Seeds & Tears

One thing God has spoken, two things have I heard: that you, O God, are strong, and that you, O Lord, are loving... -Psalm 62:11-12

I am staring at my baby plants as I sit here on the floor with a gulp in my throat. This last year has brought about so many changes in my attitude & character. I am learning what makes me cry. I am learning what gives me joy. I am learning more of who He is, so that I can be more like Him.

I have learned that two things will bring immediate tears to my eyes & sorrow to my heart. The first is when I disobey His commands & His will. This one has been a challenge to me - learning how to love, live, accept forgiveness, and learn from it.

But the second has been hard: I hurt the most when I hurt other people.

It is a true statement. We are called to love & serve (Mark 10:45). God is love & we know this love and show this love. We build character by following His example & testing it in our daily walk. We use godly character to exhibit our love.

Now I can be pretty forgiving if I fail in my godly character against myself. I know its between God & me - and that He is mighty to save & forgive - and He is faithful to love.

But when I fail in my godly character to love another? That hurts me a lot. Because not only is it now between me & God - but me & another.

I planted seeds last week. Yesterday I noticed they were just sprouting! 19 little plants popped out of the soil! They looked so strong and healthy. But you know, I came home today & noticed that all of the plants were bent toward the sun. Some of the plants were so thin & tiny - they looked like they would fall over! But all plants have one goal - to make food from the sun. I turned the pot so that the plants would "reach for the sun" from the other side, to avoid them from breaking & tipping.

An hour later, I looked at my plants again. The stems (in just one hour!) had completely turned toward the sun again! What great strength, desire, and passion these plants had to face the sun. It is a beautiful thing that God has created.

Somedays I still feel like a small seedling. I reach for the Son - desire for His ways, but outside forces "spin me around". They tempt, they twist, they confuse, and if I don't adjust to focus on HIM alone - my Sun - then I will fall over. And how important it is to stay focused on His love through tough times.

This week has been a heck of a week for me. Ups, downs, emotions, situations - but I look back to Psalm 62 and see that our God is STRONG and our God is LOVING.

Praise God for His forgiveness, praise God for His people who seek His will, praise God for those He has placed in my life to love, and for those who continually encourage me - despite my weaknesses.

I love you, O LORD, my strength.

Camp Updates

For those of you "following" my blog (I don't know why you would?) I started my summer camp blog. Because I have been SO involved in the winter/spring time as well - I changed it into a Lake Lundgren Blog for now. Updates are there from this last winter season. You can click on the link to the right (camp 2011 updates) or click on my link below.

Summer 2011 planning starts now, with verses to memorize, letter to write, people to contact, knowledge to learn. So please be praying that I am prepared in my heart & mind for camp this summer! Thank you!

Lake Lundgren - Get a Clue 2011 blog here!

The Doctrine of Election

For the last two years or so, I have heard many of my good friends and family discussing the doctrine of election, Calvinism, Arminianism, and theology. I enjoy a good theological discussion, but in the past have avoided a real answer by saying that “God is infinite, and therefore we as humans with our finite minds can never understand His mysteries or comprehend His judgment.”

In a sense, it is true. “Who can fathom the mysteries of God? Can you probe the limits of the Almighty?”(Job 11:7) But I do believe God has given us these mysteries so that we can search him out more to get a clue. In Ephesians 3, we see that Paul explains that mysteries that were once unexplainable (ones the rabbis would discuss about Gentiles being included in the new covenant) are now being revealed to both the Jews & the Gentiles. We, in a same sense, need to seek out and search mysteries. We may not find the perfect answer we are looking for, but when we look for him with all of our heart and soul, we will find HIM. (Deut 4:29)

So I would like to briefly discuss the topic of election. Not necessarily “the Five Points of Calvinism” but just some brief things I have been learning related to election. I am not a seminary student, I don’t suppose to know everything, and I know I am putting myself out on a limb for even writing about such things. I’m sure Kirk & Geoff will have their good say about the things I post.

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“I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.” –Romans 7:18

I have often heard people say that God cannot just choose and pick whom should or shouldn’t be saved. I have heard that this idea is unjust. And since God is just and loving – then he would not just choose and pick certain people.

But let us see what is more just and loving – 1. That humans can create their own sense of faith, choose to believe in Him with their own free will, and take part in the process of salvation, or 2. That He saved us while we were yet sinners and to gave us the gift of salvation & faith in order that we may believe.

I believe the latter. How can I, (in which there is no good, Rom 7:18) be capable of understanding and believing in a God that is holy & perfect? As it is written in Romans 3, “There is no one righteous; not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. "

If no one seeks God, then how can I choose to believe in Him? If no one seeks God, how can we secure our salvation through faith in Jesus Christ? He once said, “No one comes to the Father except through Me…For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life." We get that. We know it is through Christ Jesus that we are saved. But Jesus also quoted later – “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent me draws him…” (John 6)

Okay. So we’ve got to establish that God chose me, called me in with his kindness, led me to repentance (Rom 2:4), has given me a faith not of myself but a gift of grace from God (Eph 2:8) and unconditionally loves me.

But you still say, “It’s not fair. What about the people God doesn’t choose? Why is he so unjust to not choose some and only choose others?”
This is more than likely a simple human argument. And I'll admit - I’ve been there too. Why would some be condemned to hell, but others be called to eternal life? How unfair!

But then I look upon His grace and think in praise – “Why would He, a holy and perfect God, WANT to save or call ME, while I was still a sinner?”

That’s what really makes no sense.

He shouldn’t save us sinful, ungodly, unruly people. It doesn’t make sense. He is holy, and we are filth.

But He did. (!)

And now that we are a saved group of people, the body of Christ, holy and without fault before Him through our Lord Jesus Christ – we stand here asking “What about that guy? Or that girl over there? Why isn’t she saved?”

So let me ask -- Why is it that before we’re saved, we so perfectly understand that we are in need of a Savior, but then turn around later and question God as to why He won’t save someone? Here’s a personal question –

Before you were saved:
Did you think it was unfair that God saved some and not others? Did that even cross your mind? Were you upset that He would choose Megan, but not Tom? He would choose Billy, but not Jason? Did it bother you that God was perfectly sovereign over their lives?

Before we are called to Him, we see NO REASON to need a Savior. We have no understanding of how low we are. We just live life – and think that’s the way it works.

Then we start seeing things. Differences. Lives being changed. People caring & loving. Why did this “all-of-a-sudden-I-notice-things” start happening? Do you think there’s a magical time in our life that we start noticing Christians around us seeming “different”? The Church has been around since your birth. If you were saved at 12, why did you not notice His love at 8? If you were saved at 30, why did you not notice His grace at 15?

We have to be called. He has to summon us into His presence – the Holy Spirit – begins to guide our hearts and our minds.

Who knows if my view will be molded and changed in the next year or so. This is my first time ever REALLY thinking hard about this topic – and my first time sharing about it. If you have any questions, disagree with me, want to mold my ideas, PLEASE send me an email (musicfreak28@gmail.com) or message on FB.

Thanks.

Metaphor in a Metaphor

More recently, my friend and I have been studying one chapter of Proverbs every night. More of a difficult book to “study” per se, but nice to read the wisdom and compare it to other Scriptures.

As we were reading, I got to thinking about how God loves to use metaphors in Proverbs for us to better understand something. Better yet? I ran into a metaphor inside a metaphor. Check this out:

Proverbs 5:14-20
15 Drink water from your own cistern,
running water from your own well.
16 Should your springs overflow in the streets,
your streams of water in the public squares?
17 Let them be yours alone,
never to be shared with strangers.
18 May your fountain be blessed,
and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth.
19 A loving doe, a graceful deer—
may her breasts satisfy you always,
may you ever be captivated by her love.
20 Why be captivated, my son, by an adulteress?
Why embrace the bosom of another man's wife?

Often, commentaries will discuss that this is a passage of Scripture convincing the son that he needs to refrain from sexual immorality and adultery. And how true!
Here lies the first metaphor “Drink from your own cistern, running water from your own well.”

Water is necessary and the source of life. But in Scriptural times, getting your water was a difficult thing. You had to walk all the way to your family’s well (possibly the village you lived in) to retrieve your water. Then you had to pull it up and then carry it all the way back home. Often you would go early in the morning, before the day began. You had to be determined and devoted to working hard for your water every morning.

Now what if you weren’t determined or devoted? You just decided, “Oh today I’m not going to get water or work for it. I’ll go see if my neighbor next door has water later today, or maybe I’ll go to that closer well in the town of Samaria, even though we don’t go there because they are not our people.”

Now compare this to your sexual purity and devotion to your spouse. Everyday you live with your spouse. Everyday you have to work hard to keep that relationship growing – whether it be in communication, love, sex, and family. You can’t just wake up in the morning and say “I don’t have the time or effort to love my spouse today. I need a day off.” You can’t wake up and say, “I’m bored with my spouse today, so I’ll just go try another person to excite me.” No! You must be devoted to that water. You must not drink from another’s cistern. As the Proverb continues on – “May you ever be captivated by her love.”
EVER. always. CAPTIVATED. in awe. LOVE. commitment.
So I’m hoping you understand this metaphor, right?

Because, I believe there’s ANOTHER metaphor in this passage.

If you look at the first nine chapters of Proverbs, Solomon is continually reminding the son that he needs to stay focused on wisdom, on the knowledge of God, and to pay attention to instruction. He reminds the son never to turn away and follow the evil-doers. He says that Wisdom is best, and to never forsake HER. He instructs not to follow Deceit and her adulterous ways. So Solomon has been quietly working in another metaphor. (After the first 9 chapters, Solomon just gives little 1 sentence proverbs. I like to call these text proverbs because they’re usually 140 characters or less. :) hehe)

Chapters 1-9 are about wisdom and folly. We don’t even get to “avoid adultery” until Chapter 7. So why would Solomon throw the previous passage (Proverbs 5:15-20) right in the midst of discussing wisdom and evil? Why would he throw in Chapter 7 and choose “adultery” as the one sin to focus on?

It’s another metaphor.

We in our sinful nature have a choice to make everyday to “drink of our own cistern”. To follow God and God alone. To understand and seek His righteous ways and to put no other gods before us. It’s almost as if Solomon is saying “You can’t devote your time, love, energy, and life into another god or idol in your life…I want you to devote everything to your FIRST love. Your only Love.”

For the first nine chapters, there’s almost this insinuation that if we are not focusing and following God’s wisdom and yearning for His knowledge – we are just as sinful as one committing adultery. We follow sinful ways, we seek evil, and we may even do think things in our hearts that push God to the side. We put our love and passion toward other “lovers” and not God alone.

The point stands that this passage does use a water metaphor to say-- “Do not commit adultery. Be warned about adultery.”
But what do I see? A beautiful metaphor of marital faithfulness saying, “You are my love. I want you and you alone. You don’t even deserve my love, and yet I love you more than money, drugs, sex, television, and games could ever satisfy. Love Me only. For I am a jealous God.” (Deuteronomy 4:23-24)

“And may you ever be captivated by His love.”
EVER. always. CAPTIVATED. in awe. LOVE. commitment.

Childlike Faith

I started school this week. Not high school. Not college.

I started Kindergarten.

I am currently working in a school district with a full-time job. It is the strangest new experience of mine. I feel like I often live two lives. During the day, I am a mature school faculty member who encourages good behavior and sits in the teacher lounge. On the weekends I work at Lake Lundgren Bible Camp with minor staff, missionary staff and SSTers - exuberating a great joy and love to be wild! One life of a mature 19 year-old woman, and another life of a crazy 19 year-old girl.

But in the midst of my teaching, I have started to understand a biblical term coined "faith like a child".

Look at some important points here:
1. Children have unconditional love. They will hug you after you yell at them. They will blow kisses when you've finished reprimanding their behavior.
2. Children know your discipline is for the good. Though they may pout a little, they DO learn from discipline. At a young age, children are so moldable and can be easily persuaded to do good and not evil.
3. Children ask for help. It takes 2 seconds for a kid to ask you to open their milk, tie their shoes, or button their jacket. They're not afraid to ask for help when they fail.
4. Children believe without seeing tangible evidence. If you tell a kid "Being a bully is bad", and then ask them "Is being a bully good?"-- they will instantly respond "NO!" They didn't have to experience or see it, they believe you.

This is just a small list (because I need to get offline) but look back at those four. Think about your relationship with Christ. Do we LOVE him with everything? do we learn from His discipline? Do we ask for help when we can't seem to make it through? Do we believe in faith?

Be a child once again.

Forever

"God has been faithful. He will be again. His love & compassion? It has no end." –Sara Groves

It's so crazy that one minute you can be laughing and praising God, and then the next minute you feel so pressured by different worries in your life! It's funny –cuz I'm never worried or upset about anything in life. Except money. Because I never really have any.

I've been giving plasma now since January, which brings in a nice profit to use for gas. And I occasionally like to buy Kelly & others something special. Trips to Wausau are expensive, so gas money is needed for my classes. Well, I had 6 plasma dates set up for the rest of May, which would put me at having about $120 for gas and end-of-the-year gifts. All set and ready, I made sure I had tithed and even gave a little extra toward camp ministry. I felt financially secure. That was Tuesday.

Wednesday I went to give plasma. What happens? I get deferred. Never again will I be able to give plasma or blood. I'm 18 years old and I'm off the list FOREVER. That's a hard word to grasp until something that big comes up. FOREVER.

I was ready to cry Wednesday night. Crying. And I wasn't crying because I was out of money. I cried because of that word. Forever. I have sooo many more years ahead of me, but now I'll never be able to give plasma. Gone forever.

I got to thinking Thursday morning. Our name is written on another list forever. A heavenly list. If we make a choice to follow Him, God has written our names in the Book of Life. FOREVER. And funny as it is, the word "forever" isn't hitting me as hard as the giving blood thing. God & Forever? That's still AMAZING though. Forever. And now this made me cry in happiness. A beautiful forever.

Tonight has been a little tougher for me. I'm beginning to realize I want money for a few friends' weddings and I need to make 2 trips to Wausau before I leave GB and the church I attend is about a 30 minute drive there & back. (I think?) Thanks Trucky for your lack of gas milage.
And I'm out of my interpreting job this summer. Just camp. But that will be MORE than worth it.

Best part about it all? God has been faithful in the past. He has ALWAYS provided. He will again. He will again & again & again. Praise God.

So God? What's next in this step of faith?

Chasing His Heart

"David--He chased God's own heart. All I ever seem to chase is me." -The Chasing Song, Andrew Peterson

As some of you may know, I recently moved to Green Bay & wake up at 5:30 for a "full-time job" with 40-50 hours a week. I actually thought going from 3 school days and 18 hours of work to THIS would be insanely impossible--but I actually find it beautiful. There is something wonderful with a consistency and stability. In college, I was sporadically waking up, randomly doing homework, and constantly on the internet. Now? Well, I'm still on the internet each evening, but my life is SO different! One thing I love about my new "life" here in Green Bay is that each morning my uncle and I sit to read our Bibles and eat breakfast. So beautiful. So peaceful.
And why did I start doing this? Because I saw HIM do it, and I thought, Hmm. I should read my Bible at breakfast too. So as a side note, I can't WAIT to set that example for my children.

But anywhos. Back on topic. I've been studying a lot of the Old Testament, because I feel very unfamiliar with the stories. When I studied the New Testament, I took a good year to read over & over the chapters and books--almost memorizing where things were sectioned off. Last summer I began digesting that New Testament--digging it out for extra meaning. This year's plan? Read Old Testament over and over again. Next year? Study it for in-depth meaning. Of course, I'm already doing that now.

STILL not on "topic" yet. DAVID. GOD. HIS PLAN. That's my topic.

As I mentioned to a friend last night, I have been reading II Samuel 6-12. Those are some of my favorite chapters in the Bible. I was first interested after reading David's prayer in chapter 7. David decides, "Oh. I'm gonna build a temple for God, because I have a big kingdom and God just has a tent." But instead, God says that He doesn't want a "house to dwell in." He's GOD! So God continues telling David that He has an AWESOME plan for David's throne. That of his descendant will come a King that establishes the throne forever.

2 Sam 7:12-13
12 When your days are over and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom.
13 He is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.
(NIV)

And what does David do? Well, remember when I posted a blog about worship being instinctive & immediate? That's right. David praises God. But check out this AWESOME prayer:

2 Sam 7:18-29
18 Then King David went in and sat before the LORD, and he said: "Who am I, O Sovereign LORD, and what is my family, that you have brought me this far?
19 And as if this were not enough in your sight, O Sovereign LORD, you have also spoken about the future of the house of your servant. Is this your usual way of dealing with man, O Sovereign LORD?
20 "What more can David say to you? For you know your servant, O Sovereign LORD.
21 For the sake of your word and according to your will, you have done this great thing and made it known to your servant.
22 "How great you are, O Sovereign LORD! There is no one like you, and there is no God but you, as we have heard with our own ears.
23 And who is like your people Israel-- the one nation on earth that God went out to redeem as a people for himself, and to make a name for himself, and to perform great and awesome wonders by driving out nations and their gods from before your people, whom you redeemed from Egypt?
24 You have established your people Israel as your very own forever, and you, O LORD, have become their God.
25 "And now, LORD God, keep forever the promise you have made concerning your servant and his house. Do as you promised,
26 so that your name will be great forever. Then men will say, 'The LORD Almighty is God over Israel!' And the house of your servant David will be established before you.
27 "O LORD Almighty, God of Israel, you have revealed this to your servant, saying, 'I will build a house for you.' So your servant has found courage to offer you this prayer.
28 O Sovereign LORD, you are God! Your words are trustworthy, and you have promised these good things to your servant.
29 Now be pleased to bless the house of your servant, that it may continue forever in your sight; for you, O Sovereign LORD, have spoken, and with your blessing the house of your servant will be blessed forever."
(NIV)

That right there just sets a PERFECT example of a prayerfully-minded man. WOW.

Well, let's continue. Chapters 8, 9, & 10. "In the course of time, David defeated this people and this people and this people...." Because of who? GOD. <--This could definitely lead into another passage on Psalm 33, but I'll relax. Too much information!

Chapter 11. Uh-oh. We all know this story. David sees a beautiful woman. Uriah's wife Bathsheba. This woman was more than likely gorgeous, hot, sexy, beautiful, and more-- because he SAW this woman from his roof top. Now, I don't know how close the houses were to his kingdom. But wow!

As the story goes, David sleeps with her, works his way around hiding it, gets word that Bathsheba is pregnant, and Uriah gets put at the front of the battle lines to die. David gets his wife Bathsheba, the baby is "struck by God and becomes ill" and dies.
David sleeps with his new wife and they have a second child together: Solomon who is also known as Jedidiah. (fun fact. I didn't know that!)

So here we have it. The summary: Something GREAT (God's promise) causes David to instantly worship God (the prayer) but then not too soon after, he falls into temptation (sins with Bathsheba) but God used this sin for the good of His glory (Solomon would be the ancestor of Joseph--the husband of Mary, the mother of Christ).

Is this not AMAZING? God has promised us so much in our lives. And so many times we have to live by faith--not knowing if plans now will affect our lives later, or hundreds of years later! But sometimes, in the midst of "good times," we forget God's goodness and fall into temptation & sin. Just like David. But despite these times--God can use our evil & sin and make good come from it. Just like Solomon and his purpose to be an ancestor of Jesus Christ. WOW. David wouldn't see THAT plan come into effect until hundreds and hundreds of years later. Pretty neat, huh?

That's enough for now. This is ultimately the longest post I've written and will more than likely be used for a devotion!