Resurrection Sunday, March 23, 2008

System overload!

Just as I was sitting down to write, AmCam showed up, and whoopdie-doo! She’s a great girl, but I was ready to wind down and call it a night. “You always make me feel so welcome,” she hugged me on her way out the door. Little Hypocrite Abigail stood by smiling, eager to dash back to the safe haven of her bedroom. But if love is action, is it wrong to hide my own desires to make someone feel welcome? Is that hypocrisy or love?

Lydia rose this morning with skin as smooth as a new born baby’s. Praise the Lord!

Our home was brimming over with activity as we got ready for our meeting this morning. In addition to Dathan and Nick, Bruce, Lauren and Nathaniel all pulled in late last night and Josh joined us after the Sunrise Service at First Baptist. As we reflected on Christ’s death and resurrection, Josh’s questions brought to light some beautiful details: how Christ’s sufferings were greater than any sinner will ever face in hell, because in those three hours on the cross he was forsaken by God, His own Holy Father; how, even God’s grace in the shining of the sun was blotted out while Jesus hung on the cross paying the penalty for the world’s sin; how death could not hold him—in three hours time He had paid for every sin ever committed or that ever would be committed and was able to commit His spirit to God; how, while His body lay in the grave, He went and preached triumph to the souls in sheol, and when he ascended back to God, He led forth those who had been waiting on the credit of faith in God for the Messiah who would free them from their sins; how we know He was heard because of His piety, in that God raised Him again! In this is our confident hope, that as Jesus conquered death and rose again to the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life, confident that we shall be raised into the likeness of His perfection one day. This is God: both just and the justifier.

From there Papa turned to teach from First Timothy chapter two—about prayer in the assembly, by the males, and the females redirection to a role in the home. It’s hard to shake ourselves loose of the cultural concept that women should be “liberated” and should be independent. When all of us learn to be truly independent individuals, society will crumble. Interdependence is what holds a family, a marriage, a community together. God’s plan for separate roles—where each person performs a special part that only they can do well. Like the spider is important to the earth’s ecosystem in her ability to build webs and trap insects like no other creature, so the woman’s importance is not in her ability to compete with men, but in her ability to bear children—something no man can do. Strange it is, that women have “liberated” themselves from the freedom of enjoying what they were created to be, and have enslaved themselves in the rat-race that is corporate life—little realizing how much that second income is actually costing them: second car/insurance/expense/wear and tear, wardrobe, daycare, eating out or pre-made food, to mention nothing of medical bills due to stress and strain at work and home. The femanazis of our day have embraced a double curse—was it not enough to have pain in child-birth, but that they also must work the ground by the sweat of their brow? How blessed I am to have been raised in a family who sought to function under God’s plan, and has reaped so many of the blessings He reserves for those who seek His ways. As we studied, I was struck by the concept that a godly woman is not an independent entity. The headship passage in First Corinthians eleven began to gel with me. God is the head. Even Jesus said He could do nothing on His own initiative—He was only an ambassador of God. Each man is an ambassador of Christ and each woman, an ambassador of her man—husband or, in my case, father. It’s not a weighty chain of command, it’s a layered umbrella of protection. The godly woman adorns herself with modesty and good works, as an ambassador of her man. I found myself slipping into a brown study, reevaluating my life, my activities, my attitudes. Am I pleasing my father? Am I seeking to further his ministry? Am I blessing him? As an expression of my love for Christ.

Lauren and Nathaniel shared with me what they've been learning from "Created to be His Helpmeet"—girls tend to think themselves spiritual because they talk on and on about how God leads them, in every little thing. Guys are carnal, of course, because they don’t have the same subjective, emotional reactions. So how does God lead? Can we look back and see His leading in the past? I’m sure, as I read back through my journals, that I can see God’s hand, see His leading. I set up Ebenezer stones, saying “Thus far has the Lord brought me”. Is that mistaken? Emotional? Shallow?

How am I ever going to sort out the scrambled mess my mind and heart have reached?

I think I’ll go to bed. In the morning I will defragment.

Lord, my heart seems bruised and shattered,
Swirling winds of doubt have scattered.
Lost within the storm, I stand
Wishing I could understand.

What’s a girl to do? I wonder.
Confused by flashes, peals of thunder,
Pelted by the boiling rain—
Unite my heart to fear Thy name.