Humbling

I am OK | I am not OK

~ Natalie Hart ~ Leave a comment
Two Randi Ford prints, one Paul Stoub print; one Basil Wiering photo; one Butch Schepel print; one Nora Faber clay painting; two Chris Overvoorde works (preparations for paintings); one horseshoe found at my Grandpa’s farm in Zeeland; on the far wall a photo by Evvia Marshall, and an image of a print of a tulip that I tore out of a magazine over 25 years ago.
I am doing OK.

Work life is good

In this COVID-year I’ve had paid work that took advantage of my mixture of skills–writing, social media, newsletters, administration, organization. The week after my church started doing online services, I started sending out weekly emails newsletters (and print versions by mail for those members who don’t do email) that contained news about the church and about each other, and a meditation by the pastor. I gleaned the news from anywhere I could find it: Facebook, Instagram, emails. My new best friend was command-shift-4, so I could take screen shots and, ahem, borrow photos from those platforms.

To this I added a weekly email for parents/grandparents-who-bring-their-grandkids-to-church with children’s bulletins, notes of encouragement, information about kids and coping and parents and coping with COVID, flyers for writing Pandemic Prayers, faith formation activities. Four times in the last year, I printed out faith formation activities for the children of the church, added snacks and fun craft supplies, and driven the packets out to each house and apartment. I hosted Backyard Bible Clubs in my backyard when the weather was good. The videos I made at first weren’t as successful among the kids (our parents didn’t want all their kids’ time spent online), but I can now shoot a video, edit it, and upload it no problem.

A month into the pandemic the leadership of our food pantry left, and I was the one to pick it up–to make sure that we had enough volunteers, to change how we gave out the food so the volunteers and the community would be safe, to order the food and decide what we were packing each week, to report to FeedingAmerica. This was good work and I felt connected to my Dutch ancestors who helped their family and neighbors get through the Hunger Winter, that last year of WWII.

While the church building has been fallow I’ve been doing a deep re-organizing of the children’s materials, the storage rooms, and the church filing system. Organizing is one of my favorite things to do, and the resulting ease of use of each space is a satisfying reward.

This work of keeping the congregation connected and encouraged, and keeping our community fed, has been a privilege. Having paid work that is so meaningful has kept me going, for sure.

But it’s also, if I’m honest, sometimes a heavy emotional burden.

I am grateful for the active and energetic deacons we selected this fall; they’ve taken over leadership of the food pantry and I just get to do the fun part, taking the names and information of those who come for food and handing them their bursting bags. I know them all by name, and I love seeing our regulars every Tuesday morning; I worry if we haven’t seen them in a couple of weeks and can get teary when a missing regular comes back.

My church is full of encouraging people, so I get thanked for this work all the time.

But still, after a year of this, I’m bone-tired.

Kids are mostly good

My adult children are home with me. It’s been good to have them home because I both love and like them, but this has been a frustrating time for them. Neither was in school or felt solid about a direction for school, and work has been hard to find. They’d prefer to be on their own, but that just isn’t possible now. They did enjoy the fire pit I put in the back, gathering with their friends for late-night fires, and I loved hearing the sound of raucous laughter again. We’ve always been the hang-out house, and I miss the kids’ friends.

But it’s been hard to know how to parent adult children in this time. What is the right balance of encouragement, empathy, and incitement to action when so many things feel impossible? They’ve had forward motion in important areas, so they’re feeling less stuck, but it’s been tough. There was so little of a difference I could make in their realities.

My romantic relationship is good.

My boyfriend and I have been pushing back the furniture and dancing in the dining room instead of at Billy’s. We’ve made an event of cooking together on Friday nights and watched a lot of good TV and movies. We are good for each other and I’ve been so grateful for him.

But oh the sameness of everything. The unrelenting sameness.

My house is good.

In September I took my only week of vacation during 2020. Didn’t go anywhere, but dedicated that week and the following few months to doing ALL the nagging jobs in my house.

  • Redid the basement: removed carpet, painted floor and walls, reorganized storage room (the mouse infestation clarified what to get rid of), made an exercise space.
  • Redid garden in front and back yards.
  • Added fire pit and chairs.
  • Repainted kitchen floor and exterior kitchen cabinets.
  • Repainted all trim.
  • Repaired many things myself and hired out what I couldn’t do.
  • Organized all closets.
  • Added a bar in the kitchen and learned how to make mixed drinks.
  • Finally learned how to keep a clean house, not just a neat house.
  • Framed and hung ALL the art I’d been collecting from friends for many, many years. This is the thing that makes me happiest when I walk around my house. The cover photo is the grouping from my stairwell. The one below is from my dining room.

I did all that so I’d have my mind free to get back to my own writing. The idea was that with nothing hanging over my head (except this COVID) I’d be out of excuses not to write.

And I haven’t written.

Food is good.

Like so many others, I explored in the kitchen. I made my own granola for the first time. There’s almost always cabbage in my fridge now because I discovered how easy it is to make great coleslaw with mayo doctored with Asian and Mexican sauces. And I love coleslaw. My Community Supported Agriculture share brought in tons of veggies that I used in all kinds of things I’d never made before–Asian-flavored Swiss chard; the Spanish sauce Romesco (with red peppers and almonds); the Middle Eastern dish of eggs cooked in tomato and pepper sauce, Shakshuka. It was a really tasty food year.

But I keep burning myself.

Four of the nine scars in a row; two more on my index finger knuckle.

I have 9 scars on my right hand from the last 6 months. They will be a lasting reminder that this has been a hard year, that even when things were generally OK, they were also generally hard. I’ve never burned myself on the racks in my oven this often. And that doesn’t include all the times I’ve picked up a hot handle with my bare hand.

To me, this is a physical sign of how not-OK I am. I’m scatterbrained, when I’ve always been focused. I am not careful with myself, not paying attention.

My other relationships are not good.

This inability to focus on anything but what is right in front of me (and sometimes not even that) has meant that my friendships and family relationships have suffered. In the summer it was OK because we could see each other outside. But now that it’s winter, I’m over Zoom (and so are they) and I forget to call during hours when people are awake, and I feel guilty for neglecting my parents. I vow to do better, and then I get distracted.

My devotional life has suffered. I’ve spent so much time and energy making sure the children and families of the congregation have faith formation things to do that I’ve neglected my own spiritual practices unless my church has a Zoom group. We’re reading Lent of Liberation: Confronting the Legacy of American Slavery now and it is excellent–each devotion includes a slave’s story. But I’m so tired of my own excuses for neglecting time with God.

The state of the country is not so good.

In June of last year I wrote about the opportunity we had with the pandemic and all of us feeling our lives and hearts plowed up, to enter a time of truth-telling and reckoning about systemic racism in our country. The skyrocketing sales of books about Black Americans’ experiences this summer tells me that lots of individual white people have learned a lot. But the country as a whole barely budged.

It is so disturbing to me how a solid one quarter to one third of the country is under the glamour of a huckster and fully invested in a complete delusion–that Tr*** is even remotely competent, that he has been treated worse than any other president in history, that the election in November was not safe and fair and valid. Even more disturbing is how many Christians have been taken in–and that they use their faith to justify it.

Admittedly, my general stress level is reduced since I no longer have to hear the previous president’s voice all the time, or read what craziness he’s up to every day. But the people he emboldened are still here, and the Republican party is, for the most part, still in his thrall.

I now that chances are better if we love people out of a delusion, but how on earth do we do it?

Right now is good.

I’ve been lucky to not lose anyone I know to the disease, although I know lots of people who have, lots who’ve gotten it, including one friend who’s a long-hauler. Things are looking up for my kids. The vaccine rollout is happening.

I’m on my first real vacation in years–not visiting anyone, just relaxing. Doing yoga, going for walks, napping, taking saunas, reading, and trying to jumpstart my spiritual practices and my writing. Aggressively taking it easy to correct the burn-out I was so close to.

I’m finally reading All the Days Past, All the Days to Come, the last of Mildred D. Taylor’s books about the Logan family, describing their lives from 5 years after the Civil War to the 1960s. I read the previous 9 this fall. The storytelling is amazing and important.

How about you?

How was your COVID-year? What was your combo of “I am OK | I am not OK”?

Plow up the hard ground

~ Natalie Hart ~ Leave a comment
An image of a hand plow scraping over hard ground.

“Plow up the hard ground of your hearts!
    Do not waste your good seed among thorns.
O people … surrender your pride and power.”

Jeremiah 4:2-3 NLT

This has been my prayer for many years. It’s a tough one because it leads to discomfort. It means that I’ll eventually have to admit that I’m wrong, that I do not always choose to do or say the right thing, that I need to forgive people who have wronged me, that I do not know everything, that I am not the center of the world. I will have to change. And I’m sad a lot because the state of the world affects me. And it’s a tough one because the world seems to reward people who’ve let their hearts grow hard against anyone unlike them.

We live in an age of trolls–people who attack those they disagree with in horribly personal ways, threatening them with violence or telling them they deserve violence. Friends have shared a little bit of the trolling they’ve received and it’s upsetting and scary. We are governed by a Troll in Chief who relishes name calling and threats of violence–and millions of people cheer him on, including people who profess the same faith I do. Whole TV channels are devoted to people yelling at each other from their own little boxes, reiterating the same self-satisfied points, the same outrage over things nobody should be outraged about.

And these days a hardened heart feels so dangerous. Is so dangerous. Racism comes from a heart hardened against people with a different skin color and has been codified into a system that is bound and determined to keep its power and is threatened by truth and facts.

However, because of coronavirus, we are all feeling more vulnerable. Most of us are taking everyday actions designed to keep others safe–masks keep people safer from those with asymptomatic COVID-19, we’ve been staying home and not seeing our friends and loved ones, especially if they have any kind of health condition. People all over the world do a 7:00pm noisy cheer for their medical teams. Show many of us a story about exhausted medical workers or anyone who does anything remotely kind for someone else and we get a little teary. Or a lot teary.

And then three unarmed African Americans were killed (Ahmaud Aubery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd) in short order, and two of those killings were filmed, and two were by police, and it scraped against our already-vulnerable hearts and became unbearable–unbearable for those who experience racism, unbearable for those who understand how deep the tentacles of systemic racism reach, and even unbearable for people with a vested interest in the myth that they are not racist but how dare black people make uppity demands for freedom from danger in their own country. Nobody can turn away from what is happening; we can disagree about what they see, but we can’t turn away.

Which makes this a unique opportunity.

Our hearts feel thoroughly plowed up. Even for those who would deny it, their actions reveal how raw they are feeling.

The more we pay attention to the peaceful protesters, to those who have long been working towards a society with real justice for all, and to those who bring the energy and passion of youth to that work, and ignore the siren call of being more outraged by violence to buildings than we are by violence to persons, the better the chance that we’ll take advantage of those plowed-up hearts and really listen, and really talk about the deeper issues of systemic racism.

The more white Christians pay attention to biblical calls to live with truth, mercy, justice, and take care of the orphans, widows, and strangers within our gates, and the more we remember that it is the most basic action of Christian faith to admit that we are wrong and to ask forgiveness, the better the chance that we’ll really listen and really talk.

Frederick Douglass said,

“Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are people who want crops without ploughing the ground…. The struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, or it may be both. But it must be a struggle.” 

Our cultural ground and our hearts are all plowed up. But that’s only step one in producing good fruit. There’s a lot more work to be done.

Oh I hope and I pray that we take advantage of it. I hope and I pray that white America really listens and gives up its pride and power and that there’s real change. I don’t know that I’m exactly hopeful, but I’ve seen more white people talking about systemic racism in ways they haven’t before. Maybe this time it will make a difference.

Do we need a Garden of Gethsemane moment?

~ Natalie Hart ~ Leave a comment

Have you ever had to do something that was hard, that you’d rather not do, but you do it because it’s part of a bigger plan for the good of all people?

You, know, like now?

We’re staying home, away from our friends and loved ones, avoiding human contact. Every aspect of our lives has changed: school, work, religious practice, shopping, eating, entertainment, how we express love and care. It’s really hard. But we’re doing it–partly out of fear of getting COVID-19 ourselves, and partly out of the desire to protect the more vulnerable in our community.

As Dr. TaLawnda Bragg said in a Zoom call I was part of:

COVID is something new. We have no defense to it. Despite what you hear, there is no cure, no vaccine. All we can do is supportive care (help you breathe) until your body figures out how to fight it. Our only response is to limit the spread. 

So we change our lives. It’s hard, and it’s sad, and we grieve the things we miss. But it’s our only choice, so we do it for our own good and the good of our community.

There is a person in the Bible who knows exactly how we feel.

Jesus.

Remember Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, the night before he died, saying,

“My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.” … He prayed that, if it were possible, the awful hour awaiting him might pass him by. “Abba, Father,” he cried out, “everything is possible for you. Please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”

Mark 14: 34-36

He prayed that three times. Dying and suffering for us was not something Jesus did lightly or easily. It crushed him with grief. Even after he’d stopped asking that he not have to go through with it, Luke describes him this way:

Then an angel from heaven appeared and strengthened him. He prayed more fervently, and he was in such agony of spirit that his sweat fell to the ground like great drops of blood.

Luke 14:43-44

Grieving. In agony of spirit. Suffering and dying was going to be hard and sad. But Jesus did it anyway because he loved you and me and all the people and his death was the plan to bring us right with God again.

Jesus knows how we’re feeling now. He’s been there, too.

And he shows us how to deal with it:

  • talk to God,
  • ask your friends for support (not that the disciples were much good to him–they kept falling asleep),
  • tell God how you’re feeling,
  • ask God for what you want,
  • have an “and yet” orientation and be prepared to follow God’s way even when it isn’t the most comfortable.

We can do that now.

Lord God, I am sad that I can’t hug my friends, that my kids can’t hang out with their friends in person, that I can’t visit my parents, that my mother’s aunt died without anyone able to visit her for the last few weeks of her life. I cried this morning when I watched my pastor lead communion by himself as we recorded our worship service for tomorrow. I miss my church family, the children most of all. I am frightened for the poor and vulnerable in my community, for those who’ve lost work, for those who live in homes that are not safe places. Oh God I want to leave the house without worrying about what I touch and when I washed my hands and whether I’m going to be able to find toilet paper when I need it. I want this to be over. And yet, I want to keep people safe, and I want to do what I can to help. I want to love people with a love like yours. So I will stay home as much as I can, and I will greet people with jazz hands, and I will explore every other way I can to keep up my connections, and I will do my part to share physical and digital resources. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

When your soul feels crushed to the point of death because of everything sad that’s happening now and the hard things that are being asked of us, let it be your Garden of Gethsemane moment. Jesus had to do something that was going to be very difficult and painful and made him very sad, but he talked to God about it, and then he did what he had to do for the good of all people. Let’s be like Jesus. Our version, in Spring 2020: stay home, stay safe.

We’ve gone without toilet paper before.

A woman sits on the toilet, on the floor is a basket of newspaper strips and a magazine caddy, her middle finger peeks through a strip of folded newspaper.
~ Natalie Hart ~ 2 Comments
An image of a woman on the toilet with a basket of newspaper strips and a magazine caddy on the floor, her middle fingertip peeks through the middle of a folded piece of newspaper.

I spent all of Friday writing informational, factual, calming, encouraging, and supportive communications about COVID-19. Emails, an article (Changing Our Habits and Getting Creative: Church in the Age of COVID-19), texts, and about 1,000 more emails. It was a great day. I felt like I was part of helping people navigate this new reality by providing more light than heat.

But my Facebook feed was full of photos of empty store shelves where toilet paper usually was–empty shelves at megastore after megastore.

Which reminded me of a story from my family archives.

My dad was born in occupied Holland during World War II. He is the 4th of 7 kids, so he’s got 3 older brothers who remember growing up during wartime. I’ve told some of the stories elsewhere (here and here), but this one is new to this space. It has to do with toilet paper.

In September 1944, just in time for the Hunger Winter, my dad’s family moved out of the city of Velp and to Ermolo, where my Oma’s sister lived. The Holtrops owned a soup factory and had a big house in the country that could kind of fit the three families who wound up living there that winter. The Nazis had long commandeered all the actually edible food from the factory, but left them fish heads and other odds and ends that they ground and turned into gruel to nourish themselves–they ate in two shifts, younger kids first so they couldn’t see the older kids and adults gag their way through meals. After all, the youngest kids didn’t remember a time when food was delicious.

So of course there was no toilet paper. It would have been an unimaginable luxury. But it’s not like people stop going to the bathroom. Here’s what my uncle told me they did:

  • Next to the toilet was a basket with strips of newspaper.
  • When you finished your business you folded one and only one strip of paper.
  • Then you poked a hole in the middle of the folded strip.
  • You pushed your middle fingertip through the hole and used that to wipe your bum–your finger. You’d use your finger.
  • Then you used the newspaper to clean off your finger.
  • If that didn’t do the job you had to refold the paper and wipe again. With your finger.

Lovely.

Why didn’t they just flat-out use a few of those strips and leave the finger out of it? After all, during the same time period my mother’s family in Michigan used the traditional Sears catalogue in their outhouse.

I’m guessing because even the newspaper they had was rare and no, they could not spare a strip. It’s possible that it was often an underground Resistance newspaper, like this one that one of my uncles still has.

I really hope we don’t get to that point in this country. Also, I don’t get a newspaper anymore, so I’d have to use magazines and that sounds like it’d be ouchier. Do I need to stop recycling my magazines now so I have a stack all ready? Then again, if the hoarders keep snapping up all the T.P. maybe I’ll just buy a toilet-top bidet. I will not do what a friend had in the outhouse as a kid and use dry corn cobs!!!

Hoarders of T.P., I know that you’re anxious and you’re trying to control what you can, but you’ve created a problem. When the plush white rolls are back on the shelves, please let others have some. You will be okay. My father’s family all survived their finger-newspaper-toilet-paper ordeal. Well, they survived, but their humor and conversational topics definitely run to the scatalogical.

And now, because I can’t resist, here is what I learned at the Kent County Health Department today that is helping me not panic:

How is the virus transmitted:

  • Via droplets that an infected person coughs or sneezes out. The virus is only on our hands and hard surfaces because people cover coughs and sneezes with their hands or not at all, and then touch stuff.
  • The contact zone is within 6 feet of an individual with active COVID-19 for more than 10 minutes (walking past someone is not enough to get the virus).
  • If someone is infected but not showing symptoms, or if they have mild symptoms, their chance of transmitting the virus is similarly low—the disease is more likely to be transmitted the worse the symptoms are. Read that again. It is very good news, especially about our children as disease vectors. They’re apparently great at spreading the common cold and the stomach flu, less great at spreading COVID-19, because the disease affects them very mildly.

What you can do as an individual:

  • Wash your hands often.
  • Stay home if you’re sick.
  • Cover your mouth with something other than your hand when you cough and sneeze.
  • No handshakes. No hugging.
  • Limit touches to hard surfaces.
  • Spread out! Limit the amount of time you are less than 6 feet away from members of the public for 10 minutes or more. This is the virus transmission zone.
  • Before you visit someone, ask if anyone is sick, if anyone has a fever or a new cough. If so, go to a virtual visit (phone call or video chat). If not, maintain safe distance and no handshakes/hugs.
  • Disinfect hard surfaces regularly.

Letters to and from children

~ Natalie Hart ~ Leave a comment

I am frequently very silly with the children in the church programs I run, but I also love to take them very seriously. If a kid makes a reasonable suggestion, I follow it. Thanks to one young man, we now have small recycling bins in each children’s worship room. When they ask a question, I answer it, even when the answer is, “that’s one of the hardest things for even grownups to understand and agree about,” and even when it takes us on wild tangents that I have to work to take us back from. When our Sunday school class makes a group art piece to reflect a Psalm (we’ve done Psalms 1 and 23 so far), I let the kids have pretty free rein so they feel like the product is truly theirs, even if that means there are misspelled words and it looks more messy than aesthetically pleasing.

So this year, when I received two letters from kids, it was my privilege to take both of the writers very seriously–even while I inwardly pinched their cheeks and ruffled their hair because of how adorable their young spelling and printing was (but it really doesn’t do to ever show them that).

Letter One

The first letter was anonymous:

A note in child’s handwriting: Don’t ban Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho from this church.

Most of the children love to sing “Joshua fought the battle of Jericho” (which, technically is, “Joshua fit the battle of Jericho,” but that would involve too much explaining). They line up and pretend to be the wall of Jericho while the leader sings the song and then they decide whether or not to fall at the end–falling is often dramatic, delayed, or acrobatic.

Most of the leaders do not love this song with a similar passion. With a group of 8 kids, it’s fine, but you get 10-16 and they rile each other up to further heights and no matter how many times you explain the biblical story basis of the song, it just becomes about who can get away with doing a near cartwheel.

So I’m clear with the leaders at the beginning of the year: they are free to say, “We’re not doing that one today,” or even, “We don’t do that song when I’m leading.” I frequently say no, and I’m clear why: “You all are too wound up already today. No stand-up songs.”

They must’ve had a bunch of no’s in a row for that child to write that note. Although I would weep no tears if we never did it again (and certain kids who don’t like it when things get crazy wouldn’t be upset, either), this was my response:

Letter in adult handwriting reading: Dear members of the 2nd-3rd grade Children’s Worship room: Thanks you for letting me know of your concerns regarding “Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho.” It is a song that kids at Grace have enjoyed for many, many years, and I promise that I will not ban it. However, I do not promise that you will get to do it every week. The song selection is up to each leader, so sometimes you will have a leader who does the song, and sometimes you won’t. That’s how it is in grown-up church, too–the songs are different every week. You must’ve had a few leaders in a row say “no,” bringing about the fear that we banned it. In fact, I am your leader this week, and I promise that we’ll do it! Yours in Christ, Miss Natalie

This felt like a good response because I was

  1. letting the kids know that I saw them and understood what they liked to do,
  2. treating them like they were worthy of an explanation for why the song choice system is set up like it is,
  3. demonstrating that I’m willing to join in the fun and give them something that they love.

And 10 out of 12 kids were overjoyed–you can never please everyone.

Letter Two

The second letter was handed to me by the child on Easter Sunday.

Letter in child’s handwriting: Dear Ms. Natalie, Sorry for being inappropriate at Palm Sunday. Next time I will not do that.

This letter was prompted by the parent due to said child’s behavior at being forced to participate in the parade of children and adults waving palm branches during the service. I’m going to guess it was an epic scowl; I was at the front of the parade, so I had no idea what was happening behind me. (I should note that we had 3 dozen or so kids in the parade that Sunday, a number of whom participated under duress, so I’m not singling out the lone scowler. I also have the child’s parent’s permission to post this.)

I accepted the note, and a couple of weeks later, gave this to the child:

A letter in adult handwriting: Dear [name], Thank you for your note, apologizing for being cranky about joining in with our palm waving on Palm Sunday. Can I tell you that it was a lovely surprise to me that you’d agreed to do it because I know you don’t normally like to do that kind of thing. Also, can I confess something to you? When you gave me your note on Easter, I was hugely cranky about things that
[continuation of note] had happened in the church service and before the service that morning–so I know what it’s like to serve God even while being cranky about it! I even have a prayer that I pray: “Dear God, you’re going to have to give me your patience, because I have none of my own left.” It works! Anyway–I know how you feel. And I am grateful that God accepts you and me and our cranky service and everything else. But I do hope Palms are more fun next time. love, Miss Natalie

I really had been in a mood Easter Sunday. Sometimes when I have heavy responsibilities on a Sunday morning I can still lose myself in worship, but that day I could not. At all.

There’s a children’s song that I have a hate-tolerate relationship with, “God loves a cheerful giver, give it all you’ve got, He loves to hear you laughing when you’re in an awkward spot.” I was not cheerfully giving or serving, and all through the service, I could not laugh. It is entirely possible that I was muttering at points. And aggressively crossing and recrossing my legs.

But still, I served.

Oh I can definitely relate to my letter writer. I’m not always cheerful about what I do for the Lord. But when I serve prayerfully–even when the prayer itself is a childish footstomp of a request/demand–and with a heart that is open, God will help me see something that will take me outside of my crankiness and will even open to door to joy.

That Easter Sunday it was so many moments: heartfelt narration, a girl playing Jesus in one scene, an anxious kid nailing his lines, the disciples doing Fortnite dances when they saw the risen Jesus in the upper room, the host of angels, and the generalized chaos that are my liturgical skits with their room for readers, nonreaders, children, adults, people with developmental disabilities, people who show up for rehearsal and people who don’t, people who are on time for church and people who are late.

Indeed, I am grateful that God not only accepted but transformed my cranky service on Easter Sunday–and I hope my letter writer gives palm waving another shot and lets God transform it, if not into something joyful and fun, then at least to something not horrible and torturous.

My help comes from Adonai

~ Natalie Hart ~ Leave a comment
An image of the Calder sculpture in downtown Grand Rapids Michigan with a sign held up in front of it that says Hate Has No Home Here in several languages.
Last night, I (and a few hundred other people) went to a candlelight vigil sponsored by Temple Emanuel, Congregation Ahavas Israel, Jewish Federation of Grand Rapids, and Chabad House of Western Michigan in response to the murder of 11 people at Tree of Life in Pittsburgh last week. As with the other outdoor candlelight vigil I went to this past summer, it was too breezy to keep my candle lit. But unlike the last time, I was prepared: I’d downloaded a flashlight app on my phone so I held the candle next to that light. One intrepid boy had brought a battery-powered candle. Some in the crowd passed out tin foil squares to put around the candles to protect them from the breeze, but they interfered with the sound system, creating feedback and causing it to go out for several minutes after the speakers began, so those had to go away. I watched Grand Rapids Police Chief David Rahinsky try to fix the speakers, with no luck. By the fourth speaker, the microphones were working, but I know I missed some good words. On the one hand, it was a beautiful event. Any time people come together to support one another in mourning and try to reach for hope is a good thing. But people are, well, people. There were mutterings about not being able to hear. The Jewish women I stood near had varying opinions about the speakers and what they had to say. I was impressed that each speaker spoke fully out of their religious tradition: the Imam told the story of Cain and Abel using names from the Koran (different from the Torah and Bible names), and the Hindu woman prayed to God as Mother and omm-ed (which echoed around Calder Square). Rabbi Michael Schadick of Temple Emanuel was the first to speak, his first words very simple: “We are here for shalom.” Shalom is one of those words that we can’t unpack with only one English word: peace, harmony, wholeness, completeness, prosperity, wellbeing, and tranquility. He spoke about the man who murdered 11 worshippers at Tree of Life Temple in Pittsburgh:
“He hoped to kill our spirit, but he strengthened it.”
The cantor of Temple Emanuel lead the crowd in a song of Psalm 133 (CJB). Read the words while you listen to the song:

Oh, how good, how pleasant it is for brothers to live together in harmony.

It is like fragrant oil on the head that runs down over the beard, over the beard of Aharon, and flows down on the collar of his robes.

It is like the dew of Hermon that settles on the mountains of Tziyon. For it was there that Adonai ordained the blessing of everlasting life.

Rev. David Baak, executive pastor at Westminster Presbyterian Church was the next to speak, and after him was Rev. Joe Jones, Second Ward City Commissioner. Jones quoted George Washington Carver:
Fear of something is at the root of hate for others, and hate within will eventually destroy the hater.
Jones also spoke about forgiveness being integral to the ability to love, which is true, but the women around me were not ready to hear that. I’ve certainly had seasons when I was not ready to talk forgiveness, when I had to ask God to make me even want to want to forgive. But how do you forgive a man who hates your people enough to murder them in their place of worship? To scream his hatred of Jews while being cared for by Jewish medical professionals? How do you forgive a murderer when you know that there are others out there like him, and because of that, you have to have armed guards at your synagogue? It feels like forgiving the ideology and culture that spawned those beliefs and that hatred. Imam Morsy Salem of PLACE spoke next. It was such an interesting experience to listen to him unpack the story of Cain and Abel, aka Qābīl and Hābīl, but his message was clear: do not hate each other, do not kill each other. Rabbi Yosef Weingarten of Chabad House said about prayer that it isn’t merely an opportunity to ask for what you need:
Prayer provides us with the opportunity to align our body and our soul with the…God above. In these moments of unspeakable pain, as we search for answers, we take refuge in our traditions–[in our Jewish tradition, mourning is not just about pain], but hope and conviction.”
He encouraged all of us to add just one small act of kindness in our daily lives to build each other up. In honor of the members and police officers who were injured in the shooting at Tree of Life, Rabbi Weingarten and Chief Rahinsky read Psalm 121 (CJB) as a prayer, the Rabbi in Hebrew and the Chief in English:

If I raise my eyes to the hills, from where will my help come? My help comes from Adonai, the maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip — your guardian is not asleep. No, the guardian of Isra’el never slumbers or sleeps.

Adonai is your guardian; at your right hand Adonai provides you with shade — the sun can’t strike you during the day or even the moon at night.

Adonai will guard you against all harm; he will guard your life. Adonai will guard your coming and going from now on and forever.

Following him were Father Robert Sirico of the Acton Institute and Rev. Colleen Squires of All Souls Community Church. Rev. Squires is a regular attender at Grand Rapids Association of Pastor meetings, so I know her a little bit. I was moved by the emotion in her voice as she talked about the hospitality of Congregation Ahavas Israel, which has given All Souls the space to worship for the last 13 years, and how it was both right and weighty to walk into their mutual building for services the day after the shooting. Then came Teresa Thome of Self-Realization Fellowship (representing the Hindu faith) and Dr. Doug Kinshi of GVSU’s Kaufman Interfaith Center. Rabbi David Krishev of Congregation Ahavas put it in stark words:
The question, ‘Am I willing to give up my life for my faith,’ is a question we don’t want to hear, and don’t want to answer. It is a question we thought we’d left behind.
He went on to list the people of various faiths who are being killed due to their beliefs. His desire was simple: “We, as people who believe in the power of religious community, want to continue to gather at our places of worship openly…and safely.” Rabbi Schadick closed the event with a song from the end of the mourner’s Kaddish, lead by a soloist from Temple Emanuel:
He who creates peace in His celestial heights, may He create peace for us and for all Israel; and say, Amen.
It was a wonderful event, full of talk of love and respect and standing together against hate. I loved the use of Adonai instead of “the Lord” in the passages read; if felt so intimate. My favorite part was the singing–listening to those ancient words being sung all around me, all known by heart, was powerful. Those words have been said and sung in that form for many thousands of years. Those words and those messages have survived. They’ve survived many attempts to eradicate them and those who speak them, and they’ll survive this one, too. I’ll add a few more from Psalm 95:7-8 (NLT) as my prayer for my fellow Christians who are consumed with fear and hate:
If only you would listen to his voice today! The Lord says, “Don’t harden your hearts…” 

Permission Slips for the Resistance

~ Natalie Hart ~ Leave a comment

My Opa (Dutch for grandfather) worked in an underground/resistance group in German-occupied Netherlands during World War II. I’ve known this all my life, but I am still learning new stories and seeing new evidence as my uncles dig through their papers and unearth some gems.

At this year’s family reunion, my Uncle Henk pulled out some war-era papers that left me awed. He laid out this dark history on a peeling picnic table on a warm and sunny day. I am now even more grateful that Opa undermined the occupying Nazis any way he could–and that he survived. Here is the story in brief, told by my uncle:

The leader was our family doctor, Oostenbrink. This work was already beginning when our family arrived in Velp in September of 1941 and Rev. Klaas Hart joined in soon after arriving. As a result at some time he also became a wanted person and had to find a safe place to live. In July of 1944 the Germans entered Oostenbrink’s and our home to search for evidence of illegal activity, which resulted in the dismantling of the resistance group and that, in turn, led to our flight by horse and wagon to the safer home of the Holtrusts in Ermelo in September of 1944. His work was utterly dangerous and a number of his group’s co-workers were arrested and either executed or sent to a concentration camp where they died.

And here is the story of a resistance worker, told in a series of permissions, notes, and newspapers.

May 30, 1942 letter to Rev. Klaas Hart, telling him to be careful because of his anti-occupation preaching.
A letter from a fellow Dutchman in the Press and Propaganda department of the National Socialist Movement in the Netherlands, telling Rev. Hart that there were ministers who were preaching dangerous sermons and they should be careful. My uncles characterized this is a funny letter, because Opa was the minister in question and this was a very roundabout way of warning him. May 30, 1942. Dutch.

Permission for K. Hart to keep his bicycle. August 27, 1942, Velp. Dutch.
Permission to keep his bicycle–technically “exempt from the obligation to surrender bicycle.” August 27, 1942, Velp. Dutch.

Permission to travel from Velp in Gelderland to Groningen between August 21-24, 1943. German.
Permission to travel from Velp in Gelderland to Groningen between August 21-24, 1943. German. The uncles remember that he said this was to provide pastoral care for his previous congregation.

Note from the mayor informing them that the Germans want their house, so they have to move. December 4, 1943
Note from the mayor informing them that the Germans want their house, so they have to move. “In connection with the claim of your home, I inform you that as soon as your home has been vacated, you must notify the Ommerschofschelaan office as soon as possible. You will be notified when the house is taken over by the German opposition from you. An inventory list of the goods left behind will then be drawn up. The keys will then have to be handed over to the German authorities.” December 4, 1943. Dutch.

Permission to take Henrik Hart (the oldest child, 9 years old) and Peter Hart (my father, 8 months old) somewhere because they were sick. October 8, 1944
Sickness transport. Permission to take Henrik Hart (the oldest child, 9 years old) and Peter Hart (my father, 20 months old) somewhere because they were sick. The thing is, nobody remembered them ever being this ill, so the assumption is that this was a ruse to move someone/something else. October 8, 1944. Dutch.

Handwritten note from Red Cross for this mysterious illness of Hendrik and Peter Hart. October, 1944. Dutch.
Handwritten note from Red Cross for this mysterious illness of Hendrik and Peter Hart. October, 1944. Dutch.

Permission from the Red Cross to go out after air raids to help anyone who needed help. October 21, 1944. German.
Permission from the Red Cross to go out after air raids to help anyone who needed help. October 21, 1944. This is after they moved to Ermelo, in the province of Gelderland. German.

Appointment from the Red Cross to "provide spiritual assistance to evacuees in these areas." October 21, 1944. Dutch.
Appointment from the Red Cross to “provide spiritual assistance to evacuees in these areas.” Because of this, he was able to wear a Red Cross armband while he went around doing his underground work. October 21, 1944. Dutch.

A note in code from a courier in his resistance group. Dutch.
A note in code from a courier in his resistance group. Dutch.

Permission from the Interior Military Forces of the Netherlands to travel between Ermelo and Velp on April 21, 1945.
Permission from the Interior Military Forces of the Netherlands to travel between Ermelo and Velp on April 21, 1945. (The Netherlands was liberated on May 5.) Dutch.

Permission to travel on all the roads in Velp. May 3, 1945. Dutch.
Permission to travel on all the roads in Velp. May 3, 1945. Dutch.

A very early edition of Trouw, the newspaper of the resistance.
A very early edition of Trouw, the newspaper of the resistance. Trouw means faithful.

A Google translation: “Our country sits, let’s just confess it, at the moment heavy in the stuffy hero. The whole life of every day bears witness to it. Also many articles in this issue of our magazine talk about it. We are overwhelmed, we are heavily enslaved and we can not resist it. Such is the conclusion of many. And others think and share their opinions in the misery of this during the striking hand of God. However, it is not good to stand by. Nothing is more dangerous than Lydelykhied. Lydelyke people, they are just the kind that the [Germans] can use.” (In Africaans, Lyde means suffering and lyke means corpses, but beyond that, Google translate cannot go.) 

A later edition of Trouw, the underground newspaper. December 1944.
A later edition of Trouw, the underground newspaper. December 1944.

A different resistance/underground newspaper: Je Maintiendrai.
A different resistance/underground newspaper: Je Maintiendrai.

Seeing these tiny permission slips really brought home how restricted any movement was during occupation: being on the road, owning a bicycle, and trying to help people were all grounds for arrest. They needed permission for every little thing, and often double permission: once from a Dutch authority, once from the Germans. Their home could be taken. From other family stories, we know their food and livestock were confiscated by the German soldiers, and they were left with fish heads and oats to turn into a barely edible gruel that final winter of the war.

With all of these permissions, he would have travelled as himself: Rev. Klaas Hart. At least one of the permissions said it only counted if the person also had their ID on them. However, he also traveled under a different identification card, that my father has (my only image of it is on a CD and my computer has no CD drive). When they moved from Velp to a relative’s house in Ermelo, it meant a two-day walk for the family of 7, including a newborn. They had to beg a farmer for a place to sleep–everyone slept on fresh hay in the barn except for my Oma and the baby, who were welcomed into the house.

Yes, this was dangerous work. My Opa used his status as a minister to enable his wartime activities. He left the Netherlands for Canada after the war because there was no work for him, and no prospects for his six sons and one daughter.

I am the daughter of an immigrant, and granddaughter of a resistance worker. I descended from people who had to flee for their lives. The pull of the family legacy of working for justice and against injustice is strong and I answer it as best I can by writing letters and emails and calling my elected representatives, writing blog posts for myself and for the Grand Rapids Association of Pastors, and attending prayer vigils. It doesn’t feel like much when compared to what my family went through in the 1940s, but it’s something. #Resist

Forgiveness is unnatural. I did it anyway.

~ Natalie Hart ~ 6 Comments

a toddler boy is yelling and has his hands over his ears

Someone wrongs you, hurts you, not just once but over the course of many years, causing you serious pain and trauma, and you’re supposed to forgive them?

God says, yes.

Because I don’t remember a time when I didn’t love Jesus or when I didn’t want to follow him, that idea didn’t feel strange or unnatural until I recently tried to explain it to a 4th grade boy. He looked at me like the whole idea of forgiveness was flat out nuts and I was crazy for suggesting it.

I didn’t manage to convince him (although I hope I planted a seed), but his flat-out rejection of the idea of forgiveness helped me. Focussing on it as a strange, crazy, un-intuitive act made sense of the struggle I was having with forgiving my ex-husband.

For many months after the implosion of our marriage, I didn’t even want to want to forgive him, so my prayer was, “Lord, you’re going to have to do the work to make me want to want to forgive him, because I’m fighting it.” The Lord was silent on that particular issue, but He began bombarding me with the message:

You are my beloved. And my desire is for you.

I’ve written before about the grief and the glory of that message, and how much I needed it (Beloved). It carried me through many waves of sadness and anger, and even brought me to want to forgive my ex–but no farther.

This winter, I was swamped by grief that I wasn’t a married person. I’d worked so hard for so long to remain so; it was a big part of my identity. I was proud of being married for over 20 years. And now I wasn’t. This wasn’t about my ex, because I most certainly didn’t want to be married to him, but about me and adjusting to my new reality.

And I got angry at him all over again. I liked my anger. It was satisfying to rehearse the wrongs, to re-argue my point of view, to tend to the nugget of ill-will in a corner of my heart, to write diatribes in my mind that I knew I’d never publish but that I relished. I didn’t want to forgive if it meant I’d have to give up my right to be angry about the wrongs done to me.

But the issue of forgiveness wouldn’t go away–in part because of two pastors and my counselor, who kept asking about it. In part because I want to be a faithful child of God, and that means:

If another believer sins, rebuke that person; then if there is repentance, forgive. Even if that person wrongs you seven times a day and each time turns again and asks forgiveness, you must forgive. (Luke 17:3-4)

If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins. (Matthew 6:14-15)

 Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you. (Ephesians 4:31-21)

No matter how right my anger felt, I couldn’t escape the clear call of God for me to forgive the one who’d caused me serious pain and trauma. My prayers on this matter were brief requests for God to bring me to the point where I could do it.

He was getting me closer when my minister preached a great sermon on forgiveness that was also about anger. He unpacked Ephesians 4:26a: “don’t sin by letting anger control you” (NLT), “Be angry but do not sin” (NRSV), and “In your anger do not sin” (NIV). He pointed out that the anger is not the sin, that there is a difference between being angry and sinning–that sometimes anger is the right response.

Sometimes anger is the right response.

But I would be sinning if I let that anger control me and turn my heart towards bitterness, which I was.

My minister put it this way,

“Bitterness is a sin because it’s a failure to forgive as God, in Christ, forgave you. An unforgiving heart is an unforgiven heart. And if you can’t forgive it’s because you haven’t sensed His forgiveness of you.”

That worked through the final knot of resistance.

I am beloved. I am forgiven. I mustn’t let my anger control me.

So I forgave my ex.

Even so, I didn’t rush into it. I’ve lived with my forgiveness of him for a week, and, as with so much, writing it through helped cement it.

In case this makes me sound like I was thinking all these things through like reasonable person, you should know that I was not. I was like a toddler throwing a temper tantrum, digging my heels in, going slack like a noodle, putting my hands over my ears and screaming. The ability to forgive my ex is a gift from God, and one that I am immeasurably grateful for.

So if you have a nugget of ill will and bitterness against someone who’s wronged you, I shouldn’t recommend acting like a toddler, but I will anyway. Toddlers rail and kick and scream against the thing their parent wants them to do that they don’t want to–and then run to that same parent for comfort at the state the tantrum has put them in. So kick and scream and run to your heavenly Father. He’ll know what you need and give it to you (even if it comes  very slooooowly).

Writing, writing everywhere

~ Natalie Hart ~ Leave a comment

a fountain pen sits atop an open notebook

Except here 🙂

But I will not moan about it, and I will not give you lengthy justifications and explanations. I will, however, share some of the writing I’ve done recently, everywhere but here.

Other ministries

I love talking with pastors about the work they’re doing, about the passions that drive their ministry choices–which is good, because that’s a big part of the writing I do for Gatherings of Hope, a non-profit aimed at helping pastors and congregations in Grand Rapids. It’s extra good because I recently got paid to talk with a friend who had pastored me well for 9 years.

The Gift of The Ask: Deepening Ministry by Growing Connections is my profile of Pastor Denise Evans, and her work with the Kingdom Life Ministries Community Development Corporation, in particular, about her work as the community liaison for The Deborah Project and The Deborah House. She’s the connector who finds organizations and people who want to help her church provide temporary housing and services to young single mothers and their kids. It was such a thrill to talk with her about her important and necessary work.

And to talk with one of her conspirators, Pastor Doriane Parker-Sims, the visionary behind those projects. She is doing deeply good work in Grand Rapids, and I was so glad she took the time to talk with me about it. When the Needs Are Deep, the Vision Gets Deeper: How one Grand Rapids church went from giving away backpacks to providing housing.

Favorite analogy

This isn’t terribly recent, but it’s a piece of writing I love: Leading From the Middle: Pastor as Shepherd. I got to take the research I did about shepherding for The Giant Slayer and apply it to the image of the pastor as shepherd. I highlighted how the image of the sheep streaming after the shepherd and respectfully following him in a neat line was lovely and romantic … but doesn’t reflect the ministry reality. Rather, shepherds lead from the middle, they do intimate, one-on-one work that gets messy, but they also provide direction and take the long view. I even like my ending, mostly because I’d been trying to write an article that the quote from Khary would work in for close to a year.

So why would anyone take this on? Especially for the bi-vocational pastors who do this all-consuming work during their non-paid-work hours.

Of course, as pastors, you are called and equipped to this work by God, and empowered by the Holy Spirit. But Khary Bridgewater, Senior Program Officer for Gatherings of Hope, points out that something else is true of you:

“Let’s start with you not being normal because you like sheep and most people think sheep stink.”

You love those sheep.

That doesn’t make the job any easier or less messy, but it does help explain how you can not only keep going, but even long to be with those messy, wandering creatures. You’re not normal — and we thank God for that.

My Writer Unboxed debut

I’ve been reading Writer Unboxed in a daily basis for close to ten years. I’ve been part of their Facebook group from the beginning, I’ve gone to their two Unconferences, and I’m a moderator of the WU Breakout Novelist Book Dissection group. I admire all the writing gurus, published and unpublished, who I read there. And last week, I got to join them–not as a writing guru, but as a reporter for the novel dissection group. I got to write about a book I loved, and about a discussion I loved being part of, for a site that is a crucial part of my life as a writer. It was a big deal. Dissecting A Man Called Ove:

Don’t worry, no men called Ove will be harmed and no physical guts revealed in this post, but we will expose some of the techniques Frederik Backman used to craft his breakout novel, A Man Called Ove:
* he told a compelling “domestic” story without An Antagonist
* he made omniscient point of view feel as intimate as first person.
* he masterfully wove past and present.

Getting political without getting nasty

I’m doing something new: writing about politics. I’ve normally steered clear of that, but I am concerned about my adopted country of the U.S. of A. So I’ve joined a group blog called Letters to Trump. Once a month, I’ll write a letter directly to our current President. Here are two attempts at getting political without getting nasty:

Day 3

Dear Mr. President,

I am worried about you. Not for your personal safety—the Secret Service will protect your body. I am worried about you. As a person.

You seem obsessed, not with doing the best, but with being seen as The Best Ever. Those are very different things.

Needing others to laud you as The Best Ever gives them the power to determine your worth and value as a person, which is a very insecure position to be in. Even though millions of people think you are great, it’ll never be enough—your need is a swirling beast that will never be satisfied.

Day 170 – You Are Isolating Us to Feed Your Ego, Mr. President.

… Yes, there is probably satisfaction that you get from standing alone, the Big Man, facing down those smaller than you. But it makes me sad for you. You see, some of the best things I’ve done have come during times of collaboration, and I’m sad that you will miss out on the opportunity to learn, to grow, and to do something far bigger than you could accomplish on your own.

I was recently part of a collaboration of 8 churches–three were majority white, five were majority African-American, from 4 different denominations–to put on a Vacation Bible School (VBS). Together. Each church had done summer programs for kids, but we came together to do something bigger, something new to each of us, something that could show our community that the people of God could work together for the benefit of our neighborhood. Did we start out with more churches and did some leave us as we went through the planning process? Yes. Did we have the occasional 45-minute discussion about something only to discover we’d been saying the same thing but with slightly different vocabulary? Yes. Did the VBS we chose look like anything our churches had done before? No, and this produced some early tension.

But we learned to trust each other and rely on each other, and it was glorious.

Obnoxious?

Hopefully this link-y post all about me wasn’t too obnoxious. It’s been more challenging than I’d thought to combine fiction writing, paid freelance writing and editing, two paid mini-jobs, and keeping up with my blog. But I’m working it out.

And I hope you keep working out what you need to work out, and that you don’t give up on things you enjoy doing, even if how you do it winds up changing. We’re in this together!

sometimes you are wrong

~ Natalie Hart ~ 2 Comments

The words "I'm sorry" have been typed on paper in a typewriter

Or, more to the point, recently I was wrong.

I was talking with some friends and I said something that stereotyped a group of people, and one friend called me on it. Did I handle it well? Not in that moment. The hot flush of shame rose up my neck and I defended myself. Because I knew my intentions, and I knew my love and respect for the people I’d stereotyped. My words hadn’t been mean-spirited. So I justified my behavior. And the friend and I parted for the evening.

It took all of 10 minutes for me to realize that I’d been wrong.

I immediately sent her an apology for bungling what I’d been trying to say, but by the time I saw her the next day, I was grateful to her for calling me on my words. It would’ve been so easy to just get mad and leave the conversation and then express her frustration to other people. But she didn’t, and because of that, I was given the opportunity to hear my words from another’s point of view: I couldn’t hear the stereotyping until she revealed it to me. I asked for her forgiveness, she gave it, and our friendship deepened.

So why am I sharing this story that doesn’t put me in the best light?

I am concerned about my Christian brothers and sisters, both as individuals and as institutions: we are too concerned with justifying ourselves, our words, our actions. When other people point out how wrong, how hurtful, how against our own principles our words or actions are, we don’t get past the initial flush of shame and self-defense. We do not take the prayerful time to see whether God might be telling us something through the critic, something we need to pay attention to. We seem to have lost the inclination and ability to ask for forgiveness from people we’ve hurt and wronged. And seeing that we’ve been wrong and asking forgiveness is basic to our faith.

There is biblical precedence for God using someone else to tell us what we need to hear. There is the famous story of the prophet Nathan getting David to see the wrongness of his behavior with Bathsheba and Uriah, causing David to confess his sin (2 Samuel 12:1-13). There’s another interesting story about David. After he’d been king of Israel for some time, he chose to flee Jerusalem when his son Absalom staged a coup. This happened when they were on the run (2 Samuel 16:5-13):

As King David came to Bahurim, a man came out of the village cursing them. It was Shimei son of Gera, from the same clan as Saul’s family. He threw stones at the king and the king’s officers and all the mighty warriors who surrounded him. “Get out of here, you murderer, you scoundrel!” he shouted at David. “The Lord is paying you back for all the bloodshed in Saul’s clan. You stole his throne, and now the Lord has given it to your son Absalom. At last you will taste some of your own medicine, for you are a murderer!”

“Why should this dead dog curse my lord the king?” Abishai son of Zeruiah demanded. “Let me go over and cut off his head!”

“No!” the king said. “Who asked your opinion, you sons of Zeruiah! If the Lord has told him to curse me, who are you to stop him?”

Then David said to Abishai and to all his servants, “My own son is trying to kill me. Doesn’t this relative of Saul have even more reason to do so? Leave him alone and let him curse, for the Lord has told him to do it. And perhaps the Lord will see that I am being wronged and will bless me because of these curses today.” So David and his men continued down the road, and Shimei kept pace with them on a nearby hillside, cursing and throwing stones and dirt at David.

It would certainly have been within the culture of kingship to give his nephew, Abishai, the nod to cut off Shimei’s head–the man was insulting and lobbing weapons at him. It might even have satisfied a frustrated urge to lash out, since David was choosing not to fight against his son. But David didn’t choose that. He was a man after God’s own heart, and he recognized that God’s way is not always the comfortable way, that sometimes God is in the person telling you that you did wrong things. Now, David didn’t repent of taking over the kingship of Israel, but he did accept it when God told him that he wouldn’t be the one to build the Temple because he had shed much blood (1 Chronicles 28:3). Perhaps Shimei’s actions prepared him to hear that message.

And then there’s the story about David’s first attempt to bring the recovered Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. The Ark was carried on an oxen-drawn cart amid a grand parade of soldiers and people, with singing and playing of musical instruments.

But when they arrived at the threshing floor of Nacon, the oxen stumbled, and Uzzah reached out his hand and steadied the Ark of God. Then the Lord’s anger was aroused against Uzzah, and God struck him dead because of this. So Uzzah died right there beside the Ark of God. (2 Samuel 6:6-7)

I don’t really get this story. I don’t like it. Uzzah was just trying to make sure the Ark didn’t wind up in the dirt. Surely that was a good thing to do. But God’s earlier directions to the Israelites were clear: only certain people could carry the Ark, but even they could not touch it, and the penalty for doing so was death (Numbers 4:15).

The only way I can approach this story is to hear this message in it: our good intentions do not excuse the action. If our actions or words are wrong, that is more important to God than our intentions being right.

Our belief in our good intentions keeps us from being open to the idea that we may have said or done something wrong, something sinful. It keeps us from moving beyond the hot flush of shame and self-defense. It blocks us from the blessing of forgiveness.

It’s my prayer that we lovers of Jesus grow ever more able to move past our good intentions and towards the ability to not only see when we’ve been wrong, but also to admit it, and even to ask forgiveness for it. It would be a glorious witness.