Karen Rabbitt

Take No Good Thing for Granted

Creator-God, Father,

Today we would take no part of your good creation for granted. We thank you for lungs that absorb your oxygen and release our carbon dioxide. We thank you for hearts that keep up the rhythm for our pulsing blood. We thank you for bones that fortify us.

We are grateful today for green plants and blue sky, not to be taken as our due, but to be received as magnificent gift. Rice, potatoes, and cassava are your provision. We appreciate trees— cypress, sassafras, maple. We rest against their trunks, we drink their tea, we savor their sap.

You have set for us a mysterious world to explore. Neutrinos and quarks; cell nuclei and mitochondria; DNA, RNA, and the human genome. Light, both wave and particle. Is the variety of color infinite or does it just seem so?

Every piece of your work shouts your name. Had we ears to hear, the reverberations would split our eardrums. Today, we want to join that unheard song of praise. Thank you for listening.

Winter Sustenance

Like ‘50s farm women who canned corn in August for January sustenance, we can store up God’s word in the cellars of our hearts. Such stored wisdom can carry us through our spiritual winters. When tragedy and disappointment threaten to overwhelm our trust in God’s goodness, those summer-stored words can nourish us.

“Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him.” Job’s words strengthen my faith as I contemplate tragedies around me— the California wildfires, the untimely death of a friend’s child, the catastrophic losses in China and Myanmar. If Job can hope in God in spite of his immense losses, we can too.

Job’s testimony of hope was called up from a summer’s reserve. He didn’t grow that trust as his children died, his servants perished, and his crops failed. That faith had grown out of his intimate friendship with God before those reversals.

Sometimes we find God in suffering but the road is smoother if we’ve gathered up sustenance ahead of time. We don’t have to leave the path to find food if we carry it with us. What scriptures carry you through? What wisdom is tucked away in the cool basement of your heart?

Here are two more from my storeroom:
 “The Lord will rescue me from every evil attack and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom.” 2 Ti 4:18
“I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.” Ro 8:18

Jesus, please help us store in summer what we'll need in winter.

A Sure Foundation

"That steel I-beam sure looks strong." My husband and I had just awakened this morning in the unfinished basement of my daughter's two-story house.

"It looks strong, but in a fire, wood would only char. That steel is like hard wax--it would melt. A beam of several pine 2x12s nailed and glued together would maintain its structural integrity, even in the flames."

"So even though the steel looks more stable, wood is better in a fire.

"Yup."

There's an image. What's our foundation made of? Do we look strong or are we really strong? Are we strong in ourselves or strong in the Lord? And how can we know, except in the fire?

Paul says, in 1Corinthians 3, there is one foundation--Jesus Christ. Maybe in our everyday lives, we're not so aware of our foundations. We manage a busy household, we perform well in a challenging job, and/or we get A's in graduate school.

But what happens when a child gets leukemia, a new boss fires us, or we sustain a closed-head injury?  Or even the lesser fires of the flu, a critical boss, or a bout of the blues?

What do we rest on then? What supports our weight in those flames? It's not our good looks. It is the surety of that Jesus-beam that undergirds us. He is the foundation that survives every fire. 

Lord, Isaiah 33:6 says you are "a sure foundation for our times." May we rest our weight on you.

The Mountains also Testify

"For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." Romans 1:20

At my daughter's, almost every morning for the last three weeks, I've walked across the lawn and boulders of her back yard, opened the gate, and walked a path around a three hundred acre lake just to the east. Thirty miles west, Long's Peak, more than 14,000 feet, glows in the early light. Two evenly-matched smaller peaks--Twin Sisters--shore up the north side of the "fourteener." They are part of the front range that stretches for a hundred and seventy-five miles, as if anchoring not only Colorado, but all of America.

But I'm a water person, myself. The smell of the sea, the ceaseless roll of the waves, the endless view across the ocean speaks God's poetry. And yet, the mountains also testify.

"I am a rock," Long's Peak says, "like your God is a rock." Rocks endure. These high hills will give witness to the steadiness of the Godhead until the end.  Twenty years ago, I ascended another fourteener, Pike's Peak. The three jet fighters that roared round the rock below us accentuated the height, approaching three miles. The enormous stone formations at the foot--the Garden of the Gods--looked like some giant had arranged boulders in his backyard, like a gargantuan version of my daughter's landscaping. 

But we don't need to walk the beach or contemplate the heights to perceive God's character. We can open our own front door. The iridescence of a blackbird's neck, the yellow center of a daisy, the blue of a cloudless sky--they all reveal God's power and love. Indeed, we need look no further than the design of our own hand to sense his care. God has given great thought to the making of the earth and its inhabitants so that we can begin to discern his nature by his creation.

Creator-Father, open our eyes to see your character in your handiwork. 

Surprised by Grace

On May 8, I wrote about three extra pounds I needed to lose before I came out to Colorado for the birth of our first grandson.  I just knew I wouldn't be able to resist eating the cookies and chunks of nutty granola treats that had been a downfall on previous visits.

But guess what? God had a different plan.  I lost a pound before I got here and I've lost two pounds here. Who knew I could resist? I had it all figured out--what I needed. But, once again, God showed me his power and grace.

Don't we all have areas where we just know how it's going to be? We know what's going to happen, especially if we don't do what we need to do. If we don't apply for that job a week before the deadline, we can't possibly be hired. We think if we've smoked for fifty years, we'll never quit. Maybe eating is your issue, too, and you just know you'll go to the grave in the body size you are now. You've made your bed and you'll just have to lie in it, just like your Mother always said.

Turns out, though, Moms are not always right. Sometimes God's surprising grace overrides Moms and our own expectations to bless us with a new experience of him.

Holy Spirit, thank you for your fresh manifestation of grace. May every reader be surprised by your gracious power today.

Cherished Children

"He's adorable!" "Oh, how sweet!" "He's so cute!"

That's what we've been hearing a lot of around here as we admire our new grandboy, now just nine days old. Mom, Dad, and Grandma (that's me :)) keep touching his soft skin, chuckling at his funny faces, and rushing to pick him up at the first sign of fussiness.  As we meet his every need quickly and kindly, we are laying the foundations of his life.  I am so grateful that his parents are able to give him such a good start.

My foundations were roughly laid and missing a whole wall. Having little sense of how to help build a life, I screwed up my daughter's foundation. She, however, has worked hard to let God build his house in her heart. And she's now ready, by grace and with grace, to lay a solid footing for her son.

Many of us have been betrayed by those who should have responded to our needs. A father isn't there. A mother's attention is directed to an older sister. A grandfather takes advantage of us. No one told us we were sweet, cute, or adorable.

Except the God who calls himself Father, even Abba, Daddy. He thinks we're delightful. Fallen, broken, and yet, his cherished children.

Father, show us how to receive, again, or for the first time, your fathering.

Life Begins as Life Continues

On Tuesday, our thirty-sixth wedding anniversary, our first grandchild was born in Colorado. In God's sweet timing, I arrived on the right day. (Photos will be up soon on www.rabbittsoupcom ) He was expected next week, but when I left Salina, Kansas at 6 a.m. on the second day of my two-day drive, my phone tingled with a text message:  "Guess where I am." Her water had broken at midnight and she was in the hospital. Praying across the prairie, I pondered the labor process.

Step by step, a child is born. Every birth proceeds from beginning to middle to delivery. The water breaks, the contractions start, the pushing begins. It's a messy process and not always orderly. Life begins as life continues. Messy and disorderly sometimes, but moving towards a goal.

Line upon line, precept upon precept, God is bringing to birth his goal of a family.  Beginning with "Let there be light," continuing with the light of the world sent into the darkness of our first parent's sin, and finishing with a golden kingdom beyond our imagination, God is giving life to his vision. Just like my daughter and son-in-law, we will all consider the end worth the labor.

Father, thank you for your vision. May we see more clearly what you see and, like you, may we count the birth-pangs worth the kingdom. 

Can You Hear Me?

My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. John 10:27(NIV)

Do we know his voice? Some of us struggle to believe his voice is the one we are hearing. Often we believe what we’ve heard is just our own thoughts. How can we distinguish his words from media voices, parental words, Satan’s input, and our own ruminations? A friend recommended a helpful book, Can You Hear Me? by Brad Jersak.

Jersak, a Canadian pastor, writes clearly on hearing Jesus’ voice. He talks about the simplicity of listening, blocks to hearing, and the life of listening prayer. His simple instructions offer practical guidelines. For example, he describes listening through biblical stories by starting with picturing the details of a Bible story, after asking God to bring to mind one that is meaningful to you. After you imagine the characters and their behavior, he suggests, just in your imagination, to use your senses of touch, taste, sight, hearing, and smell to immerse yourself in the narrative. Then, see where Jesus is and what he’s doing. Finally, as you draw near to him, ask him what truth he wants to speak to you.

Following these instructions with the Mary and Martha story, I got a clear sense of a personal word. I was surprised, actually. I’ve often questioned whether I’m listening to his voice, but the sentence that came to me spoke directly to a current need.

As Jersak points out, this particular prayer strategy isn’t new, but he communicates it in a way I can grasp. In addition to this engagement with scripture stories, Jersak teaches other ways of hearing God. He also talks about intercession, justice, and inner healing, among other topics. If you, too, are hungry to hear the shepard’s voice, this book will feed you.

Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit, we want to hear and obey your voice.

Who Will Stand?

Americans now know, with gas at more than $4 a gallon, what Europeans have known for years. Energy is precious. We are learning deliberation. “If I drive to Meijers, across town, I need to stop at the library, Ace hardware, and Sam’s on the way.” I ran out of ink yesterday. Knowing I’d be near Wal-Mart today, I didn’t run out for ink. Ridership is up on mass transit and bike sales must be picking up. That’s just the first layer of effects.

The second economic effect is how the increase in gas prices increases consumer prices. We’re beginning to feel those pangs, too. The local whole wheat flour I buy for bread-making has increased $.12 a pound. Our trash bill went up recently. We’ve yet to see the full effect of increased transportation costs. Some effects are predictable—increased food pantry demand—while others remain to be seen.

World economic pressures add additional uncertainty to the mix. China and India, with their rapid development, increase demand for clothing, cars, and building materials. And why should America remain on the top of the heap? What gives us the right to use so much of the world’s resources? But what a painful slide it will be. Some American middle-class folks will slide right into poverty. And what will the poor do?

When I turn my eyes from the gas pumps to the scriptures, I see Jesus. After foreseeing people “fainting from terror” because of the events of the end, he says:   “When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” Luke 21:28 (NIV) Are we near the time of the end? I don’t know. But as prices squeeze us, let’s look up to Jesus’ promises, more precious than any fuel. When the end comes, only he, and those who hold his hand, will stand.

Jesus, may we feel the pressure of your hand today.

Join the Dark Side?

“Join the dark side.” That was the bumper sticker I saw this morning. Yikes. Why would anyone consciously want to join with darkness? Many have made an unknowing contract with the dark of night, for example, when they allow themselves to be addicted to drugs. But, a well-thought-out choice?

I can think of three reasons: 1. They’ve never seen the light. 2. Darkness promises power. 3. They want to be with someone who lives in darkness. “God is light and in him there is no darkness at all,” John says. (1John 1:5, NIV)  With no experience of God’s multi-splendored light, the light that illumines the colors of life, the dark side may feel like the realistic side. Then, the dark side promises the ability to achieve your own purposes. To join with God is to put aside our own desires and to work with him to bring the rule and reign of King Jesus. And, it’s easy to slide into darkness if people depend on others who have already chosen the dark side.

But those who join with darkness do not foresee the consequences. They see only the glittery promises of personal power or the comfort of connection. The dark one hides in the shadows, around the corner, behind the shed.

Even for those of us who walk in the light, the darkness sometimes entices. For most of us, drugs are easy to recognize as lightless. Pride, prejudice, and greed are not so easy to see, crouching in the shadows. Let’s keep asking King Jesus to shine his light into our dark passages. We need his power to see the consequences of darkness. By his grace, we will choose the light of day, every day.

Holy Spirit, come illumine the hidden corners of our hearts.