Category Archive

Below is an interview between two of my favorite people, Ben Stein and R.C. Sproul.  Super fun!

*Hattip to the Lovely Dana.  Again. 

Paradoxuganda is my new favorite blog.  A married pair of doctors who also happen to be missionaries.  Or the other way around.

I first discovered them earlier this week when doing a search on Ebola, my favorite virus.  (Don’t ask, I’ll tell you later.)  Their blog came up on the search for a post a couple of years ago on “Ebola Heroes”, men and women who cared for Ebola patients at great risk to their own lives.  I couldn’t stop reading.

Their stories are compelling, their witness lovely to see, their blog and accompanying pictures, wonderful.  I hope you visit them.

There are fables and legends aplenty for Christmas, St. Nicolas, Santa Clause, flying reindeer, elves and a magical ride around the earth in one night with lots of presents and just a little coal, and POOF! you have a childhood fairy tale. The problem is that this fairy tale is just that, a tale, and once you turn four, somehow you know that there isn’t a real Santa, that reindeer don’t fly and Mom, Dad and the Grandparents are really responsible for all those great presents under the tree, partly cause you specifically did not ask Santa for a 6 pack of tighty whiteys. So, somehow, Christmas looses some of it’s magic when you find out that the jolly man with the supersled and the cold, cold workhouse packed with elf-slaves doesn’t exist.

But there is a deeper magic to Christmas, one that doesn’t unravel when you gain some thinking skills. This past Sunday my pastor, Mike Coleman, preached on the truth of the biblical story of Christmas, more specifically, the story of the birth of the Christ Child. We don’t know precisely when Jesus was born, but we do know about when. We have the Roman records of the census call from Caesar Augustus, we know that the census was taken around 1 AD. We don’t know what month or what day he was born, but we know he was born.

The deeper magic of Jesus birth and the circumstances of his conception are such that if we pay attention, we can only stand in awe. Or bow down in awe. In the very begining, at the creation, evil magic crept in to spoil everything. Even then the deeper magic of redemption was at work, the deeper magic was there all the time. God became man retaining his perfect holiness so that he could reconcile a wicked people to be his own. It happened at the right time and in the right location. Magic.

There is a wonderful mysteriousness to God, his plans are not our plans, and his ways are not our ways. His total otherness to our humanness and the mystery of the incarnation are impossible to wrap our brains around. In Job God doesn’t answer Job’s why questions with answers, but rather reminds him of who God is and what he is. “Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me.”* God says. Then “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements - surely you know!”* For the next two chapters God asks Job all these, to us humans, unanswerable questions. Those chapters come at the end of Jobs long lament for his lost children and they have been invaluable to me over the years, keeping me humble when my pride threatens to overwhelm me. God reminds me that he is in charge and I am not, that his perspective is not mine and that he really is in control of all things and does as he pleases for his own reasons and that I can’t possibly understand or comprehend him. I know that he judges us, I know that I don’t understand him.

After Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in late August I heard rumblings in the Christian community of Gods judgment on New Orleans for it’s sins. I also read a story that some al Qaida terrorist boys had celebrated the storms vast damage and dubbed it a private in their little army of terror. They saw the destruction of New Orleans and the rest of the terrible damage as proof of God’s wrath against us, Americans for being the Great Satan.

Actually, I think coming from a puny human with a highly limited understanding of the workings of God, (and I include everyone still breathing as a puny human) that it is a dangerous and proud thing to engage in declaring something a judgment from God. Considering that we just don’t know unless he comes and reveals that clearly and evidently to many people, it would seem highly prudent to remain silent on what God was doing when a disaster strikes.

So what is our response to be? Compassion, obviously, go help in anyway we can. How do we explain the whys of a disaster? You don’t because you can’t. Really, you can’t. You can say that there was a recurring cycle of higher cyclonic activity as was last seen in the 50’s, and that we are just going through a high period. That is true. You can say that the Gulf waters are very warm at that time of year and that contributed to the strength of the storm, that is true as well. Why did it hit where it hit? Only God knows. And then leave it there, there are no other answers. Considering that we don’t even slightly understand 1% of the wheres and whys of weather, I think it is wise humility that lets it be.

When the terrible earthquake hit Central Asia this past week and killed thousands, I cried as I watched the mothers and fathers search for their children in the rubble of crushed schools, knowing that their babies were most likely dead and praying that they would be found. But I didn’t think that this earthquake in anyway was a result of the general sinfulness of the people who lived there or as a heavenly referendum on the Muslim faith. I am a Christian and I have strong convictions about ways to God and salvation and where it is from, I just don’t see that when people are hurting and dying it’s time to step into a blame game, rain falls on sinner and saint, move on. It’s time to show where your faith is and who you serve. I didn’t see the hurricanes as a sign that God is more especially ticked at the Gulf states than he is at the rest of the country. I don’t see the tsunami’s, mudslides, earthquakes or flooding that wreak havoc in our world as anything other than a call for us to show mercy. If God has another meaning in these events, it’s up to him to make that clear, not me, my marching orders from him are to comfort and to show mercy, not to judge a case that is far beyond my scope of understanding.

Sure, there are some things that made the flooding of New Orleans worse, the MR-GO waterway being one, and the poor construction in Pakistan that made those buildings unable to withstand an earthquake. Those are things we need to look at and learn from.

There are just some times that should remind us that we are dust, and we will return to dust, and that we stand in the way of the awesome power of nature and of God. Even more importantly, especially when tragedy stikes, we should refrain from assuming the mind, heart and purposes of God, purposes we can not possibly be privy to.

*Job 38:2 -4 English Standard Version

We are staring at another monstrosity, a Christmas yard display gone horribly awry. The lawn of a neighbor is covered in a collection of Christmas and Holiday figures that seems to have been chosen for one common feature, they all plug in. It’s blinding, I put my sunglasses on in an attempt to ward off night-blindness when I look away. I see other neighbors slathering 35 sunblock on and sitting in lawn chairs hoping to get a late season tan. My mind is full of anything but Christmas cheer.

“It’s beautiful Auntie Vivian. I love it.” says my nearly 4 year old nephew, The Mancub.

“Look at the pretty colors!” says Sweetpea, my 6 year old niece. “Isn’t it lovely?”

“Yes.” I lie. “See the reindeer’s heads moving? And their legs move too.”

“Ooooh!” Both of them sigh.

Sweetpea asks me to pull closer to the manger scene. As we pull up, they Oooh and Aaah in unison. This display also glows from within.

Sweetpea squeals “Look, there’s Mary and Joseph and the baby Jesus, and the Wise Men.”

“Ooooh!” The Mancub sighs

I think the visit to the lights is going swimmingly. Then comes the question.

“So, where was everyone before Jesus was born?” Asks The Mancub innocently.

“Well, they were all here.” I said.

“But you said Jesus is God. How could they be here if he wasn’t born yet?”

Me, not seeing the trap answers “Honey, Jesus is God’s son,…”

“That means Joseph is God?” The Mancub smartly closing this little pre-school trap on me.

What follows is me trying to explain that Joseph isn’t God, the eternal nature of God and the incarnation. I try to relate how Joseph is Jesus daddy on earth, stupidly, through adoption. They know that I had a daughter and gave her up. Somehow, I think they understand this, we’ve talked about it for the past two years. I think, this is an easy way to explain. I was wrong.

“No. You know how Amy is my daughter, but Susan and Harry are her Mommy and Daddy?”

“How old were you when you gave her up?” they ask.

“17. So back to Jesus…”

Sweetpea “17 is young.”

The Mancub “Those sure are pretty lights.”

Me “Yes, it is young, yes they are pretty lights. So God wanted to send his Son Jesus…”

Sweetpea “Did Grandma and Grandpa get angry at you?”

Now I’m beginning to feel terror, Pandora’s Box is open and I can’t seem to close it. “Yes honey, they were angry. So Jesus…”

Sweetpea “Well, you were very young.”

Me “Yes. Jesus…”

The Mancub “Look, Santa’s on their porch. Is he real?”

Me “No, he’s a statue. Now, back to Jesus…”

Sweetpea “Will my Mommy and Daddy ever give me up?” I begin to hear the coming flood. “Can I live with you if they ever have to give me, (sniff) up?”

Me “Sweetpea, your Mommy and Daddy will never ever give you up. And you can always live with me. So, now Jesus…”

Sweetpea “Well, you were young.”

I chicken out and decide to run “Look! More Christmas Lights!”

The Mancub and Sweetpea “Oooohh!”

It’s the still small voice of the Lord we are told over and over to listen for, the voice you must train your heart to hear. Often I’ve longed for God to shout to me what he wants me to do, be or think. It’s the voice I love to hear and to my shame don’t hear often enough. When I do hear it I am grateful. It has taken years to get to a place where I can hear him more often, more clearly. But still I’ve often wished I could turn up God’s volume.

Then this morning happened.

It’s Christmas time, so I was listening to Christmas music during my morning commute. The second verse of Do You Hear What I Hear? stopped me in my tracks, so to speak, I was still driving.

Here are the lyrics:

Do you hear what I hear

Ringing through the sky, shepherd boy,

Do you hear what I hear

A song, a song, high above the trees

With a voice as big as the sea

With a voice as big as the sea

So I thought, no, God’s voice is small and still, but it could be as big as the sea. I’m always telling my nieces and nephews that God’s love is as big as he is, as big as the entire universe. But he whispers to us. Why? Then I thought about the one time God’s voice was raised to a shout, when Jesus on the cross cried out “My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?” What followed was shattering. Earthquakes, the dead being raised out of their graves, the temple curtain rent in two. Did you know that scholars have studied that curtain and its making? That curtain wasn’t some simple gauzy linen thing. It was a thick woolen hanging, as thick as two inches, maybe more. Only God could tear something in two with his voice. After all, that’s what he used to create the world, he spoke us into being. I realized that if God were to shout at me I would be undone. Molecularly unmade. Gone.

I will be content then, with whispers, I will be grateful that he, The Lord of the Universe, speaks to this lowly woman at all. When I am in heaven I will ask God if we can hear his creating voice, I imagine it is unimaginably wonderful. (I’ve always loved the thought that God, like C.S. Lewis’s Aslan, created the world with song. But really, his voice will be the most melodious and lovely voice we will ever hear.)

Below I’ve included the lyrics for the whole song.

Have a holly jolly Christmas!

May you know the blessings of Jesus!

Do You Hear What I hear?

Said the night wind to the little lamb,

do you see what I see

Way up in the sky, little lamb,

do you see what I see

A star, a star, dancing in the night

With a tail as big as a kite

With a tail as big as a kite

Said the little lamb to the shepherd boy,

do you hear what I hear

Ringing through the sky, shepherd boy,

do you hear what I hear

A song, a song, high above the trees

With a voice as big as the sea

With a voice as big as the sea

Said the shepherd boy to the mighty king,

do you know what I know

In your palace warm, mighty king,

do you know what I know

A Child, a Child shivers in the cold

Let us bring Him silver and gold

Let us bring Him silver and gold

Said the king to the people everywhere,

listen to what I say

Pray for peace, people everywhere!

listen to what I say

The Child, the Child, sleeping in the night

He will bring us goodness and light

He will bring us goodness and light

by Hans Christian Anderson