He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. (Psalm 23:2)

Recently in a not-infrequent kitchen mishap, I found that a pan of water had boiled dry and the eggs it contained had disintegrated. To mask the odor, I lit my favorite candle, a gift from my dear friend Marci. Later, when I snuffed out the flame, the thought occurred that the candle wax and the pot of water had been exposed to the same agent, but with vastly different outcomes, likewise with logs burning in our fireplace. Exposed to the same force — heat — water evaporates, wax melts, and wood dries and crumbles.

The forces with which we daily contend have a certain sameness. But despite the similarity, our reactions to trials vary. On a given day, confronted with difficulty, we work the problem or work around it. But on another day, facing a similar trial, resolve evaporates like water, patience melts like candle wax, a positive outlook crumbles like a charred piece of oak. Why is this so?

To live victoriously— strong and unruffled — we must regularly separate ourselves from the world. Admittedly this is not an easy task but it is an essential one. Somehow, each in our own way, we must carve out time to walk in green pastures, to wander beside hushed waters. Those are the times when the soul is restored and union with our Creator is closer for the experience.

Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me. (Luke 9:23)

Jesus was walking by the Sea of Galilee when he called his first disciples. Simon Peter and his brother Andrew were casting a net into the sea when Jesus said to them, "Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men." Throughout his brief ministry, Jesus called people to action using those same words. "Follow me." In his resurrection appearance in Galilee, the Risen Christ summoned Peter again with the same familiar phrase. "Follow me."

The Spirit of Christ walks by the lakeside of our lives today, calling us to follow him. The appeal has a number of meanings. In a general sense, we follow Christ by engaging in a way of life consistent with his teachings. Follow can also mean watching something steadily or focusing purposefully, as in following the flight of a ball or following a speech. Jesus enables us to follow him in those ways, too. "Blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears for they hear."

To follow Jesus is also to live in keeping with the example he set for us. One way of life stands out. Jesus never let a day pass without attending to someone in need, most battered by life's crosswinds. He didn't perform random acts of kindness, as some encourage us to do today. Instead, in a purposeful and targeted way, he gave people what they needed.

By his example, Jesus calls us to extend meaningful help to others, not only to family, but also to those outside our home. In some instances, help is a simple phone call, e-mail, or visit. In other circumstances, assistance and support require sacrifice. His words instruct us to take up those responsibilities every day.

In the final chapter of the gospel of John, the author supposed that if everything Jesus did were written down that the whole world could not contain the books. In my life, and perhaps in yours, there are long stretches in which the ways I reach out to others in need combine for an uninspiring short story. At other times, the account of my sacrificial acts create at best a modest novella.

But an affirmative response to the Lord's "Follow me" is meant to be life changing. The pledge requires a commitment of heart and time. With that truth in mind, perhaps as the year progresses, we might look back and see that our life narrative is changing. With God's grace, it can become an inspiring and lengthy story that is pleasing to Him and dedicated to His name.

Joseph was a ... righteous man. (Matthew 1:19)

 

The gospels record not a single quote attributed to Joseph, yet what Jesus’ earthly father did could surely fill compelling volumes. While engaged to Mary, he learned of her pregnancy and decided to quietly divorce her. He had a change of heart, however, after receiving what Joseph knew was a divine message. He lived, no doubt, a difficult life, beginning with the journey to Bethlehem during the late stage of Mary’s pregnancy, an arduous trek across harsh and hostile lands. The manger birth and the later frantic flight to Egypt must have been frightening, not to mention living through a parent’s worst nightmare some years later—a missing child.

 

Despite the crosswinds Joseph endured, he remained a righteous man, a man of honor, a man whose actions spoke louder than words. His life inspires us to ask ourselves, “What are my actions saying to others today?”

Praise the Lord, I tell myself, and never forget the good things he does for me. (Psalm 103:2)

 

The psalms contain exquisite words of praise and I read them regularly. They are meant to acknowledge attributes or characteristics of God and to lift our perspective from the earthly to the spiritual.

 

I confess, though, that when I attempt to praise God as the psalmists did, I feel like a plagiarist, as if I’m stealing another’s words. When I try to praise God as contemporary preachers, speakers, or vocalists do so beautifully I am left feeling like a phony. Yet I know that my God is worthy to be praised and I want to offer what the early Jewish Christians called a sacrifice of praise.

 

For those of you who face a similar hurdle, I offer this. Years ago, I made a small, inferior photocopy of an artist’s rendition of Jesus. The colors have faded over time and the cardstock is dog-eared, but the image has a magnetic quality and gazing into the eyes of Jesus helps me to praise. My words are always a variation of this...

 

Jesus, there is so much about you that I love and admire. When you were here on earth, you were kind, compassionate, and merciful. I think often about a particular man whose sight you restored. “What do you want?” you asked him. “I want to see,” he answered, and see he did.

You were an exceptional teacher and I love your way with words, especially in the parables. The stories are memorable and colorful and rich with truth. My words fail, though, to express how much I admire your determination to carry out your mission to do the Father’s will. You were bold and courageous, yet you didn’t shut out those close to you when you were grieving, like the night in Gethsemane just before you were arrested. 

I’m trying to be more like you. I have a long way to go, but the Holy Spirit is a patient, merciful teacher.

 

My words of praise are neither profound nor eloquent. They will never be quoted, recorded, or sung. But the praise comes from my heart and I have absolute confidence that my expressions, despite their inadequacy, are pleasing to God — the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — and so are yours.

In the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. (Genesis 1:27)

 

When I picture Jesus during his earthly ministry, I often imagine him in a swarm of people, all hungering for something. At other times I picture a more serene setting. The day is drawing to a close. Jesus and the disciples are in a boat, people crowding together on the shore, their many needs heavy on his heart.

 

What it must have meant to Jesus, such a sensitive soul, to realize that some in the crowd were there just to be near him. Not to be cured or healed. Not to be fed or forgiven. Sometimes, not even yearning to be taught. How comforting for Jesus to make eye contact with a man who simply smiled or a woman who nodded faintly and touched her hand to her heart.

 

For a while now, I’ve begun some of my quiet times with words such as these. Jesus, you’ve done so much for me and I know I can always turn to you, but I’m here now not because I need anything, not even to be taught. I simply want to be near you. No prayer list. No devotional. Not even my Bible. Just silence and a grateful heart.

 

I like to think that these silent times, in some mysterious way, comfort the Great Eternal Heart. How? you ask. Because our desire to be loved and appreciated just for ourselves (not for what we do or contribute or provide) might well be something we “inherited” from our Creator. We were, after all, created in His image.

Jesus was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they awoke him and said, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” (Mark 4:38)

 

After a day of preaching to an enormous crowd, Jesus and his disciples boarded a boat when evening came. They were headed toward the opposite side of the sea when a fierce storm arose, causing waves to break over the sides of the vessel, alarming even the experienced fisherman on board.

 

The disciples believed that Jesus was sleeping through the crisis and that could well be true, exhausted as he must have been after a long day. It's possible too that he had just stretched out on the cushion for a moment of quiet as he placed in the Father’s hands the people he’d ministered to that day. In either case, he surely wasn’t oblivious to such a fierce and threatening storm, but neither was he alarmed.

 

Clearly, Jesus could have ordered the sea’s first angry wave to be calm. He could have commanded the first gust of wind to be still. The fact that he did not suggests that in some of life’s storms, God waits until the tempest is at its full fierceness before intervening. Sometimes I wish His method were otherwise, don't you? Intense storms can be frightening. But without them, spiritual lessons go unlearned, and the reassuring sense of our Creator’s tender nearness is sadly lost.

Why then do you tolerate the treacherous? Why are you silent while the wicked swallow up those more righteous than themselves? (Habakkuk 1:13)

 

Without question, each of us knows what it’s like to suffer injury directly or indirectly at the hands of another person. Many blameless individuals bare deep psychological scars because of someone else’s problems or behavior. Some of us have mourned the injury, even the death of an innocent because of another’s evil acts.

 

Like the prophet Habakkuk, we ask Why, God, do you tolerate this? Why are you silent while wicked individuals wreak havoc on innocent people’s lives?

 

No one knows the answer to such questions. No one knows why heartless, wicked people seem to get away with so much or why the innocent and defenseless are denied justice and vindication.

 

But this we do know...

 

Even Jesus, the sinless Son of God, had to wait to be vindicated. After receiving the death penalty for crimes he did not commit, he was crucified. Despite the injustice, he asked the Father to forgive his killers. He assured one of the criminals executed with him that he would join Jesus in paradise. Our Lord’s vindication was three days in coming, days he lay in a tomb. Then came his resurrection, the most glorious vindication in history, an event that has changed billions of lives through the ages.

 

With this in mind, we can be sure that no matter what vicious crosswind has battered our lives, no matter that the one who wronged us appears to have gotten away with it, our Creator can be trusted to bring about ultimate, eternal justice. That’s what Jesus taught. That’s what Jesus proved.

“I love those who love me, and those who seek me find me.” (Proverb 8:17)

 

Each of us can point to times or moments when we felt a particularly close intimacy with Our Creator, with our Heavenly Father whom Jesus came to reveal. The same can be said for the grief we have each felt when we failed our Father so miserably. Given the chance, though, the Holy Spirit will remind us that it was for our failures that Jesus died, that it was to a man who had failed him that Jesus entrusted his precious lambs, and that it was to a man who had tortured and murdered his followers that the Ascended Christ gave the mission of sharing his gospel to the Gentiles.

 

Since Peter and Paul, countless men and women have endured the bitter experience of failure, you and I among them. We pass through the valley of shame and regret, only to face again and again life's crosswinds on our journey. But why? Theologians and scholars offer numerous explanations, but this I know...

 

As followers of Christ, we are called to show others the way. I suspect that the Seekers among us are drawn to God less by those who walk on sunlit paths and more so by those who fall and recover, who sacrifice willingly, and who face life’s crosswinds bravely. Deep inside, the Seekers knows that courage in such circumstances can only be found in Help Divine — the very One whom they are seeking.

"He who began a good work in you will carry it unto completion. (Philippians 1:6)

Years ago, on one of my husband's and my many trips to Ruidoso, New Mexico, I watched a chainsaw-wielding artist carve a five-foot bear from the trunk of a fallen Ponderosa pine. Amazed as the work progressed, I asked, "How in the world did you learn to do that?" The man, standing in a pile of wood shavings, smiled and said, "I just carve away anything that doesn't look like a bear."

I was reminded of that encounter recently when I read the opening words of Paul's letter to the Philippians. "He who began a good work in you will carry it unto completion." Another often-quoted phrase quickly followed. "God's not finished with me yet." I have to confess that I am sometimes put off by those words, a statement which has become — Don't you think?— a bit of a cliche. It seems to me that the words are too often used to rationalize behaviors and attitudes that are insensitive or hurtful.

But if we embrace Paul's point of view and attitude toward one another, we would all be more compassionate and understanding. Of a husband who disappoints. Of a parent who falls short. Of a teen who betrays. "God is still completing his work. Our Creator is carving away all that is unlike Jesus, his Son."

Holy Spirit, when I am critical or judgmental or wounded, remind me that your work in those near to me is incomplete. And, please, Lord, remind them of the same about me when I'm stumbling my way through life's crosswinds.

"I have called you friends, for everything I learned from my Father I have made known to you." (John 15:15)

I've always loved this verse. There is something so open and embracing in what Jesus said. He considered his disciples, and by extension all followers then present and to come, his friends. Because of that perspective, he was eager to share every aspect of his life: joy, sorrow, truth, wisdom, faith and much more.

When times are hard, we instinctively turn to a friend. That friend could be a spouse, another family member, or someone unrelated whom we love and trust. How comforting it is to confide in a caring, trustworthy person, to gain their perspective, or simply to be heard.

I have found, though, that when crosswinds are relentless and intense, it is impossible to fully and openly express to even the closest friend the extent of my discouragement, weariness, or fear. Some will say there are psychological reasons for this inability to reveal our inner struggles: denial, pride, fear of being let down or betrayed. But I think there is a singular reason, one that is at the same time mysterious and yet easily understood.

Each of us, even those who would deny it, has a deeply held need for Divine Companionship. No human being, no matter how close or loving or devoted, can fill that need. If we seek or expect otherwise, we will surely be hurt and disappointed. On the other hand, how liberating it is to abandon that expectation.

Only with our Divine Companion can we experience a level of intimate understanding that will not fail. And in that mutual friendship we will have all that we need to stand strong and to find our way through, when facing life's inevitable crosswinds.