Interesting phenomenon

Sometimes when I write a blog post specifically about trusting God and why I do trust him, I end up entering a period of time in which I'm strongly tempted to feel very, very sorry for myself for one reason or another (I have learned/am learning not to blog extensively at those times so I don't cringe as often at whininess when reading over old posts). Anyway, then I have to work to put what I just wrote into play in my life.

Sometimes I can't decide if this is a temptation or an opportunity. (That sounded kind of corporate-lingoistic, but I hope you know what I mean.) I choose to believe the latter. Even if things turn out as bleak as I can imagine they will at these sorts of times, I will trust that his ways are just and he acts for my good, because I love him and he says that's because he loved me first (I John 4:19), and ultimate good is in store for those he loves (Rom. 8:28).

Meanwhile, on this side of ultimate good, I've been having a sad sort of week and I'm praying for endurance and patience and perspective. (If you're praying and this happens to come to your mind, I'd appreciate some backup.)

"Weeping may last for the night, but a shout of joy comes in the morning" (Ps. 30:5b).

It always seems soon. Afterward.

Tomorrow will care for itself

One of my company newsletters had an article/editorial this month on the subject of worry. Several broad claims were made without any citations to back them up, which tends to set my Snopes sense tingling. It made for good blog fodder, though, which is something I always appreciate. Below are the main points of the article and my responses to each.

1) Citizens of the United States are more worried now than they ever were in the history of the country. 

• I'd like to see some serious psychological studies from a cross-section of history to back this up. Because from what I recall of my own studies, our history started with feeling disenfranchised from our rulers (the British Empire) and progressed to all-out war fought between seasoned troops and farmers. We had a war over states' rights, partly because we had "citizens" who didn't legally count as full people. We participated in two World Wars that sandwiched the Great Depression. We experienced a major terrorist attack. Seems to me we've had some pretty tense times in our history. Why be so worried now?

2) Anxiety/depression medications are big business.

• Undisputed. But sad. Aren't wealthy people supposed to feel safe and happy? Don't we have more money per capita than most of the rest of the world. What's going on?

3) The media is largely to blame.

• As a song from a favorite childhood record says, "You don't have to read about everything they write / And you don't have to watch everything that's on tonight."

4) Worry is a bad habit "just like overeating, biting your fingernails, or smoking."

• Aren't many of the latter habits connected to worrying? Moving on, though, obviously even emotional behavioral patterns become habits, but somehow they are "okay" habits. People can warn you about the dangers of smoking or overeating, or the sheer annoyance of listening as you bite your fingernails, and you don't really mind. Tell me I worry too much and I may have to make a conscious effort to keep my back from flying up higher than an angry cat's.

5) You can stop worrying if you try hard enough (the article suggests keeping a "worry journal" and clocking your worry times). 

• Oh, great, I'm just not trying hard enough. Something else to worry about. Also, even if a worry journal weren't another thing to add to my list of things to keep track of, I see a greater potential for it to remind me of things to worry about than to make me feel better.

6) Worry doesn't accomplish anything.

• 100% agreement. Or as the best summation of this that I've ever read says, "Who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life?" (Matthew 6:27).

Jesus doesn't just say "Don't worry." He doesn't even say, "Don't worry...be happy!" Instead, he offers a set of "Don't worry, because..." statements. Don't worry, because life is more than food, and the body is more than clothing. Don't worry, because your heavenly Father feeds the birds and because you are worth even more than the birds. Don't worry, because you can't add time to your life by doing so. Don't worry, because your Father—your Father, who cares for you—is by no means ignorant of your needs. 

To worry is to forget all of the above. And yet this notion that worry is a good and effective pursuit has sunk so deeply into us that it shows itself in how we speak. How often I've said something like, "I'm worried the echo in the room will make it hard for the audience to hear the actors," when what I mean is something more like, "I've identified a potential problem with our acoustics and we need to address it." I'm not truly worried. It isn't worry that makes me aware of my surroundings. People who aren't worried don't float through life in a blissful state of constant oblivion to the world around them, they choose not to dwell on such potential problems for too long. They choose to dwell on the big picture instead.

Big picture, my Father holds all of the history of all of the world in his hands. And he knows what I need.

Thoughts for a New President

"Behold, you are trusting now in Egypt, that broken reed of a staff, which will pierce the hand of any man who leans on it. Such is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him." (2 Kings 18:21)

You are buoyed by a tremendous amount of public support, Mr. President. For now. People across the country are happy tonight. Some say they are finally proud to be Americans again. Most, being human, are likely prouder to be feeling in the right than they are about an abstract ideal. Be someone they didn't expect and you may find yourself stabbed in worse places than through the hand. The much-vilified former president probably didn't expect all the shoes, back when his approval ratings were soaring (they were, once).

Don't be tempted to place your trust in people, not exclusively. Not enough to lean your full weight on them. None of us can bear that weight without collapsing under the pressure.

"On an appointed day Herod put on his royal robes, took his seat upon the throne, and delivered an oration to them. And the people were shouting, 'The voice of a god, and not of a man!' Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down, because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by worms and breathed his last.

"But the word of God increased and multiplied." (Acts 12:21-24)

"It's like the biggest church service I've ever seen," one NPR commentator said about the mood at your inauguration. It's become the subject of late-show humorists, this messiah-ship many are trying to foist upon you. 

Watch out; be on the alert. It is a dangerous thing for a human to be venerated. Dangerous both to his worshippers and to himself. Please, please, please, for your own sake...stop and look at yourself once in a while. Look honestly at your failings and remind yourself you are not the god some seem to think you are. And consider that final note, too: a popular ruler died ignominiously despite his way with words, but the Word continued to spread. Quietly. Persistently. 

The rise and fall of kings, emperors, and presidents are none of them as important as we think. Be humble. Know your place, delight in it, and flourish there.

"If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it." (Genesis 4:7)

Seek acceptance from God, not man. Man can't grant it and God won't refuse it when you seek him with everything you have in you. You have so many gifts. Use them well.

I'm praying for you, Mr. President. May God use you mightily.

Something new

I was just listening to a little BNL, which I'll leave abbreviated in case sensitive eyes read this, and thinking about how if I ever get married it will be to somebody who enjoys goofy songs sometimes, and how ridiculously terrific we would be, because anybody who marries me will necessarily be half of the most terrific couple ever, and I realized.... This is new.

Not me thinking about potential marriage in my future, but the way I've been thinking about it lately. (I know I've been writing a lot about this topic lately. It loomed large in my life in 2008 and I'm still sorting through what I've learned.) Here are the main differences:

1) Marriage as one of two equally valid options for the course of my life. Not something to obsess over or freak out about, whether or not I eventually participate in it. Just a potential course God may have me take someday. If I never get married, I will be fine. More than fine. Blessed. Because God doesn't withhold blessings from His children, and it's exciting to see how blessings come in different ways. (If I do marry, no matter when it is, I know I won't regret the wait. And if I never marry, I won't be pressured to give up the best last name in the history of last names. Seriously? Winter? You can't beat that. Apologies to the rest of the world.)

2) Marriage as pleasantly challenging, even when it's difficult. Last Sunday night Pastor Dale spoke of the importance of fighting for unity with each other, of striving to put others first, of choosing to give in for the sake of the relationship. And I found myself smiling and thinking, "Yes. Bring it on." (Dangerous thoughts fully known to a dangerous God.) 

3) Marriage as sharing. Sharing responsibilities, and joys, and sorrows, and frustrations, and interests, and experiences, and encouragement, and growth. Not one grasping for more, but both eager to give of self and of time and of possessions. 

4) This might be the biggest change...marriage as fun. My favorite aunt and uncle got divorced when I was fifteen. Ever since then, I've focused a lot on how difficult a marriage relationship would be. Nothing but work, work, work, all the time. In the past year or so, and especially since certain epiphanies about the true nature of my character, something has been shifting. Now I think that if I were to get married, it would be hilarious on many levels, not least of which would be the radical divergences from my past perspectives. 

But all of this is not primarily about How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Marriage. This is primarily about God pulling me out of myself, leading me though dangerous valleys and beside still waters, feeding my desire for depth by continuing to deepen me in all my relationships. It's about trusting God and taking risks because of it (risks that sometimes involve waiting and patience). About how looking back over my own life increases my faith that God knows what He's doing. About affirming that what He has for me, whatever He has for me, is good. About living as His child in His family: sometimes leaning hard on each other and sometimes smashing up against each other and showering sparks in the process of sharpening us for the tasks at hand, but always pulling towards the same goal. 

I want to get my hands dirty in this glorifying God business.

Romantic Flash Points (Columbus #3)

It's a good thing nobody wanted to fall in love with me in Columbus, because I was on the edge. (You missed your chance, Beth.) There I was, surrounded by intelligent people with similar interests, and even though most of them didn't live anywhere close to me and apparently spent a lot more time listening to NPR than I do, I could barely bring myself to care. I fell in love with the exotic feel of the whole experience, and I felt the pull to transfer that infatuation to a person. 

In one of my favorite posts from his site Stuff Christians Like, Jon Acuff writes about similar feelings in the context of missions trips. The phenomenon extends beyond missions trips to any intense shared experience. Besides the recent arts festival example, I have been to a few conferences in which the group did a lot of communal soul-searching and heart-baring, and I got obliquely asked out in consequence. (Digression: one of the things that turned me off to this oblique request was that this man had previously expressed in a sharing time that a major goal of his future life was to ask more women out. Thank you for making me a check mark on your list, buddy. I feel so special.)

I have certainly heard the siren call of heightened emotional situations. The danger, of course, is that life is not always emotionally intense. In most lives, there are long stretches of boring in there. Nobody is going to be the same kind of shiny in those times as they were at the conference, or at the festival, or on the trip. And does anybody keep in touch on even a casual level with half of the way cool people that you meet in these sorts of situations?

I have my romantic side, but I don't trust it. Look up "romance" in the dictionary. Here, I'll do it for you. Notice that romance, by definition, lacks a firm base in everyday reality. It's all well and good to throw around little romantic gestures, but they aren't what get you through life. Some days you will wake up with bad breath, or come down with a flu, or just be really irritable for no good reason, and romance won't be anywhere around. Love might (should) be, but love is more about sacrifice than showing off. It could be legitimately argued that there is a place for showing off, a place for theatrical flair, but it shouldn't hold the primary place. 

I'm not saying there's anything wrong with drinking in a heightened emotional landscape. I just don't want to get drunk on one.

Maintaining Appearances (Columbus Post #2)

You know that stereotype about women worrying more about their appearance than men worry about theirs? I think that's a lie. I know several men who are balding and sigh over it. Speaking of hair, hair gel for men is a good example of male attention to their appearance. I have several guy friends who are very concerned about their weight (one of the latter, when talking about New Year's resolutions in Columbus, said his "shallow resolution" was: "Lose some weight, fatty"). This isn't to say that women don't worry about appearance, but that in many important ways, men and women are more alike than we are different.

For a long time, I confused humility with self-deprecation. I thought humility meant never accepting compliments, never believing you could be the best at anything, never letting somebody insult you if you could beat them to it. I ignored everything my parents said about how none of this was good for me. Then I ran into some girls who were doing the same sorts of things I was doing and I found those behaviors to be hugely annoying. Why? 

As strongly as self-obsession does, self-deprecation implies that you are the one who gets to defines yourself. Beware how you go about such work: "For the most part we do not see first, then define; we define first and then see" (Walter Lippmann). Usually, until my friends point out that they've gained weight, or that they haven't had anything interesting to say all night, or that they haven't cleaned in too long, I don't notice any of those things. Once they've been pointed out, even if I don't agree with the statement, I'll spend some time thinking about it. Waste some time. Previously, I was thinking about things like how great their band sounds, or how we can talk about anything, or simply how it's nice to see them. A self-deprecating remark derails the easy relational flow that we had going...or that I had going. It reveals pain I didn't know was there, and it opens up my own insecurity.

Because if something like a little weight fluctuation or a lull in the conversation or a few dirty dishes are important to my friend, then what do they notice about me? I'm not perfect, either.

None of us are. We know it. Somewhere below the worrying over what other people think is the knowledge that none of us is perfect enough to be loved for everything we are. We cover up, praising or shaming ourselves in turn, trying to distract others from our real problems, foolishly imagining that our problems preoccupy everyone else the way they preoccupy us, when in reality everyone else is busy looking for cover, too.

When Adam and Eve chose to partake of the forbidden and found it wasn't all the serpent promised it would be, they went looking for fig leaves to sew into clothing. I wonder if they searched in separate directions. I wonder if they could stand to make eye contact before God came looking for them.

When He came, He didn't tell them they were wrong to seek covering. He showed them they had chosen the wrong way to go about it, that He was the one who covers in a meaningful way. Later, He would send perfection personified, a person who wasn't all that much to look at but who brought perfection as clothing for those who saw how much they needed it and that He was the only one who could give it to them.

Here's the bad news: We can't ever be pretty enough, or thin enough, or smart enough, or charming enough, or enough enough, to merit or hold onto love.

Here's the good news: Grace abounds. Real love covers a multitude of all kinds of failings, from a bad hair day to harsh words hurled in anger. "We love, because He first loved us" (I John 4:19). You can't earn it...but you can't stop it, either.

As for me, I have repeatedly found that when I choose to define by love instead of looks, I get the fringe benefit of that choice thrown in: love makes people beautiful like nothing else ever can.

Places old and new

"You get a strange feeling when you're about to leave a place," Azar Nafisi recalls telling someone in Reading Lolita in Tehran, "like you'll not only miss the people you love, but you'll miss the person you are now, at this time and this place, because you'll never be this way again."

This idea was on my mind this morning as we held our first church service in our new building. Many people, if not most of them, were excited about it. I was a bit trepidatious. There are new rhythms to figure out, especially in regards to the movements of my first grade class but also for things like how I sit in the chairs and where I will find people and how I can try to pick out the best hymnal without a hymnal cart. 

The transition will be made easier by the fact that the people are the same. Mostly. We're not the same, not entirely. An era has ended. A period of my life—of our lives—is over. A new chapter has opened. Still, we're heading into it together, and that's no small thing.

I feel strangely about this coming year. It swirls with half-seen possibilities (good and bad alike) in a way previous years haven't for me, in a way that make it seem appropriate that I have already done so many things I've never done before. I've eaten a goat cheese omelet. I've talked to several people I didn't know well, and purposely sat by someone I didn't know at all. I've worshipped at the new building, where I shared a hymnal with somebody whose name I didn't know. (These might seem like small things. Unless you know me.)

I loved the old building. There are certainly things I will miss. But I'm ready for the new one.

New Year's Resolutions (Columbus post #1)

[Going to Columbus for the Wild Goose Creative New Year's Festival (henceforth to be known as the NYF for short) was like going to Harrisburg for Jeremiah and Dorothy's wedding in that there were a lot of post ideas that came out of it. That's why I'm using the same title format I did for the wedding, which I'm not done blogging about yet.]

When I was a kid, I used to try to make New Year's resolutions, just because everybody else did it and I thought maybe I should give it a try, too. I can't even remember one that I made, though, because my heart was never really in it. As I got older, this solidified into the thought that if something is worth doing, it's worth doing now. I don't store up resolutions for a calendar date.

In Columbus we made New Year's Resolution pendants, two small pieces of felt sewn together around a piece of paper on which you were encouraged to write a New Year's resolution. A lot of ideas for this were rattling around in my head, things I had already "resolved" to do before January 1. I went with the most traditional option, the one for which I most felt the need of a deadline.

Afterwards, as we were standing around before the next event, Morgan was asking people what their resolutions were and getting a little annoyed that most were responding that they couldn't tell him, as if they were birthday wishes. So much for accountability, he said.

We have a love/hate relationship with accountability. We know it's good for us, and sometimes we feel motivated by it. But on the other hand, what if we are feeling lazy and want to slack off? What if we declare an intention and fail to turn it into an accomplishment? What if, perhaps worst of all, we reveal something of our hearts and are laughed at, or looked down on?

Well, what if we do? The potential positives outweigh the potential negatives, don't they? Why live like we're in a Thomas Hardy novel, governed by "chance" that is always malicious?

On my slip of paper I wrote: "New Year's Resolution 2009: Pursue publication."

Feel free to check up on me.

A glimpse at my schedule

Here's what I'll be up to for the rest of this week and through the weekend. I know, I know...you're either jealous or you're one of the people who invited me. 

Happy New Year, everyone! I'll be seeing some of you before the year is out!

All the good men

Where have all the good men gone
and where are all the gods
Where's the streetwise Hercules
to fight the rising odds
Isn't there a white knight
upon a fiery steed
Late at night I toss and turn
and dream of what I need
I need a hero


In Save the Males, Kathleen Parker argues that women are largely to blame for the scarcity of good men. Feminism started out as a protest that women are able to do many things men do, and somehow morphed into the decree that they could always do them better—"the best man for the job is a woman," as the slogan on Lois Lane's coffee mug reads in Lois & Clark.

I'm appreciating the book so far. I can't say I'm enjoying it because it paints a grim picture of the state of men in Western culture. Males have been portrayed as abusive, as stupid, as inattentive. Small boys are too rowdy, too jittery. Adult men are too obsessed with video games, too incapable of real relationships. While this might allow the other half of the species a bit of a self-esteem rush, it's also true that, for any woman paying proper attention, such a rush must be followed with a rapid descent into melancholy.

Where have all the good men gone? Is it possible that women have helped to chase them into hiding, at the very least?

To be honest, between the lines of this book I read my own culpability. I have done my share of big talking about how much smarter/more sensitive/easier to relate to women are. Of course they are often easier to relate to. They tend to think more like I do. But we weren't made to be entirely surrounded with people like ourselves. We were made to be stretched by difference.

When Adam needed a companion, God didn't bring him a drinking buddy, he brought him a wife. In this time before sin, difference was seen as marvelous, not threatening. I find it interesting that the original sin involved woman rushing ahead to do things on her own and man sitting back passively. How often throughout history has that pattern been repeated? How often have we mourned the lack of proper, godly male leadership?

I miss male companionship. I miss it like crazy. My best friend while I was growing up was my brother, and I got along wonderfully with my father, my grandfathers, my male cousins. At college, I lived in community with men and women alike, a community that wasn't affected nearly as much by the acquisition of boyfriends or girlfriends as my later life has been. Now, I live in an increasingly Amazonian world. Most of my co-workers are female. No male family members live nearby. And it has been my experience that in a non-communal setting, male friends tend to fade away after they acquire girlfriends, and virtually disappear once the girlfriends become wives.

I, like Lois Lane, tend to retreat to the rather sour grapes position that men are unneeded, and that there are no heroes left. But that's all cover. Really, I believe in capable Supermen and classy Clark Kents (again, we're talking Lois & Clark, not Smallville).

From the sparks I've seen in so many males of my acquaintance, right down to the very young, there is vast potential out there for males to rise to what they were meant to be. To them I have two things I want to say: Don't underestimate your power to encourage the other half of the species. And thank you.

Snowy Sundays

It has been happening once or twice a winter: my church cancels all services due to weather-related trifles like blizzards. Then I have the whole day open, and I don't quite know what to do with myself. You might think it would just feel like an extra Saturday, but it doesn't, and here are the five main reasons why.

1) The rhythm of the weekend is upset if church is cancelled. Usually, it goes: day at work, day running errands and visiting friends, day at church. And usually, by the time I receive notice that church has been cancelled, I am almost ready to leave, and thus not feeling like going back to bed immediately.

2) If church is cancelled, it feels like a serious road situation. I am almost constitutionally obligated not to leave the apartment. (I'm not sure what constitution I'm talking about here.)

3) If I don't leave the apartment, I have a whole day at home, which is rare. And while I may do a few things here and there on a Sunday, chore-wise, I don't make a concerted effort to work like I would on a Saturday. I do any cleaning, organizing, etc. in a consciously more relaxed mode than usual.

4) If I have a whole day at home, I don't see another human being unless one comes to me for some reason, which is almost stranger than me seeing nobody, especially because....

5) If I don't plan to see another human being, I dress accordingly. Today, for instance, I'm wearing sweatpants and a baggy shirt, and my hair is up in loose French braids. Totally casual and very comfortable.

Today I listened to a few sermons online, and I trimmed Apollo's nails and his flight feathers, and I ironed, and I organized my bathroom closet a bit better, and I did a bit of communication on the subject of the youth group banquet, and I have been and am watching the two Anne of Green Gables movies that I own. I missed being with my church family, especially since I'll be out of town for a few weeks now for the holidays, but it has certainly been a restfully productive day. 

Every once in a while, I like being forced to slow down. 

Gift Games

I am extraordinarily competitive. I'll repeat it for emphasis: extraordinarily competitive. For many years, I avoided any game I didn't have a good shot at winning, because persistent not-winning would make me very unpleasant to be around.

This competitive tendency has been reined in quite a bit, but it still bleeds out from time to time. The unfortunate thing is that it isn't something that confines itself to games. I'm competitive about life.

One year, I bought my brother the game Guess Who? for his birthday. It was on his list, and something I knew he really liked. Then my parents brought out their gift: a Batcave playset for his action figures. Guess what? The game was all but forgotten. This was probably more than fifteen years ago, but I still remember the rush of anger and frustration I felt at being upstaged. My gift was not the coolest, which meant I was not the coolest. I vowed never to let that happen again.

Fast forward to present day. I have practically zero imagination for gifts. I can buy off a list, no problem. I (sometimes) see something in a store and think of someone, sure. But if it comes down to "it's Christmas/my friend's birthday/some other special event, and it is time to buy her/him a present"? PRESSURE.

Because when I buy a gift, I like it to be something that's an in-joke, or something that strongly reminds me of someone, and sometimes I sit around and nothing in particular comes to mind, and I brand myself as a horrible friend because I don't know the person well enough to come up with something immediately. Or what if I buy a gift and it's cute and everything, but my friend is thinking, "Wow, I'm worth $10 to her and she's worth $20 to me. I wish I would have donated that extra $10 to charity"? And sometimes I just think, "Personally, I feel I have a lot of junk lying around already. I don't want to add to their pile of junk."

I love my friends. I do. But mostly, in lieu of gifts, I'd rather we just sat around in a room for a couple hours. Yeah, it's what my friends and I usually do, but I just like sitting with them. Doing nothing. Requiring nothing. Being together.

But what if, at least for Christmas and birthdays and other special events, my friend would rather have a new book or DVD or scented candle or something mysterious that I haven't figured out than spend a few hours sitting in the same room with me? What if I'm not a happy-sitting-around level friend to them?

Gift-giving is a risky game. 

The 99 Things Meme

Things I’ve done in bold. 
Things I haven’t done but would like to do in italics.
Things I haven’t done and don't want to do in plain text.

1. Started your own blog.
2. Slept under the stars. (I sleep under the stars every night. Do some of you sleep above them?)
3. Played in a band — or musical.
4. Visited Hawaii.
5. Watched a meteor shower.
6. Given more than you can afford to charity. (What's the definition of "more than you can afford," anyway?)
7. Been to Disneyland. (I went to Disney World.)

8. Climbed a mountain. 
9. Held a praying mantis.
10. Sang a solo. 
11. Bungee jumped.
12. Visited Paris.
13. Watched a lightning storm at sea.
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch.
15. Adopted a child.
16. Had food poisoning.
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty.
18. Grown your own vegetables.
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France.
20. Slept on an overnight train.
21. Had a pillow fight. 
22. Hitchhiked. (With my dad, because we ran out of gas.)
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill.
24. Built a snow fort. (And had it collapse on me.)
25. Held a lamb.
26. Gone skinny dipping.
27. Run a Marathon.
28. Ridden a Gondola in Venice.
29. Seen a total eclipse.
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset.
31. Hit a home run.
32. Been on a cruise.
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person.
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors.
35. Seen an Amish community.
36. Taught yourself a new language.
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied. (I'm satisfied with what I have, but the satisfaction isn't really monetarily rooted.)
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person.
39. Gone rock climbing. (Clambering up without gear on real rocks, with gear on indoor rocks. Still in pain sometimes from an incident on my last outing...I'm so hardcore/clumsy.)
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David.
41. Sung karaoke.
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt.
43. Bought a stranger a meal in a restaurant.
44. Visited Africa.
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight.
46. Been transported in an ambulance. (Yeah, this one is weird, I admit. And I don't want to pay for it or actually need to be in it, really...but I want to ride in one, absolutely.)
47. Had your portrait painted.
48. Gone deep sea fishing.
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person.
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris. (I only went to the second floor, but wouldn't mind going to the third if I were there again.)
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling.
52. Kissed in the rain.
53. Played in the mud. (Yay, Calvin Mud Bowl!)
54. Gone to a drive-in theater.
55. Been in a movie.
56. Visited the Great Wall of China.
57. Started a business.
58. Taken a martial arts class.
59. Visited Russia.
60. Served at a soup kitchen.
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies.
62. Gone whale watching.
63. Gotten flowers for no reason. (From a co-worker's husband...and there WAS a reason, it was because his company had extra sitting around that he brought in for everybody at our office.)
64. Donated blood, platelets, or plasma.
65. Gone sky diving.
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp.
67. Bounced a check.
68. Flown in a helicopter.
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy. 
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial.
71. Eaten Caviar.
72. Pieced a quilt.
73. Stood in Times Square.
74. Toured the Everglades. (I've been, but it wasn't exactly "touring.")
75. Been fired from a job. (More like "let go from a temp position," but still.)
76. Seen the Changing of the Guard in London.
77. Broken a bone. (Mine, or someone else's? Haha, just kidding...neither.)
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle.
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person.
80. Published a book.
81. Visited the Vatican.
82. Bought a brand new car.
83. Walked in Jerusalem.
84. Had your picture in the newspaper.
85. Read the entire Bible.
86. Visited the White House. (As in saw it from outside.)
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating.
88. Had chickenpox.
89. Saaaaaved someone’s life. (I added those extra vowels.)
90. Sat on a jury.
91. Met someone famous.
92. Joined a book club.
93. Lost a loved one.
94. Had a baby. (Would I like to have children someday? Yes. Would I like to have one biologically? I don't think so.)
95. Seen the Alamo in person. (I may actually have done this...if so, it was when I was really little. I don't quite remember.)
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake.
97. Been involved in a law suit.
98. Owned a cell phone.
99. Been stung by a bee.

Public Tears (Wedding Post #3)

When I was a little girl, I would see my mother crying at the drop of a hat and something about it bothered me. I was not going to grow up and be that person. I was not going to cry in public, to let people see my feelings that swiftly. I was going to be strong.

It turned out, of course, that this was one of the things that irritated me so forcefully because I could sense something of myself in it. Still, I worked on not crying for a long time. I would rub my eyes surreptitiously at emotional scenes in movies. I would save whatever tears I had for whatever reason until I was behind closed doors. I would not cry much even when family members died...not in public, anyway. I had to be strong. 

I am becoming increasingly convinced that nobody really needs us to be strong, or impressive, or even right. While those may all be good things in the proper context, what we really need, deeply and desperately, is honesty paired with love.

Honestly? Anyone who cares to look can probably see my emotions rippling just under my skin. Probably people would rather see me cry than experience me lashing out in frustrated self-protection. And letting myself cry in public is another way of acknowledging I rely on Someone beyond myself to protect me.

I cried a fair bit over the wedding weekend. Weddings are emotional at any time, and with it being a family wedding it was even more so. Then there was the fact that it was the most Christ-centered wedding service I've ever witnessed, and the beauty of it and the hope of it and the glory of it were so magnificent that tears of joy and of longing were the only appropriate response to what was resonating through my heart.

After the wedding, my mom said, "You were having a hard time up there." 

"I was crying," I said. "But I wasn't having a hard time."

What we have a hard time with is dealing with tears. We want them to go away. We want to fix things, to make things "better." We want to pat people on the shoulder and give them pitying looks, which generally doesn't fix anything at all but may drive wounds further under the surface. It's up to God to dry every tear, not us. And not now. Here, now, our tears can sometimes be our sacrifices, sacrifices of gratitude, of contrition, of love. Don't try to stop that. Be there for people, but be careful not to confuse your discomfort with another person's, of stopping the flow of communion with God with a hastily proffered Kleenex. (I'm writing this to myself as well.)

I am weak, but it doesn't mean I am helpless. He is my help. And He is strong.

"You'll just know." (Wedding Post #2)

My revelation on the way out to Metamora (see last post) was well timed, because I got a fair amount of sideways "it's okay you're not married and someday you might still be" comments over the weekend of the wedding. This is the sort of thing that happens when people start to think it's really not okay, or that maybe you think it's not okay. Kind of like how ever since the age of about 26, every birthday brings a few "you're still young yet" comments. I've never heard anybody say that to an 18-year-old.

A whole conversation on the merits of online dating sprung up in the room where some of the wedding party gathered while Jeremiah and Dorothy were in the receiving line. Again, it's the sort of conversation that comes up more frequently as I get older. But maybe I'm paranoid. Maybe it's just because online dating is becoming more prevalent. Maybe they're not trying to imply that I've got to get on this "singleness" problem right now in whatever way I can. In all fairness, they didn't come straight out and tell me to join eHarmony. "You'll be going along minding your own business," one of the bride's attendants said, "and all of sudden...you'll just know."

This must be something that only makes sense to the people who "just know." I have never understood it. And I mean never. 

When I was a little girl playing Barbies, the Ken doll would propose and Barbie would say, "I'm going to need a week or two to think about it." Barbie understood that this was a major, life-changing decision, and not one to be taken lightly.

When Wonder Woman was choosing which superhero to marry (this is the sort of thing that happens when your little brother decides he doesn't want to play Barbies with you anymore...he puts up with you dragging typical little girl storylines across toy genres), she would hesitate: "With a mask, or without a mask?" Wonder Woman didn't believe in soulmates or One True Loves.

And this was before I ever encountered a real life couple who had "just known" and then had just changed their minds.

Probably what they mean, all these people who say "you'll just know," is that it is one of those moments of knowing that reinvents everything that came before it...one of those moments, like the experience of grace, that gives you a new perspective. One of those moments that makes the years of not knowing seem insignificant. 

Come to think of it, I have known my share of those.

First Sight (in Retrospect)

he was funny-looking

shallow

dull-witted

she was obnoxious

abrasive

boring

they were uncaring

fawning

impossible

you were annoyed

isolationist

self-righteous

when suddenly

laughably

the victor began rewriting history

G.O.A.T. (or, Wedding Weekend Post #1)

(Oh, so much to post from last weekend! I decided to do it in installments instead of cramming everything into one post, so they'll be trickling through.)

I was feeling mopey on my way to my parents' house on Tuesday afternoon. My little brother would be getting married in a few days. I was nowhere close to getting married. Because nobody ever liked me. Because I wasn't as whatever as the other girls who got married. Whine, whine; angst, angst.

Way back when I was a kid I heard that humility was a virtue and I translated humility as "putting yourself down so nobody thinks you're good at anything." (I've said it before and I'll say it again: kids might not be hearing what you are actually trying to say.) For the past two decades or so I've tried the self-deprecating route. It's never made me feel better, and it's left me kind of confused. I think it's because you get confused when you lie to yourself.

Because, as I was singing along to my music and dancing in my car and in general being ridiculous, I felt a smile come onto my face and this little voice said, "Who are you kidding? You think you're amazing."

Let's be honest. I'm not dealing with a lack of self-esteem. I'm dealing with a perceived deficit in how much other people esteem me, because I think they should be crazy about me. Because I have mad writing skills and a quick wit and an intellect to rival the Sicilian's and a penchant for random references and nerd pride and, and, and...and I enjoy that. All of that.

Am I perfect? No. (Duh. Raise your hand if you've met somebody who's perfect and I'll raise my hand if I spot any liars.) But the Holy Spirit is working in me towards that goal. Do I want to turn from self-deprecation to wallow in utter conceit, or use "it's who I am" as a shield of pride to ward off needed changes? No. But I don't want to be somebody else. I do want to make the most of who I am. To dig down to the core of the uniqueness that is me and shine it up to the glory of God, who made each one of us unique. Each one of us has something a little different to bring, and I want to bring what I have.

In thinking about how people might not like me for whatever reason, I realized that I'm not even really mopey about that. Mostly I'm just frustrated when other people don't show a willingness to fight to love me like I fight to love them (not that it's always a fight, but sometimes it is).

As for how all that relates to the bit about me not being married, well.... 

They had a bouquet toss at the wedding reception. My cousin and I got up and stood in the back. When we returned to our seats, our grandmother joked, "You didn't even try!" 

I replied, "I have self-respect. I don't jump for flowers...somebody needs to come and hand them to me." 

Granted, I'm probably very intimidating to anybody interested in trying. 

I enjoy that bit, too.

Giving Thanks

Last Sunday I asked my first grade class what they were thankful for.

"Nothing," came the first smirky response.

"Nothing," I said. "You have absolutely nothing in your life that you enjoy."

"Ice cream!" he said.

One boy ran through a list of all the kids in class he liked, starting with his best friend, continuing through most of the other boys in the class, and ending with, "...and even the teacher." Which was actually kind of sweet coming from that particular kid.

Some of the kids broke out their Sunday School answers: "God and Jesus!" said one boy.

"Good," I said. "What about them?"

The boy looked panicked, then came up with, "Well, they're Christians...and they're the same person...."

We attempted a small bit of theology adjusting on the "they're Christians" score, but it was a good start. Because it's sure a lot easier to rattle off God and/or Jesus in a list of things you're thankful for than it is to think about why you're thankful for either/both.

Thankfulness is something that takes mental effort, sometimes. It's a choice of focus. I could choose to dwell on all the things I want that I still don't have, and all the reasons I might not have them. Or I could think about how I always, always get what I need, and how what I want and what I need are intersecting more and more frequently.

The first choice spirals me down towards depression, and the second brings a smile to my face and peace to my heart. (Why, then, is that choice sometimes hard? Doesn't it seem ludicrously simple?)

I have so much to be thankful for this year. I know you do, too. If it doesn't seem like it right now, just search for it. You'll find it.

Things old and new

I am a writer. And I should write more fiction, in whatever form presents itself, because if I don't have that kind of outlet I tend to write my life. "I will say this, and then so-and-so will say that, and then I will reply...." I can get very invested in these shadow extensions of people with familiar faces. More than once I've mourned when reality dissolved them. More than once I've held back from people out of the fear of simply inventing them to my liking.

I am a reader. Maybe I should have read less, because somewhere along the line I got the idea that I could read real people as easily as fictional people. It turns out that real people are far more independent than fictional people, and I've read them wrongly with enough frequency that I no longer put full confidence in my ability to read them at all.

I am an analyzer, a pattern-finder. I should remember, in an "active remembering" sort of way, that things as they were do not equal things as they are, or vice versa. I am not doomed to repeat all the same patterns I've fallen into so often before. No matter how much it feels like I am stuck in a time loop in which only external details change (underneath, the same emotions; the same thought patterns; the same sins).

I am becoming a fighter. Even if it means struggling uphill all the way, I won't let my worst tendencies master me. I will not pretend to know what you're going to do. I won't presume to know what you're thinking and will trust what you tell me. I will have faith in a God who can break patterns, interrupt cycles, turn the very sun back in its path. And if I've prayed all these times for these thorns to be removed and they have not been, I will not have the arrogance to assume that I can thwart the power of God by not believing in just the right way. His grace is sufficient. His power is perfected in weakness.

No matter how I feel from day to day, I am new. (2 Cor. 5:7)

Anybody...

...want one of these?

It's kind of hilarious to me that they exist.

Spiritual Warfare

"Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm." (Ephesians 6:10-13)

Somehow in growing up I got the idea that the spiritual forces thing was kind of over. No more miracles, no more demons after you. That was all from the Bible, and since the Bible was now complete, God handed the world over to science. Which was kind of nice, because I like when things are visible and in my face. I've not been very good at picking up on subtlety. I've read the wrong things into just about everything I could.

Then I had a good friend, Jolene, who talked about the spiritual realm as though it were as real as anything she could see. She would pray earnestly for deliverance from oppressive spiritual forces. She didn't leave the house without praying on the armor of God.

Personally, I was afraid that I would confuse oppressive spiritual forces with stuff that makes me uncomfortable, or things my senses tricked me into. I didn't want to be praying away a demon that was really only a piece of undigested bit of beef.

Lately I've been thinking that God doesn't mind me praying away the undigested bit of beef, either. But I've also been noticing a trend. It seems that when I promise God I will do my best for Him in a particular area, or when I make a public proclamation of a truth I cling to, clutter starts accumulating. Someone tells me news I didn't want to hear. Traffic lights are all red when I get to them. I forget to put something I needed on my grocery list. Old worries rattle around with new ones. Thorns grow up around the new plant sprung from seeds of the Gospel. 

I am starting to realize that my weapons are divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses (2 Cor. 10:4). And I am beginning to see you, invisible foes. 

You shall not pass.

Asking, seeking, knocking, expecting

Whenever I go to visit my grandmother, she's always trying to give me things. She will buy extra food so that I can take it home. She will rummage through closets for a sweater I can wear and then tell me I can keep that, too. She pays for lunches and dinners and show tickets and whatnot.

Her daughter, my mom, is like this as well. My mom likes to shop at Goodwill (or Kohl's, or most anywhere there's a bargain advertised), and she's constantly picking up things that remind her of me. She rarely comes to visit without a bag full of things she has for me to look at or a basket of laundry she's done for me. She'll send me home with food almost every time I go visit my parents.

I used to brush these things off. "No, Grandma, I don't need that pudding." "Mom, I can't think of anything I could possibly ever want from that store." Why should I make them spend their money on me when I didn't even need anything? But eventually one day I realized from their disappointed expressions that what they wanted me to say was something more like, "Thank you for thinking of me. I will accept the food/clothing/random gift you are offering me because what it is to you is not just a thing, it's a way of showing love. And if accepting graciously is me loving you and not me taking advantage of you, that's what I will do." (Okay, they didn't really want me to say all that. But that's the gist of it, I think.)

This last time I visited my grandmother, it hit me: God is like her and my mom. He doesn't want me to stand back saying I have everything I need and couldn't possibly want anything else, thanks anyway. He wants me coming to him like a child. And one of the things children do is ask you for things without thinking about if it's proper for them to do so, or if you have the time, or the resources, or the desire to grant the request. 

God's not like me. He doesn't worry about whether or not our relationship is balanced, whether or not we're giving equally or loving each other equally (and all praise to Him for that!). He is not hesitant about blessing me beyond all I could ask or imagine, whether I ask for it or not. But I think He wants me to imagine good things, the best things I can, and to ask for those; and to wait with my eyes closed and my hands held out, expecting to get what I asked for or better.

He's not the God of second-best or of disappointing results. It's high time I stopped living like He was.

"Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. Or what man is there among you who, when his son asks for a loaf, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, he will not give him a snake, will he? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give what is good to those who ask Him!" (Matthew 7:7-11)

Random Fact

I used to hate static electricity a lot more before Elle was introduced in the second season of Heroes. Now I often run my hand purposefully along metallic surfaces and approach file cabinet corners palm first.

It's fun in my world.

Dangerous Prayers

I may have mentioned this before, but I prayed one of those dangerous prayers again. About this time last year, I prayed for God to give me peace in unusual situations I'd never dealt with before, and within about a month my brother began dating the woman who will soon become his wife (shout-out to Dorothy, in case she's reading this: way to be an answer to prayer; I'm sure it won't be the last time).

About a month ago, I prayed for God to protect my heart, to take away my useless dragon scales I try so hard to pull back around me, to take my controlling hands away from my life, and to bring me to full recognition of His control (all clauses of the same prayer). Since then, God has brought a bunch of issues up in a roiling boil. 

A few weeks ago, it was the election. How much trust was I putting in laws written on paper by humans instead of laws written on hearts by God? How much confidence was I putting in God's sovereignty over all things? How hard was I willing to fight for harmony with fellow citizens of a kingdom far greater than any on earth? 

Post-election, there's the youth group banquet. This has been "my" thing for about five or six years and it has been my major theatrical outlet. This year, somebody else not only came up with the main idea but wants to be involved in its execution. Also, two people sometimes more popular and almost entirely always more laid back and thus possibly more inherently likable than I am are competing for the leader spotlight.

This afternoon, I pondered how tightly my identity had gotten wrapped up in this annual church youth group event, how much prouder I was of it than I thought, how much I liked basking in the affection of any youth group kids willing to offer it, how supplanted I felt. I was still thinking about this when I got to church tonight...and found the guest pastor had changed his sermon from "Godly Grief" to "Godly Boasting."

He said boasting in the Lord means...

...we praise God for whatever He does through us.

...we don't boast based on comparison with others.

...we don't exaggerate our strengths.

...we don't take credit for what we didn't accomplish.

...we value the Lord's opinion above any others.

God is the only one worth impressing, he said. God is the only one who gives you worth, he said. We can have peace with ourselves through peace with God...it will never come from the adulation of others.

Again with the timing of God.

This banquet is not (should not be) about how awesome Suzanne is. Or how awesome the other leaders are. Or the performers, or the cooks, or whoever. We're doing this to raise funds for ministry, not fuel our egos.

Also, thinking that people only have room in their hearts for one person, and that if they care about somebody else they can't also care about me, is pretty shallow. Especially considering I've been increasingly experiencing the reverse: that the more deeply my love is based on God's love for me, the more people I can love deeply.

And what if some focus is being taken off this creative outlet because it's time for me to stretch my creative self in other ways? 

I don't know what else the Holy Spirit is going to be doing in my life this year, but what I do know is this: it's going to be something amazing.

Timing is everything

Yesterday I went out to the company warehouse to organize boxes. I was feeling very sorry for myself about current events in my life, and then suddenly I heard the receiving foreman saying to the truck driver who had just come by to pick up a truckload of foam: "Jesus Christ was in the tomb for three days and He rose again."

My heart jumped. Immediately I was tuned into their conversation. They talked about trusting God and praising God at all times: in good health and bad, strong economic situations and shaky ones.

"It is not by accident that I am in the warehouse right now," I thought, and I almost cried at the encouragement that was pouring over my soul as I was reminded (again): God's timing is right. God knows where I will be, and for what reason, and He leads me along where I need to go. I barely see the next footstep, but He sees the whole path...and gives light for one step at a time because that's all I can take, anyway. And He uses people even when they don't know it.

"Keep that church on wheels moving!" the foreman called out cheerfully as the driver left, then turned to me. "Did you see his truck?"

We went to the door and looked out at the semi parked at the dock. "JESUS IS LORD," it proclaimed in big red letters.

"Amen!" I said. 

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ. But if we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; or if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which is effective in the patient enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer; and our hope for you is firmly grounded, knowing that as you are sharers of our sufferings, so also you are sharers of our comfort.

For we do not want you to be unaware, brethren, of our affliction which came to us in Asia, that we were burdened excessively, beyond our strength, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a peril of death, and will deliver us, he on whom we have set our hope. 

And he will yet deliver us, you also joining in helping us through your prayers, that thanks may be given by many persons on our behalf for the favor bestowed upon us through the prayers of many.

~~ I Corinthians 1:3-11

My heart is burdened beyond my strength, and I don't want to keep people unaware of it until it starts crushing me again, like it did before when I was relying so heavily on my own strength. I am faced with things I am not and things I want to be and everything is swirling around in my head faster and faster and I am fighting for perspective to see past this moment.

He will yet deliver me; please join in helping me through your prayers to the glory of God.

I'm pretending that Brittany tagged me for this one-word meme. Because these sorts of things cheer me up somehow, and lately I take what I can get in that department.

Where is your mobile phone? Desk
Where is your significant other? Dawdling
Your hair colour? Brown
Your mother? Smiles
Your father? Laughs
Your favorite thing? Many
Your dream last night? Unremembered
Your dream goal? Write
The room you’re in? Messy
Your hobby? Nerdy
Your fear? Failure
Where do you want to be in 6 years? Beyond
Where were you last night? Jen's
What you’re not? Telepathic
One of your wish-list items? Tower
Where you grew up? East
The last thing you did? When?
What are you wearing? Red
Your TV? Old
Your pets? Gorgeous
Your computer? Shiny
Your mood? Drained
Missing someone? Yes
Your car? Honda!
Something you’re not wearing? Monocle
Favorite shop? Pet
Your summer? *woosh*
Love someone? Improving
Your favourite colour? Blue
When is the last time you laughed? Tonight
When is the last time you cried? *sigh*

Well, that was fun. Even though it ended on a crying note. Come on, meme-writers, you're supposed to be cheering people up.

My Shtick (or part of it, anyway)

I am hyper-concerned about image and I hate it. It is a constant struggle for me to place God at the center of my striving and let people feel the outpourings of that love that I want to surpass all other loves, especially the self-love that comes so easily.

Crazy example? Okay.

Tonight we auditioned a bunch of youth group kids for roles in the annual fundraising banquet. One of the roles was "the ugly girl." And I got my back up because I'm very sensitive about ugly girls. I don't think we should be so concerned about image. Why? Partly because, as mentioned, I'm hyper-concerned about image, and when people talk about physical appearance a lot I feel all shrivelly and gross. (This is not a bid for compliments on my appearance, it's a confession of self-idolatry, which is the most insatiable form I've ever encountered.)

And then I have to be at least twice as funny to make up for my perceived lack of gorgeousness. Which is good because "funny" is one of the power plays I have down so people will like me. In my interview for church membership, I was hilarious.

Am I always funny to make people like me? I hope not. I hope that more and more often I'm simply exercising a gift to bring enjoyment to self and others. Do I actually think I'm ugly? Parts of me, sometimes, and certainly not as infrequently as I should. (Oh, but sometimes I think I'm all that and then some.)

Seriously? I am a ridiculous human being. I think we probably all have this part in common. My goal is to be a more and more sincere human being...and that includes being sincere about my ridiculous bits. 

Someday all of me--physical appearance and humor and skill sets and all--all of me will be focused on the right things, the right Person, and then it will bring joy to others and to me in ways I can't even imagine now.

Today, and tomorrow, and the next day, and until that someday--I fight.

So my brother's getting married this month....

I thought I would be married by now. As a kid, I mean, that's what I thought. If you had told me that my little brother would be getting married before I'd ever dated, and that even he would be nearing 28 by the time this happened.... Well, that just wasn't possible. Because you grew up, started dating, got married, had kids. That is how life worked. 

Except not really. Really, life worked (works) like this: God sets the schedule, not me. God sets the agenda. 

And God let me fall on my face where my original agenda was concerned (a lot). He let me try out different angles and adjust my paradigm based on past experience and attempt to work out a nice safe scientific theory that covered all the variables and eliminated all potential problems. Then he knocked that one over and let me start again. And again. And again.

He let this happen until I was thoroughly content with being unmarried forever, and then he brought my future sister-in-law into the picture and showed me how big of a liar I can be, even to myself. He let me see contentment in all circumstances wasn't about feeling perfectly fulfilled in all circumstances. He let me think about where I expected that perfect fulfillment to come from, anyway, and when.

He let me ponder the myriad ways other people could let me down, the myriad ways I could let myself and others down, and led me into pondering why I was so concerned about the harm any of us could do to each other, why I was clinging to my dragon scale armor when he gave me his own and sized it to fit me (or perhaps me to fit it).

He let me make my lists, back in the college days, of what I was looking for in a guy (how tall/smart/funny/etc. he should be), so I could see from here how thoroughly worthless most of the list was, how impossible it is for a human to fill my needs, how harmful to myself and others to lean on them so hard.

He let me rush in like a fool so I would appreciate the virtue and wisdom of being still, of waiting.

He made "I give up" and "I don't know" important and precious sayings in my life, inasmuch as they relate to giving up the hurtful things and not presuming to know all things.

For instance, I don't know whether or not I'll ever be married. But I give up on making marital status an indication of extra-special blessing I haven't earned yet, and also on making it something that I can't even think about until I've reached some mystical goal point in my spiritual life. 

Am I free of all my fears about commitment? No. Am I going to start introducing myself to every unattached male I see? No. Am I attracted to the idea of marriage?

If it looks like this, I am.

Election day thoughts

The king's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD;

he turns it wherever he will.

~~ Proverbs 21:1

Nothing takes God by surprise.

No differences of opinion confuse him.

No political zealot sways him from his intended purpose, but the prayers of his people are effective and accomplish much...more by far than you can ask or imagine.

In a time of rising political unrest, with all eyes on Rome, Christ came to be born in a small town to politically insignificant parents. He was the most important event in history, and the only savior of any country. (When ticker-tape parades are over, every elected official eventually becomes human.)

He cares about national politics, but he's more concerned about individual hearts.

And when you ask him to show you your heart and to take guarding it out of your hands, he can be amazingly quick to respond. (He is dangerous.)

So get some sleep, Suzanne. He doesn't need your worrying to save the world. He is already using you in ways you may never know (and some that you may), and there are greater things to come. Know your place, and know that it is under his protection and care.

Peace. Be still.

A different kingdom

When the Israelites asked for a king "like all the nations," God told Samuel he'd give them one. But he told him to warn them: that kind of king wouldn't be what they thought he'd be. 

Sure, Saul was tall and charismatic and popular. So were a lot of Israel's kings, no doubt. But God warned the people that their kings would look out for themselves first and their friends second; that they would raise taxes higher and higher; that their administrations would balloon out of control.

Sound familiar? It should.  This is what happens with human rulers. Even now, even here in the United States, where our form of government is far more free than that of other nations. This is what happens.

I haven't been watching political ads much this year. They used to make me angry, but this year they make my heart ache. Every ad promises that a better life hinges on which candidate you vote for. Every ad promises change. Every ad promises more than any human being has a right to promise, let alone the ability to follow through on.

Every ad sounds like offering cosmetic surgery to cancer patients.

John McCain may be able to keep the troops in Iraq, but he will not be able to stop terrorism. Barack Obama may be able to change your health care plan, but he will not be able to keep you healthy. They are right: we need change. They are wrong about the kind of change we need most.

No matter who is elected on Tuesday, on Wednesday morning there will be people who wake up hating each other. There will be people who wake up with physical illnesses, people who wake up apathetic about their jobs, concerned about their relationships, afraid of what will happen to them in this economy. People with, at the ground level, the same concerns that people had back in the founding days of the United States. Or in the founding days of the nation of Israel, for that matter.

Who is going to protect us? Who is going to look out for us? Who is going to make us look good to everybody else?

Two thousand years ago, along came this blue collar worker from a backwoods town, with no ad campaign to speak of except for some guy dressed in camel skins. He didn't address the problems people brought to him, he told them they only really had one problem.

Our problem isn't that we don't look good enough. We don't need nose jobs or tummy tucks. Our problem is that we are not good enough. Like cancer, which turns the body's cells against themselves, our very selves are operating at odds to the way they are meant to operate. (It is said that, when asked to write an essay on what was wrong with the world, G.K. Chesterton replied, "I am.")

We stand guilty before God of violating our purposes. Our hearts need to be changed.  And only God can do it...so it's a good thing he's already offered: "I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh" (Exodus 36:26).

There is only one physician capable of this kind of heart transplant, and of cleansing us of the cancer of self-righteousness. The only conditions? That we acknowledge that we can't do it ourselves and that we ask him to do it for us. That we stop trying on our own and do it his way. It isn't painless; no surgery is. But there's no other cure.

If you'd rather opt for cosmetic change, there is no end to your options. Two men and their running mates have been throwing some of those at you for months now.

"The kingdom of God has come to you," the blue collar worker named Jesus said (Luke 11:20). And this kingdom is about power, not fancy speeches (I Cor. 4:20).

I'm so tired of fancy speeches.