In One Day...Advent, Waiting and Bringing the Folks

“The Israelites journeyed from Rameses to Sukkoth.  There were about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children.  Many other people went up with them and also large droves of livestock, both flocks and herds. With the dough the Israelites had brought from Egypt, they baked loaves of unleavened bread.”  ~ Exodus 12:37-39

“Be careful,” Jesus warned.” them. “Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod.” 

~ Mark 8:15

Advent means waiting. Waiting is writ large all over the pages of the Great Story.  So much of the waiting in Scripture is bound up with a longing for freedom and deliverance.  God counsels His people everywhere, from the beginning, to be patient, and to believe, even when the outlook seems grim. 

But in some times and places throughout the checkered story of human history, there are peppered answered prayers and fulfilled longings so great, that they transform the world and individual hearts at the same time.  The time of patience is completed.  The time of the hoped for deliverance arrives. 

For 430 years, the Jewish people were enslaved in Egypt.  They were bent, hunched and humiliated despite the promise to their forefathers that they would be a mighty nation, blessed in a land of freedom and abundance.  And so they waited and prayed and waited and wept and waited and despaired and waited and hoped.  Until in one day, Moses walked millions of God’s people, along with “many other people who went with them”, out of the bondage of Egypt into their long awaited freedom.   430 years boiled down to one unforgettable day.  

When the prophet Malachi penned the final words of what would become the Old Testament, there would follow 400 years of silence from the Holy One of Israel.  The people of God waited and prayed for the promised Messiah who would deliver His people not only from external tyranny but from the ancient ravages of sin and spiritual darkness.  And then, in one day, Jesus Christ the promised One was born to a virgin in a dusty backwards desert town in obscurity and humility.  The Son of God altered the course of history in one day, after so much waiting.

And we know the story.  Jesus had to die and rise again for the story to reach its climax.  The Exodus from Egypt is a shadow - the deliverance of millions of God’s people along with many others who did not originally worship the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  The shadow came to life in Jesus.  Christianity started with a group of rag tag Jews who with the flame of the Holy Spirit set the world on fire.  And many Gentiles, pagans and unbelievers, went up with them.

And now, the people of God wait patiently again.  One more round of patient waiting is required.  Jesus promised He would return, this time in great glory for all to see.  He will vindicate the patient endurance of His people and bring them to the true land “flowing with milk and honey”, where they will live with Him forever, justified by faith in Jesus the Messiah.  

The Jews left Egypt carrying dough without yeast in it, having hurried out of Egypt.  Even this was a sign that would find deeper meaning when Jesus warned about the yeast of Herod, and the Pharisees – the yeast of unbelief.  Both Herod and the Pharisees rejected the Savior.  Herod refused to follow Jesus because it meant a devotion that would cramp his sin laden appetites, and the Pharisees refused because they pridefully thought they could justify themselves by adhering to works of the law.  And so they perished by both forms of unbelief, still in play in our culture today.  

As we wait for Jesus to come again, it seems to me that the people of God are most in danger of losing heart and losing hope.  The American church is shrinking, orthodox Christian doctrines are mocked, and we people of the Way are all too sleepy when we should be keeping watch.  (I love when I preach to myself…)  So I remind you of these two great moments when long stretches of endurance and waiting were followed by great joy in the fulfillment of the promise.

I pray we will rejoice in this time of Christmastide, grateful for our beautiful inheritance from the Old and New Testaments, thankful for those who patiently waited and hoped before us without shipwrecking their faith on the rocks of impatience and unbelief.  

Jesus will return.  Let’s remove the leaven of unbelief, rouse our faith in so Great a King, and pray and work so that “many others will go up with us”.  It will all happen in one day.

Your friend on the Pilgrim Road,

Loriann

Good Fear?

 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.  Proverbs 1:7

 

The statement above from the book of Proverbs is not only counter-cultural.  It’s the kind of proclamation that would cause many intelligent, up-to-the-minute modern thinkers to cock their heads in baffled wonder before dismissing the ancient precept altogether.  We’ve lost the beauty and joy that comes with the right kind of fear.  In its place, well I don’t have to tell you.  History tells the tale.

Indeed, in many ways it has been ever thus.  

That modern classic movie Jurassic Park nails it with that unforgettable  quote by Dr. Ian Malcolm:  

"God creates dinosaurs, God destroys dinosaurs. God creates Man, man destroys God. Man creates dinosaurs."

When man ceases to fear God, the fictional disaster depicted in Jurassic Park becomes a metaphor for the reality of chaos in a world where “everyone does what is right in his own eyes.”  

I’ve grappled with the fear of God lo these many years of stumbling and stammering in my life as a follower of Christ.  Can you love Someone you fear?  Should you fear Someone who calls Himself your Father?  What do I fear?  His wrath?  His discipline?  

The Proverbs call the fear of the Lord the BEGINNING of knowledge.  In this context, it seems to mean the foundation that sets the wheels in motion on the path to right understanding– and right application of what is understood.  Like the foundation of a house holds it up, like the bread won’t be bread without leaven, like a car isn’t a car without an engine.  

To fear God is to grasp the non-negotiable, binding, perfect and just authority He has in His ownership of this world and everyone and everything in it. Even the wrath of God, a very unpopular subject of discussion, is good and right.  God’s absolute hatred of sin and what it has done to His creation is good. 

Fear is a powerful mindset.  Like mighty rushing water, it can destroy what is good when it runs amok without a path and a purpose.  Hence the Bible’s plentiful commands to “fear not.” But when fear is rightly understood it becomes a catalyst for what is important and valuable.  The Hoover Dam harnesses the power of water to provide electricity to millions of people.  It’s a fearful force that tourists visit with awestruck wonder but-wouldn’t want to carelessly paddle their canoes under…

The tension between the right kind of fear of God and the destructive kind is something I’ve grappled with for a long time.  Different temperaments and different times and places approach the fear of God in varying ways.  In general, our culture is on the dismissive end of the pendulum, taking lightly those moral bedrocks that have weathered the battering storms of time.  Past cultures have often gone to the other extreme, being so afraid of God they fell into the trap of superstition and horrifying sacrificial practices.  As usual, neither of these poles make for a fruitful, relational life with God.  

Since we live in a time when the fear of God is mostly absent, we are in the dangerous flow of a river where human wisdom = folly.  Right now, murderers are being released on bail.  Authority is mocked.  The smallest and weakest among us are destroyed and buildings are lit up in celebration.  Commitments are shallow, entitlement abounds…man creates dinosaur…

I cannot say where the healthy fear of God finds its sweet spot.  It’s something I think must be prayed for, sought, learned from scripture, wrestled with and considered every day.  This I do know.  The knee must be bent, the cross of Christ always kept at the forefront, a heart of gratitude the cornerstone.  

“Fools despise wisdom and instruction”.  Maybe there is one thing today you can do to energize the right kind of fear of God in your life. Consider the changing leaves, and all the intricacies of how that happens.  Take a walk in a cemetery and remember your mortality.  Light a bonfire in the backyard andlift your heart to the God who made fire to burn and to comfort. Stand in awe of all these things.  And, remember always, that everything, everything He does, is ultimately right and good. 

Your friend on the pilgrim road,

Loriann

Be Deadly Serious...And Laugh at the Days to Come

Proverbs 31 haunts me with a particular phrase: “She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.” 

Here is a woman living in a time before penicillin, washing machines and the rule of law.  In a geopolitical culture where a bad king could make life hell, and where an invading enemy could destroy everything you worked for, and where you were very likely going to lose at least one child to death, or die yourself bringing them forth.  She lived in a world where bad guys could round up your family members and enslave or kill them in the blink of an eye. 

There was no Medicare, Social Security or government backed securities. 

The earth has always been a rugged place to live, in every time, in one way or another.  Where the human race struggled for eons to stave off starvation, it now battles (at least in the West) diabetes and hypertension, often the result of the availability and consumption of too much food. Ironically, where pain was a mostly unsolvable problem, thousands are dying in our day in America of pain-killer overdoses. Poverty was, and ever will be with us until the earth is renewed. Pestilence and war and death rattle their noisy chains as loudly as ever.  Cain is still killing Abel.  The heavy anvil of sin and its fallout has made its cosmic dent on mankind. 

So is this bold statement realistic for disciples of Christ in the 21^st century?   Is it possible, let alone advisable, to laugh in the face of all the folly and despair and devastation of a world where wrong is seen as right, where the ancient understanding of an unchanging, foundational moral law is mocked?  Where to seriously believe that the Bible’s traditional sexual ethic is true is to make one a hater or a bigot? 

I know a few living examples of saints who somehow find the balance between a serious and sober take on their lives and callings, but who can also laugh long and loud at the goofiness of a dog, or the Abbot and Costello “Who’s on First” skit, or some personal ding-a-ling thing they’ve done.  These are the people I want to be around, and to be like.  They have a faith so sturdy and grounded that they can “rejoice with those who rejoice and sorrow with those who sorrow”, managing these context switches with ease and grace.

What kind of a world are we talking about living in if those who have glimpsed at the robust joy of Jesus carry on with sour faces and doom and gloom outlooks?  (It’s always hard, this preaching to oneself…). 

I’m re-reading a favorite time travel novel right now, (it’s actually a 2-part book: Blackout and All Clear by Connie Willis).  It’s a masterfully written fiction with a whole lot of real history weaved into the story. The novel(s) takes place mostly in London during the German Blitz, when the English were mercilessly hammered by Hitler’s Luftwaffe from September 1940- May 1941.  Stores stubbornly stayed open at Christmastime, and Londoners determined to keep their Yuletide spirit alive while their world was on fire.  Mugs of tea were passed out in the underground train shelters, because no one is coming between a Brit and their cuppa.  There’s no doubt these folks were facing an existential threat…and no doubt they worried and wept and wondered… but there was an undertone of hope, a trust that the darkness would not prevail.  And that proved to be critical to their survival in the end.

There’s no mistake that these are the times we are made for:

“From one man He has made every nationality to live over the whole earth, and has determined their appointed times and the boundaries of where they live.”  Acts 17:26 

We could not choose when we were born, nor where.  But this we can do: we can choose to live in hope.  We can believe that the Keeper of Israel, who does not slumber or sleep, is sovereign.  No ultimate harm can come to those in His care, in His abounding, extraordinary, gracious shelter.  We must be deadly serious in our own efforts to kill the sin within that seeks to kill us.  We must help those who suffer, mourn with those who mourn, and have a true and sober view of things as they are. We must stand up and face the darkness, even with trembling, tea in hand…

And dare I say, we who have such a lofty Hope, can laugh at the days to come…

Your friend on the Pilgrim Road,

 LS

Why I'm Not Watching the Beijing Olympics

Frustrating, isn’t it?  How there are so many wrongs in the world that we have no power to make right  ... The truth is we folks struggle our whole lives to overcome the darkness within our own souls, in the only place where we have some leverage.  The farther out we go in concentric circles from ourselves, the less control we have to make an impact.  Nevertheless, in the sphere we inhabit, there are small or incremental choices we can make to turn the ship, at least of our own hearts, and maybe that of a few others.

The country of China is full of people just like us.  Men, women, and children who work, play, love their families and share the existential hopes and fears experienced by all human beings.  It is also an enormous and powerful country ruled by a small number of shrewd, authoritarian despots.  The history of China’s human rights abuses aside, right now in the “People’s Republic”, there are approximately 1.5 million Uyghur people (a Muslim religious minority) who are the target of what the United States has officially declared a genocide.

Here is a sampling of what’s happening to the Uyghur people:

• Detainment in internment and “re-education” camps (replete with the horrors of malnutrition, lack of sanitation and medical care, rape of female prisoners, beatings, forced labor)
• Random arrest and torture 
• Forced abortion and sterilization of Uyghur women
• Uyghur children removed to Chinese orphanages 
• Uyghur women “married” to Chinese soldiers
• Medical experimentation on Uyghur people
• Gang rape
• Ongoing surveillance
• Disappearance of Uyghurs from their homes

These are only some of the reported atrocities occurring against this ethnic minority simply because of their religious beliefs.  

Haven’t you often thought “What can I do to help (fill in the blank) in (some far away part of the world)?"  In this social media/news saturated culture, there are so many tragedies before our eyes.  Far too many for us to absorb and certainly almost all out of our reach to upend in a meaningful way.  One caveat: I’m the last one to say that fervent prayer isn’t powerful – it is.  Who knows but that it was the prayers of the faithful that were the ultimate cause of the take down of past atrocities and injustices?  Prayer to the One and Only is a weapon like no other.  Sometimes it’s all we have.  But if faith without works is dead, in the smallness of our own reach, what CAN we do?  Rather than be overwhelmed, is there anything our hands and feet can accomplish?  Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

Last night, what I assume was the beautiful and moving spectacle of the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games was televised around the world from Beijing China.  And today the figure skaters will begin swirling, the skiers flying, the bobsledders zipping through the ice and snow in strength and glory.  The backdrop to all this wonder is a country where human rights are being violated in the most profound and disturbing ways imaginable.  It’s like putting a crown on a pig.  It’s baffling how the Olympic Committee and the free world agreed to allow Communist China to host games that are supposed to represent what is good and beautiful.  

I realize there are terrible things happening all over the world.  I don’t even know what they all are, much less do I have any power to do anything about them. But I do have this one power: I can change the channel on my TV.  I can say with one small click of the remote that I will not support NBC, nor the companies paying for commercial time, nor indeed the whole fandango of unrighteousness that is driving this phony operation.  This small thing is within my power.  And it costs me little.  I pray to be willing to do the right thing when it costs me much more.

You can’t fix everything wrong in the world.  One day Jesus Christ, the only Great Hero, will do that.  But you can do something.  Pray for the Uyghur people.  Insist that our government hold China accountable by reaching out to your senators and congresspeople. And turn the dial for the next few weeks.  Better yet, turn the TV off altogether and give thanks to God that you were born free – and use your freedom to bless your family, your friends, your coworkers - someone right within your sphere.  In the place where you CAN do some real good.

Your friend on the pilgrim road,

Loriann Smith