Happy 44th Birthday to My Husband

I didn't know about that scar on your finger - 

after 18 years together I'm

still discovering, learning

new things about you and

isn't that what marriage is -

committing to be a life-long learner of you

until there's nothing left to know except

Everything?

Here's to 44 more years of

discovering scars on fingers from

accidents when we were children,

playing hide-and-seek in bookshops and

behaving like "one of my typhoid patients."

Let us laugh at being middle-aged,

act like teenagers in love and 

look forward to our twilight years

as though it's only dawn,

the beginning of an exquisite day.

-a.k.e.

I Kings 19: A Tornado of Emotions

When Elijah reached Horeb he hid in a cave.  It was only then - 40 days later - that God asked him, "Elijah, what are you doing here?"  Elijah spewed forth an answer drenched in anger and frustration.  God told him to go stand on the mountain for He was about to pass by.  Elijah did so, and God proceeded to send a terrible wind that shattered rocks, an earthquake, and a fire, but He didn't pass by in any of those.  No, God appeared in the form of a gentle whisper.  He then asked Elijah a second time, "What are you doing here?"  Elijah gave the same response, word for word.  Or did he?

Elijah's first answer was filled with frustration and anger.  He let God have it, so to speak, and the underlying text is "Where were You?" and maybe even "I'm angry with You, God!"

I'd like to think that God appreciated Elijah's honesty.  Just as we present a carefully-scripted self to others, I think we often present to God only one aspect of ourselves, rather than our whole self.  We put on an act, in other words. But not Elijah, and God responded by sending a series of powerful, natural disasters. Yet if God only appeared in the gentle whisper, why did He send the wind, earthquake and fire? 

I used to think that God did it to display His power and to remind Elijah with Whom he was speaking, as if to say, "I could blast you if I wanted, but I won't... at least for now."  I don't think that anymore.  I think God - in a strange show of compassion - was giving a physical manifestation to the turmoil of emotions that seethed inside Elijah.  I think God was entering into Elijah's emotions and validating them, giving Elijah space to voice them completely.

Then came the gentle whisper, and we finally see the real emotions behind Elijah's anger: hurt, fear, rejection.  "God, where were You? I did everything You asked!"  Elijah finished expressing the intensity of his emotions, the physical world responded in solidarity, and now he cries out in vulnerable humanity, "I'm hurt. I'm afaid. I'm alone."

Only there, in the honesty of a softened and raw heart, do Elijah and God have a meaningful dialogue.

I Kings 19: The Power of Food

To set the scene, I Kings 19 begins with Elijah running for his life.  He's just pulled off two incredible miracles, has seen the power of God firsthand, and yet the words of one woman send him running for his life.  He dismisses his servant, travels a day's journey into the desert, and decides that he wants to die.  In other words, I Kings 19 begins with a cowardly, faithless, suicidal prophet.

If I were to imagine what God did next, I could guess several things:  1) Blast Elijah with a lightning bolt and incinerate him, 2) Give him the mother of all lectures and let him have it, or 3) Turn your back on him for being so faithless after such incredible displays of heavenly power.   But God didn't do that.  Oh no... God did something completely unexpected by human standards; He sent food. Yes, in I Kings 19 we have what might possibly be the world's first pizza delivery angel.

"All at once an angel touched him and said, 'Get up and eat.' He looked around, and there by his head was some bread baked over hot coals, and a jar of water. He ate and drank and then lay down again.  The angel of the Lord came back a second time and touched him and said, 'Get up and eat, for the journey is too much for you.' So he got up and ate and drank. Strengthened by that food, he traveled forty days and forty nights until he reached Horeb." - vv. 5-8

There's something about food that breaks down walls, encourages fellowship, and facilitates meaningful conversations.  Put a hot cup of tea or coffee in someone's hand and the dialogue flows much easier than if they're sitting in a sterile office twiddling their thumbs.  Food nourishes, gives energy, and improves the mood, but that's not really what touches me here.

What touches me in this story is the incomprehensible compassion of God.  In many respects, Elijah had no reason to run for his life, let alone decide to end it!  He had no "right" to distrust God or walk away from his job.  But God never once chastised him.  He let Elijah vent, and then, without saying a word, put the kettle on and prepared a meal as if to say, "I understand. You are weary and afraid.  Here, take this and eat it.  I know the journey is too much for you."

A God who demonstrates such compassion in moments of weakness and failure completely overwhelms me.

I Kings 19: An Intro Explaining the Frenzy

I've been reading I Kings 19 like a kid in a candy store.  I can't get enough of it; there are so many stories and side stories that each speak to my soul somewhere deep. In fact, I'm so "hungry" for this chapter that I've read it in seven different translations and a few different languages, looking for more "crumbs" to be squeezed out of a word change here or a perspective shift there.

I can't remember a time when reading the Bible was so appealing to me that I couldn't get enough.  There were times when it came naturally and easily, there were times of reading that led to great growth, there were times when I read only out of "duty" or guilt, and there were times when I didn't want to read it at all.  But to read the same chapter over and over and over again... this is new for me.  I don't even know why this is so, or what prompted it.

I will share with you each of the "stories" in I Kings 19 that speaks to me, because I think it speaks to all of us on some level, but I'll break it up into smaller posts so the reading is a bit more manageable.  Can't wait to share!

Autumn Blossoms

There is always a tree blooming in South Africa, no matter the season.  This is one of the trees that flowers in autumn:

I love it how autumn leaves are falling off of certain trees while others are blooming.  It reminds me of people and how we're all at different stages of growth.  There is beauty in each stage, isn't there? (By the way, if anyone knows the name of this tree, please let me know!)

Thoughts on Feeling Irritated

Perhaps you never become irritated by other people, but I am not so saintly. There is this one woman I know who never fails to irritate me.  No matter the day or what mood I'm in, her mannerisms and the things she says consistently rub me the wrong way.

This morning, I was complaining about her to my husband.  This afternoon, in the car, I suddenly had a thought:  if the last time I saw her was my last encounter with her ever, would I still have complained?  Surprisingly, the answer was no.  If I knew that my encounter with her was my last on earth, I think I would have tried to find something about her to appreciate.

So why does it make a difference whether it's the last time I see her or not?  It's a simple matter of perspective.  If I know I will see her often, I go into the encounter prepared to be irritated (which, by the way, is not only judging her, but subjugating her as well).  If I know it's the last time I'll ever see her, there is an awareness of her "otherness" - her uniqueness - and the reminder that she is to be respected and honoured.

I felt remorseful for being so petty and exclusive.  If I need to pretend that every time I see her is the last time, I will.  I only know that I want to honour her and respect her otherness rather than be irritated because she isn't like me.

"Every man is in some way my superior, in that I can learn from him." 

 - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Thoughts on Appreciating Mystery

I've been thinking lately about the need of Westerners to have an answer for everything.  We seem to like having explanations and rationalisations for every little thing.  That which is unknown or unknowable bothers us because it is undefined.  In other words, we like to put things in neat, little boxes.

I am not speaking about the pursuit of knowledge and understanding. That is all well and good.  I am referring instead to the mysteries of life that can't be explained, the things that we would rather not deal with because we can't find the answers.  I wonder how much we miss because we won't entertain these mysteries with a sense of wonder and hospitality?

"The fruit of the Enlightenment has been a boringly small world devoid of both mystery and the sacred. Science offered us a brave new world of wonder-full technologies and products but has not lived up to its promises. A world devoid of mystery turns out to be a world that is too small for the human spirit. This is why Albert Einstein said, 'The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious... Whoever does not know it and can no longer wonder, no longer marvel, is as good as dead, and his eyes are diminished.'

"The great Jewish rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said that there are two possible ways of knowing and responding to the world: the way of reason and the way of wonder. The way of reason seeks to eliminate mystery and bring the world under our control. The way of wonder accepts the mysteries of life and responds with something that is familiar to children but forgotten by most adults: awe."

-David Benner, Soulful Spirituality (Albert Einstein quote from Ideas and Opinions)