Tag: Patience

One Thing New

November 12, 2018 / Shari Baar / 4 Comments

Dear Daughters,

Several decades ago, Aunt Val gave me a cutting board she made in high school woodshop. She had carefully cut out thin strips of various types of wood, glued them together, varnished them and proudly given it to me on my birthday. I have chopped countless vegetables, fruits, nuts, and meats on that faithful board, but there came a time when I started using thin plastic cutting boards for ease of cleaning and storing.

One day Dad found that well-worn cutting board in the pile going to Goodwill and took it out because he had an idea of making it into something new. As you know, I have been annoyed in past years when Dad wants to save things I would rather throw out or give away. I’m sure I made some snide remark when he told me he was going to save it for a project because, of course, we all know about his black hole of unfinished projects in the basement. What goes in never comes out. I quickly dismissed the incident from my mind.

Oh me of little faith.

Several months later he showed me his completed project. From that worn out, cut up, beat up board he had made a beautiful table for my plants. I was quite impressed. Over the years that board had become so ugly, splinters coming off the edges, dull and useless (so I thought) but now it was transformed into a striking piece of art.

For over 15 years now it has faithfully held my favorite green ivy plant, curling and twisting around. About the same time I put the ivy on this plant stand someone gave me a little decorative tile to stick in the dirt. I really didn’t look at the words imprinted on the stick, I just put it in the dirt because I liked the colors. Recently though, I looked at that transformed cutting board and the words on the stick.

I make all things new.

Revelation 21:5

I will admit, sometimes I am a very slow learner. It takes years after I assent to something intellectually to make it a habit in my life. Looking at the previously battered cutting board now transformed into a new thing along with the scripture in the ivy, I finally realized that this is precisely what’s happening in me and my family. I used to be ungrateful, critical, quick to find fault with people. But through many years of God’s faithful chiseling on my personality, I am learning to become thankful for the good gifts He gives every day. I have learned to encourage and build up instead of criticize and tear down. I seek to search out the good in people instead of focusing on the annoying traits. Of course I still stumble and fall, but I feel like I am continually becoming a new person.

All through the Bible, from beginning to end, in story after story, God is making all things and people new. Look at Joseph, the self-centered, arrogant teenager bragging to his brothers about the dreams he’s dreamed. God didn’t just say, Now you shape up, get humble and quit bragging about those dreams. Instead, God allowed circumstances in his life to humble him. Tough circumstances like sitting in prison for many years, serving for a crime he didn’t commit. Suffering worked humility into him, so well that he was later able to forgive his brothers for all the evil they had shown toward him.

And then there’s Moses. As the young Prince of Egypt, he was ready to swoop in to help his fellow Israelites escape their cruel slave masters by murdering one of them. Again, God didn’t just give him a stern lecture, telling him to change. He provided 40 years as a shepherd on the back side of a desert in order to humble and fashion him into someone who would eventually become a fearless, humble leader.

This is God’s way. He is never in a hurry, but patiently, consistently and gently provides circumstances, bringing us to the end of ourselves and opening our eyes to our need for Him. Every day is a new day, as he is molding us to be more like Him. Just like an artist, he chisels and creates us to be like His gracious personality. And the really cool thing is when just one person starts becoming new, it becomes infectious to others in the vicinity.

Of course, marriage is a major chiseling tool for God to bring changes into our personality.

For a time I felt like Dad’s and my relationship had become battered, worn and dull. But when I invited God to help me love, teach me to respect, and speak the language of peace and forgiveness, He began to make our marriage new. So………even if you feel like your marriage is beat up, full of slivers, and just plain worn out – never fear. God makes all things new, as long as you let Him have His way with you.

As Tim Keller wisely says:

In some mysterious way, troubles and suffering refine us like gold and turn us,

inwardly and spiritually, into something beautiful and great.

Accept with an open hand whatever comes your way, trusting your Heavenly Father who has the love and wisdom to mold you into his likeness.

Love, Mom

Wind

April 3, 2018 / Shari Baar / 2 Comments

Dear Daughters,

Last week I found Grandpa sitting on his chair with the garage door wide open, enjoying the Spring sunshine. I asked how things were going. He replied,

Good, I’m just watching the clouds. Do you see those clouds? The thin wispy ones are going much faster than the big cluster of cumulous clouds. They must be in different wind currents and altitudes.

Being a pilot in his younger years, he has studied stuff like that. So I sat down in a chair nearby and we had a chat about clouds and wind. Sure enough, when I took the time to sit, study and watch the clouds, I could see that they were definitely moving at different speeds. It was quite a fascinating conversation, and I learned a lot just listening to Grandpa and watching the clouds in the beautiful blue sky.

Over 25 years ago a vast enclosed ecosystem of 3.14 acres was built outside of Tuscon, Arizona. In this ecosystem, given the name Biosphere 2, scientists set out to study Earth’s living systems in a controlled environment. Trees grown in Biosphere 2 grew quickly, faster than their counterparts in the wild. The scientists were mystified though, when the trees became thin and weak with underdeveloped root systems, many of them falling over before they reached maturity. Finally it was discovered that one element always found in the wild had been forgotten and neglected in Biosphere 2:

Wind

When trees grow in the wild they are subject to strong winds which are necessary to develop stress wood, strong fibrous wood that enables the tree to become stronger and vastly improves the quality of life for the tree. Without stress wood, a tree can grow quickly but not sustain the weight that accompanies the height.

Thousands of years ago – back in the book of Exodus – the Israelis were taking their 40 year journey through the wilderness and they deplored the difficulty of crossing the desert. They grumbled and whined that everything was too hard; they wanted to go back to slavery in Egypt because those were the ‘good old days.’

But the reason God led them through the desert the long hard way was because He wanted them to grow up and mature. As you may remember, the Israelis continually asked

Why God, why?

When God, when?

How God, how?

They wanted the answers to all those questions immediately instead of simply trusting God to provide what and when He knew was best for them. All God asked was that they trust and obey. Even though they had free food from heaven every morning, water to drink, shoes and clothes that never wore out – they wanted more. They were never content, never grateful, always complaining.

How similar our stories sound today. Your marriage right now may seem too difficult and you would like this business of loving your husband to be a whole lot easier. You may wonder when and how your relationship will get better. But you know what happens when life gets hard? We find that we need God more, we learn that by ourselves we cannot love the way we should.

You have been hurt, offended and at times it seems that your husband might drive you crazy with all his annoying habits. Yet through it all, Jesus is trying to get you to lean into Him, trust Him in all the mess, and ask for help in loving your man.

It’s a struggle, a fight not to complain, not fall into the bitterness mode, but it is not too hard because God’s strength is always available. And the good thing in all this? Through these difficult times in your marriage you are becoming stronger, more loving, more patient – if you choose to forgive, compromise and give up your right to always be right. You are becoming the woman of God you are meant to be.

I love Paul’s reminder to us, a verse I have read many times, fighting to believe that God’s word is true.

And let us not lose heart and grow weary and faint in acting nobly and doing right, for in due time and at the appointed season we shall reap, if we do not give up.

Galatians 6:9

We will reap what we sow. But we need to keep acting nobly and doing right – and not give up.

True character is always shown in adversity. Anyone can be happy when things go their way, but the real test is seeing how we act when things are not going our way. Are we still able to trust God and do good in spite of how we are feeling? God wants us to be stable in all circumstances because it shows we are trusting Him for our future. Unfortunately, we can only learn trust through trials and difficulties – when we know we cannot do life on our own – which for me is every single day.

A few years ago Dad and I went through a difficult time in our relationship. Yes, even after decades of marriage they still happen. Initially I wanted to shut down, blame him and walk away. Then I remembered these letters I’m writing to you and figured I better take my own advice – forgive him, acknowledge my own sin and let it go. I had to fight for it but after a time I was able to say,

Thank you, Lord, for allowing this to happen to us, and I thank you in advance for how you will use it to strengthen our relationship.

Let me tell you, those words didn’t come without tears and agony, but I did speak them out loud, and I thank God for the grace that enabled me to say them. Gratitude, not resentment, is the wisest response to these hard times.

Today was a typical Spring 40-mph windy day here in Idaho. As I was walking down the lane I saw many trees leaning and blowing in the wind. It’s a wonder that all the trees don’t permanently lean slightly to the East because of the amount of wind we receive, but they don’t. They stand strong and straight – just like we as people stand strong if we do not lose heart. Even though it’s tough , continue to do good and don’t let the winds of life knock you down. Let them play their part in strengthening you, getting stronger and stronger as you trust God to work in both you and your husband,.

Just as the clouds in the sky are in different altitudes and move at different speeds, so you too may move at a different speed from your man. That’s OK. Welcome the wind, embrace the wind. Stand strong, be patient, and know that God is good.

Love, Mom

Someone Better

August 25, 2015 / Shari Baar / 4 Comments

Dear Daughters,

Have you ever looked over at that husband of yours and wondered “who is this guy?” There are times when, even after decades of marriage, it seems as though I am living with a stranger.

When we marry, we are often in love with a fantasy rather than a real human person. While dating, our best side always shines, but then marriage and reality come, flaws surface and we begin to wonder if we ever knew him in the first place.

How can we know when we marry who our man will turn out to be? On the other hand, how can he know who we will become?

I must admit that I married for selfish reasons. I married because I wanted security, children, a soul-mate, and someone to make me happy. I soon found that this was not Dad’s central focus. He had work to do, dreams to chase, and he was thinking that my central focus in life should be to make him happy.

I began to consider that perhaps I had married the wrong person.

While dating, Dad saw only a joyful, cheerful woman. During the seasons of our lives, however, he has seen me angry, disheartened, sick, hopeless, livid, and thankfully at times, that previously joyful and cheerful woman as well. To be fair, I have seen all those same passions in him.

Instead of being repulsed and ready to bail when those potentially divisive events happen, what if we expected marriage to be about helping each other grow out of our flaws and sins and into the person God is creating? It would be much easier to expect those challenging times and when they happen, and understand that this is just another facet of love (patience, kindness, forgiveness…) that we need to learn.

But, alas, our selfish natures demand that we get our way. If we don’t we often throw a tantrum, give the silent treatment, or some other unproductive behavior.

When I married Dad I had no idea where our lives would go. I thought I had married an Idaho dairyman, just like my two sisters. Indeed I had, but for only four short years. Then it was off to Michigan with our two little girls, enrolling in seminary, moving and living in five different houses in five years as Dad was required to do internship work in various cities and states. There were times, after a move, that I would feel as if I had been thrown into the spin cycle of a washing machine, then tossed out into a whole new world.

Coming back to Idaho for vacations, I would often be envious of the families who were still living in the same house, having a somewhat predictable life and putting down roots with friends. They went to the same grocery store every week, they knew where everything was down each of those aisles, and they didn’t get lost while driving in their town. I remember going back to Michigan with that big green-eyed monster dangling its tentacles in my mind.

Early on I found that I could not depend on friends to last. I would get to know people for a few months, say good-bye, and start over in yet another location. It seemed that saying hello and good-bye would become the only predictable events I could count on in my life.

At this point I had a choice to make: I could either accept and rejoice in the life that God had given me (I had certainly not chosen it) or I could wallow in the mire of self-pity, wishing I was some other guy’s wife living an established, non-moving life. For a time I did not accept my lot in life. I began to see God as cold and non-caring; I did not trust that He loved me. It certainly didn’t feel like He cared.

David the King spoke my feelings so well:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Why are you so far from saving me, so far from the words of my groaning?

O my God, I cry out by day but you do not answer, by night, and am not silent.

~ Psalm 22

Have you ever felt forgotten, dropped by God, hearing nothing but silence from heaven?

Here I was, a pastor’s wife, going through the motions of being a good church lady, but inside disappointed and disgruntled with my life and with God. Dad had become a stranger to me, and I to him. He was intent in his work, striving to show himself a good pastor, me delving into making a somewhat stable life for you girls.

You may have felt that separation in your own marriage, going in different directions and drifting farther and farther apart. The next logical thing seems to be to split up, try someone new, find someone better, someone more compatible. But you know what? I have talked to many married women and have found none that live in a compatible marriage.

Tim Keller teaches “…that the great thing about the model of Christian marriage we are presenting here is that when you envision the ‘someone better,’ you can think about the future version of the person to whom you are already married. The someone better is the spouse that you already have. God has indeed given us a desire for the perfect spouse, but you should see it in the one to whom you’re married…. The only way you’re going to actually begin to see another person’s ‘glory-self’ is to stick with him or her.”

Marriage is, at its best, trusting God with the man that He has entrusted to you. Yes, there will be fights, misunderstandings, anger. But continue to pray for him more than you criticize, encourage more than condemn, build up instead of tear down. It will take a lifetime for God to change us all, molding us all into that someone better that we are looking for.

When I finally made the choice to thank God for where he had placed me and bloom wherever I was transplanted, I found joy and peace. Not quickly, not overnight, and not without struggles, but I became free to focus on the many delightful people that God brought into our lives and kick out the monster of envy. As Paul writes, “…I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.” Philippians 4:13

Rest and rejoice in the knowledge that Jesus has you in the right place, right now. His ways are not our ways, but they are good. Even if it feels as if God has dropped or forgotten you, the fact is, He has not. Cry out to him, for the ability to love better and bolder, anticipating and enjoying the ways that you and your husband are becoming one.

Love, Mom

I Shouldn’t Have to Wait

February 11, 2015 / Shari Baar / 0 Comments

Dear Daughters,

I cringe every time I read about the Israelites traveling through the desert because I feel like I am often just like them. Even though they had been freed from horribly oppressive slavery in Egypt they repeatedly wandered around, complaining, impatient, depressed and discouraged.

In Joyce Meyer’s Battlefield of the Mind we find #5 of the Wilderness Mentalities:

I shouldn’t have to wait.

Now that’s a good one for our immediate gratification society of which we have become such a part. When you consider that everything around us screams that we should have it our way now, we deserve the best now, we need fast food fast, pain relief now, it’s quite a shocker that God would actually expect us to wait.

The beautiful thing about God, though, is that He doesn’t change just because our society changes. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. If He expected people thousands of years ago to wait for Him then He expects us to wait as well.

If you haven’t experienced this already in your life, I will tell you a fact that I’ve learned: God is not efficient. He is in absolutely no hurry to give you what you think you want or need. When I got sick three years ago and had to quit teaching school mid-year, I was certain that I just needed a few months of rest and then would be back to school in the fall.

God had different plans.

Having struggled with insomnia for over ten years, by February 2012 my body simply would not go on. Being so tired, exhausted, completely spent and still not able to sleep well had cast a long shadow over a decade of my life. So I finally collapsed, able to go no longer. The majority of my days were spent alone on the couch, so fatigued, wilted like a flower. Meds had helped me survive through many years – barely – but now I was weary of life, exhausted and still unable to sleep, night or day without artificial help.

So often when challenging circumstances come, we ask the question, “Why is this happening to me?” We all have plans for our lives, good things we want for our kids, for us, our marriages, our husbands – and most of them have not yet happened. But how would our attitudes change if we asked the question, “Why is this happening for me?”

As I lay on the couch I became impatient, depressed, discouraged. Around this time of despondency I got a package in the mail from Aunt Rhonda. It was a CD by Laura Story, and included the song Blessings in which she sings:

…what if your blessings come through raindrops,

what if your healing comes through tears,

what if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You’re near….

I had never heard the song before and as I listened to the words I wept, I felt as if the song had been written for me. As months went by and still so little recovery, I lamented that my physical healing was not happening as I waited. Yet something better was happening – a change in my heart.

When my body collapsed and was subjected to hours on the couch I needed God and Dad more than I ever had before. I couldn’t shop for groceries, I rarely left the house. I had to learn that my identity was being a child of God, not doing all those things that had become such a part of my life – a music teacher, mother, preacher’s wife, Bible Study leader….

Before I got sick I was proud of who I was, what I could do, and often I didn’t feel as if I really needed God all that much. Sure, I went to church every Sunday, attended Bible studies, I even read the Bible on my own once in a while. But over all I was self-confident about what I did. I had gifts, I had talents and I used them for God. Independence, the ability to do things on my own was what I loved.

But now I had to allow Dad to take care of me, do most of the stuff I used to do. Interestingly, as he did, my love for him grew. We talked better than we ever had, we were honest about things that in the past we had simply let slide.

God uses marriage and other hardships as a crucible to refine us, heal us, teach us to love, and above all become like Him in character, especially learning that difficult trait called patience, learning to wait.

So often we want to have a life that is happy and trouble-free. Everyone wants their own Utopia. But history has proven over and over again that when our lives are easy, everything going our way, we forget God. Only when circumstances come that are out of our control, do we cry out for help.

Throughout the Bible, in story after story, people forget about God when times are good. So God lovingly allows a little misery and hardship to come. Inevitably there is repentance, sorrow and sadness from the people who had tried to live without God. And as always, God has mercy and grace and forgives His people time after time, year after year, century after century. It’s often only when we are hurting, wounded, and weakened that we cry out to God for help. When you stop to think about it, it’s quite a self-centered way to live, but it’s typical human nature. As I look on my life I had behaved exactly the same way.

I have learned that God is never in a hurry to change us, never in a hurry to demand we be more loving, more submissive, more compassionate. He knows our weaknesses, our brokenness, our struggles and he simply encourages us every day to wait on Him and trust the Holy Spirit to change us and our marriages moment by moment, day by day, year after year. Then slowly, gradually, we will grow to be the women that God has intended us to be.

Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I obey your word.

You are good and what you do is good: teach me your decrees.

Psalm 119:67-68

Love, Mom

Go Slow

January 14, 2015 / Shari Baar / 0 Comments

Dear Daughters,

The other day I was walking down the hall and there was Dad lying down on the cold tile floor taking a picture of Grandma’s Christmas cactus. Now I know Dad loves to take pictures and they are really good ones, but taking pictures from below the flowers? It is a beautiful plant, but as Dad found out, the real beauty truly came from slowing down, lying below and looking up. I know because I stopped, took the time and laid down beside him to see for myself.

When I was in junior high I loved to play the piano, loud and fast. I hated to play slow songs – they were so boring. Plus, all the kids were impressed when I played fast and loud – spider fingers is what they called me.

Later on in college, Professor Worst would say to me, Slow down, Shari, your music will have so much more life to it if you just go slower. Breathe.

Years ago, when I walked with my friends I loved to walk fast. We would walk and walk and talk. Then when Grandma came to visit, just she and I would go. I would be silently annoyed because she walked slower than I liked, but I would grudgingly adapt to her speed.

When you are in Wyoming and the gas gauge on your car is getting low and there’s not a gas station for another 52 miles, what’s the best thing to do? Slow down so your mileage goes up and maybe, just maybe you can make it to the next town before the tank is empty. (It didn’t always work for us, but in theory it should.)

In my younger years I wanted to be efficient, multi-task, get the most done in the least amount of time. Isn’t that the way a good Christian woman should be? I wanted to do my best for God, which meant to do it quickly and well, or so I thought. I expected the same from God: He should be efficient, answer my prayers soon, maybe not quickly, but I really shouldn’t have to wait too long, should I?

And then I got sick and was laid low, on my back, for weeks. I couldn’t walk around the block, much less walk fast around the block. Of course I was irritated, angry that I didn’t get better quickly.

One day as I was on the couch, lying down and looking up, I read in Isaiah the following words that jumped out from the page:

Woe to those who say, ‘Let God hurry and carry out His plans so that we can see something happening and know that his word is true.’

I was shocked, surprised, and if truth be told, hurt, to read that God was in no hurry to answer my prayers of healing or of anything else I desired, in fact there was a woe attached to hurry. In the past I had been so busy that I had not listened to his voice that also said

Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for Him.

Psalm 37:7

A few months ago I was practicing the song Breathe on the piano and it had some difficult parts in it when I was keeping the same speed throughout. But as I was working out the hard spots, having to go slow, I noticed a beauty that I hadn’t heard before. I found that if I took extra time and breathed into the song some times of slowing, stretching the tempo, it came alive and was much more beautiful than simply trying to keep the challenging parts the same speed as the rest of the song. I needed to be reminded again, Go slow. Especially the hard parts.

Eventually I was able to get up and around again after my time on the couch, but I have learned and am still learning to remember to go slow, take time, and

Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.

Psalm 27:14.

I’m assuming that because the phrase wait for the Lord is stated two times in that little short verse, God is really adamant about waiting. As Ann Voskamp says so often, Life is not an emergency. Breathe.

In our marriages we want changes in our husband, in us and in our kids. When we invite God into our hard parts of life, He will bring about change – but never in a hurried way.

The amazing thing is that while I was on the couch God did an important reconciling work between Dad and I. In the world’s eyes I was not at all productive, but in that time of slowdown He did some important, humbling work in me that could have never been done otherwise.

In God’s eyes relationships are much more important than busyness. I know that God will work out every detail, every hurt, every little thing in you and in your men in His time. Trust Him with your life and your marriage – and go slow.

Love, Mom

Tag: Patience

One Thing New

Wind

Someone Better

I Shouldn’t Have to Wait

Go Slow

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