Once I had a neighbor who every fall stretched a line on a pulley from a tree near his house to the frame of the window of his study. At first he hung a bird feeder near the tree, and gradually, over a few weeks, pulled the feeder closer and closer to the window. “The birds don’t seem to notice”, he said, “and eventually I can sit quietly here in my chair, or at my desk and watch them up close.” I saw that it worked, as the feeder was quite busy and already near the house.

I will walk among you, and be your God, and you will be my people.” (Lev. 26:12)

My neighbor wanted nothing more than to enjoy the lives of the birds in a small way, to observe them and have them near him every day. Our God, on the other hand, desires to enter into the lives of His people, to”walk among” us and to be in conscious relationship with us.

The Lord, like my neighbor, is patient. He is willing to wait a short or long time before we find Him to be a welcome companion, even a Friend, and ultimately a Brother. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead I have called you Friends, for everything I learned from my father I have made known to you. (John 15:15).

The attraction of the birds was irresistible to my neighbor. Our lives, too , are irresistible to our God. My neighbor built a line to his house so that he could enjoy the birds more. God has sent a line out to us in His son, who would “gather us in” if we let him: . . . how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you are not willing. (Luke 13:34)

Some birds came to the feeder only as long as it was half way to the house, while others were emboldened to come all the way to the window. The birds were not mindful of a presence desiring to be close to them and drawing them nearer. They did not “know their master’s business”; but we can experience our God and even know His motive: I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness. (Jer. 31:3).

Love in Him,

Prue

Some fifteen years ago my husband Jack was given a small sealed glass globe containing two tiny shrimp swimming around a single small piece of coral. The globe was accompanied by instructions for its care and the admonition that the shrimps’ life expectancy was about two years. The larger of the two died within a year, but the smaller one, about a quarter of an inch long, still dives and swims and rests in its watery dome. It’s unchanging diet is nearly microscopic algae attached to the coral.

I marvel at the tiny creature’s endurance, and I salute it for it’s apparent joie de vivre that communicates to me through the glass

Of the many novels and short stories of the sea written by the Polish/ English author Joseph Conrad, fourteen of them include an incident of suicide. While the suicides have various motivations there is a recurring theme of loneliness resulting in a loss of meaning in life. It’s as if suicide is seen by the author as a somehow understandable response to loneliness.

From the earliest creation God has revealed Himself to be the God of life. . . . the word (of God) is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so that you may obey it. ( Deut. 30:14). Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to Him. For the Lord is your life. . . (Deut. 30:19).

If these scriptures are true, and God is truly our life, then it is also true that we are never actually alone. If a tiny crustacean finds sheer existence well worth living and experiences no self- destructive urges living entirely alone for fifteen years in an unchanging environment, it is because he finds life itself irresistible.

The God who is our life, however, has given us choices. Side by side with our ability to choose are examples like the shrimp, to show us God’s handiwork in another creature: For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor rulers, nor any powers, neither height nor depth nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:38).

Love in Him,

Prue

Watching Nathan Chen on T.V. deliver an exquisite figure skating performance at the Olympics in Beijing was an exhilarating experience made even greater by the announcement that some of the combination of jumps he achieved had never before been seen at the Olympics. Nathan Chen performed five different types of quadruple jumps.

He had committed himself to an unremitting program of training in order to accomplish his goal. He remained focused and concentrated and he persevered against the knowledge that the things he attempted had not been done before.

After so many years of Olympic competition it was a surprise to know that new records could still be set, and the limits of human achievement on ice skates could be pushed ever farther.

Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love Him. (James 1:12).

In our spiritual lives as in skating, it is easy to reach plateaus when we believe that we are as close to our goals as we will ever be, but for those who persevere, God opens the door to more and more of Himself. Indeed, in His kingdom there is no knowledge of what cannot be achieved, but only the resounding promise of the “crown of life” that awaits those who love Him.

Nathan Chen’s perseverance rested on his faith that what had not yet been achieved, yet could be achieved, just as the Christians’ perseverance rests on the faith that God sets no limits to our friendship with Him, for love knows no stopping place.

Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed; for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. (Lamentations 3:22-23)

He is the well of our perseverance, the assurance that our lives bear fruit, no matter how unlikely it may seem to be or how blind we are to His handiwork. He is eternal life itself to those who love Him.

Love in Him,

Prue

Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest. (Mark 6:31) These are the words of Jesus when he and his disciples had been so pressed by the crowds seeking healing that they did not even have time to eat. They are sweet words of concern for his followers. They all attempted to leave, but the crowds followed them seeking more of Jesus.

It was not to the disciples, but to the crowd that Jesus turned: So he began to teach them many things. Jesus turned from the respite he knew he and his disciples needed, to the teaching of “many things” about his Father God. ( Mark 6:34)Tired and hungry, Jesus taught and shared himself with a crowd that eventually reached at least five thousand men. This is the moment remembered as the “feeding of the five thousand” when Jesus broke five loaves of bread and two fish into enough pieces to feed five thousand plus, and had baskets full of leftovers. (Mark 6: 38-44).

After Jesus’ resurrection he met Peter and six other disciples by the Sea of Galilee where they had gone to fish. Jesus three times singled out Peter with a charge : “Do you love me?” Then, “Feed my sheep.” (John 21:15-17). From all that Peter had witnessed in his three years with Jesus he must have known that “feeding the sheep” would mean denying his own hunger and tiredness, that the task would last a lifetime, and that it was the deepest purpose of his life.

Coming apart together to rest with Jesus sounds very welcoming, until I remember that Jesus’ invitation was interrupted by teeming crowds who needed him: When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.” (Mark 6:34). His compassion outweighed his own fatigue and hunger, and Peter witnessed it first hand.

I believe that God’s love for His people outweighs every other consideration in His relationship to us. I believe that we cannot measure that love, yet in every generation there are disciples , even now, hearing His voice and feeding His sheep.

Love in Him,

Prue

When I drew back the draperies in our front room Thursday morning I was startled by the brilliant light that flooded in from the sun’s reflection off the snow outside. It was a sight that we rarely see in Texas.

I had been reading about the white cloud that had flooded the tabernacle that Moses had just completed , and couldn’t help thinking of the “glory of the Lord”: “Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle.” (Exodus 40:34). The times when the white cloud factored into Moses’ and the Israelites” lives were many and frequent. The white cloud was a daily companion to the whole nation for 40 years, and a particular message to Moses when he approached the tent of meeting.

I have heard someone say that it would be easier to believe if we had a more tangible evidence of God’s presence, such as the cloud.

Jesus is that tangible evidence. In showing himself to three disciples in the midst of a cloud on the mountain top he displayed his tangible connection to both the disciples and the Father. (Luke 9:34). From the moment that the risen Jesus said to Mary Magdalene,Do not hold onto me…go instead to my brothers and tell them “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”(John 20:17), we have been given a brother and Father in place of the cloud. We have been invited into an intimate relationship with God. We have been sweetly included in the very family of God as children and heirs: Now if we are children then we are heirs—heirs of God and co—heirs with Christ…(Romans 8:17) He destined us in love to be His sons (and daughters) through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace which He freely bestowed on us in the one He loves.( Ephesians 1:5 )

The glare of the sun on the snow pouring through the window of our cluttered home office, nevertheless opened my mind to the presence of our loving God in Christ in every corner of my life, and I knew again that even sunlight on melting snow can speak of an eternal Father God.

Love in Him,

Prue

One night this winter I stood on a deck over-looking Possum Kingdom Lake, and looked up to see a sky that had almost disappeared behind the density of stars in constellations above and apparently around me. For the first time I felt as if I were truly in the midst of the Milky Way galaxy, and I wanted to stay there. I couldn’t remember ever having seen the sky like that, but it felt entirely familiar. Identifying Orion and others helped with that.

The day is yours, and yours is the night; you established the sun and moon. It was you who set the boundaries of the earth; you who made both summer and winter. (Psalm74:16&17)

When Paul heard the voice of Jesus calling him, he answered, “Who are you, Lord?” as if the voice was familiar, but completely new at the same time. (Acts 9:3-5).

When Moses walked toward the burning bush he walked toward something familiar, the bush, and at the same time something completely new, the fire and the voice.

When we open the Bible to hear God’s voice we open a very old and familiar book, but if we read it without agendas, certain that we can hear Him, the old old book leaps into life and delivers an altogether new message to us. The Spirit of God looks for those who persevere in reading His book. For the eyes of the Lord search back and forth throughout the whole earth to strengthen those whose hearts are set on Him. (Second Chronicles 16:9).

There is no clearer sign of our hearts being set on God than the desire and the resolve to spend time alone with His word. Standing on the deck looking at the Milky Way made me feel as if I was in an entirely different place from my everyday life. I believe that when God finds us in His book He sees us in an entirely different place, and it pleases and sometimes might even surprise Him.

Love in Him,

Prue

In 1558 when twenty-five year old Princess Elizabeth Tudor was confined to house arrest by her half sister Mary, Elizabeth was sitting one day out doors reading a book when she was approached by a group of riders who were men of importance at court in London. She didn’t know if they would require her to return to the Tower of London as a prisoner, or if they had a more peaceful reason to be visiting. In fact, they dismounted and told Elizabeth that Mary had died, and that she, Elizabeth, was now the Queen of England.

Elizabeth’s response was, “This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.” (Psalm 118:23) The whole verse reads, The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this and it is marvelous in our eyes; Let us rejoice and be glad. She had moved from being a rejected prisoner whose life was in the balance, to being the Queen of England in the space of a few anxious moments.

Elizabeth saw the events of her life in the context of scripture, and those events made sense only in that context. She lived in the center of political and religious upheaval. As the daughter of Henry VIII she grew up a “reject” in her father’s march through the lives and deaths of six women in his effort to acquire a male heir.

While Henry was on his quest , one of England’s greatest future monarch’s was growing up in his own household and under his own direction, but he could not see the great queen she would be.

In the process the king wrenched his nation out of the only official church it had known, and sent England on a see-saw of religious instability between Catholicism and Protestantism.

The times were ripe for a young princess to abandon her faith altogether when Henry died and first his Protestant son, then his Catholic older daughter reigned. The stakes were high, as each side felt compelled to annihilate its opposition.

It would seem only natural that a young person in such an environment would become cynical and reject scriptural faith altogether, but it was the scripture itself that Elizabeth read (in Greek) and that gave order out of the chaos of warring religious factors, all claiming to be “Christian.”

Knowing that the living God was at work in her life (“This is the Lord’s doing”), and that His word was accessible to her, enabled Elizabeth I to become the cornerstone of England’s “Golden Age.”

Love in Him, Prue

Gone Fishing

Captains Courageous by Rudyard Kipling is the story of Harvey Cheyne, the spoiled fifteen year old son of a railroad baron. The boy falls overboard from an ocean liner on his way to Europe with his mother. Unknown to anyone on the liner, Harvey is picked up alive by a nearby fishing boat which will not return to port for at least five months. Thus begins the saga of Harvey’s “coming of age”, as he must earn his keep on the “We’re Here” fishing boat for those months at sea.

Near the end of the story Kipling introduces the boy’s father, Harvey Cheyne senior, as he grieves for the loss of his son: “ Of his own sorrow he spoke little—hardly realized the depth of it till he caught himself asking the calendar on his writing desk, ‘ What’s the use of going on?’” The senior Cheyne’s trip to self understanding and change is less dramatic than his son’s, but equally great.

A fishing boat was Peter’s first recourse as he mulled the death and resurrection of his friend Jesus. Peter, too, may have wondered, “What’s the use of going on?” When he said, I’m going out to fish. (John 21:3). When Jesus died Peter knew that he had not been the friend he had wanted to be.

When his son disappeared, the fictional Harvey Cheyne realized that he had not been the father he had wanted to be. The father who thought he had lost a son, and Peter, who thought he had lost Jesus, are both infused with hope and purpose when they finally have a one-on-one encounter with their “lost” one.

I believe that God seeks a one-on-one reunion with every soul. The power of the real knowledge of resurrection can work slowly at first, but it becomes the deepest , most abiding change in Peter. That personal contact with the risen friend was required for Peter’s transformation, enabling him to fulfill Jesus’ promise that Peter would be the rock on which Jesus would build his church. ( Matt. 16:18). Throughout all time the ways of God are still deeply personal, and they still supply the hope, joy, and purpose that we need.

Love in Him,

Prue

My sister Nancy has a buoyant and friendly personality. Until recently she also had bright red hair so that she stood out in a group. When she was first married she taught second grade in the public school.

One day in October while she was teaching, her principal entered the room with a red-headed second grade boy. The principal handed Nancy the boy’s file and said, “You have a new student, Warren Tichman.” Nancy glanced at the transfer paper and saw that Warren had been transferred twice already, both times for “personality conflict” with the teachers.

Nancy placed the student desk face to face with her own desk and told Warren that that was his desk. A month later when his mother came for her first conference Nancy showed her Warren’s work and that it was quite satisfactory. “Yes,” said his mother, “but how is he really doing in the class?” Nancy told me that she decided to be honest. “How do you think a little red-haired boy would do in my class?” she asked.

When the mom left, there were tears in her eyes. Her son had found wholly unmerited favor. When Nancy looked at Warren, she saw the future son she hoped for. She and Warren had a very good year that year.

When God looks at us and sees His son in us, there is favor. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you.. . . I have told you this so that my Joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete (John 15:11). Peter affirms God’s favor toward His people: But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession. (1Peter2:9)

For the time he was in Nancy’s class, Warren was her “special possession.” She confessed that at least some of the children probably thought that he was her son and she never denied it. The children took for granted that he would be favored.

The Bible is full of “chosen” ones who were “favored”. When Saul is told about a young son of Jesse who can play the lyre and who is both brave and a warrior, he is also told , “And the Lord is with him” (1Samuel 16:18), clearly a sign of “favor” before David has even met Saul or heard of Goliath.

Since we are all made in God’s image, it’s safe to say that in a funny way, we are all red-headed believers who are loved and favored by a red-headed God.

Love in Him,

Prue

In the spring of Stephanie’s junior year in high school when she was a villager in “Brigadoon”, a few senior football players were also villagers. They didn’t have lines to speak, but they sang and danced.

One day Stephanie told me that back stage, before the “villagers” went on, she heard Brad, a senior varsity player, say, “If I had known how much fun this is, I’d have done this instead of playing football.”

I asked if he was joking and she replied, “Not at all! He meant it!” I marveled and continue to marvel at that tiny incident with such a big window of possible implications.

Jesus “marveled only twice in the New Testament; once in Nazareth when neighbors he knew and loved didn’t recognize him as holy,( Mark 6:6) and once in Capernaum when a Roman centurion did. (Matthew 8:10).

I was surprised to read that Jesus, who “did not need any testimony about mankind, for he knew what was in each person.” (John 2:25) was himself surprised at the Centurion who recognized God in His son: The Centurion replied, “Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one ‘Go’, and he goes, and that one ‘come’, and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this’, and he does it.

When Jesus heard this he was amazed and said to those following him, ‘Truly I tell you, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith!’ (Matthew 8:8-10)

I was surprised that the centurion’s schooling in obedience was the vehicle by which he recognized God’s son. I was surprised that the centurion so easily identified with Jesus, and I envied him for being able to surprise Jesus.

I believe that if Jesus has given himself to us as fully as we know he has, even this tiny thing, being able to surprise him, has not been withheld. For him to find an opening in our spirits today that wasn’t there yesterday, for him to hear us say, “If I had known how it would be with him before, I would have come sooner,” could surprise him even today.

The fruit of that surprise for Brad was a great time in his senior year before graduation, and for the centurion, an eagerly sought healing for his servant.

Love in Him,

Prue