Destination Discipline

Have you ever longed for security? Has the ground you walk on been uneven and swampy? Do you take one step only to see your foot disappear into a bog of quicksand? Just when you think you have solid footing, you tumble headlong into a pond filled with rotting fishes? Did you think, “Man, I should have smelled that coming!” Or is it just me?

I have been practicing my French lately, as in, “pardon my French.” These little articulations of discomfort reveal the unsteadiness of my footing as French is not my native tongue. I’ve been trying to navigate an obstacle course of adverse events without breaking my leg and frankly, I have sprained both ankles. I like to consider myself a pretty hardy individual but I’m plumb tuckered out. I find myself praying, “Help, I just need help,” a lot more frequently than I care to admit. And it’s not because I’m a pansy. (Though I do like pansies – especially the yellow and violet colored kind.)

Several important questions have come to my mind as I consider my life and my place in the world. First, can I live up to my own high standards? It’s so easy for me to think about what other people are doing–or rather, should be doing–and form an opinion that shapes my attitude and behavior toward them. Second, can I extend grace to people the way God has extended grace to me? I often have this idea that everyone should be disciplined or they are just lazy. It is much easier to point fingers than take responsibility for my own actions. Which leads me to the last question, do I have the strength to surrender to God’s will for my life?

Why is this happening to me?

Someone wiser than myself might respond, “Why not me?” But when God’s boot squishes my face into the gravel, I would like an explanation. That doesn’t mean I’m going to get one, but while I’m coughing up blood, those questions just sort of necessarily intermingle with the fluids.

The thing is, I have been praying for something to change and it hasn’t. Because of that, I frequently doubt God’s goodness. I “kick against the goads” so to speak (see Acts 26:12-18). God is pointing me to move in one direction, but I keep trying to avoid His sharp, pointy stick. He is inevitably forced to push me to the ground with a simple question, “Margaret, what’s up? Do you want to follow me or not?”

My initial gut reaction is, “I’m not sure.” Because I’d rather walk on the easy path where there are gumdrop cobblestones and licorice arm rails and lollipop signs pointing to sugary (ignorance is) bliss. I find that I despise the discipline of the lord and grow weary when reproved by Him (Hebrews 12:5) because I have forgotten who He is.

Who is God?

“Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me. Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements–surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the songs of God shouted for joy?” – Job 38:2-7

I am not a god, though I have frequently tried to be. I think my way is the best way and especially, I don’t think my heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. I figure I know best and that’s that. Basically, I am in need of a little instruction. God knows this. He also knows I’m resistant to correction. Like Job and his friends, I have a fundamental misunderstanding of God. I disrespect His power, His holiness and His right understanding of the way things are in His universe.

Annie Dillard gives an interesting account in her famous book, The Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. “What else is going on right this minute while ground water creeps under my feet? The galaxy is careening in a slow, muffled widening. If a million solar systems are born every hour, then surely hundreds burst into being as I shift my weight to the other elbow. The sun’s surface is now exploding; other stars implode and vanish, heavy and black, out of sight. Meteorites are arcing to earth invisibly all day long. On the planet the winds are blowing: the polar easterlies, the westerlies, the northeast and southeast trades. Somewhere, someone under full sail is becalmed, in the horse latitudes, in the doldrums; in the northland, a trapper is maddened, crazed, by the eerie scent of the chinook, the snow-eater, a wind that can melt two feet of snow in a day. The pampero blows, and the tramontane, and the Boro, sirocco, levanter, mistral. Lick a finger: feel the now.”

I have made my experience of the universe too small. Why have I only focused on me? As if my experience of the world is all there is. Not only have I wrongly set my eyes in the mirror, but I have darkened my gaze to the beauty and mystery of the world around me. Where does life spring forth from? What makes the snake slither? How are the clouds shaped? Why does the earth have to move at all? It is always in motion. And why is it circular instead of square or oval or … flat?

I don’t have an answer to these questions, and I won’t. But rather than focus on these glorious mysteries and the magic in the world around me, I’m busy crying about transient things. I have been cursing when I should have been marveling. Behold what manner of love the Father has given to me that I should be called a child of God. And so I am! I am loved. Cherished. Precious in the sight of my creator – and flawed by sin. He wants to remake me in the image of His Son but I’m chasing after pots of fools gold at the end of fluorescent rainbows. I say I want security, but I already have it. I was purchased with the blood of His only son. So why am I trying to kick him in the shins and run away?

The pain in life is a reminder of what a broken, fallen world we live in. “Therefore, we must pay much closer to attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. For since the message declared by angels proved to be reliable, and every transgression or disobedience received a just retribution, how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? It was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard, while God also bore witness by signs and wonders and various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit distributed according to his will.” (Hebrews 2:1-4)

If I am brave enough to recognize that He is God and I am not, I must surrender to His will in order to claim the security He promises. There are no coincidences. His sovereign will is always done. Nothing occurs apart from his sight, therefore, like Job, I repent in dust and ashes.

I have been trying to control people and situations, when I can’t even control myself. How foolish I have been. Am I the only one?

There are some very real tragedies in life that cloud my view of God. But the very essence of faith is trusting what I cannot see. Therefore, I must shift my gaze to Heaven. I must trust that God’s word is true and is no lie; He is a shield for all who take refuge in Him. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear Him and delivers them. (Psalm 34).

My friend, if you have been kicking against the goads, as I have, let me remind you who is stronger and mightier and more loving than you could ever imagine. He loves us too much to leave us as we were. Surrender is sweet when we trust the Lord. And He is faithful who promised. He will never permit the righteous to be moved. And we are only righteous by the blood of His son, who laid down His life for us.

“A fool’s lips walk into a fight, and his mouth invites a beating.” – Proverbs 18:6

One of the great joys of parenting is experiencing the world through the eyes of one’s child. A piece of bread tossed into the serrated beak of snow-white duck, the sweet red, white and blue popsicle dripping from a sticky chin onto hot pavement, or the grin from eyes to ears while holding ones first fluffy pet – these are memories that resonate through time like the clink of glasses on New Year’s Eve.

In a similar fashion, however, are the pains of a child whose heart is breaking. One never really forgets the first horror of realizing a friend is not a friend but instead a vile enemy. There are hot tears, gut wrenching sobs, and the numbness of a heart that has gone cold but still continues to beat.

When I was in junior high I had a friend who enjoyed tormenting other children. In my innocence I joined with her in a cruel joke to a mutual friend. The joke was to ignore our friend for no reason and pretend she didn’t exist. My friend suggested the prank and I went along because I didn’t want to be contrary and jeopardize her affection for me. The prank lasted only a few hours before our friend was hurt and crying. The next thing I knew, everyone was angry with me because they had been told it was all my idea. They attacked me and chased me into the restroom where they berated and terrorized me while the girl whose idea it was stood back and smiled. It was a terrible lesson in treachery – both of my own guilt and of the wiles of a person who gets off on picking a fight. Unfortunately, I spent years under the thrall of this girl and ended up in many foolish situations before I learned a true friend doesn’t behave in such a manner.

It’s strange to be an adult and watch my child go through a similar scenario. To see the hot tears, the frustration, the misunderstanding of why someone loves you one day and hates you the next is…horrible. Last week they were hanging out at the arcade and this week parents with no scruples are calling the police. Try as I might to protect my children, there is no escape from people with evil intention.

“A fools mouth is his ruin, and his lips are a snare to his soul.” – Proverbs 18:7

“Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruits.” – Proverbs 18:21

I feel strange searching for meaning in the ruins of a tattered relationship. What lessons can we learn? What hope can we find for the future? Do we guard our heart in order to protect ourselves from future hurt by barring the gates to new friends? I find myself turning over conversations in my head wondering how things might be different, how I could affect a different outcome. But the results are the same. The pain remains. It’s bad enough as an adult, but to see a child suffer is the worst kind of torment.

I find there really is no immunization for heartache. To love is to risk. But I also find that to forgive truly is sublime. It does no good to cling to bitterness or harbor ill will. Those who are contemptuous drive a stake through their own heart and that is something we cannot remove. But we can let go of the pain and move forward with a clean conscience. This is what I strive to teach my child; love is a beautiful thing. We should never regret giving the gift of love no matter how the relationship ends. We are not responsible for how people respond to us, only how we treat them. Does it hurt? Yes. Can we learn from it? Yes. Can we heal? With God’s help, yes.

I sit here with the pain of past relationships ricocheting through my mind like a bullet. Memories fade but don’t generally evaporate. So I open my bible and I pray. And I remember the words that comfort me when the darkness envelopes my heart and mind:

“A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” – Proverbs 18:24

I know I am both perpetrator and victim. I’ve done my share of wounding and asking forgiveness. Therefore, I too must forgive. And though we walk through the ruins of a relationship gone wrong, we will not stop loving. Jesus made a better way by His blood on the cross and that is the path I choose to take.

Freddy Mercury once sang, “Empty spaces, what are we living for? Abandoned places,
I guess we know the score. On and on, does anybody know what we are looking for?”

We are looking for love. And I believe we only find it through forgiveness and grace. We just have to keep fighting for it. No matter what.

“Has not man a hard service on earth, and are not his days like the days of a hired hand? Like a slave who longs for the shadow, and like a hired hand who looks for his wages, so I am allotted months of emptiness and nights of misery are apportioned to me.” – Job

Many of us are facing each day with a kind of hesitation; which way will the world tilt today? It’s like we are in a pinball machine and there is a maniacal clown at the controls. One day we are boinking along with happy little bells ringing when suddenly the whammy hits and we get swacked into the stratosphere only to experience sheer terror at the hands of gravity and a black hole beneath our feet. We don’t even have time to question who will catch us when we fall.

If you aren’t familiar with Job (from the Bible) you might like to get acquainted with his philosophies. He’s got a pretty realistic approach to life and some really crappy friends trying to set him straight after the pinball machine of life hurls him into the gutter.

(I mean, can you relate? Have you ever had something bad happen to you and all the squirrels jump out of their trees to tell you how you could have avoided such a catastrophe?)

But seriously, Job asks a lot of really good questions. Here is a sample:

“Why was I not hidden as a stillborn child, as infants who never see the light?”

“Why is light given to him who is in misery, and life to the bitter in soul, who long for death, but it comes not, and dig for it more than for hidden treasures?”

You might be asking why we should care – after all – the dude lived a couple thousand years ago. But I think his story bears relevance to today. Job was deeply afflicted physically, emotionally and spiritually. He was wealthy and lost his goods. He had beautiful children and they all died in a day. He was physically afflicted with sores from head to toe, but he didn’t die, even though he longed for it. He was a man who feared God, yet he asked some pretty tough questions of Him.

Like Job, my questions come in waves as the clouds obscure my vision of God. Why isn’t my life the way I expected? Why do the people I love hurt me? Why is there so much evil in the world? Why do good people have to die? Why do my friends let me down? Everyone asks these questions, but they approach them differently. Some become bitter and resentful. They speak fluent sarcasm and take solace in biting actions and words. Others just pretend to be happy. They fill their life with television programs and movies and other forms of entertainment. Some write self-help books. Meanwhile, I quietly wrestle with how to function in a pain-filled, sin-saturated world where even my friends are no real help.

I was jogging earlier this week when I tried to cross an intersection in a residential neighborhood. Two vehicles were stopped at the red light across from the high school. Since I had the right of way, Annabelle and I jogged in front of the first, a large 4X4 truck. But suddenly the owner of that truck ran the red light and nearly crushed us. I jumped back just in time and neither my dog or I was hurt, but the car behind the truck didn’t move. The driver wore an expression of horror and shock that I had not been pulverized like an errant opposum right before her eyes. For what seemed like an eternity, I hugged the sidewalk and we stared at each other. Life and death hung in the balance and this time I stood on the side of life. I praised God for His kindness to my family and to me. The truck never even slowed down.

But the next day when the lower vertebrae on my back went out, my outlook on life shifted. That pinched nerve made it nearly impossible to walk. It wasn’t just pain–it was the inability to move. I have developed a healthy sense of humor about my back – I like to say, “The pain is breathtaking!” while I imagine myself in a York Peppermint Patty commercial. But what I’m REALLY thinking is, that old maniacal clown is swacking me around again and I’m getting ready to drop into the black hole.

Need I even mention current events?

The debate between Job and his friends is epic. They call him a windbag, a heathen sinner who’s being punished, and worse.

“Know then that God exacts of you less than your guilt deserves.” – Zophar

And yet there’s no record of Job smacking them. Maybe his sores were particularly painful that day and he couldn’t move. Either way, God eventually speaks up and puts the friends in their place, “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?” And then God tells Job who He is.

To me, this is the magnificent crescendo of the symphony that is the story of Job.

God speaks to man…

“Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth and the wicked be shaken out of it?” – God

…and man responds by falling on his face with humility and terror. Poor Job. All he can do is just shake his head and try not to wet himself. Or maybe he did. The text doesn’t say. (I wouldn’t write that in either if it happened to me). I personally always wonder why God doesn’t allow Job’s atoms to dissolve why he’s still conscious and then put him back together again – you know, just as an example of His power. But really, why do we think God is safe? And why do we think we know better how to run this world? And just who the heck do we think we are anyway? (I might be channeling a little Voddie Baucham here…)

Because God doesn’t owe me any explanations. I am flesh and He is divine. The problem is, we forget this sometimes. With all the “Jesus loves me” mooshy stuff, we forget this deity is the one who created the rhinoceros, the alligator, the whale and the sun (which would rightly fry us to a crisp if we were on the Enterprise and got sucked into its orbit without shields). And since the moon hasn’t turned to blood (today) and the sun is still in the sky (and not raining burning cinders onto our faces) I would venture to guess He is still running the universe just fine (thank you very much!). And since we know the bible is true, we can trust that if we repent of our sin by the blood of Jesus, He will forgive us our sin and not incinerate us in a moment of wrath because Jesus atoned for it. The bible says He is waiting patiently, not wanting anyone to perish but wanting everyone to come to repentance.

I have a feeling things are going to get a lot worse before they get better. If you think gas prices are high now, don’t blink. And if you think we’ve heard the worst on Ukraine, don’t hold your breath. And if your still afraid of Covid, take heart; God is in control.

So, pray like there is no tomorrow. Rejoice in hope. Be patience in affliction. And trust that God really does have the whole world in His hands. You are not in a pinball machine and there is no maniacal clown at the helm. And you can take that to the bank (especially when your paper money becomes worthless)!