To be or not to be

What is one of your most important desires that if not met leaves you feeling empty, without direction, without purpose, and alone even if you are surrounded by people?  What are three words that if you heard them spoken sincerely to you spark a relationship that goes deeper than the surfing with which most people are content? What connects you to someone that can withstand the waves of life that beat against your heart?

I suspect that many of you may be answering these questions in this fashion: To be loved, “I love you,” and love.

Love, love, love. All you need is love. Love is all you need. This Beatles hit song can spin the hearts of a man and a woman into a whirlwind of emotion. Yet, much too often we find that this love that catches our heart like Cupid’s arrow actually pierces to the depth of our soul and finds a truer unmet need that if not satisfied will wash away superficial love like a sand castle on the beach.

What am I talking about that would, if you stripped away the “love” in a relationship or the “love” that we are supposed to show others, still leave you empty, without direction or purpose, and alone?

Yes, some of you are already grasping the upper story line, that all we need is God’s love, but that standing alone is not what God wants. If that were true, when God made the first man, Adam, He would have stopped there and said, “I am finished, I have made man, and his only purpose is to love me.”  We should know that is not true. God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”¹ God made woman from man and blessed them saying, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth…”²

Now, before there is any misunderstanding of how I am weaving this thread into its intended message, this is not about marriage, sex, or making babies.

During Jesus’ last supper with His disciples he told them, “My children, I will be with you only a little longer…A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”³

Jesus tells them three times to “love one another”…as I have loved you.

Therein is the message Jesus wants you to receive: “Love as I love.”

Knowing then that I am not talking about the Beatles love song, “All you need is love,” what is your deeper desire that needs fulfilled that Jesus can fulfill in you and wants you to fulfill with others?

To be understood.

How do you feel, sense, or discern God’s love for you? Does He hug you, wipe away your tears, or hold your hand? Not in the flesh, yet in your spirit you can feel the Spirit of God comfort you, lift you out of your grief, and give you security…because Jesus understands you, your situation, and the future that He destines for you. That is how Jesus loved…with understanding.

And this is how Jesus lived out his love for all of us:

My servant grew up in the Lord’s presence like a tender green shoot,

    like a root in dry ground.

There was nothing beautiful or majestic about his appearance,

    nothing to attract us to him.

He was despised and rejected—

    a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief.

We turned our backs on him and looked the other way.

    He was despised, and we did not care.

Yet it was our weaknesses he carried;

    it was our sorrows that weighed him down.

And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God,

    a punishment for his own sins!

But he was pierced for our rebellion,

    crushed for our sins.

He was beaten so we could be whole.

    He was whipped so we could be healed.

All of us, like sheep, have strayed away.

    We have left God’s paths to follow our own.

Yet the Lord laid on him

    the sins of us all.⁴

Jesus understands us all. He takes us as we truly are, without our pretenses, our façade, or the face we put on for others to like us. Jesus takes us as the vessels we are, broken and unable to hold water on our own. He understands you and shows His love for you despite your brokenness.

I was inspired to write this meditation after hearing this story about puppies for sale written by Dan Clark:⁵

A store owner was tacking a sign above his door that read “Puppies For Sale." Signs like that have a way of attracting small children, and sure enough, a little boy appeared under the store owner's sign. "How much are you going to sell the puppies for?" he asked. The store owner replied, "Anywhere from $30 to $50." The little boy reached in his pocket and pulled out some change. "I have $2.37," he said. "Can I please look at them?" The store owner smiled and whistled and out of the kennel came Lady, who ran down the aisle of his store followed by five teeny, tiny balls of fur. One puppy was lagging considerably behind. Immediately the little boy singled out the lagging, limping puppy and said, "What's wrong with that little dog?" The store owner explained that the veterinarian had examined the little puppy and had discovered it didn't have a hip socket. It would always limp. It would always be lame. The little boy became excited. "That is the little puppy that I want to buy." The store owner said, "No, you don't want to buy that little dog. If you really want him, I'll just give him to you." The little boy got quite upset. He looked straight into the store owner's eyes, pointing his finger, and said, "I don't want you to give him to me. That little dog is worth every bit as much as all the other dogs and I'll pay full price. In fact, I'll give you $2.37 now, and 50 cents a month until I have him paid for." The store owner countered, "You really don't want to buy this little dog. He is never going to be able to run and jump and play with you like the other puppies." To this, the little boy reached down and rolled up his pant leg to reveal a badly twisted, crippled left leg supported by a big metal brace. He looked up at the store owner and softly replied, "Well, I don't run so well myself, and the little puppy will need someone who understands!"

 

The little boy understood the puppy with the limp. The next time you think that all you need is love, consider that your need to be understood is what God’s love fulfills. Love one another with God’s love and begin to desire to understand one another…your parents, brother, sister, friend, husband, wife, coworker, the person serving you, the person you are serving, the homeless wandering the streets, the drug addict, the stripper, the alcoholic, the depressed, the anxious, the person afflicted with a disease…

Surely, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, the famed actor whose life was destroyed by heroin, was loved by thousands, but was he understood?

Surely, <fill in the name> whose life is being destroyed by <fill in the tragedy, trauma or affliction>, but is he or she understood?

Reach out today and understand someone…and let him or her know that you do.

¹Genesis 2:18 NIV

²Genesis 1:28 NIV

³John 13:33-34

⁴Isaiah 53:2-6 NLT

⁵From Chicken Soup for the Soul (Volume I): 101 Stories to Open the Heart and Rekindle the Spirit, © 1993 Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen, published by Health Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Copyright ©March 30, 2014 by Jeff Cambridge

Transitions II: Band of Brothers

I have a passion for the Lord Jesus the Christ.  This passion is the fuel and sustenance of why I get up early in the morning to write, commune with Him during the day, and meditate on His Word at night.  He is the One and Only,¹ the Almighty God,² Sovereign and Lord,³ Faithful and True.⁴  It is Christ that gives me strength, abundantly prospers me, and consistently lifts me up when I fall.  

     The mighty warrior and king, David, relied on Christ’s strength to overcome his enemies, the same forces of this world that come against us to trip us in our walk of faith.  A psalmist wrote this passage that symbolizes David’s example as a leader of faith, a man of God, and a man after God’s own heart:⁵

Though hostile nations surrounded me,

I destroyed them all in the name of the LORD.

Yes, they surrounded and attacked me,

but I destroyed them all in the name of the LORD.

They swarmed around me like bees;

they blazed against me like a roaring flame.

But I destroyed them in the name of the LORD.

You did your best to kill me, O my enemy,

but the LORD helped me.

The LORD is my strength and my song;

he has become my victory.⁶

Back in the garden on the night of Jesus’ Last Supper with the men He chose to pass the baton,⁷ 
with the men He predicted would stumble because of Him and scatter to their separate ways,⁸ 

with the men He promised to give another Helper, the Holy Spirit, who would teach them all things, bring to remembrance all things He had taught them and anoint them with power,⁹

a great transition was about to unfold.

What is the catalyst that begins a transition?  What breaks the mold created by past behaviors and experiences?  What upsets the cart, rocks the boat, turns over the tables?  First, Jesus took aside His top three disciples, Peter, James, and John.  These three men were granted privileged time in Jesus’ presences on several occasions: during the healing of Jairus’ daughter,¹⁰ during the Transfiguration of Elijah and Moses on the mountaintop,¹¹ and now here in the Garden of Gethsemane as Jesus prepares to pray to His Father:

And they came to an olive grove called Gethsemane, and Jesus said, “Sit here while I go and pray.”  He took Peter, James, and John with him, and he began to be filled with horror and deep distress.  He told them, “My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death.  Stay here and watch with me.”¹²

In the upstairs room where the disciples had last supped with Jesus, all of them had just expressed their allegiance to Him, even to death as a retort to Jesus’ prophetic words that they would stumble and scatter:

Peter said to Him, “Even if everyone else deserts you, I never will.”

“Peter,” Jesus replied, “the truth is, this very night, before the rooster crows twice, you will deny me three times.”

“No!” Peter insisted.  “Not even if I have to die with you!  I will never deny you!”  And all the others vowed the same.¹³

“And all the others vowed the same.”  This band of brothers stood before their King as armor bearers to die for Him.  Yet Jesus knew of His Father’s other plans.¹⁴

1. John 1:14,18 NIV
2. Genesis 17:1, 35:11 NIV
3. Jude 1:4 NIV
4. Revelations 19:11 NIV
5. 1 Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22
6. Psalm 118:10-14 
7. Luke 6:12-16, John 15:16, 19, 26-27, 17:18, Matthew 28:19
8. Zechariah 13:7, Matthew 26:31, 56
9. John 14:26, Acts 1:8
10. Luke 8:49-56
11. Matthew 17:1-2
12. Mark14:32-34 
13. Mark 14:29-31
14. John 18:4

Excerpt from A Spiritual Diary, “Transitions,” part 2 of a 6 part series. Copyright © August 5, 2004 by Jeff Cambridge

Transitions I: A Walk in the Garden

Change.  What causes it?  Something that disrupts the present state that results in an evolution from the “status quo” to a “state of flux” is a catalyst of change, for instance, the spark that ignites the first flame.  During a “state of flux,”—when life is fluid, moving, and changing—a series of transitions occurs when people are in between their “status quo”—life as usual—present and their “never experienced before” future.  These transitional events change the lives of the people the catalyst effects.  

       Transition.  What is its importance?  Transition is necessary to get from one stage in life to another.  Without transition, there would be no “passage from one state, stage, subject, or place to another”.¹ Without transition, the shock of moving from one set of circumstances to another would be too overwhelming, and yet to effect change, a shock or catalyst must be placed in the present state system.

Let’s look at Jesus’ transition from His earthly sojourn to His ascension into heaven, where today He lives, reigns, and sits at the right hand of God.²  The scene takes place in the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus often met with His disciples.³  All were present except Judas, who having had Satan enter him, left Jesus and the disciples at the Last Supper table and went to meet with the Jewish leaders to which he would betray Jesus.⁴  Jesus had often used the garden on the slope of the Mount of Olives as a place of solitude for prayer, avoiding the crowds of people continually following Him.⁵  So far, nothing unusual is taking place; to the disciples it’s a “status quo”—as usual—walk in the garden.

Then accompanied by the disciples, Jesus left the upstairs room and went as usual to the Mount of Olives.  There he told them, “Pray that you will not be overcome by temptation.”⁶ —Christ, the catalyst

1. Webster’s Dictionary, p1254, italics added
2. Luke 22:69, Acts 1:3,9, 2:30-36, 7:55-56, Romans 8:34, Colossians 3:1, Hebrews 1:3, 8:1, 10:12, 12:1-2, 1 Peter 3:22
3. John 18:1-2
4. John 13:2,27, 30, 18:3, Matthew 26:14-16
5. Matthew 14:23, Luke 6:12, 9:28, 22:39-40, John 18:1-2
6. Luke 22:39-40

Excerpt from A Spiritual Diary, “Transitions,” part 1 of a 6 part series. Copyright © August 4, 2004 by Jeff Cambridge

Crushed Yet Not Forgotten

“The LORD is close to the brokenhearted”

Psalm 34:18

Walking in a shell of worldly existence with a heart hardened by our response to circumstances that have treated us none to kindly, we create a façade of “everything is all right,” afraid to expose the realness of the pain we feel inside, or the numbness of non-existent emotion encapsulated far beneath the surface.  We “feel” that we cannot feel the reality around us, wanting only to lash out at the very feeling for which we desperately long—love and its tenderness, affection and its luring stroke of calmness on our spirit.  But does a rock feel the brush of a feather against its coarseness or does a calloused foot understand the softness of cotton underneath its step?  With layers of protection armored to survive, we have chosen on our own accord to inflict this insensitivity upon ourselves, thinking mindlessly from the torment of our own self-pity, that we cannot bear to tolerate that which is our only salvation, a crushed spirit.

  It is not until we fully accept, with total abandonment, that Christ will save us from ourselves, that the mighty Winepress must squeeze out our very existence that He created, leaving behind the shell that kept us from experiencing His eternal life.  New wine is made and new wineskins must be used as a vessel for this new man or woman, the old discarded, useless and dead.¹  We must first die before we can live, and we must experience the crushing of our “self” spirit to embrace His spirit anew.²  God does the crushing.  He is there every step it takes, for as long as it takes to make the new wine.  Jesus has not forgotten you.  As the Good Shepherd that He is, the lost sheep is sought after, not one shall be destroyed.³

  You must take the first step.  Break away from your rebellion, your insistence to rely on your façade, your shell, and your armor to survive, and be vulnerable to His love that, once you accept Him, can penetrate to your core.  Let the molten mass of tears erupt as He purges your innermost being, the good wine awaiting His harvest, “for He saves those who are crushed in spirit.”⁴

   

1. Matthew 9:17 NIV
2. 1 Corinthians 15:22
3. Luke 15:4-7
4. Revelations 14:14-16, Psalm 34:18 italics added

Excerpt from A Spiritual Diary, copyright © April 20, 2004 by Jeff Cambridge