Where do you want to live?

I read a book a few days ago that really spoke to me.  The book is called "A Requiem For Love" by Calvin Miller.  The storyline follows the biblical account of Adam and Eve living in the Garden of Eden, although Dr. Miller changed the names and embellished a lot on what could have happened.  I would recommend this book highly!

The book really got me thinking about my spiritual walk.  As much as I would love to go into detail about how Dr. Miller painted the picture of temptation that broke through Eve's resolve, I refuse to ruin the book for you!  We all know that she did stumble, and that she thought there was good that was going to come to her life if she did.  She wanted to be like God, knowing good and evil.

The book painted a clear contrast between the Garden of Eden and the wilderness outside the Garden.  Eve knew if she sinned she would be banished from the Garden.  She and Adam even stood where they could look out of the Garden and see the wasteland of the wilderness - and she still chose to sin. 

I wonder, what would happen if we honestly considered the consequences when we were tempted, instead of simply taking the easy way of following our selfish desires.  What if we looked at the temptation and considered the full cost of following our human nature versus the benefits of following God's holy nature?  What would life look like?

God's promises throughout the Bible are to bless those who live in the shadow of His love.  Romans 8:28 encourages us with these words, "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose."  Wouldn't it be grand to know that we are living in such a love relationship with God that He is always working things out for our good?  Even when life hits us with its hardest pains (cancer, job loss, death of a loved one, etc.) we can KNOW that it will work out for our good!  Wouldn't you like to live with that confidence?

Let's paint ourselves a mind-picture.  How do you envision the Garden of Eden?  I see lovely green grass, better than the best golf course!  I see gentle flowing streams, full of fish, ducks lazily swimming along, and water as clear as glass.  I see tall trees providing protection from the wind and sun.  I see birds and harmless animals living in perfect harmony with man.  I see God walking hand-in-hand with Adam and Eve, loving them in a way that only He can.  He is taking care of their every need.  His love knows no bounds.

Now, how do you envision the wilderness?  I see a hard land, full of thorns and thistles.  I see wild animals lurking behind trees and boulders, out of sight until I let my guard down, ready to attack.  I see a river that goes from drought to a roaring flood in minutes.  I see storms that appear suddenly with devastating winds and drenching rain.  I see loneliness and sorrow in the wilderness.

Here is the big question.  The temptation is before you.  You can follow God and live in the Garden of Eden, with all your needs being provided by God.  Or you can follow your own desires and live in the dangerous wilderness, fending for your own safety and living by the the sweat of your brow.  Which will you choose?  Every temptation provides that choice.  Live with God, or live apart from Him.  Joshua so clearly stated his choice, and I hope we all will follow his lead and say, "As for me and my family, we will serve the Lord."

A Change In Life Habits

The Mrs. and I are making some lifestyle changes with our eating habits.  Since I started serving as a pastor again, my weight has been steadily climbing - again.   I have always enjoyed eating - a lot!  When I was growing up on the farm, I was as skinny as a rail.  Hard work and the high metabolism of a growing teenage boy prevented any fat from attaching itself to my body.  But as I got older, things began to change.

After marrying the Mrs., my weight slowly began to climb.  Some blessings seems to carry a curse with them.  I married a great cook, but that meant I began eating better and eating more.  The result was a slow, but steady weight gain.  I was able to keep most of the weight off through light exercise, like playing church softball, but still it was creeping up.  When the Mrs. was pregnant with our first son, she craved chocolate malts which caused me to experience significant "sympathy" weight gains.  Still, I was keeping my weight below 190 lbs., so I wasn't overly concerned.

After we moved to Sioux City, I hit the magical age of 30 and found my weight was getting harder to manage.  I added a bicycling commute to work to get the exercise I needed, and was still able to keep my weight down.  But, when I started serving as the church planter for a new church start in Kingsley, my time to exercise slipped away and the pounds starting slipping on.

By the time we moved to Rochester, my weight was officially a problem.  I went on a diet and lost a lot of weight, and started biking again to keep it off.  Even with that, I was gaining some weight back over the winter - a little at a time.  When I started serving as the pastor of Viola Bible Church, the biking slowed significantly and my weight ballooned again.

So, here I am with a problem and, after the Mrs. had a health scare, a new motivation to get the weight off and keep it off.  Her doctor recommended she start following the GI Diet (glycemic index).  So we both adopted that diet as our new eating lifestyle.  The whole idea of the GI Diet is to stabilize the rate that sugar is entering the bloodstream.  Some foods digest quicker than others and cause a spike in your blood sugars shortly after eating.  Those are naughty foods and we were told to avoid them.  Some digest slowly and are slowly releasing sugar into the blood stream.  Those are nice foods and we can have lots of them.

To make a long story short, the diet is working, the pounds are coming off and I am feeling better about where our health is headed.  And I don't feel hungry all the time.  I haven't been eating some of my favorite foods, but I really haven't missed them.  The Mrs. is really a good cook and can make almost anything taste good.  Except broccoli, which is categorized as a noxious weed. 

I needed some discipline in my eating habits, and now I am motivated and have been given the right instructions to do that.  Our souls need discipline too.  We need to meditate on the Bible and pray every day so we can hear God talk to us.  It is for our own good, but it is so easy to grow lax in that discipline and just coast along. 

My memory verse this past week has been Psalm 5:3, "In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation."  As I have worked at memorizing this verse, I have been blessed by it.  First, the psalmist is committing himself to pray every morning to God.  He is showing good discipline!  But then he adds the benefit - he waits in expectation.  He truly expects God to answer his prayers!  Why shouldn't he think that?  Jesus promised in Mark 11:24 that we could ask for anything and know that He will answer our prayer!  That doesn't mean that we will receive anything we ask for; the Bible clearly teaches that unconfessed sin can hinder our prayers.  Barring that, when we are earnestly seeking God's will on an issue, we can "wait in expectation" for an answer. 

Let's not pray and wonder if God will answer it.  Let's pray and ask God to reveal His perfect plan for us and "wait in expectation" for the answer!

Power of Prayer

January 5, 2010 is a day I will never forget.  It started like every other day, but it shook my world.  When I came home from work, we were planning on having our weekly "family night."  This is a tradition we started when the boys were pretty young.  One person in the family gets to pick where we eat dinner and pick a fun activity for the family to enjoy.  While we were out, the Mrs. asked me to stop at Walmart and pick up some aspirin. 

We came home and played a new game that the Mrs. had received for Christmas - Bananagrams.  After the game, the Mrs. told me she was feeling "pressure" in her chest.  I knew that was a symptom of a heart attack, but I went to the computer and checked it on MayoClinic.com.  It recommended going to the Emergency Room.  I came back upstairs and the Mrs. was getting dressed to go out.  She had come to the same conclusion and off we went. 

When she explained her symptoms to the desk clerk, they immediately took her to the critical care area and began running tests.  Shortly they mentioned the two words that we didn't want to hear, nor really expected to hear - "heart attack."  She really wasn't even in pain - just this pressure in her chest.  For the next 4 hours, the doctors worked on her.  She received nitroglycerin to open her blood vessels, they gave her other medications to lower her blood pressure and reduce her heart rate.  Finally she was resting in a hospital bed; it was late, so I headed home.  Sleep came, but it was far from restful.

I had to get up early the next morning to get Mr. Youngster off to school.  I told him what was happening and told him I would keep him notified of any news.  He left for school and I picked up the phone to call two of my closest prayer partners.  They were both out of town and in a meeting - the same meeting.  They prayed with me and I headed back to the hospital.  January 6th was a day of tests as they worked to figure out why the Mrs. had a heart attack - an EKG and an angiogram were the tests de jour.  I continually texted my prayer partners as we learned each new piece of info.  The EKG showed where the damage was, but the angiogram showed absolutely no problems.  According to the doctor, her arteries were "beautifully wide and clear."  They had fully expected to find blockage in the artery where the EKG had shown the damage, but there was nothing.

More text messages went out, phone calls were made to family, and we were starting to breathe a little easier.  Our prayer request went out to more people - pastors, church members, and fellow Baptists across Minnesota and Wisconsin.  The Mrs. finally was allowed to eat supper and she was starting to get some real rest. 

The next day brought an MRI on her heart.  We were assured that the MRI would tell us why she had the heart attack.  The doctor explained that blocked arteries are not the only cause of a heart attack, the attack could be brought on by a blood clot or a constricted artery.  The MRI would show where that had happened.  The MRI results came back with a better picture of the damage, but nothing to indicate why it happened.  I texted the good news back to my prayer partners.

Now the Mrs. and I are making major lifestyle changes.  Our primary care physician has placed us on a diet that is to be a permanent change of eating habits.  The Mrs. is now exercising and my bike is begging me to start riding when the weather warms up.

I have never experienced anything as scary as what I experienced on Jan. 5.  To look down at my beloved Mrs. and know there is nothing I can do for her but hold her hand and pray is a scary feeling.  I can't begin to explain the emotions I felt.  I went from great fear one minute to great joy when we received the good news from the angiogram.  I will never take the Mrs. for granted again.  She is the greatest gift that God has ever given me.

James 5:16 tells us "The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective."  We still don't know what caused the heart attack.  I know that I had two righteous men praying for the Mrs.  Maybe God heard their prayers and healed her before the doctors found the problem.  Maybe the doctors just never found the problem.  Either way, I know the prayers of those two men helped me and the Mrs. tremendously through the whole ordeal.  I know prayer works and I know I need to spend more time with the One who showers blessings down on me and the Mrs.  I don't plan to take God for granted anymore either.  God is good - all the time.