Something Outta Nothing

If you’ve never heard a variation of this old fable, I’m going to treat you to the “Lisa” version of it.

A stranger wandered into town one afternoon, tired, hungry, and needing to rest before he continued on his journey. His inquiries about food and lodging were met with inhospitable responses from the townspeople. “I have no food for you,” he heard over and over again.

“That’s ok, and thank you,” he replied. “Since none of you have any food to share, I’m just going to make homemade soup. Enough to feed us all…and all I need is (reaching into his pocket) this old nail!”

“Hogwash!” said someone; and to prove him wrong, the skeptic dragged a big kettle to the town square. “Let’s see you do it!”

The stranger quietly filled the pot with water from the community well, gathered some sticks, and built a fire. A faint “klink” was heard as the nail came to rest in the bottom of the kettle. As the water began to boil, he leaned in to sniff an imaginary aroma. Curious onlookers began to move in closer, their inquisitiveness overriding their cynicism over the man’s outrageous claim. He blew on a spoonful of the broth before tasting. “It’s fine just like it is, but a little salt and pepper would be divine!”

“I have no food for you,” spoke a woman from the crowd, “but I do have some salt and pepper in my pantry.” With that, she disappears from the crowd, reappearing with the seasonings. The stranger thanks her, tosses some salt and pepper into the pot, and continues stirring.

“Last time I made this, I decided to experiment a little. I threw in some onions and potatoes, and you know, it was actually pretty good,” he said calmly, almost as if he were talking to himself.

“I don’t have any food to give you,” a man spoke out, “but I may be able to wrangle up some old onions and potatoes in my cellar.” And with that, he produced his contribution. After stirring the onions and potatoes into the mix, suddenly an appetizing smell began to waft into the crowd.

“I wonder if carrots and celery would make it better?” said another lady. “I might have some put back for a rainy day.” Suddenly, it was a domino effect. An ear of corn here, a handful of peas there. A cabbage. And lo and behold, one ornery old cuss even brought a soup bone. After all, they had to prove this crazy stranger wrong!

Before long, town square smelled heavenly; and folks disappeared long enough to return with bowls and spoons. And they all shared a hearty feast together that evening…laughing and talking and singing the praises of the man who made this magnificent concoction “out of just one old nail!”

____

In the spiritual sense, how many times have we come to God with our needs, only to have Him require something on our part first? He isn’t trying to insult our intelligence; He’s trying to expand our understanding to a heavenly principle that defies our earthly paradigms. We can look at Elijah’s audacious request to a widow who was preparing one final meal for her young son and herself, and say, “Man, you have absolutely lost your mind! You foolish, selfish thing…leave that woman alone in her need, and go find your own food!” However, desperate times often spark some pretty radical faith! This woman was just ripe for a boom-or-bust miracle; and so, she responded to Elijah’s claim of continual provision if she were to make the first move. Sure enough, God honored the prophet’s declaration, and the woman and her son never again had to fear hunger…even in the middle of a famine!

This outrageous God we serve has a track record for “something outta nothing.” We’re not even going to rewind back to the times of Creation when entire galaxies were formed at His command. We’re just going to go forward to a huge crowd of hungry people, too far out of town to grab a bite in the drive-thru. Here they have followed Jesus, not paying attention to the time or the distance, or to their lack of preparation for a journey. Surveying the problem, all the disciples are able to come up with is a little tike whose momma had thrown together a child’s portion bread-and-fish lunch. Tuna fish and crackers for us, if you will, only the Happy Meal version. They didn’t have to pry it out of his hands. With a child’s faith, I’m guessing he probably thought, “If it’s Jesus I’m giving it to, it’ll be alright.” We adults would probably be tempted to hide our little stash! Or, we’d reason that our contribution was just a drop in the bucket; justifiable alibi for not revealing that we had it. Survival of the fittest, you know. Interesting. That child’s drop in the bucket, blessed and broken by the Master, had 12 baskets of leftovers afterwards.

And if that weren’t enough to perplex our carnal minds, enter a man with what the Bible describes as a “withered hand.” He could’ve crushed it while working in the field or managing his livestock. He could’ve had a stroke. He may have been born with a body part that failed to fully develop. We don’t know that part, but we can reason that he was tired of walking around with a dead hand that didn’t work. And how does Jesus respond to the man’s request for healing? He asks the man to stretch that hand toward Him! Nowadays, people would be threatening to sue for discrimination against the disabled. I wonder how many spectators in the crowd were whispering among themselves, “Jesus, get a clue! If he could stretch it out, he wouldn’t be asking You to heal it!” How we, in all our “intelligence,” miss the point! The man didn’t miss the point, however. I don’t know how much effort it took to get that hand aimed toward Jesus, but he had nothing to lose. It may have been a little humiliating, even, putting the object of his shame right there in the open for everyone to gawk at. Nevertheless, the man gives his best effort to reach the useless hand toward the Savior. Only…by the time the hand reaches Jesus, the fingers are long and limber. The grip is strong. There is movement, flexibility, and feeling! Something outta nothing, yes. Faith trumps reason! Always!

As you stand before God today with your own list of needs, don’t be surprised if He requires you to produce your nothingness as a gift to Him. Don’t be insulted. He already knows what you have and what you don’t have. He will ask you to produce the very source of your pain, your shame, your deficiency. Don’t hide it behind your back and pretend it doesn’t exist! With the faith of that widow, that boy, and that man, present to Him what you have…even if it’s an empty bowl, a drained bank account, a ruined reputation, a used-up body. We are all just empty containers. We all are lacking in some area. Give God your container—YOU—and He will fill you to overflowing with His goodness. If you perceive yourself to be too old, wasted, uneducated, tainted, broken, or useless, know that He’s just looking for your willingness to give Him your pitiful little offering! He’s not going to laugh at you and say, “WHAT? You expect Me to make something good out of YOU???!” No, He will work with what you give Him. He may even toss your inadequacy into His kettle with other people’s inadequacies…and produce something of quality that blesses everyone around you, emitting a pleasing savor as it simmers to perfection.

Impossible, you say? Nope. It’s as easy as making soup with just one old nail.

No Such Thing as a Lost Cause

Dana was watching a history show today on TV about a man named Hugh Glass, a frontiersman in early 1800’s South Dakota. I was in the next room, but the story caught my attention and I found myself listening in. Apparently, this man was attacked by a bear and mauled so badly that his traveling companions thought he couldn’t possibly have survived. They dug a shallow, open “grave” and just placed him inside, sure he was either dead or soon to die. Being pioneers who didn’t waste anything, they stripped him of his tools and personal effects and left him in that ditch. A couple of months later, people in a fort some distance away were shocked when a severely wounded and emaciated man crawled into their midst, claiming to be Hugh Glass. Many didn’t believe he was who he said he was. Others thought he was a dead man come back to life and it terrified them. The unpleasant details of how he managed to survive make up a story that is nothing short of miraculous.

How many of our loved ones are in such bad shape that we finally just give up on them? Physically, perhaps they’re very sick and we have lost any expectation of their recovery…or spiritually, perhaps they’ve been so mean, so addicted, so rebellious, or so detached from our families that we’ve written them off as hopeless cases? Or marriages in which we become just too tired to do the work of making them last? I’m writing this to urge you, if you’re tempted to give up on someone, DON’T! The Bible is full of lost causes! Jairus’ daughter. The demoniac of Gadara. Lazarus. Gomer, the estranged wife of the prophet Hosea. Peter, in prison. If you will persist in prayer, that person may be the next “dead man” to stagger into your midst, alive and set free from the clutches of Satan!

Who prayed for you? Now, for whom will you pray WITHOUT GIVING UP? “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.” (Galatians 6:9 ESV)

Lord, raise up an army of lost causes, and may their testimonies of deliverance shake open the doors where others are held captive!

The Maker’s Mark

2111280 As I sat in the living room floor wrapping Christmas packages, I noticed that every few inches or so of this big roll of economy wrapping paper was imprinted with copyright information and the year. Now, I paid all of three dollars for this roll of paper, so it amused me that somewhere in the Library of Congress records, this roll of disposable (and not particularly fancy, I might add) paper has a registered copyright that says no other human being has a right to claim credit for the design except its creator. And my rabbit-trailing imagination pondered how many government employees, vast computer networks, and file cabinets are responsible for cataloging and keeping track of the billions and billions of items registered just like this one. Why, even the roll of adhesive name tags was imprinted with little © symbols on each one!

I can appreciate the beauty of the copyright. For the professional who relies on copyrighted works to make a living, I must concede that it’s a good thing not to have one’s hard work lost to someone’s thievery. A few years back, being merely an amateur freelancer trying to break into the world of works for hire, I guarded my first few songs and compositions like a lioness with her cubs. I dared not unveil my latest masterpiece until, months and months after I’d duly completed the paperwork and mailed in my fee, I would receive the documentation with the official seal on it that certified this creation was mine and all mine. Over time, however, when the publisher was unable to find an artist to record my first “big” song, and my editorials had to be non-gratis just to make their way to the public eye, I came to value that seal of authentication less and less. Now, I’m pretty much happy just to see my works not go to waste…and I’d probably be more flattered than angry if one of my works were plagiarized! Ha!

We are so taught to prize affirmation in this society, to be credited with every accomplishment, to have a “like” for every random thought we post. We crave it. We feel we need it. We dare not share our glory with another, and Heaven forbid that it might be said someone else thought of our idea first. We have a figurative hope chest filled with all the things we pull out, on occasion, to remind ourselves that we made our mark and that we matter to the world.

And yet…as I ponder eternity and the Christmas message, the little “c” in a circle gets smaller and smaller, until it’s an unrecognizable speck on the page. Truly, the only One who has a bona fide claim to ownership rights is our Creator. A loving Father, Who sends His Son to earth to pay an ultimate price to redeem fallen mankind; a Creator Who has every right to demand what’s His, and yet He installs in each individual masterpiece something unheard of—free will.

I think, as well, of the given Son, Who lays down His claim to rights and privileges when He leaves a throne to don a rabbi’s shawl and some well-worn sandals. He forfeits, for 33 ½ years, immunity from suffering, sickness, and mortality. For that span of time, He permits mankind to do their worst to Him—and they do.

So today, as I give this copyrighted wrapping paper its one and only moment of glory in the spotlight before being bagged up and discarded, I will never know the person who designed the white snowflakes on a red background and then filed paperwork to see that no one else gets to duplicate his or her work. I will, however, give praise and worship to the Creator Who made me and then gave me a choice to serve Him—or not. I recognize that I truly am not my own; I am bought with a price. I will give Him glory and due recognition for the hard work and investment of love He has made in me, and I will wear His insignia—His copyright symbol—with great gratitude and pleasure. It’s my prayer that you will, too.

“He put his mark on us to show that we are his, and he put his Spirit in our hearts to be a guarantee for all he has promised.” (2 Corinthians 1:22 NCV)

And In the Bad Times, Too

SOMETIMES BEING FAITHFUL WHEN ALL IS NOT WELL IS THE GREATEST TESTIMONY WE CAN GIVE

“In all of this, Job did not sin by blaming God.” – Job 1:22 NLT

My husband and I just finished reading through the story of Job in the Bible. I can honestly remember a time when, as a young girl, I would hurriedly turn past that book. In my mind, I felt that if I didn’t read about dealing with hard times, maybe I wouldn’t have to face them. How juvenile! Boy, how wrong I was! Ready or not, life has a way of getting all in our business.

I know of situations all around me, and have come through a number of them myself, where the outcome of circumstances was quite different from what had been prayed. It reminds me of that old song, “We’ll understand it better by and by,” because there are some things we’re not going to understand here.

Life is so full of circumstances which are unfair. It just is. It has been since the fall of Adam, in which Satan took over the earth’s lease from one man’s (and woman’s) disobedience. Every bad thing which you’ve ever encountered is a result of sin being given dominion in the earth…not necessarily that you or I did something in particular to deserve the bad, but that sin itself has a place of rule in our atmosphere. It sets up a chain reaction of sorrow, pain, sickness, loss, and ruin which attacks everyone in its path. Deserve has nothing to do with it, as often as not.

There have been so many instances when I’ve prayed—and sincerely believed—for a favorable outcome, only for it not to happen as I’d hoped. Good people have gone on to be with the Lord who, if measured by their faithfulness to God, should have been healed and gone on to live out their days unscathed. And every time I interceded on their behalf, my mind always went to how the Lord would be glorified if they received their miracle. My heart counted on seeing people’s faith bolstered when that miracle took place; and in part, my prayers were often motivated by a fear that people would become discouraged and forsake the Lord if an outcome was not as was hoped for.

I can’t fathom how God has such a more thorough view of things than we have. We’re told in the Scriptures that His ways are higher than ours, and it’s true. One thing I’m learning as I grow in the Lord is, His answers to our prayers are always based on eternity rather than this one tiny life. As a matter of fact, if we received a ‘yes’ to every prayer, we humans would make everything about the here and now. Our affections would be vested in the present, rather than eternity. Our desires would be totally self-serving.

I’m not saying that everything we ask for is selfish. Most of the time, we’re asking for good things; needed things. But just as a child who gets everything it whines for, we too would become spoiled if we got everything we asked for in prayer. We would serve God just for the loaves and fishes, rather than to know Him intimately. When Who He is becomes eclipsed by what we can get out of Him, we bypass relationship for quick gratification. And when good people have only good things happen to them, we begin to forget that it’s God’s grace instead of our works which gives us favor in His sight.

So where’s the balance in it all? We should always pray with faith in the Word and what it says about our situation; but we must always allow God the sovereignty in how He chooses to answer. He knows so much more about the future than we can possibly comprehend. And in truth, sometimes we need to see living examples of people who remain faithful even when the outcome of their prayers isn’t what they asked. Though it’s not what we enjoy witnessing, we sometimes need to see good people encounter difficulties and face them with courage. Sometimes we ourselves are those good people who have to walk in wilderness settings. You can learn a lot more about faith from someone who has to forge through trial and tribulation, than you can from someone who seems to have everything going right and well in his/her life.

If we never have to go through hard times, we are probably not going to be compassionate toward others who struggle. It’s easy to become sanctimonious when we feel we have an “edge” on other people spiritually. Why do you think Jesus allowed Himself to experience everything a human can be tempted with? Aren’t you glad He intercedes for you before the Father, knowing that He has first-hand experience at what you’re facing and feeling?

We also need to remember that when we’re going through terrible things,God’s not doing it to us! Going back to the truth that sin has ruined Eden for all of us, remember that your enemy—the Devil—is behind anything bad you’re encountering. So often I hear people misquote the Scriptures, and their explanation of the hard time is that “God won’t PUT ANYTHING on us that we can’t bear.” That’s not what it says! It says, “No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not LET you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.” (1 Cor. 10:13 NIV) Furthermore, His Word says, “And remember, when you are being tempted, do not say, “God is tempting me.” God is never tempted to do wrong, and he never tempts anyone else.” (James 1:13 NLT) It is true, however, that God will test us; but it’s not so that He can see whether we will remain faithful. He already knows! He allows us to go through things so that we ourselves can know the depth of our faith. And like muscles, faith will atrophy if we don’t have to exercise it once in awhile. Remember, a test from God is designed to strengthen and refine you…a temptation or attack of the enemy is an attempt to destroy you, and at the very least, to destroy your faith. If something has come about to steal from you, to kill you, or to destroy you or someone you love, it’s not God’s doing! It’s orchestrated by the one who kills, steals, and destroys. Jesus’ will is to give you life—and a more abundant one, at that!

As we wait for answers to our many requests today, I pray that we will be willing to allow God to answer our needs in light of eternity. I pray that we’ll be mature enough to endure with grace those seasons when there is no detour around trouble. And I pray that, should we have to come through something unthinkably hard, our testimony of remaining faithful to the end will be as effective an example as if our troubles had vanished immediately upon asking. Whether you realize it, your life and how you live it is an ongoing teaching to others, so we need to be teaching the right lesson! It’s not all about this life, but eternity! Those saints who allowed themselves to be martyred for their faith knew this…and not even death could defeat them. Even now, when we come to the end of this finite human life, death cannot defeat us because Jesus took the keys to death and Hell!

Lord, we want blessing all the time; we just do. The carnal, selfish part craves getting our own way and it pouts when we don’t get it. But I pray, help us this day to be faithful in plenty and in famine, in good times and in bad, and in times when the answer isn’t what we asked for. You are good all the time; may our speech, our attitudes, and our actions point to an eternal versus a temporal hope in You. Just as You restored Job after a terrible storm in his life, You will take care of us too. In life and in death, people are watching us, so help us to live right and to die right, perhaps leading someone else to an eternity with You in the process. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

(No) Left-Foot Braking

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.” (Deut 6:5-9 NIV)

In tenth grade, in 1983, I won the Drivers Ed award. Now, I don’t think I won because I was necessarily the superior driver in our class…I’m pretty sure that it was because of the notebook.

Mr. Harold Jude was our teacher, and much to the disappointment of our young expectations, the greater part of our time wasn’t going to be spent actually driving; rather, it was going to be reading about driving. Gee, it had looked so fun in junior high when we’d covetously watch the older kids behind the wheel of the student driver car, pulling off the parking lot to go who knows where–we just knew they were going to get cheeseburgers or skip classes or some other awesomeness. What a shattered illusion!

No, the driving part would come later on—but for right now, our teacher was going to drill us over and over again on the rules of the road. Part of that process was that Mr. Jude assigned us to do a notebook which would be turned in and graded, and it would count as a significant percentage of our semester. At the end of each chapter was a long set of questions. He would make us write the question and then write the answer in our notebook. Well, Little Miss Perfectionist decided to go the extra mile, typewriting and color-coding my notebook on my old manual Remington typewriter (a hospital dumpster dive rescue, and yes, you may laugh)…black for the questions, red for the answers. I wore holes in the typewriter ribbon, but it got me an “A!”

At the time, I thought the notebook was a bit unreasonable. But, an impatient teenager just wants to cut to the chase and hit the highway! I realized down the road, however, that he was aiming for something other than eating up my free time with his homework assignment: he was making sure that when we did actually get out there, those rules would be tattooed on our brains! (Plus, Mr. Jude being tasked with the hard stuff like helping me not to freak out at sharing the road with coal trucks, parallel parking and the like, Dad would in turn only have to teach me how to drive a standard shift later without stripping the gears out of his little Ford Escort…which is a story for another time.)

Among other rules he drilled into our heads, Mr. Jude repeatedly said, “No left-foot braking.” Now, I can’t remember whether it’s an actual code in the WV Drivers Manual, but I think the reasoning behind it was that in order to hit the brake, one would have to take the right foot off the gas pedal to engage the brake, thus preventing an accidental engine surge when the car needed to stop. I can remember a hilarious incident where Mr. Jude had us in a big open field, where the Matewan Town Hall now sits and the Magnolia Fair is held, letting us drive around and round to practice. One of my classmates which shall remain nameless was at the wheel that day, and she did exactly what he had told us not to do…and when she did, she stomped on the gas pedal instead of the brake and had us in a cloud of dust, barreling toward the river like a runaway train. Those of us in the back seat knew we were goners. Since the drivers ed car had dual controls, Mr. Jude stopped the car and cried out, “Now don’t…be…doing…that!” I laugh every time I remember it, because I still hear it in his understandably rattled voice. God bless him, he deserved the Drivers Ed award instead of me, just for agreeing to take on our bunch of greenhorns.

It was a hard habit to learn, right foot braking, but all this came to my mind yesterday as I glanced down and noticed that my left foot was tucked back against the car seat—something I had begun doing all those years ago to prevent that foot from creeping up to that brake pedal…just to keep my teacher from scolding me! In trying to prevent being told I was doing it wrong, I inadvertently began doing it right!

So what have rules about driving got to do with one’s spiritual life, much less life in general? It’s actually a pretty good analogy. If we don’t learn the rules of engagement, we’ll almost certainly try to do the right thing the wrong way. That’s true whether we’re learning to drive, play an instrument, develop any kind of life skill, and yes, grow to maturity in our Christian walk. Somewhere along the way, while going over those questions and answers over and over in this notebook assignment, I became a better driver before I was even entrusted with a set of keys. Interesting, huh? Going over and over the Scriptures throughout my life has sure helped me live a lot better, too. Oh that I’d followed them in every situation I’ve encountered!

Sometimes when I read the Bible, particularly the Old Testament when God was setting forth His laws to His children in the wilderness, I marvel that He would even have to tell them (and us) not to do some things. In fact, some acts seemed to violate common sense even before they hit the sin category…such as God telling us we shouldn’t commit bestiality or murder. Yet, the Lord has always known that we humans, when left to our own devices, will go and do what defies even common sense. Romans 1 is a good New Testament example. Was He trying to insult our intelligence when He was so specific about the do’s and don’ts? Of course not. He just knew that humankind’s tendency is to let soul override spirit in the decision-making process. An unsanctified soul will always pair up with its cohort, the unsanctified body, unless the Word is alive in our spirit man and drawing our head knowledge toward the spiritual rather than the carnal.

Sex within marriage? Not a sin. Sex outside marriage? Sin. Left-foot braking…taking something which is right and going about it all wrong. The right foot’s still on the gas and the left foot’s trying to hit the brake, and we slam into the guardrail…assuming of course that there even is a guardrail. The curve may be steep and cliff may be high…if all we get are a few dings and dents and a higher insurance premium, we’ll be getting off easy. We may wind up, however, with an unplanned pregnancy, jealousy or difficulties in marriage or later relationships, a soul tie with someone we can no longer stand, AIDS or some other dreaded disease. And worst of all, we’ve just sinned against God and against our own bodies.

That’s just one instance of left-foot braking. What about our other appetites? One cookie turns into a whole pack. A craving for momentary satisfaction turns into a violent addiction. A few dollars from the cash drawer, with an intent to pay it back, later becomes a regular practice of “borrowing” followed by a jail sentence for embezzlement. Why? Because the flesh will never say, “No” or “Enough.” The flesh will never say, “Deny yourself” or “Wait” or “Do the right thing.” The flesh-driven soul reasons that although it may have gone terribly wrong for someone else, it won’t happen to you. You can control it. You can quit any time you want. Right? Wrong.

The truth is, we need a rule book. We need God’s Word to tell us what to do, how to respond, how to pray…and when we mess up, how to recover. Personally, I’m glad that God has made life an open Book test, with all the answers where we can freely access them. When we regularly talk about them, write them, rehearse them, they become ingrained in our thought pattern. We may have temptations, but when we choose to use our spirit—our right foot if you will—to accelerate and to do the braking too, we’re so much more likely to please our Teacher. And when we’re trying to do the right thing, grace is that second brake pedal on His side of the car. He is well able to keep us from falling, or in this case, crashing. And I’m so thankful that for all the times I’ve failed miserably, not once has He stopped loving me.

Makes me want to get it right…how about you?