Not only is it Biblical (Philippians 4:5-7) but it is inspiring and simple to remember. I wanted one but soon found out that my very good friend had already put one in her kitchen. And then another friend had put one in her living room. And then I just wasn’t sure where to get one. And so I didn’t get one.

I recently moved into a new house and was trying to cover the walls with something.It appears, however, that I’m a little resistant to parting with money to purchase art. As such, faced with a beautiful set of silver frames, I elected to make my own print. I’ve enjoyed it (it’s very simple) for the last few weeks but feel compelled to share it here as a means to reflect on some recent happenings. It’s not penance, mind you, but rather a way to ramble with some built-in accountability:

I have loved this phrase (a line taken out of some mysterious hymn – ie: I can’t remember its name) since I first heard/sang it and I’m thankful to have it posted above my ironing board. Up until today I have typically taken it in as I’ve prepared for the day. Today, however, was not one of those days. Instead, I just caught myself reading it thinking ‘Hmph. I wish I had kept that in mind before I went off the deep end.’

You see, in just a few minutes, I felt like my pride (ick – pride!) got sucker-punched back to back resulting in me becoming instantly moody and forgetting the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

As I settled down after exhibiting a not-so-attractive tantrum, I quickly realized that perhaps if I had not been clenching a few key crowns of my life so tightly, I wouldn’t have been injured so much when they were taken from my hands.

Depending on who you talk to, Christians may tell you that when we arrive in heaven we will be crowned by Jesus according to the lives we have led. While that is fascinating in a way, I am much more concerned about the crowns that I’m trying to bestow myself with and their danger. Just like the assortment in the pictures above, the crowns I try to wear vary in material, size, and splendor. All of them, however, are crafted by me and I’m thankful that the Holy Spirit has shown me that they will not make me happy in the long run. For now, all I can do is to look towards Jesus Christ, the God-man who came to earth to wear a crown of thorns (John 19:5), be crucified and die so that he could resurrect and ascend into heaven to wear a golden crown (Revelation 14:14).

It’s His crown that really matters, right?

Faced with their hurt, I wasn’t too helpful. Upon trying to encourage them with Christianese, I sinned against them. In so many words, I failed them as I encouraged them to “try harder” instead of  pointing to Jesus’ grace, the Father’s care, and the super-naturalness of the Holy Spirit. As I moved into Wednesday, my trite pep talk hung with me and by Thursday, as I sat down to continue the study of 1st Timothy that I had started on a recent vacation, God was faithful to illuminate verses 12 through 14 in chapter one. Prior to this, these verses had stood in the background among others that had pulled on my heart strings (verses 5, 15-16). Moved by this, I sent the following to my community group (along with an apology for the mindless rambling which had occurred a few days prior) and felt compelled to share it with you too.

1st Timothy 1/

¹²I thank him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he judged me faithful, appointing me to his service, ¹³though formerly I was a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, ¹⁴and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.

I love, love, love that the grace of the Lord overflows for us with faith and love… can’t you just imagine, God, the Father standing beside us with a water hose blasting us with cool water as a relief to the hot and sticky weather (or the heat of life that we encounter)? Just when we think we have had enough or are getting too wet, He’s still there, still blasting us out of care and concern. The moment that the droplets of relief start to evaporate in the heat, He is there again with the hose on high pressure.

It’s my prayer that we would remember the beautiful truth of the gospel. I often pray that I would remember the gospel so that I would serve others well but I think that the danger in that some days is that I’m simply an intermediary instead of a beneficiary of God’s good grace. I pray that you would find yourself having deep, deep joy knowing that you can’t escape the Lord’s grace, mercy, or love today or any other day.

I’m part of a book club which is rereading Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. The club is rereading the book authored by Lisa See for two reasons:

1. It has been dubbed the club’s “all time favorite”.
2. It will be coming out as a movie this summer.

I was not part of the book club when this book was initially read so I enthusiastically ordered it off of Amazon when the club decided to reread it. It was mentioned at nearly every book club meeting that I had ever attended and my friend, E, really loved it in particular.

I’m only three chapters into it (including the introduction) and it already brought up an issue which I felt compelled to explore here. You see, if you hadn’t already picked up on it upon reading the title, the book is set in China and starts in the early 19th century and introduces the reader to a six year old girl named Lilly. Why is this important? Because one of the very first significant acts that occurs in the book is the foot binding of Lilly, her cousin, and her younger sister.

I am not an on expert on foot binding but let me give you a brief explanation of what it consists of and why it happened. Young girls would have their feet nearly bent in half and shaped so that they would ultimately become more marriageable. As Lilly explains in the book:

“All I knew was that foot binding would make me more marriageable and therefore bring me closer to the greatest love and greatest joy in the woman’s life – a son. To that end my goal was to achieve a pair of perfectly bound feet …. seven centimeters — about the length of a thumb — is the ideal.”

I knew that I would be squeamish reading about Lilly’s foot binding experience (it was actually very tastefully written if that is even imaginable). It turns out that it was worse. After reading the first third of the foot binding chapter, I began to shake. They were big shakes and not those attributable to being chilly (although I at first assumed it was so). As I read on, I realized that I kept flexing my feet and standing on my toes, and was, in that moment, in agony for Lilly and all of the real women who she represented. As I thought about my size 8 feet and the years they’ve spent running in the grass, along the Pacific ocean, pushing a clutch in my manual transmission car, and most importantly, twirling around in dance class, I was so grateful for the time and place where God has placed me. And then, I became dumbfounded.

I went to work the next day and discussed the book’s events with my boss. I had so many questions. How could men think that turning  women’s feet into animal hooves was attractive? Why were they mystified? I wanted to do more research to understand when the practice began and when it finally stopped. My boss politely listened to my commentary and then made the most unfathomable observation. “J,” she said, “you realize that foot binding also prevented the women from running away…”

I then became infuriated. Is this what God had intended when He formed Eve out of Adam’s rib? That women’s feet would be bound at the age of six (little girl’s bones have a higher water content at this time) or that they be genitally mutilated (an act that still occurs today)? NO – of course not! I immediately desired solace from God’s word, affirmation that women were not only important to Him but cherished. That He, in His omnipotence, omnipresence, and sovereignty was particularly outraged over the sins committed against women in past, present, and future.

When I returned from work, I logged into my study Bible and performed a word search of “woman” confident that there would be something to quell my tension. My aim was to write a post listing all of the verses which affirmed women, creating a spiritual storehouse where I could turn to for consolation. There were 358 results. I read all of them. There wasn’t one verse which even remotely struck me as useable.

I realize that this is where this post could be considered dangerous if one stopped reading here. Surely, the comments included in the prior paragraph would lead some to call me “ungrateful”, a “blasphemer” or a “heathen”. To be honest, I felt this way. Most (as in more than 50%) of the verses in the English Standard Version translation of the Old Testament referencing women did so in regards to the fact that they would be adulterers if they had relations with another man while married, were considered unclean in their menstrual impurity, and that they writhed with the pain of labor. As I moved onto the New Testament, the gospel references detailed women who participated in Jesus’ ministry or were beneficiaries of His miraculous healing whereas the epistles detailed how married women were to submit (it’s not a bad thing!) to their husbands.

‘Jesus’, I prayed, ‘where is the justice that I know you provide?’

Faithfully, Jesus stepped in as I read the study notes of 1 Corinthians, Chapter 11 (a chapter which is often misused as it addresses marital roles in the family) where I read the following:

1 Cor. 11:7–9. Woman is the glory of man probably uses “glory” in the sense of “one who shows the excellence of.” Paul argues that a woman, by the excellence of her being, also shows how excellent man is, since she was taken out of man at the beginning (1 Cor. 11:8) and also was created as a helper for man at the beginning (v. 9; see also Gen. 2:20–24). Paul does not deny that the woman was also made in God’s image, something that Gen. 1:27 explicitly affirms, nor does he deny that the woman reflects God’s glory.

Immediately, my heart knew that my approach had been wrong. I had run to God’s word eager to find support for my cause rather than His truth. Where I had hoped to find votes for the value of women, I found that God would not take sides on the gender war as the defilement of His creation through human sinfulness has already done such a terrible disservice to His children.

The truth of the matter is that we, man and woman alike, were truly created in God’s image to be loved by Him and be in relationship with Him. In the sight of Jesus, we are all His children: equal but undeniably different. As I reflect on this, I am so thankful that collectively, we are invited into the presence of God. It was Him after all who promised the following:

And I will walk among you and will be your God, and you shall be my people.

Leviticus 26:12

Yesterday was my first day back to work after a mini-vacation. Back in the real world, I had started making a list of all the things that I needed to do, one of which was something that I felt Jesus had been asking me to do for a while. While I mentally broke my Monday into hours, I quickly came to the decision that if I was going to get eight hours or sleep, then Jesus’ request was going to have to be postponed. Alphabetically, my name does come first after all…

I sensed the human-ness in my response. The postponed task wouldn’t really take more than an hour or two. Who was I to become suddenly regimental over my sleeping habits when just weeks before watching episodes from Parks and Recreation or writing posts for my other blog carried me into the wee hours of the night?

As a means for internal accountability (I know, I know… this use of facebook probably wasn’t intended by Mark Zuckerberg when he created it), I posted the following on facebook:

In consideration of all the kingdom building which needs to be done, I wonder if eight hours of sleep really is a priority?

It didn’t take my godmother too long to come up with the following oh-so-appropriate response:

Not if it’s the end of world this week

Which brings me to the following two important things:

1) The smiley face: My aunt included the smiley face as a means of  a wink between the two of us. Her comment was referring to the INSANE amount of speculation regarding May 21st, the date of which a so-called Christian (I’m sorry if this offends some people but you’ll see why I’ve written this very shortly) has amassed a huge amount of donations and media attention to try to scare people into believing that judgment day will be coming this Saturday.

I am not a prophet. I haven’t gone to seminary either. I do love Jesus though and I read His word pretty consistently and based on those two things alone, I am pretty sure that this May 21st-is-the-end-of-the-world-movement’s use of a website (I don’t even want to know the number of hits its received), billboards, and wrap-around car ads blatantly conflict with the following as said by Jesus himself:

Luke 17 |  ²⁰Being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them, “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed, ²¹nor will they say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘There!’ for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you.” ²²And he said to the disciples, “The days are coming when you will desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it. ²³And they will say to you, ‘Look, there!’ or ‘Look, here!’ Do not go out or follow them. ²⁴For as the lightning flashes and lights up the sky from one side to the other, so will the Son of Man be in his day. ²⁵But first he must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation.

Matthew 24 | ³⁶“But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only.

Scholars who have studied the Bible more intensely and over a longer period of time will have even more verses to support the truth that the time of the final judgment day cannot be predicted. So what’s the takeaway from point number one: it’s ok to not give any credibility to the latest end-of-the-world movement and, if you feel so inclined, to feel frustrated.

Which brings me to the second important item..

2) Developing a worldview: Perhaps you didn’t need the verses above to know that the May 21st prophecy was a sham. I ask you, ‘Why?’ Did it conflict with your worldview, sound crazy or merely make you uncomfortable so you decided to ignore it?

One of the most unfortunate results of the latest end-of-the-world campaign were the reactions to people who haven’t formed a worldview for them to leverage their life upon.

You know (because you’re most likely my friend as this blog does not generate a lot of search term traffic) which team I’m on and why I’ve subscribed to my worldview. This post (surprisingly) though isn’t about teams.

Instead, I’m writing this as a plea for you to form your worldview because it provides purpose and structure to an otherwise chaotic life. As you ask the hard questions you’ll come to conclusions regarding the existence of God, whether there’s an afterlife and what it consists of, and what a life well-lived looks like. It also provides a platform for intellectual conversations among friends and family as we dwell on what really matters so we’re not spending time refuting false claims but rather sharing life together in a meaningful and purposeful way.

John 14:6/

⁶Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

]]> http://coffeestainedpapyrus.com/2011/05/17/two-important-things/feed/ 0 pickettje http://coffeestainedpapyrus.com/2011/03/05/all-you-need-is-love/ http://coffeestainedpapyrus.com/2011/03/05/all-you-need-is-love/#comments Sat, 05 Mar 2011 06:19:15 +0000 Jessica http://coffeestainedpapyrus.com/?p=249 ]]> Dear friends,

I have not forgot about my book report. Or Coffee-Stained Papyrus. Is it silly to admit that I finished The Four Loves in September and am still mulling over all it’s implications? Or that I felt the full weight of what blogging about Jesus really means and got nervous?

Stay tuned… affectionate love is coming soon. <3 Thank you so much for your prayers.

J.

I am not a big fan of space or deep sea exploration. Watching the IMAX film about the discovery of the Titanic in the third grade made me queasy. The fact that the pressure per square inch in the deep blue sea can be so significant that it could bend a human in half 1,000 times over is ridiculously scary to me. If we ever get to the point where the United Federation of Planets is pulling in starships down to Earth so we can flee to Mars, I’ll be staying put. I’ve always liked earth and by that, I mean land. Reading about the Chilean miners trapped more than a mile underground led me to refine my preference: I like earth, and by that, I mean being on top of land. In consideration of all of these preferences, it would be an understatement to say that I was distraught for the miners. I can barely wait for Amazon’s 3-5 day standard shipping. How would these men last for 142 days underground – just waiting for something that might not happen?

Well, in my infinite wisdom and maturity, I “forgot” about the miners. No sooner had I read about their plight than I fell back in my normal routine about being annoyed over trivial things like Glee not issuing an album to accompany the start of the second season and rejoicing in finding 3 gallon compost bags at Target (the 2 gallon bags really are too small). My prayers were consumed with requests for “easy” work weeks, manageable traffic, and for Howard Schultz to extend the Starbucks treat receipt promotion for just a few more weeks.

A couple weeks ago, my casual perusal of NYT again led me to a story about the miners. This time, however, there was good news! One of the drills (evidently there were three of them?) had made it through the layers of rock and matter and the rescue was considerably ahead of schedule. With the announcement of good news and the perceived assurance that a successful rescue was in the bag, I was glued to the developing story. I read about the families who had camped out for the 68 days since the mine’s collapse creating a place called Camp Hope. I learned that experts from around the world had joined forces to care for and rescue the men underground. With the promise of success, I was able to invest in the rescue filled with hope. On October 12^th, when the miners began to emerge from the mining shaft, I was visiting the NYT’s website hourly announcing the count of the rescued men.

Finally, at 6:30 PM, I was able to hit “refresh” and see that all men had been rescued safely.

At the time, I remember praising Jesus for all that He had done. I thanked Him for creating the earth even though it had caved in on the miners. I thanked him for the miners’ perseverance as they waited without contact for the 17 days not knowing if they would be found and then waited 68 days waiting for their rescue. I thanked Jesus for designing us to have families and for those who had prayed, hoped, and encouraged their loved ones. I thanked Him for giving men and women wisdom and for blessing all of the parties involved for their brilliance and diligence in expediting the rescue mission. I thanked Jesus for money and for it being readily available to bring the men to safety. Lastly, I thanked Jesus for the communication mediums He blessed the world with so that we could watch and wait and rejoice together as each man emerged.

One thing that I did not immediately thank Jesus for but want to now is for patience. I am so thankful that the Chilean miners had the patience to hope for a rescue. It was something that I didn’t have between August 23^rd and October 9^th, the period of time when I fell back in the world populated solely by me. It’s not something I have most of the time when life’s events don’t coincide with my timeline. While the current media has come up with infinite lists of “lessons learned” from the Chilean mining incident, the most significant thing that I have picked up is that “good odds” or “promising prospects” cannot be the kindling for hope. Instead, it’s someone much bigger than that and that someone is Jesus.

Romans 8:24/ Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

When I told the two human men that our more-than-friend relationship needed to cease, I either turned around and walked quickly away or hung up the phone so that the conversation couldn’t continue. Truly, I really thought I was serving them better at the time. One should never have to convince another to be more-than-friends. To me, the mutual affection and broad scope of common interests blended with something that just can’t be explained confirms true affection. As such, it was easier to take the blame and move forward bearing only the mark of being a girl who used a cliché to end something that wouldn’t work.

With Jesus, it isn’t that easy. Over the last few weeks, I’ve felt something that also can’t be explained. It’s not sadness or complacency. I’ve asked Jesus several times to name it and then today, on the ferry ride home from Victoria, I noted that I was disappointed in myself over the list of good things that I’ve neglected to do and all the wrong things that I’ve done with fervor. So I resorted to the cop-out phrase. As I floated through the San Juan Islands, I closed my eyes, felt the sun on my face and once again said “It’s not You, it’s me.”  What I wanted from this was the freedom to turn around once again and quickly walk off feeling the release that I had experienced twice before. The release didn’t come. Instead a still, small voice said, “Yes, it is you. I can help though if you’ll let Me.”

I can’t get into the details yet because I don’t know if there are details to get into. Instead I’m just trying to stop dissecting and analyzing because God has spoken plainly through His Word that He cares for me. As Matthew (chapter 11) recorded:

²⁵ At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; … Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. ²⁹Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰For⁾ my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

It’s at these moments where the seed of faith has to be planted, for grace through Jesus is given to those who believe. While my flesh is conflicted and fearful of what can happen, I truly believe that Jesus finds joy in giving rest to my soul. It makes no sense to feel guilty about handing over the “untidy me” to Jesus. He has already carried the cross… who am I to tell Him that He can’t or shouldn’t take on more?

I’ve been thinking about heaven a lot lately. As a Seattle-ite, it’s hard not to do when I find myself in 80-85 degree weather, watching the sky change from blue to pink to orange to purple to navy. It’s hard not to think of heaven when the snowy peaks of the Olympics contrast against the bright blue waters of Puget Sound or when every man, woman, child, and dog walk happily around Greenlake. The beauty of Seattle summers encourages my heart towards heaven… until I pick up the Sunday paper.

I did it today as I was waiting for a sweet friend to partner with me for some heavy shopping. The first page spoke about the declining oyster population and the growing impact of global warming. The ‘Newsline’ on page A2 describes an oil leak that I didn’t even know of (in Michigan, not the Gulf of Mexico) that has leaked 1 MILLION gallons of oil. Flipping to section B, I read about how the state’s judicial system has led to the improper incarceration of two men for the last 17 years and that the state has hesitated to express an apology from keeping these men from their families or a regular life due to false testimony. On the same page, a story talks about how a national religion started by a SCIENCE FICTION writer has built new headquarters in Seattle. I must admit, it’s hard for me to remember heaven with the daily news in the forefront and the “Good News” in the background.

Surely, the preoccupation of the fallen world can lead to anxiety or strife. It can, at times, mislead me to worry about “self preservation” instead of “eternal preparation”. I often find myself anxious or angry as I fume over what appears to be the degradation of creation rather than looking ahead at what must come in order to fulfill what has been promised. As Peter wrote (2 Peter 3):

⁸But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. ⁹The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. ¹⁰But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.

¹¹Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, ¹² waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! ¹³But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.

As this sweet Seattle summer continues, I pray that my heart would be shaped by the hope that is in heaven: the place where Jesus rightly reigns and the consequences of our current world are dissolved and forgotten. I pray that rather than endure, all Christians would thrive for God’s glory to clearly show that heaven is not yet a place on earth (or a yellow cupcake with chocolate frosting).

Revelation 21:1-4/

¹Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. ²And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. ³And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. ⁴He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

• Work (including actual work and getting to various clients): 55 hours
• Sleep (most often 6 hours per night): 42 hours
• Maintenance and Primping : 10 hours
• Church (volunteering, attending, and going to community group): 8 hours
• Maintaining personal e-mail: 8 hours
• Working Out (when it seriously does happen): 4 hours
• Thinking About Working Out: 4 hours
• Quiet Time: 4 hours
• Driving from Place A to Place B to Place C in Puget Sound Traffic: 4 hours
• Volunteering with Sorority: 3 hours
• Cooking and/or Making Lunches: 3 hours
• Running Errands and Grocery Shopping: 2 hours

That leaves 21 hours to what? Let me tell you: Facebook. Ok, so seriously… do I really spend 21 hours on the world’s largest social media outlet? Probably not but as I think about what I’m doing with my time and talents, I do find that I often will jump online to see what’s going on in the lives of my friends and family. Sometimes, I have good intentions. Sometimes, I don’t.

I will disclose right now that this is not a tirade against Facebook. Number one: facebook.com is an inanimate object which I proactively have to visit on my computer and phone. It does not lurk in the corners only to attack me with messages from friends and timely messages from Banana Republic. Number two: facebook.com is a wonderful way to stay in touch with people. If I didn’t have it, I would have no idea that high school classmates are having babies or former summer project friends are getting engaged. Nope, facebook.com is definitely a good thing. I am becoming the ever more aware, however, that it is me who is making it an idol-thing.

Idolatry? Isn’t that something that the Aztecs did when they worshipped the sun? How does a college-educated woman become an idolater in the twenty-first century… especially of a website? Well, I can tell you, it begins with my profile. In twenty or so fields, I paint a picture of what I look like on a good day. Hence, I put my best “face” forward. So, in Facebook, my interests include:

• Vanilla cupcakes
• Baby watching
• (Future) home design

If I were being a little more realistic, my Buttbook page (the honest profile which captures me au natural) would tell you that those activities above translate into:

• Gorging myself into a sugar high because I stress-eat
• Baby COVETING
• Getting a little too excited about an $800 white damask duvet cover

Do I think really like the things that are currently on my profile? Sure…but in my heart of hearts I think they’re more crafted to impress people than express who I am. What’s worse though is that rather than just listing out my interests and letting that be that, I nearly double-check my profile everyday to do a quick assessment of my profile. Do I still sound “cute”? Will people read this and want to be me? While ancient cultures tended to put their hope in created things (the sun, certain astrological signs, cows), it’s my opinion that the common form of idolatry in my life (as evidenced by where my time goes) is the hope that I put in myself and my Facebook page.

When Moses prepared the Israelites for their inhabitance of the Promised Land, he takes nearly 25 chapters in Deuteronomy to lay out the laws that God would require them to uphold. The first seven chapters of Moses’ address (chapters 4-10), however, seem to say the same thing to me:

Remember how God has helped you and loves you. Worship no one besides Him.

Reading through Deuteronomy this morning, I found the weight of my Facebook habits to be heavier than usual. What good am I doing spending so much time perusing through peoples’ walls, scanning peoples’ fabulous albums of vacations or weddings, and analyzing discussions? Am I doing this to serve them or to benchmark myself? Am I checking my newsfeed in order to identify opportunities to pray for my friends and family or because I want to see how many people thought my status update was clever? Will people defriend me because of this post or will they relate to what I’m going through?

Hmmm… the more I face the beast that I’ve made of Facebook, the more I’m aware of my selfish motives. In faith, I’ll turn these over to Jesus and ask that He redeem this good thing and make it less of a god thing. I know, however, that He’ll ask me (just as He did of the Israelites) to step out in faith and start shuffling some of those 21 hours above into new wildernesses that He wants to guide me through. It begins by stepping away from the computer…

Deuteronomy 4/

15″Therefore watch yourselves very carefully. … 16beware lest you act corruptly by making a carved image for yourselves, in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, 17the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the air, 18the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth. 19And beware lest you raise your eyes to heaven, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them, things that the LORD your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven.

…

²³ Take care, lest you forget the covenant of the LORD your God, which he made with you, and make a carved image, the form of anything that the LORD your God has forbidden you. ²⁴For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.

I didn’t even make it through the introduction before realizing that this was a book that I’m going to love and will probably be quoting at community group five years from now. As friends tell me, CS Lewis (Lewis) will do that to you.

Anyway… Lewis starts his book by saying that initially he was only going to write about two loves: Gift Love and Need Love to show that God is love. Lewis writes that gift love is the love that propels our fathers to work each day in order to support our families. Need love is the love that drives us into the arms of our fathers when Valificent enters the scene in Disney’s animated version of Sleeping Beauty (that did happen to you, right?).  He found, however, that there was more to explore and putting things in a ‘Need Love versus Gift Love’ box wouldn’t really allow love justice. As Lewis writes, “Every time I have tried to think the thing out along these lines I have ended in puzzles and contradictions. The reality is more complicated than I supposed.’

Well Lewis, I suppose so. Even as I read the first few pages of Lewis describing what he wanted to write, I quickly wanted to join him in his natural pull of putting need love in the “non-love” category. It is after-all so NEEDY. It takes and uses and never ceases, right? Thinking about this made me think about the type of love I express on a reoccurring basis when I have my quiet time in the morning. With the assistance of the Holy Spirit and (let’s be honest) some coffee, I spend my morning reading the Bible and scrawling out prayers only to end every entry with, “I love you. ♥ Amen.”

Which of the two loves is this? Since I’m being honest, I’ll admit that most of the time, this is often Non-thinking love. God, I non-think, you’ve given  your only Son and sent him to Earth to live without sin, be ridiculed, murdered, and then be resurrected so that I can have a personal relationship with you. Of course, I love you. Who wouldn’t?

Uh-oh.  The danger of this love is that it is neither gift love or need love but a non-love. It can be, at times, an obligatory love expressed out of formality… it reminds me of a particularly painful conversation that I had with my dad when I was five. I had just come home from a visit at my grandmother’s house and told him that I only loved my grandma because she bought me stuff. His jaw could have hit the floor and I remember wincing at my selfishness. Twenty-one years later I have somewhat grown up. I love my grandmother because of her character and love for other people and there are definitely a plethora of relationships where my love was not purchased. For some reason though, I am still tempted to hang the ‘For Sale’ sign on my heart when it comes to loving Jesus.

Lewis writes that ‘man’s love for God, from the very nature of the case, must always be largely, and must often be entirely a Need-love. This is obvious when [Christians] implore forgiveness for [their] sins and or support in [their] tribulations. But in the long run it is perhaps even more apparent in [their] growing – for it ought to be growing – awareness that [their] whole being by its very nature is one vast need; incomplete, preparatory, empty yet clustered, crying out for Him who can untie things that are now knotted together and tie up things that are still dangling loose. ‘

So… my non-love reflects my need love for Jesus’ continuing redemption and transformation in my life which He graciously responds to and move towards with His gift love for me. I don’t deserve it but He knows I need it.

Jesus, I love (aka need) you. ♥ Amen.

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Psalm 5:7/ But I, through the abundance of your steadfast love, will enter your house. I will bow down toward your holy temple in the fear of you.