Healthy Fear

Late last spring, I was working on a Bible study lesson about the flood. THE flood. We think of it as Noah’s flood, though it was actually God’s. We picture pairs of cartoon-character animals scooting their way up a ramp, welcomed by a jolly Noah. As the raindrops fall, the sweet little boat bobbles along on the water with a giraffe’s head popping out the top. It’s the stuff we decorate our baby nurseries with. But as I read and studied the account in Genesis 6 and 7, that image was quickly replaced by one of horror. 

God, my God—the God I think I know so well—destroyed the entire earth. He killed every living thing except for those He spared on the ark. Suddenly the image in my head is no longer of cute animals but of drowning children. Of desperate mothers trying to throw their babies onto the ark in hope they would be saved. But they weren’t. They were “blotted out,” along with every other living thing on the face of the earth. When I got beyond my storybook images and let myself go there, I could barely speak the name of God. Who was this? Is this the same God I talk with every day, that I sing to, that I’ve entrusted my life to? How could it be?

A strange feeling crept into my stomach and settled in. I couldn’t identity it, but I knew it was something I hadn’t felt before. As I thought about other Bible stories—particularly Uzzah, the guy who was struck dead on the spot for simply trying to steady the Ark of the Covenant as David brought it home to Jerusalem—the feeling became more intense but no more identifiable. I could sort of shake it, bring it under control, at times. I didn’t notice it when I ran through my daily prayer requests or bebopped through the house singing Chris Tomlin. I didn’t notice it at church. But it hit me hard every time I returned to the flood story, and it also snuck up on me at odd times—like when I was deep in thought doing the dishes. I’m no fan of mysteries or vague, unnamed feelings. I wanted God to show me what this was, and more importantly, I wanted it to go away.

One day I was reading one of my favorite things, the book-reviews section in Christianity Today. I saw this little snippet, so small that had I blinked, I would have missed it. God ensured I didn’t blink. It said, “[God’s] presence is like radiation, more dangerous than plutonium. Nothing can live when God comes near.” And just like that, my nameless feeling had a name. It was the fear of God.

Could it be that I have followed God nearly my whole life, immersed myself in His Word and taught others to do the same, and yet had never grasped for myself the fear of God? I could have written you a helpful, concise definition of it, but I couldn’t have told you what it looked like in practice. But that feeling in my stomach told me I was beginning to know.

Of course I wanted to hear more about how God is like radiation, and I bought the book immediately. The author is Drew Dyck, and the book is Yawning at Tigers. I figured he earned my ten bucks with the name alone. Dyck’s thesis is that our modern Christian world has done such a great job telling us how much God loves us that we’ve lost sight of His holiness. Without understanding God’s holiness, we can never fully grasp His love and mercy.

When you think about the sermons we hear, the songs we sing, the prayers we pray, it’s easy to see how our perception’s gotten skewed. How easy it is to picture God as an adoring grandfather who wants nothing more than to shower affection, forgiveness, and sweet treats on us and, when necessary, keep us from falling down the stairs. It’s true that God is love, and “every good and perfect gift” comes from Him. But He is also holy, just, and untame. We don’t like to think about it, but what He is as much as anything else is dangerous. No matter what we do to try to minimize Him, manage Him, control Him, or even understand Him, we fail. We only deceive ourselves. If you ever hear anyone say they’ve got God all figured out, your most biblical response may be to duck and cover.

 Why do we try to tame God? Why do we prefer thinking of Him as our buddy instead of as the Creator and Ruler of the universe? Why do we focus on His love over His holiness? Maybe to think of Him rightly is just too much for our minds. God is completely “other,” completely unknowable by us—Drew Dyck compares us to ants running across an iPad with no concept of its power and ability—and yet He desires relationship with us, the ants. He desires it so much that He revealed Himself, in ways we can sort of understand, through the Scriptures. He desires it so much that He sent His son to become one of us, and to die for us. How wild is that? How can we begin to grasp it?

Drew Dyck writes: “We might assume knowing God simply includes getting all our facts about him straight. But maybe the first step is vertigo, a holy disorientation. Perhaps only once we’ve been shocked out of our normal way of processing reality—categorizing it, mastering it—can we hope to gain even a glimpse of God’s awesome power and beauty.”

Vertigo. Holy disorientation. Fear of the Lord. Whatever it is, I’ve been experiencing it this summer, and I hope to share some of it with you in my next couple of entries. Stay tuned. 

My Day in 9th Grade

Indulge me just one more "my-kids-are-getting-older" post, and then I promise I'll get on to something else. Last week I went to my son’s 9^th grade back-to-school night. The parents follow their kid’s schedule in a much-condensed day, so that we went to eight classes in about an hour and a half. I got to start my “day” in a room full of books, the English room. Here I felt safe and at home. Though I could have stayed there all day and listened to the sweet young teacher talk about the value of printed (not digital) words, I didn’t get to stay. I had to uproot myself and move on to a combination talk by the PE and world history teachers. PE and world history? Together? Jarring, especially because they were in the cafeteria and none of these things seemed to go together, but OK.

Then we shuffled off to the speech and debate room, where I had to imagine standing up in front of a room full of judges and giving a speech. That made me slightly queasy. Not as queasy, however, as the next several classes. Honors biology. A room full of creepy, crawly critters and a teacher who promises this will be the biggest academic jump our kids will make. I like science in a practical sort of way. I’m grateful for things like gravity and oxygen and DNA and the universe. Studying science? Makes me queasy. So does Algebra II. The very nice young teacher explained with great enthusiasm that the class would be studying functions this year. To me, a function is a social event in which I get to dress up and get out of the house. Apparently it also has something to do with math, and he rattled off a number of these functions. I’m pretty sure I took Algebra II during the Reagan Administration, but he might as well have been speaking Greek.

And speaking of Greek, we also spent 10 very intense minutes in Braden’s Latin class. (Don’t even think of calling it a dead language.) The teacher, a red-faced middle-aged man seemingly fresh off the boat from Italy, had passion oozing from his ears and an accent so thick I could barely understand what all the passion was about. The whiteboard was covered with words—I think—that looked scary and intimidating to even me, a person who loves words more than chocolate. At one point the teacher started barking orders to his service dog, who only speaks Italian, and then he wouldn’t let us out of the class, even after the bell rang, until we could differentiate between a Latin subject and a direct object. 

My son goes to a very good school, and his teachers are fabulous. But I was still a little freaked out for him. He does this every day? He goes from conjugating Latin verbs to translating protein synthesis to working out some sort of function? Every day? Five days a week? I was exhausted and overwhelmed by 90 minutes. It made me glad I’m old. When we got home, I asked my husband if he’s relieved he doesn’t have to do that every day. Then I thought about what my husband does every day. Payroll. Taxes of all kinds. Hiring and firing employees. Litigious customers. High school probably sounds comforting to him.

I’m a mom with four busy kids who need food, rides, advice, and help memorizing poems. I work a little on the side, and I volunteer here and there. I’ve always got a load of laundry to fold or a grocery store run to make. But I’m convinced I’ve got the best, easiest job in the world. Please no one make me go back to high school. 

Blogger Potpourri

It's the August tornado again, when parents and kids and people who don't transition well are sucked up into a whirlwind of new schools, new schedules, new activities, new people, new everything. Every year I promise myself I'll do it better than I did the year before, and every year I find tears trickling randomly down my cheek at the oddest times. Last year I sent my last child to all-day school for the first time. This year's transition is sending my son to high school and my oldest daughter to junior high, which if you didn't know it, is entirely different than sending a son to junior high.

If I were to sit down and write something right now, the sappiness would either bore or embarrass you to tears. So I'll spare you that and instead link to a few other great sites that have challenged me in the past week.

Give Me Gratitude or Give Me Debt should be mandatory reading for every middle-class woman in America. God did not design us to be slaves to our discontent. Preach it, Glennon!

This next one, on courtship, is long and may have a narrow audience, but it rocked my world. These are the dating thoughts I've been having as long as I've been parenting, but they weren't nearly this well developed, researched, or articulated. Personally, I think this is a breath of fresh air in our tight, controlled evangelical circles, although I know others will disagree. Dating children are still down the road a bit for us, but I'm always pondering and refining my philosophies, just in case. Would love to interact with any of you who have thoughts on this.


And finally, in honor of a transition time of year, a time when God brings new people, and with them new challenges, into our lives, I share my favorite non-C.S. Lewis quote of all time:

"Every day I put love on the line. There is nothing I am less good at than love. I am far better in competition than in love. I am far better at responding to my instincts and ambitions to get ahead and make my mark than I am at figuring out how to love another. I am schooled and trained in acquisitive skills, in getting my own way. And yet I decide every day, to set aside what I do best and attempt what I do very clumsily--open myself to the frustrations and failures of loving, daring to believe that failing in love is better than succeeding in pride." (Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction)

My Day at the DMV

I am now the parent of a 15-year-old. If you polled parents of 15-year-olds about their greatest fear, I’m guessing “learner’s permit” would rank high on the list. But I think we’ve got it wrong. Our greatest fear should not be putting our child behind the wheel of a two-ton killing machine; it should be the process that starts it all—the trip to the DMV.

Braden and I made this trip on Tuesday. Adequately forewarned, we dragged in a large bag full of books, games, snacks, and gadgets. After waking up at an hour most teenagers don’t see during the summer, we arrived at the DMV a few minutes before 8 and took our place in a Disney-attraction-sized line.  By 8:14 we had secured a ticket from the unsmiling receptionist and snagged the last two available seats in the room. This was our first time to scope out the room: a sea of tattoos with pockets of crying babies and sleepy children—some teenagers—in jammies.

An intricate, computerized system called out numbers and flashed them on a screen. We were told to pay no attention to this system, which the staff had yet to figure out in the two years since its installation. During a brief orientation, we also learned that uniformed military personnel and the elderly would take precedence over the rest of us. While this was fine with me, I guessed the mother with three screaming toddlers was wishing she’d borrowed a military uniform or a grandmother.

Our ticket predicted a 12-minute wait. Encouraged, Braden and I didn’t even take out our books. The people-watching was superb and could easily fill 12 minutes of our time. Except 12 minutes came and went, followed by 12 more, and none of the people seemed to be moving or changing. We hunkered down with our books and waited for P707. Two hours later, our number came up.

The lady at the counter was nice but clearly distracted. As Braden rattled off the answers to the eye exam, she filled out paperwork for another person. She talked the women next to her through the computer process while occasionally tossing out questions that may or may not have been for Braden: Do you want to be a tissue donor? Have you surrendered your license in all other states? Did you try hitting the F-7 key? Have you been physically or mentally traumatized? She seemed pleased with our answers and thrust papers at me stating that I would take full financial responsibility for any harm caused by my teenage driver. I took a deep breath and signed. We paid our $14 and were told to wait for the next step.

Once you forfeit your chair at the DMV, it’s gone for good. People lined all the walls, the aisles, and the floors. We headed to a little open space in the back of the room but realized we’d have to listen carefully to the lady calling names in the front. It was at this point—standing at attention, no distractions, fully aware of our environment—that I began questioning the wisdom of giving driving privileges to just about anyone in the room. (I confess, I was feeling far more judgmental than missional on Tuesday.) Like the teenage boy with hair hanging four inches over his eyes and pants three inches under his underwear. Could he even see to take the eye test? Or the overly pierced, overly tattooed man with the deranged Snow White plastered over his left calf. Are we sure all that ink doesn’t cause some sort of mental impairment? And then there was the older teenager at the counter right next to us. After waiting two hours like us, he had flunked the test. Braden and I found it ironic that his shirt said, “Party like there’s no tomorrow.” I wonder if his mother felt like partying after her wasted morning.

Really, if you need a reminder that your teenager is awesome, that you wouldn’t trade him in on another model any day, visit the DMV. My 15-year-old wears a shirt that says, “I’m secretly correcting your grammar,” but he did ace the test. And he has nice, short, clean hair. He has no small children of his own, and he’d make a lovely tissue donor. He also makes clever, snarky comments with me about the other people at the DMV, which made the time—three hours and 22 minutes in total—go a whole lot faster.

I don’t know how he’ll be out on the road, but his propensity toward caution and good common sense makes me think I’d rather follow him on the streets of Colorado Springs than the rest of our new friends from the DMV. 

Don't Miss the Forest!

Last week, I woke up a little before 3 a.m. and couldn’t get back to sleep. There are times you know sleep’s just not coming back, and this was one of those times. Since my alarm was set for 5 anyway, I decided to get up and make the most of a quiet house.

I sat down in my dining room to get some work done. This summer, I’m working on a Bible study on the book of Genesis. I spent those two hours editing, writing, editing some more, and ending up pretty pleased with the paragraphs that appeared. (This particular lesson was on Genesis 17 and the introduction of circumcision. It takes a lot to be pleased with paragraphs on circumcision.) It wasn’t until much later in the morning when I realized I had spent two hours writing about God without actually talking to Him. Talk about not seeing the forest for the trees.

Imagine if I were writing about a key moment in my mom’s life, and she was right there in the room with me.  But instead of talking to her about it, what if I just ignored her and busied myself with putting her story in my own fine words? That would be arrogant, foolish, and just plain weird. I would never do that. I would ask a million questions and check with her on the sensitive wording. I would read everything back to her to make sure I was accurately representing her. Telling another person’s story is a privilege, and I work hard to honor that person. This should be especially true when the Person is God. 

When I started my new job writing and editing Bible studies back in the spring, my prayer life kicked into overdrive. Working with sacred material kept me in regular conversation with the real Author. There were days when I felt dependent on Him for every single word. But as so often happens, I got comfortable. The sacred became familiar. And all of a sudden I had handled His Word for two hours without even acknowledging Him.

There’s a risk for those of us who work for God to earn a living. Over time, the holy can become ordinary. The trees can consume our vision, until the forest—the grand, magnificent, awe-inspiring forest—is blurred. Distant. Corporate. Ugh.

God, please keep my eyes on the big picture. Do the same for the many, many friends I have in ministry. Remind us that we are on holy ground doing holy work for a most holy Master, even if it looks like a spreadsheet or a Word document. You are good and loving and near, but, oh, you are much too big to become ordinary. 

The Forgotten Grandest Thing

In 1899, Orison Swett Marden wrote a popular manual called Character: The Grandest Thing in the World. Marden knew his audience well. At that time, public life centered on the farm, being neighborly, relating with extended family members, and proving oneself a contributing part of the community. Character was grand, and it was essential if you wanted to have a decent life.

Marden wrote another book in 1920, also well received. This one was called Masterful Personality. Everything had changed.

I learned this from Susan Cain’s book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking. I actually learned many things from the book, but the transition from a Culture of Character (prior to 1900) to a Culture of Personality has really got me thinking. I got the book to help me understand my introverted husband and oldest daughter. It shed light on them, but also on my son, who revels in public speaking and can convince almost anyone he’s right about almost everything. What I also got from the book was a history lesson on how our culture became a place where image and salesmanship are everything. Or, as Cain writes, “a culture in which every American was to become a performing self . . . a salesman, a social operator, someone with a ready smile and a masterful handshake, and the ability to get along with colleagues while simultaneously outshining them.”

Cain cites the results of a study that counted the words appearing most frequently in “self-help” manuals of the early twentieth century versus those from the nineteenth century. In the 1800s, it was common to find words like citizenship, duty, work, honor, reputation, morals, manners, and integrity. But a cultural switch—triggered by mass industrialization, consumerism, and advertising—led to words like magnetic, fascinating, stunning, attractive, dominant, forceful, and energetic. It seems the kinder, gentler United States had vanished, replaced by a culture fueled by competition, popularity, and impressing others at all costs. Shaving cream ads that once just presented the facts about the shaving cream now used lines like these: “All around you people are judging you silently” or “Critical eyes are sizing you up right now.”

And we wonder why we’re all neurotic!

Cain limited her discussion to in-person personality, but we have ample evidence of how this plays out on the internet. What is social media if not a global exercise in the Culture of Personality? Except you get to pick your personality. A shy, timid teenager can be the life of the virtual party. If he’s clever and deceptive enough, the 63-year-old recluse can hang out with the cool kids. He may even get a 16-year-old girlfriend out of the deal. We can all impress our friends with our “stunning” and “attractive” lives online, while conveniently hiding the stuff that’s not so stunning or attractive.

That’s not to say there’s no authentic relating on the internet. There is. Relationships can be renewed and restored online, and that’s a very good thing. Other mass media broadcast stories of do-gooders around the globe that can motivate the rest of us. But I can’t help but lament what was lost in the shift from character to personality. We so quickly reward those with over-the-top personalities (the Kardashians come to mind) instead of those who help their neighbors or forgive those who hurt them or simply love their children well. Who at the water cooler is talking about humility and chastity? Do we even look for noble character in our leaders and politicians, or are we more interested in how entertaining they are in tweets or on late-night TV?

Orison Marden got it right the first time, back in 1899. Character is the grandest thing in the world. If only we lived like we believe it.   

O, Death

Last night, the Happy Chicken Egg Farmers (my family) buried our first happy chicken. Her name was Buffy. We raised her from the little ball of fluff she was 16 months ago. Buffy was always the overachiever of our chicks—the first to flap her wigs and scoot across the pen, the first to roost, and one of the first to lay an egg. I suppose it's fitting that she was the first to die. Except who knew you could get so attached to a chicken? The irony of it all, when my freezer is full of dead chicken. But I suspect those chickens didn't have names. They didn't have little girls telling them each night, "I love you, Buff." And at the end of their lives, they weren't cradled on the front lawn by a weeping 12-year-old who did genuinely love them. 

Who knew that raising chickens wasn't for the faint of heart? I look at our 14 who remain and think, "Ugh, 14 more times we've got to do this?" Maybe it will get easier, but maybe not. I'm not sure that "death" and "easy" can coexist in the same sentence, let alone in real life. 

We get our kids pets so they can practice loving and caring, but also so they can practice losing. We tell them that death is a part of life and that they need to make peace with it. I've said those words myself. Yet something in me recoils from that. Deep down within me, I know I'm not supposed to make peace with death. This is not the way it's supposed to be. God did not create us for death. He created us for life! Death is our consequence, but it's also our enemy—1 Corinthians 15:26 says it will be the last enemy to be destroyed when Jesus returns.

I try to imagine death through the eyes of the incarnate Christ. Did He love and lose a pet as a little boy? Did He think, "Wait a minute! That's not how we designed it"? I wonder if He was right there, watching His grandparents grow old and die, or maybe Joseph, His earthly father? How unnatural it must have seemed. We know that He wept over the death of his friend Lazarus. Perhaps He was crying as much about death itself as He was about Lazarus. And then to experience death Himself--how alien, foreign, and completely at odds with Himself that was. Can we even imagine it?  

I don't fear death, not for myself anyway. It's my gateway to Jesus, and I'll do anything to get to live with Him and know Him face to face. But I cannot make peace with death. I can't tell my children, "This is natural." Everything in me knows that's not true. When you see a beautifully alive creature wither, struggle, and die right before your very eyes, you can't say it's natural. Common, yes, but not natural. I've seen it happen to people I loved, and nothing about it was natural or peaceful.

My kids are learning that we must expect and accept death as part of life in a fallen world. But I also want them to fiercely believe—more than they believe anything else in the world—that death doesn't get the last word. All of creation may be groaning with the pains from this world (Romans 8:22), but it's not a hopeless groan. It's an expectant groan. 

I hate you, death. I cannot wait for your defeat, and I know that it's coming.

"When our dying bodies have been transformed into bodies that will never die, this Scripture will be fulfilled:

'Death is swallowed up in victory.

O death, where is your victory?

O death, where is your sting? . . . 

Thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ." (1 Corinthians 15:54-56)