When will it be safe?

Three years ago, I was inspired by one national debate and a blogger to write an essay called, "Is It Safe Yet?"  Today I am re-writing it to exclude political leanings because I have so much inspiration from so many sources, it has become clear that the pursuit of safety transcends political boundaries.  I made some other changes, deleting some thoughts that I now realize are irrelevant, adding another thought and tightening up other paragraphs.  This essay is not saying that making reasonable efforts to be safe is bad.  Locking up criminals after they have committed a crime, requiring machinery to be safe, enforcing traffic laws, protecting people from thieves and swindlers, and some measures of gun control are wise and necessary measures.  What I am talking about is pursuing safety as the primary objective of our country. 

A fatal flaw in the philosophy of the pursuit of safety is that no law, no political party, no weapon can make us truly safe because the sin in each of us will cause us to always want what is truly bad for us. Given a choice most of us would date the bad boy or girl, smoke a pack or two of cigarettes a day, drive our car after knocking back a few drinks, sit in totally inactivity for long periods of time to watch inane programs while our brain turns to oatmeal, eat foods chock full of saturated fat and high fructose corn syrup and always unplug an electrical device by pulling on the cord while taking a bath. These are the choices we make when we have been "freed" from self-control and reason.  Furthermore, sin convinces us to wallow in our hurts and grievances, encouraging us to withhold forgiveness until it turns to bitterness and hatred, qualities which make us unsafe towards others.  You can take the person out of danger but you can't take danger out of the person*

An unintended consequence of our desire for safety is that the desire to live in a perfectly safe environment erodes our compassion.  If we are all perfectly safe, then we have no understanding of suffering and cannot offer comfort to those who are suffering because, after all, it must be their fault.  And if something bad happens to me it must be someone else's fault.  Oops, there goes forgiveness out the door also.  So we become a nation of finger-pointing, blame-shifters when trouble comes to us and hard-hearted judges when trouble comes to other people rather than being a nation of people who forgive and are forgiven and who provide comfort and aid to those who are bullied, incapacitated, helpless and/or hopeless. 

ASIDE:  Remember, I wrote the above paragraph three years ago.  Is ANY of this bringing up thoughts on our political narrative at all?  Does this resemble what we have become as a country? 

And yet another consequence that I didn't discuss initially is that, in the interest of our safety, we would take stances that effectively assume someone's guilt until proven innocence, which is happening as people want to pass laws of all kinds to prevent things from happening.  George W. Bush attacked Iraq on the pretense that they 'might' attack us with weapons of mass destruction before any evidence was presented nationally to back him up.  Muslims are locked up in Guantanamo Bay as potential terrorists or accomplices of terrorists without the benefit of a Constitutional-based trial (i.e., where the prosecution must prove the defendant's guilt beyond reasonable doubt).  Those advocating for tougher gun control laws or even an end to the 2nd amendment are effectively saying that we need to assume people will use guns for evil rather than hunting or using it to protect themselves against lunatics with guns, who seem to have a knack for getting them both legally and illegally.  Police seem to assume that black men are out to kill them because there have been so many incidences where police officers have used guns as their first line of defense, shooting to kill and black men believe that police are out to kill them because police are shooting to kill them seemingly as a reflex.  Some Americans advocate tougher immigration policies for certain groups of people or shutting down immigration altogether to prevent potential rapists, thieves, murderers and terrorists from entering the country.  Once again, prevention is impossible and there are times I wonder if we are turning people into paranoid crackpots with all the fear-mongering promoted by our politicians and the media and in our pursuit of this insane level of safety. 

As a Christian, this safety-driven philosophy also flies in the face of the gospel, which is a story of the intense suffering of one man who was executed on the cross for crimes he didn't commit.  Philippians 2:5-11 lists all of the things Jesus suffered so that we, the guilty, sin-festering slobs, could be redeemed from the death penalty we truly deserved:  He suffered to be separated from the Father and Holy Spirit; he suffered to become a helpless baby who grew to be a poor man in a small village; he suffered to become a servant, he suffered a brutal, undeserved death.  John 18:5 says that Jesus knocked down a contingent of soldiers coming to arrest him with mere words.  And yet, he submitted to their arrest, their illegal trial, torture and guilty verdict rather than walking away.  Why?  What was his motivation?  Romans 5:8 says "...God demonstrates his own love for us in this:  while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."  God continues to pour out his love for us daily and Jesus calls us to take up our cross daily and love others like he has loved us, i.e., whether they deserve it or not.  His plans for his children might include suffering for His sake or suffering for the sins of others.  In other words, Christians should be the ones pursuing an anti-safety philosophy, encouraging each other to give up the rights we feel we deserve and serve the God who so richly deserves all of our love and respect.  I know that this sounds like absolute foolishness, but I would rather be a fool for Christ than a fool worshipping at the alter of unattainable safety, always unsatisfied until I become an abject coward.

And yet, I confess that I still have fears lurking and trying to control me--fears that my kids will die unnatural deaths, that the economy will collapse, that we are only a few generations away from a tyrannical leader who can take control because Americans have been chipping away at the Constitution over the course of time in the pursuit of safety.  And yet, there are so many Bible verses encouraging us to stop being afraid and to be of good courage.  Romans 5:3-5 says "Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.  And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us."  And this gives me the power to turn away from my fears and to serve God wherever He leads me and encourage my kids and others to do the same because I know that he will either provide his protection in this life or take me/my kids/my fellow Christians to be with him forever, a place of complete, perfect safety.

Below is an afterward I wrote three years ago, but it is even more true today than it was then. 

I would like to add one more thing to this  as an afterward.  God has been making me eat these words and leave my safety/comfort zone in so many ways.  There are times when it has been very hard and frustrating and humbling.  And yet, looking back, I consider myself blessed for the experiences He has given me, the people who I have the privilege to call friends and the awe in how God works so gently and yet so persistently to open my eyes to see His vision of heaven and earth, His vision of me and those around me.  Alleluliah!

* inspired by a Baby Blues cartoon

Freaky week

I have been telling people that I suspect my kids have a plan to take turns working me to my last nerve each week, because for the first three weeks of school a different child each week stood out as particularly difficult. The only child that has not accomplished her goal in the past three weeks is my sweetest girl, though I won't name names. This week, however, I think it was God's turn, because there were too many crazy things that happened that had nothing to do with my kids:

1. Jessi found a scorpion on the leg of a kitchen chair while cleaning the kitchen. Scorpions are pretty creepy anywhere in the house, but considering how much time we spend sitting on the kitchen chairs, the thought of a scorpion's stinger inches away from a child's leg was a bit unnerving. It is now a dead scorpion, BTW.

2. While walking one night, Jacques and I encountered a dog running off leash in the golf course. His owner was there, but he ignored the commands of his owner and trotted over to where Jacques had stopped. The unfettered dog, a big boxer, proceeded to jump on Jacques, growling and acting like he wanted to rip Jacques throat. Thankfully, no blood was spilled and I hope the owner didn't mind that I tried to hit his dog on the head with my big, heavy flashlight to force him away from mine. I think the word "unnerving" also applies to this situation.

3. I left my cell phone in the Fry's food store. I knew I left it in the Fry's because my husband installed a "find phone" app on his phone and on the iPad and the GPS told us it was in the vicinity of the Fry's store. When I went, sans Eric's phone, the clueless employee I encountered hapazardly searched through the lost and found drawer for 30 seconds and couldn't find any iPhone with a fluorescent green cover on it. Thoroughly discouraged, I went home and started to walk the dog with the intent of seeing if it was just lying in the parking lot or bushes or some random location around Fry's.

4. Within a few feet of our house as I was walking Jacques, a couple of stray dogs approached us. They didn't respond to my "No. Stay AWAY." until after four or five repetitions. At this point, I realized that I was still a little freaked out by the previous dog incident and didn't want to risk any further adventures with loose dogs. I turned around and walked the 1/2 block back to my house. I asked Eric to go look for the phone. He apparently found the one useful employee there at nine-thirty p.m. who successfully located my phone and gave it to him when he proved by entering the security code that it was "his."

5. Yesterday morning, while I was trying to start up the first ever Vandertoom P.E. Co-op, some kind of police bust happened within 100 yards of our three families. Several plainclothes police officers and several more uniformed officers with big guns descended on a guy carrying a backpack and arrested him after searching through the contents of the bag. One of the moms, totally freaked out, called to the police and asked them if it was going to be safe to stay or if we should leave. The officer replied that it now safe. Aren't those comforting words? Not really. I picked the park because it is a good midway point between several families and because I usually see mom's with their kids playing at the park, not drug dealers or other criminals. It didn't occur to me much later that the guy arrested could have been carrying a gun and determined to use it to resist arrest.

All this reminds me that the world in which we live is NOT safe, no matter how hard we try to make it safe with fences, child safety equipment, pest control, seat belts, child safety seats, the CPC, air bags, airport security, police, FBI, army, navy, air force and marines. I am also reminded of what I should do when I am freaked out:

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests to God. And the peace of God, which passes all understanding shall guard your hearts in Christ Jesus." This comes from Philippians 4:6-7, which I typed from memory because our small church group is encouraging each other to memorize verses.

So, after repeating that verse and having God put things in His perspective, I am very glad and thankful this week. I am glad that my Jacques is okay, glad that my kids have keen eyesight and that scorpions don't move quickly, glad that my phone was easily found, and glad that an arrest was made without anyone having to use a gun. And I am thankful to God that He kept us safe throughout the week and humbled by the fact that I don't really even deserve His protection , but that He gives it anyway because He loves us more than we can ever imagine, for which I am most glad.

What is your definition of "safe"?

In The Princess Bride, (the book, not the movie), as Wesley leads Buttercup into the "safety" of the fire swamp, Buttercup thinks that Wesley must have learned a different definition of the word "safe."

I think Paul must have had a different definition of the word "rescue", too. In 2 Timothy 3:11, after talking about all of his trials as an apostle, he says "but the Lord rescued me from all of it." It sounds great, doesn't it? Until you read 2 Corinthians 11:24-25, when he describes how he was scourged (whipped) 39 times on five different occasions, beaten with rods on three different occasions, shipwrecked and stoned, which does not mean getting high on drugs, but means literaly having people throw stones at you until they think you are dead (though you might be only mostly dead). There is pretty good evidence that Paul wrote 2 Timothy in his last days on earth, so he was remembering all these events when he says that he was rescued. It's not exactly my definition of rescue.

Yesterday, my husband was laid off of work. We knew things weren't financially good at his company (or should I say his former company? Not yet, he is not totally off company payroll). When things first started looking shaky, we asked God if it was time to leave. "Not yet. Stay where you are", He replied. We had confirmation after confirmation after confirmation that we were to stay where we were. He promised us that He would take care of us. So is God welching on the deal? Are we, like Inigo Montoyo (you killed my father--prepare to die) and Fezzik (you ARE the brute squad), up against impossible odds to storm the castle without a true hero to help us? Hebrews 13:5 promises us that God will never leave us or forsake us. So that means that his definition of "take care of us" is slightly different than our definition, but that He is trustworthy. It means we are still right where God intends us to be and that is a very peaceful place to be.

Praise God from whom all blessings flow! Praise Him all creatures here below! Praise him all ye heavenly host! Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost!