Time in a Bottle.

 

I love that song and I’ve a story about it. It was my high school senior (’74) class song and Jim Croce had been killed in a plane crash just before the song was released. One evening that May, my entire family was in our car together when it played; and everybody sat there and listened until it finished. Mother commented that the words were so true…

 

…there never seems to be enough time

       to do the things you want to do

           once you find them…

 

My daddy had just been diagnosed with bone cancer and he died 19 months later. He was only 43. I thought a lot about that the year I turned 43. We just never know how many more breaths we’re going to get.

 

For they are like

     a breath of air;

         their days are like

               a passing shadow.

                  Psalm 144:4

 

 

But there’s a whole next life coming after this one. And I know, beyond a shadow of any doubt, I’ll see him again.

 

Till then, I’ll keep praying.

 

Years ago Dan initiated a family Christmas communion at our church. Speaking softly to each family gathered around the candlelit table, he’d give them a word…maybe peace, possibly love, perhaps commitment…a different word for each family.

 

God gave me a word back in the year before Dan was killed. My word was exhilaration. I really liked my word and it wafted around in my thinking at odd times. My mental image was of diving into a clear blue pool of spring water and also of surfing over the tops of waves. I’m not a good swimmer, but I loved thinking about my word and wondering about it.

 

My mother-in-law used to say she was homesick for heaven. An interesting thought really—being homesick for a place you’ve never been. Then one day I sensed a yearning for something more—and I immediately knew what it was.

 

“There is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every man which cannot be filled by any created thing, but only by God, the Creator, made known through Jesus” (Pascal 1623-1662)

 

And Jesus said…

 

There is more than enough room

     in my Father’s home.

If this were not so,

     would I have told you

     that I am going to prepare

     a place for you?

John 14:2

 

What an amazing invisible God I serve. He created me to want to be with him PLUS he’s already reserved me a room in his Father’s house.

 

Exhilarating.

 

(Sunset over the Mediterranean)

 

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.