The gentle tone of this week's postings has lightened my load for certain. Joseph Bentz's ceramic chicken story will be in my thoughts for a long time as I continue to learn the practice of waiting on God. Marlo Schalesky's tradition that she practices with her kids reminds us that the journey to the cross was a sacrifice for Christ but a process for us. Gail Martin reminds us of the joy of sharing our faith practices and the lessons we learn in corporate worship. And then we revisited my years as I shared my story as a recovering cantata addict. While there is no condemnation in the lessons we learn, there is joy and freedom as we reap the benefits of a life lived in surrender.
Here are the names pulled from this week's blog feedback:
When God Takes Too Long by Joseph Bentz--winner is Karen Harrington
A Son Comes Home by Joseph Bentz-- winner is Jennifer Eckert
Any Patricia Hickman novel in stock--winner is Connie Sue Larson
Thank you so much, my friends for visiting Words to Go. Next week is a week that Christ-followers set aside to commemorate one perfect life and our gratitude for His sacrifice. Join us next week for the Crosswalk--In the Shadow of Redemption.
The days leading up to Christ's laying down his body on a splintery cross was full of foreshadowing. He is saying a lot and his words are very telling, but no one is listening.
Have you ever had a check inside you, like a warning? But you discounted it because you did not want to believe it, or else thought your mind was misfiring?
I'm sure that is how the disciples felt when they saw their leader strung up like a sacrificial lamb and their group scattered into hiding. Suddenly the last words that were said from their Lord must have gone off like a giant church bell in their souls.
In the coming days, Words to Go will open up Christ's final days and hours for discussion. While Joseph Bentz's books and a book of the reader's choice will be given away for Saturday's give, next week will will be very spare, a week set aside for the practice of introspection and meditation, things that lead to a renewed heart that is full of gratitude.
If you have a favorite "last hour" story, please put it up as I'm making a list and don't want to leave out something.
"He said to them, 'My cup you shall drink; but to sit on My right and on My left, this is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by My Father.'" Matt. 20:23
Coming after Easter Week, "The Simple Life" with some of today's best selling authors.
My journey of faith includes some memorable and then forgettable experiences regarding Easter or the holy season as I now like to refer to this commemorative season for believers. I’d like to forget that I participated in them; but that’s not to disparage their importance to some, only that having seen certain practices from the tender under belly of life as a pastor’s wife, I’d like to confess that for many years the Easter season was a drudgery.
I’ve led holiday events, for lack of a better word; I was in charge of pageants and oversaw the productions, especially for children. And I’ve got a bit of acting talent, so as soon as I had finished the Christmas production season, I was being roped into the perennial Easter cantata.
The rehearsals for a big church production began six months prior to the event. I’m not talking about those sweet little plays we put our children into with dishrags for a costume. I’ve directed musical productions with some high price tags including special effects that rivaled some of the community theaters going on at the same time. But there is a tension and pressure within the core of that type of event that began to dissatisfy me.
Personally, I was full of pride and arrogance over what we had done and then, worse, was left with all energy expended, useless to God and the work to which I was truly called. So Easter would pass and it would have been nothing for me but an exhaustive production that brought no fruit to the kingdom. I remember the tension of the altar call. The pastor would come forward and invite guests who had otherwise not shadowed the church doors all year long to come forward and accept Christ. We all sat in breathless expectation. Then Joe the Church Character would get up and break the spell and come and accept Christ—again.
But then we would quickly put aside the fact that our four and five months of work and financial output had not brought exactly what we had hoped it might. We would go down to the fellowship hall for the cast party where we swapped kudos and hugs. There is a certain amount of self worth that can be gained for a laity that is made star for a day. And we did bond and I loved that part of the experience. Unfortunately the stage, for some, is a heady experience. It’s like writers who get good reviews and then begin to believe our own fictions.
When Jessica died, I was emptied of baggage because I just couldn’t carry it all any more. I had to choose carefully what I carried. And I needed the power of resurrection in my hollowed out shell. I retreated and sought answers in solitude. There was not any person who claimed to have “power” who could lay hands on me and fix my paralysis. Only Christ has the power to heal and bring a soul back from the brink. In all of the histrionics that we had made of Easter, our dramas about miracles and children being raised from the dead, I will confess, that while some of what we did elevated interest in the Easter story, our high priced pageants still could not match the power that Resurrection Sunday represents.
So I now seek resurrection power at the power source found only in the person of Christ. I will admit that he is still a great mystery. But that is why I have his Word to shine light on my dark soul and illuminate the story that makes every day Easter in my heart.
I thank you for allowing me this moment of musing. Bloggers leaving feedback each day will have your name entered in The Big Straw Hat for book gives this Saturday. For today's blog post, I will give away a book too, this week, a reader’s pick from whatever I have in my stock. Thanks for stopping by Words to Go.
I was a bus ministry kid. My mother took my sister and me to many churches for Easter so I became a connoisseur of Easter services. The plays were regionalized by southern accents and old guys in horn-rimmed glasses quoting disciples and ranting in fits when Jesus came down the church aisle riding the pastor's cousins' pinto pony. But, nonetheless, it was an interpretation that was expressed through the resources available.
As an adult, I have more than a curiosity about how others practice their faith. I learn from others how they express faith and that there are as many ways to express gratitude for what Christ has done as there are believers. Today, my friend, novelist Gail Martin is sharing with us about how her family approaches the holy season. This is her second visit, so you may read her other chat with me by visiting the WtG archives. Welcome, Gail, to Words to Go.
GAIL: Thanks, Patty. Happy Easter!
PATTY: And to you, Gail! The one practice that somehow eluded my childhood was the practice of Lent. But this is something near and dear to your heart, isn't it?
GAIL: Easter begins with Lent, forty days of repentance and contemplation on the greatest gift given to man. Sunday's are always "little Easters" but during the week, the focus is upon what the Lord has done for us. We worship each Wednesday with a theme that reminds us of Jesus suffering and death.
PATTY: Could you explain the themes?
GAIL:Palm Sunday, our worship begins with a palm procession as each person carries a palm branch --sometimes outside or inside the building. We sing hymns and the focus is on Jesus' kingship, with his royal entry into Jerusalem to celebrate the passover and later in the week face whips and scorns.
PATTY: My husband did introduce this practice and we use children from the children's church. It's so much fun and the kids look forward to it every year.
GAIL: Maundy Thursday, we contemplate the day the Lord instituted the blessing of the Eucharist, the betrayal by Judas, His own disciple, Jesus anguish in the Garden of Gethsemane, and the whips and thorns of his trial. In worship, we experience foot-washing and the stripping away paraments. The service ends in silence.
PATTY: That is amazing. And really so fitting considering what was probably going on in heaven--I can imagine the hush as the angels watch pensively, swords ready in case God changes his mind. But he didn't.
GAIL: Good Friday is our tenebrae service as we meditate on God's sacrifice by giving His Son to die for our sins. We remember the Lord's willingness to give His life and our service lowers to darkness with a loud slam, reminding us of the Lord's death.
PATTY: What I like about this is the simplicity and power of nothing but the use of the slamming noise and the darkened sanctuary. Much of the quiet power of Christ simply laying down his life is more about the inner battle; that can be lost in pageantry. The way you describe it allows everyone to participate.
GAIL:Easter is jubilant with joyful music, handbells, uplifting songs, and a message of triumph and beauty. The Easter story is never old. We are reminded of the sacrifice made for our eternal life in heaven.
PATTY: Gail, you are a Lutheran.
GAIL: Yes.
PATTY: Thank you so much for sharing your passion for God's passion for us. Gail has written over 40 books and has over a million books in print.
We have an interesting line up this week of authors sharing how they and their families commemorate the days leading up to Resurrection Sunday. Today Marlo Schalesky, a novelist and mom, shares with us a way to show our kids the meaning of the season. Welcome, Marlo, to Words to Go!
MARLO: Thanks, Patty. I love this time of year.
PATTY: So do I. Daffodils are springing up. I'll can green beans and salsa in the coming weeks and prepare my gardens for summer. But best of all, my lilies are starting to raise up from the soil. There are so many metaphors for spring during lily season--what was once dead is coming back to life and flowering. But you and I were recently discussing what you and your kids do this time of year. Would you mind sharing with everyone?
MARLO: I'd be glad to, Patty. We have a little craft with the kids for each day of the week. On the first day, we make little paper Jesus dolls, then we may make a little garden in a Tupperware container and put our Jesus dolls in there for the Garden of Gethsemane.
PATTY: So each child makes a paper doll of Christ?
MARLO: Yes. Then we place Jesus at the table for communion--the Last Supper.
PATTY: So you mean that you make a communion table out of paper too?
MARLO: Yes, we draw them and cut them out.
PATTY: My kids are grown but were arty too. But as a former children's pastor, let me add that there are patterns galore like this on the Internet--so don't think you have to be a Rembrandt to lead your kids in a paper craft. Now this sounds like a progressive craft, something that is done leading up to Resurrection Sunday.
MARLO: It is. Come Friday we make crosses out of popsicle sticks and put Jesus on them. Then we use little boxes and take Jesus down from the cross and put him in the box tomb. Then, on Sunday morning, the kids check the boxes/tombs and surprise! Jesus isn’t there. He is risen! Yay!
PATTY: You are a fun mom, Marlo! Makes me miss our days with our little ones. Bloggers, please feel free to post your feedback. As you can see, I'm doing this a week early, so everyone care share ideas and have time to prepare for coming holy season. See you tomorrow for more fun author chats on the eve of the holiest season of the year.
Fun Fact: Before becoming a novelist Patty worked alongside her hubby in children's ministry. She was Pitter Pat the clown and her troupe was the subject of a mini-documentary for the Children's Miracle Network.
Although author Joseph Bentz's first four books were novels, one non-fiction idea kept pursuing him so intently that he finally gave in and wrote When God Takes Too Long: Learning to Thrive During Life's Delays. The book sprang from his own bewilderment at God's often unusual timing. "One of my greatest frustrations as a Christian is that I am always waiting on God to act. I wrote this book to better understand how God uses "waiting" in our lives."
How well Joseph understands the trials of waiting: his first novel took ten years to write.Joseph has a fresh and unique perspective on his stories and I’ve already picked out one that I’m going to read. Joseph, we’re so glad you could drop by Words to Go today. Our readers visiting here are always on the prowl for a new and fresh read. I’m so glad to introduce them to you.
JOSEPH: Thank you, Patty.
PATTY: Waiting on God has been a recent theme of several of our authors. Why do you think this subject is one we all visit so regularly?
JOSEPH: I read the entire Bible with this issue in mind, and I was amazed at how crucial waiting was in the lives of such biblical figures as Moses, Joseph, Abraham, David, Jeremiah, Paul and others. From their stories, key principles emerge about how God's timing and methods differ from our own. For instance I wrote When God Takes Too Long to examine those principles and to help readers transform this frustration into a positive force in their lives."
PATTY: Is there a particular lesson you’ve learned you would share?
JOSEPH: I never thought a ceramic chicken could teach me anything, but recently I learned something about waiting on God from one. I’ve always been impatient for God to act in my life, which I guess is why I keep writing so much about Waiting, both in my fiction and non-fiction.
PATTY: A ceramic chicken?
JOSEPH: I’ll explain. I’m usually trying to hurry God along, but one thing I’m figuring out is that God’s answer is sometimes “Not now,” which doesn’t necessarily mean “Never.” I have a friend named Diana Glyer who is a writer and a Christian and is very attuned to God’s call in her life. She keeps a ceramic chicken in her office to help her deal with the times when God’s answer seems to be “Not yet.”
PATTY: I’ve been getting a lot of those lately.
JOSEPH: Sometimes the writing projects she is most passionate about get sidetracked or don't find a publisher, while other projects prosper. When this happens, she has learned to put the languishing project underneath the ceramic chicken. She continues to pray about that project, but she lets it sit there for as long as it needs to, maybe a month, maybe a year. Like an egg waiting to hatch, the project waits under the chicken until its proper time.
PATTY: I get it. That is really funny, though.
JOSEPH: I liked her idea so much that I went out and bought my own ceramic chicken, and it makes an appearance in the DVD for When God Takes Too Long.
PATTY: It obviously inspired you.
JOSEPH: As a writer I’m always getting ideas whose time has not yet come, but people outside of the writing world deal with this too. They get a glimmer of a dream or a call that they really believe is from God long before it’s possible to fulfill it. The calling might be real, but the timing might be wrong. Maybe that idea needs to go under the chicken, and with prayer and time and God's leading, it will hatch when the time is right.
PATTY: I do see this situation often at writer’s workshops. I’ll read a manuscript that I can sense seems like “the one” to the writer. But it’s underdeveloped or, because of the writer’s lack of training, doesn’t work. It’s agony to have to tell them their manuscript is not yet ready for human consumption.
JOSEPH: I teach literature at AzusaPacificUniversity, and right now we’re in the toughest time of the semester. Spring break is still a couple weeks away, people feel bogged down with work, and all of us are in a “get-through-it” mode. Seniors especially just want to “get the semester over with” so they can graduate. I know how they feel, but it also makes me regret how much time they—and I—spend wishing and waiting our lives away.
PATTY: I’m so glad you said that because the journey is something that life, God, or just the human condition is not going to evaporate just because we will it. We are going to embark on the journey when we set out on new terrain.
JOSEPH: When I look at my college students, I think, if I were in their shoes, I would enjoy every minute of the young, energetic lives they’ve been given.
PATTY: It’s hard for me to pick a favorite age to teach, but college kids are my favorite but also a challenge because they’re “raring at the bit” to get on with life. They seem to “do” more than “see” what is in front of them. As educators we have to help them slow down long enough to “see.”
JOSEPH: But most of them are focused on the future much of the time. They can't wait to get class over with so that they can get to their next class. Then they want that one to end as soon as possible so that they can get to their part-time jobs, and then they can't wait for those slow hours to pass so they can get back to campus to get their papers written so that they can get this semester over with so that they can move to the next semester so that they can get college over with so that they can graduate and get a job so that they can endure that long enough to get a better job.
PATTY: Sounds very familiar. I believe they learn this practice from dear old dad and mom.
JOSEPH: On and on this goes, but I have to admit I’m not much different, as if life is really about seeing how many items I can check off the to-do list. I find myself in “get through it” mode even with things I enjoy sometimes!
PATTY: In a couple of weeks, I’m asking some authors to talk about simplicity and slowing down to enjoy the process. It’s because it’s been a hard lesson I’ve had to learn.
JOSEPH: Lately I’ve made a deliberate effort to do what I can to slow down and enjoy the moment. I have made lists of those small pleasures in life that help get me through the day, like taking my morning run, losing myself in a good book, playing kickball with my kids in the backyard, relaxing for a few minutes on the porch after a long day, watching a movie in the quiet of the night with my wife after the kids have gone to bed.
PATTY: We have to remember that the life we’re striving for is paying for these stolen moments—so why not redeem them?
JOSEPH: I’ve sat in my office on some of the worst days and thought, I am overwhelmed by the decisions I have to make and the tasks I have to carry out. Nothing is going the way I want. I'm exhausted. I'm under siege….ButThen I'll step back into the arena and do battle. this cup of coffee tastes really good, and I am going to enjoy these few moments of respite and relish every sip, and I am going to look out at the sunshine and be grateful that I am alive.
PATTY: I think we writers have to practice these moments of respite or we’d never get a word down.
JOSEPH: I don’t want to “wait” my life away, thinking only about the future. I realize how sad it would be to get to the end of my life and think, I never really lived my life because I was always waiting for it to happen.
PATTY: “Life’s what happens when we’re busy doing other things.” John Lennon.
JOSEPH: I don’t want to sleepwalk through my life. As Ecclesiastes 11:8 puts it, "Even if you live a long time, don't take a single day for granted. Take delight in each light-filled hour."
PATTY: Joseph, we have certainly delighted in our talk with you. We’re so glad you jogged by and stopped by our front porch at Words to Go.
JOSEPH: I’m glad I did too, Patty.
PATTY: Joseph is giving away When God Takes Too Long and his novel A Son Comes Home, both excellent books that some lucky readers will soon add to their bookshelves in Saturday’s book give.
Tomorrow, novelist Marlo Schalesky is back and she’s going to share with moms her ideas for getting kids into the spirit of Easter. See you all tomorrow here at Words to Go.
If the weather has you holed up in your hacienda, today is a good day to invite a new author into your life. And we're getting ready to do just that for some happy winners. Here are the names drawn this morning from the Big Straw Hat from this week's author chats:
Carly Kendall has won Homestead by Jane Kirkpatrick
Ruth Dell has won A Flickering Light by Jane Kirkpatrick (release date in April)
Wanda Chamberlain has won Fatal Deduction by Gayle Roper
Alice Trego has won She's in a Better Place by Angela Elwell Hunt
I hope your weekend is full of reading and family time--or both. Don't discount the power of read-alouds. Our sons still talk the most about being read to all the way into their teen years. It's a great way to get kids to open up and talk about things they may not share otherwise.
"Our grandmothers, and even--with some scrambling--our mothers, lived in a circle small enough to let them implement in action most of the impulses of their hearts and minds." --Anne Morrow Lindbergh; Gifts From the Sea
Whether your road takes you on literal journeys or inward soul treks, you are welcome to stop by and leave a word to go for others who may pass by this word hub on the side of the road. There are places that you've seen that others might enjoy knowing about. Maybe you've gained some wisdom from your treks. Share and partake equitably. Journey with a benevolent eye. But do stop and muse. That is when the road has time to settle into memory and teach us the things we can't learn when we rush past overlooked places.
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