Not so Simple

We were sitting around the table eating dinner before we went to the Ash Wednesday Service.  We were discussing the community hubbub about the observation of Lent, when my oldest daughter said, "the older I get the more I realize that Christianity is not so simple."  My husband laughed at the fact that she thought she was "older."  I heard angels singing in my ears.

Christianity is not so simple, and she is gaining wisdom.  Two of her teachers were debating a topic this week, I can't remember what it was, but I know Madie was conflicted about it.  She respects both teachers and knows that they are committed Christians.  I think she is unsettled because she is realizing there are very few "right" answers.  Wisdom means you need to know Jesus.  You need to follow him even when people you respect might not hold the same opinion.  You can both be faithful followers of Jesus and do things differently.  She is beginning to understand that we can't settle into a comfortable legalism and be faithful to our savior.  I think right now she finds that unsettling, but I hope that she comes to see it as glory.

The glory of it is that God is so much bigger than we are.  He hasn't created a bunch of robots that can do everything right.  He has created the world in such a way that we can follow him in many different ways.  We need the richness of variety.  We grow by experiencing new things, new ideas, new situations, new ways of seeing who God is.  We grow when we suffer.  When there is a conflict of ideas, we turn to God and ask for wisdom, and he gives it.  We listen to different pastors who have different flocks, so they emphasize different attributes of God.  It is all part of growing up, and getting older, and realizing that you don't know everything.

The older I get the more I realize that there is so much more of God to know.  I think I have wrapped my mind around one concept and he gives me a situation that changes my perspective so that I have to turn to him again.  All the checklists I thought I could make to measure my children, or my friends, or my pastors, or my parents just don't fit most situations.  When a younger mom asks me how to discipline her child, I find myself thinking that I can't answer her well since I don't know her child.  There is always a tendency when we have a lot of experience with a subject to put things in general categories, which God also does, but within those categories there are a myriad of variables which all require special knowledge.  I hesitate to make any blanket statements anymore about any situation, but especially things like discipline, adoption, dating, marriage, discipleship, they are just not simple in any way.  My standard answer these days is prayer.  You can go a very long way by being in God's Word every day, and being faithful to take everything to him in prayer.  It's so simple, but powerful.  It doesn't mean that you will have the quick, easy answer every time, in fact it means you will often have to tell the person you will get back to them, or you will have to come back and tell them you were probably wrong about what you told them off the cuff.  It's OK, that's the honest and best answer.

Today I am just so very thankful that Madie gets this.  She doesn't think she knows everything, and she is very willing to listen to conflicting arguments.  She would love to have someone just tell her what is right, but she knows that that kind of thinking leads us to worship a person instead of God.  She is learning to think for herself.  She is learning to study what she believes and why.  She knows when she sees or hears something stupid, and really tries to be able to articulate why she thinks that.  I don't know where she will be next year, but I know it will be where God wants her to be.  I am not worried about her losing her faith, or being led astray.  She has a good head on her shoulders, and best of all she has a humble faith.  She may not charge out front with the sword leading any battles, but she will ask hard questions. She will wrestle with answers that sort of sound right, but don't sit well with her.  I know her God and I know that if he is big enough to find me in college, he is big enough to keep watch over her.  After all, he is her father.

Today I am thankful for...

Moms who make Valentine's Day cookies for the kids, and in our case Grandmoms

Teachers who ask hard questions and let the students wrestle with them

Varieties of opinions and cheerful debate

Sunny days in the winter

Lent, a season to reflect on the sacrifice that God made to rescue us

Good gifts: wine, chocolate, coffee, pizza, cheese, music, laughter, books, polar fleece, hot water

Days that get longer every spring

Beautiful sunrises each and every morning