and KNOW that I AM GOD.
January 2010 archive
Many of us would acknowledge we are more than a little confused about heaven. This morning, some writing from Dan Allender, that calls us to rethink heaven:
“Our images aren’t much better We speak so seldom of heaven and when we do, the images are sickly: fat babies fluttering around with tiny wings, bored saints lazing on shapeless clouds, strumming harps and wondering what’s happening back on earth where the real action is.
The crisis of hope that afflicts the church today is a crisis of imagination. Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft writes:
Medieval imagery (which is almost totally biblical imagery) of light, jewels, stars, candles, trumpets, and angels no longer fits our ranch.style, supermarket world. Pathetic modern substitutes of fluffy clouds, sexless cherubs, harps and metal halos (not halos of light) presided over by a stuffy divine Chairman of the Bored are a joke, not a glory Even more modern, more up‑to‑date substitutes‑Heaven as a comfortable feeling of peaceand kindness, sweetness and light, and God as a vague grandfatherly benevolence, a senile philanthropist‑are even more insipid. Our pictures of Heaven simply do not move us; they are not moving pictures. It is this aesthetic failure rather than intellectual or moral failures in our pictures of Heaven and of God that threatens faith most potently today. Our Pictures Of Heaven are dull, platitudinous and syrupy; therefore, so is our faith, our hope, and our love of heaven….It doesn’t matter whether it’s a dull lie or a dull truth. Dullness, not doubt, is the strongest enemy of faith, just as indifference, not hate is the strongest enemy of love. (Everything You Wanted to Know about Heaven).
If our pictures of heaven are to move us, they must be moving pictures. So go ahead. Dream a little. Use your imagination. Picture the best possible ending to your story you can. If that isn’t heaven, something better is.”
Dan Allender, To Be Told
“This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave-tending life. It’s adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike, ‘What’s next, Papa?’ God’s Spirit touches our spirits and confirms who we really are. We know who he is, and we know who we are: Father and children.”
“Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ’s love for us? There is no way!” Eugene Peterson, The Message, Romans 8:15-17, 35
Discussing the part of Romans 8 that deals with our adoption as “sons” (yes, sons, women is actually a very dignifying attributive in Biblical context, and we women are called “sons”! In that culture, being a son meant you got the inheritance!), Tim Keller writes:
“Secondly, the image of “adoption” tells us that our relationship with God is based completely on a legal act by the Father. You don’t “win” a father, and you don’t “negotiate” for a parent. Adoption is a legal act on the part of the father — it is very expensive and costly only for him. There is nothing the son does to win or earn the status. It is simply received (v.15).”
I read this and thought, “Well, no. At least in the experience of so many people I know, you do ‘win’ a father, and you do ‘negotiate’ for a parent.’ I thought, “Maybe we should wish we were adopted!” And then it hit me — the glorious good news! Oh yeah, we are! God the Father went to a lot of trouble and expense to adopt ME. Wow. And I didn’t do anything to earn or win the status. I must simply RECEIVE it.
That’s it. All the words I’m going to write on this because I think it’s time for us to step back and ponder this amazing story, more amazing than any one you’ll see on CNN today.
Ponder:
1. Say it aloud, write it five times. God went to a lot of cost and expense to adopt ME! How do you feel about that?
2. Again, say it aloud, write it five times. ”And I didn’t do anything to earn or deserve it.” How do you feel about that?
3. One more time, “I must simply RECEIVE it.” How do you feel about that?
When my kids were young, aged 6 to 1 month, there would be moments of extreme chaos everywhere and I’d sort of stop, like pressing pause on the DVD player, and the motion around me would continue but I’d be in my own interior world, and i’d ask, “Who am I and how did I get here…” I just never expected to be a full-time mother of four young children. I had my life planned — I was going to have exactly two children, one boy and one girl (like both my husband and I had) and I would continue working as an English teacher at the private school in Atlanta I had attended. That period of my life is only one in which God came in and hijacked my plans and took me to a different, but very redemptive place altogether.
This is just one small example of why we need to stop from time to time and look at our stories, find out what’s really going on, watch what has happened, feel the pain of loss and experience the great joy and hope of redemption. And this is why I LOVE helping people read their own stories, to seek the hidden treasure of redemption in their lives. For it is in seeing the passion and pleasure of God written into our stories that frees us to really live! Galatians 5:1 says, “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.”
I love to teach the TRUE story of Scripture, because there we see how God writes his story of grace — in very unexpected ways. I love to help people look at the intersection of their stories and the stories of Scripture. Wow, look at this, i’m just like Sarah — when she laughed — I’m afraid I laugh all the time at God — “Oh, you can’t do that! Oh you wouldn’t do something that wonderful for ME!” And He is so kind and even a little teasing, calling me out to play in the freedom for which Christ set me free, “Oh, BUT YOU DID LAUGH!” 
Boy, do I feel caught. And yet, He doesn’t catch us to humiliate us. He catches us to see HIM. And when we see God, we see that He has stunning answers to the question, “Who am I and what am I doing here?”
“You are my beloved, and you are here to enjoy me and worship me forever!”
For reflection:
1. What about you? Do you stop from time to time and look at your story, asking the questions, “Who am I and what am I doing here?”
2. Think about setting aside a morning or a day to ponder some core questions about your story: when was there rest and peace, how was it disturbed or disrupted, what did you do to try to re-establish equilibrium, can you see God’s redemption and restoration working in this story?
Today, the second part of author Jennie Schut‘s guest blog on how knowing God is our refuge frees us to create boldly. If you missed part 1, please visit yesterday’s blog.
Jennie's bold creation
My recent experience of this was an art project I was assigned to do for school. We each were asked to build identical black foam core boxes (they were all to look the same on the outside) and build a metaphorical environment on the inside, which could be accessed only by a keyhole that the viewer could peer into and see the miniature environment. This scene was to be based on a traumatic event that had happened to us. So, from the outside, these projects just appeared to be black boxes with a tiny peep hole and maybe a couple trap doors to operate interior lights. Peering into the box revealed a scene that represented our experience symbolically.
I chose to do my project about a family that I knew very well and had grown up with. I deeply respected this family, as they were highly involved and active in the church. My life intertwined with theirs on several different levels. When I became a young adult, my idealistic family began to dismantle before me. The father had made sexual advances toward me and it became apparent years later that he had been sexually abusing his daughter, my close friend. When my friend confronted her mother, she was accused of lying and trying to ruin the family.
This project was a catalyst for me to grieve that part of my story in the presence of God. I spent some time in silence and solitude and as the presence of God began to saturate my thinking and creating, I began to express my thoughts and feelings to Him who was giving me refuge as the symbolism began to take shape. The above photograph is my project and it is very difficult to see, since the image has been taken through the peephole. There are 3 birds. The male bird is in a steel wool nest in the tree (he is green, but has also been inked black – he is operating out of his own storyline of pain). There is a small female (symbolized by pink) who has been inked or “injured” laying in the grass and there is an adult female bird in the passageway, “guarding” the darkness that has been concealed. A key around her neck signifies her as keeper of the secret. She is the largest bird because she is the one wielding power.
Though creativity and expression can be a very painful process many times, it is good and possible to do. Why? Why would we walk through fear of story and the sometimes grueling process of telling story creatively? Because of Psalm 91. Because of the Presence of God. God offers us a place of true warmth and beauty to be bold and audacious in our storytelling. We have a refuge. We have a trustworthy Protector. And our creative storytelling can be informed by our intimacy with Jesus. I encourage you to sit in silence for a while and just be a receiver of God’s presence. Allow Him to speak and fill you up. Cease from your doing and working and toiling. Just “be” in the High God’s presence. You will find it a refuge!