Things shall change.

So, I’ve planned a lot of weddings in my day. You know this. If my math is right, I think I have done something like….70.

If there is one thing planning weddings taught me about life it is this:

                Tearing it down is a whole lot easier than putting it all together.

                Things are more easily destroyed than created.

 I have been reading in Luke for what seems like months and came across this verse: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. Be careful or your hearts will be weighed down with dissipation, drunkenness, and the anxieties of life…” (Luke 21:33-34a)

Isn’t that the truth? When I see the world and how it is, no doubt, passing away, I feel the weighed down-ness. Or look at that word, “dissipation.” It comes from the root in “dissipate” and while it can also mean overindulgence, it means “to disperse.” Which makes me think of fog and how the sun burns it off. Or I think of boiling a pot of water and how it just…dissipates. Or maybe the word I connect more with is “evaporate.”

Have you ever felt like your heart just EVAPORATED inside of you? It’s so weighed down, it sees the world wasting away—dissipating, if you will—and it just evaporates. No strength left in it.

*Sigh.

I see that again this life comes to a point of trust.

Do I trust in Jesus’ words, which do not pass away, or do I trust in the world, which means that my heart evaporates right along with it?

All of this reminds me of that passage in Hebrews, though.

“In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth and the heavens are the work of you hand. They will perish, but you remain;…like a garment they will be changed. But you remain the same, and your years never end.” (Hebrews 1:10-12)

Don’t you just want to yell Hallelujah? For no other reason than the fact that HE REMAINS THE SAME? We change, the world changes, the times change, BUT.NOT.HIM.

Malachi 3 says “I the LORD do not change.”
Confidence. Right there. If you are looking for stability in your life, it’s Him.

But wait a second….

He does not change.
You and I do.

But aren’t we created in his image?

So….wait….does that mean….?

I think so.

Change, kids, is not a characteristic we have inherited from him.
My, how interesting.

See. When did the first change happen? At the Fall, right? Sin changed us. NO WONDER WE HATE IT SO MUCH!

Some people will say “Change is a good thing,” to which I always think, “Umm…No. But  you must be on drugs. Change is only good if it benefits you. And how often does THAT happen? How often are we happy with EVERY aspect of a change?” Almost never.

Now let me get this straight. Change is not really a characteristic of God, yet he uses it (for God uses everything for his glory- it is his trademark to redeem a matter).

Let’s break this whole change phenomenon down sequentially then. We will start at the beginning:

A.      God molded, formed, and created us perfect, in his image, and he placed us in an environment where there was no death, no decay.

B.      We chose to sin, though, and THUS were changed, deformed, made worse, wrecked.

a.       Note: Satan never does anything for the good. Case in point.

C.       Therefore, our relationship to God, each other, and our work changed.

(If for no other reason, this is proof enough that those people who say change is a good thing are wrong.

For example, here were the first big changes in the world: 1. Being alienated from God 2. Blaming your spouse 3. Having sweat and weeds and pain in childbirth and 4. Having kids who murder each other. (Genesis 3-4)

 

{this is where I yell} TELL ME WHAT IS GOOD ABOUT THAT?????????????????????????)

D.      Jesus came to offer a reversal of the change (Romans 5:10)

E.      If the gift of Jesus is accepted, Jesus capitalizes upon our wreckage, using our ability to change to his advantage as He now CHANGES us to be conformed to the likeness of him (Romans 8:29). He starts us back on the Perfecting Process (Hebrew 12:2), i.e.

F.       HE IS CREATING US AGAIN (you are a new creation in Christ- II Cor. 5:17)—and his work will have its success.

G.      I Corinthians 15:51-54 “Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed—  in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.  For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.  When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory.’”

g. The finale of the Perfecting Process looks like this:

That which CAN BE CHANGED (those of us who were wrecked) will finally be returned to a state that CANNOT BE CHANGED- and this then being a better creation (most of the first things that happened in the Bible, First covenants, first creations, first temples, first sacrifices, are only a shadow of the one to come)

H.      See, DEATH (i.e. the ability to change/ immortality) will be swallowed up in victory. Meaning that CHANGING, PERISHING, MORTALITY, etc, is the opposite of victory. This is the curse of our sin.

 AND DON’T WE HATE IT??

We hate change, we hate death, we hate rotten food—because we know that this is not how it was supposed to be.

Like time, change is not our natural habitat. That is why it grates on us, because we are foreign to it. It speaks of the eternity set in us (Ecc. 3:11).

Change, therefore, now only has a value to the believer. For those of us who have accepted Christ, we have been set on a changing-back-to-be-like-Christ-again path. We get a do-over.

But for the non-believer?
They just get closer to death. That’s the only changes they incur.

Whoa. Yikes.

No wonder why being a Christian is hard! What is easier? There is a train cruising down a hill towards the edge of the cliff. Is it easier to let it continue towards its destruction, or to stop it and then push it back up the hill—backwards?

You get the point because, remember, like all those weddings, destroying it is easier than creating it.

Wolfies, our death has to be SWALLOWED UP (II Cor. 5) This is no pain-free process. This is a creating process. Being a Christian goes against our nature.

And that’s the point.
That’s the good news.
Because our nature sends us to the grave; our nature destroys us.
Therefore, we rejoice in our sufferings: It’s undoing our death.

Anticipation.

Lately in my Bible study with the girlies I have been talking to them about Watchfulness.

Taken from that passage in Luke (Chapter 12), the gist of it is this:

Be ready, spiritually dressed, serving in the capacity he had created and called you to serve in, for the Lord will come back like a thief in the night, and “it will be good for that servant whom the master finds doing so when he returns” (verse 43).

Another thought that goes with this is similar; it’s how we are supposed to live in this “waiting” time. “From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been trusted with much, much more will be asked.” (12:48)

See, we are told be on the lookout for the return of Christ. It’s coming, and it will come when we least expect it. Yet we are not to be idle in this time of anticipation.

Then of course the girls wanted to know about spiritual gifts, for surely those are some things we have been called to employ while we wait, so for fun I gave them one of those spiritual gifts inventories.

I was glad to find out that I have every spiritual gift.

Ha.

Bahahah! 

Yeah, not quite.

Anyway, it was fun, and they were so excited to be like, “Ok, well this one is mine, so how do I use it?!”

Yet, somehow, helping their mother make a meal plan was not necessarily what they had in mind : )

But as I have been teaching on this I have just been struck by how sorely mistaken I have lived my life since….well…since forever.

See, the deal is this: I have been anticipating the wrong thing.

So often in my life I am looking towards the future. Or rather I anticipate events that I think are going to be in the future.

Stuff with my business is going to happen, I will move here and there, travel to that place I have never been, get married, do whatever project I have always wanted to do, maybe have some kids, start a different business, speak at that conference, etc etc etc blah blah blah.

And all of that stuff is great and fine and wonderful—if that’s what the Lord gives. It’s also great and fine and wonderful if he doesn’t give it, because here is the catch: that is all kind of “filler” stuff if you think about it. I mean, ok, in comparison to, let’s say, JESUS COMING BACK all that other stuff is like “Yeah yeah whatever.”

This is just the stuff we are supposed to do and gifted to do in the “waiting period.”

Yet, I spend so much of my time anticipating, planning on, and waiting for the filler stuff and not the big show! Does that make sense? I think I do this because, if I am being honest, most of my days it doesn’t even cross my mind that HE IS COMING AGAIN. And while I think I am pretty good with keeping Jesus in my mind and as my motivation, I still totally get caught up in all the stuff of this world. And I worry about it, fret that it’s not happening the way it should…forgetting about the greatest thing that is ever going to happen post-resurrection.

When Jesus comes back for his bride.

I am not trying to start a discussion about end-times stuff here. There are other bloggers who do that. I just want to put a thought into your mind that I can’t get out of mine:

What are you anticipating?

What are you looking to?

And what are you doing with what he has told you to do in this “waiting time”?

That part of the passage where it says that it will be good for the servant to be found doing the work the master told him to do has also really gotten me. Fill in the blank with what it is in your life, but ask your self if you are preparing yourself the way you need to.

Ok, I am going to get all geeky on you right now. My favorite movie is Lord of the Rings the Two Towers. Guys, it’s so good. And I realize some of you might have a problem with these movies, but the books are written by a Christian guy, (the same guy who led C.S. Lewis to the Lord, fyi) so….well I will leave it at that.

But there is this scene at the end of the movie and this battle RAGES outside. The enemy is literally tearing down the door, they are outnumbered, and their greatest help, Gandalf, has left them days before.

But he left with a promise: “Look to my coming, at first light on the fifth day. At dawn, look to the east.”

If there is one thing I know, whether about Jesus or epic movies, it is this: when Someone promises they are coming, THEY COME. Because the Good Guy always keeps his promises.

Watch the clip here:

DOESN'T THAT JUST GIVE YOU GOOSEBUMPS????

Wolfies, the Savior always shows up. 

That’s why we call him the Savior. We don’t just hand out these titles to anyone.

And I realize that sometimes life can be really hard, and you can feel like the enemy is ripping the door of the hinges, but do you believe that when Jesus says “Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done” (Revelation 22:12) he really means that he is coming soon, his reward is with him, and he will give to everyone according to what he has done?

Do you see the pattern? It’s a promise: “I will come.” And it’s an instruction: “Do what I have told you to do while you wait for me.”

 

He will show up, Wolfies. And it will be good for us, his servants, to be found doing what he has called us to do—while looking “to the East.” Always live with the anticipation of THE RIGHT THING.

Nomads.

Last spring, I think it was, I mentioned how long ago I told the Lord, when I was in a feeling of being abandoned to him, “Lord, I would live in a tent with you.” Just like Bedouins. Except Bedouins usually don’t love Jesus. And I do. But the tent reference is the same.
And then I told you about how he kind of had me do that but now I wanted to settle more.
Blah blah blah.
You can read about that here.

Well. God, in his infinite irony, seems to be reversing the situation.

Again. Because that’s what irony does.

No, I am not moving again (well, not that I am aware of), I just have the opportunity to take a very “un-settled” trip.

Wolfies, I’m going to Israel this summer.

To minister to the Bedouins.
I KNOW. Isn’t that nuts?!

My brother who I spent last summer with is hooked up with an organization that’s going and he said, “B! We have got to go!”

So we prayed about it. And we are going.

 

Have you ever had a situation where you feel—like—totally inadequate?

Almost to a certain extent like you have nothing relevant to give, or like you can’t see how something could work?

Well, I kind of feel like that.

And it’s for a silly reason, I suppose.
See, one of the things I was told to do was “Get your testimony ready for the trip. You will need to use it.”
Which is fine. I have no problem sharing my testimony. Sharing how Jesus heard me, met me, and pulled me out of many deep waters (Psalm 18). I love telling that story. It’s my best one.

But my issue comes in that I feel as if my testimony is—well—high maintenance. Like, it all started due to First-World problems.

Does that make sense?
I mean…the things I struggled with that I got saved out of…do people who live in tents in the desert struggle with that?
I. Just. Don’t. Know.

Which is why I feel irrelevant.

But if there is anything I know it’s that if I waited to feel adequate or relevant in my “spiritual power” to do something for the Lord, well….nothing would get done. And I would just sit and drink coffee all day and read PG Wodehouse.

And I don’t believe in getting nothing done. And I am choosing to have faith and spite my fears. And inadequacies. And irrelevancies.

I am reminded of Peter when he was going into the Synagogue and he saw the crippled beggar who asked for money, to which Peter replied “Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you…” (Acts 3:6).

See, maybe I don’t have a testimony that nomads in tents can relate to. But I do have the Creator of the Universe, and I am willing to share him.

Pray for me, you beautiful people. I want to be faithful.

What we know in the darkness.

Two days ago the electricity went off in my house.

And usually when it does this it will just flicker and then come right back on. But not this time.

5 minutes later, nothing. 10 minutes, still nothing.

So I called the power company and they said they would take care of it. Which they did. An hour and a half later.

With this little hiccup putting a halt in the middle of my workday I thought, “Well, my computer runs on battery. I will blog.”

Which I did.

But halfway through writing a somewhat trivial, silly entry, my brother texted me and said, “Have you heard about Boston?”

Clearly I hadn’t; the electricity was off.

When the lights finally came back on I switched on the TV and to my horror it felt like the world had gone dark.

Not just my house.

And I feel guilty for even writing that, for I couldn’t help but think the whole time, “This kind of stuff happens every day in some cities in the world; why doesn’t that affect me the way this does?”

Maybe because this is my homeland. Probably because this is a city I can identify with.

As I sat there watching, my work day being irreversibly stalled, I found myself crying a bit. There were scenes that for some reason, I felt like I understood.

No, I have never been a part of something horrific like that.

But, the darkness. I feel like that was something I understood. The impending loss; I know what that feels like. The shock; there I have been.

The darkness, those things that make you know that this world is not how it was supposed to be, is suffocating.

Only, however, because I have memories of it. You and I, we live in this world, darkness is not new to us. We all know it, we see it everywhere, we all lived in it for some time in our life. We know its horrors.

And yet, in these days that have followed, I am always surprised (I don’t know why) by the response of the masses.

“We need peace!” they cry. “We all need to love each other, lay our differences aside.”

I am sure I crinkle my face whenever I hear things like that. Listen, peace is good. Love is good. Being different is good. Looking, however, to other people to provide those things? Looking to other PEOPLE, darkness dwellers, those of us who have a depraved nature, masses full of sin, guilt, and shame…?

No. Unfortunately, I must tell you, peace and love will not come from there.

Light to shine in our darkness, it does not…well…it does not come from darkness.

I understand that saying those things is maybe a kind gesture. Giving humanity the benefit of the doubt. I just personally won’t do that.

Why? Am I being too harsh?

Or am I maybe just taking an honest look at myself, at my own darkness I came from? Do I know what sin can do? Its havoc it loves to create?

I do. Remember, we know the darkness. Why, then, do we love to calm ourselves by placing hope in it? In some weird, twisted way. Yet, we do.

But see, if we didn’t put our hope in others to be the answer for creating peace, to love each other, then what we are also saying is that I can’t put my hope in myself for peace and the love to show to others. Because I am just like all the others in this world.

And well, that just seems…harsh. Because, well, I can’t be from the same darkness that causes tragedies, can I?

Surely there has to be something intrinsically different between me and whoever places explosives?

Maybe not.

*Sigh.

We know it’s true.

That’s why we hate things like Boston. Not only because we hate sin’s repercussions, but we hate the fact that we can identify with the darkness. We hate that not only do we know it when it is being committed against us, but we hate that we can identify with being the offenders.

See, I have not just been wounded by darkness in this life; I, too, have been a “wound-er.” One who does the wounding.

Because in me is darkness. In all of us. It’s our natural habitat. And we try to say we love the light, “Peace, peace,” we cry! I fear, however, those sayings are a cover-up. They are us wanting to believe that “goodness” can come from us. Reality, however, will always tell us that “goodness” does not come from us. The only thing humans have the power to do is choose to not commit massive crimes. Really, the only difference can be found in one little sentence, “Well, I PERSONALLY wouldn’t do something like that.”

Our president said in a press conference, “We don’t know who did this, we don’t know why.”

Well. That’s only half true. We don’t know who did this. But we do know why. We’ve known forever.

“The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it….He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.” (John 1:5, 10-11)

Some people look at these tragedies and they scream with anger in their eyes “There is no God!” They think something like this is good evidence in the case against God. But really, doesn’t stuff like this actually prove that he is who he says he is? Doesn’t it prove what he has said to be true? Because, well, he said this would happen. He has already told us WHY this happened. We already know the answer.

Darkness does not love the light.

It’s as simple as that, Wolfies. And terrible things that grate on our soul like nails on a chalkboard prove over and over again the reality of our darkness, and his blinding light, which, left to our own devices, our own depravity, we love to scorn.

“This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him is no darkness at all.” (I John 1:5)

But kids. This is our hope! This is our new reality! He did not let us alone, he did not leave us in our darkness! Our bondage we can be rid of once and for all. I know we say this a lot around Christmas, but let this truth penetrate through the darkness you may still know or feel that is barking at the door, threatening your joy, stealing your peace that his brilliance gives:

“The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned…You have shattered the yoke that burdens them, the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor…For to us…a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

(Isaiah 9:2, 4, 6)

Peace, peace, I declare to you. But we will not find our peace with the darkness; the Light no longer lets us reside there peacefully.

Desert Song- Hillsong.

Powerless

Warning. I think this post is kind of wordy. Yeah. Sorry about that.

Today I am going to give you an object lesson.

Why am I giving you an object lesson?
Because it was the same object lesson that I got this week.
And sometime a blogger needs a little push to give her a good idea to write about.
: )

The story goes that I was helping a friend re-do her house. She has had it as a rental of sorts for a number of years and it is time to part with it. As you can imagine, some things in the house needed a little…attention. For lack of a better word.

One of those things being one of those stock steel doors. You know the kind. It’s metal, you put it on the outside of your house, it has a 9-paned window grid.
Yeah, you know the kind.

Now, rather than replacing the door because it was in fine condition apart from how it looked, I decided to paint it. So you put this special metal primer on it. And then you get a nice foam roller and you pick your best paint.

Great. It looks great.
But…..then you have to paint the grid.
Remember those 9 panes?
Yeah. The grid that separates them has to be painted too.

I don’t know about you, but when I paint I refuse to tape anything off. I either, A. Am careful and use a really good “cutting” brush or B. Do what I call the “mascara technique,” which means that sometimes it’s just easier to sloppily glob stuff on and then wipe it off. Like mascara. And paint.

I chose option B. because the window is glass and you can razor blade paint off glass.

Which I started to do.

But here’s the deal. I was working with this tool:

Now, this tool has its purposes and if it was sharp I would assume that it would work fine.

However, it wasn’t as sharp as I needed it to be.
So, it only KIND OF worked.
It got the big, easy stuff off the window. But the little bits left over in the corners? Not so much.
And I believe in perfect-able things being perfect. I will not settle for half-good.
See, here are some of the bits it couldn’t get:

 

Needless to say, I had to get the right tool.
This guy:

Yeah. Super sharp. The only thing that will work for the job.

And as I was scraping away, getting into all the little corners, this phrase came to my mind:

“What the law was powerless to do….” (Romans 8:3)
Because I was finally getting rid of the things “the dull scraper was powerless to do….”

And now I think I get that verse.

I am not of Hebrew descent, so the whole issue with the Law that the Bible talks about over and over again about I sometimes feel foreign to. As the phrase goes, “It’s all Greek to me.” Or in this case, “It’s all Hebrew to me…”

See, the thing we have to realize is that the law was not totally without power, just like the first scraper. It accomplished the purpose God wanted it to. It could get rid of/stop one from doing some of the “big” stuff. Like, “Ok, now that there is a rule I suppose I won’t covet my neighbors stuff, I won’t kill anyone and I won’t cheat on my spouse. Big sins. Got it, I won’t do those now.”

It had power to “remove” those big, visible sins, of sorts. It made those things off-limits.
But, also like the first scraper, while the law could MOVE some sin around, it didn’t get rid of it. I mean, what were sacrifices in the Old Testament about? They weren’t redeeming sins! They were moving the guilt of sins. That’s all. That sin hadn’t been forgiven yet, it had been transferred to wherever God held it until he could pour it all out on Christ on the cross (Hebrews 10:1-18).
Because remember “it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins” (Hebrews 10:5)—the law was powerless to TAKE AWAY sin, it just could just move it around.

However (don’t you love when there is a “However”?)—there is a second part to that verse. “What the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering…”

GOD DID.

Can you keep yourself from smiling!??!

I certainly hope not.

The law was powerless to redeem us from our sin, and we were powerless to be sinless, but God— all powerful, completely Holy, without sin of any kind, in whom there is no darkness at all—God did what we couldn’t do. He did what the law was powerless to do, what we were powerless to do.

To redeem a sinful people. To erase guilt and shame. To once and for all GET RID of sin.

Just like that razor blade and the paint. The Right Tool came along and took care of all that everything else was powerless to take care of.

Because you have got to have the right tool, Wolfies. Only that is capable to make clean, free from impurities, clear as glass to let the Light shine through.  

~~~

And I think about this concept on a day to day basis. I turn it into a fill-in-the-blank.

 What the {blank} was powerless to do….

What kinds of things do we put in the blank, only to find out later that they, too, were powerless to do what we thought they were going to do?

Yeah, yeah, we think. Jesus was powerful to get rid of our sin where the law was powerless, but the day to day life kind of stuff? No, I need something else.

Like, remember that time you got into that relationship so that you would be happy and content? Because you thought that Jesus was powerless to fulfill that in your life?

Or remember that time you moved to that neighborhood and bought that huge house so you could impress those important people, because you though that Jesus’ opinion of you would suffice in Heaven but wasn’t enough here on earth?

Or remember that time you took that really high-paying job where, yeah, you had to sacrifice family time and you didn’t have time to do to church or do any kind of ministry or helping of other people, but goodness sakes! You had a lot of money in that bank, because, remember, Jesus was powerless to meet your needs here on earth. He could save your soul, but he couldn’t keep food on your table.

Or remember that time you tried to make yourself into something other than what Jesus did because what you thought you should be was going to get you further in life, and Jesus was powerless to move you where you needed to be?

I don’t say these things to guilt you. I write them because I myself have thought…and done…all of these things at one time or another.

But thanks be to God, I have found out that those things, which kind of became another “Law” to me, are indeed “powerless to do”….what I thought they would do.

They were not the right tool.

The world is simply…not the right tool.