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Mexico highway 190 passes in front of FFHM’s home for needy children in Oaxaca, Mexico. For the last six months or so, hundreds of migrants from Central America and South America have walked down that highway making their way to the United States. Many are motivated to make the long trek by fear of dying in their homeland, oppression, economic downturns or simply a hope of a better life. I see mostly men, but also a lot of women and children, almost everyday, walking, walking, walking north, down Mexico highway 190. Here is a lament for them.
Oh, Sovereign God, we lift our voices in lament, For those who flee, in anguish, their homelands rent. In lands of strife, where war’s cruel embrace, Forces hearts to abandon, seeking a safer space.
In shadows of oppression, where fear takes its toll, Families shattered, dreams crushed, a heavy toll. They embark on a journey, through the unknown, Desperate souls, seeking a place to call their own.
Through perilous seas and treacherous lands they roam, Hoping for refuge, a glimpse of a welcoming home. Children, wide-eyed, their innocence scarred, By the harshness of a world deeply marred.
Oh, God of mercy, hear our solemn cry, For those who suffer, beneath the unforgiving sky. May your compassion guide them through the night, A beacon of hope, a source of eternal light.
Grant strength to the weary, solace to the pained, A haven of peace, where love is regained. In the midst of chaos, let justice prevail, And may the winds of freedom fill each sail.
May nations unite with hearts compassionate, To ease the burdens of those in a dire state. In this lament, we seek your divine grace, For a world where all can find a dwelling place.
Oh, Comforter Divine, embrace those in despair, Bring healing to wounds, and answer every prayer. In the symphony of sorrow, let hope resound, Until every refugee’s feet find solid ground.
“I was a stranger, and you took me in.” Matthew 25:35
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Lord God, help us to remember those who tonight will go to sleep unfed and unwelcome,
strangers in foreign lands, people who have fled for their lives and are far from their homes.
We lift up to you those who are escaping persecution and conflict, having fled death, torture or ruthless exploitation.
So many carry wounds, mental and physical. So many have suffered greatly.
Lord Jesus, give us more of your compassion for their plight, soften our hearts to their situation,
and help us follow your lead in seeking justice and mercy on their behalf.
We pray for an end to the wars, poverty and human rights abuses that drive desperate people to become refugees in the first place.
We give thanks for people working in troubled countries and ask for more of
your blessing so we can bring life, dignity and hope to those that remain.
We thank you that you are Lord of all the earth and all its people are loved by you.
We pray these things in the name of your Son who loves us and gave his life for us. For all of us.
My first blog post was January 1, 2013. I call my blog To Enjoy God, and for 10 years I have been writing about how God loves us and wants us to be happy. That idea moves me, stimulates me and keeps me going from day to day. That idea is on almost every page of the Bible, if you look hard enough. But there is another concept found throughout scripture that most of us would rather ignore for the most part, including me, and that is LAMENT. Many times a season of lament is the dark tunnel that people have to go through before they come out into the sunlight of God’s peace and joy.
This year I want to write about lament, ponder lament, read laments in the Bible and elsewhere and share laments in this blog. 52 laments is my goal, one for every week. Laments that take a broad look at a dark, sinful, painful world, and laments that consider the heart of one lonely child. Laments that speak to the issues of war and violence, and laments that lean into anxiety and fear.
Lamenting is not a popular thing to do. Many don’t know exactly what a lament is. I like this definition of lament:
In a Christian context, lament refers to a passionate expression of grief, sorrow, or mourning. It is a form of prayer or song that acknowledges pain, suffering, or injustice, while also turning to God with a sense of trust and hope. Lamentations in the Bible, especially in the Psalms, exemplify this expression of deep emotion and a plea for God’s mercy and intervention in difficult circumstances. Lament is seen as a way for believers to honestly bring their struggles before God while maintaining faith in His goodness and sovereignty.
Here is my first lament offering for 2024.
In the quiet chambers of my heart, I lament, O Lord, For the brokenness that stains a world deeply scarred. A fractured landscape of pain and strife, A symphony of suffering, echoing through life.
In the quiet corners where shadows dwell, Broken dreams and stories too painful to tell. Nations at war, hearts torn apart, A reflection of a world far from Your heart.
The cries of the oppressed, the marginalized unheard, In the brokenness of systems, justice deferred. Poverty’s grip, a relentless hold, A tale of inequality, stark and bold.
Nature groans, creation in despair, Exploited and wounded, it bears and forbears. Environmental echoes of our reckless ways, In the brokenness of ecosystems, we see our strays.
In this lament, Lord, I lift my gaze, To Your mercy and love that never decays. For in the brokenness, there’s a glimmer of grace, A divine plan unfolding, a redemptive embrace.
May our hands be instruments of healing and peace, In the brokenness, may compassion increase. Restore what’s been shattered, make all things new, For in Your love, redemption breaks through.
In this lament, I send up my plea, For a world made whole, where all are free. May Your kingdom come, Your will be done, In the midst of brokenness, let Your victory be won.
Psalm 34:18 (NIV):
“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”
In the midst of shattered dreams and harsh realities, we turn to the assurance that God is near. His presence is a balm for the brokenhearted, and in His closeness, we find hope and reconciliation. As we lament the brokenness, may we trust in the promise that the Lord is intimately connected to those who bear the weight of a wounded world.
In the book of Isaiah, we find a beautiful promise of gladness and joy. Isaiah 35 paints a vivid picture of a redeemed and restored people. It’s a passage that reminds us of the incredible hope we have in the Lord, even in the midst of life’s trials and tribulations.
The Journey of Redemption
Isaiah 35 speaks of a journey, a journey of redemption. In life, we all experience moments when our path seems rugged and our hearts heavy. We encounter deserts of despair, where hope appears distant, and joy feels elusive. But the beauty of this passage is that it reminds us that the journey doesn’t end in the desert.
Here at the home for needy children in Oaxaca, Mexico, I see children everyday whose lives were nothing but deserts of despair and hope and joy were only a distant dream. But God’s hand was on their lives and their journey brought them here, an oasis in their wilderness. Here they encounter the love of God and begin to enjoy happiness and hope. They encounter redemption.
The Destination of Joy
Isaiah prophesies that the redeemed will return to Zion with singing. Imagine the joyous procession, voices raised in praise, hearts overflowing with gratitude. This is a picture of our ultimate destination as believers. No matter how challenging the road may be, it leads to a place of eternal joy in the presence of the Lord.
Everlasting Joy
One of the most comforting aspects of this passage is the promise of everlasting joy. In a world where happiness can be fleeting and temporary, God offers us a joy that knows no end. It’s not based on circumstances but on our relationship with Him. This joy is a wellspring deep within us, sourced from the love and grace of our heavenly Father.
Gladness and Joy Overtake Sorrow
Isaiah also tells us that gladness and joy will overtake us, while sorrow and sighing will flee away. This is a powerful image of the transformative power of God’s love. No matter how heavy our burdens, no matter how deep our sorrows, God’s joy has the power to overwhelm them.
The kids here at Casa Hogar have come out of a multitude of desert experiences and have taken God’s promises to heart and are experiencing new lives filled with joy and peace. Today, let us all take these promises to heart. In our own desert experiences, let us remember that our journey doesn’t end there. We are on a path of redemption, and it leads to a place of everlasting joy. Even in the midst of challenges, we can experience God’s gladness and joy overtaking our sorrows.
As we meditate on Isaiah 35:10, let us hold fast to our faith. Let us trust in the Lord’s promises, knowing that He is faithful to bring us through the desert into a place of abundant joy. May this joy be our strength and our song, and may it shine brightly in our lives, drawing others to the hope we have in Christ.
“It is the Lord’s Day; my wish is fulfilled. I have always desired to die on a Sunday.” General Stonewall Jackson, Confederate Leader
Stonewall Jackson was accidently wounded by his own men at the battle of Chancellorsville in 1863. He suffered for a few days before he died. He was told by his doctor on Sunday, May 10, that he would probably not last the day. Later that day General Pendleton stopped by to tell him that all his troops were praying for him. That was when Jackson, in a sense, said that his prayer was already answered, for he had “always desired to die on a Sunday.”
Josefina Maceda, my mother-in-law, my Madre, died this last Sunday at the children’s home in Oaxaca, Mexico. I don’t know if it was a desire of hers to die on the Lord’s Day, but I wouldn’t be surprised. She loved the Lord’s Day. She loved going to the House of God to worship her Savior. It’s comforting to know that she is enjoying God eternally in His celestial House.
Saturday morning, as is my want, I read a chapter from Proverbs. It was chapter 28. I read a couple of verses that were at first comforting, and then disturbing, and then encouraging once again.
Verse 20 says, “A faithful person will be richly blessed…”
Verse 25 says, “those who trust in the Lord will prosper.”
I have always liked those verses and highlighted them in my Bible many years ago. But this time, I doubted. I know of few people who faithfully trusted in the Lord like Madre. Yet she didn’t seem to be richly blessed and prospering. She had been bed ridden for at least a week. In pain. Skin and bones. Every breath a groan.
I thought if that is what it means to be richly blessed and prospering, then I’ll pass, thank you very much!
I took my doubts to God. God reminded me of Romans 12:1-2, especially the part where Paul writes, ” Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
God was telling me that faithful people who trust in the Lord have renewed minds. They don’t think like the world does. They have different definitions for things like blessings and what it means to prosper. The world thinks money, power and health are what prospering is all about. God says we prosper and are blessed when we love others deeply and are loved deeply by others and have a hope that will never fade away. Madre had all those.
That put a new light on things, and I saw that even in the midst of her suffering, she was truly blessed and prospering. She was surrounded by family that she deeply loved and who deeply loved her. She had deeply loved and blessed people from all over the world – United States, Canada, Germany and Japan, to name just a few. These people have been showing their deep love for her ever since she received the cancer diagnosis by supporting her with financial help and prayers. One neighbor came the last month of her life, almost everyday for at least an hour to pray with her, for her, and to sing to her, even though Madre couldn’t respond most of the time during her last days.
Looking at the situation from that Godly, renewed mind-point of view, I came to the realization that she was indeed richly blessed and prospering beyond all measure. I will take that blessing everyday and twice on Sunday!
Right before General Stonewall Jackson breathed his last, his doctor recorded that “Presently a smile of ineffable sweetness spread itself over his pale face.”
I had never been with someone when they died before. I’m glad to say I got to be with Madre. And I was glad to see that just before she went home to the Father, she too smiled a smile of ineffable sweetness. It was as if she saw the Lord, like Stephen did in Acts 7, welcoming her into his eternal Kingdom with outstretched arms.
These last few days I have been thinking a lot about what Paul wrote to the Romans in chapter eight, verses 18 and 23.
“I consider that our present sufferings are not worthy to be compared with the glory that will be revealed in us…We who have the firstfruits of the Spirit groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.”
If only we all had that attitude and perspective. What a way to live! What a way to die!
What is it about planting a tree that makes the world a little more beautiful, and the person who plants it a little more hopeful about the future?
Maybe it’s the idea that, given the right conditions, the tree will grow. The tree will grow bigger than the person who plants it. Usually much bigger. Planting a tree reminds us that there are things bigger than ourselves. And the tree will live a long time, probably longer than the person who put it in the ground. Planting trees reminds us that we have good things to look forward to.
And the tree will occupy a space that otherwise might have been bare, or ugly or choked with weeds, and will bring a type of beauty to that space that will be hard to match as the years go by. Planting trees also makes our inner space more beautiful.
And the person who plants the tree, the planter, will look at the tree, gaze at the tree, and will have a sense of the past, present and future, all at once. The planter will remember when his or her hands dug out some dirt from the earth to make a little hole, placed a sapling in the hole, and tucked the little tree into its place, tamping the dirt gently around its tender roots. The planter will also see how beautiful the tree is at the present. “My how it has grown” and imagine what it will look like as it continues to mature – five, ten or fifteen years down the line. And the planter will smile.
Perhaps some of these thoughts were running through Martin Luther’s head when he wrote about planting his apple tree in an uncertain time. Maybe he was thinking of his God who gives strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow. Maybe he was thinking that he might not be around for too many more tomorrows, but his apple tree would.
Last Sunday, a group of Venezuelans, who live in Oaxaca, Mexico, came to the home for needy children to plant some trees. One hundred and three to be exact. They invited the children to help them and the kids responded with great enthusiasm. It was a blessed, happy thing to see adults and kids, Mexicans, Americans and Venezuelans, males and females, all working together to not only make this children’s home a more beautiful place, but the world a better place.
And to make their hearts a better space.
He that plants trees, loves others besides himself. Thomas Fuller
God loves us and wants us to be happy. This verse from Romans emphasizes that truth. Notice it does not say, “May the God of misery fill you with all despair and anguish as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hopelessness by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
No, it is all about being filled with all joy and peace and overflowing with hope. If there are three words in our vocabulary that are the essence of happiness, they must be joy, peace and hope. And Paul’s prayer is that his readers would not just possess a little bit of joy here, and a taste of peace there with a smidge of hope thrown in. No. He wants his readers to be filled with all joy and peace and overflow with hope.
How is that accomplished? Paul says it comes from trusting in God. Trusting in God like a little baby trusts in its parents. Trusting in God so deeply that, like a baby, you don’t even realize how much you are trusting him. Sometimes when I am praying, I will all of a sudden say “Goo, Goo – Ga Ga”, just to remind myself of how much I truly depend on him for every little thing I have, like bread, breath and water. It also reminds me of my insignificant knowledge in comparison to the infinite knowledge of our omniscient Father. There are so many things that I don’t understand about life and God, that I would like to understand, but I can’t. Then I get this image of Einstein trying to explain the theory of relativity to a toddler. There is no way the toddler can understand. Like me. There’s no way I can understand a lot of the things that I would like God to explain to me. So I say, “Goo, goo – ga ga”, and go on happily trusting God.
So let’s trust in Lord; taste and see that God is good, all the time, and celebrate the fact that our Father in heaven loves us and wants us to be happy.
As you may have heard, there is a somewhat important and rather contentious election coming up in a few days. A record number of people have already voted. A record number of people are anxious about the outcome. It seems everybody in the United States is pinning their hopes on one of the candidates for President to win and save America.
Worldwide, the corona virus pandemic is growing, infecting and killing more people than ever before. After a summer reprieve, infections are surging, breaking daily records. Germany, France, Spain and Italy, to name just a few countries, are announcing shutdowns to try and get the virus under control. The United States stills leads the world with 8.8 million reported corona virus cases and more than 227,000 people dead from the disease. Everyone is hoping that they or their friends or family members don’t get infected and that an effective vaccine will be available soon.
Financially speaking, the stock market lost about 900 points recently and the unemployment rate is 7.9 percent. Millions have lost their jobs and are struggling mightily to make ends meet, hoping to get back on their feet as soon as possible.
Hope. Everyone is hoping for something, or rather, a lot of somethings. From meeting daily necessities to finding a job, to ending climate change and desiring world peace. Usually though, what people hope for is a bit more mundane.
For example, I am on the school board of my daughters school here in Oaxaca, Mexico. Sometimes, especially in the age of corona virus, the zoom board meetings can drag on as long as four hours. Before our last meeting I was hoping it wouldn’t go on so long. I was hoping we could get it over with within a couple of hours. As I was considering this desire, some verses from Galatians, which I have been studying lately, came to mind.
Galatians chapter five has a surprising number of references to the Spirit. Most Christians are aware of the fruit of the Spirit, found in verses 22 and 23 (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control). But Paul also refers to the Spirit in verses 5, 16,17,18 and 25. He uses phrases like “through the Spirit”, “walk by the Spirit”, “led by the Spirit”, “live by the Spirit” and “keep in step with the Spirit”. In chapter six he mentions “pleasing the Spirit.”
Pondering this emphasis on the Spirit, I had to ask myself, “If you are walking by the Spirit, and led by the Spirit and living by the Spirit, what is the best you could be hoping for?”
This question caused me to take a step back and realize that most of the things I hope for are all about ME, and not so much about the SPIRIT.
Initially, considering the board meeting. I was hoping it would be shorter than normal because I don’t like board meetings at all, let alone long ones. And especially not long, zoom board meetings! I don’t enjoy them. There are a lot of activities I would rather be taking part in that make me happier than board meetings.
But looking at my attitude towards these meetings, with an eye towards pleasing the Spirit, I was struck by the thought that what I should truly be hoping for was a new attitude!
I have come to see that my hopes should be shaped and informed by the fruit of the Spirit and life in the Spirit. I should hope that our meetings will be full of love for one another and the families that we represent. That my goal, our goal, should be one of trying to bring joy to children and peace to parents who are struggling with zoom learning, home schooling and long distance education. My desire should be to have patience with those other board members with whom I disagree; to show self control in times of disagreement.
The more I thought about the Spirit, the fruit and my hopes, the more I became aware that I need to hope not so much about happenings and the outcome of events, but I to hope that I am walking by the Spirit and led by the Spirit in my inner being. I should hope that my attitude is pleasing to the Spirit regarding everything in life, including the election results, corona virus and my economic situation.
I don’t just want to do the right thing, but I want to think right thoughts, Spirit led thoughts, in every aspect of my life, from the mundane to the sublime. Paul writes in Galatians 5:5, “For through the Spirit we eagerly await by faith the righteousness for which we hope.”
Righteousness is not just doing right, but thinking right. We all struggle with those two aspects of life everyday. We all want to think right thoughts which will lead to right behavior, which leads to happiness. And we all know that God loves us and wants us to be happy, which is why he gave us his Word and his Spirit.
By the grace of God, I will be full of the Word and Spirit and full of the joy of the Lord. I hope.
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