Author Archives: Missytak

He Could Bear it No Longer

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But the Israelites said to the Lord, “We have sinned. Do with us whatever you think best, but please rescue us now.” Then they got rid of the foreign gods among them and served the Lord. And He could bear Israel’s misery no longer.
- Judges 10:15-16

After their 40 years in the desert, you’d think that the people of God would improve their record a little–get their act together, make sure everyone’s on board, set up some accountability and reasonable goals. But again and again as we read through their history, they fall away from the way they should be walking: in a covenant of loving obedience to the One who chose to bless them. I’m reading through the history books of the Old Testament these days and groaning every time I come across the phrase, “Again the Israelites did evil…” though of course I know that their history is a foreshadowing of my own.

But then I got to the verse above, where God could bear their misery no longer, and it stopped me mid-groan. This particular time, Israel’s in a real pickle because they’ve become major idol worshipers. They’ve forsaken God –uh-gain– despite some of His most unbelievable miracles in all of humanhistory happening just a few generations before. They’re prostituting themselves before the gods of Aram, Sidon, Moab, and so on.  Now they’re oppressed, beaten, wounded, defeated, and they come crawling back pathetically to the God they rejected. They swear their loyalty and promise (again!) to love and serve Him only.

Fool me once, shame on me; fool me twice, shame on you. Right?

Not according to God, apparently.

His inability to bear Israel’s misery led to their restoration and victory, for a time, until they decided they were finished with Him again. But God’s inability to bear the misery of His beloved is a relentless force. Ultimately it took on human form in Jesus, who likewise was moved with agonizing compassion when He looked on crowds of people needing a Shepherd, needing healing, needing truth.

If we get a little nerdy with the Greek, there’s a great mental image here. Jesus’ response of being “moved with compassion”, as Mark likes to write, comes from this awesome Greek word. The root word is “spleen.” Yeah, like the organ. It sounds strange but if you think about it, we talk about feeling things “deeply” or “in our core.” Just as God was unable to bear the Israelites’ misery no longer and moved mightily to rescue them, so too did Jesus feel kicked in the gut with agony at the reality of people’s pain. Ours is a deeply compassionate God, far beyond our own standards or even comprehension.

I tend to think that God’s attitude toward my rebellion is what my own attitude would be toward a bad friend or my misbehaving toddler: eventually I get fed up. Reluctant to forgive. Unmoved.

Not so, my God. And it’s a good thing: His love is so fierce and high and wide and deep that He can bear our misery no longer and continues to rescue.

Bible Marathon

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Y’know those lists you can create on Facebook, so that you can select which group of your friends to see? Perfect for wanting to see a news feed of family only, or classmates, or maybe you have a list with a more descriptive name like “Stalkers” or “Ladieeeez” or “Thursday Night Swashbucklers”. One of my lists is called “Acts to Follow”, and consists of people that I would like to emulate. A person on that list is named Garry Friesen.

Dr. G, as hundreds or maybe thousands of people know him, has been a professor at Multnomah University since before I was born. I’ve never met or even heard of a person who knows (and deeply loves) the first five books of the Bible as much as Dr. G does.  I could write a long and glorious blog about the dear man, but that’s not what this post is really about. It’s about a Bible-reading revolution he kinda made up and has now introduced to people all over the world. The Bible Marathon.

DO THIS. CALL YOUR FRIENDS AND MAKE THIS HAPPEN.

Take a minute and answer this question as honestly as you possibly can: What is the longest portion of Scripture that you have ever sat down and read all at once? Or maybe, what’s the longest amount of time you’ve ever spent reading the Bible? Please, really do answer those questions for yourself before you go on.

Did you answer them?

We’ve gotten so far away from how to dive into the written Word that God has given us.  Fifteen-Minute Devotional books fill the shelves, and we so easily wrap up cute little bows on a verse or two, maybe a chapter, unless we’re feeling really spiritual and tackle three or four whole chapters in one day!

The Bible Marathon is this really wonderful, exhausting, heart-changing idea in which a group of people set aside the better part of a day to read a massive, and I mean massive, chunk of Scripture aloud.  A group of about 10-20 people works best, and depending on what books of the Bible you choose to read, your marathon can take anywhere from 2-18 hours.  I bet you can imagine how taxing, difficult, and AWESOME that is.

Here is a link with suggested guidelines for a Bible Marathon, including a helpful chart of how long a certain chunk of the Bible should take to read this way.

Do it. I’m so not kidding. And invite me.

Photo Credit: Restless Pilgrim

Ending a Lull

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I’ve debated for a few days about whether or not to write this post.

Dreams can be tricky things, and I’m not sure where I land theologically on how/when/where God uses them. There are many clear examples in Scripture of dreams being spiritually significant, but I hesitate to lend any significance to my own. Still, whether this dream I had was “from God” or a composite of odd neural activity, it has been significant in my heart and life this week, so I want to share it.

It’s edgy. It’s weird. But I think you can handle that. Bear with me, okay?

I dreamed on Sunday night that I was giving my son a bath and my husband was in the room with me. I sensed a dark presence and warned Chris that something was about to get me. I then felt – I know how crazy this sounds – six demons grab a hold of me. The experience was grotesque and I won’t get into it much here, but it was outwardly apparent that I was being spiritually gripped by demonic individuals. In the dream, Chris began calling out the name of Jesus, and I felt one of the demons immediately flee. The other five hung on but in agony as my husband kept praying. I realized that though I wasn’t in control of my body, I was aware of what was happening and could therefore join in his prayers just with my heart and mind. Inside me I began calling out to Jesus for rescue. Within just a few seconds, they all fled.

Super crazy, right? I know. Here’s the thing that makes me share it with you instead of chalk it up to a bad taco before bed: I woke up as soon as the demons in the dream fled, and the sense of relief was huge. I was sweaty and my heart was racing, but there was light and life all through me. In those first few moments of wakefulness, an idea came to light quite strongly. The idea was that the dream was somewhat real–that a spiritual cover had actually been lifted from me, just for a moment, so that I would call out to Jesus and find rescue and refuge in Him; and that there really had been an attack allowed on my spirit, with the clear intent and purpose of being re-covered and sheltered in Him.

Last week I told Karen (the editor here) that I’ve been in a lull lately, hence the lack of writing. We all have spells of dryness spiritually – or at least I think we all do.  But I hadn’t been fighting hard this time. I’ve been lazy. I’ve ignored the little calls on my heart to come away with Jesus. Deliberately. And the dream was sort of the fruition of that, I think.  The natural end to walking apart from my Jesus.  But the attack in the dream didn’t feel like punishment in any way; it felt like an opportunity to wake up to how desperately I need Him as well as how firmly in His grip I am, even when I’m not acting like it. To think of the covering God has on my heart and what I’d go through apart from it is pretty significant.

It’s been easy, the last few days, to slip into conversation with Jesus at any time. There’s a tenderness that I’ve been missing lately. I think the lull is over, or perhaps ending. Whether God sent me that dream or not I don’t know, but at least I can say He has used it. I need Him oh so much. His name is oh so powerful.  He is so mighty, so quick to save, and so mine.

Crippled by Comfort

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A wise friend* told me about a sermon she had just heard. Or maybe it was a series at her church. Or a book she’d read. Or a conversation she’d had. I don’t really know what it was, but the idea was that there are these gods we worship above our actual, real, true God.  The idols I remember her mentioning were approval, pride, and comfort. There might have been something like power or control in there too, but the ones I remember are because they struck such a chord with me.

Especially comfort.

I haven’t slept through the night in 2.5 years, so I really love my afternoon nap. I mean, really love it. Also, I spend much of my day on the living room floor playing with a train set or reading board books I’ve read 147 times, so when my kids go to bed I enjoy watching the tv shows or browsing websites that are interesting to me. I’m not talking about edifying shows or sites either, I mean really mindless stuff, like Bachelorette. These comforts are supreme above others for me, but I could write a long list of all the offerings I bring to the god of being comfortable: like not reading my Bible often, having another bowl of ice cream, passing an opportunity to burn a few calories… It goes on, all in the name of my own comfort.

My adoration of comfort has taken on a life of its own, such that I’ll avoid productivity even when I feel inspired to get something done, just because it’s been hard to motivate myself in the past. There’s this whole dialogue inside me, with voices of guilt or encouragement or shame or grace all in cacophony. It can be exhausting to worship comfort, which of course makes me then want to take another nap.

There’s a very short song by Hillsong Church (but really, words kinda by Paul the apostle and idea by God Himself) that says two short lines over and over and over:

The same power that conquered the grave lives in me, lives in me.
Your love that rescued the earth lives in me, lives in me.

Those simple truths quiet the disquiet inside me and break through the habits of comfort that drive too much of what I do. The same power that conquered the grave lives in me: why would I not give my absolute all to each day, pouring my energy wholeheartedly into this incredible life God has given me? There’s death-defeating power pouring through my veins because of Jesus’ presence with me! Not only does that mean I can ask Him for the burst of energy to clean up the kitchen, but I have access to the Strength that might someday take my little family far across the globe as missionaries, even though it seems like such a daunting idea full of hard work. As for the love that rescued the earth living in me, oh what wonder that I can pour out His love to my children, husband, family, friends–that I can choose to give grace, play that darn train set with genuine enthusiasm, and my well of love will never run dry because it’s not my love, it’s the love of the very God who rescued the earth.

Comfort needn’t cripple me anymore with its allures, though I’m sure it will try to seduce me all my days. I’ll have to put that song on repeat in my heart and live it out to the only God worthy of my worship, the One who calls me to more than comfort and gives me the power and love to live fully for Him.

*(the wise friend? daniellervargas.)

No Bye-Bye

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My husband and our two-year-old son have coined a term for weekends and holidays. They call them “no bye-bye” days. It’s too cute to see their excitement the morning of a “no bye-bye” as they plan their adventures and celebrate the time together without my husband having to leave for work.

Today was a huge “bye-bye” day. My brother, sister-in-law, and their two young daughters are leaving to follow God’s call on their lives in a small, remote Russian state. They’re our closest friends and we won’t see them for many years. It’s been a hard goodbye, to say the least.

I realized on my weepy drive home tonight how much I look forward to being in heaven with my brother and his family someday. Yes, I look forward to the presence of Jesus as I feel His arms around me at last. Yes, I eagerly await the glory of the throne of grace as I gaze upon my Creator, my Father. But today, in my sadness, through the tears in my eyes as I type this up, what I look forward to most is not saying goodbye to the people dearest to me.

Missionary families have this hope when we send off our loved ones. It’s for now. It’s super sad to say goodbye, but it’s for the best reasons, and it’s not for always. Heaven will be the big scale version of my husband and son’s joy on Saturday mornings. Heaven will be one big, huge, forever “no bye-bye” day.

Where Credit is Due

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“Bouncy ball go?” I heard that phrase probably forty times. My two-year-old son’s voice rang out again and again as we crawled around the living room looking under couches and shoes and the cat for his new bright orange bouncy ball. Finally I spotted it, wedged under the coffee table, and pulled it out. “Buddy! Look!” I said, holding up the ball.

“I found it!” he yelled.

This has been happening lately. I’ll arrange his train track set in a figure eight, and when the last track is in place, he proudly proclaims, “I did it!”  Or I’ll replace the batteries in a defunct flashlight, hand it back to him, and when it turns on successfully he says, “I fixed it!”

My first reaction is, Hey wait a second, I found it. I did it. I fixed it.

But I don’t think that my son is trying to steal my rightly deserved credit. He can be sneaky at times, but in these cases his tone is nothing but innocent joy. It seems that he assumes that a victory for any member of the team is a victory for every member of the team. So what if I’m the one who saw the ball/built the trains/replaced the batteries? He and I are a community.  When I win, he wins.

It’s a wake-up call for my prideful heart. When somebody helps me, I feel obligated, guilty, or like a failure. Maybe that’s Americanism. Maybe it’s being a girl. Maybe it’s just me. It’s hard to receive, let alone rejoice, in the gift. I like taking credit for what I do, and I don’t like when I can’t take credit because I didn’t do it all by myself. How silly. How very anti-Gospel.

I’m not sure yet how to shift this way of thinking or feeling, but I thought it would help to put it out here. Maybe you have ideas on how I can change, or maybe you can relate. Maybe my toddler can sit us all down for a quick lesson in grace.

Visions of Glory While Doing the Laundry

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My excuse has been motherhood. In different chapters of my life, it’s been other things getting in the way.  Keeping up with the disciplines of the Christian life is one thing, but what I’m finding more problematic is the capacity to daydream of heavenly things. I guess that’s what meditating really is: getting caught up in wordless worship, longing for Jesus’ hands to cradle my face and see Him look me eye to eye when He returns or calls me home.

In prayer, ministry, Bible study, I feel the need to wrap my head around things and put words to thoughts. That’s well and good; certainly it’s appropriate to process things with careful intention. But how many times does Paul tell believers in early churches to set their minds on things above? Sometimes, instead of processing things in my journal, I think I’m supposed to just get caught up in it. To stand in awe of His radiance, to ache for His return, to sing along with worship music from the 80s with the windows all the way down and the volume all the way up.

God Almighty gently reminds us to “be still and know that [He is] God,” not to “spend 15 minutes journaling before the kids wake up.” Be still. Get caught up. I think I can do that… Shoot, I know I can do that. My connection to my Jesus might not be as formulaic right now as I’d like, but what’s to keep me from bringing my worrisome heart to Him while I drive to the park or brush my teeth? I can even rest in Him – as an act of worship – while nursing my son or folding underwear.  Visions of glory while doing the laundry might be all I can manage for now, but I think that’s what I need to get back to.

Though journaling is a great idea, too.