Still Standing by John Maust

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In Christian work we talk a lot about forward movement:  advancing the gospel, extending the Kingdom, spreading the good news.  We also look at numbers . . . of new churches, new converts, small groups, attenders at services, baptisms and the like.  

Results in ministry are a wonderful gift from God. But the reality is, many times we do not see visible progress and the numbers just aren’t there. 

So, what happens when all our efforts to serve God in ministry, or in any difficult life or work situation, don’t seem to be getting anywhere?  What happens when opposition and obstacles threaten to knock us down and squelch even our best efforts in ministry? Is something wrong with us? Is God not hearing our prayers?  What should we do?  

Scripture says simply, stand firm. When waves of discouragement roll in, stand firm. If the lack of success causes you to question your call or even give up, stand firm.  

Sometimes the greatest victory is simply hanging in there by faith--quietly, humbly, maintaining a presence for the gospel even when there are no visible outcomes, maybe not moving forward for the moment, but not going away either. 

Example of Julia Woodward

In this regard, I am inspired by the example of pioneering missionary Julia Anderson Woodward. In 1902, Julia and another young female missionary, Ella Ozman, were sent to work among the Quichuas, descendants of the Incas, in Ecuador’s Chimborazo Province. They learned the language mostly from children tending the family goats and sheep on the slopes of the Andes.  

It was tough going in the high altitude, the cold, the loneliness, the isolation, the frequent opposition. But the women saw signs of hope, and Julia even began translating portions of Scripture into the language.

Then in only their second year among the Quichuas, Ella died suddenly from pneumonia. A year later Julia caught smallpox, surviving with her face noticeably scarred.  1n 1915 she married fellow missionary William Woodward, only to lose a son in childbirth and then her husband from a heart attack 12 years later.  

Julia weathered health issues and threats and opposition from religious fanatics in the ensuing years. But as she continued working among the Quichuas, with other missionaries joining her, perhaps the hardest thing was the Quichuas’ unresponsiveness to the gospel.

“How can you carry on out there without anyone accepting the Lord?” someone once asked her. “The greater the darkness, the more need there is of light,” she said. Other times she would quote, “He hath not taught us to trust in His name, and thus far brought us, to bring us to shame.”  

At age 71, Julia completed her New Testament translation, a bilingual Quichua/Spanish version, a major accomplishment. But when she retired from missionary service in 1953 after more than 50  years, she said, “I can count on one hand the number of Quichuas I am sure to see in heaven.”

Some might consider Julia’s half century of ministry a failure. But the story does not end there.

Her mission, Gospel Missionary Union, considered leaving the Quichua work due to lack of response and focus instead on the cities. But out of respect for the spiritual investment in the Quichuas made by Julia and others over the decades, the work continued. 

Then, in the 1960s, a Holy Spirit-inspired people movement took place. Quichuas began turning to faith in Christ in large numbers. By 1991, some 335 Quichua churches and congregations dotted the Andes in Ecuador’s Chimborazo Province, having a constituency of more than 100,000. 

Julia was already in heaven when the breakthrough came. But one wonders: Would it even have happened had she not stood firm and maintained a presence for the gospel during all those years of seemingly fruitless labor? 

Labor not in vain

Maybe you’ve been sharing your faith with a neighbor, teaching a Sunday school class, praying for the conversion or life change of a family member, or engaged in some ministry to which you feel called but are not seeing any progress.  

If so, remember to put down even deeper roots in the Word and strengthen your relationship with the Lord (which is more important than any “results”). May your life be like a house built upon a rock, standing strong against the waves of doubt or discouragement.

“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,” Paul wrote to the Ephesians (Eph 6:13-14 NIV).

Sometimes God will give us the joy and privilege of seeing how He has used us, other times not. But what an encouragement to know that, no matter what, our labor is not in vain. 

“Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain (1 Cor 15:58, NIV).”

Photo by Samuel Nieva

Photo by Samuel Nieva

My History with Earthworms by Lorraine Triggs

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Oakland Elementary School was seven blocks from my home if one were inclined to walk the most direct route there. My sisters and I had no such inclinations, even on rainy spring mornings. Especially on rainy spring mornings.

That was the time of day the earthworms were most plentiful, squiggling their way through the ground to the edge between grass and sidewalk. Plump reddish-brown earthworms, begging for attention from schoolchildren. What followed was probably not one of the finest moments in my life. Closing our umbrellas, we used the pointy end of the handles to see how many worms we could stab at a time. The loser had to pull off the worms with her bare hands and toss them back in the grass.
 
Fortunately, my history with earthworms evolved when Wil and I discovered vermiculture, worm composting. We actually paid for red wigglers to be shipped to the house. “They look exactly like the ones I used to stab,” I declared delightedly to Wil.
 
These worms, however, were destined for a brighter future. Wil carefully drilled holes in the bottom of a Rubbermaid bin and lined the bottom with shredded black and white newspaper. He then soaked a brick of cocoa mulch in a bucket of water and added that to the bin. The worms were ready for their home and a diet of coffee grounds, vegetable and fruit scraps and eggshells.
 
Then we waited. We waited for the worms to devour the food scraps and turn them into nutrient-rich compost. Some of the worms loved cantaloupe rinds, and after feasting on one, left a rind that almost looked like lace. We were fascinated with our new self-contained, garbage-eating pets.
 
After what seemed like an eternity, all that remained of the food scraps was the lace-like rind and a few pieces of eggshell, and in its place was dark rich compost—black gold for our garden. We began to remove the compost with our bare hands, uncovering earthworms as we went.
 
We kept scooping; the red wigglers, well, kept wiggling, through our hands into the thin layer of compost now covering the bottom of the bin. We could read our pets well and quickly covered them with shredded newspaper, cocoa mulch and fresh food scraps.
 
As we scooped out the compost, we observed a few things. First, and most obvious, was the lack of smell. The food scraps we tossed in the bin didn’t smell like rotten trash, even though they sat there for several weeks. Second, one has to make a time commitment to vermiculture. Good compost doesn’t happen overnight. Third, when exposed to the sunlight, the worms would borough deeper into the compost. They needed the darkness and the rotting fruit to produce that black gold for the garden.

Along with considering birds of the air and lilies of the field, perhaps we ought to consider the red wiggler. It doesn’t fear the darkness or potential rotting food scraps. Instead, it slowly goes through the rot and darkness and turns it into rich compost that I feed my sun-loving tomatoes and roses.
 
I might adopt the red wiggler approach to the darkness of trials and suffering I encounter. Rather than my usual fix-it-fast-and-fix-it-now approach, I will sit in the darkness (note to self: darkness is not dark to our loving Father) and know that this trial produces a rich compost of endurance, character and hope that does not put us to shame.
 
This rich compost—a mix of suffering and trust in God--also produces lives that look less like us and more like Christ, lives ready to share this compost with other weary souls sitting in a golden darkness.

Chocolate Pudding and Jesus by Wil Triggs

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I was scanning through headlines online Thursday morning when this one caught my eye:

“Chocolate Pudding is the Answer”
 
Sometimes a good headline is hard to resist, pleading with you to click and read more.
 
It was right there on the same screen with others like:

  • Biden signals he’s flexible on immigration overhaul

  • How does Bill Gates plan to solve the climate crisis?

  • Opening a new musical in Tokyo in a pandemic

  • What to know about avalanche safety in the backcountry

Chocolate pudding and I go way back. When I was little, my mother’s chocolate pudding was a favorite, provided it was still warm from the stove, and before the skin formed on top. Even though she made it with cornstarch, it never had lumps.

If chocolate pudding is the answer, I wanted to know what the question was.

As a Bible school teacher, I’m used to people joking about Jesus being the answer to almost any question. And it’s true. Usually Jesus is a pretty good guess. Even if the answer I’m looking for is Joseph or Moses or Peter, I can usually shift into biblical theology and find a way to affirm the answer. So that background came to the fore. I imagined myself on Sunday morning responding, “No, Jesse, the answer is not Jesus. Chocolate pudding is the answer.”

How could that be?

So, yes, I fell for it. And clicked.

The two questions in the article were: “How are you?” and “What to cook?”

The writer told of a woman who gave trash collectors bags of home-baked cookies. Besides the pudding, it provided links to recipes for macaroni and beef casserole, kimchi fried rice, braised porkall’arrabbiataand more, then went on to describe daring to cook without a recipe at all, or only giving a description of how to cook chicken thighs with lemon, garlic and other ingredients.

Feeding people makes the world a little bit better.

“I think it’s more important than ever” says the chocolate pudding writer, “that we try to believe that people are operating mostly from a position of good faith rather than bad, and to respond to the stimuli the pandemic offers us accordingly.”

In some ways, the writer had me at chocolate, but I wasn’t so sure about that good faith thing. Most of the time I want to be nice to people, but we have been restraining ourselves in this season of sickness. We didn’t give our annual ice cream sauce Christmas gifts this year, and it’s still bothering me. Nevertheless, we kept our possibly tainted jars away from people during the holidays even though we’ve discovered a really good butterscotch recipe.

Good faith, I don’t know, doesn’t seem to fit the food we feed people or give away or don’t. But the thought of chocolate pudding was appealing.

Just an hour after reading this story, I read another that kind of spoiled the mood. Thoughts of comfort foods in this snowy pandemic February gave way to something else. Here is the brief report:

“Iranian Christian convert Ebrahim Firouzi was summoned from internal exile in early February 2021 to a court hearing, after which he was re-arrested. Ebrahim had already spent nearly seven years in prison and was completing a three-year internal exile 1,000 miles from home. He was summoned to court to respond to accusations of propaganda against the Islamic Republic in favor of hostile groups. In September 2020, Ebrahim received an unexpected package at the post office that contained Bibles. The Ministry of Intelligence was watching his mail, and when Ebrahim went to collect his package, they were waiting. They accompanied him to his house, where they confiscated laptops, cell phones and theology textbooks without a warrant. They also wanted to confiscate the Bibles, but Ebrahim told them he had been officially recognized as a Christian by the judiciary, and that he had a right to keep the Bibles.”

The article concluded “Before his court appearance, Ebrahim said, ‘I ask Christians to pray not for my acquittal, but for the great name of God to be glorified.’”

I checked some other sources and discovered that Ebrahim began a hunger strike on February 13, saying that he would not eat until charges were dropped.

Negotiating for the Bibles with authorities is something that I did in a totally different time and context, not for myself, but for Christians I was hoping to visit in a country whose authorities only wanted Bibles for profit in their black market.

So here's a third question. Not how are you. Not what to cook.

What food fills you?

Comfort food one fork or a plate at a time.

Or food that gives life with its invitation to taste and see, take and eat. Bread of life. This is my body.

And he said to me, “Son of man, eat whatever you find here. Eat this scroll, and go, speak to the house of Israel.” So I opened my mouth, and he gave me this scroll to eat. And he said to me, “Son of man, feed your belly with this scroll that I give you and fill your stomach with it.” Then I ate it, and it was in my mouth as sweet as honey. (Ezekiel 3:1-3)

Let this food comfort Ebrahim in the middle of his hunger strike.

Jesus, let me draw deep from the well of your water. Refresh and revive. Bring life through the food of your Word. May the nations fighting your Word break their souls’ hunger strike, see the truth of Jesus, and eat the food that nourishes and satisfies forever.

Pray with me and Ebrahim for the great name of God to be glorified.

Lover of Our Souls by Wendell C. Hawley

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from A Pastor Prays for His People

Everlasting God, Lover of our souls,
Open our eyes to see your love for us—
your love which was established before creation
and continues unfailing and unending, even unto this very hour.
Your Word tells us that you had a plan for us a long, long time ago.
A love for us not based on 
performance,
or beauty,
or inherent value.
A love which sent a Savior to the unlovely,
the destitute,
the helpless,
the condemned.
A Savior whose love prompted him to say:
"Come unto me all you who are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."

Lord, may you this day be the present help of all who turn to you,
whether hurt or ashamed,
whether sick or disheartened,
whether afraid or defeated,
whether troubled or angry.
You have come to change the human condition drastically, totally . . .
the sinful heart,
the stony heart,
the rebellious heart.

Holy physician, divine surgeon . . . work in our lives that our souls might prosper in spiritual health and vitality.
Thank you, Lord,
for hearing,
for answering,
for meeting every need.

Amen.

Over Packing by Lorraine Triggs

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It was July 2001, two months pre-9/11, and our multitude of bags were packed and ready to go on the first STAMP trip to Russia. We were off to summer camp to help the national staff with crafts, sports and all around entertainment (of which our skills were many).

I have always prided myself on my packing skills even with the following list:

  • camp clothes

  • good walking shoes

  • first aid kit, including pouches of grape-flavored Pedialyte

  • googly eyes for sheep craft

  • black and white yarn for sheep craft

  • construction paper, glue, tape

  • scissors

  • soda ash

  • dye from art store

  • rubber bands

  • white t-shirts

The only thing I neglected to pack was a month's supply of sticky fly paper, but I digress.

Packing for the trip home was a lot easier:

  • dirty camp clothes

  • one broken walking shoe

  • pressed wildflowers

  • our own autographed tie-dye t-shirts

We left behind the shirts, one for every camper and camp staff, now dyed in blues and magentas, leftover craft supplies, first-aid kits, sports equipment, some of our suitcases and our hearts.

Though proud of my packing skills, I never list it as other skills on my CV. Too bad, because when it come to carrying baggage, I could teach a Master Class.

Let's see, there's the baggage of childhood hurts:

  • fourth-grade teacher who played favorites (I was not one)

  • unfriended by best friend, Kathy, prior to Facebook.

Things happen. Bad or sad. If I look back for them, I can find them from any stage of life.

I probably shouldn't even mention the baggage Facebook adds to my life, but since it is a Master Class, here goes—I have zero pairs of matching Christmas pajamas, same for vacations to any of the 48 contiguous States this last year and not one photo of cute little children frolicking in the snow.

As I start to inspect my baggage, it's clear that Facebook isn't the problem. I am, and my stubbornness in carrying around jealousy, discontent and grumbling. Here's a stinging joke, like a pair of extra pants that I don't need. An unresolved disagreement is like a heavy, itchy wool sweater that takes up way too much room than it should. I add to my load the hurts and disappointments of life not going the way I had planned. I take no pride in these packing skills.

There's hope for habitual over packers like myself. It's in the One who invites the heavy laden to come and find his rest and to learn from his gentle and lowly heart. Jesus invites us to exchange our burdens for his burden that is full of light and grace and truth.

And that involves forgiveness. For me and for those who handed me stuff I don't need, that only makes traveling heavier and harder than it needs to be. Jesus frees us from all that and gives us something new. Back when we went to Russia with so many suitcases, we unloaded them and gave most everything away to help tell the campers aboutJesus and to give them anything that might be a help in the days ahead. I want to let go of heavy bags and give away the blessings God gives.

When I look for the God who gives, my heart, not my suitcases, is filled. I think of the friendships forged with Russian Sunday school teachers turned camp counselors for the summer. They never dreamed it would be possible to have children's camps and there we were doing just that in a Soviet-built school. Think of the eyes of the children at camp, bright-eyed as we unwrapped their shirts revealing bright colors of summer that came from the other side of the world. Think of the wonder of sin washed away. The one and only Savior who came with nothing more than himself, not from the other side of the world, but all the way from heaven, teaching, touching, humbly dying, rising, giving new life and calling us to follow him.

The next time a mad moment of over packing pride hits me, I will remember another childhood memory, "Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he might exalt you in due time. Casting all your cares upon him; for he careth for you." (1 Peter 5:6, 7 intentionally in the KJV)

Try a different kind  of light therapy this winter by John Maust

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“Lift your mood with light therapy” said the title of a Mayo Clinic article earlier this month.

Reading this on a gray day in January, I had to admit that a little extra light sounded good and kept reading.

The writer explained how the long, dark days of winter can sometimes send one’s spirits into a nosedive,  leading to “seasonal affective disorder,”  a kind of depression linked to changes in seasons. 

“Light therapy is one of our effective treatments,” Mayo psychologist Craig Sawchuk said. 

“You want to make sure that the light is sitting about an arm's length or so in front of you,” he said.  “You don't have to stare directly at the light, but you want to keep your eyes open.  So you could be doing things like having breakfast or a cup of coffee, watching TV, or working online," says Dr. Sawchuk.

Just keep on using light therapy into the spring, he said, or whenever your mood starts to improve.

Probably you know someone who has used light therapy.  Maybe you’ve benefitted from it yourself.

But during this wintry pandemic I wonder if perhaps we need a stronger form of light therapy.  Let’s call it “light of the world therapy.”

“I am the light of the world,” Jesus declared (John 8:12).  Indeed, “God is light; in him is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5). 

This is no light bulb we are talking about!  Looking to Jesus, the light of the world, does way more than elevate our mood. This Light points the way to eternal life and offers daily guidance and spiritual protection, among other things.

Eternal life.  Jesus said, “Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life” (John 8:12). Also, “if we walk in the light, as he is in the light…the blood of Jesus purifies us from all sin” (1 John 1:7).  

Jesus is the light who leads us from the darkness of sin and death to the light of righteousness and a right relationship with God through Him.  

Daily guidance.  In the darkness of confusion and uncertainty, when we cannot see the way ahead, let us seek God’s light on the situation through spending time with Him in prayer and daily Bible study. 

“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path,” the Psalmist says.  “You are my lamp, O Lord,” David sings. “The Lord turns my darkness into light” (2 Samuel 22:29).

Scripture says that “in his light we see light” (Ps. 36:9). 

Spiritual protection.  Lately I’ve been reflecting on Romans 13:12 where we are asked to “put on the armor of light.”  What a powerful image.  It reminds me of the incident in Lord of the Rings when Frodo defends himself from the evil spider Shelob by holding aloft the bottle filled with blinding light from Eärendil’s star.

But our armor of light is not found in a bottle.  Our armor, as detailed in Ephesians 6, consists of the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, our feet fitted with the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, helmet of salvation, and sword of the spirit which is the word of God. 

This armor of light will protect us from Satan’s attacks and help us stand strong in Christ even when temptation, discouragement and doubt besiege us. 

We can affirm with the Psalmist, “The Lord is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear? (Ps. 27:1).”

Winter will be here for awhile.  It’s fine to turn on an extra light or two until blue skies return.  But what better time to spend extra minutes sitting in the light of our Lord’s presence and His Word—getting some good old-fashioned light therapy of the soul.  The effects will be noticeable. 

“Those who look to him are radiant,” Scripture says.  “Their  faces are never covered with shame.” 

March for Life Chicago 2020: Review and Illustration Charlie Stevens

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“Go home.  You don’t belong here.”

The words penetrated the drone of the school bus as I peered through the condensation on the windows into the cold gray Chicago cityscape on January 11, 2020. 

Only an hour before, we had been in the welcoming warmth of the Commons, arranging the March for Life hats, hand warmers, snacks, and bottles of water to be gathered by the 109 attendees before boarding the chartered buses and heading downtown.  On tables in the large meeting room lay signs that had been painted at the Sanctity of Human Life Committee’s sign painting party the week before, waiting to be retrieved by their creators for display during the march.  High school and college students, singles, couples, and families collected their hats and snacks, perused the signs, and talked quietly while waiting for the event overview to begin.  Guidelines and procedures were reviewed, a prayer was said, and bus loading commenced.  Once all were present and accounted for, the buses rolled out of the parking lot and headed downtown.

Bring Illinois back to life!

Having not been on a school bus in decades, I had forgotten how noisy they were.  There were conversations taking place around us, and my daughter and I initially tried to hear and be heard, but we eventually lapsed into silence and looked out the window.  We were about three quarters of the way to our destination when I heard the voice, clear as day, telling me that we were not welcome; reminding me that our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. (Ephesians 6:12)  

Abortion: One heart stops, another heart breaks.

This was not the first sign of the opposition we faced surrounding this event.  Already that morning the bus company had called to inquire if we still planned to go downtown that day. (Well, yes… why do you ask?)  There was a situation, and they had to scramble to replace a driver for the fourth bus. Our driver was called in on his day off, and graciously agreed to drive us.  We were thankful for the Lord’s provision, and for our driver’s positive attitude, despite the inconvenience.

A person’s a person, no matter how small

When we arrived downtown, the buses let us out across from the Congress Plaza Hotel, where the march was to end, and we began our mile-long walk to the Daley Plaza where the rally was held. Our group gathered for pictures and then blended in with the crowd to listen to the speakers, who united and encouraged us with their exhortations on the theme “Life Empowers: Pro Life is Pro Woman.”  The last speaker got everyone psyched up to start the march, and the group of young people carrying the street-wide “Life is Beautiful” banner led the way down Washington Street toward Michigan Avenue.  

Save the baby humans

Across the street, those who had come to protest our stand for the lives of the unborn held their signs aloft as we passed.  The media who interviewed both sides for the news report declared them “pro-choice;” we were labelled “anti-abortion.” 

Social justice begins in the womb.

We were absorbed into a sea of people of all ages in winter coats and hats and gloves, holding up signs and phones and cameras, following the drum cadence down the street. We walked and held our signs and phones and cameras, occasionally passing or being passed by someone in a white and light blue March for Life hat. Here, a father with his high school-aged daughter followed by three middle aged men. There, a couple, each with a child strapped to their chest, walking next to an older gentleman pushing his wife’s wheelchair. Interspersed throughout were groups of young people holding signs saying, “Love Life, Choose Life” and “I am the pro-life generation.” Onlookers watched from the sidewalk, and from the windows of the office buildings that lined the street. Police officers on foot and on horseback blocked the intersections and looked on with varying degrees of interest.  We turned on Michigan Avenue and walked back to our point of origin, where the marchers collected and mingled, and we gathered and waited for our group to reassemble for the bus ride back to the church. 

Every life is precious.

I am so thankful that we have the opportunity to participate in this annual event. The next March for Life event will be January 23, 2021. Information / registration can be found by clicking here.

This photo verse art is how I processed and summarized my experience of the day; the stark reality of abortion in Illinois standing rigid and bleak against the clear but barely audible voices of a few, and against the Most High God, the giver of Life.

For you formed my inward parts;
    you knitted me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. 
Wonderful are your works;
    my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
    intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
 Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
    the days that were formed for me,
    when as yet there was none of them.

Psalm 139:14-16

 

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