Faith and Everyday Life January 2013
Surprise!
Here is a paradox. The only way to be sure that we will be able to be surprised is to actively look for surprises. We aren’t talking about the occasional thunderbolt. That one will get you, whether you are looking for it or not! We are talking about an almost innocent belief that easily-overlooked surprises are everywhere.
We have to believe in a God who delights in seeing the eyes of children as they catch their first glimpse of the presents under the Christmas tree. We have to believe that God is so pleased with creation, that God gets tickled every time our eyes widen.
Growing up into adulthood can kill this sort of thing. It doesn’t have to, but often it does.
We become practical, business-like, serious, heavy, burdened, realistic, on and on. We have suffered enough disappointments, hurts, cruelties to know what it is “’really like.”
We don’t just lose the wonder of childhood; we lose the wonder of being alive.
Many of you may be protesting that you have done no such thing, that there is plenty of life and wonder in you! … “Don’t need to read this series this year, applies to someone else….” Please don’t leave so quickly! Please be open to a few surprises! There is always a deeper layer, an event to be seen from a different angle, a word or gesture that might touch something deep inside you.
This year we will invite you to be “one who looks.” This year we will try to help you expect surprises!
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life February 2013
Surprised on Valentines Day
Valentines Day. No surprises here. Candy hearts, Hallmark cards, packets for the kids at school, and of course, the obligatory surprise gift to the one who had better get one this year after you forgot last year. It’s no surprise that surprises are supposed to happen on this day.
Do you wonder what surprises God is planning for you this Valentines Day? Do you wonder what clever way God will let grace peek though some event so small that you might just miss it if you weren’t looking for it? Have you considered using the day to try to find ways to be that “crack in the ordinary” that might be a delight so small that others might even miss it if they aren’t looking carefully?
Research on couples, and this probably applies to all of us, shows that what builds relationship is hundreds of little “Turning Towards.” These are simple gestures that take only seconds and represent a positive or even neutral response to a comment of another.
They say, “What you have said to me, no matter how small, is valuable enough that it is worth responding to.” We don’t usually even remember the content of these; they are so small, but they accumulate. The receiver feels, “I am important to you!”
What if you intentionally turned toward someone an unusually high number of times on
Valentines Day? What if you noticed counted and savored every turning toward you got from anyone that day? You might find out that you are fabulously wealthy and you might just contribute to the wealth of others! Now, wouldn’t God be surprised!
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life March 2013
Surprised by Volunteers
Something is happening in your garden. There are plants coming up that you didn’t put there. We call them “volunteers.” Of their own volition they appear, having been blown by the wind or having popped up by an unseen runner. Some just “naturalize,” having multiplied as if by magic. Can’t you see the smile of delight on God’s face?
Try this. Make a list of family or friend’s names. Limit it, or stretch it, to about a dozen.
Take the list outside with you each day and look at your volunteers. Then point to one and say, “There’s (let’s say) John.” Move on to another flower. Point to it and say, “Why, that one is Sheila.” Go through your entire list. The surprise of the flower and the loved one will soon merge.
The next day, do the same. Don’t worry about finding the same flower. Perhaps you’ll pick a different one and say, “Why today, that one is John!” What a delightful surprise!
Of course, these flowers won’t last forever. So to keep the experience, you will need to create an image in your mind, or a feeling in your heart of this friend/family/flower experience. So when the flowers fade, the experience of the surprise will not.
We did not create or even plant the flowers or the loved ones, God did. God volunteered them to us as constant sources of surprise and joy. Have you noticed? There are even more volunteers out there just waiting to be noticed, appreciated and loved. Have you looked today?
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life April 2013
Surprised by Babies
Having an infant can’t be that difficult! Change a diaper occasionally, feed the baby
(breast feed and you don’t even have to do meal prep) and sit for hours holding this bundle of joy who loves and adores you unconditionally. Nothing to it!
Surprise!
For the mom, simple life tasks take an interminably long time. The bundle screams every time you put it down and frequently after you pick it up. You wake up one morning realizing that you haven’t completed a full thought in two months. You had no idea fatigue felt like this.
Dad can excuse the mess for the first few weeks, but now it’s time for the household to return to normal, i.e. pre-baby. Let’s return to frequent and torrid sex. Besides, it is time to get his wife back and time to re-balance this preoccupation she has with catering to all the baby’s needs while not even considering his.
Surprise!
Some surprises are real shockers! Are you open to hearing that your disappointments are really the products of your believing that future should look one way, while the future does what ever it pleases? Bitter pill, eh?
Living in faith is being open to how life really is , not how we think it should be. God says, “This will be a surprise, but I will walk into the surprise with you. You can’t know this territory beforehand, but you can trust that you are not alone. Place your trust in me, not in predictability. I will help you transform disappointment into delight!”
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life May 2013
Surprised by Tears
“Where did that come from?” he said as he realized it was no longer possible to staunch the flow of water from his eyes. “My dad died a long time ago, I though I dealt with those feelings.” Then his wife said, “You get quiet every time someone mentions him. You get a far away look. When I ask what is wrong, you always say, ‘Nothing’.”
“Where do you go?” I asked. “It’s a playground. I was 9 or 10. Some big kids came along and started to push me and my friends around. I wanted my dad. I fell and ripped my pants and tore open my knee. Then out of nowhere, my dad came running up, picked me up and told them to go away.” Tears now rolled out of his eyes. “Isn’t this pathetic!?
Here I am a grown man and I must still want my daddy to protect me!”
“No,” I said. “Your dad loved you and you loved your dad. God made hearts that get all woven together with other hearts and it hurts when they get torn, just like your knee. We love the people who tend our wounds when we are hurt and who care about how it feels to us. Of course you are sad and of course you are tearful. Is that really a surprise?” He replied, “Well, now that you put it that way, maybe not.”
Surprise! You are more “normal” than you think you are. Try looking for how your feelings make sense, rather than for what is wrong with them. You have tears because you have feelings. You have feelings because you are alive. You are what God intended you to be.
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life June 2013
Surprised by Plants
A friend recently traveled to the Himalayas to trek. As she looked off in the distance, she could see only barren twisted rock that looked like it had been scoured clean by wind and snow. It looked barren and desolate and she reported feeling a chill as she thought of herself walking onto a beautiful but very dead moonscape.
As she perched on top of a 16,000 foot pass in the blistering sun, she looked down at the small shards of broken rock that constituted the landscape. There, in the midst of a dead land, was a purple leaf growing out from under the rocks. She was more shocked than even surprised. There appeared to be little to account for this plant being able to survive.
But, there it was anyway.
So, she started to look more carefully, walk more slowly and to carefully turn over the rocks at the surface of where she walked. No surprises here! She found hundreds of little plants developing at each place she turned over rocks.
Have you ever wondered about what is just beneath the surface of the people you see at church on Sunday? What tenderness, strength, virtue or wisdom? Have you turned over any rocks lately to find out? Would you like a really nice surprise every Sunday for the next month? Well, now you know where to look.
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life July 2013
Surprised by Chance Meetings
There are lots of ways to travel. Go four star, or back pack, bicycle, or cruise. There is one common denominator in all travel, and that’s people. They are in the seat next to you on the airplane, at your table on a cruise, in the line at the tourist attraction and of course, walking down the street past you wherever you go.
There is a man who, as he walks down the street, frequently asks directions of someone when he knows exactly where he is. He comments on some part of the surroundings, then asks casually “What is it like around here?” Soon he is listening to the stories that give texture to the places he visits. Try this sometime!
“I’m too shy,” you say. “That would make me very uncomfortable.” So what? I say!
Would you walk through a field that had a sign that read “Free Diamonds,” and not take at least one? God created those strangers as sure as God created diamonds. Every one has a life full of stories waiting to be told. Every one of them has something to teach you about the world, about what God is doing in it and maybe even something about yourself.
Why don’t you resolve to talk to a stranger at the Fireworks this year, or on your vacation? Stop someone who lives in the location you travel to and ask them, “What is it like around here? What do think about living here?”
Maybe God has a surprise waiting just for you.
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life August 2013
Surprised by the Other Shoe
When things are going well, we knock on wood and say, “I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop.” What we mean is that when all is well, “reality” will soon set in. It is curious that when things are going badly, we don’t also wait for the other shoe to drop. Have you ever heard anyone say, “Things are going so miserably, I’m sure that wonderful goodness will pop up at any moment!”?
This “other shoe” drops all the time; we just aren’t looking in the right places for it. The difficulties of our lives may not magically stop, but what does happen is that God sends reminders, large and small of divine love and compassion into our everyday lives.
These reminders may be in the form of kind words from someone, an unexpected bloom on a plant, a heartwarming story in the newspaper, or a cat or dog in our laps. To take the attitude, “I know it’s around here somewhere, God said so,” is a powerful viewpoint. It creates a template or lens for seeing the world. “Rejoice in the Lord always,” becomes an anticipation that God will be revealed to us on a daily basis.
When we ask the question, “Where will God show up today?” or “Where did I overlook
God today?” we embrace the promise of the Gospel.
How would your overall attitude on life change if you took up such a spiritual discipline?
Who around you would be positively affected? What would be different about your views on your life’s difficulties if you were always waiting for the other shoe to drop?
You would be very surprised!
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life September 2013
Surprised by Loving
Most people don’t realize that their heads are such noisy places. If you have ever tried to meditate, or had difficulty falling asleep, you are aware of how many random thoughts pass through our minds each minute. If you try really hard to chase them away, you can actually increase the amount of noise quite rapidly. What you resist persists.
The surprise is, that if you stay quiet and notice the thoughts as if they were interesting, but unrelated to you, your mind actually becomes more quiet. While this means that there is more room for thoughts, there is also more room for God to speak. Because you aren’t busy doing other things, you also have more time to listen.
Wouldn’t it also be interesting to allow a vision of a friend or loved one to enter your head during these times? You could imagine them being actively and personally blessed and loved by God with all good things. What a delightful thought! Wouldn’t it be even more interesting to image someone who really irritated you and do the same? Outrageous, eh?
Wouldn’t it be interesting to hear yourself say about them, “They don’t deserve that!” while God was busy saying to them, “You deserve to be loved just because I created you.”? You might have to make a choice. Keep your irritation and make God disappear from the picture or keep God and make the irritation disappear.
Warning! Don’t try this at home unless you are prepared to be changed by it.
Surprise!
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life
Surprised by God’s Way
October 2013
Can we return to that quiet meditation from last month? You know, the one that was surprisingly noisy.
You might be surprised by what actually enters your head when you listen. Some of it might be quite mundane, some interesting, but some might be rather disturbing. There is probably a rather disapproving parent in most of us who says things like, “Shame on you for having such a thought! What kind of a Christian are you? Go wash your brain out with soap!”
Don’t get us wrong, we know you can certainly dwell on thoughts of revenge, betrayal, envy and all sorts of nasty things. You can also get lost in them and become obsessed with them. We aren’t suggesting that you “’give yourself over” to these dark thoughts.
But perhaps the best way to address them isn’t to pretend that you didn’t think them in the first place. Because, of course, you most certainly did.
Isn’t it curious that we can be so fearful of our own thoughts? Let’s go back to how we related to all those random thoughts. What if we treated them all as equals? Grocery lists and lusts. What if we let them all just evaporate into the ether? What if we imaged God sitting next to us, not scolding or judging us, but saying, (with a yawn) “Oh yes, those are the kinds of things humans think. Isn’t that interesting? I wonder what else we could focus on that might fill you with love and grace? Let’s see, let me check my list……”
“Hey, remember the time when I visited you when you were so alone….?” Do we dare put ourselves in a position to be surprised by God’s gentle guidance? It’s risky you know.
You might have to live with being surprised when God actually shows up.
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life November 2013
Surprised by Leaves
Remember when you had all the time in the world? Well, probably not. After all, it was a very long time ago. Your imagination was captured by something. You looked at it endlessly, almost as if it would reveal some wonderful secret if you looked long enough.
Maybe you looked at leaves as if their veins were roadmaps to some magical destination.
You had time to actually look at the colors of a single leaf and marvel at it.
Pity, isn’t it. Those times are irrevocably gone! Very sad. Too busy these days. There are places to go and things to be accomplished. Even St Paul said so. “When I became a man…”well, you know the rest.
Surprise!
That isn’t what he meant at all. Leaving immaturity doesn’t mean ceasing to wonder at the creation. Look again at all those really important things you must do. As you peek out of your grave from one of those new video grave markers, will you see the grand effect of your completing that errand? Will anyone else?
Isn’t more likely that you will be remembered fondly if you are the kind of person who interrupted their errands to pull over and examine a particularly engaging leaf? You will be thought of as a little quirky, but probably remembered with a smile for it.
Are you really going to waste all those surprisingly beautiful leaves that God created just for you to enjoy?
We hope not.
Lutheran Counseling Network

Faith and Everyday Life December 2013
Surprised by Jesus Birth
This one’s a little tougher to pull off. After all, you have been preparing for Christmas for weeks. Besides, you probably wish you could escape from many of the reminders!
Staying open hearted and innocent, surprised by God showing up like that, well, it’s a challenge.
In this case, “I can’t believe it!” may be the greatest statement of faith we could utter.
When we shake our heads with wonder and have no words to describe it, we may successfully have captured the true spirit of Christmas.
“A baby, born in obscurity! What a clever way to do it. I would never have thought of it.”
Living with this experience of wonder and surprise about Christmas sets us up for continuing to live this way in January too. It’s also what has made what we have done for this last year possible. It makes us people who just are wonder and surprise, all the way down to our bones. It allows us to make being surprised by God a way of life.
When we do this, we carry a spark of life in our eyes and in our step. Other will notice and wonder, “So, what’s up with the spark?”
Wouldn’t that make a great entry point for sharing the surprise with someone else?
Wouldn’t it just tickle you to see someone else gain a new set of wide eyes and a sense of wonder?
Surprise! God is among us, to make sure that this miracle can freely and abundantly occur.
Lutheran Counseling Network