GPS

O satisfy us, Vance and Bethyl Joy, with Your mercy and loving-kindness in the morning (now, before we are older), that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. Psalm 90:14


We’ve been gently and persistently wakened in the morning by the birds outside our windows—welcoming us to the Ullswater area, a northern part of The Lake District. We’ve heard we are experiencing of sun and warm weather that “shouldn’t be so.” We thank God for His “most warm welcome!” Teach us to number our days that we may get us a heart of wisdom Psalm 90:12. Father, teach me today to consciously choose to receive the beauty and delightfulness and favor of the Lord our God upon us; confirm and establish the work of our hands-yes, the work of our hands, confirm and establish it. Psalm 90:17.

We’ve given these days into His will—His GPS (God’s Perfect Scheme)! When we are off course, the blue bubble is not on the purple line. Vance’s I-Phone GPS has worked poorly for several weeks—and it proved no different in the UK. Frustrating ourselves in an unsuccessful attempt to locate a car dealer just after leaving the Manchester Airport, we were lost. We opted to set that seemingly impetuous agenda aside, get on the motorway and head north to The Lake District. The GPS worked well in our recalibrated direction—and we realized our well-thought out agenda was not HIS timing.

… my head spins with the “leaving” but also the clarity that “what door/window God opens…no one can shut!” “And, what door/window God closes…no one can open!” We are walking these unmarked paths with our invisible Savior on an invisible path of faith – and watching the visible respond to His will. I’m overwhelmed with His intentional Presence. Grateful that when He shuts the door, “safe am I…safe am I in the hollow of His Hand…”

Unmasking His Glory

Lovely flights yesterday from Chicago through Heathrow to Manchester, along with a delightful drive north to Penrith, an ancient town on the northern outskirts of the Lake District, and from there to Lothwaite B&B out in the gows and fells of the civil world’s fringes. A gentle Danish couple, Jim and Tina, Mt Kili ex-guides from Tanzania, run this place with their two small daughters. We collapsed last night and did three things: slept, slept, and slept. All in that order. And now, this morning, browsed, bathed, and breakfasted.

I was aware of grieving the past lettings-go in these quiet moments. A solemn still-quiet settled in my spirit. An empty space preparing me to know it when I’ve deleted my completeds and face an empty slate. One of my readings I’ll share with you, but only so much as would be good for you:

“Unless we learn to grieve, we may need to live life at a distance in order to protect ourselves from pain. We may not be able to risk having anything that really matters to us or allow ourselves to be touched, oto be intimate, to care or be cared about. Untouched, we will suffer anyway. We just will not be transformed by our suffering. Grieving may be one of the most fundamental of life skills. It is the way that the heart can heal from loss and go on to love again and grow wise. If it were up to me, it would be taught in kindergarten, right up there with taking turns and sharing.” My Grandfather’s Blessings, p 145.

Later in this day: I’ve also enjoyed today the unmasking of God’s glory all about us as walked thru “the good land that I’ve brought you into, a land of brooks and rivers, springs and lakes, streams running out of the hills and down through the valleys…” Deut 8. He put his stunning artistry on display, encouraging us also to play, inviting our attention to stay—on Him. And so we did throughout this day, our first full day of Sabbatical. We’re counting on this being a preview of coming attractions, as we too let down, unmask, and become more clearly created in His image.   Below is a woolly look at a close to the ground part of us.

In this regard I was reading last night of a little girl who, in kindergarten, spent the day making Halloween masks with her fellow classmates. When her mother came to pick her up, she saw her mom looking in vain to find her, even though she was just right before her eyes. She burst into tears, took off her mask, and ran to her parent. Her mom consoled her child. But the child said, “Mommy, I knew who I was behind my mask; why didn’t you?” I wondered, how much do I know of me and thee, each of us securely tucked behind the masks of our own making? Lord, unmask your glory in me, and we, as you did with your more pliant creation of sheep, streams, and silvans. Amen.

Vance and Bethyl's new look

Gentling Yourself

October 6, 2010


           Today I walked about the neighborhood over 8 miles. Up and down across the rolling autumn farm fields with trees brightly lit in God’s borrowed glory. Wondering at His creativity; letting the peripherals of my existence blow off my limbs while I sink my roots into God’s soil.  Preparing now for leaving for England's sabbatical tomorrow.  Surrounded by the glory of His life within me and around me, I have enjoyed meditating on this poem from Derek Walcott, Time After Time:

The time will come

when, with elation

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your Life.

Hot Wheels

              Boy, we’ve been burning the rubber. The state we’ve been through include not only georgraphy of 25 states in the USA and one province in Canada, but also various states of mind and heart. We’ve been up, we’ve been down, but throughout we’ve been held by the Statesman of our souls. We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Canada as well as seeing relatives and a dear friend of many years in Atlanta, GA this past week. This coming weekend we speak in another church, this time in Chicago.   It’s been fun all along to travel light, feel unemcumbered with too much stuff. Thank you, Jesus.


            One story on this theme that might speak to you is from My Grandfather’s Blessings by Rachel Remen. The story goes that this six year old boy, from a poor family, became friends with his neighbor, a woman physician. They would play with his two hot wheel cars. They would race them on the window sills. Sometimes one would have the one with a chipped wheel; sometimes the other. The woman loved him very much. When a local promotion from a gas station advertised a free hot wheels car with every fill up, she mobilized her friends to get all 21 varieties of the hot wheels. Then she presented them to him in a big box. After a short time she noticed he had stopped playing with them. She asked him why he’d stopped. “He looked away and in a quivery voice he said, ‘I don’t know how to love this many cars, Rachel.’ I was stunned. Ever since, I’ve been careful to be sure not to have more Hot Wheels than I can love.” (p. 44).

We’re working on loving our exceedingly few hot wheels, four to be exact, found on our aging camper van. It’s home now for us in these days before we leave on October 7th for the UK. Thanks for praying with and for us that our time there will be free of clutching, grasping, but rather one that leads to an open and spacious place of reverence, wholeness, and holiness. Thank you, our loving and praying friends.

Am I This Kind of Bridge?

This bridge is 20 stories tall.  It's made of solid limestone.  It's millons of years old.

George Washington carved his initials here.  Thomas Jefferson bought the property from King George for 2 bucks.   Civil war soldiers were given this view as a reward for battles well fought.   Settlers used  this as a main thoroughfare west over the Appalachians on their covered wagons.

It's a silent testament to the power of bridges in our world.   We enjoyed it today as we are heading south to Atlanta through Blue Ridge Parkway country.   It made me think.   How quick am I to make a bridge of empathy between me and you?   How hard to I work to bridge differences without bending truth?   How much do I work to keep and live out the beatitude in Matthew 5:9  "You are blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight.  It is then that you know who you really are and your place in God's family. (Message)."    Lord, make me that kind of bridge.   Amen.

Courage: the next step

        Another day. Another Comfort Inn. This time after having enjoyed Ottawa and Quebec. We came, we saw, we met a missions committee, we left. We’ve enjoyed old friends, made new friends, and asked for new prayer partners. Now we’re in Waterford, NY and heading west again toward “the barn” in Michigan, through Ohio to visit family.


Yesterday’s sermon by Rick Reed at Metropolitan Bible Church was inspiring. Made me want to be a better man. Here are some thoughts from it:

“God doesn’t want us to be shy with His gifts, but bold and loving and sensible.” II Tim 1:7 (Message)


Our goal is to respect and reflect courage, even tho we have a family propensity as people toward fear. II Tim is a primer on the courage that it takes to face the possibility of losing face, friends, family, freedom. We were meant for more than ducking and dodging. He meant us to fear Him so we wouldn’t have to fear anything or anyone else that would keep us from doing what He wants us to do. Courage is the antidote to fear. Courage is fear that has said its prayers.

Courage is interior character that is impelled by the Holy Spirit to: “keep calm and carry on”, like the old poster from Britain during WWII.

Courage has power, love, and self discipline as its three building blocks:

1. Power is the ability to take action, to do the right thing, to just sometimes only do the next thing. The next thing may be small and inglorious, but essential.

2. Love is the availability to give help, even when it costs you plenty. This is Jesus’ primary take-away lesson for living.

3. Self discipline is the stable sensibility to control yourself under the Spirit’s influence, especially the interior self of thoughts and feelings.

Canada here we come!

Vance and Bethyl Joy here. We’re now a couple of hours east of our new address here in Michigan. We just moved our stuff in yesterday to our friend’s barn. Worked all day to stash the stuff up high and tight along one wall after building shelves with a local carpenter from their church. Looks great, if I do say so myself! Pix is of Bethyl and our friend of over 40 years, Marian, in whose home (with her husband, Keith) we now have a place. We spent the day before getting MI residency requirements met: new driver’s licenses, vehicle registration for our 17 yr old camper van, voter registration, MI state insurance for the van, a bank account and HSA at the local credit union. We were able to get our same personal ID license plate that we had for our Honda in CA: NCOURGR. Like to be encouragers wherever we go .

We left our new address yesterday after packing and have weathered over in Flint on the way to Ottawa. We’re meeting with the missions committee for Metropolitan Bible Church there on Sunday. This is the prior church of a good friend of ours in So Cal, Gary Stubblefield. We traveled with him and his psychologist wife, Suzanne, last summer to India and Nepal. Along the way we trekked with the chair of this committee, Chris Shadbolt. We’ll stay with his family in Ottawa. Pray that our time will go well.

On the way back south we’ll stop with friends in Rochester and then move on down, perhaps, to just say hi to the folks at Interserve HQ at Upper Darby, PA. That would be somewhere from the 23rd to the 25th of the month. We were wanting to check in with them for a bit before we hop our one way flight to the UK out of Chicago on Oct 7th. I might be able to hop a short flight to Atlanta and back to visit my sister and my “adoptive” mom, Harriette, before flying out of Chicago.

All for now from rainy Flint at the Comfort Inn. Blessings to you all. Vance and Bethyl Joy