How to see a miracle

Sometimes accepting a blessing means giving up life as we know it.

And so Zecharias comes to the temple, carrying with him the echoes of little voices he once dreamed of teaching to pray, the shadows of small hands and feet that would have followed him in his work. He wears the sorrow now as familiar as his priestly robes, disappointment woven through the fabric of his days.

And the angel appears, and in spite of his astonishment he simply cannot will his heart to believe. Hope long ago became too painful.

Living with disappointment is easier than opening his heart again.

But oh, Zecharias, this story is so much bigger than you, and if only you knew how your pain will be transformed into brightest, glorious joy.

And God will take your voice away and give you the gift of simply watching Him work. All your words of reason and doubt will be silenced. Elisabeth’s belly will swell while your own heart fills with the laughter that bursts right out of her, the wife of your youth whose arms have so long been empty. You will watch her eyes shine and see the heads wagging in wonder and you will understand something new.

And God, He will laugh too, holiest joy when all that sorrow blossoms and blooms and lays you open to purest wonder.

He is preparing the way right now, right in your heart, and when your son is placed into your arms, the first words from your new-forged faith will speak his name, the wild truth of it: John. “Jehovah is a gracious giver.”

And you won’t be able to stop them, words flowing from the wonder of this love, words from God Himself who yearns toward us to tell of His love that reached down into the womb of an old woman, this miracle that is only the beginning of miracles, the son whose birth is being proclaimed for miles around even as His own Son swells the womb of another.

And all that sorrow, all those days of pain lie like paving-stones pointing the way to this.

Maybe the pain scoops out the hard places, creates the space for Him to fill. Maybe the tears soften us to receive Him, like rain in the desert.

When we stop asking and only watch and believe, then He comes.

Adulteress

adulteress

falling helpless on stones

that sin made

i cower in

my filth.

i am

impure

unclean

cast off remnant of

a dream

raggedy ruin of a gleam

no one remembers.

i reek.

i bawl.

i shiver and crawl

and claw the crazed

thoughts that wreak

vengeance.

i am

faithless.

unfaithful.

close eyes and heart

wrap arms

bow head

welcome

the stone throwers.

arms poised

they pose

self-righteous toes

just touching

the circle of my shame.

they are me.

indignantly

insisting that this fall

is final.

after all,

such outward display

of inward decay

is surely unacceptable.

a scratch in the dirt.

a quiet word, and earth

heaves

astonished.

stones drop

arms fall

murmurs rattle small

i shatter.

You call

my name.

stretch Your arms to the frame

of my faithlessness.

You bleed.

You hang

You cry

You shudder and die

suspended

above eternity.

i am

broken

by beauty.

gathered in

unmade

You touch me unafraid

masterpiece

vessel of Your breath

i surrender.

Rubbish or resurrection?

Grumpy, that’s the only word for it. Tired of the world and all the burdens I can’t carry and all the people I fail. Tired of trying.

I said the wrong thing to a grieving friend. I yelled at my children. I burned dinner. I forgot to pray. I did the things I swore I wouldn’t do and didn’t do the things I should have. I couldn’t keep up. I didn’t want to.

I grip coffee and sigh. I try to tune out the distractions within and without, open my Bible as an act of faith. Philippians 3.

“Yet every advantage that I had gained I considered lost for Christ’s sake. Yes, and I look upon everything as loss compared with the overwhelming gain of knowing Jesus Christ my Lord. For his sake I did in actual fact suffer the loss of everything, but I considered it useless rubbish compared with being able to win Christ. For now my place is in him, and I am not dependent upon any of the self-achieved righteousness of the Law. God has given me that genuine righteousness which comes from faith in Christ. How changed are my ambitions! Now I long to know Christ and the power shown by his resurrection: now I long to share his sufferings, even to die as he died, so that I may perhaps attain as he did, the resurrection from the dead” (vv. 7-11).

Inspiring words when held at arm’s length. But let them in and their full weight settles like all the grief and rage and frustration of all the suffering world. And like the psalmist, I beg God, “Be gracious to me, O Lord!  See my affliction . . .” (Psalm 9:13)

The truth is that we lose all things whether we want to or not. The truth is that it is all rubbish, whether or not we consider it so.

But Paul sounds so joyful, so jubilant, even. “Yes, I actually did suffer a lot. I lost everything, in fact. But all that stuff is rubbish, worthless, useless!”

How is this possible? I’m a little miffed.

I suppose it all depends on what we compare our stuff to. And Paul was convinced that knowing Christ was the only thing worth having. He lost, and then he won.

And winning Him is worth it.

His one goal was to know Christ. He called it an “overwhelming gain.” He wanted it so much that he sought to suffer, in order that he might die, in order that he might be resurrected.

Resurrected!

Reborn.

Remade.

What does it take to know Christ that way? So deeply that loss leads to rejoicing and every death births new life?

The same psalmist who begged God to see him started out by praising:

“I will give thanks to you, Lord, with all my heart;
    I will tell of all your wonderful deeds.
I will be glad and rejoice in you;
    I will sing the praises of your name, O Most High” (Psalm 9:1-2).

In spite of—or because of?—his sufferings, he was confident enough to say,

“Those who know your name trust in you,
    for you, Lord, have never forsaken those who seek you.”

Those who know your name.

Doesn’t His name call out to us every day in the thousand ways He loves us? Are we so accustomed to His love that we forget it is there?

Why is it so much easier to blame than to give thanks?

Instead of listing complaints, the psalmist listed all the ways God had saved him already. He had been brought to the “gates of death” but asked God to resurrect him so he could declare His praises (v. 13).

Paul longed to “come to know the power outflowing from His resurrection” (Phil. 3:10), a power that is not is not simply a past event in history, but ongoing and eternal. And we know it when we “are made like Him in His death.”

Suffering leads to death, and there are many kinds of death. But death brings resurrection, and the power behind resurrection is love.

This is the love that satisfies, that swallows up all the empty places, that wraps around and lifts up and runs within and over and beyond.

“Now my place is in him.”

It is the one thing we all long for.

It is home.

Those who are resurrected, I think, understand that the griefs and failures only point us to God if we let them, and when our hearts yearn upward rather than inward, we see the amazing demonstrations of love quietly bursting all around us.

The toddler who squeals and runs to me, throwing her arms around my neck.

The kitten purring in my lap.

The dust on the floor left by a husband who is working hard to make our home beautiful.

The friend who forgave me, the kids smiling at me anyway, the dinner I got to burn and still eat, the God who waits patiently for me to come but who doesn’t wait to love me.

Outside the window the aspen leaves are dying, making way for winter’s sleep and spring’s rebirth. They have turned to brightest gold, and their glory fills the window with shining joy.

Still burning bright

Dear Abby,

In my first week of teaching high school English at a new school, you were the one who turned in your homework early. Days early. I was so surprised that I almost gave you an A just for that. But I didn’t have to. You did your work well. Like it mattered to you. I remember thinking, “This is going to be a good experience.”

A few years later you sat in my homeroom as a senior and I challenged you to find GodStops—those moments when you stopped and saw God’s presence. You actually took me seriously. You always had something to say. I remember the day you came in glowing, joyful about a mentor who was speaking into your life. I was jealous. I wanted to be that mentor.

You were part of the inspiration behind Bring Your Own Chair day. All the kids rolling around the hallway in crazy office chairs or lounging at the table in recliners. Once you got all the kids in class to dress up like characters from Batman.

You were always laughing.

One day I walked into the gym wearing jeans and a t-shirt, and you ran right up to me and told me I looked amazing and I should wear those jeans more often. What student says that to a teacher?

When you were in my class, I looked forward to coming to school. I felt welcomed. Seen. Heard. Students don’t often realize how alienated and alone their teachers sometimes feel, how hurt and frustrated we can be by the lack of response to our efforts. You always saw me. You were always fully there.

On the last day of school one year, you asked if you could use your birthday money to buy me ice cream. You were what, 15?

I will never forget the day I stood in front of homeroom and stared at all the faces, feeling empty and utterly inadequate. And then I just blurted it straight out, told you all of my miscarriage and the death of a dream.

That just isn’t done, a teacher being so vulnerable in front of her students. But you made it OK. I felt good about telling you, because you all had become my family.

And then one day when you were a little more grown up and already far wiser than I, you asked me to be your prayer mentor. And we prayed through a lot, didn’t we? Family, relationships, dreams for the future, needs, hurts, joys. And somehow the prayers always extended far beyond you to the people you loved and dreamed of serving, and even though I was supposed to be the mentor, you somehow always managed to teach me. And I watched you throw yourself into life with such abandon and such urgent love—you needed to be loving someone all the time. And you loved beautifully, creatively, entirely, with no holding back.

You loved God most of all. Really loved Him, like you knew Him. You did know Him, far more intimately than most of us ever have, because you spent so much time with Him. You pursued Him relentlessly. And the more you pursued Him, the brighter your love shone.

And then God let you come home. And after the first shock of grief, I thought, Of course.

You longed so hard for God that He just couldn’t take it anymore, could He? He had to have you with Him. And He knew that your brief life far outshone those with triple your years, and He took you to a place where your life would blaze with His beauty forever.

So we would remember.

You are an arrow pointing straight to His heart. You learned the secret of loving and knowing Him.

So many of us look for reasons to complain. We serve ourselves first. It’s habit. You looked for reasons to rejoice. You lived for others. You wore your selflessness effortlessly, habitually.

You still teach me every day.

Today is your birthday. I checked your Facebook wall and it’s still going strong. You are still burning 

bright. And I know you are having one heck of a party today. I feel I am invited, so I’ll celebrate from here and look forward to seeing you soon.

Happy birthday, Abs. I love you.