We can say we believe, but do we? When the way grows rough and the storm looms close do we believe as much as we did when the way was smooth and the skies clear? When it feels like you cannot catch your breath because the waves are crashing with increasing ferocity, do you believe with the same amount of fervor as when the water was as smooth as glass?
This question comes up to haunt me in the night. It hounds me when I am trapped in shame. It challenges my desperation. It ramrods my pride.
Yet, belief was the key to the sick woman and the synagogue ruler. It was their belief that fueled their desperation. It was their belief that prompted their seeking Jesus. Belief fueled their reception of their personal miracle.
Belief.
There were those in the synagogue leader’s and the woman’s life that did not believe that healing could come. Think of the woman: she spent all she had searching for health through the hands of mere men and instead of getting better she grew worse. She was probably written off as a lost cause and there was no one left to believe that she would be restored. Think of Jairus: his daughter was still alive when he fell at Jesus’ feet begging for Jesus to come and heal his daughter, yet, when Jesus finally arrived, Jairus’ daughter was dead. There was no hope because there was no life.
There have been and probably always will be those folks in my life who challenge my belief in my Jesus. There will be those that will tell me to stop bothering Jesus with the request that obviously is dead. I have those kind of latent dreams that I wonder if they will ever happen in this world. But the dreams persist and I hear Jesus tell me, just as he told Jairus: ‘Don’t be afraid, just believe.’
In that statement, Jairus had to choose who he was going to believe. Would he believe his friends and family or would he believe Jesus? Can you imagine the single-mindedness of Jairus as he walked those last, long, short steps to his home? Can you imagine the battle within his heart and what his mind was telling him? His heart is telling him to believe and reverberating through his mind is the news that his daughter is dead. Whose voice will be louder? Jesus or the crowd?
This is the challenge that I face. Will I let Jesus’ voice be louder in my mind and heart or will I let the crowd of doubt and logic drown it?
It wasn’t logical that by just one touch of Jesus’ hem would the woman be healed. It wasn’t logical that a child could be raised from the dead. There is no human logic that could explain or support a healing touch.
But what part of Jesus follows our human logic? I have experienced a peace that makes no sense when I look at the circumstances in my life. I have experienced the courage to take the next step to tear down idols that prevent the people I serve from growing in their worship experience. I have experienced freedom from the approval seeking junkie I once was.
These things are unexplainable outside the power of the touch of Jesus in my life.Will you believe? Will you be desperate? Will you seek out the presence of Jesus in your life? If you can, if you will to, you might experience miracles in your life that defy our human logic as well. And that is a very exciting place to be.
I take comfort in knowing that you too have a little mess-up in your life. It makes me not feel alone. And yet that solidarity can be a trap. It can fool us into thinking that we are on the same team that must win at being screwed up. It can trick us into the comparison game: ‘Well, I am not as bad as so and so’, or ‘boy, I really screwed up, look at her, she’s messed up too, but is making good, I don’t think I can have the life change she has’.
What if we accepted ourselves as wholly screwed up while at the same time embraced Christ for what he did for us? Which is the removal of our sin, our shame, and our guilt. What if we took the truth of God’s word and wrapped it around ourselves like a mantle and let the truths settle on our shoulders and actually felt the weight truth?
I think I would be wholly changed.
I think that my messed up soul imprint would begin to take on the imprint of God himself and then I must ask myself if I am really as messed up as I believe or is my mess somehow being made beautiful.
Or I am just seeing myself, without the guilt and shame, as God sees me.
Wholly loved.
Wholly messy beautiful.
Can mess be beautiful? I must believe it or I would be crippled by the weight of regret and bitterness and unforgiveness. Every time I have turned over my regrets to my Abba Father, I come away encouraged that there is redemption. Every time I let go of bitterness I smell the fragrance of the rose rather than feel the prick of the thorns. Each time I choose forgiveness I am reminded of my own forgiveness.
Every time I offer my mess-up soul to him, I receive grace in return and that is wholly beautiful.
Receive grace. Will you offer your messed-up self to him and open your arms to receive his grace? Grace that changes us into a new kind of beautiful we cannot even begin to imagine. Grace that reveals truth. Truth that reveals grace.
In our current society, I have found that children are considered a blessing if you have the requisite one or two and then done, but the responses to much more than that can be varied. I have four, a small or large number, depending on your perspective. My fourth was celebrated by some and barely acknowledge by others. It all depends on perspective.
In biblical times, fertility was seen as a blessing and infertility as a curse. Blessings were tied to doing things ‘right’ and curses were seen as ‘obviously, you have some unforgiven sin in your life and that is why ‘this’ is or is not happening to you’. This type of response still happens today, but that is a topic for another day. Today my heart is pondering Zechariah and Elizabeth.
Elizabeth uses the word ‘reproach’ to describe her state in her community. The word reproach implies that she was an object of disgrace, that she was blamed for her infertility, and that she was criticized by her community. This is one of our few insights into Elizabeth’s heart. God’s own words assures us that she and Zechariah were blameless and upright and kept all the laws of God. We can learn a lot about their hearts in that one statement.
Misunderstood. I would use that word to describe Elizabeth’s place in her community. She knew in her heart what God said about her, but she had to hear with her ears what her community said about her. That is a difficult place to be and it can either grow your faith or grow your bitterness. You get to decide.
Being misunderstood is a part of this life.
So how do we maneuver being misunderstood with the truth of who we are in Christ?
That is a question we must address as we move forward in this walk of life. I believe it has to become an internal tension we must grow to accept because the truth of the matter is that we will not always be understood.
We will be misunderstood.
What we do with it will shape our character.
We can defend ourselves.
We can be silent.
We can put up a wall.
We can protect ourselves.
But what if we did this instead: we accept the misunderstandings others have about us then we ask the Lord if there is any truth in the misconceptions about us, and finally, most importantly, we lay the truth of God’s word over the misunderstanding and let the word of God determine our course of action.
Sometimes it’s being secure in the truth that we are doing exactly what the Lord has asked of us. Sometimes it’s speaking the truth in love with grace. Sometimes it’s letting go of the priority we place on another person’s perception about us.
But mostly it’s about trusting God’s heart towards us and being secure in the knowledge that he is for us.
He is for you. You can trust his heart because his heart is good towards you.
