Newtown: Where was God?

The question is far from new. It's been asked for millennia. Where is God during times of tragedy? Why doesn't he prevent such atrocities as we witnessed last week in Newtown? And the statement: I could never believe in a God who allows children to suffer. 

As a pastor these are not just questions that are asked of me, but they are questions asked by me. As a parent, I shudder. My heart is gripped with a spasm of anguish. I am unable to loosen the tightness of grief that I feel. I change the channel. I busy myself, further tidying the already neat spaces that I occupy. Anything to avoid the reality and the questions that are born from the "surreality" of what happened in Newtown.  My adult daughter calls, grief-stricken- the unspoken questions audible in her silent tears. In the moment, I have no answers, no words. Literally, none. Tears answer tears.

I watched the gathering congregation this Sunday morning, streaming in under the weight of the "why?" that they wore like scarves wrapped too tightly around their throats. The third Sunday of Advent is chock full of readings of hope, joy and the call to rejoice. Hearing them was like hearing a foreign language. The words sounded as dissonant as a piano badly out of tune. What reason could we possibly have to hope? How can there ever again be joy? What good is faith at times like this?

This isn't the first time I have tried to find sense amidst the senseless. Nor will it be the last. It is never easy. As I plead with God for answers, I feel God pleading with me - pleading for me to understand his ways, his suffering. Really? His ways? His suffering?  I have come to understand that the question, "Where is God when evil strikes?" is asked amiss. The question presupposes that God can intervene when we deem it necessary. The reality is that God grants us, all of us, the ability to choose to do whatever we want. This is a gift that God will, under no circumstances, take away from us, even if we should choose to use it for evil. I have come to believe that our freedom is more costly to God than to any of us.

Think about it. How often do we use our freedom to gossip, lust or covet? We seek no intervention from God in those circumstances. In fact, we want him to keep his distance so we can continue to lie, or hold a grudge or cheat. We love our secret choices. We do indeed hurt others, but never do we ask, "Why doesn't God stop me?" The truth is, we want it both ways. We want to enjoy the blanket freedom that God gives to us, while simultaneously faulting him for not rescinding that freedom from others. God, in this instance, cannot win.

There are those who will choose evil, those who, through mental illness will become agents of evil. There are those who will cause the innocent to suffer. Didn't Jesus himself, the most innocent of all, die at the hands of evil men? Didn't he allow their choice, even though he had the power to thwart them? Didn't Jesus himself ask his Father the question that burns in our throats today, "Why have you forsaken me?" "Why will you not intervene?" To revoke our free will, God would have to recreate the universe. Our freedom is set like the stars in the sky. 

Is there any parent who hasn't grieved or rejoiced over the choices of their children? Our choices bring with them great cost and great reward. The relevant question to ask at times like this is not, "Where is God?", but "Where am I?"

How will I use this freedom? What choices will I make to bring light and love into the darkness of this world? How will we teach our children to use their freedom - to avoid evil, or just "not get caught"?

This is the season of gifts. Our God-given freedom is the most precious of gifts, costing God far more than we will ever be able to conceive. Let's carefully think about our choices, finding strength and comfort in his words:

"Prepare the way of the Lord,

make straight his paths.

Every valley shall be filled

and every mountain and hill shall be made low.

The winding roads shall be made straight,

and the rough ways made smooth,

and all flesh shall see the salvation of God."

 

~Amy 

the journey

 

Well…it’s here. The “Christmas season” is upon us. And along with it come a variety of emotions, memories and anticipation. Many of these are intensely joyful – an increased sense of belonging and being loved, a deepened awareness of God’s presence in and among us, the mystery of gifts that will be received, our own desire to bestow gifts that express heartfelt thoughtfulness and appreciation. These are just some of the ways that the spirit of Christmas satisfies very deep longings in our souls. The hard part is getting there. The difficulty for us is no different than it was for the wise men and shepherds…their challenge, and ours, is the journey that leads to the place where Jesus is.

For many of us, sadly, the spirit of Christmas is "hurry". And yet, eventually, the hour comes when the rushing ends and the race against the calendar mercifully comes to a close. And where will we be when that time comes? Will we have received any of the gift God repeatedly places within our reach – the Kingdom that is “at hand”? Will we possess any of the peace and joy of which Jesus says he came to bring?

I have spoken before of how hurry robs us. I would take it a step further by saying that we are, in fact, “irresponsibly busy”. We mask our fears and feed the ruthless furnace of self deception that fuels us through incessant busyness. Our sense of the natural rhythms of the seasons and days are lost to us. We miss the banquet of comfort that God is laying before us as we scurry and worry and hurry. What does every spiritual thinker advocate as the first steps to inner peace? Silence. Stillness. How is it that during Advent, the call to stillness and silence and reflection makes us cringe? Why do we refuse to allow these things into our lives, choosing darkness over light?

These questions can only be answered by ourselves, most likely when we are alone. Advent is not a matter of days or weeks, but of centuries - nearly twenty of them now since that holy night in Bethlehem. Christmas itself is eternal.  The older I get, the greater my longing for things eternal, the greater my longing to see the centuries old mysteries of God unfolding around me here and now. I am not so much waiting for something to occur, I am not waiting to “go to heaven”, but rather I am seeking to discover the heavenly right where I am. I desperately seek what the shepherds and wise men found – God now with us- Emmanuel.

To me, this is what Advent is all about – taking the time to hear the sounds of angels bringing me good news, above the din of this noisy life; allowing myself the space to see the shining signs that God has given to lead me on my journey; to make my pursuit of the Christ Child more important than the busyness the world offers me.

May your journey to the Christ Child this Christmas bring you to the place where you, too, find that God is with you.

~Amy

Health and Thanksgiving

 

The Health Benefits of Thanksgiving  

Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving 
and pay your vows to the Most High. 
~Psalm 50:14 

This is precisely what we do at this time of year as we gather with others. We are mindful of and acknowledge God’s many benefits to us through our giving thanks. It is a tradition that we often trace back to our pilgrim ancestors, but "thanksgiving" has a much more ancient history than that. Since the earliest dealings between man and God, there has been a desire within us to acknowledge God’s provision and goodness, hence the establishment of the altar, upon which the very first offerings of gratitude to God were made. Each week we celebrate the goodness of God to us as we partake of the Eucharist, which in the Greek means thanksgiving! It is a natural instinct within us to want to give thanks. To be thankful is a good feeling! It is the recognition and acknowledgement that we have been recipients of good things.

An article in USA Today cited studies which show an actual link between gratitude and health benefits. Thankfulness was clinically proven to improve both physiological and psychological health! For example:

• People with high blood pressure not only lower their blood pressure, but they feel less hostile and are more likely to quit smoking and lose weight when they practice gratitude.

• People who care for relatives with Alzheimer's disease feel less stress and depression when they keep daily gratitude journals, listing the positive things in their lives.

• Those who maintain a thankful attitude through life appear to have lower risks of several disorders, including depression, phobias, bulimia and alcoholism.

• Most people can lift their mood simply by writing a letter of thanks to someone. Hand-deliver the letter, and the boost in happiness can last weeks or months.

Practicing gratitude in these systematic ways changes people by changing brains that "are wired for negativity, for noticing gaps and omissions," Researcher Dr. Henry Emmons says. "When you express a feeling, you amplify it. When you express anger, you get angrier; when you express gratitude, you become more grateful."

And grateful people, he says, don't focus so much on pain and problems. They also are quicker to realize they have friends, families and communities to assist them in times of need. They see how they can help others in distress as well, he says.

We all can be thankful for so many things; big things such as the love of family and friends, food and shelter, the freedom to live in a nation such as this, the ability to worship God wherever we please etc. We can also be grateful for countless “little” things that we take for granted: a hot shower, the warmth of the sun, technology that puts us in touch with a loved one far away, and after a meal such as many of us will soon enjoy, we can be thankful for running water and dishwashers! We could all come up with our own list, and really we all should make a list of things we are grateful for and remind ourselves of them on a daily basis.

But what about the words of the psalm, “Let us offer to God a SACRIFICE of praise”? Giving thanks can also involve great sacrifice, as we hear the psalmist say. What do we do when we find ourselves in situations where it is very difficult to muster within us a sense of gratitude. How can we thank God when we are faced with a health crisis or financial hardship? How can we offer praise when rejected by a loved one or friend? Does the hardship we endure mean that God Himself is not good? Do the actions of others and the sufferings they may cause, whether friend or foe, whether city councilor or president, negate the goodness of God? Is this life only about how well things go for us, or is it not meant for us to garner a deeper meaning, which most often comes, ironically, from the hardships we experience? Is there not a bigger picture to all we experience?

Giving thanks can often be a true sacrifice. At times more true by far than to put a check in the basket. It can sometimes be one of the most difficult things we do, but in giving thanks, we can relinquish the heartache of certain situations and find the blessing in it. How many women are thankful for the pain of childbirth at the time of delivery? Yet that pain brings forth something more precious than gold. Often the pain we endure serves a greater, often hidden purpose, for which we later give thanks. We would do well, as the apostle Paul says, to “give thanks in all things.”

An entry from the devotional God Calling says this:

The hard dull way of resignation is not My Way.  
When I entered Jerusalem, knowing well 

that scorn and reviling and death awaited Me, 
it was with cries of Hosanna, and with a triumphal procession.  
Not just a few "Lost Cause" followers creeping with Me into the city.  

There was no note of sadness in My Last Supper Talk with My disciples, 

and "when we had sung an hymn" we went out unto the Mount of Olives.

 So trust, so conquer, so joy.  Love colors the way. 

Love takes the sting out of the wind of adversity.

May you enjoy a happy and healthy Thanksgiving!

~Amy

The Hope of Halloween?

With Halloween upon us, there is a lot of talk about saints, souls, and spirits. During any other time of the year, you’d get the impression that those things don’t exist because they can’t be explained scientifically. Yet all of a sudden, we’re bombarded with the ethereal at Halloween! I can’t tell you how many times I attempt a conversation dealing with the “spiritual” side of life, only to be shushed or looked at with full blown skepticism, as if the spiritual realm can’t be “known” and references to it are purely conjecture. How fickle our culture is today. Stories of vampires have made it big in Hollywood, but mention of a personal soul with a personal relationship to a loving creator God, and you should be tried among the witches of Salem!

In reality, most of us have loved ones or have known people who have passed on to live in a realm that is entirely “spiritual” and where most of us hope to find ourselves after we shed our physical bodies. But the fact remains – eternity has already begun! It is ongoing and we are part of it. Our friends and loved ones live on, though in an entirely new dimension and each of us will meet with them again in our new dwelling.

Friends, this IS the hope of our faith. This IS cause for great celebration! Few things excite me as much as the thought of life with God in an unimaginably free state of being where all is set right and creative possibilities are limitless for all eternity. To dwell with God, who IS LOVE and has created us for his purposes is what awaits each of us. We have been given a great gift - eternal life after this vale of tears. Rejoice, my friends, when this life presses hard (and it does) in the words of Jesus – “In My Father's house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also”.

~ Amy

Lessons From Summer

“Summer...and the livin’ is easy…” So say the lyrics to that famous song and, fortunately,  for most of us around here, there is a definite shift in pace from the rest of the year. It’s the time of year when we can typically slow down and take time to enjoy the longer days and more relaxed schedules. Dinner can just “happen” and bedtimes go unenforced. Mornings are noticeably free from stress as kids aren’t rushing out the door. We spend more time with family, take day trips, extend our weekends; skip church, even. Ahhh summer! How we desperately need this change from the blur of our normal high speed lives.

Yet when I took a step back and looked at what my summer schedule held out to me, I found nothing quite so different from the rest of the year. The deadlines and duties, meetings and meals were all there demanding my attention and participation. The scene outside my window screamed of summer, but it didn’t feel like summer. Nothing was different in the routine. In fact, the “daily grind” had become an all too accurate metaphor over this past year.  So, halfway into summer, I decided it was time to put on the brakes and figure out what was going on. 

In this age of information and ceaseless activity, we are too easily swept up in the  allure of newness at every turn. A new idea to read about; a new activity to pursue; a new personality to emulate. It all becomes one giant whirl of meaninglessness with no point of reference. Often in the midst of all this we find no anchor of truth on which any of this information stands, and no greater purpose that it leads us to (especially true for our children!) This unwelcome summer angst caused me to ask some basic questions: What am I doing and why am I doing it? What is the benefit to myself or anyone else? And the very scary question: What if I did things differently?

For me, times like these are the “thorn in my flesh” moments that God uses to cause me to pare away the things in life that really have little importance. Each of us has things that detract us from what we are here to do. What are we here to do, you ask? Above all else, we are here to love one another. It’s that simple.     Seriously. That means taking time to  listen and serve. To be patient and kind. To let thoughtless judgment be replaced with compassion and mercy. I struggle to love when I am feeling stressed and hurried. I have found hurry to be an insidious enemy that keeps me from seeing the hearts of people around me. Think about it. Hurry robs us of compassion. You cannot be genuinely sympathetic to someone when you are more concerned with the next place you need to be, or more concerned with fulfilling your next task. Just ask your children, spouse or colleagues how well you are doing in this area. They can tell you! 

We have cute sayings on our coffee mugs that remind us to stop and “smell the roses,” yet somehow, we are lulled into thinking that our busyness is serving us well, when usually it is quite the opposite. It takes a substantial dose of bravery these days to slow ourselves down. It takes some real discipline to intentionally make time to love others no matter if they are close to us or not. It takes determination and a concerted effort to make time to serve others rather than be swept up in the self absorption our culture promotes.

 We at Grace Church are a strong, loving community. Yet I believe that we can make efforts to become even stronger. To love and serve one another. It’s simple, but it takes time. Where else can we begin this process more easily than at home and at church? I wonder if we could make  an intentional and stated priority in our families to love and serve each other? Not as an added task on our “to do” list, but as a replacement for some of the unnecessary busyness that takes up our time. Why bother? Because love is worth it! Serving others makes us happier than anything else. And aren’t we all looking for that elusive feeling of happiness!

Realizing this, I have decided to make some changes in the way I schedule my time. I will be making many efforts this year to allow more time to minister rather than administer, making more time to listen, teach and counsel. Some things will need to give way, but they are far less important than my desire to serve and love those of you who God has placed in my life.

I hope you will also ask yourselves: What am I doing and why? And I hope this leads you to a more fervent desire to make the world a better place by making time to love.

In Christ’s love,

~Amy