Faith

How do I know? Anything for that matter. It involves a certain amount of trust. I believe the grass is green in May because I trust my eyes that saw it, my memory that remembers it, the lessons on chlorophyll that explain it to me, the poem books that rave about it, and countless human beings who have made reference to it.  Granted, in South America grass may be green in November, so I may have to qualify my assumption, but most of the time I don't bother. I just accept it. Healthy grass should be green during the growing season. That's the nature of grass. I don't have to live in a state of constant doubt and verification attempts. I just believe it.

Everything we know is the same. There is no one way of knowledge. We build. We rest  on past assumptions that held water. There is no need to blow up everything and begin anew, and if we try to go that route, we end up bleeding, confused, and no nearer the answer than we were.

Is there a God. Yes. What language did He speak? Well, DNA, for one. It's a complex living program more intricate than the finest code our programers have seen, and they, more than anyone should realize that code can't randomly make itself and function. Messed up code brings the program to a halt. Do we see glitches? Sure. We see where things went wrong and were replicated that way, but we also see the "how they should be" sitting right there above it...to the extent that we can repair some of it and are learning every day how to fix the rest.

There is a God.
So how do I know?
I am drawn to find Him. There is something within me that wants to know Him, and feels secure that I have found Him. That's intuition.
How do I know?
I am pushed to find Him. There is a world without that defies explanation in the absence of Him. That's reasoning.
How do I know?
I trust my memory--a thousand times He nudged me to an answer and reassured me in times of fear and frustration. That's experience.
How do I know? I trust the witness of thousands who have embraced Him and lived; I've listened, read their testimonies, and seen the difference in the lives of those who tried to follow Him closely compared with those who didn't. That's culture.
How do I know? I've seen miracles. And I've heard of amazing incidents in the lives of my grandparents and parents. Was I there? No. But I know these people. They never lied to me. Why should they lie about their faith, to which they held fast until we buried them in hope of resurrection day. That's testimony.
How do I know?
I trust the scriptures...internal evidence, external evidence, the historicity and veracity of narrative and prophecy. I'm not going into all that this morning. But I will say that I never study the scriptures without a sense of the value they impart to me.  I watch the impact of their presence in lives and civilizations. I believe they bring revelation. What men do with that is their own choice.

Simple. Sure. I agree. If you want complicated theses on the subject, there are countless very good books. Your mind will follow whatever you keep reading and you have a choice to feed the doubt or feed the faith. I choose faith. And I feel very confident about that choice.

Not Really Alone

The worst part of being pastors in a small town for years on end, is that eventually you have to bury your closest friends. A month ago, to be exact, we lost one of our deacons, and I'm just now feeling up to writing anything about it.

He was a farmer. He loved land...and wheat...and cows, driving a tractor for hours alone under the burning sun and the unrelenting wind of Western Oklahoma, and it was a farming accident that finally took him, alone, beside a green field--seventy nine years old and still working as if the whole Western bread supply depended on his faithfulness.

He knew every thing about this part of the country, where to buy the best convenience store pizza, who to call when you needed an antiquated part for the combine or the drill. He spoke his mind and didn't really mind when other people spoke theirs. In fact, just about the time you thought he didn't hear your opinion, he would reach out his hand and invite you to discuss  it over a snack.

He was the superintendent and teacher of the adult Sunday School class, served on the Mennonite Disaster Service board, sang bass in the choir, and held a position on the school board for years and years. Last summer he noticed broken tile in the corner of my classroom and a baseboard that came unglued from the outside wall every time it rained. That fall I had a newly tiled corner, and the board was properly attached for the year. He had installed it with his own hands. It mattered to him and it mattered to me. He was passionate about supporting missions, praying for peace in Israel, a land he was proud to have visited, and serving Christ like an honest disciple. More like Peter than Thomas, he was open, honest, and eager to charge right into the fray.

He was Turtle's special friend. Every pastor needs someone like this man, someone who will drop in for coffee, speak his mind, brainstorm solutions, give advice, and be a sounding board for crazy ideas and an ally for good ones. Whenever there was a conference, he insisted that the pastor be sent there, even accompanied him and sat through the inspirational meetings and the boring ones. He drove Turtle into the city for hospital calls sometimes, and traveled eight hours to be at Turtle's father's funeral in another state. Turtle, even yet, pulls into his shell in shock some days and says he misses the man.

He didn't trust the internet, especially facebook, and would never have wanted me to mention his name for all the world to admire, so I'm not. God's admiration was enough for him and woe to the well-meaning soul who tried to give him open praise for his gifts and labors. Many a student who attended school on his scholarship never knew. Many a church family was helped financially, even at a time when there was little or no money left in his own bank account. He lived simply--no extravagance, no flashy, new equipment; the old would serve just as well for him. So he was able to give. Magnanimously. With great love he gave.

To his children and grandchildren and church family he left a fine example:  How to live. How to die. His heart was right with God above; There was nothing to confess, nothing to amend. He died alone out under the Oklahoma spring sky--but as with all God's true children--
he was never really alone.

Promises and Hope

The sun gives life to the daffodils
and they trust the promise of spring.
I"m listening to Handel's Messiah.
Tomorrow we will sing the Hallelujah!
Handel's Hallelujah....
yes the one that comes just before
I Know that my Redeemer Liveth!
and after Isaiah's moving prediction
of a suffering Lamb, our sacrifice for sin.
 Isaiah knew--somehow he knew--that this life is not the end of all things. This life is winter; next is spring.
That Handel also knew, I have no doubt
Although he must have lived through
Many a winter, many a snow, and in old age, a blindness that seized him with dismay.
I wonder if he ever feared that he would never live again
To see his own Redeemer on a resurrection day
It was on Good Saturday that Handel died, just in time for Easter awakening....All over England they sang his songs.

They sang the tune he gave to the immortal words of Job, another strangely-hopeful man, who lingered at the edge of death to say with amazing prescience and an intrepid hope:

I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand in the later day upon the earth.
 Isaiah!
Handel!
Job!
 Countless more, a line that stretches around the world and back--to the opening curtain of our fragile, one-act play.

Yet in my flesh, I will see God.
And like the daffodils, I seek the sun
I turn my face to the light
And trust His promise.
My Redeemer liveth!
Hallelujah!

Eighty-five Students a Day

Eighty-five students a day.

That’s how many I see--

for six years of their lives.

So I've taught 450 students in over twenty  years of Christian school, and the question I ask myself is not, “Where has the time gone? I know that one.

I’ve felt its passing in my bones and seen the years collapse into piles of crumpled calendar pages... 

No. The question I ask myself is :  Where have they gone?  These students of mine: the ones I met as shy, fumbling, excited, energetic, irrepressible seventh-graders; the ones I watched , as year after year  they listened, wide-eyed and earnest, while priceless light broke over their faces; the ones whose hands I guided, whose thoughts I helped shape, whose hearts I bombarded with the story of Christ. Over the years I prayed for them, drawing their names out of a box and holding them in my hand like so many fragile pots of pre-fired green ware.  For six years they were my children too. Then they threw their graduation caps into the air and danced merrily out of my life, headed for fires or fields as the case may be. Where have they gone? What have they done? Have the hours I spent in their Christian Education mattered at all?

 I stand in the hall at CBA and turn the pages of graduated classes—sometimes I’m smiling; sometimes I’m suddenly sober. They haven’t all remembered that above all ambitions on earth is the one great ambition—glorifying God.  Some are floundering in a darkness of their own seeking and some are frail, but still searching for strength. They make me catch my breath and say: “Please God, Bring them Home.”

But there are others—so many others--who give me great joy.

They are light...in a world grown rapidly darker. 

They are salt in a tasteless society. 

They are the “city on a hill” and there is no way to measure what they bring to the Kingdom of God.

I read their blogs…and see women and men of faith—raising their children to be a generation of hope.

I listen to their songs as they create works of praise and sing them.

I see their pictures and read the scriptures they post on face book. I pray when they send out a cry for help.

They are scattered in location but united in purpose:  They honor God.  They are: doctors, soldiers, pharmacists and engineers. Some drive trucks or work on engines while others splice genes in molecular research.  Some farm and weld; some paint, write books, teach, build houses. That doesn’t really matter. What matters is that they serve Christ.

In Peru, Swaziland, and Thailand; in rescue missions, and small town mission churches. On and on, I see their faces. They are deacons, and pastors, and pastors’ wives, church planters, Sunday school teachers, and worship leaders. They counsel inner city derelicts and kids at summer camp. They volunteer for disaster projects, run Bible schools, write literature.

 

For a handful of these…my years would have been worth it…for a multitude?  I’m overwhelmed!  If I could see them all I’d tell them, just like the Apostle to his precious Philippians:

You are my joy. You are my crown. I thank God because of you.

Philippians 4: 1 Therefore, my beloved and longed-for brethren, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, beloved.

Everyone Should Have an Uncle Henry

Every Apostle Paul needs a Barnabas...a guy who's willing to give the newcomer a chance and put up with the inconsistency of young people--smiling and encouraging, rather than berating and criticizing--someone who nudges people along and tells them not to give up, because what they are going to accomplish is worth fighting for. My Uncle Henry was a man like that.

This week at his funeral we were privileged to hear the testimony of younger ministers he had encouraged and missionaries he had inspired throughout the years. My husband was one of those ministers; the church his family attended was fortunate to have a pastor who cared for the congregation, even for sometimes rebellious, often awkward, but ultimately kind-hearted teen-agers. He knew my uncle as a pastor. I just knew him as an uncle--my favorite, he'd be quick to assert.

When I was a little girl and answered the phone with "Who's calling, please?",  his standard reply was,
"This is your favorite uncle." leaving me to guess, and risk offending, should the caller turn out to be Uncle Tommy or Uncle Floyd or Uncle Dale. One day I turned the tables. I was at my grandparents' house for Thanksgiving when the phone call came: It was Uncle Henry. He said, "Who's this?"   "Your favorite niece," I replied. I could tell it threw him a challenge. After all, there were eight or nine of his nieces present that day, all running around near grandma's kitchen phone. He paused, just a second, and said, "Well it must be Lilibeth." and we both laughed, realizing how difficult a test he had just aced.

I guess I'd say Uncle Henry was everybody's favorite because everybody was his. He took people under his care and enjoyed training them and encouraging the down-trodden. I remember a time in my life when I was grumbling. The school where my father taught had moved from a small town in Missouri to Houston, Texas. I pretty much hated everything about that. No longer could I roam around town on my bike or walk to school at an old three-story brick building or live in a large house where I had my own bedroom. The weather was deplorably hot and humid; school was a world of dodging rude and apathetic strangers in the hall. In short, I was miserable and wanted commiseration. Uncle Henry did something better; he told me, "You know you are only going to be as happy as you make up your mind to be. Now decide you are going to enjoy the life you are in, and you will."  So I thought about it. And I grudgingly admitted that he was right: I couldn't change my circumstances, but I could do something about my attitude. So I did. The next year, my senior year at high school, was much more rewarding. During that year, I threw myself into tutoring handicapped students and reading books aloud for the blind. I wrote poems and books and got to know some of the strangers at school. Life wasn't intolerable anymore.

Years later, when Turtle and I first decided to become pastors, we moved to a small town in Eastern Oklahoma and stayed in a one-roomed cabin while we tried to find a church that needed us. We had two children, and no full-time job. Turtle was doing "on call" nursing at nearby hospitals. While we tried to make contact with churches, we began attending a church about thirty miles away, because that's where my Uncle Henry and Aunt Jo had moved. Once again, they were our pastors and they pulled us into the church as "helpers" while we sought orientation in our own vocations. We were invited over on Sunday afternoons, played games with the family, ate many a lunch and after church snack. In short, we were encouraged, once again and shown that the ministry, though a difficult profession, was rewarding and worth the effort. We were loved and given a chance.

Years passed. Life got faster, and there were several devastating circumstances for my Uncle Henry and Aunt Jo. They retired to a small house in Arkansas, in my husband's home town and they attended the church they had built there. They lavished affection on their grandchildren and encouraged many young people who still came to them for counsel. Whenever we visited them, we heard all their lively stories and we laughed.  How we laughed. Ever encouraging, they showed us what it meant to persevere through the grayest of challenges, to trust God to bring joy in the middle of frustration and sorrow. 

After Aunt Jo died early this year, Uncle Henry began to experience serious health problems. He underwent a heart bypass surgery and never really recovered. Too many memories faded, too much to look forward to in the next world, the comforter now comforted by a faithful family...the encourager remembered by many encouraged souls; the faithful now raised to honor. I'll always remember him smiling.

Everyone should have an Uncle Henry... or be one.

Vacation Bible School in Babylon

I hope you can see by these pictures that we had a wonderful Vacation Bible School again this year. Of course it's always wonderful, but it seems like every year is better than the one before. So far we've been to Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Galilee, Philippi, Rome, Jerusalem again, Nazareth, and--this year--Babylon. That's eight years, and nobody is tired of it yet.

We had 49 children this year--including Zaya and Mim, who came all the way from Missouri--and they were an exceptionally well-behaved group. Entering with enthusiasm into every activity and lesson, they were simply a delight!

This little girl is decorating her boxes to make a hanging garden--Babylon, remember?

The carpenters this year taught stamping with leather dies and staining. We actually used coffee for a light brown stain.

At the metal shop, they made name plates.

Every night more and more children came early--so we had to do extra singing to give the family leaders time to arrive and set their rooms in order.

The name tags didn't all survive the week, but they did endure long enough for the leaders to learn names.

Every year we have a bakery. It's everybody's favorite shop.  All evening we smell the baking bread. Then, after the singing, stories, and marketplace, each "family" gathers at "home". They light the candle, say their verse, bless the food. They eat freshly baked, whole wheat rolls and drink cool water (from the "well"). Not once--in eight years--has anybody asked for cookies and kool-aide.

Our bakers explained and demonstrated how bread was made--even grinding the wheat in a remolino. (This year, they inadvertently left the impression with the children that they had hand-ground all the flour for the bread.)

In the "families" older children took responsibility for the younger ones.

And the shop keepers stayed kindly-disposed all week, ignoring the marketplace noise and bustle.

Lights!

Singing! Dancing!

Cheers! Stories about Daniel and Nebuchadnezzar!

Clay beads.

Claye ran the Pottery booth again this year and Carina was one of the "Mater Familias".










The children made necklaces in the bead shop, screeching flutes in the music shop, and ink stamping cylinders in the House of Scribes.

They poured seeds and dirt into their own little "Hanging Gardens."
And so...by the waters of Babylon, we sat down and sang. Well, that's better than weeping.

The Weaker Brother

I've been thinking a lot lately about convictions: why it's so important to have them, and moreover, why it's so tragic to break them.  The apostle Paul was adamant about the danger of our causing a brother to sin by leading him to break a conviction that we may not hold ourselves. "So what's the big deal?" you might ask. "There's nothing wrong with that."

People may serve the same God, even attend the same church, yet, especially in the area of practices not discussed in the Bible, may hold to different standards. Some of this is due to upbringing; some is due to dedication. Paul felt that "food offered to idols" was just that--"food offered to things that had no power to change it". He ate the food and it didn't damage his conscience to do so.  However, he also refrained from eating that same food in the presence of those who felt it a sin to partake of it. His explanation was as follows: If I do this, and they follow my example, it would be against their conscience. I would cause my brother to sin.

 Breaking a conviction hardens the conscience. Anything that hardens the conscience leads to spiritual numbness, and scar after scar makes a hard heart.

That's why it's wrong for a Christian to induce other Christians to break the "scruples", "laws", "mores", and, most importantly, "convictions" they hold or have been raised with. No, you may not see anything wrong with a certain thing, but it may be devastating for them. First it's a minor step, a small thing, then another, then one step more. They begin to question everything they once stood for, and you have just helped to shipwreck a life.  If, indeed, it's important for someone to abandon the principles they once held as an honor to God, we should let God's Word convince them, not ours.

Most of the time though, "importance" doesn't enter into it. We just want to "set people straight on the issues of what we can or cannot do and still serve God".  Maybe, it's because we feel they are ridiculous and too rigid in their beliefs; but it might also be because we want someone else to do what we are doing so we can feel more justified in doing it. For disciples, the danger is rather with the one who follows farther behind...not the one who follows too closely.

Was Daniel "weak" when his conscience did not allow him to eat Nebuchadnezzar's food? Hardly. It was his conviction to hold fast in this minor thing that kept him  strong when circumstances challenged his faith. Later, his very life was tested, but he held to what was right. What if someone had convinced him that the "sin" of eating unclean food, was not relevant to his position as a war captive? What if he had eaten along with the rest? Perhaps his name would be just as obscure as the names of a thousand other captives.

When Paul speaks of the "weaker" brother, he's not condemning that disciple, nor does he try to change him. He refers to a "weak" that means "vulnerable".  It is not our job to persuade someone that they are giving up too much for God, to liberate them from their dedication, to talk a Samson into cutting his own hair--one strand at a time.  

Storms

We say strong faith "moves mountains",
Alters the course of rivers
And sets multitudes ablaze

Yet faith is fragile...like a flame
It must be guarded, if it would grow.
Faith is dependent like a branch
Attached to a vine to be sustained
It cannot yield its fruit alone.

Doubt's tenacious...suffocating.
It thrives in the desert and the dark;
Grows in solitude and sufficiency
Defiant and proudly on its own.
Doubt invades the crumbling conscience,
Of a cynical, spectating crowd
And silently erodes will to won't.

That's because Faith is alive.
Doubt is dead.
And living things take work.
Dead ones don't.






Our Sunday Scribblings Prompt was "Storm".

Driving North Into Kansas

Sandra, a fellow teacher and friend of mine lost her mom last year to a heart attack. It was a sudden tragedy, one for which the family was not prepared...but then we never are.
Jeanie was an artist, whose life in a small college town included helping the students in her clay studio. Every year they made dozens of clay projects--dishes, dolls, canisters, baskets, and ceramic statues. These were then sold at a yearly auction to benefit the college.




Yesterday, Claye and I took a trip to Kansas to purchase some of the glazes. Our trip up there and back took all day, but the weather was pleasant. We saw a tidal wave of dark clouds approaching from the east, and were soon overtaken by gentle rains.

Arriving somewhat later than we had planned, due to my hasty decision to trust the GPS over the map, we made a call and were led to a garage-shaped building on a grassy lot.
We met Sandra's father, the builder of the shop, an industrious man, who was kind enough to show us around and fit us into his work schedule for the day. The shop had been sold, but everything in it still needed to be moved into storage or bought by people like us.

We were particularly interested in the glazes, because they are expensive to buy new, and Claye uses them in her studio. There were so many of them, we hardly knew where to begin. While we selected and loaded plastic tubs full of glazes, the rain settled down to a misty drizzle. Outside, the quiet little town nodded steadily. Students popped in and out of the studio occasionally, making sure we weren't a couple of pottery thieves. We could tell they missed their mentor and felt protective of her little shop.

It took about three hours, but we got the car loaded and called the owner. He was back in a couple of seconds, between jobs and smiling, despite the sadness this task must have cost him. How do you part with the things---all the little things that gave pleasure to the one you loved? How do you let strangers carry it off without sending a little of you with every jar?

"She was happy here," he told us. "Working away for hours with clay, painting and spinning and firing." He looked around the shop. "It was usually busy here, too. Students coming and going. She had a gift. Our daughter has it too, you know, and our grandson. He can spin pots and work with all this."

"I'm not much of an artist, but I built this place for her. It's got everything she needed."
We could tell how much he had loved her by the pride in his voice and the obvious labor he had invested. There was a kiln room, spinning area, office, bathroom, painting table, and shelves everywhere. They were all full.

Claye and I showed him the buckets full of glaze and the clay tools we had chosen. I offered him as much as I knew we could afford, hoping he wouldn't think it too little.
He looked serious. I thought, "Maybe I should  offer more. Even if some of the glazes are ruined, the ones that work will be worth it, and I can manage."

Then he smiled, "If you would write that check for half the amount you offered, it would make me happy. I think Jeanie would have wanted you to have the glazes. She would be glad that they are going to good use. And the shelf you need to store them, I'll throw that  in for free."

Sometimes a thank-you isn't enough.
I was overcome with gratitude.



Here was a man with cause to be bitter, to be self-absorbed in sorrow, loathe to part with shreds of memories. But he smiled. He carried on. Courageous, that's what he was, and pleasant on a stormy, rainy day.










On the way home, I took a picture of this little tree, just standing, feet planted into the green, bathed in daylight...a daylight that finally comes after the dark cloud has passed. It reminded me of the gracious gentleman we had just left, standing in the door of his little shop with misty, new sunbeams on his bowed head.

Stars on the Ceiling

Once again, my classroom ceiling is covered with stars. Spring and stars are now intrinsically linked in my mind. Our modern missions unit involves oral reports, research biographies, a bulletin board and Stars for each missionary researched by a student. This year there are sixteen. Here's what the final board looks like.

Some of the stars are exceptional. Look at this one, which remembers the life of Eric Liddell, a Missionary to China. All the detailed props have been fashioned with clay. I was especially impressed with the spokes of the bicycle and the laces and cleats on the running shoes.

















This star--representing Corrie Ten Boom--was made by one of our students in his welding class. Each section of the second triangle was a separate bit of aluminum.









Cameron Townsend spent much of his ministry in Mexico, so his star was made of tamale-wrapping corn husks.










And Betty Green's is pilot's wings.













Florence Young's star, all hand threaded yarn, looks like the jungles on the islands she visited those many years ago.










Jim Elliot's star is made of spear tips, burned and sharpened in the fire.











Jonathan Goforth's is a fan, spread like his years of influence over Northern China.












We just finished reading chapter eleven of Hebrews in our morning teachers' meeting, and a phrase of it always runs through my mind when we do this unit: "of whom the world was not worthy"

          ³⁶And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and   imprisonment:
        ³⁷They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented;
        ³⁸(Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth. 

 I know that passage is talking about Old Testament prophets and heroes, but I feel that these missionaries would qualify for that hall of fame as well. What a wonderful thing that their sacrifices were not for nothing, that this life isn't an end to itself, but a crowded little lobby where we stand before the porthole of the next.

Someday I plan to see these people, and and I know their faces will shine brighter than our clumsy, hand-crafted stars.