Lucky are the unlucky

Up until a few years ago, people with physical and mental disabilities used to make me really uncomfortable. My family can attest to this. Whenever anyone with a disability would walk into a restaurant I would immediately lose my appetite. All I could see was the brokenness on the outside.
The Sermon on the Mount where Jesus preaches on the Beatitudes teach this truth: lucky are the unlucky. The Beatitudes go against everything we pursue and believe in- blessed are the strong, blessed are the wealthy, blessed are the powerful, blessed are the liberators, blessed are the triumphant. But in the Sermon on the Mount Jesus says if an enemy soldier slaps you, turn the other cheek. Rejoice in persecution. Be grateful for your poverty. Essentially Jesus says "How lucky are the unlucky!" In the Beatitudes, Jesus promises that these rewards lay somewhere in future but the more I learn the more I realize that the Beatitudes describe the present as well as the future. Philip Yancey says in his book The Jesus I Never Knew that he does not view the Beatitudes as patronizing slogans, but as profound insights into the mystery of human existence. "God's kingdom turns the tables upside down. The poor, the hungry, the mourners, and oppressed truly are blessed. Not because of their miserable states of course- rather, they are blessed because of an innate advantage they hold over those that are self-sufficient." (Pg. 116).
Henri Nouwen, a priest who used to teach at Harvard University, moved to a community called Daybreak near Toronto at the height of his career in order to take on the demanding chores required by his friendship with a man named Adam. Adam is a 25-year-old man who can't speak, cannot dress himself, cannot walk or eat without help. He does not cry or laugh. His back is distorted, his arms and leg movements are twisted and he suffers from severe epilepsy. Nouwen writes, "It takes me about an hour and a half to wake Adam up, give him his medication, carry him into his bath, wash him, shave him, clean his teeth, dress him, walk him to the kitchen give him his breakfast, put him in his wheelchair and bring him to the place where he spends most of his day with therapeutic exercises."
Philip Yancey writes about a time where he went to visit Nouwen in Toronto and had doubts about whether this was the best use of this man's time...he thought couldn't someone else take care of Adam because Nouwen has much to offer the world. When Yancey voiced this to Nouwen himself, he informed him that he had completely misinterpreted what was going on. "I am not giving up anything," he insisted. "It is I, not Adam, who gets the main benefit from our friendship. Adam has taught me that what makes us human is not our mind but our heart. Not our ability to think but our ability to love." From Adam's simple nature, he had glimpsed the "emptiness" necessary before one can be filled by God. Nouwen said he was enjoying a new kind of peace, acquired not within the walls of Harvard but by the bedside of Adam.
At the Reality King's and Queen's Dance on Saturday night I saw what Jesus meant by the Sermon on the Mount. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God. In the Great Reversal of God's kingdom, prosperous saints are very rare. It's not that the poor are more virtuous than anyone else, but they are less likely to pretend to be virtuous. They are more naturally dependent, because they have no choice; they must depend on others simply to survive. In summary, through no choice of their own these people find themselves in a posture that befits the grace of God. In their state of neediness and dependence they welcome God's free gift of love. Their security rests not in things but on people.

Ruthless Trust

Right now I'm reading Ruthless Trust by Brennan Manning (same author who wrote Raggamuffin Gospel) and its been awesome! I loved Raggamuffin Gospel but I might like this book even more. Here are two excerpts that I really like:

When the brilliant ethicist John Kavanaugh went to work for three months at the "house of the dying" in Calcutta, he was seeking a clear answer as to how to best spend the rest of his life. On the first morning there he met Mother Teresa. She asked, "What can I do for you?" Kavanaugh asked her to pray for him. "What do you want me to pray for?" He voiced the request that he had borne thousands of miles from the United States: "Pray that I will have clarity." She said firmly, "No, I will not do that." When he asked her why, she said, "Clarity is the last thing that you are clinging to and must let go of." When Kavanaugh commented that she always seemed to have clarity he longed for, she laughed and said, "I have never had clarity; what I have always had is trust. So I will pray that you trust God."

"Craving clarity, we attempt to eliminate risk of trusting God. Fear of the unknown path stretching ahead of us destroys childlike trust in the Father's active goodness and unrestricted love."

This book has been really convicting to me because so often I find myself praying for clarity or understanding in a situation. And when I think God has answered my prayer what I mean is that He has answered it according to my own desire. I know that sometimes I can't see how the thing granted is at all what I desire. And yet it is. For, after all, what the deepest part of me truly desires is not my will, but the will of the Father. It is not clarity that I need, it is trust. The challenge to actually trust God forces me to deconstruct what I have spent my life constructing, to stop clutching whatever it is I am so afraid of losing. Jim Cymbala says this in Fresh Faith, "The great battle of our spiritual lives is 'Will you believe?' It is not 'Will you try harder?' or 'Can you make yourself worthy?' It is squarely a matter of believing that God will do what only He can do...He's looking for faith so strong that it will anchor on His Word and wait for Him, the One who makes everything beautiful in its time."

I read stories in the Old Testament and marvel at Israel's terrible infidelity and direct disobedience to God. I see how quickly Israel runs to idols and think I would never bow down and worship a golden statue. Yet I do. Every single day. I worship convenience and comfort. I bow down to ease. I make an idol out of God's blessings. Yet the crazy thing that still blows my mind every day is that He still loves me! How amazing is this- God loves me KNOWING my future. This idea is hard to grasp until we personalize it. Would I love anyone with such fervor and unrestrained selflessness if I knew that person would betray me in just a few short days, months, or years? How could I love somebody if I know that love will be taken for granted, forgotten, rejected, and even scorned? Would I marry a man if I absolutely knew all his flaws, if I knew that he would live adulterously, that he would divorce me and marry another, that he wasn't completely committed and wouldn't love me in return? Yet, here God is, loving us DESPITE our future. His love is so deep it really is incomprehensible. How could you not want to know a God like that?!

"you will know the truth...and the truth will set you free!"

"Have you never heard?
     Have you never understood?
The LORD is the everlasting God,
     the Creator of all the earth.
He never grows weak or weary.
     No one can measure the depths of His understanding.
He gives power to the weak
     and strength to the powerless.
Even youths will become weak and tired,
     and young men will fall in exhaustion.
But those who trust in the LORD will find new strength.
     They will soar high on wings like eagles.
They will run and not grow weary.
     They will walk and not faint."
Isaiah 40: 28-31

Learning to rest in this verse.

should we really follow our heart?

So often we hear the phrase "follow your heart." It's a popular song lyric, a popular storyline in romantic movies, and a popular way people make decisions.
Proverbs 4:23 says "Above ALL else guard your heart- for it is the wellspring of life!"
In our heart lies the very center of everything we are, of who we are. The heart carries so much power over me, so much that I'm not even aware of its power at times until it's too late.
When I sit back and examine my heart it can look outrageous at times. I tend to base my decisions off what I'm feeling in the moment and it doesn't always look pretty...in fact most of the time it looks pretty bad.
Contrary to what I think, I am the WORST architect for my heart because I desire the very things that lead to my own destruction. I tend to want things I shouldn't want because my heart never knows what is best for me. I cannot trust my heart.
The Lord even warns us of our deceitful hearts in Jeremiah 17:9 "The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?"

In the spring we see beautiful flowers blooming all around us, a constant reminder of new life! This analogy reminds me of my need for a new heart, a heart that desires Him. The kind of heart David pleads for in Psalm 51. I am tired of hearing the line "follow your heart" because the heart can't be trusted. My heart will naturally chase after my own selfish ambitions and desire for instant gratification because it is irreversibly corrupted by sin. "Create me in a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me...Restore to me the joy of Your Salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me." (Psalm 51:10 & 12)

"Almighty God, You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in You." St. Augustine

Oh how He loves!

The song called "How He Loves Us" has become one of my all time favorites. The story behind this song is also really powerful.
One night during a prayer meeting a youth pastor named Steven was praying and said, "Lord, I would give my life today if it would shake the youth of this nation."
Later that night, Steven died in a car accident. John Mark McMillian (one of Steven's best friends) soon after Steven's death became a youth pastor. Nearly three years had gone by since Steven's death, and nothing (that John could see) was happening. He was angry and confused that God would take his friend and then seemingly do nothing. John Mark said he felt like people had forgotten about Steven.
Funny how God works…little did John Mark know that the Lord was going to use Steven's death to inspire him to write this song that literally gets played all over the world.
Now EVERYWHERE John Mark or whoever else plays this song, said they get thousands of emails and messages from kids and adults alike saying that this song has changed their lives...that they were SET FREE and DELIVERED and SAVED by the power of God!
I literally get chill bumps every time I hear this song...Oh how He loves!

(In this video, Kim Walker (whose voice I love) is singing the song John Mark wrote. I prefer her version over the original just because I love her voice so much!)

Life is either a daring adventure or it is nothing

Life is exciting, and challenging, and full of adventure. But it seems like my heart always longs for more. I always just think I can go deeper, there's something else great and more wonderful that I've met to find. Then I remember it's not that I haven't found it, it's what I won't find it this side of heaven. We get to experience a taste of what is to come, God gives us a small whiff of fellowship but it won't be complete here. This feeling reminds me of what C.S. Lewis talks about in "Weight of Glory" where we find beauty:
"The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust in them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things- the beauty, the memory of our own past- are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself; they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshipers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not yet found, the echo of the tune we have not yet heard, news from a country we have never yet visited."

Another Lewis quote from Mere Christianity: "Creatures are not born with desire unless satisfaction for those desires exist. A baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. A duckling wants to swim: well, there is such a thing as water. Men feel sexual desire: well, there is such a thing as sex. If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing."

We were made for that home, we will be complete and unified forever. It's hard for me to comprehend how big the world is and traveling overseas always sends a burst of liberation up my spine and through my spirit. This sense of freedom is in full force when I give up and realize I'm not in control, that this planet will continue to spin without me...that there's something more important than the life I live. Though I don't always understand this truth, each day provides experiences that continue to give meaning and beauty to our lives.

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” (Mark Twain)

"My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is perfected in weakness." 2 Cor. 12:9

This is from the daily email I get from Charles Spurgeon:

My grace is sufficient for thee.--2 Corinthians 12:9

If none of God's saints were poor and tried, we should not know half so well the consolations of divine grace. When we find the wanderer who has not where to lay his head, who yet can say, "Still will I trust in the or, when we see the pauper starving on bread and water, who still glories in Jesus; when we see the bereaved widow overwhelmed in affliction, and yet having faith in Christ, oh! what honor it reflects on the gospel. God's grace is illustrated and magnified in the poverty and trials of believers. Saints bear up under every discouragement, believing that all things work together for their good, and that out of apparent evils a real blessing shall ultimately spring--that their God will either work a deliverance for them speedily, or most assuredly support them in the trouble, as long as He is pleased to keep them in it. This patience of the saints proves the power of divine grace. There is a lighthouse out at sea: it is a calm night--I cannot tell whether the edifice is firm; the tempest must rage about it, and then I shall know whether it will stand. So with the Spirit's work: if it were not on many occasions surrounded with tempestuous waters, we should not know that it was true and strong; if the winds did not blow upon it, we should not know how firm and secure it was. The master-works of God are those men who stand in the midst of difficulties, steadfast,unmoveable,--

"Calm mid the bewildering cry, Confident of victory."

He who would glorify his God must set his account upon meeting with many trials. No man can be illustrious before the Lord unless his conflicts be many. If then, yours be a much-tried path, rejoice in it, because you will the better show forth the all-sufficient grace of God. As for His failing you, never dream of it--hate the thought. The God who has been sufficient until now, should be trusted to the end.

Amen. My heart couldn't have expressed it any better. Something I've seen in women is we have this weakness of feeling like we're either "too much" or "not enough." Our tendency is to run on either extreme of feeling too complicated or not accomplished. Jesus talks a lot about sufficiency. "Daughter, My grace is sufficient for You. You will be made rich in every way so you can be generous on every occasion." By His grace I am sufficient. Paul found the key to God's power being manifested in his life. He didn't rely on his own strength, wisdom, or understanding. One of the things I struggle with the most is self-sufficiency. John Piper writes, "Pride, or self-exaltation, or self-reliance is the one virus that causes all the moral diseases of the world. This has been the case ever since Adam and Eve ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil because they wanted to be God instead of trust God. And it will be true until the final outburst of human pride is crushed at the battle of Armageddon. There is only one basic moral issue: how to overcome the relentless urge of the human heart to assert itself against the authority and grace of God."

"If you return to the Almighty, you will be built up; You will remove iniquity far from your tents. Then you will lay your gold in the dust, And the gold of Ophir among the stones of the brooks. Yes, the Almighty will be your gold And your precious silver; For then you will have your delight in the Almighty, And lift up your face to God. You will make your prayer to Him, He will hear you, And you will pay your vows. You will also declare a thing, And it will be established for you; So light will shine on your ways. When they cast you down, and you say, 'Exaltation will come!'" Job 22:23-29