The Finiteness of Evil

Psalm 63:11

But the king shall rejoice in God;

all who swear by him shall exult,

for the mouths of liars will be stopped.

So I was reading in Psalm 63 this morning and this verse set me to thinking…yea, I know, uh oh.  Those who rejoice in God shall exult, but the mouths of liars will be stopped.  I am struck by the finiteness of evil, it will be judged, removed, destroyed, stopped.  The end.  This in contrast to that which is good, holy, identified with God, that which endures into eternity.  This is the promise and hope of my good deeds, my redemptive acts in creation and with others, now in this life.  Part of the futility of evil, as powerful and pervasive as it feels in the moment with its mass shootings, war, poverty and disasters, is that it has a short half life.  It does not and will not get equal time in the full story that God is writing.  It is a temporary, finite subplot.  In contrast the glory and hope of good is that it endures in eternity.  Good and God are not a subplot they are the story.  What I do for and in Christ has staying power beyond the present moment, how awesome is that and how motivating to do good and not evil.

It seems that most of the time we are more concerned about where evil comes from, especially as a philosophical exercise, than how it will be dealt with and removed.  Evil will only be with us for a time, God is removing it, but all that is good and God’s endures in eternity. So I will rejoice and exult in Him.  Thanks be to God.

Psalm 31

Psalm 31

One of my habits in life is to read through the Bible from cover to cover every two years.  I have a simple plan that gives me bench marks of where I need to be at the end of each month as I alternate Old Testament and New Testament and read a daily Psalm. I use a Bible on my iPad that allows me to attach my journal entries to particular verses as I make my way through my reading.  One of the fun things about this is that as I go back through from year to year I can read again my journal entries from years past.  This rereading of my journal through time and embedded into the scripture story has woven my story in the Bible’s story (God’s story.) in a very personal way for me.  What I find as I read my own story is that, for the most part, I am muddling my way through life.  There are small victories, wake me up insights, frustrations, fears, moments of delight, encouragement and unfortunately some just plain laziness that reveals itself.  Mostly I am reminded again and again of God’s steadfast love and faithfulness.

I was reading Psalm 31 today and came across this note which I find encouraging, thanks to the later date addition.  It is particularly encouraging to me somehow as I have been reading in Ezekiel (Yes, you have to read the major prophets every two years with this plan. That is another story.) about God’s judgement , the purifying and clarifying effect it has on us and the hope God always promises to follow.

Yes, it is fair game to add to previous journal entries if I add the new date, though I am not allowed to sanitize previous entries to make them more presentable or palpable to myself as I look back at myself.  It is my journal, I get to make the rules.

These are my words spoken to the One who has spoken me into being and who delights in me.  The truth of those word is both humbling, deeply comforting, and gives me the freedom to speak my feelings in the moment.

September 19, 2015

Psalm 31:12-24

At the risk of being dramatic and, yes, I know that in the grand scheme of things compared to, say, the refugee problem in Syria, this is not a biggy, but it is where I find myself  floundering at the moment.

"I have been forgotten like one who is dead;" (v.12)
I just signed up for medicare, am "retiring" for the third time to no particular calling and still seeing significant things that need attention. (The poor, the refugees, church issues, etc.)  Is my time for things like this past, do I have something to give, am I relevant to what is to come or is all I have to offer, the experiences of my past?  I feel like one of my gifts is to rethink our approach to some of these things, but am rapidly becoming invisible in the conversation...do I accept this gracefully, do I try to push myself into the conversation, do I wait to be asked or do I speak up, whatever that looks like.

I feel locked in doubly; aging into irrelevance, (Forgotten) and stuck in a culture that is in such a hurry to "do" that it does not take the time to ask why we do what we do. Do I just accept the what to do question and forget the whys?

A broken vessel (v. 12) seems to fit, terror and plots (v.13) on my life seem a little heavy for describing how I feel,  but the whispering of many (v. 13) comes in the form of the constant question, "So what are you doing these days?"  The question seeming to imply, do you do anything worthwhile since you are retired?  The fact that the question bothers me is evidence enough that I sometime question myself the significance of what I do.

Is a week babysitting the Maine grands, as I am now doing, so their parents can take some needed time off on a par with saving refugees in Syria or examining the meaning of discipleship in a church setting?

But I trust in you, O Lord;
I say, “You are my God.”
My times are in your hand; v. 14-15

Make your face shine on your servant;
save me in your steadfast love! V.16

Oh, how abundant is your goodness,
which you have stored up for those who fear you
and worked for those who take refuge in you,
in the sight of the children of mankind! v.19

Blessed be the Lord,
for he has wondrously shown his steadfast love to me
when I was in a besieged city.
I had said in my alarm,
“I am cut off from your sight.”
But you heard the voice of my pleas for mercy
when I cried to you for help.
Love the Lord, all you his saints!
The Lord preserves the faithful.
Be strong, and let your heart take courage,
all you who wait for the Lord!  v.21-24

I wait and I trust, may I do and be confident in Your steadfast love.

Wylie, my grandson, just stuck a red heart on my shirt and said, "I'm giving you some love, Papa,"  Hmm...

March 7, 2016

Today I am 5 weeks post op from my quadruple bypass* surgery, beginning cardiac rehab, not allowed to lift more than 10 pounds for another 2 months, and 5 weeks removed from any of the "significant" things I was doing with folks before, digesting the meaning of "You were within 6 months of dropping dead from a heart attack" when I thought I was healthy.  I am in an enforced stop/slow down from all activities of life, being deeply pushed by Your Spirit to consider the meaning of sacred/secular and how I live life, and finally, I hope, open and ready to hear and begin walking out a new thing.

Contrary to the above entry from September, I do not feel in any sense abandoned or in any way alone.  I feel instead very connected both directly to You and to Your body, my friends and community. Yes, if I am honest there is a measure of unrest, the what am I going to do next, feeling that I suspect I will never shake, but also tempered by a new sense of allowing You to do in me rather than me trying to do for You.

14 So, I trust in you, O Lord;
I say, “You are my God.”
15 My times are in your hand
24 Be strong, and let your heart take courage,
all you who wait for the Lord.

So I wait...Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy. (Usually abbreviated as LHM/CHM)

Steadfast love and faithfulness, God is Good!

* See blog, Visiting Hell in the Company of Angels, on 3/19/16 for that story.

The Wrath of God

Thoughts on Lamentations 4:11

The Lord gave full vent to his

wrath;

he poured out his hot anger,

and he kindled a fire in Zion

that consumed its foundations.

As people, followers of Jesus or not, we are often uncomfortable with the idea of any mention of God’s wrath.  We are much more comfortable talking about and expecting the love of God.  But, would we really want to take away the wrath of God?  Look at the previous verses and what is going on (They boiled their own babies and ate them.)...would you be drawn to a God who was not angry about this treatment of His children (Mt. 18:6), a God who would not act strongly toward those who are His?  

In Five Smooth Stones p. 129-136, Eugene Peterson, address God’s anger.  God is angry because He cares about us.  We do not become angry about things that are of no interest to us.  Because He is angry there is hope.  If evil is not a personal affront to God, then there is no hope for us, because we are of no interest to Him.  It is precisely because He gets angry that we have hope...our hope is not in the anger, our hope is in the  character of God...the One who is steadfast love and faithfulness.  Because of who He is, light does shine in the darkness and things are new in the morning.

If I were unfaithful to Jan and had the good sense to regret and repent, would I be glad if there were no anger on her part?  Would not a lack of anger be evidence of my lack of value to her?  If the whole thing to her was, "Whatever." What would it tell me about us?

Does Your wrath scare me Father, yes it does, but I think I would be more fearful if there were none present because it would mean You do not care.  Thank you for loving me that much, thank you that it does not end with wrath, but in steadfast love and faithfulness.  LHM/ CHM

Jalen Hurts Rocks

I don’t know if you read Jalen Hurts’ farewell letter to Alabama fans since he is transferring to Oklahoma. If you haven’t looked it up on social media.  He talks about his past year as an Alabama football player being hard, but that it has been formative and worth it. In his closing he references John 13:7, “Jesus answered him, What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand.”  Though Jalen does not understand all that has happened he trusts that the One who does can be trusted to do good with what Has been given. This is pretty strong stuff and an impressive perspective for a 20 year old college student in a “me” culture.  Team mates and coaches laude his humility and have nothing but good to say about his attitude and effort in the midst of a tough situation.

My Bible reading this morning was Genesis 39-42, the story of Joseph and Potiphar’s wife.  Joseph has become the head of Potiphar’s household, but is falsely accused of assault by Potiphar’s wife and is thrown into prison.  Because he is a man of character and is faithful in his duties he becomes a leader in the prison, a favorite with the warden.  After accurately interpreting dreams for a couple of prisoners he finds hope in the promotion of the cupbearer, one of the dreamers, back to the Pharaoh’s court.  He is hopeful that with an advocate in Pharaoh’s court he too might be released. But, the cupbearer forgets about him. For two years!  For two years there is nothing but silence.

What would I do with two years of silence or a year sitting on the bench?  Would I run out of hope? Would I be faithful with what I was given?

As I contemplated the above questions I turned to my Psalm for this morning, Psalm 13 and read…

1 How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?

How long will you hide your face from me?

2 How long must I take counsel in my soul

and have sorrow in my heart all the day?

What do we pray when we don’t understand the circumstances of the moment, when it seems everyone and God too has forgotten about us?  Chris Wright, in The God I Don’t Understand, notes that God seems to be ok with the rawness of our laments.  The Psalms, our prayer book, is full of them, as are the prayers of the saints in the book of Revelation. (i.e.Rev 6:10.)    God seems to welcome our laments, the “how longs” and promises that in the fulness of time all will be right and good.  He seldom, if you will notice, seems to feel an obligation to explain the why of our circumstances in the moment.  He is much more inclined to ask if we trust, not if we understand.

The "how long" question vs. the "Why". It is a bigger story than just this life and this world or this particular circumstance. The why can only be experienced in the full story not explained in the partial story, therefore, "How long", is all that can be addressed in the partial story as we experience it today and maybe even tomorrow and the next.  When we experience the full story in eternity the why's will become clearer.  Maybe. If not clearer maybe our trust will become such that the why's will seem unimportant.

Joseph was one of those who was allowed to see at least more of the big picture as time unfolded and he was quick to give God credit for all that was good even thought it came about at his expense.  Joseph’s brothers, as you will recall, had sold Joseph, into slavery in Egypt.  That was how he had ended up as Potiphar’s slave to start with.  By God’s providence he did get out of prison, experienced a meteoric rise to second in command in all of Egypt, and later found himself in a position to extract revenge on his brothers. Joseph is open to a larger story, however, and this is his response in Genesis 45:4-8. So Joseph said to his brothers, “Come near to me, please.” And they came near. And he said, “I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. 5 And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. 6 For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. 7 And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. 8 So it was not you who sent me here, but God.

If you are not familiar with the story of Joseph I invite you to read it.  What a great story!  Joseph knows that “it” is not all about him and lived out a life of trust, sacrifice, and openness to a story larger than himself written by the One who breathed him into being in the first place.

I love the end of Psalm 13:

5 But I have trusted in your steadfast love;

my heart shall rejoice in your salvation.

6 I will sing to the Lord,

because he has dealt bountifully with me.

Peace comes, not with understanding, but by trusting.  There is a guy named Palmer, I have no idea who he is but he said this, "Faith is not belief without proof, it is trust without reservation."  Jalen and Joseph have lived that before me today, and I am grateful.

Jalen is a man mature beyond his years.  God bless you Jalen, you rock!  I look forward to what God does in you in the days ahead.