Christ-follower, Husband, Dad, Pastor

acceptance

September 26, 2013

Wavy hair is great – just don’t let mine wave goodbye

Every time I visit the barber, the mirror-multitude spotlights the balding spot on my head that I would rather forget. Years ago, the stylists would encourage, “It’s not noticeable. It isn’t any larger than the last time you got your haircut.” Yeah, sure. Your mirrors make it easy for me to see the bright reflection of overhead lights from the top of my head.

As I shave in the morning, I don’t usually think about the spot because I don’t see the spot. But, the spot sure does show up when I see pictures of the back of my head. Please, pardon me today as I grieve the missing hair.

My greatest problem is not production, but distribution. My body still produces lots of hair. After all, I have plenty of hair springing out from my neck, back, ears, etc. Hair implants might get hair distributed to the used-to-be-small-patch on my head, but I am not interested in pain. I require less styling gel, but more sunscreen lotion. I am forced to wear a hat at the beach (wow, uncovered skins burns quickly!). I don’t mind having wavy hair; I just don’t want my hair waving goodbye.

I never had a spot in my twenties. According to missionary-evangelist E. Stanley Jones (1884-1973), baldness is the first of four signs of advanced age (bifocals, bridges, and bulges are the other three). Am I really getting older?

I try to console myself – I am a lover. After all, a man who is balding in the front is a thinker; a man balding in the back is a lover; a guy balding in the front and back thinks he is a lover. I do love Patti. Patti will love me either way. But, I wouldn’t mind God miraculously empowering my follicles with some fresh growth.

A balding head is better than none at all, but bald jokes abound.

  • You must be getting taller cause your head is starting to stick through your hair.
  • Once you go bald, you never grow back.
  • You aren’t getting balder – just more aerodynamic.

In the third season of Seinfeld (“The Fix Up”), Elaine describes George to a potential blind date, but her description fails miserably at the end, “He’s kind of – just kind of – losing his hair.”

“He’s bald?” the girl probes.

“No, no, no! He’s not bald . . . He’s balding.” Elaine responds.

“So he will . . . be bald?”

Her voice sliding despondently, Elaine answers, “Yee-ah.”

Yeah, I know. Feel free to fire some more jokes my way! I’ll try not to go all Old Testament on you, reminding you of 2 Kings 2:23-24. Know the story? After mocking baldheaded Elisha, forty-two young people get mauled by two bears. Just saying . . .

Why am I fretting? Why should I worry? Thankfully, the Lord is intimately aware of what I am going through. There are no secrets to Almighty God. His awesome omniscience tracks the tiniest details of my life. I should rest in faith, free from fear. Jesus encourages, “the very hairs on your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are more valuable to God than a whole flock of sparrows.” (Luke 12:7 NLT) That is how much my Heavenly Father cares for me!

I am valuable to God. He watches over me. Hair or not – doesn’t really matter. A balding spot on my head doesn’t change my relationship. It’s time for me to stop whining and go on with the good stuff He has planned for me.

If only we could get hold of the life-changing fact that there are no little things with God! Your seemingly small trouble is of eternal importance to Him this moment. He has some lovely lesson in it for you. A lesson, which if well learned now, will affect you eternally. If you and I refuse to learn it now, He still cares. The next time we “fall to the ground” He will still be there. (Eugenia Price, Share My Pleasant Stones. Christianity Today, Vol. 35, no. 4.)

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March 10, 2013

Looking For Love

Have you ever gone looking for love, or for acceptance, or to have your needs met outside of God’s plan for your life?

Do any of you remember Johnny Lee’s 1980 chart-topping-single “Looking for Love”? I didn’t see Urban Cowboy (the movie that introduced the song), but the song got LOTS of radio airplay on my school bus. I wasn’t a country music fan, but I can still recall the lyrics, “Looking for love in all the wrong places. Looking for love in too many faces, searching their eyes, looking for traces of what I’m dreaming of . . .”

The Old Testament offers a great example of someone who went looking in the wrong place. David had no business living in the land of the Philistines (1 Samuel 27, 29). Here are two big reasons for NOT living in Philistia:

  • David was already anointed to be king (1 Samuel 16). He couldn’t be killed and fulfill God’s plan.
  • God warned the Israelis of the dangers of close relations with sinful outsiders.

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David and his loyal band of misfits become pirates and liars while living in Philistia. Could the bad influence of the people around whom David chose to live be the reason nothing is said about God for the 16 months David lives in Ziklag?

I know that Saul repeatedly tried to kill David, but God delivered David every time. Why did David no longer trust God’s protection in Israel? I think David suffered from three common worries.

#1  “I’m not sure my needs will be met.”

#2  “I don’t want to get rejected by my peer group.”

#3  “I want to feel accepted or loved.”

David suffered from that internal need for acceptance – to the extreme he was willing to seek it from a Philistine king. David tried in vain to meet his own needs. David certainly got no sense of peace from King Saul but King Achish of Gath was the wrong place to go looking.

Too often people seek out the wrong folks for security. God hasn’t called you to live life outside the community of faith. David’s decision to seek acceptance outside of Israel ended horribly. Ultimately David and his men get rejected by the Philistines who refuse to fight alongside of them. David even gets rejected by his own men when they return from being rejected by the Philistines. Finally, David recognizes his mistake.

Even after his experience in Ziklag, David struggled with this same kind of concerns, but David takes his emotions to the right place. Instead of looking for love in the wrong place, David goes to the Lord directly. I appreciate David’s willingness to bare his unprocessed sentiments in open worship.

  • “O Lord, why do you stand so far away? Why do you hide when I am in trouble?” (Psalm 10:1 NLT)
  • “Quick, God, I need your helping hand! The last decent person just went down, All the friends I depended on gone. Everyone talks in lie language; Lies slide off their oily lips. They doubletalk with forked tongues.”  (Psalm 12:1-2 MSG)
  • “My God, my God, why have you deserted me? Why do you seem to be so far away when I need you to save me? Why do you seem to be so far away that you can’t hear my groans?”  (Psalm 22:1 NIRV) Every human knows this concern. Jesus used the words from this Psalm while hanging on the cross.

Your circumstances may be quite different than David’s, yet you feel those same pressure points of worry and concern. What will you do with them? Take time today to read all of Psalm 10, 12, and 22. See how the Psalmist David learned to handle those raw emotions.

God is never threatened by your honesty in prayer and worship. He knows everything about you and still invites you to come to Him. Get God’s perspective on your life. Don’t look for love in the wrong place. You are called to respond in faith to trials and difficulties in life.

For more insight into David’s Ziklag experience, check out http://www.pastorgreg.org/distressed-3-sources-to-encourage-yourself/.

 

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