Category Archives: Pondering for Joy

You gotta laugh: hope in the midst of Alzheimer’s

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My mother-in-law passed away six years ago this week. She died in her bed here in this house where we live now.

Almost five years earlier my in-laws had moved in with us so we could help with her care in her declining years, as she disappeared in the gray cloud of Alzheimer’s. You would think these wouldn’t be laughing years.

But we laughed.

I thought about it again when I came across a funny story one of my children had written. “Grandma-isms” are nested in our family conversation all the time, and even in our writing. “Look, I’ve got doubles!” she would say as she pointed to the two engagement rings she wore together (hers and her mother’s). Now, when we have two of almost anything, we’ll say to each other, “I’ve got doubles!”

So many, so many funny things she said. She pointed to Stephen playing in the snow and said, “There’s Tim on top of a pile of apples!”  Sometimes we laughed right as the words came out of her mouth, out of utter surprise, and she would invariably wrinkle her nose and laugh with us.

Is it the kind of thing only another Alzheimer’s caregiver could understand? That you can laugh in the midst of such a twilight, inevitably descending? But maybe . . . I think others could understand it too, others who have sometimes known an almost inexplicable lightness of heart in the midst of sorrow.

We cried. Yes, we cried. We felt the heaviness and the difficulty. And we cried out to God to know what to do, when she wanted to go home and couldn’t go home. When she couldn’t sleep. When she slept round the clock. When she talked nonstop. When she stopped talking altogether. When she stopped walking. When she stopped eating.

But the laughter is a gift from God. And praise God, through the sorrow, through the darkness, He gives moments of laughter.

Six years ago this week, Mom graduated to glory. She got her mind back, and she got to see Jesus.

She got doubles.

Fresh Bread, Fresh Words

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I’m studying Philippians . . .

I memorized it when I was in college. I’ve taught Bible studies on it. I studied it in-depth nine years ago.

And I pull the bread out of the fridge and sniff it, surreptitiously checking for little white spots.

Why did I start studying Philippians last month? Well, I was finished reading through my Bible in a year, and I was praying where to next focus my Bible time. Our pastor was starting a series in Philippians. And I had nine-year-old notes in my Bible that I wanted to transcribe onto the computer.

Look, I know it’s stale, but if you put it in the toaster, you won’t notice.

And so, I sat down at the computer with my open Bible and my keyboard. I was faced with words that I knew as well as the college ring that’s been on my third finger right hand for over thirty years.

Except . . . not. Unlike my college ring, these are the words of God.

I stood aghast, again, at the hardness of my heart. I cried out to God to knead me and shape me and humble me before His holy words.

And Jesus cried out, “I am the Bread of Life! He that comes to Me will never hunger!”

Lord Jesus, You are my Living Bread.

Is it possible, for something so familiar? To gather fresh grain from the field . . . to grind it fresh to make fresh flour . . . to knead it and pound it and raise it and shape it . . . and to bake it to produce from the oven a loaf, not only steaming and crusty and soft, but so nourishing that it can be called “the staff of life”?

Lord Jesus, these words reveal Your heart. Show me Your heart. I want fresh Bread.

Is it any coincidence that the Lord brought me the book of Philippians steaming and fresh, a book about joyful togetherness in suffering, at this time of my life? At the time of my life when I’m no longer turning my face away from the suffering around the world because “it’s too disturbing” and “I really just can’t think about that now,” but instead am embracing it and weeping for my brothers and sisters who are suffering and dying, standing firm in faith with them? Is it by accident that I taste the nourishment of “to me to live is Christ and to die is gain” and “don’t be terrified by your adversaries” at a time in my life when I have become aware of the very real possibility that in the near future we in the United States will be suffering for our faith as well?

I’m partaking of the Bread, fresh and nourishing. I eat it. I rejoice. I’m satisfied.  No excuses needed.

I woke up this morning thinking about these words. I had to write them now, while they’re fresh.

Thirsty yet?

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[Reprinted by request from January, 2011.]

Ho! Every one that thirsts! Come to the waters . . . Drink!

New Year’s Resolution #2,012: Drink more water.

Have you ever noticed that you can systematically drink less and less water, way less than your body needs, without feeling thirsty? Counterintuitive, I know. But that thirst mechanism behind your throat sort of atrophies or something.

And lots of people, when they do feel any thirst, go to coffee or soda to try to assuage it. Of course those beverages actually drain water from your system.

And as that thirst mechanism shrivels up, sometimes when people are thirsty they think they’re hungry, and then they eat . . . and eat . . . and eat . . . while they’re actually dying of dehydration.

Thirsty yet?

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God; when shall I come and appear before God? . . . O God, You are my God; I earnestly seek You; my soul thirsts for You; my flesh longs for You, as in a dry and weary land without water.

At eleven years old, I developed a life-threatening kidney condition that hospitalized me for two weeks. My parents made me drink two quarts of water a day, and I became the healthiest I had ever been in my life.

Did I mention that I was a very sickly child? Besides asthma and stomach problems, I had this weird skin disease all over my hands and feet that made me become unable to walk normally or do pretty much anything. I dropped out of sixth grade. My mother took me to one doctor after another. I suffered much at the hands of these physicians, and rather than growing better, I actually grew worse.

But then I got the kidney disease and got well.

It was only as an adult, married to a man who knew the importance of water, that I understood what had really happened. Throughout my childhood, I never drank water. I mean I never drank water. Since I was almost never thirsty, I drank one or two cups of milk a day, and that was it. I was dying, and my skin was trying to let me know. Finally my kidneys gave the red alert.

None of those wise skin doctors, with their pills and potions and lotions and creams and plastic bags and soaking solutions ever asked my mother, “How much does she drink?” Never. Nope. Not once. Even though probably every last one of them knew that the skin is called the third kidney.

Thirsty yet?

As an adult, when I drank more and more water, I found myself becoming thirsty more often. Drinking even more. And becoming more healthy.

Jesus stood and cried out, saying, If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink. . . . Everyone drinking of this water will thirst again; but whoever will drink of the water that I will give him will never ever thirst, because the water that I will give to him will become a fountain of water in him, springing up into everlasting life.

Oh, my soul, be Thirsty. Be very Thirsty. Don’t forsake the Living Water to hew out broken wells that can hold no water. Drink the Water. Long and deep.

Through the written Word, drink long and deep of Jesus Christ. You’ll find your Thirst Mechanism kicking in. And your Thirst can continuously be satisfied, because the Water will always be there. The Living Water. Drink, and find that you become a river.

Ho, everyone! Are you Thirsty yet?

Where’s the joy? Seriously. (Part 4)

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A friend listened to the song “If You Want Me To” by the blind songwriter Ginny Owens. She said, “I can’t say this is where I am all the time, but it’s where I want to be. I know it’s all true.”

That’s it. That’s it. “It may not be where I am all the time, but it’s where I want to be. I know it’s all true.”

This friend was about to have surgery and didn’t know if she might come out a paraplegic.

Me? I have no impending tragedy hanging over my head. Rather, my daughter, who got married a year and an half ago, just became the mother of a precious little boy. And me? I’m a new grandmother.

I’m blessed over and over, with many blessings, countless reasons to be flowing out with joy.

But something happened in those happy first few days. I began to react to the lack of sleep, the emotions, the inability to get to all the things I thought I ought to be accomplishing, the small slights and disappointments. I began to get . . . well, discouraged.

Stupid, stupid, I told myself. But it didn’t help.

Let’s see. I complained that I had no hands until I met a man who had no feet. Is that how that goes? Something like that, anyway.

It was pretty short-lived, that stupid time of reacting to circumstances, to hormones, to lack of sleep. But as I worked through it with the Lord, it reminded me of a few truths that have at various times in my life stood out in bold relief.

Even when I don’t sense the joy . . .

. . . I know all the reasons for it haven’t changed.

Even when I feel like I’m slogging in slow motion . . .

. . . I know that the Lord is with me.

Even when I feel that I’ve hit rock bottom . . .

. . . I know that Jesus Christ is the Solid Rock underneath.

I won’t feel guilty for not feeling the joy I’ve been writing about (although, I have to admit, that was a temptation). Because I know that when I go through trials—the great ones, or the small ones that niggle like cankerworms—the joy will still be there, on the other side. Because my Savior doesn’t change.

This isn’t experience-based Christianity. It’s faith-based Christianity that expects experiences.

What kind of joy did Jesus know in the Garden of Gethsemane when He was praying with great bloody drops of sweat?

I have to say . . . I think He was filled with grief, not joy.

But Hebrews 12 tells me that for the joy that was set before Him, He endured the cross, despising the shame.

Jesus knew that joy waited for Him on the other side. He had every confidence of that, even in His grief. He knew that, eventually, He would experience the joy.

And whether I’m walking alongside a precious new mother or walking in the valley of the shadow of death, even in the darkness, I can know with confidence that it’s all true.

Jesus Christ is my joy. Sometimes I taste it, like honey on my tongue. Sometimes I have to just trust and wait for Him to reveal Himself to me again.

But I always know it’s true.

 

 

Where’s the Joy? (Part 3)

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Have you ever noticed those verses in the Bible that talk about God’s judgment on the wicked coming in the form of birds picking out their eyes? (One of them is in Proverbs 30.) I know that’s really a disgusting image, but it’s describing something completely realistic: when the ravening birds would start to eat a dead body, the first place they would go was the eye. If the eye didn’t respond at all, they knew that creature was completely dead.

Not a very likely opening to a post about joy, I know.

But the point I’m making is about response. The Bible links life to responsiveness and death to unresponsiveness.  There are many, many places where this understanding of death and life bring into full focus what God is saying. For example, in Romans 6: “Consider yourselves to be dead [unresponsive] to sin, but alive [responsive] to God in Christ Jesus.” (I used to follow the standard line of portraying spiritual death as separation, but that has changed. Maybe I’ll devote a post to that someday.)

Joy is all about response. And for it to happen, you’ve got to be truly alive, so you can see, so you can hear. For it to happen on a spiritual level, you’ve got to be Comatose No More.

“I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.” Jesus said that.

How can I avoid experiencing an emotional roller coaster (not counting the menopausal one, which can affect some of us just a teensy), but instead have my emotions under the control of the Holy Spirit, as a dear friend urged me to do?

It’s by knowing Jesus, both through His Word, and through His work in my life. This is the spiritual life, the heightened spiritual awareness, the working of the spiritual senses. In the realm of the spirit, I will be alive, vitally alive, responding through what I see, hear, smell, and taste with the eyes of the spirit.

If you have ears to hear, then hear!

Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy Word.

O taste and see that the Lord is good.

In the realm of the spirit, when I’m spiritually alive—responsive to the things of God—I experience something wonderful: the love of God, the peace of God. Then, the natural response is the joy of God.

This joy can sometimes be breathtaking. John wrote his epistles so that “your joy may be full.”

Jesus promised, “These things I have spoken to you, that in me you may have full joy.”

He promised. Do I listen to His promise? Do I have ears to hear? Do I have eyes to see? Do I believe Him? Do I even think it’s possible?

This joy is more than possible, it’s natural, in the life that has received the new nature of Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s part of our Great Salvation. A.W. Tozer, Andrew Murray, Blaise Pascal, and Martyn Lloyd-Jones would back me up on that. Along with many, many others. It’s why the epistles are full to overflowing with joy.

I have to understand that, when it comes to joy in God, I can’t do the bootstrap thing. I can only humble myself before God, believe Him in faith, and seek to know Him through communion with Him and through His Word.

My physical eyes will receive the truth I see on those pages. My physical ears will hear His Name proclaimed. Then, as I believe what I see and hear, my spiritual eyes, my spiritual ears, will receive that truth and be enlightened, be opened.

When I know Him, when I see Him through the eyes of the spirit, the joy will come. When I keep my eyes on Him in faith, the joy will remain. That’s because nothing is more beautiful, grand, glorious, and good than my Savior Jesus Christ.

Conclusion #2 (restated for application to the spiritual life): Joy is a natural outspringing of exhilarating, energizing emotion, arising as a response to a sensory experience [this time a sensory experience in the realm of the spirit] that overwhelms the spirit with its beauty, grandeur, glory, goodness.

Some may be concerned that I’m advocating an emotion-based, experience-based Christianity. So I’ll seek to address that in the next post.

What is Joy? (Part 2)

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Last week I gave the first part of a definition of joy, asserting the controversial opinion that we have to admit that it’s a feeling, an emotion.

This week I want to say something that might also be considered controversial: Joy arises as a response to something outside of us. A sensory response. I’m talking about the five senses here: sight, hearing, taste, touch, smell. As in . . .

You hear wonderful news.

You taste a delectable treat.

You see, smell, feel a perfect spring day in the meadow.

Now I’ll see if I can defend that position.

One problem is that I think that some Christians, though they have an inner sense (oops, there’s that word again) that joy really does arise as a response to something, they don’t want to admit it, because they think they’re supposed to have joy in spite of circumstances rather than because of circumstances. Which means, if you take it to its logical conclusion, they think that joy arises out of nowhere.

I hope you’re staying with me on this one, because it’s really important.

Think about some times in your life that you’ve experienced what you think of as joy, an energizing exuberance that filled you up for more than a few ephemeral moments.  Wasn’t it because of something that happened? That actually occurred on the timeline of your life?

Wasn’t it because of something you heard or saw (including words) or something you felt or tasted or smelled?

When you feel a deep sense of joy or happiness (the Bible doesn’t distinguish the two), it affects you physically. That burst of life, vigor, energy that you feel—it naturally comes out of you in a physical way: You express your great pleasure by speaking, singing, moving—by catching your breath or feeling your heart beat harder.  In the case of the meadow, you might stretch out your arms and run while you sing, or at least turn in circles the way Maria did on the mountaintop.

True joy—and maybe you’ve never felt it, so it may be hard to imagine—will overwhelm your spirit, your true self, your inner, non-physical self, engulfing it like an ocean wave, to the point that you have to stop other activities and react to this experience.

Now, I said that it arises as a response to something taken in by the senses. This is assuming that you are actually alive, because a dead person doesn’t have any senses to respond with. That’s important, but you might not have thought about it before because it seemed . . . well, obvious.

But it’s important to think about because life happens on two levels. Always. There’s the physical level and the spiritual level. And lo and behold, we have a whole range of senses on the spiritual level that can respond to things that happen in the spiritual realm just as our physical senses respond to things on the physical level. In fact, even more. Way more.

If you’re dead on the spiritual level—or even comatose—it doesn’t happen.

But enough of that for now. I’m past my word limit.

Conclusion #2: Joy is a natural outspringing of exhilarating, energizing emotion arising as a response to a sensory experience that overwhelms the spirit with its beauty, grandeur, glory, goodness.

More to come.