrived, it was almost like watching an episode of This Is Your Life, where they bring out all sorts of people from your past. In this case, these were all the people that made my growing up so much fun and memorable.

As for my folks, they have shown me a legacy of love that doesn’t always look romantic between two imperfect people who mess up and make mistakes but choose to keep on loving each other in spite of it all. Or maybe because of it all.

I am truly blessed (and my sister would concur) to have such godly, wonderful parents and to get to celebrate this wonderful milestone with them. But no more surprise parties for a while, please.

Breaking Bread Together

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I don’t know about you, but for me food always tastes better when it’s shared with those you care about. I can have pizza by myself and it will taste good, but the same pizza shared with family is better. Best of all is sharing a meal with those you haven’t seen in a while.

On a side note, I’m trying to eat less bread and sugar, so I don’t literally break bread as often. And so far I’ve lost 8 pounds, so it seems to be working. Plus, I can actually get the top button on my dress shirt to fasten without gagging myself. That’s a plus.

I do believe Jesus was on to something when He told us to break bread together in remembrance of Him. It’s more than a bunch of individuals remembering Jesus and the cross in the same room. Somehow, the remembering and its significance becomes more poignant and meaningful when it is shared and experienced together.

Plus, even those little wafers and that thimble of grape juice taste better when taken together with fellow pilgrims and strangers called the body of Christ, the family of God.

The Further Adventures of Bob Dylan on the Brain

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loveandtheft

“Well, there’s voices in the night trying to be heard
I’m sitting here listening to every mind-polluting word
I know plenty of people who would put me up for a day or two
Yes, I’m tryin’ to get closer but I’m still a million miles from you” (Bob Dylan)

As of this report, I’ve made it all the way to the year 2001. In Bob Dylan time, that translates to the album Love and Theft. By this point, his voice has lost whatever velvety softness it ever had and has picked up a growly quality, kinda like ol’ Bob’s been gargling with razor blades.

Still, his voice also has a lived-in quality, like it’s from a man who’s been just about everywhere, man, and seen just about everything and lived to tell about it. Not all of it was pretty, but just about all of it makes for some really good songs.

I have to add that I think the Daniel Lanois-produced album Time out of Mind would have made an excellent musical companion to the short-lived TV show Twin Peaks. Particularly the song “Million Miles” sounds like it could have fit perfectly in with a slice of apple pie and a “damn good” cup of coffee. I especially love the reverb on the guitars. (I almost sound like I know what I’m talking about, right?) I think the Grammys got it right when they made this the album of the year way back in 1997.

He also did a couple of throwback albums, entitled Good as I Been to You and World Gone Wrong, that hearken back to when it was just Bob, his guitar, and his harmonica. I thought he did a fantastic cover of the old song “Tomorrow Night,” made famous by Sun Records-era Elvis Presley, among others. The plaintive song brings out the best in Mr. Dylan’s vocal abilities, at least in this writer’s humble opinion.

I only have five albums to go (six if I run across a great deal on his 2015 album or one of his bootlegs that I don’t have). I guess I’ll have to decide after that who to listen to next. Maybe Neil Young?

Real Love

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“If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love. Love never gives up. Love cares more for others than for self. Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have. Love doesn’t strut, Doesn’t have a swelled head, Doesn’t force itself on others, Isn’t always “me first,” Doesn’t fly off the handle, Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others, Doesn’t revel when others grovel, Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth, Puts up with anything, Trusts God always, Always looks for the best, Never looks back, But keeps going to the end” (1 Corinthians 13:4-5).

Love. It gets talked about quite a lot these days. We talk about how we love our spouses and children. We also say how much we love oreos or vanilla ice cream. We use the same word for the people whom we pledged to spend the rest of our lives with as we use for food groups.

The Greek language has four words for love. I won’t get all technical on you, but basically those words in English are companionship (between people or even between a person and his or her dog), friendship, erotic/sexual/romantic love and unconditional love. The last kind is a kind that only originates from God and while we may say we love others with this kind of love, it’s really God loving those people through us.

Love is more than a feeling. It’s definitely more than the sappy lyrics to any of the multitude of syrupy love songs you’ll hear on the radio. Real love is an action, a choice, a verb. It means you always act toward the best interests of the beloved, whether you feel like it or not.

If love is a feeling, then it won’t last, because no feeling lasts forever. But if love is a choice, then you can always keep choosing to love and keep choosing to act lovingly even when you don’t feel love.