Prodigal: He would argue with a fence post, then pull up the post and argue with the hole.
Me: Lord have mercy, let’s pray for him then.
This is from the book No Man is an Island by Thomas Merton
A selfish love seldom respects the rights of the beloved to be an autonomous person. Far from respecting the true being of another and granting his personality room to grow and expand in its own original way, this love seeks to keep him in subjection to ourselves. It insists that he conform himself to us, and it works in every possible way to make him do so. A selfish love withers and dies unless it is sustained by the attention of the beloved. When we love thus, our friends exist only in order that we may love them. In loving them we seek to make pets of them, to keep them tame. Such love fears nothing more than the escape of the beloved. It requires his subjection because that is necessary for the nourishment of our own affections.
Selfish love often appears to be unselfish, because it is willing to make any concession to the beloved in order to keep him prisoner. But it is supreme selfishness to buy what is best in a person, his liberty, his integrity, his own autonomous dignity as a person, at the price of far lesser goods. Such selfishness is all the more abominable when it takes a complacent pleasure in its concessions, deluded that they are all acts of selfless charity.
A love, therefore, that is selfless, that honestly seeks the truth, does not make unlimited concessions to the beloved.
For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath. Matthew 13:12 (KJV)
Me: As we start today, don’t forget. Don’t pray for a light load, pray for a strong back.
Prodigal: Yes, Lord help me!
This is from E.B. Pusey
This, then, is of faith, that everything, the very least, or what seems to us great, every change of the seasons, everything which touches us in mind, body, or estate, whether brought about through this outward senseless nature, or by the will of man, good or bad, is overruled to each of us by the all-holy and all-loving will of God. Whatever befalls us, however it befalls us, we must receive as the will of God. If it befalls us through man’s negligence, or ill-will, or anger, still it is, in every the least circumstance, to us the will of God. For if the least thing could happen to us without God’s permission, it would be something out of God’s control. God’s providence or His love would not be what they are. Almighty God Himself would not be the same God; not the God whom we believe, adore, and love.
Now also when I am old and greyheaded, O God, forsake me not; until I have shewed thy strength unto this generation, and thy power to every one that is to come. Psalm 71:18 (KJV)
On June 21, 2011, a maple tree fell on the van I was driving during a thunderstorm. It landed on the roof directly above my head and then rolled forward to plunge through the windshield, landing on my chest and pinning me in my seat.
In those first moments after the impact, I didn’t know I was hurt. I could hear my twelve-year old son keening in terror in the front seat beside me while my thirteen-year-old daughter shouted our names over and over again from the back seat. There was thunder and lightning and howling winds, and all I could do was pray, “God, please get my kids out of here.”
For some reason, I couldn’t turn my head to look at them, but they didn’t seem to be hurt. I could see my son out of the corner of my eye, wild-eye and pale, and I could hear his sister moving around in the back seat. “Climb out the window,” I told her. “Run to the nearest house and call 911 and then stay here. Stay inside, out of the storm. Do you understand?”
“But I don’t want to leave you guys!”
“We’re not hurt, honey. We’re just stuck.”
“But…you’re all bloody, Mom.”
“God, please help us. Save my kids,” I prayed. We were on a lonely country road with only a few houses, and no one was likely to drive by any time soon. My cell phone was lodged somewhere under the crushed dashboard. We were on our own.
Suddenly, a man spoke up from somewhere off to my left, amid the tree branches and wet leaves. “I’m here to help you, ma’am,” he said.
“Get my kids out. Please.”
He got to the passenger side in seconds and peered through the window at my boy. “I’m going to get your son out of here,” he told me. “I need you to lean his seat back, and then I’ll pull him out the backseat window.”
My daughter told me later that the stranger didn’t seem to notice when she grabbed his shoulder to steady herself as she climbed out the window. While she was doing that, I was struggling to move my hand those few inches to the seat release knob, which was located within reach of the driver in my minivan. I could see my fingers wrap around it, but they didn’t seem to want to obey and turn it.
My son’s hand closed over mine with a gentle squeeze. “I got this, Mommy,” he said, suddenly calm. I watched him go back and slowly disappear, inch by inch, until he was gone.
The stranger came back to my window. “It’s your turn, Ma’am,” he said. “I’m gonna drag you out the same way I got your son out.”
“No,” I said. “Get my kids out of here. Get them out of the storm. Pease.” I knew it was crazy to trust a complete stranger with my children, but there was something about him that just felt safe, even if I couldn’t see his face. “What’s your name?” I asked him.
“Daniel Barnes. I’ll take care of them.”
I was alone then, although it was only a matter of minutes before the fire department showed up. It took nearly forty minutes for them to cut the tree apart and get me out of the vehicle. My neck was broken, along with other injuries that left the emergency room doctor shaking his head in disbelief–especially when he looked my children over and confirmed that they were basically unharmed.
It wasn’t until several days later that I was able to read the accident report and get a phone number for the man listed as the first witness on the scene. His name was David, not Daniel, but assumed I had just heard him wrong that night. I dialed the number with shaking hands and when he answered, I thanked him for pulling my kids out of the wreckage.
“But I didn’t do that,” he told me. “Your kids were already out when I got there.”
“Where was the other guy?”
“There was no other guy.” David explained that he had actually seen the accident take place. He had passed my van going the opposite direction and glanced up in his rearview mirror just in time to see the tree fall. It had taken him a few minutes to go around the curve and find a place to turn around and come back to help us, and my kids were standing on the side of the road with their arms wrapped around each other by the time he arrived.
The fallen tree completely blocked the road. No other cars could have come or gone.
It’s a small town with only a few hundred residents, most of whom are related to each other. Everyone knows everyone else. There are few strangers in that tiny town, and no one there has ever heard of Daniel Barnes.
My son doesn’t remember being lifted out through the back window. My daughter never saw the man’s face. My only impression of him was of wet, dark hair and a narrow face. A calm voice.
People who weren’t there that night tell me that my memory is garbled because of my injuries. They say I’ve confused the names “David” and Daniel.” They can’t explain, however, just exactly who got my kids out of the van that night. No one seems to know who rescued them.
But I know who he was.
He was the answer to my prayer.
Whom, though I were righteous, yet would I not answer, but I would make supplication to my judge. Job 9:15 (KJV)
This is from the book No Man Is an Island by Thomas Merton
We can either love God because we hope for something from Him, or we can hope in Him knowing that He loves us. Sometimes we begin with the first kind of hope and grow into the second. In that case, hope and charity work together as close partners, and both rest in God. Then every act of hope may open the door to contemplation, for such hope is its own fulfillment.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16 (KJV)
This is from Illustrations for Biblical Preaching by Michael Green
Dr. R.A. Torrey, founder of the Bible Institute of Los Angeles, lost his twelve-year-old daughter in an accident. The funeral was on a rainy day. They stood there beside that hole in the ground, surrounded by loved ones. It was dark and dismal. Mrs. Torrey said to her husband, “I’m so glad Elizabeth is not in that box.” Their grief went home with them that night as they tried to sleep.
Dr. Torrey got up in the morning and went for a walk. A wave of grief broke over him anew, the loneliness of her absence, the terrible feeling knowing they would never hear her laughter again, never see her face, never witness her growth. He couldn’t take it. And he leaned against the street light and he looked up and he began to pray. This is what he experienced: “And just then the fountain , the Holy Spirit, whom I had in my heart, broke forth with such power as I think I had never experienced before. And it was the most joyful moment I had ever known in my life! It is unspeakable glorious thing to have within you a fountain ever springing up, springing up, springing up, ever springing up 365 days in every year, springing up under all circumstances.
For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor? Romans 11:34 (KJV)
This is from the book The Discipline of Grace by Jerry Bridges
Because we are focusing on our performance, we forget the meaning of grace: God’s unmerited favor to those who deserve only His wrath. Pharisee-type believers unconsciously think they have earned God’s blessing through their behavior. Guilt-laden believers are quite sure they have forfeited God’s blessing through their lack of discipline or their disobedience. Both have forgotten the meaning of grace because they have moved away from the gospel and have slipped into a performance relationship with God.
You look back and grace has escaped you. The focus is on guilt or your behaviors. The why’s are always looming in your mind. They bombarded you yesterday and you were trying to do your chores. God wants you to remember the gospel. God wants you to know that you have grace. Remember His love and grace today!
Romans 8:6-8
For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
