When Completeness Comes

“For we know in part...but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.” 1 Co 13:9-12

Every one of us have days that go down in our memory never to be forgotten and Monday was that day for me. One of my best friends from childhood was in the hospital with very little chance to survive the day. Bruce was scheduled for cataract surgery in the morning to which I was to drive him. Once surgery was over, I took him home and made my way to the hospital to be with Micki’s family and have a few hours by her side. The hours from morning to afternoon seemed to shrink and I felt the overwhelming toll on me, both physically and emotionally. By the end of the night, Bruce was already seeing better and Micki had been carried through the threshold of eternity. It was so much to process...so much to hold in my heart...so much heartache to contain.

But God is so mighty when we are so weak. The next morning Bruce had to be at the surgeon’s office for a recheck. I was so exhausted from the day before and was so relieved to hear the surgery was a success. But it wasn’t until I was driving us home that God transformed my heart through the words of my husband. Bruce began explaining to me that since he received the new lens in his right eye, he saw colors much differently than he previously had. He said when he covered his bad eye which will have a new lens in a few weeks, everything looked new... vibrant... beautiful ...crisp. But when he opened both eyes, things appeared muted and almost dingy. And when he covered his eye with the new lens, everything looked very dark with a yellow brownish tint. We talked about the way things will look when both eyes are done. And that is when God did what He lovingly always does for me...comforts and carries me. He whispered to me, ‘Micki has those new lenses now, Brenda. She is seeing things in ways she has never seen before. She is witnessing the beauty of eternity never imagined on earth. She sees Me face to face and knows Me fully like she never has. She is Home and she is now complete.’

You and I are mere reflections of who will be in Heaven. You and I see things on earth through a dark and muddled lens. You and I will one day see face to face Who we have only known in part. As we all walk towards our own completeness, I thank God that He gives us a glimpse of glory in which we will all be called one day. I thank God for Micki’s life...I thank God for my life-long friendship with her...and I thank God that He has made a way for each of us to experience eternity with both Him and our loved ones.

Seasons

“That they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” John 17:23

Seeing Beautiful Again by Lysa TerKeurst has probably been one of the most powerful devotionals I have ever read. The rawness of her emotions, the transparency of her suffering, and the pure invasion of her bold faith into the brokenness have left me speechless. There is not one page that she promises outcomes…there is not one chapter that wraps it all up with a pretty bow…but there is one message which you and I both need to hear. God adores us…God gave us His Son who died for us…God placed His Spirit within us giving us everything we need to survive every circumstance we face. Through these truths, we can find the love and unity of which Christ spoke with each other no matter our differences and experiences. ‘Seeing beautiful again has a lot less to do with the circumstances right in front of us and a lot more to do with using God’s truth to frame our perspective’ p. 251.

Even at the Last Supper, Jesus stayed engaged with friends and family although He knew His future held the brutality of the cross. ‘He was focused enough to stay very present in this moment instead of living in the dread of the future moments to come’ p. 252. So, will we? Can we be courageous enough to stay engaged when all we want to do is pull the covers over our head? Will our boldness recall the promises of God instead of the echoes of pain? Can we admit that although we rehearse the worst-case scenarios in our minds, we could instead believe in and experience the best comforts of God?

‘Hurt shapes us for better or worse. Jesus knew this. And He knew humans have such a propensity to turn healing into hating. Maybe that’s why He prayed for unity…With Jesus, unity and peace are possible…Seeing beautiful again is acknowledging what is. It’s accepting what isn’t. It’s offering to use what you learned through your hurt to ease someone else’s pain...It’s determining to look a little more like our Creator by taking what’s in front of us and creating something beautiful from it’ p. 254.

There is beauty everywhere no matter what we are experiencing because God is everywhere and in every season. I will allow the author of Ecclesiastes 3 to close out our devotion this morning.

1 There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:

2 a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,

3 a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build,

4 a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance,

5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to 

      refrain from embracing,       

6 a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away,

7 a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak,

8 a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.

Emerging Blooms

“We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.” Isaiah 64:8

Seeing Beautiful Again is one of the greatest devotionals I have ever read. It yields such authenticity, only to be paralleled by raw pain in the life of Lysa TerKeurst. She has shared the ugly, the beautiful, the messy, chaotice but healing journey of her shattered heart. It is the type of devotional that no matter what has broken your heart, you will find yourself in the middle of the same emotions of which she has so eloquently, yet painstakingly written.

She shared an impression that God gave her which will bless you and encourage you to push through the circumstances of heartbreak no matter how you arrived. I fully understand the power of impressions sent by God because so many of my ELM writings begin with an image that suddenly came to mind. She saw in her mind a beautiful paper-thin glass flower with a hand reaching out and wrapping itself around the glass applying pressure. As the hand closed around it, the flower popped and shattered. The next image was a shiny steel flower and as the hand closed around the flower, it held firm but created such pain for the hand. The last image was a flower made of white clay. As the hand closed around it, the clay squeezed through the fingers and molded into something different. ‘The hand folded and twisted and worked with the clay until suddenly an even more beautiful flower emerged’ p. 248.

Who of you feels folded and twisted this morning within the circumstances of your life? We all have the heartbreak, our secret suffering, our public journeys, and our unsettled emotions. But none of it is in vain because the Lord uses every single detail of every bit of pain to rework us in an even beautiful bloom. Our adversities will show us whether our faith is the paper-thin fragile flower that will shatter when life pressures us. Troubles will reveal the places our hearts have become hard as steel injuring those who reach out to help. But when we offer ourselves to God for healing and handling, we become more moldable… more teachable…more fertile for the Holy Spirit to do the work and emerge from the heartbreak to the new beginning.

‘Seeing beautiful again requires us to stay moldable by God. We don’t want to be too fragile or too rigid…He wants me [and you] like the clay, able to stand firm but be molded and reformed into whatever purpose He has…God isn’t ever going to forsake us, but He will go to great lengths to remake us’ p. 249.

Where Fear Can't Reach

 “I will say to the LORD, ‘My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” Psalm 91:2

This week has been a tough week in the news. The images of the Afghan people running and clinging to an airplane trying to escape their horrible fate are in the forefront of my mind. These are people trying to take refuge from a destiny that is out of their control.

This morning in my devotions there was an explanation of the difference between a refuge and a fortress. A refuge is a quick place you duck into to find shelter. A fortress is a place built intentionally for the purposes of exceptional security. The Hebrew word for fortress is metsudah, which translates as being an inaccessible place. Lysa TerKeurst, author of Seeing Beautiful Again writes, ‘God is not just a quick refuge from the storms of life. He’s also the place where fear no longer has access to me. Fear can’t catch what it can no longer reach,’ p. 213.

In a season of COVID, death, national chaos, and fear we aren’t much different than those images on television clamoring for a better life…clinging hopelessly trying to return to normal. Aren’t we all refugees of some kind? Aren’t we all at some point willing to do desperate things just to find a way out of our circumstances? God promises to be the place into where we duck when the calamity is chaotic, but He offers more than just a quick and temporary rescue. He offers a fortress, both present and eternal, one where we are safe in spite of our circumstances. He offers the peace that only He can give when nothing seems peaceful. He offers a place where fear can’t invade and chaos can’t control. But we must be looking for that refuge and fortress if we are to access it. We must come near to God so He can provide all we need in both challenging and calm times. Fear cannot dominate when we are leaning into our devotion to God and living into our relationship with Him. We will not be perfect in attaining peace, but will show progress towards it in Christ.

‘I’m learning to make progress with my fear. I now know I can feel afraid, but I don’t have to live afraid of the future. I can be present in this day without letting fear of tomorrow steal my peace today. I can only attend to what is right in front of me. I must trust God to hold the future’ p. 245.

We must fully and confidently cling to an ‘In God We Trust’ life if we are to believe in a better tomorrow.

Garden of Grief

“The God of grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.” 1 Peter 5:10

 

There is nothing messier than the process of grief.  I’ve walked through it and will certainly have to visit that garden again.  Many of you may be walking the stones of the garden of grief as you are reading this.  The word grief itself triggers images of brokenness, tears, isolation, and hopelessness in my mind.  Grief is so unsettling… interruptive… unpredictable… devastating.   When I facilitated groups for our church one of the most powerful thoughts that I have never forgotten is that ‘Grief never stays put.’  

 

Jesus tells us that in this world we will suffer just as He did, but our verse offers hope, healing, and promise through God’s grace.  Through the process of grief, we can’t help but to become stronger even if we don’t want to.  While grief is the price we pay for love, grief can be a bully flexing its muscle at the most vulnerable times.  But God made us to survive grief through His healing touch and the process we must go through with His help.  ‘Part of what makes healing so hard is the deep ache left behind after the trauma.  Loss envelops us with an aching grief that comes in unpredictable waves.  It’s hard to know if you’re getting better when a string of good days suddenly gives way to an unexpected emotional crash.   You feel angrier than ever over the unfairness of it all.’ Seeing Beautiful Again, Lysa TerKeurst, p. 239.

 

But like anything in life, process matters and to bristle against healing prolongs the inevitable of working through it and finding new life.  Finding new life after grief is not an abandonment of the old, rather faith that God has a new plan for your life.  All of the out-of-control emotions are not signs of weakness, but proof that healing is occurring.  ‘They’re evidence you aren’t dead inside.  There’s life under the surface, p. 240.   Then one day we suddenly realize the future feels a little more hopeful.  ‘Not because circumstances have changed but because we have embraced reality, released control, and found this healed version of ourselves…Our God is a God of restoration.  And all that aching within you is proof there’s a beautiful remaking in process.  Don’t give up.  God loves you.  You are not alone.  Healing is possible’ p. 240-241.  There will be blooms again in the garden of grief if we just keep moving.