In the last couple of days I’ve had conversations with several people who are angry and discouraged by the injustice going on. People in power are getting away with serious crimes while the average joe goes to jail for years for the same thing. The lying, cheating, destructive decisions, the crazy things people espouse and you can’t object without being attacked. The all drives people to anger and sometimes despair.

I’ve been rememorizing Psalm 37, the place I go when having difficulties with people (like my vengeful renter). Starting in verse 7 there is great direction for our times. Notice the commands

Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him;

do not fret when people succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes.

Refrain from anger and turn from wrath; do not fret—it leads only to evil.

For those who are evil will be destroyed,

but those who hope in the LORD will inherit the land.

A little while, and the wicked will be no more; though you look for them, they will not be found.

But the meek will inherit the land and enjoy peace and prosperity.

This reminds me of Asaph in Psalm 73 who was so stressed out by the corrupt officials. He said, “When I tried to understand all this, it troubled me deeply

till I entered the sanctuary of God; then I understood their final destiny.

Surely you place them on slippery ground; you cast them down to ruin.

How suddenly are they destroyed, completely swept away by terrors!

Then Asaph looked back on his fretting and anger and realized that “When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant; I was a brute beast before you.” Not smart!

And he also realized this, in spite of my stupidity, “Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory.

His conclusion is: “Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you.”

A good orientation for us in our times!  So, let us,“  Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him…  For those who are evil will be destroyed, but those who hope in the LORD will inherit the land.”

The Lord has a plan–are we willing to wait for His timing, and in the meantime delight ourselves in Him and His wonderful goodness?

The wrath of God will come on the wicked.   Picture from internet

On the way home from hospital after my angiogram, Dr. Christian said, “My wife and I would like to give you a car. We bought this one recently and put an ad for our old one in the paper, but for some reason the paper never printed it. I think the Lord did that so we could give it to you!”

I was flabbergasted! He wasn’t even a believer, hardly knew me and was making an offer like this!  I certainly wasn’t going to refuse it. The only drawback was that Dr. Christian’s car had a standard transmission. We’d hoped to get a car with an automatic so Barbara could drive; but on the other hand, if Barbara didn’t have to drive, it would take some stress out of her life here.

The next day we went over to Dr. Christian’s to see the car. And what a car it was! A luxury VW station wagon with four wheel drive, 16 inch tires, a 6 cylinder diesel engine, 6 speed transmission, individually heated seats, and so on. it was a true doctor’s car. And it was a beautiful spruce green, one of my favorite colors. It was everything I’d ever wanted in a vehicle but never had!

As I looked it over, Dr. Christian said, “I’ve decided not to give it to you, but to keep it in my name. That way I can put it on my insurance and I will also pay the taxes on it.”  Wow! That would save us a bundle of money! The Lord certainly was showering us with His goodness.  Later that week Dr. Christian took me with him to reregister the car and got us “JC 12” for a license plate.  “I thought that a plate mentioning Jesus Christ and His 12 disciples would be good for a believer like you!” he said. How thoughtful!

Then the next week when we went to visit Dr. Christian and Melanie, he reached out his hand and said, “Here, take this.”  “What is it?” I asked.

“It’s a credit card. Use if for your diesel fuel purchases and I’ll cover the costs!”  In addition, he proceeded to pay for all the repairs on the car when needed, put new tires on it, changed the summer and winter tires at the proper time and even paid my traffic fines! This was a whole series of wonderful gifts from God through this man—–much better than being able to sell our old car in Turkey and then buy another ancient one here in Germany. The Lord was filling our cup to more than overflowing!

Moving to Europe from the Turkish economy had meant that our income was not going to cover our expenses very well, especially with the value of the dollar dropping constantly. But now, with Dr. Christian and Melanie’s gifts, more than one third of our expenses were covered. What a wonderful provision from God!

Not only did He provide us with transportation, but this car was so much fun to drive that when Barbara would suggest we go downtown, I was ready to go, just to be able to drive it more! And when it came to driving on the autobahn, we could buzz along at 100 to 110 miles per hour (160 to 180 kilometers per hour) and it felt like we were doing 60, it was so smooth and stable.   We praised Him every time we got in the car, and we thanked Him just as often for Dr. Christian and Melanie’s generosity.

Our friendship with Dr. Christian and Melanie was also a gift. Almost every week I would ride to work with Dr. Christian and while he was in surgery, I would sit in the waiting room and work on email and my writing. It was usually the most productive day of my week.

During the 90-minute ride there and back we had great talks, discussing many of the theological questions Dr. Christian had, as well as doing Bible reading and talking about apologetics. After a year of this he said, “Now I believe. I believe that God exists, that the Bible is true and that Jesus died for my sins. But I’m not ready to surrender my life to Him; at present I have no impetus to do so.”

“Ok…..” I said, “I will treat you as a believer and we’ll move into discipleship lessons. God will bring you across the line when you are ready.”  And so God did more than a year later when, in response to a crisis, Dr. Christian prayed on his own to accept Christ as Savior and Lord. We all rejoiced at God’s faithfulness in answering our prayers. It was quite a trade we had: he gave me a car, I led him to eternal life!

Picture: the car Dr Christian loaned us parked below the two windows of our little apartment.

From my worship journal, written in 2010

You, Lord, are the God of provision, flooding our lives with your gracious goodness, your constant kindness, your wide wisdom, your illuminating insight, and great grace.

Truly, our cup overflows; you have brought us into a spacious place; you have rescued us because you delight in us.

What rich goodness you have poured out on us:

–The great and glorious privilege of being your children, sons and daughters of the Most High King.

–The grace of knowing and living ever more intimately with you, the Gracious and Glorious God.

–The worldview-shifting truth that whatever comes into our lives is part of your plan to work good, to give opportunity for us to fulfill the purpose of our lives (giving you glory by offering the sacrifice of thanksgiving).

— Giving us significant parts in moving history to its conclusion.

–The powerful possibility to rewrite every hurt from your point of view and to forgive the offender as you have forgiven us, thereby freeing ourselves from the cruel bonds of resentment.

–The wonder of your love lavished on us in undeserved richness, in marvelous breadth and height, length and depth.

–The joy of belonging, of having worth, of being competent in you.

–The security of knowing where we are going.

–The anticipated joy of spending eternity with you.

With these shining, beautiful and powerful truths, I can enter this day at your side, joining you in the adventure you have for me, the work you have for me to enter into in partnership with you.

There may be disappointments and hurts, troubles and difficulties, but each one is a fine tool you will use to shape me more into the image of Christ. And each one will be an opportunity to be weak in myself but strong in you, to offer the sacrifice of praise, to rise on wings of eagles, to see things from on high and to give you glory.

What a life you’ve bequeathed, what joy you share with us, what a God you are! May you be glorified in my life today by the working of your Spirit and Word to bring me to quick, eager, loving obedience in each situation.

Psalm 20:“May the LORD answer you when you are in distress;”

[Praise you, Jehovah Yahweh, that you DO answer as it says in Psalm 86:7, “I will call upon the Lord in the day of trouble, for he will answer me.” As each of us has seen over and over, you pay attention, you answer, you supply, you protect–be it something as simple as making it home without an accident.

Unfortunately, we often take your answers for granted, forget them and then treat each crisis and answer as a separate event, rather than seeing them in the stream of your grace. If we remember, we can say, “As He helped me there, and there, and there, so He will help me here!”]

“may the name of the God [Elohim] of Jacob protect you.”

[You, heavenly Father, are the strong and faithful One. In your name is persistent power, demonstrated in your wonderful working with that rascal, Jacob, the deceiver.

You pursued him to the end through all his lying, cheating, favoritism and selfishness. And you finally brought him to surrender in worship on his death bed. And now, in spite of his ugly past, you are not ashamed to be called “The God of Jacob!”

Your name Elohim means “the powerful and faithful One;” so you protected Jacob all through his life. In like manner you protect me at all times, in every place, in all circumstances. You are rock-solid-sure in your faithfulness and power.]
Our Heavenly Father holds our hand!

Our heavenly Father holds our hand!

More on settling into Germany in 2008

Since this was Barbara’s hometown, despite having been away for forty years, she had lots of relationships, which were very helpful.  The main connection was the Baptist church in town, whose members there were very helpful, taking us shopping and providing smaller items, like a vacuum cleaner and a used cell phone.

Our one remaining need was for a car. Since we lived in a village that was four miles outside the city, we had to have a way to take Omi (as we called Barbara’s mother) to the doctors, do her shopping and other things for her.

We were put in touch with a Christian mechanic who helped workers like us get reasonably priced used cars. He found us a fifteen-year-old VW Golf for 3000 Euros ($4,250).  One year’s insurance would cost us another 3000 Euros or more because we had no driving history in Germany.  All that seemed pretty expensive to me, but that’s how things are here: expensive. We decided to dip into our retirement money and buy it. The man said he would mail us the papers just before he went on vacation.

We waited several days, but no papers. This is very unusual in Germany, where letters normally arrive the day after being mailed. We called the fellow on his cell phone and he assured us he’d sent them, and couldn’t imagine what the problem was. As we were to find out, there was no problem, rather a divine intervention to provide for us in a much better wa

After Nat and Abby left to return to Turkey, I began having chest pains again and they got worse and worse. On a Friday afternoon our believing neighbors took me to a cardiology center, but the people there did not know what to do with our American insurance. They also wanted 5000 Euros just to do a checkup. It turned out that this place was used by rich Middle Easterners for their medical needs, and the hospital had correspondingly high prices for all foreigners. But I was no oil rich Sheik!

On Sunday, in spite of feeling poorly, I went to church so the elders could pray for me, which they did.  Afterward, as I was talking with a friend, a beautiful woman in a white suit came running up and said, “Oh, I heard about your coming to our church! It will be so nice to have some other English speakers!  My name is Melanie and I’m from South Africa. I’m married to a German and have been here for fourteen years. We live in the same village as your mother-in-law!”

She paused and looked at me more closely, “Is there something wrong with your chest?” she asked. I was in so much pain that I was leaning over, holding my left arm over my heart. I began to explain to her about my pain and history of heart problems when Melanie’s husband, Christian, came up behind her and listened.  When I finished, he spoke up, “I’m a doctor. I’ll take you to my hospital this week and get you a checkup.” That was encouraging, a definite God sighting!

On Monday night Christian called. “I’ve arranged for you to have an angiogram done on Wednesday. I’ve also gotten a 50% discount and you will have three months to pay. Can you come with me? I’ll pick you up at 6:15 in the mornin

How could I say no to that?!  So off we went on Wednesday morning and had a wonderful time getting to know each other on the way. Christian explained that he was not a believer, although his wife was. He had been raised in East Germany as an atheist and had never been in a church before meeting Melanie. He wasn’t opposed to believing, but had a lot of questions no one had been able to answer.

“Well,” I thought to myself, “Looks like I’ll have something to give him in exchange for his help—answers for his questions!”

At the hospital the doctor did an angiogram through my wrist instead of through the groin. I was happy with this because it meant I could go home the same day instead of having to stay overnight.  After viewing the DVD of the stent insertion, and doing the new angiogram, the doctor came to where I was lying on the stretcher.  “Your blood flow is better now than when the stent was first put in! Your major arteries are all clear, so you are in good shape. I think your pain is more from stress than anything else.”

He paused, thinking, “It could also be that some of your tiny arteries are clogged and are causing some of the pain, but there’s nothing we can do about that; and it isn’t dangerous. So just get rested up!”

Well, it was no surprise that stress was the major cause, what with all that had transpired during the summer, but it was good to know for sure that nothing was wrong with my heart.

And, unknown to me,  the Lord had a big surprise for me on the ride home with Christian.

Picture: Christian, Melanie and their two boys in 2008