Happy Endings

I never waste time on unhappy endings in fictional books or movies. If things look rough in the middle, I sometimes skip to the end to find the joy, but if I see only sadness, I give it no more attention. The joy to come encourages me to engage in the story. Reality is full of sadness, heart ache and pain. Yet the Author of life invites us to find healing and joy through Jesus at the end of our earth story. The promise of victory over death is true. With this real ending in mind, strength and courage inspire our journey, no matter how rocky the road appears in this current chapter. And this earthly life is really just the intro to eternity. In the mean time, my mind and imagination find inspiration in happy endings!

Solid Ground

What is the solid ground of life? Things feel so shaky sometimes and that on which I can rely isn't always trustworthy, neither is the whom=me! For the last two days I've been thinking about these words from Hebrews 5:7, "During the days of Jesus' life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission." Prayers, questions, tears, surrender...hmm, I can do those things. Every day of our lives we can be heard by the one who can save us. How lovely is this truth! The accomplishing, the failing, the strength, the weakness, the trust the fear...my own complicated recipe of self can be replaced with the simple direction of what Jesus said and did. To begin this day with these simple words is to know that I am on solid ground.

Icebergs

I have this theory about icebergs. I think the most difficult things we face in life appear as brutally sharp and hard as packed ice and often it seems we can barely hold our footing or keep from slipping into disaster. We usually find a way to hang on, or someone lovingly grabs ahold of us and we hold tight, but we feel exposed to danger and life feels harsh. The setting of such struggles makes us feel as if we are desolate and forgotten by the Almighty, if there even is one. But if we really had eyes to see in a spiritual/eternal perspective, I believe we would see the tremendous amount of darkness from which we are spared. It is that from which we are saved that is the vastness of the mountain under the water, and the water is indeed, Living Water, protecting us from the biggest portion of pain and despair. If we saw the angels and the demons and the warring, perhaps we would see the way over which we are fought and loved for the eternal long-haul! And if there were no hardship to experience, would we know the fragility of our lives? Would we know to hold onto that which is stronger than the ground on which we stand and the things we see before us? If we saw no need, we would not know our need of the one who loves us most.

Manumission

    Manumission...or manumitting, formal emancipation from slavery. I have just read this word in my morning reading. This is the direct quote in regards to stewardship of the talents given. Archbishop Trench writes "...the master's inviting his slave to sit down with him at the table did itself constitute the act of manumission; henceforth he was free." When the master returned, the first two servants presented what they'd done with what they'd been given, the master gave them freedom in return. The third servant, buried what was to be used for good, then blamed the master for being harsh, therefore justifying himself for doing nothing with what he had.  

    In unpacking this today, I think of the earthly gifts we're given; time, talent, our possessions, limited to a season, a lifetime...as compared to eternal things, the people...every person with whom we have now and have ever had contact....What am I to steward? I am to steward what I have this day, this hour. So in the one hand are earthly things, to be used purposefully for that which will last long past my lifetime here, the people. There is purpose in all things, in every day, and in everything that has to do with loving someone well with what we've got until our day of freedom from earthly entangling things comes. What I do for others is not dependent on how they react, I am to care for and give fully from what I've been given, that is the joy of pouring out, as God pours in...the days are short, and freedom from all these struggles will come. Manumission in my simple mind, encourages me to remember today what is my mission at hand, and to do it well, with what I've got.

The Feast

This morning I am thinking of chocolate, and who doesn't love a good story laced with delicious things to eat?  

    In the year of 1989-1990 I lived in Norway on a scholarship. The director of the program, Barbara Lysholt Pedersen, amazed me! She could discuss politics with diplomats and heads of state in the daytime, then in the evening, whip up the most delicious Indian Curry dishes with a martini in hand, wearing a silk house-coat and watching the Benny Hill Show with me! I felt smart and valuable (and free to enjoy another's delightful hospitality) in her company, because of the way I was treated. Barbara invited all of the scholarship recipients to the Chocolate factory in Oslo where we were given a private tour. I will never forget elegant Barbara, dressed in a pink suede suit, reaching across a conveyer belt for the broken remnants of a divine chocolate creation. We were indulged like royalty, with no exquisite taste kept from our watering mouths! I ate nothing. Yes, I am sad to say, I tasted nothing because I was dieting! We were given tiny boxes of liquor filled delicacies on our way home. At around midnight, as I sat in my room, I ate the entire contents, even though I don't even like that type of chocolate! In my legalistic mind of self preservation, I had missed the feast! I am sharing this story this morning (again with some of you because it applies to the parable of the great feast!  

    The invitations arrived, but everyone who received one had a valid excuse in their own minds why they could not partake of it. When the messenger returned empty handed, new invitations were sent to the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind (that is spiritually speaking). Trench says, "He calls to his table the spiritually sick, the spiritually needy; while the rich in their own virtues, in their own merits, at once exclude themselves and are excluded by him thence. The people who knew not the law, and whom the Pharisees accounted cursed, the despised and outcasts of the nation, the publicans and sinners, they should enter into the kingdom of God, before the great, the wise, the proud,-before those who said they saw,-before those who thanked God they were not as other men,-before those who counted that they had need of nothing." Did I need chocolate? Well, perhaps that is debatable, but it is clear that I had the most glorious chance to receive something (almost) beyond earthly blessings and I refused it! Today is the day we have to decide our steps, tomorrow is unknown, let's choose chocolate, spiritually speaking! (I think chocolate must be a hint of the feast to come, don't you?)

The Good Samaritan

 Oh this is so good!  

    In discussing The Good Samaritan, Archbishop Trench writes about the question of "Whom shall I love?" given by a young lawyer. "...for he wished to have laid down beforehand how much he was to do, and where he should be at liberty to stop, -who had a claim and who not upon his love; thus proving that he knew little of that love, whose essence is that it has no limit, except in its own inability to proceed further, that it receives a law only from itself, that it is a debt which we must be well content to be ever paying, and not less still to owe (Rom. xiii.)." Oh I am so excited to meet this man from whom I often quote, in heaven some day! I believe that the encouragement for our lives today is often most profoundly given in lives led well from the past. Archbishop Trench has been in heaven longer than his years on earth...yet today his words of Truth ring clear as fuel for the daily question of how to live and whom we shall love. If we were to stand on the witness stand at this moment, and a flood of questions were directed our way, have we lived in a manner in which we could answer all questions of our actions in truth, without fear or shame? Are we living our lives fueled by the love that never ends and loving endlessly? Are we silent or do we have a well of things to say that would bless and direct others to the truth we know about life? I am considering this in the light of all things today.

Weariness

 Let's chat about something I have read this morning, shall we? First, a bit more coffee for me, as a grandson is sleeping, which is certainly worth another mug! I wish I could transport a cup to you as well, through the airways. However brilliant our technology has become, we can still only share a cup, when we sit in each other's presence. In scripture today I stopped at a little phrase from Psalm 139:18b "When I awake, I am still with you." I was so low and weary last night and this morning that I just wanted to sleep on and on. Yes, it is humbling to say, especially since many of you have real reasons to indulge in such thinking. I have none! I have some simple thoughts, which weigh heavy on my heart today... hellos end in goodbyes, summers become fall, children grow up to be equipped to launch and leave, our parents age, the garden fades and I must adapt! The only constant is change and if we cannot keep up, we will be left behind and overwhelmed. Really? No! No. Why? Because we have a God that is trapped by none of my silly emotional roadblocks or our real struggles and sorrows, or deep needs. Whether our bodies are desperate for healing, we see no way out financially, we feel we have made a wrong decision, or our hearts have trapped us in unforgiveness or sin...God is God! Bishop Trench says God calls us not 'to' a height (as if we must work to reach a spiritual level), he calls us 'from' a height...from the otherness of this life, not to a 'high calling' ,no, he is calling to us, from 'on high'. This earth, where soil can turn to mud in the simple passing of a storm, where tiny nails pop strong tires and we are stopped dead in our tracks on the side of the road on which we travel, God is with us, immovable by earthly hardship, above our smallest and greatest difficulties. In the center of our need he calls us upward, to himself...the place where He lives and to which he calls us to 'awaken' is his unchangeable love, constant care, steady goodness, trustworthy guidance, daily provision, and ultimate purpose and plan for his children who love him. What is our part in this scenario? It is our simple surrender to his love, our giving up of earthly treasure for his priceless eternal riches and our willingness to trust in his ways. If you have entered this day with weariness or worry pulling at your spirit, ask God to fill your cup, he will! His presence is with you and me. He is good.  

Cheers to your day!

Coffee

Good Morning! Do I seem a little fixated on coffee? Yes, yes I do. Why? Well there's always a good story somewhere, after you've sorted through several uninspiring ones!

    The price of airline tickets for children leapt substantially at the age of 12, when I was a child. Thus, my frugal parents purchased individual tickets for each of their three children before the summer of our eleventh year. My fearless sister was the first to embark on the six week Norway adventure ALONE, I followed three years later. A vivid picture from my journey holds its place in my mind, like a tattered bookmark left in a favorite chapter. It is a memory so rich that if I breath in deeply, I can almost smell the coffee cooking in the worn kettle on the crackling fire, only three long strides from the icy stream. I can also almost smell the forest, moist with morning dew, as I stare at the wriggling trout, caught in an expert instant by my mother's uncle, who is ancient as the mountains, with callused hands and kind eyes. He spoke no English and I knew only the trill of foreign Norwegian words on the tip of my tongue, from the songs my mother would sing before meals or bed (I didn't learn Norwegian until I was seventeen). There were no words between us, but there was cool mountain air, sharp in my lungs and fresh on my breath. There were my uncle's steady wide steps leading me up to the special fishing spot, and the meal, caught, cleaned and cooked, just for me. And from his hand, there was the cup and the coffee shared, the smile on his deeply wrinkled face, and the love that spoke volumes between us in the middle of the forest, in the rugged Norwegian terrain. As in every tiny space on earth where two can meet in glance or embrace, love can be the unspoken beginning of the story. And sometimes the faint smell of coffee might be the fragrance of sweet memories fueling the moment.

Have a great day!