Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Joy and Frustration


Wednesday 2/29/2012 5:01 AM
Saturday I am scheduled to present an article I wrote about a year ago for Mathematics Teacher magazine on cyclic numbers to a group of community college math professors at our annual math conference.  The article is the result of a problem that I have contemplated and periodically worked on for over ten years.  The initial problem was straightforward and I solved it relatively quickly but, as is often the case in mathematics, I generalized the problem and tried to find a solution to the generalized problem.  This process led down many side paths, which resulted in both frustrating dead ends and exhilarating insights.  I distinctly remember jumping around throughout my living room after getting an insight that unlocked the secret to the problem and yet I still am puzzled by the paradoxes that have been generated by working with infinite series as I continue my reflection on the process.  Over the past few days I have spent the bulk of my mental energy trying to decide what to include in my presentation and what to leave out.  I would like to communicate both the joy and the frustration that accompanied my journey but I fear that my audience will not be able to experience it in the same way without having traveled the ten-year path.
In my relationship with God I also experience frustrating dead ends and exhilarating insights.  At times I am surprised to find God’s grace in unexpected places and at other times I feel as if I am following God closely only to find myself drifting aimlessly through life or to watch a door close on a path I was convinced was God’s will for me.  I meet with a group of men each week to share the joys and frustrations I have in my walk with God.  At times they suggest that I share my experiences with others but I think the same way about my walk with God as I do about my math problem.  While I want others to experience the great joy I have in my relationship with God and to be encouraged by my frustrations when they are going through frustrations of their own, it seems that others will not be able to experience things in the same way without traveling the path.
The Bible clearly states that we are to encourage one another and spur one another on toward love and good deeds.  The problem I have is knowing how to do that most effectively.

Saturday, February 25, 2012

Lord, Be With ...


Saturday 2/25/2012 6:28 AM
“Lord, be with my friend as they grieve the loss of their spouse.”  “Lord, be with me in my job interview today.”  “Lord, be with my friend as they undergo surgery today.”  These are typical prayers that I often hear uttered from my mouth or from the mouths of others with whom I am praying.  I have tried to eliminate them from my prayer life as much as possible over the last couple of years because they seem unnecessary.  In Joshua 1:9 God has encouraging words for Joshua, “Have I not commanded you?  Be strong and courageous.  Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”  In Matthew 28:20 Jesus promises his disciples, “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”  It seems pointless to ask God to be with me since he has already promised to do so.  I have changed my prayers so they have a different flavor, something like these.  “Lord, make me aware of your presence with me today.”  “Lord, remind my friend that you are with him in the middle of his sorrow.”
Today I read John 12:26, “Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant will also be.”  This puts a different perspective on things for me.  A servant follows his master, not the other way around.  A master tells his servant what to do, not the servant his master.  In the prayers stated above it sounds like I am giving orders to God, telling him how to spend his time and his energies, in effect, telling God to go here and to do this.  If I am to be a servant of God I need to follow where God leads and do what he tells me to do.  My prayers need to take on this tone, “Lord, give me eyes to see where you are going today and give me the strength to follow you, trusting you to provide for my needs.”  If I am to be the loving hands of God to a broken world I need to be next to him.

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Without Holiness...


Thursday 2/23/2012 4:54 AM
This is an election year and each Republican candidate for President is trying to convince the voters that he would be the candidate with the best chance of unseating President Obama.  Each candidate has his talking points that are designed to woo voters into his camp and it seems like most are trying to court the conservative element of the Republican Party.  The hot topics that seem to repeatedly emerge are abortion, immigration policy and gay marriage.  The candidates often portray themselves as Christians and, when campaigning in the primaries, will call into question the genuineness of their rival’s or opponent’s faith.  The media that report on the primary elections often portray the candidates and their followers as crazy fanatics who look out for the interests of the rich and powerful while ignoring the plight of the poor and disenfranchised of society.
I am ashamed to admit I’m a Christian to those around me if they think that all Christians are like those portrayed by the media.  If someone asks if I am a Christian I quickly backpedal and let them know that I am a Christian but not like those portrayed in the media.  I sometimes wonder why the media portrays Christians in such a negative light when most of the Christians I know are nothing like that.  Some would argue that it is just the persecution of Christians that has gone on for centuries but it seems to me that some of the media criticism of Christianity, as portrayed by some, is justified.
Today I read Hebrews 12:14, “Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.”  Perhaps the reason for the criticism is because, as a Christian community, we are not living at peace with everyone and we are failing to live holy lives.  God’s desire is that his people would be set apart, living distinctively different from the society around us, while we like to blend in so that no one will notice.  God calls us to give up our own interests and look to the interests of others while we, like the culture around us, look out for ourselves, often to the detriment of those around us.  If we want the world to see God when they look at us we need to live more like Jesus did and less like the world around us.

Monday, February 20, 2012

The Best I Like


Monday 2/20/2012 6:53 AM
Earlier this morning I read my brother’s recollection of a childhood memory.  Our cousins would come to our farm to play and we each had our favorite cousins.  My oldest sister would often say, “Howard is the best I like.”  My siblings would argue that I am the favorite child of our mother but this moniker has always made me feel uncomfortable and I feel the need to provide evidence to the contrary to deflect that status whenever we are together.  Of course, my siblings don’t buy it.
We all have favorite colors, favorite days of the week, favorite sports teams, etc., that we proudly state to any who will listen.  My favorite subject in school was mathematics and I despised any class that required me to write a term paper; so English, social studies, psychology and education classes were on my “To Be Avoided at All Costs” list.  Unfortunately many of those classes were required general education classes or, worse yet, required for my secondary education focus that accompanied my math major.  I always viewed them as necessary evils, things to be tolerated to reach my goal.
This morning I read Psalm 19 and verse 6 drew my attention.  David is writing about the sun, which is declaring the glory of God, and he describes it this way, “It rises at one end of the heavens and makes its circuit to the other; nothing is deprived of its warmth.”  It seems that the sun doesn’t play favorites; the sun warms everything.  In the Reformed community in which I was raised that is known as common grace; it rains on both the just and on the unjust.
I began to think about whether or not God has favorites.  Does he like some people more than others?  I have been blessed with good health throughout my life while others, like my Dad, are stricken with disease and die at an early age.  I have been blessed with loving family relationships while others I know have fractured relationships with their spouses that have ended in nasty divorces or they haven’t spoken to their children in years.  I have been blessed with steady work that I find energizing while others I know are stuck with a job they hate or they go through extended periods of unemployment, which exerts its own stresses upon their lives.
From a human perspective it seems like God plays favorites and he doesn’t try to hide it.  I often wonder why my life seems to move along without serious difficulties while others around me seem to move from one major setback to another.  I am grateful for what I consider to be great gifts from God but there is often a sense of shame that I experience when I talk with others who are in the midst of troubling circumstances.  I have a hard time truly celebrating the goodness in my life when others around me seem to be hit with one difficulty after another.  It seems to me that God should spread the bad things and the good things we experience in life equally so that everyone experiences some of each.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

Prayer and Service: Conjoined Twins

Saturday 2/18/2012 6:00 AM
A little over a week ago the neighbor of a friend of mine died after an extended illness.  My friend had often asked for prayer for her neighbor and also for herself, that she would know best how to care for her neighbor.  Her neighbor had no friends or family nearby and she had been estranged from her family for years so my friend would look in on her every day and bring in an occasional meal to help out in a small way.  The woman was difficult to serve and bitter about life but my friend persevered through it all, even arranging for people from our church to help clean her house and also provide an occasional meal.  The woman didn’t want help from anyone associated with the church because she was convinced they would come later asking her for money.  My friend contacted the neighbor’s estranged daughter and told her to come to visit her mother.  The daughter did and, a few days later, the neighbor died after having made peace of some sort with her daughter.
My friend is exhausted in the aftermath of it all, having poured love and energy into an ungrateful and recalcitrant person.  Her prayers for her neighbor eventually led her to action and her actions revealed the need for even more prayer.  Today I read an excerpt from Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life by Donald P. McNeill, Douglas A. Morrison and Henri J.M. Nouwen that explains this cycle of prayer and service.  “If prayer leads us into a deeper unity with the compassionate Christ, it will always give rise to concrete acts of service.  And if concrete acts of service do indeed lead us into a deeper solidarity with the poor, the hungry, the sick, the dying, and the oppressed, they will always give rise to prayer.  In prayer we meet Christ, and in him all human suffering.  In service we meet people, and in them the suffering Christ.”
I thank God for my friend, whose simple, loving acts of service toward her neighbor allowed the neighbor to experience the love of God.  The world needs more of that.

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Is Life a Bed of Roses?


Wednesday 2/8/2012 4:52 AM
Yesterday I read a short article where the author attributed all the little inconveniences that happened to him throughout the day to God’s intervention, in order to protect him.  He had a dead battery in his car.  The reason for that was to keep him from getting hit by a drunk driver.  When he ordered his sandwich at lunch the order was wrong so the restaurant had to make another sandwich.  This was because the first order was made by someone who was sick and God wanted to protect his health.  And so it went, with all the bad things explained away because a loving God was protecting him throughout the day.
I have no doubt that God could engineer the circumstances of my day so that everything would work out for my good like that but I don’t think that is the way God works, in spite of words in Romans 8:28.  Many of the inconveniences of my life are of my own making and, in my opinion, have little to do with God’s intervention.  My battery goes dead on my car because I fail to perform routine maintenance to check it regularly.  I sleep through my alarm because I did not go to bed on time, so as to be fully rested, and so on.
The Bible says that I have been made in the image of God, that he is shaping me into the image of Christ and that God wants me to live life to the full.  When I look at the nature of God and at the life of Christ, both are acquainted with suffering and grief.  If I am to have the heart of Christ fully alive within me I will experience all that life has to offer, including suffering.  Paul expressed the same sentiment in Philippians 3:10, “I want to know Christ – yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death.”  As the Spirit molds me so that I reflect the image of Christ, I will experience more and more suffering as I see the world through the eyes of Jesus.  Injustice will increasingly bother me until eventually I take a stand against it.  Seeing the broken lives of people around me will drive me to reach out to them in love, like Christ, who had compassion for the hurting and the lonely.
Some in the Christian community preach a health and wealth gospel; if I give my life to God everything will be wonderful and will work for my good.  In reality, I believe that when I give my life to God he will break my heart with what breaks his and he will move me to action so that I can be his arms of love wrapped around a broken, needy world.