Palm Sunday Reflections

I loved Palm Sunday as a little girl. The image of Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey with the crowds cheering and laying palm fronds down for him in honor felt joyful and right. I mean, this is Jesus- of course the people should be worshipping him! I also remember what I felt when I learned several years later that those same people were the ones shouting “Crucify Him!” just a few days later. The incongruence of their responses was jarring to me as a child. How could the people in my picture book Bible be worshipping one day and ready to see him die the next?

Palm Sunday holds some important truths for us if we are okay with being a little uncomfortable. The most obvious is this: sometimes we think we are worshipping Jesus for who he is, but actually we are worshipping Jesus for what we believe he will do for our agenda. The crowds waving palm branches for Jesus were delighted to hail him as a Savior- when they thought that meant a political leader who save them from their immediate problems with Rome. When it became clear that Jesus was not going to become who they wanted him to be, everything changed.

It’s not actually that surprising if we check in on our own hearts. How often am I excited to sing in the worship service on Sunday morning but am pulling away from Jesus by Tuesday when his words tell me to love my enemy or serve a complaining coworker or be slow to speak when I just know I am right and want to get my two cents in an argument…. Following Jesus seems easy when he think of him as a King who will grant us our little kingdoms. When he remember he is a suffering Savior who asks us to deny ourselves and follow him into sacrifice we come face to face with the question of whether we are actually following the Jesus or some water-down, modified version of cultural christianity. Palm Sunday reminds us: we can forget who Jesus is and what he came to do pretty easily.

But, the other, more hopeful message of Palm Sunday is Jesus will be who he is, whether we get off track or not. Jesus does not reign as King because we worship him properly. He reigns as King because it is who he is. And whether we try to get him on our agendas, or forget his mission- he won’t. We can trust him to be steady in his mission to love us, save us and change us. Remember, he knew the crowds praising him would be turning on him by the end of the week and it did not deter him one step. His love is more powerful than our inconsistency, our forgetfulness or our outright rebellion. His love compelled him to enter Jerusalem to face the cross. His power overthrew the grave. And he reigns. We get to choose if he will reign in our lives because love always allows for choice, but make no mistake- He is who he says he is- He is King. And he is worthy of our worship because he has shown us his unstoppable, unwavering love.

So this Palm Sunday I am reflecting on my Savior and how his love now compels me.

“For the love of Christ compels us because we are convinced that one died for all, therefore all died.” 2 Cor. 5:14

“For the joy set before him (we were his joy friends) he endured the cross, scorning its shame and sat down at the right hand at the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:2

An Uncomfortable Truth

Lately when I wash my face in the morning I have started putting my hands under the icy cold water as it heats up. The harshness of the cold on my skin is shocking and almost painful for the first few seconds. I don’t like it because it doesn’t feel good- at all. But I have been doing this because I have learned it will strengthen my body’s ability to move from anxious back to calm. Essentially, it is good for me though it does not feel good.

I just passed my 40th spiritual birthday. I have been a Christian since I was 11 and at 51 now, it’s been a lot of years of growing up, spiritually and otherwise. But if I’m honest, there have been big chunks of time I resisted growing. It’s not that there was not some growth, but not the kind you experience when you are actively seeking it. I have faithfully attended church my entire life and have generally lived in line with God’s teaching so this resistance wasn’t an outright rebellion. And it wasn’t even conscious. It came through a sneaky, highly “normal” first world pattern: avoidance of the uncomfortable.

More than any other temptation, I think for me, the urge to seek comfort over growth has been my struggle. I see it in the way I spent years (I mean seriously, decades!) trying to “find time” to consistently read my Bible. The obvious and available solution was always there: get up a little earlier. There was always time. It meant the discomfort of getting up early and I deeply resisted it. I see it also in the years I avoided hard conversations or conflict and allowed my people pleasing to give me a way out. As a result, it has taken me until my 40’s to finally grow through my fear of conflict and become strong enough to confront problems or work through hurts in relationships.

Paul says in James 1:2-4:

“Consider it pure joy my brothers and sisters whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so you may be mature and complete lacking nothing.”

This attitude Paul encourages us to adopt is so opposite of what comes naturally to me, and I am guessing to most of us. He tells us to choose to see hardship, suffering or discomfort as a tool that matures us. While at no time have I ever consciously thought “I want to be a spiritual toddler for the rest of my life” my general mindset of resisting the uncomfortable was keeping me underdeveloped. This verse uses an interesting word to begin: consider. Consider means to really stop and ponder. Ask some questions. Think it through.

I wonder if we all need to consider our mindset about discomfort:

• Do we immediately find a way out of things that make us uncomfortable?

• Are hardships or trials always reacted to as emergencies to be rescued from?

• How will we actually build resilience and courage if we never sit under the training of discomfort?

• Are we angry at God for subjecting us to the things that will actually help us grow?

Lately I have been very encouraged by the growth I have noticed in my heart around perseverance. And I recognize all of it, every bit of it, has happened from two shifts inside me:

1. Not resisting and avoiding the discomfort of self discipline

2. Believing that hard circumstances are being used by God to make me mature and complete

So, what about you? Maybe there are ways this week you can begin to embrace a new attitude or behavior to allow growth in your life. My husband worked in a drug and alcohol rehab center for close to 5 years. One phrase many recovering addicts used in their growth journey was: embrace the suck. While not the most gentle way of saying it, maybe that’s the point. To get healthy and strong, you have to just embrace the really hard moments knowing they are reshaping you and making you into the person God wants you to be.

Stop Being Nice (so you can start being kind)

In my community, we possess a unique culture of helping and serving. We actually, at one time, had the most faith based, non profits per capita of anywhere in the United States. I don’t know if that still holds true, but as someone who works at a faith based non profit, I am thankful so many people in this community want to help others; especially when that desire to help is also deeply connected to a desire to represent Christ well to others. But one thing I have noticed (among Christians in particular) is a confusion between kindness and “being nice”. And in a season where many of us are looking to offer kindness, I want to help us distinguish which is which- and also why I think it matters.

Kindness is defined as “a genuine care, empathy and concern for another’s well being; a desire to positively impact another person that leads to action”. The Bible includes kindness as one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit living inside us. (Galatians 5:22) And generally I think we all like the idea of being kind. But sometimes, we cut kindness short with niceness because to be honest- it requires less and feels better. It’s worth noting, nice is NOT listed as a fruit of the Spirit. My hunch is this is because while being nice can sometimes be a genuine posture toward others, it more often becomes a mask for looking good or maintaining our own comfort. Niceness is often about me; kindness is always about you.

I work with people all day long as a counselor. It is my calling, my ministry and my job. I am honored to create a safe place for others to process pain, learn new skills, change their thinking and grow into who God created them to be. But, one not-so-fun side of counseling for clients (and for me too if I’m honest) is confronting. When a client has a goal and there is a behavior or belief preventing them from reaching that goal, part of my job is to confront it. To say what I am noticing and ask good questions to allow the client to reflect on how their belief or behavior may be blocking their growth. Depending on how much they enjoy the behavior or how long they have held the belief, there is often resistance in the form or deflecting, minimizing or anger when I confront. It’s not a fun moment for anyone. But it is so incredibly important and part of me doing my job well.

Our lives need a similar level of willingness to be uncomfortable in order to truly practice kindness. When someone we love is engaging in a dysfunctional, destructive or sinful way- true kindness seeks to point out the problematic behavior for the good of the person. Niceness can look the other way. Niceness can add sympathy or affirmation, without ever challenging. Niceness, ultimately, can be for my comfort, not their good. Kindness however is not weighing my comfort at all. It is soley focused on the good of the other. It is seeking the best and highest for the person, often at a personal cost to me. This is true when I volunteer to serve the homeless a meal or stop to hug a grieving friend at church but also true when I ask a friend hard questions about how much alcohol I am noticing she is consuming or confront a family member who is constantly complaining about their life without ever making changes. Kindness can feel warm and fuzzy or hard and heavy. Because sometimes a person needs comfort and gentleness, other times they need a reality check and accountability.

And this is where growing a heart of kindness costs us. On some level we have to get out of the pattern of doing whatever is quick and easy and instead get to know people more deeply so we understand what they need. Another word for this is attunement- seeing what is happening in another person’s experience. You cannot really be kind without learning to atune. But it also costs us more than mental energy. It requires a willingness to sacrifice: time, resources, emotion and personal preferences are all things we may need to let go of to seek what is needed for another.

If you’ve raised teens you know about late night confessions and discussions. When my kids were teens, att the end of the day, I would often be so tapped out physically and emotionally- very ready for bed. Maybe it was 9:30, maybe a bit later, and in would wander one of my three, clearly ready for a chat. My instincts were often to “uh huh” my way through it so I could get to bed, but if it was a good parenting moment, I would set myself aside and really engage- actively listen, empathize, ask questions and support. Even for my children, practicing kindness in those moments was a sacrifice- though one I look back on with gladness and gratefulness. My kids needed my willingness to sacrifice sleep so they had that safe space to talk. In my own life, there have been times where kindness to me was a friend bringing me dinner and staying to clean my kitchen. At another times it was a friend leaving her house on a moment’s notice to sit with me at a hospital when one of my kids was at the ER. It also has been a friend asking me in a very hard season “where are you most vulnerable to sin in this situation?” All of those were expressions of kindness that required sacrifice in some way. Niceness would have stopped short of seeking what was needed for me in each of those moments by weighing what was best for them.

One scripture I find interesting is where we learn about God’s kindness. Romans 2:4 tells us “the kindness of the Lord leads to repentance.” This tells us two really important things. One is God’s kindness exposes our sin and brokenness because that is what repentance is- turning away from the things that break us and break God’s heart. Kindness from God looks like showing us what we need to let go of - and that is not always easy but it is always for our good. But the other implication from this scripture is God’s heart toward us is one of seeking what is best for us, and that was at great personal cost for Him. Jesus was not being nice when he chose to leave heaven and come be with us. That baby born in a manger paid a great cost to live perfectly and then ultimately die to pay the price for our sin. It was his desire to do for us what we needed to be safe and saved- to live and die in our place- that brought him to this world. It was kindness.

God sees mothers

I am now a Mom of 28, 26 and 21 year old humans, approaching my 28th Mother’s Day. I often reflect back on all the stages and struggles and sweetness and experiences I have walked (or trudged) in my Motherhood journey, with a desire to share something helpful or encouraging to other moms. Yet because there is so much it usually feels impossible to condense it down to one blog short enough for a busy Mom to read.

Today however, I realized something. Most of the learning and growing and even wisdom I have as a mom can be summed up in this beautiful statement:

God sees me, and he cares for me.

Being a mom can feel like a long journey in being unseen or misunderstood. From middle of the night feedings, to cleaning vomit out of beds, to listening to whining over and over, to being pushed away by teenagers, to going months without looking or feeling cute, to working so hard to make a sweet memory only to have children (or husband’s) complaining- there are lots of moments where the good you are trying to do goes unseen by those around you.

But not by God. He sees every sacrificial act of service, every patient conversation, every thankless load of laundry. He sees it all and he cares for you in it. He He cares about your feelings and hurts. He cares about your desire for connection, your need to protect and cherish your children and your equally strong need to have some space and time for yourself.

Less comfortably, God also sees every self righteous, prideful thought. Every selfish statement, every loss of self control and every ungrateful attitude. To be seen, really seen, means being known in both strength and weakness. But in both, God cares for you.

In his love for you, God often allows the daily grind of motherhood to wear on us: so we will turn to Him for the strength and joy that only He can give. He also allows hardship to enter our lives: so that our hearts can be reshaped and aligned with his heart through persevering and trusting Him. He even allows distance and estrangement with our children at times: so that we can remember the distance he created at the cross between Himself and his child for our salvation. Not everything that happens to us as Mother’s is good. But God brings good out of it. Not everything we do as Mother’s is good, yet God still works even our failures and sin and weakness for good.

One of my favorite stories in scripture is about a mom who was mistreated, cast aside, afraid and hopeless. Her name was Hagar. In Genesis 16 and 22 we read her story. In one of the most beautiful verses in scripture we see Hagar’s encounter with God and her name for God is El-roi “the God who sees me”. God saw her as a pregnant mother to be who felt trapped in an unfair system as well as 14 years later when she was suddenly a single mother who was homeless with no way to provide even the water she and her son needed to stay alive. In both instances, God sees her AND shows his care for her by giving guidance and provision for her need. There is no indication Hagar’s circumstances were radically changed, or at least not quickly. However, in experiencing God personally she was changed. She had hope and the ability to keep going because she knew she was not alone. God saw her, heard her prayers and met her in the lonely places.

God sees you too, Mama. Whether you are in the early stages and sleep deprived or almost to the finish line of high school graduation and feeling panicky about letting go- cry out to Him for comfort and help and guidance. He sees you and he cares for you. You can trust him to help you parent at every stage, to comfort you in sadness, to correct you in sin and to stay present and connected to you.

He sees you and he loves you. Happy Mother’s Day.

Bonfires are better than Fireworks, because Marriage is a long haul

“Marriage should be a consistently close, happy and exciting relationship where being ‘in love’ with your spouse, being desired by your spouse and feeling generally happy are benchmarks for staying married and secure.”

If one prevalent message in our culture has been more damaging to marriage, I don’t know what it is. While no one states these words, almost every movie, show, book and song are preaching them.

In working with couples trying to learn how to love one another and build strong marriages, often the starting point is repairing broken beliefs about marriage and the ensuing damage they create. Hollywood, fairy tales and social media have all contributed to this messaging for sure. Family of origin and the marriages a person observed growing up also shape this internal thought. But I also find, even within myself, the desire for marriage to be something it wasn’t designed for comes from within more than outside influence.

I grew up in Orlando, Florida which is a rare thing- to be an actual native and not a transplant. As such, I was much less wow’d by Disney World than all the thousands of tourists that traveled to our area every year. But one thing I can affirm- Disney beats everyone with their end of the day fireworks display. (Oh, and Dole Whips! but I digress) Their fireworks are truly spectacular in size and variety and color, timed perfectly to music, lasting long enough to impressed but not so long you get tired of them- they really do create that magical Disney moment.

And then they are over.

Fireworks are amazing, but they burn out quickly. They draw you in and create a magic, albeit fleeting, memory. Similarly, the “in love” euphoria is an intoxicating experience, but not one that is sustainable at that same level of intensity. Marriage is by design a marathon- a long term relationship, meant to span a lifetime. God set it up to work that way. And within that design there IS room for fireworks: moments of sweeping romantic gestures, great sexual experiences and deeply connected moments. But they will not represent the bulk of marriage nor can they be the goal.

The day to day life in a marriage is much more like a bonfire than a firework. A lot less impressive at first glance, but sustainable through regular efforts. The warmth and protection and provision of a bonfire is good, really good in fact. It allows you to draw close, to take the chill off a cold night, to cook a hot dog or marshmallow and to quietly connect at the end of a day. And all that is required is some regular adding of wood and poking the logs occasionally where the fire starts to die out. Marriage is meant to be a relationship full of security, warmth and provision- which it requires some regular tending to keep the fire going. And that requires acceptance of a trade off- magical highs that quickly fade, for faithful commited love that lasts.

We are born with longing and need for connection, significance and security. While living in a broken world, we feel a lack of all of these at times- a parent that does not know how to connect emotionally, a friend that competes with us to feel better about themselves, a teacher that shames us for our lack of knowledge or ability, a crush that rejects us. And on and on. As we live through these painful moments the longing to repair these wounds grows and we often begin to seek out the solution horizontally- that is, in other people around us. But, as seen in scripture, the real solution is to first connect vertically- to God.

“This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another…. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. We love because he first loved us.” (1 John 4:9-11, 18-19)

Through Christ all the deepest needs and longings we experience can be satisified at a soul level, which frees up marriage to be a compliment and companion on our journey, instead of the solution to our brokenness. Our spouse can be freed of the pressure to fix and heal us and instead be a source of reflecting God’s love and care as they imperfectly love over the long haul.

Placing an expectation on your marriage, and therefore spouse, to make you feel significant, secure and constantly desired is the equivalent of pouring water on your bonfire. An reasonably healthy person will fizzle out under that kind of pressure. While those positive experiences can and should, at times, be found within a loving marriage, they will not be permanent. However, if each person in a marriage has a strong vertical connection to God, they will continue to know they are significant, secure and pursued by the love of their heavenly Father. Then instead of looking for fireworks elsewhere, they can do the work of tending to their own marriage- serving and loving even in the absence of magical euphoria, forgive and repair in arguments without fear of being abandoned, be vulnerable enough to admit when they are wrong and apologize. All these actions continue to keep the fire steadily burning for a lifetime and offer the stability and security fireworks cannot. A healthy marriage trades the pursuit of momentary magic for the beauty and warmth of steady and faithful love.