Monthly Archives: September 2013

Celebrity or Commoner?

Posted on by

September never fails to include a few lovely summer days, and today was one of them. Rather than have my devotions at home, I grabbed Jack and headed for the beach, our shared favorite place.

Pretty stones.While he romped in the dunes and did happy dances upside- down on the sand, I took a few minutes to walk the wave line looking for pretty stones and the occasional piece of beach glass.

Since the waves were small today, the stones were small, too. “Mini’s” we call them. But they’re every bit as pretty as their larger counterparts. Walking along slowly picking up stones, I spotted a piece of aqua-tinted beach glass. A few feet further there was a brown one, then two frosty-white ones. Step-after-step I found more and more until I had 24 in all, quite an unusual yield for a short strip of beach.

24 pieces.It’s interesting that beach glass is man-made and stones are God-made. Both are frequently taken home as treasures, but they’re very different from one another. The bits of etched glass are glamorous, rare, the “celebrities” of beach finds. Attractive stones are more common, easier to find, and have no special sparkle.

People come in those two varieties, too. Some sparkle with fame and fortune, whether through Hollywood, Washington DC, Wall Street, or even in a pastorate. We can easily become enamored with these superstars, putting them on mental pedestals, since the rest of us are much like commonplace beach stones by comparison. We’re ordinary and have no reason to grace a magazine cover or be interviewed on TV.

Because of the stark difference between celebs and non-celebs, we commoners can sometimes fall into the trap of wondering if we’re accomplishing anything significant in our lives. If we fall prey to this kind of analysis, though, God has some comforting news for us.

Let’s pretend we’re the beach stones, and the “movers and shakers” of this world are the beach glass. God is the one walking along the shore, except that he wouldn’t do what I did this morning, picking up only the choicest finds. He would arrive at the beach with a giant scooper big enough to lift every single piece off the sand, glass and stones alike. They’d mix together indiscriminately, and once he got us home, he wouldn’t separate us into separate piles. Every piece would be equally valuable.

Mixed together.Picturing God on the beach behind the controls of a scooper is silly but expresses the truth that he loves each of us equally and offers eternal salvation to all in the same way. Living an ordinary life without sparkle or flash does nothing to diminish our “chances” with him. He loves us all, and when we say yes to him, he’ll take us home.

“God shows no favoritism. In every nation he accepts those who fear him and do what is right. This is the message of Good News…. that there is peace with God through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all.” (Acts 10:34-36)

 

Bend and Stretch

Posted on by

Easy....No one is more flexible than a baby. The way they contort and pretzel themselves makes us wonder if their joints are made of bubble gum. At 11 months, Emerald has no trouble bending her legs straight up to her mouth and nibbling on her toes. She does it often, just for the fun of it. Somewhere along the way, though, gum-like joints change to stiff ones, and unless we’re constantly pursuing the training of a gymnast, we’ll never again put our toes in our mouth (which is not to say we’d want to).

Flexibility should continue to be, however, an important feature of our adult lives in ways other than physically. Take personal opinion, for example. How many of us stubbornly cling to our views even after someone else has made a different but valid point. Sometimes we rigidly refuse to listen at all, leaving others with a negative impression of us.

Older people are often labeled as “rigid”, most frequently by younger people. Since I’m a senior now, I’ve seriously considered this negative reputation, wondering if it’s true. Maybe our refusal to change the way we think is simply a result of more accumulated life experiences than the young. We might feel we “know better” and therefore resent the label.

The truth is, younger people aren’t the only ones doing the labeling. Don’t we oldsters sometimes see their flexibility and call it “youthful foolishness?” So who’s right?

Both groups are probably wrong. The trick to appreciating each other’s points of view is just to listen in love. But do I do that?

Last Sunday our pastor challenged us to insert the pronoun “I” into the Bible’s love chapter (1 Corinthians 13) as a way to assess whether or not we’re showing love to others. Here’s what mine sounded like: “I am patient. I am kind. I don’t boast. I’m not proud. I don’t insist on my own way. My love never ends.”

Ouch.

The holes in my supposedly loving flexibility were as evident as the holes in a young person’s professionally ripped jeans. I knew I had work to do.

For more than half my adult life I’ve lived under the same roof with teens and 20-somethings, and we’ve had our share of clashes. But God has tried to teach me all kinds of things through them, not the least of which is to be flexible in my thinking when hearing them out.

The older I get, the more this phenomenon of learning from the young proves to be a practical way to combat opinion-rigidity. They are pros at listening without judging, seriously considering one another’s take on things. I’ll never be as good at it as they are, but the more I’m willing to bend and stretch to listen lovingly, the greater the chance I won’t get opinion-stiff.

Nibble nibble!As for ever again being flexible enough to suck on my toes? I’d much rather be nibbling on Emerald’s!

“Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions.” (Proverbs 18:2)

Crying It Out

Posted on by

Every woman knows what it means to “have a good cry.” There are all sorts of reasons, and we begin figuring that out when we’re still children. I remember being 10 years old and melting down on the front steps at church, a poorly chosen venue to fall apart. But good cries are no respecter of time or place, and out it poured.

Mom handled it by ushering me toward the curb saying, “Honey, I love you! Your dad loves you! Your brother and sister love you! You have lots of friends! Now get in the car!”

My tears probably had very little to do with a specific issue and more to do with the build-up of internal pressures that needed to be released. In any case, by the time we arrived home, I felt much better, which is exactly what a good cry will do for you.

A good cryBiochemists tell us people feel better after a big cry because tears are loaded with stress hormones that are ushered out of our bodies through the vehicle of our tears. Some people think tears come out when tensions become too much to bear, much like perspiration comes out when our bodies take on too much heat.

When I was a new widow, I expended a great deal of effort trying not to cry. I didn’t want to break down in front of people, not because it would have been embarrassing but because I didn’t want the sympathy that tears inevitably brought. I didn’t want to be singled out as someone who was feeling so sad she needed extra attention. And I didn’t want people to think I was the needy one in the crowd, even though I was.

Yet widows must cry. The loss of a mate, especially one who is also a dear friend, confidante, comrade, and lover, is tear-worthy for sure. And so we wait for those moments when we know we won’t be interrupted: during the night, in the car, on a walk, in the shower. And oh the good cries we have then!

But even though it’s good to cry, God doesn’t want us to get stuck there, thinking that’s as good as it’s going to get. Tears are indeed good, and God gets the credit for inventing them, but crying has limited use. As Ecclesiastes says, it may endure for a night, but joy should come in the morning. After nearly 4 years of widowhood, I’ve found that it does.

Ha ha!Sometimes our emotions are like a roller coaster, cry-joy-cry-joy-cry, but God is forever surprising us with fresh blessings and an awareness of his close presence, which helps stabilize us. And once in a while he’ll even bless us with a bout of crying that comes from laughing too hard.

When that happens, it’s a really good cry.

“Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.”  (Luke 6:21)