Tuesday

Leslie had a good day today. Her body is still racked by the treatments of radiation and chemo, and yet she is strong. Anne Johnston, our pastor's mother, came over this afternoon to play with the kids and brought us dinner. It made the evening go so smoothly once I got home. The kids got to bed early, which they really needed! Les and I even got a few minutes to visit. After tomorrow, she has only one week left of radiation!

I've had a bunch of thoughts running through my head, spawned from songs, sermons, emails, and conversations, each woven into life at some point in the past few days. I thought I should get them out.

I can't tell you how much peoples' comments on the blog and emails to me have meant. To know that people are keeping up with our lives in the midst of this journey, knowing they're praying, and knowing that some are being encouraged through it all is strengthening. I got an email from someone I've never met, just to tell me he's reading and praying. I read the comment from Rosemary today, saying they've been praying the whole way through. Rosemary was a middle schooler in my first youth group I pastored. She's now all grown up, married, and a mother of two. It blows me away that she even remembers me, let alone cares to pray for my wife. But what strikes me is this, God chooses to be glorified in some strange ways. But I don't want it to be any other way.

I don't want it to be any other way because I'm not God.  God has an uncanny way of working out everything for good. Every time He does. He doesn't parent like I wished my dad had parented me when I was a kid. When you're young, you want your dad to take it easy on you, to cut you some slack, give you what you want, and let you have your freedom. But then you grow up and realize your dad did you a favor every time he was tough on you because he was "making a man out of you." Then you grow up some more when you become a dad and are overwhelmed at the amount of love you can have for your kids, and at the same time are compelled to prepare them for life. You want to make your sons into men and your daughters into ladies. You don't want your sons to be lazy, weak or fearful; so you are tough. You don't want your daughters to be whiney, shallow, or haughty; so you don't let them wrap you (at least not too tight :-)). But then you find yourself, or at least I find myself wishing God would take it easy on me, cut me some slack, give me what I want...and I realize I'm a kid again. I'm a fool. Today, Dr. Kooistra challenged us during our staff worship time to embrace what God is taking us through. He can talk...he's got room to talk. Especially to me. His wife has been battling cancer for years. What struck me from this was one particular illustration about a professor of his from seminary was how this professor had been shaped as a result of losing a very young son to leukemia. He expressed that his son would not have been better off had he lived...and neither would he. His ministry was so shaped by this great loss, something none of us would ever want or prescribe for ourselves, let alone our enemy. And so I was convicted about my own self-pity, particularly how I've been continually questioning God why I'm not back in the pastorate. Today I was reminded that God is shaping me. He has put us through some pretty tough stuff, and there is purpose behind it.

Even in this pressure cooker I am not the man I want to be. I'm amazed how I still long to please people and hide my own struggles. I'm a hypocrite. I would rather be right than be merciful, be seen righteous than act justly, and be righteous more than be humble. I'm baffled. In the midst of such struggle I try to be seen as strong rather than dependent on Christ, viewed as happy rather than satisfied in my Savior, and be thought of as noble rather than humble. All the ingredients are there to make a man that brings glory to God, and yet I am a mess. I'm angry, thankless, and pitiful. And yet even as I write this I see God's grace in my life. I've been spared of so much. I've been blessed when I should have been cursed. Tonight I see my heavenly Father making a man out of me. Even though I feel like giving up, like a kid wanting my way rather than the tough love that will make a man out of me, even though that's how I feel I know that God is faithful. He doesn't give up on me.