But the Holy Spirit gives us love for others

Romans 15:30 Dear brothers and sisters, I urge you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to join in my struggle by praying to God for me. Do this because of your love for me, given to you by the Holy Spirit.

Romans 13:8 Pay everything you owe. But you can never pay back all the love you owe one another (NIRV).

Galatians 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love.

Last week I had the opportunity to share about Karis’s experience with a group of chaplains. It brought back to me the incredible grace, friendship and love we received from people who “joined in our struggle” over the thirty years of her life. Perhaps you are one of them. Thank you. How could we have survived without you?

*Two of Karis’s precious friends, who stuck with her through thick and thin (photo near the end of her life)*

As we consider our reasons for thankfulness this week, I also think of you who read and interact with this blog. Your comments and appreciation encourage me to continue, but I’m going to make a change. As an attempt at greater “searchability,” the posted title will reflect the content. “But God …” will still be the theme, but it will appear in the post itself. Feedback to this change is welcome!

One thing that will not change is my desire to post YOUR story of how God has intervened in your life. I would love, love, love for you to write and share your experience with God, to encourage other people and give him credit.

Today’s post is the last one in “ordinary time” of the church calendar, since I’ll be engaged with my gathered family on Thursday, and Nov. 28 is the first Sunday in Advent. Here and there I’ve seen references to people feeling anxious about gathering with their families this holiday season, fearing conflicts over political issues.

I find it encouraging that in this, Paul’s last reference to the Holy Spirit in the book of Romans, Paul shows us the beautiful fruit the Holy Spirit desires to grow in us, the fruit of love. We can ask the Holy Spirit to grow love in us, to increase our desire for harmony with those most important to us, our own families.

We have so much to share and to be grateful for—let’s not allow it to be sabotaged by politics! Instead, let’s listen to each other. Covid has increased many people’s feelings of loneliness, possibly people among our own families and friends.

And if you’d like a great (and entertaining) sermon about preparing our hearts for the holidays, I recommend Alex Banfield Hicks’ sermon yesterday (if it’s not up yet, it will be soon)!

Happy Thanksgiving.

But the Holy Spirit makes us holy

Romans 15:14-16 I am fully convinced that you are full of goodness. You know these things so well you can teach each other all about them. … I bring you the Good News so that I might present you as an acceptable offering to God, made holy by the Holy Spirit.

1 Peter 1:16 “You must be holy because I am holy” (quoting Lev. 11:44-45, 19:2) [You must be continually be made holy.]

Revelation 22:11 Let the one who is holy continue to be holy. [Let the holy continue being made holy.]

Last week we hired two men to clean up our yard and garden and prepare it for winter. They did more in two days than I had managed to do in several weeks. I am SO relieved and grateful.

I thought of this when I read this next “Holy Spirit” passage in Romans. The decision to hire two men to help me required admitting I couldn’t do it myself. It cost us cash we wouldn’t normally spend like that. It pinched my pride. But every day, several times a day, I look outside and say, “Thank you, thank you, thank you.” I’m sure our neighbors are grateful too.

*Weeded, mulched, our side of the hedge trimmed, three baby trees protected from deer… Thank you, thank you, thank you!*

“There was a boy named Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.”

Remember Eustace in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by CS Lewis?

When Eustace decided he wanted to change his dragon life, he tried in every way he could to do so himself. Failing, he finally allowed Aslan to dig deeply enough to do it for him, a painful but gloriously freeing intervention that transformed him from graceless to gracious.

To better understand Paul’s wordplay, “made holy by the Holy Spirit,” I did a small study of the Greek words translated “holy.” The two words most used in the New Testament, including this phrase, come from the same root. Hagios is a description of something or someone, declaring them to be sacred, pure, blameless. It’s a state of being, not an attainment, eg. the Holy Spirit whenever he appears, and God saying, “I am holy.”

Hagiazo, by contrast, is a process; it means to make something or someone holy; to purify, sanctify, consecrate, hallow. We can’t make ourselves holy, no matter how hard or how long we try. Only the Holy Spirit can do this for us, because innately, we are not holy. We are being made holy (hagiazo) by the Holy (hagios) Spirit—and this is ongoing, as long as we live in this fallen world. Our human goodness—acknowledged by Paul in verse 14—is not adequate to the purity God desires. Only he can do that in us, as any of us who have tried to “be good” can easily acknowledge.

Because of Jesus sacrifice on the cross, we don’t have to be “good enough” to please our Father. His love for us doesn’t depend on that. But he does want us to grow in holiness and in every virtue, for the sake of his needy and broken world, for the sake of our relationships, for the sake of our own joy.

Our part is to submit to God’s work in us through the Spirit, as Eustace submitted to Aslan in Lewis’s story. As Paul told us repeatedly in Romans 8, we can do this with confidence. We can trust the Holy Spirit’s work in us, because he is pure love.

Read back over the Holy Spirit references I’ve been highlighting in these blog posts, to remind yourself how trustworthy he is. Not always to protect us from pain, because growth and change are painful. But to accomplish his purposes in us when we reach the place, like Eustace, when we desire his holiness more than we desire our own comfort; when we desperately want his healing and restoration; when we know we can’t do it ourselves and cast ourselves on his mercy and grace.

This prayer-hymn keeps coming back to my mind as I’ve thought about these Scriptures and have sat with him, asking him to do the work I need today in my heart-garden.

Heavenly Father, in you we live and move and have our being: We humbly pray you so to guide and govern us by your Holy Spirit, that in all the cares and occupations of our life we may not forget you but may remember that we are ever walking in your sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

But Jesus faithfully forgives us, by Dick Grady, President of Global Church Planting Network

1 John 1:9 But if we confess our sins to Jesus, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.

One of our GCPN partners recently shared this story:

Solomon and his team are training new believers in a region where Christians were martyred just three years ago. Apparently, one of the training participants (we will call him Mark) had a brother among those martyrs. Mark had become a follower of Jesus like his brother, so he fled to a neighboring country, fearing for his safety.

In fact, Mark had traveled back to his home region just to attend Solomon’s training, but he didn’t know two of the men who killed his brother were also attending the training.

The intense time began when he entered the room and the two men acknowledged him, Solomon said. Tears broke out from the two men as Mark fumed with anger and urgency of wanting revenge. The training was put on hold to sort out this hot issue. Mark, a man Solomon knew as peaceful, honest, and strong in faith, confessed he was filled with anger and strong will to make these men suffer just like his brother.

Solomon said it took all night to calm the group. The killers begged for forgiveness from Mark. One of the murderers made this confession:

I understand what I did was wrong. I have no excuse. I have nothing to pay equal to the loss, pain, and sufferings you have passed through. But after your brother’s death, God touched my soul as he did with you and your late brother. I believe in Jesus Christ now; I am a new man!

The killers offered Mark their own lives. After some time, Mark decided to leave the training. It was impossible to convince him to stay, one of the trainers said. He left around 3 a.m. Then at 6 a.m. he showed up again. Mark testified how God spoke to him to learn the power of the cross. Mark said Holy Jesus spoke to him and forgave him.

Solomon continued, He said he had no choice but to forgive these men and learn how to treat them as brothers.

Solomon told me that Mark sat with the men who had killed his brother and joined in the training. They all shared testimonies about difficulties they had encountered since choosing to follow Jesus.

We prepared a lot for the training, Solomon said. But we are now facilitating something we had not planned. We are allowing the Spirit to lead.

But the Holy Spirit’s power gives us confidence

Romans 15:1-5, 13 We must not just please ourselves. We should help others do what is right and build them up in the Lord. For even Christ didn’t live to please himself … May God help you live in complete harmony with each other, as is fitting for followers of Christ Jesus. … I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.

When I was eleven and in the U.S. on furlough from Guatemala, our family visited my grandmother in Liberal, western Kansas. My sister Marsha and I slept on the floor of Grammy’s office. We noticed a row of boxes on the bottom shelf of her bookcase, the kind paper came in back then. Curious, we peeked inside one of them, and then the others. Each contained a neatly typed book manuscript. Every night after we were sent to bed, Marsha and I muffled our gasps and giggles over Grammy’s romantic novels, carefully keeping the pages and boxes in order. We loved her stories, even though we never ‘fessed up about our nocturnal invasion of her privacy.

I have no idea what became of those works after Grammy died. No relatives I asked knew anything about them. I suspect whoever cleaned out her house simply through her delightful work away. How sad.

My proposal for Book One of the Cally and Charlie series, Horse Thief 1898 (see https://horsethief1898.blog) has been turned down by forty literary agents. Why? Because I don’t have an adequate platform. What does that mean? It means, for starters, I don’t have at least ten thousand followers on at least two social media platforms and on my blogs. It means I can’t guarantee selling ten thousand books myself, through speaking, writing, and book signing events, thus recouping the costs to a publisher of taking a chance on my books in a very crowded market.

Not confidence-producing, right? So, what do I do with my conviction that God wants me to write these books? Turns out, most writers I know believe that’s true for them as well. So it doesn’t mean much in the publishing industry, but it still means a lot to us.

I’ve cycled through many different ways to think and feel about this situation. About the countless hours I’ve invested in research and writing about Cally and Charlie. Oddly enough, since I’ve given up my quest for a literary agent, and plunged back into Book Two, Treasure Hunt 1904, I feel energized and hopeful again. I feel like I’m doing what God has gifted and directed me to do. I’m trusting God to show me a step at a time how to walk forward into self-publishing Horse Thief 1898 and subsequently Treasure Hunt and Facing the Faeries. We have so many more options available now than Grammy had in the 1950s and 60s.

The number of books being published these days is overwhelming. Even so, we writers keep on writing more. Like Eric Liddell, we can each say, “When I write, I feel God’s pleasure.” Though her work wasn’t known outside her small office, I suspect my Grammy felt the same way.

So I’m curious. In what ways does the Holy Spirit give you confidence and hope in the work he’s called you to do?

But God will cover us with his feathers, by Barbara Alexander, Villers St Paul, France

Psalm 91:4, 14 He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge … The Lord says, “I will rescue those who love me. I will protect those who trust in my name.”

One day recently, during my early morning quiet time, I came upon Psalm 91:4.

Having gone through (and continuing to go through) difficult times (health issues) over the past 20 years, the image of me being covered with God’s “feathers”, and being sheltered under His wings, was of immense comfort to my soul and spirit. After all, is He not the Infinite God – without measure, without boundaries? How awesome His feathers!!

And when I contemplate His limitlessness, an illustration always helps me keep a more proper perspective:

Suppose I were to walk out my front door, and walk in a straight line, over buildings, in the air. And suppose I were to keep on “walking”, over mountains, countries, oceans, and out into space, never stopping, always moving, past stars and galaxies, swirling masses of celestial bodies. If I could do that, and NEVER stop, just keep on going, going, going – I would never get to the end of God – NEVER! And, no matter what direction I took, – north, south, east, west – the result would still be the same: He is out there, limitless, infinite, and WAY beyond the capacity of my feeble brain to imagine!

That said, as I took the dog out for our daily “promenade” that Psalm 91:4 morning, I paused for a moment on the sidewalk. I live in a small town in France, about 30 minutes’ drive north of Paris. In town, the buildings/houses/fences front the sidewalk – there is no grass between the tar of the sidewalk and the walls. Most often I find myself on a sidewalk on these outings, and that morning was no exception.

So as I paused on that morning’s walk, I was beside a building, but no eaves hung over my head. The sky was pretty clear as I recall, blue above me with a few clouds. Usually I keep on moving when I’m out with my dog Fifi – after all, that’s the purpose of this little jaunt, to get her out so she does her stuff. But that particular morning I guess neither of us was in a hurry, so I found myself standing still for a moment.

All of a sudden I noticed something in my field of vision in front of me – above me – something small and white, floating lazily down, in a zig-zag fashion, floating, gently falling, slowly, softly descending to the ground. I realized it was a little feather, an inch and a quarter long, probably from a pigeon, as there are quite a few of those around, especially on the roof of the large 12th-century stone church in the center of town, close to my home. But there were no pigeons above me as I stood there out on the sidewalk – just open sky above my head.

So where did that feather come from?

I reached down to pick it up, noting the perfect symmetry like a leaf, the soft whiteness, the fluffy curl of the “branches.” And there, in the bright, quiet morning, it seemed God was speaking to my heart: “Yes, My child, I am covering you with My feathers – feathers of love, feathers of protection, feathers of peace. You are in My infinite care, and always will be. Rest, My child, REST there, and know that My Infinite care of you cannot be surpassed. I am your Sovereign protection, over every cell of your body, every heartbeat, every breath. Rest, My child, REST.”

Needless to say, I put the feather in my pocket, took it home, and mounted it on a card, whereupon I wrote Psalm 91:4, and placed it where I would see it often. And when I see it, the truth it represents continues to comfort and calm my soul and spirit, and remind me Who is in COMPLETE control of everything that touches my little life here on this planet Earth, which is but a pinpoint in our galaxy, which is but a pinpoint in the universe, which is totally contained by the Sovereign Lord of the universe.

So, what exactly was I worrying about just now??? :):):)

But the Holy Spirit mediates harmony

Romans 14:10-20 Why do you condemn another believer? . . . Each of us will give a personal account to God. So let’s stop condemning each other . . . For the Kingdom of God is not a matter of what we eat or drink, but of living a life of goodness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. . . Let us aim for harmony in the church and try to build each other up. Don’t tear apart the work of God.

Romans 12:18 Do all you can to live in peace with everyone.

These words of Paul’s to the Romans almost two thousand years ago, could well have been crafted for us today. I’m asking myself, Am I doing all I can to live in peace? What further actions can I take?

Yesterday I listened to a Braver Angels podcast with Kirsten Powers. She offered many practical tips for grounding ourselves, setting healthy boundaries, and living in grace rather than contempt, anxiety, or anger. She also discusses what grace is not. It’s worth a listen!

Grace Under (Political) Pressure? | Kirsten Powers with Mónica Guzmán

Thinking of you who read this blog with thankfulness and love.

But the Holy Spirit prays for us

Romans 8:26-27 The Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words. And the Father who know all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God’s own will.

I’ve been trying to think of some of the most beautiful human prayers I’ve been privileged to hear. Andrea Bocelli and Celine Dion come to mind singing “The Prayer.” Here is Pentatonix singing that prayer.

Yesterday in church we sang Frances Havergal’s prayer, “Take My Life.” Here it is mediated by Brian Doerksen.

Elise Massa sings prayers directly from Scripture in Sunrise: Songs for the Morning.

What are your favorites?

Can you imagine then the beauty of a prayer by the Holy Spirit, fully knowing us, fully identifying with our pain and our needs and desires, linking our hearts to the heart of the Father. We don’t know how to pray. But the Holy Spirit prays for us, pleading for us. He knows. He cares.

Amazing. So comforting, especially when we’re aware of our weakness and brokenness.

“Someone Must Have Been Praying”—yes. Always, the Holy Spirit. Even when we’re afraid. Even when we feel alone.

But the Holy Spirit gives a foretaste of future glory

Romans 8:22-23 All creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us.

Before we left my sister’s home for the Boise airport, I received an email from the airline saying delays were possible due to thunderstorms in Chicago. My flight was still listed as On Time.

At my gate, the information board had switched to Delayed, from an 8:15 departure to 10:00. Soon an agent announced a further delay to 11:30 and asked us to make our own arrangements for connecting flights. Long lines immediately formed in front of the two agents. I called my airline and heard wait time would be 5–10-minutes.

An hour later, a representative finally responded, breezily telling me I should have no problem with my connecting flight since my Boise flight would depart at 10:00 and my flight out of Chicago was also delayed. I checked the board: indeed, it still said 10:00 a.m. I told him of the announced delay to 11:30. He said, “Well, if you’re worried, there is one seat left on the 6:10 p.m.” Gratefully, I took it. He said, “Stop worrying. We’ll get you home today one way or another.” I wasn’t worrying. I had simply asked what my options were for getting to Pittsburgh. But I imagine he had spent his day speaking with worried travelers.

We left Boise a little after 1:00 and landed at O’Hare in bright sunshine. Puddles here and there bore witness to the earlier storm. But the airport was a madhouse. Social distancing was impossible. I can only imagine the logistic challenges to restore normalcy to air travel in and out of Chicago following this benign and relatively brief weather event.

The information board said “Boarding Closed” re. my original flight. I thanked God for my seat on the 6:10, and for a place to sit at my gate after a flight departed for Houston. Passengers waited at B3 for at least three additional flights, their departures scheduled half an hour apart. The 6:10 flight was delayed three times, and then our gate changed. We all trooped down the concourse to merge with passengers at B8, and finally departed for Pittsburgh at 8:00.

In both airports, I observed that passengers did not connect with each other. Despite sharing a common reality—delayed flights and competition for available electrical outlets for our phones, laptops and iPads—each of us kept to ourselves or spoke on our phones. A primary reason for this (apart from dependence on our devices), I suspect, was the mask each of us wore. A parable.

I had time to reflect on other periods of waiting I’ve experienced, when every minute was torture because the outcome was likely to be bad news, rather than the joy of simply going home. We can be encouraged, Paul says, because we wait for Jesus with eager hope, with a guaranteed glorious outcome. We may—actually, we do—experience tough things along the way. But our final Homegoing will be spectacular, the fulfillment of our lifetime of longings. Definitely worth the wait!

But God gives hope of freedom from death and decay

Romans 8:20-23 Against its will, all creation was subjected to God’s curse. But with eager hope, the creation looks forward to the day when it will join God’s children in glorious freedom from death and decay. For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering.

In São Paulo, we lived a few blocks uphill from one of the city reservoirs, Represa Guarapiranga, a sizeable lake surrounded by grass and trees and flowers and birds. A flock of herons occupied an inlet; exotic pheasant-like birds whose name I don’t remember nested on the shore. Cows, horses and stray dogs wandered there (watch your step!). Neighborhood men and boys fished and played soccer, flew kites and maneuvered battery-powered miniature airplanes.

Hungry for green space in our industrial city of 22 million (our house had no yard), our family celebrated Easters with sunrise breakfasts at the represa and on clear nights sometimes glimpsed a few stars. We jogged there and picnicked, enjoying the gracious accent of sailboats and other craft.

Our neighbors were less sanguine about using the represa shoreline. Drugs were sold and smoked. Assaults and murders, kidnappings and rapes were too-often reported. Vagrants bathed and slept there. Soccer fields flooded during rainy season, while mosquitos thrived.

From our upstairs windows, the represa offered a soothing touch of nature amid the concrete and traffic. Such a lovely image—from a distance. Up close—hmm, not so much:

*Sadly, I can’t find the photo I took of the Guarapiranga* *shoreline*, *but this gives you the idea.* Shutterstock: Wipas Rojjanakard

My friend Loide, an architect who worked for the city, long nurtured a vision for our neighborhood shoreline. On a visit several years after Karis and I left São Paulo for Pittsburgh, I discovered Loide’s plans had been embraced and funded! Cultivated flora framed walking/jogging paths, exercise equipment, benches, and concrete tables with painted-on gameboards. The half-mile park hugging the shoreline of “our” represa was fenced, protected and maintained by a staff of guards and gardeners. Hundreds of people, from infants to elderly, now safely enjoyed the reclaimed space.

For me, Loide’s park, infusing hope in a setting of violence and violations, is an image of restoration—what Paul calls “a foretaste of future glory.”

Almighty and everlasting God, mercifully hear the supplications of your people, and in our time grant us your peace.

But God’s Spirit joins with our spirit

Romans 8:14-17 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him “Abba, Father.” For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm we are his children, we are his heirs. In fact, together with Christ we are heirs of God’s glory. But if we are to share his glory, we must also share his suffering.

Not fearful slaves. Children and heirs, who can call the creator and sovereign over the universe, Daddy.

No matter our social position on Earth, whatever our story, in the Kingdom of God, where the last will be first and leaders are to be servants, each of us is welcome at the royal table. Because first, the King of kings stooped down to live with us.

Our friend Annette introduced us to a beautiful song, whose story is here. The text follows, and you can listen here or here.

Thou who wast rich beyond all splendour,
All for love’s sake becamest poor;
Thrones for a manger didst surrender,
Sapphire-paved courts for stable floor.
Thou who wast rich beyond all splendour,
All for love’s sake becamest poor.

Thou who art God beyond all praising,
All for love’s sake becamest man;
Stooping so low, but sinners raising
Heavenward by thine eternal plan.
Thou who art God beyond all praising,
All for love’s sake becamest man.

Thou who art love beyond all telling,
Saviour and King, we worship thee.
Emmanuel, within us dwelling,
Make us what thou wouldst have us be.
Thou who art love beyond all telling,
Saviour and King, we worship thee.

Let this beautiful praise fill your heart today.

Almighty God, whose most dear Son went not up to joy but first he suffered pain, and entered not into glory before he was crucified: Mercifully grant that we, walking in the way of the Cross, may find it none other than the way of life and peace; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord.