Eternity

 

You hold on to me, you never let go

Protectively, possessively

You bear the brunt for me, you bear the load

Powerfully, willingly

You see me struggling, pulling from your grasp

Spitefully, selfishly

You wait for me

Patiently, graciously

You see me.

You long for me.

I fear you without cause, I repel you without care, I discard you without compassion.

You reach me, you reach beyond me and lift me out of my weak and broken vessel. You place me in your palm, under your wing.

“You are mine” now and for all eternity.

Marriage

Next to the drawing of my daughter with crepe paper hair and the netball roster we have this verse on a magnet on our fridge.

Proverbs 21:19   New International Version (NIV)

 Better to live in a desert    than with a quarrelsome and nagging wife.

Well… maybe not, but perhaps we should have it on our fridge?!

(Yes fellas, this is one of those moments that you DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES AGREE)

…But… (clears throat)… is it sometimes perhaps in some small iddy biddy way a little true?

Today I watched my son play hockey. Man he is so delightful to watch. Unfortunately he is a bit too polite, letting the opposition players have a turn of the ball, bless.

Today however was special, because today I discovered hockey Mums. These women lined the hockey pitch in their active wear for non-active spectators and screamed their lungs out like a herd of rhinos in active labour. Oh em gee they spewed ferocious, beastly blasts of acrid ‘advice’ for 90 mins straight. I was ashamed to be a woman.

And then I thought… wait… these women make me look good! See Paul! I’m not like that! I’m a good wife! I smiled to myself as I sat on the chair Paul had carried for me from the car, sipping my coffee.

And then from somewhere deep deep in my brain, the part I try to ignore, a thought crept up. Am I? Am I a good wife?

Am I perhaps sometimes quarrelsome and nagging?

(Yes fellas, this is one of those moments that you DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES AGREE)

Is it good enough for me to just not be truly horrible? Do I need/want to be a proactively good spouse?

Note to self-DO NOT read proverbs Proverbs 31:10-31   The Message (MSG)

  A good woman is hard to find, and worth far more than diamonds. Her husband trusts her without reserve, and never has reason to regret it. Never spiteful, she treats him generously all her life long… Blah blah blah it gets worse and worse ladies for the next 30 verses!

Never spiteful… I guess maybe sometimes?...

(Yes fellas, this is one of those moments that you DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES AGREE)

She treats him generously.

Hmmm. Ok . time to get off the computer and make my fella a cup of tea.

And maybe I should aim for the proverbs 31 wife, and less of the hockey screamer, do you think?

(Yes fellas, this is one of those moments that you DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES AGREE)

Ps. I love you Paul, you are the spouse I aspire to be. (Yes Paul, this is one of those moments when THERE IS NO CORRECT RESPONSE YOU SHOULD STEP AWAY, STEP AWAY FROM THE CONVERSATION WITH CAUTION).

Choice

Choice bro.

I was briefly tempted to write this blog in a New Zealand accent but there were no Kiwi vowels on my keyboard. Shame.

Often when I consider choice, or in fact any topic, I think of myself. Shocking I know. I think of me, and sometimes me, but mostly me.

I think of my choices, of which I have many. Because I am rich.

Strangely though, today I lifted my gaze briefly from my navel and considered someone else’s choice.

Jesus’s’ (I’m not sure how that plural/apostrophe works so I’ll double up for good measure).

Jesus had choice. Loads of it, I mean imagine him at school speaking to his career advisor. If you could do anything with your life (err... he totes can) what would you like to do?

HELLO JESUS. Big house. Pool. Parties. Loads of friends. Parties. Holidays. Parties…

Now I’m pretty sure Jesus did like to party. But he chose a rather sacrificial life (and then he said follow me which is a bit awkward).

But ALSO he cried.

John 11:35      “Jesus wept”

I so nailed this memory verse when I was a kid.

I know right? You’re thinking man she is so amazing. I’m thinking that too.

Anyhoo

I never gave it much thought. Jesus wept.

I guess he’s a nice guy, a SNAG if you will, so it’s good he wept, he had compassion.

But then a cool preacher guy got me to read the whole passage (apparently this is usually a good idea, who knew?) and he pointed out to me that Jesus wept over this dude Lazarus, even though he knew he was about to raise him from the dead!

I mean if that was me I would be all like, hold your hankies people, quit the water works I’m here to save the day. I would stride over and work my magic and there would be high fives all round. Time to Partaaay.

But Jesus wept.

Because even though he knows what is coming, even though he knows he will raise Lazarus, even though he knows the battle is already won, he chooses to enter into our experience, into our pain, and weep with us.

He chooses to feel grief.

He chooses to enter into your pain.

He chooses to weep with you.

He chooses to suffer for you.

He chooses you.

He is choice bro.

Reckless

I buckled my new born into her car seat and dragged my sleep deprived body into the car one Saturday night. I was determined to still have a life post baby, and so I was taking myself out.

I  drove up to a T junction and turned right onto a busy road. Cruising along I started to notice a car flashing their lights at me. So annoying. I checked… no I didn’t have  my lights on high beam. Then another one flashed, STOP FLASHING ME YOU LOSERS. Still more lights flashing. WHAT?! Did I have a flat tire? No. Was I accidentally towing someone whose tie got stuck in my back window? No. What the? And then the beeping of horns. WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE. I wasn’t speeding, I was doing 80kmph. My lights were on. Man, people can be so annoying. I continued on because clearly these people had lost their mind. Soon enough, bright orange lights pierced through my window at me, as a tow truck headed straight towards me with his emergency lights flashing. WHAT NOW? You are heading straight for me mate! I slow down, and he keeps coming. I screech to a halt off to the side of the road as he virtually pushes me aside with his bumper.

“Are you drunk” he yells at me? The cheek! He runs me off the road and asks if I am drunk?!

“You are on the wrong side of the road.”

And then it dawns on me. I had turned right onto a double lane carriageway and had been travelling at night at 80kmph on the wrong side of the road into oncoming traffic.

Oops.

My stomach fell into my socks as the realisation hit me. Reckless. I had been unbelievably reckless with my precious newborn in the car, putting countless others at risk, without even knowing it.

And so it is with recklessness. Sometimes what we think is safe, is actually incredibly reckless.

Perhaps we have been sold a lie, that we are on the safe path.

In fact, that’s his plan isn’t it? To fool us? That we might feel safe, that we might feel secure in our choices that are not of God?

What makes you feel safe?

What does the bible say?

Psalm 62:7 and 8    The Message (MSG)

  My help and glory are in God—granite-strength and safe-harbor-God— So trust him absolutely, people; lay your lives on the line for him. God is a safe place to be.

 It’s reckless to put our trust in the things of this world. It seems so right, but it’s actually driving on the wrong side of the road and it puts ourselves and others at risk.

It’s safe to trust in God fully and completely.

It’s safe to lay our lives on the line for him

Strength

I went to the gym once. They did a fitness test on me, perhaps to see if I should be sent to the back of the class with all the other baggy t shirt wearers, I dunno.

But anyway, they put me through a whole bunch of strength tests, of which I failed all of them with the exception of one. This test involved me lifting my body weight of 36 kilos with my arms. Lo and behold, the adjudicator gave me a tick. Tick. You have one muscle in working order, congratulations!

I was so pumped. I considered this enigma for a moment and realised what had happened. This was my hairdressing muscle! I had my arms in the air like I just don’t care and had inadvertently strengthened a muscle. Nice.

So I trudged back to the gym for a few more sessions to strengthen my remaining  600+ muscles before mercifully I read this verse in the bible from the psalms.

Psalm 62:11   The Message (MSG)

A David Psalm

God said this once and for all; how many times have I heard it repeated? “Strength comes straight from God.”

WOO HOO.

Scrap the gym, I can mainline strength straight from God! *chest bump God*

Oh man, thanks for that God, so like, I can tap into your strength at will?  Excellent, if you can hold that thought while I position myself on the couch. I’ll give you a hoi if I need you.

That’s what he meant, old Davo, in the psalm didn’t he? I have the strength of the almighty creator God at my disposal if and when I need you? So if I’m going through a tough time, your strength will carry me through.

Like when I’m at the beach, and life gets hard, you swoop me up and carry me like it says in the footprints poem? Your strength is for carrying me. I like that.

For a minute there I thought you might mean like when I’m at the beach, and life gets hard, you might say “drop and give me 20 on the sand”, because you want me to have strength  that comes from training my muscles or something ridiculous.

I thought your strength meant I could be weak? I like being weak.

When I said “Oh Lord, give me strength”. I didn’t meant make me strong!

You want to build resilience, perseverance, dependence, trust, courage, willingness, obedience?

Oh.

Hey, but what about my one muscle? It’s good for hand raising?

Not enough?

Oh dear, you don’t want me to be buff do you?

That won’t sell many posters for the back of the toilet door.

Poverty

WARNING: PROCEED WITH CAUTION FOR TOO MANY REASONS TO LIST HERE

I have a faeces fascination. Say that 3 times fast.

I don’t know why.

It’s a gift I guess.

So many wonderful memories….

Don’t panic. I’ll show some restraint… but not much.

So, let me tell you about the time I saw diarrhoea flying across the street.

I was strolling along a busy street in Kolkata one hot, and humid day. I was chatting (possibly/probably nagging) away to Paul. As I looked across to speak to Paul, I happened to time my head movement perfectly to see a woman rushing towards the bushes/dead plants on the side of the road not even 2 metres away from me. She was lifting her sari, but didn’t quite make it. She shared the contents of her bowel with the street.

Why? Because Poverty is shit.

Poverty means she doesn’t have a public toilet to visit or basin to cleanse her hands (that doesn’t require any tap turning, I mean, I’m not a savage).

She has no privacy, no dignity, no choice. She doesn’t even get to choose where she takes a dump.

That my friends, is poverty. Say it with me “poverty is shit”.

Do you know what I love?

I love when we sit in our sanitised sanctums on our arrogant wiped clean arses and spew out this vile justification for our lives… “the poor are happy”.

Sorry Mum… arrogant bottoms.

I partly hate it so much because I fell foul to its alluring safety. The belief that yeah, that kid has made a toy out of a piece of old wire and a discarded tomato can, but he is so happy, so content.

I can learn so much from him, because although he has nothing, he is so happy.

WHAT THE? So I decide to envy his serenity? I covet his brief moment of happiness before he possibly dies of an ear infection because his Mum can’t afford antibiotics? Can I really look at him and think, what take away can I have from this to make my life better?

Lord forgive me.

All together now “poverty is shit”.

Bec, you are being a bit gross. No one wants to hear stories about women pooing in the street.

No. We don’t.

But I’m pretty damn sure that woman doesn’t want to be pooing in the street a whole lot more than we don’t want to be reading about it. And if we can’t even abide having that image briefly cast before our eyes, then we have no chance of seeing ourselves.

Because poverty is shit.

And unless we can look poverty in the eyes, see the degradation and loss and pain that poverty causes, if we insist on taming it down, on turning it into palatable pieces, then we will never become the instruments of justice and mercy that God wants us to be.

So next time you’re in the dunny relieving yourself, and in fact from now on, every time you defecate, I want you to think of me. Think of me and say with me “poverty is shit”.

And as we chant our loo time mantra, perhaps we will grow an army of shitting believers who will ask the question.

“What does God want me to do about it?

Shattered

Shattered

I hate puzzles.

I mean sure, if you want me to come along after you have been working on a puzzle for hours and put the last 10 pieces in, I’ll oblige. But generally I am puzzle averse.

You know you can buy pictures that aren’t broken into pieces right?

And don’t EVEN with the where’s Wally puzzle. Where’s Wally? I DON’T CARE!

And of course we all get the whole puzzle of life. I’m SUPER pumped that my life may resemble 2 kittens, or an old cottage on a hill once the pieces are all put together. *thumbs up emoji*

But what about when your life gets shattered into a million pieces, and there’s no great picture to assemble, it’s just broken.

You’ve got nothing left.  A bomb went off and the shrapnel hit everyone around you, and you are all just barely alive.

What about that.

I reckon you’d be stoked if your Instagram inspo for the day was this verse:

Matthew 5    The Message (MSG)

3 “You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.

What the? *wide eyes flushed cheeks emoji*

Don’t you mean you’re blessed when your life is awesome? Like when your life is so freaking awesome its social media newsworthy?

#blessed.

And excuse me, but what if I am at the end of my rope, in fact my rope has dwindled down to what resembles a piece of old dental floss that the kids have left on the bathroom bench for me to clean up, and I’m clinging to it like it’s a matter of life and death waiting for God to catch me. And I’m blessed?

#shattered = #blessed… are you serious? *eye roll emoji*

With less of me there is more of God and his rule.

Yay…?

Well, I’ve always wanted to be like Corrie Ten Boom in the book “The Hiding Place”. You know when she gets moved into a lice infested dorm room in a concentration camp, and says, Cheers God for this blessing!  Because this means she will be left alone (due to the nits crawling all over her) and she will have more time to share with other nit infested people about him.

*teeth clench emoji*

But I’m not like Corrie Ten Boom. I’m a whingeing snot.

I DON'T WANT THERE TO BE LESS OF ME AND MORE OF YOU.

Awkward but true. *downcast emoji*

So given my work in progress status, I’m going to remember that there is blessing in the struggle because even a whinging frightened selfish clinging to dental floss approach to God is better than indifference.

My approach to life and suffering may be deeply flawed, but God isn’t.

When there is less of me, there is more of him.

*praising hands emoji*

Brave

So of course when I think about being brave I think about singing…

I really do like singing in church, it’s just that my Bec paraphrased version keeps interrupting.

Like the song Brave.

It goes like this…. (you have to sing this in your head)

♪♫♩♬♪

You make me brave… enough to sing along to this song with a room full of other believers

You make me brave… so that I can be bold enough to tick Christian on my hospital admission form

You call me out beyond the shore into the waves… as long as the waves don’t wet my hair

You make me brave… like that time when I alluded to the fact that I attend Church to my workmate when she asked what are you doing this weekend

You make me brave… apart from every time I have feelings I don’t like and I decide that chocolate is the comfort I need rather than you no offense

No fear can hinder now the love that made a way… apart from maybe my fear of following you without reservation or boundaries because I’m not sure what you might ask me to do if I let you get to close to me, sorry about that, but anyway it’s nice to get close to you in the confines of the Church building once a week, or sometimes once a fortnight because I like to sleep in sometimes.

You make me brave… enough to buy socially responsible water rather than drink out of the tap You make me brave… with your inspiring Instagram posts

You call me out beyond the shore into the waves… so I can feel your love wash over me (wait… are those people drowning? awkward… )

You make me brave... because you give me armour for that spiritual battle I’m engaged in… wait… what? You make me brave… so I can face the day I have planned for myself No fear can hinder now the promises you made… I’m glad we are talking about the promises YOU made, cos I aint making any promises.

You make me brave… is this song repetitive?

You make me brave… enough to accept your blessing #blessed #cheersGod I’m so awesome You call me out beyond the shore into the waves… do you?

You make me brave…but in reality I’m piss weak You make me brave… enough to reach out despite my weakness and ask your forgiveness No fear can hinder now the promises you made… to love me despite my weakness,

PHEW!

Death

Death

I love Death. Said no one ever.

So let’s chat about that shall we?

I freaking hate death. It’s scary and heart breaking.

Paul (the dude that wrote huge chunks of the bible) wrote this corker:

Philippians 1:21  New International Version (NIV)

²¹ For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.

Yeah totes, me too.

Wait… to live is Christ including a nice holiday, my family, a great car, some new shoes and successful happy Instagram worthy life thanks, with fries.

And to die is g… to die is gai…. Nup, to die still seems to suck.

To die is gain because if my life now is Christ, then in death it is still Christ, but even more super snazzy in eternity, so I get it, like, in theory.

Paul seems good at this following Christ thing.

I totally suck at it!

Maybe the message version will be kinder:

Philippians 1:21  (MSG)

Alive, I’m Christ’s messenger; dead, I’m his bounty. Life versus even more life! I can’t lose.

Yaaaaaaaaayyyyyy…..…..  nup.

To die is gain. It’s a win win, cos either way we can never be separated from God.

I kind of get it. And I kind of think if I really believe this, like not just intellectually but in my guts, then this is life transforming stuff. It’s the good life.

And I kind of think if the evil one can keep me living in fear of death, keep me grasping at the things of this life, then his work is done.

How about this Romans ripper:

Romans 8:38-39   New International Version (NIV)

³⁸ For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,^[a]neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, ³⁹ neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Yeah baby!

I think I should read that again. And again. And again. I need to let this seep into my bones, to let it tear down my barriers,  let it build in me a strength in Christ that is eternal.

Because HE IS LIFE. Christ. Now and forever.

Death can take its sting and poke itself up the butt.

I’m still working on it, so for now the BPV will have to suffice.

BPV (Bec paraphrased version):

To live is Christ, and to die still seems to suck a lot and causes immeasurable pain for those around us and I really really really don’t like it but I am starting to understand that it doesn’t separate me from you, and that is 'gain as' bro.

Children

So I went for a walk today. Imagine me, if you will, with my Lorna Janes on, striding forth listening to my worship playlist, my Fitbit recording every blessed step. Or you could imagine me trudging/waddling along mumbling to myself and resenting the perfection of my neighbour’s lawn. I’ll leave it to you.

Either way, I did go for a walk. As per my usual arrangement with God my walk commenced with my top 10 whinges for today. And on this day, number one on my list was what the heck am I going to write about on this stupid 30 day challenge I’ve set myself? I mean what were you thinking God when you let me set myself up this way?!

I had started to write this blog about children.

Obviously the super christian in me wanted to quote Jesus in this verse:

Matthew 18   New International Version (NIV)

The Greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”

² He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. ³ And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. ⁴ Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. ⁵ And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.

So I pondered. What does he mean “become like little children?”

Does he mean we should stand there fiddling with ourselves, picking our nose, waiting for him to cut the crusts off our toast?

Does he mean we should throw ourselves on the ground and scream because he didn’t give us what we wanted?

Does he mean we should hold onto the first word we learnt….. “mine”…?

I’m guessing not.

But I wasn’t sure I understood what he did mean. So as a last resort, in pure desperation, I asked him. On my walk  in the burbs I mumbled under my breath... “So what did you mean?”.  Naturally after asking this question I swiftly moved onto the reaming 9 items on my whinge list.

As I walked/trudged along my mind wandered. I started to think about one of my favourite topics, my children. My heart skipped a beat as my mind fell onto a memory of my eldest son, Lawson.

On Lawson’s first birthday I tried and tried and tried but I just couldn’t buy him a birthday card. Looking back I’m not sure that buying a card for a one year old is that essential, but with my first born, on his first birthday it seemed like a parenting fail. Why couldn’t I buy him a card? I searched and searched but there was no card created in the known universe that came close to expressing what I wanted to say to my son on his first birthday. There were no words that could capture my overwhelming love for him.

I vividly remember that day. I sat there looking at him sitting in his play pen. Yes. We had a jail/play pen, purely so I could keep him safe and sound while I did the ironing (snort).

Anyhoo, I was sitting there watching him and my adoring gaze fell upon the back of his neck. My breath left me, and I gasped at how much I loved the soft curve of his neck, the smell of him, the purity and innocence of him took my breath away. It was so overwhelming, it was like I could only bear to take in that small part of him, because if I were to linger any longer, if I were to delve further into my love for him I might expire.

“That’s what I meant.” He said.

“That’s how I want you to come to me. Knowing that I love you like that.”

“Let me lift you out of your play pen. Yes, you may have to let go of some toys, but let me lift you into my arms, let me swing you around where your legs have no footings, that I might breath you in. Trust me, I love you.”

Or something like that.

Gotcha. Become like little children…