Dreading the Judges

I'm reading Judges right now in the Bible, and I'm basically learning everything I shouldn't do in life.  I honestly don't remember if I've made it through Judges before, so I'm reading some of these passages for the first time in my memory.  On Saturday, I read Judges 11 and learned about Jephthah's "tragic vow."  If you don't know this passage, I would recommend reading it, although it confuses the heck out of me.  I wonder what Jephthah was thinking, what God was feeling, if the daughter was terrified...

Here's a brief run down...

• The Ammonites were at war with Israel.
• Jephthah was born of Gilead and a son of a prostitute.
• The elders asked Jephthah to fight against the Ammonites.
• Jephthah agrees although he realizes this is a difficult role to say the least.
• He makes a vow to God that if God gives him victory over the Ammonites, then whatever comes out from the doors of his house to meet him when he returns, he will offer it up for a burnt offering.
• Jephthah has victory over the Ammonites.
• He comes home to celebrate, and sees his daughter first come out of his home to greet him.
• Remembering his vow to God, Jephthah mourns and weeps for his daughter.
• He explains what he has done to his daughter, and his daughter requests to mourn for "her virginity" with her friends for two months in the mountains.
• She returns after two months, and her father "did with her according to his vow."
• It became a custom in Israel each year to mourn the loss of this girl, due to her father's foolish vow.

Whew...   What to do with that!!!   What was Jephthah thinking?   Did God want him to fulfill such a vile and foolish vow?  I have no answers.... just questions.   I'm in the process of looking up some commentary on this subject.  If anyone has any great resources, please share. :)

Some days, I have to take a break from Judges, and read Psalms or Thessalonians.   It was such a dark time in history, but I'm so glad we have a faithful God! 

 

Research

Currently, I am researching these topics for work, some of them will eventually be presented to the administration of our school:

• What is the proper protocol for the death/suicide of a student or staff member
• To what extent does memorializing a death in school lead to suicidal ideation in teenagers
• What are the best ways to handle school-wide grief in a multi-cultural setting
• How to reach sexual active teens and teens who have been a victim of sexual abuse.

Please pray for me as I research and work through these heavy topics over the course of the semester.

A Delicate Dance

My life is a delicate dance on a thin balancing beam.  One foot follows the other as they lead me onto the floor.  The music plays, and the crowd’s cheers fade into the distance.  My breath and my heartbeat count the steps I take, with such beauty and grace, fluidity and perfect balance.  The song rises to a climax; all eyes are waiting for the perfect flip, complete with the flawless landing.  My mind is two steps ahead of my feet, and I know the moment has arrived.  My body and the beam have acted as one, but now as my feet have left it, the beam has become the enemy and the goal—the fear and the trust.  My body moves in the air as it would in water, as if I control time and space.  Gravity takes its toll, and the beam and I are reunited, although we are not as one. I did not trust it, as I should.  The goal has been missed, the fear has been received.   I pick up my broken body, my humbled spirit, and the crowd comes into focus.  The music fades as one foot follows the other and leads me off the floor.  My dance has not been perfect, my balance not quite complete.  However, I will rise again, with such beauty and grace. And my life will continue to be a delicate dance on a thin balancing beam.

* Interpretation to come!

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** My metaphor comes from a secret love for gymnastics, ever since the Olympics with Dominique Dawes, Dominique Moceanu, and Kerri Strug.  Don't judge me. :)  

What Gives Life?

On Fridays, we have high school assembly.  This is a time for announcements, important information, and some type of quick activity or lesson.  This past Friday, we discussed this quote:

Cease from what is necessary; embrace that which gives life.
Mark Buchanan

Earlier this week, Damian (my boss, who was leading this assembly), asked a co-worker about this quote.  Mike Pollock works in Tianjin, China and is a great guy who is adding to the kingdom like crazy.  I’ve worked with him on several events, and his father wrote the most used book about the “third culture” experience for children.  Mike said the following in regards to the above quote:

Maybe our problem is in the identification of what is necessary.  This is because others often tell us what is necessary in ways that are not life-giving.  So the quest is to find others that agree on the life-giving as the necessary.  It seems to me that if the priority is set right, the tiring and the difficult things can be endured because they are not central but peripheral.  
Michael Pollock

I’m not quite sure if the students grasped the concepts here, but it has stuck with me for several days now.  I have found this to be extremely true for me in the last week.  If I know what is ultimately life giving (God), and I make Him the only necessary thing, then everything else becomes “peripheral,” not central.

In the assembly, we discussed what gives life.  There were options such as, good friends, food, sports, great weather, romance, family: all good things that at any moment can be life giving.  But, as Damian suggested, those good things are not always going to be there. What happens when summer turns to winter, we move schools and our friends are no longer with us, our hobbies no longer satisfy.  What gives life then? 

So, if the life-giving God is the only thing that is necessary, we will always be satisfied in Him.  That’s what I want.

“God is most glorified in you when you are most satisfied in Him.”
-John Piper

“I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of sharing in His sufferings…”  Philippians 3:10

Transition is a Twilight Zone

Transition is a Twilight Zone.

Grey.  Unclear.

A.w.k.w.a.r.d.

Something is amiss and

Altogether strange.

What you once knew is no longer true.

What you expected to be simple,

Turns out to be mysteriously difficult.

Important things suddenly become less important.

Plans melt like wax, and

Flexibility and Intuition become your closest friend.

What you thought has no meaning,

Turns out to be the greatest lesson learned.

Transition makes you feel incompetent. 

Turning on the air conditioner or making spaghetti

both become arduous tasks that inevitably end in tears.

Transition disrupts relationships. 

The very concept of friendship is challenged,

and immediately divided into two categories—old and new.

Transition dares to defy comfort levels and creates new spaces for growth.

Yet, it is the desire to cling to anything that makes sense.

It’s the overwhelming feeling of coming home, and not feeling home.

Transition is a twilight zone;

That space in between space,

Moving in a land of both shadow and substance,

of things and ideas.

But  s l o w l y ,

ever so slowly

The shadows will fade into the substance.

The strange will become familiar.

And the grey gradually transforms into color.

Although the picture is never fully clear,

Transition allows

For Fluidity, for Flexibility. 

For Stamina and Strength.

To Learn. To Grow.

To enjoy the new life you love

That you once thought so strange.

I decided today that I should sit down and actually think through how transition has made me feel and how it has affected my life.  We have 6 new students in the high school this semester. If I can grasp even a bit of what they feel, it allows me to connect that much more. 

I feel that these last 6 months have been more difficult than I could have imagined, thanks to my friend Transition. However, I can say that I'm finally coming out of the rough parts.  There will always be remnants of Transition's confusion, but like I say in the poem, "the grey gradually transforms into color."  I can say that I am finally high-functioning, well adjusted, loving life... and (by the way) can turn on the A.C. without crying and make spaghetti without blowing up my kitchen.  

I can say with all excitement and certainty, that I am glad to be out of Transition!