ju·ju noun
\jü-(ˌ)jü\
1 : a fetish, charm, or amulet of
West African peoples
2 : the magic attributed to or
associated with jujus
Source: Merriam-Webster Free Online
Dictionary
“Anyone who won’t shoulder
his own cross and follow behind me can’t be my disciple.” Jesus
as quoted in Luke 14:27, MSG
People
who like to write about spiritual growth and formation like to quote
guys like Bonhoeffer who once wrote, “When Christ calls a man he
bids him come and die.” I've come across this wonderful little
nugget now and again over the years in devotionals, commentaries and
treatises of inspirational value. In eleven words Bonhoeffer captured
the essence of what it means to be a follower of Jesus: He's the
boss, I'm not; even though I like to be blessed, I choose to follow
him even when it appears I am being cursed; Jesus isn't my co-pilot –
he's the pilot period. And that means contrary to what I may have
heard elsewhere, “just add Jesus” is not a formula for the
blessed life. He is not a good luck charm or ju
ju
that we rub when the cards are down.
As a volunteer
chaplain at the Barron County Justice Center, I have heard plenty of
stories of woe and despair over the years. I try and listen with a
discerning ear and be a voice of God in their personal turmoil. “In
my distress I called to the LORD; I cried to my God for help (Psalm
18;6, NIV)” the psalmist prayed. I have prayed many a prayers with
contrite prisoners and not a few times handed over my handkerchief to
them that they may have something to wipe away their tears other than
their shirt sleeve. But for some of them, when the storm passes as
far as I can tell they return to life as they know it. There's a
reason they call it “jailhouse religion” after all.
I think of a woman
who came to Christ at the JC a year or so ago. She was a “lifer”
(as the guards refer to some of the inmates there) – someone who is
doing life at the Justice Center six months at a time. She was from
our town and we had known each other for several years. When she
needed a gas voucher or help with her rent, she'd usually come around
and share with me some hard-luck story from her life. Frankly, I
often helped her for the sake of her young daughter who through no
fault of her own was captive to her mom's whims and impulses. When
she was locked up again, a guard had actually prayed with her to
receive Christ and asked me to see her. As skeptical as I was that
she was on the level, when I sat down with her in P.V. 2 I saw
something in her eyes that persuaded me that something real had
transpired; that this was perhaps a true spiritual conversion that
had occurred. We met regularly for the next several months. Her
revocation hearing was coming up and she was hoping the judge would
sentence her to a center that specialized in the treatment of those
struggling with addictions. Instead, he sentenced her to seven years
in prison. We had met shortly before the hearing and I reminded her
that no matter what went down in that courtroom, God loved her and
was for her and if it was her lot to go to prison he would go there
with her. While she agreed with me her voice lacked conviction. And
when the judge threw what part of the book he could throw at her, she
called it quits with this “Jesus experiment.” A day or so later I
was informed by the Director of Inmate Services that she no longer
wished to see me.
I find her story a
good example of what shallowness of soul we disciples at times reveal
when the poop hits the fan. Like Job in our despair we cry out, “Oh,
that I had someone to hear me! I sign now my defense – let the
Almighty answer me...” (31:35, NIV). You know the old saying, “Be
careful for what you wish for because you may get it”? Well, he
gets more than he bargains for as God shows up in the storm and takes
him to task: “Who is this that darkens my counsel with words
without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man; I will question you and
you shall answer me” (38:2-3, NIV). In my mind, I can't read that
without imagining Elihu taking a few precautionary steps back from
Job lest lightning strike him as well. For several chapters running,
Jehovah lets Job have it:
“Where were you when I created the
earth?” (v. 4)
“...who took charge of the
ocean
when it gushed forth like a baby from the womb? (v. 8)
when it gushed forth like a baby from the womb? (v. 8)
“Can you find your way to where
lightning is launched,
or to the place from which the wind blows?” (v. 24)
or to the place from which the wind blows?” (v. 24)
“Can you
catch the eye of the beautiful Pleiades sisters,
or distract Orion from his hunt?
Can you get Venus to look your way,
or get the Great Bear and her cubs to come out and play?” (v. 31-32)
or distract Orion from his hunt?
Can you get Venus to look your way,
or get the Great Bear and her cubs to come out and play?” (v. 31-32)
(all
verses from The Message)
And
on it goes like the sound of Luther's hammer as he pounds his theses
to the Wittenburg Door the sum of it saying to Job – or anyone else
who finds himself in Job's shoes – there's way more going on then
we know or guess in the workings of this universe but at the heart of
it is a God who is intimately involved in everything from mountain
goats having their kids (39:1) and hawks making their lazy circles in
the sky (39:26). If he knows the whereabouts of the wild donkey in
the wide-open places (39:5) and the eagle in her rocky crag (39:28),
he certainly sees you and me at our particular address of
perturbation. Like Job, we,
too, want our day in court so that all things may be explained to us.
But that's the irony of his story: he's never given an answer for the
reasons for his troubles. He never learns that his plight was all
about a bet between Jehovah and Satan. It's like a Charlie Daniels'
song come to life, but instead of the devil coming down to Georgia
he'd come to the land of Uz and Jehovah had put all his chips on Job
that in the end he would still be standing.
In recent months
there have been individuals from our fellowship who have traveled
through the valley of the shadow. Each has been touched by suffering
and each has written eloquently about their observations there.
 |
| Justin & Tara |
Justin used to be
our youth leader at Refuge. In 2008, he and his wife, Tara, moved to
Kansas City so that he could attend school at the International House
of Prayer in Grandview. A few years ago Lyla came along and during
the last year joy was added to joy when they moved to south-western
Colorado and Tara conceived again. And then the first ultrasound
revealed that there was something very wrong with Harper. After
several tests their doctor concluded that she had a condition
referred to as Trisomy 18 (see What is Trisomy 18?), a rare genetic disorder.
Without going into a lot of details, the long and short of it is that
T18 is a condition that is incompatible with life outside the womb.
Most T18 babies die in utero or shortly after childbirth. But of
course, God is God and as long as there is life there is hope. And so
they prayed and set all their friends and family to praying. Who
knows, we all agreed, perhaps God intends for Harper to live.
But she didn't
live. A week or so ago, she died. Faced with such an overwhelming
loss, these are the words they penned the day Harper died:
Justin:
The ultrasound
that we received yesterday morning revealed that our little Harper
Rose went home to be with Jesus sometime on Monday afternoon or
evening. For those of us who believe in the name and work of
Jesus we have a living hope that we will go to be with her when we
pass from this age to the next. Harper will forever be our
daughter and we will live forever with her in the coming kingdom of
God. We do however mourn this temporary loss and are still
going through the pain of saying goodbye.
Tara:
Our little
angel, Harper Rose, was born at around 10:30 am. She weighed 2 lb.
and was 13 inches long. She had many of the characteristic traits of
T18 including the cleft palate and elongated head, but she was
beautiful. She looked like she would have had a gentle spirit. She
had dainty little hands and feet and penetrating eyes. We had the
opportunity to spend several hours with her small frame and see God's
design in her. We had a wonderful team of photographers from "Now
I Lay Me Down to Sleep" come and take pictures shortly after her
birth. And our wonderful nurse Skyler helped us get moldings of her
hands and feet.
We are so
grateful for our little girl, and we're so grateful that she did not
have to suffer but rather went straight from mommy's womb to Jesus'
arms. We miss her, and would have loved to have her with us in this
life, but we know her's is a far, far better existence then what we
know here.
 |
| Precious in his sight |
I read these words four days before our youngest graduated from high
school. Whatever stress I was experiencing due to graduation and
party preparations paled in significance to what Justin and Tara were
experiencing as they were preparing to say good-bye to their youngest
for the last time. And yet their words reveal a depth that is deeper
than whatever chorus they like to sing when they gather at their
local fellowship. They speak of the certainty that this reality –
that we can see, and hear and touch – is but a shadow of the
greater reality that is about us.
 |
| Pam |
I am writing this at the dining room
table watching a whirlwind of snow blowing around our windows, even
while the icicles on the eaves drip steadily as they melt. Blowing
snow and dripping icicles seem to contradict each other. Spring is
here. You can feel it in the heat of the sun, but winter lingers on.
This contradiction reminds me of a
conversation I had with my daughter, Jaynee, not long after we
started chemo. We were sitting at the dining room table (obviously a
popular spot in our house) after lunch chatting, and I reminded her
how merciful God had been to us. Her response, “Yeah, getting
cancer is merciful,” in her most sarcastic 13-year-old voice. I
reminded her that the cancer was caught early. That we had a good
prognosis. Her response, “It would be more merciful not to have
cancer at all.”
That makes perfect logical sense to
the world. God allowing me to have a potentially deadly disease does
not seem the most merciful choice. But God teaches us not to judge
things with the eyes of the world--to look beyond the logic. It’s
not an easy lesson to learn. Most of us respond with fear, rejection,
dismay to any source of pain, suffering or uncertainty. In the
natural part of us, we can’t always see God doing a good thing.
Maybe we don’t even want to see God use suffering to produce a good
thing. It seems wrong somehow that the God we love and who loves us
allows us to suffer when he can reach down and stop it in a
heartbeat. Looking back in my journal from the early chemo days, I
find a lot of honestly desperate pleas to God for life and
reassurance. Now, one sentence that I wrote stands out to me, “The
testing is hard; the product is the Lord’s.”
Oswald Chambers writes, “However
much we know God, the great lesson to learn is that any moment, he
may break in ... all of a sudden God meets life.”
And how do we respond when “God
breaks in.” I guess the only way that makes sense to me is to say,
“God, I don’t know why, but I do know you. And I can trust
you--for today and for tomorrow and for eternity really.” That
doesn’t me I don’t struggle with fears about the future. I wish I
could be a shining Christian example and say, “God, your will be
done.” But honestly, I am more like, “God, don’t let this
cancer come back, and I sure hope that’s your will!”
How I have found God’s blessing
in having cancer:
I evaluate the world differently. I
am more merciful and less judgmental of others. I am more patient
with the weaknesses of others as I walk in my own weakness.
I have learned to count my days and
hours. “Teach us to realize the brevity of life, so that we may
grow in wisdom.” (Psalm 90:12) I have become more discerning in my
pursuits and activities.
Sin has become less
attractive. I have gone through a deep time of repentance. I want to
be in right relationship with Jesus. I see sin for what it really
is--an attachment to this world that hinders our journey to the next.
I want other people to understand
that there is no guarantee for tomorrow. I want them to be ready. I
want them to sense the urgency, and put away the hinderances to their
faith. I have a heart to reach out to others in a new way. I don’t
want them to wake up one day with cancer or some other deadly disease
and not be ready.
I am close to God in new, deeper
ways, as I lean on him daily and trust him for my life. Cancer is
like a wave. It leaves some people on the shore and carries others
into the sea. But God, who controls the waves literally, is in
control of the outcome.
Had someone like
myself, who has never experienced a sickness like hers, wrote those
things my words would sound cruel or insensitive at best. But Pam can
speak them with integrity because she has walked that path. She has
been there and knows, like Job, that there is always more going on
than we guess.
Dean Merrill,
former editor of Christianity Today, once made what I think is an eloquent assessment of this
world and its general screwed-upness, “This is not the Garden of
Eden. It's not even next door.” To that conclusion Bible scholar Ajith Fernando adds,
God
is powerfully at work both when the sun shines brightly and when the
dark clouds loom over us.
We must, therefore, develop a theology of the fullness of the
Spirit in the darkness. Such a teaching is not easy to grasp in this
sensual, hedonistic world, which is afraid of suffering and does so
much to avoid it. Yet the Bible tells us to anticipate suffering
rather than avoid it. If we have a theology of the fullness of
the Spirit in the darkness, we will eagerly seek the blessings we
know God will give us through the darkness (Acts: The NIV
Application Commentary, p. 266).
So when bad things happen to
good and godly people even though a cross dangled from their
rear-view mirror in their car it's not a sign that God has somehow
abandoned them. At the very least it means it's par for the course.
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