1989 May/June issue Part 2

Humdudgeons or contentment

The word humdudgeon is a new word to me and I like the sound of it. It means “a loud complaint without a trifle.” Heard any of those lately around your house? One mother thought of an excellent antidote; all humdudgeons must be presented not orally but in writing, “of two hundred words or more.” There was a sudden marked reduction in whining and complaining.

   Parents, by example, teach their children to whine. No wonder it is so difficult to teach them not to! Listen to conversations in the elevator, at the hairdresser’s, at the next table in the restaurant. Everybody’s whining about everything- weather, health, the president, the IRS, the insurance mess, traffic, kids.

1989 May/June issue Part 1

Do it at once
"No unwelcome tasks become any the less unwelcome by putting them off till tomorrow. It is only when they are put behind us and done, that we begin to find that there is a sweetness to be tasted afterwards, and that the rememberance of unwelcome duties unhesitatingly done is welcome and pleasant. Accomplished, they are full of blessings, and there is a smile on their faces as they leave us. Undone, they stand threatening and disturbing our tranquility, and hindering our communion with God. If there be lying before you any bit of work from which you shrink, go straight up to it, and do it at once. The only way to get rid of it is to do it." (Alexander MacLarer)

1989 March/April issue Part 3

There Are No Accidents

   My friend Judy Squire of Portola Valley, California, is one of the most cheerful and radiant woman I know. I met her first in prayer meeting at the beginning of a conference. She was sitting in a wheel chair and I noticed something funny about her legs. Later that day I saw her with no legs at all. In the evening she was walking around with crutches. Of course I had to ask her some questions. She was born with no legs, she had artificial ones which she used sometimes, but they were tiresome, she said (laughing) and she often left them behind. When I heard of a little baby boy named Brandon Scott, born without arms or legs, I asked if she would write to his parents, she did;

   “The first thing I would say is that all that this entails is at least one hundred times harder on the parents than the child. A birth defect by God’s grace does not rob childhood from its wonder, nor is a child burdened by high expectations. Given a supportive, creative, and loving family, I know that I enjoyed not a less-than-average life nor an average life, but as I’ve told many, my life has not been ordinary but extraordinary.

   “I am convinced without a doubt that a loving Heavenly Father oversees the creative miracles in the inner sanctum of each mother’s womb (Psalm 139), and that in His sovereignty there are no accidents.

   “’What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Creator calls a butterfly.’ As humanity we see only the imperfect, underside of God’s tapestry of our lives. What we judge to be ‘tragic- the most dreaded thing that could happen,’ I expect we’ll one day see as the awesome reason for the beauty and uniqueness of our life and our family. I think that’s why James 1:2 is a favourite verse of mine. Phillips translation put it this way: ‘When all kinds of trials and temptations crowd into your lives, my brothers, don’t resent them as intruders but welcome them as friends. ‘

1989 March/April issue Part 2

Too Many Children?

When I learned that my daughter Valerie was expecting number five, my insides tied themselves in knots.
  Val and Walt were both very peaceful about it, willing to receive this child as they had the others- as a gift from the Lord, remembering His words, “Whoever receives this child in my name receives me” (Luke 9:48). But my imagination ran to the future and its seeming impossibilities- “Poor dear Val. she has her hands more than full. What will she do with five?” Before she was married Valerie had told me she had hoped the Lord would give her six. I had smiled to myself, thinking she would probably ably revise that number after the first three or four. Practical considerations rose like thunderclouds in my mind. Money. Another room to be built into the house. Homeschooling (Valerie was teaching two already). How would the new child receive the attention he needed? Etc., etc.
  Then I began to look at the advantages. I was one of six children myself, and loved growing up in a big family. Children learn early what it means to help and to share, to take responsibility and to make sacrifices, to give place to others, to cooperate and deny themselves. Why all this turmoil in my soul? Well because I love my child! She was tired! Her hands were full! Maybe later, maybe when the others were old enough to help more, maybe... O Lord!
  I tried to talk to God about it. Breakfast time came, we ate, washed dishes, school began in the children’s schoolroom, and I went to my room, my heart churning. What does one do?
I write this because troubled young women have come to me not understanding their mothers’ reactions to the news of another baby. Was it resentment? Did they not love the grandchildren they had? Why would they not want more? Was it nothing but a meddlesome yen to run their children’s lives? Was it a revelation of a worst attitude- an unwillingness to let God be God?

1989 March/April issue Part 1

Why The Newsletter?

 

I began writing the newsletter in 1982 because kind people of the Word of God Community in Ann Arbor, Michigan, suggested that I write one and offered all their facilities for the carrying out of the idea.

  Now that my radio programme, “Gateway to Joy,” is in its sixth month I have bethought me again the need for or the wisdom of continuing the letter. I have, after all, a new channel of communication with many more people than on our mailing list. Maybe that’s enough, but then, maybe radio listeners will be wanting a newsletter. I’m in a quandary.

  To call it a "newsletter” is a bit misleading, I admit. It’s nothing like a proper one. It doesn’t keep you abreast of much of anything. It isn’t “relevant” in the popular sense. But I take refuge in C.S Lewis’s remark, “All that is not eternal is eternally out of date,” and I try always to include things of eternal. I suppose the heart of the matter is a burning desire, amounting to perhaps a compulsion akin to that of the psalmist’s (“My heart is teeming with a good word;/ I utter what I have framed concerning the King” Psalm 45:1; Kay). Often I have some treasure to share which I didn’t frame – treasures from the pens of long dead saints. Because it’s getting harder and harder to find some of the writings which have nourished my soul, I give you tastes so that you can ransack old bookstores and feast on spiritual food much more substantial than many contemporary offerings. I had wanted to give you something for an Easter meditation. Nothing I can frame comes close to this jewel from George Herbert, born in Whales in 1593.

1989 January/February issue Part 6

When Your Children Grow Up

  In response to my question as to what readers would like, one asked “how to look at one’s purpose in life when your children are grown up and gone.”
  If ones supreme ai min life is to glorify God by doing what He wants, I would suggest a careful study of the characteristics of Godly women in the New Testament as set forth in 1 Timothy 5:5-10 and Titus 2:3-5. Nancy Krumreich of Anderson, Indiana, makes a practical suggestion that fits Paul’s advice; “You might write about what you think older women ought to be doing in our world (besides going to retreats!). it seems to me that there is a gaping need for women in this category to do things other than seek careers, things which teach us younger women how to love our husbands and children. And things which we younger ones should not be doing, like being Crisis Pregnancy Center directors, picketers of abortion clinics, spending hours of time volunteering which needs to be spent with our children and/or husbands. Perhaps even things like helping us younger ones with our heavy loads and giving practical guidance and encouragement... Are there churches out there bold enough to teach that older women have this responsibility? It seems to me that the attitude is strong both in church and out of it that once the youngest child is in school, women are freed up to pursue whatever they wish.
  “I’m a young woman in search of a mother-figure, mine having dies three years ago when my middle daughter was newborn.”
  I’m sure Nancy is all for the CPC’s, the protests against abortion, and volunteer work- for those who can be free to participate without neglecting the first God-given duties. But if the young women can’t do those jobs, and older women choose to pursue something called fulfilment, who is available?
  Are there some out there with ears to hear this plea?

1989 January/February issue Part 5

God's Curriculum

"I, Thy servant, will study Thy statutes. / Thy instruction is my continual delight; / I turn to is for counsel. / I will run the course set out in Thy commandments, / For they gladden my heart" (Psalm 119:23, 24, 32; NEB).

One day recently something lit a fuse of anger in someone who then burned me with hot words. I felt sure i didn't deserve this response, but when i ran to God about it, He reminded me of part of a prayer I’d been using lately: “Teach me to treat all that comes to me with peace of soul and with firm conviction that your will governs all.”

  Where could that kind of peace come from? Only from God, who gives “not as the world gives.”

  His will that I should be burnt? Not exactly, but His will governs all. In a wrong-filled world we suffer (and cause) many a wrong. God is there to heal and comfort and forgive. He who brought blessing to many out of the sin of the jealous brothers of Joseph means this hurt for my ultimate blessing and, I think, for an increase of love between me and the one who hurt me. Love is very patient, very kind. Love never seeks its own. Love looks to God for His grace to help.

  “It was not you who sent me here but God,” Joseph said to his brothers. “You meant to do me harm; but God meant to bring good out of it” (Genesis 45:8, 50:20; NEB).

  There is a philosophy of secular education which holds that the student ought to be allowed to assemble his own curriculum according to his own preferences. Few students have a strong basis for making these choices, not knowing how little they know. Ideas of what they need to learn are not only greatly limited but greatly distorted. What they need is help- from those who know more than they do.

  Mercifully God does not allow us to choose our own curriculum. His wisdom is perfect, His knowledge braces not only all worlds but the individual hearts and minds of each of His loved children. With intimate understanding of our deepest needs and individual capacities, He chooses our curriculum. We need only ask, “Give us this day our daily bread, our daily lesson, our homework.” An angry retort from someone may be just the occasion we need in which to learn not only longsuffering and forgiveness, but meekness and gentleness, fruits not borne in us but borne by the Holy Spirit. As Amy Carmichael wrote, “A cup brimful of sweetness cannot spill even one drop of bitter water no matter how suddenly jarred.”

  God’s curriculum for all who sincerely want to know Him and do His will will always include lessons we wish we could skip. But the more we apply ourselves, the more honestly we can say what the psalmist said, “I, Thy servant, will study Thy statutes. / Thy instruction is my continual delight; / I turn to it for counsel. / I will run the course set out in Thy commandments, / for they gladden my heart” (Psalm119:23, 24, 32; NEB).