Jungle meets City

We’re living in Lima right now. Michael is working on mapping and research. We just said goodbye to M and J—our landlords in A-town—and family with whom we shared many firsts. M lived here in capital city some time back… but J, an Ashaninka, had never known anything beyond Amazonia and anything she’s seen on TV, she’d assumed stayed inside that little black box.

Her first piece of pizza. Those Papa John’s garlic sauce containers were carefully cleaned then preserved for another something another time. Any and every container thereafter was painstakingly washed, then collected in her treasured stack. The ground beef came lumped onto clear plastic. She just loved that lovely mold, holding it up to the light: Oh, look at this mold! It’s formed so nicely to hold the meat!





The ocean—she even wanted to taste the salt—so different from the river whose current pulls one way, the ocean seemed to be pulling everything away from the shore.
 
 
 
 
 
The grocery store. She put her arm through mine and said she thought she would die, unable to bear all that her eyes were seeing. All the toothpastes neatly lined in colorful boxes. There are more than two types of toothpaste? And the shampoos and conditioners. Twenty different types of sausages: green sausage, black sausage, red sausage and pink sausage. Baskets and baskets of freshly baked bread and men in white with puffy hats and flour-dusted aprons working hurriedly as if there weren’t already baskets and baskets of bread in their varied shapes. Round buns, long buns, hard bread, soft bread. Bread with cinnamon. Bread with tomatoes. Bread with cheese and with sesame seeds and with olives. Bread that was sliced and bread that was not. She stared at the bread, unable to move. I told her we could look upstairs. Upstairs?
When it was time to take the escalator, she squeezed my hand, coolly looking toward the second floor, unable to believe the ground was moving beneath her. But her daughter D, 12, was still at the bottom of the escalator in utter terror. Julia and Abigail followed the dark staircase, an almost-hidden exit down to where D waited anxiously, and they held her hands, up, up, up the escalator. Meanwhile, J walked haltingly up and down each aisle in complete disbelief. This is all real! These table cloths and these cups and these dishes and they have such pretty flowers! Can I buy this? Can I get this? Can I? Can I? I didn’t know what to say. She kept asking.
The fruits and vegetables. Glowing berries. Purple and pink and red. Fat onions. White ones. Yellow, too. Giant, just ripening avocados. The fattest, cleanest mangoes she’d seen piled in neat rows and barely pink. Oh can we get them? Can we? Can we? The family will love them! She tugged at a plastic bag, and the girls showed her how to pull at it just a bit to yank it from the rest. She loaded the bag to the tippy-top and giggled.
When we at last sat in the taxi, I felt almost dizzy with her excitement, and half-dazed by her own delirium—like I was experiencing everything for the first time through her.
That night after shopping, it was my turn to cook. I told her to leave the kitchen and insisted that she sit down with her family while they watched Soul Surfer. She never sits to rest and is always working: folding, scrubbing, peeling, picking, sorting, scouring, stirring, tasting, washing, serving… It made me happy to see her head from behind, beside her husband’s, and their children beside them, and my children, too, nestled into the mix.
So I made dinner in dim light and thought about J. About all the things she was seeing and experiencing for the first time and how the washing machine was probably her very favorite thing of all. I’d taught her which buttons to turn and she was always finding something to wash and always delighting in every turn of the button. Her favorite part was lifting it out of the ringer, whereby she would exclaim over its nearly-dryness, then thrust it all into the dryer triumphantly and with great ease.
Ashaninka. 30 something. J is an unfailingly hard-worker, a hungry learner and a competent administrator. She could cook for kings. Anything she touches is transformed by her unusual ability to transform ordinary-ness into extra-ordinary-ness. She studied nursing and loves holistic health and knows how to cure migraines or kidney infections with leaves and water. What a girl.

Earlier this week, when we were hiking up a steep cliff, returning from the beach one afternoon, she struggled to breathe. Asthma. I thought about what she would do if I was having a hard time, and went to hold her arm, just like she always does mine. She smiled and breathed heavingly while I put my hand on her back and we rested. We sat in silence.
They’ve been gone for a few days now. I’m still thinking about her. She does not know Jesus, but is learning about Him, and wanting to learn more. After she saw Soul Surfer, J came into the kitchen and whispered to me, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. She was repeating Bethany Hamilton, Soul Surfer’s young and beautiful, beautifully formed girl whose triumph as a passionately skilled surfer (though a shark had ripped her arm from her body), was because of Jesus. She (Bethany) believed I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me (Phil 4:13). J was spellbound. Again.
And again, she repeated, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. We were quiet, thinking about what she’d just seen and heard—quiet as if we both, in that moment knew that it’s not the washing machines or the fat, pink mangoes or the salty ocean, or possessing the beautifully-formed body that makes a person triumph. It’s Jesus.

Let It Be

 Sunday. M and J were here for many hours tonight. They told us of things I’d wished I’d never heard. Blood-curdling tales from their adolescent years when Peru’s then-premiere terrorist group dominated and destroyed isolated native communities. In J’s village, bodies of live women and children were piled into covered holes in the dirt for hours-- babies and toddlers drugged with tree and leaf extracts to silence them— to save them. Quityoncari! Quityoncari! Red. Blood red. Ema first taught me this word in Yarina Isla, pointing to the blood of a dead animal. Now I think of the blood of slain Ashéninka and I shudder.


Wednesday. Nathanael, Michael and his Ashéninka language helper, whom I affectionately call the Professor, spent the hottest part of the afternoon with their machetes hacking away at waist-high weeds. Michael’s hands were bloody and blistered and he, Nathanael and the Professor were all dripping with watery mud when they came in for lunch. The girls and I had baked lemon-garlic chicken with plantain and poured it over white rice with a green herb sauce. The professor ate all of it with such enthusiasm and thorough attention to every bit of the chicken bone, Julia and Abigail and I were just delighted.


Friday. The neighborhood goat is now followed by her brown little ones just like her. They were feeding on the newly cleared land beside our front porch this morning while Profesora and I were studying some translated hymns.

Crystal with her language helper outside our house.

We sat on the front porch, and rocked and sang in Ashéninka, and I learned more grammar patterns. Inintaperoeyacaeni. He loves us. Anintaperoeyerini. We love Him.

And commands.Pomampaacotyaari Pava. Sing to God!
And praises. Noquimoshirevenaquimi. You make me happy.

Somehow foreign words spill out more easily in song, so we did a lot of singing today while we watched the goats.


Saturday. The carpenter came by. Out of the blue, Michael had called him to build a workbench area in the shed, but he seemed hesitant over the phone. Upon seeing him, we knew why. H’s face was shadowy with eyes sunken back toward his forehead. Emaciated, he sat down to talk.
The woman he’s been living with sat in the moto-taxi for quite some time while the men talked on the porch. H fears for his life. He thinks he’s dying and is cursed for rejecting God. He’s afraid. And angry. He’d come to ask us to buy his land. Or did we know anybody who would buy his land so He could go to the capital city for medical help?

I went out to the moto-taxi and asked the woman to come and sit in the shade. She declined. So I brought her water then left her alone. I walked in the house and watched her from the window. Minutes later, she was handing me a plate of smoked meat and yucca through the window bars. I gave the food to the children and went to the moto-taxi and asked her to tell me a little bit about what was happening to H.

She cautiously began… and her story unfolded, which was his story, too. She said she once followed God but did not anymore. She was sad, but did not know how not to be. I asked her if I could pray for H with her. She agreed. Together, we asked God to reveal Himself to her as she accompanied H through a great valley.

When we finished, I saw H, his chin in his chest, praying with Michael.
…The Lord is the strength of my life… (Psalm 27:1).


Sunday. Instead of a church service, there was a funeral today. The casket was cut from smooth wood and painted nearly black. On top of it were three plastic soda bottles cut off at the middle to make flower vases stuffed with colorful wildflowers beside taper candles sitting in their wax melted on splintered planks. It was hot. Our bodies were all stuck together on uneven benches. We sang choruses and children played with a puppy and picked each other’s heads.

Someone passed out plastic cups filled with cold, red cola. We looked at the casket. Then they asked Michael to come up and say something. He stood beside the black box. His voice broke. In the casket was the body of a nine-year old girl, Abigail’s friend from Sunday school. She’d been tree-climbing. And fell.
He spoke few words from Psalm 84 through the tears caught in his throat.

My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God…

Blessed is the man whose strength is in You…
As they pass through the valley of weeping, they make it a spring;
They go from strength to strength…
O Lord… blessed is the man who trusts in You!

Jose's 5th birthday with a yummy Leo cake!

Saturday. While everyone was playing volleyball in the field beside the corner church, I hopped across the way to visit Leo. Michael suggested I order one of her chocolate cakes to surprise Jose for his birthday. She told me of her dream to own a cake-shop. For now, she bakes out of her house which is mainly brick and mortar without windows or doors on a muddy lot. Her baking tools are neatly covered in fabric, and shelves are stacked with pans and spoons and chocolate bars from Lima. She washes her dishes outside. It is thoroughly enchanting. She sent me with a chocolate baking bar and made me promise to return with whatever I made. I’m thinking about fudge for Thanksgiving.


Friday. It was after 4 when Nellie started singing, signaling the start of another study. While she sang, someone banged a rock on the gate. It was Anali with three other indigenous women beside her. I assumed they were all together, though I’d never seen the three before, so I invited them in.
I went to get some bananas for the crying toddlers and when I returned, the room was full but all the women were silent. That wasn’t normal. So I asked Anali, Do you not know each other?, referring to the three women with her. She nodded. No.

Apparently the women were just walking by, and they weren’t sure why they were now sitting in our front room. So I told them I would be telling a story if they’d like to stay for a bit. They agreed.

I told the woman-at-the-well story—how a rejected woman drawing water heard how she might never thirst again. We talked about our hungry hearts that seek satisfaction in a myriad of mildly-satisfying, short-lived pleasures. And of …Christ who is our life… (Colossians 3:4). I shared examples of things I’ve groped at, vainly hoping to feel fully happy only to find that Christ is all and in all (Colossians 3:11), and He who is the resurrection and the life (John 11:25), is also The fountain of living waters (Jeremiah 17:13). Our Maker, who finally and ultimately satisfies us completely, does so because we are His.

When a rejected woman at the well heard about living water: “Whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:14), and that its source was found in the One who spoke I… am He (John 4:26), she believed. And was satisfied. And could not keep silent.

When our time finished, the story was more alive to me than before, and I wanted to tell it again and again because each time I do, I believe it more.


Sunday. M and J and his cousin decided it was time we visit the caves. Our families hiked in flip flops through layers of everything green and red and grey. Mainly mud and trees. Nathanael spotted an enormous carcass of some creature … Huge femur bones and a jagged skull, something akin to a creature we read about in Job: See now, his strength in his hips… he moves his tail like a cedar; The sinews of his thighs are tightly knit. His bones are like beams of bronze. Indeed the river may rage but he is not disturbed…(Job 40).

We sank to our calves into pottery-making red clay, then bare footed through fields of wildflowers and underbrush. For lunch, there were noodles with spinach and basil sauce in a lemon grove. And mosquitoes. In a cold, clear spring, the children painted their bodies with red mud.

Found the cave. Into the earth it wound. (I know only because I looked at pictures). Michael and M, his cousin and a boy from an indigenous community disappeared into the darkness armed with flashlights, pocket knives, and a green string by which to find their way back out.

In one of the spacious areas of the cave with a pool. Are there any creatures in the water?

Some areas included sliding down chutes of mud.

Too many for a spider, too few for a centipede

J and I talked while the children hung from vines in the trees and the dog chased insects and whatever else he was barking at. The men re-emerged after some time, covered in mud, elated. They saw animal tracks and a spider-look-alike with a dozen legs…on each side. The kids begged to be lowered into the entrance. We heard screams of gleeful terror. Bats. But night was falling, so we followed the carcass-laden trail to where the truck was parked beside a stream. Following the stream led to a river, and we jumped in, commencing headstand contests and mud-scrubbing from clothes and bodies.

Smiles, screams, and laughter marked an underground adventure!

At home, I stood under the hot water apparatus until my skin burned. Through the window and barbed wire, the black sky and gauzily clouded moon yielded just enough light to see flat, waxy leaves reaching into the sky. Complete and total beauty. And my soul was lost in it entirely.

Lord, your constant love reaches to the heavens;
Your faithfulness extends to the skies.
Your righteousness is towering like the mountains;
Your justice is like the depths of the sea.
People and animals are under your care.
How precious, O God, is your constant love!
We find protection under the shadow of your wings.
We feast on the abundant food you provide;
You let us drink from the river of your goodness.
You are the source of all life, and because of your light we see the light
(Ps 36:5-9).

Tuesday. I’m going through a lot of pen and ink learning about the sovereignty of God. How one nation rises and another falls. How some people are rich and some are poor. How some know severe suffering and others do not seem to. How one thing is right for one person and certainly not for another. But so much of what I observe is only a seemingly sort of observation, a dimly-lit, sorely-lacking view of what is true.

This only seeing what seems-to-be has made me really uncomfortable. It’s much more fun to be confident and certain of most anything and being a know-it-all has always come quite effortlessly to me. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I am fully known (1 Corinthians 13:12). Yet this is what is real right now—dimness. Seeing dimly reminds me not to lean too heavily on my own understanding, but to work through these matters of following Jesus humbly: God resists the proud, but shows favor to the humble (1 Pet 5:5) and with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12b). What joyous liberty then is this matter of seeing dimly! I get to hurl myself humbly, headlong, and free into the One who loves me in a way I now only dimly see! O, but when I see Him face to face, I will know! I will know His love and I will know and understand the promise He made to the woman at the well.

O let it be!

Confessions of a City Slicker

(**WARNING – This post contains gross photos!**)

I grew up in a suburb of Orlando, Florida. My family moved to a suburb of San Diego, California when I was 13. I attended the University of California at Los Angeles in one of the largest cities in the United States. After graduating, I lived in suburbs working behind a computer all day to earn a living. My entire life has consisted of the sheltered suburb and city life.

I had never seen (not counting television) an animal die or be killed; not a cow, not a dog, not a bird, not even a rat. I take that back; I saw a chicken killed in Africa on a mission trip and it grossed me out. I didn’t eat the chicken that night. I had never been hunting before. Road-kill was about the extent of seeing dead animals and I quickly turned away and avoided dwelling on it. While enjoying steak, chicken, and hamburgers just as much as the next red-meat-loving red-blooded American, thinking too much about how the meat got to the table can make me a little queasy. I don’t think anyone would classify me as an animal lover; my only pet growing up was a fish.

Well, in the first few trips into Ashéninka communities, blood and death has been a common part of life. It has taken some getting used to. The Ashéninka love to eat meat, and although fish is often all there is, hunting and trapping is a vital part of their life. My first experience seeing a dead animal in the community was a capybara, known as a ronsoco among the locals. It is the world’s largest rodent—think of Rodents Of Unusual Size from Princess Pride—and can weigh well over 100 pounds. Hyoni shot one on the island across from Yarina Isla and as he rowed back to shore, I was intrigued and silently nervous at the same time.

I posed for pictures with this rat on steroids and forced myself to watch the pouring of boiling hot water on the body as the skin contracted and the hair was scraped off revealing a bright white skin underneath. That wasn’t nearly as bad as the de-gutting and hacking of the carcass—more tamely called field dressing. The meat was surprisingly good, but my first experience of blood, guts, and death was eye opening.

A couple pigs were killed and cut up in similar fashion. I helped drag one of the freshly dead ones and the other—killed on a separate trip—had to be hammered in the head after being shot a couple times with an air gun. The sound of hammer and skull clashing was gruesome, but again the meat tasted great. There have been various birds mixed in, but that is hardly as upsetting and the meat doesn’t taste as good. On the latest trip, Hyoni’s traps have done the hunting for us and two añujes have been caught. An añuje is another rodent creature, much bigger than a rat, but not nearly as big as the capybara. The first one had its head blown off and the second had its back blown off. Both were incredibly gruesome, but the leg meat was a special treat.

The most difficult of all was the cow that was killed for the training conference. We waited for a couple hours to get the cow in its corral, but when it wasn’t entering, it was decided to shoot her instead. I heard the shotgun blast and we started looking the cow as it ran away. Blood was dripping in the mud, but the cow was “utterly” unaffected because the shot had hit the cow near the utters. I was an eyewitness to the second blast and it still didn’t go down. Ultimately, the cow had to be roped to the ground and Hyoni jabbed a Rambo-style knife into the back of the neck and began cutting the head off. Everything about this sawing of the cow in fourths was bigger, grosser, and harder to watch. The kicker was having to carry a quarter of the cow on my shoulder for a 30 minute hike back to the boat. Yes, that was a 30 minute hike through the jungle carrying somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 pound of bloody, freshly dead flesh. In the end I was exhausted, covered in sweat and blood, reeked terribly and couldn’t believe what I had just experienced. I washed the shirt I was wearing in the river, but it was still thoroughly stained. As with most of my other jungle animal death experiences, the meat tasted great!

I had never been covered in blood like that before and reflecting back on it, I am reminded of the sacrificial system of the Bible. Animal death and blood was a common sight in Old Testament times in an effort to cover the sins of the people of Israel. No matter how many animals were sacrificed or how much blood was spilled, it was never enough to keep up with the sins that were being committed. It wasn’t until Jesus came to earth and was the final perfect bloody sacrifice on a cross did we receive the opportunity to have our sins forgiven once and for all. His blood covers us and makes us clean and sinless in the Father’s eyes. I may never get used to the blood and death that is so much a part of life in the jungle, but I sure am thankful for my Savior’s blood and death for me.

Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. (Hebrews 9:22 ESV)

Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree

Thursday
I had planned to do some laundry. The machine is broken. What do I do with all the soapy water and clothes? Should I start washing by hand? Michael specifically asked me to do some writing. So, I shall write.

Wednesday
Nathanael is having a bad day. He's temperamental. Abigail is moody. Julia is pouting because she feels left out and Chloe says no to every command. I'm boiling.
"Everyone be happy! " I command (without a hint of cheer).

Later, Abigail is crying. Her eyes are red. She sits on the corner of my bed and confesses a list of everything that's wrong with her life. Each thing, strangely enough, is something that is actually wrong with someone else in her life: Julia Noel is bossy and pouty, Chloe Joy is destroying her tent, Nathanael won't stay out of her room. Everyone else needs to change: "If they would all do the right thing, I would be such a delightful person." But until then... she is justified to moan and make her family know how they have not only destroyed her tent and her mood-- they are robbing her of the ability to be a delightful person.

Then Julia is forlorn. She stands in front of me with a long, miserable face and announces woefully, "I did the experiment. For 20 minutes, I set aside my own plans. I decided that I was going to serve Abigail. I wrote out my plan, my hypothesis and an empty space for the results. When the timer went off, it had been a horrible 20-minute-experience, so I sat in the corner of my room and cried."
"Why? I thought you were going to spend 20 minutes serving Abigail, making life great for her."
"She didn't want my service. She didn't want my plans for her. I told her that I was serving her."
"Is that how you serve someone?"
"What do you mean? I gave her that whole 20 minutes, and she rejected me. The experiment failed."
"You were not serving her. To serve her is to fit into her world, her plans. To join in with what she's already working on and make it sweeter for her. You ask her what she needs, or even just anticipate it. Serving doesn't make demands. You don't do what you want, how you want to, and call that serving. That's bossing. That's why she's mad at you to begin with."
"But I told her I was going to serve her."
"Then you proceeded to demand how and when?"
"But if I live like this, who will serve me? I'll be doing all the work and all the 'fitting-in'."

Such a good question...

Even as I'm rebuking her, I'm uncomfortable, feeling the weight of my hypocrisy. I look at her, wincing, and admit, "Julia, I'm demanding something from you that I am not doing myself," I begin.

Abigail enters, and interrupts,"Yes, that makes you a hypocrite."

Can she read my thoughts?

"True."

Julia's eyes light up, "What are some other ways you're a hypocrite?"
"I tell you to rejoice in the Lord in your every circumstance, but when I'm bothered with you, instead of praising God, or calling out to Him, sometimes I go and pout, too."

They are clearly both very satisfied upon hearing this confession, leaning in a little closer. I continue, "Abigail wants Julia to stop being the boss and pouting when she's not, but she demands this of Julia, while pouting herself."
"Amen," says Julia.
"And your idea of service is really for your own gain, Julia," I continue. She smiles uncomfortably, knowingly.


While I long for my children to motivated to serve each other out of love, I often serve them out of duty with joylessness. When they act like I do, my own choices become painfully obvious.

I suppose Julia's question is more important than I realized: Is a life of praising God and serving others cheerfully REALLY worth it? In her words, Who will take care of me? If I'm so busy serving others, who will serve me?
We talk awhile longer, realizing that none of us is the innocent party. We are confronted later, when Michael is reading to us:

"...but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant, and
whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave;
just as the Son of Man did not come to be served,
but to serve, and
to give His life a ransom for many."
Matthew 20: 27-28

Therein lies the Gospel, in all it's fullness, as it applies to bad moods and disagreements and everything else that finds it's way into a normal day...

Living Water

We live between two rivers in San Francisco de Dos Rios. These muddied water trails host plastic grocery bags carried along by a faithful current of milk boxes, soda cans, and yogurt bottles all tempted to clump along the river bed. Somehow it is still beautiful. Giant bamboo shoots jut out from hillsides like a vigilant guardian.

I am walking along a mossy bridge which carries me over the river. It is hot. My thirst is great. I long for water, but there is only the river. I can not drink. I must find a trusted source. Other options ultimately lead to harm. So it is with my thirsting heart.

Jesus is living water, poured out freely, scandalously, without end...I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts (Revelation 21:6b).

And let him who thirsts come. Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely (Rev 22:17).

He shows no restraint in giving, and demands the same of the thirsty one: Delight in abundance! It can not run short. It is not temporary. It's pleasure can not wane. Drink. Let your soul delight itself! Everyone who thirsts, come to the waters... Let your soul delight itself in abundance (Isaiah 55:1,2b). It is trusted.

Living water never stops being sweet. It is always pure. For it mercifully flows:...a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb (Rev 22:1).

His lavish giving does not stop at the river. I am not required to make a pilgrimage to a drinking spot every time I thirst. He causes this living water to burst from inside of me, for rivers of living water gush out of me, as I believe. If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water (John 7:37).

Oh! To drink deeply of that which God Almighty made to flow out of me: The river of His Spirit. It dwells in me when I believe the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus was accomplished on my behalf. This finished work, this river, quenches my thirst one choice at a time.

Orange, Blue and Belief

Driving last night just after sunset, I was silenced by pale peach clouds against sapphire sky. When have I seen those two colors together above me--orange and blue? And when do I ever remember reading this: Therefore, do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward. For you have need of endurance… “Now the just shall live by faith; But if anyone draws back, My soul has no pleasure in him.” But we are not of those who draw back to perdition, but of those who believe to the saving of the soul (Hebrews 10:35-36, 38-39).

I am struck right now by the power of what the Gospel actually is: Somehow my resolute confidence in the accomplished work of Jesus completely satisfies God’s wrath against me. Had I not believed, had I shrunk back in fear, or my aloof pompousness, it would be to my own eternal destruction. That’s perdition. It is my belief alone that secures my being thoroughly delightful to God Himself; Creator GOD.

He is the One who initiated and pursued me: You did not choose Me, but I chose you (John 15:16). When my will staggered after its own pleasures and revelries, He said, “I will put My Law in their minds, and write it on their hearts” (Jeremiah 31:33b). When He wrote His Law on my heart, it was satisfied by His own provision, the blood of Jesus-- blood that demanded my freedom, then declared it! He reassured Me His entire Law could be summed up in Love. Love the Lord your God, with all your HEART…SOUL…STRENGTH (Deuteronomy 6:4). And that love would spill over onto others by this important thing: Whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law…(Matthew 7:12). He supposes the degree to which my hope is in Him will be made obvious by how I treat other people: A good tree does not bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them (Matthew 7:18-20).

My hope in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus, the Son of God, is THE ONLY absorption of God’s consuming wrath against unbelief. Faith in Jesus is my salvation. I am saved through His mercy when I believe what He says. Everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure (1 John 3:3). My right standing with God is secured to the degree that my faith remains grounded in Him.

This takes a lot of work to believe. Trusting Jesus instead of depending on my own intuition, seeming facts, or what is tangible to me is hard work! Everything else is so much more immediate and demanding sometimes-- most times.

When I was driving home, alone in the car with the orange and blue sky, I was mad at myself. I had again failed Jesus in a hidden area of my mind only He and I knew about. I was frustrated, and cried out loud to Him, “Why do I perpetually insist on doing things my way, when my way fails to provide lasting satisfaction EVERY time?! What game plan do I need to resurrect? What now?” I groaned relentlessly, droning on and on…
Minutes later, I looked up. I saw it; the sky in furious splendor. I was silenced. Trust in the Lord and do good… feed on His faithfulness. Delight yourself also in the LORD, and He shall give you the desires of your heart (Psalms 37:3-4). In that moment, this one thing was real to me: BELIEVE JESUS MORE! To overcome trials, temptation, raging self-absorption… is to BELIEVE JESUS MORE. How can I do that?

I ran inside, closed my eyes to the piles of laundry and opened my Bible in a quiet place. Spending time with Him helps me to believe Him more. Trying harder makes me resentful. Oh! But to BELIEVE JESUS MORE (What does He say? I’ll do it!) is to have every desire of my heart satiated. My belief in what God says not only guarantees my future with Him, it frees up my present with Him, to be bubbling over with continual joy.

I am dry, pouty and dull when I am not believing God. Sometimes, I don’t know what to believe, because my mind is too full of my own blaring newscast. I’m having to stop what I am doing or thinking in that moment to feed on His faithfulness. Sometimes this means closing my eyes and crying out to Him, “I don’t know what to believe right now. Help me!” Other times, it means giving my children a task, setting my plans aside, and opening my Bible in my lap, when I’d much rather be meeting my needs my way.

Feeding on His faithfulness is hard work initially. I rarely want to do that on my own. But once the grazing begins, my only task is to believe what I’m feeding on, then do it. God himself even provided a helper for me to actually obey: the Holy Spirit. Before his death, burial and resurrection, Jesus said: It is to your advantage that I go away…the Helper…I will send Him to you (John 16:7). He therefore enables my obedience, through the Holy Spirit, to the degree that I believe. Obedience is rooted in belief. The minute I stop believing God is the minute I fall...


Therefore, do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward (Hebrews 10:35).