The art of wrestling

Right before bed, it is my habit to check if the outside doors are locked, lights have been turned off, coffee pot set up for morning, and alarm set on my phone.

But what I typically fail to do is to lay my concerns before the LORD, close all those apps so to speak, and switch my brain to snooze.

My husband possesses the amazing gift of falling asleep in three seconds or less, and staying asleep through the storms of life.  But I often wake in the deep watches of the night.  Most times, it is not God waking me for some urgent sacred need of praying for someone, but anxiety about fill in the blank.   At times, I lay in bed wide awake for hours composing scripts of what I am going to say, play by play diagrams for how I am going to handle a situation, unraveling every kind of possible and unlikely contingency, accident, blunder on my part, or unpredictable emergency.  Even those that have no relation to the problem at all.  Every single rabbit trail.  My imagination on steroids.  Trust me.

Anxiety is not a fear of the unknown, but the process of trying to figure it out on my own.  The stress I feel is carrying what God never meant me to carry.  Make that trying to carry it.  Attempting to stretch my finite brain and limited resources to come up with a one size fits all solution.  Am I struggling with a problem....or am I struggling with God's way in this?

Night before last, I was in a texting conversation shortly before I went to bed.  Instead of laying my cares about it before the LORD, well, those worries crawled into my side of the bed and crowded out any idea of me sleeping.  What is the right thing to do?  What if you did this?  What if that was the wrong thing to do?  Ahhh, you know the litany, over and over, wrestling with worries and inviting their friends to the match.

The truth is my lack of sleep contributed nothing to the solution.  I did not wake to a carefully wrapped answer tied with a bow.

I sat down that morning to read God's Word, but first scribbled down in my journal "Show me, O LORD, how to navigate this for Your glory and the well being of others."

No sudden neon signs appeared in the air or beams of light slicing through the clouds.  Just laying the situation on the altar.  I tied on my shoes and headed into the day.

Not an hour later, as I prayed my way on the treadmill, I received a text:  "No big deal.  Don't worry about it.  I'll just see you later."  Conflict resolved.  Game over. 

I lost sleep over that?  No big deal? But then again, why was I surprised at God's breaking through once I took His hand and bothered to ask His help?

God brings order out of chaos, sometimes in very unexpected, unorthodox and sacred ways, rarely on my radar, but smack dab in the midst of His intricate designs.  The chronicle of God's faithfulness in my life is an crazy map of illogical turns in the road and a history of wonders and oddities of which mostly made no sense at all to me at the time.  And He guides me in ways I do not know to the eye of the hurricane and through the jumble of absurdities, over and over again. "...the God who has been my shepherd all my life long to this day..." (Genesis 48.15)  Leading and redeeming.

Anxiety only makes the miry bog even thicker in mud.  Or am I allowing my life to be altered, changed and transformed by the reality of God?  Am I trying to figure it out on my own....and missing out on God's way and His glory in this?  Even in "impossible" situations.

Don't lose sleep over it, or worry into a panic, but  "...give God 'elbow room.'...Do not look for God to come in any particular way, but look for Him...Always be in a state of expectancy, and see that you leave room for God to come in as He likes."   (Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, January 25)

Was it not You who dried up the sea,
the waters of the great deep,
Who made the depths of the sea a way
for the redeemed to pass over?

                         Isaiah 51. 10

And who expected that?

And then the picture emerged

The puzzle that I wrote about earlier this month sat mostly untouched on the dining room table for a few weeks.  It became obvious that it was not going to solve itself, as in any dilemma in our lives.

It took time.  It took effort.  It was slow.  But every so often, bingo, someone discovered a piece to slip into place. 

The biggest problem was believing that indeed all of these pieces had a purpose, nothing missing, nothing random, even in what we could not yet see, even when it seemed to make no sense at all. But the truth is even through all my daily experiences and even in the radical shifting of life's tectonic plates, I don't have to understand how God is working it out. That is what trusting God is all about.  Because the reality is that I may not ever realize the purposes or see the whole picture, even when it's done. But God is God.  Even then.

God is not a genie who grants instant answers my way.  Poof, the puzzle is done.  God is not limited to my carefully crafted requests and perfect solutions that don't require His help at all.  God does not need my manipulation to help Him out or tweak the results for a favorable public relations image for Him.

He is "The LORD who is there," as it says on the very last line of Ezekiel, a book written in the 500s B.C. while that prophet was living in exile in ancient Babylon.  It is the very same book in which 62 times God repeats "that you will know that I am the LORD."  In case we didn't get it the first time around, in case we still don't grasp it.  Even on the journey, even when we have yet to see anything good from it, even when it is yet a mystery.

Yet is one of my favorite words of God.  Because God's timing is always perfect, and mine is not.  It is not that the outcome isn't ready.  More often, I am not. Waiting is a season of gathering and growing. Ripening is hard work.  And sometimes it takes a long time.  Not ready yet are words of hope, not wishful thinking, but that on which we can stake our lives. 

Even when I have no idea what I am doing, overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of the task, God's purposes are already in place and running strong.  Faithfulness is driven not by the emergence of the final outcome, but energized by the sticking with God in it. Faithfulness doesn't always know what is ahead.  But that doesn't matter to the faithful. A puzzle piece may not fit where I want it to, but takes its strategic (and often unlikely) place in the course of time.  "I don't get it" is no reason for despair, but for prayer.

More often than not in working this puzzle with my husband, as I was looking for one piece to fit, I found another that did.  One direction led me directly to something I wasn't even seeking.  Pieces that did not even appear related, or even part of the same picture, were suddenly aligned in a triumphant aha moment.  You'd think there was some kind of design to it.  You'd think that God knew what He was doing. Absolutely.  We don't even have to imagine that.  God is really good at being Who He is.

For awhile, I continued to be amazed, standing behind the chair of my husband.  He would sit quietly as if studying the pieces and positions and the way things were.  He did not suddenly just see the configuration.  He just stuck with it.  As for me, I just stared at the pieces, but nothing happened until I began to try, starting off with one little wing, or a smidgeon of color, or a beak, taking an actual step, realizing that it may be part of an entirely different bird in another quadrant.  One failed step and then another false move.  Nothing seemed to fit.  And then realizing it was not the cardinal after all but another exquisite delicate bird whose name I do not know.

Along the way, God brought others to observe and help.  God uses the most unlikely people for His purposes, sometimes for just a few minutes, just to connect a piece or two.  Or maybe just to have another set of eyes looking at it, bringing a bit of experience and deeper vision to it, or offering words of encouragement.  "Ahhh, that is where that one goes."  I didn't see it, but she did.  That is what fellowship does, even when we tell others "I'm good," in an effort to appear self-sufficient, and we are the ones deprived of the multi-dimensional blessings of being in community.

If life were easy, we wouldn't need to seek God.  If the path is going to be that obvious, life would be terribly boring.  If I am looking for the easy road, or the big bold six lane Interstate highway, I'm going to miss out on God's way in this.

There is always more than one side to a mystery, to a dilemma, or to a place of desperation.  Have you tried turning that piece vertically or even what appears upside down? Am I focused on looking for a new door to open? Or trying to find an exit sign as an excuse to abandon this problem?  Or intentionally staying in place and discerning a different picture that is being redeemed?

Some day on the Other Side of life, we will be shocked.  "So that is why that happened."  The whole picture is not a dim mirror image, but suddenly a reality face to face.  It is not that someday all the pieces will suddenly come together.  They already fit in an intricate design.  It just isn't time yet.

This January, we didn't just give up on the one thousand impossible little pieces.  In time, a picture of birds appeared, everything in place, as it should be.  Someday, it will be His glory over all the world, as it should be.

The puzzle has been put away in the closet, not out of defeat but in triumph,  and time for yet another challenge, another opportunity to seek Him through.

For My thought are not your thoughts,
   neither are your ways My ways, says 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.

                               Isaiah 55. 8-9

And does it really matter if I say anything?

God uses unlikely people in unexpected and awkward situations.  Being faithful to God always bears fruit that we will never see.   The point is being faithful, not in the outcome. Because we never really know how God is using us.

People are always watching you, not to see if you are perfect or to see you fall, but to know if this God of yours is real.

Decades ago, a man named Tom received his friend Chuck into his home.  Chuck was not a likeable guy.  He was tough, surly and unpredictable, and unbeknownst to Tom, Chuck was going through a huge personal and professional disaster which was called Watergate.  Chuck was Nixon's hatchet man.

Not knowing the magnitude of what his friend was going through, in the course of conversation, quietly and gently, Tom simply shared what God was doing in his own life.  Tom's offer to pray for Chuck was rebuffed.

It was the first time Tom had verbally shared his faith.

But what happened after Chuck got into his car and drove off changed the trajectory of many lives.

"Share the gospel always," said Saint Francis. "When necessary, use words."  Be not afraid to use words.  

This quiet man Tom passed away this week at the age of 94.

Click here to read about what Chuck's daughter had to say about Tom's story.

It is an amazing story.  But think about:  And does it really matter if I say anything?  More than you will ever know.

And then I looked up

Conversation opened. 1 read message.

I was zipping through my emails at a rapid pace on my phone, separating junk mail from the significant. Delete, delete, save. Instead of sitting in my usual morning reading chair, I stood absentmindedly in the living room overlooking the side porch-- for no particular reason, just because I was there -- or so I thought. I was trying to be efficient with my time, totally unaware of what was taking place around me.  Hurry, hurry, get through this and onto the next.  Reading something I wouldn't remember an hour from then, I glanced up mid-sentence.  And there to my amazement, just on the other side of the glass, a black bear was meandering across the porch, just strolling along, sniffing his way, minding his own business.  My husband Bill was reading a book not five feet away from me, totally oblivious to this majestic creature literally on our doorstep. A bear!  I was filled with a powerful sense of awe at this rare occurrence. Bill looked up, slowly put down his book, and watched with me as this magnificent animal ambled by.  "They're always there," he replied. "We just don't always see them." How many times am I totally unaware of the spectacular? If I hadn't looked up, I would have missed the wonder that the Almighty placed right before me. Because I don't look up, inquire, seek His way, I am distracted by the mundane and miss out on the extraordinary just meandering by, even like a bear in our midst. Be still,      and know that I am God.                                          Psalm 46. 10 Are we looking for particular answers we have crafted so carefully, or God's stamp of approval on our own agendas, or a neon sign suddenly appearing and pointing the way? Looking for something else--or looking at something else-- and missing out on the intricate details of His divine appointments, even those pointblank in front of us? And all along, there He is, waiting for us to lift up our eyes to Him, and stand speechless, not because of the fireworks or the parting of the Red Sea, but by His glory, even on what we consider the most ordinary of days.  Because in God's dictionary, nothing is just ordinary. My day was not changed by seeing a bear, but my heart was by a visual reminder to live in the reality that God is with us.  He is faithful. "Walk with Me." ...having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which                  He has called you, what are the riches of His glorious inheritance                                         in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness           of His power toward us who believe.....                                    Ephesians 1. 18-19

A year in books 2018

 
 "Of making many books,
       there is no end.
                    Ecclesiastes 12. 12

Here is my journey in books for the year, a mixture of new and old, some I would recommend, others I will not be reading again.  I tried this year to read more widely -- more books of fiction to enrich my imagination, more biographies to enlarge my vision, and many others to exercise my spiritual muscles.  Even the books and authors with whom I did not agree caused me to think about what I really believe.  I learned something from each one, sometimes finding an endearing phrase in the most unlikely volumes.

"Trample not on any; there may be some work of grace there,
that thou knowest not of."
                              Samuel Taylor Coleridge
                              1772-1834

This year, I began reading one book on a friend’s shelf while the whole household was napping.  I also discovered books through recommendations from friends and family, although I learned the hard way that not all recommended prove true -- including one book described as an innocent trek of a man and his grandson in Norway that was really the unraveling of a mass murder.  I have overheard titles in conversation, from reviews published in the Wall Street Journal, and on podcasts by authors I had not known. Several books were rescued from the giveaway pile when our oldest daughter moved, and of course, there is always a volume or two on our shelf that I always meant to read “someday.” 

I tried to intersperse a newly published book with one that is older, those read for the first time and those like greeting an old friend.  As C. S. Lewis once recommended, "It is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between."

Excluded from this list are the vast number of children's books read aloud again and again, and please just one more time before bed?   Some of the picture books were newly published, but the old ones we relished together, reading side by side on the bed, or sometimes the cramming and clammering of four little bodies wrestling for my lap  --the solution with the twins on my lap and the others on each arm of the chair. Of those books familiar to the children, I would often leave off a phrase or two, of which they gladly reminded me out loud.

Book of the year?   Very, very hard to pick favorites.  From each category:  fiction definitely Virgil Wander by Leif Enger, biography Becoming Dallas Willard by Gary W. Moon or Oswald Chambers: Abandoned to God by David McCasland, touching memoir Holding onto Hope by Nancy Guthrie, my nonfiction award to Leadership in Turbulent Times by Doris Kearns Goodwin, and of course, anything by Madeleine L'Engle is delightfully chocolate for my mind.  The Bible is not really last on my list, but that which holds me all together.

My year in books for 2018:

            Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God by Francis Chan (2008)

             Liturgy of the Ordinary:  Sacred Practices in Everyday Life by Tish Harrison Warren (2017)

          Can Man Live Without God? by Ravi Zacharias (1994)

           The Heart Of Evangelism by Jerram Barrs (2001)

            The Creative Habit:  Learn It and Use It For Life by Twyla Tharp (2003)

           The All-or-Nothing Marriage: How the Best Marriages Work by Eli J. Finkel (2017)

            Norwegian By Night by Derek B. Miller (2012)

           For The Time Being by Annie Dillard (1999)

           The Call:  Finding and Fulfilling the Central Purpose of Your Life by Os Guiness (1998)

           Oswald Chambers:  Abandoned to God by David McCasland (1993)

1        Still Life by Louise Penny (2005)

         John Stott’s Right Hand:  The Untold Story of Frances Whitehead by Julia Cameron (2014)

          Amazing Love by Corrie ten Boom (1953)      

           The Collaborative Habit: Life Lessons for Working Together by Twyla Tharp (2009)

          Fit or Fat: A New Way to Health and Fitness through Nutrition and Aerobic Exercise   by Covert        Bailey (1977)

1        Leopard at the Door by Jennifer McVeigh (2017)

 .        A Circle of Quiet by Madeleine L’Engle (1972)

1       Dorie:  The Girl Nobody Loved by Doris Van Stone (1979)

1       Warlight by Michael Ondaatje (2018)

2       Think Again: Relief from the Burden of Introspection by Jared Mellinger (2017)

2       Varina by Charles Frazier (2018)

2       Holding On To Hope:  A pathway through suffering to the heart of God by Nancy Guthrie (2002)

2       Practicing the King’s Economy:  Honoring Jesus In How We Work, Earn, Spend, Save, and Give by Michael Rhodes and Robby Holt (2018)

2       Frederick Law Olmsted: Plans and Views of Public Parks by Charles E. Beveridge (2015)

2       Calico Joe by John Grisham (2012)

2       Everybody Always:  Becoming Love in a World Full of Setbacks and Difficult People by Bob Goff (2018)

         Leave No Trace by Mindy Mejia (2018)

2      A Wind in the Door by Madeleine L’Engle (1973)

2       Befriend:  Create Belonging in an age of judgment, isolation and fear by Scott Sauls (2016)

        The Ninety-Third Name of God by Anya Krugovoy Silver (2010)

3      The Art of Gathering:  How We Meet and Why It Matters by Priya Parker (2018)

3       Insider Outsider by Bryan Loritts (2018)

3       Prayer:  A Holy Occupation by Oswald Chambers (1992)

3       Plenty for Everyone by Corrie Ten Boom (1967)

3       Leadership in Turbulent Times by Doris Kearns Goodwin (2018)

3     A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L’Engle (1978)

3     Crossover by Kwame Alexander (2014)

3     The Pursuit of Endurance:  Harnessing the Record-Breaking Power of Strength and Resilience by Jennifer Pharr Davis (2018)

3     The Playbook:  52 Rules to Aim, Shoot, and Score in This Game Called Life by Kwame Alexander (2017)

         Run for Your Life by Mark Cucuzzella M.D. (2018)

       Becoming Dallas Willard: The Formation of a Philosopher, Teacher, and Christ Follower by Gary W.  Moon (2018)

4     Jesus Among Secular Gods:  The Countercultural Claims of Christ by Ravi Zacharias and Vince Vitale (2017)

4        Lessons from Madame Chic by Jennifer L. Scott (2011)

4     The Winter Soldier by Daniel Mason (2018)

4     Virgil Wander by Leif Enger (2018)

4       The Heart of Prayer:  What Jesus Teaches Us by Jerram Barrs (2008)

4       The Givenness of Things:  Essays by Marilynne Robinson (2015)

4     Absolute Surrender by Andrew Murray (1895)

4      White Picket Fences: Turning Toward Love in a World Divided by Privilege by Amy Julia Becker  (2018)

5     The Bible

The picture is not completed, and the story is not over

Over the years, our family has enjoyed puzzles and board games over the holidays.  Some endeavors in the past continued for days and even weeks at times, a few minutes and a strategic move on the Risk board, a puzzle piece transplanted from one side to another as someone rushed out the door, or the discovery of that elusive piece fallen on the rug below the high chair. These joustings are eventually abandoned on the dining room table, and reluctantly shelved in the back closet sometime in mid-January. 

One of our daughters brought a new puzzle with her when she came home for Christmas this year.  A pile of literally a thousand indecipherable pieces of tiny birds waited on the dining room table like a forgotten guest. 

We barely even knew where to start.

The pieces were shaped mostly alike, with tiny beaks and teeny bird feet, snatches of color on wings and tails, and an occasional dark eye looking for its little bird face.

The puzzle is designed to ultimately form a picture when it is all put together, but the completion of puzzles and the resolution of problems are not confined to a calendar year, nor to a list of goals.  Maybe not this year is a mark of growth, not a dead end.

When it comes down to it, even the unexpected pieces, the mysterious, difficult, joyous and incomprehensible —I had a few of those this year — even in what appears to be missing or does not seem to fit, all is being redeemed.  It just may not be visible to me yet.

Not time to give up, but trust the Almighty a little more, follow a little closer, and realize how myopic I am.

Do I view the year in so many tiny unconnected pieces?

The picture is not completed, and the story is not over yet.

“Trust Me in this.” Nothing random at all, not even one little piece.  Faith is not wishful thinking that somehow it will work out, nor sorting through to find some kind of meaning in it, nor pasting a picture on the box of what I want it to look like in the end.  Faith is knowing there is a design, even in the mess, every piece is strategically positioned, every shadow faithful, everything impossible is still a carefully crafted detail.

God surprises us sometimes when a small corner unexpectedly comes together, or a couple of odd unrelated shapes fit snugly, and give a glimpse of what is and what might be. The Lord actually knows what He is doing, even if I do not, maybe especially when I do not.

There is a sacred glory after all, His ongoing grace and infinite love.

He is before all things,

and in Him,

all things hold together.

                  Colossians 1. 17

Imagine that in 2019.

Happy New Year, my friend!