A child's wisdom

Sunday morning I spent an hour in the company of second graders as they learned about Moses and the golden calf. The theme for this month's Sunday School lesson is patience, and those Israelites were anything but patient as they waited for Moses to come down from the mount!

Near the end of the lesson one of the teachers played a "true or false" game with the kids, lining them up and having them jump forward or backward off a line in response to questions read from a card; forward if they thought it was true, and backward if false.

The teacher called out this question: "True or False: God always answers prayers with a yes or a no." 

Several kids leapt forward, a few back, then forward to join the crowd. One little boy stood still on the line, hands deep in the pockets of his hoodie, a look of deep concentration on his face. "But..." he called out. "But...sometimes the answer is 'maybe.' Or...'later.'"

Oh, the wisdom of that child. 

His voice was almost lost in the giggling and chatter of the other students, but his words were so deep that I wanted to rush over and hug him. I know that God does not ever deliberately tease us with "maybe...maybe not," but I know that His answers are often hard for us to comprehend and may seem like a non-answer at the time. He often asks us to wait, to continue prayer and faith and perseverance.  The answer can be "wait" or "the time is later" or "my child, you cannot understand right now. Understanding will come with time."  God always answers, whether we see it as a clear "yes or no" or not. 

How many times as a kid did we ask our parents "But why?" only to have the response be "Because I said so." Parents often have reasons that cannot be explained to a child, so why on earth do we think we are comprehensive enough to understand and anticipate God's every move? I can point this out and say "what arrogance!" with ease, while still knowing I am guilty of it every day. We are surrounded by knowledge and science and technology that provide us with easy answers to all of life's questions...and yet. God should still be a place where we are free to express unabashed wonder and awe. We don't have to understand God completely to know that He is great and good.

I am thankful for a second-grader who reminded me that God is great and good and always answers us, even if we can't always understand the answer...at least not until later.

Words to live by

Up until very recently, if someone asked me "what's your favorite Bible verse?" I would not really have had a definite answer. I've always had trouble remembering exact references and end up saying, "you know, the one where it talks about...or that verse about the...Psalms...um...John 3:16?"

Not quite that bad, but you get the picture. But this year there is a verse that stands out and has pushed into my attention and memory. First, some back story.

In 2013 my marriage went through hell. I do not use that word lightly. It was hell. We fought constantly. We spent time apart. We said words that - while they have since been forgiven - can never be taken back. It is not a time I like to remember, and yet it resulted in much-needed growth: spiritually, personally and relationally.

At one of the darkest points Matt and I finally reached out to loved ones and admitted we needed help. We both willingly went through counseling together and attended a Marriage Intensive retreat that dug deep and hit hard. A dear friend recommended a daily devotional for me to read and gave me pages and pages of information on recovering from trauma and learning how to mourn, heal and trust in God. One page had a long list of Bible verses to read for encouragement and peace. One verse in particular stood out to me, and I wrote it several times in the devotional journal I was keeping.

Our marriage strengthened. Our wounds healed. 2014 was a year of peaceful joy. Ugly moments reared and threatened, but we worked through them together.

In January of this year the idea of a yearly theme or goal seemed all around me. Not in a "get fit" or "run a marathon" sense, but in a "words to live by" way. I thought about that verse again, but couldn't remember the reference. I dug through my notes and journals and found it. I wrote it on a sticky note stuck to my desk and tapped it into the notepad app on my phone. I thought of publicizing it somehow as my "verse of the year" but didn't make time to do it.

In late January I changed jobs within our church and began working for a new ministry.  It was a long time coming, and there was lots of prayer and consideration, but all job changes tend to come with some tiny hint of trepidation no matter how firm of a "yes!" the decision has been. The change has been exciting and busy and crazy, with promises of more exciting and busy and crazy to come.

On Monday I was preparing promotional material for the ministry's biggest event of the year: VBS. This free summer event brings in families from the community that may have never entered a church before, so it's a big deal. I went online to pull down promotional info for our website, and stopped dead when I saw the key verse for this year's event. It was my verse. Big and bold. Exuberant.

Isaiah 30:21: Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.”

Sometimes God's ways are mysterious, and sometimes they are right there in front of you, wonderfully clear and bold. Did this verse get me through a dark time in my marriage? Yes. Has it been in my thoughts for the past couple of months as I transitioned to this new job? Yes. And there it was before me, the key verse to the biggest event I will work on during my first year at said new job. I will get to see and share that verse over and over again. To me, that is God is letting me know that right now, I'm exactly where I need to be and doing the work He has set out for me. 

Isaiah 30 starts off as a pretty dismal chapter, recounting the rebellious deeds of God's children and the woe that will befall them. But right around verse 18 it begins to look up. "The LORD longs to be gracious to you," it says. "...Blessed are all who wait for Him!" If you cry out to God, He hears you, and if you listen, He guides you. It gives me such peace and security knowing that no matter where I go or what I do, if I listen to God, He will direct my path. 

So there it is. My verse of the year. What wonderful words to trust and live by.