dear rory,
she was whimpering. her face was scrunched up in an effort to keep the tears in her eyes.
"mommy..."
"come here," mom and I both said at once. being fourteen years older than my little sister, sometimes I forget I'm not her mom.
Megan forgets sometimes too, and so she threw her little self into my lap. which may have been a good thing, since mom was already crying.
with her head turned back, Megan watched the tv as she wrapped her arms around my neck.
"why are they doing that to Jesus?" she whispered sadly into my cheek.
"they want Him to die," I said. "they say He is a bad man."
"but He's not."
"you're right. He is perfect."
we both watched. the movie showed Jesus standing before jeering crowds. crowds that, only a week before, had been singing Hosannas to His name.
Jesus stayed silent to their insults.
He was oppressed and afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth; He was led like a lamb to the slaughter... (Isaiah 53:7)
they struck Him. and though it was simply a cartoon, I felt my eyes burning, and I squeezed my sister tighter. we were both watching our God die.
our God who had, as Joni Earickson Tada once described it, "poured Himself into baby flesh."
for a minute, I wanted to tell my sister that it would "be okay". that Jesus wouldn't die. but then I remembered... that's why He came as a baby in the first place.
***
"How can you become a Christian?" the Sunday-school teacher asked.
Hands shot up.
"Yes, Renee?"
"You have to ask Jesus into your heart," my seven-year-old self replied.
"And what did Jesus do to save you?"
"He died on the cross for my sins."
Easy.***
"Nay, what are they doing to Jesus now?"
"They're nailing Him to the cross."
She buried her closed eyes under my chin, as the video tactfully, but emotionally, showed the Roman soldier bend over our Savior. What it didn't show, I knew. The Roman soldier hammered metal through His outspread palm and punctured skin and bone.
But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him... (Isaiah 53:5)
I looked over towards mom. She watched as her four-year-old struggled with Jesus' death. Tears were streaming down her cheeks. Dad turned the volume down, but said quietly, "This is good. She understands."
"Is that His mother?" Megan whispered when she looked up.
"Yes, that's Mary." Mary, who was also a mother crying for her child. Mary who had carried the Son of God in her womb.
***
"Mary, did you know? That your baby boy, will one day heal the nations?"
the words were being sung to me by my cousin Elizabeth, who had been barren her whole life, but was now with child herself.
my own child felt like it could fall out at any moment.
I stood on the stage in front of a couple hundred people and tried to nonchalantly adjust my child. just for the record: rolled up blankets are not good children.
how I was chosen to be Mary for our old church's Christmas play, I still do not know. I can't sing, and I can't act. but I loved the nativity story. and I suppose my enthusiasm carried me through to the top spot.
I felt a little funny. not terribly nervous. just funny. I was at my most awkward stage of life, Joseph was like a foot shorter than me (I had to kneel down for the scene he placed his hand on my shoulder), and my solo went a little higher than my vocal chords could manage. but there I was, dressed in rag-like clothes, pretending to carry the King of the world inside my dress.
"When you kiss your little baby, you kiss the face of God..."
the stage lights were making me sweat, but at that moment, I shivered and imagined I really was Mary, about to give birth to the one who would redeem the nations. it was a scary feeling.
what would it be like to raise God in the flesh? for wholly God He would be. but also wholly man. "my" child would suffer hunger, pain, and temptation like all the rest of us. He would get thirsty. He would get sick, have headaches, wake up only to find He was still exhausted. He would face annoying people. He would have brothers and sisters to pester Him. He would have chores. He would see death and pay taxes and work hard. People would let Him down, lie to Him, cheat Him, spit on Him, hate Him, beat Him, and mock Him.
and yet He wouldn't sin and blame it on His circumstances. He would remain perfect.
I forgot about the audience and the fact that Joseph was a midget compared to me.
I was Mary. God was about to make His appearance on earth.
"This child that you deliver, will soon deliver you... oh Mary, did you know?"
***
it was useless holding my breath. seeing Mary weep as she watched her son, perfect man and perfect God, hang on the cross was heart-breaking.
Megan and I clung to each other, and I let quiet tears slide down my face. I felt like I was watching the story as a four-year-old again. Jesus is good... why are they doing this to Him?
I looked back at the seven-year-old me who had thought that salvation was so easy. In a way, salvation is easy... for us. but for God, it meant sacrifice and blood and tears and sweat and heartbreak.
my pre-teen self up on stage had grasped that concept for a moment. and now I was grasping it again. not for the first time. not for the last.
we kept watching Jesus' final hours on earth. we cried until His last breath.
and then, there was silence for three days. a dead man lay in his tomb. the world waited.
the Son of God came back to life. the grave could not stop Him.
and He is the mediator between God and man to this day. He knows what it is to be God. and He knows what it is to be man.
***
After He has suffered,
He will see the light of life
and be satisfied;
by His knowledge my
righteous servant will
justify many,
and He will bear their
iniquities...
because He poured out His
life unto death,
and was numbered with the
transgressors.
For He bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for
the transgressors.
(Isaiah 53:12)
***
thank you, Lord Jesus. for making salvation so easy that a four-year-old can understand. for making salvation so complex and beautiful that we'll never really understand all that you sacrificed by "pouring yourself into baby flesh."
love,
muffin
Showing posts with label hearts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hearts. Show all posts
27.12.12
19.12.11
from the inside looking out
“mirror mirror on the wall, who is the fairest… scratch that… who is the purest of them all?”
dear rory,
once upon a time, in a land that was obsessed with beauty and appearance, lived a woman. this woman was an older lady. she was small. she was slight. she was weak and yellow and frail. and on top of all that, she was sick. very sick. she had had cancer for sixteen years and it had taken its toll on her body.
to be honest, she wasn’t very beautiful… at least, not if you gave her a brief glance. not if you were making a quick evaluation.
why, if you had happened to live in this land and had happened to know this woman and had happened to be the doctor who gave her a check-up, you would have noticed that besides being small and frail and unattractive, she was also bruised and beat up. especially her knees.
how did such a woman belong in such a land?
she didn’t.
she didn’t belong in that land at all. yes, she lived there, but her heart belonged in a kingdom that was far greater than that petty land. she belonged to a kingdom that was ruled by a mighty King. the mightiest King that ever was. a King she had given her life to as a gift to build His Kingdom. a King she would soon get to meet face to face.
I remember hearing of this woman’s death. you see, I live in the same land that she did. this woman was a dear friend of our family’s. her name was Ruth, and while she was not the most beautiful in the land, she was one of the most beautiful women in the kingdom.
for sixteen years she had battled her cancer. for sixteen years she had prayed and cried out to the King of Kings. for sixteen years, she never turned her back on Him.
she used her last few days to witness to the hospice nurse caring for her. that nurse became a citizen of the kingdom.
and what of those bruises on Ruth’s knees? how did she get them? I cry even as I write this- those bruises were from the hours she spent kneeling in prayer.
not hours praying for herself. hours praying for others. hours praying for me.
looks can be deceiving.
especially in this land in which we live.
I have a childhood memory that frequently haunts my mind.
(side note: isn’t it annoying how we remember some of the oddest, most obscure things about childhood, but seem to forget all the important events? like remembering the scary biker neighbor bringing his pet iguana over for a visit but not remembering the birth of a sibling?)
like I was saying… I have this childhood memory that frequently haunts my mind. years and years ago, I was at AWANA (a Bible group for kids) and at this particular Wednesday night meeting, we had a guest speaker. and the speaker had brought two cakes.
one was beautifully decorated. instantly it made my stomach growl and my eyes bug out. a frozen sea of white, creamy frosting glazed the surface and little candy flowers ornamented this miracle of a cake. the other cake was frosted a nasty color… pea green. and it had no flowers or borders, only a light dusting of bitter coffee grounds.
I saw the speaker take out a knife to cut the cakes, and in that moment I knew what was going to happen. the other little girls watched hungrily as the speaker cut into the beautiful cake. I leaned back and cringed.
as you may have guessed, the beautiful cake was nasty on the inside, and the ugly one was filled with springy, yellow yummy-ness.
I wasn’t surprised. but the whole thing bothered me. and I didn’t know why. so the memory grabbed a magazine, got comfortable in some back corner, and for many years only occasionally strolled to the front of my mind to see if I could make anything of it.
after Ruth died, it hit me. a cake that is ugly on the outside and nice on the inside doesn’t exist. and THAT’S what had been bothering me for so long.
you see, we have become so accustomed to living in this land, that we have forgotten what beauty is. beauty isn’t how much frosting you can pile on a cake or how much make-up you can paint on a face. It isn’t how many sugary flowers you can place on top or how many layers of nice clothes you can wear.
beauty is what radiates from a person. beauty is what makes you forget a person’s outward imperfections and only see the smile in their eyes. it’s the kind tone you hear in their voice. it’s the warmth you feel in their grasp. it’s the wrinkles bearing witness to years of smiling friendliness.
beauty is what you find when you stop searching someone’s face for what this land considers beautiful and allow yourself to see something bigger. beauty is allowing yourself to see the King shining through an individual.
I can honestly say I have never met a person who is pure on the inside and ugly on the outside. ugly cakes with perfect middles just don’t exist.
it’s easy to judge a book by its cover. people in this land do it all the time.
what’s harder and not as normal is to judge a cover by the book.
from the inside looking out.
love you!
muffin
dear rory,
once upon a time, in a land that was obsessed with beauty and appearance, lived a woman. this woman was an older lady. she was small. she was slight. she was weak and yellow and frail. and on top of all that, she was sick. very sick. she had had cancer for sixteen years and it had taken its toll on her body.
to be honest, she wasn’t very beautiful… at least, not if you gave her a brief glance. not if you were making a quick evaluation.
why, if you had happened to live in this land and had happened to know this woman and had happened to be the doctor who gave her a check-up, you would have noticed that besides being small and frail and unattractive, she was also bruised and beat up. especially her knees.
how did such a woman belong in such a land?
she didn’t.
she didn’t belong in that land at all. yes, she lived there, but her heart belonged in a kingdom that was far greater than that petty land. she belonged to a kingdom that was ruled by a mighty King. the mightiest King that ever was. a King she had given her life to as a gift to build His Kingdom. a King she would soon get to meet face to face.
I remember hearing of this woman’s death. you see, I live in the same land that she did. this woman was a dear friend of our family’s. her name was Ruth, and while she was not the most beautiful in the land, she was one of the most beautiful women in the kingdom.
for sixteen years she had battled her cancer. for sixteen years she had prayed and cried out to the King of Kings. for sixteen years, she never turned her back on Him.
she used her last few days to witness to the hospice nurse caring for her. that nurse became a citizen of the kingdom.
and what of those bruises on Ruth’s knees? how did she get them? I cry even as I write this- those bruises were from the hours she spent kneeling in prayer.
not hours praying for herself. hours praying for others. hours praying for me.
looks can be deceiving.
especially in this land in which we live.
I have a childhood memory that frequently haunts my mind.
(side note: isn’t it annoying how we remember some of the oddest, most obscure things about childhood, but seem to forget all the important events? like remembering the scary biker neighbor bringing his pet iguana over for a visit but not remembering the birth of a sibling?)
like I was saying… I have this childhood memory that frequently haunts my mind. years and years ago, I was at AWANA (a Bible group for kids) and at this particular Wednesday night meeting, we had a guest speaker. and the speaker had brought two cakes.
one was beautifully decorated. instantly it made my stomach growl and my eyes bug out. a frozen sea of white, creamy frosting glazed the surface and little candy flowers ornamented this miracle of a cake. the other cake was frosted a nasty color… pea green. and it had no flowers or borders, only a light dusting of bitter coffee grounds.
I saw the speaker take out a knife to cut the cakes, and in that moment I knew what was going to happen. the other little girls watched hungrily as the speaker cut into the beautiful cake. I leaned back and cringed.
as you may have guessed, the beautiful cake was nasty on the inside, and the ugly one was filled with springy, yellow yummy-ness.
I wasn’t surprised. but the whole thing bothered me. and I didn’t know why. so the memory grabbed a magazine, got comfortable in some back corner, and for many years only occasionally strolled to the front of my mind to see if I could make anything of it.
after Ruth died, it hit me. a cake that is ugly on the outside and nice on the inside doesn’t exist. and THAT’S what had been bothering me for so long.
you see, we have become so accustomed to living in this land, that we have forgotten what beauty is. beauty isn’t how much frosting you can pile on a cake or how much make-up you can paint on a face. It isn’t how many sugary flowers you can place on top or how many layers of nice clothes you can wear.
beauty is what radiates from a person. beauty is what makes you forget a person’s outward imperfections and only see the smile in their eyes. it’s the kind tone you hear in their voice. it’s the warmth you feel in their grasp. it’s the wrinkles bearing witness to years of smiling friendliness.
beauty is what you find when you stop searching someone’s face for what this land considers beautiful and allow yourself to see something bigger. beauty is allowing yourself to see the King shining through an individual.
I can honestly say I have never met a person who is pure on the inside and ugly on the outside. ugly cakes with perfect middles just don’t exist.
it’s easy to judge a book by its cover. people in this land do it all the time.
what’s harder and not as normal is to judge a cover by the book.
from the inside looking out.
love you!
muffin
27.8.11
beautifully broken
dear rory,
beauty.
that word brings so many images into my mind. ladybugs, mountains, gandalf’s horse shadowfax, the grand canyon, the color blue, a feathered arrow, queen esther, sparkling eyes, crystal chandeliers, natalie portman, chocolate (don’t look at me like that… it’s beautiful… in a way), caves full of diamonds, peaceful streams, long dark hair, gold lockets, old barns, and weeping willows are just a few.
what exactly is beauty?
according to the oxford dictionary, beauty is “a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight”.
in other words, beauty is something that you see on the outside. it is appealing and charming and much sought after.
but wait a minute. is that really all beauty is?
I have a confession: I often get caught up with outward beauty. I want to know what the latest style is, where that person got her scarf, how that lady did her make-up, when I can get my next hair-cut, why I can’t be as beautiful as that person over there, and, in fact, is it really too much to just ask to be the most beautiful person in the world?
however, over the past few years, God has been trying to teach me what true beauty is. He is patient with me and gives me little reminders time and time again.
for instance:
I remember a few years ago, while my family and I were on vacation, we went to a church service at a place called the Tabernacle. it was the children’s night to get up on stage and perform the Bible verses and songs they had been learning in Sunday School.
the third grade group climbed (some of them trudging… looking extremely uncomfortable in their church clothes…. probably wishing they had never been born… inwardly shaking their fists at their parents for making them do this) up onto the stage. you could immediately pick out which kids were the “cool” ones. they were the children who were doing their best not to stick to the program. the ones who were trying to trip the kid next to them. the ones who had their hands in their pockets with their heads thrown back proudly as if to say, “I am not associated with these other losers.”
I watched from my seat as the children lined up. parents darted up the aisles to snap a picture of their precious angels and some of the little girls waved and smiled and twirled their pig-tails. most of the boys just looked uncomfortable. and most of the teachers looked frazzled.
the music started, and the children began to sing the song they had been practicing at Sunday school. only three-quarters of the group were half-heartedly doing the hand motions, a few bold ones decided to go for the more attention-grabbing “everyone look how obnoxious I am” style of exaggerating every movement and over-annunciating every word, and the rest of them refused to sing or do any hand motions at all.
I had seen this kind of service hundreds of times. it was more like a show than church. a show that I could fall asleep while watching.
but as I settled back into the pew, I noticed one child in particular. it was a little boy. he was sitting in a wheel chair and tubes were attached to different parts of him. (I didn’t look too closely to see what those tubes were attached to because I get queasy with tubes and needles and blood and bandages and… well, for the sake of time, let’s just say I get queasy around a lot of things.) I noticed his arms were hanging somewhat limply and his head kind of rolled from side to side. his eyes were big, and his face was shaped a little differently from everyone else’s. obviously, he had some sort of physical disability, and it appeared that he may have had a mental one as well.
I pitied him. he wasn’t what one would consider beautiful. in fact, the world would despise him. he was weak and broken and ugly. he sat there unable to take care of himself. unable and incapable of doing so many things.
but he was capable of singing. or trying to sing.
and so he sang.
and his arm that still functioned relatively well swayed with the music and laboriously did every hand motion it could. the other arm lay uselessly on the wheel chair, but I could see that his hand was flinching as if trying to join the other.
he kept singing and dancing throughout the entire song. easily at first. working harder to keep up his energy by the end.
this child wasn’t looking at the other children to see if they thought he was cool. he wasn’t wishing he had worn his other shirt. he wasn’t hoping the song would hurry up and end so that he could go do whatever he wanted. this child was praising God. and he was using every ounce of strength he had to do it.
as tears filled my eyes watching him, I couldn’t help but imagine that God was looking down on this child and asking me quietly, “isn’t he beautiful?”
and I couldn’t help but think that he was.
when I think of that boy now, I remember that “charm is deceitful and beauty is vain” [Prov. 31:30]. I remember that outward beauty is not everything.
guess what? people grow old, their hair falls out, their teeth decay, fashions change, mountains crumble, ladybugs get stuck between the screen and the window pane and shrivel up, chocolate goes bad, weeping willows get cut down, “the grass will wither and the flower will fade away“ [James 1:11], etc.
a heart that loves the Lord and wants to follow Him always, a heart that only cares what He will think, a heart that wants to know Him better, a heart that is anxious to please Him and not “aesthetic senses”, a heart that is willing to praise Him with all the strength it can muster… now that is a beautiful thing.
I still enjoy outwardly beautiful things. God created us to enjoy them. but something I am learning, is that God often creates beautiful things out of what man would deem unbeautiful. out of hearts. out of sinners. out of dust. out of that child in the wheel chair.
God is so good.
love,
muffin
beauty.
that word brings so many images into my mind. ladybugs, mountains, gandalf’s horse shadowfax, the grand canyon, the color blue, a feathered arrow, queen esther, sparkling eyes, crystal chandeliers, natalie portman, chocolate (don’t look at me like that… it’s beautiful… in a way), caves full of diamonds, peaceful streams, long dark hair, gold lockets, old barns, and weeping willows are just a few.
what exactly is beauty?
according to the oxford dictionary, beauty is “a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight”.
in other words, beauty is something that you see on the outside. it is appealing and charming and much sought after.
but wait a minute. is that really all beauty is?
I have a confession: I often get caught up with outward beauty. I want to know what the latest style is, where that person got her scarf, how that lady did her make-up, when I can get my next hair-cut, why I can’t be as beautiful as that person over there, and, in fact, is it really too much to just ask to be the most beautiful person in the world?
however, over the past few years, God has been trying to teach me what true beauty is. He is patient with me and gives me little reminders time and time again.
for instance:
I remember a few years ago, while my family and I were on vacation, we went to a church service at a place called the Tabernacle. it was the children’s night to get up on stage and perform the Bible verses and songs they had been learning in Sunday School.
the third grade group climbed (some of them trudging… looking extremely uncomfortable in their church clothes…. probably wishing they had never been born… inwardly shaking their fists at their parents for making them do this) up onto the stage. you could immediately pick out which kids were the “cool” ones. they were the children who were doing their best not to stick to the program. the ones who were trying to trip the kid next to them. the ones who had their hands in their pockets with their heads thrown back proudly as if to say, “I am not associated with these other losers.”
I watched from my seat as the children lined up. parents darted up the aisles to snap a picture of their precious angels and some of the little girls waved and smiled and twirled their pig-tails. most of the boys just looked uncomfortable. and most of the teachers looked frazzled.
the music started, and the children began to sing the song they had been practicing at Sunday school. only three-quarters of the group were half-heartedly doing the hand motions, a few bold ones decided to go for the more attention-grabbing “everyone look how obnoxious I am” style of exaggerating every movement and over-annunciating every word, and the rest of them refused to sing or do any hand motions at all.
I had seen this kind of service hundreds of times. it was more like a show than church. a show that I could fall asleep while watching.
but as I settled back into the pew, I noticed one child in particular. it was a little boy. he was sitting in a wheel chair and tubes were attached to different parts of him. (I didn’t look too closely to see what those tubes were attached to because I get queasy with tubes and needles and blood and bandages and… well, for the sake of time, let’s just say I get queasy around a lot of things.) I noticed his arms were hanging somewhat limply and his head kind of rolled from side to side. his eyes were big, and his face was shaped a little differently from everyone else’s. obviously, he had some sort of physical disability, and it appeared that he may have had a mental one as well.
I pitied him. he wasn’t what one would consider beautiful. in fact, the world would despise him. he was weak and broken and ugly. he sat there unable to take care of himself. unable and incapable of doing so many things.
but he was capable of singing. or trying to sing.
and so he sang.
and his arm that still functioned relatively well swayed with the music and laboriously did every hand motion it could. the other arm lay uselessly on the wheel chair, but I could see that his hand was flinching as if trying to join the other.
he kept singing and dancing throughout the entire song. easily at first. working harder to keep up his energy by the end.
this child wasn’t looking at the other children to see if they thought he was cool. he wasn’t wishing he had worn his other shirt. he wasn’t hoping the song would hurry up and end so that he could go do whatever he wanted. this child was praising God. and he was using every ounce of strength he had to do it.
as tears filled my eyes watching him, I couldn’t help but imagine that God was looking down on this child and asking me quietly, “isn’t he beautiful?”
and I couldn’t help but think that he was.
when I think of that boy now, I remember that “charm is deceitful and beauty is vain” [Prov. 31:30]. I remember that outward beauty is not everything.
guess what? people grow old, their hair falls out, their teeth decay, fashions change, mountains crumble, ladybugs get stuck between the screen and the window pane and shrivel up, chocolate goes bad, weeping willows get cut down, “the grass will wither and the flower will fade away“ [James 1:11], etc.
a heart that loves the Lord and wants to follow Him always, a heart that only cares what He will think, a heart that wants to know Him better, a heart that is anxious to please Him and not “aesthetic senses”, a heart that is willing to praise Him with all the strength it can muster… now that is a beautiful thing.
I still enjoy outwardly beautiful things. God created us to enjoy them. but something I am learning, is that God often creates beautiful things out of what man would deem unbeautiful. out of hearts. out of sinners. out of dust. out of that child in the wheel chair.
God is so good.
love,
muffin
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