God, my banker

Have you ever sensed God speaking to you through someone else?  This week I was inspired through the voice of a particular man.  From the moment I met him, I felt blessed.  We had talked probably 5 minutes, and suddenly he threw in a zinger.  “Let God be your banker,” he uttered.  I had mentioned nothing to him about the dollar signs dancing in my head.  Ideas about books, and music, and coffeehouses, and questions of how financially they could all work together had felt cluttered in my brain.  This man’s words zeroed right in to quell any worry.  In a sort of teaching mode while he spoke, his forefinger pointed in the air and then at me, so I was sure to hear.  And what set the whole stage for me to keenly listen was his earlier comment on planting seeds and watering them and scattering stones.  At first I thought of 1 Corinthians 3, but the part about scattering stones I had recently read in Ecclesiastes.  Interestingly I had taught on those exact verses a couple of Sundays ago, so my attention was certainly drawn, as if looking up to find myself sitting in the Lord’s classroom with Him personally teaching me in the moment.  Simply I had entered the doors of the hospital that day, unaware of how the Lord would connect me in conversation.  Forever He is weaving His goodness amongst and within.

Boldly from a wheelchair

“Does anybody have praises to tell about?”  The lady at my table smiled to tell the whole room, “It’s Wednesday, and I’m happy to come to church!”  Refreshingly, and very simply, she was right.  Her gentle voice matched a unique contentment in her eyes, both seeming to reach far beyond the circumstances of her wheelchair.  And her words had given me reason to pause.  This week has been different.  Kind of quiet, in fact.  A phone call to a friend with Crohn’s disease set me in a pensive mode.  A phone call to a friend dealing with dialysis set me pensive again.  Prior to those calls, I had sat with a friend at an infusion center downtown, my eyes being opened for a closer look at the processes of blood replacement and liver transplantation.  Each moment held its own reason to ponder and be thankful, and I loved the availability the Lord had given me to serve—waiting for my friend and being so glad for her to regain some energy, entertaining the little boy at the clinic who loved to eat Skittles while waiting for his grandpa, talking with the lady making a cross-stitch bib while waiting for her son, and overall being thankful for the many who donate blood in order for all these to receive.  All in all, life has appeared more fragile lately.  I look forward to some friends coming for dinner on Saturday, realizing they too have dealt with fragility in the form of cancer.  It’s a Psalm 46:10 week.  I can sit still and know God.  As my table-mate reminded me last night . . . it’s Thursday, and I’m happy to have come to know the Lord!

The book of Job + $1.10

In San Antonio, $1.10 buys a seat on the bus.  Yesterday I wanted to meet my husband close to where he works across town, and then we’d drive together to church.  I paid my $1.10 on the 648, chose a seat near the front, and began reading the book of Job.  Poor Job is having a hard time, and actually that’s a huge understatement because Satan is afflicting him intensely.  I’m reading where Job is losing his livestock, his servants, and his family, and suddenly I hear a man’s voice and look up to acknowledge him taking the seat behind me.  He had recognized my Bible’s columnar pages and smiled to say he enjoyed reading too.  Genesis was the book that really made him think, he said.  He elaborated a bit, and all the while he spoke, my heart was leaping to realize this was no ordinary bus ride.  I was sitting in the midst of the Lord at work.  He was transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary.  As an orchestra conductor might cue the clarinets alongside the violas, the Lord had cued my new neighbor and me to meet on the bus that afternoon.  Only the Lord’s orchestra is exponentially more vast.  He brought joy into the hearts of 2 people who until recently had lived in distant parts of the world.  Yet never is the Lord far from His children, nor is a day with Him ever humdrum.  Especially in those occasions like Job’s when the afflictions of Satan excruciate, we find peace in knowing the Lord is near.

Rubbing elbows in the trenches

“You’re Everywhere”—it’s one of my favorite songs.  YouTube hosts several Third Day renditions, in case you’d like to listen. The lyrics correlate with what happened this past weekend.  We sat in our living room with friends, taking turns telling stories of God.  Conversation ran deep from the start, as our friends had been enduring the throes of death and how it can change the landscape of a family's personality.  It was tearful and gut-wrenching, yet joyous at the same time.  It seemed the deeper the pit, the sweeter was the Lord’s deliverance.  My husband told the story of how the Lord one morning washed away his deep, deep anger.  I told of the multitude of blessings the Lord bestowed when I lost a job.  In the midst of physical ailment that sent me to the doctor and a wounded pride that didn’t let me sleep at night, the Lord let me know His presence, even blessing me all the way through to my daughter, whose college scholarships we saw Him increase to compensate for my lack of a job.  Little did we know that our stories in the living room on Saturday would become part of our friend’s sermon on Sunday.  Midway on his drive to San Antonio, he had realized he’d forgotten his preaching notes.  Now the Lord was using our stories to fill some gaps for his sermon.  It was two for one—a two-fer, you might say.  Storytelling wasn’t simply storytelling.  The song lyrics say, “My God, You are everywhere from the lowest depths to the heavens.”  According to 1 Corinthians 3:9, we are God’s fellow workers.  When He’s not carrying us, He's working alongside, rubbing elbows with us in the trenches. 

Guitar crossover

I’ve been resisting it.  Learning guitar hasn’t been my idea of fun lately.  I am fully aware that enormous blessings have come my way through things I didn’t choose myself, yet somehow I’ve resisted.  Yesterday was good, though.  I dived in with chords G, C, and D.  Thought I’d try them on “Lord, I Lift Your Name on High,” thinking maybe a familiar tune with lots of voices would prevail over my inexperienced hands straining across the strings.  And actually it was fun.  A refreshing memory came to mind as well.  My husband and I used to study with a friend who would bring his guitar to start our Friday evenings with a few songs.  Each Friday, he invariably fumbled some chords, and I loved it.  His fingers hit crosswise, and I always smiled in my heart and maybe on my face too.  The fumbled chords brought a reality to our worship.  Real life has fumbled chords, so to say.  We hit rough spots and need to bounce back.  Just as our friend double-checked his chord chart to replay, we regain our footing with the Lord and step back on track.  Yesterday, sitting on the couch with the guitar on my knee, this memory did lighten the task and bring joy to this new endeavor.  My crossovers from oboe to piano and then piano to voice have stretched me indeed, and sometimes I haven’t understood how it would all work together, but it did.  May the Lord continue to overpower my selfish heart and give joy for the new road. 

An earful of blessing

Listening can be good.  Listening, rather than always talking, that is.  It takes me out of the driver’s seat, presenting opportunity to see into the life of another, offering the reminder that little ol’ me isn’t really at the center of things.  This week I visited 2 friends in the hospital—one who awaits a liver transplant, and another who’s enduring kidney transplant complications.  They’ve both dealt with all kinds of hardships and excruciating pain, yet to hear them talk, it’s their love of the Lord at the forefront.  Seeing Him in their gentle, gracious ways inspires me and has caused me to sit and ponder a number of things.  Not too long ago, I was inspired through another friend as well.  I’d been praying for him to find a job, but somehow we had never talked about houses or apartments or anything.  I had no idea he lived at the Salvation Army shelter.  I’d never heard him complain about living arrangements, and indeed how I admired his mindset to press on and look forward.  In my neighborhood, I've found a wonderful joy in the form of a German shepherd down the street.  Hearing him bark and seeing him wag his tail to greet his master sets my heart afloat.  It takes a few seconds to slow down, listen, and watch this dog, but his utter joy is contagious.  James 1 says we should all be quick to listen and slow to speak.  Some say that’s why the Lord gave us 2 ears and only 1 mouth.  May we seek Him for how to listen today—with the neighbor who's lonely, perhaps with the aunt who so readily criticizes or the guy in the office with the insanely crazy clothes, yet certainly still affording ourselves time to listen for the voice of the Lord himself.  Whether two minutes or twenty or more, blessing lies within.

The wandering man at the festival

` I saw a man from within the crowd.  He walked alone.  He walked in circles sometimes.  Both days, he frequented our corner of the Hills Alive festival, which was held in Rapid City’s downtown park.  He looked at the ground mostly, not connecting verbally with anyone, though he did pause occasionally to watch children.  Given the 90-degree heat, I wanted to offer him a drink of cold water, yet an occasion with a photographer caused me to wait.  In pursuit of photographing a girl, the photographer crossed paths with the man, who seemed to not understand the camera.  He peered up into the lens, almost touching it with his nose.  Something about his reaction to the photographer made me hesitate to approach him with any water.  Perhaps my approach would confuse or scare him.  Later the crowd grew denser, and where the man went I don’t know, but I thought about him many times.  The whole festival was a wonderful time of music and testimony.  For the organizers to offer free admission is quite remarkable, realizing other festivals charge $100+.  It was entirely fun to see a friend from San Antonio hosting a booth there.  And I smile to remember a lady at a different booth who noted my use of the word “y’all,” reminding me all over again that Toto and I weren’t in Texas anymore.  Yet still today, I think of the wandering man.  The Lord connected me with him for a reason.  Praying for him was another highlight of the festival.  Without knowing his name or any details of his life, I am privileged still now to ask the Lord to protect him and provide for his needs.  May he know Jesus as his Savior.

Not a Sunday stage

The big stage doesn’t always attract.  People exit the building dissatisfied.  Some wonder why life feels flat.  They become angry and critical, and soon the whole subject of church has grown sour.  So we ask, “What are we looking for on Sundays?”  Perhaps consider blessings of a different size and shape.  Not all God's gifts are wrapped tall and pretty in the main sanctuary.  Consider the parking lot.  For me it’s been a wonderful place of prayer.  Last Sunday someone new inquired about piano lessons, and the inquiry sent me back to that hot, sweaty day in the parking lot a year ago when multiple people offered prayers on my behalf for this issue of piano lessons.  How I've been blessed to relive those initial prayers.  I stand in amazement to look upon the Lord’s blessings since then.  The parking lot has been a place I’ve found people needing physical help, such as the lady who fell between the street curb and the concrete steps.  Sometimes it’s opportunity to offer someone a ride to the bus stop or invite them to lunch.  Also reconsider maybe an unlikely place—the women’s restroom.  Sometimes the restroom serves as its name implies, as actually a place of rest.  Girls go there to find a tissue when they’re crying.  They go there to see if the crying made their mascara run.  Women go there to regain composure when the antics of their children have tested their last nerve.  Sometimes they’re there because the music is too loud or the seating is too crowded.  Basically there’s something uncomfortable for them, and they’re seeking respite.  It’s opportunity to offer help.  It's opportunity to listen, maybe talk, and see the Lord at work.  The point being that church is more than any single event in a single room on any given day.  The platform at the front of the room is not a stage.  It's not a concert.  Church is people.  We love as the Lord first loved us, and we look to know Him in whatever circumstances He brings.  May He give us joy for opening those packages that deliver to side doors and parking lots.

The openness of the 119th

I ask for many things.  The other day, it was for help while phone shopping among too many bundle choices.  A few minutes ago, it was for wasp-killing in the kitchen.  Somehow every time I wanted to swat the wasp, the cat was in the way, and we provided each other frustration and comic relief both.  The point being that I’m often asking the Lord for something specific, whether help with a phone purchase or a job or health or something else.  Yet I read Psalm 119 and see something different.  The psalmist speaks of praise and rejoicing and meditating on precepts, of delighting in the Lord and guarding against deceit.  Lots of whole-being things rather than specifics.  Lots of declaring His righteousness, obeying His statutes, and finding good in affliction, which are much bigger aspects of living than any single pesky wasp in the kitchen.  This psalm models for us a wonderfully open time with the Lord.  Enjoy letting Him mold our thought patterns overall.  Savor the openness of not knowing how exactly He will enter our lives each day.  Leave the ball in His park, so to say, to amaze us and grow us, without our always dictating a laundry list of “Help me with this” and “May I have that?”  Even my encounter with this psalm was by His orchestration. 

Fragmented, useful, & in perfect time

The timing was impeccable. All the postponements held their own human reasons, but now each was revealing the larger purpose of God. Only on this particular Sunday would the missionaries to Nicaragua be sitting with us on our back 2 rows. Exciting already was seeing the Lord’s message given through our pastor align with the message given to me, but then my heart leaped higher still to hear the guys going to Nicaragua explain how the Lord gave them the same message. At the end of the service when the one young man mentioned not understanding Spanish, my ears perked up. Evidently the only part he understood in our Spanish congregation that morning was my English portion. My fragmented Spanish usually fizzles out midway, and I start inserting some English. As much as I’ve wanted to know the whole Spanish vocabulary, here today I was amazed to see my fragments being actually useful. This young man echoed and expounded: “If God calls you to do something, go do it. Even if we don’t understand everything, we’re still supposed to go. The Lord’s grace will be sufficient.” Some of the other guys heading to the airport that afternoon didn’t know Spanish either, yet they felt called by the Lord and were pressing forward to go. I had testified about the Lord leading my husband and me to our Spanish congregation a year and a half ago, though I knew even less of the language then. In the beginning, I didn’t see how the Lord would grow my Spanish for use in the hospital and on the streets. Interestingly, earlier this Sunday morning, I attempted to rehearse my testimony but to no avail. My stomach felt strangely sick when I tried to rehearse, as if the Lord was diverting me from trying to memorize anything. I sensed the testimony was to be a casual conveyance of how the Lord is at work in the midst of our everyday living, always cuing people and places in perfect time. Because the testimony was unrehearsed, my Spanish was certainly fragmented, and the message was accentuated and dispersed for all involved. It was a fresh glimpse of the Lord's orchestration. All the more, I am encouraged to follow Him beyond what I can see. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding,” says Proverbs 3:5.