Heart Housekeeping

Passage: Psalm 51 as it relates to 1 Sam 16:1-13

There's so much to this passage. But first, we'll start with the stuff I seriously just don't get.

This is something I have slowly learned to get used to in reading the Bible. I don't get it. Sometimes, it doesn't make any sense to me whatsoever. So I learned to pray about that and just move on. I'm learning to be okay with not getting it. Eventually I do, and when I do, it's like SCORE! It's better than hitting a secret big sale at my favorite store.

So here are my puzzlers:

4 Against you, and you alone, have I sinned;....

Uh...David, seriously? What about Uzziah? He was sort of sinned against to death, don't you think? Not to mention Bathsheba, who had her life turned upside down by your impulsive choices. Yeah, I admit, I don't get this line.

5 For I was born a sinner -- yes, from the moment my mother conceived me...

Yes, I believe in original sin. Clearly, since people still die a physical death. The world is still subject to the consequences of Adam's choice. But I really don't believe that a baby in the womb is a "sinner" as in someone who has committed a sin. I guess it's possible that he could be using "sinner" as one who will commit sins because of our fallen nature as humans. Still, this one is a bit of a puzzler for me.

My favorite section...it almost leapt off the page at me:

10 Create in me a clean heart, O God. Renew a loyal spirit within me.

I really love this part.

I am so distractable. I am constantly thinking of lots of other things to do besides nurture my relationship with God. It's all I can do to get this blog post done because Ticket to Ride is calling my name...and the new season of Project Runway has started and I have the first episode on DVR.

Nothing terrible happens when I give in to this distractions. Not at first. But eventually, I find myself being my old self centered me (not that I get very far from this me anyway, but...) using words and having thoughts I don't really want in my life. And I wonder how my relationship with God got to be so mechanical and lifeless.

This is where marriage is such a blessing. Marriage to Ross continues to teach me that my relationship with God is just as in need of maintenance. Lucky for me, Ross is not as patient as God is. He is a lot more vocal about wanting my time.

I never was very good at friendship. My brother is amazing at it. He is still close friends with the same guy from when he was 12. They've been friends for 28 years. I used to think that my brother was just built more loyal than me.

I find it pretty easy to let go of relationships with people. I used to chalk it up to being the lifecycle of friendship for me. I only developed friendships with people who came into my life naturally. I worked with them. We were in the same club. We went to the same church. Worked in the same ministry. Loyalty lasted as long as the natural, easy connection was tended by proximity and convenience rather than actual effort.

That's just not going to cut it by the way I read the Bible. Love takes effort. I need a loyal heart, and it will have to start with God. After that, I hope I will find it easier to tend my human relationships.

Facile Facades

Passage: 1 Samuel 16:1-13

7 But the Lord said to Samuel, "Don't judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The Lord doesn't see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Dear Jesus,

Sometimes I wish you judged by the surface, taking me at face value. I could probably handle that on my own. Most of the time, I look like I've got it all going on. Especially if you didn't use your super x-ray vision omniscience to see behind closed doors. I could totally rock this Christian life then.

I could say that I love reading my Bible the moment I wake up and you'd never know that I was really just sleeping in. Every day. Or I could say I spent my evening praying for the needs you laid on my heart and you would never know I was actually catching up on Season 6 of Medium.

You'd think that my smiling face on Sunday morning was genuine worship...and really, most of the time of it is. But you wouldn't know about those times when I'm actually thinking about all the stuff I screwed up or forgot to follow up on or the people I didn't call back because I have a totally irrational fear of talking on the phone.

I'd have to insist you stay out of my car too, because not only is it a mess, you would undoubtedly notice that my peace, patience, kindness, gentleness and self control all get thrown out the moonroof when I have to share the road with other people. Other (old) people that drive 5 under the speed limit when I'm in a hurry.

I could just follow the cultural rules of American Christianity and pretty much just skate my way to heaven. I could slide in like socks on a hardwood floor.

But then, there would be no one in the whole universe who knows everything there is to know about me. And loves me anyway. There would be no one to make sense of the stupid things I used to do, and no reason, really, to have stopped doing them.

I could be skating my way through life. Purposeless. Pointless.

Instead, in exchange for knowing you see every part of me, in exchange for yeilding to your judgement and wisdom, I get Real Life. I get to see you work through me, challenge me and change me into what I was supposed to be in the first place.

And that makes me want to be more real, more genuine, more me than ever before, such that my outward appearance and my heart start looking pretty doggone similar.

Love,
Jennifer

Where The Eye Leads

Passage: Isaiah 26:3

I hate rubbernecking. With absolutely no data to support it, I am certain that more accidents are caused by rubbernecking than tailgating.

Not long ago, I was walking through my neighborhood. One of my neighbors was out with his son, who was showing off his brand new skills at riding a bicycle without the training wheels. The little boy was very serious about his business, riding his bike. And then, he saw me. I must have been fascinating, because he stared at me. He was entranced. Fixated. He was totally focused on me, until I had to dive out of the way because he was going to run me over.

He went where his eye led.

In today's passage, we are plunged in the middle of a song of praise to God. The song is in response to an enthusiastically graphic description of the end of the world. The bad guys come to justice, the good guys are restored, all is finally right and good.

They sing of perfect peace those who trust, those who fix their thoughts on God.

It's so easy to sing of...so hard to do. Like rubbernecking. Here is a once in a lifetime opportunity to see real drama from a safe distance that doesn't actually involve me. Of course we want to look. The twisted cars, people in distress, telling black marks on the pavement, shattered glass fragments scattered like diamonds. I find myself trying to imagine how it happened. And I want to look.

But if I do, I won't be looking at the road in front of me anymore. Which is where I want to go. And which, presumably, contains any number of cars I am also not watching, but am heading toward. That split second of inattention and suddenly, the drama very much involves me.

So I don't look. At least, when I'm remembering where my eyes are supposed to be.

Whoops, He Did It Again

Study passage: 1 Samuel 13:1-14

You gotta feel sorry for Saul after a while. The guy goes out looking for donkeys for his dad and comes back an anointed king. I figure it wasn't exactly on his 'to-do' list, you know?

Worse, it seems to me that while he'd been anointed a king, nobody knew about it, so it probably had a 'did that really just happen to me?' sort of vibe to it. It would be easy to think you dreamed it and whew, aren't you glad that didn't really just happen?

But then the Israelites began clamoring for a king. And it all seemed much too real. So much so that Saul, despite being the tallest and best looking guy in the country, went and hid. With the baggage. Nothing to see here, moving right along. But as he found out: you can't hide from God.

So now he's king. Only now everyone knows about it. But he seems to have not let it go to his head, because next time we see him, he's out working in the fields. You think of the majestic splendor of Solomon's kingship just two generations away, and here is Saul with his hands dirty, sweating in the hot sun, following the unattractive end of a ox. I'm thinking it hadn't quite sunk in yet.

Now the Israelites get the king they were asking for. Neighboring king Nahash is out to expand his eye-gouging empire when the news comes to Saul as he's working in the field. Saul becomes a holy terror, tearing apart two oxen and sending the pieces out as a visual cue for what to expect if you messed with him. Nabesh is sent packing.

The next accounted battle, Saul's son knocks over a hornets nest when he takes on a garrison of Philistines and wins. Suddenly there are as many Philistines "as the grains of sand on the seashore", all itching for Israelite blood. And the loyalty of Saul's army is proven: they scatter to hide under any rock they can find.

Saul is supposed to wait for Samuel to come and seek God's blessing on the approaching battle. He waits a week. I can just see him drumming his fingers on his armor. He turns to his assistant and grumbles, "Dude, where is Samuel? We can't start this party without him!" Meanwhile, Saul's fighters are melting away like the Wicked Witch of the West in a hot tub.

I wonder what Saul did to kill time while he waited. Maybe he made a list of other career options.

Finally, Saul has had enough. He figures that Samuel isn't coming so Saul makes the sacrifices and burnt offerings for the battle. And just as soon as he is done, Samuel shows up.

You have to love God's timing. It makes for killer reading material. But you know, it sucks to live through personally, especially if you're the impatient type.

So many stories just like this one. God promises Abraham descendants beyond number, years pass, then decades, until sheer physical limitations push Sarah (biological clock says tick-tock, tick-tock) to take matters into her own hands.

This week, we're supposed to looking at worry and how we're supposed to lay it all on God. I see it as more about patience and trust. So often we worry about things that will never happen. But how do we handle waiting for God to fulfill his promises? Make out a list of other career options? There are only two things on that list, spiritually speaking: follow God, or follow the other guy. Suddenly, waiting seems to go down a little (sometimes a very little) bit easier.