Psalm 37:1-3, 5, 7, 12-13 Don’t worry about the wicked or envy those who do wrong. For like grass, they soon fade away. Like spring flowers, they soon wither. Trust in the Lord and do good. . . Be still in the presence of the Lord and wait patiently for him to act. Stop being angry! Do not lose your temper—it only leads to harm. For the wicked will be destroyed . . . The wicked plot against the godly; they snarl at them in defiance. But the Lord just laughs, for he sees their day of judgment coming.

Don’t worry.

Trust in the Lord and do good.

Be still in the presence of the Lord.

Wait patiently for him to act.

Stop being angry! It only leads to harm.

Hey, is it just me, or do you also find these instructions challenging? How can we not react with worry, anger, and agitation when we see injustice and wrongdoing hurting people we love and care about? And when we have so little power to make it stop?

Through the guidance of my spiritual director, I’ve had to stop reading about Venezuela every day. It was making me too upset and anxious, affecting my ability to “do good” in other arenas. Instead, though I pray every day, I’m now spending just one focused time catching up on Venezuela each week. And I’m having to apply this to other areas of injustice too. Clearly, I have a long way to go in learning to trust, not be angry, and wait patiently for the Lord to act.

While I was thinking about Psalm 37 this morning, the image came into my mind of a toddler throwing a tantrum. This image does not address the evil that this psalm describes. But it does help me imagine the Lord laughing. Because a toddler is so full of him or herself, so confident that the universe revolves around him or her. Yet toddlers are still so little, and dependent, and limited in their knowledge and understanding that it’s easy to find their displays of temper comical. Haven’t you, as a parent or aunt or uncle or friend, found yourself laughing sometimes at a young child’s certainty of his or her own importance and power?

The tricky thing, as a parent, is not to be pulled in, manipulated, and distracted by toddler drama. I too easily get pulled in and upset by seeing people oppress others, with too little trust in God’s concern about justice. I forget that he is at work behind the scenes, even when I can’t see what he is doing. I forget that I am not impotent: my small attempts to “do good” actually can matter when I give my small loaves and fishes to Jesus (John 6:8-9).

Musing a bit more: a parent who is confident in his own position of love and authority over a little one’s life can respond calmly and proactively when his or her child is out of control. This is what I see God calling me to today. I have let the evildoers of the world have too much power over me. God calls me instead to trust him. Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you your heart’s desires. Commit everything you do to the Lord. Trust him, and he will help you. He will make the justice of your cause shine like the noonday sun (verses 4-6). Can I do it? Only by what the psalmist calls “delight”: conscious, mindful dependence on him, the one who can, in his way and time, make justice shine.

2 Thessalonians 3:3 But the Lord is faithful, and he will strengthen you and protect you from the evil one

Like most couples, my husband of almost 37 years and I had occasionally chatted about those “someday” dreams, when we might travel to places where we’d never been, or minister as short-term missionaries.

In 2017 he “graduated” to a suffering-free life. A year or so beforehand, I began to realize how fragile life is, and that I should start to prepare myself for living without him. Earlier that year, we were told that his case was chronic; in other words, no cure was to be expected.

The end came rather unexpectedly, with no time to say goodbye or even “I love you”, though of course those latter words were repeated often over the years.

Mourning brought with it lonely days and nights in an empty house. At the same time, more than ever before in my life, I clung to God and discovered new treasures in his Word as they spoke to my new situation.

Life is unpredictable. We can’t put our trust in humans, in our own dreams, or in our own expectations.

Although some people assured me that I was “a strong woman” and would survive, I knew that I was weak by nature. My true strength was my heavenly Father. As Paul said, “he will strengthen you.”

My husband’s name was Refugio, or Refuge, but at the end of the day I have had to realize that my true, unfailing refuge is the Lord.

Margie, Refugio and their grandchildren in 2016.

She says, “These (along with her two children) are gifts the train of life has given me.”

Margie is Canadian, and we became friends at Wheaton College. We dreamed of being partners in mission to some remote place, she as a Bible translator and I as a doctor. Then Dave and I started dating, and she went to Mexico and met Refugio . . .  Margie lives in Puebla, Mexico, where she writes and teaches. The last time I had seen her was at my wedding, but she made the trip from Puebla to Cuernavaca to visit my sister and me when I was visiting Jan a couple of years ago, a lovely treat!

Margie is translating Karis, All I See Is Grace into Spanish! Please pray for her in this challenging work of love.

Psalm 34:15-16 The eyes of the Lord watch over those who do right; his ears are open to their cries for help. But the Lord turns his face against those who do evil; he will erase their memory from the earth.

As I unpacked my suitcase and began tackling the weeds that grew up while we were gone to our extended family reunion (44 people, if I counted right, out of 67 if everyone had been able to come), I tried to make sense out of these verses. They give me hope in various directions—what’s happening in Venezuela and in our own country, for example. I grieve, and weep, yet I have hope that those who do evil will be held accountable by God, and that our Lord is amazingly able to help and stand with those who are suffering injustice and oppression, as tough and painful and impossible as situations do become.

On the other hand, is it really a good idea for the Lord to erase from the earth the memory of those who do evil? Isn’t it a good thing to remember, and see the consequences of their acts, so that we can choose differently for ourselves?

With many tears, I’m reading The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson. Since I didn’t grow up in this country, I’m trying to educate myself on its history. Appalling as it is, I need to try to understand the heritage of my neighbors. Otherwise, how can I understand them? I may hurt them out of ignorance, without even realizing I’m doing so. If ignorance of the law is no excuse, how much more is there no excuse for not trying to understand those among whom we live here, not just “overseas,” the places we go with the desire to bring blessing and healing to people of other cultures and nations.

The organizing team chose the theme of “legacy” for our family reunion. Our oldest sister shared with us a genogram of the five generations of our family she has known. She recounted a brief outline of our family history, which includes a great deal of evil and consequences of that evil which have stretched down through the generations. Some of our children (we call our generation the “Gr8~8 sibs and spouses,” and our kids the “cousin generation) knew very little of this story. For some, it gave a framework for understanding family dynamics which had been confusing to them.

The marvelous thing, though, is that our history was told within a context of hope. Our sister recounted the healing path God has provided for the eight of us sibs, and all but one of the eight were able to be there and to add our own comments and perspectives as we wished. The overall tone was of wonder and gratitude to God for what he has done, and the benefits that our healing passes on to the next generations. God’s grace is all over this story!

So here’s what I’m thinking (provisionally!) at this moment about God erasing the memory of evildoers from the earth. When we don’t need to remember anymore—when our healing is complete—those memories of pain and wounding will fade away into the joy of the abundant life God intends for us. Maybe that will be our experience only in Heaven. Meanwhile, there are maybe three (at least) ways of remembering. One is with bitterness and anger, the expression of what is killing us inside. This can be done with vengeance, hurting others as we have been hurt, or with the goal of cleansing it from our hearts. Our REVER (emotional healing) ministries are all about that. This kind of remembering—when the wounding is still raw and powerful inside us—is marked by desperation and a profound need for liberation from emotional bondage. When we’re able to leave vengeance in God’s hands, he can take us to healing. His ears are open to our cry for help.

A second way of remembering is to learn from and not repeat the past (easier said than done!). This is often marked by a strong desire to change history, to be different and to make a difference. And by humility and insecurity, as we realize we can only do that in dependence on God.

A third way of remembering is all about wonder and awe, praising God for what he has done for us, freeing us as only he can from the natural negative consequences of what has hurt us. Come, let us tell of the Lord’s greatness; let us exalt his name together (Psalm 34:3).

This journey is not a sprint. It’s a marathon. Hold on to the hope!

Psalm 18:16-19 The Lord reached down from heaven and rescued me; he drew me out of deep waters. . . I was in distress, but the Lord supported me. He led me to a place of safety; he rescued me because he delights in me.

We used to call the Transplant ICU at Montefiore Hospital “The Dungeon,” and never more so than after Karis spent time in an incredibly light and bright ICU in Maine, where every room had picture windows. “Our” TICU was in a basement, with small, high windows looking out at brick or concrete walls, usually covered by blinds.

I suppose there was some logic to this arrangement—after all, most of the patients in that place were unconscious most of the time. Usually by the time they were aware enough of their surroundings to notice, they were on their way up to the floors, where the rooms did have big picture windows and views. But The Dungeon was hard on family members, especially for frequent flyers like us. The rooms were small, crowded with equipment and the noise of machines. There was no space for any comfort for an anxious mom or dad, brother or sister or friend, except for a folding chair or a stool to perch on. Any procedure that required two or more medical personnel squeezed family into a corner or out the door.

Why am I telling you all this? Because these verses from Psalm 18 became a lifeline for me. The NIV and most English translations translate verse 19 as “He brought me out into a spacious place.” Both concepts, of safety and of wide, open spaces, were life-giving to me in those long days (and sometimes weeks) of fighting to bring Karis back from the valley of death. When it all seemed to close in on me, the Lord supported me by broadening my imagination into spaciousness, helping my spirit roam through acres of gardens and mountain vistas of vast oceans. In my mind’s eye I could look up to the heavens and marvel at the expanse of glimmering stars or see amusing figures in puffy clouds.

It’s not surprising that after Karis went Home, I found healing in wandering outdoors, with no confining walls, beeps and whirs, tubes and bandages, gowns and hospital smells. All these years later, I quickly feel suffocated by small spaces. But I want to register today my gratitude to the Lord for supporting me through those days and weeks in the TICU. And if you find yourself in a tight, weary, anxious place, you too can ask the Lord to lead you into safety and spaciousness.

Our Lord Jesus, Creator of the universe, confined himself to the restraints of a human womb, a human body, for our sake. He understands our needs. He rescues us because he delights in us. Love so amazing . . .

Psalm 18:1-2, 30-31, 46 I love you, Lord; you are my strength. The Lord is my rock, my fortress, and my savior; my God is my rock in whom I find protection. He is my shield, the power that saves me and my place of safety . . . He is a shield for all who look to him for protection. For who is God except the Lord? Who but our God is a solid rock? . . . The Lord lives! Praise to my Rock!

As Dave and I prayed together before we got out of bed this morning, our list was long of people we know going through big challenges right now. Our hearts go out to them because, yes, we’ve been there. And often through the tough years with Karis, God brought to my attention this image of himself as my rock. Flipping through the Psalms, I see noted on many pages dates and brief notations of times the Lord impressed on me that when all was uncertain and tumultuous around me, I could plant my feet firmly on him, on solid rock. This is what I’m praying for our friends today.

Sometimes placing my feet on the Rock requires digging deep, clearing away the mud and debris that make the surface slippery and separate me from direct contact with my firm foundation (see Luke 6:48). For me, that requires time, even a few minutes of quiet stillness, asking God to show me what needs attention in my life. The first moments after I wake up in the morning, before I even move, are a time like that for me.

A house on a rock

And I’m finding that a task which seems so hard to fit into my days—weeding!—carries that reward with it as well. I don’t know how it is for you, but we have had so much rain here in Pittsburgh that the weeds are growing like crazy. I can’t keep up with them, and I’m somewhat comforted that it seems many of our neighbors are in the same predicament. One friend said her weeds are smirking at her. But I’ve discovered weeding as a time I can be quiet before God, communicate my concerns to him. Listen to him. Place my feet back on the solid dependableness of who he is. Find safety once again.

Speaking of that, I need to get out there before it gets any hotter. The weeds are smirking!

Psalm 3:1-3; 5:11-12 O Lord, I have so many enemies; so many are against me . . . But you, O Lord, are a shield around me; you are my glory, the one who holds my head high. . . Let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them sing joyful praises forever. Spread your protection over them, that all who love your name may be filled with joy. For you bless the godly, O Lord; you surround them with your shield of love.

I have a friend who is going through an unbelievably tough time right now. She has a condition that prevents her from doing everything she is passionate about. It’s not at all clear yet whether this will ever heal or change. I noticed when talking with her this week that she feels her true battlefield is inside her own mind, fighting enemies like despair, anxiety, panic, and futility. And loneliness, because she basically can’t leave her home right now.

She is one who often in the past encouraged others (including me, I reminded her, in some of my tough times with Karis). Now she wonders whether that was all fake, a kind of hypocrisy, since she feels she’s not doing well in her own struggles. She doesn’t think she’s a good model of the trust in God she recommended to others.

Isn’t that just like the enemy, to “play dirty,” to punch us when we’re down, to know exactly where we’re vulnerable, where he can hurt us most? We, her friends, can help her trust in God’s shield of love as we surround her and fight for her in prayer. Not just one or two of us, but many of us, can help her hold her head high. We can do this because she is humble enough to admit she needs our help, that this battle is too big for her to manage alone.

I’ve mentioned before a tough time in my own struggle, when I confessed to a pastor that I didn’t feel able to trust God. Instead of judging, condemning, exhorting, or criticizing me (as I was already doing to myself), he said, “Then it’s time for the Body of Christ to have faith for you.”

Who do you know who needs you to help shield him or her from the attacks of the enemy? In what ways do you need God’s protection through the Body of Christ?

Nehemiah 9:16-17 Our ancestors were proud and stubborn, and they paid no attention to your commands . . . But you are a God of forgiveness, gracious and merciful, slow to become angry, and rich in unfailing love. You did not abandon them.

I’m attending the St Davids  Christian Writers’ Conference in Grove City, PA. This morning Sue, the devotional speaker, told us a wonderful story that I want to share with you. It’s the story behind the third verse of the hymn, “The Love of God.” The third verse goes like this:

Could we with ink the ocean fill, and were the skies of parchment made,

Were ev’ry stalk on earth a quill, and ev’ry man a scribe by trade,

To write the love of God above, would drain the ocean dry;

Nor could the scroll contain the whole, tho’ stretched from sky to sky.

              (Chorus) O love of God, how rich and pure! How measureless and strong!

              It shall forever more endure, the saints’ and angels’ song.

Frederick M. Lehman wrote the first two verses of this hymn in 1917, but he got stuck on verse three—and a proper hymn needed to have three stanzas! After some time, a man brought him the words above, which had been discovered scratched on the wall behind the bed of an asylum patient who had died.

As it turned out, the words had actually been penned long before, in Germany between 1050 and 1100 AD. Henry IV had declared himself a Holy Roman Emperor. But it’s one thing to decide you want to be ruler of the world, and it’s another to convince everyone else. Henry needed a cause, something dramatic that would make him famous. His advisers suggested they mount their own “Crusade” right there in Germany, to extinguish the Jewish population. (Yes: horrifying anti-Semitism way back then!).

Henry decided to meet with the chief rabbi, Rabbi Meir. “Give me a reason not to destroy your people,” he demanded. Rabbi Meir went home and wrote ninety two-line couplets, including what would become centuries later the third verse of “The Love of God.”

Henry was so impressed with Rabbi Meir’s work that he canceled his “Crusade” against the Jews. Since then, Rabbi Meir’s ninety couplets are still used in Jewish worship.

Today, you and I too can celebrate the great love of God, who is a God of forgiveness, gracious and merciful, slow to become angry, and rich in unfailing love. He does not abandon us!

Psalm 115:1, 11, 14-18 Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name goes all the glory for your unfailing love and faithfulness . . . All you who fear the Lord, trust the Lord! He is your helper and your shield . . . May the Lord richly bless both you and your children. May you be blessed by the Lord, who made heaven and earth. The heavens belong to the Lord, but he has given the earth to all humanity. . . . We can praise the Lord both now and forever!

I’m reading a novel about the civil war, written from the perspective of the confederacy. It includes a sermon by a preacher defending as biblical the institution of slavery, as obvious as the inferiority of the Irish and of women. And it details the atrocities committed by the Federalists as they completely lost sight of any goal other than utterly destroying their enemy, their fellow Americans. In the novel, the twelve-year-old protagonist wonders how the idea of fighting for Union matches the fact that the soldiers in their brutality were teaching the South to hate them.

Yikes! Amid the echoes of this same loss of perspective in our political discourse today, Psalm 115 feels to me this morning like a breath of bracing fresh air. God has given the earth to all humanity. We are meant to steward it, and share it, not to fight over it like spoiled kids who think they are the center of the universe or by rights ought to be. Over and over again this beautiful psalm points us away from our idolatry and back to the Lord who, when we celebrate the fact that He—who profoundly loves each one of us!—is the center of the universe. He can put us back on track and pour out his blessings. “He will bless those who fear the Lord, both great and lowly” (verse 13). I don’t have to be “great,” whatever I think that means, to be blessed by the Lord! In fact, Jesus taught that it is the “lowly” who can most enjoy God’s favor.

He loves each one of us so much! He wants so much to bless us! Can we stop spouting nonsense and stop fighting and hurting each other, and turn back to trusting the Lord to be our helper and protector and provider? Can I?

OK. I’m climbing down from my soapbox now. I never have been good at keeping my balance up there.

Mark 13:9-11 You will stand trial before governors and kings because you are my followers. But this will be your opportunity to tell them about me. For the Good News must first be preached to all nations. But when you are arrested and stand trial, don’t worry in advance about what to say. Just say what God tells you at that time, for it is not you who will be speaking, but the Holy Spirit.

This summer on Wednesday evenings at our house a group of friends are gathering to study the book God Space by Doug Pollock. Last week somehow the discussion included martyrs. One of our friends offered this intriguing perspective: that the martyrs faced all at one time in a concentrated way the type of opposition that many believers deal with in milder ways throughout their lifetimes. In both cases, she said, the key is dependence on the Holy Spirit. And what matters is communicating who Jesus is so that the focus is on him, not on us. The Holy Spirit will always glorify Jesus.

This made me think of Jesus as he was dying asking the Father to forgive his murderers. And Stephen in similar fashion with his last breath shouted, “Lord, don’t charge them with this sin!” (Acts 7:60). That’s a life completely empowered by the Holy Spirit.

How did Stephen get to that place of strength and courage and compassion? We don’t know much about him, but when he was chosen to be one of the seven first deacons, Luke tells us he was a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit (Act 6:5). Later in the same chapter, he is described as “full of God’s grace and power, performing amazing miracles and signs among the people” (Acts 6:8). Those who tried to debate him couldn’t stand against the “wisdom and the Spirit with which Stephen spoke” (Acts 6:10).

My takeaway is that I need to develop spiritual muscles by daily submitting to the Holy Spirit, seeking intentionally to keep my life free of whatever might hinder or block his freedom in my life. That way I don’t have to be afraid of encounters big or small that might at any time feel threatening. Or at least, I can admit my fears, offer them to the Lord, and receive through the Spirit his peace and love in their place—love that extends even to those who might want to do me harm. That is “Spiritnatural”!

Matthew 3:11-17 (Mark 1:7-8, Luke 3:16) [John the Baptist said] “I baptize with water those who repent of their sins and turn to God. But someone is coming soon who is greater than I am—so much greater that I’m not worthy even to be his slave and carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.” . . . Then Jesus went from Galilee to the Jordan River to be baptized by John . . . As Jesus came up out of the water, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and settling on him. And a voice from heaven said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.”

On April 30 2002, the week before her 19^th birthday, Karis attempted a description of her life in Brazil prior to Notre Dame:

I used to be strong. I used to be disciplined. And pure. I would spend each morning and night alone with God in my room, window open, pure, free, overflowing. I would dance far from mirrors. In a very different way, with my whole heart in it, unashamed. I would pray for many people, visit them, make things for them. I and my Father, my God, were very close. The Holy Spirit would speak with me. My work was done with joy. I dreamed huge. I hurt much but it never crushed my spirit. I almost never cried. I could never express enough joy. I brought much joy to my parents, I was the door my sisters took into the world, I was my brother’s companion.

And a couple of weeks later, in May 2002:

I don’t drink. I don’t need to in order to drown frustrations of emptiness or melancholy—don’t need to in order to become wildly joyous and do ridiculous things—don’t need to in order to be soul-close and together with people, to find a reason to laugh or something to be proud of, or even in order to be sick. Don’t need to be freed up from inhibitions. The Holy Spirit drowns, comforts, fills, frees. I get drunk on Him.

Love (expressed in many different ways), and freedom, and joy, and intimacy. That’s how Karis described her experience of the Holy Spirit. Reading all that into the Acts 2 account of Pentecost (where some people thought the believers were drunk!) gives it a different emotional tone from what is explicitly described, but it feels so right to me.

Our long-time worship minister, Jeanne Kohn, chose Pentecost for the day she would officially retire. What a celebration! Besides a couple of spontaneous praise songs introduced along the way, Jeanne planned 22 pieces of music into the service, drawing from a whole variety of worship traditions. (I was struck by this in part because Jeanne did the same for Karis’s memorial service: 22 pieces of music graced that service as well!)

I wish I could share them all with you, but here is one that captures the love, and freedom, and joy, and intimacy the Holy Spirit creates and facilitates in us and among us, an intertwining dance of Father, Son, and Spirit, “I Cannot Dance, O Love.” Here’s the version I found online: