Tag Archives: Trouble

Chapter-a-Day

The Tension

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The Tension (CaD Heb 8) – Wayfarer

By calling this covenant “new,” he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and outdated will soon disappear.
Hebrews 8:13 (NIV)

The Temple Mount in Jerusalem is, and likely will always be, a place of constant tension. The three major world religions consider it sacred space, and this means that there are frequent disputes that take many different shapes. The Al Aqsa Mosque with its gold dome sits atop the Mount surrounded by ancient walls. Below the western wall of the Mosque are remnants of the ancient Jewish Temple, commonly called “the wailing wall” where Jews and Christians pray daily. There is always tension.

I and my two companions were there during a particularly tense political period, things were largely locked down and access was limited. We had two interpreters and guides. One was an older woman, Jewish by birth, who had become a believer in Jesus and considered herself “a completed Jew.” The other was Arab by birth, Jewish by citizenship, and Christian by faith. He was a carpenter in Nazareth.

As we walked along the open area leading to the wailing wall, our female guide spoke of incidents in which Muslims violently attacked and killed Jews at the wall. A few moments later, our male guide quietly leaned into me to explain that the area where we were standing had once been a poor Arab neighborhood which the Jews bulldozed to make public space at the wall. Our time in Jerusalem was like that. Our guides, both followers of Jesus, saw everything from vastly different perspectives. They loved one another, but they often argued (always in Hebrew, which they both spoke but we didn’t). It was a microcosm of the much larger tension that exists there.

Our Arab brother, in particular, quietly saw to it that we experienced the tension first hand. The Temple Mount and Mosque were shut down to tourists because of the tensions, but he insisted on trying to get permission for us to see it briefly. We were grudgingly allowed to ascend a building of the Temple Authorities to view the mosque and its courtyard from the roof over the wall. The entire time we were followed, watched and made to feel the contempt and authority of our disgruntled hosts.

In a separate experience, our guide snuck us as tag-along with a group of Jews visiting the area’s Temple center. Not knowing that four Christians were in the audience, we were treated to hear about the group’s rabid desire to someday rebuild the Jewish Temple and return to the sacrificial system of Moses (complete with blueprints, exhaustive construction plans, and multi-media presentation). As a bonus, we got to hear the presenters speak mockingly of both Jesus and His followers.

I thought of these experiences this morning as I mulled over today’s chapter. The author of the letter to the Hebrews is facing similar tension as he explains that a spiritual shift of tectonic proportions has taken place through Jesus’ death and resurrection. For his fellow Hebrews, this means every religious thing they’ve ever known has changed. The old covenant between God and Moses is literally “obsolete” and a new covenant has taken its place. He then states quite emphatically that the “outdated will soon disappear.”

As I read this I had two thoughts. One was simply that tension that must have existed. Humans don’t like change, and I’ve observed it to be especially true when it comes to well-established and deep-seated religious traditions. The second thought was of Jesus and His followers as they left the Temple mount just days before His impending crucifixion. His followers were impressed with the Temple complex, but Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”

And that’s what happened in 70 A.D. when Roman legions descended on Jerusalem to stomp out the Jewish rebellion against Rome. The Temple was torn down. All of the Jewish genealogical records were destroyed, ensuring that it could no longer be definitively established who the descendants of Aaron, Levi, or any other tribe were. Because only descendants of Aaron could be priests, and only Levites could serve in the temple, the sacrificial system was essentially wiped out with the Temple’s destruction.

In the quiet this morning, I’m reminded that Jesus promised His followers that there would be trouble in this world, along with trials, suffering, and persecution. He said that there will be wars and rumors of war. Nations conspire, people plot, and rulers rage.

There’s always tension.

At the very same time, Jesus told His followers not to allow their hearts to be troubled by such things. He said that there is a peace with which He would leave us. It’s not an international peace, but an inner and interpersonal peace that “passes all understanding” available to me.

In just a moment, I will descend to the kitchen to peruse today’s headlines with Wendy over breakfast. I already know what I will find there. Wars and rumors of war. People plotting. Rulers raging. Tension. I needed the reminder of peace this morning. The words of Isaiah come to mind as I wrap up today’s post:

You will keep in perfect peace
    those whose minds are steadfast,
    because they trust in you.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

Pilgrimage, Pandemic, and Perspective

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Pilgrimage, Pandemic, and Perspective (CaD Gen 47) – Wayfarer

And Jacob said to Pharaoh, “The years of my pilgrimage are a hundred and thirty. My years have been few and difficult, and they do not equal the years of the pilgrimage of my fathers.”
Genesis 47:9 (NIV)

This morning as I booted up to write this post and record the podcast, one app flashed a big banner saying “2021 is a Wrap” and offering to show me all the stats and data from the last twelve months. And so, it begins. December and January are typically times of contemplation about where we’ve been and where we’re going. Get ready for media to start posting all of the lists of the “bests,” “worsts,” and “mosts” for 2021.

We’re coming up on two years since COVID changed life on our planet. In early 2020, Wendy and I went on a cruise with friends. The pandemic had barely begun and was believed at that point to be confined to China. Our cruise line told us that passengers from China had been barred from the cruise. Within a few weeks after that cruise, the world was in full lockdown.

One of the observations I’ve made in these two years is the degree to which people fear death, and just how powerfully that fear can drive a person’s thoughts, words, and actions.

Today’s chapter is fascinating to read in the context of our own times. The known world was in a similar state of mass insecurity due to the seven years of famine they were experiencing. Step-by-step, Egyptians submitted their money, livestock, land, and their very selves to the State in exchange for their survival. By the time the famine was over, the State of Egypt owned everything and everyone.

The thing that resonated most deeply with me was Jacob’s answer to Pharaoh when asked his age. He speaks of his life as a pilgrimage. The Hebrew word is māgôr and it isn’t very common, though it’s already been used a few times in reference to the lives of Jacob, his father, and grandfather. What struck me was the metaphor. He sees his entire life as a pilgrimage, a sojourn, a period of exile on this earth. As the songwriter put it: “This world is not my home, I’m a just a passin’ through.”

Jesus called His followers to have this same perspective as Jacob. He called me to understand that what happens after this earthly life is more real, more important, and valuable than what happens here on this earth. What comes after this life is where Jesus tells me to invest my treasure, which in turn changes the way I observe, think, believe, and live in my own pilgrimage as a “poor wayfaring stranger traveling through this world of woe.” Jesus also tells me to expect trouble on the earthly journey and to be at peace in the midst of it.

In the quiet this morning, I’m reminded by Jacob’s experience that there is nothing new under the sun. Pandemics, famines, floods, earthquakes, wars, and eruptions dot human history. Jesus not only tells me to expect more of the same but also calls them the birth pains which will lead to the nativity of something profoundly new.

Wendy and I are once again going on a cruise with friends to start 2022. I’m looking forward to it despite the continued restrictions. Just as our last cruise marked, for me, the beginning bookend of COVD, I’m hoping I might look back on this cruise as the other bookend. In the meantime, I continue to press on in my own pilgrimage on this earthly journey and expectantly look forward to a homecoming that lies beyond its end.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

Trouble and Peace

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Trouble and Peace (CaD John 16) – Wayfarer

“They will put you out of the synagogue; in fact, the time is coming when anyone who kills you will think they are offering a service to God.” 
John 16:2 (NIV)

The little Iowa town where Wendy and I live has a fascinating history. It was founded and designed by a pastor who was escaping persecution in the Netherlands. That sounds odd to most people since the Netherlands is known for being a place of tolerance. In the early 1800s, however, the King of the Netherlands, and the government, controlled the church of the Netherlands. Pastors were told what to preach, and were threatened and punished if they disobeyed.

There was a group of rebellious young pastors who led an organized secession from the state church. Some were imprisoned for it. The leader of the secessionist movement was H.P. Scholte, and it was during this period of conflict with the state church of the Netherlands that he decided he wanted to experience the freedom of religion and the freedom of speech guaranteed to all Americans. In 1847, he led hundreds of followers to the Iowa prairie and created a town out of nothing.

In America, Scholte fully exercised his freedoms. Always a maverick, he refused to join any denomination and eventually built his own church which he led as a local, independent, non-denominational congregation. He practiced his freedom of speech by publishing his own paper, loudly speaking out for the abolition of slavery, and getting involved in the political process. He became a friend of Abraham Lincoln. The faith and spirit that Scholte and his wife imbued in this town is still evident for those who have eyes to see it.

Today’s chapter is the third of four chapters that John dedicates to all the things Jesus told His followers on the night before His crucifixion. Almost 20% of his biography is dedicated to those few hours on a Thursday evening.

Two chapters ago, I observed that all of the players present in the “fall” in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3) are represented and/or referenced on this fateful evening. Again in today’s chapter, Jesus references the “prince of this world.” Jesus points to the fact that the events of this evening are part of a larger story; They are part of the Great Story.

What fascinated me as I, once again, read Jesus words to His followers this morning was both the warning and the promise with which today’s chapter is bookended. Jesus begins by warning His followers of the difficulties they will soon face: institutional persecution and the threat of death. Jesus wasn’t lying. All but one of the eleven disciples listening to these words (Judas was, at that moment, carrying out his betrayal) would be killed, martyred, for carrying out Jesus’ mission. At the end of the chapter, Jesus reiterates the “trouble” that they will experience in this world adding that “in Him” they would find peace amidst the conflict.

As I contemplate this, I am reminded of three things:

First, that when Wendy and I attended our local gathering of Jesus’ followers yesterday, it was the result of a legacy of believers who literally risked life and limb to escape “trouble” to carve out lives in the freedom of America.

Second, I am reminded of the “trouble” that many followers of Jesus face this day. I recently read that in Nigeria, 43,000 followers of Jesus have been killed in the past 12 years. An additional 18,000 have permanently disappeared. 17,500 churches have been attacked. There are 49 other countries in which the risk of “trouble” for being a follower of Jesus is rated “very high” to “extreme.” Those are dangers a follower of Jesus in America can largely ignore because it’s not my reality.

Which brings me to my third thought. In recent weeks, almost 60 churches have been attacked and burned in Canada, and last week a group of followers exercising their right to freely assemble and publicly worship were physically attacked by Antifa while police allegedly stood by and did nothing. “Trouble” is suddenly hits closer to home in ways I never expected to see in my lifetime.

In the quiet this morning, I’m reminded of Jesus’ promise which was a very direct contrast statement: “In this world you will have trouble,” He stated, while “In me you will have peace.” The latter was never intended to negate or escape the former. Rather, it was intended as the means to endure it.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

Exilic Reflections

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Exilic Reflections (CaD Ps 107) – Wayfarer

Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble,
    and he delivered them from their distress.
Psalm 107:6 (NIV)

As I’ve been mulling over the spiritual milestones I’ve shared about recently, I have been looking back at my life journey of 20,000+ days and my spiritual journey of 40 years. There have been some amazing moments, some stretches of prosperity on multiple levels, and then there have been some seasons of soul-stretching adversity. As I recount the peaks and valleys and where they’ve brought me, it occurs to me that the latter has been more critical in my spiritual growth. And, very often the former follows. The valleys of life prune me spiritually, and when I eventually reach the high places they are particularly fruitful.

“Exile” is one of the grand themes of the Great Story. Some scholars have gone so far as to say that it is the primary theme that occurs over and over again, beginning with Adam and Eve being exiled from the Garden and their intimate relationship with the Creator. The Hebrews living in bondage and exile in Egypt, then later being exiled and scattered by the Babylonian and Assyrian empires. The crux of the Great Story is Jesus leaving heaven to be exiled here as one of us to make a way for us to escape our own earthly exile and be at home in eternity. And, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Exile is a theme in the stories of Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, David, Ruth, Esther, Daniel, Nehemiah, Mary, Joseph, John the Baptist, Jesus, John, and Paul.

All good stories are a reflection of the Great Story, and I typically find the theme of exile in every major human epic.

Today’s chapter, Psalm 107, kicks off the fifth and final “Book” of Hebrew Song lyrics we know as the Psalms. Psalm 107 is another liturgical song, most likely written to be sung during one of the Hebrew religious festivals. Most scholars agree that it was penned during the period of time when the Hebrews returned from Babylonian exile, rebuilt Jerusalem and God’s temple there. Having come through years of captivity and exile, they have ascended Mount Zion to worship, reflect on their experiences, and give thanks.

The song lyrics introduce different exilic experiences: wandering in the desert, living in darkness, struggling through captivity and forced labor, bitter consequences of foolish choices, sickness and disease, and being lost and rudderless on the stormy seas. In each of the stanzas the description of exilic struggle leads to the phrase: “Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble.” This is followed by God’s salvation, deliverance, redemption, and restoration. Each stanza ends calling the listener to gratitude and praise.

In the quiet this morning, I’m seeing the pattern. Out of darkness into the light. Up from the valley to the mountaintop. Return from exilic adversity to the blessing of finding myself safe at home. This is the Great Story. It’s life’s story. It’s my story, too.

As I meditate on the lyrics of Psalm 107 and look back on my journey, I’m reminded that there is purpose in the painful stretches. Perseverance has always paid off. I have always been able to cry out to the Lord in my troubles. There have always been better stretches ahead.

Note: A new message has been posted to my Messages Page.

Chapter-a-Day

Refuge Within

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Refuge Within (CaD Ps 46) – Wayfarer

God is our refuge and strength,
    a very present help in trouble.
Psalm 46:1 (NRSVCE)

It seems strange in today’s world, but when I was a kid we walked to school and we would walk home. There were safety patrol members standing at the busy corners to make sure kids didn’t walk across the street when the sign said “don’t walk.” It was a sea of childhood humanity flooding out of the school and making a daily pilgrimage home.

Once you were off school grounds, of course, there was no adult supervision. It’s amazing how quickly we learned that there was safety in numbers, and since I had older siblings I had the advantage of knowing a bunch of kids older than me. I could tag along and feel the relative safety of being with a “big kid.”

The real goal, however, was home. There was a certain sense of safety once I got to my own block. That was my territory. I was known there. I experienced real safety, however, once I was inside my house. Any fear of bullies or anxiety of potential trouble melted away. I was safe at home.

Today’s chapter, Psalm 46, is a song that celebrated refuge. For the ancient Hebrews, home base was the walled city of Jerusalem. The temple was there on Mount Zion. For the Hebrews, God was there in His temple. Their warrior-king was there in his palace. Troubles may rage, but they celebrated the safety they felt being safely in the place God resided. For those who remember growing up singing the great hymns, today’s psalm was the inspiration for Martin Luther’s A Mighty Fortress is Our God.

As I have written about on numerous occasions, Jesus changed the entire spiritual landscape. He made it clear that God’s “temple” was not a bricks-and-mortar edifice. When I open my heart and life and invite Jesus in, God’s Spirit indwells me. The temple is me.

How radically that changes the metaphor of refuge. Refuge is no longer without. Refuge is within. Writing to the followers of Jesus in Phillipi, Paul explained that God’s peace, which is beyond human comprehension, guards my heart and guards my mind. Though troubles may surround me on all sides, I may find a peace within sourced not in me, but the Spirit in me.

In the quiet this morning, I’m taking comfort in that.

Very early in the Jesus Movement, believers began a ritual of “passing the Peace.” They would say to one another “the peace of Christ be with you.” It was a tangible way of reminding one another of this spiritual intangible of God’s refuge within.

In this world, we have lots of troubles. Jesus told us to expect it, and not to worry about it because He overcame the world. The beginning of another work week. Here we go.

The peace of Christ be with you, my friend.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

Refining and Revelation

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At that time I, Daniel, mourned for three weeks. I ate no choice food; no meat or wine touched my lips; and I used no lotions at all until the three weeks were over.
Daniel 10:2-3 (NIV)

This past Sunday I had the privilege of giving the message among our local gathering of Jesus’ followers. One of the things our team of teachers has been grappling with of late is a continued season in which we are experiencing an unusually high number of deaths. From young to old, from expected to unexpected, and from natural to painfully tragic, we have had almost two hundred families touched by death in two years. It has been a long season marked by grief that seems to continue. We are going through the very human experience of trying to process and find understanding within it.

The last half of the book of Daniel is a record of dreams and visions that he had. It’s easy to get caught up in the details of the strange images inside. It all seems as confusing as an acid trip for even learned readers. I find that most people bail on it quickly and move on.

I have learned along the way, however, that some of the great lessons I’ve discovered in my perpetual journey through God’s Message are not in the details but in the macro perspective when I step back and get a handle on what’s happening on the landscape of the chapter. Today is a great example.

Daniel’s strange visions are not unique to him during this period of history. Ezra and Ezekiel were other Hebrews in the same exile experience having eerily similar visions and visitations of a fantastical nature. They were all experiencing a particularly painful time of being captives far from home. They were all in mourning for their people, their home, their culture, and their faith in uncertain times and circumstances. They had spent a lifetime in exile and were eager for a sign or promise that their people would return home from captivity, that their Temple in Jerusalem would be rebuilt, and that restoration God promised through the prophets would actually happen (think 90-year-old Cubs fans prior to 2016). In today’s chapter, Daniel had been fasting, praying, and mourning for three weeks before the vision in today’s chapter was given to him.

My takeaway from this is that these dreams and visions were given to a specific group of mourning Hebrew exiles after a long period of suffering and in the midst of a time of intense personal struggle against doubt, despair, and grief.

In the quiet this morning I find myself thinking back to particularly stressful and painful stretches of my own journey. It was in these dark valleys of the journey that very specific and important spiritual lessons and personal revelations came to light. Is there a connection? I believe that there is.

In my message on Sunday, I quoted from Peter’s letters to the suffering believers scattered around the known world. He compares the trials they are experiencing to the way fire refines gold (1 Peter 1:6-7). I have come to believe through experience that it is in the midst of suffering and trial that the non-essential trivialities with which we daily concern ourselves are burned away. When our hearts are broken and our spirits laid bare with suffering we are particularly open to what God described to the prophet Jeremiah (33:3) as “great and unsearchable things you do not know.”

[Note: Speaking of messages, I realized in writing the post this morning that it’s been a while since I updated my Messages page, which I subsequently did for anyone interested.]

Chapter-a-Day

Level 1 Pain; Level 4 Purpose

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But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.
2 Corinthians 12:9 (NIV)

A week ago Sunday I had the privilege of giving the message amidst my local gathering of Jesus followers. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, we’re in the middle of a one-year journey through the book, The Acts of the Apostles, more commonly referred to as simply Acts. The reason that we’re making our way through 2 Corinthians is that I wanted to read through all of Paul’s letters in the order he wrote them in conjunction with my local gathering’s journey through Acts.

In my message last week I noted that there are four levels at which the story in Acts is happening. Level 1 is the personal, individual story level in which individuals are having experiences and having a personal, relational interaction with God. Level 4 is the eternal, cosmic, heavenly realm of the Spirit. I observed in my message that if my spiritual world-view remains confined to Level 1, then I will always struggle against the inequities of circumstance. It’s been fascinating how this simple theme has suddenly seemed to present itself in a myriad of ways. Like, today’s chapter.

As I read through today’s chapter, I found it (once again) one of the most extraordinary things Paul ever wrote. Paul writes in the third person of “a man” who had a Level 4 experience. By the way, using the third person was a commonly used literary device in Paul’s day so writers would present something that may be perceived as boastful about themselves with humility. Paul explains a mysterious experience in which he was caught up in heaven. The whole thing is mystical and mysterious and Paul explains that he’s not permitted to reveal some of what he saw, heard, and/or experienced.

Paul then immediately explains that he was subsequently given “a thorn in the flesh” to keep him humble. In other words, there was some kind of Level 1 suffering that Paul was experiencing. Scholars have debated and argued for years regarding what this “thorn in the flesh” was. We’ll never know for sure. What it was is not the point. Anyone whose had the experience of being pierced with an object which remained buried in the flesh knows that it’s an on-going, ever-present form of suffering.

What I noticed in the chapter this morning was, once again, I find this weaving together of Level 4 and Level 1, the eternal and the temporal.  Paul pleaded with God to remove this Level 1 “thorn in the flesh” that was causing him physical suffering only to come to a Level 4 perspective of his affliction. Paul is told: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power (Level 4) is made perfect in weakness (Level 1).” By the way, the word “power” that Paul uses is the same Greek word “dynamos” that is used by Jesus in Acts 1:8 : “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you.” He’s definitely talking about Spiritual, eternal, Level 4 “power”

In the quiet this morning I continue to find myself mulling over a number of things. Paul’s mystical, mysterious experience is intriguing. This description and meaning of the “third heaven” is another point of intense debate among scholars. Then there’s question about exactly what Paul’s “thorn in the flesh” referred to. Speculation and discussion about these things can be an interesting and entertaining. What is clear, and what I walk away with as I enter my day, is the reminder that the troubles and sufferings we experience can have spiritual purposes.

Chapter-a-Day

Truth About Trouble

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As soon as it was night, the believers sent Paul and Silas away to Berea.
Acts 17:10 (NIV)

Trouble in the water, trouble in the air
Go all the way to the other side of the world, you’ll find trouble there
Revolution even ain’t no solution for trouble

Trouble
Trouble, trouble, trouble
Nothin’ but trouble

-Bob Dylan, Trouble, 1989 (Shot of Love)

These are the lyrics from the song that flitted into my brain as I read today’s chapter. That’s the way my right-brain works. It connects events I’m experiencing or what I’m reading with an appropriate theme song from memory. I know. Weird.

The book of Acts is the story of how the Jesus movement explosively expanded in the decades following Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. Whenever a company, organization, or movement expands rapidly there are certain inflection points at which a major shift occurs in perception and reaction towards that expansion. We saw one a few chapters back when the Jesus Movement broke through the borders of its Jewish roots.

In today’s chapter, we’re following Paul, Silas, and Timothy on a journey through Greece. As always, the goal of their journey is to proclaim the Message of Jesus to those who’ve probably never heard it. They have a standard game-plan which is to start in the local Jewish synagogue where Paul uses his steel-trap knowledge of the Law and Prophets to explain to the Jews that the Messiah is not who they think He is. He’s not some human conqueror who would show up with an army to wipe out Rome and set up an earthly Kingdom. Rather, Paul argued, the prophets describe a suffering servant who would be sacrificed for humanity, then raised from the dead to declare victory over death, not Rome.

While Paul’s preaching had gotten him in trouble before, in today’s chapter we see that trouble begins following him. Locals aren’t content to simply drive Paul and his posse from the city, now his detractors are following him, and bringing trouble with them. Trouble in Thessalonica drives Paul to Berea, but Jews from Thessalonica arrive to stir up trouble for Paul in Berea, which drives Paul to Athens.

What strikes me in the circumstances is how trouble, rather than thwarting God’s plan, actually advances it. How long would Paul have stayed in the Thessalonica if everything had been peaceful? How long would it have taken him to move on to Berea? And, would Paul have even made the long journey Athens had it not been for trouble?

Along this Life journey I’ve encountered periods of trouble when daily existence is accompanied by emotional stress, sleeplessness, anxiety, unwarranted fear, and the like. It’s easy for me to obsess about the troubles I’m experiencing. It’s also easy for me to feel that only doom and gloom will be the outcome. Today’s chapter is a good reminder for me to stop obsessing about the trouble, and start looking for where God might be using the trouble to propel and advance His purposes for me.

The very next track after Trouble on Bob Dylan’s Shot of Love LP is Every Grain of Sand which contains this lyric:

In the fury of the moment I can see the Master’s hand
In every leaf that trembles, in every grain of sand

Sometimes trouble propels me toward the place the Master’s hand is guiding me if I’m willing to open my eyes to see it.

Have a great day, my friend.

Chapter-a-Day

When Trouble Unexpectedly Blows In

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In his time of trouble King Ahaz became even more unfaithful to the Lord.
2 Chronicles 28:22 (NIV)

Just a few weeks ago a tornado descended on the small community where Wendy and I live. That day there were some 27 tornadoes that ripped through Iowa. The tornado here in Pella hit a local manufacturing company, wreaking havoc on multiple plants and turning cars in the parking lot into a pile scrap metal. Since it happened in the middle of the workday, it seems to me a miracle that no one was killed. Only a handful of people were injured, and none seriously.

In the weeks that have followed, it’s been fascinating to watch the community mobilize. The business that took the brunt of the damage is already in the process of rebuilding. Churches and charities are working with those in need. In a time of unexpected trouble, I can see the strength and faith of our community and its people. We’ll be alright.

Along my journey I’ve observed that times of trouble and unexpected tragedy are windows into Spirit. When trouble and tragedy unexpectedly descend like a tornado and blow through our lives, our response reveals what kind of spiritual foundation lies beneath the surface of our lives. It makes known how deep our spiritual roots descend into Life’s soil.

In today’s chapter, the story of King Ahaz reads like a spiritual tragedy. Not only does Ahaz not follow God, but he seems willing to follow any god, any time, any where. He goes from god-to-god sacrificing and paying tribute. When trouble hits Ahaz reaches out to Assyria for help, only to be double-crossed. Ahaz dishonors some of the articles of Solomon’s temple to try to buy his way out of trouble. It doesn’t work. When defeated by Damascus, Ahaz worships their gods in hopes that it will help. It doesn’t.

Ahaz is so willing to believe anything that his troubles reveal that he believes nothing. He has no spiritual roots. He has no foundation. His life was one of constantly grasping for anything only to be left with nothing. He was such a tragic failure, that the people of Judah refuse to entomb Ahaz’s dead body with the other kings.

I’m reminded this morning of how James put it: “the one who doubts is like the wave of the sea, blown about and tossed by the wind.” I’m also reminded of how the Psalmist contrasted the righteous and the wicked in the lyric of Psalm 1. The righteous are described as strong trees with deep roots that continually produce good fruit and don’t wither in trouble. The wicked, however, are like dust blown helplessly in the wind.

On this life journey, I believe almost every one of us will experience trouble and tragedy unexpectedly descending into our lives like a tornado. In that moment, I find out what kind of spiritual roots I’ve developed. If my roots go deep then I will weather the storm, get back to work, and come through the experience even stronger. If I have no spiritual roots then I think I’m going to be more like Ahaz, blown about, grasping for something, anything to hold onto.

(Thanks to everyone who reached out to make sure Wendy and I were alright. We live on the opposite side of town from where the tornado struck and were not in harms way.)

Chapter-a-Day

(Don’t) Be Afraid, (Don’t) Be Very, Very, Afraid

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The Lord is good,
     a refuge in times of trouble.
He cares for those who trust in him…
Nahum 1:7 (NIV)

The prophet Nahum lived and wrote his prophecy in troubled times. The kingdom of Israel had been split in two, the northern kingdom called Israel, and the southern kingdom called Judah. When Nahum wrote his prophecy the northern kingdom had been attacked and decimated by the Assyrians.

The Assyrians were known for their brutality and cruelty. When they conquered a city, they would mercilessly hack the limbs off their victims and then leave the limbs and bodies stacked like a pyramid outside the city gates. It was their calling card, the sign that the Assyrians had been there. Now that the northern kingdom of Israel had experienced it, the southern kingdom of Judah feared a similar Assyrian attack.

Fear and anxiety are common emotions. Today I find it common for people to experience economic fear (When will the economy get moving again? Will we experience what happened in Greece? Is the stock market going to collapse?) and fear of terror-ism (When’s the next 9-11? Are ISIS terrorist cells on our soil just waiting to attack? ). There is anxiety about global politics (Will Iran get a bomb and attack Israel?) and climate change (Will global warming  create disastrous change in weather patterns?). When Wendy and I watch or read the news we will often observe to one another that there seems to be one major theme: “Be afraid. Be very, very afraid.”

Nahum also lived in a time of fear, and his prophetic message was to encourage his readers not to give into fear, but rather to trust in God. Nineveh (the capitol of the Assyrian empire), he prophesied, would be destroyed. His prophetic word was fulfilled. Assyria was destroyed by the Medes and Persians in 612 B.C.

It’s Monday morning as I write this post. The first Monday of a new month. For some of us, even the prospect of what the coming week holds brings anxiety. There is uncertainty about what we’re going to do in the coming month and how we’ll get through. Nahum’s message is a good one. Notice that he doesn’t promise freedom from trouble, but that we will find God a caring refuge in whatever comes our way.

Today, I’m choosing not to give into anxiety and fear, but to trust God to be a caring refuge for whatever comes my way.