Christmas Confessions

As we start this Christmas Season, there's one thought I just can't shake.  It's captured in the last couple lines of this poem by Kay Ryan:

Crib

From the Greek for 

woven or plaited,

which quickly translated

to basket. Whence the verb

crib, which meant “to filch”

under cover of wicker

anything–some liquor,

a cutlet.

For we want to make off

with things that are not

our own. There is a pleasure

theft brings, a vitality

to the home.

Cribbed objects or answers

keep their guilty shimmer

forever, have you noticed?

Yet religions downplay this. 

Note, for instance, in our

annual rehearsals of innocence,

the substitution of manger for crib–

as if we ever deserved that baby,

or thought we did.

This poem kinda reflects how I feel about the whole Christmas idea right now: guilty.  I feel like a filthy sinner who deserves to be shut out of the Kingdom forever.  But the thing is...I'm not.  In sending His Son to Earth to die for me, God gave me the innocence of that manger baby.  It's mine, and I get to walk in the fact that the greatest part about Christmas is that Christ's innocence has been credited to me.  As I say this, I struggle with sin.  I struggle with my own imperfection, my own rebellion, my own total lack of anything good to call my own.  And I don't feel good about it.  But therein lies the heart of the gospel: I am not capable of good, so I don't have to be "good"... God doesn't see that about me any more.  So while I'm frustrated and feel dirty and stained, God is saying to me "Have hope, my little Daughter - I'm not asking for your good, but for your heart. Dirty and all.  I'll wash it up a bit before I use it."  In the midst of my darkness, I have hope that I am not defined in Erin terms, but in God terms.  God's messenger uses my own name to preach to me.  Erin - Peace.  Evangeline - Good news.  granted, they were saying it in Aramaic, not Greek.  but somehow, God knew I would need to remember who I am.  A sinner given the peace of God through the good news of Christ.  my guilt no longer matters.

so please excuse this bit of self-evangelism...sometimes preaching to yourself is necessary.  But please don't think that this message is only meant for me.  It's for all of us.  this Christmas season, think about that manger baby.  Think about what He means.  Really.  Personally.  To you.  You will get no greater gift this year.

The Eternal Now.

It's been a while since I updated this thing.

I recently encountered an argument against Christianity in the books of Philip Pullman, author of the "His Dark Materials" trilogy.  In his books, he exploits the past and present failures of Christianity to say that God has outlived His usefulness, and it's time to watch Him blow away.  The main argument is that the Christianity of men like CS Lewis is grounded not in our present reality, but in an intangible future hope that renders Christians incapable of present goodness.

I think he missed the point.  I think we all sometimes do.

So what is the point?

I think in the Bible it's very clear - Christ was about the Eternal "here and now".  That sounds contradictory, but let me explain.  When Christ came, the Prophets had all been saying "The kingdom of God is coming...."  Christ began preaching "The kingdom of God has come.  It is here.  Don't miss it" (see Mark 1:14-15).  Obviously, people were a bit confused.  Still are.  But after Christ, this preaching continued, and people continued to say that following Christ was about what I've called in this post "The Eternal Now".

What do I mean by that?  I mean that for the Christian, the hope of Eternity glorifying God starts in the moment they decide to make Jesus Christ the Lord of their life.  Their Spirit, now born of God, has been given the promise of Eternity with Him, and is therefore immortal.  We cannot be separated from God, not even by death. (Romans 8:38-39) We are now counted as being God's children, and we are ambassadors in the "now" for the Eternal God (2 Corinthians 5:20).  Again and again, we are told to live while we are in the present age - the "now" - in this Truth, conducting ourselves in a way to bring glory to God (1 Peter 1:17-21).  All the letters of the apostles to the Church emphasize our responsibility to live in the now in a way that will glorify God.  Jesus Himself instructed us on the way to live.  The point of the New Testament is to show the fulfillment of God's promise, and to answer the question "How now shall we live?"

Unfortunately, we've gotten caught up in the fact that we cannot be "of the world" rather than owning the fact that we are "in the world" for a reason (John 17:15-18).

Heart Cry for RezWeek 2011

Hey friends and family! This is the poem I wrote and read for REZweek.  It was a work of the Spirit, not of me, but some people said they wanted to see it, so here it is.

Do you remember Me?
I know you in the dark places,
in the secret places hidden from time.
I form you from the dust of the earth
fold and knit you from fabric of My making
so that you may know Me.
don't you remember?

do you remember Me?
I nourish you with Manna,
Bread of Heaven, Words of Life
I give you Living Water from the Rock
and teach you to drink deeply
to quench your thirst from My bounty.
do you even remember?

do you remember Me?
My voice rumbles from the mountaintop
prophets declare my thoughts
you are struck through with fear and rightly
for I am holy and you are lowly
but I am wholly yours.
don't you remember?

do you remember Me?
I give to you the Good and Promised Land
I choose you to be My People,
you stubborn, unmoving children!
not because of your merit
but because I choose to love you
do you even remember?

do you remember Me?
I am the Lord who loves you,
the God of gods and Lord of lords
the great God, mighty and awesome
The Lord who is among you
The One who hears your cry.
don't you remember?

do you remember Me?
I hang upon a cross
drink the boiling cup of God's hatred
I drink it to the burning dregs
agony upon agony
All for you, My cherished People
do you even remember?

do you remember Me?
I remember you.
there's a place for you in eternity
you'll share with Me in Victory
all pain forgotten, all foes vanquished
I long for you to join me here
don't you remember?

do you remember Me?
do you remember your First Love?
do you remember Light?
do you remember answered prayers
do you remember the joy of faith
the joy of restored sight?
do you even remember?

Breached

I was Jericho
with walls high and wide
But love higher and wider
Swept over the side
Now I've been captured
With love so divine
The wall has been breached
This wall that was mine.

I thought I was covered,
I posted the guard.
Who knew that you'd soften
A heart that was hard?
I locked all the doors
And melted the key
But I never counted
On Your love for me.

Inside the walls
I cowered and cried
No one would rescue me -
No body tried.
And You came along
And softly you said
I'll give You a life
if you give up your death.

The dam's broken loose
We'll let the tide flow
as over and under
Your love quickly goes
Knee deep in water
That washed away fears
And anger and hatred
And traded with tears.

The walls have begun
To crumble in me
And now I'm beginning
To finally see
A wall built on nothing
Round a hole six feet down
Where a little girl hiding
All alone was found.

Who celebrates surrender
when everything's lost?
Only when you see
what Victory cost.
A life lived in love
And a heart filled with grace
Hung on a tree
To die cursed in my place.

The wall was breached
The wall that was high
And now without it
I can see sky!
I'm free to live life
Unbounded by chains
Of sin and of sorrow
And of suffering and pain.

Breaking Holy

Recently, there's been a phrase that has been going around that I despise. I'm not going to tell you the phrase, because I don't want to seem as if I'm judging anyone, cause I'm not (my sister brought this to my attention when I was ranting at her). But I'll tell you why - because it glosses over the significance of who God is. 

What do I mean by that? I mean that the significance of everything that is most important about our God - His Holiness.

And as I was thinking about this, I realized. We have no cultural concept of "holy." What does it mean in Revelation 4 when the creatures around God's throne cry out that He is "Holy, Holy, Holy!"? Our culture has no idea.

Holiness is an idea of being set apart. Being special. Being special because of being touched by the divine. In a culture that denies holiness, we deny the Divine. We deny that He touches us, that He uses us, and that He - is.

Everything that was once holy is no longer. Take sex as the classic example. Sex was something so pure, so special, so celebrated in the context God designed for - its holy context. It is a holy metaphor: The longing for one another, the connection, the feeling of joy and being love no matter what, the feeling of being enough and of being essential and of being whole - it all points to how God wants to be with us, how He wants us to be with Him. It was holy in its context of being set apart. And then it stopped being set apart for two people. With the assault of porn, it became something other people could take part in. With orgies and multiple partners, sex lost its mystery and its "set apartness". Then it started being included i movies, in tv, in commercials, in music, on billboards. And now, sex is for everyone. it means nothing except physical pleasure. Sex has ceased to be holy. And this is just the easiest example. I could show you so many things that used to be holy - the cross, music, the Bible - that no longer are holy.

The consequence of breaking down barriers setting things apart is that we no longer see barriers at all.

Back to my point - the phrase that I am objecting to. I object to it because it glosses over something so holy, so special, so integral to our understanding of who God is:

HIS NAME.

Madeliene and the Meaning of Grace

So, right about now those of us who remember the way our world was shaken on 9-11 are celebrating the fact that the mastermind behind the horrendous events is dead.  I myself was relieved and felt vindicated.  I remember worrying about my Dad at Ft. Bragg while we were in Pittsburgh.  I remember seeing the towers fall on live TV.  I remember feeling a pain that was more than physical - my security, comfort, and trust were all brought down as I watched a powerful symbol of the Free World come crashing to the ground.  I remember being scared about another attack.  I remember the plane going down in Somerset just a few minute's drive away.  I remember the fear.  I remember watching as people mourned their losses.  I remember sending my Dad off to war.  I remember wondering if he was coming back.  I remember praying that God would keep my Daddy safe and I remember hoping that bin Laden be captured, then drawn and quartered, or flayed alive, or anything to prolong his agony before he died.  I didn't think of the fact that no matter how he dies, he's gonna be in eternal agony.  As the worst of sinners, a man who believed in a false prophet (eternally cursed according tothe Apostle Paul) he deserved as much agony as we could give him.

My reaction to bin Laden's death was joy.  He'd gotten what he deserved, and died like a coward, using a woman as a shield.  Even now, I can't help feeling a sense of having won and the irony of it all being just and right.  He died like a rat.

And then Madeliene, as she is so prone to doing, shook my world again.  She said in the car this morning that she was sad that bin Laden had died, but relieved.  I asked her why she was sad.  "It's kinda complicated and confusing" she said "I am relieved that he can't hurt anyone else, and even glad about that.  But now, he can't be forgiven.  He missed his chance, and now he's seperated from Jesus forever.  I can't imagine being seperated from Jesus.  It would be horrible."

and I thought...CONVICTION 

This kid knows the meaning of Grace.  my almost-eleven-year-old-sister understands the gospel better than I do.

Granted, she doesn't remember the Twin Towers.  She was a baby.  Her world wasn't shaken that day.  But she does know that this man has caused Thousands upon Thousands to die.  Some have even gone to hell because of his delusion that he was doing the will of God.  She knows that Daddy put his life in danger because this man was alive.  But she wouldn't deny him the Grace that God extends to every man, woman and child.  I can't say that I would do the same.  Deserving of death? Osama was.  Deserving of eternal seperation from God and eternal agony? Madeliene knew that wasn't her place to judge.

You see, Madeliene, in her short life, seems to have grasped exactly what Paul meant when he said "For ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23, emphasis mine) and "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23).  We are all sinners.  We are all equally deserving of eternal seperation from God.  "For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.  For He who said "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not commit murder." If you do not commit adultery, but you do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker" (James 2:10-11).

I'm reading this awesome book by Jerry Bridges called The Discipline of Grace at the same time that I am reading Prodigal God  by Tim Keller.  In both books, the authors define sin as anything that does not glorify God.  Anything that does not glorify God is an act of rebellion against Him, basically spitting in His face.  According to this definition, obedience to the law in order to show what a perfect Christian YOU are instead of how good God is, is in fact sin and rebellion against Him.  I am guilty of rebelling against God every day of my life, for I am guilty of doing things for reasons other than those that would glorify God.  That's in addition to just breaking the law of God about 325,000 times a day (ok, so that might be an exaggeration - there aren't even that many seconds in a day...but you get my point).  I am a sinner - a lawbreaker - and the worst kind.  One who does so knowing what it costs and yet does it anyway.  I deserve death.  I deserve seperation from God.  I deserve hell just as much as Osama bin Laden did, if my actions are the measure by which I'm accepted into heaven.

but Madeliene understands something else - 

We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each has turned to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Isaiah 53:6

Madeliene understands that no matter what our sin was, is or will be, God's paid for it already.  He made Christ Jesus the representative of all humanity, and though Christ had lived a sinless life, he absorbed the entire penalty of our sin - everything we deserved: God's hatred, malice, justice, essentially everything I wanted to see Osama bin Laden receive at the hand of American soldiers.  Christ knew the penalty, and took it for us.  Being one with God, he knew how powerful God's hatred of sin was.  And he took it.  He hung there and drank it all.  And all He asks in return is that we accept His love, His sacrifice, His payment for our just desserts, while we live our days on this planet.  ANYTIME while we live our life, grace is available to us.

And my brother, the son of Adam, Osama bin Laden, missed his chance.  He could have been saved from everything, but he wouldn't accept the forgiveness of God.  And you know what? If I had been there, I wouldn't have given him a chance to do it.  I would have sent him straight to hell for everything he's done.  I would have been guilty of denying him the chance God mercifully extended to me. 

None of this is to say Osama would have taken it.  I doubt very strongly that he would...he was living his life for something else that he believed was right and good.  He denied the grace of God with his every breath.  But that's not my point.  My point is that my reaction to what I've been viewing as a triumph is wrong.  This is a tragedy.  There was a free gift of grace for this man, this fellow sinner, and he just didn't grasp it before he died.

If this has meant anything to you at all, then do what I did after dropping Madeliene off at school this morning.  Thank God for the gift of grace that he's extended to all of us.  If you haven't already, please accept the fact that you can't get to heaven on your own merit, that it is the grace of God in sacrificing His Son as the payment for our crimes and belief in that grace alone that saves us.  Commit to a life that you will live for the glory of God, even when you mess up.  Which you will.  And tell someone about it.  Pray and begin a journey toward heaven that will make your life a triumph of God instead of a tragedy of Men.

For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. John 3:17-19

“I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life." John 5:24

I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life. 1 John 5:13

For Starters...

...what you're thinking is "Oh no! They let her loose on the internet!"

- actually, it was my Dad.  He's been reading my writing and I think every time I write something new, he says something about starting a blog.  For a long time I fought him on it (mentally) saying to myself that I didn't know what to write, or I didn't have time to write, or I couldn't think of a title for my blog.  Mainly, I was intimidated.  Starting a blog is different from writing occasionally a note on facebook, set on private where nobody is even going to know you exist.  Writing a blog means people can see you.  And for someone who only writes what's on her heart, that means exposing my heart to be seen.  Scary stuff.

But I was writing today, and recognized something.  I say my entire life is lived so that others may see and glorify God, but I'm afraid of being seen? I have a name for someone who says something and does something else.  It's a hypocrite.  I hate hypocrites.  And I'm the biggest hypocrite of them all sometimes.

Dealing with something else entirely, though, is dealing with the fear.  God has not given us a spirit of fear (2 Timothy 1:7), but I have been bowing to the Prince of Fear by ignoring what my Dad said.  And when I'm bowing to fear, I'm not glorifying God.  When I'm not glorifying God I'm not living what I say.  When I'm not living what I say, I'm doing what I hate.  Hypocrite.  In the immortal words of a widely recognized sage of our time: D'oh!


So here I am, loose on the internet.  Let's see how this project progresses.