A Happy Thanksgiving?

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Blog readerI started Thanksgiving Day by talking to God about you blog readers, with extra time spent on those who are widows. Many of you have contacted me through this site in 2013, and I’ve saved each of your stories in a cyber-file. You’re important to me, especially those of you walking through your first 12 months without your beloved.

In asking the Lord what his desire was for the words in this Thanksgiving post, I could  just hear him say, “Comfort those who are grieving. By my Spirit, give them something to be thankful for.”

I wasn’t sure how best to do that, but as is always true with God, he showed me. “Remember the devotional you read yesterday? That message will bring them comfort.”

Though I didn’t remember, when I looked back I saw the reason he wanted me to use it. The topic was sorrow and joy, and I knew each of us could benefit from reading it tonight. Spurgeon began by reminding us of an intensely sad situation in the Bible. After Jesus had been killed, his disciples felt abandoned and were crushed with disappointment. Deep in sorrow, they wondered how they could possibly go on without him.

And then! Their beloved teacher and mentor reappeared, very much alive and back “on duty” as the one they’d become so attached to and loved so dearly. Their joy overflowed!

Spurgeon then moves from that story to sorrowful people today:

“All the sorrows of saints* shall be thus transmuted, even the worst of them, which look as if they must forever remain fountains of bitterness. Then the more sorrow, the more joy. If we have loads of sorrow, then the Lord’s power will turn them into tons of joy. Then the bitterer the trouble, the sweeter the pleasure.

“The swinging of the pendulum far to the left will cause it to go all the farther to the right. The remembrances of grief shall heighten the flavor of the delight. We shall set the one in contrast with the other, and the brilliance of the diamond shall be the more clearly seen because of the black foil behind it.

“Come, my heart, cheer up! In a little while I shall be as glad as I am now gloomy. Jesus tells me that by a heavenly alchemy my sorrow shall be turned into joy. I do not see how it is to be, but I believe it, and I begin to sing by way of anticipation.” **

WonderingSo whether you’re a widow whose heart is full of sadness or a non-widow dealing with struggles of another kind, these words are a gift of comfort from the Father to you. And in the dark of night, if you haven’t thought of a single thing to be thankful for, now you have one: God’s promise of better days ahead.

Spurgeon may have been talking about our joy-filled life in the hereafter, but from my own grief experience I can tell you it’s a promise God applies in this world, too.

“Your sorrow shall be turned into joy.” (John 16:20)

*Spurgeon refers to all Christians as “saints”.   **Cheque Book of the Bank of Faith, p. 331.

Too cold!

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An early ThanksgivingThanksgiving is “my” holiday, the one where everybody comes to our house. It began back in 1969 when Nate and I got married on Thanksgiving weekend, and friends of our parents put on a lavish spread the day before our rehearsal dinner.

In November of 1970 (when Nate was still in law school) we decided to host Thanksgiving in our small apartment far from home, and were thrilled when extended family agreed to make the drive.

Forty Thanksgivings later, I’ve learned that the hardest part about the meal is making sure the turkey is thawed in time. (I’ve also learned that if it isn’t, the giblet bag inside will go through the baking process without a problem, though it isn’t nearly as tasty as stuffing.)

Some Thanksgivings we’ve had over 40 guests, but this year it will be only 19. Many are bringing food contributions to the meal, and Louisa and Birgitta (currently living with me) are wonderful co-workers. We’ve also got a first-time helper working with us: 13 month old Emerald.

Fooling with frozen turkeyAfter coming home from the grocery store Monday, I deposited 18 bags of food on the kitchen counter and sat her in the middle of them to assist with unloading. A 24 pound bird and several extra turkey breasts were part of the haul, so I put them on the counter to begin thawing.

Emerald was fascinated with the netted bags, plucking at the smaller breasts and laughing as they spun around on the counter.

Too coldEventually she began patting them saying, “Hot… Hot…” (not yet knowing the word “cold”) when all of a sudden she started crying. Since she was still patting the frozen meat, it didn’t take long to figure out her tender hands were hurting from the cold. Though we quickly moved to a warmer project, it was interesting that she hadn’t known enough to stop her patting. She needed me to do it for her.

How many times have I needed God to do something like that for me? It’s happened when I’ve jumped into a project without adequate knowledge or preparation, rushing ahead to do things my way without asking God what he preferred. Or it was that I hadn’t had any experience but thought I could accomplish a task just as well as someone who had. I’ve been burned badly in both situations and needed God to terminate the projects.

Scripture tells us there is safety in the presence of wise counselors, and of course the ultimate adviser is God himself. We ought never to tackle something big without first getting thorough instructions from our superiors. That might mean going all the way to THE superior One to get our marching orders directly from him.

In the mean time, all of us learn pretty well from experience, sometimes painfully so. Just ask Emerald.

“Where there is no counsel, the people fall; but in the multitude of counselors there is safety.” (Proverbs 11:14)

Damage Control

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Last weekend a bunch of us drove from our home in southwest Michigan to the Chicago area for a wedding. As we approached the city on the Dan Ryan Expressway, a disturbing sign caught my eye:

892 TRAFFIC DEATHS THIS YEAR      DRIVE NOW     TEXT LATER

Traffic deathsSurely all 892 weren’t killed as a result of texting, but some probably were. I know what it feels like to stray from my lane while texting and have done it just enough to say, “No more.” One second too many could exact a terrible price.

The other day Birgitta showed me an iPhone video taken through the front windshield of a squad car. An SUV in front of the policeman began drifting left. As it hit the shoulder, the driver must have looked up, recognized his error, and sharply overcompensated to the right.

He cut across several lanes and hit the side of a truck on the far right, bounced left across those same lanes and into oncoming traffic, and was hit head-on by a fast-moving 18-wheeler. The SUV and anyone inside were disintegrated on impact in an accident that took 5 seconds.

All of us are tempted to say, “I’ll just glance for a second.”

I wonder if similar life-devastation can happen when we look away from the Lord for “just a second.” The problem with texting while driving and also with taking our eyes off God probably isn’t as much about the quick look away as the getting stuck on what we’re looking at. Two seconds. Maybe three or four.

Whatever it is, it grabs our attention ever-so-slightly longer than the one second we promised ourselves. Suddenly we’re “stuck” and catastrophe occurs. It wouldn’t have happened at all except that whatever we were glancing at was, for those seconds, worth it to us.

The most devastating part of the whole thing is that there are no do-overs. If our quick peek turns into a longer one, it’s willful, risky, and a foolish gamble on our part. And if permanent damage gets done, whether while driving and texting, or in other areas of life when we let ourselves dwell on something we shouldn’t, back-peddling isn’t possible.

In hindsight, that just-a-second peek is virtually never worth it, because it doesn’t take much of a look to find us quickly invested in what we’re seeing. And when that happens, it gets more and more difficult to look back at God. As a matter of fact, it might be quite a while before we can pull our attention from what first distracted us to turn back toward him.

So hopefully, if we don’t text and drive, the odds are good we won’t be one of those numbers on Chicago’s expressway sign. Better than that, though, is not to take our eyes off God, not even for a second. If we focus exclusively on him, he’ll save us from many an accident.

“[Lord], turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in Your ways.” (Psalm 119:37)