My dear family and friends,
At the end of this letter, you’ll find the lyrics of John Newton’s hymn “I Asked the Lord.” I include them because their poetry and poignancy beautifully express my heart theme for 2011. As I processed the struggles of the past and the constant bumps of life in general, each day seemed to illuminate a different facet of the last verse: “These inward trials I employ from self and pride to set thee free and break thy schemes of earthly joy, that thou mayest seek thy all in Me.” Little by little, in the persistent, loving lessons of my faithful Father, the Great and Gentle Teacher, I am beginning to see the beauty of suffering –however it may look, whatever the severity may be.
Last year highlighted a deeper understanding of the first half of the stanza: suffering makes me more like Christ, setting me free of my deceptively deep pride and selfishness. Passages like Hebrews 12:3-11 and James 1:2-4 became personal realities. This year, the emphasis was, and continues to be, on the latter half, which can be summed up in one word: expectation.
The Lord knows that as much as I claim Christ as my all, as much as I declare him to be sufficient, I spend far too many of my moments expecting satisfaction from “earthly joys”: comfort, financial stability, vocational success, health, marriage, approval, fulfilled plans. The list goes on. And no item on the list is wrong or sinful in and of itself. Rather, they are all good things. But they are temporal. Vapor. And so, they aren’t the best thing. In the words of C.S. Lewis, I’m “like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because [I] cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. [I am] far too easily pleased.” But that’s just it –nearly all my attempts to make merry with these earth-bound mud pies have ended in disappointment. I have yet to discover any ultimate pleasure in those endeavors. And, again, the problem is not in health or marriage, or any other “earthly joy.” The problem is that such expectations run the great risk of quickly becoming obstructions in my vision of God and his Kingdom. They are constantly in competition for my affections. And when I place my highest affections on an earthly joy, God is no longer the object of my worship. The only One worthy of those affections is replaced by terribly inferior and ineffective substitutes.
While I learned all this years ago, only now have I come to realize that I actually set myself up for suffering when I expect to find satisfaction in someone or something other than God. In his great kindness, my Father must break those false hopes to reset my focus on him, the only unchanging Source of true and lasting joy.
I’m so grateful 2011 brought this deeper understanding of my own frailty. Even so, I know I cannot whip up a remedy to bring immediate and complete change. No, such change will only come by the grace of God as I continue to commit every moment and every day to dependence on the Holy Spirit, fervently asking that Paul’s words to the Corinthians would be proven in me, that I may genuinely say: “On him I have set my hope” (2 Cor 1:10). And I must pray for grace to rest fully on the profound truth of Proverbs 30:5, living in its promises.
As you move toward a new year, I pray you will see Ephesians 1:15-23 reflected by your life in ways far more abundant than anything you could ask or think. And if “the eyes of your heart” are not yet “enlightened”, I pray this will be the year you see Christ in all his beauty and glory and that it will bring you to your knees in genuine repentance and faith.
Joyfully pressing on by grace to hope entirely in him,
Cristi
2011 praises
-a January course in KY with a new favorite prof: Dr. Allison
-a North Carolinian holiday
-aunthood with Jack, Hallee, and Charlie
-a full summer of travels, classes, weddings, and lake trips
-a fruitful women’s spring study
-Antholz girls’ Denver trip to see Broadway’s Lion King
-The Prodigal God by Tim Keller
-music by Gungor
-a refreshing fall semester of teaching
-Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand
-“In Feast or Fallow” by Sandra McCracken
-Molten Chocolate Lava Cakes
-culinary experiments like butternut squash soup & borscht
2012 prayers
-a Thailand trip with my dear friend Leia to visit our dear friend Rachel
-aunthood with Jack, Hallee, Charlie, and Henry
-making blankets with Grandma Jan
-studying The Prodigal God with community ladies
-graduating from SBTS in May
-living out Philippians 1:27 more faithfully
-a new season of teaching, more saturated in the Father’s wisdom and love than ever before
-continued explorations on the piano and in the kitchen
-more game nights with family and friends
-a life marked by steadfast prayer
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