Purses

33Sell what you own. Give to those who are poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out. Put away riches in heaven that will not be used up. There, no thief can come near it. There, no moth can destroy it.

 

34Your heart will be where your riches are.  In this section of Luke 12 , Jesus says a lot of things we would rather ignore. Things like not to worry, sell what we own, he did not come to earth to bring peace...which seems in contradiction to the Angels song at Christmas. Little nuggets like what we say in secret will be proclaimed from the mountain top, he comes to bring fire to this earth...persecution and pain and ...get a good purse. I love purses, maybe that is why this verse speaks to me. Of course it speaks to me because it says what I want to hear. If I love purses...Jesus is telling me to provide myself with what I love.  What I carry in my purse is a bit like an emergency kit...it is a 'what if ' kind of purse. What if I find myself in a once in life time situation...I will have something in my purse to carry the day. Like our shoes and our hair...purses proclaim to the world in a oh so subtle way what we want to project about ourselves. A non-verbal expression of our very personalities. The bigger , the more prepared..or the pain in the shoulder.    BUT..Why would Jesus after telling everyone to get rid of everything then tell them to make sure they have purses that will not wear out?  Wouldn't the purses be that very thing that carries our treasures?  The treasure that is supposed to be somewhere less permanent?  Here they are to have purses but a few passages before, they weren't allowed to carry purses. These 'purses' the men carried was for their money...they were the original wallets. WHAT IS GOING ON HERE? I think it is the same reason we carry small purses when we know we have errands to run. Jesus speaks in parables to confuse, he speaks clearly to convict, he speaks tenderly to comfort and sometimes he speaks practically to calm.  I think the latter is what he is saying. Maybe something like..."Stuff, money and things are a spiders web that will entangle you and give you a false confidence. You will keep thinking that the more you have the safer you will be and I am telling you the opposite is true. Carry what you need...because for all practicalities, people need to be paid for the necessities. But in this small but tough purse carry what you need to do what I ask. The bigger the purse does not mean the better prepared but the more encumbered. Careful the spiderweb of imagined need or imagined confidence. Riches are bigger than any purse can carry...so let your treasures be unconfined and your necessary money where it belongs, in a simple bag." When I am running errands...I carry my wallet and phone. It keeps me focused on the task at hand, unencumbered. If I am in need...I call/pray.

Forfeit: A game of penalties

for·feit

/ˈfɔr fɪt/ Show Spelled 

noun

1.a fine; penalty.

2. an act of forfeiting; forfeiture.

3. something to which the right is lost, as for commission of a crime or misdeed, neglect of duty, or violation of a contract.

4. an article deposited in a game because of a mistake and redeemable by a fine or penalty.

5. forfeits, ( used with a singular verb ) a game in which such articles are taken from the players.

 

In Luke 9 Jesus says to his disciples..."For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits his own self?"      So I wonder several things; why this word forfeit, what does it mean to lose and how can this soul be redeemable, and what is the fine?

Profit

gain

lose

forfeit...it all seems very practical if it didn't have to do with oneself or in other translations...ones soul.

It is most often seen in light of salvation and that makes sense, what would you gain if everything you work for and everything you become is a penalty?  Like in a football game of which I have been watching a lot...it doesn't matter how perfect the touchdown if a flag is thrown.

 

I maybe see this in a different light...absolutely salvation, but what about wanting to control everything?  Gaining is also controlling...so if we said, What does it profit a woman if she thinks she can control everything and everyone around to her benefit and happiness but while she works and worries and wonders, she is forfeiting herself...her soul...her peace. For in the verse previous Jesus says as passionately...you want to follow me, deny yourself, take up the cross...follow.

 

I think we women seek control more then we seek God. I think there are flags all over our perfect fields ! 

2013....day 2

I made a resolution to run at least 30 minutes straight without stopping ,outside in the great outdoors...Yesterday, I did just that and now I am done.
I either underestimated my running ability or I was strangely motivated by the resolution.
Maybe the key is to resolve to only do what you know you can do without much effort.
I resolve to wake up and go to work.
I resolve to eat meals
I resolve to continue everything I did last year and not change a thing....
That would be sad, to stay the same year after year after year.

I am to speak in chapel tomorrow to our student body. I want to talk to them about changing who we are and to make efforts to change the perception people have about our school.  I am nervous, unusually so. I want to challenge them to have the resolve to change behavior and that is always a hard hard thing to talk about. But, we can't keep doing the same thing over and over again and just hope that somehow we will be different....INSANE...or as a friend so readily says..it is just crazy making. 

I have a few more resolutions...may they be accomplished with as much zeal !

Running out of time...

It is funny, I am kind of running out of time for advent posts...Christmas being less than a week away.  This season has been so full of the unexpected that the routine of this season has been lost. In fact, to be totally honest...I am not in the Christmas 'spirit' at all.

I was hoping that as the school time winds down I would wander effortlessly into the warm fuzzy of Christmas time but having a student dealing with chemotherapy on the eve of Christmas, having violence hang so heavy in the air has washed this season of its sparkle. 

It's ok...it is what it is and I can't generate what isn't.
Sorry folks...
Merry Christmas!

Bathsheba...ashes and beauty

We are familiar with this story in all of its titillating details.  I have often thought that this isn't story about Bathsheba at all but about how sin spatters and ruins and destroys people around especially when you think your sin is secret, especially when you keep your sin secret.  David's arrogance seduces, destroys what was a great love story and murders. David repents and writes eloquently about his repentance in a often quoted Psalm but Uriah still is dead and Bathsheba still lost her baby and her life and her husband. 

There isn't much in this story after all is said and done. David is front and center ... What do we know about Bathsheba. She was beautiful, she was bathing on a roof top...most likely a ritual bathing area for purification, David wanted what he saw and he got it.  She got pregnant...David began the process of cleaning up his tracks. He hadn't thought about marrying her...he wanted Uriah to unknowingly become the father of his baby growing in Bathsheba's womb. Uriah was a good man, a noble man and loyal man. David was none of those things. He dies, Bathsheba marries David, baby dies...another baby is born and baby Solomon becomes the next king, wisest man in the world. Bathsheba's is mentioned in Mathew as the wife of Uriah...she is mentioned only in connection too...Some think this is a slight to Bathsheba, I think it is an honoring of Uriah ,who was not in the line of Jesus.

This week we are numb with the horror of children's death by a madman. It is the face of evil, it is the embodiment of what evil is...The madman who killed 20 children, the madman who killed all the babies in Bethlehem, the madman who killed one man.

A baby changes everything...

Come, Lord Jesus, Come...
Make things right
Shine again in this dark night
Let us hear some angels sing
And hear the hope those angels bring
We will come and bow before
Only to adore..only to adore
Broken hearts and bended knee
 Such a desperate need

Ruth...Once upon a time

Ruth 1:1There was a time when Israel didn't have kings to rule over them. But they had leaders to help them. This is a story about some things that happened during that time.


The Bible doesn't ever say, once upon a time but Ruth comes close. This is a story about things that happened during this time...and it is a love story.

Ruth...a daughter-in-law, a widow, a servant to her mother-in-law ( on a side, that must have been one amazing mother-in-law for Ruth to forsake all just to be with her) a provider, a pursuer, a bride, a mother ... a wife. She was resilient, obedient, kind, loyal, beautiful, unselfish, strong and kind.

Ruth is a story of great loss and bitterness, struggle, resilience, survival and redemption. In every step, God was worshiped and honored.

Once upon a time everything was really bad, then everyone trusted God and they loved happily every after.

Ruth 4: 11 Then the elders and all who were at the gate spoke. They said, "We are witnesses. The woman is coming into your home. May the LORD make her to be like Rachel and Leah. Together they built up the nation of Israel. May you be an important person in Ephrathah. May you be famous in Bethlehem.

12The LORD will give you children through this young woman. May your family be like the family of Perez. He was the son Tamar had by Judah.”

Here we are in Ruth and we are pulled back to Tamar...that other resilient woman: Happy ever after. How does this prepare us for Christmas? Have you been seeing the same themes over and over again in these stories of women? It is beauty for ashes...redemption stories ...every one of them.

This means, that this Christmas all my ashes are not worthless. My story is not a mismatch of events, or losses disorganized and haphazard.

My story today, your story today is being written in the ink of redemption. That is the always story of Christmas.

 

A silent night for me...

I drove home from Childrens' hospital having just heard from the doctors that one of my Chinese students has Stage4 lymphoma Hodgkin's cancer.  It is hard to focus on Christmas or family joy or anything for that matter. She is only 17 but the offensive thing about cancer is that as we sit in the waiting rooms for hours on end there is a stream of children wandering through with bald heads, tubes and cute knitted caps, holding on to IV tubes.  There are 4 floors and they are adding on to this hospital full of very sick kids.  I have said that this place is sacred, for healing takes place and hope is dispersed by competent and skilled doctors, nurses and staff. Cancer is so offensive , evil, insidious, and scary.  So much needs to happen to get her ready for the treatment that ironically will make her feel much sicker then this deadly disease ever will.  Her parents have to come from China, they have to be here for the next 4 months while she fights for the right to live longer. So many moving parts...

A silent night as I pondered the weight of this information. She does not know how much God loves her...or her parents...I pray in these awful months she will.