“We have heard it with our ears, O God; our ancestors have told us what you did in their days, in days long ago.” (Psalm 44:1 NIV)

The psalmist is up against some new troubles and he does a powerful thing. He looks back and considers how God has moved in the past. We look with him and recall the mighty feats: purposeful plagues, parting seas, manna amidst the desert, stone walls crumbling. We see that God’s arm is never too short. We realize that our human contribution to the victory is historically quite small. We bring faith and obedience to the table, He brings the victory. Why? His word says it clearly; He loves His people.

“It was not by their sword that they won the land, nor did their arm bring them victory; it was your right hand, your arm, and the light of your face, for you loved them.” (Psalm 44:3 NIV)

We can gaze back over every victory in our lives and see a flurry of love letters falling from heaven. The most profound pen and ink parchment? His victory over our sin. When we are discouraged, we do well to look back. We consider the kinds of things He’s conquered before. What battle could be bigger than the one He already crushed on the cross? 

I’ve spent a few snow days this April in quiet revelry. Ordinary household routines have afforded some needed reflection after twelve long months of a million-miles-a-minute. I cannot believe what God has brought us through, what He’s accomplished through an ordinary handmaid like me. I’ve realized what so many have rightly concluded before me; when come to the end of our cunning, our ability, our sight and our strength, when we give we up our solo efforts, it’s in that bankrupt space when we finally confront the rock-solid strength of our Father’s love. Where we end, His love and faithfulness truly begins. 

“In God we make our boast all day long, and we will praise your name forever.” (Psalm 44:8 NIV)

Lord, thank You for quiet days of reflection. Thank You for six thousand years of  written history, six thousand years of God encounters to bolster our faith. Lord, may we look back and gain confidence in Your ability to do it again. May we trust the strength of Your love for us. Amen.

“For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” (2 Corinthians 4:17 NIV)

These past few weeks we’ve received what has to be record amounts of late snowfall. I’m guessing we’ve seen more snow in the month of April than the previous six months combined. Yesterday, I was shoveling my way through a two and a half foot drift when this thought came to mind. ‘Our troubles are light and momentary.’  I gotta admit, I harumphed a bit as I bent my already aching back to lift another heavy scoopful, but I kept thinking about it as I worked steadily.

Spring will be here soon. The robins have been flitting about for weeks. The tulips and daffodils are bravely bursting under the blanket of snow. Today’s thick, wet quilt will vanish in the warm light of the next sunny day. 

It only feels like we live in Narnia, as though winter will go on forever. The truth is, it can’t last much longer. Our troubles are the same. They feel crippling, back-breaking and burying today. But they are as light and momentary as a late April snow. God will, one day, allow the spiritual season to change and the burdens that blanket us now will melt off in the light of eternity. Only the character produced amidst the hardships will remain. One day, we’ll barely be able to remember what winter looked like because the sun will be shining and the grass will be achingly green. On that day it will be hard to recall that our landscape was ever blanketed in such deep sorrow.

Today’s heaviest snowfall ever will melt away in the tomorrow of eternity.

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” (Galatians 6:9 NIV)

Lord, please help us hold on. Give us the grace and strength to keep digging. Keep us from giving up on doing good but bolster our backs to keep plowing through the hard stuff. Remind us that painful moments produce in us the character we keep for eternity. May we not grow resentful of today’s tasks, but ever more hopeful of tomorrow’s sunshine. Amen.

“They went to the olive grove called Gethsemane, and Jesus said, “Sit here while I go and pray.” He took Peter, James, and John with him, and he became deeply troubled and distressed.” (Mark 14:32-33 NLT)

Jesus surely wasn’t just now feeling all this sorrow. It had to have been mounting for months, even years, and tomorrow was day. The morning would come and the cross would come for Him, the hinge of history would turn on His back in just a few, brief hours. Over and over in the gospels we’d seen Him step away, alone, to pray. Perhaps to grieve and resign Himself with God’s plan? 

I suspect Jesus did this, what I would call grief-damming. When He felt sorrow over the impending cross, it seems He tucked it away to deal with it in His quiet moments with the Father. But He didn’t ignore it forever. 

If we have to dam up our grief, we also have to find safe moments to open the flood gates and alleviate the pressure. Otherwise the dam itself will compromise and wash away the life below.

Today I am thankful for Mark 14. I’m thankful that our Savior pulled His disciples close and let them in on His most aching moments so we could read of it thousands of years later. It’s in the garden scriptures that we learn how to rightly process our own setbacks and sorrows.  

Jesus’ vulnerability in the garden let’s us know that it’s human to hurt and there are godly ways to deal with grief. He shows us that we grieve up. We ask for help from our friends and family. And when the sun rises, we rise to the tasks of the day, even if our faces are still tear-stained.

“But in my distress I cried out to the Lord; yes, I prayed to my God for help. He heard me from his sanctuary; my cry to him reached his ears.” (Psalms 18:6 NLT)

“He reached down from heaven and rescued me; he drew me out of deep waters.” (Psalms 18:16 NLT)

Thank You Lord, for Your example of healthy sorrow. Thank You for never leaving us alone in the dark, even when our well-meaning friends fall asleep. We are so grateful for Your story, it’s life-giving in our own. Amen.

“So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him.” (Luke 15:20 NLT)

Do you know that the word prodigal can have two meanings?

Prodigal: spending resources freely and recklessly, wastefully extravagant, imprudent, profligate.

Prodigal: having or giving something on a lavish scale, generous, liberal, unstinting, unsparing, bounteous.

I can remember my mother telling me that it wasn’t so much the son in this story that was prodigal, as it was the Father. The Father held nothing back.

I heard a sermon at General Council last summer that has stuck with me. The preacher challenged; if we could hold our head to God’s chest and press our ear to hear His heartbeat, it would read “give.” The heart of God is generosity. His love for us is prodigal. How do we know for sure? He sent His son Jesus to bring us home.

“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16 NLT)

Prodigal Fathers keep looking and keep loving. Prodigal people live likewise. 

As we learn to receive and believe God’s love for us, we also learn to uncurl our own fists. The proximity of His heartbeat re-syncopates our own and we begin to live out the big give also. We become generous, compassionate. We start searching the skyline for lost lambs coming home. We aren’t waiting to indict or judge, but to welcome brothers and sisters back into the family fold. We are ready to love them with the hands and feet of heaven. We are ready and willing to teach them how to prayerfully watch for the next potential saints on the horizon.

Lord help us love like You do. Prodigal. Extravagant. Prolific. Change our hearts from self-indulgent to serving. Give us the courage to keep loving and keep looking, even when wayward sons and daughters have hurt our hearts. Let us never give up on the best in them because You have never given up on us. Amen.