Sacrament of Hope

 “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.  For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.  And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.  For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees?  But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”

Romans 8:18-25, ESV

Early in 2012, one of the first new friends blogging brought me lost her fourth child in miscarriage. It was not unexpected; the doctor had told her it was imminent. That was not a great comfort in the physical and emotional pain.

Ever since reading the bad news of the coming loss, I had been praying for her and for her family. On the day it arrived, I wept for her from far away and prayed again. As I prayed, I felt two ideas with certainty: there would be another child for her, and I needed to act out that hope for her until she was able to hope again. “A sacrament of hope,” I thought. “What a silly idea. Or is it?”

The church of my childhood defined sacrament as “an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible reality.” What outward and visible sign of hope befit this situation? How could I enact hope, as David did when he prepared for the temple he wasn’t permitted to build, as he did when he composed a psalm for the dedication of said temple before ever the foundations were laid (Psalm 30), as Joseph did when he issued instructions for future generations to carry his bones back to Israel when the Lord restored them to the land of promise?

Nothing so grand lay in my purview, but I could make a baby blanket. I chose a pattern, made notes of the yardage and weight of yarn needed, and invested valuable and scarce energy in driving myself to the yarn store. (It wasn’t far, but I was mostly homebound and rarely able to drive then.) The woman who assisted me with yarn selection looked at me like I’d lost my mind in shopping for yarn for a baby not yet conceived. No, I didn’t know the gender. No, I didn’t know the colors chosen for the nursery. This was a blanket of hope for my friend who’d lost her child. Maybe a few shades of green? That’s gender-neutral, right?

That very day, the day I learned of her loss, I started a baby blanket for the child that would come. That child, a son, is 8 years old.

When we started rescuing butterflies-in-training this summer, that same phrase came unbidden to my mind. We have endured so much loss the last two years, from surgeries to bereavement to pandemic isolation to social unrest to violence near and far. None of that can be fixed or undone, but it can and will be redeemed for those who are in Christ. In our own small way, Amore and I are acting out the hope of redemption, resurrection, and restoration by rescuing 17 caterpillars from wasps, protecting and feeding them through the stages of their transformation, and releasing them as gently as we can into this rebellious and broken world. My heart finds this also a sacrament of hope. We are waiting on the last chrysalis, a queen, now, and the embers of my hope in the unseen, long-awaited consummation of history have been stoked into a glowing promise of rekindled flame.

Lord, revive our flagging hope that Your promises are sure. Resurrect dead hopes if they originated in You. Fill is with Your Spirit of hope that we might walk daily in eager expectation of Your good promises becoming reality. Show us what actions best adorn and enact the hope in our hearts. Come soon, Lord Jesus. Amen. 

Operation Winged Victory {Butterfly Photos}

As of September 6, 2021, our caterpillar rescue operation has released an even dozen butterflies into the world. We have watched eight monarchs and four queens transform, and we still have four monarch chrysalides and one queen waiting for their wings. Here's a peek into the process.

Queen Butterflies

Make me Your butterfly, O Lord.

Peel back layers and layers and layers

Of wormy flesh and wriggling self

(Always crawling off the altar).

Transform through myriad tiny deaths—

Surrender and surrender and surrender—

Till final entombment of that old me

And rebirth into winged victory—

Soaring and soaring and soaring

Homeward to You.

Monarch Butterflies

Chrysalis on the left and a caterpillar "J-ed up" and preparing for pupation on the right

The caterpillar "unzips" the skin from head to tail. The pupa which hardens into a chrysalis is inside the caterpillar skin.

Monarch pupa (what's inside the caterpillar)

A pair of monarch chrysalides after the pupae contracted and hardened

As the butterfly prepares to emerge, the green chrysalis fades to grey and then becomes translucent, showing the wings of the butterfly within.

Note how swollen the abdomen is and how limp the wings. She pumps the fluid out of the body into the wings. Then they harden over the course of several hours. Until then she cannot fly.

The habitat we used for those caterpillars seems to be no longer available from Amazon, but there are plenty of options, and a large jar covered securely with cheesecloth also works (affiliate link):

https://amzn.to/3yUKlqo

Here is a helpful guide if you'd like to try raising your own caterpillars:

https://www.joyfulbutterfly.com/caterpillar-home-indoors/#:~:text=Ideas%20for%20an%20enclosed%20caterpillar,containers%20from%20pet%20stores%2C%20etc.

Women’s History Month #FridayFive

In honor of Women's History Month, may I introduce you to five of my heroes? Through their words, these women have mentored me for decades, though they have already preceded me into the presence of the Lord.

📚One of my very first mentors as a young Christian was Elisabeth Elliot. My mom gave me a cassette (Google it, youngsters) of a conference talk she gave which had been broadcast on Christian radio. I wore that thing out and spent much of my babysitting money on her books. She served as a missionary in Ecuador for her early ministry. Her first husband, Jim, was one of 5 men martyred in an attempt to make friendly contact with the Waodani tribe. That bereavement unexpectedly launched Elisabeth's writing career, beginning with the story of the men and their deaths: Through Gates of Splendor. Many of the tribe did eventually come to faith in Christ. It was my privilege and blessing to hear her in person many times and converse with her in a small group setting once. Amore and I heard Mincaye, one of the men who speared the missionaries to death, and Steve Saint, son of one of the martyrs, speak at a Steven Curtis Chapman concert. What glorious gospel fruit grew out of that sacrifice!

My favorite of her books is A Path Through Suffering, which considers the cycle of death, life, and fruitfulness in the life of a Christian as illustrated by the life cycle of plants. Elisabeth's thoughts here were inspired by Lilias Trotter's book Parables of the Cross, which was out of print at the time of this publication but has since become available. Path features some of Trotter's art alongside Elisabeth's words.

The recent biography Becoming Elisabeth Elliot would be another suggestion if you are new to her. Elisabeth herself wrote a biography of my next mentor....

📚Amy Carmichael spent most of her life as a missionary in India. She wrote truthfully of conditions there and what we would today call human trafficking taking place, mostly involving young girls. Much of her work involved rescuing girls from temple prostitution, and she founded a home, Dohnavur Fellowship (still in existence) where they could receive shelter and a Christian upbringing.

An injury which left her permanently disabled and in chronic pain redirected much of her ministry toward writing. Her themes include suffering, communion with Christ, sacrifice, and surrender. Her poems and hymns were collected by Elisabeth Elliot in Mountain Breezes. It would be hard to choose a favorite of her books, but since chronic illness and disability are also part of my story, I'm highlighting Rose from Brier, which she described as a book from the ill to the ill. She offers up the truth that kept her going in her own limitations. If is an even smaller book, beautifully written, on the theme of Calvary love.

Biographies abound on "Amma," as the Dohnavur chidren called her. Elisabeth Elliot's, A Chance to Die, and Iain Murray's Amy Carmichael would be my recommendations.

📚And then there is dear Corrie: Corrie ten Boom, the unlikely Resistance leader. Corrie's middle years working quietly in her father's Haarlem watch shop were disrupted by the German occupation of the Netherlands during World War II. One small "yes" to shelter a Jewish neighbor led to a hiding place and relocation operation for many more. Corrie and most of her family were arrested for that work and interned in German concentration camps. Her father and beloved sister Betsie both died there, and several other family members who were imprisoned, tortured, or executed.

Corrie co-wrote her own story of this experience in The Hiding Place. That is unequivocally the place to start if you don't yet know her. Memorable illustrations and scenes abound, and the love between Corrie and her sister is beautiful to witness. She traveled, spoke, and wrote extensively about God's faithfulness in the war, the camps, and the years since. Although so many aspects of her story were excruciatingly painful, her ministry and writing are marked with joy and gratitude in God's goodness and sovereignty. Her testimony of forgiveness of her captors also stuns with its grace and beauty.

📚Darlene Deibler Rose only wrote one book that I know of: Evidence Not Seen. She also was missionary and another whose memoir focuses on World War II. She was a new bride serving with her husband in the Western Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea. They were taken captive by Japanese troops and, like Corrie ten Boom, interned in concentration camps. Darlene's suffering was more solitary than Corrie's. Her husband and their mentor were sent to different camps and died there. Though their captors and many circumstances were different, her experience of God's faithfulness and care bears some resemblance to Corrie's. Both women also experienced the sustaining power of God's Word. Darlene in particular reaped the benefits of a lifetime of Scripture memory. She had many opportunities for spiritual conversation with the camp's commanding officer through her translation assistance. Her recorded testimony is available on YouTube.

📚Finally, there is Edith Schaeffer. She and her husband Francis relocated their family to Switzerland after World War II to assess and minister to the spiritual wounds of war. In her foundational book L'Abri, she told the story of God's leading them to found a ministry of refuge (the meaning of the name L'Abri) where seekers could find honest answers to honest questions. Francis wrote important works of apologetics such as The God Who Is There and True Spirituality. Edith wrote the story of the ministry, the letters to the family of ministry supporters (collected in Love, Edith), a hard-to-find autobiography of the couple called The Tapestry, and thematic books like Affliction, The Life of Prayer, The Hidden Art of Homemaking, and the one depicted here, Forever Music. Their ministry became a unique convergence of Christian hospitality, prayer, apologetics, community life, and a love for and particularly Christian perspective on the arts. The ministry continues today in multiple branches, including the original location in the Swiss Alps.

📚As a bonus, I'll award an honorable mention to Lilias Trotter. She was trained as an artist and mentored by John Ruskin. She left the prospect of a fine professional career as a painter in order to take the gospel of Christ to Algeria (including an opportunity among the Sufis). Her life in the desert reshaped her art, which continued to overflow from her walk with the Lord. One of her essays inspired the hymn  "Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus."

My firsthand knowledge of her is less than the others, but she is featured in the Elisabeth Elliot book described above and has received increasing interest in recent years, thanks to a biography of her life (A Passion for the Impossible), republication of her books with her original artwork intact, and the biographical documentary Many Beautiful Things and narrated by Michele Dockery (Downton Abbey).

Until the day when I can thank and enjoy fellowship with these women in person, I rejoice at the opportunity for their continued mentorship through their words. If you haven't yet made their acquaintance, may these brief glimpses whet your appetite to know more.

All of them exemplified courage in times of trial. More than that, their testimonies gleam with the goodness and faithfulness of their Lord. His care for them helps me take my own next scared steps with courage in trusting Him.

Friday five, devotionals

If you are looking for a new devotional for 2021 and would like my unsolicited advice😜, here are my 5 favorites, ones I return to often through the years.

📚Morning and Evening, by Charles Spurgeon: This is such a hopeful book. He grounds his words in the promises of God. There are versions with updated language for those who prefer them.

📚My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers: Chambers writes battle-ready words, admonishing and encouraging readers to fight spiritual battles bravely and serve others in the name of the Lord sacrificially.

📚Voices from the Past, Volumes 1 and 2: These excerpts from Puritan writers provide a carefully curated introduction to their themes and style. It helped me discern which ones are the best fit for me to read their full works right now.

📚Streams in the Desert, by Mrs. Charles Cowman: As the title hints, this collection of thoughts by various writers is water to a dry and thirsty soul. This devotional formed my theology of suffering before I knew how much I would need it.

📚New Morning Mercies, by Paul David Tripp: These wise and fortifying essays are like starting the day with 10 minutes of Biblical counseling. So helpful. Each day's entry includes a Bible passage for further study and reflection.

(As a bonus, the first, second, and fourth of these are available free online.)

#FridayFive #devotionals #newyearnewbooks #unsolicitedreadingadvice