Even Bigger, Even Better by Lorraine Triggs

The idea behind the once popular Bigger and Better Scavenger Hunts was to go from house to house and trade-up items. The best thing my son brought home from his youth group Bigger and Better Scavenger hunt was a clunky 1980s style bread machine that worked. I was excited about the trade up. Obviously, I have a low bar for trade ups.

When I went off to college and opened the door to my dorm room, I exclaimed to my sisters, “Look, I only have to share a room with one other person.” Like I said, a low bar.

The bar did rise considerably when I traded up my cat for my husband and his allergies—the only trade-up that has gotten better and better with each year.

Other than my trade-up of cat for husband, we typically trade up when we don’t think something is enough and want something more valuable, more expensive, bigger and better than a clunky bread machine.

Every now and then posts pop up on my social feeds that declare Jesus is enough. I understand that these posts want to communicate that all we need is Jesus, but something seems off-kilter to me, especially if I am always on the hunt for something bigger and better in my life.

The hunt makes it easy to be tempted, not to trade in Jesus, put to trade up to Jesus plus XYZ, ever-so subtly equating XYZ with Jesus, and that’s enough, for now. Or we put God right there at the top of our list, with family and country a close second and third. An honest look at the list, however, would make us realize that the One is not like the others.

Jesus isn't at the top of my list. He made the list and he made me and saved me. There is no one other than him. He is the list, beginning, middle and end God does not have equals or second or third place competitors. He is all—period, full stop.

Leland Ryken’s book The Heart in Pilgrimagelives up to its subtitle: “A Treasury of Classic Devotionals on the Christian Life.” One of these treasures is the selection of reflections by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Jonathan Edwards and Thomas Watson (pp. 87-89).

Says Ryken: “The genre of the three selections is known aspanegyric—a composition that praises a person or thing in superlative terms,” and points out that they “use a vocabulary ofmoreandmostandrichestanddearerandbetterand such like. The effect is to elevate Christ above everything else.”

As Thomas Watson wrote, “Christ must be dearer to us than all. He must weigh heavier than relations in the balance of our affections. . .” 

Let us praise him in all things.

Colossians 1:15-20, the Christ hymn, was sung in the ancient church. Perhaps it’s time to start singing again: “He is the beginning, the first born from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” (vv.18-19) as we look forward to dwelling in the fullness forever. 

Period. Full stop.

Active Listening by Wil Triggs

As I was telling the story of missionary Adoniram Judson and his journey to Burma (now Myanmar) in Bible school last week, I had some competition. No disrespect to the teacher, but many of the kids needed to tell something or show something to the person sitting next to them. A missing tooth. A birthday. A new toy. A new baby brother or sister. My biting problem. I have to go potty.

“Wait,” I said, looking at some of the culprits. “We can’t all talk at once and it’s my turn to talk right now.” Three claps of the hand sometimes work.

We teachers act like grown-ups always listen when they’re supposed to. But we’re lying.

How many times a day am I only halfway there? “Wait. Say that again,” trying to make it seem like I was listening when I was thinking about an essay I just read, or how much the visit to the auto mechanic was going to set me back. What’s my next meeting? How many messages are waiting for me? Should I pull out my phone and look at the screen? Oh, now, what was that you were saying? I’m right there with the Kindergarteners in the front, middle or back row, halfway hearing the missionary story or the Bible story.

We aren’t very good at listening to what other people say.

Jesus kept telling people to listen. Let those with ears hear.

While we have a hard time listening, God never turns a deaf ear to us. I can always do better at listening, but I find solace in the truth that God actively listens, knows, always hears. I don’t think we really believe that’s true. We live like our sin is stronger than God’s Son. Ultimately, though, God’s listening atones for everything.

Give ear, give ear, I feel the need to complain, to pour out the words of my Easter Saturday sadness and pain. Spring, summer, autumn, I wonder, do you hear me? Perhaps I don’t even think about you. Do you know and care? Are you really there? Even more to the point: if you should answer, do I hear you?

Where can I go that you cannot hear? What words can I think that you do not see? If I wonder where you were when my best friend died, your listening ear is not stopped; it does not hide. Right there, that’s where. Even if I wander down the street of my grand illusion of want, or the anger or shame of my ghostly haunt, still you hear without being called. When I ask the world why, I’m talking to you. Eyes to hear, ears to see.

Into your hands I commit my words. You hear even the words I cannot speak, the ones I don’t even know I have.

With you there is only nearness, shear nearness; even and ever, you are here, not over there but right here, closer than my imagination dreams. 

Incline your ear to me;
    rescue me speedily!
Be a rock of refuge for me,
    a strong fortress to save me!

For you are my rock and my fortress;
    and for your name's sake you lead me and guide me;
 you take me out of the net they have hidden for me,
    for you are my refuge.
Into your hand I commit my spirit;
    you have redeemed me, O Lord, faithful God.

Psalm 32:2-5

The Making Time Count Equation by Lorraine Triggs

Author and journalist Oliver Burkeman might be making a fortune off our finitude. He’s the author of Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals. In another book he scales back the four thousand weeks to four: Meditations for Mortals: Four Weeks to Embrace Limitations and Make Time for What Counts. Burkeman is no fan of multi-tasking and prefers we mortals focus on being finite.

I wonder what Burkeman thinks about Jesus’ time management skills. Would he applaud Jesus' reaolve in setting his face toward Jerusalem, while reminding him, "You can't serve everyone, right?" Actually wrong. A lot happened when the Infinite One became flesh and dwelt among the finite ones.

On that road to Jerusalem, where the religious leaders were lying in wait to kill him, we see Jesus making time for what counts. The road was cluttered with crowds, Pharisees, children, a rich young man, arguing disciples and one Blind Bartimaeus. Jesus taught the crowds, exposed the Pharisees, welcomed the children, loved a rich young man and settled an argument among his disciples.

But how does Blind Bartimaeus off to the side of the road, apart from the crowd, fit into the make-time-for-what-counts equation? He’s blind. He’s a beggar. He’s loud, obnoxious even. As soon as he hears Jesus was there “he began to cry out and say, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.'" (Mark 10:47) Many “rebuked” him, telling him to be quiet. I can imagine these people, devices in hand, making sure Jesus was on message and sticking to his agenda. Dealing with a beggar, let alone a blind beggar, was not on plan.

Jesus, however, was sticking to his agenda: to seek and to save that which was lost, so he stopped and told his followers to call Blind Bartimaeus. Their words to the blind man were graced words: “They called to the blind man, saying to him, ‘Take heart. Get up; he is calling you.’ And throwing off his cloak, he sprang up and came to Jesus.” (Mark 10:49-50) And there on the road between Jericho and Jerusalem, the one now formerly known as Blind Bartimaeus was dazzled by eternal light and followed Jesus.

These are graced words to us this Easter. Take heart. Get up. He is calling you. Because the Infinite One took on finitude, he understands our weariness and sympathizes with our weakness. Take heart. Because the Infinite One took on the form of a servant and humbled himself to the point of death on a cross, there is no need to sit in the darkness of sin. So, get up from the side of the road and follow Jesus.

On Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, that road was cluttered with cloaks and palm branches, but not Bartimaeus’ cloak. That had been discarded and forgotten, as he waited to put on new clothes that would be washed on Friday and ready to wear for infinity on Sunday.

Hosanna! The Lord saves.

Missing Lunch by Wil Triggs

Long, long ago, airfares dropped between Chicago and London so that it actually cost less to fly to London than Los Angeles. So once again, we found ourselves in London on holiday.

When we travel, we like to be both spontaneous and in control. We made a list of places we wanted to see and things we wanted to do. Sunday afternoon was assigned a specific place, but first was Sunday morning. That meant church.

We went to All Souls Church. Back then, that meant John Stott. We got there on time and had a seat. We could see that there was some community life in this church, that it was a lot more than just the church where John Stott preached. We felt more or less at home. This happens in other parts of the world, too, so it’s not just an English-speaking thing. Even if we don’t understand the language of the church where we're worshiping, we’re at home.

At the end of the service, as we walked toward the back, we started talking to a man. He was a regular attender. He showed interest in us. We answered his questions, and he seemed especially keen on our missions background. We got to talking and it was hard to stop. We didn’t want to stop talking and neither did he.

Then, he invited us to his home for lunch. What were we to do with this unexpected invitation? We were on holiday, and Sunday morning may have meant church, but Sunday afternoon, well, that meant a museum or a gallery or a park. We explained that we had our plans. He understood and wished us well. We parted ways and went on to the expected part of our day.

Looking back, I don’t recall what places we visited that Sunday after church. What I do remember is that kind man's invitation and feel a sadness about what that Sunday lunch may have held for us. We will never know. I like to think that I am different nowadays—choosing the family of God over the art, artifacts and trinkets of human achievement.

Jesus didn’t hesitate to accept dinner invitations from tax collectors, sinners or Pharisees, and he always brought the unexpected to the table. In Luke 14, Jesus was dining with a ruler of the Pharisees. It almost sounds as if the Pharisees were anticipating the unexpected from Jesus as they carefully watched him (Luke 14:1), and Jesus didn’t disappoint them. After calling out the Pharisees for their hypocrisy and pride of place, he turns to his host with a guest list for his next dinner or fancy banquet: “When you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.” (Luke 14:13-14)

One day we will sit down with that man from All Souls. Jesus opens the door and invites us in. He serves a feast, lamb seasoned with spices and placed on a table with freshly washed and neatly folded linens. He is risen.

Pink Candle By Wil Triggs

“Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”  (Luke 2:10b-11)
 
“Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.”  (Luke 2:15b)
 
“For a second year running, there is no Christmas cheer in Bethlehem, with tourists shunning the Palestinian city and many residents seeking a way out as the Gaza war grinds on,” a Reuters story reported December 1, 2024. “Bethlehem's Manger Square in front of the Church of the Nativity is largely deserted and souvenir shops are shuttered.”
 
Life can be tumultuous.

William Blake's paintngs include two sides of humanity—one of Newton planning and creating, leaning forward with a compass planning for higher things; the other is Nebuchadnezzar, matted hair on head and beard, leaning forward on all fours eating grass in the field like a wild animal. These images are the power and folly of human leadership without God in a fallen universe.

The head on the side of the building could have been Caesar or Nero or Caligula. Think Marx. Think Lenin, Stalin, Tito, Mao Zedong. Wall portraiture rendered itself with some features but years and decades smooth over the faces, trading them out for new ones. Pilate, Kim Il Sung, Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Slobodan Milosevic. Nebuchadnezzars all of them. We hate or we exalt leaders in various ways. Bashar al-Assad. Duvalier. Ceausescu. Ivan the Terrible. Brilliant and powerful one moment. Animals hungry for grass the next. And then Ozymandias.
 
In contrast to human leaders of earthly kingdoms, Jesus brings an other-worldly joy to us from the kingdom of heaven. Where the world celebrates the power of human might and humans running away from or drifting toward tyranny, Jesus calls us to sacrifice, to a way that puts the good of others first.
 
The Old Testament prophets foreshadow the altogether new.
 
Hosea lives the foreshadowing—with the prophet marrying a harlot, with children named Judgment and No Mercy and Not My People. The Lord said to Hosea, “Go again, love a woman who is loved by another man and is an adulteress, even as the Lord loves the children of Israel.” (Hosea 3:1)
 
The glass is dark, but the light is flickering, dawning into a new day that is not the way of man.
 
God’s ways, not ours. Against his better judgment, Jonah journeys from the stomach of the whale into the heart of Ninevah to call people to the one true God and then to sit under the tree... “I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster.” (Jonah 4:2b)
 
To be like Jesus is to bleed and die and, by faith, live again.
 
Did all the shepherds live to hear the Sermon on the Mount? Did any of them eat the miraculous bread and fish? Did they see Jesus on the cross? Were any of them among the witnesses of the resurrected Christ? For Simeon and Anna, seeing him as a baby was enough. It was not the full picture—no miracles yet, no cross, no empty tomb or disciples staring up at the sky. But they were not bereft of joy in their waiting.
 
We are blessed to have the full revelation of the Bible—rejoice in that! But we should not fool ourselves into thinking that we can fully grasp or attain everything here until the darkened glass grows clear. And though it is clearer than it was, it is still dark.
 
Yet we must embrace joy. We can’t help it. We follow the Jesus joy-giver.  We can know this shepherd joy before us now no matter what we might face.
 
Missionary Amy Carmichael wrote, “Joy is not gush. Joy is not mere jolliness. Joy is perfect acquiescence—acceptance, rest—in God’s will, whatever comes. And that is so only for the soul who delights himself in God.”
 
For those who pray year after year for loved ones to turn in believing faith for the first time ever,
 
For those of us with loved ones estranged from God,
 
For those who wonder—did that person die lost or was there a cry out before the end, he comes.
 
For those facing or fighting disease that robs of strength and health,
 
For people who don’t know who they are and their families who don’t know what to do,
 
For those with broken marriages who wonder if healing and change will ever come,
 
For those grief-stricken with the loss of ones loved, and loved ones who can never be replaced, he comes.
 
If you find yourself wandering in a strange land you never dreamed would be your home,
 
If you find yourself in prison—literal and metaphorical—waiting, longing, dreaming of freedom, he comes.
 
Every dream and every longing, the lost coin, the precious pearl, the smallest of seeds sown in the land and in our hearts—know that it grows. The Good Shepherd, having left the 99, setting aside the robes and splendors, finds us and hoists us onto his shoulders from the ground where we are caught or hurt or both, and he starts the walk back to the flock.
 
The inns are all filled, but the good Lord Christ enters in to the forgotten, stinky manger places of the soul; he knows the longing, doubting, fearing, loving hearts. Even when he seems far away, he’s near, right beside us. We are carried unknowingly on his shoulders.
 
With laughter and with tears filling our eyes, we light the pink candle of the shepherds, the candle of joy.

Awed by Awe By Lorraine Triggs

We can now add awe to diet and exercise in our pursuit of a healthy lifestyle. So writes Hope Reese in her article “How a Bit of Awe Can Improve Your Health.” Reese quotes Dr. Dacher Keltner, a psychologist at the University of California, Berkely, who defines awe as “the feeling of being in the presence of something vast that transcends your understanding of the world.”

It’s also accessible to everyone and part of everyday life as Keltner writes in his book Awe: The New Science of Everyday Wonder and How It Can Transform Your Life. Keltner says that awe “is its own thing,” and not one of the six basic emotions—anger, surprise, disgust, enjoyment, fear and sadness—that were identified in 1972.

I don’t know how we coped prior to 1972 with these emotions and awe, but Keltner and other experts are currently awed by awe and its impact on our health and well-being. A professor of medical social sciences at Northwestern University points out that “intentional awe experiences, like walks in nature, collective movement, like dance or ceremony” improve our psychological well-being.

Awe hasn’t always meant nature walks or well-being. The archaic definition of awe is dread or terror, to fear greatly or to feel a great reluctance to meet or face, which underscores the audacity of Moses’s request of God in Exodus 33:18, “Please show me your glory.” (At least Moses said please.) God turned down Moses because of awe. God knew that no one could see his face and live. Instead, God showed Moses his heart—his goodness, his grace and his mercy.

Like Moses, David had a sense of this archaic awe in Psalm 51, but instead of asking to see God’s face, David asked God to hide his face from David’s sin. Like he did with Moses, God showed David his mercy, unfailing love and great compassion. Even Dr. Keltner would have to agree that this is awe, something so vast that it transcends our understanding of the world, especially in a world that finds retribution easier to understand than mercy and compassion. But God, who is rich in mercy, unfailing in his love and abounding in compassion, brings healing in his wings and light to people sitting in darkness.

This is the awe of Advent—vast transcendent visits of angels to a young girl, a carpenter and senior saints one minute and the night sky the next, proclaiming great news of great joy of a newborn baby who chose to enter the very world he created, full of grace and truth, unfailing love and great compassion, to save his people from their sins.

May we all be awed by awe this Advent.

The Paper Pumpkin Thanksgiving Mystery By Wil Triggs

This last Sunday, we asked the Kindergarteners to think of something they’re thankful for and 25 children, gave or take a few, raised their hands. Lorraine had a bunch of construction paper pumpkins, and when the children replied, they could put a pumpkin on the whiteboard under the banner “We are thankful for. . .” Repeats were allowed. We will ask for more thanks this Sunday, but so far, this is their pumpkin harvest of thanks:

God
Sister
Dad
Stuffed animals
Mom
Jesus
God
Thanksgiving at grandparents
Aunt Sarah
Fish
Sharing food
K class
Pumpkin pie
Family
Ana and Noah
Jesus
Family
Grandparents
Pumpkin pie
God
Family

To me, there’s something about writing down one’s thanks that makes it more real, more concrete. I sometimes save notes people mail in or drop off at church. One stands out. I go back to it often.

Eighty-six-year-old Anne sent a notecard to College Church with the following message:

One of your church members gave me a ride to the train station last week. It was a cold and snowy day and with my cane I was not managing the snow-covered sidewalk too well.

She would not accept any money so I told her I’d put it in the donation at church.
This is to say thank you, God bless,
Anne

At the Thanksgiving Eve service, brave people stood and publicly expressed thanks. They were brief and heartfelt. You know with each one that there is longer story in the background.  

Loving parents, family, home, my friend, College Church, my job, the prayers of the church for my mother, youth group, ever-present Jesus, sharing the gospel with my students, College Church’s music, KMs, HYACKs, the goodness of God, the family of the church, KMs, the Living Word class, the Lord's help when I faced thoughts of suicide, God's covenantal love, the seventh-grade boys, Mike, the metaphor of a new pair of glasses, Baxter, my job, women's Bible study, God's presence in the storms of life.

As I listened, what people said brought things to mind from the past year. How interwoven we are with others, blessed to be connected and worshiping together.

Thinking back to Anne’s note, there’s a mystery to this message. How did Anne know her helper was from College Church? It doesn’t matter really, but it makes me curious to know more of the story. There is mystery when people help others. I think sometimes because we don’t always know how God might be at work in the kind acts, or the kind words we say to strangers, or the path we walk together through the years.

These are the type of mystery I think I like best—not a whodunit, but just the good stories of lovingkindness spreading without the need of shining a spotlight anywhere else but on Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. He is working, especially in those times when we don't even know it, hearts burning with us.

Who is the man on the road to Emmaus talking to us with such wisdom?

How can we feed such a multitude with only one boy’s lunch?

Terrified, I wonder what I’m seeing in the storm, the figure of a man walking across the stormy roiling waves as if on a level floor?

Why save the best wine for last?

Why does only one in ten healed of leprosy bother to say thanks?

Why tell a crippled man to get up and walk?

Why cast our net on the other side of the boat after a whole night without a single fish?

Why open the tomb after a man has been dead for so many days?

Who is it I see from the boat cooking breakfast onshore and calling out to us?

Jesus, thank you for coming to us in the storm, thank you for talking to us on the road, praise you for giving us wine when we only expect water, bless you for filling our nets, casting out demons, bringing to life muscles, nerves, bones with the simple command, get up and walk. Thank you that your ways are not ours and you do not leave us to our own ways. Thank you for accepting meager thanks, even when we know our hearts should be overflowing with thanksgiving. Jesus, thank you for empty tombs and tombs, our tombs even, that will be empty one day, each of us stepping out or up or in from temporal to eternal, Jesus.

So as thankful as I am for pumpkin pie, corn casseroles, mashed potatoes and turkey, I am even more grateful for a simple breakfast on the beach and your invitation to come, follow, love, give.

House Church by Lorraine Triggs

In its heyday, my childhood church in suburban Detroit was a megachurch before megachurches existed. The building was a wonderful mishmash of church architectural styles from the 1940s, 60s and 70s when various additions were made. It made a great home for the children of the church, where we children freely roamed the educational wing, obediently heading to our classrooms when the bell rang for Sunday school or evening Training Union.

Until the evening someone dared Billy to stick his head through the bars of the stair’s railing. Billy was an average size kid with an average size head, and as good Baptist children, we loudly voiced our opinions about the dare, but before a consensus could be reached, Billy took the dare and stuck his head through the railing.

We were in awe, until Billy realized he couldn’t pull his head back out. The bell for Training Union went off, no one moved and then chaos ensued. Teachers ran out of the classrooms and tried to pull Billy out. Someone ran down the stairs to the church kitchen for a tub of lard. Billy twisted and turned his head and started to cry. Then off in the distance, a siren wailed. We began to breathe easier. Help was on the way, and despite that nasty-sounding electric saw cutting through the railing, Billy’s head remained attached to his body.

I’m happy to report that we all made it safely to adulthood and today communicate mainly through the church’s alumni Facebook group, since my childhood church no longer exists. It wasn’t abandoned but demolished, unlike the roughly 1,100 former churches currently for sale in the U.S. according to an article in The New York Times. It was the headline that caught my eye: “For Sale: Hundreds of Abandoned Churches. Great Prices. Need Work.” I am still deciding what bothers me more—the demolition of my once-vibrant home church, the abandoned churches put up for sale all over the country, or the buyers snapping them up to convert them into one-of-a kind private homes.

In early church history, houses became churches—not the other way around. In 1 Corinthians 16:19, the church in Aquila and Prisca’s house sent hearty greetings to the church in Corinth. Paul deepens the definition of a house when he instructs the believers in Galatia to “do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.” (Galatians 6:10) Paul’s personal greetings at the end of his letter to the Romans use the language of family to describe the members of this new household of faith—Andronicus and Junia are kinsmen (as well as fellow prisoners), beloved Stachys and Persis, and Rufus’ mother—who has been a mother to Paul.

The church is at its best when it is a home for the lost, the found, the sick, the ones who are sick but don’t admit it. It’s a home where the door is left open for a prodigal’s return, or gently closed on the clamor and chaos for the world weary to find rest. It’s a place where you and I are “no longer strangers and aliens, but . . . fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.” (Ephesians 2:19)

In the end, the church is home to pilgrims who are looking forward to a feast set on a table that overflows with the bounty of grace and mercy in a home that lasts forever.