weeklythoughtexchange

We begin as children: “For play I am a zookeeper and you are my lion.” “I’m the mom and you’re the dad, for play.”  “For play the bad guys try to take my children but I fight him off.” “For play…” As wee ones, we are practicing reality by having every good thing happen to us, the main characters, and whenever something goes wrong we’re quickly able to correct it.

Then, suddenly, something goes wrong and we’re not able to correct it: dreams seem impossible to reach. We believe that we have encountered reality. The high taxes and low paychecks squelch the “cozy cottage” dream or “luxurious mansion” dream. Close friends drift apart and steal the “friends forever” dream. Broken hearts shatter the “true love” dream. Problems that can’t be solved with high ideals and the snap of a finger dissolve the “I can do anything” dream…and the dreams continue to float away like balloons released from a child’s hand.

Nevertheless, our souls are drawn to a more perfect reality just as the waves keep reaching for the shore.  We read books about it, watch movies about it, and create our own facades about it on Facebook and Twitter. There’s an inner craving for something tangibly real that we can sink our hearts into. We long for meaning that doesn’t fade like Christmas trees lining the sidewalk. There’s a divine restlessness in our souls.

It is not uncommon for this restlessness to be addressed with thoughts such as, “Perhaps if I pour myself out in doing good, or make enough money to buy all I want, or travel the world…I’ll be satisfied, I’ll be content.” But even there, the question of what’s real haunts us. How do we know that pride isn’t our motivation for doing good? How do we know that a friendship is sincere and not merely a ploy to benefit from our prosperity?  After all of our travels, how do we know that home is truly home?

We want the lives we’ve always imagined: money enough, time enough, friends enough, content enough, happy enough. Yet life rarely meets our expectations; as soon as hopes are realized, disappointment is quick to follow. Does that mean joy isn’t real, or that reality is always bad? No. It simply means that as kids we know anything is possible, even perfection. But when we reach the age of awareness we allow the challenges of hope deferred to assume greater reality than the possibilities of hope realized. Our craving for more is heaven-sent; it forces us to keep seeking. The vessel must return to the maker in order to find the meaning of its existence. It is only in a heart relationship with God that we can find the peace that is “for real.”

Last week I reflected on the Christmas Journey and the three parties that made the journey so long ago.  Yet I also indicated that every one of us will make a Christmas journey at some point in our lives, and perhaps this year it was your turn.  Over the past week I was privileged to hear a few testimonies about journeys in progress.

One of them belonged to a dear confidante of mine (she always has some powerful insights and experiences to share with me, and I’ve referred to some of them on my blog before. If she had a blog, her pen name would be WordWeaver).  Her Christmas journey involved getting past herself just enough to see the path to Jesus, yet not so much that she didn’t have anything left to bring Him. Allow me to use her words to explain:

“I am restless in my faith because I look around me and see Christians stuck in ruts of ease. We no longer strive for excellence because it is too hard. We are settling for mediocre and filling ourselves up with emptiness. I feel like I am waiting for permission from others to let my walk with God grow! I know what He wants me to do, but it’s unconventional and risky, so people resent it. When I don’t get a green light from them, I stop – and I stop growing in faith, or get frustrated with God.  But I think that’s going to change.

I am not so important that the world revolves around me, but I’m not so insignificant that I can’t make a difference in it. Perhaps I need to accept that I am on a journey to know Jesus in a deeper way. Am I willing to keep my focus on that destination despite the distractions and dangers trying to deter me from it? It is a time for me to remember that God is real and He came for me, His beloved. He sees my journey and will give the strength and courage to make it through…Jesus chose me. I can see Him standing behind me, arms outstretched so that they cover mine. He matches me move for move. I can do nothing without Him. When I am sad, He embraces me;  when I stumble, He catches me; when I am assaulted, He defends me. If I abide in Him, my peace is secured.  Realizing this is the destination of my Christmas Journey.”

I could not have said it better than that. My dear friend battled the distractions and dangers that sought to block her way to the Manger.  She arrived and knelt before the King of Kings, who is Reality.  What about you? Are you by the Manger? If not, I pray that you soon will be. The meaning of life begins there.

There are many powerful symbols of spiritual truth in the Christmas story, but one that has been especially poignant to me this Christmas is the journey. Think about it for a moment: Mary and Joseph journeyed from Nazareth to Bethlehem; the Wise Men journeyed from the East; and the Christ Child Himself journeyed from heaven to earth.  Obvious enough, right, but what is the spiritual signficance in the journey?

I see at least 5 spiritual truths:

1. A divine destination – each journey resulted in a destination that connected God with man.

2. A deliverance – each journey brought the delivery of a gift. Mary and Joseph delivered Jesus; the Wise Men delivered valuable gifts in worship of the King; Jesus delivered Himself to the world.

3. Distractions – though the Bible doesn’t specify all of the distractions our travellers encountered, I’m sure there were many and some of them were probably quite dangerous. However, we do know that there were people seeking to kill Jesus and anyone connected with Him. We do know that Herod called the Wise Men in for an informal interrogation.  To reach the destination all had to stay focused on their goal.

4. Disquiet of the soul – again, the Bible doesn’t specify all the ponderings of the heart that these 3 parties held within them. But being human myself, I can only imagine what doubts must have surged through their hearts, minds, and souls as they set forth and kept going. Mary and Joseph may have wondered if they were truly able to bear the Son of God. Perhaps they were fearful of the consequences if they were to make a mistake in their parenting of Him. The Wise Men may have questioned their sanity to be following a star into the wilderness. And Jesus? He knew the road that laid before Him and it was not a joyous one. Did He ever want to turn around? Perhaps.

5. Determination – despite the doubts, dangers, and distractions, our selected travellers set forth for their destination and did not turn back. They went through fearsome trials that we can only imagine and deep self-reflections that were only between them and God. But in the end, man met the Savior and the Savior delivered His beloved.

Next week I will bring the Christmas journey home to our hearts, but for the time being I hope you will be reflecting on the journey you are on right now. How are you reaching out to Jesus?  I know that He is reaching out to you.

Have you ever remembered? What did you remember?

Was it a flood of warmth as you reminisced on Christmas moments with your loved ones? Did you walk down memory lane with a best friend? Did you smile nostalgically at thoughts of school escapades with your classmates?

Or did pain clutch your heart at thoughts of betrayal from someone you trusted? Did an icy wave of shame flood your mind with memories of childhood abuse that you still believe is your fault? Do tears still spring to your eyes when you remember snapshot after snapshot of loneliness, taunting, blame, and emptiness?

Human beings often place little significance on beginnings, but beginnings are everything. They are the foundation of tomorrow and connect us to the finish. If we don’t start off well it can take supernatural strength to keep us in the race. Our memories are often the fuel that drives us forward, or the magnetic force that pulls us downward.  At this very moment memories are being made, and for a myriad of desperate youngsters in the foster care system the memories are going to be painful ones. Many of this children only long for an assurance that they matter to someone and a safe place to call home.  Others just want the pain to stop.

If these children never find that place and that assurance they will reach adulthood with little to motivate them to keep being the best they can possibly be. They could lead aimless lives simply trying to fill the void that an empty childhood created in their hearts; there are many dangers waiting to sabotage them in their search for meaning. 

But you can stop the cycle of pain in a child’s life. You can make a difference by opening your heart and home to either fostering a child, or adopting one.  If you have a flood of painful memories that seep into your heart every day, turn it into a force of good and determine to make inspirational memories for today’s child.  If you have a happy childhood to recall, then multiply the joy for tomorrow’s adult. 

Create a new beginning today and harness the power of memories.

One year ago my jubilant athlete of a dog underwent double knee surgery. One knee recovered 100%; the other appeared to be 100% recovered, until recently. When she gets too active the leg will start to slow her down.  I was having the Thanksgiving blues this weekend and decided to go for a long run with my faithful friend. She started limping, but kept up with me and had a smile on her face the whole time. It got me to thinking…

The Limp

There are days when I can run the race of life forever,

And then there are days when I run with a limp.

Most days life’s a party with laughs and jokes and great conversations.

But sometimes I hurt and my heart beats with a limp.

I usually crave long walks in flower-filled fields and hikes in the mountains of living;

Yet occasionally I’m slowed with that limp.

I love to teach my students and reach out to others, to be myself, free to dream about tomorrow.

Often my steps are jolted by the hindering limp of reality.

In this life we are designed to run and walk, live, dream, and love.

As long as we’re here we will always be slowed down by a limp.

I’m living with a limp, but I am living.

This is an excerpt from John MacArthur’s book, Hard to Believe:

“A missionary whose story has influenced my life greatly is a man…named Henry Martyn. After a long and difficult life of Christian service in India, he announced he was going to Persia (modern Iran), because God had laid it upon his heart to translate the New Testament and the Psalms into the Persian language.

By then he was an old man. People told him that if he stayed in India, he would die from the heat, and that Persia was hotter than India. But he went nonetheless. There he studed the Persian language and then translated the entire New Testament and Psalms in nine months. Then he learned that he couldn’t print or circulate them until he received the Shah’s permission. He traveled six hundred miles to Tehran; there he was denied permission to see the Shah. He turned around made a four-hundred-mile trip to find the British ambassador, who gave him the proper letters of introduction and sent him the four hundred miles back to Tehran. This was in 1812, and Martyn made the whole trip on the back of a mule, traveling at night and resting by day, protected from the sweltering desert sun by nothing but a strip of canvas.

He finally arrived back in Tehran, was received by the Shah, and secured permission for the Scriptures to be printed and criculated in Persia. Ten days later he died. But shortly before his death, he had written this statement in his diary: ‘I sat in the orchard, and thought, with sweet comfort and peace, of my God; in solitude my Company, my Friend, and Comforter.’

He certainly did not live a life of ease, but it was a life worth remembering. and he’s one of many God used to turn redemptive history.”

There are those days when, driving home from work, I’m not really sure if it was a successful day or not. I didn’t really check anything off my to-do list; I actually laughed when my students were goofing around; I had to ring the bell more than once, several times in a row, to get students’ attention; I think I threatened consequences more than I followed through; and I didn’t check my work e-mail until right before leaving.  So, what am I going to do?

I think I’m finally figuring out that it’s better:

To laugh with my students than to yell at them.

To walk among my students and see their efforts than to sit at my desk and see mine.

To have them instruct each other than to remind them to listen to me.

To look at faces when answering questions than counting down the minutes till the class ends.

To follow through once than to threaten twice.

To spend five minutes talking story than to spend fifty with disconnected eighth graders.

To give challenge to the challenging than to give labels to the misunderstood.

To embrace the victory than to dwell on the defeat.

To run my fingers through my hair and find a piece of tape that says, “We love you,” than to have every hair in place.