Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Dear Amelia



I miss you so much.  Do you like my Indian crown?  I saw the picture of yours and wanted to make one just like it.  When I see you again, we can bring our Indian crowns and wear them together.  Today at rest time I saw a robin, a house finch, a mockingbird, a Carolina wren, and a grackle.  I can't wait to see you again and go to the beach.  Are you excited to move into your new house?  Today we are eating crepes for dinner and then going to kilometer kids (where we run around the park).  I had to buy some running shoes and shorts, and they gave us these bright green shirts.  All of the trees in our yard are blooming, and I want to walk around and take some pictures to show you.  There's the peach tree, the Japanese magnolia, and the pear.  Oh, and this is our teepee...









Justice, Mercy, and Grace

We've been doing Tim Keller's Bible study on the book of Galatians in Sunday school, and the topic inevitably turns to parenting and how we apply these truths to raising children.  We had such a thought-provoking conversation this week that I wanted to write it down so I could remember it, let it simmer, and come back to these ideas in the future.

We talked about the difference between justice, mercy and grace, and how God shows all three throughout Scripture, and how we as parents are to show all three too.  Justice was defined as getting something you deserve - punishment for sin.  As we parent, this is the picture of the law - having clear boundaries established for our children, and clear consequences when boundaries are broken.  One parent asked our pastor what justice looks like specifically when he parents - and how he still maintains the law in his home, but communicates to his kids that they are no longer under the curse of the law.  He says they have varying consequences for varying levels of sin, and that some times they need to be firmer and come down harder on their kids, but as soon as repentance is displayed, his whole demeanor changes, forgiveness is quickly given, fellowship is restored, and there's a mini celebration of sorts.

Mercy was defined as not getting something we deserve.  I have often called this grace when dealing with my children, so it was a good distinction to make.  When a child disobeys and deserves a consequence for their sin, we give them mercy by withholding the consequence.  God is full of mercy, and so this too should be present in our homes and as we deal with other people.

So the big discussion came when we got to grace.  What does it look like to give our kids grace?  Grace was defined as being given something that is undeserved - a free gift not at all reliant upon our actions or attitudes.  Many of us were wondering what this can look like as we seek to raise our children, and one woman had such a beautiful example.  Here is her story:
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She has 5 children, and her middle daughter came to her one morning asking if she could please wear one of her older sister's hair bows.  The big bows are more expensive, and used for special occasions, so the mother was not feeling inclined to let her wear it to school, but the daughter was so eager to wear it, and assured her mother she would take great care of it and bring it back home exactly as it was.  Finally after much talk over expectations, etc., the mother granted the child permission.  The next morning as the children were getting ready for school, she asked her daughter where the hair bow was.  Her daughter said, "oh yeah, I'll just put it on the bathroom."  Then out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the girl slip in and out of the bathroom and slip away.  Feeling like something was amiss, the mother wen to the bathroom and saw that the bow had been utterly destroyed.  Not only had her daughter not taken care of the bow as she had promised she would, but she tried to hide the fact from her mother and essentially lied to her.

At this point the mother was very angry, but the bus for school was waiting, and so she told her daughter they would talk about it after school (she knew she wasn't in the right state of mind to talk about it then anyway).  All day the mother was confronted with her anger - the money lost, the cover-up, the irresponsibility of the daughter.  When the daughter returned home from school, they went to the couch to talk about the situation.  Her mother said, "You didn't take care of the bow as you assured me you would, you didn't tell me that you had ruined the bow, and then when I asked you for it, you tried to deceive me by quietly slipping the bow back into the bathroom.  You deserve to be disciplined on many different levels, but Mommy isn't going to discipline you this time.  Instead, I bought you a new bow - one of the big ones - the most beautiful one I could find.  And this bow is yours - to do with and take care of how you please.  I won't ask you to show it to me, or to keep it nice, it is given freely to you with no expectations."
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Even though it's just a story about a bow, I thought it was such a beautiful example of showing grace in parenting.  I look forward to continuing this conversation alongside this group of parents who are seeking to honor God as they raise their children.    

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Redeeming Fruit

Yesterday in church, for the first Sunday of Lent, we read from Genesis 2 and 3, and the pastor focused on God's question to Adam and Eve from 3:8,

But the Lord God called to the man, "Where are you?"

This question comes in response to the man and woman hiding from God among the trees of the Garden, which is a direct response to discovering their nakedness, which is a result of eating the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

God commands in genesis 2:16-17, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."

The crafty serpent comes into the garden, tempting the woman and convincing her that God is not really good.  And "when the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it.  She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.  Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves." (3:6-7)

Our pastor said that we've been hiding from God ever since.  And just like Eve, we've been buying into the serpent's lies that God doesn't really love us or know what's best for us.  His encouragement was this: stop hiding!  We are not a victim of sin, but a participator in sin.  When we drop the fig leaves and stop hiding our sin from God (and ourselves) and repent of our sin, we receive more love and grace than we could ever imagine.

There was something my pastor said in the course of his sermon that really got me thinking about fruit in a new way, hence the title, Redeeming Fruit.  He said (and this may also be a quote from Keller?), "Disobedience is a fruit of unbelief - every sin stems from unbelief."  So disobedience is a fruit of unbelief, and original unbelief came into the garden via the serpent and out of our hearts through the act of eating fruit - real, tangible fruit.  Forbidden fruit.

In the very beginning, the man and woman choose a lie over freedom, and by eating the fruit they experience a death of sorts.  They see their nakedness (sin?) and try to take care of it on their own (by sewing fig leaves and hiding from God).  That obviously doesn't work, and when God confronts them he dishes out some pretty serious consequences for their sin, and to Adam he says,

"Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field.  By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food..."

Those abundant fruit trees of the garden must have looked pretty good at this point.  From what we can tell, Adam and Eve had all the fruit they wanted whenever they wanted - it seems as if there was no real "working for food" before the curse.  Yet after the curse growing food becomes an all-consuming, painful toiling, sweat of your brow kind of job.  There is a shift from the idyllic garden setting to an agrarian farming setting, and a shift from freely eating and enjoying God's presence in the cool of the day to hard work - both in toiling the ground and in relating to God.

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Skip ahead to the new testament after Christ has died and was raised from the dead.

In Sunday school we are studying the book of Galatians and talking about how Christ redeems the law, and how the Gospel unites all Christians - Jews and Gentiles.  We are all equally in need of a Savior, because the law was never meant to save, nor was it able to do so.  Paul says in Galatians 2:19, "For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God."   We skipped over to Romans 7 where Paul uses an illustration from marriage to flesh out what Paul means by, "through the law I died to the law".  In this illustration, he says, "So, my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God." (7:4)  This is in contrast to when we were controlled by the sinful nature and were only able to bear "fruit for death." (7:5)

The Law reveals God's holiness and exposes our sin, for how else would we know that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" if it were not for the standard of the Law?  Yet Paul says even he was only capable of bearing fruit for death in his efforts to uphold the Law because he was controlled by the sinful nature.  In order to bear fruit to God he must first die to his old master (his sinful nature which is exposed by the Law) and be united to another, Christ.

I love the way the new testament talks about bearing fruit, as if we are trees.  And the lifeblood of the tree dictates the fruit that is produced by the tree.  If we belong to Christ, then it is his lifeblood that lives in us, and we are able to bear fruit to God.  I was thinking about this beautiful picture of redemption, and how even the fruit is being redeemed.  Disobedience is a fruit of unbelief, man's original unbelief is acted out by eating forbidden fruit, and now through Christ we can bear fruit to God.  We are like the tree of the garden we ate from in disobedience - the tree that opens our eyes to the difference between good and evil.  We are able to bear fruit for death, or able to bear fruit for God... depending on our lifeblood...


Monday, March 10, 2014

Lent

I have been remembering this time last year, how snowy and grey it was in Maine (with no hope of the snow melting anytime soon), how we still didn't know where we would be moving come Summer, and how hard it was to wait patiently on the Lord.  It has been a rhythm of life for us for many years now - for Hubry to apply for jobs in the early Fall, to make it to the on-campus stage, and then for February to be a long, dark, emotional month of waiting, hoping, and not entirely knowing how to direct our prayers, but trusting deep down that the Lord is working together all things for the good of those who love him...

Over the past month, Hubry has been informed twice that he was runner up for the position he interviewed for.  Two times he was told that if the other candidate didn't accept the position, they would offer it to him, but both times the other candidate did accept the position.  I guess it's good to know you're a close second, but that makes 4 times now that Hubry has been a very close second. :)

Yet, here we are in Kennesaw, Georgia, Hubry with a good tenure track position and blessings abounding when we have eyes to see them.  And we are filled with thankfulness.

Georgia has the advantage over Maine when it comes to Spring.  There's a lot of beauty in Maine, and a lot we miss about it, but I can honestly say I don't miss March through May, when you are hopeful for Spring, but the weather remains the same, and the ground remains covered with a blanket of snow.  There truly is something glorious about March in Georgia, when all of a sudden the time changes (which is still a totally weird thing we do, by the way) and the Spring bursts out of hiding.  Birds are loud in their chirping, buds are peeking out, and the earth is filled with color.  It is hard for this not to color the soul as well...

Last year during this time I wrote this:  
"It is Lent, a season of preparation. For Lent Hubry and I purposed to daily wake before the children. We've been "giving up" sleeping in and "putting on" early morning Scripture reading. It's something we've always applauded in the ideal, but a habit hard to keep with our early morning risers...

It is Lent, a time to focus on repentance. With the early morning Scripture reading has come a sweeter communion with the Father, an answer to prayer. Yet in my mind more time in Scripture should equal happy, bright, and gay, not cold and grey. But as always, there is much weeding to be done, and a lot of sin to be exposed. I guess there is no way to focus on repentance, without first focusing on our sin. We can't turn from our sin without seeing it first. But the light this morning was so bright and cheerful, a hint of what is to come. The point of Lent, after all, is not the preparation or the repentance, but the culmination of Christ's work on the cross. Because we are preparing for something - and that something was a historical event that really happened...."

We find ourself in the midst of this season again, once again choosing to daily wake before the children in order to put on early morning Scripture reading.  It is a season of preparation, of weeding and rejoicing...and in Georgia the earth can hardly contain it's excitement as we wait to celebrate the culmination of Christ's work on the cross.