Get Smart, the Proverbs Way

I’ve been eagerly anticipating this summer’s new string of movies, and this Sunday’s paper’s listing of all the upcoming blockbusters, only got me more excited for them to hit the theaters. 

In particular, I’m looking forward to the next Narnia edition: Prince Caspian (May 16), the newest Indiana Jones flick (May 22), M. Night Shyamalan’s latest thriller The Happening (June 13), Pixar’s Wall·e (June 27), and the old school TV show spinoff, Get Smart (June 20). 

In watching these trailers and anticipating the movies, I’ve been thinking particularly about the messages these movies are sending to the masses.  These movies are big, blockbuster hits, ones that millions will see in the coming months. 

I’m excited about the Christian worldview that Prince Caspian might offer, if the director is true to the book’s perspective and values.  The Get Smart film has some wonderful potential for presenting a Christian worldview, but it’s probably not going to be the film that gets the most attention for it this summer. 

If you’re not familiar with the premise of the original Get Smart show, let me fill you in.  Two secret agents, 86 and 99, battle against the bad guys.  Agent 86 (Maxwell Smart) is a bumbling fool who relies on his more experienced and wise sidekick, the sexy agent 99 (we never learn her name, as far as I know) to get the job done. 

Mel Brooks created the original show (Man, that guy has his hands in everything funny, it seems!  I just watched the Producers last week and laughed my head off.).  The humor comes from the irony of the fact that a guy named “Smart” is incredibly stupid and inept, but he manages to fight crime successfully, partly due to dumb luck and largely due to a very wise woman at his side. 

Why do we laugh?  We laugh because we recognize truth and its absence, folly. 

The Bible tells us about wise women like agent 99 and their role in supporting men, to make them better then they are by themselves.  It’s not a demeaning role.  It’s an honorable one: companions and equal workers for a noble cause.  We know from Genesis that when God created man, he was alone, and God created woman as his best suited helper (Genesis 2:18). 

Maxwell Smart constantly defies his name by persisting in clumsy stupidity.  It’s funny because we recognize that his actions should lead to death or at least unemployment. “Understanding is a fountain of life to those who have it, but folly brings punishment to fools” (Proverbs 16:22).

Proverbs, that great book on wisdom, tells us the rewards we can expect from wisdom, true “smarts” (not the type that Maxwell Smart exhibits): 

Do not forsake wisdom, and she will protect you; love her, and she will watch over you. Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding. Esteem her, and she will exalt you; embrace her, and she will honor you. She will set a garland of grace on your head and present you with a crown of splendor (6-9).

In true Proverbs 31 fashion, Agent 99 is the wise woman who stands beside her man to offer him help when he needs it: “She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue” (26).  Agent 99 just happens to have a fairly difficult assignment, one that I don’t envy.  Anne Hathaway has some pretty big shoes to fill as 99.  Here’s hoping she can keep Smart in line, as her predecessor, Barbara Feldon, did before her. 

Bearing Good Fruit

Last year, you might recall my experiments with gardening, well, if you want to call it that.  It’s more like a couple pots of herbs in my window.  Emboldened by my success with the fresh herbs, I decided to expand my repertoire and try growing food, you know, to eat.

Mom and dad have always grown beautiful tomato plants.  Here’s a shot of my little sis and me enjoying them.  Well, actually, she’s enjoying them. I’m busy glaring at my mom, ready to throw my wooden shoe at her for making me dress up like a little Dutch girl. 

I miss those fresh, vine ripe tomatoes.  So, I thought I’d try my hand at growing them on my deck.  How hard could it be?

I went to Lowe’s and bought potting soil, tomato plants, and pots.  There, job complete.  But, on the way home, I stopped at my favorite place, the library, where the master gardeners happened to be manning the “ask the master gardener” table.  So, leaving my plants to wilt in the sun in my car for awhile longer, I picked their brain about my plants.

Here’s what I learned about myself, I mean my tomato plant.

• To bear good fruit, my plant needs big, strong roots.

 The master gardener told me to take the roots and lay them horizontally across the soil, to allow for the most root support and growth in the pot.  This way, when the heavy fruit shows up, the plant will be strong enough to support all the weight, while absorbing enough nutrients from the soil to grow lots of fruit.

Am I deeply rooted in God’s word?  Do I grow deep and wide in the knowledge of Him? To bear fruit, the fruit of the spirit, I need to have daily time with God and his Word, to let him nourish me.

• My plant needs the right food

 I assumed that I just needed to water my plant, and that would be all. It works for my herbs.  But apparently, tomatoes are hungry little buggers.  They are “big eaters,” according to the master gardener.  So, I had to plant them in nutrient rich compost and regularly feed them specific tomato food. 

 Jesus told us that man should not live by bread alone but on the Word of God (Matthew 4:4).  We are to feast on God’s word and let it feed us life.  Just like starving plants don’t bear fruit, starving Christians won’t either. 

•  My plant needs pruning

The gardener told me about non-fruit filled branches called “suckers” that literally suck the energy out of the plant and waste what could be otherwise going to fruit production.  My job as tomato keeper is to promptly remove all suckers, so my plant can focus on bearing fruit.

 I wonder how many “suckers” I have in my own life.  What useless limbs do I grow that take away from my God given tasks?  Are there any responsibilities that I’ve taken on that are “sucking” my ability to serve God?  I think about the jobs I volunteer for that don’t use my God given gifts.  Maybe those are simply “suckers,” needing to be pruned.

•  The plant needs a stake to guide it

 I showed the gardener the height of my itty bitty plant with my hands, and she was adamant that I needed to stake it immediately.  “Train it while it’s young.”  Those were her words exactly.  I’m not making that up.  The tomatoes stake gives the plant more freedom to grow.  Without the stake, it will fall over once it produces some fruit, and it will cease to produce more.  With the stake, the plant has room for much more fruit; the sky is literally the limit. 

 We often don’t like the sound of rules and regulations imposed on us.  They seem confining and too limiting, a kill joy.  But James tells us of the “perfect law which brings freedom” (1:25).  And like the plant, I need God’s law to direct me, to give me guidance, so I might bear the most possible fruit. 

 So the sky is my limit.  

Jesus, our Afikomen

On Saturday, we joined Jewish families around the globe in celebrating the Passover.  I cooked all day, preparing unleavened treats, and Dan set up the Seder table for our family and guests (the Zug family). 

Dan and I have been hosting Seders for several years now, with a variety of different people, across the county.  And each time I sit down at this sacred and traditional meal, I come away learning something new about Jesus.

When we host a Seder meal, Dan and I assume two familiar roles.  He plays the rabbi, or the Jewish man of the home, dressed in his prayer shawl and wearing his yarmulke.  I sit at his right hand as the Messianic interpreter, the one who explains the traditions in terms of its Christian significance and how we can see Jesus in each element.

This year, for the first time, we led a Seder that involved small children, two under the age of five.  We wanted to see what the Seder was like through the eyes of a child, plus it was a new challenge for us to appeal to someone with a shorter attention span. 

A lot of the chanting and the drinking of the different cups of wine went right over their heads.  Rightly, they hated eating the bitter herbs.  That’s the point.  I think we adults try to sugar coat it with meaning, but to the kids, it’s bitter.  They just wanted to spit it back out.  That’s probably the best response.

The children especially liked it when Dan got down on the floor with them and washed their hands with a pitcher and a bowl of water.  I thought about how Jesus stepped down from heaven to our level, for a moment in time, to be with us.  And at this point in the Passover (the Last Supper), in humility, Jesus bowed down lower to wash the disciple’s feet.  The kids recognized how special it was for the host to leave his place of honor at the head of the table and sit on the floor by them to wash their hands. 

But their favorite part of the entire meal was the Afikomen.  It comes at two points during the meal.  The first is when the leader takes a piece of matzah, the unleavened bread, and breaks it in half.  The first half goes in the matzah tash, a special ceremonial bag with three compartments.  But the second half becomes the Afikomen (Greek for “that which comes last”).

The leader wraps the Afikomen in a piece of cloth and tells the children to hide their eyes while he hides it.  Later, towards the end of the Seder meal, the leader reminds the children of the hidden Afikomen, and they set out to find it.  The child who finds it gets a reward. 

You might be thinking, “This is a bizarre tradition.”  Yes, it probably sounds that way, to the western mindset.  Our Thanksgiving dinners don’t exactly involve lots of liturgy or symbolic elements.  But, this has been going on for thousands of years, and each element has ties back to the Exodus from Egypt.  And for Christians, we believe that they also have forward looking ties to Yeshua, Jesus, our Messiah, who fulfills all of these elements.

For thousands of years, Jewish families have been talking about the Afikomen Jesus.  He, like the matzah, left his home in heaven, represented by the tri-part trinity matzah tash bag.  He was broken, pierced, wrapped in a white cloth, and buried.  Then, after a time, he was raised to life again.  

The children played a key part in this re-enactment of Jesus’ birth, death, burial, and resurrection.  It was the undervalued, lower-class women who found the empty tomb, and likewise, it is the innocent, young children who are the ones to find the hidden Afikomen.  They joyfully run back with the good news, to receive their prize.  What’s been lost has now been found. 

This must be what Jesus meant when he told us to have the faith of a child-to run eagerly to spread the good news, to believe you’ve found the truth and want to share it, and to earnestly expect your promised reward. 

Trinitarian Bamboo

I feel like my life is tuned into the China channel right now.  Many events in my life are conspiring against me to make me more informed about this country and this people.

For one, I’m in a highly unusual reading rut at the moment.  China keeps popping up everywhere.  One book group is reading Amy Tan’s The Kitchen God’s Wife this month, so I’m learning a lot about a Chinese-American woman’s domestic life, especially around WWII.  In another book club (yes, I have more than one), we just finished reading Snowflower and the Secret Fan, which is about a Chinese woman’s life at the turn of the 19^th century.  There’s a lot in there about foot binding, and plenty of other information to make me happy that I’m living in this century, in this country.

Then, the Dali Lama comes to Seattle for a couple days, and the newpapers are plastered with news about him and the protests about China and Tibet.  So, now I’m looking up and reading lots of information on who he is, what he believes, and why people are so riled up right now about China and Tibet.

On top of that, my sister just bought her very first home.  I wanted to get her a housewarming present, so I went to IKEA and purchased her some decorative bamboo.  It seemed like a hip addition to her stylish new condo, and she’d mentioned that she’d liked the stuff. 

I didn’t realize how many choices went into purchasing bamboo, which is sold as “lucky bamboo.”  You can choose curly or straight.  There’s various containers in which to place it.  But, most importantly, you have to figure out how many stalks of bamboo to purchase because it apparently brings different luck to the household. 

The sign told me that 3 pieces of bamboo would bring the home happiness.  Five pieces would bring good health.  Something like 21 pieces would bring what sounded like Bliss.  “Why can’t only one bring Bliss?” I mused.

As I read the large sign that informed me about the different types of luck I could purchase, I thought back to The Kichen God’s Wife and the Snowflower and the Secret Fan, how luck was such a key ingredient to these people’s lives.  The women spent great deals of money to change their luck or to convince fortune tellers to change it for them.  At funerals, the mourners would eat “lucky candy” to ward off evil spirits.  They lived lives in fear of a negative change in their luck, due to a social misstep.

“If I buy the wrong amount of bamboo, will I give my sister bad luck?” I wondered to myself. 

Here I was, an American with no Buddhist ties, worried about bringing my sister bad luck with a decorative plant.  I think I let these ideas get the better of me.

Standing in front of the bamboo display, I decided, then and there, that luck wouldn’t rule my decisions.  I don’t have an impersonal universe dictating my fate.  I have a personal God who loves me and wants what’s best for me. He listens to me at any moment of any day.  I don’t have to pay him bribe money or follow silly rules.  I just have to love him and trust him. 

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows (James 1:17).  (Yes, it’s a memory verse). 

So, I bought 3 pieces of bamboo, to represent the trinitarian God that I love. And, if Ellen happens to host a Chinese person, versed in feng shui, at her home, she won’t be embarrassed to have a 3 stalk bamboo decoration that signifies happiness. 

Afterall, three is a great number for happiness.

Three O’clock Calico

Three o’clock calico
Do you not know
What people do at 3?
We sleep, in fact, deeply.

Your cries might seem cute
In daylight.
But at night, they’re downright
Rude, and selfish

Introduce yourself sometime
Preferably on my doorstep,
Not by my nightstand,
Not when I’m dreaming.

You remember me-

I’m the crazy chick,
With the hair in a knot,
Peeling back the shutters,
Scolding you and your purple collar.

“Go home to your people!”
“No, that’s not me!”

You belong in the country
Where you can yowl all you want,
Not in the city, where people need sleep.

Three nights I’ve heard you
One more and I’ll get traps.
There are humane ones,
But perhaps they’re too nice…

You’d probably still howl
Scratch
Moan
And mew

Let me sleep.
You little 3 a.m. banshee.

In Wandring Mazes Lost

I’m getting more adventurous now that I’ve got more energy.  My daily walks are stretching longer each day.  Last week, I realized that my minutes were adding up to something more substantial, something that might get me outside the confines of my apartment complex.  I’ve enjoyed getting to know my neighbors a little better, and I’ve come to know the comings and goings of all the maintenance workers like clockwork. But, I was ready to push it a little further and venture into the wide and wondrous world.

Equipped with my water bottle, a roadmap, and a cell phone, I took off in a direction that I’ll call North, but as you’ll soon learn, that all depends on which way you hold the map.

My neighborhood’s arrangement makes no logical sense to me.  No roads travel straight for very long, it climbs and drops with unpredictable hills, and the urban planners had absolutely no creativity when they named the streets.  Within one block, you’ll see 177^th place, 177^th road, and 177^th avenue.  A mile away, they’ll throw in another 177^th, but it will be a North or a South, or perhaps an East or a West. 

I picked a road, we’ll call it 177^th, but it doesn’t matter because even though I committed to walking along it and never wavered off course, I noticed that the road had changed names on me, and I had gone in so many twists and turns, I forgot the direction from which I’d come.  I pulled out my map and scratched my head, as I tried to locate which 177^th I’d left, and which 144^th I was on.  Those roads never met, so apparently, 177^th had changed a couple times before I’d noticed. 

I saw homes that I’d never seen before, but I was growing very tired, and I just wanted to get home.  I kept walking, hoping that I’d see something familiar or run into a street, road, place, or something that was clearly marked on the map.  There weren’t even any nice cats for me to play with along the way.

A half an hour went by, and I was getting very tired.  I still had no clue where I was.  I shuffled along the road, only to take a few bad turns that ended up as dead ends.  I’d taken to walking while holding my map, hoping to see some street that looked familiar. 

After about 45 minutes, I started to recognize the neighborhood, but I still couldn’t find it on the map.  Depressed, exhausted, embarrassed, and very dizzy, I collapsed on the sidewalk.  Well, that sounds more dramatic than it was. In actuality, I sat my sorry rear end on the curb and started to cry.

Eventually, I got out my cell phone and called my husband, who by that time had arrived home from work.  I read him the sign at the intersection, and he used that information to find me with the car. 

He had no problem finding me. He’s a great navigator. 

In my life, I frequently get lost because I am stubborn.  I struggle to find my own way, only to find myself utterly off course.  Like my loving husband who comes to my rescue, God’s always been there to find me and help when I ask.  But I only seem to ask when I’m at my wits end, when I’ve reached the end of my power and am a useless pile sitting on the curb. 

Why not consult my navigator before I take off on the journey?  He knows the road; he’s got the best plan.  At the beginning of my day, I can ask him for help, for directions.  But, I also need to remember to call out to him at the first sign of trouble, instead of waiting until the bitter end.  He’s always there, always ready and waiting for us to ask for directions when we’re lost. 

For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost (Luke 19:10).

Shout to the Whales!

We interrupt the regular stream of posts about my recovery from surgery for a brief social commentary.

Literary genre:  RANT

I tuned in tonight to watch the last half hour of American Idol’s charity program, “Idol Gives Back,” and got to watch the stars sing and dance and strum their guitars for poor people around the globe.  I’m fine with all that.  I have no problem with that.  Okay, maybe it was a bit sappy, but it’s sap for a good cause.

My problem was the last song. Ryan Seacrest announced that the contestants would end the show singing one of my favorite modern worship songs “Shout to the Lord.”  Honestly, I couldn’t believe that I was hearing him right, because it’s a praise song to Jesus.  And, this is mainstream America we’re talking about.  I’d more expect a song called “Shout to the Poor” or “Shout to the Whales.”

But, they cleared up the problem with the first few notes.  They only changed one key word in the song to make it more palatable:  Jesus.   Instead of “My Jesus, my savior” we got “My shepherd, my savior.” 

You might be thinking, “Amy, get your undies out of a bunch. It’s the same thing.” 

No, it’s not! 

It’s the only freaking word they changed in the entire song, and I listened carefully to see if there were others.  The only change was the most important word in there!

Here’s the lyrics to the song, as Darlene Zschech wrote it.

My Jesus, My Savior
Lord there is none like You
All of my days, I want to praise
The wonders of Your mighty love
My Comfort, My Shelter
Tower of refuge and strength
Let every breath, all that I am
Never cease to worship You

Shout to the Lord, all the earth
Let us sing. Power and majesty, praise to the King.
Mountains bow down and the seas will roar
At the sound of Your name
I sing for joy at the work of Your hands
Forever I’ll love you, forever I’ll stand
Nothing compares to the promise I have in YOU!

(repeat, ad nauseum, with increasing fervor, and if you’re charismatic, sing the last refrain slower, without backup music).

Now, just get rid of the reference to Jesus, and you have their version. 

Let me just clear something up for the people who are still thinking this isn’t a big deal.  Jesus IS the deal.  Without that name in there, it doesn’t make one bit of sense. There’s NO other name by which we can be saved (Acts 4:12).  Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life.  Nobody comes to the Father except through him (John 14:6). 

Without that name, people merely insert their own functional savior. And I promise you, if it isn’t Jesus, it isn’t going to have mountains bowing down.  The seas won’t roar for your favorite savior because they don’t recognize anybody but Jesus as their maker, redeemer, and king.

Note to the American Idol producers:  Don’t mess with my favorite praise songs.  But more importantly, don’t mess with Jesus.  He’s got mountains and oceans at his command.  You should know. You heard the song.

The Great Physician’s Scalpel

The great physician has been using his scalpel on me lately, and it hurts like heck.  Having recently undergone a major surgery, I should know a thing or two about how this works.  But of course, like with many spiritual matters, it takes me awhile to figure it out. I was feeling pain, and I got angry, not recognizing that my loving surgeon was doing some necessary repairs to my life and heart. 

For my esophagus surgery, I had an amazing surgeon, to whom I gave my full trust, to cut me open and repair my messed up gastrointestinal tract.  And even though I went to him with a list of questions and left with pages full of answers, I still had plenty of surprises in the recovery process. 

At my two week exam, I hobbled into the office, clutching the left part of my ribcage, asking, “Why does it hurt here so badly?”  The surgeon explained that he needed to cut deeply into my muscles to get at whatever he needed to fix.  It was the most complex and deepest of the cuts, so it hurt the most.  It’s also taking the longest to heal.

In my life, Jesus, the great physician, has been lovingly using his scalpel, so I can heal and become the person he wants me to be.  The problem is, scalpel cuts don’t feel very good, especially the deep ones.

I think it started with my home.  I got a note from my apartment owners, saying that when our lease runs out, we need to move.  I love our apartments, and this doesn’t fit with my own plan.  I wanted to stay here, in this apartment, with my sunny living room and my Jesus loving neighbor.  I like my view, and my garage is convenient.  And I HATE moving. 

But the scalpel cut that away.

Then, I got a note from my ministry leader, letting me know that my ministry is being cancelled.  I won’t be writing for my church any longer, and it upset me more than I thought it would.  Suddenly, it became MY ministry, not God’s service. 

So, the scalpel cut that too.

First, I got angry and defensive, not a very pleasant person to be around.  Then, I sulked.  Finally, after I was done with my pity party, I prayed.  (Why, oh why, is that always last?)

And God reminded me of the 5 wounds on my stomach and the trust I gave to my surgeon to fix me.  Even though I’ve been going through weeks of pain and annoying lifestyle changes, I continue to trust that my surgeon knows what he’s doing.

But, what about the Great Physician, to whom I gave my entire life?  The one who I trusted to take care of me and heal me, to make me more like him?  Why can’t I trust that he knows what he’s doing in these matters, even though they hurt, even though they cause me some inconvenience?

So, convicted and annoyed with myself that I didn’t see it sooner, I’m having lots of chats with my Great Physician, and I’m trying to trust him and his expert hands to do what is right for me and my life.  Even if it hurts like heck.