Remember the Sparrow

I am a fish killer. One morning last week my goldfish Sparrow (RIP) was floating upside down in the top of his bowl. I lovingly and sadly scooped him out with the net. No movement or flutter of little happy fins. I carried him to the bathroom with tears in my eyes. No movement. I plopped him into the toilet and THEN he started to swim. Did I scoop him out and rinse him off? NOOOOO, I took a deep (sad & teary) breath and flushed. I closed the lid because I could not look. I am a fish killer.

It is bad to be a fish killer. People stop trusting you to babysit their fish, and worse, when you tell them that another fish has passed away to the great fish bowl in the sky, they accuse you of “setting it free”. Sparrow is not the first fish I have sent prematurely to a watery grave, and likely is not the last. Every once in a while I think, “We need a fish”.  Maybe I should be dissuaded by the fish sales person who thinks it is inhumane to put a goldfish in an actual bowl. Apparently a full tank is needed. I must interject here that Sparrow had a long (for a goldfish) and happy life.

I chose the name Sparrow for my fish for two reasons:  I named him Captain Jack Sparrow because fish come from the sea and so do pirates. But I also named him Sparrow because it reminded me of one of my favorite verses in the Bible which is found in Matthew 10. Jesus is talking with the disciples about the hard path of discipleship. He tells them that if a single sparrow falls from the sky, the Father is aware of it. If a single, seemingly insignificant bird or a tiny goldfish perish, our Father is aware of it. Matthew 10:31, says this, “So don’t be afraid, you are more important to God than a whole flock of sparrows.” 

In the middle of whatever is going on in my life, whether big or small, I take comfort in the fact that God cares for me. He has given the birds of the air everything they need and they are just birds. I, His beloved child, am given so much more. I, His beloved child, have value to God. And so, I remember the Sparrow.

Transformed

At different times of the year I feel like I need a transformation: the new improved me, or the younger fitter me. I typically end up with the same old me in a new outfit. Transformation for the low, low price of $80! If only it was that easy to be renewed or transformed.

I crave, even long for, being a person who looks more like my heavenly father and less like my earthly self. So often the desire for godliness doesn’t translate to the actions that, when taken on my part, would lead me closer to him and the transformation I desire. My teenage son recently said it like this: “Sometimes I feel really close to God, and others I don’t feel close to Him at all.” My husband reminded him that in order to feel really close to someone, to feel kinship and connectedness, you have to spend time hanging out with them.

I long for time with good friends-the ones with whom conversation is not an effort, the ones who care about the silly and important details in my life. These are the friends who really know me and love me anyway. I will arrange my schedule to go away with them, and juggle a thousand details to go to coffee. This connectedness comes from history and trust and time spent together.  In fact, if you saw us together you would probably be able to tell we were friends. People who spend a lot of time together often start to resemble each other in mannerisms, the way they look, and the way they communicate.  

The same is true in my relationship with God. If I don’t feel connected, if I don’t see His transforming work in my life, it’s highly possible that I am not spending time hanging out with Him. If I don’t feel close, it is I who am moving away. If I am not becoming someone who more closely resembles Him, it could be that I am making time for the wrong things.

Transformation is a work of the Holy Spirit in my life, but it does require some participation on my part. Bible study, meditation, and prayer all lead to intimacy and connectedness to the Father.  Even time spent with him while walking the dog, or that quiet moment when I stop to remember all his goodness toward me, are meaningful ways to connect. Connectedness leads to transformation. You can’t help but be more like those you spend a lot of time with. 

Romans 12:2 "Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect."

 

Playing With Fire

"I don't want to LIVE there but I would like to see Hell. It's supposed to have lots of fire and you know how much I like fire..." (Trevor, 9 years old)

 

Do you play with sin this way? I think Trevor’s comment reveals what many of us think about sin. “I don’t want to live there, but there’s a lot of it, you know how much I like it…” Like moths to flame, we are drawn to sin. Playing with sin is a lot like playing with fire.  There is a reason you are not supposed to play with either. Fire, like sin, is enticing. It is sparkly, shiny and bright.  It’s exciting, and at first, it seems to be satisfying and warm your soul.  You think you can control it. But fire, like sin, can easily overtake you. Fire, like sin, consumes. Before you know it, you are engulfed by its flames and your life is in ashes around you. 

We can’t completely avoid sin. As an imperfect (normal) person, my day is filled with small and maybe large inconsistencies between the way I want to live my life and the way I actually get through my day. Anger, unkind words or thoughts, and selfishness are a few of the ways that I can get wrapped up in my own sin. Surely I deserve to be angry. Surely it is my right to feel misunderstood and fantasize about the way I could get even, or about what I should have said in response to unkindness. Don’t I deserve to be first? All of these thoughts, when not given over to God lead to sin.  Soon, if left unchecked, that bright shiny spark of frustration turns to anger, and then to sin.  Like Trevor, I am playing with fire.

1 Peter 3:10-12

For, “The one who desires life, to love and see good days,
Must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit.
 “He must turn away from evil and do good;
He must seek peace and pursue it.
 “For the eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous,
And His ears attend to their prayer,
But the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”

Crispy on the Edges

This morning while making sure that Buzz, the best dog in the world, had fresh water, I realized that I had not watered the flower pots in about 4 days. Let me interject here that I should get points for remembering the dog…but am apparently neglecting the garden.  My garden is definitely looking a little parched. The flowers in the pots are looking a little faded and weary, and the roses are (gasp) even a little crispy around the edges.  Let me justify my neglect: I have been busy. There was a lot going on a work, a lot to keep track of at home, and frankly, I felt that what I deserved to do was sit on the couch.

This morning while checking on the garden I was reminded of what that kind of neglect will cost me. While I can salvage the plants in the pots, they will not produce the kind of flowers I will be hoping for. The crispiness of the roses will mean a lack of new growth. All of the energy of the plants will be put into sustaining life, not into the production of something beautiful.

So it is with my relationship with God. When I neglect to water and feed it, my soul becomes a little faded and dreary, and dare I say it, a little crispy around the edges. My soul needs and longs to be fed: daily, hourly, upon the word of God. Life is sustained by Him, but souls are fed, grow and bear fruit from the daily watering, feeding, and abiding in Him and His word.

Psalm 1:2-3 “…He enjoys reading the law of the Lord, and studying it day and night. He is like a tree that grows beside a stream; it gives fruit at the right time, and its leaves do not dry up. He succeeds in everything he does.”

Whatever

What is the state of your closet?  Yes, THAT closet: The one that is big and roomy and seems to fill up with all of the unmatched, unwanted, and forgotten stuff in your life. 

I actually like to clean closets. I love to pull everything out and sort it into three piles: the keepers, the give-away pile, and the stuff I don’t really want but am not yet willing to part with.  The keepers and give-away piles are easy.  We pull close what we love and dispose of what is bad or unnecessary. It is the stuff that I don’t really want but am not willing to part with that is difficult. 

 My heart is the same way. It is easy to keep the good stuff close to my heart, and it’s pretty easy to let go of what is glaringly bad in my life.  It is difficult to part with the stuff that I don’t really want but have an emotional attachment to.   Sometimes I am emotionally attached to my feeling of anger toward someone.  It could be that I have unrealistic expectations for my spouse.  Maybe I am attached to a need to control everything and everyone around me.  We can become emotionally attached to our feelings, sins, desires or entitlements and these are the very things that God wants us to dispose of.

I think of a closet as a place where things are stored and forgotten. The closet space in my heart, however, works differently.  What I store in my heart may seem put away and out of sight, but it will inevitably affect my life through my attitude and actions,

What should I be storing in the personal closet space of my heart?  Philippians 4:8 tells us to dwell on the whatever’s:  "Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.”  If  what I am storing  in my closet is not part of God’s list of whatever’s, it is probably something I should dispose of.  This week I plan on examining the closet space in my heart and see what I'm storing there.  I plan to embrace the keepers, and add at least one of the things I am holding tightly to, to the give-away pile.

Abundance

 

John 1:16 From his abundance we have all received one gracious blessing after another. 

As a child of God I am the recipient of His blessing.  I am full, even overflowing with all God has graciously bestowed upon me. What is His abundance in my life?  Today I decided to think of as many examples of His abundance in my life that I could (I am sure there are more). I invite you to do the same.

I am His. I belong to Him. I have family and friends who love me. I have purpose. I have health and happiness. There is plenty of chocolate and coffee in the world. I have creativity and know joy. My flowers are blooming, My dog is not too old to walk with me. My husband and son put up with my crazy. I enjoy sunshine, wind and storms in my life. I see beauty and feel sorrow. My Hope is in Him. 

“God will overflow your cup, so grab the biggest one you can find.” Rob Liano

Kicked out of the Garden

I’ve been kicked out of my garden. The roses have just finished their first big bloom of the season, the snapdragons are ready to pop open and the birds are welcoming the day with some loud hallelujahs.  I would like nothing more than to take the floral tour of my own garden to see how things are doing. There may be aphids waiting to be eliminated. There may be flowers to dead-head. There is certainly a wicker chair waiting for me, my book and a glass of iced tea. 

It is not to be.  There is evil afoot in my garden. The large, awful, ugly tree with the treacherous little white “flowers” is blooming in full splendor.  Along with its splendor comes my misery. Watery eyes, runny nose and itchy face accompany the blooming of the tree. How can something that seems so harmless chase me away from the garden? How can it separate me from the thing that I love?

 

Each of us has something that we harbor within us that chases us away from spending time in the garden.  My secret sins, my lack of discipline, my laziness chase me out of the garden. Seemingly harmless things build up until I barely realize that I am harboring such sins in my heart. These things separate me from the One I love.

As a child of the Master Gardener I am loved, forgiven, and always welcomed, but I am still able to stray from the garden. How easy it is to glance over the fence without entering. So often I say “later” to the garden and the Master Gardener. I can choose to not pull up the wicker chair and sit for a while. I can choose not to tend to my emotions and responsibilities. I can choose to not tend to the spiritual disciplines that will cause me to want to spend time with the Master Gardner.

I hope you are finding time to be in the garden. If not, what is keeping you away?  What are you allowing to come between you and the One who loves you?  Allow yourself to sink deeper into relationship with Him. Spend time in the garden. The Master Gardner is there, tending the garden, waiting for you to pull up the wicker chair and sit a while with Him.

 

Psalm 37:3 “Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness.” 

Garments of Forgiveness

This morning I was reading in Genesis when Eve is tested by Satan and falls to the temptation of wanting more than God has already given her. She is convinced by Satan’s lies that God is withholding something good from her, and falls prey to his scheme. It is so easy to believe that there is something good and necessary to our lives that God has not given us. It is easy to accept the false narrative Satan or the world might have us believe.

Adam and Eve realize they are naked. They are exposed not just bodily, but their hearts and longings are exposed to God as well. “You gave us everything and we grasped for more,” they say, and we say every day.   They cover the evidence of their sin with physical garments, but for true forgiveness, a sacrifice must be made. Our sin, covered by a cloak of Christ’s own blood, shed to restore us to a relationship with God; if we choose to accept it. This garment of forgiveness has been crafted specifically for you and me; covering our nakedness and depravity with the compassion, mercy, love, and forgiveness of the Father.  Even in the midst of our disobedience God provides.

Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Awake O My Soul

“O God, you are my God; I earnestly search for you. My soul thirsts for you; My whole body longs for you in this parched and weary land…Your unfailing love is better than life itself, How I praise You...I will praise you as long as I live, lifting up my hands to you in prayer…I lie awake thinking of you meditating on you through the night…Because you are my helper I sing for joy in the shadow of your wings. “  Psalms 63

Of all the things that keep me up at night, I don’t usually think of God as being one of them.  Bills, busyness, family, and many other things have kept me awake in the middle of the night, only to fade to a more realistic focus by the light of day. The concerns of life always seem to have a magnified importance in the middle of the night.

Lately I have been considering the possibility that God himself is the source of my sleepless night. What if my sleepless night is really a call to spend time with Him-exclusively and completely focused on the Lord; searching for His heart in my awakened soul? I’ve often used a sleepless night as time to pray: for family and friends, for nagging concerns and for many other people and things. Since praying in the middle of the night usually puts me to sleep, I have to believe that those few times when I have actually gotten out of bed and pursued time with God, have been appointed by Him.  Like an invitation to coffee with a friend, comes the invitation from my Father to spend time together. 

What if my awakened soul is a divine appointment with Him, and an opportunity for me to not just put my wants and concerns before him, but a time for me to go deeper with Him? Time spent with God in the wee hours of the morning, for me, are often a more sharpened time of intimacy and closeness to my Father.  It is a midnight meeting with an opportunity for intimacy and relationship, and a never to be reclaimed moment if missed. “I lie awake thinking of you, meditating on you through the night”. 

Awaken to hear the invitation. Awake O my soul.

Soul Guardian

Movies are made and books are written that reflect the fact that as humans, we have a yearning to be cared for and protected. For hope to prevail within our hearts and in society, we need heroes. We believe that we are self-sufficient, but deep inside we want to know that there is someone bigger and stronger than us to rescue us.  We can deny it, but popular culture is full of heroes who rush in to save the day, and we rush in to watch or read all about it. 

I heard a story about a young man whose mom was so messed up that she wanted him to fail. The better he did the worse she felt about herself, so the worse she wanted to make him feel.  Fortunately, someone came along who recognized that this young man needed help. Someone who could be responsible for his care: physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Someone who said, I"t is my pleasure to see you do well, to see you succeed, to see you grow".  He needed a hero.  He needed a guardian.

 A guardian is an overseer or a watcher. They protect and guide. Scripture tells us that Jesus is the ultimate in guardians. He is in fact, the guardian of your soul.

1 Peter 2:25 “Once you were like sheep who wandered away, but now you have turned to your shepherd, the guardian of your souls.”

It is interesting that the guardian in this scripture is not presented to us in the form of a super hero complete with cape, mask and tights flying in to save the day.  The guardian of our souls is a shepherd. While many of us may not be aware of all of a shepherd’s duties, we can all agree that they care for sheep. They have an entire flock of folks to be watching out for. However, sheep are known for wandering away. We like sheep, also tend to wander. We are looking for the next adventure or the next cool thing, and wander toward the newest bright and shiny light.

In 1 Peter, it says, once we were like these wandering sheep, then we turned to our shepherd, the one who is our protector and overseer. Superman looks pretty spiffy, and Batman is super cool, but our protector doesn’t just watch over our outer shell, he guards our soul…the very essence of who I am, protected by the very one who made me. My soul guardian:  Imagine the cape for that!

Devoted

I was privileged to grow up in a Christian home. From the time I was 5 years old going to church was important to my family, and it was a regular part of every week. We did not just attend because it was the thing to do, we attended because my parents each had a personal relationship with God and saw church attendance as pivotal to fellowship and growth. We were involved in mid week church activities; and my parents attended Bible studies and were involved in church leadership. However, Family Devotions were an elusive part of our family life. Family Devotions were not something to look forward to, they were something we all dreaded. Devotions were even something that were pulled out when we were all being rotten! The kids are behaving badly? Let’s have a family devotion! There is nothing that makes you dread spending time in the word more than being sent there so that you “could think about what you have done”.

 

 I don’t believe that this is the spirit in which God wants us to spend time with Him. While the word of God is designed to point to the sin in our lives, it is also meant to encourage us in our faith by helping us to see the promises of God and how he has worked over time in the lives of his people, as well as how he has worked through His son, Jesus Christ, to redeem the world. It is so much more than a reprimand.  It is my delight.  I delight in chocolate so I eat it. I delight in spending time with my sister, so I make time for it.  I delight in walking my dog, so we walk. If I delight in God’s word, I will choose to make time for it. Psalm 1:1-3 says of those who choose to walk with God,

“But they delight in the law of the Lord,
    meditating on it day and night.
They are like trees planted along the riverbank,
    bearing fruit each season.
Their leaves never wither,
    and they prosper in all they do.”

I desire to be delighted with God’s word and time spent with Him, yet the delight doesn’t always translate into time. The desire to spend time with God is something that seems to have an ebb and flow in my life. There are times when I crave that intimacy with Him, and times when I am there out of obedience.  Each has a place, and blessing abounds because he is a good and faithful God who desires my devotion; Devotion to Him, not devotions for the sake of duty.

So Let it Grow

Have you ever wondered how it would feel to be perfect?  I think it would be pretty great. I would never be wrong. I would never do anything less than capably, correctly and with great quality. If I was perfect I would never say the wrong thing, never make a bad decision and be an amazing wife, mother and friend all the time. I would be perfect! Life would be perfect! 

In the book of James, God has something to say to us about perfection, and frankly, it dims the glow for me just a little bit:

“Dear brothers and sisters, when trouble comes your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete lacking in nothing.” (James 1:2-4)

Ah. So perfection, at least the biblical variety, comes through trouble, testing and endurance.  There are actually people who enjoy endurance…they are quite often runners, and usually do things like train in the rain for a marathon, or enter mud runs and other crazy races. They have the ability to withstand hardship and stress. They know what it is like to persevere.  I am struck by the way James says (about endurance) “So let it grow!!!!”  As for me, I feel like the four (added) exclamation points are necessary. It is like he is saying, “Bring on the perfection! Let adversity and the testing of faith begin! I want to complete and lacking in nothing.”

Hebrews 6:11, 12 “And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence so as to realize the full assurance of hope until the end, that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience, inherit the promises. “ Could it be that being perfect is not about a flawless life, but that being perfect and complete means we inherit the promises of God?

The good news is this. Even if you are not the world’s best wife and mother, if you sometimes say the wrong thing, and if every task you take on is not accomplished in the way Martha Stewart might do it, as a believer in Christ your are perfect and complete and lack nothing because of Christ and his work of completion in your life.  This ongoing work of completion will certainly include hardship, trials and tests.  But we know the outcome: perfect in the sight of our heavenly father. And that is all that matters.  “So let it grow!!!!”

Deep & Wide

I am awestruck by the incredible depth of God’s love for me. I see it in my life, in the lives of those around me, and in creation itself.  The word of God has much to say about our father’s love for us. Ephesians 3:16-18 are some of my favorite verses on this subject.

“I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources He will empower you with inner strength through his spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in Him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is.”

His love for you and me is deep and wide. Deep: his love permeates my very being, sinking down into my soul. He desires for us to have a full awareness of his great, unceasing and amazing love.  This love is to be accepted with no doubt as to its realness. Have you ever sat on a comfy chair to find that it has sucked you in? God’s love surrounds and enfolds you: like a caterpillar safe in its cocoon, like a joey in its mama’s pouch, we are protected, surrounded, loved.  Wide:  his love encompasses every area of my life and is with me wherever I go. I am never away from his love for me. Like a light piercing the most complete and dense darkness or a shadow cast wider than the tallest mountain, his love falls over me, casting a wide and complete net.

As children, we accept this love without reservation, as adults we strive to be worthy of it.  Ephesians 3:19 goes on to say, “May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully, then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.” From our understanding and experience of God’s love comes completeness. We don’t deserve his love because we are complete, completeness comes after accepting His love.

Be Still

As a kid I think I was constantly told to “Be Still”! Admittedly, I was a serious wiggle worm with a propensity to keep moving. Sitting still was not on my daily list of things to do. Stillness is still not something that is always on my daily list of things to do. Being still is an art, and it is one that I have striven to cultivate in my own life. Our society values people who are on the go, and so do our churches. Scripture tells us to do things like: follow God, pursue righteousness, and flee from temptation.  All of these things require action. However, we are also told to “be still”. What purpose is served by being still? Psalm 46:10 tells us, “Be still and know that I am God.” Stillness allows us to put focus on God: the creator and sustainer of our souls. 

Sometimes I enjoy being still…quiet, aloneness, and introspective. I have found that stillness can be a state of the heart and mind, not of being. I spent a lot of time in my car driving back and forth to my mom’s house while she was terminally ill. I found this to be an incredible time of aloneness, and of thoughtful contemplation. I would often drive the full hour to her house and realize I had not even turned on the radio; I had been consumed by the stillness around me, and in that stillness, when we allow Him, God speaks.

“I wait quietly before God, for my victory comes from Him. Let all that I am wait quietly before God, for my hope is in Him”. Psalm 62:1 & 5

I can rest in Gods’ care for me, and can put my confidence in Him to give me hope and victory over whatever is going on in my life. Cultivating stillness allows me to spend time in quiet contemplation before God, allowing Him to speak into my life.

“Instead, I have calmed and quieted myself, like a weaned child who no longer cries for its mother’s milk. Yes, like a weaned child is my soul within me”.  Psalm 131:2

Instead of worrying about all manner of things, I can rest in God’s care for me, the way a baby relies on its mother for rest and nourishment. Then, weaned, grown away from milk, ready for more. My soul, having found its rest in God, is ready for more.

Ringing in the New Year

Most local churches used to have towers with bells in them. The bells were rung daily to mark time, and also for special events. In England it used to be customary to ring the church bells at midnight on New Year’s  day, to both send out the old year-as you would ring the bell for someone who had died-and to welcome in the New Year.  Because of this, we “Ring in the New Year.”

 I have always found New Year’s to be a little bit of a let-down. The holidays are over, my house looks bleak without the Christmas tree and decorations, and there seems to be a slight air of unrest.  It is as if the New Year is asking for more of me.  There are certain things that I find myself doing: cleaning closets, organizing drawers and paperwork, exercising more, eating better.  Each year I think I will make some changes. I decide this is the year that I won’t let my paperwork pile up before I file it.  I will stop hiding chocolate in the cupboard and eating it when no one is looking. I will walk my dog more often and go to yoga twice a week. I will spend more time in the Word.  Somehow, someway, I crave change.

This year, the New Year has already been “rung in”, but it isn’t too late to affect change in my life.  I want to view change as a healthy and regular part of life. In truth, change is coming whether I want it or not. However, like the New Year, I can choose the way I ”ring it in”. If I am standing still, if life is standing still around me, I am stagnant and unable to grow. If I am open to change in my life, in my heart and in all that goes on around me then I am ready to receive whatever it is the Lord has for me this year.  And in this world of change, my God remains steadfast. He remains the constant to which I will cling.

“Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed,” says the Lord, who has compassion on you.” Is 54:10