#TellHisStory: Fences and Walls

No longer will violence be heard in your land,

nor ruin or destruction within your borders,

but you will call your walls Salvation

and your gates Praise.

Isaiah 60:18

I've been thinking about fences and walls.  Yes, those structures that define boundaries.  It started with buying this house that doesn't have a fence for our dog.  Our ever-so-curious-just-a-little-bit-naughty dog who likes to take himself for solo walks.  So far, he's listened, albeit reluctantly at times, when we call him back to come inside.  But we're afraid 'so far' will not last much longer.  And, he deserves some time to himself, outside.  Without his human family holding him back from enjoying dog things.

So, wall-type one - the fence we want - is the kind that allows my dog to see his boundaries without interference from us.  I don't think of this as a restriction, but rather a 'freedom enhancer'.  It isn't intended to keep anything out, just to keep our increasingly independent dog safe.  Kind of like a sheepfold.

But, as I think about fences, I think about others I've seen.  In Texas, we built wall-type two - designed to not only give our dogs space to run without supervision (see picture above...), but to keep outside eyes out.  It was a privacy fence.  We had fenced in a kind of personal retreat - no traffic movement, no passing pedestrians, tall enough to block the view in from the road, but not so tall that it hid the trees and woods that were not part of our property.  Kind of like the walls of Jericho.

Then there's wall-type three.  The very real kind we build inside ourselves.  Not always visible, not always acknowledged - but there.  This is the kind of wall that defines our personal boundaries - the kind of fence that we build around the tender shoots of our emotions, around our carefully cultivated beliefs - insulating and protecting us from the rages and unpredictability of the world around us.  Holding us in while pushing the world out.  This fence compartmentalizes.  It separates.  It protects.  It blinds.  All of these.  

And sometimes these fences break down, and need repair.  And sometimes these walls just need to be moved, in or out to redefine the boundaries of our thinking.  And sometimes, sometimes they just need to be removed.  Taken away because they are no longer necessary.  No longer necessary to mark property.  No longer necessary to keep in.  And no longer necessary to push away.

I imagine heaven as a place with no need of fences or walls.  Isn't that an image to keep...

Heavenly Father, thank you for your promise of salvation.  Thank you for this glimpse of Your Kingdom in heaven.  I know, that for now I need fences.  But I look forward to the day when none of us do.  Thank you for that vision.

Linking with TellHisStory

A Sign

When evening comes, you say, ‘It will be fair weather, for the sky is red,’ and in the morning, ‘Today it will be stormy, for the sky is red and overcast.’ You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.  A wicked and adulterous generation looks for a sign, but none will be given it except the sign of Jonah.

Matthew 16:2-4

"What do you seek?"

The sun was rising over the teacher's shoulder as he spoke.  Bulbous and red, it demanded attention.  Bad weather coming.  They must make haste.  The rocks behind him stood like flames, capturing a fiery canyon that led away and away to the river and eventually to the sea.  

"What do you seek?"

Again, the question, 

"I do not seek," the traveller's eyes betrayed his thoughts.  No, looking for something was not his purpose.  He no longer looked; he already knew.  And now, with this snare, the world would know the charlatan, the faker, the false promise.  "I have come for a sign."   The words spun across the still space between them, like a single strand from a web.  A web made for trapping.   The traveler averted his gaze from the eyes of his prey, and he focused again on the morning sky.

"A sign?"  The teacher's mouth tightened slightly at the corners; his eyes lightened, pupils contracting in the brightening day.

These things showed the traveler the man was not simple.  He had understood.  The trap had been sprung.

"A sign such as this?"  The teacher stood and raised his eyes to the sky and the red underbelly of the gathering clouds.

Foolish man, the traveller thought.  Maybe he is simple after all - gesturing toward what every schoolboy knew.  Red sky in the morning bespoke storm and rain.  He finished the thought - and red sky at night was a promise of clear weather.  His impatience with his task, this baiting and trapping of this teacher, this prophet, this worker of miracles showed in the traveler's posture and demeanor.  His lips drew back from his teeth in an unwholesome smile.  This man before him, gesturing at the sky, knew not who his questioner was.  But, he would soon enough.  This rabble rouser, this spawn of Satan.  This destroyer of the Law.  He would know when God Almighty struck him down - or swallowed him whole.

"No," the teacher spoke again, with authority, "you have not come for a sign.  Because you have been given signs.  Isn't the world itself enough miracle for you?  Isn't the fact that you live and speak enough?  The sun rises and sets - the weather comes and goes.  If you don't recognize these obvious signs, how will you recognize any others?  You have come for me.  You are a foolish and shortsighted man.  There is no sign that will convince one who will not see.  Stop wasting time - stop traveling to places you refuse to know - stop asking for things you have already been shown."

He sat back down, crossing his legs.  His voice had dropped to a whisper.  The teacher's eyes - great pools of compassion - looked directly into those of the traveler.

"Swallowed whole is what you seek.  Swallowed whole will come.  But only for three days."  The teacher looked longingly at the heavens.  He followed the flight path of a bird, a bird that slipped between ragged scraps of sky and wisps of clouds.  A wild finger of light stroked his face and in the moment, in the moment, it was as if a fog lifted from the traveller.  He saw into the Teacher's eyes - Wisdom, Glory, the Ancient of Days.

And then the man spoke again - the man with the eyes of God, the Teacher.  "It won't be enough sign for you."  The last words were uttered with great tenderness and love.

Father God, thank you for this new day.  Thank you for daily miracles.  Thank you for your never-ending love, your undeserved love.  Thank you for faith.

Linking with Women Helping Women

A Cup of Cold Water

Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division.

Luke 12:51

"Come to the fountain and drink."  

The maiden was young, and he could tell, shapely beneath her robe and veil.  It had been a long, hot, dusty day for him and he was thirsty.  His sandals were wearing blisters on his feet; it was time to stop and rest.  It had been a long, hot, dusty day.

He watched as she leaned over the low wall, holding back her veil with one hand as she used the other to dip the long handle of the drinking ladle into the water - the clear, cool, soon-to-be refreshing water.  Precious water.  Precious youth.  Precious woman.  Cracks on his lips, the grit of the road on his face, he was tired.  Tired of this journey.  Tired of travel.  Tired of all of the nots he had grown used to.  Not sleeping in his own bed.  Not eating regular meals.  The people who were not understanding his message.  

He shook his head slowly, as much to stretch and work his neck and shoulders as to shake out his thinking.  

She held the ladle toward him, eyes downcast.  "Drink", she said, simply.  And he did.  And it was all he thought it would be.  His head tilted back and back until the cup was empty.  He could feel the change immediately, new strength, resilience even, flowed into him.  Renewal.  Yes.  It was just what he had needed.  Gazing at his men - his followers - he saw that they, too, had been renewed by the rest, by the refreshment, renewed by the view.

They were scattered around the fountain, sitting and standing in clusters, like heads of grain - some here, some there - full and ripe and waiting for the threshing floor.  And he knew what they didn't.  The threshing floor was close before them.  A time of separation.  A time of division, of conflict.  A time of winnowing, cleansing.  He knew the things to come, and they were not easy.  But they were necessary. 

 He was molding soldiers for his Kingdom.  He was preparing the way.  He closed his eyes.  Father, they want it all now, he prayed, they want instant everything: instant riches, instant glory, instant peace.  Show me, help me to make them see how far they need to go, how long and how difficult the road is.  God, like water, flowed through his limbs.  He could feel the power, the resolve.  Standing, he called his disciples to him.  He was about to turn their world upside down. 

"Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth."  

He saw the confusion on their faces, he felt their puzzlement.  The women at the fountain stopped filling their water vessels.  Even the breeze had silenced, as if the world stood still.  

"I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law—a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.   

Glancing toward heaven, he silently thanked his Father for the words, the words from the ancient scripture, words that everyone knew.   

“Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me."   

Upside down.  On the threshing floor.  Confusion, like a wall, pushed at him from all sides.  But his time was so short, and there was so much to be understood.  He tried to explain again, another way.

"Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me."

Some of his followers were nodding in assent.  He could sense the wall coming down.

"Whoever finds their life will lose it..."

More confusion.  Upside down.  This was so difficult - one of the nots.  They were not understanding, not comprehending.  He was losing them.  Some of the women had turned away and were beginning again to ladle water - precious, change-making water into their jars.  The clay jars, vessels of life.  He spoke louder, turning toward the women at the fountain.

"...and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it."

He had found life at the hand of the girl.  Renewal and refreshment.  What were they, after all, but vessels of clay, made to hold that life.  This, the people understood.  This, he could use.

“Anyone who welcomes you welcomes me, and anyone who welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me."  He pointed toward heaven, lest there be any doubt.  And appealed to the age-old custom of hospitality.

"Whoever welcomes a prophet as a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever welcomes a righteous person as a righteous person will receive a righteous person’s reward."  This they understood.  They had grown attentive again.  He walked, purposefully, toward the young maiden who had given him refreshment.  He smiled at her, encouraging her to look at him, eyes at him.

"And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, truly I tell you, that person will certainly not lose their reward.”

Father, sometimes we want peace now, everything now.  Sometimes we over-simplify.  

Thank you for showing us that conflict and division can grow us in you.  

That understanding sometimes comes from faith.

  

Linked with Monday's Musings

Hear It On Sunday

A Small Huge Thing

Behold, I belong to God like you; I too have been formed out of the clay.

Job 33:6

It was just a small thing, really.  Just a flip of the hair.  The hair that we had finally been able to grow out after years of Buster Brown haircuts she had long outgrown - after years of forced visitation to a poisonous environment (read I-won't-say-any-more-because-it-isn't-very-nice).  The hair was finally long.  Finally her own to choose to do with as she wanted.  Finally so many things.

And then this small gesture.  We were at lunch.  My teacher friends, me, and my daughter.  We'd made a date to go to the outlet mall for some shopping and long overdue relaxation.  And we were at lunch.

And the waiter was a young man.  And my daughter asked for a diet coke and then flipped her hair.  At him.  With a smile.  A big smile.  And a little giggle.  And she turned to us and said, "I love men."

Oh dear!  Such a small thing and then it was huge.  This girl, my daughter, my beautiful, then-seventeen-year-old Down Syndrome daughter was making her hormones known.  Like a typical teenager.  Like any other girl.  Flipping her hair and giggling.  Oh dear!

And in an instant, I saw her in a different light.  Perhaps in God's light.  This child, this teen, this young woman.  Doing the normal, the typical, and doing it out loud.  Such a small, huge thing.

Linking with Five Minute Friday

His Peace

Do not be anxious about anything, 

but in every situation, by prayer and petition, 

with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 

And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, 

will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Phillipians 4:6-7

How gracious is our God!  It is good to be reminded on this beautiful Saturday - one week ended, one week about to begin.  The school year about to start.  New opportunities on the horizon.

How he loves us!  How he shows us - always - in the big and the small, the loud and the soft.

He lives in every atom, every molecule, every seed, leaf, branch, and flower, every insect, every star, every grain of sand.  He lives in every one of us - we are His children.  His precious children.

And he gives us peace.

Thank you, God, for taking my worries and anxieties and transforming them to eagerness and anticipation.  Opportunity and discovery - discovery of Your plan in my life.  Thank you for peace.

Linking with StillSaturday