Bovine Theology - Part Deux

So here's another Biblical debrief that I picked up from the farm.



Meditation and Rumination

Cows have 4 stomachs: the omasum, the abomasum, the rumen, and the reticulum. When a cow eats, it sends the food to the first two stomachs (the rumen and the reticulum), and there it sits while the cow rests. Later, the cow will cough up the food from the rumen and the reticulum in order to chew and to swallow it again (this is called chewing the cud). This time the food travels to the omasum and the abomasum where it is fully digested.

"Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day." -Psalm 119:97

I nanny three of the funniest kids in the world, and for some reason, they think that the bathroom is the best place to create stories. I got a little worried one day when the 6 year-old had been in there for a solid thirty minutes, so I went to check on her. I stood outside the door and heard this strange mumbling sound, so I knocked and walked in only to find that the 6 year-old had put the toilet seat completely down and was sitting on top of it guru-style humming. When I asked her what in the world she was doing, her response was that she was meditating!

Obviously, this is not the type of meditation that David had in mind in Psalm 119. He was commenting on how much he loved to reflect on God's Word. Let me remind you that David basically had the Pentateuch, so when he said that he loved the law of the Lord, he was referring to Genesis-Deuteronomy. And how often do you hear people say that they heart the book of Leviticus?

I love the Word of God! It is my bread and my drink. It nourishes, challenges, encourages, and satisfies me in a way that no one or nothing else can do. I get so absorbed in its stories thinking about how these people must have felt and what must have been going through their minds. And its teachings - I am constantly amazed at God's ability to craft all of life's details and masterfully weave them to fulfill His overarching plan for the universe. He is so big! Yet He knows me, and He wrote this love letter to you and to me in order that we might know Him and know How to live in obedience to Him.

When I think of meditating on Scripture, I picture a cow chewing the cud. While David may not have had cows in mind when he penned this verse, it captures the idea of meditation. Study or eat some Scripture, digest and reflect on it for a while, spit it up - bring it under focus again, then chew on it some more. A cow has to go through this process in order to gain the proper nourishment from its food, and by meditating and regurgitating the Word, we can get so much more nourishment from it for our soul. A cow spends 6 hours of its day eating and about 8 hours ruminating - that's 14 hours of its day! Imagine if you spent that much of your day ruminating on Scripture - how would your life be different? How would that affect the choices that you make and how you spend your time?

"I remember the days of old; I meditate on all that you have done; I ponder the work of your hands." -Psalm 143:5

Not only did David meditate on God's Word, he also meditated on what God has done. Whether it's reflecting on what He has done for you in the past or on what Scripture records regarding His actions, remembering His past acts builds our faith. We can trust that He will be just as faithful in the future as He has been in the past. David ruminated on God's steadfast love, on His justice, on His righteousness, and on so many of His other attributes.

There's one professor at school who often reminds us that we should not put our service to God ahead of our awe and adoration of God. Rather, our service should be an overflow of our love and adoration - that's when its worship. We can't adore Someone that we do not know, and in order to be in awe of God, we need to step back and consider His attributes, to consider Who He is and just how incredible He is. Meditating - consistently chewing - on God's attributes and God's acts enables us to better understand the God we serve and to know that He will never change. He will always be faithful to His Word. Chewing the proverbial cud helps increase our confidence in God's faithfulness. Holy cow!

Some Random Bovine Facts:

1. Each day, a cow will eat about 40 kg of food (that's the equivalent of 360 cheeseburgers) and drink a bathtub full of water (400-800 glasses).
2. Cows chew at least 50 times a minute.

Bovine Theology

In addition to judging chickens, I also competed on a dairy quiz bowl team in high school. While learning about SI, genetics, bovine anatomy, and milking practices, I also amassed some insights from cows about Christianity. In my teaching experiences, I have learned that attaching a concrete image to a concept increases one's ability to remember and to understand the concept, so here's some practical theology learned from the dairy.



Milking and Confession

For those of you who have never milked a cow or been around a cow prior to being milked, cows are delicate, nervous animals. On average, cows will produce 18-20 liters of milk a day, which is a lot of milk weight to be carrying around (it's equivalent to 9-10 large bottles of coke). If not milked regularly, her udder will swell, and she will experience discomfort for several days. Milking a cow relieves her of the milk's pressure in her udder. Understandably, she feels much better after having been milked.

In relation, confession is to the Christian as being milked is to the cow. When sin is not confessed to the Lord and to others, it builds up like milk in a cow's udder. It's not meant to be stored inside. It's meant to be expelled. And think of the relief that comes when the sin is no longer held on to, when all is forgiven and restoration occurs! God designed us to confess just as He designed cows to yield milk. Neither of us are meant to hold it in.

"Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another..." (James 5:16a)

"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." (1 John 1:9)

The Quintessential Square Peg

My roommate and I have had two mantras this semester: "Nobody's got it all together" and "No matter what, the Lord still sees you as righteous." I cannot express how many times I have needed those two reminders, particularly the last statement. I have learned so much about myself and about other people this semester, and I'm finally getting the chance to reflect on some of it and to make connections. This whole post stems from a conversation that my roommate and I had this past week, and the content is my synthesis of our own experiences, of conversations with countless girls, and of material from my counseling classes.

The proverbial square peg in a round hole - none of us can make ourselves fit that mold. But we try. For those of us who are perfectionists, we strive to fit the mold that we expect of ourselves or that we think others, even God, expects of us. We perceive that there is a standard to live up to, and we are determined not to fail.

But we already have. Failed, that is. Paul reminds us that "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Rm. 3:23). If God were a target, we wouldn't be able to reach Him because of our sin. It separates us. Our own actions have separated us from God. Not only that but we can do nothing to meet God's perfect standard. Any attempt to do so aligns with the facere quod mentality, which is unbiblical.

There is no mere mortal who embodies the perfect round peg that we're attempting to become. No one except Jesus. Yet so many of us have the Christian Barbie Complex. However, it is totally unrealistic to think that we could ever measure up.

I played with Barbies as a child. My favorite thing to do was to pick out clothes for them (think this was an early indicator that I would totally enjoy shopping). Glamorous outfits. Perfect hair. No blemish of any kind. Skinny as a rail. And she had a guy - Ken, who was just as perfect as Barbie. Dream house. Hot pink limo (don't judge - I was 6). Yet who has any of that? But that was the standard that was set. Those were society expectations that I observed at an early age, even though they are not grounded in reality (especially the pink limousine that had a pool in the back of it).

What is the Christian Barbie Doll? Good question. No one knows because like the plastic Matel figure, she does not exist in real life except for in the minds of countless females. No one has met her, although we often look at other women and think that they have got it all together. They don't. None of us do. And it is dangerous to play the comparison game. God didn't create you to be someone else. Only you can be yourself. God made you the way you are for a very specific reason, and He doesn't make mistakes. You reflect something about God that no one else on earth reflects, which makes you extremely unique, beautiful, and valuable. Wishing that you looked like Jessica or that you had Rebekah's talents or that you lived Sarah's life - doing this is communicating to God that you think He messed up, that His plan is faulty. Yet if His plan or His creation is imperfect, then God cannot be perfect because Someone Who is perfect cannot do anything that is imperfect. Let's get this straight - God is perfect, which means that you are who you are by His perfect design.

One of the tell-tale signs of a perfectionist is the MOANS. Listen to the words that they use in conversation. Typically, it will involve the following: must, ought, always, need, should. I ought to do this. I have to achieve that. I must be this way. There are a variety of factors for why a person is a perfectionist, but for whatever reason, they think that they have to be perfect. Christian Barbie Doll = perfect Christian. Yet to be this way is to expect more of yourself than God does. How many times is our standard for ourselves higher than God's standard?

Beware. Perfectionists make excellent guards. They patrol all of the time, often without realizing it. Keeping people at an arm's length - guarding one's self from the scrutiny of others by not letting them get close - this is necessary in order to keep up the facade of being a perfect Christian. And it is a facade. We are square pegs trying to make ourselves fit in a round hole, and no matter how well we pretend that we fit the round hole, we don't. And we can't keep up the masquerade forever. This is the fear of perfectionism - fear that someone will find you out, that someone will see you as you really are. The false bravado and the fake confidence will finally be stripped away.

Heaven forbid that anyone see our cracks, for anyone to realize that we don't know it all, that we're not superheroes, and that we don't have it all together. Does anyone truly have such expectations of us? Do we honestly expect everyone else in the world to be perfect? No! Each of us is only human. So if we can have grace with other people - accept that they are imperfect and will, thus, make mistakes and let us down - then why can't we have such grace with ourselves? God has such grace with us, and He even sees us as justified. How in the world is that possible when we are so indelibly messed up? Because when He looks at us, He sees His Son.

Let's quit whitewashing the truth about ourselves.

Sanctification. Becoming the round peg. It's what we're called to, isn't it? So how does that happen? How does this square peg become a round peg, so it can fit in the round hole? I can't do it myself. Neither can you. Only God can shape us and form us. The Fall transformed us from round to square, and only God can fix what has been broken and misshapen by sin. Only God can make us the way that He wants us to be. We do not possess the power or the ability or the will to do this on our own. It is only through the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives, molding and changing us. And it is a process - a process in which I will sometimes succeed and sometimes fail. But you know what? Even when I fail, the Lord still sees me as righteous. While this does not give us the liberty to engage in depraved lifestyles, it does free us from worrying about how the Lord views us when we do not measure up.

I have always loved to learn. However, as much as I try to do well in school, I will not ace every test or successfully complete every assignment, especially considering that I have more than one job, am involved in the ministry, and try to have a semblance of a social life. Over the years, God has reminded me that people are more important the paperwork, that school is not the most important thing in the grand scheme of life. While it is important, it is not the most important thing. Yet it kills me to do poorly. For me, doing poorly presents an inaccurate view of my learning (especially considering that most classes do not have proper assessments - trust me, I spent two years studying education and assessment theory. But that's another blog for another day...If you want to know more, start with reading Differentiated Instruction and Understanding By Design by Carol Ann Tomlinson and William McTighe). Basically, I do not consider memorizing information for a test to be learning in the pure sense of the word. Such assessments only indicate a person's ability to memorize. It does not demonstrate what they have analyzed, evaluated, processed, or synthesized from the content.

Digression ended. Returning from my mini-soapbox, the point is that there were multiple times this semester (and they usually coincided with Hebrew) when my roommate would remind me that no matter how I perform on a test or how I respond to a question - the Lord still sees me as righteous. I so needed to hear that reminder! God doesn't base His perceptions of me on my performance. While He knows my faults, weaknesses, and failures, He also knows my heart. He knows that I am His child. Like Punchinello in the Max Lucado children's book You Are Special, I need to spend time with my Maker in order to get an accurate view of myself, for God loves me just the way I am. I need to see myself as He sees me.

Any time we take our eyes off Christ, we lose perspective, and it is so easy to become consumed with naval-gazing. We allow ourselves to get distracted from the ministry and from the people that God has placed in our lives. We lose opportunities because we are so self-consumed. This prevents us from being the person Whom God has designed us to be. It harms our relationships with others. In trying to become that Christian Barbie Doll, we miss out on becoming who God wants us to be, which also means that we miss out on ministering to others. The Christian life is meant to be lived for the sake of others. And you do others a disservice and present them with an inadequate portrayal of God and Christianity when you are not being the real you and when you are not where you need to be in relation with God. Being self-consumed prevents you from engaging in ministry (or if you do "ministry," it's to meet your own needs or to gratify your own desires and has little to do with God or others because it's all about you).

In John 15:4-5, Jesus commands His disciples to abide in Him, and being in relationship with Him enables Him to mold us, to shave off our square edges. We have to yield control to Him. Essentially, we decide whether or not we trust Him, and if we trust Him, then we can and will submit to His Lordship and yield control of our lives to Him. It seems like risky business. But it's not - because it is God Who is sovereign over all.

Christianity is not performance-based spirituality. Even though James 2 teaches that faith without works is dead, the Christian life is not supposed to be consumed with our performance, how much we do. It is about love. As 1 Corinthians 13 communicates, if we do not love, then we are nothing. How can we love others if we do not love the One Who gave Himself for us? Our passion for God is directly related to our love and our passion for people, including ourselves. Works are supposed to be an overflow of our love for our God, stemming from our relationship with God. It is our connection with God that gives us the impetus to serve others, to aid the poor, and to do good works. Knowing who we are, grasping that we are made in the image of God and all that this means for us and for our self-worth and for how valuable that makes us - once we understand who we are in relationship to God, we can understand who we are in relationship to others. And we can realize that God is not about our performance. He's about our heart. He's about our connection to Him, our abiding with Him. As we do this, He will be working in us, sanctifying us. As we spend time with Him, He will be conforming us to His image.

***Disclaimer: I am not saying that it is wrong for girls to have or to play with Barbie dolls. It is important, however, for girls to understand that they are not expected to look like Barbie. God has made each of us just the way we are, and He has formed us in His image. Our self-worth comes from Him alone - it should not come from any expectation of society, culture, media, or people.

When the Answer is "No"

There is a matter that has been a personal prayer concern for this whole semester. It is something that I have prayed for on a weekly, if not a daily, basis, for the past three months. In fact, I had spent a good bit of time yesterday really praying and seeking the Lord's face, and last night, I got my answer. It was a resounding "no."

Let's be real. It's not always easy to get a "no." Sometimes, it hurts. Especially when it's something that you've prayed long and hard for.

There is relief in finally getting answer. But sometimes, it's not always the answer that you want to hear.

In relation, the beloved father of a friend of mine was diagnosed with cancer my junior year of high school, and for four years, our whole faith family prayed that God would heal him. He had such a testimony, was such a light in our community, and God was using his cancer as a platform to share the Gospel. God specifically burdened my heart for this family, and I was constantly lifting up prayers on their behalf. It weighed on my mind and my heart. I remember when I found out that he died. All I could do was get into my truck and drive home sobbing. It was a heart-wrenching "no" to the numerous prayers issued by his family, our church, the community, and myself. I wasn't even his child or related to him, so I cannot even imagine the depth of his family's pain.

A "no" is not always easy to hear, but as painful as it can be, it should garner our response of praise to God. When I seek the wisdom of the Father, I have to respect His answer because there is wisdom in His "no." There is love in His "no." There are factors and variables of whose existence I am not even aware, but He is certainly aware of them all. He knows the plan that He has for all of creation and how each person's role ties into His overarching design. He knows what He has planned for my life and for the lives of others. He knows what needs to happen for that plan to be effected. He knows what I need to learn. He knows what will distract me from His purpose. He knows everything. So how can I be upset with His "no" when He knows best? How can I be upset with His "no" when I know that He loves me? I can praise God when I receive a "no" because His plans are better than mine. Because His thoughts are higher than mine. He knows all, and He is sovereign. So even though a "no" hurts and even though my heart is quite bruised at such a response, there is hope. I know that there is hope because I know in Whom I hope. I know that He is enough. He is sufficient.

"For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth." -Job 19:25

"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart." -Jeremiah 29:11-13

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." -Isaiah 55:8-9

Poultry and a Savior

A white leghorn hen peering at you with its beady eyes from behind its wired cage...There are only so many minutes for you to examine four different hens and to rate their production ability with enough information to explain your rationale to a judge. The clock is ticking. Hens are clucking. Beating heart, sweaty palms, rapid breathing - the competition is fierce.

Analyzing the hen's persistency and intensity is what guides your decision. Check for pigment in the vent, eye ring, ear lobe, beak, bottoms of feet, shanks, and tops of hock and toes, for as hens lay eggs, they lose pigment in this order of body parts. Firmly but not too quickly (you don't want to scare the bird), you open the cage and pin the bird down, ensuring that your hands cover her wings so they don't flap you in the face. Turning the hen so she comes out head first, you tuck her to your side as if you were carrying a football. After measuring the finger-space between the hen's pubic and keel bone then between the two pubic bones (the wider the better), you feel the hen's abdomen (assessing the handling quality), check for molt (molt = poor producer), and return the hen to her cage.

Confession: I was a Tift County 4-H poultry judger for 5 years. Not only that, but my team won the 2003 national 4-H poultry judging contest (you can Google it if you don't believe me). Live birds and reasons was my specialty. Do I look like a farm girl? Not at all. Yet I drove a truck ('01 Chevy Silverado), went mud-bogging, made redneck bombs, competed on a dairy quiz bowl team, and judged chickens. You never can tell about people...

I love Christmas! Hands down - it is my favorite time of the year. December 26 = Day 1 of Christmas shopping for the next year. End of September- the Christmas music comes out. Beginning of October, I try to watch a different Christmas movie a week (White Christmas is my fave!). I can never wait until Christmas Day to give people their presents. So it's no surprise that my favorite Bible story is found in Luke 1.

In Luke 1:26-38, the angel Gabriel appears to Mary, who, up to that point, had been just an average young Jewish girl. God chose her - I don't know why. Why does He choose any of us? A teenage girl engaged to a carpenter chosen to be the mother of the Messiah. Who would believe it? But you never can tell about people...

Gabriel made a point to address Mary as the "favored one" (Lk. 1:28). Mary wasn't some paragon of virtue. I'm quite sure she never expected to play such a prominent role in salvation history. She simply lived out her faith in obedience to God. Yet she had God's favor! Out of all women, God selected her for this very special task - not because of who she was but because of Who He is. Mary was an obscure individual with nothing to recommend her for such a great task, yet God casted her to carry the Word in her womb. All of the heroes of the faith - Abraham, Moses, Rahab, David, Mary, etc. - who were they before God reached down and raised them up from their lowly positions? You never can tell about people...

"And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end" (Lk. 1:31-32 - ESV).

Immanuel. "God with us." God pleased with us to dwell. For God to leave the splendor of Heaven to spend nine months in a womb then be born in such a sin-scarred world - how incredible! The Maker of all things allowed Himself to be made a man. The glory of God encased in a man-child. The Helper and Savior of all came as a helpless babe.

"So the Word became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father's one and only Son" (Jn. 1:14 - NLT).

A baby boy born in a dreary cave on a dark night amidst great scandal to parents of no consequence on tax day - He to be the Savior of the World? I guess you never can tell about people...

"Glory to God in the highest," (Lk. 2:14a).

Invested in the Eternal

What is life but a collection of vaporous moments? I've been entrenched in Genesis, and in verse 1 of chapter 23, Sarah, Abraham's princess and the matriarch of Israel, dies. While spending a week studying and mourning the death of a woman who lived eons ago, I braved a week of finals - a week that did not go as I had planned, and as a Type A perfectionist, I do my best to plan everything. Ecclesiastes 3:11 states that God has planted eternity in the heart of man. We know that we are meant for more than this. The temporal, the finite - this is not the end, there is more. We wrestle with this, and many do not acknowledge it. But the knowledge is in the heart of man. Truth does not have to be acknowledged in order to be truth. It is what it is. It is not dependent on anything external. My believing in it does not make it so.

Vaporous moments. Life. It is what it is. And only what's done for God will last. When Amy Carmichael was walking the streets of Ireland, she was awakened to her otherworldly calling with the passage of Scripture stating, "Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide..." (1 Cor. 3:12-14a). Amy resolved to live a life invested only in what would eternally abide.

Do I live each day, each moment, as if it were a vapor? Do I measure my actions according to the plumb line of eternal significance? Sweet tea is an essential in my house (and for anyone who is not aware - for it to be considered "sweet" tea, there must be at least 1 1/2 - 2 cups of sugar per gallon). As the water boils on the stove, steam rises then dissipates. C'est la vie. Such is life. Womb to tomb - over in an instant. And how is it measured? What was the contribution of the life to the work of God? More important than how will the person be remembered is how faithful were they to invest in the eternal? In John 15:4-5, Jesus informs His disciples that, unless they are connected to Him, they cannot do anything of spiritual import. In order for our life to result in fruit that will eternally abide, we must spend our earthly time abiding in the Eternal One.

Only one life. It is but a breath. I don't want to waste it, but living out this desire is a battle between my flesh and my spirit as Paul references in Romans 7:13-25. Desires, convictions, beliefs - what do they matter unless acted upon? Faith without works is meaningless (James 2:20).

I have 24 years to my credit. Sarah lived to be 127. By faith, she left her home, her family, and everything that was familiar in order to follow her husband as he obeyed God - a God she had not heard, could not see, and was not able to touch. Ridiculous! About 60 years of her life were spent wandering. All of her possessions and her tent were with her, but she never settled. The first real estate her husband owned post-Ur was her burial plot (Gen. 23), and this was the only land he ever physically owned in the land promised to him by God.

God's promises. He promised a land that they saw but could not have. 90 years of barrenness, and He promised not only a child but a nation of descendants. While at the age of 90, Sarah gave birth to "Laughter," but when she died, Isaac was 37, still single, and living at home. Not a very promising start when a multitude of people are supposed to come from you. But God's promises were so sure that they could be spoken of in the past tense, as if they had already come to pass. And the promises were fulfilled. Sarah just didn't live to see them this side of Heaven. But a life invested in the eternal does not have to see it to believe it. Believing is seeing. She lived her life in faith, which means that she lived her life in obedience. Perfect obedience? Perfect faith? Hardly. But looking at the big picture of her life, Sarah faithfully walked in obedience to God.

127 years - it doesn't seem like a vapor, but in comparison to eternity, it rushes by. It is but a dot on an infinite line. I want my dot to count. I want it to matter. Live life on purpose and with purpose. No matter how daily life can be, I should not take it for granted. I am not guaranteed more than the breath that is exiting my lungs at this very moment. My Sustainer numbered my days before the creation of time. He organized the dot of my life into His masterpiece of redemptive history at this specific time and place for a reason (Eph. 3:10). He formulated the perfect plan for my life - completely mapped it out - and he has orchestrated all of it for the purpose of His glory. It reminds me of the Marauder's Map. He can see where everyone is at all times. Unlike the work of Mooney, Wormtail, Padfoot, & Prongs, He not only sees our steps, He knows them in advance, for His knowledge of us is not limited (Ps. 139). What a comfort! I may have no clue what happens after graduation or who I will marry or what to cook for dinner - He knows it all. Not only that, but the Creator of the universe actually cares about the mundane in my life! It is not mundane to Him! This one dot in the expanse of eternity - my Creator cares about me! Such works are too marvelous for me to comprehend - they are too high!

He knows all, and He is over all. I like to be in control, but I'm not. He is - perfectly so. I may stress about a class, but in the scope of the eternal, is that really what's important? Conditioning myself to receive what He has planned with a grateful and fervent heart - praise has been the instrument through which I am learning not just to demonstrate appreciation of what God has done in the past but to be a risk-taker (not easy for a control freak to do) by praising Him in advance for what He has planned for the future. It's perfect. He's sovereign. So why do I worry? This dot so easily loses sight of the Eternal. I need glasses. I need spiritual help to focus on spiritual things. I need God. I can't do any of this without Him, nor do I need to live this life without Him being preeminent. He's the reason for this fleeting life, and may He be honored and praised by my collection of vaporous moments.

"Set your mind on things above, not on earthly things" (Col. 3:2).