And a Child Shall Lead...

...and the wisdom comes through the babes. This has been a theme God said to watch for this year, and indeed it has proven true in three situations already: "hearing" God through contact with the observations of young people in times when my own busy world crowds out my own powers of observation. The most recent episode brings to mind my sense of wonder at the economy of God in His use of imagery--like fallen leaves incorporated back into the environment as a new season's compost for growth, God makes that principle true in the perceptive life of the spirit as well, making a point of the fact that all wisdom of any value comes from Him, lest we forget.

I have friends who have a son that is a student at the school where I work. They also have an older son who has "left the faith" for a more new age philosophy of life. I know this by their profession, as I have never met this elder son and his wife. But, the family is precious enough to me that I took the plight of their pain over this son's faith to You, Lord, in intercessory prayer and You gave me one of those visionary dreams that start with my lone work of visualization and end a surprising work of the Spirit.

In this one, I was in prayer for this couple's faith and for the incredible strain of life they face right now when suddenly I saw a cardboard corral contained them. It was small, only about 10-12 feet in diameter; but when I ripped through the cardboard to enter it, from the inside it seemed endlessly large. Inside, it was dark and sulphuric in smell. Demonic creatures that had a power to startle thought not hurt lurked everywhere and would suddenly come up like a mad wolf, snapping teeth and then just as suddenly recede only to be replaced by another on a different side. Exhaustion set in quickly as the strain of this jarring attack kicked up adrenaline again and again.

I thought, I should get them out of here. But then, the question popped into my mind, "What if I'm 'making all this us'? Is this some vision or is it just wishful dreaming?" It felt as if God said, "Do you believe you could get them out?" I considered it a moment, then said, "Certainly, if that's Your intention for me." Immediately, the actual smallness of the environment became my perception again, and I saw the hole in the cardboard wall that I'd created in the first place. I drug them out through that wall. We were all exhausted, but they collapsed on the ground, and their clothes were sooty and smoking. Also, I was facing outward but they were still facing inward--like they still weren't really aware of me as their rescuer nor of the gap that permitted their exit. And so I pulled them out with an arm around each of their waists, but they did not really see me.

I had this dream last spring, even telling the father of both these boys about it. Just recently, the second son, the one I know as a student at my school, has become someone You have highlighted as significant for prayer. As I've prayed for him, I've watched, as You always have these two go hand in hand. In my classroom one day, I posted a scripture that had been distributed by one of the teachers as a blessing on us all. It's from Zephaniah 3:17:
The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will quiet you in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.
Only there was a typo that spellcheck wouldn't have caught. Instead of save the typist had put same. (Reminds me of the t-shirt my principal laughingly told us about in the teacher's workroom: Spellcheck is impotent.) Many kids and some adults had come and gone and seen that mini-poster up on my bulletin board, but none had seen anything but the word that is "supposed" to be there, until this boy came in. "Same-" he said, pointing. I looked, amazed. He was right. I hadn't noticed because I hadn't really "read" it, owing to the fact that this is one of my favorite verses and I see it in my head whenever the words of it begin. And in that moment, the boy became something You marked with transcendence--seeing things not just as they should be out of habitual expectation, but as they are. This is a gift that is pertinent.

Then Sunday in church, I grabbed a bulletin and after settling down in service, experienced a chilling observation: cardboard was being used in the message in a significant way. On the front of the bulletin was a picture of a man standing, holding a cardboard sign in front of his own face that says "mind games" on the front of it. His eyes peer over the top of the sign. On the platform, an easel was set set up as a "visual aid" to the lesson. Displayed on it was another sheet of cardboard on which was written: abandoned by God. At the end of the service (one about the "mind games" God's enemy uses to trick us into diminishing our true and clear faith) came a song of rejoicing when the cardboard was turned over and on the back said, "Loved by God." I asked You, O God, whether to share this with the young man. then for two days, kept running into him every where I turned. Finally, I told him we should meet and pray about something. We met during homeroom--10 minutes was all it took to share the dream and to pray for whatever his part might be in the work God is already doing in the lives of those in his brother's family.

Then came Your economy, and the gift of further revelation every time I'm willing to go out in faithfulness to Your call. I woke the next day remembering another dream I had that suddenly has a glimmer of "spiritual logic" in its imagery. At least two and a half years ago, I had a dream in which I took a car load of young people happily forward when suddenly we hit a blizzard, a white out that caused me to slam on the brakes. When the car came to a stop, it was resting before a wall of crashed cars. The light was as that of twilight and the snowy cover on the cars seemed ancient, like snows that lay across them for centuries. I knew that it was important to break through that wall of crashed cars, and so began searching around for a way to get through when suddenly a group of young hikers came up looking for a knife for the very same purpose. I fished around in my purse until I found a little box-cutter my husband had brought home from work. One of the young hikers ran his thumb along the knife, saying, "Why this isn't even sharp!" He looked at me like I was an idiot while I said, "But you felt it on the wrong side!" But just then, someone else came up with this beautiful display knife...lovely in appearance, but to my perception far too flimsy to be at all effective. Nevertheless, the group of young hikers were enamoured with the knife and took it off to attempt to cut down the wall.
Not until after a leap of faith did I see the parallels of walls that appeared flimsy from the outside but massive from the inside. Nor did I see the parallel that a simple box cutter for cutting cardboard boxes would be sufficient for this mind-games wall, but no one can believe it because the wall has been there collecting snow for centuries. That even this wall should be cardboard offends our intellect and bemuses us as on some deep level we think there surely couldn't be any "new song" come form You that hasn't already been "heard" by some great mind of the last 2,000 years...certainly not through some plain little plastic box cutter that is almost an embarrassment to pull out as the tool of choice against such a wall...almost as embarrassing as a handful of pebbles against Goliath...

Is the gift of prophecy dead?

(...because some say it died when the text of the Bible was complete.)



Trees rarely greet fall color as a cluster.
Clusters come, gradually
and full-blown color, eventually.
But at first...
(while still the days are full of heat
and chilled airis but a thing of the deepest hours of the night...)
at first,is the inspiration of the one lone tree.
Somehow (it is for God to say when and how and which tree)
it makes the change.
Its branches as flares, flung outsaying,
"Yes, my color serves as prelude to winter's death season,
but whence comes this fear of change?
Is not spring ever chasing winter away?
So I'll wear my red and my purple and my orange.
Bold and brash, confident in the time for every purpose under heaven.
Though I stand alone for now;
still, autumn cometh.
Though some nearby me rustle their green all the more loudly when they see me;
still, I know...
Even now is the time to send the sap deep, and let the colors glow."