Destination Discipline

“For what will it profit a man if he gain the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?” – Jesus

There is nothing that will make one feel more out of control than to have a child who is in danger. When we received notification that a threat had been made to a teacher at school that involved bombs and firearms, I was naturally nervous. The administration assured us they were taking every precaution. The next day they cancelled school. I wondered what was happening so I called another parent whose child was more directly impacted. Details were vague. Someone in the community sent an email to someone at school making serious threats. So the principal sent an email that included the following…

This message caused more questions in my mind. What were the specific “acts of hate”? Why are they blaming religious bigotry? It’s all so…unclear.

My son told me that there are some children in the school who are “furries”. They wear ears and tails and like to walk on all fours around the school. He said they are antagonistic and aggressive. They bark at the other students. Some of these children participated in the St. Charles Parks Department summer camp program. They were kicked out after they started biting other children. (I’m not kidding). They have also been demonstrating with signs saying they are oppressed. He said it’s “really annoying.” It is also disruptive. The other children respond by barking back at them. I wonder why the administration was allowing this behavior.

My son is not allowed to talk about God in school. One of the teachers told him religion doesn’t belong in school. I wonder what would happen if my son decided to demonstrate that we need God in school and wanted to hold a prayer meeting on campus. Would he feel “supported and cared for” or would he simply be asked to leave?

My child faces these dangers every day. His young mind is inundated with a culture that celebrates sexual liberation rather than chastity. He is 13 years old and the predominating narrative is “do what feels right to you.” Therefore, children are being emboldened to embrace nonsense ideas – like they can be a furry animal, or that they can be a different sex than they were born with, or that they can be “non-binary”. The adults in their lives who know better lack courage to speak truth to these people with immature brains and so they swirl in confusion. The law isn’t much help in this regard either.

All of this begs the question: which danger is most pressing for my child? Is it a bomb blowing up his classroom or is it that these ideas have tangible consequences? (Because how do you explain puberty to a girl who thinks she’s a dog? Not to mention the question of why we are hypersexualizing children?) On a recent visit to the pediatrician my son saw this picture of Minnie Mouse on the wall and said, “Why is her skirt flipped up and her underwear showing?” Good question.

Why is Minnie Mouse so immodest?

These questions create within me a sense of powerlessness because the truth is, I do not have ultimate control over my child. Evil people are going to threaten and possibly harm him. He is going to make decisions that have permanent consequences. And since our educational system has, for the most part, removed God (and moral authority) from our classrooms, unless I teach him at home, he will never know the satisfaction and joy of relationship with the creator of the universe.

There will be people who read this and feel the need to attack me for my belief system. They might say that I am hateful and a religious bigot. This makes me sad. Am I intolerant? Am I exclusive?

I think our culture is confused about what peace, joy and satisfaction actually look like. True meaning and purpose cannot be found in sexual ethics. The only way to true and lasting peace is through Jesus Christ via a relationship with God the Father. It cannot be found in the arms of another human being – no matter how well-intentioned each party is, just as it cannot be found in food, shopping or wild African safaris. I welcome the dear reader to try. But why does this make me a religious bigot?

We disenfranchise our youth when we withhold truth from them just because we don’t like it. There is a God and He created the universe. He created men and women with a perfect plan to populate the world–but more importantly to love and be loved by Him.

Jesus said we must “deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow him.” He said whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 16:24-25) This would be a good place to begin with our children… “The creator of the world loves you. He knows you are a sinner and made a way to heal you of that sin and bring you into relationship with the Father. Believe in Him and you will be saved. Also, you will be supremely satisfied in Him forever.”

The only real security we have in this life is through God. Tornadoes will suck up our houses. Fires will ravage our businesses. Illness will rob our vitality. Death is the eventuality for every human who lives. So I ask you again, “what will it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul?”

No matter how many bombs go off or how many lies the world tries to peddle about human sexuality – our souls are secure in Christ. No one can snatch us out of his hands.

Today, if any of this resonates with you, I hope you will seek Him out and discover who he really is and what he did for you. He loves you. He is standing at the door waiting for you to open it.

“The bee did buzz, did land, did taste. She swatted at the beast. And so the hairy demon stung and poison was released.

The bee did die but left behind a welt of fiery pain. The lass did cry but stomping on the bee was all in vain.”

Sometimes stomping feels good. Especially if we have been hurt in some way. It feels productive in the moment. Nobody wants to be a blathering victim crying in their pudding. We want to hit back. We want to take out the bully, the robber, or the boss.

But how do we respond when there is no anesthetic for the pain? What happens when the body of our friend lies cold? When sickness clings and does not abate? When the friend does not relent of their betrayal?

Lashing out is extremely gratifying in the heat of the moment, but does nothing to heal our wound. The bee sting still throbs–or worse–sends us running for a shot to stop anaphylactic shock!

I have been “hot under the collar” for some time now and working hard to manage my rage. I’m sure I don’t seem like a particularly angry person, but I am. There is no shortage of things to be angry at. Be it the evening news, politics, the pandemic, or that pesky driver who wasn’t paying attention and hit me hard enough to shove me into another car; yeah, I’ve been pretty “steamed”. I have friends who disagree with me on vaccines and masks and some who have even cut me out of their lives. And the cutting goes both ways. My social media feed shrinks every day.

It’s not a sin to be angry. Anger is an emotion God gave us. Jesus got angry. God certainly gets angry. I’ve been reading in Ezekiel and am quite disturbed by the first few chapters. For all those people (charlatans?) who claim to be prophets, who of them ever got a vision from God telling them to pronounce judgement on a nation by cooking all their meals over human dung? God hates sin. And “hate” is a very strong word.

But my question to me is, “What am I supposed to do with all this anger?” So many of the things I’m angry about are out of my control. Dead Marines? Check. Dead Christians? Check. Incompetent leadership? Check. And those are just the things I can think of off the top of my head. I could list another 20 or 30, but that would be boring.

Tick

Most recently I’m really angry about ticks. Ticks bite. Literally. My whole life I’ve been getting ticks on my body and never had a problem other than an itchy spot for a few weeks. But in early July I picked up a tick carrying a bacteria called “Ehrlichia chaffeensis“. Both humans and dogs can get this bacteria and it causes a nasty infection that kills white blood cells. Therefore, when I went to the hospital with a 103.5 fever and discovered my white blood cells were low (81) and my liver enzymes were over 500, the doctors were a little concerned. The good news, they said, was that a little antibiotic (doxycycline) would fix me right up. If I would “give it a day or two”, I would be just fine. But, a week later, when I was still running a fever, I went back to hospital and got another “all expense paid by me” trip through the ER and another painful IV to boot. I was told I had a secondary infection, needed more antibiotics, and was told to “go home and rest”.

I suppose at the time I was too tired to be full-on angry, but my pot was simmering nonetheless. I have worked very hard to get healthy and stay healthy but this was beyond my control. Still, I have to admit I was “hot under the collar” at God. I blamed him. He allowed me to get the “tick-ness”. And it just didn’t feel fair or right.

Maybe I shouldn’t admit that; but it’s true. And here I am at the end of August, still tired, still queasy in my guts, and still weak. If you want to know the truth, I’m aggravated.

So I’ve had my little “stomp”. I’ve also done my fair share of crying and pity-partying. I also realize that in the grand scheme of life, Ehrlichia is not the worst thing that could happen to me or anybody else. It’s treatable. Curable, even. Even if it’s taking longer than I want it to. Things could be worse. I could have a tumor that turned out to be my mostly absorbed twin from birth and all that’s left is some teeth and a grotesque looking eyeball. That would really be disturbing.

There are plenty of verses in the bible about anger, but I’ll spare the dear reader. Sometimes when the kettle begins to boil, the steam must come out. I am human, not a robot. There are a few activities that are helpful (like burning a bonfire in my backyard). I can also go the river and throw rocks in the water. The fish might be annoyed, but they can suck it. And when the anger cools and the pain takes hold, I cling to the promises Jesus made to his followers…

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” John 14:27

Today, if you are angry, stomp! But then remember you are loved. And when the smoke clears, remember the One who bore the brunt of the Father’s wrath on the cross so that you might have eternal salvation.

“I don’t want to leave my home. My husband says we have to move. So I am going to leave him.”

My new friend trembled as she spoke, the register of her voice was barely above a whisper. Her silver hair waved around her ears–soft and elegantly simple. I looked from her face to the scalloped white collar that buttoned at her throat. She appeared neat, clean and honorably pious.

She said, “I don’t believe in God anymore. I don’t think he’s real.”

She looked around nervously. “I’ve attended this church for 10 years. I don’t talk to anyone and they don’t talk to me. I don’t believe all this stuff they are talking about. But my husband insists we come here.”

She was as still as a mouse. With tense shoulders, she was hiding in plain sight–as if a cat would pounce at any moment.

“I’ve been married for 39 years. I don’t want to leave my city, even though most of my friends have died or moved away. I love my home. I thought I would die there. How can I live if I leave?”

I said, “I don’t have all the answers, but I know how it feels to leave the home I love–and I only lived in mine for 17 years.”

She grabbed my hand. “Oh!” She said. “Then you know how I feel!”

I said, “I do. But my house was just a building. God is my real home. And he is with me wherever I go.”

Our real world suffering can seem mighty big compared to the invisible God who does not intervene when and where we want him to. One could even say our pain is like a thick, gray storm cloud that is filled with dust. It chokes us so that we can see no way out. With dirt particles filling our nose and mouth, we grasp for a lifeline–and when one doesn’t arrive on our timeline–we fall to the ground in defeat. All our faith feels intangible and hollow. Our doubts rise up like a stallion and trample our hope. Our eyes sting with tears. Our hearts sag with dread.

My friend is not the only person I know who has stopped believing in God. I know others who stopped trusting. They left loveless marriages and stubborn, rebellious husbands. They have struggled with loneliness, heartache, and questions that found no answers.

“O Lord God of hosts, who is mighty as you are, O Lord, with your faithfulness all around you?” Psalm 89: 8

Is God really faithful?

I have struggled in my marriage too. I have gone to bed angry. I have lashed out with barbed words intending to do serious damage. We have screamed and cried and separated. I have sobbed myself to sleep. I have climbed from bed exhausted and with a cold spirit. I have wondered where God is and why he allows me to suffer.

I am not the only woman in the world who has thought, “If God really loves me, why won’t He change the man I married? Why won’t God make him kinder, more attentive, less…..lazy?” (I am certain there are plenty of men who feel the same about their wives.)

Another good friend of mine is married to a man who has never earned an honest living. They are in their 70’s. She told me candidly, “If it weren’t for the inheritance my parents gave me–and my wise investing of it–he’d be living in his car.” Her husband is one of the most fluent “God-talking” people I ever met, and he has failed his wife miserably.

“Lord, where is your steadfast love of old, which by your faithfulness you swore to David?” Psalm 89:49

I have hidden my broken heart in fantasy novels, chick flicks, and endless bowls of M&M’s. I have dreamed and schemed a way to fix what seems unfixable. But it wasn’t until I submitted and surrendered to God’s authority over over my life that I ever found peace.

I run the risk of sounding like a clanging symbol here. I write like God waved a magic wand over my marriage and made all our arguments into flocks of white doves. Like I’m sitting over here plucking the petals off a daisy and smelling the roses while chaos swirls around me.

As if!

No–it’s better than that. I trust God today because he has walked with me through the fires of divorce and reconciliation, and the deep waters of residual anger and bitterness–and has delivered me by his righteous right hand. I no longer believe in “happily ever after’s” but have found strength in the steadfast love of the Lord. When I opened my heart to him, he showed me the ways I was sinning in my marriage and offered to heal me so that I could live without guilt and shame. Because when I sin against my husband–I sin first and foremost–against God. And that sin is costly. It denies me peace with God. There is a lie the enemy likes to tell us–that we are victims who have a right to take justice into our own hands. But God clearly says, “Justice is mine. I will repay. Do not take vengeance into your own hands.”

This is not a popular teaching. We want revenge and we often execute it. But as Alexander Dumas brilliantly displayed in his masterpiece, “The Count of Monte Cristo”, revenge is devastating no matter what color you paint it (and his hero painted it blood red). We will all be held accountable for the sin we commit against God and the only person I am responsible for is me. But I have learned (very uncomfortably, I might add) that revenge does not bring peace. A sword begets a sword. And this is why I cling to Jesus–He wields the sword so I can rest in him and his perfect justice. I love my husband–yes, even when he is imperfect–because God loves me. Because through the lens of faith I recognize I am imperfect too.

My new friend can’t fix her husband. He wants to move and she won’t change his mind. She had lost all hope that there was a way out of her situation. I encouraged her to trust in the steadfast love of the Lord. His mercies really are new every morning. His faithfulness is great. (Psalm 89 is a perfect depiction of the real-life tension we all feel in this area and I encourage the dear reader to read the whole thing.)

At the end of our conversation she told me she believes in Jesus and has a relationship with him. She then said, “I know God sent you to talk to me today.” Then she grabbed my hands. “You saved me today. I mean, you physically saved me. You don’t know what I was going to do.”

I thought about all the moments and memories that brought me to that place and time–the pain, the suffering, and the hardship. Then I said to her with absolute peace: “God loves you. He is with you. Trust Him.”