Really.  I will.

But for now… Look at this cool picture my 13 year old daughter took in New York!

He may delay because it would not be safe to give us at once what we ask: we are not ready for it. To give ere we could truly receive, would be to destroy the very heart and hope of prayer, to cease to be our Father. The delay itself may work to bring us nearer to our help, to increase the desire, perfect the prayer, and ripen the receptive condition. ~ George MacDonald

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke

ht: cawleyblog

I can never resisit excellent stuff from Tim Keller (ht: Denis Haack’s excellent blog,  A Glass Darkly)

There are two basic narrative identities at work among professing Christians. The first is what I will call the moral-performance narrative identity. These are people who in their heart of hearts say, I obey; therefore I am accepted by God. The second is what I will call the grace narrative identity. This basic operating principle is, I am accepted by God through Christ; therefore I obey.

People living their lives on the basis of these two different principles may superficially look alike. They may sit right beside one another in the church pew, both striving to obey the law of God, to pray, to give money generously, to be good family members. But they are doing so out of radically different motives, in radically different spirits, resulting in radically different personal characters.

When persons living in the moral-performance narrative are criticized, they are furious or devastated because they cannot tolerate threats to their self-image of being a “good person.”

But in the gospel our identity is not built on such an image, and we have the emotional ballast to handle criticism without attacking back. When people living in the moral-performance narrative base their self-worth on being hard working or theologically sound, then they must look down on those whom they perceive to be lazy or theologically weak.

But those who understand the gospel cannot possibly look down on anyone, since they were saved by sheer grace, not by their perfect doctrine or strong moral character.

To read the rest of this article (original source, “The Advent of Humility: Jesus is the reason to stop concentrating on ourselves,” by Tim Keller in Christianity Today, December 2008, pp. 50-53) click here.

John’s point in 1 John 4, “God is love,” is that those who really do know God come to love that way too.  Doubtless we do not do it very well, but aren’t Christians supposed to love the unlovable-even our enemies?  Because the Gospel has transformed us, our love is to be self-originating, not elicited by the loveliness of the loved.  For that is the way it is with God.  He loves because love is one of His perfections, in perfect harmony with all His other perfections. ~ D.A. Carson, The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God, p. 63.

In John 13 the point was that, if an individual Christian does not show love toward other true Christians, the world has a right to judge that he is not a Christian.  Here (in John 17:21) Jesus is stating something else which is much more cutting, much more profound:  We cannot expect the world to believe the Father sent the Son, that Jesus’ claims are true, and that Christianity is true, unless the world sees some reality of the oneness of true Christians.~ Francis Schaeffer, The Mark of the Christian

What does forgiveness cost? What is the currency that’s expended in trade for the words, “I forgive you?” The coin of the realm we must relinquish is legal tender backed by the things we hold dearest: our pride, our patience, our time… To forgive costs us our pride. It costs us the right to be the one who is right. It costs us our patience and our time, because to forgive means to step down from our hard won high place and stand on level ground where we might have to give again, might have to sacrifice again, and might even have to bare the indignation of being wronged again.

We have to learn to commit not only the future but also the past to the Lord. ~Daniel Fuller, The Unity of the Bible, p. 286.

The intentions of Providence commonly do not appear till a great while after the event, perhaps many years after. The sentences in the book of providence are sometimes long, and you must read a great way before you can apprehend the sense of them. ~Matthew Henry

Our yesterdays present irreparable things to us; it is true that we have lost opportunities which will never return, but God can transform this destructive anxiety into a constructive thoughtfulness for the future. Let the past sleep, but let it sleep on the bosom of Christ. Leave the Irreparable Past in His hands, and step out into the Irresistible Future with Him. ~Oswald Chambers

Sometimes providences, like Hebrew letters, must be read backward. ~John Flavel

Why believe the devil instead of believing God? Rise up and realize the truth about yourself – that all the past has gone, and you are one with Christ, and all your sins have been blotted out once and for ever. O let us remember that it is sin to doubt God’s Word. It is sin to allow the past, which God has dealt with, to rob us of our joy and our usefulness in the present and in the future.  ~Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiritual Depression – Its Causes and its Cures, p.76

Let the past sleep, but let it sleep on the bosom of Christ. Leave the Irreparable Past in His hands, and step out into the Irresistible Future with Him. ~Oswald Chambers

His purposes will ripen fast,
Unfolding every hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flower.

~William Cowper, Light Shining Out of Darkness

Only if we trust God to turn past calamities into future comfort can we look with gratitude for all things. ~John Piper, Future Grace, p. 49

Without retrospect, no real prospect is possible. ~H. Richard Niebuhr

Anxiety does not empty tomorrow of its sorrows, but only empties today of its strength. ~C.H. Spurgeon

Mending and healing are two different things, I’m learning.  Mending means the stitches hold, the pain gradually lessens, the energy slowly returns.  Mending seems to be inextricably releated to time.  You can’t rush mending.

I have a feeling that healing is something different.  Healing, I think, is more connected to re-creating than rebuilding.

I’m working on mending right now, but I’m craving healing, in oh-so-many ways.   Time makes a poor thread for binding deep wounds, and the healing that comes with “give it time” is such a poor replacement for the healing balm of gospel restoration.

We cannot enjoy peace in this world unless we are ready to yield to the will of God in respect of death. Our times are in His hand, at His sovereign disposal. We must accept that as best.

John Owen (Meditation on the Glory of Christ, 1684, Preface)

The best moment of a Christian’s life is his last one, because it is the one that is nearest heaven.  And then it is that he begins to strike the keynote of the song which he shall sing to all eternity.

C.H. Spurgeon

Death in its substance has been removed, and only the shadow of it remains…Nobody is afraid of a shadow, for a shadow cannot block a man’s pathway for even a moment. The shadow of a dog can’t bite; the shadow of a sword can’t kill.

C.H. Spurgeon

A Christian knows that death shall be the funeral of all his sins, his sorrows, his afflictions, his temptations, his vexations, his oppressions, his persecutions.  He knows that death shall be the resurrection of all his hopes, his joys, his delights, his comforts, his contentments.

Thomas Brooks (The Transcendent Excellency of a Believer’s Portion above All Earthly Portions)

Death is the last and best physician, which cures all diseases and sins – the aching head and the unbelieving heart. Sin was the midwife which brought death into the world; and death shall be the grave to bury sin! O the privilege of a believer!

Thomas Watson (The Christian’s Charter.)

Tears are a tribute to our deceased friends.  When the body is sown, it must be watered.  But we must not sorrow as those that have no hope; for we have a good hope through grace both concerning them and concerning ourselves.

Matthew Henry

For we brought nothing into the world and we cannot take anything out of the world (1 Tim. 6:7).  There are no U-Hauls behind hearses.

John Piper (Desiring God, p. 161)

Once a man is united to God, how could he not live forever?

C.S. Lewis

If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.

C.S. Lewis (Mere Christianity, p. 119.)

I don’t know about you, but the more I think about the new heaven and the new earth, the more excited I get! It is incredible to think that one day soon we will not only experience the resurrection of our carcasses, but the renewal of the cosmos and the return of the Creator. We will literally have heaven on earth. Eden lost will become Eden restored and a whole lot more! Not only will we experience God’s fellowship as Adam did, but we will see our Savior face to face. God incarnate will live in our midst. And we will never come to the end of exploring the infinite, inexhaustible I AM or the grandeur and glory of his incomparable creation.

Hank Hanegraaff (Resurrection, p. 92.)

God never wastes pain.

 ~Jerry Bridges

It’s a good thing to have all the props pulled out from under us occasionally. It gives us some sense of what is rock under our feet, and what is sand.

~Madeleine L’Engle

Your afflictions may only prove that you are more immediately under the Father’s hand.  There is no time that the patient is such an object of tender interest to the surgeon, as when he is bleeding beneath his knife.  So you may be sure if you are suffering from the hand of a reconciled God, that His eye is all the more bent on you.

~Robert Murray McCheyne

Most of the grand truths of God have to be learned by trouble; they must be burned into us with the hot iron of affliction, otherwise we shall not truly receive them.

~C.H. Spurgeon

Afflictions make the heart more deep, more experimental, more knowing and profound, and so, more able to hold, to contain, and beat more.

~John Bunyan

The Lord afflicts us at times; but it is always a thousand times less than we deserve, and much less than many of our fellow-creatures are suffering around us.  Let us therefore pray for grace to be humble, thankful, and patient.

~John Newton

Poverty and affliction take away the fuel that feeds pride.

~Richard Sibbes

When I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord’s choicest wines.

~Samuel Rutherford

Iron till it be thoroughly heated is incapable to be wrought; so God sees good to cast some men into the furnace of affliction, and then beats them on His anvil into what frame He desires.

~Anne Bradstreet

Afflictions tend to wean us from the world  - and to fix our affections on things above.

~John Angell James

Since I’m having kind of a dry spell of blogging here anyway…

My friend Kathryn Trent Brown offered the following challenge in Facebook note, which I’m passing on here to you.

If you want to join in the fun and get a little something in return … be one of the first THREE people to leave a comment on this post and you’ll receive a gift from me during this year. There’s a small catch…You knew there would be didn’t you? Post this on your blog or Facebook wall (sorry, no MySpace-ing) referencing this post then come back and leave a comment on this post, telling me you’re in. Fun, huh? And by in, you do know that means you have to Pay It Forward and give something to three people on your blog or Facebook page. I don’t even care if you make something … just giving something is good with me!

Remember, only the first 3 comments receive the gift from me. When and what will be a surprise.

If you have been putting off going to another person to try to achieve reconciliation with him, you have wronged him. ~ Jay Adams

We must take the initiative to restore peace. Jesus taught that it makes no difference whether you have wronged your brother or he has wronged you.  Either way, you are always responsible to initiate efforts toward peace (see Matthew 5:23-24 and 18:15).  If  we are serious about intently pursuing peace, we won’t be concerned about which of us is the offending party.  We will have one goal: To restore peace in a godly manner.  Unresolved conflict between believers is sin and must be treated as such; otherwise, it will spread throughout the body like cancer until it requires radical spiritual surgery. ~ Jerry Bridges

Time heals things. We’ve heard that many times. And occasionally it is true that people’s emotions die down and they lose the heart to disagree or fight. But to depend on time alone in the body of Christ to mend church problems is a very dangerous path.  More often than not the problems only fester, become more serious, and then explode. ~ Curtis C. Thomas

Because peace is a fruit of the Spirit, we are dependent upon the Spirit’s work in our lives to produce the desire and the means to pursue peace.  But we are also responsible to use the means He has given us and to take all practical steps to attain both peace within and peace with others. ~ Jerry Bridges

It is one of the severest tests of friendship to tell your friend his faults.  So to love a man that you cannot bear to see a stain upon him, and to speak painful truth through loving words, that is friendship. ~Henry Ward Beecher

Divisions in the church always breed atheism in the world. ~ Thomas Manton

The more fractured we are, the greater we become spectacles to the world.  The more we are united in love, the more the world sees Christ. ~ Curtis C. Thomas

Fractured fellowship robs Christians of joy and effectiveness, robs God of glory, and robs the world of the true testimony of the gospel.  A high price for an ego trip! ~ John MacArthur

Why is it that you harbor strife, bad temper, dissention, schism, and quarreling?  Do we not have one God, one Christ, one Spirit of grace which was poured out on us? ~ Clement of Rome

Jesus won’t allow the unreconciled condition to continue among believers.  In Matthew 5, if another considers you to have wronged him, Jesus says that you must go.  In Matthew 18, He says that if the other person has done something wrong to you, you must go.  There is never a time when you can sit and wait for your brother to come to you.  Jesus doesn’t allow for that.  He gives no opportunity for that.  It is always your obligation to go. ~Jay Adams

Last week’s Ten For Tuesday: On Forgiveness

I just finished reading my first Anna Quindlen novel. This bit of redemptive dialogue between Bridgette and Irving, in the final chapter of Rise and Shine, seemed worth sharing. (The first speaker is Bridgette, arguing with her rough and worldly friend Irvine, after he chastises her for a spat she’s just had with her sister.)

“You’re taking her side! You are! I can’t believe it!”

“There are no sides. You love somebody and you help them. You give ‘em a break. And they do things you don’t like! But you love them, so you go along.”

“Like a deal…”

Irvine shook his head.

“If it’s like a deal, you’re screwed, ” he said. “A deal means you’re expecting something back.”

Nobody is free who is unforgiven. ~ John Stott

Forgiveness is the only way to break the cycle of blame–and pain–in a relationship…It does not settle all questions of blame and justice and fairness…But it does allow relationships to start over. In that way, said Solzhenitsyn, we differ from all animals. It is not our capacity to think that makes us different, but our capacity to repent, and to forgive. ~Philip Yancey

If I find myself half-carelessly taking lapses for granted, “Oh, that’s what they always do.” “Oh, of course she talks like that, he acts like that,” then I know nothing of Calvary love. ~Amy Carmichael

But forgiveness is not an emotion… Forgiveness is an act of will, and the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart. ~Corrie Ten Boom

Those who say they will forgive but can’t forget, simply bury the hatchet but leave the handle out for immediate use. ~Dwight L Moody

The practice of comprehensive forgiveness overcomes our love of being right, our actual enjoyment and treasuring of our sense of being wronged…  The constant practice of forgiveness leaves no room for self-righteousness.  Frustrated condemnation of others and treasuring of old wrongs are not part of the artillery of God, but the slithering, slimy, deadly creatures of the Prince of Darkness. ~C. John Miller and Barbara Miller Juliani

We take God’s forgiveness for granted (when) we stubbornly withhold our forgiveness from others.  In effect, we behave as though others’ sins against us are more serious than our sins against God. ~Ken Sande

The person who is living by grace sees this vast contrast between his own sins against God and the offenses of others against him.  He forgives others because he himself has been so graciously forgiven.  He realizes that, by receiving God’s forgiveness through Christ, he has forfeited the right to be offended when others hurt him. ~Jerry Bridges.

The ability to forgive is one of the surest signs of having been forgiven.  It is part of the proof that we have received God’s grace…  Those who are truly forgiven, truly forgive.  The sins they commit are of greater importance to them than the sins they suffer. ~ Philip Graham Ryken

Forgiveness may be described as a decision to make four promises:

“I will not dwell on this incident.”

“I will not bring up this incident again and use it against you.”

“I will not talk to others about this incident.”

“I will not let this incident stand between us or hinder our personal relationship.”

~ Ken Sande

Next week’s Ten For Tuesday: On Reconciliation

Last week’s Ten For Tuesday: On Repentance

The glory of Christianity is to conquer by forgiveness. –William Blake

I went back and read Micah 6:8 this morning, because “justice” and “mercy” keep coming up in my internal and external conversations. Despite having sung that verse to a campy little tune all my life, and despite hearing countless sermons on that verse over the years, I confess I often have a mistaken version of it rolling around in my head.

What I think I want that verse to say, is something along the lines of “He has shown you, oh man, what is good and what the Lord requires of you: to seek justice and love mercy…”

But of course, it doesn’t.

I can’t parse the Hebrew to know what the best translation of those words really is. The best I can do is use Bible Gateway to compare standard translations and learn this: none of them talk about seeking justice. The part about “justice” is all about my actions…

“to act justly” (NIV)

“to do justice” (NASB, ESV)

“to do what is right” (NLT)

“to do justly” (KJV, NKJV)

Now, I have to beg cultural influence here, as a bit of a defense for my poor internal exegesis. “Justice and mercy” get thrown around in a pairing to suit every need, particularly by those wanting to draw our attention to the social implications of the gospel. But most of the time, when you hear those words paired, the subtle implication is that we should be fighting to get other people to act justly, and focused on showing mercy ourselves.

But Micah 6:8 calls US to act justly.

Now I admit: I’m a product of my surroundings. I’ve been living in a small Presbyterian world of graded church courts and layers of accountability and circles of authority and hey! I think all those things are a great and biblical model of church government. Except that they’re made up, at each level, by a bunch of sinners. The checks and balances don’t always work. In other words, pushing for “justice” where there has been conflict doesn’t always bring satisfaction.

I’m also a big fan of Ken Sande’s Peacemaker book. In fact, I’d be quite happy if we could all just get together and open a vein and sign a contract promising to apply the peacemaker principles at every turn (since I think they’re simply careful applications of biblical principles.) But again, the process is broken: it takes two to tango, in all the best and worst senses. Darn sin! It messes up everything!

So, in the midst of ongoing unresolved conflict, I need to read Micah 6:8 again. When everything in me wants that verse to confirm my craving for justice, I’m instead reminded that I must act justly. I must continue to repent, wait, pray…. Micah 6:8 isn’t a battle cry for judicial action, it’s a bucket of cold water, thrown in love, on even our valid cries that we’re being treated unjustly ourselves.

To DO what is right, and to love mercy… I want to GET what is right and then make myself look all the better by showing forgiveness and mercy. Whew! How’s that for a stinkin’ bunch of heart idols: I want to eat my cake and be called generous for giving some away after I’m stuffed.

To act justly: keep doing the right thing.

To love mercy: can I learn to love mercy so much that I can really give it where it isn’t deserved or even asked for? (Since that’s ultimately the type of mercy we’re shown through Christ?)

Micah 6:8 is hard. I’m not going to sing it to that campy little tune any more.

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I’m a hopeless collector of words.  So I’ve started a new “commonplace book” called locus communis as a place to keep and categorize them all.

Contributions will be happily considered, especially if they have source references cited, which most of my collection so far doesn’t

In an excellent message on Ephesians 4:22-27,  titled as above, John Piper points out that “if there is any way that Satan can assist you to hold a grudge, he will do it. For there are… … goals of Satan which are greatly advanced when professing Christians hold grudges…”

One of those goals of Satan is to crush Christians into uselessness.  Here’s a place Satan has a hey day in my life: when repentance (which can be accomplished by one person) doesn’t lead to reconciliation (which takes two), I can fall into a paralysis of self-doubt.  When I don’t measure up to being “fixed enough” to be worth the effort of relationship in the eyes of someone, it’s easy to start listening to Satan’s words more than Christ’s.

Here’s how Piper puts it:

Satan aims to crush broken Christians until they are depressed into uselessness. Paul tells about an instance of church discipline at Corinth in which the offending party repented. Paul counsels in 2 Corinthians 2:7, “So you should turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. So I beg you reaffirm your love for him.” The burdens of life are so great at times that someone’s grudge against us can be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. You can destroy a person by holding a grudge against them—the very work of Satan from the time of Cain and Abel.

(John Piper, Satan Seeks A Gap Called Grudge, www.desiringgod.org) (h.t. cawleyblog)

So the battle for me is to find my rest in the reconciliation of Christ.  I feel, so strongly, the tug and pull of how Satan would like to destroy every shred of faith I have, by keeping me focused on the pain of unreleased grudges others hold against me.  The battle requires falling and getting up a thousand times: sometimes a thousand times a day, it would seem.   Piper’s sermon is a good reminder that my enemy isn’t the person with the grudge, but Satan.

This morning, going into the weekend, I’m in the middle of those 1000 times.  And, through the sadness, shouting Micah 7:7-8 at Satan as often and as loudly as I can.

Have you ever noticed that all the hard words of the Christian life start with R?

Rejoicing, Resting, Repentance, Reconciliation, Restoration, Restitution…

 A stiff apology is a second insult. ~ G.K. Chesterton

All the longer your delay, the more your sin gets strength and rooting. If you cannot bend a twig, how will you be able to bend it when it is a tree?

~ Richard Baxter

We have a strange illusion that mere time cancels sin. But mere time does nothing either to the fact or to the guilt of a sin. ~ C.S. Lewis

The Christian who has stopped repenting has stopped growing. ~ A.W. Pink

Our Lord and Master Jesus Christ, in saying, Repent Ye, intended that the whole of the life of believers should be repentance. ~ Martin Luther

Though true repentance is never too late, yet late repentance is seldom true.

~ Thomas Brooks

Again and again, God’s Word reveals that He is not as concerned about the depth or extent of the sin we commit as He is about our attitude and response when we are confronted with our sin. ~ Nancy Leigh DeMoss

Scripture considers repentance a path to liberation, not condemnation. ~ Ed Welch

Repentance that renews precious fellowship with our incomparably wonderful God ultimately furthers our joy.  Just as we cannot enter into true repentance without sorrow for our guilt, we cannot emerge from true repentance without joy for our release from shame. ~ Bryan Chapell

Some people do not like to hear much of repentance; but I think it is so necessary that if I should die in the pulpit, I would desire to die preaching repentance, and if out of the pulpit I would desire to die practicing it. ~ Matthew Henry

Next week’s Ten For Tuesday: On Forgiveness

I still consider myself very much a student of painting, and I’m far from confident whenever I approach a new piece of work.  But there is, even in the learning process, a delightful sense in which I can loose myself in the seeing. Today, painting the velvety petals of anemones, I saw how their violet blue color can have a golden orange warmth and a rose red highlight and a blue black shadow, all within the space of a few centimeters.

When I’ve been painting all day, as I did today, I have a few residual hours after I leave the easel in which my sight is changed.  For a few hours, every fold and crease and texture gets noted and named.  I mix colors in my mind as I look at objects and people (I watch my daughter sitting on the couch: how would I catch the way the warm light from the wood stove is playing on her face, pushing back the shadow that curves around her defined features… raw sienna… a touch of alizarin crimson at the round of her cheek…a bit of cobalt blue where the light begins to fade…)

Then my seeing begins to fade.  I still have sight, but I stop seeing. I move through the house and see words and uses instead of colors; there’s the folder of papers I need to remember to take tomorrow, there’s the coffee cup I left out this morning (and I wonder if the dishwasher needs to be run?) and there are the shoes I kicked off in the middle of the kitchen floor…  My mind begins to fill up with thoughts and projects and duties and, before I know it, I’ve lost the sight I gained, like some forgotten childhood language.

“Now we see through a glass darkly…”    For me, part of the “redemption” of heaven might mean the redemption of seeing all things properly and fully.  Maybe for now, I can’t really handle seeing like that all the time, and so God only allows me little controlled bursts of it.  Maybe there’s a sort of safety mechanism that keeps us from seeing too clearly when our souls can’t hold it yet. (I picture something like the natural defense our irises provide to protect our optic nerves from receiving too much light: maybe there’s a sort of “aperture” that closes on our attention, to keep us from burning ourselves out in a full, unveiled awareness of beauty…

I picture that when we’re able to look at God with unveiled faces, we’ll be looking with those perfected bodies and minds that can contain the pure beauty we’ll stand before.

For today, just the purple in an anemone was enough to bowl me over.  I can’t wait for heaven.