The Valley of Vision

A little plug for a book of puritan prayers that I've recently begun to reread. These prayers are generally one page long, and they are filled with beautiful expressions of worship. The book is titled, The Valley of Vision.

The Valley of Vision

Lord, high and holy, meek and lowly,
Thou hast brought me to the valley of vision,
where I live in the depth but see thee in the heights;
hemmed in by mountains of sin I behold thy glory.

Let me learn by paradox
that the way down is the way up,
that to be low is to be high,
that the broken heart is the healed heart,
that the contrite spirit is the rejoicing spirit,
that the repenting soul is the victorious soul,
that to have nothing is to possess all,
that to bear the cross is to wear the crown,
that to give is to receive,
that the valley is the place of vision.
Lord, in the daytime stars can be seen from deepest wells,
and the deeper the wells the brighter thy stars shine;
Let me find thy light in my darkness,
thy life in my death,
thy joy in my sorrow,
thy grace in my sin,
thy riches in my poverty,
thy glory in my valley.

On Perfection

I have a problem.

Maybe some of you are thinking, "Gee, she finally realized it!":)

I've been thinking a lot lately about perfection. Now, I'm not what you would call a perfectionist. My room is often messy, I don't finish (or half-finish) things perfectly, and I don't necessarily follow directions to the letter. There's no area where I have things set up exactly how I want them and if you move them, you're in trouble (especially now). But even though I am quick to tell you how imperfect I am, and quick to realize how short of the highest mark I fall, I do always strive to be as perfect as I can. Maybe it's something that stems from my German heritage (my German relatives tend to be awfully meticulous), or maybe it's just because my dad always told me to do the best that I can. But wherever it came from, it has created a problem.

Because for the longest time, I would look at the Bible as a story of heroes. And I certainly didn't want my heroes to have flaws. I couldn't understand why David was considered a man after God's own heart - I mean, hello! He slept with Bathsheba and killed her husband!! Boy did that make me mad. I couldn't believe he fell like that and people still looked up to him!

And then there's Jonah. The guy who ran away from God, was swallowed by a whale because he wouldn't do what God said, grudgingly followed God's command, whined about the whole time, and then berated God for killing a vine that shaded him and for having mercy on a whole people group. Talk about a whiny loser.

These people had flaws. And I couldn't understand why they would be included in the Bible. After all, shouldn't we see people who do mighty things for the Lord and strive for perfection and almost, nearly reach it? I looked down on these people and many other people who had obvious flaws. I expected better of them. They're Christians, after all. God's chosen people. Shouldn't they be like God? Perfect? (Notice I exempted myself from this lofty expectation!) I have failed to remember, especially lately, that the Bible is not simply a guidebook to being a really good person.

Then I started reading Give Them Grace, by Elyse Fitzpatrick. One of my facebook friends recommended it for parents as well as for teachers. And since I'll be spending a considerable amount of time with children under the age of 10 this year, I thought I should read up on parenting, since those skills are helpful for teachers as well. This book really diagnosed my problem with perfectionism.

Listen to what she says about obedience vs. the message of the Bible:

"...[E]very story is about God's grace through Jesus Christ and the gospel... The story of Jonah isn't about learning to be obedient or facing the consequences. The story of Jonah is about how God is merciful to both the religiously self-righteous, unloving Pharisee (Jonah) and the irreligious, violent pagan. The story is about God's ability to save souls and use us even when we disobey. It's a story about God's mercy, not our obedience."

She goes on to ask how many times you use the Bible as a rule book instead of the "good news." Unfortunately, I think I've been using the Bible for my rule book. I got upset when people disobeyed the rules, as if that were giving us a bad example. But the primary goal of the Bible is not to teach us to be obedient. Yes, we are to grow to be more like Christ, and we are no longer slaves to sin like we were before. But we're supposed to focus on God's grace, His mercy, NOT how to be perfect! The goal is to bring us to Christ. To show us the great mercy of God in saving us even though we fail Him again and again and again and again. Even His greatest king, David, failed him in a very great way! And yet, God calls him a man after His own heart. The Israelites turned away from Him time after time after time. They whined when they were slaves in Egypt and they whined after He set them free. They followed Him, but also other Gods even though He reminded them over and over again that if they didn't obey Him alone, there would be consequences. And yet He says, "Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are continually before me." (Isaiah 49:16) He even calls them his children, dearly beloved by the God of all the earth: "But the Lord's portion is his people, Jacob his allotted heritage. He found him in a desert land, and in the howling waste of the wilderness; he encircled him, he cared for him, he kept him as the apple of his eye" (Deut. 32:10). The creator and maker of the world stoops to call us His children, forgives our weaknesses, gives us strength to be better, saves us from ourselves, loves us.

May I learn to be more and more like my merciful God, and less like the rule-obeying, self-righteous Pharisees.

"The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; His mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness." (Lam. 3:22-24)

Catching Up

I often question my desire to write in a blog. I came across a quote recently that made me chuckle: "Blogs used to be called Diaries, and they were written by twelve-year-old girls" (Greg Gutfeld). I am certainly no twelve-year-old, although I am a girl. My struggle entails my own (un)worthiness to write a blog. How much knowledge can I actually have that others need? I haven't lived that long, I have no children, I don't even have my own house right now! Can I really put anything on the internet that people need to know?

The answer, of course, is probably not. However, I think I will try to keep posting. Sometimes I just get so full of words that I have to share with someone, or I might explode. And sometimes I so desperately want to share other people's words that I've found to be useful to me, and I think a blog does this job very effectively.

I know that I haven't been updating my blog lately. Truth is, I've been adjusting to a new situation in life. As of May 1, 2011 I no longer live in a little white house in the middle of nowhere. God has graciously given my husband a job that allowed us to move closer to our families. So, here we are, back in Central Pa, living in my parents' house... saving up for a home of our own. I also got a 3/4 times teaching job that will start in the fall. Once again, God has shown his loving-kindness to us in ways that I cannot fathom. I look at myself and see how unworthy I am, how I doubt Him over and over, and how He just keeps lavishing blessings on us, one after another, saving us, answering prayer, answering worries even before I prayed (shame on me). I want to share those things with you, the things I observe, the things I wonder, the questions I have, the examples of the goodness of our Creator. So, be patient with me; I know that once school starts I will be one busy chica. But hopefully over the next few weeks I will become regular at posting.

For now, here's a quote I found this morning from Ann Voskamp, who also writes a blog. She was featured in World Magazine a few weeks ago, and I just got around to reading her column. To shorten, she thanked God for holding back the rain so that her husband could finish planting his soy beans (I cannot emphasize enough how much the weather affects farmers' livelihoods). Her daughter asked her why she didn't thank God if it rained, even though they didn't want the rain. "If God really works in everything - then why don't we thank Him for everything?" As the rain started coming down, Ann thought about this question, and here is where she ended up.



" If I only thank Him when the fig tree buds - is this "selective faith?"? Practical atheism? What of faith in a God who wastes nothing? Who makes all into grace?
... is thanking God for everything... thanking Him for evil?
When we bought the enemy's lie in the beginning and ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, Satan hissed then that we'd really see and know what is good and evil. But the father of lies, he'd duped us in the whole nine yards. Though we ate of that tree we did not become like God, and we have no knowledge of good and evil apart from God; my seeing, it is not omniscient. Can I really see if a death, disaster, dilemma, is actually evil? Mine is only to see His Word faithfully and wholly obey Him in this. Therein is the tree of life.
Is this why he commands 'giv[e] thanks always and for everything'? Because to thank God in all is to refuse Satan's relentless lure to be god-like in all; to thank God in all is to bend the knee in allegiance to God Who alone knows all; to thank God in all is to give God glory in all. Is this not our chief end? When I only give thanks for some things, aren't I likely to miss giving God glory in most things?
Murmuring thanks isn't to deny that an event isn't a tragedy and neither does it deny that there's a cracking fissure straight across the heart. Giving thanks is only this: making the canyon of pain into a megaphone to proclaim the ultimate goodness of God...
This is not easy: That which I refuse to thank Christ for, I refuse to believe Christ can redeem."


Anyways, I hope it was a blessing to you as well. Until next time...

Biblical Submission

I came upon this article in a blog that I read. The blog hilighted Guideline #2, but I read through the rest of the article and found Guideline #3 to be particularly helpful in understanding my relationship with my husband. I often forget this part (that we are co-heirs in Christ together) and focus more on the wife part.

Guideline #3: A wife is also a sister in Christ to her husband.

In Christian marriage, the spousal relation­ship is not the only one that characterizes the involvement of a man and wife. For Christians, a wife is married to her brother in Christ. All the passages in Scripture about marriage are relevant to a Christian wife, but all the passages about walk­ing with a brother in the Lord are also relevant to her.⁹ This means a wife will not be a good sister in Christ if she engages in behavior that tends to lead her husband into sin (Rom 14:23), or if she avoids rebuking her husband in his sin (Luke 17:3; Gal 6:1-2).¹⁰ one of God's greatest gifts to me is a sis­ter in Christ who sees me more closely than anyone else and, so, is equipped to point out sin in my life that nobody else sees. Marital submission does not mean that a wife ceases to be a fellow Christian along with her husband. Likewise, marital author­ity does not insulate a man from being helped in his sanctification by his wife. Because a wife is called to submit to her husband she will need to think about how to engage her husband in a respectful way, but she must not avoid it all together. If a husband sins against his wife "during the day" she should talk to him about it and rebuke him with respect.

from: http://www.cbmw.org/Journal/Vol-15-No-2/Breaking-the-Marital-Impasse-How-Authority-and-Submission-Work-When-Spouses-Disagree

The Sky is Falling

During my rather long hiatus lots of things have occurred. The sun has risen and set, the clouds have covered the sun, babies have been born, snow has fallen, melted, and more recently, fallen again. I usually get a severe case of the winter doldrums between February and April. It has been especially bad these last two years as I've been living in a place where many people don't plant vegetables until the weekend before Memorial Day (in other words, spring comes late here). I love seeing all the seasons come and go, but to be honest, February always seems like the longest month of the year. I'm tired of dead things. I'm tired of being cold. But the pre-spring season this year has been punctuated by even more depressing happenings than snow storms. It has been a season of death and disaster.

A family in my hometown recently lost 7 of their 8 children in a house fire. It's a loss that I can't even fathom, and I'm not sure many people can, with the exception of Job, who lost 10 children. Unlike Job, this family has had the unwavering support of the community and even the nation, as donations and prayers have poured in. The immediate community has already framed a replacement house for them. But what little comfort these donations must be to them. Their arms will never hold their children again. And how can they keep from wondering why this has happened to them, despite the fact that they're a godly, Christian family. Or maybe because of that fact. Isn't God supposed to protect his people?

On a world-wide scale, the earthquake and tsunami in Japan has killed an unfathomable amount of people (over 18,000 as I write this). And the nuclear plant's struggle to keep the reactor stable - or make it stable, rather - certainly has the world concerned. Add to this the protests in Libya and Egypt, and some people are thinking about the movie 2012. One of my 7th grade students emphatically assured me that the movie events were happening in real life and that we're all going to die next year.

I've been reluctant to speak on the subject, but I can barely go a day before I hear of someone's untimely death. And maybe it's always been this way, and I'm just more sensitive to it because of the Japan disaster and the deaths of those 7 children. It seems trite and selfish to say that it's gotten me "down," but apparently I'm not the only one. I've heard a lot of talk about the end of times recently. And I know I'm young and I don't have the knowledge and experience that many older, wiser people do, but it's a free country after all, so I thought I'd post my thoughts on this subject.

This, of course, is coming from a Christian point of view. And a Calvinistic one, at that. If you're not a Christian or don't believe in a Sovereign, all-powerful God, the end of the world, I suppose, will look quite different to you. I mean, can you prevent it? Can anyone? I can't pretend to know the beliefs of anyone but myself and those who I've personally heard speak on the subject so I will remain silent on them.

The most commonly quoted Bible verses on the end of times are probably from Revelation (naturally) and the 3 gospels that contain Jesus' comments on the fall of Jerusalem and the coming of the Son of Man. Of course, many of these verses have been interpreted differently by many different people, and once again, these are only MY thoughts. I didn't go to seminary, and I am female, so you can take this with however many grains of salt you wish. But here is the verse I've seen quoted:

"For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places." Matthew 24:7

I've always liked history. When I see that verse, I see the whole of human history in it. Has there ever been a time when two nations or kingdoms haven't been at war against each other? And how many times have there been famines and earthquakes? Even in the last 10 years? This, to me, is not conclusive evidence that the world is ending immediately. If you go in the passage it says, "All these are but the beginning of the birth pains" (v. 8), and then it talks about the destruction of the temple for a while. But it's hard to say where Jesus stops talking about the destruction of Jerusalem and starts talking about the end of the world. The commentators that have published my Bible say that at around verse 29, the talk turns to the end of the world. To be sure, it doesn't sound pleasant. But what I'm more interested is Jesus' own comments on his prophesies.

"But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man." Matthew 24:36-39

Now, you may be thinking, that's not quite fair! How can God take these people away before giving them a warning to stop their sinning and repent! Well, my answer would be that he did. I mean, isn't every day a chance and a warning? Isn't every earthquake, every war, every death a warning and a sign that someday, be it tomorrow or 20 years from now, we will all die? This life will come to an end, whether it be from World War III, or natural disasters, or global warming, or whatever. I will come to an end. Whether it be from a car accident on the slippery roads this morning, or from old age, or cancer, or heart disease, or any other malady.

Christ follows up his warning with an entreaty to "stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect" (Matthew 24:42-44).

So, I don't really care much if the world is ending. I care very much for these people who are going through horrible, sorrowful times. But I hope that they can take comfort in Jesus' words in John 16:33 - "In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart, I have overcome the world." I have peace from this verse. I believe in a sovereign, mighty, all powerful God. I believe that he has a plan and that nothing will deviate Him from His plan (Romans 11:33-36). I know that He works out all things for the good of those who love Him (Romans 8:28). And I know that no matter where I am when I die, He will take me to His side and I will praise him eternally (Mark13:27). Everyone who believes in God, sincerely, with his or her whole heart and soul and mind, has these promises to hold onto. Nothing can take us out of God's hand (John 10:27-30). Those who trust in God have a strong foundation. It's not volatile like the nuclear reactor. It's not shaky like the earth's foundations. It's secure. We are secure.

Perhaps I've been presumptuous to speak on these things. Perhaps the world WILL end next year. But if it does, what then? I had better stop worrying and start preparing! For certainly the world will end, or I will end. One of the two has to happen. And I know it's unpopular to speak of God, but I've never cared much for popularity. It's more important to speak of the things that are on my heart, if they stand a chance of helping anyone. That's all I can hope my words can do.

Can I claim a snow day?

Alright, when I started the "useful item" blog, I had ALL these ideas, but I should have written them down, because now they're gone and I'm really struggling! I think I'm about two weeks behind? I'll post two useful things here to get back on track.

Firstly, sour cream/ricotta cheese containers. I know what you're thinking... leftovers. Period. Well, I happen to use them for my plants. Perhaps there's some horrible chemical in the plastic, and this is bad advice..., but I really think that's unlikely. If it's true, I'm very sorry. I find sour cream containers useful for planting seedlings (I tried yogurt containers, but the shape of the Yoplait kind made freeing the seedling a somewhat similar task to freeing your wet feet from rubber boots), and for holding young African violet starts - before you have a more permanent pot for them. Of course if you plant your African violet starts in terra cotta pots, you may have to cut the plastic container down and use it like those very cheap plastic watering dishes at Lowe's. But these you already paid for, and you got to enjoy some sour cream! Much better.



Next, these lovely ringed notecard holders. I found them very useful in college for studying Spanish vocabulary or anatomy terms, but now I use them for verses to be memorized and I have one for prayer concerns. They're tidy, and you don't have to worry about losing them. You can even make your own (bigger) set by punching holes in 3x5 cards and purchasing a binder ring from an office or craft store. I got a big box from amazon.com once. They may even sell 3x5 cards with holes already punched in them!



Anyhow, I hope you are enjoying your Friday. I am off to bake my Valentine's Day cake, which will be consumed tomorrow, with our epic Valentine's meal. I'm planning on outdoing myself, and I hope to remember to post pictures!

Useful Tuesdays...er, Fridays?

Today's useful item is the lovely accordion file:


Do you get magazines and find one or two useful pages inside which makes you reluctant to keep the whole magazine? I certainly didn't want to keep scores of issues of the three magazines I subscribe to. So I rip out the pages and store them in different sections of this accordion file. It's very handy and makes you feel so organized. Well, it makes me feel organized at least.



I got this one at a bookstore because it was very pretty and not much more expensive than a plain one. I am currently in the process of ripping out the pages from about 4 months of magazines. Remember that organized feeling? Well, sometimes it's just a feeling :)

On a different note, I'm going to pose a question for you all (the handful of people who read this). How do you decorate your house after Christmas? Do you have a winter theme? Do you put your spring items up to fight the winter blues? Do you go all out for Valentine's day and/or Saint Patrick's day? I'd love to hear your answers.

Have a lovely, warm, safe weekend!