I just got tagged by my dear friend little redhead, so here goes my response.

1. WHAT DID YOU DO 10 YEARS AGO?

Ten years ago at this time, I was moving back to Alabama from a wonderful adventure living a year near the beach in California, then a year in the glorious northwest in a small town called Roseburg. I had just met my husband-to-be at little redhead’s wedding, and we would wind up getting married in March 1999. I was beginning my job at the mental health center, counseling children and adolescents as well.

2. FIVE ITEMS ON YOUR TO-DO LIST TODAY:

Have fun. Have fun. Have fun. Have fun. Have fun. (I can always move the thank you notes and laundry and other junk to tomorrow, right?

3. SNACKS I ENJOY:

I love popcorn, the good buttery kind, chocolate of any kind, gala apples peeled and sliced thinly, diet coke with lime, homemade pimento cheese, lots of other stuff too. Food, glorious food.

4. WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU WERE A BILLIONAIRE?

Oh, that would be way too wonderful for words. I’d start a series of homes for kids who don’t have parents or whose parents neglect and abuse them. We’d have horses and all kinds of animals. I’d hire staff to live in and help care for them. We’d definitely have a getaway house at the beach. Invest a bunch. Give a bunch. Get a red jeep. Travel with my kids and hubby.

Okay, I’m tagging chewymom, emily, and Kristen

If you have been tagged recently and you don’t wish to join in on the fun, please don’t feel obligated! Here Are the Rules: Answer the following questions about yourself. At the end of the post you pass on the questions to some other bloggers and list their names. Then write them a comment telling them that they’ve been tagged and ask them to read your blog. Let the person who tagged you know that you’ve accepted the challenge and refer to your post.

I listened to a sermon this week from a wonderful church locally. The pastor is going through some Old Testament stories. The story of the week was the one about Uzzah touching the ark of the covenant and being instantly killed, found in 2 Samuel 6. The main point of the sermon was that we do not any longer have a healthy fear of God, and we do not respect him or teach our kids to do so. That we should do better. Certainly there were some good and true points.

But I couldn’t help but see some major problems. I couldn’t help but think that he missed the point. Let me try to explain.

I grew up hearing and reading all of these Old Testament stories, and obtaining a very strong sense of God’s holiness, his wrath, and a huge dose of healthy fear of God. As time went on, that fear became unhealthy for me, and it certainly did not encourage a life of freedom in Christ. I found it very hard to believe God was pleased with me, that he loved me, that he liked me. And that kind of God is hard to draw close to, hard to love and obey.

Over many years and many deep valleys personally, I have come to understand something I missed all those years. And something I think most of us miss all the time.

It is true that God is holy, that in the Old Testament we see this glory that inspires a holy fear. An awe that this God is mighty and not to be messed with or taken lightly. We see that he is far from the Santa Claus God of our imagination.

BUT the rest of the story is so often forgotten. The point of every Bible story is to show us Jesus, who shows us God. There was no mention of any of this in this “healthy dose of fear” sermon. The problem was that we should all shape up and start doing better and teach our kids to do so also.

Here is the beautiful truth of the gospel that this dear man missed. In the Old Testament, all the stories are there to point to our great, desperate, panting need for a Savior. Think of it like a captivating play. The stage is all set. The characters are in a heap of trouble, doomed without a doubt. Then the hero rushes in and saves the day.

First of all, there was no mention of what the ark of the covenant contained. It housed the very presence of God. Now that is nothing to take lightly. This ark was kept in the holy of holies in the tabernacle. Only the high priest could go in that room and only once a year. But what happened to that curtain into the holy of holies when Christ took our sins on him and made atonement on the cross? It was ripped in two from the top to bottom. God ripped it. God wanted to be close to us. God made it so that everyone who calls out in trust to a Savior can enter the holy of holies any time. We can draw close to this God. (See Mark 15:38-39 and Hebrews 4:14-16)

To hear this sermon, you would think that what God wants is a distant, reverant relationship like that of a servant to an emperor. But Jesus said he calls us friends. My friends are people I let come close, let see the good and the not so good about me. I need them. I enjoy them. I like them. I want them.

Also, this pastor kept talking about the wrath of God, which is real and which is very scary apart from that Hero that God sent rushing in. It is true his wrath could and should consume all of us. But in his great mercy, he sent Someone to take that wrath. His dear Son. Now, this is not an easy thing to swallow if you take the time to think about it. But, we no longer have to fear the wrath of God. 1 John says that “There is no fear in love, because perfect love drives out all fear, because fear has to do with punishment.” Jesus took our punishment and showed us God’s perfect love, so we no longer need to fear.

So why the heck are we using fear to try to get Christians to shape up? Why do we use fear to try to get people to turn to God? A few weeks ago I saw a man on a busy street in my town with a sign that said, “Repent or burn.” This kind of thing makes me so mad. It does not show the heart of God at all, and it does not make people want to reach out to him.

Okay, another point that he was silent about that could have been a great discussion was David’s response to Uzzah’s death. David, this “man after God’s own heart,” was angry about Uzzah’s death, and then he was afraid. He wanted nothing to do with having the ark brought to him anymore, which is what Uzzah was helping to do when he died. What freedom we find in this man who passionately loved God, having a period of three months where we was a bit miffed and afraid of God. Over time, God wooed him back to himself, and he will always do the same for us. He showed David how much he blessed the house of Obed Edom where the ark had remained those three months. They were blessed by God’s presence.

And finally David brought the ark up to Jerusalem with great rejoicing. He partied like a wild man, dancing in the streets in only a linen ephod, and he gave loaves of bread and cakes to all the people who were there for the celebration. We can have that same response when we also find out the truth of the presence of God. It is for us, the real us. We can party like David when we realize we no longer have to fear. We can really draw close with all of our shortcomings, because he has taken them away in Jesus. We can be mad at this God and bring it to him. He will match us. He gets us.

Read this quote from my dear friend Sue:

Moral values did not hang on a cross for you. Moral values cannot know you or care about you. Moral values do not love you. Moral values cannot melt your heart and transform you. They cannot raise you from the dead. They cannot impart life to your soul. If you worship and serve morality, Christ is of no value to you at all. You are not living by faith in Jesus, but rather by trust in your own performance. You are not looking at what’s unseen, but rather in what is seen. It can feel so holy to reject your humanity and do your duty. But it’s not holy at all. It’s stoicism.

Let’s stop worshiping and serving moral values. Let us stop making “doing better” the point. Let’s get the know the real point, the Person of God we can draw close to, because the curtain has been torn in two! Hallelujah. Hallelujah.

“Christ will make our crosses medicinal, working health in our soul, working sin out and grace in.”

My five year old daughter came home from a visit at a friend’s house last night, in which she had eaten supper. Before bed, she was recalling this story:

“I glulped when I drank my water. (said just like “gulp” but with an “l” after the “g” - say it out loud) My friend said it was bad manners. But you understand that I sometimes have to glulp when I drink because I get too much water. She just needs to understand that’s the way I am, and I glulp. . .And I’m lucky. I can snap my fingers and whistle, and some people can’t do either one of those things. I’m lucky. Some people can’t see. Some people can’t walk. I’m lucky. Even though I glulp.”

Enough said.

Anne Lamott is today’s woman of wow. I absolutely love how funny and honest she is! She is the mother of a pre-teen boy and an elder in a Presbyterian church in San Francisco. She has written inspiring non-fiction and several novels. I you haven’t read any of her work, you’ve got to read Traveling Mercies. She was raised to be an atheist, and she lost her alcoholic father to cancer. When she ended up an alcoholic and drug-user, she stumbled upon Someone who cared. If you’d like to read more about her amazing story, check out this site.

The other morning my 7 year old son and I were reading the book of John about how Jesus came into the world and the world didn’t know him, even though he had made the world. This got my son to thinking. He mused aloud, “Is God ever coming back to get us again?” We had a great discussion about how he has promised he will come again, and he will do what he promised, but sometimes we wish it would be NOW.

He said a prayer aloud, “God, please come back and get us; we are hurt.” I thought it was refreshingly simple and honest. Then he quickly added, “But come tomorrow because I’m really excited about our plans for today.” Again, I loved the childlike love of life, even with the honest yearning for God to come make things right. I want to be like that, enjoying the good things in life (a day swimming with friends was enough to make my son pray for God to wait a day. . .) but still yearning for the perfection he promises to restore one day.

I first learned about Amy Carmichael in college. And ever since then, she has been one of my favorite women of all time. Her biography A Chance to Die by Elisabeth Elliot tells many wonderful detailed stories about her life. Basically, she was an Irish-born young woman from a wealthy family who gave her life to loving the poor of India. She is best known for rescuing young girls from temple prostitution. My favorite story of her is told often. As a little girl, she prayed and prayed for her brown eyes to turn blue. Her prayer was not answered. Years later, when she would disguise herself as an Indian woman to rescue girls, making her skin darker with tea leaves, she thought about what a dead giveaway blue eyes would have been. She was able to thank God for making her the way he knew would be best for the life work he had for her. If you’d like to read a bit more about her life, check out this link. She has written extensively as well, and my personal favorite is a devotional called His Thoughts Said, His Father Said.

This is a beautiful and powerful message.  What I love most about it is that it is the gospel.  These people do not have to hide their mistakes and failures, but they can wear them proudly on a sign. . . because “HE loves me.”  How would our relationships and our churches be different if we lived this way, not hiding the things in our past and in our present that we struggle with, but believing the love of the Father enough to proclaim how he could love someone like me?  This video is worth taking a look at. 

Jesus quoted the above words from Hoseah 6, when he told the Pharisees to go figure out what God meant by them. Basically, he told them to go think about it!

For I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.

This passage was read and discussed yesterday morning in church. One of the points was to avoid judgment by not judging others. The Pharisees were very good at making judgments, very good at looking down at others from their self-righteous status, and thanking God that they were not like those other people. The good news of the gospel is precisely that, though. I am just like those other people. Even those Pharisees that I despise when I read the gospels. I’m a whole lot more like them than I am like Jesus, and I’m a whole lot more like them than I would care to admit, even to myself.

We can all be like the Pharisees at some time or another. If my spouse, or my kids, or my neighbor, or whoever, could just act and think and do like me. Our thoughts are something like this: If they would just stop judging me. If they would keep their yard mowed. If they would make their kids behave. If my spouse would just give me a break. . . . and on and on.

So, even though I am a whole lot like the people I can’t stand at times and in ways I don’t care to see, God has had mercy on me. He continues to have mercy on me. And as I bask in that mercy, I do change. I become less like the judgemental, self-righteous gang, who wants to right everyone else’s wrongs, and more like the One who has given mercy to me.

As I listened to the sermon yesterday, my heart melted. We had had one of those grumpy mornings before church. My dear hubby and I. Yet, as I listened, and as I sat in the sanctuary and heard God’s Word, the mercy and love of God for me, melted me. And I wanted to be just like Him, full of love and showing mercy to those who need it as badly as I do.

So, what is your gut reaction to the words Jesus quoted?  I desire mercy not sacrifice. (What I really want is your heart to be softened by the love I have for you and for you to show that same mercy to others. I’m not really interested in how you have all your crap together and how busy you are doing “good” stuff.)

Once upon a time, when I would hear these words or similar ones, I actually would think to myself, “You’ve got to be kidding. Love? What is the big deal? We’ve got to make an impact for eternity. Share the gospel with a lot of people. Read. Pray. Blah, blah, blah, blah.” But yesterday, as I listened, my heart bowed low to the ground in gratitude. Thank you God, for having mercy on me, thank you for forgiving a sinner like me. Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Maybe that is what those words mean. A life of mercy flows from a heart that receives and basks in mercy.

(And if you love this artwork, you can go here to learn more about it.)

Today’s woman of wow is Mary Groves Muller, wife of George Muller, who founded orphanages in Bristol, England in the early 1800’s. It took a remarkable woman to be the wife of this man of faith. First of all, he almost did not marry her because of his fear that marriage would slow him down in his ministry. When he found himself in love with her, he was suprised because she was eight years older than he, and because she had a very large nose and wasn’t pretty like an earlier girlfriend George had. But what Mary Groves did have was a sincere faith, a willingness to give up everything for the work they wanted to do, and a maturity and smart mind that became a huge comfort and support to George.

In the book George Muller The Guardian of Bristol’s Orphans, a story is told which illustrates just what an incredible woman Mary was. When they were first wed, Mary and George loaded up her things on a stagecoach to their new home. George was surprised at how many things Mary had, four trunks full of household items. (Doesn’t really sound like too much to our American ears, does it?) After Mary had taken a week to get everything settled and arranged beautifully into George’s small home, he came home one evening disheartened by all the worldly possessions they had. He told her that every unnecessary thing had to go, all the silver, china, and tapestries. She was shocked and probably a little hurt because she had worked so hard to make their home lovely. But the next evening when George came home, all of the extra things were gone, and in their place there was a stack of pound notes, which she told him to use as he thought best. “And may God help us both,” she said.

I love that it was her love of George and her faith in her heavenly Father that allowed her to do what he requested. I probably would have pitched a fit and said “No way.” Or dutifully but angrily done the right thing. Mary sincerely surrendered to this and jumped in wholeheartedly with George’s way of life.

Mary and George went through many trials together, including the death of their young son, the death of Mary’s father, serious bouts of illness for George, and a very simple life bordering on poverty. They always took everything to God in prayer, and Mary worked tirelessly by George’s side to serve hundreds of unloved orphans, giving them a place to live, bread to eat, and a God to love. Bravo to you, good woman! I wish I could know you and I want to be a bit more like you.