A perfect storm—either plain old weather-related phenomena or somebody’s real life events. The weather story seems like a great script for a blockbuster movie, but the real life story not so much—especially if it’s your real life.

 

I had a perfect storm year a while back. Happenings just kept piling up in ways I couldn’t control. I worked hard and stayed busy, but sometimes realized I was really only an observer in God’s bigger picture.

 

I learned it’s possible that, at the end of the day, the outcome of a perfect storm might not be the worst thing.

 

John Piper, in The Pleasures of God, shares a wonderful analogy explaining the fear of the Lord. He suggests imagining hiking across a glacier and getting caught in a huge storm. Then seeking shelter in a cleft where you can safely observe the storm:

 

Even though (you are) secure, the awesome might of the storm rages on, and you watch it with a kind of trembling pleasure as it surges out across the distant glaciers. Not everything we call fear vanishes from your heart, only the life-threatening part. There remains the trembling, the awe, the wonder, the feeling that you would never want to tangle with such a storm or be the adversary of such a power.

 

Exhilarating.

 

In my perfect storm year, I did my best to make the outcomes different, but they weren’t. It bemused me that, even though there were a lot of unknowns, I wasn’t afraid.

 

So.

 

I continue to learn new lessons and I don’t think storms are very scary anymore—because I know God is doing for me what he did for Moses:

 

…I will hide you

   in the crevice of the rock

       and cover you with my hand…

Exodus 33:22

 

Time is moving quickly. I visualize hourglass grains of sand racing along and tumbling down to join the ones already fallen.

 

I am a pray-er and I believe spiritual winds are blowing. I’ve a strong sense we’re approaching a vortex in time.

 

My on-going prayer is:  Lord, change me first. I don’t want to pray changes for someone else that I’m not willing to pray for myself.

 

Jesus Christ said,

 

“Look!

        I stand at the door

        and knock.

                If you hear my voice

                and open the door,

                        I will come in,

                        and we will share a meal

                                together as friends…”

                                     (Revelation 3:20)

 

On the other hand…

 

The god of this age

         has blinded the minds

         of unbelievers,

                 so that they cannot see

                  the light of the gospel

                          that displays the glory of Christ,

                          who is the image of God.

(2 Corinthians 4:4)

 

Scripture overflows with descriptive words and phrases that help my heart know my invisible God. And Dr. John White’s descriptive prayer imagery, in Parents in Pain, enlarges my prayer language.

 

…ask with every confidence that God will open the eyes of the morally and spiritually blind…

 

…ask that the self deceptions, that we hide behind, be burned away in the fierce light of truth…

 

…ask that dark caverns of the mind be ripped open to let the sunlight pour in…

 

…ask that self disguises may be stripped from a man or woman to reveal the horror of their nakedness in the holy light of God…

 

…ask that the glory of the face of Christ will shine through the spiritual blindness caused by the god of this world…

 

…ask that he deliver us from overwhelming temptation…

 

…and give us every opportunity…

 

…to see his beauty, his tenderness, his forgiveness…

 

I can ask these things with every assurance that God will not only hear, but will delight to answer.

 

BUT I cannot ask him to force any man or woman to love and trust him against their own free will.

 

So. I will stubbornly and persistently continue to pray

 

Kintsugi is the Japanese art of mending flaws of broken pottery with costly liquid gold. The breakage and repair then become part of the history of the piece and celebrate its beauty in a new and more valuable way.

 

God’s redemptive grace to me is his art of covering my sins and imperfections with the costly blood of his Son’s sacrifice. My brokenness and repair then become part of my history and there is a new beauty and priceless value change within me.

 

Watch for the gleam of liquid gold binding together these fragments of King David’s life:

 

At his beginning

 

…God said,

    ‘I have found David

     son of Jesse,

     a man after my own heart.

He will do everything I want him to do.’

Acts 13:22

 

 

At his middle (God’s words)

 

…The Lord, the God of Israel, says:

    I anointed you king of Israel

     and saved you from the power of Saul.

 

I gave you your master’s house

    and his wives

     and the kingdoms

     of Israel and Judah.

And if that had not been enough,

    I would have given you much,

     much more.

 

Why, then, have you despised

    the word of the Lord

     and done this horrible deed?

For you have murdered

    Uriah the Hittite

     with the sword

      of the Ammonites

     and stolen his wife.

2 Samuel 12:7-9

 

 

At his middle (David’s words)

 

Wash me clean from my guilt.

Purify me from my sin.

For I recognize my rebellion;

    It haunts me day and night.

Against you,

    and you alone,

     have I sinned.

I have done what is evil

    in your sight.

 

Purify me from my sins,

    and I will be clean;

     wash me,

     and I will be whiter than snow.

Oh, give me back my joy again…

 

The sacrifice you desire

    is a broken spirit.

You will not reject

    a broken and repentant heart,

     O God.

(Psalm 51:2-4; 8; 19)

 

 

At his end (God’s words to and through David)

 

“The Spirit of the Lord

     speaks through me;

      his words are upon my tongue.

 

The God of Israel spoke.

       The Rock of Israel said to me:

 

‘The one who rules righteously,

      who rules in the fear of God, 

       is like the light of morning at sunrise,

       like a morning without clouds,

       like the gleaming of the sun

       on new grass after rain.’

 

Is it not my family

    God has chosen?

Yes, he has made

    an everlasting covenant with me…

(2 Samuel 23:2-5)

 

And, praise be to God, he has made a New Covenant with me.

 

Mama Jan, I’m exhasterated

Really? Why are you exhasterated?

Because I ate ice cream and ate the sprinkles and you said bad words.

Really? What were my bad words?

You said, “Eat your ice cream” (instead of playing with the sprinkles).

So you’re exhasterated.

Yes.

Faith Cora is 2.

 

I want to do what is good,

but I don’t.

I don’t want to do what is wrong,

but I do it anyway.

Romans 7:19

 

The Apostle Paul was in his early 50’s. I wonder if he ever felt exhasterated.

 

I feel exhasterated when a day passes by that hasn’t begun with focused and disciplined prayer time in God’s presence. Because, if I rush into the day without some quiet time with God, the rest of my day never feels like it gets in sync.

 

And I’m older than Faith Cora AND the Apostle Paul.

 

🙂 🙂 🙂

 

Thirty some years ago, after we started our family, I read Dr. James Dobson’s book The Strong Willed Child and loved it. It resonated with me—a balanced approach to parenting that was practical and worked.

 

Recently I saw a quote someone had posted from the preface of his latest book Your Legacy.

 

“For parents who believe passionately in Jesus Christ and anticipate His promised gift of eternal life, there is no higher priority in life than providing effective spiritual training at home. Unless we are successful in introducing our children to Him, we will never see them again in the afterlife.”

 

What a terribly sobering thought.

 

My years of daily parenting are done and I am so grateful that my children walk with the Lord. It’s amazing how quickly those windows and doors of daily hands-on influence closed.

 

But I love knowing that prayer transcends time and distance and God is always listening. I can take the names and faces of those I love to him at any time. And then he, in some unfathomable unearthly way, unleashes his power into our lives.

 

Never stop praying.   (1 Thessalonians 5:17)