Thoughts on September Grief

Earthly nations decay, and there is no exception. It's much easier to read about it in history, than to be in the middle of it happening. Nations are made of people,  and sin and death, the instruments of decay, hurt people. I am one. When, like decadent and luxurious Rome, nations topple, the people in them are hit with sudden grief. And just like many Americans, the people now buried in dust thought at the time that Babylon or Rome or the Caliphate would always be the world's power. Our nation hasn't toppled yet, but the worms are eating it - and that's both grievous and okay.

He who said "My kingdom is not of this world" is our King. His servants are safe both here and hereafter in His service, but perhaps we've forgotten what that kind of safety is. It's a safety that transcends anything a government can provide. A just government should provide safety for its citizens because it is right, but if we put our trust in it, we are wrong. We want a safe and righteous country and should pray for one, but we don't need one in order to be the witnesses of the risen Christ. If He sees us not doing a great job of witnessing for Him in a safe context of dignity and respectability, He is free to give us a dangerous context of misrepresentation and scorn, in which we can discover that we are still safe in His omnipotent love.

If we haven't wanted badly enough for Jesus to return, we might start feeling uncomfortable enough to start praying for it more earnestly. We might start feeling unsafe enough to stop worrying about our perceived safety and serving with more abandon the One who is a shield about us in all places.

Conservatives being depicted as Klan members in Facebook post 9-14-2025

We could curl up in grief and demonize our opponents. They are blinded by their unwillingness to acknowledge Christ as Lord, and so they demonize us as His representatives. It makes them feel in the right, and it hurts us deeply, when the Lord's people have enjoyed decades of national respectability. We are tempted to fight to prove them wrong and get our dignity back. We could list their monstrosities of error and could scorn them as miserable liars. Or we can choose to lay down our lives for them as people worth the Redeemer's blood. For them, we can risk proclaiming the gospel narrative because it has a power to convert and redeem that surpasses every reasonable argument. The dividing line must come at the cross of Christ. Let them know that it is for Christ's sake that they hate us, and not our food choice, school choice, or political choices. Only proclaiming the gospel itself draws the line that gets us hated as Christ's people. Being hated merely as a white conservative is not worth it. Being hated for Christ's sake is worth it. But do they know where we stand?

Make no mistake at this juncture. Those who serve this world may be in the guise of the left or the right, though the right is more sympathetic at this point in history to the things Christians value. We must not confuse the temporary blessings of God's grace with our eternal calling as His people. We must not be willing to sacrifice our love for the lost (including people on the left who hate us) speaking words of hatred against them because we want our nation back the way it was. We want Christ's kingdom to come. We want people on the left and the right to worship Him. Our pursuit of justice should be done as a service to God who calls nations to do justice, and not motivated by idolatrous fear for our comfort. If justice is taken from us, it's not the end of our Christian life. It's the next step in our calling to follow Him who was rejected of men. When He returns, no one will reject Him, and it will be worth everything to know that we are His.

After Talking to Hispanic Workmen on a Rainy Day

The house is still and warm.

Front door bangs to on 

drizzle, cold, and foggy

conversation with the 

work men come to 

lay new cables with 

their new brown hands.

They stumble over

English words, their brown eyes

hiding from another 

round of "I don't understand".

Hunched against the dampness, 

they think Spanish thoughts 

inside.

 

The dryer tumbles to a stop

just as I step inside,

My cold hands dive

into a nest of toasted t-shirts,

basking in the light bulb's 

yellow glow.

Outside it's grey.

 

Some time today,

brown hands will

end their day in rain

and take off hats,

printed with English words.

The lights will glow on in their

Spanish eyes, and Spanish

thoughts come tumbling

out like warm towels

into homey, waiting hands.

Three Poems for The Time

Nowadays

All that is required
is wine poured out
to Caesar -
an affirmation
- none exempt -
that he is lord.

Here is the cup,
where is your hand?
(Your soul is still your own)
Give Caesar his
three words of honor
with your mouth,
a second’s motion
with your hand,
and go your way
in peace.
Refusal is dishonor
and a gory death.
Don’t be a
narrow-minded fool
It’s just good manners
Nowadays.

===============

The Flattened Bow

"And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud: and I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh." - Genesis 9:14-15

A bow is much too
threatening
when it’s bent.
Take it down
and cut the string
Throw away
disturbing memories
of a God
who punishes and pardons.
His promises
of patience with the wicked
Are redolent of oppression,
archaic and offensive
to our realized selves.

Let’s break the bow
and keep the colors
for a flag
to celebrate ourselves.
We are the gods.
We are the selves.
We do the punishing and pardoning now,
and bear the fragments of the bow
of ancient covenant
with no thanks
for being spared
another deluge.

===============

 

Do Not Go Fragile

I owe the energy, language, and rhythm of this poem to Dylan Thomas’ famous poem, “Do Not Go Gentle”, which began to pulse in my brain and beg to be drummed out with different words. It is a call to those who feel the weight of the rising tide of cultural change to not be cowed by a sense of the inevitable, but to be courageously faithful in the midst of the darkness.

Do not go fragile into this loud night
Old truth must hold the torch at close of day
Burn, burn against the dying of the light

Wise men may see the end beyond our sight
of dawn above the tide of dark, and they
Do not go fragile into this loud night

Good men, the waves gone by, crying how bright
A faithful deed may shine above the bay
Burn, burn against the dying of the light

Free men, who watch and work while sun takes flight,
With grief grown bold observe departing day,
Do not go fragile into this loud night.

Grave men, whose eyes hold love of truth and right
Above the waves that rise to crush their prey,
Burn, burn against the dying of the light.

And you my brothers, thronged on that bare height,
Curse, bless this land with your fierce tears I pray.
Do not go fragile into this loud night.
Burn, burn against the dying of the light.

Diana or Christ?

Edwin Long (1829–1891)

The Mad Mother's Song

The children and I were recently introduced to The Mad Gardener's Song by Lewis Carroll via The Daily Poem. What a brilliant piece of nonsense! We all enjoyed it, especially me - so much so, that early this morning, I found myself composing my own version in the same form. The practice of composing one's own words in another's form is a way to learn different writing styles, and is a handy way for me to enjoy composition in this sometimes hectic season of life. My poem is  un-originally titled -

The Mad Mother's Song

She thought she saw a flock of sheep
That grazed upon a moor,
She looked again and saw
A soggy diaper on the floor.
"I should be grieved," she said
"If this remained forevermore."

She thought she saw a roll
Of toilet paper on the shelf.
She looked again and saw it was
An evil Christmas elf.
"Deception is the worst" she said
"When practised on one's self."

She thought she saw her husband
Coming home from work at noon.
She looked again and saw
It was the baby's dirty spoon.
"How rare," she sighed,
"To see our hopes be realized too soon."

She thought she saw a tank of goldfish
Waiting to be fed.
She looked and saw it was
A pile of laundry on the bed.
"Were those as dry as these," she said
"They would be rather dead."

She thought she saw a flock of geese
Migrating to the west.
She looked again and saw it was
Her daughter's winter vest.
"If one cannot migrate," she mused,
"It's best to be well dressed."

She thought she saw an ostrich
With her purse upon its back.
She looked again and saw it was
Her child's unfinished snack.
"If we waste food like this," she fumed,
"We'll end up in a shack."

She thought she saw her FitBit said
She'd walked a hundred miles
She looked and saw her husband
Had been standing there awhile
"How good," she cried, "To be alive
To greet him with a smile."

She thought she saw a choir of toddlers
Singing in her bed.
She looked again and saw
It was a doll without a head.
"How true," she thought, "that many trials
Are less than what we dread."

Note to the curious: I actually do not have a Christmas elf on the shelf or a FitBit, nor do I regularly encounter headless dolls. These simply came to mind as common items that fit my rhyme pattern!

The Good Life

I keep thinking about this piece of a paragraph from a current read - "Love Your God With All Your Mind" by J. P. Moreland:

"According to the modern view, the good life is the satisfaction of any pleasure or desire that someone freely and autonomously chooses for himself or herself. The successful person is the individual who has a life of pleasure and can obtain enough consumer goods to satisfy his or her desires. Freedom is the right to do what I want, not the power to do what I by nature ought to. Community gives way to individualism with the result that narcissism - an inordinate sense of self-love and self-centered involvement - is an accurate description of many people's lives."

This could seem at a glance to be another sadly accurate commentary upon the pitiful contemporary culture in the West - I've heard stuff like this so many times. But in this clear, objective description, I was unsettled to realize how much I saw of myself. I tend to think that I, as a Christian, am a separated observer of the follies of my surrounding culture - that I may have plenty of my own follies, but they are not those of the prevailing mucky-muck. I don't watch their shows, read their books, or worship their celebrities. I like old shows, read old books, and maintain a sincere fondness for G. K. Chesterton and Charles Spurgeon. But these are surface things, really. As much as I detest to admit it, I am a product of my culture. I am redeemed and sanctified in Christ, but I am not immune to the modern world's influence, anymore than a fish in a tank of water dyed pink. Don't I think of the good life kind of in the way he describes - sometimes? Sometimes I do think of life at its best when I have money to spend on something I want and time to do what I want. Time for me, stuff for me. Even if it isn't watching the latest chick flick on a brand new big screen TV, or some other culturally common ideal that I sort of despise, the underlying mindset can be the same.

What To Do, What To Do?

If news media reports, television announcements, and social media trending topics could be weighed in a balance, I wonder what the daily tonnage would be? Surely it would be a weight too burdensome to be borne. Even the fraction of the stuff that the average American tends to gather for their sack of daily worries is too heavy for my taste, so I try to accumulate as small a load as possible. But I still end up on many days with a chunk of discouraging information about the state of things...and oh, what to do with it? Especially for mothers, every bit of baddish news adds a weight of care to our concern for our children. What do I do as a mother with another piece of news that reminds me what a dangerous, broken world I will have to send my child to face? I don't have to list the variety of depressing issues available for us to consider - anyone reading this probably knows them all too well. 

But to make the illustration concrete, here is a piece of something I happened to pick up yesterday from a Washington Post article on Trump attacking someone on Twitter - "Her phone began ringing with callers leaving threatening messages that were often sexual in nature." One thinks, Ah, poor lady! but a mother thinks, How awful that our nation is increasingly full of predators, and I have this sweet baby girl - oh God, help! Mamas know this thought sequence really well. But I paused in my sorrowful prayer and thought What DO I do? What do I want for my children? This world is just going to be nasty until Jesus comes back, and I can't always protect my children. What do I seek for them? What can I give them? and the words came to my mind - "Holding fast to the word of life (Php. 2:16)." Yes. Yes! This is what I want for them. This is what I will labor to give them and pray to see made real in them - the truth about God, the gospel of Jesus, the whole counsel of Scripture, the grand, sweet promises, the unshakable hope, the words that bring life to the soul, that sustain the believer through every trial and carry them onward to Heaven, that nothing on earth can take away from them. Truly, if the bad things on the news happened to my children - and yet, they held fast to the word of life - it would be enough.

Yes, the worst could happen - that a child does not hold to the word of life. But the battle cry of every mother's heart should be, Not if I can help it! Or for the more vigorous among us, Over my dead body! This is done, not simply by force-feeding the tots a pile of memory verses -though that doesn't much hurt! - but pressing into the solid comfort of the Word of God myself. I can't give what I don't have. But when it comes to what to do with 'the stuff out there', I can use those heavy lumps of bad news, and plunk them down on the lever of my determination to hold fast to the word of life before my children - to know and cherish the word of God for myself, and so doing to set it more faithfully before them. To use another metaphor - the colder the thermometer drops outside, the more wood you throw on the fire. Let me be found strengthening my soul with the Word of God, and when my children need strength, it will be the first thing I give them.

Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.
(Philippians 2:13-16 ESV)

Art ~ Munkácsy, Mihály, Woman Carrying Faggot, 1873

Consider the other side of the battle on The Impossible Goal.

A Prayer for Our Town

Every time I go to the local grocery store, or the library, or just about anywhere that isn't going back over the border into Virginia, I have to drive past a disturbing assortment of "gentleman's clubs" (oh so un-aptly named!) locally known as strip clubs, as well as the adult store, pubs and other questionable establishments. Giving thanks that my little ones in the backseat can't read signs yet, I also feel burdened to pray and to act toward our nearest town's great traffic in sin.

What can one tired, hands-full mama do? Praying is a lot. I asked the ladies at our small group to pray with me and listening to one of them pray, I realized that she was latching on to specific requests for different people involved, and that I needed to do the same. I started crafting a prayer, with a dream to print and post on every public bulletin board and church resource table in town. "Take one and pray with me wherever you are at 8pm" or something like that. But for now, it's starting right here with me.

A Prayer for Our Town

God, we confess that we are a people who follow our selfish desires more than love for our neighbor. We have thought, spoken and acted in ways that are unclean and dishonoring to you. We have not done what we should. We pray that you would cleanse us and change our hearts.

We pray that you would bring righteousness to this town, specifically that you would shut down the strip clubs in our town, where your glory and honor are despised. Turn the hearts of each club manager to do right, and to help our community instead of harming it.

We pray that you would provide club dancers and other troubled women in our town with good, better jobs, that you would cleanse them, restore them, and show them your mercy and love. Lord, deliver them!

We pray that you would turn the hearts of men to their wives and families, to love women instead of lusting for them, to build up what is broken in their lives and to seek you above all. Give us whole families who will love and serve you.

We pray that you would turn the hearts of every man, woman and child in this town to You.  

All this is a work that only You can do, so that is why we ask You to do it in the name of Jesus 

Amen.

This Too Will Be For Good

When I was a freshman in college, I experienced the typical reaction to the first week of classes - often called "syllabus shock" - how would I ever be able to muster the time and mental resources to complete this enormous load of assignments just presented to me? Stressed and anxious, I took the matter to the Lord, praying for help. The truth that he opened to my fretful heart in those first weeks was that though I had trusted him for my financial needs, I had not learned to trust him for those less tangible matters of energy and time, yet these were just as much in his power to provide as the other. I was enabled to begin trusting that these too would be given to me for the asking - and they were.

This lesson often pictures to me what it is like to face a new lesson of faith. I must learn to trust my God in all things, and not just in the places where I have grown familiar with seeing His hand. I think this is a lesson that I and many of my fellow believers will have to learn as we look at our nation and are tempted to despair. 

I wonder how many of us are thinking something like, "Well, I know God is in charge, but this is going to be terrible"? Having a bad president may be terrible, but a dozen other things one may meet in this fallen world may terrible, while "through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God" This ugly scary state of things is the very place for us to firmly believe that God is good to His people. Do I believe that "In all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose" is more deep and solid than our nation's foundations? Do I believe that if the nation falls into the hands of unprincipled tyrants, despite all we can do as faithful citizens, it is just a new step in the lessons of faith our Father has for us between here and Heaven? 

There is a pervasive sense that we are entering bad times in our country. Maybe this is true. But I think there is a place for a bolder faith that can look straight in the face of the dreadful political reports and sing - 

"Ye fearful saints fresh courage take

The clouds ye so much dread

Are big with mercy and shall break

In blessing on your head!"

Yes, our God is "He who disciplines the nations" (Psalm 94:10 ESV), which is a fearful thing for America. But God has also promised His children regarding the painful discipline they undergo (surely even if they must pass through the discipline of their nation at large) - "later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it." (Heb 12:11 ESV). For a nation it may be judgment, but for the believers in it, it may be a wholesome training with sweet fruit. This is a good thing.

So here's to faith in 2016 - faith that God's promises are better than the U. S. Constitution, and more sure and everlasting - faith that loving and obeying God will still be the path of ultimate blessing for His children, whether or not God blesses America nationally. Faith is God's great gift to us on the way to Heaven - and that is our better country.

Pop Stars in the News and Thinking Like a Christian

A little while ago, a friend of mine posted to Facebook a video of an interview with the newly-spiritual Justin Bieber. I was intrigued and hopeful as I watched, but was disappointed to see that in all this troubled young man's reaching after God, he had never grasped the real gospel, true repentance and faith in Christ. (I also wished that someone would muzzle the incredibly banal interviewer.) How good it would be for someone come into his life and build sound doctrine on the few things he's grasped.



But that wasn't the end of my thoughts on the topic. If it was, the thoughts wouldn't be nagging me to write about this Bieber thing instead of taking a nap on the couch. There are lots of videos out there of people with shallow doctrine on which we could make judicious comments for the rest of our free time. But there was something deeper. What won't leave my mind is what this video did to my feelings about pop stars and the crazy world out there in general.

First, I have to say that I believe it a waste of time and compromise of pursuing holiness for believers to try to keep up with pop stardom. We have better things to do. But while living a normal life, we do end up hearing or seeing something about the most notable in the limelight. And how do we respond? I was thinking about this especially in regard to the young and dissolute Justin Bieber, who over the past few years became among the most despised, ridiculed figures in conservative America. Who among the 20-something generation hasn't heard at some point a humorous comment which referenced Bieber?

But when I watched this video, I was struck by this one thing. While we were continuing to mock Justin Bieber for his follies, the young man himself was feeling his misery and seeking help. And who of us were praying for him? Again, I'm not hoping that Christians will start reading People magazine to find prayer requests - I'm thinking about our general attitude to things we hear. It doesn't take the Holy Spirit to despise an immoral pop star. It does take the Holy Spirit to be grieved that another person is sinning (so publicly especially) and falling short of God's glory, and yet, yet they may be justified freely by His grace in Jesus Christ. I don't think Bieber reached this point - and yet, he could, and so could any other by God's grace.

Christians with the Holy Spirit should be glad to know as little as possible of the vain doings of the world, but what we do hear should not make us smirk. It's fun for our pride to lift itself up on the rubble of the popular. That's why we enjoy laughing at them, and in one sense it is good to keep a perspective that the world's pursuits are vain and empty ("the world is passing away along with its desires"- 1 John 2:17). But Christ looked at the rich young ruler and loved him (Mark 10:21), and he calls us to die to self and follow in His steps. We may not be acting Christianly every time we laugh - perhaps we ought to hope, pity and pray.

That Masculine Strength

Here's a delightful tidbit of Lewis from the last book in his space trilogy - That Hideous Strength. The Director's words to the doubting, searching Jane gave me a fresh perspective on how my girl's life has been drastically changing as I've married a man and am now preparing to have a boy child. Maleness and femaleness are much deeper than biology and we oughtn't to run from what God intended these realities to do in our lives. 

Here's the Director's response to the unhappily married Jane, who is realizing, with some disturbance, that masculinity is not the primitive and barbarian thing she once thought it to be:

"There is no escape [from being invaded by the masculine]. If it were a virginal rejection of the male, He would allow it. Such souls can bypass the male and go on to meet something far more masculine, higher up, to which they must make a yet deeper surrender.  But your trouble has been what the old poets called Daungier. We call it Pride. You are offended by the masculine itself: the loud, irruptive, possessive thing - the gold lion, the bearded bull - which breaks through hedges and scatters the little kingdom of your primness as the dwarfs scattered the carefully made bed. The male you could have escaped, for it exists only on the biological level.  But the masculine none of us can escape.  What is above and beyond all things is so masculine that we are all feminine in relation to it..."

I love these words - not only for how they give me a healthy perspective on my own life, but also for how they fly like a fresh wind in the face of current reasoning about the legitimacy of homosexuality. I'm not like Jane in that I'm quite happy to be married to a real masculine person. But words that can pull one person from disapproval to appreciation, can also move another person from vague appreciation to hearty appreciation, and that's what they did for me.

The conversation continues:

"...You had better agree with your adversary quickly."
"You mean I shall have to become a Christian?" said Jane.
"It looks like it," said the Director.

Under the Rainbow

Have you seen the banner for the Gay Pride movement?

It's nearly a dumb question, because nearly no one hasn't seen the signature rainbow flag - in college dorm windows, on bumper stickers, on television news reports, etc. I've seen plenty of them, and noticed another on a bumper sticker this morning as I was walking up Liberty Street. I've always gotten the message the movement is trying to send with their colorful stripes - "We like diversity and we accept everyone and it's a big happy party".

But this morning, for some reason, the flag on that bumper sticker sent me a different message.
It's a rainbow.
The rainbow is a sign of God's covenant mercy and patience with man's perversity:

"... the LORD said in his heart, “I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done. While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.” (Genesis 8:21-22 ESV)
When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh." (Genesis 9:14-15 ESV)

Isn't it amazing? That a movement seeking to promote a lifestyle that goes against what God created them to be, a movement marching proudly into the last frontiers of man's heart that "is evil from his youth", should do so under the banner of God's patiently withheld judgment?

This morning the gay pride bumper sticker with its bright rainbow colors said to me, "God is patient with you - sinners, both homosexual and 'straight'- not wanting any to perish but all to come to repentance." It said, "We are a nation under judgment - but oh, of what a patient and merciful God". Incredible that rebels against a good King should march under the sign of His longsuffering. But we cannot wave the sign of God's promised mercy in His face as we disobey Him forever. The Lord is not a God to be mocked, but to be glorified for both his patience and his justice.

"For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.
But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.
Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. 
(2 Peter 3:5-13 ESV)

Someday, people who marched under the rainbow flag will stand with others who abhorred that striped banner - both worshiping before the rainbow-encircled throne, glorifying God for His mercy, for they have all been washed and sanctified and justified by the blood of the Son of God. But that will only happen if God's mercy leads them to repentance here.  Think of it next time you see a rainbow flag.

American Amnesia

We are a people who have amnesia toward God. He is the end and goal of the entire universe. How can it be that he is so absent from our lives? The answer is of course, sin. But we don't call it that. Murder is sin. But forgetting God?...

American commercialism emphasizes the enhancement of our enjoyment of God's gifts - "Indulge your senses and satisfy your cravings; though it cost all you have, get comfort!" Advertisements don't call their goods God's gifts. He is simply ignored, and we are quickly and quietly led to completely forget Him, though he is the Giver. This is so wrong.

This departure from the divine is extremely subtle. To the Christian, the silence toward God ought to sound louder than every perky voice and trite tune that surrounds and fruitlessly endeavors to fill that silent space. But more often we are drawn by American commercialism into a world filled with pleasant things we don't possess and health we don't have (unless we would use that brand of laxative...) namely we are presented with a heaven on earth without God! In such a God-less paradise may we ever hear the hollow, howling void that whispers "hell."

In television programs and advertisements about healthy, care-free, luxurious, comfortable lives, may we ever see what lies beyond them - namely eternity - and remember. Remember eternity. Remember God. Television causes you to forget what is important.

Therefore, let us turn from the hollow world, choosing not to fill our God-given minds with the God-less American dream. In practical English: Turn of the television, get your Bible and start praying that God would make you a person who loves Him and lives for eternity.

Let us then, turning from the world, turn to our Lord Jesus who is himself heaven on earth, even in impoverishment. He is in a cold and lonely house our dearest friend; in crawling, crowded tenements our joy and peace. His love is better than life! Let us not love this world and forget God, but let us hate our lives in this world that we may keep them for eternal life!