Lead, Kindly Light

When it’s a sign. Or…at least a symbol of a sign.

Since we got several inches of snow a couple days ago, I thought I should take a walk outside today and capture some photographs before the sooner of two things happens: one, it melts; or two, I leave this town.

I trailed my usual route, though more slowly because I stopped so often to snap pictures. I looped through the neighborhood, then crossed over to the convent so I could get a better glimpse of Lake Michigan. On my way to the Lake, however, I caught sight of this:

Yep, just sitting there, resting and occasionally chirping, was a beautiful red cardinal. I was surprised – because I had only ever seen cardinals around here flitting around wildly from tree to tree. And here was one, just calmly reposing.

I inched closer as quietly as possible, and used my zoom to get as good a photograph as possible. All the while, it just sat there. It was quite a sight to see. Not only was it beautiful, but it reminded me of God’s faithfulness to me through the years. As every rainbow probably provoked Noah’s memory of how God delivered him and his family from the Great Flood, so cardinals always remind me of how God restored my faith many years ago.

Perhaps I should back up a bit.

When I was in high school, I was part of an evangelism program that trained teenagers like myself to go into neighborhoods and share the Gospel of Jesus Christ to kids through weekly clubs. Each summer, all of us teachers went through an intense, week-long training camp up north, and then we returned to our respective homes to run clubs all over our towns during the rest of the summer months.

When I was sixteen, I went to my second training camp. It was a lot of work, but a lot of fun – since I was a veteran, I had friends at camp already, and the whole process was less intimidating and a lot less difficult. Something happened up at camp during that week, though, that rocked my faith to the core.

It had to do with some of the people who lived near the camp. Between alleged threats of violence against us missionaries, the demonic-ish rituals that took place at the neighbors’ place, and the fact that one of our own started acting very strangely and speaking incomprehensibly when we all were praying in our cabin at night, all at once I lost my foothold in the faith. I was scared that evil was penetrating our camp, and I was scared that I was afraid.

I had been taught that because Christians have Jesus living in their hearts, Christians should not be afraid – especially of evil spirits – because Jesus will always win. And I still believe that’s true, as I did then. But what got me then, was the fact that in addition to holding that belief, I was scared. And because I was scared, I suspected that maybe I didn’t have faith. Because if I had faith, I shouldn’t be scared. When I think about it now, it doesn’t quite make sense to me … but that’s how the logic worked for me back then, and it certainly put the fear of God in me – literally.

There are verses in the Bible that support the notion that once a believer has faith in Jesus Christ for salvation, that person cannot lose her faith. I had learned that in church, and believed it to be true… and I thought that I had been a believer, but – suddenly I wasn’t so sure. If I was afraid now, then maybe I didn’t presently have the faith that I thought I had – and maybe I never had the faith to begin with. That was the most frightening thought in the world to me – that perhaps I had all the head knowledge needed for salvation, but it hadn’t trickled down into my heart. And the heart is what really matters in the end. There are plenty of people who have walked this Earth knowing lots of facts about Christianity and the workings of salvation, but in the end, there is a choice to believe or not to believe in Christ for salvation. That summer, at missionary camp, I started fearing that I hadn’t made that choice to believe.

I wanted to believe. Some people have crises of faith where they question the existence of God, or the mechanics of Christianity and the reality of the power of Jesus Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. My crisis of faith was different. It was because I believed (as matters of fact) everything the Bible said about sin, Jesus, and eternal consequences that I was petrified that I would be left behind because I didn’t truly believe in Jesus as my Savior in my heart.

The next morning after all this happened, I woke one of my dearest friends at the camp, explained my desperate plight, and asked her to please PLEASE share the Gospel with me – because I wanted to pray with her and accept Jesus as my Savior. Just in case. And she helped me through that. But the fear was still there – fear of the events that had occurred the previous night, and the bigger fear about the status of my salvation.

Somehow I made it through the rest of the week of training, practicing story-telling about missionaries, memorizing verses that I would later teach to children in my town, and reading the Bible a lot. And praying incessantly. Praying for mercy, praying for grace, praying for real belief. And a feeling that I believed.

I returned home, spiritually broken. I didn’t tell many people about my crisis in the faith because I felt ashamed of it…and I thought it would sound ridiculous to anyone and everyone. I had grown up in church, and become a Christian at a very young age. Now, ten years later – why the crazy doubting?

I confided in the pastor who preached at our missionary camp, and he explained the concept of seasons of faith to me. He told me that Christians have different “seasons” in their walks with Jesus, and there are some that will immediately gratify us, and some that will try us, but all will bless us.

He pointed me to I Peter 1:6-7 – “Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations – these have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed.” And he encouraged me to pray for increased faith during this season, and for hope that God would grant it to me again.

Things took a while, and in the interim, I was a wreck. Every morning for the next ten weeks or so, I knelt on the floor in my bedroom, and prayed that God would not let me die that day, and that He would not return that day, because I wasn’t sure whether I would go to heaven or not if either of those events should happen. Never before in my life had I been as afraid of death as I was during those ten weeks when I wasn’t sure where death might lead. Gone was my childhood faith that because I believed in Jesus, that I would go to heaven. And it wasn’t that I didn’t believe that faith in Christ led to heaven — it’s that I doubted whether or not I held that requisite belief.

During that time, I began asking God for a sign. I arbitrarily picked a cardinal, in part because it would be easy to know if I had seen one, and in part because I had actually never seen a real cardinal before in my life. If God showed me that bird, I wanted it to be a sign of His deliverance; I wanted to know the sign was from Him – so I picked the red bird. And I added that to my daily plea. I begged Him to please show me a cardinal flying through the sky, or sitting in a tree, or something – so that I would be reminded that He still had me in mind and would help me with my faith problem.

The weeks passed. I read and reread all the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John during that time – focusing on all the red words. I knew that whatever my problem was, the answer couldn’t possibly lie in running away from God. So I made a point to keep reading the words of Jesus, hoping that some would sink in and click in my soul somewhere and save me.

I can’t tell you at what point I “regained” my faith. All I can say is that sometime in the fall or winter following, God restored my security in my faith in Him – and my crazy fears about dying and lost faith went away. I never did see a cardinal during that time, but it was enough that He had brought me through. That’s all I really wanted.

But in the years since – I have, on rare occasion, seen cardinals around here. Every time, it reminds me of the summer I begged God to please show me one as a sign that He would bring me back to faith in Him. And it makes me rejoice that He answered my prayers then – as He does now.

Dear Reader, I offer to you these words of truth from Psalm 145 – I read this last night before I went to bed, and it was a great encouragement to me:

¹⁴ The LORD upholds all those who fall
and lifts up all who are bowed down.

¹⁵ The eyes of all look to you,
and you give them their food at the proper time.

¹⁶ You open your hand
and satisfy the desires of every living thing.

¹⁷ The LORD is righteous in all his ways
and loving toward all he has made.

¹⁸ The LORD is near to all who call on him,
to all who call on him in truth.

¹⁹ He fulfills the desires of those who fear him;
he hears their cry and saves them.

Taken on Christmas Eve – wonderful early Christmas present from God, no?

Dear Jesus,

Today we remember the day you came to live among us here on Earth, leaving all the glories and riches of heaven to dwell among Your creation.

It’s because You came that we have a reason to believe, because You died that we have redemption, because You rose that we have freedom, because You will return that we have hope.

Happy birthday, Lord Jesus! And Maranatha–hasten Your return.

Two thousand something years ago, something incredible and amazing happened. Even I have trouble contemplating it sometimes – I can’t think about it long enough, or my mind will start to spin.

Jesus left His throne in heaven, left His position of power and dominion with the Father and Spirit, and was born as a helpless little baby. His arrival wasn’t grand in the manner that people would ordinarily expect would befit a royal son. But I can only imagine that the Earth – the stones, the mountains, the trees, the animals, and all of creation that naturally does what it’s supposed to do – rejoiced at His descension to this place.

It’s because Jesus came to this Earth as a baby, and because He grew up into a boy and then a man, that He truly felt the sorrows and joys of mankind to the fullest. And yet unlike us, the Bible tells us, Jesus went through all his trials and sufferings on Earth without ever sinning – without ever disobeying the will or command of His heavenly Father. It’s because of that, that when He was crucified on the cross, that His perfect blood was sufficient to pay for the sins of everyone in the human race, past, present, and future. And when He rose from the dead on the third day, Jesus conquered death once and for all – so that anyone who believed in Him and His work on the cross from then on could be justified (made right with God) and live eternally.

All that began on a Christmas eve many years ago – the night before Jesus was born was the last day in history of its kind. Because on Christmas day, hope was born for all people who would hear and believe that Jesus is Lord.

Merry Christmas, everyone. Peace on Earth and in our hearts. God bless!

I feel like maybe I should not post deep and brooding thoughts all the time. So – to lighten things up a bit, I offer a series of lawyer jokes. Pardon me if you’ve heard them before; and I hope you get a laugh or two. I can poke fun at my own profession – I don’t mind. 🙂

Q: What’s the difference between a lawyer lying dead on the road and roadkill?

A: There are skid marks in front of the roadkill.

Q: Do you know how to save a drowning lawyer?

A: No? Good!

Q: How many lawyers does it take to change a lightbulb?

A: None. They like to keep their clients in the dark.

Q: Why does California have the most attorneys, and New Jersey have the most toxic waste dumps?

A: New Jersey got first pick.

Q: How many lawyer jokes are there?

A: Three. The rest are true.

In all seriousness, I think that law is a noble profession – at least, in most cases, it is. A few rotten apples are out there, but truth be told – I’ve only met a couple of them, but the rest of the lawyers I know are people of strong work ethic, incredible intelligence, dedication to their profession, and they are men and women of integrity. Really. So – laughs aside, I salute my present and future brothers and sisters of the bar – they may make fun of us, but they need us, and when we do our work well, we can really make a difference.

I just finished watching a 1989 film starring Morgan Freeman, called “Lean on Me.” It’s based on a true story of a high school principal in New Jersey named Joe Clark, who turned around a school that most people had given up on. It was such an inspirational film – it almost made me want to quit law and go into teaching, or school administration, or something that could have a more direct and immediate impact on this society’s children. Of course, I know that I lack the experience that I’d need – and I grossly lack the type of understanding of poor, suffering communities and populations that made Joe Clark great.

It got me thinking, though. I have a whole career in front of me. And I really, really want to make a difference. Preferably in the lives of children and teenagers who are sent through the juvenile justice system… but I’ll take making a difference in the lives of prisoners, or victims oppressed by gang violence and organized crime, or mentoring disadvantaged kids and adults. I just really want to make a mark on this world.

But how?

Here I am, twenty-something years old and about to graduate with a fancy law degree, and headed to a large law firm in Manhattan.  How will I get from the law firm to changing people’s lives? What are all the steps required in-between? And am I on the right track? Or am I just another dreamer who will spend her life admiring people who make the sacrifices and reap real rewards, while remaining on the outside looking in? I hope to heaven that won’t be me…

While out with Peter today, I brought up to him the fact that sometimes I wish I’d never been born. Don’t freak out; I’m not depressed. But what I mean is this – that as someone who believes in eternity, it’s a big responsibility, to be a human being. The moment you’re born, you are born into an eternal scheme–one that doesn’t end at earthly death, but one that continues on into forever. As I told Peter, if I didn’t believe in forever, life would be a lot easier because after sixty, seventy, eighty years–you’re done and that’s that.

But that’s not the life we live. Like a ray, which begins at a point and continues to infinity, our lives as humans transcend our relatively brief time on Earth. Yet there are lasting consequences to the beliefs we hold, the choices we make, the things we do with our lives here. I want my life to have value–but sometimes the weight of that challenge seems too much to contemplate.

Peter’s response was this – that when running a long and hard race, he doesn’t forget about the end – but he does focus on what is right in front of him, focusing on the present moment and the immediate leg of the race. It was, I suppose, his de-spiritualized way of echoing my oft-repeated borrowed wisdom of, “Live God-centered days to live God-centered years.”

It was a good reminder. And in the end, God just calls us to obedience – He may call us to obey Him in things small and great. I need more faith, I need more trust, and I need more obedience. Lord have mercy.

While on break at home, I’ve joined Netflix and my parents and I have started watching movies in the long queue I’ve set up. We started with “The Devil Wears Prada,” which reminded me a lot of “Ugly Betty.” Then we watched “Defending Your Life,” a film about what happens after we die.

Basically, the movie assumes that after we die on Earth, we go to Judgment City. There, celestial lawyers argue before judges who decide whether or not we deserve to move on to the next world. During each person’s “trial,” scenes from their lives that are recorded on Earth, are replayed in Judgment City, then proffered by the lawyers as exhibits of evidence. The judges then base their decision of whether a person should move on or be sent back to Earth to re-live life on the degree to which the person’s life was governed by fear.

Without saying much about the bit about fear, I’ll just focus on the whole concept of each moment of our lives being recorded. Any viewer of this film will become acutely aware of the consequences of such a concept, and it really made me question the way I spend my moments, my days, my months, my years.

Anyone who knows me well knows that I work pretty hard. But even I’ll admit that starting from junior year of college, and slowly through my three years in law school, I’ve grown more and more relaxed. I have taken myself out of certain competitive positions, have (at times) mastered the art of saying “no” – perhaps to a fault – and have altogether become less ambitious. I have mixed feelings about whether this is a good or bad thing.

On one hand, I think that it’s good to have ambition. Especially if you have been given talents, interests, resources, and opportunities–that’s a combination that not everyone has been gifted with…so the person who finds that under the Christmas tree should be a good steward and maximize whatever results that can deliver. On the other hand, I feel like that kind of “good” ambition can often morph into something awful, and corrupt one’s character and morals and displace priorities until right seems wrong and wrong seems right.

As a result of fear of the latter, I have conducted my law school years with something I’d like to call moderation – though now I wonder whether I went too far in that direction and didn’t make the best use of the opportunities I had. I didn’t even try out for the Law Review, reasoning that even if I got in, it wouldn’t really help me get to the U.S. Attorney’s Office anyway – so I might as well not waste my time. I still think I was right about that.

But what of all the other things I did along the way? A ski trip here, a weekend with friends there, movie night here, shopping trip there… I had always reasoned that since I was working hard enough to pull decent grades, that it was more important that I build relationships with the people around me. But where is the balance? Did I spend too much time socializing, and not enough time studying? I wonder whether, in ten/fifteen/twenty years, I will regret some of these decisions and wish that I could redo law school.

I do believe that God can redeem our mistakes. So even if I royally screwed up and closed doors that I should have propped open, I believe that “If God really wants you in Egypt, He will send twelve angry brothers to get you there if He has to” (something my friend Kimberly used to say). Still, we aren’t called to test the Lord God — and we are instead supposed to honor Him with our lives as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to Him (Romans 12:1-2). So… I’ll need to keep thinking about this. I don’t have an immediate answer.

I am just thinking…if my life ended today and I had to defend it, what would I do? How much could I bring to God and say, “Here’s what I did with my life to bring glory to You”?  I know it won’t be nothing, but will it be the product of my very best?