Crow hopping

My first horse was a white gelding with splayed hooves from some previous pleasure and a limp from a wire cut on his left hock. Obviously, 7-Up had a mysterious prior life.

He had one pink eye and one with a black patch, like eyeliner. He was basically ugly but he made up for that by being pretty dense, too.

His focus for his day was eating hay and avoiding double riders by throwing out a little crow hop when my little sister climbed behind the saddle. (A crow hop happens when the horse bucks straight up.)

I thought that he’d be delighted to be with us after his dark past. We never allowed him to founder and we guarded him from any wire cuts. He was our first horse so he got lots of brushing and some apples on the side. There was always plenty of fresh water and lots of room to roll and run. He had a good life but he still crow hopped.

We came to God like 7-up came to us, a little beat up from our previous life, and we get treated pretty well. God gives us freedom and new life and hope. He loves us and shows us a better way.

And then we crow hop. We think he’s asking too much when he says something crazy like “If you love me, you will obey what I command.”

We think God is burdening us with his commands. But when we have an obedience problem, we really have a love problem.

Servants

We handed tissues and listened quietly as our friend sobbed with agony. "I'm tired of my life. Does God even care anymore about me?"

The week before, another friend had stood defiantly. "God doesn't care. I've prayed and I've even fasted but he's not coming through for me."

On cue, we began our litany to prove that God cares. He'd provided finances at critical times. He'd protected children on the highway and friends in illnesses.

"Well, he doesn't care about me. I feel cursed."

So then we gave our litany on the value of hindsight. We now understood what we had not known before. God had prepared us for some upcoming event by a difficulty in our lives.

The point, as I look back, was to show our friend that God has purpose. But I think we might have been more honest had we said, instead, that we didn't always know why he allowed something. We live in an imperfect world, our days weighed down by consequences. We can waste a lot of time seeking answers to "why" questions.

But now I would tell my friend that we are servants. If the Master chooses to tell us why he's placed us in a particular place, then we're fortunate. Our place is not that of an informed confidant but of a beloved servant. Our task is to listen to our Lord and not our own desires. Our task is to trust and obey.

Those who obey his commands live in him, and he in them. 1 John 3:24

Sweet fruit

Abundant lush red grapes hanging from thick green vine appeal to me. So, when Jesus compared himself to a vine, promising fruit to those who cling to him, the imagery grabs me.

I can taste the sweetness of the juice and savor the fruit.

But when Jesus said to remain in his love, that is more abstract. How do I remain in his love?

Jesus answered the question in a talk with his disciples. To remain in his love comes on the path of obedience. ("If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love..." John 15:10)

Well, OK. But what is his command? Jesus must have been fielding questions from his disciples, because he answered that question shortly: "My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you" (John 15:12)

So we are to love others as he loved us. That seems easy enough when the object of our love is a newborn or a dear family member. We get warm fuzzies back and feel good about it all.

Jesus expanded the circle, however. He wasn't speaking of the love that seeks return but of a tougher sort. "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends." (John 15:13)
Now we're getting to it. How do I remain in his love? By laying down my life for others. That's what he commands.

When Susan washed clothes behind the scenes for weeks when a family was struck with a terrible illness, she laid down her life for others. When Sam hauled out trash and pulled weeds for a neighbor who could not- and was bitter about it- he laid down his life for another. When Nate spent his vacation feeding orphans in Haiti, he laid down his life.

Laying down our life isn't always rewarding except in one sense. Jesus promises his presence to those who remain in his love. And that is sweet fruit.

Going

Divorce was not an option for Rose, but her husband just walked out 15 years ago, leaving her in a pit of debt and two young daughters to raise.

Rose didn’t buckle. She turned her situation over to God, got some counsel about finances, and began to dig out.

Today, she lives in the same small house but it’s paid for. She has no debt and her daughters are now on their own, both followers of Jesus.

Today Rose recycles carefully, nurtures her old car, and tends to the details because she is a world traveler. She works as a librarian in a school in Texas and sets money aside monthly for her next trip.

For the last 4 years, Rose has spent two weeks each summer in the Yucatan. One year she was able to slip over to Cuba for several days. She’s taught Vacation Bible Schools and helped with outdoor evangelism outreaches.

This year, she spent a week venturing into a youth detention center in the cool of the evening, where teenage boys are imprisoned. “They are guilty until proven innocent,” she told me.

Omar caught her heart early. “I was outside a store,” he told her, “when my friends went inside and stole some things. Maybe I shouldn’t have waited for them.” Omar got four years in the detention center for waiting for them, but Rose has given him a Bible and he has given his heart to Jesus.

“Please pray for me,” he told her. “It’s hard in here to stay with Jesus.”

Rose will pray. And she’ll be back again next year.

Jesus told his disciples, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations…” (Matt 28:19)

It can be done, even by a woman shackled with debt. Start praying about how you’ll go.

Out-there lures

Daisy broke out Sunday morning and I learned in the adventure.

You need to know that Daisy was a wild child who wanted her own way and was leery of authority. I won’t describe the wrestling match involved in starting the tethering process.

But the break seemed to come. She lowered her head in obedience.

We weren’t satisfied with obedience, however. We wanted trust and began a long process of wooing her to us. We started with obedience but we really wanted love.

So when she escaped Sunday morning, I was anxious that the out-there might snag her attention. But her eyes were on me. After she saw me, she walked up calmly and began to follow me.

Daisy is a two-year-old filly that we saw transformed from an over-the-fence kind of baby into a gentle horse willing to trade the wide-open spaces for my hand and protection.

But Daisy is my teenage daughter and my pre-teen son, too. How the freedom can beckon! Many horses (and teens) are hungry for the green grass on the other side of the fence, not knowing the harm mixed with the pleasure.

Had Daisy bolted from me, she faced a field of ripe alfalfa – a sure death-trap for a greedy and hungry horse. She faced a highway with trucks rolling at 60 mph. She faced an irrigation ditch filled with rushing water and steep sides. Dangers crouched where she could not see.

I want our children to find a safe path, to look at our lead and follow.

And, it occurred to me as I brushed down Daisy Sunday, that our Father wants the same thing from us. He is willing to wrestle with us as he did with Jacob, to teach us obedience.

But the ultimate goal is, when the gate is open and the out-there whispers, that we search out his eye and follow him.

If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love.

John 15:10

Cleaning out

I knew things were going to get a little sticky when I uncovered a CD for a printer that I don’t recall owning. Then there was the CD with a black Sharpie question mark label.

What in the world?

It was finals time so to speak. I had popped off the lid to my trusted plastic CD box. I had to deliver the goods just like a test at the end of the semester.

If you recall, my laptop computer crashed last week. After a stubborn time of trying to restore files, I finally moved on. (Did I say stubborn? I meant persistent, of course.)

The hard drive was re-formatted and it was time to re-install my programs. Although nobody accuses me of being well-organized (well, someone did once but that was before they saw my desk), I took some pride on my box as a shred of planning.

Every program CD went into that box. Well, except for the MS Office CD but that’s a whole ‘nother story that I can’t explain. It is somewhere in my office.

I am proud to say that there were no 5 ½ inch floppies in there. Using my system, that’s a miracle.

(Remind me to tell you the story of the Apple IIc that is stored in my son’s room.)

I found programs that won’t run on anything newer than Windows 98. I found programs for pre-schoolers. (Our youngest is 11.) I found a CD from our classical music days.

I haven’t had the time to check out the question-mark CD yet, although there’s the fleeting issue of why I’d save a CD inscribed that way. I’d like to blame this on the kids but they never open the box. I am the computer technician at our house. They just run the programs and don’t mess with the details.

Wonder where they learned that?

There’s a principle swirling in that plastic box. Crisis tends to reveal. What was once hidden becomes public in calamity. It became obvious that I don’t maintain my plastic box. I just toss things in there without seeing what is no longer relevant (or maybe never relevant.)

The past should have been worked through, not allowed to take up space. We grow, just as our computers change. Remember when Windows 95 was the big deal? Remember when our approach to problems was to eat or shop or party?

We need to keep our lives cleaned out. I’m wondering how many question-mark CDs I allow in my heart. And how many irrelevant CDs are taking up space I could be using.

A CD box isn’t the focus of my life, but my walk with the Lord had better not look like my box. I need to be in his presence daily, cleaning out the old and extraneous. I need my walk with my King to be free of garbage.

Paul put it so well:

I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ.

Phil 3:8

I’m cleaning out my box!

Spiritual understanding

The golden rule for understanding spiritually is not intellect, but obedience.
—My Utmost For His Highest