Tilling up Holy Ground

It was evening on one of those absolutely beautiful days when I just needed to be outside. Needed to soak up the last rays on sunlight as they slanted strong and glimmering into our backyard. Hank and I started a garden at our little rent house because, certainly we want fresh veggies knowing we helped produce them, but also because being outside reminds us to simply breathe.

  Tilling the soil and getting rich, brown dirt under my fingernails reminds me where I came from. Not in a dust to dust sort of way, but back to my roots (pun intended!). Back to that house on the hill in the Texas Hill Country where my Opa came and taught us how to plant a garden when I was a youngster. Back to the sight of his work and time worn hands digging deep with a chunk of potatoes, eyes growing out everywhere, to show us the magic in planting.

  Opa was a home builder but a farmer first and he never forgot the magic of the harvest, how it teaches you to wait, toiling with the hope that one day you will put the most delicious tomatoes off the vine and feed it to all your family with some left over. It was just another way he loved and lived, planting seeds and waiting eversopatiently as they sprouted and bore fruit.

  He sowed seeds in his family too. Wisdom seeds given as he wrote commonsense truths on the little notepad in his pocket. Sharing how he had observed and learned and communicating it with the wisdom of the sage that we was. He was a farmer, a teacher, a good man in the truest sense of the phrase. His word was always good and he was known to give generously with a near loathing for any praise or thanks. He worked hard, quietly, with no complaining.

His blood flows in my veins and so it is not surprise that I find the truest peace just walking outside and staring at the trees and how they stand out stark against the early morning sky, or the beauty of a water tower when the soft light of dusk hits it at the right angle. Or the way that I get giddy watching seedlings grow and mature in the little garden we have.

   Oh it is good to have such roots.

Heartbroken

I didn't know my heart could break for people I have never met. This past week I have been reading a book by one of the leaders of the Tianenmen Square movement that preceded the Tianenman Massacre in June of 1989. I was two when this happened and I honestly don't remember it at all.

   What I do remember is standing in that square in June of last year, staring in awe at the massive monument to Chairman Mao, the beautiful statue to the people, the expansive space filled with hundreds of gawking Chinese tourists who had likely spent their life's savings to come to the famed capital city.

    I remember knowing somewhere in the back of my head that something absolutely terrible had happened in that place. You know there is a spiritual dimension to the physical. I think that a space can have a spiritual feeling and the feeling in that square was somewhat oppressive.

    While one of my friends there was a history major, we all knew that one could not speak of the Massacre in public. In fact, it was best not to speak of it at all. To do so would be to jeopardize our status in China and the status of those who brought us.

     Now, as I read Chai Ling's "A Heart For Freedom," my heart breaks for the pain, the oppression, the anguish that I conveniently ignored.

   And while I am saddened to hear the details of the Massacre and how easily it could have been prevented, I am devastated because I know that the policies, culture and hierarchy that caused the massacre are still in existence. My heart breaks because there is still oppression but it exists below the surface, known but not acknowledged by the common people.

    Because while hundreds and perhaps thousands died on one day in June, every 2.5 seconds a baby is aborted in China. Every day a massacre happens under the guise of three politically correct words: One Child Policy.
 
     I know students whose parents had abortions because they simply couldn't afford the outrageous fines given them by the government if they were to keep the child. I know students who grew up feeling worthless and unloved because they weren't born with a penis.

    I know students whose parent are still paying the consequences for keeping their second and third child. In China, not only do the parents incur fines, but they are refused the allowance given for raising a child. One-child homes recieve a stipend to help cover the (outrageous) costs of education, food, clothing needed to raise their little emperor or empress.

     I know girls who are still slaving away in college so that they can prove their worth to parents who wish they had been boys.

     The devastating truth is this: the one child policy has become so interwoven in chinese culture and so normalized in the Chinese mind that many women do not realize they are being forced to have an abortion. As Chai Ling says, the power of shame, family and government pressure is enough to force a women to give up the life of her child.

    In China, couples must have a birth permit to have a baby. This birth permit can not be attained by a single woman. Instead, when a young college student finds that they are pregnant (and birth control is not taught in China, so pregnancy is hardly avoided) they must get an abortion. There is no option.

If they keep the baby they lose their chances of graduating and consign themselves to the life of a low-class laborer. This means they lose all chances for a good job with which they can bare the unweildy burden of supporting both parents in their old age, and they consign themselves to a life of shame and poverty. Not only this, but the child they bear will have little chance of succeeding in the world. They will be poor, possibly denied an ID card and thus not allowed to attend school, ride trains, be treated at the public hospital or participate in society as a whole.

   My heart aches for the faces that I carry around in my heart. I see these beautiful faces of the women in my class and haunted eyes peer back at me in my mind. You see, only 14% of women in China will NOT have an abortion. 40% will have two or more. That means that nearly all of my precious girls will experience this pain. Worse, they will be forced to bear the burden alone and silent. You see, these things aren't really talked about AT ALL.

     It is a huge loss of honor to admit you had an abortion. In a culture where honor is everything, silence reigns and women are forced to deal with the pain following abortion. Their culture tells them this is normal, that this is the right thing to do if they are good citizens, that this is what they must do if they love their families. No one talks about the baby or the pain the mother will experience.

    No one talks about the 500 women who die of suicide daily in China. (?)
So here I am and I am not quite sure how to proceed. I honestly want to board a plane and go hug all those precious students and whisper into their ears this truth: Jesus Loves them and He alone can heal their hearts and set them free. This is the heart cry of Chai Ling, who came to faith after moving to America. The cry is not simply, "God will forgive," but "God Loves and Heals."

      It is his kindness and mercy that draws us in, not his justice. His justice was satisfied on a cross where my sins were nailed right along with the government officials who ordered the massacre and the women who still bear the grief of unborn life.

Providence

Yesterday morning I got in my car around 8:24 prepared to rush off to work. Twenty minutes earlier, while trying to make my lunch, I spilled nearly the whole bowl of quinoa and black bean salad I had made the night before. My nerves were tense and I had already run inside a few times to grab various items I had forgotten. With little thought, I plunged my key into the ignition with all the force of my anxious impatience and cranked the engine. It turned and then nothing happened.

 Just like that I was car-less, anxious and in a hurry. Can you spell d.i.s.a.s.t.e.r.? Hank and I hurriedly moved my stuff to his car and off I went. On the way to work my mind was moving almost as fast as my tires. I was stressing out about how much it would cost and whether I would be late to work when I just sort of stopped and realized how futile and silly my train of thought was.

First of all, I had so much to be thankful for. The car could have stopped working the day before or the day after when Hank had to use his car for work. As it was, he was working from home Friday and didn't need it. Second, we have been taking a Dave Ramsey course at a local church and just got our $1000 emergency fund finished. We know where the money will come from to fix my car. I finally know what financial peace feels like. God is good and his timing is not lost on me.

Thirdly, Hank and I are taking Monday off to go to the local stockshow and rodea and were going to work today (Sat) to make up for it. Fortunately, I was able to call my boss last night and he was able to go to work with his vehicle while I basked in the beginning of a needed three day weekend.

Hank flew to Brenam this morning and I am slightly jealous of the hamburger he had for lunch. We have been doing a cleanse this week and cutting out certain (MOST) foods in order to get our bodies in check. It has been good and I find I am enjoying the benefits of eating uber healthy, but MAN, Sometimes I just need chocolate! More on the Cleanse later.


Peace.

Plowing on Patient

Ever been in a place where you desperately want to know the answers to the future? It sort of helps me understand ouiji boards and future tellers a bit more. If I didn't know that it was all in God's hands and in his timing, I might be tempted to consult one of those mediums.

    As it is, I have taken up pleading prayers that I might have discernment for the days ahead. It is scary when those dearly held dreams don't seem to be working out so dreamily in real life.

I am feeling the need to let go of the well thought out plans I had for my life and just trust that Papa knows my desires, my dreams, my skills as well as my weaknesses, the things I can't stand and would loathe doing.

He knows it all and more. He has made me lots of promises and He never breaks them. He has promised this one familiar one, that he has GOOD plans for me. He has plans to prosper this marriage, this girl, this home, our ministry, my job.

    Several years back I read a book by Elizabeth Elliott. I highly recommend her books (especially Passion and Purity for teens). She talked about how the Lord called her to put her hands to the plow and not turn back. To focus on His will and His call no matter what obstacles got in the way.

   You probably know that she had a few obstacles. In fact, she had some that would absolutely knock me flat and make me seriously consider crawling, no running all the way back to my comfort zone. Her husband was killed by indians she later went to share the Gospel with. Dang. That is a real woman.

    Lately I am hearing that gentle refrain. To keep going. To not turn back. I don't plow these fields of life alone. Jesus walks with me and honestly, he pushes the plow most of the time. When I let him.

   So while I wait to find out exactly what will happen with my job and dreams, I am going to keep plowing in the ways I know to. I will seek to worship even if it is just in the car on my way to work. And I will seek His face- even if it is just a few minutes before rushing off. Because He keeps me going down the long rows of furrows and fallow.

   And he knows what I need each step of the way.

Honestly...

A look at what I am currently learning

Upon reading Calvin Miller’s memoir I am finding a deep realization sinking in amidst a hard week of struggling to feel at peace with my two current jobs. I can love Christ and not NEED the church. He is everything I need and Christian employment and involvement will not complete me.

Ever since I was in high school, I have found a lot of validation in Christian service. I was an odd ball at my high school who wore clothes that were too big on an oddly shaped awkward body. I didn’t listen to the same music or watch the same movies and I generally felt a little tense walking down the halls of my high school because I knew I was surrounded by wolves. Not that these kids had a bigger sin nature than me but I knew they would defend their popularity no matter the cost and if I was to offend or endanger that popularity I would be put down in order for them to climb up.

I know this because I was a wolf in my preteen years and every once in a while I find my wolf like tendencies come out again. I can even be wolfish in my marriage. “No honey, we can’t do that! Do you know what they will think of us?” More than half the reason I didn’t kiss or have sex before marriage is because I had a rather prudish and overly spiritual reputation to keep up.

I am a people pleaser. I come by it honestly as I am one of a long line of people pleasers. My great grandmother never stepped out of the house without a girdle and a face full of clay. My grandma still thinks she is overweight at probably 130 pounds. While I love these ladies I can see how ridiculous their obsession is and yet I have justified my own for so long.

In college, I went to a small church and I loved it, mostly. Yet I also had this niggling fear that I would one day screw up and they would realize that I am wholly imperfect, have all sorts of wrong thoughts, can be extremely judgmental and all in all just don’t have it all together.

By the grace of God, I married a man who doesn’t worry about these things like I do. He is somehow his own unique, beautiful and flawed human being a he is ok with people knowing it. He doesn’t have to be the coolest person and he is not afraid to make a fool of himself. He even sings loud and off key in church while I worry about what the people in front of us are thinking. He is worshipping and I am worrying.

When I graduated, I had no doubts I would work in some sort of holy job. I went to China and lived in a community of sinners and I learned that forgiveness is more important than appearances. One of my teammates would frustrate me so and I learned to ask forgiveness even when she didn’t know I needed. I learned that quick forgiveness is much more freeing that austere perfection.

Yet I returned to the states and some of those hard lessons seemed to melt away. I still needed to keep up my reputation, to impress and to show the world just how good of a person I was. Funny thing is- Jesus didn’t come to save the good. He came to save the broken and I was certainly that. I just didn’t want to admit it. So we went to church at the same place after marriage and my beloved learned first hand how poisonous my obsession with reputation was. The majority of our early arguments were not about sex or even money (although we have had a few of those) they were about being late to church.

We sat through a good many worship songs brooding about the fight we had and not really focusing or worshipping.

Again by God’s grace we moved to Houston. It isn’t that I don’t love that little church, it is that I needed a new fresh and white canvas. Hubby and I needed a new start where I wasn’t so bound my people’s expectations. Its been marvelous and painful. I feel the need to find a church because I crave the community. At the same time it has been wonderful to find our own rhythm. We can sleep in if that is the healthy option and I don’t whine and complain about what people will think if we aren’t there. We can garden on Sunday and worship God in the absolute splendor of his creation.

But there is still one thing that I haven’t fully surrendered and perhaps it is the hardest one. As I said, I thought I would certainly work in some sort of holy career where I could save thousands of people from the pit of hell, have lots of spiritual children and make everyone’s life a little better.

Last week I started working at an Christian ESL school. It is an uncomfortable and uprooting process but I have felt so many of my precious and tightly held presuppositions cracked, shattered and blown to smitherines. We have students from all over the world with every religion you could possibly imagine thrown into the mix. It is a true melting pot. It should be my dream job but I starting to wonder if such a thing really exists.

I feel like I don’t belong. I am trying to be what they expect of me but I guess I am sort of tired of putting on airs. So I don’t always laugh at their jokes and I see the problems of disorganization and poor management and I can’t help but want to change them. It isn’t ok with me that this is how they have always done things. I see the injustice and for once I am slowly losing my affection for a good reputation.

All I can see is the opportunities being squandered. I can feel the tension in the classroom, in the whole building. There are high hopes from professors to shed the light of Christ on these pagan students. And yet, I am looking in their eyes and seeing true joy, hope, light. I always thought non-believers would have dead eyes- no joy. I was wrong. And I am struggling with this: They don’t seem to really need what I have to give. From a theological standpoint I know they do. I am still unyielding in my belief that Jesus is the only way to true Life. The problem is that it is getting harder to reconcile my theology with my experiences. I know what they say: You must let your theology define your experiences and not your experiences define your theology. But they are all sitting in comfortable offices teaching truths that are much harder to live.

They haven’t met my incredible refugee students that I teach in the apartment complex downtown. You have never seen such open-faced gratitude, such simple child like joy and contentment. They have been through hell living in refugee camps and now starting over in a foreign country, yet they laugh with sweet abandon when I act-a-fool trying to explain English.

I wanted to do something Holy, Great, Meaningful with my life. I wanted to be the Texas Mother Theresa. Yet I am realizing her work wasn’t really very glorious. It was stinky and frustrating, tiring and heartbreaking. It was probably pretty mundane and people probably thought she was crazy. Here I am filing more papers than I ever cared to and trying to figure out exactly what I am supposed to be doing and finishing eleven hour days with sore feet and not much in my tank (emotional, spiritual, physical and gas tanks).

So I am praying and seeking to find if this current job is really the place where I am to stay. Meanwhile, I am trying to figure out how to be content being me, or Me and Jesus and Hank, for the timebeing.

Biblical Headship and a Church

Hank and I are still ‘Church Shopping’ as he calls it and the more we shop the more picky we find we are. We want a place where we feel comfortable and at home, we want the people to be friendly but not overly so- in a natural and comfortable sort of way. We want solid worship with songs that have a message of truth not just relevance and repetition. We want a solid preacher who focuses more on the passages and what they say than the topic he picked and what he can find to back it up.

This morning we went to a church that seemed to fit all of those standards- CRAZY right?! Now I am not so naïve as to think it is perfect or that we won’t quickly discover problems if/when we join. Every church has issues just as every person has issues. The church is a lot of people so you just have to multiply the issues x number of  people and you’ll understand.

Nevertheless, we were immediately greeted at the door outside and again right after we entered. A very bald man with a huge smile pointed us in the direction of the coffee(always a good sign) and asked us about ourselves. We (I) got some coffee, talked with the hospitality people and headed into the sanctuary.  The lyrics of the music were mostly hymn-ish but the beat was something you could tap your toe to. We sang and the lyrics were all a message in themselves.

As part of the worship, the singers read scripture and one read in Spanish- the other in English. LOVE.

The pastor got up after worship and made his announcements. As he introduced the topic he said we would be delving into issues that were difficult to discuss. He was right! We started into 1 Cor 11:1-16 and immediately began talking about biblical headship in the marriage and church. I would normally be a bit on edge but he handled it in such a biblical, truthful and honest way. He didn’t apologize for the words of the apostle but showed the principles of modesty and love inherent in the separate roles of women and men. He showed the responsibility of men as reporting directly to Christ on the state of their home and the responsibility of women to let the men lead and to submit. It was soo good. He talked about how partnership and headship are each important in a biblical marriage just as we see them inherent in the relationship of Christ and the Father. They are equal in essence but different in function just as man and woman are.

I felt like he MUST have taken some classes from my bible profs. Hank leaned over several times and made references to the steps he was taking that lined up with the methods we were taught in Biblical Foundations at LeTourneau. “Ok now he is crossing the principalizing bridge…”

Recently I finished reading Calvin Miller’s memoir. It is called “Life is Mostly Edges” and it is honest, refreshing, convicting, funny, sad and triumphant all at once. It is a beautiful testament of a life lived for the Lord- failingly at times but nonetheless for His Glory.

In the end, Miller talks about why he feels the Lord calling him away from the ministry of pastoring a successful, growing and thriving church to become a seminary prof. He says that God called him away from the church for the sake of the church. He felt himself no longer what the church wanted and maybe even needed. He had always sought to be a scholar-pastor and what they wanted was a relevant community leader. They wanted, in many ways, someone who was more interested in the church softball league signups that the etymology of a specific word in Greek.

From his perspective, he saw that the church in the emergent movement became more interested in what culture was (and what their place was in it) than what culture should be.

I am not a student of the emergent church and I don’t claim to know much about the ins and outs of the short movement or the current movement we are in. But I think Miller has a point. I think relevance can somehow cheapen the faith by gravitating too much towards what we think the ‘outsiders,’ or the unsaved are looking for. If we become just like that concert they went to than do we really think they will come? The concert is a whole lot more fun and they don’t have to face a crowd of people they feel they don’t belong to.

When they come in, surely it will be truth that draws them. I am not sure that truth must take one form (ex. Hymns and expositional sermons) but it must be Truth with a capital T. It is the truth that Jesus loves but is also just that makes the mercy the more beautiful.

I found myself personally convicted because of the language I use in my own home with Hank. Sometimes I seem to think I am on this journey alone. I say things like “I won’t let our kids do that,” or bemoan our dirty house by saying, “I need to do the laundry and clean the kitchen.” Hank, in his sensitive yet firm way, says, “Dear, we will clean the kitchen together and we will do the laundry.”

I am not in this alone. I have a partner but I also have a man who is very much the captain of this ship. Sometimes it is scary to trust that he can lead us well but the more he loves, the more I trust and it all works out.

Thus I am going to work on changing my language and with it my attitude.

He is my partner but he is also the head of our home and I love him so much for that.

P.s. we were on time for church this morning. This is a major accomplishment and worth noting. J

Talking Rocks

I am not a big fan of being alone at home for long periods of time. I used to love it when my family would leave for the day and I could just read and read and read. I could usually go to sleep without too much trouble. But NOW that I am married, I hear every noise, every shifting of the house. I've been reading a Frank Peretti book off and on all day and my eyes are about to fall out of my skull.

     Today I felt the need to read something else. That familiar tug that drew me back to the Words that will endure forever, that will never lose relevance.

Randomly I started reading towards the end of Joshua, where God is parcelling out the land that he has given Israel. The details are so beautiful.

Joshua begins by setting up cities of refuge- where people who committed accidental murders could run and not be killed by the deceased person's family. It struck me how simple and yet beautiful God's plans are. He created peace by giving a sanctuary to those who had made such an aggegious mistake. He stopped the chain of events that would certainly be fueled by hate and grief and brought peace to the situation.

Then I kept reading. In Joshua 23, Joshua speaks his final words to Israel. He has come to the end of his life and he knows it. So he does what a father would do, what a leader would do, what any man who had shepherded a whole people group and followed in the footsteps of Moses would do...

He gives them their commission. Just as Moses gave him a great commission, he commissions the entire tribe.

"Soon I will die, going the way of all the earth. Deep in your hearts you know that every promise of the Lord your God has come true. Not a single one has failed! But as surely as the Lord your God has given you the good things he promised, he will also bring disaster on you if you disobey him. He will completely wipe you out from this good land he has given you. If you break the covenant of the Lord your Godby worshipping and serving other gods, his anger will burn against you, and you will quickly be wiped out from the good land he has given you." Josh 23: 14-16

First of all, how incredible is it that God brought every promise to fruition in the lives of his people? Wow. He kept his word completely in faithfulness. Second of all, Joshua is pretty blunt eh? No nonsense where disobedience is concerned!

After reminding the people of the faithfulness of God and the necessity to keep his covenant, he reviews the vast and complex history that brought them to where they are at that moment.
   He has labored and saved a complaining, moaning and rebellious people. God has extended grace upon grace.

"It was not your swords or bows that brought you victory. I gave you cities you did not build- the cities in which you are now living. I gave you vineyards and olive groves for food, though you did not plant them."
   Oh Lord, isn't that my prayer? That you would give me an inheritance in this place? That you would allow me to build upon the legacy others have left? That you would show me spiritual vineyards and olive groves ready for the picking?

Then Joshua gives the people a choice. God has been faithful to them despite everything. Everything.
Now the people have a choice. They can make a covenant with the Holy, Jealous God of the universe or they can turn to false gods. There really isn't a choice because God will destroy them if they take the latter and they will inevitably fail with the first option. But I can imagine that Joshua asked so that they were personally responsible for their commitment to God. It wasn't going to be their leader's faith or the Levites faith, they needed to own it if they were going to remain faithful once Joshua was gone.

The people chose to follow God(Smart choice) and Joshua made a covenant with the people "committing them to a permanent and binding contract between themselves and the Lord." (23:25b)

But Joshua was a smart leader. He knew how quickly people forget their commitments after an emotional experience. Perhaps he had struggled to stay faithful himself.
 
   So Joshua took a rock.

I have no idea why he took a rock but that is what he did.

He took a big ol' rock and rolled it under the oak tree, right where everyone would see it on the way to the tabernacle. There was no going to the meeting place of the Most High without remembering the commitment they had made.

This is the part I love.

"This stone has heard everything the Lord said to us. It will be a witness to testify against you if you go back on your word to God. "

Part of me thinks this is pretty funny. Common Josh, a stone?! Everyone knows rocks can't talk.... Isn't that where we get the expression, "dumb as a rock." But then I remember this. I remember that Jesus said if we are silent and don't proclaim is name, even the rocks will cry out! Maybe they aren't as dumb as we think.

Sometimes I forget to see the stone. Sometimes I forget that the very walls of this house hear and see my daily communion with God. These walls bear witness to the time I have spent just wasting time. They bear witness to my good intentions that never happen. They see my worship and my prayers but they don't see or hear those enough.

If these walls could talk I am not sure I would want to know what they have to say.

Have I forgotten the commitment, the covenant I made with the Jealous fierce warrior-King that loves me deeper and more fully than I can imagine?

It isn't the rock that is important but the remembering. It is grace that gives a reminder in the first place. Because He knew/knows that we would/will forget and so he surrounds us with reminders simple, clear and beautiful.

Let the walls of my house be rocks of remembrance. May the scriptures I put up be coordinates to guide my daily living.