Category Archives: Children

We want the details.

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Our Birgitta began drawing faces at age 3 and never stopped, so with all those years of practice, her portraits have become (I believe) quite good.

When she was little, though, she drew primitively like most children do. As her attention span lengthened and she focused on one piece of paper longer, she added more detail. This picture was drawn at age 4, and like all her creations, I loved asking her about it.

“Who’s this?” I said.

“It’s a girl. She’s thinking.”

“About what?”

“Cookies,” she said. “She loves cookies.”

“She has a pretty bow,” I said, noticing its three parts colored differently.

“For her curly hair.”

We talked about the elbow marks, the hairy eyebrows, the beautiful teeth, the dramatic makeup, and the curly bangs. I saw how she’d carefully colored the inside of her mouth red and put pupils in the eyes, nostrils on the nose.

Life’s important stuff is in the details. When we buy a new car, we want to know everything it can do. When we purchase a product at the grocery store, we flip it over to read its ingredients. When someone has a baby, we want the blow-by-blow of labor and delivery.

Our quest for detail is also true when we ponder the events of Good Friday, but God hasn’t told us everything we want to know. I’d like to know how much detail Jesus himself knew ahead of time about those last 48 hours.

When did he learn Judas was a traitor? Did he know it when he first chose him? What about the bogus trials he’d have to endure and the humiliation he would experience through the mocking of his captors? Did he know the extent of that ahead of time? Did he know his disciples would run when he needed them most? His words to Peter about betrayal hinted that he did.

Did he have an inkling of how brutal the Roman torture would be? And did he really believe his Father would turn away completely? Surely these details had all come clear by the time he was agonizing in the garden, face to the ground.

Tonight at our church we attempted to participate in some of the details of those last 48 hours as we walked The Stations of the Cross: tasting his salty tears, lifting his heavy cross, tearing fabric to represent his torn flesh. We think maybe if we knew more, we might be able to participate more in his suffering.

Though Scripture tells us much, a great deal is left unsaid. But just like the detail in Birgitta’s current drawings has become more complete (at left), I believe Jesus will one day let us know the particulars of his incredible sacrifice. It’ll happen when we’re living with him in paradise, and when we get the full knowledge of those last 48 hours, we’ll go flat on our faces before him, awed that he endured so much…

…for us.

“Grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life.” (2 Timothy 1:9,10)

Telling the Truth

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All seven of our children attended a Christian elementary school, followed by several years in public schools. Although the government-regulated high school taught opinions we didn’t always like, Nate and I thought this was a good chance for our teens to decide what they believed.

One day Louisa came home with quite a story. In her freshman English class, the teacher had sparked a lively political debate by pitting one group of students against another. Then he’d told them to line up from most liberal to most conservative, based on the opinions that had been offered during discussion.

Louisa ended up at the very end of the line, identified as “most conservative.” The teacher quizzed her, as well as the boy deemed “most liberal,” garnering extremely diverse viewpoints on the same political hot topics. After a few minutes he said to Louisa, “I’ll bet you’re a Christian.” When she answered affirmatively, he said, “What brand? I mean, what kind?”

Louisa didn’t even pause. She said, “The born-again kind.”

I had to hand it to her. She came on strong and labeled herself, despite knowing she might be teased for her extreme point of view.

All of us have occasionally been handed a golden opportunity to testify for Christ, then forfeited it by watering down our answers. I’ve done it repeatedly, always regretting it later.

One of the many admirable traits of Jesus was his consistent refusal to back away from telling the truth… the whole truth. He paid no mind to how it would be received. It wasn’t that he relished rejection, and he experienced the ultimate rejection since he was murdered for his beliefs. It was that his relationship with God was #1, and he wouldn’t compromise it in any way.

The question then is, what’s wrong with me? Why am I so worried about how people will respond? Is their approval more important to me than God’s?

Something Jesus said has always bothered me:

“Whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.” (10:33)

I certainly want Jesus to stand up for me when that time comes. The thought of him saying, “Her? No, not her,” is frightening. But which scene scares me more; that one then, or public ridicule now?

It’s good to put ourselves through an occasional behavioral analysis. Jesus tells us that if we label ourselves “Christian” or “born again,” we’re going to be sitting ducks for rejection by those who aren’t. He said we should expect it and should even prepare to be hated. After all, he was.

Louisa acted courageously that day in class, opening herself up to mockery by telling the truth about herself. But by doing so, she won Jesus’ endorsement in front of the heavenly Father and actually brought pleasure to the Godhead.

“Everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before My Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 10:32)

Ok

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When I was growing up, our fun-loving mom served pancakes every Saturday morning, inviting the neighbor kids to join us. She urged us to see who could eat the most, churning out pancakes by the dozen. When I eventually had a kitchen table full of my own children, I carried on the same Saturday morning ritual.

This weekend, in a hotel breakfast nook (eating the free meal that frequently comes with room rental), I learned how pancake-making has reached a new level. Never before had I seen a machine that could turn out fresh 6” pancakes with the push of one button.

It was automated assembly-line flapjacks, and the only thing we had to do was be ready with a plate at the end of the line. Mom would have loved it, the mess-free marriage of chef-ing and tech-ing.

 

If only every life problem could be solved so easily. One-two-three done.

In our efforts to problem-solve, we usually set out steps to follow: first, then next, then eventually, then bingo: solution.

Trouble comes when the end result isn’t what we expected. With the pancake maker, we wait 1 minute while staring at a picture of a fluffy pancake, and after traveling through the short, prescribed steps, it produces what’s been promised.

The problem with life’s dilemmas is twofold: we often don’t know what steps we should take, and even when we know, the result might take us by surprise, like a pancake machine spitting out a muffin.

Interestingly, God is often the one intentionally rearranging the order of our one-two-three’s and setting up those end-surprises. As frustrating as this can be for us, he does it hoping to teach us things we need to know or to reverse our march toward destruction.

We stomp our feet and say, “But one-two-three just has to lead to four! It can’t work any other way!”

If we put God in charge, however, it means saying yes to a bit of uncertainty. His supernatural reasons for doing things don’t resemble our natural ones. They’re better, higher, finer than ours. The only question we have to ask is, “Do I want God’s superior steps with their element of uncertainty or my inferior ones based on human logic?”

He knows that when we sign on with him not knowing where or how he’s going to lead, we feel uneasy. Though he may not eliminate that part of it, he does provide some comfort by letting us see his plan in hindsight. As we do, we’re encouraged to say, “Ok, your way again next time.”

And with enough practice, that ok becomes almost as easy as pushing the ok button on a pancake maker.

“O Lord my God… Your plans for us are too numerous to list. You have no equal. If I tried to recite all your wonderful deeds, I would never come to the end of them.” (Psalm 40:5)