Archive for March, 2008
permanent
Who is the King of Glory? YHWH . . . He is the King of Glory. Selah.
Psalm 24
“You get the tattoo,” I told Jason. “I’ll get a nose ring. It’s not as . . . permanent.” Jason and I had decided that we wanted to do something special, something a tad bit monumental, to celebrate debt freedom, our upcoming anniversary & new chapters. We wanted to mark this moment.
So, Jason designed his tattoo, setting an appointment to get inked on March 29. I went ahead and got my nose pierced a couple weeks ago.
Then, something changed in me. The story goes like this:
I had come to God to talk and listen several morning’s ago. My week, for reasons I don’t fully understand, had been filled with anxiety, unrest, fear. I was weary of it, sad about the panic that had begun to define my days. By God’s grace, I quieted myself as birds sang outside my window and the sun kissed a new cerulean sky. And, as I listened, the Spirit whispered silently, “Selah.”
It was a call. A call I wanted to understand and meditate on. So I paused, thinking about what I knew of the word. Then I turned to the Psalms and began a search. A search for rest. For truth. For worship.
What I found moved me so powerfully and in ways I can’t completely describe, that I decided to have the Hebrew word permanently grafted on my right wrist.
So, why selah? Because I desire for my whole life, now to eternity, to be about resting in, trusting and worshiping God.
And why the Hebrew letters? Because it’s the original language in which this word – and so many other life-giving words – were spoken. And because the letters are so beautiful, like a piece of art.
Why the right wrist? The right wrist because my right hand is my strong hand, but even its strength, is weakness. And the wrist because Christ had 10-inch Roman nails driven through His wrists so I might know selah.
Why a tattoo? I have come to an understanding about my “thorn in the flesh,” as Paul called it. And selah is it’s antithesis, it’s antidote. We don’t have to get tattoos every time God speaks a life-altering word to us. But I want the reminder to rest my anxious heart in the bed He makes for me. I want the reminder to worship God in all my strength and all my weakness. I need selah written on my arm. Beautiful. Permanent.
6 Commentsjust living
When I was in third grade, Jenny Tully told me, “Just wait till you get to fourth grade. You’re gonna hate it. And if you get Mrs. O’Hare, it’s gonna be really bad. She’s mean.”
Jenny was a neighborhood playmate and a year older than me. So I believed her. And when I found out that Mrs. O’Hare would be my fourth grade teacher, I spent the entire summer terrified, having nightmares about the monster who would be my teacher.
But then I got to the fourth grade. And I liked it. In fact, it was quite a good year. I liked Mrs. O’Hare, did stellar work on math & my Oregon book report, and made super friends with Abbey Duke.
So fourth grade didn’t turn out the way Jenny said it would.
Then, when I was in high school, former graduates would come back from time to time, to homecoming events and basketball games. And all they could talk about was how hard college was. “Just wait, you’re gonna hate it,” they would say to us trembling underclassmen.
But then I got to college. And I loved it! I mean really loved it. Loved it so much, I did extra work, read extra stories, wrote extra papers, and began a lifelong love affair with reading, writing and learning.
So college didn’t turn out the way they said it would.
But then I stayed single for a long time – like super-duper, ultra-uber single. Never a date, a boyfriend or a good-night kiss on the front stoop. And they would tell me how hard married life was and to treasure my single years. “Just wait,” they would say, “your life will never be your own again. Marriage is really hard.”
But then I got married. And I LOVE it! I mean, to-the-stars-and-back-and-to-the-stars-again LOVE it! And I love my husband in a way I never knew I was capable of loving. And I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. And of course there are adjustments, and we’ve faced some ugly stuff together even in two years, but I’ve married my best friend. I wouldn’t trade a second of our lives together to be single again.
So marriage didn’t turn out the way they said it would.
And now they’re telling me, “Just wait till you have a kid. Your life will never be your own again. You can’t do anything. Everything is hard, everything is about the kids. You don’t have sex, you don’t have a life, you don’t sleep, you don’t have any fun. Etc., etc., etc. ad nauseum…”
Now I don’t have a baby yet. And I don’t presume to know what life with a child of any age is like. But I do know that I’ve had people telling me my whole life what the next step is gonna look like and, generally, how awful it’s gonna be. And it has never looked like they said it would.
I’ve decided, I’m done “just waiting.” I’ve been “just waiting,” buying the lie that the next thing is some hairy scary monster because someone a few steps ahead of me tells me that’s the way it is.
So, if you’ve got something to say about how hard having a baby is gonna be, or how bad moving into a house is gonna be, or how terrible turning 30, or 40, or 50 is gonna be, you should try scaring someone else. Because I’m not just waiting anymore… I’m just living.
2 Commentsmy shack
Image Courtesy: TheShackBook.com
If you haven’t read The Shack, then surely you’ve heard of it, seen it stacked nearly to the ceiling at your local Borders or Barnes, found yourself accidentally eavesdropping on a conversation about it while waiting to get your tires rotated. The Shack is everywhere. And it’s stirring stuff up.
I admit, I had problems with this book in the beginning. I had just finished Atonement, Ian McEwan’s beautifully written sprawling epic. So when I picked up The Shack, I found the writing a bit lacking, a tad prosaic. But I kept reading because so many people had recommended, said it changed their lives. And then, a handful of chapters in, I got it.
Maybe offering a few quotes will help you understand how powerful this story is. All of these statements are made by God to the main character, Mack:
“Remember, I am not about performance and fitting into man-made structures; I am about being. As you grow in relationship with me, what you do will simply reflect who you really are.”
“’If you think about it, Mack,’ Jesus answered, ‘it should be very freeing to know that you can offer us nothing, at least not anything that can add or take away from who we are…. That should alleviate any pressure to perform.’”
“Rules cannot bring freedom; they only have the power to accuse.”
“Responsibilities and expectations are the basis of guilt and shame and judgment, and they provide the essential framework that promotes performance as the basis for identity and value.”
“…check the truthfulness of your paradigms – what you believe. Just because you believe something firmly doesn’t make it true. Be willing to reexamine what you believe.”
“…you’re only seeing the institution, a man-made system. That’s not what I came to build. What I see are people and their lives, a living breathing community of all those who love me, not buildings and programs.”
“When I live in you, then together we can live through everything that happens to you. Rather than a pyramid, I want to be the center of a mobile, where everything in your life – your friends, family, occupation, thoughts, activities – is connected to me but moves with the wind, in and out and back and forth, in an incredible dance of being.”
“I don’t do humiliation, or guilt, or condemnation. They don’t produce one speck of wholeness or righteousness, and that is why they were nailed into Jesus on the cross.”
I finished the book yesterday, sitting in our neighborhood bookstore, crying and smiling and finding myself filled with a deepened desire for God. Just to be with Him. And knowing how much he wants to be with me.
Maybe more than any Bible study or sermon, this simply told story spoke life-giving, life-altering truth. While some of the externals may push and challenge and rub up against our ideas of God and humanity and reality, the heart of The Shack is God’s deep and abiding love, His passionate pursuit of us, His absolute holiness and glory.
No Commentsthe anti-curse
“You are the anti-curse. Death going in reverse.” ~ Derek Webb
There’s an Asian woman who walks around our apartment complex when the weather is nice, like it was today, this first full day of Spring. In front of her, she pushes a gadgety black wheelchair that carries her son. I’ve studied them many times from my driver’s seat, slowing to a near stop to respectfully pass them. I studied them today.
His face, as always, was blank with retardation. Drool traced the line of his jaw and had dripped onto his t-shirt. He sat slouched, his tall and robust body curved like an S, his legs dangling just off the footrests. He could be my age, or close to it. And, if he was, he might be a writer or a singer or a reader who would cross my path and we would chat for a minute about Steinbeck or Billy Collins or Sting’s Labyrinth at the local bookstore while waiting in line on our tea and coffee. But, we won’t; he only has the mind of an infant.
And she, mom, stands barely five feet tall. With all her petite strength, she pushed this hulking, dead-weight child: her lower back arched, shoulder blades pinched, knuckles white, palms wet. Her leg muscles contracted with definition. But it’s her face that told the stories. Too many stories. Determination has formed her jawline. Courage and constance have carved her cheekbones. Tenacious-ness has lined her brow. And some kind of longing I don’t understand now (and maybe never will) has colored and crowded her eyes.
I watched them today, this holy & good Friday, a day to remember necessary death and imperishable sacrifice, lifesaving atonement and finished work, a broken Saviour, a satisfied Father. I watched this mother and her son and asked, “Why?” knowing full well it was the wrong question. Knowing full well that it was good to grieve this loss because He has wept all our tears with us. Knowing that where there is death and veil and mess, life and fullness and beauty lay in wait. They wait for the third day. And for the anti-curse.
No Commentsh2o for everyone
This week’s Non-Weekly Mid-Week Pick of the Week (aka, nwmwp) is World Water Day.
In 1992, the UN deemed March 22 World Water Day to raise awareness about the lack of clean, safe drinking water around the world.
A few stats:
Nearly 1.1 billion people (roughly 20% of the world’s population) lack access to safe drinking water (WaterAid, 2005).
Lack of clean, safe drinking water is estimated to kill almost 4,500 children per day (UNICEF/WHO 2005).
Women and young girls in rural areas in Sub-Saharan Africa and other parts of the world must trek as much as six miles everyday to retrieve water for their families (UNESCO/ International Year of Fresh Water 2003).
$1 can provide a year of water for an African (Blood:Water Mission).
If any of this info makes you curious to learn more or drives you to action, check out World Water Day or Blood:Water Mission.
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