Abigail's nugget of pure gold

I have always loved the story of Abigail, always wondering why David searched any further for any other woman when he seems to have found the "perfect" woman for him in her.

Her first husband is a fool and everyone who knows him knows it, including her.  It could have been easy for her to pull into her own cocoon of dashed hopes and unmet longings for what she lacked in a husband.  We see no evidence of this attitude in her.  Instead on the day of perhaps his greatest folly when he basically "spits in the face" of the man who is largely responsible for preserving all the lives of the people of Israel and in the words of the people has "slayed his ten thousands," she maintains complete presence of mind.  She intercepts the warrior David as a woman with no weapons and as the wife of the one who has offended him exceedingly.  She in turn saves the household, her own life and the lives of all of the servants and stewards of the house.  Certainly, Abigail is a heroine in the great stories told in the pages of Scripture.

What I never saw until recently are the words Abigail offered David to encourage his soul and to pronounce Divine Promise upon his life.  She speaks to David words of great faith and hope in God recognizing that he is not fighting his own battles but the Lord's.  (I Samuel 25:28)  She goes further and speaks beautiful words of promise "...the life of my lord shall be bound in the bundle of the living in the care of the Lord your God." (v. 29)

David had been running from Saul who chased him all over as he sought to undo the inevitable future.  He knew David was going to be king.  He still pursued.  David has already been anointed by Samuel but much fleeing from his enemies has ensued since that anointing.  We know from the Psalms that David was full of anguish and great doubt at times.  He was tired and now this ridiculous Nabal was daring to deny a meal to men who had protected him and the lives of his workers.  Aside from the rage that now was sure to consume David, he must have wondered if the things Samuel spoke would really come to pass.  Perhaps he would indeed die before he ruled as king.

This beautiful picture of being bound in the bundle of the living reflect an ancient custom of binding valuables in a securely and in such a way so that they would not be harmed.  The protection was certain because of how they were bound and the valuable items were so arranged because they were precious.

David's life seemed anything but precious to so many others.  He had little value as a nomad and not yet king.  On this day, he had no concern for his reputation.  He was exhausted and hungry and did not feel like he was safely bound anywhere.  Yet, here is this woman of grace not only turning aside his rage and sparing her own life and the lives of her household but pronouncing promise to David that his life would be kept safe despite what things seemed around him.

We have that same protection as children of the living God.  David was the man after God's own heart who would conquer all of God's enemies and finish the work that God had marked out for him as warrior and conqueror. There is work that God has for each of us.  There is so much to fear in this world but we have a secure promise to make our own here.  Our lives are kept safe as the ancient valuables were.  "We are invincible until our work on earth is done."  (Spurgeon)

Hallelujah!

Whom shall we fear?

The Day In Between

The anticipation of the day of His rising is brimming all around us ... about to bubble over in Hallelujah after Hallelujah.  It's not hard for us on this side of the resurrection to feel excitement at the anticipation of a day that marks His triumph over that last enemy... even death itself.  But have you ever pondered what this day inbetween held for those closest to Jesus?

His nearest friends, the disciples, couldn't even keep their eyes open as he had directed them to pray lest they fall into temptation.  To be fair, this was not the fatigue we feel from long days of busyness or the malaise of the "blah" we may feel on a given day.  The Bible says it was from sorrow they slept. Stumbling from the guilt of their slumber, they watched as Jesus was arrested. Though he had told of the hour of His betrayal, the shock was still real and each forsook and fled his own way.  They didn't run away together that they might be comforted with the reminders of their time with Him and the words He spoke.  What a time of great despair this must have been. Did any think of running away as far as they could or even despaired unto death as the psalmist speaks of?  Similar to the psalmist however, they had not been left without hope. If they could just believe that what He said would come to pass... that He would rise from the grave on the next day.

Or what of our Lord's mother? We know she stood at His feet as he breathed His last.  Jesus was her son but moreso He was her Saviour.  Could she muster up the hope that He would live again, in the face of her overwhelming grief?  Or Martha who had been told by Jesus Himself that He was indeed the resurrection and the life?  She and her sister, Mary, had witnessed tbe raising of their brother, Lazarus, on the 4th day after his death.  And what about Lazarus himself?  Surely he could set the record straight and declare his utter expectation that Jesus would rise.  But no such declaration is recorded.  Little is written about the activity of Jesus' nearest and dearest on this day in between His death and resurrection.

Are you weak in faith today?  Do you wonder how things that seem unclear will ever be made clear?  Is there a hope in you that is rising with anticipation at all the promises He will yet fulfill? Or are you dull to all of this, bogged down with tbe cares of your busy days and nights?  Does anything matter more than the anticipation of seeing that empty tomb and knowing that all the powers of hell and earth could not hold Him?  Do you live in hope and expectation that He will indeed come again to judge the earth and all who love His appearing through all the ages will be with Him forever? We know that on this day in between the disciples felt a wide range of emotions.  One thing is certain to me,  once they saw their Lord, it was the most amazing hope fulfilled in their lifetime.  Doubting, despairing, feeble and frail ones, will you look to Him for the hope you desperately need?  For indeed each and every one of His promises will come to pass.

Living Forward

We all know the "Pay it Forward" movement.  It is the perspective that giving to others something of the good that's been given to you is how you should live your life.  I agree with it whole-heartedly.  If everyone in the world lived that way, imagine the world we'd live in!

But I've come to love and embrace another concept I call "Live Forward." What I mean by living forward is that we only have one direction we actually can successfully live our lives--and that place is forward.  Whether it's forward to this goal, or forward to that achievement, or forward to this relationship being reconciled, or as every believer should live, forward to heaven while living with eternity in our hearts.

Many of us resonate with the Apostle Paul's words in Philippians:  "Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended, but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus."  (Philippians 3:13-14, ESV emphasis mine)  According to Paul, our aim should be to forget and reach forward.  I believe these verbs are indeed mutually exclusive.  I don't believe we can do one without also doing the other.

It is important at times to look back, especially on mistakes we've made, sin we've committed, people we've hurt.  We have to look back and see the under layers of those things SO THAT we might move forward. Once we've acknowledged and confessed what we've been or done and made every effort to nail it to the cross and if necessary, confessed to another and then together nailed those things to the cross, we are able to be active "forgetters." Looking back should always be the means of eventually forgetting the wrong, being rid of the regret and moving forward with faith, and as one continually being sanctified.

Unfortunately, what I too often do is look backward and linger.  I stay there.  I don't take the steps needed or I feel like I can't or I feel like I should have the chance to do it differently.  I dwell over what I cannot change and in that, I am unable to forget and ultimately unable to move forward the way I must.

Thankfully, because the Spirit of God is active in my life as He is in the life of every true believer, He is merciful and reminds me that I can only live forward.  I am not able to go back and live differently in the situation that is behind me.  I am able, however, to live what I've learned in today's and tomorrow's opportunities and situations that I may find myself in.  By God's grace, I want to be someone who knows how to live life forward in the big and the small, in the temporal and the eternal.  I want to learn from the past and then move forward changed in the right ways.  How about you?  Are you ready to live your life forward ?

Jacob and Esau--A Closer Look

Most, if not all of you reading this know that I am a twin (identical).  You may also know that I have birthed a set of twins of my own (one of each... obviously not identical).  So, twins are a fascinating topic for me to muse upon.  Thus, today's post about a well-known set of twins.

The most "popular" set of twins in the Bible are Jacob and Esau.  As the story begins, we see a precious, God-seeking husband in Isaac praying for his dear barren wife, Rebekah.  God in His infinite kindness, answers a loving man's prayer and opens the womb of his wife.  As the pregnancy progresses, Rebekah senses a war of sorts going on inside of her.  She seeks the Lord for an answer and is told that 2 nations are fighting in her womb.  And when all is said and done, the older will serve the younger.  Now, as appealing as that last part is, since I was the younger in my twindom, it must have been quite alot for a first-time mother to take in.

Eventually the twins are born looking completely different and with completely opposite personalities.  Esau red and hairy (I picture him quite stout and burley) and a hunter of animals, enjoying the outdoors and the wild.  Jacob, quite the opposite and said to be timid and a "homebody."  He was quickly the favorite of his mother.  We don't hear much of their growing up years, who walked first, who talked first, their favorite games to play.  We can only imagine they had their moments of love for one another and their more frequent "sibling rivalry" but they had each other and only each other with no evidence of other siblings recorded.

What we do learn next is that Esau (with the obvious short-fuse and dramatic nature) came in one day from hunting and was famished.  He begged Jacob for some food and Jacob only granted it once Esau agreed to give Jacob his birthright in exchange for the food.  The next thing we know is that Isaac sees his days waning and is just about blind.  He tells his eldest son to go hunt and fix a meal that his father loves that he may bless Esau his oldest and beloved son. While Esau is hunting, with the nudging of his mother, Jacob tricks Isaac and obtains the blessing reserved for Esau.  Esau rages and says Jacob which means "deceiver" is fitly named.  Jacob flees for his life.

Fast forward at least a decade or two, and Jacob has left the land in which he met and married his wives.  He has grown rich and had his own journey wrestling with and encountering his Lord God.  We haven't heard anything about Esau as these years have passed for Jacob. BUT...

We now discover that the moment Jacob has dreaded all these years, is upon him.  He hears that along his journey, he must cross the path of his twin, Esau.  He sends gifts followed by himself, followed by his least favorite wives and children and the furthest from his twin, his favored son and beloved wife, Rachel.  Each step must have felt full of weight and dread.  Jacob's heart almost fails him.  What of Esau? We once again see the man who lives in the moment.  He runs to meet his brother and embraces and kisses him.  He asks what is meant by the gifts.  From all we can see, there seems to be no recollection of the rotten things done by his brother.

In the ensuing years, we know that with the help of Jacob's gifts, Esau and Jacob each become so mighty and powerful that they cannot dwell near one another.  This time out of necessity, they part ways in peace.  God builds nations through both.  Nations with very different purposes and destinies.

Now, I know the story of Biblical history.  I know that Jacob (later named "Israel") is the one God set apart as the father of the nation of Israel, whose offspring form the 12 tribes of a great, mighty, and conquering nation.  I also know what Romans 9 says about God's heart towards these twins...But, today, I cannot help but pause and reflect on the twins' relationship itself.

Jacob had every reason to believe his brother wanted nothing to do with him, or worse yet, wanted only to murder him as he did the day he stole his blessing.  It can often be worse to live as the person who brought trouble on another even when you've seen great blessing from God.  That was Jacob.

Esau lived his life knowing it wouldn't be blessed, at least not as greatly as his rival twin Jacob's would be.  I am not saying that his days were spent nobly and seeking the God of Jacob.  We know his wives brought trouble to his mother and likely turned his heart to worship any god other than the True One.  But, we also have recorded in sacred writ that when the day came to see the twin who kept him from knowing the blessing he might have known and then ran away so his righteous anger could not be vented, he was soft and full of seemingly genuine affection and love.  He was ready to embrace.  He ran to Jacob.  He ran to his twin, his womb-mate.

Jacob and Esau were the warring of nations in their mother's womb.  But they also show us that there really should be nothing to keep us from embracing our nearest of kin.  And when the day came to bury their father and their mother, it was Jacob and Esau who performed the duty... together.

broken hallelujah

The song by Leonard Cohen with this phrase in it, moves hearts and souls of people with all kinds of perspective on God.  I have done research on the writing of the song, read analysis of what the 16 verses are referring to and still can't understand the picture that he was trying to create as he wrote the words through bouts of insomnia.  But, what I can say is true of me is that the broken hallelujah is the kind I give.  At my best, my tokens of praise and thanksgiving are fractured with all that I fail to reflect of His image.

I was told the story of Rich Mullins and his love for going to small country churches.  He loved to hear the people singing out of tune.  He loved the vocal and musical form of the broken hallelujah.  I understand why. The sound of a broken hallelujah from a heart more true and sure of what it sings is worth a hundred cathedral choirs singing in perfect pitch and harmony with no truth of soul.

How is it that I can bring acceptable worship to the God of the Universe when every thought and motive of my heart is known to Him. Laid bare before His face.  He knows and yet He receives my broken hallelujah.  In the midst of worship He beckons me to the day when the Hallelujah will no longer be broken. When all the wrong of my heart will be set right, when in a moment and in the twinkling of an eye, I will be changed like unto Him.

But isn't it true that the unbroken praise of heaven will be all the more beautiful because of what was so broken in this life? Were I, or any of His children redeemed from unbroken lives, could the praise of heaven and the hallelujahs of eternity ring with the same clarity and perfection?  If we were able to live a day in perfection would the endless days of eternal bliss be as perfect?

Reflecting and praying with a friend last night, we spoke of the broken people dear to her heart.  We spoke of just how terribly broken some must become before they can be brought to the arms of the One whose hallelujahs never missed a chord but whose heart could never cast away the most shattered one who but takes one small step toward Him.

We know that Jesus sang a hymn with His disciples at least once.  What the praise of the perfect Son of God must have sounded like as it mixed with the broken hallelujahs of the disciples who had not even come close to grasping what He had come to do... I do not know... but I marvel at the thought that He sang His perfect hallelujah and allowed it to blend with the broken ones that fell so short of what the Son of God deserved to hear echoing in His perfect ears.

My Sabbath Journey

Sabbath in Hebrew literally means"time of rest" or "cessation"... Ask most Christians what "Sabbath" means and you'd hear "Sunday" "Church day"  ... if asked why Sunday, many may looked puzzled, a few may give an actual answer of "because that was the day of our Lord's resurrection"...

The Fourth Commandment (the one that tells us to honor the Sabbath and keep it holy) is one that brought great controversy in the home of my youth.  My mother, an avid football fan, and my father, who was never much concerned for football, did not see eye to eye on the subject.  The church I was a part of only made the matter more confusing to me.  I felt a sense of tension constantly. The Lord saved me when I was young.  I wanted to honor Him in all things, but the Sabbath I couldn't understand its meaning to a Christian.

I spent afternoons at times next to my mom watching her beloved Eagles play so that I could spend time with her.  Other times, I took a walk with my dad or spent time reading books about God and His word, but I felt no clarity as long as I lived with my parents.  I just felt tension.

When I was put on a secular campus during my college years with a handful of Christians only, I knew I had a chance to live apart from the Sabbath tension and search my heart and God's mind on the matter. As I awoke on Sundays and found a ride to church, I was struck by the quietness of the campus, not because of my classmates regard for the Sabbath but because of late nights partying and the ensuing recovery... Personally, I inconsistently kept the Sabbath and sought to rest and focus on my Lord.  The reason was usually based on the tyranny of the urgent and my lack of being able to organize my life and work load on other days, not because I had come to any strong conviction myself.

However, it was during my later college years that I came to an understanding that I was asking all of the wrong questions.  It was never about what I should or shouldn't do, but about a God who so infinitely loved His creation that He set aside a day for Himself and us to draw away and be in His presence.  To be able to be with Him and as much as is humanly possible to think upon Him, His kingdom,  His word and enjoy the fellowship of His people in a way that the normal demands of the other days of an ordinary work week does not allow.  I realized that if there ever was a commandment of the Lord that spoke of His love and desire for the good of His people, it was this one.  I was liberated.

For the rest of my days in college and the years after college as I was in church settings and among christian friends, I knew what I believed.  I sought to keep the Sabbath and knew great joy in doing so.   It was no burden to me or something to wrestle with but it became an incomparable gift to me.  As a single woman, I had the privilege of spending the time between worship services taking long walks, meditating on His Word, journaling, writing poems, reading good books and fellowship with and serving with His people.  I can't tell you of one other person that I knew and saw regularly on Sundays that followed the same pattern, but that didn't matter.  If someone asked about my choices, I would tell them of my journey to freedom to keep the Sabbath unto the Lord.

I will never forget the night that I sat in my church when it was Super Bowl Sunday and I was part of a church that eventually used this particular Sunday as an outreach to unbelievers, and the pastor shook his head in disbelief, pain and sorrow as he surveyed the thread-bare congregation that typically was packed to capacity for an evening service.  It cut his heart.  It wasn't a matter ever addressed from the pulpit in that place.  It wasn't a matter the church held any particular view on to my knowledge.  But here was a man standing to preach on the Sabbath and he felt the dying of a day meant for something far deeper than what it had become to so many Christians.

I invite you to see this day God made to draw us deeper and closer to Himself and to give us a taste of the glory of the age to come.  Rest on this day from much more than the demands and cares of this life and your striving to be what you never can be.  Rest from your attempts even as a Christian to be better and good enough apart from Christ. Rest knowing that the version you will obtain here on this earth is but a morsel of what it will one day be when eternal rest is yours.

Les Mis

Why does the story of Les Miserables grip so many? I was trying to explain to my husband what i love about the story that became the musical that became the movie. For the past 3 days since seeing the movie, i can't get the songs out of my head. i tear up thinking of the story. i find a strange sort of comfort as i sing. but what is it that makes the story grip the heart so as to not let it go? For one, the triumph of good over evil is seen through different eyes. Who of the main characters can we truly see as evil? Can we really think of Javert as a villian? He can't understand. He gropes. He struggles to find meaning. He believes with all his heart "once a thief always a thief"... but is he really harder on anyone else than he is on himself? Isn't he just in torment over what he set his life mission to be and simply cannot reconcile that with what he sees in Jean Valjean? He is to be pitied. He is not the "bad guy." So what then of the triumph of good over evil... where do we see it? it's in no other place than the human heart. how is it brought about but through the kindness of one soul? We see this in the life of our hero but also in life of the afflicted and pitiable Fantine. Is it just a simple "do good and good will come back to you?" in the way one might think of karma? I don't believe so. I think to show kindness to one destitute of any hope is to be like Jesus who "demonstrated His own love for us in this 'while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." He loved the unlovely. We see the picture of mercy and compassion and we marvel yet still at the One who most clearly demonstrated these things toward a lost and fallen humanity. But what else do we see? We see that hope's resilience. We look at the young Cosette sweeping and singing of her dreams and loving arms to embrace her. We see a child who looks for hope and believes it will come even if all around her speaks otherwise. Hope keeps us soft and that's why we love Cozette. Juxtaposed to Cosette is the sure "other worldliness" of Eponine? She has selfish crooks for parents and somehow becomes a woman who will live deep and sacrificially in the face of that. The tragedy of unrequited love looms clearly in her but what of these other passions and demonstrations of care for others that seem to come in the face of what would make most bitter? At the end of the story, what i find most compelling is Jean Valjean offering his feeble attempts at goodness as just what they are. He knows he's fallen short of what he hoped to be. He knows that he would not have been half of what he was had he not been taught to love. He knows that at best he's strained and fallen short. I see the shadow of the cross over this final scene. For it's only through the transforming grace of Divine love that any man can be set free. Not only free when death comes but free to live without fear of what men might do to the one whose life is not his own. Jean Valjean was changed for a purpose far greater than his own good and avoidance of prison. And he knows it. The story itself moves me and the songs do even more to wring the heart of its last attempts at goodness apart from grace; of judgment apart from mercy; of "rightness" apart from compassion. These are just some of the reasons i linger with this story and so now, i linger on.