Reflections on my fifty-fourth birthday

Posted on September 5, 2011 by Rebecca

Not long ago a young friend found out my age and expressed surprise. “I didn’t know you were that o—”

She stopped. “I mean. . . .” She back-pedalled. “I mean . . . you’re not old.” She blushed. “I mean, I didn’t know you were that far along.”

Indeed, I’m pretty far along. Even, by some people’s estimation, old. (Apparently not that friend’s.)

I’m old enough to remember the first time I ate pizza. I was sixteen.

I’m old enough to remember when everyone was excited because someone in our social group had gotten a VCR (that’s video cassette recorder, for anyone too young to remember it). I was invited to that someone’s apartment to watch Stars Wars—there was only one at that time—on the small screen. (The young man who wanted to spend some time with me later ended up spending his life with me, but that’s another story.)

I’m old enough to remember when records were being replaced with cassettes (remember those?), so I went out and bought several Patch the Pirate records for my children when the price went down to two dollars each.

I’m old enough to remember asking some friends, “Now what is the internet, and what’s the point of it?”

I also remember, during the six months when I was engaged to be married, thinking about the precious children I hoped to have, and how our country would, if it continued on the same course, be so much more wicked when they were grown. I remember getting on my knees to pray for them, those ones I loved who were yet unborn.

So here we are. My children are young adults, and my daughter is expecting her first baby, to be born into a land that is going topsy-turvy. And again I get on my knees and pray, as I have through the years, trusting in a God who is mighty to save.

One reason I love the psalms is because so many of them begin with anguish—”Where are you, O Lord? Why aren’t you helping me?” but end with joy: “I will praise you all my days; I will lift up your holy Name.”

This is where we are. This is what we do. We cry out to the only One who can save, and we lift up His holy Name.

But let all the ones who put their trust in you rejoice!
Let them always shout for joy, because you defend them!
Let them that love your name be joyful in you.
For you, Jehovah, will bless the righteous ones;
with your powerful grace you will compass them as with a shield.

He is our Shield. He is our Protector. And we stand amazed together at His powerful grace—the strength to face the unknown days ahead, and to face them with joyful confidence in Him.

A brief timeline of redemptive history

Posted on August 24, 2011 by Rebecca

In our homeschool Bible teaching with Joshua, we’re emphasizing three levels of learning the Bible:

Level One: Know those Bible stories. Know them in context. Sometimes in detail. (In our daughter Christiana’s college Bible class, she was surprised at how many young people from Christian homes didn’t know the Bible stories.) Know the general course of the progression of the Bible stories. Know where the stories came in relation to each other. Know them. If you don’t, your progress in further understanding will be severely hampered. To this end, I’ve been telling Bible stories to the children for 22 years.

Level Two: Learn life lessons from the stories. Trust God. Show initiative. Be kind. These very basic truths are where most Sunday school programs and character curricula stop. But we can’t stop there.

Level Three: See Jesus. See him in the outworking of all the Bible stories—the sacrifice of Isaac, the wandering in the wilderness, the building of the temple—and then in the outworking of all the history since the Bible stories. See redemption, see the ongoing work of God. This overarching, God-oriented perspective is what not only takes us to higher “learning” but even transforms our lives.

In order to help with Level One understanding, the foundation for Levels Two and Three, I’ve had my children memorize nine points of history, at 500-year increments. They can learn it in about ten minutes, and then we can put everything else we learn in context of those nine points. These are rounded dates, but when it comes right down to it, is it more important to try to memorize the exact date that the historians say Rome “fell,” for example, or to have the big picture of history?

2000 B.C. Abraham

1500 B.C. Moses

1000 B.C. David

500 B.C. Rebuilding of the temple (by the remnant returned from captivity)

0 B.C. Jesus

500 A.D. Fall of Rome (often called the beginning of the Middle Ages)

1000 A.D. High Middle Ages

1500 A.D. Renaissance, Reformation, Discovery (typically called the beginning of the Modern Age)

2000 A.D. Now

This is the schema–the slots into which all other dates fit. I can ask questions like, when did Rome become a world power? (It had to be after the rebuilding of the temple because that was Babylon, and it had to be before Jesus because Romans are all through the New Testament. So it was between 500 B.C. and the coming of Christ.) When did Solomon live in relation to Abraham? (He was David’s son, so about a thousand years later.)

Keeping the timeline in our minds–without memorizing a lot of specific dates–has helped my children a lot in not only seeing the big picture but in keeping our own time period in perspective. In studying the timeline running along our wall in the hallway, Joshua recently observed that the Modern Age isn’t nearly as long as he would have thought.

We’re but a speck on the timeline. But our God is eternal, and His purpose is sure.

Looking for a publisher for your non-fiction book

Posted on August 11, 2011 by Rebecca

Since several people have asked me for publishing advice, I’ll finally write what I’ve been considering writing for a while. My experience is limited, but I’ll tell you what I know.

When you’re writing non-fiction, first of all, you have to have either some sort of marketable uniqueness, or what is called a “platform.”

Uniqueness: You have to be able to show to the publisher that nobody else has published a book like yours, and there is definitely a market for it. Perhaps, for example, you can show that your book about Amy Carmichael is the first children’s biography of its kind, and that children need to know about this amazing woman. This takes research, but with the internet, the research is far easier to accomplish than it used to be.

Platform: Let’s say you’re writing a book on a topic about which there are already a hundred books, like, for example, a book for women about joy. Not only does your book need to be fresh and different, but also you need to show that you’ll have a significant ability to market the book yourself. Maybe you’re the pastor of a megachurch. Maybe you teach very large Bible study groups. Maybe you write regular magazine articles. You’re creating your own market. (Publishers want the author to be able to sell his own book.)

Second, I recommend getting Sally Stuart’s book The Christian Writer’s Market. A new edition comes out every year, with book and magazine publishers, and now even internet publishers. The market is constantly changing, so Sally keeps it up to date. Study this book and find all the publishers that seem like they would probably be interested in your book. This takes time.

Then, take that list of publishers and go to the internet and study the website of each one. If you’ve done your first assignment, you’ll know which ones have already published a book similar to yours, so you won’t want to pursue them. Look for one that might have a gaping hole in the very area you’re writing about.

Most publishers these days will describe online how authors can submit manuscripts, usually through an Author Information form and a Book Information form. The next step is, from the best publishers that you’ve chosen (probably around five to ten), take time to fill out these forms well and thoughtfully. This will take a lot more time.

Finally, submit these forms. Then wait. This will take more time, but at least you can be doing something else while you’re waiting (like catching up on all the housework that got backed up while you were working on your submission).

These are the basics. I’ll be glad sometime to elaborate on any aspects that aren’t clear. Also, I want to hasten to add that there are REAMS of information about this very topic out here in cyberspace written by people a lot more knowledgeable than I am. But I’m writing this for those people who have come, and will come, to me personally.

All best wishes in your writing. By God’s grace, for God’s glory!

Perhaps another opportunity in Japan

Posted on March 20, 2011 by Rebecca

I heard once that after World War II a call went out for missionaries to Japan. They had been defeated by a superpower, and they were open to that superpower’s religion.

But only a few missionaries went. So the story goes that Japan looked at the United States and embraced the religion they thought they saw.

Materialism.

They became an advanced nation.

And now we hear that the current devastation might be an even greater disaster than what was wreaked by the atomic bombs of 1945.

And the call goes out. Will we pray? Will we give? And when the time is right, will we go?

Maybe we have another window of opportunity. And even through this unspeakable tragedy, maybe the Lord will call many to Himself.

Mother’s Day in February

Posted on February 8, 2011 by Rebecca

The sands of time are sinking . . .

“Mother, you’re in the hospital. You had a stroke. Remember?”

Slow nod, barely perceptible. Eyes closed, a cloud of silver hair on the pillow.

The dawn of heaven breaks . . .

And there she is, at the piano with me, black hair, bright eyes, big smile, cheery voice. The voice that her teacher told her could have gone into opera. “Happy happy me! Happy happy you! When I see someone who is happy, I feel happy too!” The voice that she decided to use for church and children.

I sit on the bench, swinging my legs, singing, clapping. “Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world. . . .”

Sleep now. There you are, spreading out the birthday tablecloth. Through the years I looked for but never found a tablecloth like that. Cottage cheese pancakes for breakfast, homemade chili for supper. Yellow cake with chocolate frosting. So many gifts.

We came here in a breath, in a blink. And in another breath, another blink, I will be the one on the pillow, and my own children will say, “Mother, you’re in the hospital. Here, Mother, let me help you. Do you want just one more bite? No, you can’t do that, Mother. You need to rest now.”

The summer morn I’ve sighed for—the fair, sweet morn awakes.

You took my out to lunch when I was in high school. When I was the one who wasn’t speaking, except in monosyllables. You tried. Thank you.

And there you are, thrusting Stepping Heavenward into my hands. The book that brought me to my knees, not once, but all three times that I read it.

“Mother, would you like for me to read to you from the Bible?”

Eyes focus a little more. Slight smile. Small nod.

One psalm. Another. Another.

“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea. . . . Be still and know that I am God.”

“I waited patiently for the Lord, and He inclined unto me and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out the the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.”

“O keep my soul, and deliver me: let me not be ashamed; for I put my trust in thee.”

“Mother, who are you putting your trust in?”

Dark, dark hath been the midnight, but dayspring is at hand.

Low voice, barely audible. “The Lord Jesus Christ.”

Thank you, Mother. Thank you for loving me. Thank you for pointing me to Jesus.

And glory . . . glory . . . dwelleth . . . in Immanuel’s land.

The magnifying glass of God

Posted on December 5, 2010 by Rebecca

Recently my publisher asked me to contribute to a book to be published in 2011 with a theme of “What the Bible means to me.” This is what I wrote:

“One of the great reasons that so many Christians never come out of the Old Covenant, never even know that they are in it, and have to come out of it, is that there is so much head knowledge, without the power of the Spirit in the heart being waited for.” ~Andrew Murray, The Believer’s New Covenant

I was studying through the Psalms, taking copious notes. If this was God’s message to me, then you’d better believe that with all the determination I could muster, I was going to understand it. I wanted the Word of God to be my greatest delight. So I kept getting up early and studying, studying. Learning, learning. And even glad to be learning.

Honestly, though, it never even crossed my mind to ask God to open my understanding. He had given me a brain, and that’s what I was using. After all, didn’t somebody say that I shouldn’t ask God to do for me what He had already given me the ability to do for myself?

Then I came to Psalm 22, the one all about Jesus dying on the cross. And the sad fact is that I wasn’t interested in studying it. I knew why. I knew exactly why. It was because it wasn’t about me. Almost every other psalm so far had been, in my mind, about me. But I knew this one was important, and I knew it wasn’t about me, and I knew that I wasn’t excited about reading it.

I wrote in the margin of my wide-margin Bible, “12-2-1993: I’m struggling with the fact that I don’t appreciate a psalm as much when it’s about Jesus instead of me, and what selfishness and immaturity that reveals. Now I’m faced with a psalm that can’t possibly be appreciated properly unless it’s applied to Jesus. God, grant me the grace to rejoice in Your holy Word!”

To look at it now, it seems ridiculous not to appreciate a passage about Jesus. But this was one of the first times in my life—if not the first time—that I actually asked God to open my understanding.

And I almost tremble to recall the results. Psalm 22 opened to me like Aladdin’s cave. I came to tears again and again at the beauty and grace and outpouring of love I saw in my Savior. Beyond seeing Him as simply my great Example (that’s how I kept referring to Him in the first few days of my study), I began to see Him more clearly as the ultimate Sacrifice, His sweat poured out, His blood poured out. As the ultimate Victor, singing the praise of God in the great congregation. As the ultimate Feast of His meek ones, the all-satisfying Living Bread. As the Great Accomplisher of the greatest Work. It is Finished.

This experience marked a turning point in my Christian life.

Through the years, I had thought of the Bible in a number of different metaphorical terms. A friend told me that too many Christians read it as if they’re looking for a Daily Vitamin Pill. When I began reading for actual understanding, I thought of it as my Map from God, giving directions to Him. I thought of it as my greatest Treasure.

But this experience with Psalm 22 began the process of removing the written Word from my heart’s pedestal and placing the Living Word there instead. Though it was years before I began to consistently cry out for the opening of my understanding every time I opened the Word, I began more and more to see the Bible as my great Magnifying Glass.

May my heart ever resound with unending praise to the Savior, the one to whom this Magnifying Glass points like a laser beam, the one who alone is worthy of all blessing and honor and praise and glory and power.

Oh, magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His Name together!

Postscript, October 2011: That book is now available for order, here.

Here's the Joy

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