The Power of a Reading Mom

There was something so familiar in that voice that it was almost mesmerizing.  My mom was co-teaching a class at Cairn University with me this past week and she was reading a letter from one of our interns.  As she read, I was swept away to a different time and place when I was only a child and loved to hear that same voice.  It was strong and confident and made the words so real.  I would often get lost in the stories and find myself imagining that I was actually in Narnia or some other imaginary land that she introduced me to.  This wonderful voice would  animate the books that I read as a child as I could hear her reading in my head even as I was simply reading on my own.  Her voice became the soundtrack of my reading world and made my books seem so much more interesting.   I loved to watch my friends as they heard my mom read to us and see them discover how a book could really sound.  Many of them became book lovers too.

Far too soon, I went off to boarding school and began to live life far from that wonderful voice.  No matter the distance between us, I knew one thing for sure; my Mom would be praying for me in that very same voice.   We would write to each other (long before e-mail) and I would imagine her reading my letters out loud to my Dad and how different they would sound in her melodic tone.  To this day, my siblings and I remember our family devotions as times of excitement and joy as Mom would choose a new book to read that we had never heard before or revisit one of our old favorites.  God’s Word never sounded the same when other people read it.  Somehow, it seemed to come alive in startling ways when she took the Bible in her hands.

Many years ago, a group of reading and praying moms were asking God for something very specific.  They wanted a Christian bookstore in there part of Philadelphia.  More importantly, they wanted access to books they could read to their own children and to be able to share their love for great Christian literature.  In God’s timing, the CLC team in Fort Washington decided to move a bookstore from the headquarters campus to the very part of the city that these women lived in.   God answered that prayer and generations of children have been impacted by this lighthouse in the city.

Tonight, I ventured out into the city to meet with a small group of African American women who had invited me to speak.  Once again, praying moms want access to Christian books to make sure this generation gets to hear the gospel through the words of the Bible and other wonderful Christian books.  Their passion and excitement for reading was evident from the moment I arrived.  Many of them recalled the names of books that had meant so much in their lives.  As a special treat, I was able to bring my mom along to this gathering and she got to speak as well.  Her belief in the power of the printed page has never changed and she inspired every other woman in the room.   Who knows how many more kids will now grow up to be lifelong readers as a result of the passion for reading that these women will share. 

How Do You Say “I Love You” After 25 Years

She was in my seat or so I thought.  As it turned out, she was simply leaning across my chair to chat with the interesting guy next to me.  Little did I know how fortuitous that day in September of 1985 would turn out to be.  This intriguing girl struck up a conversation with me and we have been talking ever since.   Four years after this first conversation, we got married and we will celebrate our twenty- fifth wedding anniversary this coming June.

Marriage is complicated and staying married in America is a 50/50 proposition these days.  While love is only one component in a successful marriage it is an important one.  In I Corinthians 13, the Bible says, “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.”  If that verse is referring to all our human relationships, how much more does it apply to marriage? 

If there is one thing I have learned (and I am a slow learner in this area), love in marriage is so much more than the words we speak.  As my grandmother used to say, “Actions speak louder than words” and this has proven to be ever so true in our marriage.  On this Valentine’s Day weekend I thought I would share a few ways love is expressed at this stage in our relationship

• Love Is – Noticing the laundry basket in the hall and taking it downstairs to the washing machine before she notices it and maybe even starting the first load.  We sometimes refer to this as the “laundry elf” at work.

• Love Is – Doing the Saturday morning errands together just because we like each other’s company.

• Love Is – Reading different books together and stopping half way through to share why we loved or hated the book we are in.

• Love Is – Knowing that she will always read the last chapter of every book to see if it has a satisfactory ending and making sure you have done the same before ever attempting to buy her a book.

• Love Is – Listening to that nagging cough and making sure that he or she actually goes to see a doctor about it this time.

• Love Is – Committing to going to the gym for the third time in a week when neither of us really feels like it.

• Love is – Choosing to face fear together and actually talk about those things that are easier left unsaid.

• Love is – Confronting those ugly sins that seem so persistent and doing it with patience that only comes from God.

• Love is – still wanting to be with each other more than anyone else even if we are not talking at all.

• Love Is – reminding each other that there is always one relationship more important than ours and that spending time with our maker is not optional, but essential to our lives.

When we were first married, we often talked about the idea of “growing old together”.  Now that we have done some of that growing and are definitely older, it is certainly true that love does get richer and more meaningful with every passing year.  I cannot imagine doing life with anyone else and look forward to the next twenty five years of getting to know this intriguing girl who is still the best listener I have ever met.

 

Will It Ever End?

There are some things in life that seem to be never ending – like the winter we are experiencing in Pennsylvania this year.  It started early and has never seemed to let up.  Given my propensity to dislike everything about this season every year (I can’t help the fact that I grew up in the Caribbean); I get particularly bent out of shape when there seems to be no end in sight.  As usual, God knows that and sent us a curve ball this week.  First we had a deep heavy snow and then a massive ice storm resulting in many trees and tree limbs coming down and widespread power outages in our area.  Despite the fact that we never lost power during the storm when many hundreds of thousands of our neighbors did, I was still grumpy.

On Friday morning, I was walking up the driveway to a prayer meeting we hold once a month with our sister mission, WEC International.  As I was looking at the piles of snow on either side of the road and trying not to slip and fall on black ice, I noticed something.  Right along the side of the road someone had plowed wider than normal and exposed the ground.  That might not sound like a big deal, but given that we have not seen much of the ground at all this winter, I was startled for a moment.  Then it hit me, it was almost as if God were smiling down on me at that very moment.  This small patch of ground is actually pretty important to me and my family.  That exact spot is where, for a few brief weeks each summer, a beautiful patch of Tiger Lilies springs out of the earth to reflect the glory of their creator.

I can’t control the weather.  I can’t control the snow and ice.  I can’t control the flowers or the plants.  But, I serve a God who controls all three.

Somehow this brief moment of levity with God smiling down on me reminded me that he has imbedded the very story of the gospel into the cycles of nature that He created.  The death and destruction of the winter always leads to the beauty and flourishing of the spring.  Jesus’ death and agony on the cross produce the same life, joy and flourishing in those He came to save.   How quickly I forget as a stare out my window at the trees with no leaves and the never ending piles of snow and ice. 

Finding joy in the midst of the seasons of life that bring “never ending” struggles requires us to find patches of ground with no snow.  We have to be reminded over and over again who God really is and who we are created to be.   This week, I attended a memorial service for a young man in our community who took his own life.  At that service, one of the speakers said something remarkably profound.  In attempting to answer the question on everyone’s mind, “Why did this happen?” he said, “For one brief tragic moment this young man forgot why God put him on this earth.”  How easy it is for all of us to do that and make monumental mistakes as a result. 

This week, I will be looking for more patches of earth, but I may have to wait a few weeks for the first flowers to poke their heads through.  It is nice to know that in God’s time they will always bloom every year and I bet He enjoys watching the smile on my face when I see them for the first time.

Flourishing in the City

Driving down Broad Street is a feast for the eyes.  There is so much going on at all times that it can almost be overwhelming to take in.  With pedestrians swarming from all sides and traffic patterns changing on a regular basis, it is tempting to keep your head down, eyes focused on the road and ignore what is going on around you.  When I first came to Philadelphia, that was my tendency too.  If I did look up it was to notice the dilapidation, crumbling buildings and stores that were closed.

A few years ago, I began a new habit.  I started looking up.  It was easy to see the things that were dead or dying, but harder to notice the new and thriving.  This week as I was driving down Broad Street, I nearly had to stop and pull over because of what I saw.  On a building that had been boarded up and abandoned at the intersection with Lehigh Street was a huge mural with the word RISE on in bold colors.  It was so big it could be seen from blocks away.  I couldn’t get the image out of my head and was sure to look for the building again as I drove back up Broad Street from my appointment and suddenly noticed the word SHINE on the opposite side of the building in letters that were just as big, bold and beautiful.   This wonderful project completed by the mural arts program is symbolic of what God is doing in Philly and cities all over the country.

I have just finished reading a wonderful new book called Why Cities Matter by Stephen Um and Justin Buzzard and was struck by what they had to say in the introduction.  “Intentionally or unintentionally, cities have been portrayed as places of problem, rather than places of opportunity and blessedness.  The reality is bigger and more beautiful than the evangelical portrayal has typically shown – the city is a wonderful, dynamic, exciting place for people to live, work and make a difference.”

As I have served and worked alongside people who have taken this mandate seriously, my eyes have been opened to the work of God in my city.  There are amazing things taking place if you look carefully enough:

•  A former Eagles football player became a pastor, started a church on Broad Street and reclaimed an entire city block.  His People to People not-for-profit initiative has made such an impact that it has been recognized by Presidents of the United States.

• Burdened by the need for quality education in a Christian school setting, the Children’s Jubilee Fund was established to provide scholarships for kids that could not afford to go these schools.  Over the years, hundreds of kids have now benefited from the program and many are in college today.

• Biblical training for lay people and pastors is alive and well in the city.  CUTS (the Center for Urban Theological Studies) has recently partnered with Lancaster Bible College to provide fully accredited degrees to those studying for the pastorate.  Bethel Deliverance Church continues to provide high quality lay training through its Bethel Bible Institute and attracts attendees from churches all over the city.

• Church planting is alive and well and CMA Pastor Jim Rudd has just announced that True Vine Community Church has signed a lease for their newest campus at 4500 Tyson Avenue.
  

• Immigrants are being welcomed in name of the Lord Jesus Christ and ESL training at Northeast Community Church is growing by leaps and bounds.  People from China, India, Russia, Pakistan, Algeria and many other nations who have moved to Philly are learning English and meeting Christ followers in a fun and engaging setting.

As I dream about the move of the gospel in Philly, this year, I am encouraged to see so many people looking up with me and seeing the possibilities and not just the problems.  Who knows what God will do in the days ahead through the power of Christian literature as I join in to help make resources available through our ministry and partner with these types of organizations?  Nothing is too big for my God.