Mission Fielding

 

We've arrived. 'Tis the season to join arms with just about every family in our small town and surrounding areas to cheer on our young ones as they compete in what some would consider America's greatest pastime. Softball. Baseball.

 

 

I still hear it from my sister, the softball star. I'd look up from my book just long enough to watch her bat, then down went the nose and I was back to the grindstone.

 

 

My son understands the temptation to self-entertain when the going gets slow in a sibling game.

 

But now I pay attention.That's my daughter out there. I laugh. I cheer.

 

Even when the slow roller inches its way across the infield and the pitcher, shortstop, and third baseman all descend upon it like owls on a mouse. They collide like the actors in those heartfelt family misfit comedies, and we laugh like they're behind a screen and can't hear us.

 

And after a few more of those little mishaps you begin to thank Jesus for the long ride home because otherwise you just might be tempted to turn these collisions into a drinking game.

 

I've been playing closer attention lately, perhaps also because I've been struggling with this whole position-playing life of ours. When do I bat? Or am I already doing that? Or am I on deck? Surely I'm deck for something really great- some really great act of faith for the furthering of God's kingdom. On deck, right? No? In the dugout? Or am I more defensive, fighting the urge to field a mission meant for someone else?

 

See what I mean? It gets tricky.

 

 

Last weekend, I had the most amazing opportunity that I don't take often enough. I had an afternoon to listen to missionaries to Hong Kong, and then participate in the sending of five missionaries, some to Lima and Peru.  There is no where in the world like Mission Central. No. where.

 

With tears for every story, I listened and wondered, "Could I do that?" "Why am I not doing that?"

 

"Lord, could you call my family to do that?"

 

Because there is something so attractive about light shining in the darkness. And you just want to grab a hint of it.

 

After the presentations and sending, Gary introduced me to one of his dear friends (I've never met a man with more)- I was Lauren, "the real missionary."

 

I smiled a blurry smile as Gary's words hit me in the way I knew he intended.

 

My heart had been aching for what it already had.

 

I watch those around me fielding missions God has meant for them, all the while forgetting that the mission I serve is still His mission. Like my daughter, I look longingly at those playing different, "important," positions and wonder why not me, ignoring that He has been training me all along for the position I am in.

 

We don't have to question where we play, when we know for Whom we play.

 

We don't have to anticipate the next great act of faith when the One in whom we place our faith makes every act great.

 

He is the definition of great,

 

We don't have to determine the magnitude of our mission, when the Mission Himself has already acted on behalf of all humankind. It is His mission, we are just witnesses to it, living in gratitude for it.

 

Because as much as I absolutely love being a wife and mother, daughter, sister, friend, it's not really about me anyway. It's about Him. There is peace in that. Joy, love, and hope.

Memorial Day

In honor of Memorial Day, I will be saving my blog post for later this week. God bless you all as we take the time to remember the sacrifices offered by men and women so that we can have the freedom to do what we do- speak and write the Word of God boldly!

We Are All of Us Jobs

I ran yesterday. A short run along a country road. Uphill and down. Uphill again. On the way home relentless wind against my steps at least 10 miles per hour. Had I wings there is no doubt the forces against me would have lifted me sky high.

I stagger in to a disorienting blend of Our God's Alive in my earphones and Fox News on the television.

Me running head-on into wind.

Wind running head-on into people and structures and vehicles.

At the same time.

We left in the evening for my daughter's end of the year school program, The Principal and the Pea.

The grace was not lost on me...

 

 

Last night I finished the book of Job to the din of reporters and meteorologists.

 

 

Because when the world offers death tolls and figures, we need some godly poetry to remind us that God's love is a big-picture kind of art, an act of true heart.

 

 

Because when the chaos of a moment takes the life out of a person, we need some godly wisdom to clue us into a perspective that works always for good. Always for eternal and right-here-and-now good.

 

 

Because... When we want to know answers God simply wants us to know Him. -Ann Voskamp

 

 

He gave me some words hard to swallow in my first chapter of reading for the night. Chewing words and truths like gravel in my mouth. I sat long enough to grind it in, "Whether for correction or for his land or for love, he causes it to happen." Job 37:13.

 

He causes it to happen.

 

Job is so appropriate. The Word, the only Wind that can take the destruction of an EF-5 tornado and draw forth blessing.

 

Ever since I lost my babies I have loved Job. What before had been tedious whining I now read as legitimate offenses against a decent and godly life. Did I not make those same claims of the Lord in the face of death?

 

What did I do to deserve this?

Why didn't You stop it?

Where are You?

 

Don't you care?

 

In my heart I cried the words of Job,

                  Behold I go forward, but he is not there, and backward, but I do not perceive him. (23:8)

 

and Mary,

                  Lord, if you had been there... (John 11:32)

 

and I took the company of believers beyond belief.

 

Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?”

John 11:40

 

The fortunes of Job were restored. The dead were raised.

 

I too was raised, as gradually as Job's children were born and as completely as Lazarus' heart beat.

 

But I'll always have that connection. I'll hear those words the Lord spoke out of the whirlwind that blow me back into my place,

 

Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?

 

 God's words, the "know your role" reminder for the prideful Job. You tell him, Lord!

 

But more than that. Our God, who takes and brings life in a single breath, is making more than a point. He is answering Job's, my, most heartfelt questions.

 

Job 38-

"Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding."

Where am I? I am where I have always been. I am here. I am.

 

"Who determined its measurements- surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it?

On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?"

Do I not care? I took great care in creating all my creation, and I delight in caring for it. I always have. I have never stopped caring. Never.

 

Line by line, chapter by chapter, poetry and wisdom weave a portrait of a God who is not summed up in a formula of our own design. We are unbelievably blessed to have a God whose ways are far beyond ours, but whose heart is known in His word, whose love is known in His Son.

 

Whose Spirit works within us and through us to point the "why's" of a grieving nation to the Whom of the Savior.

Five Minute Friday: Song

Before you read today's Five Minute Friday, I have a request. Please take a moment to pray for a woman whose name I never caught. You will read about her here shortly, and perhaps then understand why. I may never see her again here on earth, but I so fervently would like to see her again in heaven and hear of the wonderful ways she witnessed God in her life- perhaps even in a simple hour at breakfast with a stranger half her age.

Five Minute Friday means five minutes of writing with no edits, no going back. I admit, I had a lot to say here, so limiting it to 5 minutes was a struggle. But everyone has a song, if you are willing to stop and listen. Thank you for stopping here.

Today's Five Minute Friday prompt: Song

GO

I told my huband I had one of those If you ask it, she will speak moments.

Ask what? I searched for minutes for just the right question as I stared out the Panera Bread window at the parking lot and trees.

Isn't it so nice to see the sun shining again?

She was caught off guard, I know it.

Yes it is. Now I just hope this warm weather will move west to the UK, and then I'll be fine.

Oh? Why is that?

Because she was leaving in few short days to visit the UK, to have her birthday dinner with her historic clan chieftain in Scotland. Because this woman in her sixties (I am guessing here) was taking another photography class at a local college and was taking another trip overseas to search out beauty. To capture it. Somehow process it and convey it.

Everyone has a song if you are willing to stop and listen to it.

What would have been a brief intermission in her life became a glorious aria, the duration of which was over an hour. My invitations to continue and small interjections probably contributed about 5 minutes to the opera.

She sang of poison dart frogs and tailless scorpians.

My husband chimed in about the beauty of God's creation.

She sang of the first "color" television.

I cheeped out a ditty about how removed I already am from the highschoolers at church.

She sang of preserving historical remnants of WW2.

I composed a melody of a Jewish Christian forgiving the Nazis because forgiveness is "what we do."

She sang of poverty.

I belted the truth that poverty has more to do with your spirit than your pocketbook.

And she glossed our one-liners over with a confused smile as she continued her song.

But I knew she was listening. Because she knew I was listening. Really listening. To her.

And somehow I get a glimpse of Jesus hearing a blind beggar man call his name, "Son of David, have mercy on me," and I know that at that moment, in the din of a bagel joint, Jesus was listening.

STOP

F Words We All Can Appreciate

Turn Off the TV Week is kicking my behind. Not at all because I want to watch TV, but because there is some stable comfort in knowing that for a half hour each morning I will have some time to collect thoughts and perhaps blog. We miss you, Daniel Tiger... This is the kind of post I write when you are gone for three days...

Our educationally neglected third child and I have begun alphabet work. I say educationally neglected because for the first 2-3 years of the older two children's lives I was the picture of spiritual education. The third kid, she'll pick it up along the way. God help the fourth.

I admit there are a couple teaching points that make me tee-hee like a grade-schooler. The first- getting to the "it" endings in a rhyming lesson. The second one I hadn't thought too much about until today.

The letter F.

Now the girl is 3, and a bit precocious, so we play this school stuff loosely. A brown cinderblock wall makes a fabulous chalkboard, so we get to work making our "F Word" Wall. F words all over the place. You can laugh if you want. It's ok. I said F words a lot today, and the child in me giggles as I type that.

The F says ffff. We repeat. We draw, color, laugh. I search for just the right F word. Family, Frown, Fun, Flowers, Feet, Farm, Four, Five... She hears the clues and guesses the F word and laughs again.

Good times- when F words are safe.

I can't avoid the F word forever, I know. She'll hear it, learn it, possibly say it. She'll learn F words that will cause more pain than profanity.

Like failure.

And fear.

The mother in me wants to protect her from those words. Whisk her away like a sleeping beauty, so she'll never feel the prick of words that kill spirits. Failure. Fear.

I can't do it, though. For a flower to bloom, must it not cease to be just a seed? Must it not break open? And this little princess, she has been born not of perishable seed, but imperishable.

There's an F word for you.

Forgiven.

Free.

Found. Forever found.

I'm not called to remove God's precious child from a world of hurt, but to prepare and equip her for the victory that is hers in Jesus Christ. I am called to gift her with words, and The Word, like battle armor. In fact, Ephesians 6 gives a few F words I can appreciate...

Finally- Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.

Flesh- 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.

Firm-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.

Fastened- Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness,

Feet- ...and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace.

Faith- In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one

¹⁷ and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, ¹⁸ praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, ¹⁹ and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, ²⁰ for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.

Then one day, my dear ones will be able to confess with King David that there is an F word they can't help but proclaim...

 

I have not hidden your deliverance within my heart; I have spoken of your faithfulness and your salvation; I have not concealed your steadfast love and your faithfulness from the great congregation.

Psalm 40:10