Lightning

The other night we had a weather phenomenon that is new to me despite years of living places with real winter weather: thunder snow. Ever experienced that? Here we are in February, it's cold outside, and lightning is illuminating the nighttime skies, followed by thunder and accompanied by high winds and blowing snow. We expect the lightning bolts in the summertime, but not in the winter.

People often say that they would like a "lightning bolt" experience when they are seeking direction for a decision or inspiration for an idea. I have wished and prayed for such a thing on many occasions, but those prayers seem to fall on deaf ears most of the time. This is puzzling; after all, the Bible says, "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you." (Matthew 7:7). Why don't we get the lightning bolt?

Maybe the better question is why we get it when we do. I had one the other day. I was waiting at the doctor's office, trying to read a novel but actually ruminating on some career decisions I need to make. I knew I had to deal with these decisions but was really unsure of what God wanted me to do. I finally said, with a totally open mind and heart, "God, I just need some direction. Your direction. That's it." Well, nothing happened right away, so I picked up my book and resumed reading. I turned the page, and there in front of me was a paragraph about the very thing I was considering. In black and white on one page out of hundreds in a book with no other content related to this subject, there lay His direction.

Some will say it's a coincidence, but my knowledge of statistics casts doubt on that theory. Some will say I wanted it to confirm something I desired, but again, I truly wasn't looking for confirmation, just direction. Some will say it was just an example of the kind of thing I could do but not a prescription to do so, yet why that particular example? That particular moment?

I think we just get so used to not receiving the lightning bolts that when they do arrive, we don't know what to do with them. God still answers. In Jeremiah 29:13, He says, "You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart." Why did He answer me this time? I had no agenda. I wasn't asking forgiveness instead of permission. I wasn't making my plans and asking Him to rubber-stamp them after I was committed. I just sought His guidance, His heart, pure and simple.

Is this a guarantee of a clear answer, a lightning bolt every time? Certainly not. Does it mean that you are seeking with somewhat less than your whole heart if you don't get an answer? Also not, but it is much less effective to ask for something with an agenda in mind, then get angry and defensive when the answer is not what I wanted to hear! Simply asking for God to reveal His will (and being willing to hear it and follow it) is the open door to the lightning bolt, in any season.

I'd love to hear about your "lightning bolts"--how has God answered your prayers? How has He (seemingly) not?

God's grace and peace to you.

White Out

It is snowing this afternoon, covering the brown, sandy roads and stained snowbanks with a fresh, downy coat, and my thoughts turn to white-out. Did you know that in a medical record, it is illegal to correct errors with white-out? That a mistake must be lined out and initialed instead? How humiliating, you might think; if I leave the mistake visible, people will know that I messed up and had to fix it! People will think I'm not smart. I could be held accountable for something I wrote by mistake and never even acted on...

Humans love to cover their tracks. We'd love it if all our mistakes were edited away, leaving only perfection behind. We live in a time of easy fixes, and we expect them. If we make a typo, we hit the backspace key and it's gone. If we get our hair done and don't like it, we choose a different color. If we wreck our car, we take it to the body shop, and voila, perfection once again. No one ever has to know we made these mistakes.

But some mistakes can't be whited out. The mistaken decision to drive drunk may leave behind a wheelchair (yours or someone else's) that cannot be hidden. The decision to shoplift (if signs in fitting rooms can be believed) may leave you with a permanent criminal record. The decision to cheat on an exam may cost you your college career or a job opportunity.

The drive to white out the mistakes has costs, too. When I try to appear perfect, who knows what person is put off, a person who might need my encouragement as one who has "been there" but can't recognize me as such. When I white out my mistakes, I'm also denying their existence to myself, shoving them down under layer after layer of cover until I think I can't see them anymore. But you know what happens with white-out; after a while it starts to flake and crack, and you can rub it off, revealing what is behind it.

Today I resolve to not use white-out. Am I suggesting that we all introduce ourselves with a litany of past mistakes and sins? Not at all. Neither am I suggesting that we keep ourselves from healing from things in our past that have hurt us deeply. But let's line out those things in our minds instead of trying to mask them with white-out. Let's not forget the process of healing and the opportunity to minister to others because of it. And let's not forget that none of us is perfect and cut each other a little slack. Mercy. Receive it. Give it.

God's grace and peace to you.