Keep calm and carry on...

I found this quote on a journal at a bookstore. I buy a new journal every year with the idea that i will have enough profound thoughts to fill it up before the year comes to an end. Since I write here, most thoughts profound or otherwise don't quite make it to the journal. Out of habit I still do and this year the quote has become my mantra/motto/theme. This theme was based on an original WWII poster commissioned by the British Government Ministry of Information. It was mean to convey a sense of calm during uncertain times...and as we enter 2010 it seems to resonate again. I don't know how it is for you but for me and mine there is an uncertainty of what will happen in this coming year. After the accident 6 months ago I am so much more uncertain, fearful and fragile. When before I would anticipate the new, this year I am afraid of what may.
We begin this year with Scott going to Thailand for 3 weeks with the National Guard. Then he will be working in Tacoma if no work opens up here. This means he will be away from home from Sunday night till Thursday night. We have financial well as emotional hurdles to overcome and as uncertain as the times are I want to keep calm and carry on. I want the verse "may the God of hope fill us with joy and peace as we trust in Him, so that He may fill us with all hope through the power of the Holy Spirit" to be more then what we know but what we experience.
So this coming year if you wander it through with me, I hope to work this trust thing through. I really have no idea what will happen...but keeping calm and carrying on.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

From this day until the first has to be one of my favorite times of the year. Why you ask....PURGE....I get to purge the old year to prepare for the new year. We are going through all our belongings and see what we cannot use and give it away or throw it away. I LOVE this...there is something some therapeutic and cathartic about gleaning out the old year and preparing for the new....I will let you know how it all went. :)

Redemption

One of those things about my personality/strengths is that I look for connections in everything. It can be fun to do but often times if I can't articulate well enough it is hard to describe why I see a connection in random things and why that matters. This is done usually without even knowing it but lately as I have been inundated with seemingly random Christmas stories . I have been looking hard for the connection between a story like Rudolph and The Christmas Carol, Prancer and White Christmas, Miracle on 32/or 34th (can't remember which number) Street and It's a Wonderful Life. Every night on TV you can enter another re-creation of the Christmas Carol or a inane story about ....and here is the connection...redemption. Think about the stories...there is a broken situation...a realization of the broken-ness...a divine intervention...redemption. The divine intervention often comes in the form of 'Christmas magic', nevertheless there is restoration of relationships, a realization of what is important and poof....redemption IE: a made for TV Christmas special.
The irony in all of this is that in the birth of Jesus, there is no redemption YET. It is redemption at the start but not in its final draft. You have to have the story of the death and Resurrection to make the story of Christmas complete. Yet in the hoopla of this season, every story of redemption from the trivial of Elf to the profound of The Christmas Carol would not resonate if that wasn't all our desires. The desire of nations...this baby in the manger...redemption in swaddling cloths.

Santa Clause

Last night we were watching Miracle on 34th Street and I realized at the end of the movie how much I want God to be Santa Clause. Look...he is Just, the bad get what they deserve and the good get rewarded for good behavior, ever year not just at the end of time.
He gives you what you ask for...He is gentle and kind and never angry...We have had this image of Santa every year and I think every year we want God to be more and more like him. Our prayers become more like wish lists and when we get what we want we think it is a result of good behavior, or faithful prayer on our behalf. When the 'bad' people get caught or get ill, we silently think that God had it out for them and they got what they deserved.
I wonder if maybe we continue to encourage this idea when we share this holiday with Santa...slowly but surely God is morphed into a benevolent old man who listens to our list and gives us what we want if we are really really good.
Santa looks better in comparison to the Mysterious Almighty who comes as a weak baby in the middle of oppression and war. There is no nostalgic warmth, wintry snow flakes and cute little elves ... it is scary Angels, devouring dragons, evil Kings, meek Shepherds, pregnant teenagers, wandering wise men, smelly stables and a small village in a forgotten country far far away. That won't do for a Christmas card...Santa looks much better. A much better brand for the Christmas season.
BUT...the cosmic story is so much better. A present under the tree does not compare to freedom from guilt. Elves and the North Pole doesn't shine as brilliantly as the empty tomb. The benevolent old man giving us pretty trinkets doesn't carry the same weight as the simple words of Jesus when he said, let the little children come or you have to be like a child to get anything about me. I want what I want, He gives what I need. Santa is safe, God is Glorious.
Santa gives presents, God gives life. Santa smiles gently, God roars from the heavens and whispers in the wind.
I know, none of you thinks that there is any comparison but watch yourself and listen to how we talk about prayer and justice. Santa creeps in too often and not just in our children stories.
Better watch out...Santa is coming to a prayer near you.

Explaining The Story

As we entered into this season called Christmas it began to dawn on me that my Chinese students had absolutely no idea what Christmas was all about. So today I began to tell the story and realized you can't start in Bethlehem ... you have to start in Genesis. You have to explain the Roman Empire, Caesar and being Jewish. You have to describe what Angels may have looked like and that shepherds were afraid not because they looked like beautiful women but maybe because they looked a bit scary and large and maybe even fierce. You answer questions like; why did God choose Mary and why did they have to be in a stable with dirty animals? Mary must have been very sore and tired and large and uncomfortable. As I animated and explained they became engaged in this GREAT story. I never realized what a great story it is all by itself without the history of faith. Better with the history but as I finished with the wise men and the horrible deaths of the babies and the escape to Egypt one of the girls said in amazement...this is a great story you have to tell me more.
We need to remember this.. this is not only a great story, it is the first chapter of the best story ever....
If you have been reading my blogs lately you know there are several issues I am dealing with on a personal level having to do with the accident and its raminfications. Today as I saw the delight in the story, the questions and observations I realized in it all I have been given a most amazing gift. I told The Story for the first time to those who had never heard it before.

Mocha's visa

She is a funny animal. I was using this old visa for a book mark and had put it down as I read. Mocha is sneaky in that whatever she thinks is important and accessible she will attempt to procure. Then the game is on...she runs away, we chase and she is a happy happy dog. Her delight is our attention no matter what she has to do to get it. Lately, her MO is stealing whatever we have just used and is small enough to put in her mouth.

I gave her a chew bone the other day. Her very own 'Precious' and she has been very Gollum about it. If anyone walks in the room while the bone is near her she growls. If I walk towards her she growls, shakes, picks up her leg, lowers her stance and averts her eyes. Not too long ago she would have peed. She doesn't think it is quite as fun when we take from her what she wants, or delights in the give and take when it is her stuff. It is all fun and games when it is ours, it's all shakes and growls when it is hers.

We are so much better then a dog aren't we? Mocha wants everything ours, hers, theirs...in fun, in spite, in fear...she just wants it all.

Contentment...That would be the best Christmas Spirit EVER !

18%

I have no idea if you all do this but part of my relationship with God has to do with bargaining. If you will do this goes my prayer then I am supposed to do thaat. Such as...
If you help us with this then that means we have to do this...Direction Bargain
If I hear this song then I know you are thinking of me...Love Bargain etc. As I do it...I reprimand myself for the foolishness of it all but I do it anyway. It is the whole fleece thing which I know many many people do as they try and make sure that the direction they are going in is the direction they are supposed to be going in.
We have been waiting on the hospital to make a decision about the stack of money we owe them. It has been a six month process so there has been a lot of time to get really creative in the bargaining prayer department. It goes like this...So God, if you get them to forgive the whole debt then we will know for sure we are supposed to go on the mission field again. This is a win win for me...BUT then I think, well, I really want to be with Mijo as she finishes High school rather then send her to boarding school...so I have changed the request to ..If we get the debt forgiven we should stay here...Can you see how silly it all is to bargain with God about ANYTHING. I am so fickle and unsure and silly. Silly is a great word.
SO yesterday after all these bargaining prayers...the hospital comes back with, we will give you 18% off on your bill. WHAT DO YOU DO WITH THAT ? I had to laugh which I did and have done quite often since. Nothing like a weird number to signify absolutely nothing.
So now what...what exactly am I trusting in God for...debt forgiveness, bank loan, ability to pay the bill without going into debt, FFA to take responsibility...I have no idea. I just smile at all the contortion I have gone through to get God to do what I want Him to do...like He is Santa Clause.
18% of the answer , I think it is 100% of what I needed. Life is always 18% of what we expect. A strange mixture of hope, dreams and reality all mixed together. God does not play games...He isn't a slot machine where all we have to do is put in the right prayer change and hope for the jack pot. I know He is not a formula to figure out...
This I have learned in this 18% answer to prayer.

Hope

May the God of Hope fill you with joy and peace as you trust in Him. (Rom. 15.13)
I have this thing for babies. I love to hold them for as long as the mother lets me. It is hard for me to think of Jesus as a baby. Babies...they are all about potential. What they will be doing rather then what they are doing. As babies ,we don't have to deal with anything but hope because the babies haven't disappointed yet...all they have done is come. Jesus is much easier to deal with as a baby but really not that easy to follow. Can't trust a baby with anything, can't depend on him, listen to him, or even emulate anything that he does. All you really can do with a baby is hold and love, feed and bath, change and burp. Christmas is like that baby...potential and hope.
Christmas is about the people around the baby...the mom and dad, the shepherds, the wisemen, the angels,their hopes and dreams, their trust. Good thing there is a trinity...because I can't begin to trust a baby.
May the God of hope fill you with joy and peace as you trust in Him. This is my Christmas verse...it is what is true and what is real. I need this verse to carve a beam of light in all the hoopla and business of this season. I am waiting for, looking at, hoping in...just like they did.