Where the Wild Things Are

You know whats strange? Walnuts don’t look like walnuts when they are still on the tree. They look like limes.

You’d have to know what you are looking at to know what’s inside. And my husband and I? We had no clue what we were looking at.

Walnuts are encased in a peel just like citrus fruit. I hear they are a ton of work to get out and even less enjoyable right out of the womb. I can speak from experience that a walnut without a baked brown sugar and cayenne rub, tastes a bit like bitter chocolate. But it isn’t their flavor that makes them valuable, it is what’s inside of them. They are infused with rich antioxidants and anti-inflammatory properties. They ward off the risk of heart disease and are “exceptionally nutritious”.

I wish I liked them.

Hidden Hollow keeps revealing her gifts a little at a time. But the theme remains: God blesses bigger than we know to ask for.

Do you doubt that? I do.

And yet, he doesn’t stop beating the blessing drum for me. I keep stumbling upon centuries old fruit that I had no part in planting or pruning, but are mine to enjoy and marvel at. It is as if I’ve stumbled upon someone else’s full grown dream lying under a thin sheet of neglect—just like the dust on my car. It is as if someone has poured their heart and soul into this parcel and we were literally handed the keys as sheer gift. Not because we’ve worked hard or deserve it, but because something bigger than us okay’d the whole deal.

Yes, you are still mine.

Why in the world does God go to great lengths to provide and bless his kids? Whether big or small gifts, why does he even care if we smile or laugh? If you see God as a stern fellow throwing around lightning bolts, this won’t really make sense to you. He only wants obedience, not delight. I don’t know. I think he’s better than a grouchy old storm thrower.

What if our God was strange and mysterious instead of angry and edgy? What if he was the kind of God that wraps walnuts in a bright green peel to hide the good stuff for the ones who seek until they find? Does God do odd things that make everyone raise their eyebrows and bat away the mystical side of his being? Does he convict our self-righteousness in the form of lavish kindness?

I think he might. Only because I find it easier to box him into hymnal covers and budgets of well-managed moods and predictable prayers.

I’m not sure what to do now that wild things are happening. Except marvel. To go to the grove. To weep over the blossoms and the budding. To be reminded again and again that God’s love for me, and you, is still in full bloom.

RESTORING THE ROOT

In that sense, Hidden Hollow feels like restoring joy of one’s salvation. The sweet, rich benefit of accepting the gift of Jesus’ hard work on my behalf. His planting, toiling, pruning, and tending while I hold his hand and simply pop walnuts into my mouth.

I know there has been decades of dirty work and burning fingertips from those who have worked the ground and the land before me. All I can do now is to learn things I do not know and take care of what I’ve been entrusted with. I can not try to take credit for work I did not do. Its gift. All gift.

“The earth and everything in it, the world and its inhabitants, belong to the Lord; for he laid the foundations on the seas and established it on the rivers. Who may stand in his holy place? The one who has clean hands and a pure heart, who has not appealed to what is false, or sworn deceitfully. He will receive a blessing from the Lord, and righteousness from the God of his salvation. Such is the generation of those who inquire of him, who seek the face of the God fo Jacob.” (Psalm 24:1-6)

This is what’s beautiful about the idea of ownership in the Christian faith tradition. The material and spiritual come from the same generous heart of a God who gives. He doesn’t withhold material goodness because its bad—that’s Gnosticism. And he doesn’t withhold spiritual goodness, because you’re bad—that’s Donatism. Both are heresies that have plagued church folk for centuries. Self-righteousness continues to dress herself up in different hats that fit the cultural temperature. But we don’t need fancy names or a seminary education to distract us from what it really is. Sin.

It’s as simple as this.

God gives. Walnuts. Apricots. Life. Joy. Delight. Abundance. Love.

We take. Walnuts. Apricots. Life. Delight, Abundance. Love.

In a nutshell, God gives Himself. The question remains: are we taking to experience more of him or are we taking so we can experience more of ourselves? Are we asking for peace to feel better about our broken lives or peace to know him more in the middle of our broken lives? Are we asking for delight because we know we should be happier than we are or because we want to see his joy made complete in us?

We can take all that we want as long as our asking is rooted in revelation. If we ask because we want to see more of God’s adore-worthy nature, we will get the goods. The minute we start wanting God’s gifts to get the credit for God’s gifts, we have broken the first commandment. God can’t bless greed. When we take to consume, instead of take to create He holds up the show and lovingly calls a brief intermission.

But when we clamor for his compassion because we are worn out and faith is wearing thin? He never fails.

THE RELUCTANT RECEIVER

The discipline of holy delight is the deal for me right now, it might not be what God is teaching you, and that’s ok. We are all on a different learning curve. Delight and rest are weaknesses of mine and always have been. It has been years of developing a taste not just for God’s beauty but for truly believing I was worthy or receiving it. I even struggle opening gifts. I feel a lump in my throat. Tis better to give than to receive. Amen. But somehow I feel like I’m missing the point of that verse.

So I started small to grow in the godly discipline of delight. I took time to thank God for the rain drops on my red-barked Japanese maple back in Bothell. I cried in gratitude when the money was almost gone and someone dropped off groceries. I drank in the beauty when my marriage was hard and my days were long and I prayed for a day when we would kiss again without feeling like it was work—nonetheless we kept kissing.

I grew in delight during the midnight awakenings when Jesus would woo me to the couch for a bleary eyed prayer session. I relished in the gift of tears in women’s eyes who were hearing from the same God I heard from. I waded deeply into those excited, awe-inspired exchanges where we got to dish all of things we were hearing from God—shocked that he would talk to girls like us.

I took pictures and wrote prose about our city stream that was fueled by drain off from the large neighborhood up the street. I saw past the litter and the rust colored water to the sounds of a stream somewhere else.

Here is what I am learning about receiving good things from God.

Abundance isn’t a bank account balance. It isn’t a beautiful land spread. It isn’t even a family or a marriage or a good reputation. Abundance is believing you are worthy of God’s love and stopping at nothing to let him unleash the good things he has for you.

Abundance is seeing joy in the hard. Hope in the dark. Spring in the water. What we see is what we move towards.

Sometimes adundance begins with a picture of a dirty rain-water stream littered with someone else’s trash. Don’t shun the small gifts in their seed form. Believe me, they grow much bigger than you can imagine.