The Greatest of These is Love

Many times in the past two months my heart has been bursting to set these words down, but as many times it has been cast down by anxiety and fear and I couldn’t bear to write through the pain. The deepest betrayal of my life has brought me perhaps the greatest blessing: the absolute certainty and powerful experience of God’s unrelenting, un-soundably deep love for me. If when Samuel Clemens stood on the riverboat, he took a measure of the depth of God’s love instead of the Mississippi River, his pen name would have been “By the Mark, Fathomless” – and Mark Fathomless wouldn’t have rolled off the tongue or stood out on the book cover like Mark Twain. But how overjoyed I am to cry out, “Mark, Fathomless! Relentless! Flood stage!” Will Mark Fathomless turn this blog into a book? Editors, take note . . . .

Can you see between the lines to my leaping heart, and do you wonder how betrayal can turn into dancing? Two things have become the floor under me: the power of forgiveness and the power of God’s love. From the outset of this crisis, I determined that I would forgive, come Hell or high water, for my own sake and for Jesus’ sake as much as for my betrayers. Forgiveness alone couldn’t support me, couldn’t keep me standing through the torrent that threatens to tear down the foundation of 37 years of my life, and I sensed immediately that I needed God’s love working through me to restore my heart and give me brand new love for my betrayer. I never dreamed that love would come through knowing how deeply I am loved by God, but now I see THAT is the bedrock of my life, and so it was meant to be for all of us.

I hang on to a verse in Jeremiah when I’ve felt the sting of rejection over the past seven months. I remember the “address” to this verse by thinking of it (with only a joke in the waist department and slight exaggeration in the hips) as my measurements: “They will be my people, and I will be their God. I will give them singleness of heart and action, so that they will always fear me for their own good and the good of their children after me. I will make an everlasting covenant with them: I will never stop doing good to them . . . . I will rejoice in doing them good . . . . “(Jeremiah 32: 38-41)

Joy I never felt before spills over in me in unexpected places and moments. So many small miracles, seemingly unrelated to the calamity I’m facing, nevertheless tell me that God hears me and delights, absolutely rejoices, in doing me good because he LOVES me! From meeting Robin Mark, a singer whose music on my iPod reduces me to tears and praise on my daily dog walks, to the many times I’ve been a channel of blessing to someone who needed encouragement, to connections with women walking the same road with me, to an outpouring of provision for my upcoming mission trip to Thailand, to sweet conversations with Jesus whispered in my spirit, God’s hand surrounds me, guides me, provides for me, surprises me, gives me “warm fuzzies” and downright belly laughs. I have dared - yes, I do fear and reverance God, BUT I have dared to leap into my Abba's lap, bury my head in chest, and know he loves it. That childlike confidence in our Father's love is ALSO, and perhaps truly, to fear and reverence the LORD.

My latest chuckle came yesterday as I ate a grilled salmon taco with mango salsa, and suddenly I sensed Jesus telling me how much he enjoyed eating grilled fish there by the Sea of Galilee. Wow, I was transported to his side, fire crackling, fish sizzling, and I ate the rest of my taco with Jesus beside me in the Taqueria. Do you bristle with religious indignation or with disbelief that I would dare to see myself sitting beside Jesus on the shore as I sit in Tia Rosa's? My unabashed boldness and embrace of every sweet moment with him comes from knowing in the deepest places within me that Jesus is nothing but love, and he did – and does – all he did and does for me out of love for me. Now I see it as an affront to the cross to question his love for me.

Beloved of the Lord, that love birthed new love, faith, and forgiveness in me, a passion for the one who wronged me that burns through rejection and hopelessness like the fire that consumed the drenched wood and soggy sacrifice on the altar when Elijah confronted the prophets of Baal and Asherah (1 Kings 18:16-39) I know in the depths of my soul that the God who answers by fire – the fire of passionate, forgiving, overcoming-the-Gates-of-Hell love – he is God, and he loves me.

I don’t know the end of this journey yet, but I feel like Merry and Pippin in the movie version of Lord of the Rings when they sat in the branches of Treebeard as the rushing waters of the Rive Isen swept away the evil of Isengard. I sit on the shoulders of my beloved bridegroom Jesus, the true Oak of Righteousness, who says to me, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. For I am the LORD, your God. The Holy One of Israel, your Savior.” (Isaiah 41: 2-3)

I reply to him, as King David did: "When I said, 'My foot is slipping, your love, O LORD, supported me. When anxiety was great within me, your consolation brought joy to my soul.’” (Psalm 94: 18-19)

I see now and more importantly know the bedrock truth of 1 Corinthians 13:13: “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” Love has a power greater than even great faith and steadfast hope: knowing how much you are loved heals and transforms and empowers amazing new love within you. Beloved, I don’t know the river sweeping over you or the fire blazing all around you, but you are unceasingly loved by Jesus, and his love will renew your heart and carry you through to love those you never thought you could love, with his own heart.

“And we have come to know and have believed the love that God has for us.” (1 John 4:16)

By the Mark, Fathomless!

A "BUT . . ." to pray: Almighty God, my ABBA,sometimes when I look at the circumstances of my life I just don't feel your love. Honestly, I've wondered if it's true. How that must grieve you! Okay, Father . . . I see my failures, I hurt because of ________________________ in my life, BUT you say that you love me, and you don't lie! I may not feel it this instant, BUT I know that when I ask you to draw me in to your love, you won't turn away from me; you will embrace me joyfully. Father, ready or not (whether I'm ready or not, because YOU always are), here I come!Help me today to KNOW your love for me!

If this blog has blessed you and you would like to contribute to my October 2010 mission trip to speak at a women's leadership conference in China, you can send a check made out to Outreach - City of Grace, with Rose Jackson China on the memo line, and mail it to:

City of Grace, 655 East University Drive, Mesa, AZ 85203

Check my posts of January and February 2008 to read about my first trip.

Trophy Bride

(Please do read this, even if you are male, and substitute friend for bride if you can't get past the feminine nature of the word bride.)

Rose Jackson © 9/22/09

How ironic that the answer to the cry of my heart came out of utter destruction. Over a year ago I prayed to really experience God’s love for me, to move knowledge from my head to reality in my gut. So many of my friends seemed to slip so easily into his heart for them, like stepping into a beautiful ball gown (the sanguine friends) or sliding into a soft, voluminous cashmere sweater (my fellow melancholies).

Maybe I’m so analytical that it took this much agony to override my analysis. Whatever the reason, unless you have found yourself a crumpled shell in the desolate, burned-out crater of the loss of all you once loved or of all you hoped for, you probably can’t comprehend an utter emptiness that is deeper than death – and the resulting desperate longing that compels you directly into the flame of the blazing, ardent, passionate, jealous love God has for you.

I found my answer, and how poetic that it came during the Fourth of July weekend – a celebration of freedom.

Again and again in my daily reading in June I came upon verses containing the word “shield.” “Blessed are you, O Israel, a people saved by the LORD. He is your shield and helper and your glorious sword.” (Deuteronomy 33:29) “Okay, nice metaphor,” I asked God, “but painful things are hitting me like flaming arrows. What does it really mean that you are my shield?”

Then over the July 4th weekend I house-sat for some friends of mine for four days, partly to help their home look "lived in" while they were away, and partly to get away from the relentless stress I’m under at home. Sitting on their front porch that Sunday morning, listening to birds chirp in the mulberry trees and delighting in the crisp white picket fence bordering their lawn, I opened my Bible for my devotional reading and it fell open to Song of Songs - a place I never go for inspiration. There it was, nonetheless, Song of Songs 3:1: "Come out you daughters of Zion, and look at King Solomon wearing the crown, the crown with which his mother crowned him on the day of his wedding, the day his heart rejoiced."

Hmmmm . . . okay. And then my eye crossed the page to 4:7

"All beautiful you are, my darling; there is no flaw in you."

Tears streamed from my eyes. In my spirit I sensed the Holy Spirit telling me (and you, too!) that the Father put a crown on Jesus the day I (and you) came to salvation and became his, our "wedding" day with him. On that day Jesus' heart rejoiced! He sees me as absolutely ravishing, with no flaw at all, thanks to his righteousness which robes me.

Caveat here – I don’t get visions or dreams from God. How I wish I did, but the way he seems to speak to me is by pouring sudden understanding like a heap of treasure into my mind and heart. I dig into the pile, pulling up sparkling strands of thoughts and images that come together in beautiful clarity, though frequently the thoughts take the shape of analogies from unusual places. That morning the first strand I pulled up was a scene from the movie “Cleopatra” (not at all a spiritual motion picture!), specifically to a scene of a triumphal procession into Rome. Almost instantly 2 Corinthians 2: 14 came up in my other “hand”: “Thanks be to God who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ,” entangled with Ephesians 4:8 “When he ascended on high, he led captives in his train and gave gifts to men.” I could hear trumpets and drums, but it wasn’t Cleopatra and her retinue marching in; the captives Jesus led into the throne room of Heaven, including me, including you, are not the conquered, but the rescued and ransomed! Aha! I saw myself standing on the steps of the throne of God, alongside the victor, Jesus, who holds his sword and shield . . . .

Two days later at our weekly Bible study, our church outreach director spoke on Ephesians 6 and the armor of God. Trumpets up again in my memory, God poured another armful on the pile of my understanding. Ephesians 6:12-13 reads: "Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm, then . . . . ” In quick succession, two friends in the study who didn’t know what I am going through shared these verses:
Genesis 15:1 "Do not be afraid, I am your shield, your very great reward."

Exodus 14:14 "The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still."

Wait a minute! Christ holds his sword in his left hand, so if he is my shield and glorious sword . . . that means I am on Jesus' left side, sheltered behind HIS shield! If I am on his left, and he is at the right hand of God, then the Father is on my left side, and I stand sheltered between them both.

Aha! I sensed that my warfare now is simply standing, and where I stand in this battle is on the steps of the throne of God at Jesus' left side, his shield (that's his faithfulness) in his left hand covering and shielding my heart, mind and spirit, and his right hand (his promises and his sovereign power) fighting the battle for me. My job is to stay out of the way of his sword-swinging right hand and simply cheer him on with my shout, “Yes, Jesus, do all you plan and purpose and desire!”

The chains of my captivity to the effects of betrayal, fear, and anger lie thrown down on the steps of the throne of God as a trophy of Jesus’ victory in my life on the day I took him as my savior and he took me as his own beloved. I am a trophy of Jesus' triumph. I am a TROPHY BRIDE! I am FREE (no matter what is going on in my life), and I am ecstatic to be in Christ’s embrace as he lifts me upon his shoulder and shows the hosts of heaven, "This is one I have set my love upon!"

I know Song of Songs can be seen as a metaphor for the love God has for us, the Bride of Christ, the Church (not the institution, but the individuals who comprise the Church), so I believe the "extrapolation" God gave me to us as individuals is not heretical. I sensed the Holy Spirit affirming (to you, too, even if you are a guy!) that the Father put a crown on Jesus the day I (and you) came to salvation and became his.

He rejoices in you, his trophy and prize, the one he fought for, the beloved one whose salvation is a crown upon his head! In the middle of whatever battle you are facing, even if you feel you are chained to your past or sitting in the smoking ashes of your hopes, dreams, health, relationships, security, and future, REJOICE in the truth that Jesus ended all of your captivity and fights now for you! Stand and rejoice in whose you are and where you stand!

“You Raise Me Up”
Brendon Joseph Graham, Rolf U. Loevland

When I am down, and oh, my soul so weary,
When troubles come and my heart burdened be,
Then I am still and wait here in the silence
Until you come and sit a while with me.

You raise me up so I can stand on mountains,
You raise me up to walk on stormy seas.
I am strong when I am on your shoulders,
You raise me up to more than I can be.

Backfire!

Rose Jackson © 9/1/2009

(A family tradition is to write our names in sparkler. No name in this one, but maybe that's because it was meant for you, and your name is hidden in the fire!)

How to get this implosion of understanding onto paper in all of the power with which it came upon me this morning? No beautifully crafted words this morning. No, the imperative of this sudden insight compel me to get it down and out to you who hear the flames crackling and cringe from the heat pressing against you.

Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. For I am the LORD your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. Isaiah 43:1-3

Walking through this fiery trial, I am not burned up. In fact, more and more I am enveloped in times of glorious joy and confidence, love and power, as I was this morning out walking the dogs. How can this be, except that God, the Holy Spirit, dunamis, (dynamite!) sets a backfire by his presence and power within me that sweeps over and burns out the blaze the enemy has set in my life and marriage? “Oh, my gosh!” I exclaimed with sudden recognition within myself. “This is exactly what firefighters do to put out brush fires and forest fires: extinguish them by removing their fuel, fighting fire with fire!”

Like the burning bush that was not consumed – I suspect like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego walking around in the fiery furnace with and surrounded by the holy, protecting fire of the fourth figure (Jesus himself?!) who looked “like a son of the gods” - I can feel the ring of the Spirit’s holy fire around me, protecting me from the ravenous flames of Satan. My enemy’s plans for me and my husband will backfire because of the BACKFIRE of the Spirit of God surrounding his throne, where I stand!

“For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.” (Deut. 4:24)

“. . . and among the lampstands was someone ‘like a son of man,’ dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash around his chest. His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters.” (Rev. 1:12-15)

How many stories have I heard of missionaries whose lives were preserved by cordons of flaming beings or rings of fire, visible to their enemies? Flames and fire are not metaphors for God; he is that fire, and somehow a fire that preserves his beloved while it destroys his enemies! A backfire of jealous love!

He, the unquenchable holy fire, fills his children! “Come be the fire inside of me; come be the flame upon my heart.” From the song “You Won’t Relent,” sung by Kim Walker and Chris Quilala. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLNlnf80nXo

“But after me will come one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not fit to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.“ Matthew 3:11

Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit . . . . “ Acts 2:2-3

No wonder I can stand more and more often in rapturous joy, tears streaming down my face in absolute delight! Now wonder I dance in the face of betrayal and hopelessness. I am surrounded by hope that protects and preserves my heart!

Nebuchadnezzar then approached the opening of the blazing furnace and shouted, “Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out! Come here! So Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the fire, and the satraps, prefects, governors and royal advisers crowded around them. They saw that the fire had not harmed their bodies, nor was a hair of their heads singed; their robes were not scorched, and there was no smell of fire on them. Daniel 3: 26-27

. . . And when this is over, I won’t be consumed. You won’t either, dear one! The enemy's plans against us are bound to backfire! There won’t be so much as the hint of a s’more-making campfire upon us! On the contrary, we will pour out the fragrance of our beloved, our God and Savior Jesus!

Conformity? Really? Really!

Rose Jackson © 8/27/2009

(caveat: I am not suggesting anyone endure physical or emotional abuse. Be safe and get help, please!)

The photo is the front door of the little house with the screen door out back; these front steps are filled with love.

Love that keeps on coming. Love that gets slapped down and gets up again to keep loving. Love that refuses to quit.

I used to read the verse, “And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:18) and other verses like it (1 Cor. 15:49, Romans 8:29) that talk about being like Christ, and I’d think, “Oh, yes, God, that’s what I want to be!”

Did I? Did I want to be the one who’s betrayed and comes back, bleeding, but loving still? Did I really want to be the one who endures accusations, condemnation and lies, and looks beyond the sin to see the wounding of the sinner and to forgive? Is that what I really wanted? I never looked that deeply into what it cost God to bring us to him, because that’s the reality of being like Jesus: love that never turns away, never gives up! Love that bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. (I Cor. 13: 7)

In frustration I often cry out, “God, why don’t you . . . why aren't you . . . .?” My real question - as Philip Yancey writes in his book "Disappointment with God" - should be, “God, why do you bother to . . . . What is it that drives you to love me still in the face of my anger, my accusations, my condemnation, my apathy, my lies about your motives and your heart? Why don't you give up on me?”

My real question should be why Jesus had to die to prove God’s love for us. Yes, I know Jesus' blood atones for us. But God isn't bloodthirsty., so why did it require that? I wonder – is it in part because our sixth love language (beyond affirming words, loving touch, giving gifts, acts of service, and quality time) , the bottom line we humans all understand, the one we all hold out for and perhaps even demand as proof of love, is blood: sacrificing your own life for mine? That we understand - maybe, until some circumstance or event that doesn't go according to our plans causes us to question God's heart. I'm not condemning you, my readers; I've done that myself, and I know it comes out of pain and confusion.

Even after Jesus shed his own blood and God sacrificed his beloved Son, we don’t believe God loves us! Is it that perhaps some stubborn, self-preserving pride drives us to deny such love?

“No, my circumstances tell me . . . . " "But I don’t feel your love, God . . . ." Perversely somehow we'd rather think we're right that God doesn't love us than come to him in humbled recognition that there’s no reason on earth that God should love us – no reason besides WHO GOD IS himself: completely LOVE!

"We love because he first loved us." 1 John 4:19
"This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us." 1 John 3:16

I can hardly read the computer screen through the tears flooding from my recognition of the extravagant, unjustified, unrelenting love of God. My tears come, too, from the knowledge that I had to endure betrayal – and that I had to recognize the lies I had held onto, also, that kept me from loving unrelentingly – to finally get it in my gut that God IS love, nothing but love, purely and unceasingly love.

This conforming business hurts – but rather than resent God for the pain, I see and now hunger to press in to the truth that Jesus bore, and bears joyfully, even deeper pain to love me. In the scariest valley of my life, I am rejoicing and reveling like a glutton in the passionate, unrelenting love God has for me - so I can get up and love again, and again, and again.

Why won’t you come through the screen door into arms waiting to embrace you? What circumstances in your life are big enough to outweigh the relentless, extravagant love of God in Jesus? What are you holding out for?

“God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8)

Why won’t you love with his love? Who won’t you love with his love?

A “ . . . but . . . “ to pray: God, ABBA Father, Daddy, maybe not in my mind, but in my heart I have denied your love for me over and over again, BUT who are you, what kind of love can this be that loves in the face of pain, again and again and again? I want that love for me and in me. Maybe I’m still too scared to truly want it through me, BUT because you love me, I am willing to love this one who keeps denying and rejecting my love. Hold my hand and hold my heart as I keep loving, and please give me joy along the way so I can persist and pursue and bear your likeness in me.

Your own “. . . but . . .” to pay: Father God, Jesus, lover of my soul, I have denied your love for me because _________________________________ BUT I lay that down in the face of your relentless love, and I say to you now _____________________. I've been hurt so badly that I don't want to keep loving ________________, BUT ___________________.

Lost and Found

Oooh, bad family photo of us all from about 1968, with my Dad and his sister Francine in center.

You may have noticed my posts are distinctly lacking in the “God is in the flowers and rainbows” flavor. In fact, more of my posts are about trials I face or disappointments in myself. This no doubt comes from the fact that, while I am every bit female, I‘ve never been a “girly” girl. I look like death warmed over in pink, I simply look silly in ruffles, and though I love jewelry, the beautiful blingy cocktail rings my sweet friend Patty has given me are a glaring contradiction on my thin, veiny hands. And frankly, my life has been so challenge-filled since 1995 that I find little comfort in stress-busting devotionals that advise me to take a bubble bath or have my nails done. God IS in the flowers and rainbows, and probably in bubbles, too, but I need a God who is there to be found IN my pain, loss, anxiety, disappointments, grief, and frustrations. If He isn’t to be encountered and experienced there, then what hope do any of us have?

After I take the bubble bath and have my nails done, what has changed? Have those admittedly fun exercises changed my circumstances? If they haven’t changed my situation, have they changed me? No. And while I love bubble baths, I need something more substantial in my life. The most effective stress-buster to me is seeing God’s hand moving to transform me in the middle of the messes my life seems to step into again and again like the ubiquitous gum on a summer day in a Wal-Mart parking lot.

I long to dance in the rain - not because I’m a pessimist, but because I know rain will come. I need a God who isn’t afraid to get wet, who can transcend, transfigure, translate and transform, as the lyrics in John Mark McMillan’s moving, anointed song, “How He Loves” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Chx6s3qXKt4&feature=related powerfully declare: “When all of a sudden, I am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by glory, and I realize just how beautiful You are and how great your affections are for me.” I need a God of grit and guts and glory. That’s who I’m encountering in this deepest trial of my life – a God of incredible, deep compassion and love – and that’s who I pray you find within these thoughts and discoveries of mine.

This post is about my father, but Bill and Susan Miller, this one is for you. I love you!

Rose Jackson ©7/24/2009

“Uuuuhhhh . . . uuuhh . . . .” Dad’s mouth opened as he tried to speak. His eyes still held that “deer in the headlights” look of incomprehension so typical of Alzheimer’s patients, but I caught a spark of – what – hope? Thanks? Love? Mom, Bonnie and I were gathered around him holding his hand, once so strong and steady as he guided wood through the saw blade, but now so forceless and weak, and touching his now thin shoulders. We’d come to say good-bye.

Dad had developed pneumonia and seemed to recover from that, but now he had stopped eating. This Monday morning, the day before Dad’s 75th birthday, a nurse in the Alzheimer’s unit of the nursing home had called my Mom to tell her to come quickly, as this might be Dad’s last day. I’d thrown the car into gear and flown to Mom’s house to pick her up and quickly dash up to the home. “Oh, Rosie!” was all she could get out through her sobbing. The past five years of grieving as we watched Dad steadily decline still hadn’t prepared our hearts for this day.

Surprisingly, when Mom and I arrived, Dad actually looked pretty good. He was sitting up in a chair looking apparently healthy and pretty much like he usually did. Mom and I chatted to him while the nurses worked around us. “To him” was all we could do, because Dad hadn’t been able to speak for the past two years; in fact, he hadn’t even uttered so much as a syllable on the many Sundays when my husband, our ten-year-old son and I stopped in to see him after church. Ethan had never really known Grandpa when he was well, this man who made wagons and pedal fire trucks and doll houses and so many treasures for his grandchildren before dementia robbed him of his considerable talents.

But he was still Grandpa, still my Dad, and I thought back to treasured evenings in our back yard sitting on his telescope mount as he twirled me around the stars, or standing beside him in the garage redolent with the fragrance of newly sawn pine as he showed me how to drive a nail and drill a hole in a scrap of lumber. He was still the man I loved and respected, somewhere inside there. I dared to believe that, fought to hope it was true. Mom and I stepped aside to let the nurse take Dad’s vitals. The door opened and my sister Bonnie walked into the room. The nurse gave a slight gasp as my Dad’s vital signs shot up. Bonnie hadn’t seen Dad in two years, not since he moved from his home into this skilled nursing facility. She did live quite a distance away, but it was just too painful for her to see Dad in his continually deteriorating condition. I understood completely. Bonnie had always been there for Dad and Mom over the years, and she still helped Mom every way she could.

Dad hadn’t seen her in two years, yet something in him rose up in recognition of a face he loved, and rose up so powerfully that his heart rate and respiration increased immediately!

“Should we pray with him? Should we tell him . . .?” I honestly don’t remember now which one of us voiced what we all were thinking: should we give Dad permission to go home to Jesus? Should we give him our blessing and love? Wordlessly we all agreed, gathered around Dad, and began to pray. “Thank you so much, Father, for our father, for his love, for the faith he shared so freely . . . . “

Then we said it, every eye awash in tears that flowed to the nurses in the room, too. “Dad, if you’re ready to go, we give you our blessing to go home to Heaven.” That’s when it happened: Dad tried to speak! He looked directly into our faces and said, “Uuuhhh . . . uuuhhhhhh.” Those might have been babbled syllables to anyone else, but to the tree of us, they were the voice of a beloved husband and father, struck dumb by a disease advancing brain cell by brain cell for five years, but the man still alive and vital inside, somewhere, somehow!

One by one we bent down and kissed him, hugged him, squeezed his feeble hand, and left, fairly confident that his healthy appearance meant this might be a false alarm. Two days later he died, sweetly and quietly and I believe liberated to leave the prison of his disease and go meet his fellow carpenter.

Some people might understandable dismiss this as coincidence to which we attributed too much significance. I might, too, had it not been for a comment from one of the nurses after Dad died, and the same scene repeated exactly four weeks later over the bed of Dad’s sister, my Aunt Cine. Francine developed Alzheimer’s two years before Dad exhibited signs of the disease. She had been bedridden, fallen away to 80 pounds, unable to walk or speak, at death’s door for over a year. Mom and I went to see her on her birthday. We took her some balloons.

“Should we tell her?” Mom asked, and I agreed. “Should we tell her that her brother died?”

“Yes,” I concurred without hesitation.

Cine was in much worse shape than Dad had been, but the day Dad died, one of the nurses on Dad’s floor at his nursing home had said to me, ‘Your father was such a sweet, wonderful man. We enjoyed him so much.” How had she known that? How can you know that about someone who can’t communicate . . . unless Dad’s spirit had been able to break out of his silence and communicate somehow, quite apart from words?

So my mother and I bent down on either side of Dad’s sister, took her hands, and I softly said, “Aunt Cine, we want you to know your brother has gone on ahead of you. He’s waiting for you with Jesus. If you’re ready to go, we give you our permission and blessing to go home.”

“Uuuhhh . . . . uuuhhhh.” Her face turned up to mine, her wild yet shallow eyes looking directly into mine, and I knew she was there. She saw me. We kissed her and went home. So did Cine, the very next day.

I never gave much credence to the notion that sometimes people need permission from their loved ones to leave. I always thought your body had the deciding voice in when you die. Now I’m certain that is not always the case.

Two intelligent, resourceful, achieving, loving people, struck down by a disease so heinous and hideous that it strikes terror in the hearts of most people. Any way but that one! What could possible be the sliver lining in my father’s and my aunt’s deaths? Simply and profoundly this: no matter what disease does to our bodies or our brains, God’s Spirit never leaves our spirit. We remain, whole, intact, filled with all the life and love we’ve known and given away, whether the outside world can access it or not. And is that a meager comfort in the face of such deep loss and pain? No, even though my sister, brother and I know we live in the shadow of DNA that may spell the same end for us, especially now that our mother has vascular dementia from numerous small strokes. It is somehow a great comfort and source of hope.

Yes, I pray researchers will home in quickly on what causes and what can cure and prevent Alzheimer’s, BUT while I wait, I rest in the knowledge that who I truly am, who we truly are, endures above and beyond all else. Count that as an incredible, joyful, overcoming blessing!

Today, honestly, I am prayed out, simply resting in Jesus. I let you lift your own prayer in whatever you are facing:

God, this __________________ seems insurmountable, impossible, impassable, life-threatening, BUT you ______________________________________________. Amen!

Fire in the Ashes

Rose Jackson © 8/3/2009

Some journeys take you to unexpected discoveries in familiar places. Right now I’m walking through the most difficult time of my life through the smoking ruins of a destroyed relationship. Recently my friend Sharon’s daughter, Charity, told me she wanted to take me on a journey through “the Father’s house,” a spiritual journey into Jesus that had given her a breakthrough in a challenging time in her own life. Hungry to experience God’s presence more deeply, I sat with her in Sharon’s bedroom two weeks ago and lifted my sanctified imagination to the Holy Spirit’s voice.

“Please, God, I don’t want to conjure this out of my own imagination,” I silently cried out. Long ago I had sat beside my then boyfriend in a “spiritual” Sunday evening church service, the hair standing up on my arms, my spirit filled with the suspicion that the “spirit guide” the pastor was listening to absolutely was NOT Jesus. I wanted nothing to do with that kind of experience ever again! But I know Sharon’s and Charity’s heart and faith, and my own as well, so this day I could sit in confidence believing that Jesus guarded my thoughts and nothing of the Enemy could enter. So I set off in my mind’s eye up a long driveway. We talked about what we were “seeing,” and my friend described a beautiful mansion in vivid detail. I was having some trouble, my analytical brain questioning whether what I was sensing was me or the Lord, but I pressed on in faith, believing God truly did want to speak something to my heart. Crossing polished hardwood floors, walking into large rooms whose vague details disappeared as I tried to focus on them, I just wasn’t getting anything. The idea is to “walk” through God’s house to find Jesus. My friend’s words were awash in love and amazement as she narrated her journey.

Hmmm . . . . No such experience for me. Why was I getting nowhere? After much mental wandering, I decided to follow the tug on my heart to go “out back,” and I pushed open a worn screen door and smelled my Grandmother’s apple tree. As my friend saw glorious flowers and a beautiful river filled with gems, I sat on the old wooden tree swing and felt someone pushing me. Ah, could I dare to believe this was Jesus? So natural, so common, so familiar, so ordinary . . . so wonderful! What I was experiencing wasn’t at all like the things Charity had seen in her own walk, wasn’t like the things her friend who’d first shared the journey with her had seen on her own walk, wasn’t like the splendor my friend was seeing now. So simple. So free.

Now Jesus and I sat in the grass on the edge of my Grandmother’s garden, and I smelled dill and rich, warm earth. “What does Jesus want to give you?” Charity asked.

“That’s a good question!” I thought. Nothing was coming into my vision as my hands dug beside Jesus’ hands in Grandma’s deep brown, moist soil. Ha! My hand playfully put a smudge of black dirt on Jesus’ left cheek, and I sensed -or maybe dared to believe - it pleased him. This wasn’t the grand spiritual adventure, the overwhelming breaking in of the Holy Spirit that I had hoped to receive. This wasn’t Acts 2 in the upper room. This was sitting on the grass with my hands in dirt, my hands beside another set of hands, feeling completely at peace and joyfully loved. This was awfully ordinary for a powerful spiritual encounter.

“Jesus wants to give you something. What is it? Ask him,” Charity gently encouraged. Vaguely I sensed something like a gold brooch in an extended hand, sensed rather than saw, and I got the impression the gold setting held an opal. He was holding it against my chest. “Ask him what it means,” Charity offered.

“Uumm . . . . ,” I was determined NOT to attach any meaning that wasn’t absolutely of God onto this experience. The still small voice of God was so quiet, more a trickle of understanding seeping into my mind. Sharon wasn’t sure what opals looked like. I know many precious stones are mentioned in Revelation 21 where John describes the foundations of the walls of the New Jerusalem, but I wasn’t at all sure opals were among those stones. “Opals – really pure, beautiful opals – are fiery,” I recounted. “Maybe – maybe Jesus is saying, ‘Don’t let the fire go out in your heart.’ Or maybe, ‘I won’t let the fire go out.’”

Tears erupted from my eyes. My heart is under siege – has been for the past three months. This wasn’t the encounter I wanted with the splendor of God, but a sweet communion with the passionately loving heart of Jesus, and if he wanted to run under me on my Grandma’s swing and wear a smudge of dirt from my hand, that was more than fine by me. He was telling me there was no place he’d rather be than here in my heart.

Wow! Sharon and Charity may have been a bit puzzled and underwhelmed, but I was overcome. I remembered I have a small opal pin at home. I checked both my jewelry box and my concordance as soon as I got home. Yep, there was the pin with four small opals, though the tiny white stones in it aren’t very fiery, and nope, opals aren’t mentioned in the Bible. Did that mean my experience had come solely out of my own imagination? I left a message asking about the significance of opals with a friend who’d spoken a year or so ago about gems in scripture to ask her about opals. When she returned my call, Amy said nope, it was a mystery to her, too. The Bible doesn’t mention opals. She did go on to explain some information she’d found on opals, and my heart soared as God’s assurance settled deeply in. This information wasn’t in any of the geology books we had at home:

Opals are semiprecious stones treasured for their fire and light. Very fragile, opals deteriorate in heat and cold. They contain water, but lose water easily in dry air and become brittle, so opals need to be worn next to flesh so the oils from the body can seal in their moisture. To clean an opal, you must wash it in pure water. Left to dry, an opal will crack and lose its brilliance and beauty.

There it was, God’s word to me: my heart is like an opal, and just as fragile. He washed and cleansed my heart in pure water, the Living Water of Jesus. My heart is meant to be – God WANTS me to be - filled with Jesus, my heart pressed close to his so it doesn’t dry out and lose its fire, brilliance, and beauty. There is absolutely nothing common or ordinary in that truth!

In this dry, hope-sucking valley of the shadow of death that I’m walking through where the Enemy is working to destroy my heart (are you walking that valley too?), God wants above all else for my heart (yours, too!) to be whole, beautiful, and filled with his fire, pressed against his chest in a place of safety, sustaining, and love.

I clasped my opal pin on the chain of a necklace I haven’t worn in over 30 years. The pendant on the chain is a gold-colored, jagged-edged half circle inscribed with these words from Song of Songs 2:16: “I am my Beloved’s.” Surprisingly, when the opal pin hangs on the chain, it looks like a cross . . . .

A " . . . BUT . . . " to pray: Oh, Abba Father God, my heart feels crushed, ground into the dust, broken, BUT your word says, "All beautiful you are, my darling; there is no flaw in you." (SOS 4:7) and you promise I can count on your love and power as "(I) wait in hope for the LORD; he is (my) help and (my) shield. In him (my) heart rejoices, for (I) trust in his holy name. May your unfailing love rest upon (me), O LORD, even as (I) put my hope in you." (Psalm 33:20-22) Restore the lustre, beauty, fire, and water to my heart even in the driest place with the Living Water of your love, Jesus. Thank you that my heart is precious to you and you hold my heart close to yours! Amen!

Your own" . . . BUT . . . " Abba, Father, Beloved, my heart is weighed down with ________________________ BUT I know you desire to restore my heart, so I give you ______________________________________________ and I receive your _________________________________________________. Take me to that place where your heart resides in me. Amen!

Spin Me Around the Stars

Rose Jackson ©4/29/2009

(This is a slight departure from my usual style of post, but I'm so moved today by the sense that so many people, me included, truly need to feel God's love for them individually. I hope you get a glimpse of the godly man my Dad was, and I hope you have your own fun with God through this post!)

Crickets chirped in the warm summer night as I looked upward, expectantly waiting for my father to do what I’d longingly waited for. He lifted the long black tube of his hand-built telescope off its mount and set it delicately down in the soft grass. Darkness draped over us like a shawl, made lacy with the bright and faint punctuations of myriads of stars. Stars and planets were the awe of the evening, but my delight was in what sometimes happened next. My father swooped down, scooped me up, planted me gently on the flat mount atop his tripod, and spun me around. I looked up at the heavens in complete bliss as the stars whirled around me, covered with wonder and embraced in my father’s love.

I don’t think Dad ever knew how much what to him must have seemed just spontaneous silliness meant to me. He must have enjoyed it, though, because he did it many times. My father wasn’t a man given to horseplay, merriment, or even much conversation. He surely must have said it while I was young – I think – but I don’t remember hearing him say the words “I love you” until I was nearly 30. I knew his love when I stood beside him at his bench in the garage as he helped me hammer nails into a board or click the Morse code key of his radio, or when I sat in his lap as he read the Sunday funnies to me. But I felt his love when he spun me around the stars.

Today, flat on my face on the floor, crying out to experience, to feel, the love of my heavenly Father, this whisper of a memory came to me. In the vastness of the throne room of Heaven, surrounded by angelic hosts, bathed in the unapproachable light of the glory of God, knowing full well it’s only because of Jesus, I have the audacity to ask God for what I’d love: for my Father to step down, scoop me up, plant me atop the mount of his hand-made “telescope” – which is probably his very own hand - and spin me around the stars, covered with wonder and embraced in my Father’s love.

I know, I know; we ought to have a holy reverential fear of God, and I do. But I have to wonder, does it delight God when his child longs for and has the faith to ask for a simple moment of a Father’s daddy-ness? When his children delight simply in him, in who he is, in his love? Delight pops up in many verses of scripture - so why do I feel guilty when I long to look for God's love to delight me? I know my earthly Dad didn't take offense when I wanted to enjoy something special and Dad-daughter with him. Hmmm . . .

". . . the LORD delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love." Psalm 147:11

"The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing." Zephaniah 3:17

"Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart." Psalm 37:4

Some people are privileged to know an outpouring of fatherly love from their earthly fathers. Many more don’t. But I don’t think we need to fear taking to our heavenly Father that empty spot in our hearts that needs the embrace of a daddy’s spontaneous "silliness"/joy. I understand that the writer of Hebrews was talking about our weakness and temptation when he wrote, “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need,” (Heb. 4:16) but I dare to trust that we can approach the throne of grace with confidence so that we can receive the lavish mercy of a Father's delighted love.

“How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” 1 John 3:1

For now it’s a metaphor that brings me (and you too, I pray) peace and encouragement to ask God for experiences with him that delight my soul, but I also look forward expectantly to the day God my Father really does spin me around the stars!

A “. . . but . . .” to pray:

Father God, sometimes I feel so far from your love, and I think often it’s my earthly perception of love based on flawed experience, coupled with lingering “God of judgment” attitudes about you, that hold me back from truly knowing your love. BUT I dare to believe you meant it when you told the apostle Paul that nothing - not even my flawed attitudes - can separate me from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8: 38-39) So I have the faith-based audacity today to ask you to delight me with your love, show me some spontaneous fatherly ”silliness” that will mean the world to me, and help me delight, just purely delight, in you.

Your own “. . . but . . .” to pray:

Father God, I’ve been afraid sometimes to ask for an embrace from your love. Sometimes I’ve doubted you are willing to do that, BUT today I’m going to trust that _____________________.

Simply a Saturday Miracle

Rose Jackson © 3/25/2009

Prani breathlessly opened the pool gate and called, “Does anybody here know anyone with B-negative blood?”

That’s the last question you expect to hear the assistant manager of a guest house in Thailand ask tourist families splashing in the pool and licking ice cream treats on a warm Saturday afternoon.

Startled, Monica rose up on her arm from her towel on the pool deck next to me and quizzically replied, “Emma does.”

“Oh, my gosh!” I exclaimed. I didn’t know that, and I’m her mother-in-law.

Monica, a nurse, turned to me with a panicked “Where is she?” look as she shot back to Prani, “What happened?”

“A tourist who just came here last night was in an accident and needs blood so the doctors can do emergency surgery. He’s B-negative.”

I must have still looked confused as Monica and I both scrambled to our feet, because Monica hastily explained, “Asians don’t have the Rh-negative factor in their blood. Where’s Emma?”

Like a beautifully painted scroll unrolling, the full implication of this emergency spun through my mind. A couple thrown into crisis on their first day in a strange, foreign city. Doctors tell the wife surgery is urgent to save her husband’s life, but they have no compatible blood, nor does the other hospital in town. Panic must grip her. Is there a foreigner in town with compatible blood, and how could they possibly track that person down? Where could they even begin to look? Hotels certainly don’t have that information. What are the odds?

Rushing past Prani, I blurt, “Emma’s on her way here with the children. I’ll find her!” Prani replies, “I’ll call the hospital.”

What a wonder: this is the one Saturday of our stay when we didn’t plan any tours or shopping trips. Emma stops, children in hand, as I rush toward her down the path, panting. “It’s an emergency. Someone needs B-negative blood.” We scoop up the children and dash back to their room, hand the kids off with a fleeting explanation to a puzzled Rick, toss on T-shirts and jeans, and run through the dappled shade on the driveway toward the guest house office, the laughter of children swinging and sliding on the playground an other-worldly contrast to our anxious hearts.

As Emma gives information to Prani, the pieces of this puzzle fly together to reveal a picture nothing short of a miracle. Piece one: Prani used to be a nurse, and she “happens” to know the nurse overseeing foreigners at this hospital. Piece two: the injured man “happens” to be taken to this particular hospital. Piece three: Emma has B-negative blood. Piece four: Emma “happens” to be in this particular town at this particular time. Piece five: Emma and Rick “happen” to be staying at the guest house Prani manages. Piece six: Monica, a colleague of Emma and Rick, “happens” to know Emma’s blood type. Piece seven: Monica “happens” to be at the pool with her children when Prani comes, hoping against hope to find a blood donor. If even one piece were missing, this man would die.

Like a jasmine-laden breeze, a peaceful calm enfolded us as attendants quickly bustled Emma into the ambulance that seemed to appear out of nowhere. Mouths open in wonder, we looked at each other across the cots. What’s the proper protocol when you realize you’re caught up by the hand of God in a miracle? Nothing seemed better to do than pray for this man, his doctors, and his wife, and pray that Emma would be able to give the blood he desperately needed.

“I know, I have small veins,” Emma apologized to the hospital technicians who speedily and skillfully descended upon her as soon as we arrived. Though their English was halting, it was obvious they were thankful Emma was willing to give her blood. Two attempts, two veins, and several embarrassed giggles and apologies in Thai later, a phlebotomist sped off with the pint of blood that meant life to someone we would never meet. Wanting to offer some comfort and hope, we asked if we could speak to the man’s wife. Privacy rules made that impossible, so we prayed again that the surgery would go smoothly and healing would come quickly.

How surreal! On vacation in between conferences, here we were in Thailand in a hospital on a Saturday afternoon, Emma with bandages on both of her arms, and me still wearing a bathing suit under my shirt and jeans! Is that what a miracle is supposed to look like? To the rest of the bustling city, it was simply Saturday. Shouldn’t the heavens open, or an angel appear, or something supernatural happen to let you know you’re in the middle of the miraculous?

Evidently not, or at least not always. Sometimes – probably most frequently, I expect – miracles come in quite ordinary packages, via quite ordinary “happen-ings,” pieced together extraordinarily and placed in the praying hands of people who helplessly hope for them. Do they wonder, and will that couple ever know, their miracle is named Emma? Perhaps some Saturday quite simply, when and where you least expect it, someone’s miracle will be named you!

For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Ephesians 2:10

Today, TWO ". . . but . . ."s to pray: Most amazing Father, sometimes I've looked for heaven-rending miracles and passed off as coincidence so many of the "ordinary" miracles you've done for me. I need one now and don't see how it can happen, BUT I know you will and do position your resources and your children to provide wondrous help to supply my deepest needs. Too often I'm focused on receiving a miracle, BUT it's just awesome to be an instrument in your hand in delivering a miracle for someone else! I give you permission to - in fact, I pray you will - use me in extraordinary ways in "ordinary", "simply Saturday" miracles to bless the world around me.

Your own ". . . but . . ." to pray:
God of miracles and my Father in Heaven, I've been so busy looking for ____________________ and I haven't recognized the amazing things you are doing for and through me, BUT I believe you can __________________________________ . I am in awe to know you can and will move your people around the world to meet my needs, and I have faith to ask you to use me to _______________________________________ Amen!

God's Goodness - A Greater Miracle: to be part of one

Heart pounding, I leaped up from the sofa, ran down the hall to my bedroom, and anxiously searched through my jewelry box. Where was it? I didn’t even remember the last time I’d worn it. Could I find it? Now was the moment, the divine instant. There in the corner, under pearls, gold earrings and an opal necklace, was a tiny, flat gray piece of barbed wire – now the most priceless jewelry I owned. Grasping it tightly I ran back to the living room. Leana looked at me with wonder that bordered on alarm. We’d met just nine days earlier. “She must be thinking ‘This is one crazy woman,’” I laughed to myself as I opened my hand and placed the small pin in hers.

“This is yours,” I said, and my mind flew back over fifteen years as I began to explain to the confused young woman why I had flown from the room in the middle of her story. In my memory I could still clearly see the unimposing figure, a courageous man who carried Bibles into the Soviet Union. We listened with humility and admiration as he related how difficult life was for Christians living under the threat of persecution. For some reason I didn’t understand, his words kindled a passion in my heart for that land, and I bought a tiny barbed wire pin and wore it to remind me to pray for those people. Years passed, and as so often happens, I didn’t wear the pin as frequently. Eventually it drifted to the bottom of my jewelry box, but that didn’t quell the prompting I sensed from time to time to pray for someone. I didn’t know for whom I was praying, but I prayed God would protect, guide, bless, and be very real to her or him.

Leana was one of four Russian girls our church was supporting in a college in the Midwest. Because the dorms were closed for two weeks over the Christmas break, the girls needed a place to stay. Tom, the youth director at our church, asked for host homes from the teens in the youth group. A year earlier our older son and a dozen youth had gone to Russia with Tom, taking medical supplies and an incubator to two hospitals in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Since our son loved his adventure in Russia, and since we had an extra bedroom, and even though we didn’t have a girl in the family, my husband, our two boys and I thought it would be fun to share our home and holidays with one of the Russian girls.

Tom chose Leana for us, and her addition to our family made the holiday magical as we experienced our traditions anew through her eyes. With all four girls we went Christmas caroling up and down neighborhood streets, freely singing our faith. One Saturday Leana perched on bleachers beside our younger son and tasted her first cotton candy while flower-strewn floats and marching bands passed by in the first non-military parade she had ever seen. At the zoo she laughed delightedly as she swayed on her first camel ride. On Christmas Eve the candlelight flickered on her young face, reflecting the hope we felt rise more powerfully than ever with the strains of “Silent Night.” Our extended family showered her with gifts on Christmas Day, and Leana gave us beautiful gifts from her homeland.

There had been so much activity that Leana and I hadn’t had much time to simply talk, so I seized the opportunity for some girl time with her while my husband and the boys were out one afternoon. Side-by-side on the sofa, I asked Leana about college, about her career dreams, about her family and her life in Russia, and about how she met Tom.

“My parents aren’t Christians,” she said, relating the years of wondering and longing that drew her to ask questions about God as she grew up. “I wanted to know the truth about Jesus. Then I heard Tom speak at . . .," she continued, and I didn’t hear another word. The quiet voice I heard in my heart drowned out Leana’s words:

“Do you remember that person you prayed for in Russia, the one you didn’t know?”

“Yes, God.”

“Well . . . there she sits.”

That was it, simply matter-of-fact, but this sudden recognition launched my heart so jubilantly that I had to leap up and find the tiny pin. Now I knew whose it was.

“This is yours, Leana. I’ve prayed for you for fifteen years, even though I didn't know I was praying for you. God put you in my heart long ago!” Tears brimmed in her eyes and mingled with mine as we embraced and cried together.

How is it possible to love someone you’ve never met? How is it possible to hear a child’s heart-cry and add your prayers to hers? How much more improbable is it to find yourself one day, in your own home, looking into the face of that same person? How breathtaking is it to be part of a miracle?

I don’t think my prayers were the only ones God prompted for Leana, but how incredible it is to have played even a small role in the answer to her prayers! That to me is miraculous, and now I know it’s true that to be part of delivering a miracle for someone else is as astounding and life-changing as receiving a miracle of your own – perhaps even more so!



"My intercessor is my friend as my eyes pour out tears to God; on behalf of a man he pleads with God as a man pleads for his friend." Job 16:20-21

"This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us - whatever we ask - we know that we have what we asked of him." 1 John 5:14-15

A ". . . but . . ." to pray: Glroious God, I've prayed and sometimes not seen an answer to my prayers. It's tempting at those times to think you don't hear me, BUT I know you do, because Jesus told his disciples (and all of us, me included) to pray. You wouldn't tell me to do pray if you didn't passionately want to speak to me, hear from me, and move divinely in response to my prayers. Thank you that you inspire me to pray for others. I may never see or hear the results of my prayers, BUT I believe they will accomplish much more than I know. How wonderful if I could someday meet the one those prayers are for, BUT even if I can't, thank you for giving my life incredible impact by making me part of a miracle, and thank you for moving someone I don't know to pray for my needs.





Your own ". . . but . . ." to pray: God, sometimes I think my prayers go no higher than the ceiling because I don't see the answers, or because the answers are so long in coming, BUT I am willing to believe that ______________________________. Thank you for inspiring me to pray today for someone who needs a miracle.

God's Goodness: The Power of Purpose

(In the photo are 28 of the many-more blessings God gave us in this place)

It was an unlikely spot for a miracle to begin: the curb of a Howard Johnson’s parking lot on a Friday night. I huddled on the cold concrete, oblivious to the flaming glory of autumn leaves above me, my husband inside the hotel oblivious to my desolate grief. My chest heaved with sobs as I cried out from an abyss of desperation, “Did you bring me here to abandon me?”

So much had gone wrong in the six weeks since the September morning I’d said good-bye to our older son and his fiancée, our family, our home of 28 years, our friends, and a dynamic church - aside from my husband and our younger son, everyone and everything that mattered to me. My husband’s new job took us 2,000 miles across the country. Our house sold in two hours – a hopeful balm to the loss I felt - and I considered the lightning-quick sale confirmation that God’s hand was guiding our move.

But was it? The 40 houses we’d looked at were at least $100,000 more than we had, and each one disappointing in some major way. The first house we saw had no closets, and things only got worse from there. We had signed a contract on one house and purchased new appliances to upgrade the kitchen, but a week later the owner decided not to sell and backed out of the contract. That left us with $5000 worth of appliances sitting in storage with no house to put them into... My husband’s new company rented us a house for one month, but what they didn’t realize was the owner of the house had rented it every weekend to “leaf peepers.” Friday nights we packed up and moved back to the hotel; on Sunday nights we moved back to the rental, where I washed dirty dishes, sheets and towels, cleaned the bathroom, and vacuumed before we could even unpack.

With no permanent address, we couldn’t enroll our son in school. I didn’t want to start him in one school, then move him to another in weeks or months. He felt uprooted enough! Then my husband found a condo we could rent in November in the town where we hoped to settle, so I met with the principal to convince him to let our son start school. We’d moved from a metropolitan area where our son’s school was ethically diverse to a tiny pocket of rural New England. A friend from our home church glowingly described their new home in Connecticut as a “Leave It to Beaver” neighborhood, and I drank in the hope that our new town would be the same. But during the first week in his new school, a girl in our son’s class announced, “You’re from somewhere else. That makes you different, so we aren’t going to be your friends.” And that’s how the school year went. Our son, the befriender of the outsider, the compassionate kid who made hurting children feel accepted, was now an outcast and devastated. Every day I drove him to the small school nestled in the lovely valley, and every day he battled rejection and tried to make a friend.

So I sat rocking on that cold curb, anticipating mountains of cleaning on Sunday night, everything I loved stripped away from me, every hope for happiness seemingly strangled, and wept bitterly. Through sobs I looked up and cried, “God, I can’t do this! Please send us back home!”

“If only . . . .” I whispered, “If I could see a purpose . . . . I could live with all of this if there was a reason.”

At our 10,000-member home church I wrote books with the senior pastor and led groups in a vibrant women’s ministry; our son loved the lively, creative Sunday School program. Now we were looking for any Bible-believing church. Earlier that week I’d called the pastor of yet another congregation to get directions to his church. “No,” he replied to my questions, “we don’t have a women’s ministry or a youth group. My sons and one other boy are the only children in the church older than preschoolers.” Most of the church’s 60 members were college students.

“Oh, great,” I thought ruefully as I picked myself up off the curb in the gathering dark and my mounting gloom, “I told him we’d visit. Now we’ll have to go through with it just out of courtesy.”

Sunday we took our seats on folding chairs at a local library. An older couple behind us tapped our shoulders, introduced themselves, and said, “We’d love for you to come to our house for lunch after church.” Our son’s eyes met mine, silently pleading, “Please, no – can’t we go to MacDonald’s?” But we accepted. It couldn’t hurt to meet people who were friendly!

Loretta and Dana were gracious and genuine. Over lunch in their kitchen, my husband mentioned that he worked for a Japanese-owned firm. Loretta said their son had worked in Japan. Thinking for a moment, she added, “I know a Japanese woman here who’d like to be in a Bible study, but she’s uncomfortable with her English. Her husband works here, so she comes for three months, then returns to Japan for three months. I think,” she added, "they live in the town where you’ll be living next month. Would you be willing to have a Bible study with her?” At least it would give me something constructive to do, so I took the woman’s phone number.

I had no idea I was poised on the brink of a miracle.

“Coincidentally” this woman lived in the complex we’d soon move into. In fact, Hiroko lived two buildings down, and her husband was president of the company my husband worked for! “Coincidentally” we’d visited the church I wanted no part of, in front of the couple who could connect me with Hiroko and my miracle of purpose. Hope rushed in as a door opened for me into new understanding. Now I knew why the contract fell through on the house we bought appliances for! I knew why we were renting a too-small condo. I knew we had a church home. I knew God had a purpose for me and meaning for this move!

Incredibly, God moved us across the country to answer the prayer of a woman from the other side of the world. Hard as it was for our son and me, we were answers to prayer. God’s hand was in every detail of this move, and if that was true, his goodness was there for our family.

This foreign land for both Hiroko and me became a place of miracles. The next year our son made good friends at the regional junior high who didn’t know he was from “somewhere else.” We found a house with closets. I helped start a women’s ministry with precious friends who became like family.

God’s miraculous answer to my anguished cry on the curb of the Howard Johnson's was not to send me home, but to plant my heart in the purpose he had for me in a new home. This, too, is God's character: he gives our lives meaning that gives our lives joy, no matter who or where or in what circumstance we are. Not all miracles of healing involve your body. Some miracles – perhaps the most powerful and lasting - heal your heart. That healing is God's heart for you today.

"For I know the plans that I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11

A " . . . but . . ." to pray:

God, I've misjudged you when I have only seen difficult circumstances, not the potential for meaning, purpose and miracles even in difficult situations. Sometimes you are hard to discern, BUT I believe and delight that you love to make me an answer to prayer and give my life meaning and purpose that make even hard places and circumstances become places of blessing. You are great, and you are good! Amen!

Your own " . . . but . . ." to move:

God, I look around me and see _____________________ in my life, not goodness, BUT I know you long to use me to answer the cry of someone's heart, and I know in being that answer, I'll __________________________ and you'll fill and strengthen my heart, too.

A Miracle-working God

Rose Jackson© 1/2009

The miracles began to unfold when the problem became a crisis. I got the phone call on Monday afternoon. “Mom, Emily’s bleeding. They’re evacuating her to Hong Kong.” He paused, the anguish breaking Eric’s voice,” I don’t know if Evan and I will be able to go with her.” A cold jolt ran down my back and momentarily paralyzed my breathing. “I’m on my way,” I exhaled, my thoughts speeding off in dozens of directions. How? Where? Who could help?

Emily and Eric were working and studying Asia. Expecting their second child, our daughter-in-law was 29 weeks into the pregnancy. After episodes of spotting in her first trimester, things had been going fine. Until now.

Emily had started spotting again on Sunday, so she and Eric went to the hospital while their three-year-old son Evan stayed with friends. Things took a drastic turn on Monday, and the hospital staff told Emily and Eric they weren’t equipped to handle such a premature birth. Both the baby and Emily could die. The closest hospitals equipped for premature births were 350 miles away in Hong Kong. How could they get there in time to save the baby’s life? At this point of desperation, when none of us could do anything but pray, God delivered miracles.

Looking back on them now, it’s almost like peering over God’s shoulder as he marked off a checklist:

Make a corporate jet “coincidentally” available and close enough to fly in.
Make the jet big enough for Eric and Evan to go along.
Connect a colleague in Hong Kong quickly with an ambulance to meet them there.

Getting to Hong Kong was just the tip of the iceberg of impossibilities. Which hospital? Was there a hospital with a bed available and staff available for whatever might happen? Where could Eric and Evan stay indefinitely on their meager resources? Who would take care of Evan?

On the other side of the world, I bought an airline ticket while my mind whirled with my own questions. How could we afford this? What about local currency? A miracle itself, my passport had just come back in record time the week before, but did I need a visa to get into Hong Kong? Where would Eric and Evan be? How could I find them?

“Call Julia” flashed through my mind. We’d met Julia six years earlier when we lived briefly on the East Coast. She was from Hong Kong. Her parents still lived there. Could one of them possibly meet me at the airport? Was Julia even home? I was set to fly out at five in the morning. Making a connection would take a miracle. God’s checklist:

Move us to New England in 1997 so we meet Julia.
Be sure Julia is at home on Monday night.
Ensure Julia’s mother is available and willing to meet me at the airport.
Provide a phone number where Julia’s mother can contact Eric and find out where he is.
Send Emily to the hospital with the best neonatal intensive care unit in all of East Asia.
Provide an affordable apartment in Hong Kong for four weeks.

“What-if’s” swirled through my thoughts. How would I recognize Julia’s mother Linda, whom I’d met only once? I tucked Julia’s wedding photo in my carry-on, held my husband close, and tried to get a few hours of fitful sleep. Thirty-four hours later across the Pacific Ocean, I saw a small hand waving a sign that read “Rose.” Amid a sea of people I thankfully hugged Linda, who had taken a taxi, bus and subway across two islands far out of her way to meet me. One hour later I leaped out of a taxi to embrace Evan and Eric in the middle of a narrow, dark street between canyons of buildings. Eric smiled and said, “Welcome to Hong Kong . . . Grandma!”

Born by emergency C-section, little Elsa weighed two pounds fifteen ounces. Doctors guardedly told Eric and Emily to expect Elsa to be in the NICU until her original due date, even if she didn’t develop complications. Now our needs were less critical, but real, nonetheless. After the first four weeks, where could we stay that would be close enough to allow Emily and Eric to make twice-daily breast milk runs to the hospital? How could they afford rent when Eric already had paid the hospital thousands of dollars? How could Eric and Emily continue their studies without their books? The miracles continued:

Connect Eric and Emily’s Hong Kong colleague with a friend who worked for an elder in a local church.
Through that that church provide an apartment, rent-free, for Eric and Emily for two weeks.
Make another apartment available rent-free for six weeks beyond that.
Bring friends through Hong Kong with Eric and Emily’s books and some of Evan’s best-loved toys.
Protect Elsa and keep her infection- and complication-free.

Three weeks passed, and we had so much to be thankful for at Thanksgiving that we weren’t too disappointed by our oven that didn’t work and the turkey dinner we couldn’t afford at a local restaurant. We were content to find turkey sandwiches at a nearby deli, but God, who had pulled off huge miracles for us already, had two small, delightful ones still on his list. At the church we attended the Sunday before Thanksgiving, a genial woman with twinkling eyes turned around to offer, “Would you like to come to our apartment for Thanksgiving dinner? It will only be chicken, but I have a can of cranberry sauce!” Astonished, we delightedly accepted. After church, one of the members told this woman she’d bring over a complete turkey dinner from the outrageously-priced restaurant, where she worked! God must have winked as he checked off:

Provide a turkey dinner with all the trimmings, down to pumpkin pie.
Supply for free a small Christmas tree complete with lights and ornaments.

The most amazing miracle left the NICU two weeks later, and one week after that, one month ahead of schedule, little Elsa Faith was released from the hospital, well on her way to becoming the bright, beautiful, unstoppable toddler she is today.

Is it a miracle when friends drop their own agendas to make critically needed things happen that you can’t arrange or do for yourself? Is it a miracle when strangers go out of their way to meet your needs, both the desperate and the simply encouraging ones? Is it a miracle when you’re moved across the country to meet someone who will fill a unique need in years to come? Is it a miracle when the cells of a tiny body grow healthy and strong despite being thrust suddenly into a hostile environment?

Technically these extraordinary, ordinary provisions - even taken together - may not be miracles, but they certainly felt like miracles to Emily, Eric, Evan and me! This much I do know: when my loved ones or I am in formidable, urgent, grave need that’s beyond our capacity to fill, I’ll take my miracles any way God wants to conceive, create, and deliver them!

If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. . . . For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. . . . your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Psalm 139: 9, 13, 16-17

A ". . . but . . ." to pray: Loving Father, so often when trouble strikes, my first reaction is to cry out to you, "Why are you allowing this?" and fly into panic mode, BUT again and again you have proved yourself faithful and mighty to provide everything my loved ones and I need. The world is not too large, no emergency is too difficult, AND no heart-cry is too insignificant for you to care, provide, heal, and bring victory. I will remember that in the needs I face today. In Jesus' name, Amen!

Your own ". . . but . . ." to move/pray: Loving and living Father, I fear that ___________________, BUT I choose to put my confidence in your compassion and your power. trusting you will _________________________. Thanks that you will meet all my needs in amazing ways - and I surrender my expectations to your greater wisdom and limitless love. Amen!

Two Brown Shoes, Take Three: God's goodness

Rose Jackson © 2/ 2009

(see first post "Two Brown Shoes Don't Make a Pair" to read about my brown boot goof)

What I believe about God’s character is the third application of my “two brown shoes” mistake – and I’m preaching to myself today, swimming in the same sea of difficult circumstances that many of you are struggling to stay afloat in. Looking at those two mismatched shoes, I realized that circumstances tempt me to believe lies about God’s character and intent toward me and my loved ones:

“Why are you dashing our son’s dreams?”
“Have you abandoned us?”
“You gave my friend success, but not me. You must love her more than you love me.”
“I pray for others, and they receive miracles of healing – but you must not want me healed.”

Do you hear in these an echo of your own perplexed, hurting heart? When I take a closer look at my outbursts, I recognize what I’m really saying is, “God, you don’t love me/us. Your love is inconstant. You show partiality. You withhold your goodness. Your word can’t be trusted.”

My image of God in hard times bears striking differences to what I believe about God when my life is going smoothly. In prosperous, healthier, joyful times I gladly agree with the biblical writers who rejoiced in God's character:

By you, O Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness. (Ps. 86:15)

He is the Rock, his works are perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is he. (Deut. 32:4)

For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations. (Ps 100:5)

Taste and see that the LORD is good. . . . (Ps 34:8)

Taste and see . . . . I think of my neighbor’s Crawfish Etoufeé. Many years ago, after eating a disgusting, multi-legged slice of a marine invertebrate during a trip to Asia, I made a resolution never to eat anything with less than two or more than four legs, so when my neighbor recently brought over a steaming bowl of her signature Louisiana chowder, I cringed. I knew it couldn’t possibly taste good. Too many legs!

Since our neighbor had gone to so much trouble to make it, though, what could I do but set it on the table and partake of her hospitality? I carefully tipped all but two crawfish off the spoon and back into the dish before ladling a serving onto my plate. Tentatively I bit into one, and . . . it actually didn’t taste bad. It didn’t taste wonderful, either – it’s the crawfish’s art-gum eraser texture that throws me - but the non-crawfish part of the chowder was quite tasty. My husband and our son enjoyed the crawfish, though, and happily ate the rest of my share, which proves two things: first, one man’s gastronomic challenge is another man’s gusto, and second, there is goodness in things outside of my definition of “good.” To put it another way, God’s goodness may not always taste the way I think it should, but it still is goodness.


Looking back through my journals to so many of the troubling times when I couldn’t see any sign of God’s goodness, again and again I find good. We wanted two children, and timing them four years apart so we wouldn’t have two kids in college at the same time just made good economic sense to me. However, it took seven years for me to conceive our second child: seven years of prayers and hope repeatedly dashed, till I almost gave up hoping, before Ethan came along. Our sons were born eleven years apart – and in the year our younger son graduated from high school, our older son received his Ph.D. God answered my prayer with a yes; I just hadn’t realized that eleven years would fit the timetable of my request perfectly! After Ethan’s birth, I also realized that any other child we might have conceived would not have been Ethan - a creative, compassionate, intelligent, honest, giving, loving, loyal, hard-working young man of faith and vision. go through the boy Scout Oath, and that's Ethan. God had a specific purpose for that specific combination of DNA that is Ethan. That is goodness; that is love; that is faithfulness. The seven-year heartache that became a spoonful of goodness is the empathy I now have for women struggling with infertility.

Again and again I remember crises and wrenching situations that became avenues of blessing on down the road: a treasured necklace lost, a lost diamond found, and acknowledging that the God who was good when I found the one was the same good God when I didn’t find the other. My husband laid off and out of work for six months - and a loving God who connected him with a job better than he applied for. A cross-country move I didn’t want to make away from everyone and everything I cherished – and through that frustrating move when I thought he had abandoned me, God twice met desperate needs my kids and I would have years later. That’s goodness. That’s faithfulness. That’s love.

I think back to those evidences of God’s faithful, loving goodness even while I wonder as my emotions struggle with our retirment funds cut in half with retirement just on the horizon and this week’s discouraging news for Ethan's dream job . . . is it God who is inconstant, or my emotions and my thinking that don’t line up with truth and can’t be trusted? I open my Bible to Psalm 89, to the words of another Ethan, “the Ezrahite,” and I stand on this “. . . BUT . . .” for me and for our own Ethan:

“I will sing of the LORD’s great love forever . . . . I will declare that your love stands firm forever, that you established your faithfulness in heaven itself . . . . Blessed are those who have learned to acclaim you, who walk in the light of your presence, O LORD. . . . For you are their glory and strength . . . . ”

Today I make a choice to believe God’s character, not the economy, not my arthritis, not the circumstances around us, and I will walk in those two matching shoes BELIEVING God’s love, kindness, compassion, and power till I get to the place where I can turn and see we’ve been surrounded by his goodness all the while.

A “. . . but . . . “ to pray: Loving Father, I look at all the problems, discouraging news, financial losses, and uncertainties ahead of me, BUT I trust that you love us, you never forsake me, your will is for our good, and you are faithfully working out blessing even when I can’t see you. Thank you that I’ll look back in a few days, weeks, or years and rejoice in what you are doing to work all of this "chowder" together for my good through your steadfast, mighty wisdom, provision, and love. I WILL taste and see your goodness! Amen!

Your own “. . . but . . .”: Loving Father, I’m so confused when I see ___________ in my life today, BUT I choose to believe you are _____________ and you love me faithfully. "I am confident of this: I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living." (Psalm 27:13) I will wait for you, LORD; I will be strong and take heart and wait for you, LORD. (Ps 27:14)

Two Brown Shoes, Take Two

I intimated that I found three applications for what I learned from my non-matching brown shoes escapade. Read the previous entry for the gory details of my shoe-buying goof. Suffice it here to say that I accidentally ended up purchasing two different brown short lace-up boots, but didn't recognize my mistake till I'd worn them for roughly one month!

Beyond "no lie is of the truth" and the importance of making sure my thoughts line up with the whole truth, I recognized almost immediately that all too often my "walk" doesn't line up with that of Jesus. I may do the kinds of actions you'd expect from a "What would Jesus do?" good-deed-doing person . . . but that doesn't mean my life is even close to a match with His.

Case in point (and isn't there always a recent one handy?) is last spring's battle with weeds in our front yard. I remember this life lesson afresh, as January rains have brought their usual crop of weeds springing up in otherwise rock-hard, "desert landscaped" aka rock-covered ground. Our neighbors just never seem to get around to weeding along our mutual property line. In their defense, they both work full-time - a thought that did not escape me as I surveyed the two-feet-tall sprouts going to seed on their side of the line last spring. I'd just spent an hour weeding our side of the front yards, with the beginnings of a stiff neck to show for it, and as I sat doing neck rolls on my side of the line, I realized that all my weeding was for naught as soon as one gentle breeze spread those seeds our direction.

What to do? GET RID OF THOSE WEEDS! "They certainly aren't going to," I muttered as I unkinked my way upright and strode over to their side. I began pulling up the sinister spikes, which turned out to be easier than I expected, given the good length of stem on which to get a solid purchase. Down from their fence, around the parked car, under the parked car, out to the sidewalk . . . . To the casual observer, I was doing a good deed weeding my neighbor's yard. I heard the "Ahem . . ." about the time I reached under the front bumper of the car to grab a handful of plant, thinking, "They could spend an occasional weekend working in the yard instead of off riding their ATV's. . . ." Grumbling intercepted, I recognized the voice: that still, small voice of the Holy Spirit that intrudes upon my ruminations. "What you're doing is fine . . . but your motivation is anything but God-honoring and neighbor-blessing."

Of course I realized that was completely true, and no matter how it might have looked even to the neighbors, I wasn't doing them a favor out of love. It was pretty ugly weed-pulling. As awful as I sound in these self-revelations on this blog, I really do want a heart more like Jesus, and it was to that desire that I turned my attitude. "But they . . . " gave way to,"Transplant your love in me, Jesus. No matter how they choose to spend their time, I'm going to secretly bless them. They may not even notice the weeds are gone, but that doesn't matter." The great encouragement is that God wants this transformation in me even more than I do, and he promises to make it happen:

"I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.: Ezekiel 36:26-27

That passage goes on to enumerate blessings and provision God promises his people. Oh, do I want the blessing of a warm and beating "heart of flesh" walking out of love for everyone whose life mine intersects! Wouldn't that be wonderful? Admit it - you do, too, and let out a big sigh of longing and gratitude.

I get to choose: will I do the right things out of the wrong heart, souring my own day in the process and doing Heaven-knows-what to my brain chemistry, or will I do the right thing out of the right heart, Jesus' heart, protecting my own heart in the process?

There they are in the yard again this spring . . . . Where will my heart be?

A " . . . but . . . " for you to pray: Jesus, I don't like the difference I feel when my heart is in the wrong place. I fight this battle so often, BUT thank you that you promise to give me a new heard and your own Spirit! Thank you that you are SO patient with me when I wear the wrong "shoe", loving enough to point out the differences I don't see, forgiving me, and enabling me to have a blessing heart in all I do. Amen!

Your own " . . . but . . . " : Jesus, I see that I'm not walking like you when I _______________, BUT I believe your promise to change my heart and I know I'll see your change in ________________________________________. Amen!