Blessed are the Piece-makers

“Hi, I’m David and I’m an anxiety addict.” Every day I wonder if I can match up to others’ expectations of me. Do I perform my job correctly? Do I spend my free time effectively? This is what the little voice inside of me asks regularly. Or in bed at night, I think and wrestle over positive or negative ways that I can change myself, others or anything else I may be able to effect. These questions make me and keep me anxious. And I can’t seem to get away from them.

Several years ago, a speaker at my favorite summer camp spent the week talking about the beatitudes that Jesus lists in Matthew 5. At about that time, I had a shirt that stated one of them on the back: “Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God” (Matthew 5:9). The speaker’s hope was that the campers would form their lives around what he referred to as the “Be-Attitudes.” As I grew, I continued to work at building my life around these truths. Now that I am older and wiser, I realize that I probably have, though because of my anxiety issue, I still find that true peace is a fleeting desire. I have also learned that there may be more Be-Attitudes than I originally thought.

My parents have been marriage and family councilors for years. My Dad has been a pastor since before I was born, and I have heard many testimonies of how they have brought about and encouraged healing in the lives of their clients. (See their website www.theducklows.ca for more.) Because of people like them, I don’t believe the beatitudes of the New Testament are exhaustive, because I would not be surprised to hear Christ say something like this:

“Blessed are the Piece-makers for they shall be whole.”

People who look at my parents, and others like them, wonder in awe at how they can maintain a marriage, raise a family or disciple a community as they do. My answer: “Because they do their best to be piece-makers, they are blessed.”

Just like the other beatitudes, piece-makers are not only professional councilors, psychologists or pastors and others who seem to have their lives together. Piece-makers could also be stay at home parents, truck drivers, or hopefully S.E.A’s like me. They are nobody special. They are just people who enjoy a good relational puzzle every once in a while. They enjoy the challenge of getting others on track, slowly fitting one piece together with its unique partner designed by God to make that person whole.

Last week, over breakfast, my boss placed a basket on the table and encouraged all the others present to take a sheet of paper and pray for the name on the paper. I grabbed one quickly and placed it in my pocket. A few days later, I approached the person whose name I had picked and asked, “So, how can I be praying for you?” I could have also said, “How can I pray so that the pieces of your life may fit, become bigger and you may become whole?” We are supposed to be praying for these people for one week, but I hope to remember this colleague’s name in prayer until the pieces of her life fit together.

Who is your piece-maker? And to whom are you being a piece-maker? Over the past few years, I have felt somewhat incomplete. I have been a Christian for over eighteen years so faith has become a fairly large piece in my life and probably isn’t my problem. I have graduated from university and college, so I feel like I have achieved in the academic realm. I am part of a church family that loves me to pieces (no pun intended), and is willing to find and put the pieces that are missing, together. However, as I mentioned at the beginning, anxiety has always been a close but unwanted companion. If you drew my name out of the basket, feel free to pray against this unwanted companion in my life.

Each of us, no matter what our age, faith or occupation is, can play a role in putting someone else’s pieces back together and they can do the same for you. In that way, we may feel blessed.

Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit.
Blessed is the lamb whose blood flows.
Blessed are the sat upon, spat upon, ratted on,
O lord, why have you forsaken me?
I got no place to go,
I’ve walked around soho for the last night or so.
Ah, but it doesn’t matter, no.

Blessed - Simon & Garfunkel

IF NOT ... / THEN WHAT?

­Society today tells you that there are many reasons why it cannot love you just the way you are. It tells you that if you don’t look more beautiful, if you don’t wear the popular clothes, if you are not more cool, then people will not accept you. This is what it takes to be accepted by the standards of our society.

As I studied English in high school, I learned about something called an if / then clause. It is a rule that if you use the word ‘if’ in a sentence, you must also use the word ‘then’ soon after it. It is there to indicate a cause/ effect relationship.

In Herbie’s story, we read of a couple ‘if/then’ clauses in his life. If you believed that you had sinned too much for God to ever be able to forgive you, then you would feel hopeless about life. This is how Herbie felt. If you had “led a rough life” and had become separated from your family and friends, then you would become lonely. Just as Herbie was.

Often, society is cruel in its consequences for our actions. Perhaps you too have been through circumstances that have dealt you nothing but hopelessness, loneliness, and pain.

However, God offers us a chance to experience his blessing and loving kindness if we will only come to Him. In 1st John 1:7-9, the author tells us about three if / then clauses that lead to life! He says:

1. If we claim to be without sin, [then] we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

2. If we confess our sins [then] He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

3. If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, [then] the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.

What peace and joy came into Herbie’s life when he submitted to God’s truth and came to Jesus for cleansing and a new life? This hope is available to all, if they only come to God through the way he has opened, his Son Jesus Christ. Please consider this final if / then clause in Scripture. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His one and only Son. [If we] believe in Him, [then] we shall not die, but have ever lasting life.” (John 3:16 my paraphrase) If you truly catch the meaning of this, you will find eternal life...Just as Herbie did!

To learn more about Herbie, read his testimony at: http://www.thestreetcorner.org/

Short Term Vision

After John Esau signed in at the hospital, the doctors told him “the stab wound was not [his] greatest problem.” They had seen a bigger problem than he had seen. That must have been difficult for him to understand. “What do you mean a greater problem? I just got stabbed and am in excruciating pain, there can’t be a greater problem than that!” But the doctors had long term vision and saw his greater need.

Some of us suffer from a problem called ‘short term memory’ and because I am one of those people, I understand how frustrating it can be. I forget people’s names, conversations I have had, or responsibilities I may have just been given. Another, greater, problem that we all experience could be called “short term vision.” Something might happen to us because we can only see the short term consequences of actions we may take.

For example, if you’ve just lost your job, short term vision would probably result in anxiety, discouragement and very few answers to a growing list of frantic questions. You may injure your writing hand and wonder “how you will ever be able to complete this assignment on time. Or your computer may crash for no known reason, and the immediate problems you will face may be endless! Problems like these seem so big when we have short term vision and it is the only thing we can see. What will you do?

You can do several things in response to these problems. You can exhaust yourself thinking about how you could find another job or alternate income. You could try to teach your other hand to continue writing the assignment. Or you could pay as much as is required so the computer is fixed correctly. These ideas may or may not work.

But Jesus offers a fourth solution that has a 100% guarantee for those who have chosen to try it. In the Bible, He beckons us to:

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”

Matt. 11:28

Jesus does not promise to be the man to fix all of our worldly problems, especially in the same way we want them to be fixed. But he will give us rest, the one thing we all seek but rarely find, if we simply ask Him for it.

To his horror, John Esau discovered there was a greater problem than his stab wound that needed to be fixed first. If you will let Him, Jesus wants to show you the greater wounds in your life that only He can heal, and are more important than the problems you can see like a lost job, a broken bone or a computer that shuts down. Jesus wants to give you long term vision, something that only he can give because only He has it.

Prayer for Long Term Vision

Lord Jesus, teach me to see what only you can see,

The eternal things that are currently invisible to me,

Give me long term vision so I( may trust you to make me free,

And take away my anxious thoughts and replace them with faith in thee!

To learn more about John Esau, read his testimony at: http://www.thestreetcorner.org/

I learn again

Sometimes when I am living inside my shell,
I believe I don’t need You more than anybody else,
But when I moved my eyes from You to me, I fell,
So, I learn again . . . I need You more than words can ever tell.

Sometimes I want the things I should not have,
Help me to love You more than the cookies on the shelf,
Lest I stuff myself with junk, accumulating desires and wealth,
I learn again . . . I need You more than I need myself.

To work for friends, grades, and a living is fine,
But what do we really gain in the daily grind?
Lord Jesus, help me to seek You most with my time,
Because, I’ve learned again . . . what I really need is Divine.

The Silver Rule

Whether you call yourself a Christian or not, you have surely heard the words of Jesus at least once. Matthew 7:12; “in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you”, is one of the most quoted verses for children. And, whether in a memorable context or one we would rather forget, we remember it as adults. Teachers quote it, encouraging kids to treat each other fairly, husbands and wives bring it to mind, reminding each other to love the way they desire to be loved, or business partners treat each other well, so that the favor might be returned. We refer to this verse as “the Golden rule” and we have worked hard to keep it.

This past week, I was on my way to a teacher’s conference in Kelowna with colleagues of mine. Just before we were to reach the toll booth on the Coquihalla, the engine gave up, and we coasted to a stop on the side of the cold, dark, road. Stranded, realizing we would not make it to the conference, our driver began to do everything in her power to make things right, waving for cars to pull over and offer assistance, making cell phone calls for a tow truck and apologizing repeatedly that our destination would not be reached. Our only destination was back to Vancouver in the cab of the truck.

As I sat in the warm truck, a question began to form in my mind. As teachers, don’t we give kids grace when they make a mistake? When we do the same, whether we have control over the situation or not, shouldn’t we give ourselves the same grace? At my school, we work hard to teach the next generation to obey the golden rule. But we forget the silver lining in it. If we personalize it for ourselves, it asks us to “Do to yourself as you would do to others.” What would this look like?

Two verses in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians focus directly on our responsibilities towards each other and ourselves. My paraphrase of Ephesians 4:31-32 goes a little bit like this.

“Forgive your friends, enemies and yourself because in Christ, God has already forgiven you. All bitterness, rage, anger, brawling, slander, and all forms of malice are history. Therefore, be kind and compassionate to one another.” Isn’t it better this way?

The effect of being forgiven is amazing. Like removing a huge weight from around our shoulders, the feeling of forgiveness is certainly underrated. We all agree that we should do it more often, but forgiving ourselves is and always will be difficult in a society that demands perfection of its members. What makes it worse is that we demand perfection of ourselves. Therefore, Bible teacher Chuck Swindoll's (see Insight for Living) hypothesis that, “we are the last to forgive ourselves” makes sense.

But if we remember the silver rule we may find forgiving our friends, enemies and especially ourselves much easier.

"If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness."

1^st John 1:7-9

It’s good . . . to be Lonely

I have a nasty habit. My habit is that I find too many things to be sorry for. In response to my apologies, friends and acquaintances may say, “it’s no big deal,” my Australian friends may reply: “no worries” and Timon and Pumbaa from the Lion King sing, “Hakuna Matata!” The idea of being sorry, worried or frustrated is ingrained in our North American culture. So when I listened to a song several years ago that said it’s good to have these feelings, I listened hard and often, and its reminder, has become one of my favorites. The song addresses three feelings which we would rather discard rather than face, but to each of these feelings, Wayne Watson says, “it’s good. . . .”
Psalm 23:1 says “GOD, my shepherd! I don't need a thing.” What, we don’t need anything? If we look around, it will not take long for us to desire something and we may find ourselves saying, “I need this,” “I want that.” Last night, I watched “Stranger than Fiction”, a movie about Harold Crick, an IRS agent, who falls in love with a client of his. In an awkward attempt to get closer to his newly found love, Crick bluntly states, “I want you.”
Loneliness is not usually something that we want. Instead, we would go to great lengths to avoid it. Being a shepherd, David, the author of Psalm 23, spent a lot of time alone and knew what it meant to be lonely. But rather than see it as a time of being separate from everyone, David viewed loneliness as a time to be alone, together with his God. Like David, Watson sees loneliness differently. In his first verse, he writes:

It's good to be lonely every now and again
To be parted from the ones you adore
To sit at a table for two all alone
And take a look at the world around you
At people with no one to go home to
Some with a place to belong
Others consumed by their weakness
And another when weak seems so strong

It may be impossible or at least very hard for us to find any reason why it would ever be good to be lonely. But if we spend time in this frame of mind, we may learn that there are indeed good things that can be found in loneliness. David found some of those good things in his Psalm:

You have bedded me down in lush meadows,
you find me quiet pools to drink from.
True to your word,
you let me catch my breath
and send me in the right direction.
Even when the way goes through
Death Valley, I'm not afraid
when you walk at my side.
Your trusty shepherd's crook
makes me feel secure.
You serve me a six-course dinner
right in front of my enemies.
You revive my drooping head;
my cup brims with blessing.
Psalm 23:2-5 (The Message)

David doesn’t sound so lonely anymore, does he?

It’s good . . . to go down to Defeat

Genesis 37-50 tells the beautiful story of Joseph. His name means, “the Lord shall add,” and the Lord added to him many things. The casual reader may remember that God gave him power, making him second in command in all of Egypt. Or you may remember that he was his father’s favorite son, who gave him a coat of many colors. But did you know what God gave him? God gave Joseph a resilient spirit that accepted defeat, and an ability to overcome it that few people have ever experienced.

Again, you may be able to remember when Joseph was defeated. The story of Joseph being robbed, stripped and sold into slavery by his brothers is well known. But his greatest sense of defeat was when he was accused of rape by Potiphar's Wife, and spent two years as a criminal in the king’s prison for a crime he never committed.

Heaven and earth view defeat differently. The world views defeat as the way to prove that you are a looser, and Joseph may have felt like one on many occasions. But Heaven says the only way to win is to be defeated first and Joseph is an ideal example of this.

You have probably experienced defeat in your own life. Whether on the job, at home, or among friends, feeling defeated has been experienced by many. Wayne Watson continues his song with council for the defeated.

It's good to go down to defeat now and then
To fail at some noble pursuit
To fall short of the prize
And find in His eyes
There's nothing your victory can do
To secure higher favor
He cannot love you more than now
Winners and losers
All are the same somehow

The last line of this verse proclaims one of the most unheard truths in our society. Whether differences become evident at work, school, in your family or your social circle, we know we are “all the same somehow” and we cherish this. Yet as long as we view our differences positively, it makes us feel successful and we cherish them even more. “I was the only one to receive this raise because I was able to do something none of the others could.” “I’m the only person here to have this disability, so I ride for free,” or the old kids rhyme that I heard many times this week, “I’m the king of the castle and you’re the dirty rascal!” As much as we may claim that we are the same our differences stick out like soar thumbs, and as long as we are on top, we love them because that makes us unique. But, if we are not on top, our overwhelming feeling may be one of deep sorrow instead. It is to this topic that Watson turns next.