Upon Shigionoth

Despite being named after the sound of coughing up phlegm, Habakkuk comes across as a pretty transparent character. His first words, straight out of the gate, are cries of lament: How long, Lord, must I call for your help but you do not listen?"  He knew God.  He believed in God.  He had heard the great stories of God, but he longed to experience God's activity in his life.  I can relate, and so today Habakkuk prays for me (3:2):

 LORD, I have heard of your fame;
   I stand in awe of your deeds, LORD.
Repeat them in our day,
   in our time make them known;
   in wrath remember mercy.

Reverse Butterfly Effect

The Butterfly Effect... something along the lines of a butterfly flaps its wings in South American which produces enough climate change to form a hurricane in the Atlantic several weeks later.  Or, a kid sneezes in China and a group of Syracuse students break the Guinness World record for the largest flapjack. Huh? It has something to do with Chaos Theory - I'm lost already but I do know that in Genesis 1 the Spirit of God is hovering over the "chaos" and then God preaches order out of chaos, "Let there be light..." You're confused now, so let me explain.

 My current job? - Helping build fences.  Notice I did not say, "building fences."  The key word is "helping." I spend many of my days carrying pickets.  I'm the machine, a rather scrawny one, driven by the commands of my gracious boss - like a front end loader for Munchkinland.  As I'm in the monotonous rhythm of loading and unloading today I start feeling a desire to preach again.  AHHH!  I cannot even get through a day without crying, so the thought of wanting to return to the pulpit makes me nervous.  I explore the origins of such an out of place thought, "Why am I feeling the desire to preach right now?"

1. I believe over the last three months I have gained new insight regarding sin, compassion, love, and loneliness which helps me understand and relate better to people when preaching.
2. Preaching makes me feel significant... DING! DING!  There's the red flag!

And I waved that red flag right in front of my face.  I'm on a mission to connect deeply with God, not feel significant.  I was mad at myself for so easily reverting to my old pattern, but I desperately want to be significant.  And that's when the mental scroll started rolling, "I LONG to be significant.  I LONG to be desired.  I LONG to be admired.  I LONG to be attractive.  I LONG to be wanted."  Dagnabadidabit! I was so angry with myself.  I want and should LONG for God, but I don't, even after all the crap, I don't. So, I just started praying Psalm 63:1

O God, you are my God,
   earnestly I seek you;
my soul thirsts for you,
   my body LONGS for you,
in a dry and weary land
   where there is no water.

Over and over, I moved wood and whispered the prayer, over and over, over and over... when finally I whisper shouted, "God where are you?  Come on!"  SO MUCH SILENCE! But then I went back to Psalm 63 and transferring wooden pickets.  As I gathered the next load to carry into the yard a single butterfly landed on my stack of pickets.  This may not mean anything to you, and it wouldn't to me either if my wife had not written this blog entry a few days ago.  In it she says, "At the beginning of this "hell" a dear friend of mine gave me this necklace [of a] butterfly: She told me..... 'God can create something beautiful out of this mess.  From the ugly caterpillar comes a beautiful butterfly.  God can make something new and beautiful again.'" God bringing order out of chaos.

 

I cannot be absolute that it was God giving me an Elijah Whisper, "I'm right here!" but I would like to think so.  It affirmed what the resurrection proves: it will be okay, not only for me, but for everyone involved.  Out of my hurricane of destruction God brought the butterfly.

Jegodsus

Marcion blew a head gasket!  A piece of hardware must have come loose in that noggin of his.  Doesn't he know that you cannot work for a church and ask ridiculously honest questions.  He was a bishop for Pete's sake,  a bishop in the Second Century and as he read through the Bible he noted some discrepancies between God in the Old Testament and God in the New Testament.  He did not have the nerve to diagnose God with multiple personality disorder so he suggested two gods in scripture: the lower class God of the OT and the good God of the NT.  And what does The Bishop get for taking off  the blinders and wrestling with some of the confusion about God?  -A platter of excommunication with a side of heretic.  Nice knowing you Marc!

Now, while I don't agree with Marcion's conclusions, I think I would enjoy a breakfast conversation with him over some Eggs Benedict and Kenyan Chai.  Because there are things about God that confuse me, that make me angry...

1. God tests Abraham by commanding him to sacrifice his son?  Whether he ever intended to let him do it or not... still. (Gen. 22)
2. I feel sorry for the Exodus Pharaoh because although half of the time he hardens his own heart, the other half of the time God hardens his heart.  How do you win that one? (Ex. 9:12)
3. God's command to punish the Amalekites by killing everything: men, women, and CHILDREN (I Samuel 15:1-4)
4. "The next day an evil (harmful) spirit from God came forcefully upon Saul." (I Sam. 18:10)
5. Or, one of my favorites, when God sends a deceiving spirit into the prophets' mouths in to lure Ahab into the battle of his demise. (I Kings 22:19-23)
6. The Book of Job... uh, where do I start?

There are things about God that are disturbing, things we often don't talk about on Sunday AM, or read to our kids before nighty-night.  I know, I know, "You don't want to serve a God who you can fully understand.  His ways are beyond our ways.  God works in mysterious ways!"  I get that, but I think sometimes Christians use those bumper-sticker sayings to be intellectually and faithfully lazy.  God has a history of revealing himself.  He wants us to KNOW him.  So what do I do with confusing aspects/tactics of a God who wants me to know him intimately yet is far larger than my minuscule brain; a God who sometimes seems to step outside of his self-definition - "God is Love;"  a God who, at times, I wouldn't want to meet in a dark ally... what do I do?  I don't have a sure answer.  I tell you what I do  right now.  I turn to Jesus.

Sometimes God appears inconsistent, but then there is Jesus.  He is consistent.  He says, "This is how life looks, life as it is designed to be lived," and then he lives it.  You look at that wandering homeless rabbi and you start naming all the cliches "That guy walks the talk, practices what he preaches..."  Jesus makes sense; I cannot get away from it.  And then Colossians 2:9 says, "For in Christ ALL the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form." and then John says (1:18), "No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son who himself is God... has made him known."

When I am confused by God, when I am angry because I cannot figure him out, when scripture seems to present different perspectives of God, the whole story of God and God himself points me to Jesus.  Jesus is God saying, "I know I'm confusing the heck out of you right now.  I know you don't get it.  I know you think I've lost my mind, but look at Jesus.  That's me, God.  Right now some things don't make sense, but I'm Jesus: the one who heals the leper with a touch, the one who forgives the prostitute, the one who feeds the hungry crowds, the one who cuddles the babies, the one who empties myself on the cross!"  When God is far off and I cannot see what he is doing, I look through Jesus and things get clearer.