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29 April 2011

A Conference and A Wedding

Our family spent an April weekend in Estcourt, South Africa for our organization's first “Cluster Staff Conference.” It was a gathering of bases from South Africa (Bethlehem, Winterton, Durban) and Lesotho coming together as a larger YWAM family to grow in relationship with each other and with God. Though the scripture for our conference focused on being rooted in Christ’s love, two distinct threads wove their way into our weekend: becoming like little children, and disappointments that stemmed from seemingly unfulfilled promises of God.

As a result of the latter it was proposed that each person who could relate, who believed God had spoken about a certain issue and since that time had been strangely silent and distant, promise unfulfilled, each one of them was to find a stone. A stone for each broken dream, for every promise that had yet come to pass. In a time of worship and reflection each person would have a chance to bring his or her stone to the cross, laying it down before the Lord, offering back to Him the treasure that each was clinging to more than the One who gave it, a wordless deed conveying this: I trust You with this, God.

A small group of us had been asked to discuss how to arrange the chapel for this Saturday evening session. One woman said she felt like there should be candles leading up to the cross. Similarly, I felt like there should also be an isle leading to the cross, one lined with palm fronds symbolic of Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem –and ultimately to the cross– for the joy set before Him. After the brainstorming, I acquired the tea light candles and only slightly defaced the grounds for palm-looking branches.

Of course, you can’t be in the middle of a garden on your knees, with half of your body in a bush while you hack away at its branches with safety scissors, without attracting some attention.

The children of each staff family, immediately intrigued by my endeavors, asked if they could help. I “agreed” and set them to a parallel task of flower picking to keep them busy while at the same time keep them out of my hair.

The cross stood several meters opposite the double door entryway of the chapel. Halfway through lining the isle with palm branches I noticed that one of the children deviated from her assignment and began scattering rose petals and leafy bits down the center. I stared in disbelief at the colored flecks. I could feel my frustration mounting as other children joined in, joyfully tossing their flower heads and plant pieces on my isle. This looks like a wedding isle, I thought incredulously.

THIS was not what I had in mind.

Then Holy Spirit gently spoke. Reminding me, rescuing me from my acute case of seriousness: Be like a little child. The kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as these.

Childlike.

I was so focused on the theme of broken dreams that I almost forgot the call to become more like a child. They were both major themes that God had been reiterating over the last 24 hours. How often had I allowed broken dreams to overshadow the invitation into joy? How often had I lost sight of the Dream Giver in the pursuit of the dream?

The overture was obvious. I shook off my own plans. Who cared how it looked. It was the Spirit behind it that mattered. “Don’t forget up here!” I called as I joined the children in their happy decoration celebration for the worship time ahead. Though we had finished the isle, the little ones continued beautifying the portico while the older children debated on what to “give” to the adults as they came into the tiny sanctuary for evening worship. So we prayed.

“What do you feel God is saying to you? Is He putting a thought into your mind that you want to share?” One child replied, “ I think God wants us to welcome them.” Another stated matter-of-factly, “I think He wants to give them love.”

To welcome us. To give us Love. We want to give You our grievances and YOU want to give us LOVE. How very like us. How very like You.

Twillight hues of burnt orange and deep fucsha made way for a royal night sky. Lights dimmed, candles lit, stones in hand we sang, lifting our voices in one accord to the One who loved us and called us. I sat on the floor, Caleb’s and Adara’s slumbering crowns resting in my lap. I looked at the isle, strewn in vibrant color. In the shadow and candlelight it looked very much like a wedding isle, ready for a procession, ready for a bride.

Then it struck me, a revelation that I knew as a concept in my mind yet for the first time truly penetrated my heart:

WE ARE THE BRIDE.

On one end of the isle stood a bride, a body of believers making themselves ready to move deeper with Jesus. On the other end stood a perfect bridegroom, willing and wanting to receive the bride before Him, for better or worse, seeing her faults and loving her anyway.

My breath caught in my chest and my heart began to pound. I couldn’t bring myself to look at the cross. I just couldn’t. Slowly my eyes would go down the walkway only to stop at the foot of the cross, yet all the while imagining that there, at the very place of the cross, was the radiant Bridegroom. “There’s gonna be a wedding, it’s the reason that I’m living…” The lyrics of a Prayer Room song rang through my mind. At that moment, though I knew what was at the end of this isle (after all, I had put it there) I knew that One day there would be a wedding, and the great marriage supper of the Lamb, and at the end of that isle wouldn’t be the symbol of a risen Savior, it would be the flesh and blood God-Man, Jesus Christ Himself, awaiting the bride who made herself ready for Him.

The hearts of children had heard the heart of God.

Making ready the way for Love.

“There’s gonna be a wedding, it’s the reason that I’m living…” Sweet Jesus, let this be the song of my heart! Take my heart of stone, fettered with the bitterness of unmet expectations, and give me a new heart, a heart of flesh. One that hears Your voice, strong and true. A heart like a child. You are coming for a bride made ready. Help me, Holy Spirit, in preparation for that glorious encounter with my Beloved.

21 April 2011

When the Lie Seems Real

It began from the moment I awoke.

It’s not fair. Why can’t I do that? So and so’s not helping. I always have to do that myself.

One would have thought that the children had gotten an early start on the day’s sibling rivalry. But the broken lyrics were my own, a sad start to a Thursday morning song.

I stepped into my day with an unwelcomed restlessness in my heart.

I have only recently become acquainted with restlessness, a “holy dissatisfaction” that creates a longing and a hunger for the things of Christ. It stirs me to move out of the place of selfish ambition and to pursue intimacy with the Lover of my soul.

This was not that kind of that kind of dissatisfaction.

This was agitation, an internal riot. Churning. Roiling. Pointing out how overworked and underappreciated I am. I could feel the little roots of bitterness latching their weedy grip onto my heart. I am no gardener but I know this: Weeds are harder to pull the bigger they get. And yet I let them grow, my frustrations feeding their frenzy, my good judgment thrown off for a little self-justice. And why not?

Nathan peacefully (and obliviously) started and finished his prayer time while Adara climbed loops over my head and into my lap as I tried to answer my bible study questions. The children came behind all my cleaning efforts with train tracks and pots and pans and baby dolls and spilt milk and grains of rice strewn like confetti. Adara played her game called “Steal Whatever Brother Has and Run Away and If I Get Caught, Throw It.” Caleb sang his “I’m Gonna Stand on the Highest Thing in the House and Shout At the Top of My Lungs” songs.

I was losing it.

Couldn’t Nathan see my struggle? Why couldn’t he just do whatever so obviously needed to be done with out me having to ask? On it went, each query building on the other, breeding doubt. Giving way to mistrust.

I was unappreciated for my domestic efforts, and quite frankly held back in living out my “full potential.”

Honestly, God, I could be put to much better use than what You have me doing.

As I stood at the sink scouring hardened rice and starch from a pot I unconsciously stewed in my own self-pity, letting thoughts flow freely, a wash of emotion to the great neglect and disservice that I had suffered over the course of the day. I had convinced myself that my husband was of little help to me. Every time I thought it, it seemed more true. My husband is lazy.

I continued scrubbing, frustrated that I was home tending to children, left in what Nathan described as “a spirit of chaos” before he left. And where was he? Bible study. He practically had something happening every night this week. And everything he did all day long was in preparation for those things. All he does is work. My husband is a workaholic.

What?

My spirit, stifled from my cancerous thoughts, suddenly stirred.

That didn’t make any sense. How could I accuse Nathan of not doing anything only to charge him with doing too much? Something wasn’t right here. I backtracked, tracing my line of thoughts throughout the day.

Not one was uplifting.

Not one was life giving.

I realized that I had not taken any of my thoughts captive. I had not asked for the mind of Christ. Instead, I chose not to align my thinking with the Word of God. I had simply let my mind go wherever it wanted and oh how it had wandered! Rather than recognizing and renouncing those thoughts that instigated and brought division, I had allowed them to meld with my discontent until what I knew in my heart to be false appeared, in whatever twisted capacity, to be true.

Somewhere along the way I had believed a lie, giving birth to many.

Lies about my husband. Lies about my children. Lies about myself. Lies about God.

I knew God had invited me to walk the road of servanthood. I knew God had called me to a domestic ministry. He reassuringly spoke to my spirit that there was nothing greater that I could do than what He called me to do. And here I was, all day long, believing the lie that I was meant for something better than what God had planned for me. The tyrant, Pride, was suddenly unmasked and the great lie lost its power.

Oh, God, forgive me for my pride and for forgetting Your promises! Holy Spirit, help me to recognize lies masquerading as truth. Teach me the humility of my Jesus though His example of meekness in the ministry of the cross. Help me to stay grounded in the truth of Your Word. Jesus, You ARE Truth. Thank You for Your unwavering faithfulness, oh Lord, and for grace that takes me back, again and again. Oh how I love You!

“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ…” 2 Corinthians 10:4-6

01 April 2011

Epic God

Sometimes what God chooses to do is so fantastical, so unfathomable, so unbelievable, it is hard to put into words. As I attempt to conclude what happened the weekend of my dear friend’s “epic move” I laugh because it doesn’t seem believable, like a wild tale a child might tell. But it IS real, and the author of the tale is God Himself…

His ways are most definitely not our ways, certainly not my ways, and when circumstances reveal this truth I am suddenly confronted with His God-ness, His Other-ness, and I come to the realization that I don’t actually know Him like I thought I did. His Mystery meets my mediocrity, and I have to decide: Do I trust Him? His track record demands that I do, and yet there are times, to my own dismay, that I doubt. I doubt the Promise Keeper who’s Word is always true. In the midst of my doubt, when things do not go as planned or when God seemingly fails, I have the choice thrust upon me: Will I choose faith?

It was evident that we were not going to cross that river.

Why, Lord, would you bring us all this way, only to be thwarted here?

What exactly was this “better way” that God had in mind?

After some mapping out and phone call making, it was decided: all of Bekah’s and her colleague’s furniture would be stored in Letseng for safe keeping until the expedition leaders could arrange another weekend to finish the job they had begun. Because Letseng is one of the top producing diamond mines in the world, and so they know a thing or two about keeping things safe. I was caravanning with diamond mine people.

Our journey to the diamond mine took us though some of the most stunning Lesotho countryside I have ever seen. We followed the river up to Katse dam. Water rushing, heaving, the force so great the air rumbled as the open-mouthed dam thundered the reason we were not able to drive across the river.

We traveled down a personal memory lane as we bumped along a road I took on my first mountain drive in Lesotho, to the village of Motete. We journeyed across breathtaking expanse of God-formed mounts, untouched by the advent of technology, our sweaters gripped close as the winter chill already began to settle its icy grip upon the peaks.

We “followed” a rainbow to the diamond mine and when we finally arrived the rainbow hovered over the mine itself, end to end fixed firmly with the mine’s boarders. It was as if God was making it VERY clear that despite any misgivings we may have had, this was certainly a part of what He had planned.

So we stayed the night there, at the mine. All the while my mind reeled as I recalled the day’s events, how God orchestrated everything. How the river we should have crossed turned into a detour, which led to a symbol of promise over an unexpected blessing.

On our return journey to Maseru, the outreach team we were with arranged for a tour of the hydroelectric plant that generated electricity for Lesotho and some of South Africa.

Lord, who ARE these people to have these kinds of elite connections, and how in the world did I get the privilege of sharing in them? Truly you are God and I am your child!

Before we began our “electric” tour, the guide informed us that just days earlier two major malfunctions were identified within the plant, causing them to cut off the water supply to the generators. With the massive valves shut, the Katse dam was filled to excess. Which led to the need to release the overflow. Which caused the river to flood. Which kept us from our destination. I had to let it sink in…Did God really bring us to a place where our “why” could be answered?

We never made it to our destination. Because it really didn’t have anything to do with our destination. It had everything to do with the journey. Because God is all about the journey.

The God of the Journey had something bigger than “moving day” planned for that weekend. He knew that we were anticipating something larger-than-life to take place, something of epic proportions. He decided that furniture transport would not suffice. Instead He brought us a better way, through a test of faith and a detour beyond our wildest imaginations, in hopes that in our frustrations we would turn to Him.

In our weakness we would lean on Him.

And in our journey we would grow in Him. With Him. The Epic God.

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