by Elizabeth | Apr 7, 2011 | Learning Story
6 But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says:“God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” James 4:6-7
Tuesday I quoted from Lynn Twist about our sense of scarcity. Well she says we have this nagging sense of not-enough-ness: I didn’t get enough sleep; I don’t have enough time; I’m not smart enough, tall enough, pretty enough…She says, “sufficiency…is a context we generate.”
As Christians, we live in a strange story of sufficiency that overflows in surplus. This is such a simple verse – and short enough to keep the whole thing in my head at one time: “But he gives more grace.” Don’t pass over it. Stop and chew on that. Put it in your mouth like a piece of Juicy Fruit that explodes into flavor. Unlike the gum, the words leave a lingering joy:
“BUT HE GIVES MORE GRACE.”
Where are you not-enough today? What do you have not-enough of? How will you pray? Will you pray that God gives you enough? Will you remember that God’s grace is sufficient? Indeed it is sufficient, but it is also surpassing. There’s a surplus of it. Let us not forget it. (Sorry if I’m coming on strong. I’m preaching to myself:)
I was going to quote John Stott on this, but I’ll save that for tomorrow. A vignette just came to mind. How might this look in my life today? I’m headed out on a road trip with my 17-year-old daughter later. I’m not strong enough to lift my suitcase into the car without feeling some retributive pain later. MORE GRACE in this circumstance could look many ways, but since God is as efficient as He is sufficient, I imagine asking for MORE GRACE is as simple as asking my daughter to put my suitcase in the vehicle. Not rocket science for most of you, but for one who’s lived my life being SELF-sufficient, to ask is a surrender to my weakness made perfect in God’s strength through my healthy daughter.
What about you? Where will you ask for and look for God to “give you more grace” today?
by Elizabeth | Apr 5, 2011 | Learning Story
Cartoonchurch.com
“My grace is sufficient for you.” Recently I experienced one of those heavyweight championship bouts with horrendous insomnia. Some of you know the kind – top ten terrible — when you are awake alone for so many hours you go beyond worrying whether you will sleep that night and begin to believe you will never actually sleep again.
Finally, I remembered one of the best strategies for beating the monstrous fear, which is the larger beast than the Insomnia itself – rest. Repeat something true and meaningful — for me, on this night, “Be still and know that I am God, came to mind.” Repeat it gently, and rest in its reality. Take deep breaths, and rest. Be very still. Know that God is God.
As my body began to calm and my mind began to slow the race, another verse entered my head, welcome but unsought: “My grace is sufficient for you.”
There is no fairy tale ending. I didn’t fall asleep and rest like an infant should. I drifted eventually into one of those light imitation versions of pseudo-sleep and woke feeling the reality of the night, as if I had hardly slept at all. BUT – I did rediscover the reality I need to know in times of fullness and scarcity – God’s grace is sufficient. I actually marveled through the day at how relatively energetic I felt – where did that come from, I would think, as I walked out of an hour and a half at PT with a little extra?
Brene Brown talks about how fear of not having enough interferes with an attitude of joy: “These are anxious and fearful times, both of which breed scarcity. We’re afraid to lose what we love the most, and we hate that there are no guarantees. We think if we can beat vulnerability to the punch by imaging loss, we’ll suffer less. We’re wrong. There is one guarantee: if we’re not practicing gratitude and allowing ourselves to know joy, we are missing out on the two things that will actually sustain us during the hard times.” The Gift of Imperfection
She quotes Lynne Twist’s book, The Soul of Money about being enough:
“For me, and for many of us, our first waking thought of the day is “I didn’t get enough sleep.” the next one is, “I don’t have enough time.” whether true or not, that thought of ‘not enough’ occurs to us automatically before we even think to examine it or question it….
We each have the choice in any setting to step back and let go of the mindset of scarcity. Once we let go of scarcity, we discover the surprising truth of sufficiency. By sufficiency, I don’t mean a quantity of anything. Sufficiency isn’t two steps up from poverty or one step short of abundance. It isn’t a measure of barely enough. Sufficiency isn’t an amount at all. It is an experience, a context we generate, a declaration, a knowing that there is enough and we’re not enough.”
I think Brown and Twist are on to something with this fear of scarcity. They take me back to my need to rest in the heart of sufficiency:
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” 2Corinthians 12:9
How about you? What do you not have enough of, or fear not having enough of? How does God meet you in this fear?
by Elizabeth | Mar 30, 2011 | Learning Story
Long ago, I named the groups that met to share stories “Story People.” One day i walked into a gallery in New Orleans and discovered Brian Andreas’ Story People. I decided we must be “Kindred Spirits.” Here’s a fun new item from their site.
Watch Universal Sign:Peace on Earth by StoryPeeps in Animation | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com
by Elizabeth | Mar 29, 2011 | Learning Story
“Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-29
Today, for something different, a ‘videocast.’ Do you care for yourself as Jesus cares?
(And yes, I am aware the YouTube chose a particularly unflattering place to freeze my face. I am considering it a practice in being ‘humble in heart’:) to post this.)
This will remain posted on main page as featured video.
by Elizabeth | Mar 27, 2011 | Learning Story
http://thebestchristpainting.blogspot.com/2010/11/blood-of-christ-painting.html
I discovered recently that there are some modern theologians who suggest that blood was used metaphorically in the Bible. That was very surprising to me, especially in light of Leviticus and communion. Read these two verses, then take the five minutes of slow reading aloud to go through what the Puritan writer Henry Law says about the blood of Christ. What do you think? Is the “blood of Christ” significant?
“And I will turn against anyone, whether an Israelite or a foreigner living among you, who eats or drinks blood in any form. I will cut off such a person from the community, for the life of any creature is in its blood. I have given you the blood so you can make atonement for your sins. It is the blood, representing life, that brings you atonement.” Leviticus 17:10-11
53 Jesus said to them, “I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. 55 For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. 56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. 57 Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your forefathers ate manna and died, but he who feeds on this bread will live forever.” 59 John 6:53-59
We join Henry Law writing about theprohibition against blood in Leviticus 17.
“From age to age, until the expected Jesus came, the same forbidding voice was heard, ‘Touch not, taste not, the blood. It is devoted unto God. It is most holy unto Him. It pictures out redeeming suffering. It is atonement for the soul.’
Reader, the elders of faith’s family were thus constrained to note this mark. No day could pass without remembrance of its hallowed end. We live in Gospel-day. The wondrous death is no more veiled in mystic types. We gaze with open eye upon the blood-stained cross. We can approach the fountain opened in a Savior’s side. We may sit down beneath the trickling drops. We may there wash our every sin away. Shall we, thus privileged, fall short in reverence? Forbid it faith, forbid it love, forbid it every throb of every new-born heart.
Come, think for a few moments of the grand antitype—Christ’s blood. Ponder its worth—its use—its mighty power—its unspeakable results. And may the Spirit reveal its glories in their fullest light.
Turn not your eyes from the grand dignity of Calvary’s Lamb. This is the marrow of all Gospel-hope. This brings in merit. God cannot ask, or find, a greater or a worthier price. Oh! bless the Father for this appointed help. Bless Jesus for this all-sufficient aid. Here is an able Savior, for the blood flows in the channel of omnipotence.” Henry Law’s Commentary on Leviticus
by Elizabeth | Mar 25, 2011 | Learning Story
Abbey the 'wonder-dog' scared the burglars away with her barking!
“Shame on you.”
The police officer shrugged as he said it, as if to say, “Yeah, I know, we all get lax about locking our cars when they’re parked in the garage.”
“Yeah, it’s a group of teenagers – they steal small electronics, wallets, even guns – but only from unlocked cars. They figure if your car’s unlocked, you’re fair game.”
My response – “That’s just WRONG.” Because I write and teach and think in the grid of creation-fall-redemption-restoration, I used that structure to figure out WHY that thinking is so wrong-headed. I thought of at least 3 reasons:
- I am created in the image of God. They are disrespecting me when they transgress my space.
- They are created in the image of God. They should be out mowing the lawns of the elderly, not stealing from people who didn’t lock their cars.
- They are blaming me for their sin. That goes straight back to the Fall, when Adam even dared to blame God for making ‘that woman’!
It also made me think of Leviticus, which I am currently studying for a Sunday school lesson for high school seniors. Many people observe that some of the strangeness of Levitical law is for the healthy functioning of society, and that is of course true. But what we can’t miss is that the core of the Levitical narrative (yes, it is part of the Israelite history) is the HOLINESS of God.
“Be holy; for I am holy” (Lev. 11:44) is the central theme of Leviticus. The reason the teenagers shouldn’t have stolen from an unlocked car is that they are created in the image of God and placed in a cosmos and community where people are meant to live and love in harmony. Because of the Fall, people do steal; shalom is violated. Law is a necessary part, not only of community life, but also of living a holy life.
There’s more to say about how Leviticus led me to hope for redemption for these young people, but it’s time to conclude. I’ll leave you with the verse Eugene Peterson quotes in his introduction to Leviticus in The Message:
“So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life – your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking around life – and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. (Romans 12:1-2)
