PSALM 112 - Is Life A Crap Shoot?

Light dawns in the darkness for the upright. He is gracious, merciful and righteous. It is well with the man who deals generously and lends. Who conducts his affairs with justice. For the righteous will never be moved. He will be remembered forever. He is not afraid of bad news. His heart is firm, trusting in the Lord.   (Verses 4-7)

Comme ci comme ca. Que sera, sera. What goes around comes around. You gotta take the good with the bad. Easy come, easy go. Life is a crap shoot. You are what you think...or eat. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. When life hands you lemons, make lemonade. Religion is the opiate of the masses.

I've heard several people lately discuss the meaning of life, or rather the meaninglessness of it. Especially in terms of its ups and downs. A few of my friends are influenced by Eastern religious thought. Guided by Buddhist teachings, fascinated by the multitude of Hindu gods. Or just convinced by the vicissitudes of life that it's rather random. That we need a pattern of thinking that will get us through somehow. And that is why we make up God...or gods. To make sense of what is nonsensical and confusing about living on Earth. It seems to them that we chart the course, for the good or the bad. We make lemonade or drink the bitter offerings handed to us by a desultory universe. There might be guiding principles, certainly Buddhism abounds with them, to prod us to live in the moment, to meditate and quiet our busy interior selves down. Hindu gods reveal themselves in yoga asanas. Group chanting makes the experience corporate and soothing. But the expectation isn't that one will find life purpose this way. At least not according to my friends. The purpose is to be able to live in the present - the now. To cope. And if there is understanding of the broader universe, it is in relation to finding the interior strength to live today in a world awash with various pleasures and pain and the peace is an end in itself.

I love my friends, so this isn't a diatribe about Eastern religions. It's only a simple comparison. With my God. With His world view. To reveal there is, in the mind and heart of the God of the Bible to whom I am privileged to relate as Father to daughter, true Light in darkness. True purpose in pain. A plan for each life that is intricately woven into the fabric of  history with an imprint as infinitely unique as is each snowflake--each fingerprint. My God is intentionally relational. He doesn't just spout esoteric one-liners for my edification and His glory. God, my Father, takes my hand and walks with me through this life He's given me. Yes, there are things God desires of  me. Statutes that make me better able to live in the now...and forever. But I'm not left to chant them into my heart or meditate over them for meaning. If I wake to meditate in the early morning hours, I'm speaking to the One True God Who hasn't hidden Himself in the forms of idols nor divided Himself into smaller, lesser gods. I have relationship with God because He loves me...and you...personally. Has known us since before the foundations of the world (Ephesians 1). Life isn't a crap shoot. It sometimes feels like it. Even to Christians, but that is why our hope is so important. Why prayer is more than the rote chantings of religion. It's my heart-to-heart with the One Who controls it all.

So when bad news comes, and it does to everyone, I have an anchor. I know some think I made Him up so I could survive the bad times. My opiate to keep from thinking more deeply about this world and its pain. That couldn't be further from the truth. First of all, I'd never make up a god who is my father. I wouldn't even think to do that. My god would have to be all powerful, therefore vengeful and angry with everything that angers me. He'd give me whatever I asked for. He'd be very small minded because I am. But my God challenges me personally every day, just like any good father. Corrects me. Leads me. Loves me. Sings over me. Holds me. Teaches me. Guides me. Laughs with me. Cries with me. Walks with me. Talks with me. He is not my opiate. He is my iron lung. He is my beating heart. It is He Who whispers in my ear, "Go this way."

What if I am right...and the Bible is correct...about this God? Then every life has purpose and each of us is precious to the God over all gods. He lives to bring  us to Him. Promises that even the bad times work for our good and His glory (Romans 8). Through the death and resurrection of Jesus, we have the Holy Spirit living within us enabling us to navigate the life expected of us by our God. It is an amazing package. Christianity. Why would anyone settle for less? A loving God who deals justly with injustice, Who empowers us to live in a confusing, out of control world, by indwelling our very souls, a Father Whose purpose is to grow us up and bring us home to His glorious dwelling place, and a path that is lit for us as we endeavor to walk it hand-in-hand with Him. If' I'm wrong, I will have lived for more than getting through, because if all the gods are a product of our desiring to cope with planet Earth, mine wins, hands down.

 

PSALM 112 - Cold Oatmeal and Long Prayers

Praise the Lord! Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who greatly delights in His commandments! His offspring will be mighty in the land. The generation of the upright will be blessed. Wealth and riches are in his house, and his righteousness endures forever.
(Verses 1-3)

Seek first the kingdom of God and all these (other) things will be added to you. Matthew 6:33

"Get up, John Jr.!" bellowed the elder on Sunday mornings for all the child's life. "It's time to go to the Lord's House!"

The child stumbled out from under the covers and made his way to the bathroom where he washed the sleep out of his eyes and attempted to run a comb through his unruly hair. Downstairs, breakfast awaited. Oatmeal and toast, usually. John prayed over the food in accentuated holiness. A long speech to God that, when finally over, left the oatmeal cold. "This isn't fit to eat," said the father harshly to his wife. "It's cold as ice. Can't you even make breakfast?" He got up from the table and stuck his bowl in the microwave while his wife bowed her head and slumped down into her chair. Not wanting to be noticed or called out, John Jr. dug his spoon into breakfast and ate quickly. The sooner her could leave the table the better.

In the car on the way, big John quizzed his son about school. He wasn't really involved in the kid's life except to pontificate on the very little he knew about him. Usually that amounted to the drive to church each week. "How are your grades?" the man queried.

"Okay." John Jr. didn't want to start anything so early in the day.

"That's not an answer!" John Sr., already riled. "I asked you 'How are your grades?'"

John Jr. was always a little miffed that his mom just sat there. Said nothing. Like she was afraid of the man. "I have an A in English, a B in math, I don't know my grade in Social Studies.."

"Then find out!" John Sr. broke in. "What do you mean, you don't know! Of course, you know! God doesn't bless the slothful, John Jr.!"

And so it always went. At church, though, John Sr. was head deacon. A man in a dark suit, hair oiled and flat against his head, smelling of cologne and praying in loud and poignant rhetoric. An angry soul whose self-righteousness masked a heart dissatisfied and languishing. He didn't drink. He didn't cuss. He always gave a tenth. He provided for his wife and kid. What more could God want? John Sr. wasn't into the sentimentality of religion, though his tenor could be heard above the others as he bellowed out the hymns he'd grown up with. Life owed him for these things he did. God owed John Sr. because he played by the rules. Felt good about himself because he kept the Ten Commandments!

Across the congregation sat Patrick with his wife and three children. They'd begun the morning as they did every day. With prayer. "What's on your minds today, kids?" asked Patrick as they sat around the kitchen table after breakfast. "What do we need to talk to Jesus about?" Each of the children had stuff. Like always. "You know, Jesus hears our prayers, right?" They all nodded in agreement. "Okay. Well, let's talk to Him." And they did.

On the way to church, they sang Sunday School songs. Patrick wasn't a Christian as a child, so some of the songs his children learned were new to him. God had changed his life. Made him a new man. Church was the place where he learned how to live like Jesus wants him to. Patrick was amazed every morning when he got up that God loves him. Awed Jesus wanted a personal relationship with him. Patrick couldn't give enough, couldn't do enough, couldn't praise enough to ever return to Jesus all He had given. Patrick wanted to be a father to his own children that reflected the Father he now had in his God. "I know I'm not perfect," he'd say to his kids, "but I'm trying to be so you can know how wonderful Jesus is." He blew it sometimes. Sure. But he didn't live his life blowing up.

Two fathers. Keeping the commandments. Going to church. The psalmist pointing out that it's the father through whom the blessings come to the offspring. And having grown up in a very denominational environment, I get that we are often turned off by what we received from the experience. What God wants is a heart overtaken by His love. The man who obeys out of his own great passion for Jesus. Both fathers might look much alike in the congregation, but God is after what we do with all the other hours of our lives. Fathers impart holiness to their kids. Teach them to pray. Help them to walk the walk. By example. The chances of raising godly children are infinitely increased when the father delights in God. Runs to do what God asks of him. With joy. And only then can fathers be consistent in their walk with God on a daily basis. Rules don't change us. Commandments only tell us what we are doing wrong. If, by their own power, men try to live by the letter of the law, they will fail. Impart empty lives to children who are scorned for their inadequacies. The relationship of the father to his children should mirror the relationship of the father to his Father. And that is one of unconditional love and acceptance that stimulates children to compassion and good works. Because that's what "my daddy" did.

The promise is blessing to the father's children. Health and wealth--riches. A godly father will have imparted the road map for joy. Caught--not taught. If the father has a heart like his Father, his children will have a much better chance of taking that gift to the next generation. Generation to generation is how righteousness lives forever.

Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children lest they become discouraged.  Colossians 3  (Italics, mine)

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church, and gave Himself up for her...husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes it and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church.
Ephesians 5

Daddies have a big job. Praise be to God that He has given you everything you need to live a life of godliness! 2 Peter 1:3

 

PSALM 111 - The Big Santa In The Sky

He sent redemption to His people. He has commanded His covenant forever. Holy and awesome is His name! The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. All those who practice it have a good understanding. His praise endures forever! (Verses 9-10)

The young man walking near the field that morning heard a quiet whimper. Maybe a wounded animal. It was hard to tell. He walked further, but heard it again. Stopped him cold. I think it's a baby. The man then cut into the short grass of the acreage to try and find the child. It lay not far from the road, umbilical still attached, naked and unwashed from its recent birth. A baby girl. Thrown, no doubt, by her mother into a certain death, unwanted. Garbage to the woman. The traveler, however, had great compassion on the tiny wriggling child wallowing in the blood of her birth. "Live!" he cried as he took her into his arms. "Live, child!" Oh, how he loved her in that moment.

The man took the baby into the village where be found a wet nurse to care for her. He provided her with a home and family. Out of his bounteous wealth, he spared no expense on her as she grew into womanhood. It was his care for her that caused her to flourish. Though he traveled extensively, the man kept in touch with the parents who had taken her in. He hadn't seen her in years when he came upon her again. This time she was fully grown, a woman tall and graceful. But she was poorly clothed. With no sense of propriety. In need of a different cleansing than before. She was lovely to him, so he took his expensive cloak and covered her with it. Offered his life to her. Wanted her to be his forever. Took her to be his bride.

In his love for the young woman, the man covered her in silks and fine leather. Bathed her uncleanness and anointed her with oil. He bought her expensive jewelry. Put jewels in her ears and necklaces around her neck and made her his queen. As such, the woman had the best foods, the finest flour, honey and oils. Her exceeding beauty was renowned worldwide. His love had made her beautiful, but she trusted in it and used it for her own advantage. Lured other men into their home and lay about with them on the gorgeous robes her husband had provided. In her debauchery, she took the jewelry and had it made into little gods to wear around her neck. The abundance of food in her home also became a lure for her liaisons with lesser  men. The last straw for the husband who loved her was when she took their children and sacrificed them to the god of self that had completely overtaken her soul.

What to do. She has completely forgotten that I took her from the field and made her live! In the darkness of her adulteries--her constant thoughts of only herself--she doesn't remember where her beauty came from. No thankfulness. No reciprocal love for the one who saved her from death. Gave her abundance. Saw her potential in grace and beauty. No understanding of the heart of the one who loved her so. The heart of God.

God Himself tells this story in Ezekiel 16. And it played in my head this morning when I read this psalm again. It is God Who finds us in our need. Crying in our desperation. Needing a Savior as we lie naked and vulnerable in the field of woe in which we find ourselves abandoned by every addiction and trick of the devil to die in our pain. Whimpering and alone, He comes to find us. Takes us up and nurtures us, marries us to Himself as His Beloved. This is the heart of our God. It is the reverence for that which is the beginning of our understanding of Him, the catalyst for wisdom. If we are in awe only of His wrath, scared by His power or bowed down under His commandments, we miss the real reason to fall at God's feet in holy awe. It is His relentless love for us that should make us say with the psalmist, "Holy and awesome is His name!" He redeemed us by His own will out of His vast, fathomless and everlasting love to become people He makes a promise to. Really? Caught up in God's hands from the bloody repercussions of our natural birth to be born again into royalty, clothed in fine linen, tended to, provided for, watched over and coddled. We belong to God, His children, the Bride of Christ. No wonder when we go after other gods, spirits of the universe who can only be a facsimile of the real and powerful God of All, it is to Him adulterous. We leave Him for Hindu gods or the worldly idols of our selfish hearts. When He, alone, is  the God who cares for us.

In order to walk with Jesus, we must understand and revere that heart. We won't last long in the faith if we think it's about the rules of the game. The stakes are too high and we'll lose because we don't have it in us to be perfect like the law demands. Nor will we be glued to the Father if all we want is good times because life is hard and things don't always go our way. If we think God is a great big Santa in the sky, we'll also fail when we don't get what we want every time we pray. I was thinking last night as I prayed before I fell asleep about God's rescue of me from sin. I was pretty far gone in my heart. Trapped by own choices. Deep in the pit. But what I discovered as I cried out to the One Who had found me in the field was that I loved Him just a little bit more than I loved my sin. Pitiful, I know. But it was the beginning of wisdom for me. He loved me first. My love was reciprocal, a response to His. But certainly not in kind. And the knowledge that my God still loved me, stuck in the mire as I was, so pierced the darkness of my heart that it melted just a little. I remembered a far off time when I'd danced before Him and adored Him. And I was homesick for that relationship. It wasn't until that moment that I grasped the depth of my failure. But my Beloved wanted me back. And that was enough to get me dragging my mud-slogged body out of hell.

In my prayer I was asking my Father last night to bind me to Him. To carry me along with Him like mothers carry their children in Baby Bjorns. To hear my Father's pulse. Never again do I want to lose the wonder of the Father's love because it is that love that makes me yearn to understand Him better and to walk in a way that pleases Him. And that is the wisest choice I can make.
 

PSALM 111 - Wonder What He'll Come Up With For That One!

Full of splendor and majesty is His work, and His righteousness endures forever. He has caused His wondrous works to be remembered. The Lord is gracious and merciful. He provides food for those who fear Him. He remembers His covenant forever. He has shown His people the power of His works in giving them the inheritance of the nations. The works of His hands are faithful and just. All His precepts are trustworthy. They are established forever and ever, to be performed with faithfulness and uprightness. (Verses 3-8)

 Hildebrand Gurlitt was a curator and art dealer when Hitler rose to power in the days before the second world war. Hired by Goebbels to rid museums of what Hitler declared to be "degenerate" art, Mr. Gurlitt hid many of the works of art by major artists like Picasso and Matisse. In the past few months it has been discovered that his son, Cornelius Gurlitt has been in possession of the artwork since the end of the war. Its worth. Over two billion dollars. Over the years the younger Gurlitt would sell a painting in order to make a living. The cache of paintings were stored in his trash filled home. Great worth in nugatory surroundings. Their splendor hidden for years until happened upon in the house of an ordinary eighty-year-old man. Masterpieces forgotten in the press of day-to-day.

I look at a masterpiece of God every single day. The ocean. How is glistens in the morning dawn, silver then pink then sparkling blue. The peachy-orange it turns as the sun goes slowly down in the evening. Dolphins rolling in the waves close to shore. Sea gulls squawking against a bright blue sky and sandpipers running along the shoreline pecking for sand crabs. A painting that can't be hidden. A wonder that will never be found in the trash of someone's closet. Too unfathomably large a canvas to be obscured. And I applaud. Every time. Always to my mind comes the song, "For the beauty of the earth, for the glory of the skies, for the love which from our birth, over and around us lies, Lord of all, to Thee we raise, this our hymn of grateful praise." Why then is He not recognized as the master Creator He is? Who can miss the spectacle of His works. Mountains, streams, valleys, mesas--the stuff of lesser artists' renderings. Only a copy, a very small snapshot of the bigger vista that no one painting could capture. A lone tree, perhaps. The snowy peak of a mountain viewed from a distance. God is the Master Painter Whose brush strokes often bring us to our knees in awe. We can only duplicate it. We cannot create it, too. So how is it He is not acknowledged as the Wonder He is?

It is in discovering the Artist that we often appreciate His works. I've spent my fair share of time roaming through famous and not so famous art museums discovering which works mesmerize me and which artists are not to my taste. But what I always acknowledge is they have a gift I don't possess. A passion for their subjects--a need to create on canvas. Why are we built like that? Where does our joy in beauty come from? Dogs don't paint. Horses don't recite poetry. Hogs don't look at the moon and wonder at its beauty. People do. Created in the image of God, we know what He knows, intrinsically. It was all made for us to enjoy. It's way too ordered and magnificent to have been accidental. We'd never say that about a Matisse or a Picasso. They had something in mind when they painted. An idea. A landscape. A story. Just as what they paint is a copy of the broader landscape created by God, so is their desire to express the beauty and share it. And the more admiration we have for the artwork, the more we want to know about the artist. What makes her tick? Where does her inspiration come from? Why does she love to paint?

And if the wonders of this world are the canvas of its Creator, made for us to marvel at in the museum that is Earth, we can be connected to Him and His art. God wants to tell us why He paints. What's was on His mind when He thought up the butterfly. The only creature that completely transforms from one thing (caterpillar) to a wholly other thing in its cocoon. Like going in a tricycle and coming out an airplane. Was it to transfix us? To ask, "How did You do that?" Most of the time, we just look at butterflies and say, "How pretty." But that is simply one masterpiece we should be in awe of every second of every day. Ordinary, really. There is so much artwork, breathtaking artwork, just on my back porch. Hummingbirds, camellias, cactus, spiders that somehow make a web from tree to tree. I believe it takes way more faith to believe they just came to pass over millions of years than to believe an awesome mind conceived the cricket and held it in His hand to admire it as He set it onto Earth. When man was given the task of naming elephants or rhinos, I think the God Who walked with him in the garden chuckled. Wonder what the man will come up with for that one! It takes more faith to believe that the hues and textures of the varied landscapes of our world were simply an accident of evolution than that One with an eye for balance and composition wanted us to applaud oases and rain forests, tide pools and fir covered slopes, vast deserts and vaster seas--nothing boring and mundane. Lest we make it so.

So maybe it's the very thought that to admire the masterpiece means to understand there is One Who conceived it in the first place. And if we acknowledge that it is painted for us to stand in awe of and wonder at the artist, we must acknowledge the artist Himself. We would find that He is not only a brilliant designer, but that God is a faithful Lover, a righteous Judge, a generous Provider, a merciful Father and a keeper of covenant promises. God is a Personality. To be reckoned with. And the works of art in which we daily live are to remind us as we hear sea gulls call or see the stars twinkling their own specific glory in the skies at night that God is alive and intricately connected to and well acquainted with all of His creation. Every brush stroke. Every curve, height, depth and contour. Just like Monet or de la Tour. He is not like them. They are like Him. And if God's great works are hidden, it's because we don't want to see. Unlike Gurlitt who knew their worth, when we ignore the art that so decorates our world, we do so in order to ignore the Artist, and deny His value.

Oh, Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth! You have set Your glory above the heavens...When I look at the heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars You have set in place, what is man that You think about him?......  Psalm 8  (italics, mine)T

PSALM 111 - Jesus and the Mango Smoothie

I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart, in the company of the upright, in the congregation. Great are the works of the Lord, studied by all who delight in them.
(Verses 1-2)

I experienced a bit of push back by the enemy of my soul this weekend. Here's why.

I met a friend for coffee earlier in the week. Well, mango smoothie for me, as coffee past nine in the morning makes me a hyper machine that doesn't shut down until way past when I should've gone to bed. The purpose of our getting together was for my friend to share what's been going on in her work life. To blow off a little steam and get clarity. On my way out of the door, I heard the Lord whisper, "Bring a Bible." So, I left my car running in the garage while I ran back upstairs for one. Left it in the car when I got to the strip mall where we met.

My friend is not a Christian...or was not one. Though she has a heart for God. Always has. And stirring within her recently has been the knowledge that there's something more. A restless heart. She is Jewish. And in a recent conversation I had with her, I told her we have the same God. It resonated with her so that she's been chewing on it since. But I didn't go to the coffee shop to proselytize her. I'm simply her friend. Wanted to give her an ear because I love her.

During our conversation, Vanessa sent me a text. In the middle of a very busy day, Judy (not her real name) had called offering her home once again for my daughter to spend the night instead of making the two hour drive home. Then I told my friend the story of Vanessa's very demanding job, twelve and thirteen hour days, often very late nights, then driving home. Early on I began praying that a woman would come into the upscale hotel in Beverly Hills where Vanessa works as a special events planner and offer our daughter a room or a casita to rent or stay in. And that is what God did. Brought Judy to the hotel. She loved my baby and offered a retreat for her in Bel Air. She often stays there several nights a week. Our God doing amazing things.

My friend couldn't get over it. How God answers prayers like that. He is amazing. "How do you get that kind of relationship with Him?" she asked.

"Jesus," was my answer.

And we talked about Old Testament sacrifices and New Testament covenants. She has a Bible now. Also has a new light in her eyes. Knowing God more fully is a joyful process. I'm just happy to be watching what the Lord is doing in her life.

But as I drove home, talking to my Father, I was struck by how one miracle intruded upon the other. Had Judy not called asking Vanessa to come spend the night, had I not received the text and told the story, the Bible would've possibly have remained in the car and we'd have talked of other things. But God had different plans. Came to sit with us over a mango smoothie and tea. Loves my friend. Is wooing her to Himself. Just as surely as He came to eat with the disciples, walk with the lepers and break bread for the multitudes. Still doing His greatest work of all. Our salvation.

So my weekend was marred by the push back of the enemy. It involved broken glass and feeling stupid. Funny, though, I was well into my irritation with myself before I recognized the real source of it. Jesus is greater than the enemy who would rob me of my peace. I never want to underestimate the miracle of clarity. Never want to forget the authority Christ has given me to speak His name to demons who would slay me. Yes, His works are great! I marvel at them, delight in Him and live to see what my God will do today. I love Him with my whole heart. Can you see me dancing?

PSALM 110 - Don't Wade in the River Styx!

The Lord is at your right hand to help you. When He becomes angry, He will crush kings. He will judge those nations, filling them with dead bodies. He will defeat rulers all over the world. The King will drink from the brook on the way. Then he will be strengthened.  (Verses 5-7)

But I trust in You, Lord. I say, "You are my God." My times are in Your hands." Rescue me from the hand of my enemies and from my persecutors!  Psalm 31

I'd just been to the obstetrician. "Yep," he declared. "You're pregnant!" Flooded with a mixture of joy and consternation, I walked from his office in a daze. I'd taken an early pregnancy test a couple of weeks before, was experiencing a little nausea and was needing naps at odd times of the day. So, I wasn't surprised. But the confirmation of the new life growing in me sealed the deal. Our daughters were seven and nine, and we weren't expecting the addition to our family. Had to get all the baby things together again. Bassinet, crib, changing table, stroller...all the things we'd bid adieu to long before. There was so much on my mind as I drove across town to the Dallas hospital where my best friend, Cathette, lay awaiting news of a biopsy on a lump in her breast.

I met my friend the first day of our teaching careers in Red Oak, Texas, a little town outside of Dallas. She was so pretty, sitting on the other side of the room with her long dark hair, her red heart-shaped lips pursed in a half-smile that revealed her deep dimples and accentuated her rosy cheeks. Our eyes met. We knew in that moment we were comrades-in-arms in this suburban high school. She was a Catholic. Had thought of becoming a nun. Her love for Jesus was authentic. I loved her. From the very start. My beautiful friend. We studied the Bible together during lunch. She spent many hours in our home. Rejoiced over both of our daughters with us. Made me maternity clothes. Cathette finally married in her early thirties and wanted to begin her own family. But she contracted mumps on her honeymoon. Not long afterward, the lump appeared. And now she was waiting for me, along with her husband, to visit her in the hospital.

When I turned the corner from the elevator and wandered down the hall looking for the room number, I felt my stomach churning. Desperately wanting her news to be good. To match mine. But a dread becoming stronger with each footstep that her life was about to drastically change. "Hi," I said as I tiptoed into her room. I was going to say, "How are you?" but I knew from the looks on their faces it wasn't good.

"It's cancer, Kay," she whispered. She was holding her husband's hand. Like she was holding on for dear life trying to stay on a lifeboat. I took her other hand in mine. Breathed in. Breathed out. What to say? All I could think of was, "Oh, Cathette." My eyes filled with tears as her huge green eyes pooled with her own. "I am the Lord's, Kay."

After we prayed together, I got back on the elevator, stunned. New life beginning in me. The time in my life for joy ricocheting off her new struggle. And I reached for His hand to steady my doubts. Our times must rest in the knowledge that He loves and protects us.

Never will I forget that acknowledgment in the midst of the battle that was now her reality. That assurance would take her through the next few years of her short life. Remission. Two adopted sons. Another bout with cancer. Her eventual death. She is the Lord's. I know to some it would seem He abandoned her. Let her fall on the battlefield. But for us all, the last real enemy is death. And if we don't know we are His in life and in death, we will expect things to go differently. Our times--the length of our days, the direction of our path, the purposes of our journey--are in His hands. Though Satan grabs for us, trying to snatch us into hell, we are secure in our God. So in dancing and in dirges, we belong to Christ Who sustains us. Who fights for us. Rescued from the ravages of cancer, I know Cathette rejoices whole and beyond happy as she looks at her conquering Savior today.

Our times are confusing and treacherous. We are tempted on all sides to be squeezed into the world's mold. Pornography, drugs, alcohol, adulterous relationships, greed, power--enemies of our souls. Sent to rob us of a holy walk with God. It seems daily that one more moral standard succumbs to political correctness and we wade through the polluted waters of the River Styx while we pray to be clean. Our promise, though, in all of this? God is going to stand up one day and judge it. This chaotic, unholy world. It is a war He is destined to win. In the meantime, we need a drink from the brook. To gulp living water until we overflow with it. To be refreshed during our time here, trusting He holds our hand through thick and thin and holds it still when we leave this fleshy life, trading it for eternity. Our battle plan in the meantime?

Brothers and sisters, I ask you to look for those who cause people to be against each other and who upset other people's faith. They are against the true teaching you learned, so stay away from them. Such people are not serving our Lord Christ but are only doing what pleases themselves. They use fancy talk and fine words to fool the minds of those who do not know about evil...Be wise in what is good and innocent in what is evil. Then the God Who brings peace will crush Satan under your feet!   Romans 16

 

PSALM 110 - Taxes and Tears

The Lord has sworn an oath and will not change His mind. He said, "You are a priest forever like Melchizedek." (Verse 4)

Melchizedek. King of Righteousness. King of Peace. As King of Salem, Genesis 14 seems to indicate He is King of Jerusalem, also called Salem. Abram's nephew, Lot, was taken prisoner when several kings mounted war against each other. So into the fray rode Abram with 318 members of his household whom he'd trained for war. In a nighttime raid, the men of Abram defeated them. After they'd chased the surviving troops north of Damascus, Abram and his men took for themselves all the plunder left behind in the hasty retreat. Lot was rescued and his belongings restored. The defeat was miraculous and profitable. The King of Sodom came to meet Abram in the King's Valley. But before they could have a conversation, Melchizedek approached Abram, carrying bread and wine. Abram recognized him to be a priest of the Most High God, although it's clear neither man knew where Melchizedek came from or where he was going.

"Abram is blessed by God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth, and I give praise to God Most High Who has handed over your enemies to you." Melchizedek pronounced this blessing over a humbled Abram. Though there is no mention of further conversation, Abram immediately desires to give the King and Priest a tenth of all the spoils. He understood the blessing as Yahweh reminding him that the miraculous defeat was from God, not from Abram's own hand. It isn't clear what the priest and king did with the bread and wine, but it must have been part of the blessing. The sharing of it.

Melchizedek was eternal, showing up out of nowhere, never returning quite that way again in the history the Bible records. Biblical scholars understand the verse, quoted again in the New Testament book of Hebrews, to be about the coming Messiah. For no earthly priest and king is eternal. They all die. Only One is both King and Priest. He also came offering bread and wine. At once the priest over the sacrifice and the sacrifice itself. Jesus.

 I'm interested in the response Abram had to Melchizedek, the King of Righteousness and Peace. Not king of Asia, or France or Italy. This is a different kingdom altogether. Abram didn't commit a tenth of his spoils to a man who ruled a land nearby. The act was spiritual. Physical stuff given to a spiritual king. More an act of the heart's willingness to part with some of what God provided as an acknowledgment of God's being the provision all along. The Bible doesn't say what Melchizedek did with the offering. That doesn't seem to matter to Abram. His heart was so overwhelmed with thankfulness and so awed by the presence of the priest, that he gave. It's what knowing Jesus does to us...

The unpopular little tax collector made his money off the backs of the hard working people of Jericho. Stole from them, really, by cheating them on their tax reports. Too short to see Jesus when He came into town, the man, Zacchaeus, ran ahead of the crowd and climbed a tree that was next to the path where the Man soon be standing. Legs dangling, head bobbing, trying to get a look from his aerie. To the crooked collector's amazement, Jesus stopped right beneath the tree. "Zacchaeus, hurry up and come down from there. I must stay at your house today!"

"What?!" The people not only stunned, by disgusted. The man with ill-gotten gains. The cheat! The liar! Why him?

"I will give half my possessions to the poor!" the little man declared as he stood to his feet looking up at Jesus. "And, if I've cheated anyone, I'll pay them back four times more!" Just blurted it out. Couldn't help himself. The spoils he'd taken from others now presented to his very own Melchizedek.

"Salvation has come to your house today, Zacchaeus!" Jesus beamed. "The Son of Man came to find lost people and to save them!"

A sinful woman heard that Jesus was eating at the home of Simon, a Pharisee. Her heart got the better of her head as she grabbed some perfume and ran brazenly into the home of the Jewish ruler. He was standing speaking to Jesus when she came up behind Him and threw herself at His feet. Touching them, being near Jesus, shame caressing righteousness, the woman burst into tears. They flowed in grief and remorse, washing the sand sprinkled ankles and arches of the Teacher. It's not what she planned. To cry this way. How to clean up the mess. Quickly, before He could notice, she took her hair down and wiped the mess she'd made from His feet, kissing them as she dried the tears away. The perfume! She'd almost forgotten in her cleansing that she'd wanted to give the Man this gift. She grabbed the bottle from her belt and poured its fragrance in abundance all over the feet of Jesus. Rubbing its scent into His skin. Wiping her uncleanness from His purity.

"Hmmph!" thought the Pharisee, "If Jesus were truly a prophet, He'd know what a sinful strumpet is touching Him!"

"Simon," said Jesus, looking him straight into his accusing eyes. "Let me tell you a little story."

"Uh..sure," stuttered Simon.

"There were two men who owed the same banker. One owed him five hundred coins. One owed him fifty. Neither had the money to repay him. The banker forgave both debts. Which one will love him more?"

"I think it would be the one who owed him the most money," answered Simon.

"Right!" Jesus looked at the woman at His feet. "You didn't even offer me a bowl to wash My feet when I entered your home, nor did you kiss Me in greeting. But she washed My feet with her tears, dried them with her hair, and anointed Me with perfume. I'm telling you, she has many sins and they are forgiven. That's why she showed me such great love." The woman dried her eyes and looked up at Jesus. "Your sins are forgiven. Go in peace." The blessing of her very own Melchizedek to Whom she offered her thankful gift.

"You see, Simon," said Jesus as he turned to the man, now red faced with embarrassment, "the one who's forgiven only a little will love only a little."

Something about our Priest and King makes us want to reciprocate somehow. Without being told to. "Here, take everything. And more. For I was nothing before You found me."

Therefore, since we have a great high priest Who has passed through the heavens--Jesus, the Son of God--let us hold fast to the confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but One Who has been tested in every way as we are, yet without sin. Therefore, let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us at the proper time.    Hebrews 4