Posting Elsewhere Right Now

I know I have been absent from this space for a long time. Right now, I am posting my devotional thoughts at an alternate site: http://matthewshours.blogspot.com.

Rend Your Heart

Joel 2:12-13

"Even now," declares the LORD, "return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning."
Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity.

As I sit this morning while Gideon naps, I have felt a distance from You. Certainly tennis camp made it hard to find a place to seek You, and Andrew's wedding was filled with time for family. It felt selfish to set aside time for You when I could spend it with a soon-to-be married brother, a twice-a-year seen sister from Colorado, and the rest of my beloved family. But two weeks without real discipline is too much, and our relationship has been strained by my doing. Consider this my love letter of apology.

Now I'm not worried about Your punishment yet, no, I'm worried about our love. I don't like to see us grow cold, for me to lose sight of Your presence, for our hearts to be distant. And so I have wondered to myself and to You, "What do I do to repair the strain?"

And Lord, my love, You never fail to answer when I seek with sincerity. "Return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning. Rend your heart..." Again, You wish to see me seek and follow with truth and sincerity. My heart is broken for the damage I've done, and sometimes the wounds become callous and it seems to overwhelming to pick them open and wade through them. But my Lord of Renewal, You are a healer. So deep the wounds might be that I have caused You with my silence, but You are gracious and abounding in love. Receive my heart-broken apology.

Now, my son will soon call, and I will leave this place of peace with You. But do not let peace leave me. Do not take Your spirit away. Continue to give, and in the way that I respond; to Gideon, to Courtney, to strangers, I will give because of You. Help me to remember that.

Love,
Matthew.

A Prayer for Solitude

Lord God, my Father and Sustainer...

In the summer we drift,
more accurately, I drift.
In a busyness season,
I am surrounded with
those I love and those
I am obligated to.
Weddings and camps,
anniversaries and baby-sitting,
late nights because I can sleep in,
difficulty getting up because I
sleep next to the most beautiful
women you've yet made.
I've stayed interested,
but I've wandering commitment.
When I'm in rhythm,
You fit into all the cracks,
You fill the freedom of Gideon's naps,
the preps when I relax.
When I'm out of practice,
I'd rather read about You.
I'd rather long to be with You
than actually be with You.
So, Lord of Renewal,
what can renew? I'm now
allowing myself to desire to,
where can I find You?
Draw me away for some time,
allow me peace where inside
I find a drink under this summer,
the refreshment of loneliness.

My Desire

"This is my son, I am well pleased"

I've been reading Sacred Rhythms, a book by Ruth Haley Barton. This book is uncovering my true longing for spiritual intimacy with You. As she describes the serenity and peace of solitude and silence, I long to sit on a hillside watching the insects buzz close to the tips of the grass. As she describes the fullness of Scripture realized in Lectio Divina, I long to again sit with the text in an unhurried, meditative way. She writes of the spiritual discipline of taking care of our bodies, and I feel like standing up straighter and paying attention to my diet desires. She speaks of Sabbath as the life-giving day, I yearn to take a nap in the sun.

All this to say I've been inspired. Inspired to intimacy with You. So after finishing the book in hurried fashion while in Florida, I'm back to slow down and go through the practices. So I started today with Chapter 1, which was about naming your desire before God. The idea, is that if we go before God with our truest desires, in our most vulnerable and needy spot, there we will be met and there we will be changed.

So I spent today walking with my son and my dog, thinking to myself: What do I want from You? I imagined You walking up to me and saying, "So, what do you want me to do?" I went through lots of answers, and in all of them I was attempting honest self-examination. I want to do your will..."So what do you want me to do?" I want to have a focus..."So what do you want me to do?" I want to spend more time like this with Gideon..."So what do you want me to do?" As I kept circling through things that I thought I wanted, I realized that they had more to do with what I need to do that what I wanted from You.

Then it hit me, so hard I said it out loud (which was weird because there was a lady running past my as I exclaimed): Validation. I experience a lot of perceived and real rejection in my life. I need someone who is saying well done. And then You said it, just like in Scripture but to me. This is my son, I am well pleased. I am Your son, and You are pleased with me. It is a relief and a stress reliever just to know that. I want to revel in that reality, for You have and are meeting my deepest desire.

My response is simple too: You are my dad, I love you. I will continue to try to please You.

The Arrogant One

Scripture Reading: Jeremiah 49-50

-the pride of your heart have deceived you
- Arise and attack a nation at ease, which lives in confidence
- See, I am against you, you arrogant one
- The arrogant one will stumble and fall and no one will help her up

Lord God, the school year is ending. It is a time of much reflection for me, where I look back and think about what has happened over the last year and what I truly did well and could have done better. In many ways, it is the only true time of reflection that I have about the school year, because the rest of the term is such a whirlwind of activity. Heck, even the end of the year has its things that must get done and planned, mostly by me it seems.

The end of the year is also a time where I receive a whole lot of praise from various sources. Hank in my end-of-the-year conversation, telling me how great I'm going to be as the Bible teacher. A note from Grace's mom, a mention from Emma's mom, Nathan's dad appreciating the award he got, another mom who almost cried because her child only got one award and it was from my class. I look through the year and I also tend to grab and elaborate on success stories. It makes me all feel good. It makes my stress smooth out a bit and I don't worry so much about next year.

And yet at the same time I have a bit of doubt heading into the summer. How will I be able to effectively translate the truths of Your unbelievably tasty word to the middle school mind? Will I experience any success at all in convincing the unconvinced student of the importance of Bible study and relationship with You? I am not trying to make Christians, just trying to give them an appreciation for deepening their relationship with You. Will any of the guys grab onto that, because this year working with the guys was kind of an absolute failure. So will they? How will it affect me that I will have a health class to teach too? Will that just throw me off? Will it be easy to keep that as unimportant and therefore Ii won't really do a good job? Will I honor You with my teaching?

I appreciate the doubts though, because they keep hacking away at my pride. I have had bouts of pride recently, and I hate it when You have to use failure to cut me down rather than doubt. I look at the Scriptures today, just a litany of tribes and nations being overthrown because of their pride and arrogance. It is a human trait that I believe You truly hate. But it is so tempting to fall into it, to truly take credit, to stroke my own ego a bit. And it comes in the darnedest of places for me.

- When I have a good Sunday teaching at Exodus
- When I am experiencing success in avoiding sin
- When I am experiencing success in discipline
- When someone praises the work I do, teaching, tennis, church, whatever

It's odd because most of those things are things that I pray to You to help me with. On Sunday's I will often pray that You speak to everybody and use Your words, not mine. But yet I get prideful about my position when You actually do speak through me. Instead of the praise of answered prayer that is due to You, I try to grab the glory for myself. Same thing at avoiding sin and discipline, I am always praying to You for help, and when You do, I take credit.

Ridiculous. And so then I must fail. I have to make everyone sit through a crappy Sunday teaching, so that You can put me back in my own place. I must rely on my strength and fall to sin, become undisciplined, etc. And then I again realize I need You.

I certainly am always tired of failure, and as I reflect on things, I'm tired of myself. Things go much better when I let myself be used by You, instead of use You. So today, one resounding word of thanks for Your word! And then one resounding prayer, not me but You, and to God be the glory!

Hurt and Hope

Scripture Reading: Jeremiah 30-31

- "Your wound is incurable, your injury beyond healing."
- "So there is hope for your descendants," declares the LORD. "Your children will return to their own land."
- "But I will restore you to health and heal your wounds," declares the LORD.

Sunday I taught a sermon called "Community of Truth." We covered these very same topics that show up here in the text of Jeremiah. The idea is that we all have real struggles, real wounds, real and deep hurt that we must walk through. And that You offer hope out of these hurts that is just as real.

It's great words, very true. But have I taken the time to reflect on it myself? Not so much. Where is my true hurt? What do I really struggle with that wounds me again and again? Do I have the confidence in You to face up to it? Do I have the trust in You to hope? Do I have the internal strength to order my life in such a way to claim "victory in Jesus"?

Hurt. I suppose I hurt in many ways. For whatever reason, I've recognized that rejection is one of the deepest wounds upon my heart. Well, maybe that is true. Lack of appreciation is another deep wounder of my soul. It is interesting, because both of these have to do mightily with what others think of me. It matters a great deal to me what others think of me. I think that makes sense, because I also recognize that I play a peace-making role in almost every community I am in, and to play that peace-making role when I am in conflict with many people would be difficult. And so kind of without thinking about it this whole cycle falls into place. I do not stand firm with strong convictions, but where I put my foot timidly forward, offering myself up in one capacity or another, I am rejected. I am easy to reject because I am timid, I am easy to under appreciate because I do not think highly of myself. When I am under appreciated and rejected, or even if I awkwardly feel like things are headed that way, I curl back up into my introvert shell and lick my wounds. Because I believe in truth and community, I will timidly put myself out there again, only to go through the same cycle. But off to the side, I am trying to heal the hurts and desires that go unnoticed myself.

Let me be more concrete. One of the hurts that I struggle with is not being taken seriously by my wife. In other words, she basically knows that I will do what she wants to do, and for the most part that is fine with me. An example, if I try to woo her into an "intimate" time, she will often feel free to say "no, I don't really feel like it." I know that that doesn't sound like rejection, but hearing it time and time again is wounding to me. Or I'll suggest that we think about moving the TV out of the living room, or that we stop watching pointless shows, or that we try to do devotions together as a family. She may agree, but then put so little effort into actually doing those things that I get frustrated, give up, and feel like my ideas for the betterment of my family are not appreciated. Because of who I am, I don't believe in just keeping these things to myself. So I'll tell Courtney how I'm feeling, but she always gets overwhelmed and doesn't know how to respond. So she doesn't respond. And I don't hold that against her, I know that is easier. But it leaves me in a place of rejection again. Off to the side, I struggle through bouts of temptation with lust and pornography, because the internet rarely says no.

This hurt can be played out with Exodus Community as well. I'm a spit-baller when it comes to ideas, I think large, I think small, I think action, I think rest, I just think. And so I like to throw out ideas. Sometimes, whether it be because Bryan and Joel are tired, don't have enough time, or my ideas are bad (which is entirely possible), my ideas get met with a continual pessimism. Again, this goes to the deep place of hurt I have for not being taken seriously, because things will just get dismissed. The way I am tempted to respond to this hurt is to just take control, but without any community. To say things in front of the whole community that have not been brought up in the group of leaders. To slowly and subversively try to get MY ideas into the group, instead of approaching with truth and honesty. And it's all because of hurt.

But there is hope.

"But I will restore you to health and heal your wounds." You declare this to all who will listen. This is a declaration for the many at Exodus Community, for the many wallowing in sorrow in our world, and more specifically today, You are talking to me. Yet, I know that much is required of me to do the actions of hope. I must trust that the hope is real, that Your peace is real. And I must be willing to do things that I am uncomfortable with in order to order my life around Your values and Your commands.

Lord God, be in my actions and words today.
Order them, make them pleasing in Your way,
help me to continue to serve You
and to hope and trust that my service will bring peace.
Remind me that in You, I am not rejected.
Remind me that in You, I am always appreciated.
Remind me, though I do not like trite "life" verses,
that I am "fearfully and wonderfully made."
Let me find joy in that, let me find peace in that.
You are the Creator, the words You speak are truth.
Bring me out of hurt into the depths of Your hope.
Amen.

Perhaps They Will Listen

Scripture Reading: Jeremiah 26-29

- Perhaps they will listen and each will turn from their evil ways.
- If you do not listen to me and follow my law...
- ...if you do not listen to the words of my servants...
- Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.

Lord God, You are a listener. From everlasting to everlasting it seems that You take the time to listen to us. You hear and You act, the true definition of listening. In these passages above, an all to common life theme is revealed: we are invited to listen, we do not listen, but You continue to hear us.

How tiring it must get to be the Lord. Most people, given time and focus of honest reflection, hear what they are doing wrong. They can recognize the ways in which their life doesn't match up to what You call us to. I know, right at this moment, what the places of familiar struggle that are still out of line with Your truth are: my eating habits, my lack of service to the needy, my lust, and my oft-times selfish attitude of doing what is easiest for me. But am I truly listening to Your promise of peace if these situations are properly dealt with?

Well, either I am not listening or I do not believe You. Lack of trust is such a basic issue to mankind. The immediacy of our own ideas and the belief in our own hands to work things out causes such a block in our true faith. There are several areas of my life that I have never truly been able to struggle through with You to a conclusion, and the root of those areas is distrust.

Why do I distrust?

I want to listen for the answer to this question today from You. I want to be more open to Your "community of truth" words to me. Lord, this morning I desire the beginning of a change. Do not leave me listening to dead space all day. Speak, Lord, speak in truth. Speak to me, to change me this day. And continue to develop in me a listening ear.