spreading out the bad news (Hezekiah and prayer)

I love the Old Testament. Partly because it has such great stories about prayer. 

Here's one that struck me lately, in Isaiah 37.* Jerusalem is under threat from the Assyrians, who've been striking down their enemies right and left. Destroying everyone. Winning every battle. Terrifying their enemies.

And then Hezekiah, the king in Jerusalem, receives a letter from the Assyrians, talking about all the people they've destroyed, and about how Jerusalem is next, and so don't think your God can save you.

Hezekiah, true son of David that he is, knows that the enemies of God are especially in trouble when they defy God (think Goliath). And so this is what he does:

Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers, and read it; and Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord, and spread it before the Lord.

He takes the bad news, and he spreads it out in front of God.

I love that.

Hezekiah also (again, true son of David that he is), pleads for God to help for God's own great name's sake.

O Lord, the God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, you are the God, you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth; you have made heaven and earth. Incline your ear, O Lord, and hear; open your eyes, O Lord, and see; and hear the words of Sennacherib, which he has sent to mock the living God. Truly, O Lord, the kings of Assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands and have cast their gods into the fire, for they were not gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone. Therefore they were destroyed. So now, O Lord our God, save us, please, from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, O Lord, are God alone.

You and I are not Hezekiah. But we do follow the even greater, even truer Son of David. And I think that when we get bad news, Hezekiah's example is not a bad one to follow. 

We are also not God, and so we don't know which outcomes will most glorify His great name--maybe what we ask for isn't what He wants. (To quote another good example, "But if not...") 

But we are God's people, and so when we get bad news, we can spread it before Him, and beg Him for His help.

And we can trust in Him who alone can save us.


Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell








*The story is also recorded in 2 Kings 19.

Weekly Links!

~ LINKS TO SOME INTERESTING READING, FOR WHAT'S LEFT OF YOUR WEEKEND ~

FAITH

-"The Battle is the Lord's" - a snippet:

God is God. He has the power and the plan and all will be well and jolly and good and beautiful in the end no matter what I do, but I can be a part of the jollification. God does not need me, but I can be there.

-"Family Worship as Spiritual Formation": This is one post from a really excellent new series over at Mere Orthodoxy.

-"On Family Worship and Failure": This is another.

-"Father and Son at the Cross"

-"Giving People a Chance to Grow"

-"On Acts 29 and Spiritual Gifts"

Family

-"On the Outside": I know this was written to make me tear up. But...it worked.

Fiction

-"The Speculative World of William Shakespeare"

I hope you have a lovely Sunday, full of worship and rest!

Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

Weekly Links!

(not really)

~ LINKS TO SOME INTERESTING READING AND WATCHING, FOR WHAT'S LEFT OF YOUR WEEKEND ~



-"Why Pray for the Dead?": On the difference between praying for and with the saints, vs. praying to the saints.


-"9 Ways to Pastor Those Longing for Marriage": so much better than most things I read on this subject, honestly.


(Quick sidebar: If you're talking about singleness in the Christian life, and you're not taking into account the fact that we're all following a Man who never married during His earthly life, you're really not talking about it properly.)



-"The Hollywood Executive and the Hand Transplant That Changed His Life": if you like reading about fascinating medical stories (I do!), you'll love this.




-Finally, this is all good, but I really appreciated the second half, where they get into the difference between "How does the reality of the Trinity have an impact on your prayer life?" and "How does your awareness/knowledge of the Trinity have an impact on your prayer life?"

God is very gracious to us, meeting with us and listening to us, despite our (fathomless) ignorance.







I hope you have a lovely Sunday, full of worship and rest!

Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

Weekly Links!

~ LINKS TO SOME INTERESTING READING & Watching, FOR WHAT'S LEFT OF YOUR WEEKEND ~

-"Not Writing for Writers": I enjoyed this post about how pursuing non-literary art forms help writers write better. Here's a snippet:

What amazes me the most is that I haven’t lost anything. I don’t have less time to enjoy the audiobooks and films and tv shows and social media I love. But I have incentive to be more purposeful about what I consume, because it has to be better than spending time with my thoughts. I’ve lost patience for the empty noise, I only want the good stuff.

-"On Signaling Versus Displaying Virtue in a Trumpian Age"


-"How the Order of the Beatitudes Could Change Your Life": I can't remember ever seeing this point made elsewhere, and it's a really helpful insight.


-"I Work from Home":  I'm enough of an introvert that I can't identify with much of this, but as someone who does work from home, I still find it hilarious.


-"Dear Supporter, There's So Much More I Wish I Could Tell You": a missionary friend of mine linked to this post, and (for what it's worth) as a missionary kid, I commend it to you.

Pray for the missionaries you know, folks. And then pray for them some more.


-"Ten Meter Tower": I could not look away from this. Weirdly fascinating.


-"C.S. Lewis Talks to a Dog About Lust": So helpful.


-"Why Our Son Doesn't Have a Smartphone"


-"I Was a Black, Female Thru-Hiker on the Appalachian Trail"



-"An Iceberg Flipped Over, and Its Underside is Breathtaking": really gorgeous pictures.


-"Which Paid Marketing Works (and Doesn't Work) for Books": I know this is totally inside baseball, but I like Rachel Aaron's blog (and recommend her book), and found this long meaty post really interesting.



---Finally, on a note of shameless self-promotion, it's almost Lent, and if you don't already have a copy of "Let Us Keep the Feast: Living the Church Year at Home," now is a great time to buy one! Cate MacDonald and Lindsay Marshall do a great job of showing you simple, meaningful ways to bring the church's celebration of Lent and Easter into your own home.

You won't regret getting yourself a copy before Ash Wednesday rolls around (March 1, this year.)---


I hope you have a lovely Sunday, full of worship and rest!

Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell








This post contains Amazon affiliate links; if you purchase a book from this link, I receive a small percentage of the purchase price.  (See full disclosure on sidebar of my blog.)

How We Have Devotions with our Children

The original model.

A few weeks ago, I wrote a lengthy post about how I have my daily devotions and, at the end of it, I promised to write a follow-up about how Adam and I lead devotions with our children. This is that follow-up--and forgive me for posting it later than I'd hoped.


And, fair warning: most of what I'm going to say here is a natural outgrowth of the content of that first post. I.e., our devotions with our children are really a continuation of our own devotional lives, and that's really what I hope you come away from this post remembering.


There are three main ways we lead our kids in learning about, praying to, worshiping, and serving the Lord, and the first two are stupidly obvious (but worth noting)--and the last one might be, too.

1. Go to church (live like Christians)

If your lives aren't centered around the Lord, your children will know it, regardless of whether or not you read them a Bible verse now and again. One primary way your children will know the reality of your devotion is by seeing how you spend your time. Do you make time in your days, in your weeks, for serving the Lord? Live like a Christian (because you are one). Be a part of your local church. Worship in community regularly. Let God's love permeate your life. When you sin against your kids or your spouse, repent and ask forgiveness. Love your neighbors. Work on all those good and terrifying lists of virtues Paul was always sticking in his epistles.

Be real. And by "real," I don't mean, "let all your vices hang out."  I mean, "really follow Jesus, and yes, that includes doing the real work, and letting your kids see that you don't always get it right, but that you always let Jesus pick you up and help you keep following Him."

(Note: I know church attendance is hard. And I know church people can be hard to get along with. And I know churches can get it wrong, and can hurt you, and... and all of that. Anyone who's been in church any length of time has stories about it. Keep trying. God loves these folks. Hang in there. We really are supposed to do it, and God gives grace for the struggle. You might be walking through a desert right now when it comes to church; keep walking. Keep your heart set on the pilgrim way, for God can make the desert a place of springs.)

2. Pray together regularly

This can be really simple: pray together before meals and at bedtimes. Thank God for your food and ask Him for good sleep. If you have trouble with extemporaneous prayers, use a formal prayer (at various times we've used the Lord's Prayer or the simple "Guide us waking, oh Lord, and guard us sleeping, that awake we may watch with Christ, and asleep we may rest in peace"--the Book of Common Prayer has LOTS of other good ones, too, if you're looking for help).

This is an area, frankly, where I'm hoping to grow our family's own practice. We're very regular at praying, but not very... varying. I want to help the kids learn how to pray more for themselves, for others, how to use prayer to worship and to confess, to petition... but the good thing is, we do have a habit of prayer. And I think once you have a habit, you can build on it and refine it.

So start the habit, and feel free to start simply. Just start.

3. Teach them the Bible (out of your own devotions)

So, while this is probably as stupidly obvious as my first two points, it's the insight that's been absolutely revolutionary for me this year.

I've used, and still love and appreciate, devotional books like The Jesus Storybook Bible, or The Biggest Story, and I'm sure I'll keep using them.

BUT.

But the very best teaching times we've had with our kids are when we teach them out of the passages we ourselves are studying. So, when I'm reading Luke in my personal devotions, at bedtime I'll read to the kids out of Luke, and I'll explain it to them. Or Adam will read to them some of what he's been pondering in the Bible recently, and he'll explain it to them. (Or we'll read whatever's in the lectionary that week.)

Recently, I was reading through Nehemiah, and so I read big chunks of that to the kids for a week or so, and explained to them what it meant. And it was wonderful, because right there in Nehemiah was an explanation of exactly what we were doing! In Nehemiah 8, the scribe Ezra reads the law to the people, and as he reads, a crowd of Levites stands ready to assist him. And how exactly do the Levites assist him?

"[They] helped the people to understand... they read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading (emphasis mine)".

That is what you can do for your kids: read to them from the Bible, and then help them to understand it.

And how do you do that? By making sure you understand it yourself. And for that, you have to be spending time reading it, meditating on it, studying it, and even listening to and reading good theology from people more learned than you are.

This is what I mean when I say that your children's devotions should grow out of your own devotions. Because you know that they're going to have questions. You know they're going to ask what it means, and what about this, and, Mom, does that mean that I should ...????

And that's the really good stuff. That's the stuff that sticks. And you're only going to be up to the task if you're regularly seeking the Lord's face yourself, regularly turning your own heart towards Him, regularly feeding yourself on His word.


Which brings us to ... food!  Food. Here is an analogy for you: think of how you feed older babies--babies that aren't really toddlers yet, but they're not just toothless breastfed babes anymore either. Yes, you may have a few foods for them that are really just prepared for babies (jarred baby food, etc.), but the older they get, the more you can just modify your own supper. You cut up the grapes, you mash up the main dish, you spoonfeed them a properly prepared version of what the rest of the family is eating.

It’s easier that way, AND it’s healthy. (Assuming your normal diet is healthy…and it should be.)

This is what it's like to modify your own devotions for your children's needs. Feed them what the rest of the family (the church) is eating. Just break it down enough that they can easily take it in.

Yes, there's still room for prepared devotional materials. They're so helpful--much like jarred baby food. I would not want to be without the excellent resources careful Christian authors have prepared to help children learn about God. BUT…you don't feed your baby just jarred baby foods. You help your baby eat what the rest of the family is eating. THAT is what your children's devotional life should be like.

(Also, I'm pretty convinced that Scripture memorization fits in here somewhere, too. But, to be honest, that's something I'm still trying to figure out how to incorporate regularly into our lives. I'll update as we keep working on it!)

One Last Note

I was talking to my own mother about composing this post, and I asked her if she thought I'd missed anything important. Her response was a thoughtful, "Sometimes each child is going to need individual discipleship."

It was such a good reminder that I couldn't close this post without sharing it. Yes, each child is an individual, and there are times when each of them will need attention, help, resources, prayer, time, thought, guidance, study... all of these good things, and that child will need them from YOU, the parent. So please, don't take this post as an end-all or be-all. I've only been a parent for about 12 years now, and if I have as much to learn in the next 12 years as I have in the last 12... well, I have a really, really long way to go.

So please take this post in the spirit it's offered: as a reflection from someone who's a ways down the road, but not that far down, and who wants to offer what she knows so far, just in case it might help someone else on the path. I know I'm missing things, and I'm sure somewhere in here I've said something wrong.

But we're meant to help each other on this journey. I pray the Lord lets whatever is good here stick in your heart and your mind, and that He graciously lets you forget and discard anything harmful. May you enjoy many, many rich times of prayer and study and discussion with your kids, as you lead them to follow you, as you follow Christ.


Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell




This post contains Amazon affiliate links; if you purchase a book from this link, I receive a small percentage of the purchase price.  (See full disclosure on sidebar of my blog.)

How I Have My Daily Devotions

I’m a faithful listener to Russell Moore’s Signposts podcast, and I enjoyed the one he did last spring about how he has his daily devotions. 

Discussions like these are a lot like parenting discussions: hearing how someone else did it isn’t necessarily going to dictate exactly how YOU should do it, but it’s always helpful to get ideas from someone else in the trenches.

And in that spirit, I offer this post: here’s how I have my daily devotions.

Part One: Prayer

I’ll admit my bias from the beginning: I think I have an advantage here as an Anglican. The Book of Common Prayer is just such a rich resource when it comes to devotional instruction. It’s actually what first drew me to the Anglican church: when I first read the words of the General Confession, I thought, Here are the words I’ve been trying to say to God for my whole life.

I knew I’d found my home then.

And so, in my daily devotions, I use the structure of the BCP. When I have a lot of time, I’ll read the entire Morning Prayer service. But, happily for those of us who aren’t cloistered religious, there are shorter services in the BCP, too. I usually use the one-page “Daily Devotions for Individuals and Families.” This leads me through an opening few prayers, gives me the space to sing a hymn, gives me a place to ask my own individual requests, and closes with the Lord’s Prayer and a collect.

Moving parts: 

-I work my way through the hymnal, singing one a day, and only using the ones whose melodies I can work out with my very poor skills on the recorder. :)  I just work my way from front to back of the hymnal during Ordinary Time, and then I switch to seasonal hymns (Advent, Christmas, Lent) when appropriate.

-I say the collect of the week right after the closing collect. This is a nice link to our Sunday services, since I hear the weekly collect first at Sunday worship.

-Personal petitions: I keep track of who I want to pray for using a simple notebook. I pray for my immediate family and my parents and siblings (and their spouses and children) every day. I also pray for my extended family on Mondays, my husband’s extended family on Tuesdays, our church and church stuff on Wednesdays, ministries and missionaries on Thursdays, and specific requests from friends and family on Fridays.


I used to be overwhelmed by the number of things I meant to remember to talk to God about, and the idea of getting to them all at once was so daunting that I didn’t even start. I still have this forlorn idea that it might be perfect if I COULD remember everyone before the Lord every day of the week, but I’ve learned that it’s better to start somewhere than to let myself get so intimidated by the perfect that I lose the good. And so I divide things up.

This isn’t a strict rule, by the way: when I feel moved to pray for someone on Tuesday’s list, I don’t say, “Oh no, it’s Monday, I can’t do that yet!”  The list just gives a normal structure for normal days.

Part Two: Bible-reading

So here’s where I’m sort of untraditional: I listen to the Bible much, MUCH more than I actually read it. And I need to be honest: I’m not sure this is the IDEAL way to get the scripture into my heart and mind.

BUT, it is the way that has SUCCESSFULLY gotten the scripture into my heart and mind and so, again, it’s better than the Not Doing It At All Because I Cannot Do It Perfectly.

So here’s how I do it. I use two tools: the St. James Daily Devotional and Alexander Scourby’s complete reading of the King James Bible. (Note: I’m not a KJV-only reader. I just really like Scourby’s reading voice. He does a great job of reading the words like they actually MEAN something.)

Every weekend, I take the St. James devotional, and I make myself a playlist in iTunes of the week's readings. (I also read Fr. Reardon's commentary on the readings, because it inevitably gives helpful and illuminating context.) The devotional takes you through the OT once every two years, the NT every year, and the Psalms every month. I put the chapters for the week on a playlist, and I add in the Proverbs for the week. (As Proverbs has 31 chapters, it’s pretty easy to read it through every month, just matching the chapter number to the date.)

This playlist is usually about 2 hours long. I spend some time on the weekend listening to the OT chapters and Psalms, and deleting almost all of them as I go. If a chapter or Psalm really stands out, I’ll leave it on, and eventually I have a half hour playlist of mostly gospels and epistles (and a Proverb a day) that I can commit to listening to each weekday morning.

Then, on each weekday morning, after I’ve prayed, I spend a half hour knitting and listening to the Bible. I do this because I find that having something rhythmic for my hands to do leaves my mind free to concentrate on the words I’m hearing. It can't be anything complicated--no counting!--or else it becomes a distraction rather than a help.

I find that listening instead of reading slows me down enough to really pay attention to what’s going on in the lesson (I’m a fast reader, and skimming is a bad habit when it comes to scripture). Sometimes, I’ll stop the playback and look up something on Bible Gateway, so that I can slow down even more, and really see what the author of the book is getting at.


I can’t tell you how much this has changed my life: I’ve become a different person in the last six years or so that I’ve been doing this. Having the scripture running through my head this way…you can’t spend that much time in God’s word and NOT have it change you, I don’t think.

I have pieces of the Psalms floating though my head every day now. It’s so good.

Never, never, never give up

If there were one thing I could encourage every Christian to do, it would be to spend more time in the Word. And I know that’s probably something you hear everywhere, and maybe it’s something that makes you feel guilty, and all I can say is: keep trying. Don’t give up. Beg God for help. Ask Him to help you find whatever method is going to work for you. Try it a million different ways until you find one that sticks, and don’t forget to pray the whole way through, because you have an Enemy who will fight you every step of the way.

It took me to my thirties to make this a regular habit, and I have been a Christian since I was two. (Really. I remember.)

And admitting that it took so long makes me feel so silly. It shouldn't take a grown-up Christian decades to figure out a regular devotional habit, right? But I offer it in case it encourages someone else to keep going. PLEASE, keep going. And when you fall down, get up, and keep going again. We all stumble in many ways…

But He who is with you is greater. Ask Him for help here, and He will give it to you. He gave you this great deposit of faith already; He WANTS you to listen to Him. He wants His law to form your heart and your mind.



I’m hoping to follow this post up next week with a post about how we have devotions with our kids, because it’s really something that’s grown out of our (my husband’s and my) personal devotional practices.

Meanwhile: read the Bible any way you can. Pray for yourself and those you love. Keep going. Don’t give up. I can’t tell you how often it feels like I’m struggling through the La Brea tar pits in order to get to my prayer time, as if there were gooey stiff black ooze sucking at every movement of my legs. It can really suck sometimes, trying to fight towards that oasis of light and refreshment. And there are even times when I finish and think, “That was completely rote. I don’t feel anything but stupid and frustrated and dry. I don’t feel like I was even talking to myself, let alone to GOD.”

That’s okay. It’s like that sometimes. Keep going. Just like it matters that you kiss your children goodnight, even when you’re tired and sore and grumpy, because you LOVE them, and OF COURSE you’re going to show them so, no matter how you’re feeling; it matters that you spend time with your Lord, talking to Him and listening to His word.  You are not bad or unfaithful or rotten for having it be hard. You are a normal Christian, living in a fallen, whiny world.

It’s okay. Keep going.

Remember that, as a mother loves the least little wonderful efforts her children make towards goodness, so your Heavenly Father loves your stumbling steps towards Him.

He is good. Spending time in His presence is worth it. Keep going. Because He is good.


Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell


The links to the Scourby recording and the BCP are Amazon affiliate links, because why not? Read full disclosure about Amazon affiliate links on the sidebar of this blog.  Other links are just normal links.

Psalm 4: A Meditation for These Times

photo credit: Betsy Barber

It is not a restful time in our country, or in history.

And, perhaps, if the truth were fully known, fully acknowledged, there has never really been a restful time in any country or at any point in history. As I read Psalm 4, the psalmist’s rhetorical demand sounds painfully familiar:

“O men…how long will you love vain words and seek after lies?”

Vain words and lies…sounds like what I read every time I turn to the internet.

I’m so grateful for this psalm, though, because it models what a godly heart does after beholding shame, injustice, and wrong in the world:

“Be angry, and do not sin;
Ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent
…and put your trust in the Lord.”

This is where good is to be found: in silence, in the quiet peace of the evening, when you close your eyes and your mouth, and you commune with your own heart, in the presence of the Lord. And though, as the psalmist points out,

“Many are saying, ‘Who will show us any good?’"

There is only one demand that will actually bring the good before our eyes:

"Lift up the light of thy countenance upon us, oh God.”

Yes! This! Of COURSE no one else is going to show us any good! Why are we looking to the world and its troubles anyway? Look to the Lord...

This is the psalmist, talking to his own soul, and reminding himself to take the time to just shut up and meditate on the Lord's goodness.

And after that communing with his own soul, in his own heart, reminding himself of the Lord’s great works, here is the conclusion he comes to:

“You have put more joy in my heart
Than they have when their grain and wine abound.
In peace I will both lie down and sleep;
For you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.”

I love that God gave us this picture in the scriptures: this intimate picture of both of what godly agitation looks like (”Help, Lord! Look at what’s happening!”) and also what godly meditation and self-calming and recollection looks like (”ponder in your own hearts on your own beds, and be silent”).

It’s a pattern that shows up over and over again in the Psalms (see Psalm 11, for another good example), and it’s such a gift.

“Be angry…but sin not.”

It’s good just to know that that’s possible…and also good to know that we can turn from anger, and over to peace and to praise.


Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

Desperate Faith: How to Pray When You Know You're Not Enough

I was listening again to the story in Mark 9, of the time when a father begged Jesus to deliver his son from torment, and Jesus listened, and did.

It's a justly famous story for the father's excruciatingly honest declaration,

"Lord, I believe! Help my unbelief!" ....

Listening to it this time, I realized that the father's belief actually is very strong: he is willing to do whatever is necessary to save his son. Even if what is necessary is to believe.

If there is a miracle on offer, he will believe in it.

If believing is what is required, he will do it.

But he is so desperate, he cares SO MUCH, and--I think this is important--he is SO IN EARNEST--that he has to be honest about what he knows about his own ability - he knows he cannot believe enough, he knows he doesn't have enough faith, he knows he is in desperate, horrible, helpless need ... and that is why he is there in the first place.


And that is why we are before Jesus in the first place, too. When we go to church, when we approach the communion rail, when we hold out our hands before him in prayer: we are there because we are in such desperate, horrible, helpless need.

We have some faith (God's gift!), but it is not enough.

We have such need, and it has overwhelmed us.

So, in that place of desperate need and insufficient faith, here is what we must be sure of about ourselves: that we are not enough, that we cannot believe enough, and yet that we desperately need Jesus' help. He is the one who can free us of our demons and our torment.

Lord, I believe. Help thou my unbelief!

The first is needed for the second, and the first LEADS to the second.


And be sure of this: the Lord Jesus will meet us there. There in Mark 9, you see that our Lord responds to our honest confession of insufficiency. He takes our small, weak, desperate cries, and meets them with unshakable, sure, overwhelming strength. He is good and kind.

He will help our unbelief, and he will make us strong enough to see and to bear his mercies.


Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

Weekly Links: a free Mars Rover video game, advice on socializing as an introvert, and more!

SOME GOOD READING FOR YOUR SUNDAY AFTERNOON, SET OUT IN MY USUAL CATEGORIES OF FAITH, AND FAMILY, AND FICTION...

Faith

-"Praying for the Police":

It’s easy to be cynical about the cultural Christianity that infuses life in the Bible Belt like hot water in a cup of tea. But this gathering—following so much anger, fear, destruction and despair—touched me. Members of my own family are in law enforcement. And another member of my family is a young black man. I don’t want to lose any of them. 

-"The Gift of My Anxiety"

-"The Casserole-Toting Church ladies Hold the Secret to Happiness": This one is absolutely my favorite link of the week. 

-"Rosaria Butterfield: No Free Passes": I've been impressed by everything I've seen from Dr. Butterfield, and this interview is no exception.

Family

-"Ask a Boss: I'm an Introvert and It's Holding Me Back!": This article is aimed at a work situation, but it still has some of the best advice I've ever read for introverts, full-stop:

A lot of introverts ... just resign themselves to this aspect of work always feeling like a performance. It can be an exhausting performance when it doesn’t come naturally, but their thinking is that it’s like anything else you might have to do at work that you don’t love — say, filling out expense reports or sitting through a boring staff meeting. 

But I think you’re more likely to be happy in the long term if you figure out your own ways to build rapport with people, even if those ways don’t look anything like the methods your colleagues are using. One of the most straightforward ways to do that — and one that a lot of introverts find easier to pull off — is just to take a genuine interest in people. You probably have a natural curiosity about people somewhere in you, even if you don’t typically indulge it at work, and this is the time to let it out.

Go over and read the rest of the article too--it's worth it--but I just love that core kernel of an idea: that introverts have their own way to be both genuine and social. It doesn't have to be a performance; when you hook socializing onto our natural fascination with the world, we can socialize with real interest, and not with awkward falsity.


-Mars Rover Game - my kids have been alternately enthralled and completely frustrated by this free game from NASA. Enjoy!

Fiction

-"Christian Fiction and Biblical Worldview Stories are NOT Synonomous": 

[CBA-approved fiction].. is framed by specific boundaries. While it exists within a biblical worldview, it only represents a cubicle within that world. Strictures such as no profanity, no graphic sex, no zombies, or explicit redemptive themes, are unique to the genre. They do not, however, necessarily frame a biblical worldview. CBA guidelines are far more evidence of a specific theology than they are necessarily representative of the larger biblical worldview. 

-"Praying for Romance": I enjoyed this article by about romance-writing from a Roman Catholic, Filipino, indie point-of-view. 


-Finally, this video is just a ton of fun (and if you pay attention, the task assignment is really clever):

I hope you have a lovely weekend!

Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

One extra way to pray on Sundays

though the storms beat against us...

Anne Kennedy recently wrote a great post on how difficult it is to get to church on a Sunday, and how maybe - just maybe - that difficulty isn't all in our imaginations.

As she points out, the Devil does not want us to go to church.

And all this reminds me of a habit I've fallen into lately: praying for my fellow parishioners on Sunday.

Our church-going habits are a little different than yours might be, simply because our church meets in the evening. We're a small Anglican church plant and we rent from a larger church, so we don't get access to the sanctuary till 4 p.m., at which point a small army of us arrive and scurry around until everything's set up for that evening's Eucharist.

Sunday doesn't feel as long as it should when church cuts your lazy afternoon to a close so soon after lunch, when it's suddenly time to make sure everyone's showered and dressed properly and NO YOU MAY NOT WEAR THOSE DIRTY CROCS TO CHURCH WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOUR NICE SHOES DON'T FIT ANYMORE WHY DID YOU WAIT TILL NOW TO TELL ME THIS???

Anyway: it's a scramble, most Sundays.


And so, slowly--so slowly I feel like a complete idiot for not thinking of it sooner--I've started praying for my fellow parishioners, and for any guests and visitors the Lord wants to bring our way: to pray that they're able to come to church that evening, that no evil or inconvenience or temptation will stop them, that everyone will come whom the Lord wants there, and that we will all have hearts and minds open to hear, soak in, and obey the Word we will encounter there, in that hastily prepared sanctuary.


It's the kind of prayer that grows to fill extra crevices of time, and that changes the way I look at the people around me. Every person here had to fight to be here, and the Lord's arm was the arm strengthening theirs for the fight. Every person here is loved by God. Every person here is more than they appear to be. Every person here is loved by the One who loved me. 


The prayer dips and grows and changes and curves. Sometimes I forget. Sometimes I remember not before the service, but midway through, and I want to kick myself.

But if prayer is the work, as C. S. Lewis said, then it is the Lord's work, and I can trust Him not just to give me my assignments, but to give me also the grace not to turn away from the call, grace to work at the right time, grace to forgive me when I fail or when I refuse.

And I need it. It's hard to get to church; and it's hard to actually pray.


But I am learning, more and more, that the two are intertwined at the very heart. (And perhaps--maybe more than "perhaps"-- that I myself am there in that sanctuary because of the many, many people who have entreated the Lord for me.)

May God bring us all, week after week, again to His house, to worship Him in the company of our brothers and sisters.


Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

Midnight Prayer

(I'm revisiting old posts - and sometimes updating them. This post was originally published in January, 2007.)

When I was in college, my mom introduced me to the writing of Frederica Mathewes-Greene. I quickly devoured her books Facing East and At the Corner of East and Now, chronicles of her conversion to Christianity and thence to Eastern Orthodoxy, and of life as priest's wife in a new mission church.

I enjoyed her lucid prose, her word-portraits of her parishioners, and the explanation of the parts of Eastern Orthodoxy I had hitherto found utterly mysterious. As a former Protestant, she went about explaining the exact oddities I had puzzled over in exactly the way this still-Protestant wanted explained. But there was one habit of hers she wrote about that I couldn't make heads or tails of.

In fact, none of the icon-writing, confession-making, or fast-undertaking puzzled the teenage me so much as her assertion that she spent a half hour every night out of her bed, awake, and praying. She woke up at the same time every night, hauled herself out of her bed, and said the Jesus prayer. Over and over and over.

As I said, I was in college, and the idea of purposefully giving up one minute of precious sleep was horrifying.

Okay, that's not quite true. I stayed up late with the best of them. But waking up early after I had finally gotten to bed, waking up for the express purpose of going to sleep again after I'd finished my prayers, waking up without planning on getting dressed and going somewhere? It just didn't make sense. It didn't sound like anything anyone outside of a monastery would do. It sounded like torture. It gave me the same feeling that reading Foxe's Book of Martyrs gave me. "Dear Lord," I would think, grudgingly, "I suppose I can believe that some people are called to serve you like this." Followed by, softly and to myself: "But oh am I glad it's not me." Followed then by a whisper I barely dared let myself hear: "please, please, please, I know you could call me to that too, but oh please don't." I thought I'd rather go without food for a month of Fridays than ever have to take up such a hard habit.


You know where this is going, right? ... But then I had kids. Then I had kids and found myself up at nights nursing them, sometimes four or five times a night when they were in the midst of teething or illness, going month-in and month-out without a full night of sleep.

It was with Bess, my first child, that the thought occurred to me that Mathewes-Green's habit of watching (as I learned this sort of fasting from sleep is called) might have started when she herself had had her children. But somehow, it wasn't until I was nursing Gamgee, my second, that I thought of using those nighttime nursings for prayer. All I can say is that the sleep-deprived new-mom mind moves a little slower than old molasses.

And now I find myself looking forward to the middle of the night. Not always, of course, but more than I used to. Because three in the morning is quieter than any other time of the day, and the darkness takes away the distractions I've grown used to. In the daylight, I can always find a book to read, a magazine headline to scan or a blog article to look through. In the middle of the night I can't read. In the middle of the night, with my boy at my breast, there's no one to talk to except God.

And so I do. 

I find that I'm often anxious in the middle of the night. My imagination conjures up attackers hiding in dark corners and then jumps ahead to my plans for the day and points out all the ways that they might go awry. 

But there's no one to talk to about those worries but God. And so I do. I talk to him about my plans, which makes me start to think about whether or not they fit in with his plans, and then I talk to him about that to. It's a time for me to settle down, to present the thoughts whirling 'round my head for his inspection, and to listen to what he has to say to me about them. Or about anything else. And slowly I grow calm, and slowly my son stops nursing, and then I say goodnight to him and to the Lord, and everyone in the house goes back to sleep.

Other nights, especially on those four-or-five-wakings nights, I can't think straight enough to even worry to the Lord about my day. So I say the Jesus prayer, just like I learned from Mathewes-Green., over and over: "Lord Jesus, have mercy on me, a sinner. Lord Jesus, have mercy on me, a sinner. Lord Jesus, have mercy on me, a sinner." Other nights I'll sing Tallis' canon, All Praise to Thee My God This Night, over and over in my head. It's a song that resolves all nighttime fears, even the fear of death:

"Teach me to die that so I may
Rise glorious at the awful day."

So thank you, Frederica Mathewes-Green, for putting the idea of night-prayer in my head, even though it was years before I knew how to use it. Somehow, I think I might still be saying the Jesus Prayer in the middle of the night years from now. My kids'll outgrow their need to nurse at three in the morning, but I don't think I'll outgrow my need for quiet, undistracted time with my Lord.


Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

This post contains Amazon affiliate links; if you purchase a book from this link, I receive a small percentage of the purchase price.  (See full disclosure on sidebar of my blog.)

Weekly Links - Supergirl, Slushpiles, and more!

SOME GOOD READING FOR YOUR SUNDAY AFTERNOON, set out in my usual categories of faith, family, and fiction ...

Faith

-"The Gospel of Jesus on Sexual Binaries": I'm not sure which snippet of this to quote (because I really want to quote the wonderful last line, which seems like bad form). 

- "How to Trick Yourself Into Daily Prayer":

There is more humility in saying, "Lord, I offer this day up to you, and that's all I got, because I suck," than "I need to make a sincere and thorough morning offering, which I will do as soon as I'm in the proper frame of mind, which I will work on achieving as soon as I dispense with these emails, and -- oh, gosh, I never printed out that thing that I need to scan and return, and -- oh, nuts, we're out of paper. I'll write it on the list. Now, where's a pen? Why are there never pens in this house? My life is so chaotic! Ugh, the heck with this, I'm going on Facebook."

Family 

- "Seven Tips for Keeping the House a Little Bit Cleaner" - I'm a bit late on this one, considering spring cleaning is supposed to happen before Easter, but it's still a great read.

- This Russell Moore article ("Why Porn Kills Sex") is a reaction & reflection to this TIME magazine article (behind a paywall, I'm afraid), and they're both worth reading.

- "Understanding the Spectrum" - a fantastic comic about autism.

Fiction

- "In Praise of Daredevil's Karen Page":

While Matt preaches endlessly about giving everyone a second chance, and God being the only one who can decide who lives and who dies, Karen is the one who actually responds to killers with empathy. Matt doesn’t sit by Grotto’s side—Karen does.

- "On Reviewing Bad Books When You're Part of the Literary Community" - oh my goodness, this spoke to my SOUL.

- "Why Supergirl Is a Better Superman Story than Superman v Batman": Works for me.

- And here is an interview with S. B. Divya, who was a slushpile reader for a sci-fi magazine, and recently moved up to assistant editor. I found it fascinating.

- "Writerly Bits: What I've Learned in 5 Years": This is one of those lovely, detail-heavy pieces that are always fun to stumble upon.



Happy Sunday!
-Jessica Snell







http://theoraah.tumblr.com/post/142300214156/understanding-the-spectrum

http://www.ncregister.com/blog/simcha-fisher/how-to-trick-yourself-into-daily-prayer

Asking Jesus to Leave

If you're visiting my blog today because you found me via The Lent Project, welcome! Take a look around and make yourself at home. :)


And if you're one of my regular readers, please come and stop by The Lent Project today! I have a devotional up about Jesus' healing of the demon-possessed man ... though I take it a bit of a different direction. Here's how it starts:

This is the story about the people who asked Jesus to leave. 

Yes, it is also the story about the horde of demons infesting one naked and helpless man. It’s also the story about the herd of pigs streaming down the cliff to their deaths. The story about the maniacal strength of the fallen angels as they used their host to break iron shackles, to scream their filthiness to the skies, to dance in the dark around the mountains and the tombs, to terrorize everyone who came near them.

It is that story. 

But it is also the story about the people who asked Jesus to leave.

Please head over to The Lent Project to read the rest, and to enjoy and ponder the art and music that accompanies the devotional. (Biola's CCCA does such an amazing job putting together the readings, art, and music for this every year; it's an honor to get to take part in such a beautiful and collaborative piece of work.)


Peace of Christ to you,
Jessica Snell

Weekly Links - gospel, wine, matchmakers, movies, and more!

photo credit: Betsy Barber

I'm still counting this post as getting my links up on the weekend, because my kids are home from school today in honor of Lincoln's birthday. That said, here is your weekly (!) good reading from around the web:


On Faith:
"Why I Don't Share the Gospel" - it's all about joy.

"Our Prayer Instincts Are Backwards" - why we start in the wrong direction when we talk to God.

"Today Is Susanna Wesley's Birthday" - Susanna Wesley is one of my favorite saints. I love reading about her!

"What My Grandmother Taught Me About Church" - a moving memorial from Russell Moore - also good reading for parents and grandparents out there who want their children to grow up loving the house of the Lord.

"When God Writes Your Story" - this testimonial about books and faith is one of the most beautiful things I've read.

"Lord, You Said There Would Be Wine" - one last good piece of reading for Ordinary Time.



General Interest:
"Interview with a Former Professional Matchmaker"

"Fiber: the least sexy weight-loss tool" - my thanks to my friend Becca for this link!

"Old Movie Review: UNBREAKABLE" - this makes me want to watch this one, and ...

"Hail, Caesar!" - and this review really makes me want to watch this one!



I hope you have a good week, and especially a good beginning to Lent on Wednesday.

-Jessica Snell