No doubt, this woman (who shall remain nameless until I go to my grave) has no idea how much she has impacted my life since I met her many years ago. I once described her as a person who inspired me to accomplish as much as possible before I died, but a friend corrected me and said, “She did not inspire you. She motivated you.”
I often imagine this striking woman getting to the end of her life, looking back, and seeing that she did nothing but get her hair and nails done regularly. Oh yeah, she does read People magazine, so there’s that. But you can’t even say she raised her children because she got someone else to do that for her. She didn’t cook, she had no hobbies, she never worked (inside or outside the home), she belonged to no particular group or club, didn’t surround herself with friends, she didn’t volunteer her time, and was not active in a church. Actually, even though she had the capacity to be significantly philanthropic, to my knowledge she was not.
Here’s the troubling part, though. I don’t think any of this bothers her. She’s perfectly content with things the way they are. I, on the other hand, worry that she will have terrible regrets one day when she realizes she has done little to make a difference. The idea of having that late revelation at the end of one’s life is so unsettling to me, it’s frightening, so she just motivates me to do more. It’s hard for me to imagine that God didn’t ask something of her somewhere along the way, and that her life couldn’t have been much richer.
Sometimes, when I am out speaking to groups about Blue Monarch, I see an occasional face in the crowd that tells me this person is troubled by the same fear. From time to time, someone will come up to me afterwards, with tears in her eyes, and confess she has felt for a long time God was asking something of her, but she had run the other way. This is not just a female thing. Men have told me the same thing. Clearly, avoiding God’s request has not brought them any peace, and for some, it has actually crossed over into real pain. The agony is tangible. Regret is a terrible thing.
A while back, I decided to read the Bible from front to back. I know, some people assume because I founded a Christian organization that I should have done that years ago. But, honestly, I spent most of my life using the Russian roulette system of Bible reading. I randomly opened it and found the verses that shouted to me in that moment, and then convinced myself God showed me all I needed.
When I began this project, I intentionally set no time limits on myself so I wouldn’t speed through the Bible just to meet my goal. I’m terribly competitive, so I resisted the urge to research how long it should take me. (I will confess, I have loved it so much, I am certain I will begin the process all over again as soon as I finish Revelation.)
I am often aware that I see the world through a slightly different lens than the masses, and my interpretation of the Bible has been no different. For instance, when a few of my co-workers were speaking Christianese at lunch one day, I remarked that I had just finished reading the Books of 1st and 2nd Slaughter (there’s some brutal stuff in there!) and after reading Psalms, I found David to be quite a whiner. He’s great! Then he’s not. He’s great! Then he’s not. And when I discovered God had killed Ezekiel’s wife just to prove a point...well, I didn’t speak to him for two days. You miss a lot with the Russian roulette system.
Once I reached the book of Jonah, however, I got stuck. Although I think Jonah is a bit of a spoiled brat, I have been absolutely fascinated with the book and have read it over and over like a broken record. I have read every commentary I can get my hands on and it has been fun comparing all the various translations I can find. I will have to say, I prefer the Living Bible version of Jonah over all the others, simply for the first paragraph. It basically says that God found the wickedness in Nineveh so appalling, it “smells to highest heaven.” Isn’t that great? I think I’m going to start using that. There are lots of things I would say “smell to highest heaven.”
My affection for the book of Jonah clearly goes back to the troubled people I just described. Jonah knew what God was asking him to do. It was a pretty impressive assignment - to warn the people of Ninevah to clean up their act or something terrible might result. Jonah chose to run the opposite direction. It’s really pretty hilarious if you think about it. Jonah ended up on a boat in a terrible storm, got thrown overboard and nearly drowned, found slimy seaweed tangled around his head, was swallowed by a huge fish (how gross is that?), begged for God’s mercy, and finally got vomited onto dry land. And after all that, God picked up where they left off and said, “Remember that thing I asked you to do way back then? Well, I still need you to do it.”
This coronavirus pandemic reminds me a lot of Jonah’s experience. In fact, I would say we have been in the belly of the fish, not for three days and nights, but for the past six weeks or so. People all over the globe are having heart to heart conversations with God right now, reevaluating their choices, reflecting on their lives and priorities, making COVID-19 resolutions, and promising what they will do differently when this ugly season is over – just like Jonah.
But Jonah’s memory was short, and I hope ours is not. It didn’t take him long to forget his promises from the belly of the fish and before you know it, he was back to his poor choices and narcissistic self. For Jonah, it was so important to be right, he actually wanted to die when God spared the people of Nineveh instead of destroying them as Jonah had warned. The prophet even blamed God for his own initial failure to carry out God’s will. “See, I knew what you would do – it’s your fault I ran the other way. I knew you would spare them because you are just that kind of guy.” (Again, my interpretation.)
And then, just in case he might get lucky after all, Jonah found himself a good vantage point to sit back with a bag of popcorn and simply wait for the people of Nineveh to hopefully screw up – just so he could take pleasure in their pain and enjoy God’s wrath. He totally overlooked the joy he could have experienced, knowing that God used him to help so many people turn from their “smelly” ways and totally transform their lives. That was an honor he totally missed.
If you have ever heard me tell the story of Blue Monarch, I describe how I had a powerful revelation one day when I realized what God was asking me to do. Just like Jonah, I wanted to run the opposite direction. I wanted to hide under a rock and not make eye contact with God. Did God not know I was incapable and unworthy of such an assignment? Maybe he would forget he had asked me. I actually cried about it for three days (and three nights?) Finally, my daughter said something to me that was a game changer.
“Mommy, you can tell God no, and he won’t love you any less than if you said yes.”
Hmm...how could I say no to a God like that? That’s when I decided to take a deep breath and say yes. It’s the moment my life went from ordinary to extraordinary, and even in the most difficult times, I have never regretted it.
I can hardly bear to imagine what I would have missed if I had said no, and I don’t have to look far to see what that could have been.
For instance, just last week I decided to surprise the women and children who were quarantined at Blue Monarch, with a trunk load of ice cream. I loaded up every flavor I could find at the store, along with a huge jug of chocolate syrup, and couldn’t wait to see their faces. I had not seen them in five weeks (except for on a computer screen) and was missing them something terrible. I suspected it would be hard to respect social distancing when I really wanted to give each one of them a big hug.
What I didn’t expect, though, was that the best treat would be my own. In that short visit I was blessed over and over. Heather couldn’t wait to share how the quarantine had enabled her to have some exciting revelations about her new life and sobriety. Katie, who always has colorful, descriptive thoughts, shared hers as well. Taylor read me an incredible poem she had written, and every word reached in and touched my heart in a special way. Jennifer, with her powerful voice, sang a moving song she had composed about her recovery journey at Blue Monarch, as her daughter gazed at her with pride. We laughed about how Chris, a spunky three-year-old, thought our staff members were in trouble, which was why we had not been there in so long. Guess he thought everyone except our on-site staff members were in time-out for something really bad.
Even though those things may sound simple, I wouldn’t trade that one day for a lifetime of what I might have experienced otherwise, if I had said no to God. And that is what I struggle with the most. The folks who resist or reject God’s plan are still loved by him, but they miss out on a joy that is greater than anything they can ever imagine. They are not living life to its fullest and don’t even know it.
I have to wonder - do they feel incapable and unworthy? Is that their hesitation? Well, guess what. That just makes them even more perfect for the job because God uses incapable and unworthy people throughout the entire Bible to do amazing things. And he uses them today.
When this pandemic is over and we are spit out onto dry land again, I truly believe God is going to pick up where he left off and say, “Remember that thing I asked you to do way back then? Well, I still need you to do it.”
I hope this time he hears a resounding "yes" from around the world - and that it rings all the way to the highest heaven. Now, wouldn't that be amazing.
And when God saw that they had put a stop to their evil ways, he abandoned his plan to destroy them, and didn't carry it through. Jonah 3:10
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