Category Archives: God’s plans for us

Star of the Show

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Young children soak up information like beach sand soaks up rain, taking it all in. And once in a while they come up with something that makes us scratch our heads and say, “Where did that come from?”

The other morning Skylar, my oldest grandchild (age 3) had come awake in her bedroom, so her daddy went in to greet her. He found her peeking through the blinds. “Daddy, it’s morning! I heard the sky putting the stars away.”

The mind of a child is a brilliant thing. But truth be told, our adult minds are astonishing, too. It’s just that our heads get so crowded with detail, creative thought often gets buried.

When God hears an original idea like Skylar’s, I imagine he smiles, pleased with what she said. She simplified a complicated concept and accepted it completely. Could we, too, please God with this kind of creative thinking? The biblical David tried, and succeeded:

  • Let the light of your face shine on us. (Ps. 4:6)
  • Keep me as the apple of your eye. (Ps. 17:8)
  • You, Lord, keep my lamp burning; my God turns my darkness into light. (Ps. 18:28)
  • Extol him who rides on the clouds. (Ps. 68:4)
  • You turned my wailing into dancing. (Ps. 30:11)
  • I thirst for you… in a dry and parched land where there is no water. (Ps. 63:1)
  • Apart from you I have no good thing. (Ps. 16:2)
  • Were I to speak and tell of your deeds, they would be too many to declare. (Ps. 40:5)

All of us can think about God, the ultimate original, and come up with fresh things to say about/to him. He demonstrates for us with an example. He says he had no beginning and will have no end, yet he calls himself the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. (Revelation 22:13)

What does he mean?

I think he took the difficult concept of “no beginning” and “no ending” and gave it imagery we could grasp. In a sense, he was doing what Skylar did, wrapping logic around an illogical idea. Children have no trouble accepting the illogical wonder of God and his world, as long as they can cloak the ideas in logic as she did. The sky putting stars away? It makes perfect sense.

If we find ourselves stymied about God and what he’s done or not done, it might be good to reduce the problem to a simple, everyday picture. Maybe then we’d be able to understand (and accept) the uncertain and puzzling parts of life.

It worked for David.

It works for Skylar.

And it’ll work for us, too.

“He determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name. Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit.” (Psalm 147:4-5)

 

Helped by Highlights

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Klaus recently taught me how to use a Microsoft Word tool I didn’t even know existed. “If you press ‘control’ and ‘f’ together,” he said, “a box comes up with an option to highlight certain words in a document. Let’s say you’re wondering how many times you’ve used the word ‘dog’ in one of your posts. Type it in, click ‘highlight all’ and all the ‘dogs’ will be come up in yellow.”

I tried it, loved it, and have used it daily ever since. This morning I was thinking about the beautifully bright highlights on the computer screen and thought, “Wouldn’t it be spectacular if I could highlight God’s messages to me in bright yellow?” I could be absolutely sure I was following his advice, making correct decisions, and catching every sin. There would be no wiggle-room for mistakes or detours.

He could also highlight every blessing in yellow so I wouldn’t miss a single one. Although it’s easy to spot the big ones, the little ones often slip past me unnoticed. God knows my tendency to focus first on the faded parts of life, the grey zones, the black things. They loom large, dominating all things visible, and he could help significantly with lots of eye-catching yellow surrounding all the good stuff.

When I was in journalism school, we studied advertising signage and learned the most attention-grabbing color was yellow (on a black background). It’s arresting and easy to read, commanding our attention. That’s exactly what I need.

God could certainly do this. But he doesn’t.

Actually he could do lots of stuff to make things easier for us but doesn’t. Why is that? Since he hasn’t highlighted the answer, I’m not sure. But since my relationship with him is daughter-to-father, I’ve tried to analyze it by studying human parenting strategies.

Teaching youngsters most effectively is simple. We issue the rules, then hope self-discipline will come after they experience natural consequences. For example, if we open the oven and say, “It’s hot! Don’t touch it!” they usually touch anyway. But a little burn teaches them flawlessly. Had we printed the word “hot” on the oven door in captivating yellow letters, it wouldn’t have been very effective.

Another example: when we teach a teen to manage a debit card, we can highlight our counsel: “BIG FEES FOR OVERDRAWING!” But more effective is having to pay $36 for going in the hole. None of us likes to obey advisory signs, and most of us aren’t very good at it. And that’s probably why God doesn’t highlight anything in yellow for us.

He knows it wouldn’t do a bit of good.

Whatever his reason, I’m not going to stress over it but will find my highlighting-fun by way of “control-plus-f.”

“I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go.” (Psalm 143:8)

On the Move

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Fall is a season of change. Children go back to school, college co-eds head back to campus, and many young adults sign new apartment leases. Each change involves packing up, rearranging all things familiar and, in some cases, making a major move.

Last week my sister and brother-in-law joined the relocation parade by moving from their suburban home of 40 years to downtown Chicago.

The buyer of their 5000+ square foot house was a young couple with a toddler and baby. After hunting in the area for a year, they toured Bervin and Mary’s home and fell in love with it the first time through. We puzzled over why such a small family would commit to such a large house, but gradually the pieces came together.

The young mother, on her second visit, made mention of the “Christian energy” throughout the rooms, commenting on the peaceful atmosphere. “It’s just what we’ve been looking for,” she said. Her husband asked if they could buy the 3’ X 4’ framed Scripture verse hanging over the front door: “Know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind.”

At the real estate closing, the reason they chose a large home became clear. The buyers handed Mary a note of gratitude and described how they felt called to help missionaries and planned to use their extra rooms for that purpose.

It can be a challenge to leave the home where you’ve raised 7 children, but when the process became difficult, the testimony of these young buyers made it easier. As Mary said, “I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather have living in our home.”

Last summer Bervin and Mary offered housing to missionaries from Ireland. This family of 6 needed a place to stay for a month, and also needed a car. Bervin and Mary gave a thumbs-up to both requests, proving to be good examples of the scriptural instruction hanging in their entry. Their buyers will continue in this vein.

All of us can look back on multiple moves, and it’s a good idea to search for God’s plan in the progression; sometimes it’s as plain as an architect’s blueprint. Over four decades of time, because of Mary and Bervin’s willingness to serve, God used their home for his purposes in hundreds of ways. As they left that address, he moved along with them and is preparing a fresh blueprint with plans for use of their new home.

Yesterday Louisa and her cousin Marta made a move of their own, from their family homes to an apartment just north of the Loop. After unloading cars and pickups full of boxes, bins and beds, we gathered in their small living room and Bervin prayed, inviting God’s involvement in their new home.

And we know the Lord is ready with the perfect blueprint for two 20-somethings living in the heart of Chicago.

“Know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind. If thou seek him, he will be found of thee.” (1 Chronicles 28:9)