Category: Just thinking (Page 6 of 8)

Four Anchors

April 26, 2020 / Shari Baar / 0 Comments

Dear Daughters,

I’ve been kinda crabby lately. Somedays I just wake up angry. Dad is annoying me – not intentionally – I’ve just become easily annoyed. Uncertainty, knowing this world is not what it used to be, the palpable fear and panic in people’s eyes and voices is taking a toll on us all.

Rebekah Lyons summarized my emotions well:

I woke up hoppin’ mad a couple days ago for reasons I couldn’t explain. Maybe because the adrenaline of a new challenge has worn off, Ground Hog Day has kicked in, the month of positivity and reset is over, and isolation feels indefinite.

We’re all in this pandemic together, but the thoughts we entertain can cause either anxiety and fear or bring us peace. If I try to look too far into the future and consider what might happen to all of you, your children and our world, I become anxious because the future holds much ambiguity. But if we’re honest, the future has always been uncertain. We’ve never had a playbook for the future. We may have had the illusion of control, but in all reality it was just that, an illusion.

Now, however, the deception is gone forever. One little virus seems to be virtually ruling the entire world – except for the cool continent of Antarctica.

How then shall we think? The thoughts we think become our emotions which in turn drives everything we say and do.

On what anchors for our soul can we truly rely? Mark Batterson points out in Acts 27, when Paul and many others had been on a ship for 14 days in a severe storm on the Adriatic Sea, there was fear that they would be dashed against the rocks, so …they dropped four anchors from the stern and prayed for daylight.

The only true words I know, which can be anchors for our soul, those which have been true for millennium, are out of the #1 Bestseller of all time – The Bible. Here’s a few anchors I have been dropping in my mind lately in order to keep free from anxiety:

The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger,

abounding in love. Psalm 103:8

Psalm 103 is one of my favorite Psalms, it speaks throughout about how He has brought me out of the pit, crowned me with love and compassion, satisfies me with good things, and forgives all my sins. Although King David who wrote this song lived 1,000 years before Jesus, his words still ring true today.

My second anchor is:

For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are Your ways my ways, declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:8-9

Since God is the Creator of everything seen and unseen as well as the Creator of me, it is an undeniable fact that His thoughts are higher than mine. An astrophysicist has estimated our universe to be about 93 billion light years. Since a single light-year is the distance light travels in one year (around 6 trillion miles) and He has created everything within our universe, I know He’s a lot wiser than I. It’s a bit like comparing my thoughts to an ant’s thoughts – though a trillion times more. He understands many things I cannot even imagine. I don’t always like or even understand His thoughts, but I believe they are true and good.

The third anchor for my soul is Romans 8:28:

For we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose.

Notice He doesn’t say all things are good. It’s a well-known fact that bad things happen to good people, life is unfair… Yet, God is the God of great reversals, He brings light out of darkness, life out of death. Just remember the stories of Joseph, Job, Ruth, Esther, King David and Jesus. They all went through dark, scary, uncertain times, yet God eventually brought good out of everything.

Of course there were years of grief, heartache and despair, yet the ending in every single story was good. Reading the Old Testament stories are a wonderful antidote for anxiety. And since Jesus says he is the same yesterday, today and forever, I believe He will bring good out of this tragedy as well.

And my fourth anchor is 2 Timothy 1:7

For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, and of power, and of a sound mind.

Just repeating this verse gives me comfort. It reminds me that fear doesn’t come from God – only love, power and a sound mind come from Him.

All fear is but the notion that God’s love ends,

says Ann Voskamp.

So even though it sounds simple to keep these four anchors in my mind, it is not easy. The dire predictions for the future will come, yet I will – with the help of the Holy Spirit – believe that this world is not my home, I’m just-a-passin’ through. Then my soul is at peace, and amazingly, joy and love slip in the back door. I will not get annoyed so easily at circumstances out of my control.

In the first book of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Frodo – the bearer of the Ring – laments that a great evil has disrupted his life.

I wish it need not have happened in my time, he says.

Gandalf responds with both compassion and wisdom:

So do I, and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

I think I will decide to hang on to the anchors that will steady me in the time of this storm and wait for the daylight.

Love, Mom

Thanksgiving at the Table

April 9, 2020 / Shari Baar / 2 Comments

Dear Daughters,

This week I have been meditating on how Jesus spent the last few days of His short life here on earth. I find it quite astounding that the day before he was brutally murdered, he celebrated the Jewish Passover meal with his 12 disciples.

In Israel, over 2,000 years ago where the Last Supper was celebrated, people walked most everywhere they traveled. It was common in those days after coming into someone’s home to have a servant wash the guests’ feet. The dusty roads in first century Israel made it imperative for feet to be washed before a meal since people usually reclined at a low table and dirty feet would be quite evident.

What was surprising the night of this meal, was that Jesus already knew that his traitor, Judas Iscariot, was just about ready to leave and collect his 30 pieces of silver – a reward for betraying his teacher. He knew Peter was soon to deny that he even knew Jesus, and the other ten disciples would scatter in fear. Yet, Jesus knelt down in humility and servanthood, took a towel and stooped before each one of those disciples. He washed their feet, all 24 of them, dried them, then walked back and took his place at the table.

I have heard this story many times, so many in fact that in years past I had skimmed over those facts, not paying much attention to them. But somehow, this year the whole story simply stuns me. Why would Jesus, the Creator of the world, stoop down and be so kind and generous to his friends who often argued among themselves who would be the greatest in this new Kingdom?

And then, even though he knew all of the beating, mocking, whipping and nails that were soon to unveil, he took the loaf of bread in front of him and gave thanks. Gave thanks??

What was there to give thanks about?

A group of friends who were going to run away in a few hours?

Give thanks for the Roman soldiers who would soon flog him?

Give thanks as he listened to his own people shout for his death?

I was just rereading the story of Aslan’s death in The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. CS Lewis portrays the time before the killing of the great Lion:

A great crowd of people were standing all around the Stone Table and though the moon was shining many of them carried torches which burned with evil-looking red flames and black smoke. But such people! Ogres with monstrous teeth, and wolves, and bull-headed men; spirits of evil trees and poisonous plants…Cruels and Hags and Incubuses, Wraiths…

Then the Witch gave a wild, fierce laugh. ‘The fool! The fool has come. Bind him fast.’

For many people in that day, and even today, what Jesus did was utterly foolish. What kind of King would let his people treat him as they did? A King who loved his people so much he was willing to die in their place.

As Ann Voskamp wisely writes:

God is love – thus He only gets to define love.

And He defines love as cross-shaped, cross-formed, stretched out, formed into a reaching givenness that leaves the heart breathtakingly vulnerable.

True love is willing to open oneself to hurt and heartache – all the while thanking God in spite of all the betrayal, lies and fear showing their ugliness through people in our lives. We have all hurt others, we have all betrayed friends, we have all told lies to make ourselves look better.

Yet we are all welcomed to come to Jesus, the bridge between God and man.

If Jesus was able to give thanks on the eve of his death, focusing on the needs of others before his own, surely I can give thanks during this week as we live in a time of pandemic, uncertainty of the future, and lessened contact with those I love.

Giving thanks, in both times of joy as well as times of anguish, gives voice to the fact of our certainty and belief in the love of our Savior. Although the world has changed, our Savior has not and is as close as He has always been.

Love, Mom

Fly Away on a Goose?

March 26, 2020 / Shari Baar / 2 Comments

Dear Daughters,

Last week I was walking outside and saw three groups of geese, flying in their typical V formations, each following the other. Because it had been a hard day – Grandpa is failing and the extra care that entails, the pandemic which is affecting us all – I longed to hop on one of those geese and fly away into the beautiful blue sky.

I remember when caring for Grandma at the end stages of dementia over three years ago, I had the same thought – wanting to run away from responsibilities, flee from the hard stuff, fly away and be free of trouble, heartache, aging and death.

So, last night I watched the movie Winged Migration thinking I could imagine the carefree, flying-high life of a bird. It’s a lovely 2002 film chronicling the migration patterns of storks, swan, geese, eagles, sage grouse, terns, penguins and other feathered friends I had never heard of before.

I had no idea that many of these birds travel from 1,000 to 2,500 miles every year. Now I know there are lots of good wind currents available for flying up above the earth but that’s still a lot of wing flapping and energy exerted as they fly from one continent to another.

While watching the movie I learned about the many obstacles migrating birds face as they fly on their yearly journeys.

*They often endure hostile weather conditions, storms which may blow them off their intended path.

*Their vulnerability to predators, both human, animal and other birds of prey, is considerably worse than what I imagined.

*Collisions with objects like tall buildings, airplanes or wind turbines can be an unexpected danger.

*Inadequate food supplies can lead to starvation of the birds.

After watching the movie and learning about all the hazards these winged creatures face during their travels, my desire to fly away on one of their backs lessened considerably. It often seems like other people or creatures have it easier than me, and sometimes I become a bit discouraged. But the other day I heard a quote by Katherine Wolf:

The obsession of a pain-free life is a ridiculous idea.

Spoken from the mouth of a woman who is 38 years old and in a wheel chair because of a brain stem stroke suffered 12 years ago, I was struck by the fact that she lives with such joy. She was pursuing a career as a model when her life took a totally unexpected path.

Katherine and her husband, Jay, have weathered months in hospital and rehab centers yet have together written a book called Suffer Strong. One of their favorite verses is:

…we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character, and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. Romans 5:3-5

We will suffer in this life, and anyone who tries to tell us that we should never suffer is setting us up for depression and despair. It’s not what we suffer, but how we respond to suffering which is the most important. Yes, life is hard – it has been in the past, it is now, and it will continue to be so. But when we trust God and give Him thanks, even in the hard times, we can have the joy He has come to give.

So, even though we are limited in what we can do, I know God has put you and me in the places we are for such a time as this. He has called us to suffer strong, give thanks, and trust that He is working all things together for good.

I’ve given up the desire to hop on the wings of a goose and fly away into a better life. I will be content now, enjoying the joy God sends every day of my life. I’ll continue to help Grandpa with his oxygen, give him the breathing treatments he needs, wrap his swollen ankles and give thanks for life, for the difficult stuff now, and the good things that are yet to come.

Love, Mom

CS Lewis on the Virus

March 14, 2020 / Shari Baar / 2 Comments

Dear Daughters,

One of my favorite writers, C.S. Lewis (author of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe), wrote an interesting few paragraphs 72 years ago. Even though his essay was written in light of the recently-dropped atomic bomb back in 1945, it is still relevant today. All we need to do is replace the words “atomic bomb” with “Coronavirus.”

I do believe all necessary precautions should be set in place and taken seriously, yet, we are still able to live in peace and not fear.

Fear and anxiety are more contagious than any virus.

John Eldredge

Below are Lewis’ wonderfully wise three paragraphs:

On Living in an Atomic Age (1948) by C.S. Lewis

In one way we think a great deal too much about the atomic bomb. “How are we to live in an atomic age?” I am tempted to reply: “Why, as you would have lived in the sixteenth century when the plague visited London almost every year, or as you would have lived in a Viking age when raiders from Scandinavia might land and cut your throat any night; or indeed, as you are already living in an age of cancer, an age of syphilis, an age of paralysis, an age of air raids, an age of railway accidents, an age of motor accidents.”

In other words, do not let us begin by exaggerating the novelty of our situation. Believe me, dear sir or madam, you and all whom you love were already sentenced to death before the atomic bomb was invented: and quite a high percentage of us were going to die in unpleasant ways. We had, indeed, one very great advantage over our ancestors – anesthetics; but we have that still. It is perfectly ridiculous to go about whimpering and drawing long faces because the scientists have added one more chance of painful and premature death to a world already bristled with such chances and in which death itself was not a chance at all, but a certainty.

This is the first point to be made: and the first action to be taken is to pull ourselves together. If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things – praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts – not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.

God is still the same today as He has been throughout eternity. The Coronavirus did not take Him by surprise, and it is only through Him that we are able to have peace in the midst of chaos and panic. God is still good, and Jesus comforts us with His own words:

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not be afraid. John 14:27

I pray for you as you stand strong in hope and peace.

Love, Mom

One Minute Pause

January 30, 2020 / Shari Baar / 2 Comments

Dear Daughters,

It is a gnarly time to be a human being. And God cares about your humanity…

John Eldredge writes these words, and gnarly is a great descriptor of the era in which we live. Twisted, rough, crooked, distorted, dangerous, hazardous, precarious, insecure – all are definitions for the word gnarly. And some days more than others, I am tempted to feel those emotions.

The origin of gnarly apparently came from surfers’ slang, from the appearance of a rough sea, where most of the waves are starting to break. Although I have body surfed during my younger days in Southern California, I have never desired to go out on a stormy day and catch the big waves in the ocean.

Whenever tempests of life come, they often have to do with people in your sphere of influence or decisions which clamor for your attention. Because John Eldredge understands people so well and the pain which all our souls endure, he and his team at Ransomed Heart Ministries have put together an amazing little app (and it’s free) to be a sanctuary in the chaos, a sort of lifeline on a stormy day.

I’ve shared it with many people in the last few weeks, so thought I’d share it with you as well. The app is built around several simple practices, the first which is,

Benevolent detachment – based on the verse:

Cast all your cares upon God, for He cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7

I love the word benevolent – kind, compassionate, tenderhearted. It sounds warm and loving. Yet when benevolent is paired with the word detachment, they almost seem like opposites. Jesus wants us to love people of course, and to care about the circumstances surrounding them, but He also wants us to understand what our part is and not usurp His role in their lives.

If you look at the life of Jesus, it’s how he lived. He loved well but was never dependent on people’s opinions – negative or positive – he simply cared deeply but never entangled himself in order to coerce or control.

What do you need to let go of, to benevolently detach from?

Your children?

Your parents?

The text you just received?

Your expectations of the perfect life you had hoped would someday appear?

Your worries about finances?

Your husband?

Your planning for the future?

The number of likes you received from your latest social media post?

The frustrations of your job?

So often I have the crazy idea that I’m in control of my world, I must figure stuff out on my own, and it’s up to me to make it work. But this verse reminds me that I don’t have to carry that load, and there’s no way I can. Jesus has offered to bear it all, so why not let Him?

There are many instances when we simply cannot fix our own or others’ problems. We can’t change other people, it’s actually quite tough to bring change in our own lives. But we can direct them to seek God and His wisdom, surrendering ourselves and others to Him.

The second practice of the One-Minute Pause App is:

Union with God – We were created to be in union with God, just as Jesus is one with the Father. Every distraction in the world is bent on getting us away from God, tempting us to trust in our money, in people around us, in our status. Other folks are not to be our saviors or our idols; our money is not our security – any one of these we could lose tomorrow.

Bottom line, all of this Union with God boils down to trust.

Do you trust that God loves you, that He cares about every detail of your life?

Do you trust that He loves your family more than you do?

There have been times when I have not believed, when I have doubted, when I thought I knew better than God what I needed. I actually thought I could do a better job than He, and I lived for years never consulting Him about anything. Ann Voskamp calls it practical atheism.

But then tough stuff happened, my life was not unfolding as I had hoped or could even imagine and I had no choice but to cast my cares on Jesus. I had to give up on my own wisdom, my own strength. Falling into the arms of God is the best decision I have ever made. Union with God – it is a safe place, an abode of peace and security.

The third practice of the One Minute Pause is:

Praying the River of Life – In our life today there is much fear, anxiety, worries about our health, our safety, the threat of war, death, and the loss of human relationships. How we need to pray for the River of Life – because the river of death is so prevalent all around us – to wash over us, surround and envelope us in His Love.

I’m amazed to see how much more aware I’ve become of my incessant and continual need for God. After using the One Minute Pause for a few months, I have found a beautiful reprieve from thinking too much about the past, learning to find joy in the present and not worrying about the future. I have learned to tether my soul to Him and not be pulled to and fro like waves on the ocean.

If you desire an oasis in the middle of your morning or afternoon, give the One Minute Pause a try.

Change is a marathon won by a million baby steps. Ann Voskamp

Love, Mom

If you would like to download the app and give it a try, simply type into Google:

One Minute Pause App

The Holy But

January 8, 2020 / Shari Baar / 2 Comments

Dear Daughters,

Once again Christmas is past, New Years has been celebrated and here we are in a new decade, with emotions ranging from anticipation to anxiety, fear to hope, wonder to boredom – depending on our circumstances in life. Along with many other folks this time of year, I have made some goals for the year/decade. One of the areas I would like to work on has to do with the words I speak.

Have you ever gotten home from being with someone or a group of people and rewound the conversation in your mind? Do you ever wish you could take back some words you have spoken and replaced them with better, kinder words? Yeah, me too – more often than I like.

I’ve been listening to myself as well as others and have noticed that many people live after the but. That is, the word “but.” If you listen carefully to others (or yourself) you will find out what they really believe after the but. It doesn’t matter what they say first, what they truly believe comes after the but. Someone may say,

I really like Charissa, but she’s kinda gossipy. She didn’t call me when she knew I was having a hard time.

Oh yes, Nathan is so funny, but did you know he had a temper tantrum after he didn’t get the deal he wanted?

Mara is so beautiful, but did you see the look she gave me when I mentioned where I shop?

I really like our pastor, but he never visited my mom when she was sick.

It’s good and healthy to express honest emotions, but most people live in the world after the but. It doesn’t matter what someone says, you’ll find out what they really believe if you listen to what comes after the but. We say things like:

I know God loves me, but I feel so abandoned.

I know God promised to provide for me, but I don’t really have what I need.

I know God promises me wisdom, but all I feel is confusion.

When we talk like that we live only in the present circumstance. The only hope we have is for a change in our feelings or in our current state of affairs. If we trust solely in our emotions or what is happening around us, we can easily fall into despair. Satan doesn’t care about our talking about God as long as we put Him before the but.

Dan Stone writes about something called The Holy But. It’s putting God after the but, where He belongs. When Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, the night before he was killed, he prayed something like this (a paraphrase of Dan Stone).

Father, I don’t want to be separated from you. If it’s possible please let me out of it. In fact, this is so heavy on me right now that my soul feels very depressed…

…Yet

…nevertheless

…BUT

…not as I will but as You will.

Jesus was emotionally honest, he spoke freely about what he felt, how hard it was, how he was suffering, but he was willing to submit to His Father’s will.

King David, one of the main writers of the Psalms, was painfully honest with God. In Psalm 13 he laments:

How long, O Lord, will you forget me forever?

How long will you hide your face from me?

How long shall I take counsel in my soul,

Having sorrow in my heart all the day?

How long will my enemy be exalted over me…. (verses 1-2)

Many of us think these things but would never dare say them out loud. David, however, not only spoke them but wrote them down for people to read thousands of years later. And the interesting thing is God doesn’t mind our honesty. In fact he desires it. But the fascinating part of this prayer of lament is the way David ends the Psalm,

But I trust in your unfailing love,

My heart rejoices in your salvation.

I will sing the Lord’s praise,

For He has been good to me. (verses 5-6)

That’s an example of the Holy But. Nothing had changed in David’s circumstances, but his perspective changed. It moved him from where he was stuck – in despair and sorrow – and into faith.

Even though your life may look hopeless at this moment, you can choose to remember how God has been faithful throughout your life. And if, as on those categorically hard days, you forget about the good things in your past, you can look to the stories in the Bible about how He always keeps His promises, always brings good out of evil, and promises to never, ever, no not ever abandon us.

Remember the stories of Abraham,

Jacob,

Joseph,

Daniel,

Ruth,

Esther,

Rahab,

and the list goes on….

The Holy But is able to change your situation from concentrating on the external issues in life to the internal – your spirit. You take all those emotions back to the Person dwelling in you and get God into it. Then you can experience peace even in the midst of the storm.

All fear is but the notion that God’s love ends ~ Ann Voskamp

Welcome this new year and consider letting God bless you in the days ahead by using the Holy But.

The year ahead looks daunting, but I know You are holding me with Your everlasting arms.

I feel like a loser today, but I know You love me anyway.

The world happenings are causing me fear, but I know You are still the King of the earth, King of me and I trust You.

Lord, life is going by so fast! It frightens me unless I remember your eternity. We are as rootless as tumbleweeds and will be blown about all our lives unless You are our dwelling place. In You we are home. What I have in You I can never lose and will have forever. I praise You for this unfathomable comfort. Amen. ~ Tim Keller

Love, Mom

A Gift of Rags

December 17, 2019 / Shari Baar / 4 Comments

Dear Daughters,

My friend, Ann, always makes me laugh. She is a storyteller extraordinaire, and somehow even sad stories end up funny when Ann is the narrator.

A few years ago in December, Ann prepared Christmas gifts for her and Ed’s employees, just as they do every Christmas. She carefully placed each employee’s bonus and gift inside brown paper bags. It is always Ed’s job to deliver the bags to the employees. Strangely, after distributing all the bags, he had one leftover. Ann knew she had the correct number of bags ready for Ed, so they were both curious and wondering how he ended up with an extra gift bag.

So, Ed decided to call each employee personally and ask if he had received his Christmas gift. Yes, the first guy received his, and the next and the next. Finally he called the last guy, and his response was

What did I ever do to offend you?

Ed and Ann’s daughter worked in a beauty salon and periodically brought hair-dye stained rags home to her dad because he could always find a use for them in the barn. Those rags were always brought home in a brown paper bag. Apparently, Ed had picked up that bag of rags with all the others and …. well, you can figure out the rest of the story.

Ann and I laughed as she told me the story, but on the way home I got thinking about the bags of rags we give to each other at different times.

About 15 years ago, you and your families were at our house for a Christmas celebration. As our tradition has been for many years, every person has to hunt for one of their presents. We are all given 10 clues and at the end of the search there is a gift to reward the searcher.

Well, this particular year I successfully got to the end of my 10 clues and for whatever reason, the gift spot was empty. Immediately the words came into my mind:

Yep, this is always your life. You try hard, work hard, but there will never be any prize for you….

I put on a happy face and tried to laugh about it but inside I was weeping, hurt and trying not to believe those ugly words in my head. I knew the empty spot was not left intentionally that way, but it was still empty and the words ricocheted through my mind.

To be fair, this happened during a year I was going through menopause, rejection from people I loved, and a chronic illness. But whatever your back story is, words and wounds in life – either perceived or actual – always hurt.

We have all received rag bags of ugly, stained words from those we love, and we have all given bags of rags to those we love.

I have given many rag bags to Dad over the years– words said in anger, frustration and sometimes bitterness. Bags like

You always forget my birthday (yes, a few times he did)

You have lists but you don’t ever do them (he does much of what is on his list but not always when I want him to do).

Some of the rag bags I have given to Dad have been deliberate, others have been unintentional.

And of course, it goes both ways. Dad has given me bags of rags as well, but since this blog comes from my perspective and not his I will refrain from speaking about those.

Because we live in a fallen world, offense comes often and it can be intense. We cannot predict or control what bags of rags we are given, but we are responsible for our reaction to them.

We can believe those thoughts and words that are spoken and creep into our mind – we are worthless, unlovable and a failure, that all our efforts are useless and wasted,

We can choose to believe we are loved by God, a chosen, beautiful child of God. When we fail, when we hurt, when we pray for better relationships we can believe He is for us and not against us. He is always working for our good. We can forgive and move on in our lives, knowing that Jesus always uses those hardships to make us stronger and more like Him. Tim Keller says it so well:

In some mysterious way, troubles and suffering refine us like gold and turn us, inwardly and spiritually, into something beautiful and great.

When Jesus came down to earth many centuries ago, He came directly into our rags of humanity. The Roman Empire at that time was corrupt, brutal, dark, inhumane and heartless. Interestingly, he didn’t start explaining the darkness and why it was there. He didn’t rail and condemn the Empire, He simply came into it (Immanuel – God with us) and showed us a way out. He presented us with new life, a better way to live, the way of love even in the face of unjust tyrants and religious hypocrites.

When you are given a bag of rags, invite Jesus into it. His specialty is making good come out of suffering, righting wrongs, making all things new, and above all – teaching us to trust Him. When we love freely, forgive abundantly, and give those bags of rags to Him, we will find joy, freedom and contentment.

The employee who received the bag of rags that long-ago Christmas? He still carries the offense around with him. He hasn’t come to see it as an accident or even a humorous error from his employer. Of course, his bag was replaced with the intended beautiful Christmas gift, but he still hangs on to the rags in his mind.

Remember, remember, you can always get rid of those bags of rags and trade them in for the Perfect gift.

Love, Mom

One Thousand Gifts

November 26, 2019 / Shari Baar / 4 Comments

Dear Daughters,

The most life-changing book I’ve ever read is One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp. She writes about how God has extravagantly showered you and I with gifts – every day of our lives. Never before had I read someone who was so vulnerable, sharing her insecurities, doubts, anxieties, depression, disappointment with God and her fierce struggle to find joy in everyday living. As I read, I felt a kinship with her and was ready to learn whatever it was that had transformed her to become honest, bold and joyful.

Ann’s friend had challenged her to make a list of a thousand things she loves – 1,000 gifts. She started that very day to chronicle the simple gifts of life – jam on toast, the cry of a blue jay, wool sweaters with turtleneck collars – and became surprised by the joy that naming these gifts created in her. Joy that had eluded her for years now appeared through the simple act of thanksgiving.

Because joy had been eluding me as well, I bought a journal and started writing down gifts, not gifts that I want, but gifts God has already given me. Looking for gifts and writing them down in detail felt like I was on a quest for beauty – something I had never done before. I too was surprised by joy springing up in my heart. I became more aware of the beauty in our home, in the surrounding countryside, the people in my life. I started thanking God for the little things: my ten fingers, the energy to fold laundry, tulips in bloom, melted butter on my broccoli. I found I couldn’t name just three a day – it became five, ten, sometimes more – simply because it brought such delight that I hadn’t realized had been missing in my ife. It was easy to find and write down so many good gifts ….for many months.

Then came what Ann calls the hard Eucharisteo (the Greek word for thanks). It’s easy to give thanks when things are going well, when my plans are moving forward and life is pleasant. But when illness comes to visit, when relationships unfurl, when everywhere we turn we see envy, greed and bitterness, the most expected behavior in the world is to slip down into the hole of self-pity and start believing the lies that snake into our minds.

God is good when life is good,

but He must be mad at me because now life is bad.

He loves other people more than me

I’m never good enough

Why try? Everything I do fails…

I’m just a has-been

God has abandoned me…

A woman of wisdom, Ann writes:

There can be a lying snake curled between your neural membranes

and his lies can run poison in your veins.

I’ve experienced that poison in my veins, and it produces heaviness, despair and hopelessness. When I focused on those lies that crept in my mind and not on the truth of God’s goodness, life didn’t seem worth living.

So in the midst of my anguish – when yet another move with the all too familiar sight of mountains of boxes around me, a body not functioning like I had hoped and the failing of key relationships – I went back and read One Thousand Gifts again in order to remember. I found that I struggle with soul amnesia, as Ann names it. Forgetting the fact that God is good, in the times of sunny skies as well as those days of clouds and darkness. Even though the sun is not shining for me to see, it’s still there behind the clouds.

When I finished reading the book a third time, I read it again – I had to for survival. And I kept writing in my gratitude journal. Many days I would write through the midst of tears and grief, because I had to be reminded that God is good even though life is hard. I was on a pursuit of things to be thankful for, even during the time of life I would have never scripted for myself.

Joy is always a function of gratitude –

and gratitude is always a function of perspective.

When I finally asked God for perspective, with eyes to believe that He does work all things together for good, then joy returned. It was a sometimes slow and arduous process, but gratitude always reaps joy.

If we are going to change our lives, we’re going to have to change the way we see. This recording our gratitudes, this looking for blessings everywhere, this counting of gifts – this is what changes what we are looking for. This is what changes our perspective. Thanksgiving is the lens God means for us to see joy all year round.

Ann Voskamp

Giving thanks toward the end of November is good, but God never meant for us to imprison thanksgiving for only a season. As is it written in Psalm 100,

Enter His gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise;

Give thanks to Him and praise His name.

For the Lord is good and His love endures forever,

His faithfulness continues through all generations.

Without the daily habit of giving thanks, I would be a puddle on the floor.

Love, Mom

Wounded Beauty

September 23, 2019 / Shari Baar / 2 Comments

Dear Daughters,

One day last summer, Dad came home from kayaking around the lake, excited about what he’d found on an old wounded oak tree. So I went back with him, interested to know what he had discovered on our otherwise quiet and not-so-exciting lake.

When we got to the tree, I saw the most gorgeous and amazing growths on the side of the tree. From a distance they looked like beautiful yellow flowers, but going closer we could tell they were some kind of curious looking fungus.

We took some pictures, and after learning about these Chicken of the Woods mushrooms, Dad cut some off the tree and cooked them up. He said they were quite the tasty gourmet treat.

I, however, was more interested in why they were growing on a tree than in eating them. I love mushrooms and will readily buy many different varieties from farm markets, but am always a little sketchy about mushrooms in the wild.

Anyway, as I was learning about these Chicken of the Woods, I found that they typically grow on oak trees, and usually on those having a wound. Because I admire my Creator so much, I got thinking about the significance of these colorful intriguing mushrooms being attached on an injured tree.

Perhaps a storm caused a large branch to be broken off, leaving the tree to become vulnerable to the invading fungus. Whatever the reason, I got pondering the parallels to humans who are wounded, maybe having a limb torn off in the wind and the branches of their heart scattered along the beach.

Let’s face it, all of us have been wounded. Whether it is a wound caused by a person, an illness or accident, it hurts and leaves a scar. But the greatest wounding comes from words, or lack of words we crave from people closest to us, which leave painful scarring on our hearts. Someone may have been behind-the-scenes hurtful toward you, it may have been misunderstood, or there may have been outright belligerent harm done.

Whatever the case, we all have wounds. The wounds may not show on the outside of our physical bodies, yet they are still very real and extremely painful. Your wounds may come from words said to you as a child, and even though they were lies, they stick in your mind clamoring to be believed as the truth. Lies like

You’re going to have to figure out life on your own

You can’t trust anyone

Life is never going to get better

Why try? I’m never good enough

Life is hopeless

Believing there’s no hope that life will ever change is a wound which will cause your heart to stay closed and scarred. Hopelessness will turn into despair, to bitterness and a temptation to recoil from the world. But those scars from past pain can be healed, and turned into beauty for others to enjoy.

How?

By talking about those scars, entrusting others with your pain, acknowledging the hurt people have caused you. Crying out in anguish to God about the unfairness of life, being honest to Him about your anger, the harm you have endured and thoughts of revenge which are rolling around in your mind. They don’t have to be proper words or scrubbed-clean clichés, just simple authentic raw emotions. He’s been there, He’s suffered immensely and desires to walk through your suffering as well.

And then….forgiving, which is some of the hardest work you will ever do. Your whole being will cry out for justice and revenge against whoever caused you pain, but if you go that route your wound will not ever heal, it will only ooze and fester – growing rancid inside your heart.

Tim Keller tells a story of an amazing man in the Netherlands,

In 2004 the Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh was killed by a Muslim radical. In the aftermath of his death, both churches and mosques in the Netherlands experienced retaliatory attacks, including the bombing of an Islamic school. The outpouring of violent rage shook the Dutch nation that had prided itself on being a peaceful and open society. At this incendiary moment, a Dutch Protestant minister, Reverend Kees Sybrandi, did something radical. Sybrandi was a very conservative traditional Dutchman who lived in a community where poor Middle Eastern immigrants had brought much poverty and crime. Yet that week, Sybrandi “walked into his neighborhood mosque. He knocked firmly on the door, and to the shock of the Muslims huddled inside, he announced that he would stand guard outside the mosque every night until…the attacks ceased. In the days and weeks that followed, the minister called on other churches in the area and they joined him, circling and guarding the mosques throughout the region for more than three months.”

When Sybrandi was asked why he would do such a thing, he simply replied “Jesus commanded me to love my neighbor – my enemy too.”

The act of forgiveness that Sybrandi showed was small but its effect was immense. His was a public grace of forgiveness, but even my seemingly small insignificant forgiving of just one person will have unknown beautiful results which only time will reveal.

It’s easy to love those who love us, but far more difficult to love our enemies. Yet that’s the only way healing comes. I struggle with forgiving and I’m sure you do too. There are baits of offenses everywhere to be taken every day.

But through the slow and often arduously painful process of speaking your pain and moving toward forgiveness, beauty will grow on that wound and the beauty will outshine the wound. How I urge you to be honest, speak your pain and allow God’s love to grow in you as you open your heart to be healed.

Love, Mom

Help, Thanks, Wow!

August 1, 2019 / Shari Baar / 0 Comments

Dear Daughters,

On Sunday my friend Shari, who spells her name the same as I, gave a children’s message at church. The subject for the day was prayer. Being a teacher for decades, she obviously knows and loves children well and is able to speak simply yet profoundly. Shari taught the children there are basically three kinds of prayers.

To be honest, I am amazed that God hears every person, knows every heart – all the emotions in every life – and actually cares about every single one. And in a world containing over 7 billion people, that in itself blows my mind – but it is true. And since He’s the one who created us in the first place, it makes sense that he would know us intimately and love us compassionately.

Borrowing some wise words from Ann Lamott, Shari taught the children about these three types of prayer:

Help

Thanks

Wow

Unfortunately, the prayer Help is probably the most common prayer of all. It’s the basic cry of our heart. Many of us try to live our lives on our own, thinking we are wise and knowing the best way to go about relationships, business decisions, and any other details we happen to come across. Then, inevitably, our world takes a hit here or there or everywhere and we cry out Help. You have heard the proverbial fox-hole prayer, a prayer commonly heard from the trenches of war,

Lord, if you get me out of this mess, I’ll do what you want me to do.

So He does, but often we don’t.

…Until the next problem comes up and we cry Help again. And again, in His astonishing patience and faithfulness, he listens and helps again. It reminds me of those Israelites in the wilderness, wandering around for 40 years, trying to do life on their own, grumbling when things aren’t to their liking, messing up in their words and deeds, asking for mercy, and amazingly receiving mercy from their and our Creator God. Yeah, it’s completely astounding.

I am not unlike the Israelites, having soul amnesia when it comes to God’s goodness, so I continue to cry Help in my times of need – which is typically every day, every hour, and often moment by moment.

Then there’s the second category of prayer,

Thanks

This type of prayer has become my favorite mainly because of reading Ann Voskamp’s book One Thousand Gifts about ten years ago. Ann found joy out of despair, peace from fear, and learned to see life through a whole new lens – a lens of thanksgiving. She learned that simply giving thanks for everything changed her whole perspective on life.

The act of giving thanks to God for the many gifts He has given us enlarges our life, creates joy in living, and bolsters the trust and faith we have in Him.

Once, while in my own pit of anguish, I started a gratitude journal and began a search for beauty. As a matter of survival, I started listing the gifts from God that were all around me, everywhere I looked – when I took time to look. Monarch butterflies, raging red sunsets, softly drizzling rain, sunshine yellow daffodils, brilliant red leaves, spotted ladybugs , the extraordinary variety of mushrooms, reading glasses, the veins in my hands, the ripples on our lake. Eventually, I learned to give thanks for the hard times in life – gray hair, a move to another state, hot humid days, illness, watching my mother die. When we give thanks, we begin to see circumstances as God sees them – little steps in developing our character, knowing and trusting that He does indeed work all things together for good. Not that those things are good in themselves, but He uses them all for good.

Giving thanks brings peace.

Giving thanks brings joy… even in heartache.

The third type of prayer is Wow.

Wow prayers are when you see something in the world which is absolutely amazing. Of course these could also fall into the category of Thanks, but the Wow prayers are even more astounding, spectacular and incredible. They are the breathtaking sights and living creatures which take us by surprise, the unexpected beauty as we turn round the bend in a road, the exquisite, the gorgeous.

Jesus loves it when we talk to him, make Him our best friend, surrender our lives to Him. The best thing of all is that He’s available night and day, in bad weather and good, during our snarky times and during our joy-filled moments.

Help

Thanks

Wow

Those three simple words aptly summarize all of our conversations with God and I am grateful they are available all the time, eternally and forever.

Love, Mom

Category: Just thinking (Page 6 of 8)

Four Anchors

Thanksgiving at the Table

Fly Away on a Goose?

CS Lewis on the Virus

One Minute Pause

The Holy But

A Gift of Rags

One Thousand Gifts

Wounded Beauty

Help, Thanks, Wow!

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