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Begin with Honesty

 

“If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.” 1 John 1:8

Apple coreDeception and dishonesty began in the garden. Caught out with the apple, Eve said, “The serpent deceived me and I ate.” Genesis 3:13. The serpent encouraged her to believe a lie, but she accepted his version. In his version, she wouldn’t die; she’d become wise. Wouldn’t the honest response be: “Yes, I sinned. I knew the serpent was wrong.”

Jeremiah describes our dishonesty:

“The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” Jeremiah 17:9

Like Mother Eve, we are endlessly self-deceptive. Confronted with our failures, we say, or at least think, “What, me? You’re saying I’m self-centered?” “I don’t listen?” “You think I’m arrogant?” Self-deception is our default mode.

Only one can break through:

“I the LORD search the heart and examine the mind,
to reward each person according to their conduct,
according to what their deeds deserve.” Jeremiah 17:10

Only the Father can penetrate our self-deception. Only he convicts. When we suddenly recognize our sin, thanking him is the only wise response.

Even wiser is an everyday prayer: “Father, where am I being dishonest with myself?” or “Lord Jesus, purify my heart.” or “Search me and try me. Expose my sin that I might not cause pain.”

We begin with honesty–truthfulness, free from deception. When we’re honest with ourselves, we know there’s always more to be exposed, forgiven, and healed. Confession, then, agrees with God about our sin. From honesty and confession comes cleansing:

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”1 John 1:9

I’d ask where you are deceiving yourself, but how would you know? Come, Spirit of Jesus who proceeds from the Father. Expose our sin, cleanse us from our unrighteousness and draw us into your heart, where all goodness dwells.

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A Courageous Father

 

Last week, I wrote, “I wanted a father’s love.” Even at sixty years old, there is part of me that misses a good father and depictions of good fathering touch me. So I was touched by the stories of the men of the Courageous movie. Four cops and one laborer show how five fathers’ characters are changed or exposed after a tragedy. Sherwood Baptist’s fourth film follows an abandoning father, a distracted father, a crooked father, and two heroic, courageous fathers.

Courageous Poster Most of us had one of those kinds of fathers.  Many children rarely or never see their fathers. Some have criminal fathers. Others grew up with fathers whose attention was elsewhere even when they were home. Few of us have heroic fathers, fathers who reliably protected, provided, confronted and comforted us.

And yet, Father-God is a heroic father who wants to father each one of us. Do we believe that?  Our experiences with our first authorities shape our expectations of Father-God, the ultimate authority.  If you want to attach to God as a father, start with identifying what kind of father you had. Was he there? What kind of eye contact did he give you? Did he give you hugs? Were those hugs safe? How was his integrity? Did he do what he said he would do? Did he keep his promises?

Then, compare those answers to how you believe God deals with you. Is he walking beside you? Is he looking at you with eyes of compassion? Do you sit on the couch with his arm around you? Do you feel safe with him? Has he done what he promised he would do?

We want to believe God is good, good in every way and at all times. We affirm it intellectually, but do we know his goodness in our experience? Spiritual growth is that continual movement toward merging our heads and our hearts.

While it’s easy to become a Christian, to say the words, it’s not easy to go deep with God. Depth takes a relentless pursuit of our own hearts and of God’s heart. Depth, like fatherhood, takes courage.

Father, give us the courage to know ourselves and to know you.

 

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Desperate?

I am desperate.

I don’t feel desperate. I feel healthy and happy.

That’s the problem.

I’m not sick, hungry, thirsty, or poor. But whether I feel it or not, I am desperate for God. I need his power. I need his wisdom. I need to be taught to pray.

I need power to love. I need power to want to love. I need power to want to forgive. I need the love of God put in my heart for others.

How about you?

A neighboring child desperate for affection Pictures, Images and PhotosJesus’ first statement when he sat on the mountain to teach was about being “poor in spirit.” Brennan Manning says that’s about knowing our utter poverty before God. We have nothing to offer him. Nothing. We are completely dependent. Indeed, desperate.

Though we are in critical need, we need not despair, because the Holy Spirit is at work in us.

But if we felt our spiritual desperation more keenly, we might seek more intensely. Distracted by pleasure and comfort, health and happiness, we may find it challenging to seek God’s wisdom, power, love.

Whether we feel it or not, the reality remains. We are all desperate for God.

Lord Jesus, work a poverty of spirit into our hearts. Help us grasp our inherent desperation for you.  Come, Holy Spirit.

 

 

 

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Heart Hammock

Abraham never wavered in believing God’s promise. In fact, his faith grew stronger, and in this he brought glory to God. He was fully convinced that God is able to do whatever he promises. Romans 4:20-21

 

Good promises provide a structure in which we can rest. When a father promises a child Disneyland for spring break, the child builds that future in his imagination.

He finds the Disney website, the better to see himself there. He checks youtube for videos from the Screaming California roller coaster. He anticipates the adrenaline rush of riding the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. He looks forward to ice cream, meeting Mickey, and experiencing the Rainforest Café.

Pawleys Island DuraCord outdoor Rope Hammock Oatmeal Pictures, Images and PhotosHe adds that promise to others, the ones spoken and unspoken. He counts on his parents’ unspoken promise to give him food, clothing, and a place to live. Together, promises create a structure, like a rope hammock, in which his heart can rest.

Like a happy child, our rest depends on our trust. With Abraham, I want to be fully convinced that God is able to do whatever he promises.

Recently, God has convicted me that I have been looking too much at my own inability and not enough at his ability. When I began writing and speaking, I began because of a promise he gave me personally.

But I haven’t fully rested in that promise. Parts of me have, or I wouldn’t have attempted to write Trading Fathers or get published in Today’s Christian Woman. However, a significant part of me has been afraid to relax in that enveloping hammock.

But I am so ready.

How’s your heart? All in the hammock? Or are parts of you pacing, wishing you could just lie down?

Jesus, we want to rest in your promises. Calm our hearts today.

 

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In the Midst of Ordinary Life

A week ago, the Japanese were working, playing, and studying, when the ground began to shake. The shaking continues–after tsunami, on to radiation releases with long-term consequences. Economic shaking will ripple through their bank accounts. In the midst of their ordinary lives, they have awakened to the extraordinary.

Though we may be thousands of miles removed from this current shaking, we ache with them because we know what a life changed in an instant feels like. Even if whole pieces of our country and economy have not been devastated, many of us have answered the phone call or opened the door to a reality that shifted our personal foundations.

Especially if we are Americans, the very normality of our lives can lull us into a kind of short-sightedness. We forget that we will all die. We wake up, we eat breakfast, we go to the office or to the kitchen for our daily work. We drive home through rush hour traffic or we ride the train or we wait for a spouse to return from his or her work.

The days pile on each other, in a rhythm that lulls us into certain kinds of expectations. We do not expect the ground to shake today. We expect our spouse to return with a smile, our children to live to adulthood. We expect life to go on, as we know it now. Though we vaguely know we’ll die someday, it seems far off.

And yet. Life will not always be as we expect. There is an end coming. Psalm 90 teaches us to “number our days.” Indeed, our days can be numbered and wisdom keeps that in mind, in the ordinariness of our everyday lives.

Father, we pray for mercy for the people of Japan. And we pray for wisdom for all of us, to recognize the deeper realities. For your glory and your coming kingdom. Amen.

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Receive His Peace

“Jesus, I receive your peace.” That’s my prayer lately. Jesus says, “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” John 14:27

Growing up with the constant fear and sometimes reality of sexual abuse, I breathed worry, tumult, and distress. The emotional atmosphere of our childhood leaves its mark. Warmth, concern, compassion yields an interior sense of calm and hope. The constant, low-level fear that marked my upbringing set me up for an automatic expectation of evil. At a young age, evil had surprised me and I half-expected pain around every corner.

Prince of Peace Pictures, Images and PhotosEven when we’ve experienced much healing, that expectation of difficulty dies hard. We worry our children won’t come home from an overnighter. We’re afraid to fly–not so much because of pat-downs, though they also scare us–but because the plane might crash. We know our spouse is faithful, but that doesn’t stop images of unfaithfulness flitting through our minds.

There’s been something helpful lately in that prayer:  “Jesus, I receive your peace.” He says he gives it to us. Not based on circumstances, but based in his character. The God who comes in the flesh to be with us is still right here, right now.

Jesus, show us how to receive the peace you offer. For your glory. Amen.

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Dependent, Like it or Not

What scriptures do you dislike? Here’s one I wish was different:  “Therefore, in order to keep me (Paul) from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” 2 Corinthians 12:7-9  Nobody knows exactly what that thorn was–physical, emotional, spiritual. And we all have various kinds of weaknesses.

I’m developing a new retreat. This morning, I woke up early with some ideas to expand the basic concept. That was God. By myself, I get stuck on the core idea, with little sense of how to expand the focus. I know it needs expansion and to be viewed from several different angles, but it is one of my weaknesses as a developer to actually be able to see the related concepts.

Even using a number of helps–mind-mapping, mining my own story, and reading others’ explorations of the topic, I still feel stuck sometimes. I’d much rather be full of ideas, able to see the relationships between them and able to grasp what needs to be included. But that is a request for a different kind of intelligence than God has given me. I have a weakness in this area.

How do you feel about that idea, that God’s power is made perfect in our weaknesses? Are you comfortable with that? Good! I’m working on it. I’m grateful for this morning’s input. Whether I like it or not, I depend on his help.

But is dependence easy for any of us? Independence is the familiar sin. Our primeval parents said, “No, God, I’m not going to listen to you. This snake here has a better idea.”

But it is God’s idea that we are dependent beings. That feels like weakness to us. We prefer conceit. But we are made for his glory (Isaiah 43:7).

Yes. So be it.

Father, show your glory through us today!

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I Will Yet Praise Him

praise Pictures, Images and PhotosWhy are you downcast, O my soul?                                                                                                                                       Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and my God. Psalm 42: 5, 11 and 43:5

Three times in these two Psalms, the writer admonishes himself. In D. Martin Lloyd-Jones book, Spiritual Depression, which I read years ago when I fought serious depression, he references these verses as he talks about “taking ourselves in hand.” That’s the phrase I recalled as I slogged through July.

In previous years, it was a revelation that I didn’t have to let myself live in what I felt. I could, to some extent,”take myself in hand,” and step outside it, into more objectivity.

When we’re seriously depressed, though, there’s no objectivity. We see only what’s right in front of us. Our perspective narrows. But the blahs come in several shades of gray.  And my July experience, rather than the nighttime of severe depression, was about the color of our house–a pewter hue of slowed-downness.

One of the secrets of coping with feeling down is not to shame oneself for it. That down mood is our cue to ask for insight and wisdom from our Father-God who loves to give us what we need. We need to know what’s feeding the depression so we can pray more effectively.

I don’t know all that burdened me those weeks. (Even therapists don’t always make sense of their own issues.) Jerry’s cancer, my extra few pounds, feeling professionally stymied, all contributed. I assume Satan had a hand in it.

Whatever. Under stress, I’m prone to depression. We all have our weaknesses. Unlike some other periods of my life, I got out of bed every day. I cooked and did my usual duties. But I read a lot, wasn’t creative, and praise required choice.

I chose to remind myself, daily, that my hope is in Jesus. Not ministry, or a healthy husband, or weighing what I weighed in high school.

When we cannot muster deep-hearted praise, it’s time to remind ourselves that we will again. God will bring us back. He will bring us out. Jesus promises his peace.

Jesus, thank you for all the times you’ve carried us through. Meet us again, today, with your truth and your smile.

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Real Role in Cosmic Play

I’m not a real writer. Yes, I’ve won an award for my memoir, written a prize-winning poem, published articles in national magazines, and devote several hours a week to writing. And yet, it doesn’t drive my life, like some writers. “I have to write.” “I need to make sentences.” “Not a day goes by that I don’t think about my WIP (work in progress).” I’ve read many versions of those statements.

Although, on the other hand, “writers write.”  I do write. Most predictably I produce this weekly devotional. Googling “Karen Rabbitt” (with the quote marks) points to several pages of writing.

Writing, though, isn’t my prime focus. Thinking is. Thinking about how to experience the depth of Father-God’s passion and compassion for myself. How to communicate that depth to others. How to help people heal from shame, choose forgiveness, and grieve life’s losses.

And yet, I’m not a real thinker, either. Real thinkers study harder, read more research, spend hours in Bible study.

I think it’s the internet that drives the thoughts of not being “real.” The contact on Twitter and the blogosphere with more focused, “real” writers and thinkers. It’s the old comparison trap, amplified by access to dozens, hundreds, thousands of better writers and thinkers.

Time to refocus. Regain perspective. Reread the script God’s handed me. Whether I’m a real writer or a real thinker by some personal standard, I want to be the “real” Karen Rabbitt in this play God is directing. Sounds ironic, doesn’t it?

But author God is writing his cosmic play. To be real is to play the part written for us.

Father, May we stop looking at the roles you’ve written for others. Give us eyes only for our own script.

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Always Emmanuel

“Do this in remembrance of me,” Jesus said as he broke the bread and poured the wine at the last passover with his disciples before his crucifixion. Some churches remember him in communion every Sunday, some less often, but regularly. Some of us do communion ourselves, spouse with spouse. Others believe the elements must be consecrated by church authorities. Some believe the bread and the wine are the literal body and blood. Others understand it to be symbolic.

However we understand communion, Christians are all called to do it to help our memories. We serve a forgettable God. A God whose reality can slide out of the front of our minds. Odd, isn’t it, that our creator can be forgotten?

Those of us who believe Jesus is who he said he was don’t easily forget his actual existence. But what about some of the key details? In the midst of some minor stresses this week, I forgot what I so easily tell others:  “God is right there with you, suffering alongside of you.” That detail–I’m not alone in my distress–rushed back into my memory like the first daffodil of spring. With his company, I can endure.

What are you enduring these days? Hot days, unemployment, boredom, fussy children, cancer, death of a spouse, or a few minor inconveniences you feel guilty for stressing out about? In all the ways we endure in this fallen world, he has promised he will never leave or forsake us. Let’s help each other remember:  he is here, with us. Emmanuel is not just a Christmas song. He is always Emmanuel, God with us.

Jesus, thank you for your presence, remembered or unremembered.

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Sow Five Positive Words

Here’s a self-compassion challenge: for every negative thought about our self or our behavior, write five positive sentences. Words that are true, kind, and hopeful.

A local newspaper columnist from the ’80s often referred to his wife as his “constant companion.” Since we are our own constant companion, let’s apply some marital research to our inner life. That’s where sowing positivity comes in.

Research shows that for every criticism, a healthy couple gives five affirmations. After twenty years of doing psychotherapy with individuals and observing my own emotional growth, I’ve learned healthy self-regard also balances out criticism with compliments.

If we’re already in a good relationship with ourselves, we instinctively think kind thoughts when we perform badly. We know sowing negativity doesn’t help. But if we’re just starting to learn a new skill, we need to make it a conscious process. Writing out sentences will help.

Here are some true, kind, and hopeful words that apply to all of us who desire to walk close to Jesus:

1. I am accepted in the Beloved. (Ephesians 1:6, KJV)

2. Jesus does not condemn me. (Romans 8:1)

3.  I can love myself just as I am because God does. (1 John 4:16)

4.  God is at work in me. I can rest in his work. (Philippians 2:13)

5. I am my Father’s project. He will finish what he has started. (Philippians 1:6)

Self-punishment is hard-packed clay in which nothing grows. Self-kindness is loam and compost and peat moss. Half the battle of growth is self-kindness. In that soil, change can germinate.

Jesus, let your word fertilize our soil. For your glory. Amen.

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Hoping for a Sure Thing

Okay. Time to throw cancer out out the back door of my mind. Jerry is done with radiation. I won’t pick him up from the cancer center this afternoon. Surely, that door will just slam shut. Denial is my friend.
doors to closet and bathroom Pictures, Images and Photos
It’s my friend because it’s unconscious. I don’t even know I’m doing it. I just go blithely on my way, leaving those nasty deathbed images piled up in the backyard, where I never venture.

Suppression is the conscious version of denial. I’ll probably have to settle for that. I’ll install a lock on the back bedroom so when those hospital images come, I can herd them back there and lock them in. Then, in the room where I live, I’ll pull out the faith file and plaster the walls with God words and images.

Faith, Hebrews says, is being “sure of what we hope for.” What, exactly, can I be sure of? What can I hope for? Those seem like two different arenas. I can be sure that Jesus will be with us, through anything. He will provide, protect, confront, and comfort us. I can be sure that “your will be done” is always a good prayer. I do hope for his will to be done, but short-term, I don’t always want it.

I want to hope for twenty more good years. I can put up pictures of traveling the Oregon coast and taking grandboy to the zoo and snuggling together every morning. But who can be sure?

I heard recently about a woman who’d been so afraid to fly she always took trains. Then she died while driving her car a mile from home when somebody pulled out in front of her. Suddenly, she’s in eternity.

Let’s hope for what we can be sure of when we approach that gate made of a single pearl. Jesus will have triumphed over cancer, one way or another. Papa-God is watching at the window for us. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Father and the Son, has carried us through, beyond the deathbed, to life that lasts forever.

Father, give us grace to hope for what we can be sure of.

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The Disputable God

Why is it that everything God does can be disputed? I just read the Pentecost account where the people came running to see what had happened because they heard the “mighty rushing wind.” At least fifteen different people groups were represented in those who heard the 120 disciples speaking in unlearned languages. Each of them heard their own language. And yet, some said, “They’re drunk.”(Acts 2)

Even after the resurrection of Jesus, when he’d been with his followers for forty days, eating with them, teaching them, letting himself be touched–some doubted. (Matt.28:17)

And when my sciatic nerve pain was healed through prayer with the laying on of hands, was that God? It hasn’t come back in many years. Feels like God to me. And yet, others would say it was coincidence or I did something else that caused the pain to resolve.

Don’t you have a dozen places in your journey where you’re sure you’ve been touched by the God who is there and active, that others would question?

Believing these are God touches is about faith, of course, but why is faith important? The phrase came to me: “He wants to be wanted.” When I searched for that phrase, I learned that A.W. Tozer already said it. God wants to be wanted. He wants to be desired. He wants our genuine, heartfelt love.

Just like us. We want to be wanted. Seems to be one of the ways in which we are made in his image.

Jesus, we want to want you today. We want to want you as you deserve to be wanted. With whole hearts and active minds and hot pursuit.

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