Lent day 3: a prayer
“Help me, gracious Lord, to hear you calling, to celebrate your love, and to accept your healing in every area of my life.” // NT Wright
Lent day 2: a prayer
“Sovereign Lord, help us to trust you when things seem out of control.” // NT Wright
I really needed this today. What about you?
Lent Day 1: a prayer for Ash Wednesday
A Prayer for Ash Wednesday:
“Wake us up, gracious Lord, by the message of your coming, and help us, in our hearts and our lives, be ready.” // NT Wright
Are you giving up anything, or adding anything to your life or worship for Lent?
It’s ok. I got you.
Out of 5.75 children (our sixth child and fifth son will be born in May), we only have one daughter.
A rambunctious two-year-old named Eden Joy.
Recently she’s been perfecting her gift of words. And by perfecting, I mean using them constantly. Generally, the only time she isn’t saying something is when she’s asleep (but that’s not even a guarantee).
She makes jokes, she sings songs, she role plays with her dolls.
So far, she’s developed a fairly decent vocabulary (although at times we still need a toddler translator), but what I find really interesting is the five words she says when she’s afraid.
Maybe a noise startles her, or there’s a tense moment in a film, or perhaps it’s simply too dark in her room.
No matter what it is, she always says the same thing.
She’ll seek out either mommy or daddy and say:
“It’s ok. I got you.”
Pretty quickly, I realized those two short sentences were actually several questions to which her racing heart needed answers:
“Is everything ok?”
“Do you have me?”
“Will you protect me?”
“Do you see how scared I am?”
“Can I stay with you?”
“Is it safe with you?”
I’m convinced the most lucrative, powerful, and harmful currency in the thought market of the world is fear.
It distorts elections.
It begins wars.
It destroys relationships.
It kills dreams.
It stifles truth.
It keeps us from all sorts of adventure…love…discovery…life.
The seductive powers of fear control and manipulate people all day, each day across every corner of the earth.
Marketers use it to sell products, and governments use it to sway public opinion.
“Ask your doctor about this medication…so you don’t die suddenly of a terrible disease…oh, and by the way, one of the side effects of this medication (in rare cases) is…DEATH.”
“We must not let [insert random unpopular people group, cultural/social ideal, or religious perspective here] gain more of a foothold in our nation…or else…DOOM.”
“If they knew the truth…they wouldn’t love you anymore…”
I’m sure if you thought for a moment, you can come up with all sorts of examples that fly fear kamikaze missions in the airspace of your own life.
But, all throughout scripture, when a pivotal moment is approaching or at hand, nearly every time one of the first phrases spoken by a prophet, angel, messenger or even Christ Himself is, “Don’t be afraid…”
Why?
Well, mainly because, just like my daughter Eden, each of us has a place to run when the lights go out.
Unfortunately, when we face down a moment of terror, we’re so out of practice running to our safe place FIRST, we react to the fear instead…which often leads to rash, unwise decisions. (For which we reap the consequences later.)
The world needs you to stop giving in to fear. Even if you only give in to fear in one tiny area…stop. That one area could change everything.
Fear bribes us into believing it’s protecting us, when really it’s enslaving us.
To excuses.
To denial.
To doubt.
To self-hate.
To laziness.
As soon as Eden utters, “It’s ok. I got you.”, I always scoop her up and reassure her that yes…it is ok…I do have her…I will protect her…she’s safe with me…no matter how loud the noise gets or how dark it gets around her. Sometimes I’ll even carry her back to the place that made her afraid to help her see what’s really going on instead of whatever lie fear has force fed her imagination.
I’m her rescuer. And that’s what rescuers do.
Stop reading the book of lies fear has written you. Run to Jesus. He will scoop you up just like Eden and remind you He’s there…He protects you…you’re safe…
Jesus waits. Always. Nearby. For you.
He’s your rescuer. And that’s what rescuers do.
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“…Giving up control over our future and letting God define our life, trusting that God moulds us according to God’s love and not according to our fear.” // Henri Nouwen
“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” // Jesus // St. John 14:27
Digital dirty laundry
So, last month our family washing machine broke.
The same week we were trying to go to Florida for a week.
Two parents + five kids = almost immediately, every laundry basket we own was piled high with dirty laundry.
You couldn’t enter a room in our home without seeing dirty laundry. (Full disclosure: we live in a small house, but still…seeing unwashed clothing everywhere was quite frustrating.)
We researched and purchased a replacement as quickly as possible, but it wouldn’t arrive until we’d already left town.
There was only one thing to do…
Collect a pile of quarters so large it would have made anyone playing the slot machines in Vegas think they’d won the jackpot, and head to the laundromat.
The Chambers family officially staked claim to one whole corner of the building and the washing/drying/folding of what amounted to 20 loads of laundry commenced.
Piles of dirty laundry are never attractive, but we have a specific room in our house where laundry goes.
If I were to start distributing that same laundry all over my neighbors’ yards or houses, suddenly I’d have a problem.
Why? Because it’s not their filthy clothing. It’s ours.
The same principle applies to the information about our lives in what and how we make information public.
Frequently on the internet and especially Facebook, my feed will be littered with other people’s dirty laundry.
Couples who are angry at each other and directly or passively taking shots in their status updates…
Friends calling one another out…
Personal attacks…
Whining…
Complaining…
Digital dirty laundry…
When our machine broke, we had several friends who offered their own machines to us. They were people we knew…people who loved us…people we trusted.
We didn’t take our laundry door to door until someone responded.
Social media and the internet as a whole is still a fairly new experience, but something I’m not sure we always remember is that what we and say online is there forever.
Our words.
Our photos.
Our history.
Much of what’s there probably shouldn’t be.
Now, I’m not talking about sharing your needs. There have been many times where we will ask for prayer, share an area where we need help or offer opinions on certain issues. (In fact, I’ve hosted several spirited conversation on different political, religious and social issues on my own Facebook wall.)
Those are legitimate ways for us to support each other…remind each other that we’re listening…that we care…and offer help and hope when we can.
However, airing your personal needs is very different than airing information that is damaging to someone else. That’s dirty laundry that needs to stay in its proper place.
I’m not advocating for you to pretend to be different online than you are in real life, but most of us wouldn’t go to the grocery store and have it out with someone else in front of a live audience.
We must remember that the people who follow us on Twitter, Facebook, blogs, etc are a live audience, and how we interact is influential and can be detrimental.
So…
Let’s make sure we filter our digital presence.
Let’s make sure our words don’t dishonor or disgrace.
Let’s make sure what we say online is something we’re ok with lasting forever (because it does…everything we post is archived somewhere.)
Just because we may be justified in doing something, doesn’t mean we always should.
The world is not our laundromat.
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“To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it.” // GK Chesterton
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Here’s a short, powerful video clip of just how influential social media is…click here to watch and be amazed!
