Hidden manna

After Revelation 2:12-17 

To those who 

hold fast in 

the face of 

persecution

and destruction, 

in the face

of hostility 

and ridicule,

to them is 

given the hidden

manna, sustenance 

designed to provide 

and nourish

in the face 

of compromise

and surrender 

which seem

overwhelming 

but will be

dispelled and 

destroyed.

 

Photograph by Roger Vaughan via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Sunday Readings

 

The Ways of a Father in Challenging Times – Kenneth Wingate at Ligonier.

 

Love Never Fails – Kwan Johns at Evangelical Magazine.

 

When the Monsters Came: There is Beauty – Seth Haines.

 

A white stone

After Revelation 2:12-17 

To the one who conquers,

to the one who prevails, 

I will give a white stone,

a smooth white stone,

one bearing a new name,

the stone of admittance,

the stone of acquittal, 

bearing a new name for

the one who receives it, 

a name known only 

to the one who receives

the stone. It is the stone

of new identity, a washed

and cleaned identity,

admittance to membership

in heaven.

 

Photograph by Dynamic Wang via Unsplash. Used with permission.

Some Friday Readings

 

Absalom, Absalom – poem by Brian Yapko at Society of Classical Poets.

 

“A Quintina of Crosses,” poem by Chad Walsh – D.S. Martin at Kingdom Poets.

 

Martha and Mary – poem by Tania Runyan at Poet Jesus.

 

“Lord, in the Morning,” hymn by Isaac Watts – Joseph Bottum at Poems Ancient and Modern.

 

A Sonnet on the Transfiguration – Malcolm Guite.

 

Means With No Ends – Seth Lewis.

 

The Picture on the Nightstand – Kara Dedert at Think Twice.

The Metaphor of the Tree

For a long time we had a crabapple at one of the front corners of our house. Small when we planted it, it grew rather large, and welcomed spring each year with a profusion of purplish flowers. 

After a number of years we found ourselves ducking when we walked by it, like when I cut the grass or walked in the garden to turn on a hose. So from time to time it needed pruning and trimming, but it kept growing, sitting there rather content to occupy its corner. 

One day last year, I noticed a limb drooping slightly toward the ground, or at least lower than it should have been. All looked right with the tree, but I mentioned it to my wife and we started to keep an eye on it. 

Before long, it was becoming obvious: the tree was leaning, away from the house, fortunately. The leaning was becoming pronounced. We had a tree expert come in, and he mentioned things like the drought and dry soil and how it would probably stop leaning.  

It didn’t stop. One day, it was all the way over to the ground. In came the tree removal service. 

I’ll miss the blossoms this spring, but the tree lived its life, providing shade and beauty for a time. 

A tree, writes Bob Sorge in The Fire of Delayed Answers, is a lot like a godly man. It’s fruitful in its season; it’s strong in dry times; it stands out as a landmark; it’s unmoved by storms (although storms can be battering); and it provides shade for others. “When the godly perseveres through tough times, the prosperity of God will inevitably manifest,” he says. “He is blessed because he has found a place of special affection in the heart of God. And in the final analysis, that is the ultimate reward of the godly: the smile of Jesus.” 

It’s a beautiful metaphor.  

Right now, at this point in my life, I feel a bit like that crabapple. I’ve been enduring a situation for a number of years now, and I can say that the “How long, Lord, how long?” question has crossed my mind, and more than once. I know all the right answers; but it’s always different when you’re experiencing something that doesn’t seem to want to end but keeps repeating itself in endless circles. 

I keep reminding myself that the point, however, is not the resolution. There may ultimately be no resolution.  

The point is the endurance, the perseverance. 

Led by Jason Stasyszen and Sarah Salter, we’ve been reading The Fire of Delayed Answers. To see more posts on this chapter, “Don’t Cast Away Your Confidence,” please visit Jason at Connecting to Impact. 

Photograph by Ellen Sholk via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.

Suffering and Why

For a year, my work had been intense. Some organizational changes reduced resources, just as major calls on those resources were getting underway. It was one of those perfect storms. The work mushroomed; the resources didn’t. the resources were diverted to whatever was the fashion of the moment.

And it didn’t get any better. The work demands grew in intensity. It became so intense, in fact, that I had to do something once unthinkable for me – I “triaged” the work, and determined what simply wasn’t going to get done.

There was a cost for this, of course. There was an organizational cost, and there was a personal cost. More than once I silently asked the question, “When is this going to end?”

I didn’t think that it might not end. I didn’t consider that this might be a permanent state of affairs.

Things changed, eventually. But the change happened slowly, and in ways I didn’t expect.

I look back on that time today, and I still don’t know if I can see the point. Perhaps that’s the point – there wasn’t one. Perhaps it was a simple demonstration of a broken human workplace, inhabited by broken human beings.

As difficult as it was, it wasn't a life-threatening event. It wasn’t a serious illness or loss of a loved one. This wasn't the horror of the Holocaust or genocide. There are many more worse things to experience than a broken workplace. And I wasn’t Bob Cratchit working for Ebenezer Scrooge.

But it was hard. It was daily, very daily. It became hard to get up each day and try to look forward to work. It became hard not to become a clock watcher.

And the circumstances led to an inevitable question, one that Bob Sorge asks in The Fire of Delayed Answers.

“Is it God’s will for me to suffer in this way at this present time?”

In his own case, the answer to the question was yes.

And as I’m drawn to the same answer, I don’t want to be. I don’t want to think through the implications of that “yes.” And yet the “yes” is plainly there.

The “yes,” of course, is immediately followed by “why.” And there’s no good answer to “why,” no humanly understandable answer. This is the question of suffering so often asked – if there is a God, why does he allow suffering?

The honest answer is “I don’t know.” A theological answer is probably readily at hand, but when someone is suffering, the last thing they want is a treatise on theology. Or being told there must be some major sin in their life.

Pat answers to suffering have been around a long time. Since the Book of Job was first written, in fact, and it’s the oldest book of the Bible. The answers weren’t very satisfying then, either.

Led by Jason Stasyszen and Sarah Salter, we’re reading The Fire of Delayed Answers. To see what others had to say about this chapter, “The Perseverance of Job,” please visit Sarah at Living Between the Lines.

Photograph of the Holocaust Monument, Moscow, by Lynn Greyling via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.

Perseverance, Nor Patience

Until I read The Fire of Delayed Answers by Bob Sorge, I never questioned where the expression “the patience of Job” came from.

“Keep in mind that Job wasn’t writing a book of the Bible,” Sorge writes. “He was journaling his honest, gut-wrenching wrestlings with God. He’s not tiptoeing through the tulips in his discourses, trying to say it nicely, nor is he trying to keep from offending God. You’re getting him in the privacy of his inner thoughts, and in that transparency we see a man who survived a horrific ordeal but never relinquished his fundamental faith in and trust in God.”

That’s not a description of patience. It doesn’t resemble anything close to patience.

So when, and where, did we come to associate Job with patience?

I looked up “the patience of Job.” Every reference associated with the story on the Bible. Most acknowledged that it had at some time in the past become proverbial. All referred to Job’s faith in waiting on God to answer him.

What I found most interesting, though, was that these are explanations that have the big picture – that know how the Book of Job ends. God restores (or replaces) Job’s family and possessions. All’s well that ends well.

But when Job is going through the trials he endured – loss of his family, destruction of his property, physical affliction, and no help from his friends – he doesn’t know how the story will end. He is suffering unimaginable physical and emotional agonies, and he has no idea of whether or not God will hear and answer his cries.

Job is adrift in a ferocious storm, and he has no idea when or if the storm will end.

This isn’t patience. This is perseverance. This is hanging on by your fingernails, and they’re breaking apart.

Job’s wife tells him to curse God and die. He refuses to do that, but still he hurts and questions – he profoundly questions God. He slips into serious depression. He feels utterly alone and utterly abandoned, and his friends and their wisdom are worse than useless.

He doesn’t wait patiently, believing that good things are just around the corner.

He perseveres.

That’s what Job is about.

Perseverance.

Led by Jason Stasyszen and Sarah Salter, we’re reading The Fire of Delayed Answers. This week’s discussion is on chapter 2, “The Perseverance of Job.” To see more posts on this chapter, please visit Jason at Connecting to Impact.

Photograph by George Hodan via Public Domain Pictures. Used with permission.