Yearly Archives: 2013

Out of Ashes

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40Forty is an important biblical number. During the Genesis flood it rained 40 days and 40 nights; Moses grew up in pharaoh’s palace for 40 years, lived in the wilderness for another 40, and led the Israelites through the desert during his last 40; at the time of the Ten Commandments, he was on Mt. Sinai for 40 days.

It took the Israelite spies 40 days to search out the Promised Land; King Saul, King David, and King Solomon each reigned for 40 years; the people of Nineveh repented after 40 days; Jesus was tempted in the wilderness for 40 days; and there were 40 days between Jesus’ resurrection and his ascension.

So what’s the significance of this number? Many scholars say the biblical 40 most often references a period of significant testing or struggle, followed by a time of God’s blessing.

Crown of Thorns

Today we find ourselves at another important 40, the days of Lent. As we again consider the horror of the cross, it’s a good idea to carve out time to reflect on all that our Savior endured. Knowing the number 40 represents struggle, 40 days for Lent seems appropriate.

I often wonder what Jesus did during his 40 days of misery in the wilderness. Scripture doesn’t let us in on the details, but we do know a few things: he lived among wild animals during that time; he was tempted by Satan repeatedly, possibly on all 40 days; he ate nothing and grew very hungry; and at the end of this agony, angels rushed from heaven to earth to help him.

Because we’re unable to participate in any of Jesus’ sufferings, whether in the wilderness or on a cross, Lent offers a time to rearrange our lives just a little by offering token participation in what Jesus went through. We willingly force ourselves to give up something we usually enjoy or surrender some of “our” time to do good for others.

Because our congregation was together tonight to initiate these 40 days of thinking about the cross, Pastor Kyle offered a symbolic way for us to recognize it was our sin that put Jesus on the cross to die: ashes on the forehead. Setting aside what little I knew about this Lenten custom, I focused on why I need the repentance Christ made possible and stepped forward for my ashes, a sign of death and grief.

The pastor said, “Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord,” a quote from Psalm 130 and also the cry of my heart. “If you, Lord, kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness.” (vv. 3-4)

The Cross

May 40 days of small sacrifices shake up our thinking enough to prompt fresh, potent understanding of what Jesus willingly did to bring the beauty of eternal life from the ashes of certain death.

“Put your hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is unfailing love and with him is full redemption.” (Psalm 130:7)

The Unclogging Process

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After two days of watching my enthusiastic relatives work to clear my basement pipes, I’m sad to say they remain clogged. Things other than pipes, however, have been unclogging.

It began as blog readers shared their plumbing adventures with me and each other. Nancy wrote, “We had rocking toilets, collapsing sewer pipes, root-clogged drainage pipes, and so much more. One time our shower water was not going down, so David took the entire drain apart. I went upstairs and looked at the ‘air hole’ under the faucet, which was full of hair. I pulled the hair out, and David, who was downstairs looking up, got a face full of water.”

But Nancy also wrote about clogs of a different sort, the things that clog relationships and inhibit the important back-and-forth flow of communication between two people: “God used our house issues to teach David and me how to communicate without sharp words and with lots of love. Just like frustration levels soar with blocked pipes, so other emotions can sneak in and [clog our relationship], leading to spilled words that don’t belong in a marriage.”

She described how sin between two people (or between one person and God) is hidden from view when it begins, and then unforgiven sin is the start of big-time clogs in the relationships. The Bible says we’re to be “quick to hear,” and if someone can’t hear what God or each other is saying because sin is clogging the way, relationships dry up in a hurry. The reverse is true, too. Where would we be without the ability to pour out our troubles to God?

Clean drain

Yesterday my sister mentioned a TV ad from long ago in which a clear acrylic drain trap under the sink was filled with gunk. When the drain-clearing product being advertised was poured into the acrylic pipe, we watched in amazement as the clog rushed away like a mini-roller coaster on a track, allowing clean water to flow freely through the pipe.

That’s exactly how it is when we keep current in our communication with God and each other. As soon as the slightest bit of goo accumulates in the lines between us, we should quickly route it out before it gets big enough to hinder the flow. If the talking-listening paths become as badly clogged as my basement pipes are, restoring the back-and-forth of open communication might take days or even weeks.

Possibly...

It may not happen at all without painful excavating, followed by major reconstruction…. which is exactly where I fear my basement pipe-project is going.

I have an ace-in-the-hole, though: Nancy.

If I become feeble in whatever plumbing process lies ahead of me, I can always email her voice of experience, and I know she’ll “hear me clearly.”

“Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.” (Ephesians 4:29)

Obstructed (Part 2)

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After a discouraging day yesterday trying to rod out a basement drain pipe, my brother-in-law Bervin and nephew Karl returned early this morning with a bigger, better cable machine, determined to solve the problem. They’d figured out that the pipe, on its way from our shower to the street sewer, had become blocked with hair-like roots surrounded by globs of dirt.

From the pipe

Apparently a tiny root needs only a sliver between two sections of clay pipe to work its way in. As it grows, it produces a network of new roots, and the steady water supply of a shower-fed pipe facilitates hearty growth.

Little by little dirt follows roots into the pipe, and voila, a colossal clog. The guys pulled out a bucket-full of root-parts along with a generous supply of rich black soil, and it wasn’t long before the basement smelled like a newly rototilled garden.

As Bervin forced the twisting cable further and further down the pipe, there was no end to the root-dirt combo they found. It seemed to be literally filling the pipe, some roots the thickness of a finger. How any shower water could have drained in recent weeks was beyond our understanding.

Phase 2

About 3 hours later and 60 feet of cable down the pipe, our diligent workers reached an impasse beyond which the spinning line absolutely refused to go. By their calculations, it had passed under our entire basement floor, through the front yard, and out to the road in front of our house. Still the whoosh of free-flowing water we’d all longed to hear, hadn’t happened.

Eventually everybody runs into projects like this one, a set of rigid circumstances that refuses to bend to our will. It’s exasperating and even angering, but neither of those emotions help solve the problem.

Sometimes we encounter people-projects just as exasperating and angering, and our frustration leads us to apply the same force to change a person as we applied to the basement pipe, with the hope that we can make someone bend to our will. We might use our most creative ingenuity in an effort to force them to change, but much like our basement dilemma, for various reasons it doesn’t work.

After years of trying and lots of failing on my part, I’ve finally learned there’s only one way to change another person, and that’s to step back and let God do it. His power to convict, correct, and create something new within a human being is in a category all its own, just like a professional plumber’s high-powered equipment is superior to anything we’ve been able to use in our pipe.

God’s Spirit can cause change to flow into someone’s life like we never could, and I’m hoping a well-equipped plumber will be able to get water flowing through my shower drain again.

(Fingers crossed.)

Jesus cried out, “Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ ” (John 7:38)