Twenty questions

But Jesus asked, “What do you want?”

John 1:35-38 The following day [after his baptism by John the Baptist] John was again standing with two of his disciples. As Jesus walked by, John looked at him and declared, “Look! There is the Lamb of God! When John’s two disciples heard this, they followed Jesus. Jesus looked around and saw them following. “What do you want?” he asked them.

Have you played the game Twenty Questions? When I was a child, my siblings and I entertained ourselves on long car trips playing this. A person thinks of an object, and the others try to guess it through asking fewer than twenty questions. The first question is, “Animal, vegetable, or mineral?” to narrow the field.

Jesus’ first question of two men following him also narrowed the field. They could have responded a zillion ways to the question, “What do you want?”

What do you want?

If Jesus showed up in your living room today asking this question, what would you answer?

Jesus is still, two thousand years later, asking this question. I invite you to take a few minutes to respond. And even to write down your answer. Think about it now. What do you really, really want?

Next time, I’ll share a few of my responses. I would love for you to share too.

The mystery of hope

But God is the only Savior

Hosea 13:4 [The Lord says] You must acknowledge no god but me, for there is no other savior.

And what a Savior! I encourage you to take a few minutes to ponder the words of this wonderful celebration of mystery: the hope we hold even in tumultuous times.

Blossoms in winter: 11 blooms this time.

Come, Behold the Wondrous Myst’ry

Keith and Krysten Getty, Matt Boswell, Matt Papa, Michael Bleeker

Come, behold the wondrous myst’ry in the dawning of the King,

He, the theme of heaven’s praises, robed in frail humanity.

In our longing, in our darkness, now the light of life has come.

Look to Christ, who condescended, took on flesh to ransom us.

Come, behold the wondrous myst’ry, he the perfect Son of Man,

In his living, in his suffering never trace nor stain of sin.

See the true and better Adam, come to save the hell-bound man,

Christ, the great and sure fulfillment of the law, in him we stand.

Come, behold the wondrous myst’ry, Christ the Lord upon the tree.

In the stead of ruined sinners hangs the Lamb in victory.

See the price of our redemption, see the Father’s plan unfold,

Bringing many sons to glory, grace unmeasured, love untold.

Come, behold the wondrous myst’ry, slain by death, the God of life.

But no grave could e’er restrain him: praise the Lor, he is alive!

What a foretaste of deliverance, how unwavering our hope:

Christ in power resurrected, as we will be when he comes.

What a foretaste of deliverance, how unwavering our hope:

Christ in power resurrected as we will be when he comes.

A love song from a broken heart

But God yearns for his people

Hosea 11:1-4, 7, 8, 11; 12:6 When my people were children, I loved them … I myself taught them to walk, leading them by the hand. But they don’t know or even care that it was I who took care of them. I led them along with my ropes of kindness and love. I myself stooped to feed them. … But my people are determined to desert me. … Oh, how can I give you up? How can I let you go? My heart is torn within me, and my compassion overflows. … Someday, the people will follow me. … And I will bring them home again, says the Lord. … So come back to your God.

In Hosea 10, God spoke like a farmer. In chapter 11, he is a parent, broken over his children’s rebellion against him. A New Testament parallel is Jesus’ parable often called “The Prodigal Son.” In both cases, the father yearns for the return of his beloved, fugitive child, longing for restoration.

Shutterstock: Adam Jan Figel

I may have commented before that when I write stories, the characters themselves tell me what happens to them, and I just write it down. One scene, reminiscent of Luke 15, still brings tears to my eyes.

In Horse Thief 1898, Cally and Teddy went missing because they had been kidnapped by abusive relatives who wanted to use the orphans as farm labor. The loving people who had been caring for them did all they could to find and free them, but it was the children themselves who found their way home.

Nathanael, prepared to attend Ignacy Paderewski’s Carnegie Hall piano concert,

… sat on his porch swing singing an off-key tune to [his baby] Jimmy, waiting for James to bring the brougham. How grand to hear the famous Mr. Paderewski in the new concert hall!

Tobias wandered out holding the hand of his brother Ben, faces scrubbed, hair still wet.

“Father, look! Is that—”

Nathanael leaped to his feet, thrust Jimmy into Tobias’s arms, and ran down the street, his arms open wide.

Cally and Teddy were filthy. It didn’t matter.

Just so, our Father is thrilled when we come home to him. Even when we’re filthy. He is the one who makes us clean again; to quote Curt Thompson, “Seen, soothed, safe, and secure.”

Press on

But God says our love matters more than sacrifices

Hosea 6:1-3, 6 Come, let us return to the Lord. He has torn us to pieces; now he will heal us. In just a short time he will restore us, so that we may live in his presence. Oh, that we might know the Lord! Let us press on to know him. … [The Lord says] I want you to show love, not offer sacrifices. I want you to know me more than I want burnt offerings.

Over the last week and a half, as we marked eleven years since Karis left us, I have re-read Karis: All I See Is Grace. I couldn’t remember which parts of her life—of the three thousand pages of my first draft—had made the editing cut and into the book. I hadn’t remembered how often she referenced this passage from Hosea.

To understand this, it’s necessary to know that Karis had a high view of God’s sovereignty. She believed that NOTHING happened without the permission of God. He, all-powerful and all-knowing, could end or cause anything at any time. Often, she believed, he did not act when he could have because he so honors human free will. He wants us to choose him of our own volition. He wants us to obey him because we love him, not from force or manipulation. He gives us more latitude in our choices than perhaps we are wise enough to handle. Yet we learn from our mistakes. Painful as their consequences may be, God doesn’t usually step in to shield us from the results of what we have chosen. But this doesn’t mean he doesn’t see, or know, or care what we are going through.

A harder concept for me is Karis’s belief that her birth defect, with all its mosaic of positive and negative impacts on her life, was chosen for her by God. That his purposes for her required the suffering she endured. That had she not spent so much time in clinics and hospitals, she would not have met the people with whom she was meant to share God’s love.

I tend to think that Karis was born without functional intestinal nerves not because God so willed, but because we live in a fallen, imperfect world in which this kind of thing can happen. The question for me is whether we allow God to act within our circumstances to accomplish his desire to love others through us.

Either way, it’s clear God longs for us to know him. To personally know his heart of love toward us. To put ourselves intentionally in the way of knowing him better, in every way we can “pressing on” to know him and to love him, not whatever image of him we have inherited or invented. This, for Karis, was her lifelong quest.

Sovereign by Chris Tomlin

“Don’t fret”

But God calls leaders to account for their treatment of the poor, helpless, and oppressed

Hosea 5:1, 4, 5, 7-8, 15 Hear this, you priests. Pay attention, you leaders. … You have led the people into a snare by worshipping idols. … Your arrogance testifies against you. … You have betrayed the honor of the Lord. … Sound the alarm! … Admit your guilt and return to me.

Amos 2:4-7; 5:15, 21, 24 This is what the Lord says: “The people have been led astray by lies. … They sell honorable people for silver and poor people for a pair of sandals. They trample helpless people in the dust and shove the oppressed out of the way. … You twist justice, making it a bitter pill for the oppressed. … You trample the poor. … Instead, hate evil and love what is good: turn your courts into true halls of justice. … I hate all your show and pretense. … Instead, I want to see a mighty flood of justice, an endless river of righteous living.”

Before I went to sleep, my friend said, “Don’t fret.”

But several times I woke up in distress.

I kept dreaming that I was with friends in a church, or a school, or a home, when ICE came and dragged my friends away. Not criminals. Not illegals. My friends, who had followed all the protocols to enter this country legally. Friends who love the Lord and their families, who work hard and pay taxes, even though they don’t yet receive the benefits of citizenship. Friends who were suddenly jerked away from their children, leaving them in shock and confusion.

Each time, an ICE person yelled, “Sorry, we can’t find enough criminals so we need you to meet our quota!”

Distraught, I went to the Lord. It seemed that current events fit alarmingly well into the prophets I’ve been studying: Hosea and his early contemporary, Amos.

When Hosea and Amos prophesied, King Jeroboam II of Israel had expanded its territory and its trade, making some people very wealthy and many others poor and destitute, ignoring the laws of Moses that would have preserved a level of economic equality. Instead of caring for all people equally, the king and his cronies engaged in and fostered syncretism. They pretended belief in God, while in fact practicing idolatry. They did all kinds of horrible things (including sexual slavery) to keep their god Baal happy, since they credited him with being the source of their prosperity. Instead of protecting needy people through the courts, the needy were “trampled” (Amos 2:7), used and abused and treated unjustly.

Amos preached at Bethel (“House of God”), which Hosea often calls Beth-Aven (“House of Wickedness”) because of the syncretism at this place of worship. Amos was not poor himself: the Hebrew words he uses in calling himself a shepherd denote an owner of sheep and orchards, not a laborer. Yet he anguished over the oppression inherent in the wealth gap of his day. He quotes God as saying, in the words of Eugene Peterson, “I’ve had all I can take of your noisy ego-music … Do you know what I want? I want justice—oceans of it. I want fairness—rivers of it. That’s what I want. That’s all I want” (Amos 5:24, The Message).

Curious about parallels to our time, I discovered that the wealth disparity in the United States has shifted dramatically in the last forty years. “Trickle down” economics hasn’t worked. The most recent figures I found show that the top 10% control 67% of the wealth, whereas the bottom 50% has access to only 2.5%. And this disparity continues to increase, as those with money and power control the laws and the courts to benefit themselves.

Can we expect God’s blessing on us under these conditions?

Interesting in terms of timing: the lesson this week for my international Zoom discipleship group includes Acts 2:42-47 and 4:32-37. “There were no needy people among them” (Acts 4:34), because everyone shared what they had, voluntarily and joyously.

How did this early church portrait become so distorted in practice over time? I know there are still many, many followers of Jesus—we ourselves are supported in missions by these beloved ones—who lovingly and generously share what they have in order to further the work of the Kingdom. Yet I’m left wondering what has happened to the community of believers, that we have supported such a different model nationally.

Don’t fret? “Trust God,” my friend told me. “Everything will work out fine in the end.”

I believe that is true. Ultimately God will bring justice to the world. Come, Lord Jesus. Meanwhile, though, people’s lives, already traumatized, are being smashed to pieces.

I appreciated a song we sang in worship yesterday (God of All Comfort, Resound Worship):

God of all comfort, God of compassion, reveal your mercy through us your church;

Disturb our slumber, move us to action, to show your kingdom on the earth.

Make us like Jesus, full of your Spirit, declaring good news to the poor,

Proclaiming freedom for every captive and the favor of the Lord.

Show us the value of every person, show us your image in every face.

We all are equal, we all are broken, and need the kindness of your grace.

We stand together, here in the margins, here in the hardship and the pain.

We cry for justice and restoration, until the silent sing again.

Loving shame more than honor

But God grieves over us

Hosea 4:1, 3, 6, 7, 12, 18 The Lord has brought charges against you, saying: “There is no faithfulness, no kindness, no knowledge of God in your land … That is why your land is in mourning. … My people are being destroyed because they don’t know me. … They have exchanged the glory of God for the shame of idols. … Longing after idols has made them foolish. … They love shame more than honor.

Nearly three thousand years ago, long before writers like John Bradshaw and Brené Brown helped us understand shame, the prophet Hosea linked it with not knowing God, not understanding his compassion and love, his yearning for a close relationship with his beloved people.

Instead, in Hosea’s day, both leaders and ordinary people turned to idols [anything that takes God’s place in our hearts], pleasures, addictions, violence, unfaithfulness in relationships, sexual depravity, cheating, and other forms of robbery.

Has anything changed in the last three thousand years?

The Hebrew word Hosea uses is gâlôwn, translated shame in most English versions. Associated words are disgrace, confusion, dishonor, ignominy [public disgrace], reproach. This shame is vile, base, and despicable.

“My people are being destroyed because they don’t know me,” laments the Lord (Hosea 4:6, 2:20). “Oh, that we might know the Lord,” cries Hosea (6:3).

The kind of shame Hosea describes is extremely painful. Why would we choose shame rather than honor? Perhaps we fear God’s judgment? Fear the loss of things we’ve come to love? Fear rejection by others if anyone detects our true struggles? As Brené Brown often points out, shame thrives in secrecy, in darkness, in isolation. Shame flees when brought into the light. Yet we fear exposing our shame to God, to others, and even to ourselves, even though that’s the best way to be free from it.

A friend recently described to me her cycle of shame. She feels lonely, or disappointed, or betrayed. To ease those feelings, she escapes into her addiction, soothing herself with a temporary pleasure. When she comes out of that, she’s embarrassed and frustrated with herself that she gave in to a temptation that she knows is harmful to her health. When she’s alone, those feelings are so uncomfortable that she again buries them with her addiction. And on and on her cycle of shame spirals. When she’s with other people, her shame prevents her from indulging, and prevents her from finding help, because she doesn’t want to expose her struggle and become an object of pity or of disdain or of judgment.

Every one of us can relate. Each of us has our own way of trying to escape painful feelings. If we realize it’s not just us, maybe we can become more willing to let an understanding friend listen to our struggle. And go with us into the presence of God, who longs to heal us and show us his compassion—as my friend courageously did with me. And I with her.

This high priest of ours [Jesus] understands our weaknesses, for he faced all the same testings we do, yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most (Hebrews 4:15-16).

Dog and cat theology

But God still loves his people

Hosea 3:1, 5 The Lord still loves his people, even though they have turned to other gods and love to worship them. … But afterward they will return and devote themselves to the Lord their God. … In the last days, they will tremble in awe of the Lord and of his goodness.

You feed and walk your dog and give it affection and shelter.

Your dog thinks, “You must be God.”

You feed and care for your cat and give it affection and shelter.

Your cat thinks, “I must be God.”

We, too, inevitably worship. If not ourselves, then something or someone else.

We worship what we most prize or most fear, that which at our core orients and motivates us, that which we count on and build our lives on. Our highest value may be our own pleasure or happiness or “fulfillment,” which we think we can obtain on our own or we manipulate others into creating for us.

Hosea talks a LOT about the misplaced worship of the people of his day—which doesn’t end well. Yet he keeps repeating this message of hope: God still loves you. He invites you to turn to him, so that he can heal you and share his goodness with you (Hosea 3:5; 5:4, 15; 6:1; 7:10; 11:5; 14:1-2).

Humans fight with each other over what or whom they worship, fearful, often, that if others get more, we will get less. We take sides to defend what we have and are often aggressive in taking from others what we tell ourselves the “others” don’t deserve or have obtained unjustly. We even claim God is on our side (making him into our image, rather than God making us into his) and decide the others are not only wrong; they are evil.

Thinking about this, I received an email from Jim Hobby (houseofgladness.com). Jim wrote, “The question for us is never whether the Lord is on our side. Human “sides” will never circumscribe the Lord’s side. Every human ‘side’ will always fall short of God’s kingdom. The question is whether we are on His side. Are we following Him, imitating Him, listening to His voice, being transformed by His presence, transcending our ‘side’?”

God keeps on inviting us to his side. Not because we deserve it. Simply because he loves us. And when we choose to worship him above all else and all others, including ourselves, we may discover those “others” aren’t so very different from us. We all need God’s provision and care and affection and shelter. And forgiveness for our arrogance.

Using God’s gifts to serve others, with Peter Johnson, Hershey, PA

But God gifts each of his children

Hosea 2:8 [The Lord said] It was I who gave her everything she has … But she gave all my gifts to Baal [an idol].

1 John 5:21 Dear children, keep yourselves from idols [anything that might take God’s place in your hearts NLT].

The thing about the prophets is that they smack us right between the eyes. They have the courage (and often pay a high personal price) to confront us with our wrongdoing and to detail its consequences.

So the immediate question is, what are the gifts God has given me? And what have I done with them? And what are the name(s) of the idol(s) that tempt and seduce me into squandering those gifts and dishonor their Giver?

I won’t drag you through the sordid list of idols that the enemy uses to war against my soul. Instead, I want to give you a positive picture of a person who has overcome all kinds of obstacles because of his love for Jesus. He doesn’t bemoan what he doesn’t have. Instead, he uses what he does have, the gifts God has given him, not to serve himself but to serve others and to honor his Lord. Here’s one example from Christmas, when Rev. Peter Johnson stood outside for hours in winter weather night after night to listen to and pray for people. Pete describes it like this:

“A few weeks ago Hanoverdale Church hosted its annual Drive Thru Bethlehem. For several nights hundreds of cars drove through our church yard experiencing different stations of the Bethlehem Christmas story. From paying taxes to Caesar, to seeing the Christ child with his parents at the manger, to listening to the angel choir, and interacting with wisemen, shepherds, Roman soldiers and townspeople, the story of Christmas came alive.

The photos are dark because it was a dark night, but they give you an idea of Drive through Bethlehem.

“As pastor, I got the opportunity to pray for people in their cars at the last station before they left to continue their journey.

“Is it worth it to stand and interact with folks in the cold? Oh, yes!!! I met people who were asking for prayer last year and came back this year to tell how God answered those prayers. One couple asked that God might allow them to become pregnant and this year they introduced me to their baby. Another asked for comfort and healing for a sick loved one on hospice with cancer, and this year they wanted me to meet the one who did not die but was healed.

“After praying for hundreds of people over two weekends, who knows those whom God answered with a different answer. But I declare to you that God is still in the prayer answering business!!!

“If you live in central Pennsylvania and are looking for a place to worship, a place where the Bible will be studied and believed, give us a try. Hanoverdale Church, 577 Hershey Rd in Hummelstown, PA, 9:00 a.m.”

A challenging choice today

But the Spirit’s fruit is always in season

Hosea 1:7 I [the Lord] will show love to the people of Judah. I will free them from their enemies—not with weapons and armies or horses and charioteers, but by my power as the Lord their God.

Zechariah 4:6 It is not by force nor by strength [that God’s plans will succeed], but by my Spirit, says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.

God spoke these words to and through Hosea and Zechariah at times of challenge and crisis, when it seemed there was no way for God’s people to overcome their enemies and return to peace and blessing.

We need these words today. I need these words today. My personal wellbeing depends on choosing to put my full trust in God’s sovereignty over history and nations and people. His plans will succeed—though not likely the way or in the timing I think best.

Meanwhile, despite my grief as I watch current events hurt people I love, I have the opportunity today, and then tomorrow, and then the next day, to affirm and to stand on God’s promises. And to open myself to the Spirit’s work—his way of doing things—in the garden of my heart, even when pulling out the weeds is painful.

The Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives:

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

Shutterstock: MVolodymyr

My daughter Valerie reminded our family yesterday of several of Martin Luther King Jr.’s sayings. One that particularly struck me is this: “Let no man pull you so low as to hate him.”

Hatred isn’t the Spirit’s way. It hurts us, and it hurts others. I’m challenged to put my mental, emotional, and spiritual energy into Spirit ways, while trusting God to manage what I can’t control anyway—even when I don’t see what he’s actively doing behind the scenes.

I’m remembering too one of my son’s middle school teachers telling him, “Don’t let people or circumstances rob you of your joy.” Letting myself savor joy—an expression of trust in God, even in the midst of grief—will accomplish more good in my small world than any amount of “warfare.”

It’s the Spirit’s way.

The fruit in our lives comes from God

But God makes fruit grow

Hosea 14:8 [The Lord says] Stay away from idols! I am the one who answers your prayers and cares for you. I am like a tree that is always green; all your fruit comes from me.

John 15:5 [Jesus said] I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing.

Shutterstock: MVolodymyr

We’re home from our vacation, spent tucked away in a small town in Ohio. For two weeks, Dave and I delighted in extended devotional times, hiked in the snow and cold, played games, built jigsaw puzzles, read books, had important conversations, slept (!), and watched a few movies. We are grateful for this restorative time, balancing and healing the intense stress of the last weeks of 2024. The challenge now will be not to get sucked back into running on adrenaline 24/7, as we are both committed to big projects in 2025.

I found myself drawn to the prophets, particularly the minor prophets, those I don’t often read or pay attention to. So from now to Easter, I plan to deep dive for “pearls” from the prophets to share with you.

In light of the work Dave and I believe God has called us to, I chose Hosea 14:8, quoted above, as my “year verse” for 2025. It reminds me of how easily I can get distracted from what God wants for me and make other things more important. These “idols” don’t yield good fruit. Neither do our own efforts, in themselves. The fruit in our lives comes from God, from his life active in us.

I would love for you to join me in exploring “pearls from the prophets”—not just reading my thoughts, but sharing your own as well.