Category Archives: marriage

keep it: the only way we maintain good times for future generations

Posted on by January 18, 2021

Over the last week with few exceptions, I’ve posted nothing on social media except scripture. I haven’t wanted to add to the noise. He has good things to say about this season, and that’s what I’ve wanted to focus on and draw attention to.

keep it: the only way we maintain good times for future generations

It’s been an interesting experiment and a good move for me, sort of like a fast.

Fret not yourself because of evildoers;
    be not envious of wrongdoers!
For they will soon fade like the grass
    and wither like the green herb.

Trust in the Lord, and do good;
    dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.

– Psalm 37:1-3

It’s been Psalm 37 all week long. But if you’re paying attention (I know many of you are) you know that really, it’s been Psalm 37 for much longer than that. The events over the last few weeks, and even leading up to election week in November, weren’t huge surprises and they’ve been in the making for a long time.

Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him;
    fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way,
    over the man who carries out evil devices!

Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath!
    Fret not yourself; it tends only to evil.
For the evildoers shall be cut off,
    but those who wait for the Lord shall inherit the land.

– Psalm 37:7-9

On January 6th, we took the day off work and prayed. And then we went to church and prayed. Our pastor talked candidly about the risk of civil war, and I’ve thought many times about how we are facing this blend of civil and revolutionary war – civil because it is among our own countrymen, but revolutionary because of the cause and the nature of it.  But our pastor also talked about the grievous things it could mean for our kids and future grandkids, and I had not fully considered it in that vivid light.

Then one of the elders prayed, and he repented for his generation that allowed so much of this to happen. They were comfortable, he said; things were easy. And they took advantage of it, and the generation that came after took the ease and comfort for granted.

It made me think of this saying that I’ve been hearing a lot over the last year:

Hard times create strong men.

Strong men create good times.

Good times create weak men.

Weak men create hard times.

And it’s so true, I know it is, but surely we must be able to break the cycle. Because if we can’t, everything seems so hopeless – why should we work to create good times if it only results in weak men who ruin it for our great grandchildren?

Or worse, there’s that other argument we hear all too often: Why bother bringing children into the world at all?

But then, the same week, I also read this:

“What sort of world is this to bring them into? That’s another consideration.”

“A very cowardly consideration, dear. A mere shirking of responsibility. It’s a heavy responsibility, of course, a double one, responsibility for the children themselves and responsibility for the world they must live in. But I know of no better incentive for the building of a decent world than the possession of children who must live in the world you’ve built.”

– Elizabeth Goudge, Pilgrim’s Inn

God creates a beautiful, strategic curriculum for our lives: The warnings and repentance, the prayer and the challenge. And I realized again that we are not headed for war; we are already at war.

We always have been. But we lose ground every time we forget it.

What hasn’t changed is that we are occupying the land of a cleanup operation: We are in the middle of a spiritual war in a physical place, and it manifests itself in both ways. We see the spiritual and physical aftermath all around us.

So even when we get back to “good times” – the corruption is revealed, the fraud is overturned, the guilty go to prison (hashtag: we’re gonna need a bigger Gitmo) – we still need to remember that we are at war. We are always at war. Our hearts and culture are the battleground, and never more so when it looks like things are safe and easy.

We are still occupying and stewarding the land, on mission, until He comes.

There are quiet victories and struggles, great sacrifices of self, and noble acts of heroism, in it…done every day in nooks and corners, and in little households, and in men’s and women’s hearts – any one of which might reconcile the sternest man to such a world, and fill him with belief and hope in it, though two-fourths of its people were at war, and another fourth at law; and that’s a bold word.

– Charles Dickens, The Battle of Life

People’s hearts – ours, and those around us – are always and still the battleground. Hearts and identities and relationships will always need wholeness and fullness, in good times and bad, and that is where God wants to stake His claim. We till the soil regardless of the weather and circumstances because strong men create good times, but strong men can also create strong children. And those strong children will continue to inherit the land.

There were still children in the world, and while there were children, men and women would not abandon the struggle to make safe homes to put them in, and while they so struggled there was hope.

– Elizabeth Goudge, Pilgrim’s Inn

When the Constitutional Convention closed in 1787, Benjamin Franklin was leaving Independence Hall when a woman asked him what kind of government they had just designed. His answer was, “A republic, if you can keep it.”

And that is still our challenge today.

Turn away from evil and do good;
    so shall you dwell forever.
For the Lord loves justice;
    he will not forsake his saints.
They are preserved forever,
    but the children of the wicked shall be cut off.
The righteous shall inherit the land
    and dwell upon it forever.

– Psalm 37:27-29

In good times or hard times, we are still loving our kids and teaching them. We are still learning more and growing. We are still passing on values and standards and true education. We are still in the Word and abiding in prayer. We cannot let up and grow soft when times are easy, and we cannot let go and become calloused when times are hard.

The only way we do that is to remember that the war is never over – it is always raging in the spiritual battleground. We are not only meant to inherit the land, but to keep it.

on repeat: the power of your mundane offerings

Posted on by May 2, 2022

If you’re super spiritual, you should just skip this post. I mean, if you read commentaries and offerings and begats for fun, and you have whole sections of the Pentateuch memorized, this probably isn’t for you. It’s for the rest of us.

on repeat: the power of your mundane offerings

If you had to look up the word “Pentateuch,” though, you’re in the right spot.

(Okay, is it safe yet? Because I’m getting ready to confess something. Deep breath.)

If you have ever read Numbers in the Old Testament, you know it can be a little…

Um…well…(cough)

Kinda boring. Right? A little repetitive.

Okay, a lot repetitive.

I’ve been reading chapters six and seven, and here’s what it says – just one very short example:

On the second day Nethanel the son of Zuar, the chief of Issachar, made an offering. He offered for his offering one silver plate whose weight was 130 shekels, one silver basin of 70 shekels, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, both of them full of fine flour mixed with oil for a grain offering; one golden dish of 10 shekels, full of incense; one bull from the herd, one ram, one male lamb a year old, for a burnt offering; one male goat for a sin offering; and for the sacrifice of peace offerings, two oxen, five rams, five male goats, and five male lambs a year old. This was the offering of Nethanel the son of Zuar.

– Number 7:18-23, ESV

FASCINATING.

No? What, you skimmed? You don’t want to hear all about the offerings? And you don’t want to hear them repeated verbatim twelve times (with the exception of different names of tribes, chiefs, and their fathers)?

Me neither. But here’s the deal: I was praying about it, and the Word never says “Blah, blah, blah” (you’ve heard me say that in Oh My Soul before) so I asked the Lord, Why do all the mundane details matter? Why are there so many of them in the Word and in our lives?

We do all these tasks that are never finished: the dishes, laundry, making the beds, teaching the kids, commuting to work. We repeat and repeat and repeat, and life is still full of them, never done.

And here’s what the Lord told me:

As you’re reading these mundane details, you are posturing yourself to hear Me. You are postured for Me to move in all these small things. You are postured to do a productive work even though you are “only” doing all those tiny, repetitive actions that don’t seem to go anywhere.

They are obedient to My calling for you, so they are going somewhere.

They are your offering.

And in the spirit of repetition, He keeps reminding me of it as I read parts of the Bible that are sticky, and as I deal with details in life that are sticky, too.

Repetition doesn’t have to equal boring and mundane. Sometimes we choose repetitive acts because they are relaxing and they help us focus on what is important – like taking communion or praying before meals, or going for a walk, or finding work for our hands so our minds can think clearly.

Earlier this year I started knitting again while I read. The movement helps me focus and it’s therapeutic for my hands. And as I’m getting ready to change colors, I’m right here:

Aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we instructed you.
– 1 Thessalonians 4:11, ESV

If you don’t know, knitting tends to be slow work. You repeat and repeat and repeat – especially in garter stitch, especially when you’re using the same color, row after row after row.

But it produces something.

Just like pages read, prayers prayed, and Scripture spoken: They all do something.

They produce results. They create and refine things…and us.

But sometimes it takes a while to see that progress – which is all the more reason to start today.

When we start a project, whether it’s knitting, writing, building, reading, painting, teaching, or any other creative endeavor, we are working toward something we cannot see.

Do you know why books such as this are so important? Because they have quality. And what does the word quality mean? To me it means texture. This book has pores. It has features. This book can go under the microscope. You’d find life under the glass, streaming past in infinite profusion.

– Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451

The woman weeding the garden, the neighbor changing the oil, the friend delivering dinner.

The officer driving, the receptionist answering the phone, the doctor prescribing a treatment.

The dad bathing the preschooler, the mom teaching the kid on the couch how to read.

A million steps of creative, mundane, prayerful, powerful faithfulness: lives lived in quiet, repetitive offering, standing for freedom and redeeming the culture.

We aren’t disgusted or despairing because the blanket isn’t complete yet after only a few rows of stitches. We know it’s a process. We see the unseen, and we work toward it.

And this is how prayer works, too.

If you are praying for some big situation or discouraged over huge current events — remember, we partner with God to work toward things that are unseen, and they change.

So we read books. We speak Scripture. We write words. We move in faithful obedience.

We are going somewhere as we obey Him in all these small things. And that includes reading the Bible – and not skipping the sticky parts, because He speaks to us in those, too.

We pray from victory, and we pray toward victory. And it works.

We make all these little stitches, and we know they make the Kingdom come. Pretty soon, we’ll see the colors start to change.

_____

Free printable download for you: Bookmark or 5×7 print.

mapping our territory: how we gain ground when we read deep & wide

Posted on by June 21, 2024

It’s what I’ve always wanted to do here – I’m about to go all crazy bookish on you. In all fairness, you might’ve seen it coming. So stand back (or kick back on the couch), and maybe arm yourself with a fresh notebook and your favorite clicker pencil.

I spent most of the last weekend immersed in The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. If that’s unfamiliar territory to you – and it is to many, I never even heard of it until a year ago – it’s by Anne Bronte, probably the least known of the famous Brontes. It wasn’t an easier read than her sisters’ more famous works. But I flew through it, probably for a couple of reasons.

mapping our territory: how we gain ground when we read deep and wide

First, I gave it a fair shot – which means when I sat down with it the first time, I read at least 15-20 pages, enough to get a little ways in and scope out the territory. And then I made sure to pick it up again before letting too many days pass, so I could get a little farther in and get familiar with what was going on before book entropy set in.

Don’t know what “book entropy” is? I made it up. But you’ve probably experienced it – you open a book, read a few pages, then set it down for a week or more, then try a few more pages, and abandon it again with the best of intentions. Before you know it, six months have passed and you’re only at page fifty, and you have no idea who Lizzie Hexam is, what her father is doing in the river retrieving corpses, or whether or not it’s important that he found that one body that one time. (It is. Of course it is.)

It’s the worst way to read anything. (Dickens, especially. Ask me how I know.) Might as well quit and start over later.

Second, I’ve gotten used to reading classics and don’t struggle through them so much anymore. In high school we read very few classics, and I used to be so intimidated by the unfamiliar territory, struggling with the language, customs, cultures, and terms. But as a young adult I started dipping my toes in, and muddled my way through a few on my own.

There is a stubbornness about me that never can bear to be frightened at the will of others. My courage always rises at every attempt to intimidate me.
― Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

We were in our early 20s, in our first apartment, and started our library with a bookshelf we bought from Fred Meyers for about $75 in quarters that we’d saved in a blue Arizona Iced Tea bottle. We sat on opposite ends of our hand-me-down couch and read quietly to ourselves and out loud to each other, eating our dinner of boxed PastaRoni because these were also the days before we learned how to cook.

In Sense and Sensibility, I had no idea why one daughter was “Miss Dashwood” and the other daughter was called by her first name. In Anna Karenina, I barely managed to untangle each character’s three separate names. (Really, are the nicknames that necessary? Tolstoy couldn’t have made it a little simpler?) I spent two years slogging through The Hunchback of Notre Dame and I don’t need to read about Parisian architecture or flying buttresses ever again. Please.

But then I started building on that scaffolding. And it started getting easier.

Give yourself unto reading. The man who never reads will never be read; he who never quotes will never be quoted. He who will not use the thoughts of other men’s brains, proves that he has no brains of his own. You need to read.

— Charles Spurgeon

(Yikes. Spurgeon is a little harsh…but he’s not wrong.)

I moved over to Pride and Prejudice and things started to make sense. I tried Sense and Sensibility again, and this time things fell into place. And then I found Gone With the Wind, The Lord of the Rings, and Jane Eyre, and fell in love.

I was hooked. This was the deep part of my ocean. This is where I could keep exploring and never get tired.

But I hit bottom pretty quickly in other areas. I read three books by Kipling that convinced me we probably aren’t kindred spirits. I endured months of Dostoevsky’s rascally Karamazov brothers and hustled my way through Crime and Punishment, and those weren’t my favorites, either. Not too long ago I went back to Hugo and it still took me over two years to finish Les Mis. But I had to spend some time with them – a fair shot’s worth – to hold an opinion in the first place.

And this is where we go wide: we stretch out into the shallows, where we dip our toes in and maybe find the water isn’t to our liking. But at least it gives us an idea of what the terrain around that edge of the ocean looks like. The fog is lifted a little; we can draw in some curves on the map instead of leaving the entire area shrouded in mist. We gain ground.

I love, love, love, finding new territory. I love helping others grow deep and wide and find new territory, too. So I started Gaining Ground for those who want to expand their territory in literature, writing, and wholeness – you know, for the slightly nerdy deep thinkers, or those who want to be slightly nerdier, deeper thinkers. You guys are my people.

Contrary to general belief, writing isn’t something that only “writers” do; writing is a basic skill for getting through life. Yet most American adults are terrified of the prospect – ask a middle-aged engineer to write a report and you’ll see something close to panic. Writing, however, isn’t a special language that belongs to English teachers and a few other sensitive souls who have a “gift for words.” Writing is thinking on paper. Anyone who thinks clearly should be able to write clearly – about any subject at all.

― William Zinsser, Writing to Learn

Life is different now, but Vin and I still sit on opposite ends of the couch, and we still read quietly to ourselves and out loud to each other. Somewhere along the way we learned to cook from scratch, and now we can make a mean chicken curry, homemade enchiladas, and bacon-wrapped jalapeños. I’m hoping this helps us live long enough to read all those books.

Because we’re still learning. We often read a book and tell the other person they absolutely must read this one next – and sometimes we actually follow those recommendations.

“I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book! — When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.”

― Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

And sometimes it works. But other times, book entropy sets in, and Anna Karenina sits on Vin’s shelf for about two years.

The bookmark is on page 111. Or, eleventy-one, for you Middle Earth fans. It might be time for him to ditch it.

So if anyone wants to borrow a beautiful old copy of Anna Karenina and struggle through all the different Russian names, I’ve got one for you. He probably won’t even notice it’s gone – and if he does, I’ll let you know.