When you don’t know what to do.

November 20, 2022

Maria 1 Peter 3, Ecclesiastes 3, God's wisdom, Humility, James 1, Jeremiah 33 , , , , Leave a comment

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. James 1:5 ESV

I drafted a different kind of post yesterday, thinking that God wanted me to take a break from writing these weekly blogs.  When I talked it over with Mike, he responded that this is one of those neutral issues, that I am free to cease or to continue. When we prayed before dinner, he asked the Lord to guide me in this decision.

After dinner, since I always check emails before settling down to read, I caught a text that gave me pause. Valerie had written me to say how much my last blog piece had helped her in the midst of some self-reproach. Wow!  I took that a guidance from Jesus to keep writing. And then this morning, Linda reenforced that encouragement with her kind words.

So, I will continue.  Below is what I THOUGHT I was going to post.  But, God!

***

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:a time to keep silence, and a time to speak….Ecclesiastes 3: -1, 7 ESV

I have been blogging regularly since 23 November 2009.  That is thirteen years.

I started writing publicly in order to capture those thoughts God generated in me based on Scripture. I had filled notebooks with them, but never went back to read my ‘nuggets’.  I ended up throwing my journals away. In shifting to blogging, my reasoning went like this:  ‘At least I’ll have a permanent record of this growing in understanding God.’

Sometimes something I heard on a Christian podcast or read in a book would prompt me to think more deeply and apply what the Lord was showing me.

No doubt you recognize my vanity in believing that my reflections can help others see something new and fresh about God.

But, even if these posts don’t connect with anyone, my life is proof of one of Mike’s favorite quotes, ‘Writing is thinking’.

But recently I have wondered if my self-generated weekly commitment to post something publicly hasn’t caused me to think too much and too often about myself and what I am feeling or going through.

This morning, the Holy Spirit focused that line of thinking, directing me to the suggestion that I ‘fast’ from writing these blogs.  I noted in my journal: “Is my blogging perpetuating this ongoing inward focus on Maria?”

You’ve heard the description of humility, no doubt: “Don’t think less of yourself, just think of yourself less.”

To that end, I am initiating an Advent fast. Will I still write?  Yes, but with a focus on magnifying God.  And privately. 

My goal is to grow into the kind of woman described in 1 Peter 3:4 and 6.  You remember that glimpse of Abraham’s wife Sarah whose inner beauty came from her faith in God during scary times?

“And you are her (Sarah’s) children, if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening…..” Verse 6.   Peter has just written earlier in verse 4, “You should clothe yourselves instead with the beauty that comes from within, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is so precious to God.”

I want to cultivate that quiet spirit.

Thank you to all of you who have written kind comments and thoughtful responses. You have encouraged me in both what I have shared and my writing skills. 

So, faithful and kind readers, I bid you ‘au revoir’ or possibly ‘adieu’.  The Lord will direct me. In the meantime, keep mining the Word for the gold that is there.  Our God promises that if we seek him with a sincere and persistent heart, he will meet with us and reveal previously hidden things.

‘Call to Me and I will answer you, and I will tell you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’ Jeremiah 33:3

Mean-spirited Maria

January 27, 2022

Maria 1 Peter 3, Conviction, Holy Spirit, Sin 3 Comments

….what is inside the heart —the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. 1 Peter 3:4 CSB

Pop often accused me of ‘pulling wings off of flies’. I had a sense of what he meant.  This was his way of letting me know how unkind I had been, picking at and trying to provoke my mom.

When I searched on line to see if my dad had just made up this expression, I read with horror: “In typical usage, it describes a cruel person, such as a bully or someone who enjoys tormenting others…… for no other reason than to take pleasure in being mean to them/in watching the other person be hurt….emotionally, physically, or otherwise. (accessed 24 Jan 2022)

I did this very thing in my most recent zoom call to Mike’s mom. She loves her Episcopal church and during our conversation, she expressed great sadness in how attendance has dwindled during the pandemic.

I could have just commiserated with her.  Instead, I boasted in how many people have joined our church. I also slipped in some remarks to the effect that in order to become a member, you have to be able to point to when you gratefully accepted Christ’s righteousness for your own and what He has done for you since then, unlike her denomination. Totally unnecessary, and meant to make her feel bad.  She never knows how to respond to me when I bring this up.

At the end of the week, I’m flying out to Seattle to spend a few days with her.  She’s growing more fragile and isolated due to all the Covid restrictions in her retirement complex. I’m hoping to cheer her up some and cook some food she’ll enjoy.

Back to that zoom call, I continued with a mean spirit, asking, ‘Do you all still have to wear masks in Seattle?’ (I knew the answer).  Again, it was meant to be a dig, designed to highlight the difference between Washington state and where I live, here in Alabama where we have no Covid restrictions. 

Then I added something about how ineffectual and silly masks are. Unnecessary!

I felt terrible during the entire conversation.

I confessed my cruelty to the Lord and told Mike.  But the following morning, the Holy Spirit REALLY convicted me.  During the first half of the day, even at the gym, He continued to reveal more and more of my heart.

Let’s call a spade a spade.  What I did during my conversation was to ‘despise’ my mother-in-law.  It dawned on me while on the rowing machine, ‘there’s no middle ground’. Either I love someone or I despise them.

Calling my sin by its nature helped me, in a painful way. This morning, the ‘reveal’ continued. 

What do you think of when you read how we are to ‘flee from sin’?

I picture Joseph escaping the clutches of the promiscuous Mrs. Potiphar. But I never have applied this warning to Maria, until this morning.

That’s when I also came across the 1 Peter advice to wives of unbelieving husbands. Again, I had never thought of how I could apply to me, in a different context.

 I’m praying and have asked friends and Mike to pray for my heart during these next few days with Mike’s mom.  I want to be that quiet (‘unprovoked and unprovoking’ per the Greek) and gentle (‘self-controlled’) gal whom the Father is pleased to call his daughter.

 

Why do they hate that I love Jesus’ words?

June 29, 2020

Maria 1 Peter 3, Babylonian Exile, Ezra 4, John 15, Persecution , , , , , Leave a comment

I live my days partially immersed in the Spanish-speaking world. Desiring to become proficient in the language, I spend 3 hours most days listening to podcasts, reading my Bible and novels, watching news in Spanish on YouTube and speaking with local Spanish-speaking natives. During the past two years I have come to understand more about the lives of many immigrants in our country.  Our pastor’s sermon yesterday morning caused me to see a similarity between ‘outsiders’ seeking a new home in America and those of us who are Christian, who are also ‘others’ and temporary residents in this world.

Joe’s text was Ezra 4. Returning Jews from 70 years of Babylonian exile had laid the foundation to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem. But the pluralistic, syncretistic locals did not like these new developments.

What did they do? First, they offered to help out with the reconstruction, hoping to redirect it to their ends. Rebuffed and rejected, they then turned their energies into “discouraging the people of Judah and making them afraid to go on building. They hired counselors to work against them and frustrate their plans (during) the entire reign of Cyrus king of Persia down to the reign of Darius king of Persia” (Ezra 4: 4-5). That’s a LONG time.  Years of persecution, harassment and hatred.  In a word – afflictions meant to derail the Lord’s work.

With a change in leadership in Persia, these persistent enemies of the Jews then wrote flagrant lies about the returnees convincing the King Artaxerxes to mandate a halt to all building in Jerusalem.

Joe used this section of God’s word to emphasize that Christians, those who love Jesus and follow him, will ALWAYS be hated and persecuted.

Why? Because we actually believe what Jesus says, what the Bible teaches, like:

  • There is only one way to be saved from hell and eternal separation from God – through Jesus.
  • There is only one true and living God, the God of the Bible.
  • Sexual unions other than what the Bible teaches are sinful. (Marriage between one man and one woman for life)
  • Complementarian roles for men and women are God’s plan for mankind.
  • Humans are created male and female.

Just to name a few biggies.

Since March 2020, when Covid19 brought an end to ‘normal’, I and most everyone have longed to return to the way things were.  In a similar way, I think American Christians have been looking back over their shoulders wishing that life would do a reboot to 30-40 years ago when being a Christian was ‘acceptable’ and even commendable.

Joe’s sermon confirmed in my heart that ‘normal’ is NOT what I think it is.  Normal IS persecution.  I’ve just been living in a bubble.

Back to my Hispanic friends and my growing empathy for ‘aliens’ and recent arrivals to the States. Many don’t feel as though they belong, whether they are documented or not. What does ‘not belonging’ look like?  Degrees of persecution are routine experiences just because they are Hispanic. Like what?

  • The mildest poor treatment is indifference. Ignoring those who are not like the majority happens even in moms’ morning-out groups at a church.
  • The sting of jokes and epithets
  • Language barriers that hinder immigrants from finding community resources.

Exclusion hurts!

Then there are those in detention camps, waiting and hoping, living in difficult conditions, in a kind of limbo between appointments with lawyers and court dates, at the mercy of any kindness.

Thoughts during the sermon made me realize:

  • How I and other believing Christians need to accept that WE, Jesus’ followers, are the aliens, the unwanted and unwelcome in many parts of our country. Often scorned, mocked and intimidated into being quiet.

Somehow knowing this and embracing this REALITY cheered me as a tonic to my soul. Coming to terms with the ‘logic’ of persecution allowed me to shed that, “I just want things to go back to normal, when being a Christian was accepted.”

What a pipe dream. Let’s get real: the ruling majority KILLED Jesus. Furthermore, this Jesus, the second person of the Holy Trinity taught: Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. (John 15:20)

Don’t you think it’s easier to live with the truth? Do we really want a return to ‘normal’?

At this point in my life, I now know that I want to complete my work and my training here as an exile. ‘Graduating’ to REAL LIFE in the presence of Jesus seems more appealing. AND I trust God’s timetable for me.

As our Sunday school teacher mentioned after the sermon: ‘The Good News is not that things are going to get better but that Jesus died once and for all, the righteous for the unrighteous.” (1 Peter 3:18). That was good news for the persecuted church in Peter’s day and it is just as true and meaningful today.

 

 

 

 

My hero and role model has feet of clay

December 22, 2018

Maria 1 Peter 3, Faith, God's Sovereignty, Holy Spirit, Husbands, Peace, Trust, Trusting God, Worry , , , , , , 2 Comments

Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear— but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious. For this is how the holy women who hoped in God used to adorn themselves, by submitting to their own husbands,  as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. And you are her children if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening.  1 Peter 3:3-6

I love this report about Sarah. I find her refreshing.  I am relieved that it is her Peter exhorts us to copy.  Yet I know the full story of Sarah.  I know that Peter, guided by God’s Spirit,  has selected the characteristics of Sarah WHEN SHE WAS AT HER BEST!  Yes, Moses wrote the unvarnished account of this matriarch who didn’t trust God all the time.  She is the one who thought she knew best how they could ‘get a baby’.  So she made her personal servant sleep with an old, old man.  And then she treated Hagar shamefully.

(One sin I think we women all share is that we, too, think we know best – pretty arrogant for a finite creature, don’t you think?_

Yet God holds her up as a role model. For me, for you (even if you are a man)

This time in life when our future feels as uncertain as that of Abraham and Sarah’s, I draw comfort from the realism-laced prescription that Peter writes.  I (and Mike as well)  am to cultivate a gentle and quiet disposition or attitude.  None of the crazed, “But what are we going to do!!!”  No need for that stress and unrest if we trust God!  We don’t HAVE to know today what we will do next week.

No, I am to be like Sarah and the other ‘holy women’ of the Bible ‘who hoped in God’.  That is they trusted, believed, counted on God to do and be what He said he would do.

But what sells me on wanting to be like my mother, or older sister Sarah is how Peter writes, “She didn’t fear what was frightening!”

We live in a scary world.  And it’s always been that way since the Fall.  That’s reality.  Yet because we have the happy, sovereign, good and all-wise triune God, we are NOT to fear.

So, do I know what will happen, what our future holds?  No.  But I am growing more able to rest and feel assured that God does know and is sovereignly working out the details.  We are to rest, trust, watch and be ready to move out.  To travel light.

Sarah left her home and friends behind in Ur. No mention is made of her pining away about what she left behind.  She moved and tented wherever her husband led.  Trusting and submitting to this fallible husband BECAUSE she trusted God.  And she was at rest.

I bet she didn’t have a worry line in her old face!

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