Author Archives: PearlS

Three Types of Fun

Remember Pa? In all those Laura Ingalls Wilder books Pa would work hard all day long, back-breaking work, the work of a starving pioneer. But at the end of the day he’d pull out his fiddle and sing the girls to sleep. Have you ever wondered why? Why didn’t he draw or play cards or lay on his back and stare up at the ceiling?

Many years ago I read an article by Gretchen Rubin, author of the Happiness Project. I think about it all the time, because it was one of those insightful memos that has come up again and again in my life.

In the article she describes three types of fun. My college degree happens to be in leisure (Leisure Management, why am I not teaching this somewhere as an ad junct? All my professors were ad junct, if that isn’t a red flag. Who was in charge? Were we learning anything at all? But I digress), so I consider myself an expert–and also a person who really, really wanted to finish my college degree as quickly, cheaply, and efficiently as possible. (Those parks and rec advisors are entirely accommodating.)

Rubin is somewhat of an expert in finding meaning in a meaningless life. She’s like a modern leisure counselor for the King Solomons of today  who have everything they could want but are looking for fulfillment void of any spiritual themes. She is a self-help memoirist.

Rubin’s three categories fun are these:

  1. Challenging fun
  2. Accommodating fun
  3. Relaxing fun

The first–challenging fun–Rubin explains, is the kind of fun where you invest energy into learning a skill–participating, practicing, and sometimes perfecting it. She gives golf as an example. My own leisure pursuits have included running, drawing, writing, and playing music. Rubin says this kind of fun is the most fulfilling.

The second, accommodating fun, is when you spend leisure time with other people, but the fun doesn’t require investing a level of skill. This could be watching your kids play soccer on a Saturday morning, taking a trip to the museum, or playing a board game with friends. Some time is committed, but the fun is more about balancing the desires of others and enjoying cooperative leisure pursuits. Lately I’ve loved cheering my kids on as they participate in archery and basketball.

The third type of fun is relaxing fun. Rubin describes this as “practically effortless” and “passive by design”. Some examples are watching TV or lying by a pool. To bring the article into 2022 (it was originally written in 2007), I’d like to add: social media, scrolling on your phone, and youtube. Relaxing fun tends to add up quickly, hour by hour (as our phones discreetly tell us by noting, your average daily screen time has gone up by 35% this week).

The interesting thing is, as Rubin points out–relaxing fun, where folks spend the majority of their leisure time–is the least kind of fun. Isn’t it fascinating that a secular expert came to the conclusion that passive fun has a limit to its “fun”?

Challenging and accommodating fun strengthen skills and focus and relationships, but relaxing fun, at some point, tends to gnaw away at life.

That feeling after you’ve watched two hours of TV and eaten a plate of pizza bites? Four hours, six hours? Somewhere in there the law of diminishing returns will apply and you’ll begin to feel less rested and more like a huge slob. It doesn’t compare to the thrill you get from making your own artwork, or performing your own music, or winning a football game.

At least that’s the wisdom of Gretchen Rubin. Is she right?

Well, sort of.

Leisure is not meaningless. Leisure and joy are brothers, and joy is crucial to a fulfilling life. But real joy can only be found in a life that has a certain level of accountability to God. And when you are accountable to a higher something, you can sort of Dave Ramsey-budget your way into finding more leisure and joy instead of wasting lots of time on unfulfilling “fun”, the kind that gnaws away at life.

What Rubin has erased from her theory is the fundamental purpose in living. It is, to borrow from the Westminster Catechism, to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever.

Erasing God from the equation–your fun has no purpose. There’s no fulfillment; there’s no rest. No contentment.
Listen to King Solomon, who had every pleasure at his hand:

I tried cheering myself with wine, and embracing folly…I wanted to see what was good for people to do under the heavens during the few days of their lives. I undertook great projects; I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I also owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me. I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired male and female singers, and a harem as well–the delights of a man’s heart… I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my labor, and this was the reward for all my toil. Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun. Ecc. 2:3-8,10-11

Solomon tried it all out–the challenging, the accommodating, the relaxing. The biggest satisfaction, he says, came from the more laborious pursuits, the work of his hands. Still, devoid of any greater meaning than “having fun”–Solomon was left to wallow in the meaninglessness of it.

There’s great news, then, because conversely, when we lean into that higher purpose–to glorify God–we will find enjoyment and satisfaction that is filled with meaning.

We are told, in the Word, to “be doers and not just hearers” (James 1:22). This sounds like Rubin’s first kind of fun. Do. Train for it and run the race to win an award (1 Cor. 9:24, 27). 

We are told to not just seek our own good, but also the good of others (1 Cor. 10:24). This sounds like the second kind of fun. We accommodate one another, and build each other up (1 Thess. 5:11).

We are warned, again and again (by Solomon himself!) to guard ourselves against passive, lazy behavior.
“Lazy hands make for poverty” (Prov. 10:4),
“A sluggard buries his hand in the dish; he will not even bring it back to his mouth!” (Prov. 19:24)
“The craving of the sluggard will be the death of him, because his hands refuse to work. All day long he craves for more, but the righteous give without sparing” (Prov.21:25-26).

Can we glorify God in our free time and leisure pursuits? If Laura’s Pa can pull out his fiddle after a long day on the prairie, I think there is plenty of time for it.

 

Tossing Babies in Rivers

At my current workplace, no one has yet brought up the subject of my health status. No one has ever asked me if I’m vaccinated or not–and I intend to keep it private, just like my weight, personal hygiene practices and sleep habits.
Would it be beneficial for my employer to know? I’m only a substitute teacher, but they offer me work every day. It’s possible–I might accidentally crush a small child in the classroom if I sat on them. I might spread disease by simply neglecting to wash my hands.
I’m all for being honest–and to the best of my ability I will create a safe, productive place to learn at school. It is maturity that guides my thinking about when, where, why, and how I should divulge my personal choices and values. 

It is an honor system. My employer doesn’t know and doesn’t ask certain things, so we maintain peace and I keep my job. 

I’m still employed because I’m a responsible, stable, qualified adult who knows how to appropriately manage children.
The situation I’m privileged to be in–where privacy is honored and personal responsibility is personal– is becoming less common. 

The Supreme Court is now in session, debating whether employers have the right to mandate vaccines for their workers. Perhaps they will vote in favor of individual rights, and perhaps they will agree with the president that workers should be fined and punished for not following mandates–but history in the long term rarely favors individual rights. Ask folks from China, Germany, Russia, Afghanistan, Cuba, Argentina…the list is a long one. Ask anyone who has fled a country for reasons of persecution. A person’s individual rights don’t typically stand a chance when power is at stake.

The question today is not if, but when we must begin tossing our metaphorical babies into rivers. Our American life is rapidly becoming less about individual freedoms and more about greasing squeaky wheels. Matters of conscience have become open to interpretation, and therefore personal decisions now fall prey to what is deemed “public safety”. It’s the whole idea of “for the greater good” while ignoring the consequences of tossing babies out with the bathwater. Can the babies cry for help? Should we listen to them anyway if it’s not a matter of their personal freedom but for a greater good?

“What’s the worst that can happen?” is one reaction to this dilemma, a question of procrastination at best. Inch by inch we are beginning to see exactly what it entails. We could list all the possible scenarios, anticipating the worst–but that’s an exercise in misery.
 

It’s a relief to read about a situation where the worst actually happened–and hope was there, waiting.

Have you heard of Jochebed? The mother of Moses was put in a hard spot when the king of the land declared the Israelite race to be inferior and too many. Is it too much to ask if we eliminate this problematic population boom?— he asked himself. A mandate went out: throw your Hebrew boy babies in the river Nile. Here it was, the worst thing that could happen.

Let’s take a look at what Jochebed did.

When she saw that (Moses) was a fine child, she hid him for three months. (Ex.2:2)
Jochebed did not immediately line up at the river to dispose of their baby. She kept him hidden from the executive order as long as possible–to keep him alive, yes, but also to make a plan.

…when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile. His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen to him. (Ex.2:3-4)
Did the mother of Moses give in to the harsh order of the king? Rather, she declared fearlessness in the face of the impossible, made a DIY waterproof basket, and had her daughter keep an eye on where it was headed.

Then Pharaoh’s daughter went down to the Nile to bathe, and her attendants were walking along the river bank. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her slave girl to get it. She opened it and saw the baby. He was crying, and she felt sorry for him. “This is one of the Hebrew babies,” she said. (Ex.2:5-6)
Was it any accident Moses’ basket ended up in the same spot of the river where Pharaoh’s daughter bathed? I think not. Jochebed pushed that basket toward a very specific destination at a very specific time. She likely timed it so Moses would be hungry enough to cry out just as the basket entered the bathing area. She appealed to the humanity of a person with authority–a woman who had the power and instinct to do something with a crying baby in a basket.

Then his sister asked Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get one of the Hebrew women to nurse the baby for you?”
“Yes, go,” she answered. And the girl went and got the baby’s mother. Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this baby and nurse him for me, and I will pay you.” (Ex.2:7-9)

Miriam, Moses’ sister was tasked with anticipating any need baby Moses had, and she spoke up in a situation that was likely intimidating. What a brave big sister! And look how it turned out–Moses’ mother, formerly a slave, now had a paying job to nurse her own baby!

Here are three things we can do when enforced federal mandates feel a bit like asking us to toss babies in the river:

1–Make a plan. Did Jochebed follow the mandate? In a way she did. She put the baby in the river as required. But could she have lived with herself if she’d let her baby drown in the water? I think not. Jochebed took time to review her options and form a plan she could live with–she looked for the best possible outcome under the worst of circumstances.
Where does your conscience allow you to make concessions? Where does it draw a line? 

2–Stand fearless in the impossible. In putting Moses in the basket, Jochebed was humbly accepting the fate of not being able to raise him the way she wanted to, but trusting God to fully handle Moses’ future. Do you know He can handle your future for your good? Do you know He is interested in the impossible?

3–Look for the humanity in a hopeless situation. Jochebed was not sending good vibes out into the world and praying for good karma. She and Miriam made intentional, human contact, appealing to the daughter of the king. Miriam very practically offered the service of a nursemaid for the infant which turned into a paying job for Moses’ mother (so cool!).
Are you continuing to seek the humanity in people around you? Are you making genuine connections with others? Can you be an unlikely ally?

Let’s not forget who Moses grew up to be!
If there is hope for giants to be born from certain-death circumstances, we have plenty of hope indeed.

church pains + how to recover

I have found in life there are many times you cannot put your finger on the pulse of what is happening in the present. It takes months and years to grow into the person who has enough wisdom to look back and understand why something happened the way it did. To gain a perspective that isn’t laced with bitterness, but mature enough to ascertain some goodness came from the bad. 

Still, isn’t it common to experience discomfort, stress, aching–signs of pain–in the present? You feel pain and it signals to your brain something is wrong.
It’s useful, but pain doesn’t bring relief, just the awareness of the disease.

Last year I was feeling pain. And now I know why.
 It was an emotional time (and I hate emotions, though I certainly feel a lot of them). I was at home with the kids full-time. Through no fault of theirs we were homeschooling and keeping our heads down, noses to the grindstone. It wasn’t ideal, but it felt like the only thing to do. 

We were attending a church that had initially seemed like such a nice oasis in Denver from the craziness of the world. It was a convenient stone’s throw away from our house. The neighborhood surrounding it was mostly Hmong and Spanish speaking households–kids who all attended school with our own.
Our church was perfectly positioned in a community and it seemed advantageous to me as a public school mom–the church could support the school and parents; the parents might in turn come to know Jesus better. My goal is always for Jesus to be better known, because in knowing Him, my life hasn’t fallen apart like it should have long ago.

The thing was, we didn’t know a lick about the denomination of the church. We detected it was a secretive little thing. The men who led it claimed they were from the “brethren” ideology, nothing more. There was no statement of faith printed on the bulletins, no hard, obvious rules to follow. The church was made of aging parishioners mixed with a couple young families. We were informed it was an upstart–the older folks had phoned a friend, so to speak, and the neighboring community of “brethren” believers sent a preacher and some families to add new life to the congregation. They decided on a new name.
It was fine–we were new. We were encouraged by the non-descript, plainness of the building, the lack of signage, and the absence of all those things fancy churches have that are showy and expensive. It seemed to elevate Jesus.
There were still many older ladies who only wore long skirts and placed doilies on their heads to cover when praying, but it meshed with younger moms in capris and sandals, and I didn’t sense it too divisive.
Of course, we had only been attending Baptist and reformed churches up until then, and so most everything seemed a little odd, but not off-putting. Sure, only men were allowed to pray aloud in the first service, but they served communion every week and let kids stay in the auditorium instead of rushing them off to “children’s church”.

We, as they say, got plugged in.

For two years we taught Sunday school to a handful of kids. We led a weekly kid’s night and fed the whole crew who came and sang and learned with us. We prepared communion and I helped lead worship. I became certified to teach English and set up a conversational class on Thursdays in the church building (it was remarkably unsuccessful, but some things are). I arranged coat drives and school supply drives and tried to do some community networking between the school and church. Joe led the security team. The church was positioned on a street with high crime incidence and many homeless people, so he got his permit to carry a concealed weapon. (You’ll remember this was around the time a terrible shooting incident took place in Texas at a church. Sadly, this is necessary in some cases.)

In the pandemic we were grateful our church only shut down for six weeks or so before the leadership decided it wasn’t a viable way to keep a church alive. If no one is attending, there certainly isn’t anyone putting money in the coffers.
Meanwhile, I was reading thru the stack of books on the church bookshelf (as recommended to me by our church’s resident expert, a man who has written and sold thousands of copies of books regarding church eldership)–all biographies written on heroes of the faith. All men who served in some missionary capacity to bring the Word to the lost world.
The books struck me as kind of paternalistic, because the heroes were all men doing maybe incredible things while also maybe abandoning their own families “for the sake of the gospel”.
Don’t get me wrong–there were many brave missionaries who brought light to dark places, but these books seemed a little pointed and weird. The protagonists were heartily applauded; the women and children too weak to endure the hardships were derided as crazy or unsupportive, or lacking faith.

We returned to in-person church–a weird thing at the the time, as you’ll recall in June of 2020 people were beginning to wear masks and it felt odd to all of us– but we were so grateful to have a bit of normalcy and willing to give it a hearty go. Our church blossomed that summer with people who were missing church (theirs having been shuttered for the foreseeable future). The leadership prided themselves on their tact and skill on handling people and church and that tricky balance of being relational, relevant, and religious.

For the first time, I noticed at church there were a lot of John MacArthur quotes being tossed around in the sermon. I knew only a tiny bit of MacArthur and had no hard feelings, but I noticed there were Bibles and hymn books in the pews with his name on them. Odd. Then there were emails to correct our musical worship–no drum kit, but a more acoustic set-up. No guitar between the singer and the microphone, because it’s too performance-based. Only these songs from this hymnal, must be piano-driven. There was no Biblical reasoning for any of this, it was simply something the elders had decided.
The men in the pulpit (always one of three elders) seemed to qualify their sermon points. It was as if they thought the free world might come to an end and so it fell on us, the local church, to align our values with theirs–should we have hope of not losing a foothold. A lot of bashing Catholics. Teasing out the differences on small issues. It’s us versus them.
This seemed a tad obscure to me and Joe (Baptists aren’t all bad, neither are church of Christers), and we felt ourselves distancing our thinking from what was said at church. 

It was around this time we began really hearing the word “eldership” pop up a lot. And the term “church-sanctioned”. A new elder had joined the group mid-pandemic, and since we had an eldership expert on the team, it wasn’t a question of qualification. Joe was urged to serve as a deacon, and when he asked what that would entail he was told it would be his usual duties of security and general service.
“So,” he said, “it would just be a title then? You want me to have a title?” He had no desire to be called a deacon, and he said so, to their disapproval (even after they offered to fly him to a John MacArthur leadership conference).

I think this is where things began rubbing the wrong way.

Nevertheless, we agreed to host a weekly home group at our house, because the elders decided–should the church face persecution in the face of Covid–we would already have sub-churches in houses. It was the practical thing to do–we were the youngest family living nearest the church, and our sprawling house could accommodate a crowd. My kids were withering from lack of social interaction (going on six months at the time), and I could use a few good friends, too.

This was our biggest mistake.


We must have looked suspicious, wearing our hearts on our sleeve. We wanted a Bible study, but our hearts were sincerely feeling turmoil over the denominational “non-denominational” vibes at church. Weren’t we invested enough in the church? Could we not allow for folks who didn’t subscribe completely to a John MacArthur theology? Shall we sit and nod dumbly while a man tells us why we ought not think Mark chapter 16 deserves to be included in canon?
Believe this, or… Agree with this, or…
In Bible study we were supposed to follow the text that was being preached on Sundays. It gave us very little wiggle room to explore what we were reading, and what were we to do with the parts where we disagreed with what the preacher had said?

No need to fear–two months in, the elders emailed out a Bible Study Life Group Mandate. Rules for how the “church-sanctioned” evening should proceed, from serving dinner to praying to what additional reading resources were or were not “elder approved”.

Angry mass emails were received that bashed “certain people” for trying to lead others astray. Warnings for church discipline.

It was many months of homeschooling kids and cleaning the house and preparing dinner on Thursdays, dreading life group. I waited and fretted and wondered why it was so miserable anticipating a Bible study. If Living Water brings Life, what was wrong with this picture? Why did it feel like a mole was planted to spy on us and report back to the elders? Why was it “for our own protection”? Where was the autonomy in having our own family culture? What would define us if we left the church? Who are Christians without a home?

You might be able to guess at the rest of the story, since I am writing this from another state entirely. It did eventually blow up in our faces in a literal way. On a spring Sunday morning one of the elders confronted Joe and said some hurtful things about me to my husband. (It didn’t help that he read my online writings regularly and thought he knew more about us than he really did.) How manipulative I am, how controlling in our marriage (this is a John MacArthur, complementarian recipe for disaster). It blew up because we did not pursue the path the local church had for us. It did not matter how many hours we served or how much we loved our community. The church was in the business of training us to follow their rules, not training up disciples of Jesus.

And it caused us great pain in the process.

This morning I was listening to a lesson by J. Vernon McGee about the time Jesus met for dinner at a Pharisee’s house. (I do still study my Bible with unconventional, non-church-sanctioned references. McGee’s been dead 35 years.) 
As the culture of the day was, neighbors gathered to watch and observe the meeting, and one woman showed up and began doing an odd thing. She was crying and letting her tears drip on the feet of Jesus. He let her continue the bizarre behavior even to the point of her kissing his feet and wiping them with her hair and the perfume she’d brought.

You have to admit, it is odd.

Simon, the Pharisee, couldn’t ignore it anymore, and Jesus, knowing his thoughts, pointed out to him that it isn’t the righteous, church-ruling leaders who are full of love for God. It’s the common folk who can’t ever get over what Jesus has done for them in forgiving their sins.

In fact, the woman with the tears and perfume performed the common courtesy of the day– washing a visitor’s feet and greeting him warmly–where Simon only had Jesus into his home as a curiosity.

And don’t I know it, the girl who can’t join a church to save her soul. Women that were cured of demons and unclean spirits and diseases followed Jesus everywhere–they invested their money and lives into making disciples; they didn’t sign up at the local church to have their wrists slapped for minor infractions.

So I will keep trailing after the lot of them, following Jesus. He lets us do that, do you know it? Even me, who was less than a stellar wife to my husband for the first decade of our marriage. Me, a pharisee in my own right. Me, a mom sending her kids to public school while culture unravels around us. It doesn’t seem so odd to me to throw myself at Jesus. He allows us to anoint his feet and drip our salty tears on Him. He invites us to get personal.

Pain that is borne is pain that can be overcome–we know this because Jesus bore it all. And He has overcome.

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him,
rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught,
and overflowing with thankfulness.
See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ.

Colossians 2:6-8

any old pocket: muslims, mullets, and finding where you belong

A couple days before we made our last move, we had to burn a couple hours at the park while the new owners came by to measure for carpet.
I took the dog along and we traipsed around the lake and enjoyed the sunny spring morning and our Chik-fil-a sandwich biscuits.
Soon we noticed parties forming in two covered gazebos. Families dressed in some middle-eastern garb gathered together, kids on swings and slides in beautiful, jewel-colored clothes.

It was the end of Ramadan. I knew this because our family once attended school with a little Muslim girl named Fatima. One day my husband went to volunteer as a Watchdog Dad and he met all our kids’ classmates. He stuck his hand out to shake theirs, but Fatima carefully kept her hand behind her back.
“I can’t touch a man,” she explained, matter-of-fact.
She also wasn’t allowed to eat school lunch during the day. I’d learned this the year before when I was volunteering in class. Muslims fast during daylight hours for an entire month while observing Ramadan. In the cafeteria she sat patiently next to the other students as they unwrapped and devoured sandwiches and chips.

I wasn’t surprised to see the segregated parties of men and women at the park. Yet it didn’t occur to me in the moment, but much later. As I stood watching my own kids play and admiring the beautiful clothes around me one of my kids came up with a couple young boys. He pointed at the dog and announced it was his, then he urged them to pet it.

“She’s nice. She’s a good dog. She loves kids,” he told them. “She loves it when you scratch her belly.”
The dog grinned and rolled on her back, tongue lolling as if to extend the invitation.
The new friends stood there with frozen smiles and eyes darting. The older one leaned down and whispered in the younger’s ear.
“We…can’t!”

Then I realized what my seven year old didn’t–what I barely knew myself.

“You know what?” I said aloud. “You don’t have to pet the dog.” I kneeled down and smiled at all three kids.
“You can just look at her. Plus, we didn’t come here because of the dog–we’re here to play!”
I scooted them back off to the playground.

I’ve thought a lot about this encounter and our Muslim friends back in Denver.
We were in a strange land, learning new things, sometimes by the seat of our pants. We found ourselves in awkward situations all the time. Life was full of backpedaling and circling cultural roundabouts, looking for the proper exit. We were country bumpkins. But we could still be kind.
If I were to flip the script, I am sure our Muslim friends would assume we were the oddballs, not celebrating Ramadan, but eating greasy sandwiches and parading our dogs around on leashes near people having picnics. But they were still kind.
We accommodate one another’s differences by being kind. We don’t have to be experts on other cultures; we can just be respectful and leave it at that. 


To further the conversation–when we moved away, it had nothing to do with how we felt about Muslims, or any other culture. Our departure wasn’t based on rebalancing or desegregating or any racial strife. It wasn’t because we hit a diversity limit or felt stifled as white people. One of the reasons we moved back to Missouri was because we were drawn to our original upbringing. We missed the comfort of familiar lands and people. We wished to reinforce values that made sense to us.
I think it’s fair to say that people do this all the time.

Folks resettle near familiar territory, even in a new place. Muslims will likely be drawn to other Muslims. Pick your nationality, your traditions, foods, language. Customs are not so easily traded in for new ways.
These things struck a deep chord in me in Covid times when we were so very isolated. I’m used to feeling isolated, but through pandemic times it leveled up. Common interactions were frowned upon, so I naturally turned inward and yearned more for the comfort of my original Home.

It’s interesting that this has all happened to my family personally at the same point in American history when politicians are trying to evaluate and correct social climate.
I’ve seen the updated “maps” of cities and counties that brag on being the most diverse. I think there is some sense of urgency these days to rush to the scene and populate it with an equal smattering of dissimilar humans, as if we were sprinkling jimmies on a sugar cookie. Not too many of this color, or it tips the scales. Even things out till the playing field feels level. 

Have you ever asked yourself, why?

I’ve even noticed this in the evangelical church. I’ve heard people preach on finding a more diverse community of believers, as if a variety of skin tone and age demarcate a holier picture of the church. 

Have you asked yourself, why?
Locally–and more rurally, it probably ain’t gonna happen. 

You won’t walk into old German Lutheran midwestern territory and see too many English language learners. You’ll see trucks and dogs and mullets. And that’s actually nothing to be ashamed of (though I will reserve the right to fight against mullets should my own boys stumble off the straight and narrow).

These things are not shameful and bad. They are simply pockets of culture. Those colorful favelas I visited in Rio de Janeiro were exclusively carioca. Most of those kids had never even been to a beach before, even though they lived less than an hour from the best waves in the world. A cultural pocket, zero shame.
My friends who’ve adopted internationally? They bring home traditions and clothing to remind their sons and daughters of the places they were born. Another special cultural pocket.

God sees us, and He sees the separate, He sees the pockets. I think He loves seeing us together, too, but the ends of the world are pretty fantastic on their own.

It might be the American way, to declare equality and fairness by making Diversity the highest goal–but the genuineness of it has been terribly skewed. The majority of folks aren’t declaring equality from a benevolent spirit. There is a loud, ferocious attempt to even things out, but those who think they know best ignore their own tendency to cherry-pick compadres.
Look who is still popular: the wealthy. The richest guy in Nigeria is black, believe it or not. Hugo Chavez was worth $1 billion when he died in Venezuela. North Korea, China, Russia–every country has their king, so to speak. Jeff Bezos isn’t hanging around with any trailer park folk, and neither are his diverse buddies on the Forbes list.

America and its so-called racial tension is a smoke-and-mirrors coverup for the divide that will never be breached– classism. And I don’t hear many people promoting a down-to-earth, blood-sweat-tears existence. The rich are immortalized and given the proverbial keys to the kingdom. The poor are swept under the rug, indentured to their own misfortune. And somewhere between the two most of us Americans fit in, living in the 8th richest country in the world, but a nation divided, forever arguing about who was here first and if FOX news and/or CNN is trash.
None of it is fair, especially the bit where we get to live in this wonderful nation.
It’s a statement of fact.
So the question for the every-person is this: can you turn off the news and find a home in any old pocket?

I think you can–and I think this should encourage you. The majority of Americans have a lot in common.
Isn’t it funny how a body can feel at home among strangers when we have nothing more in common than our common-ness? I’ve had more in common with common people every place I’ve ever lived, if that makes sense–and not many of them ever talked, lived, or looked like me. But there has been understanding. And kindness.
Moms and dads trying to raise their kids, struggling sometimes to make rent, worrying about grades, cheering at the school Christmas concert. Men and women who work day or night shifts and celebrate birthdays even when they’re dog-tired.

Every place has been a joy. It’s been thrilling to me to fumble and learn and fumble in the heavier-sprinkled places, where the playground has hijabs and pathani suits, and little boys slowly back away from unclean, slobbery dogs.

But it’s also been wonderful to find home right where I’d left it, mullets and all.

Far as the curse is found.

My sister just had a baby. He is precious and perfect; waking up to the world and its wonder, his eyes hesitant to open, his throat full of infant song.
I loved him immediately, just like I knew I would. He belongs here. He fits right into his mama’s arms.
I want him to have the best life, and I think he will–because he has amazing parents and because I’m hoping for it. I think that’s why newborn babies are always such a wonder–it’s because their lives are a huge blank slate. Everything is in front of them. You can see it in their sleepy eyes and their quizzical expressions when they dream. They are mystery wrapped up in wonder. We meet a tiny, inscrutable stranger and welcome him like a celebrity. He can do no wrong. We are just getting to know him, after all.

Along the line of new babies, I’ve always pondered how the Old Testament treats birth and babyhood. Historically there were midwives and birthing stools–Exodus is clear on how the Hebrew ladies did their thing–and surely plenty of rest and extra raisin cakes for the hungry mom. Nursing was a common sight back in the day, for there was no alternative. The first thing Moses’ adoptive mom said when she pulled him out of the watery basket was, “go get someone who can feed this baby!” Thank heavens it was Moses’ own birth mother, an immediate comfort to the hungry baby, her familiar voice and softness holding him again.

Isaiah compares the affection of the Father for his children to a nursing mama:

“I will give Jerusalem a river of peace and the wealth of nations like a flowing stream; you will nurse and be carried in her arms and dandled on her knees. As a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you; and you will be comforted over Jerusalem.”
Isaiah 66:12, 13

I can see my sister whispering to her baby, her lips brushing his head, inhaling his feathery little noggin. A mama kissing and loving her infant, gently rocking him, swaddling, changing, feeding. God feels this way about us, his people. He is motherly in his affection, tenderly and endlessly picking us up, dusting us off.

But there is another thing about babies we conveniently forget, charmed by the new baby smell and miracle of life. And I suppose we forget it about ourselves, too.

It is this: we are born with a wicked condition–a broken, evil heart. Our will from birth is betrayal. Our original credo: to know good and evil.

Not to be satisfied in our Creator, but to challenge Him. To question Him, again and again, if He really loves us.

King David cried out, “surely in sin my mother conceived me!”–not that his mother committed sin in the act of conceiving, but that as humans we are steeped in sin from the get-go, incapable of pleasing God in any fashion. It was a crushing blow to the psalmist when he realized it. A revelation of my wickedness before a holy God.

Maybe we are not so precious as we think.

This is how God dealt with sinners according to the Israelites–He gave them rules.
After giving birth, there will be a time of uncleanliness plus time to abstain from sexual relations.
After giving birth, the male child is to be circumcised, specifically on the eighth day.
After giving birth, the parents are to bring a sacrifice to the altar to make atonement for the mother’s bleeding.

These were serious rules, not some hokey-pokey game. I’m afraid I cringed when I would read these non-negotiables in Leviticus in my read-the-Bible-in-a-year plan. Why did God have to make having a new baby seem so ugly? It might’ve served some obscure purpose back then, but how is it relevant now?

Neighbors would know if you followed God’s family planning rule or slipped up after a few weeks (40 days for a boy, 80 days for a girl). Circumcision wasn’t an elective, simple procedure with Tylenol and sugar water waiting on the other side. It was a costly thing to come up with a lamb and a dove. Even Jesus’ parents had to settle for two doves.

These were some serious terms that forced a parent to answer more serious questions.

How committed, really, are you to raising a sinner? To acknowledge the weight of responsibility before God? What is this trade-off, this parenthood experience? 

The old rules weren’t to pour rain on the celebration of new life, but to remind the new family of the seriousness of raising a sinner. Yes, you’ll inhale that newborn scent, but it comes at a hefty price–that which is cursed. Surely we are steeped in sin from the get-go! 

How wonderful Jesus became the lamb for us, blood spilled to cover my sin, the sacrifice that ended a million sacrifices and gave us peace with God.
I’m thankful for the Word and its parallels to every part of my life: that physical babies are beautiful, unique gifts–but an even better birth to celebrate is new life in Jesus.

The old Jewish rules that seemed so explicit and harsh are now freedom-producing spiritual truths:

Postpartum recovery is a healing time; post-rebirth, there also seems to be a period or periods of abstinence where a believer might remove herself from the world to get her feet solidly planted on the ground. We don’t do these things because we are rule-bound, dogmatic legalists, but because it proves to be beneficial, refreshing, and life-giving.

The circumcision now is evident as the Holy Spirit serving as a seal of our redemption, but there is also a continual circumcision of the heart–His pruning to make us more fruitful. It’s still often painful, as flesh-denying goes–but the world recognizes us as God’s people through this radical spiritual “circumcision”. We are set apart, not forever dabbling in petty sin or swimming downstream with culture. We belong to Him, and people know it.

And we no longer take animals for the priests to butcher, but we offer our lives now as a living sacrifice. This means the stuff of everyday–the coffee-drinking, husband-loving, paycheck-making, child-raising, neighbor-loving life. The I-want-to-sit-down-and-close-my-eyes-but-have-to-bathe-and-feed-another-human-being life. The-God-you’re-going-to-have-to-help-me-out-here-because-I’m-at-my-wit’s-end life.

And so I’ve wondered over the years at baby dedications at local churches through the years. All those precious little people, nursed, swaddled, dandled on their mama’s knees, dressed up in their prettiest. It only tells half the story.
Each of my babies was born and invited to a special service within a month of their birth, but I could never hop on stage, smile the smile and accept the prayers and cupcakes.
I never knew why I felt this way–only that it felt too ceremonial and I was disturbed by how easily the church ladies marked it on the calendar. I mostly remember making uncomfortable jokes with whomever shared our pew that day–welp, guess we’re just raising little heathens!

But truly, I knew we were blessed to be raising even heathens. Sometimes–and especially when we had babies–I couldn’t even be nice to my husband on a Sunday morning. It was enough, letting my yes be yes, my no be no, and not faking a hyper-spirituality to the applause of church ladies. 

I’ve learned it is better to gain an understanding of why we do things before we jump in and assume we’re doing what God wants.
Tell me–isn’t it solemn to spiritually mirror the life of the early Israelites? The set-apartness, the awareness?
What is more honorable, to dress the baby up one day and make public promises, your hand on a Bible? You can make those church ladies happy today and send the baby to daycare in the morning–back to business as usual.
Or is it to allow oneself to be reminded, day to day, that our children are in dire need of a Savior? That even though we struggle, it’s also a joy to partake in spiritual abstinence, circumcision, sacrifice–because by living this set-apart life our kids begin to taste freedom in Christ.

What a gift from the Father–to know He adores babies and adores us! Even more, what a wonder–that He provided a substitute for our sin problem, and in crushing His own precious son He delivered us from life under the Law. He redeemed us so we might become His children.

And how incredible, that he gives us our own delightful, precious babes so we might help them grow up, far as the curse is found.