FLEEING & FEELING, REV. 12

"The woman FLED into the wilderness," it says in Rev. 12:6. I shared with some friends today about this passage. I hadn't realized how many characters in the Bible actually fled. Because I've berated myself in being such a big chicken, a coward, running away. I hear about people facing dangers so bravely...I know I probably wouldn't do that. I'd be looking for EXITS out of the room and using any energy to figure out the most efficient way to use them.

Sometimes I feel as Brave as a Worm...

But wait. Bible characters? Jacob fled from Esau's wrath. Joseph fled from Potipher's wife. Moses fled from "murderer!" David fled from Saul's men. Elijah fled from Jezebel. Jeremiah fled from Jonathan the scribe. Joseph and Mary fled from Herod. Paul fled from the Pharisees. And yes, the Woman in Revelation 12 fled from the Dragon.

And what I saw, in the phrase right after the comma after the information that she ran was what blew me away: "where she had a place PREPARED BY GOD"! I still remember the time Jesus defended a woman, "Leave her alone; she's MINE." (When she was criticized for extravagant use of oil.) I thought then, I'd love someone to think of me like that. A heartbeat later, I realized SOMEONE does! 

And then this verse affected me in the same way: GOD HAD TAKEN SPECIAL PAINS to prepare a special place out in the wilderness for a loved one HE KNEW would come running out there and would need a shelter! The God of the Universe gave the woman V.I.P. treatment!

Readied Room

He didn't call her a coward. He caught up the infant she'd given birth to (v.5); made sure His bride would be nourished 'til fully recuperated (v.6); and told Michael the archangel to get the servants under him to confront and expel any threatening renegades unhappy with God or heaven (vs.7-9).

Some people would say the woman of Revelation 12 is Israel, and the prophecy there is not for all. This is true. We cannot "claim" these promises to be ours accurately. But...

There was a Gentile mother who, when Jesus looked at her and told her He'd come to give bread to the Jews, and it would be wrong to take bread away from the children to which they were intended and give it to the puppies, she responded by saying even they'd be happy with the crumbs under the table. I am thinking the God who'd receive a mother in the wilderness--who'd run away from a dragon--and not call her a coward would be large-hearted enough to allow her to have a puppy, and whisper to those feeding the woman to make sure her bread is the extra crumbly type. Even Boaz told his reapers to allow handfuls of barley to fall for Ruth to glean, didn't he? Can we not hope for our Lord to be at least as gracious as a human lord?

Again, after reading these few verse and thinking these thoughts, I found myself saying, "Hey--I'm not supposed to be feeling this way. I'm reading in Revelation, not Psalms."

MCC - where Ron Sisco taught Revelation

One of the friends I was talking with was the person I had to thank most for giving me real desire to look at the book again. Ron Sisco, a retired missionary and interim leader-pastor of the English department of a church up in mainland Japan I fellowshipped at 10 years ago, preached through studies in Revelation, and his messages then got me interested. They were recorded then posted on the church website several years later. I've listened to them repeatedly since. He'd emphasized then the blessing that comes along with its reading. A lot of people avoid it, he said, because Revelation looks scary-difficult.

Maybe I'm a bit strange, but if it's not being studied, I think it feels kinda good.

GREAT RED DRAGONfly

Whew. I've typed my handwritten Japanese memoirs into 112 pages of digital text, and I'm tired. They'd been written in pencil on inexpensive notebook paper about 45 years ago, with the hope much of it would fade away, but most of it lasted, altho' now I have to strain a bit to read it. But I'm going follow the example of our first century church leaders, and "come aside and rest awhile," okay? (I almost wrote: "come apart and rest awhile"; It IS the KJV, but it can give the wrong idea--in this instance, maybe the right description...Mk.6:31)

I happened to find this picture among my things. It was sketched in 2023 when I was looking at the pond and saw a Brilliant Goldfish looking at a branch poking up from the water. A Strong-looking Turtle swimming nearby happened to be examining the same stick too, so when he turned his head to the side, the two were staring at each other. I saw them glaring at each other, neither refusing to turn away or back down. oh-oh.

After a while, it looked like we were going to have a fight to see who was the King of the Pond. A bright crimson dragonfly alit at the top of the branch above the water, looking almost like he would referee the fight. Just then, it started to rain, and everything melted away. It actually looked to me that's what they all wanted.

The name of the "referee?" I happen to be memorizing in Rev. 12, and the Great Red Dragon appears there. Poetic License. I told you I'm taking a break. This happens when my mind is kind of relaxed.

But it does get me upset that people call little insects that have wings and long tails "dragonflies", and because you can detect them in a short bandwidth of electromagnetic waves, they call them "reality"; whereas if you believe in Creation, Adam and Eve, Angels and "Great Red Dragons", things that may actually exist but human eyes can't detect them, people then look at you cross-eyed and say you believe in "fairy tales".

BICYCLE

The following is from another one of my blogs called, "Why Should It Change?" in which I've posted old devotionals I shared with Daddy way back from 2001. Many of these were posted on this "Come into an MK's Kitchen" blog back then. Since I was reading about this time period (The occurrence written about happened during the 1967 furlough in Warren, Michigan), and I know I won't be writing about this in Japanese, so maybe those who haven't read about it before would enjoy doing so now, and those of you who have seen it would be large-hearted enough to smile along with us anyway? Thank you.

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The time I learned to ride a bicycle (3rd grade), we lived next to a huge parking lot that was a paradise to ride around in. I remember one afternoon, on my bicycle on the sidewalk about to turn the corner and come home, my “mental computer” jammed. I saw a post man—there was no e-mail; we wrote letters back then—walking in my direction. If I turned the corner, I would run straight into him. I COULDN’T!!! My brain froze. Instead of turning the handle, I let the bicycle plow on straight ahead…into the car parked at the curb!

Bonk. (Good thing my child’s bicycle wasn’t going very fast anyway.) The bicycle’s rubber wheels hit the car’s metal fenders, spilling me onto the grass. The mailman came running, questions flying.

“What are you doing? Are you all right? What happened?” 

“I…I saw you…I was going to turn the corner…But if I did, I knew I would run into you, and I didn’t want to do that, so I didn’t know what to do and so kept going straight” (like the time I stayed on the bus and went all the way to the terminal!) 

“Why didn’t you just put on the brakes?”

“I…yeah…uh…I didn’t think about it.” I didn’t know what to say, really.

I think he saw I wasn’t hurt (except my silly pride) and sent me back home reminding me to use the brakes next time. I can’t remember too clearly. That’s a memory I don’t often think about, try to forget, actually; don’t really know why I’m sharing it with you. Perhaps it’s to show if God can choose things this foolish to serve Him and to glorify himself—all He asks is that we say, okay God, YOU DO YOUR THING, because I’ve proven I can make a mess doing mine.

I AIN'T NO SNAKE

It's not only the snake that speaks with a forked tongue. Humans do too. That is, I heard myself doing it today...kinda. Some friends were asking me about my writing, and I found myself first asking for prayer that I wouldn't get discouraged because I knew sometimes I found myself reading about the years of work, and finding myself feeling tired and bitter at the fruitlessness or thanklessness of it...

But the very next moment, I found myself talking about realizing, since I was writing about what I'd seen in a LIFETIME, it included some of these exciting, interesting things:

• I'd seen the Mr. and Mrs. Taba, my missionary parents' first converts, bring their son Takashi to summer camp as a little boy (I was in kindergarten then).
• 
  He didn't become a Christian tho'; in fact, strayed from church and got on the wrong side of the law, ended up in jail, where my Dad visited him. But one night when Takashi despaired of life, he remembered the story of the Cross and Jesus reminded him He gave His life for him--he was saved then.
• He gained electrician certification in prison; which enabled him later to help in the construction of many churches. Our Gushikawa Baptist Church in Tairagawa was among his first projects. Mommy got to see it before she went HOME.
• 
  Takashi did much children's work until an injury from a fall put him in bed (he couldn't move or speak), after which his wife took care of him for his dying years, returning to their workplace for several more years even after that.
• 
  His wife? God "happened to" have someone PERFECT for him. Just when the Tabas came to our first church was when Grampa Nagata (my Mom's uncle who came from Hawaii to help my parents) led to Christ my second cousin--yes, Rumiko. So there are pictures of her at summer camp around that time too, but alas, she strayed from church a good while.
• But to make a long story short, she came back when Grampa Nagata died; and she graduated from Bible School when Takashi got out of prison. There is so much more to this Boaz and Ruth story, but we won't go into that.

It's just that I realized, while talking, God had shown me so many things I should be thankful for having been allowed to see.

And I was feeling sorry for myself for having had to do so much hard work--HA! Silly girl. They do say snakes have wisdom, I think, and I ain't no snake...is that an excuse?

TRUST ME; I'M YOUR FATHER

A friend told me about a post I'd written last year on another blog...I'd completely forgotten about this story, and I thought it might be worth re-posting an excerpt here, so:

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TRUST ME; I'M YOUR FATHER

There was one program about an orphan who'd grown up thinking her parents had been killed in a fire. A wealthy butler-type man finds her, seems to fool her into thinking he may be her father who actually escaped the fire, seems to frame her for his master's murder after which he becomes filthy rich, and she is thrown into jail. The police smell something funny and discover the murder was committed by the man claiming to be her father, and he is executed, she is given fortune rightfully hers.

The VERY END of the program has a surprise. THAT BUTLER WAS ACTUALLY HER REAL FATHER, WANTING HER BEST, AND HE HAD POSED TO FRAME HER AND BE EXECUTED, KNOWING SHE WOULD END UP WITH FORTUNE BECAUSE OF IT! Long story simplified.

Murder and framing are by no means right and noble, and this is not an attempt to justify either. But it got me thinking. Sometimes God may ACT like He's "framing us" because He loves us so much He is willing to be HATED for what He does for us! At the end of the story, the main character recalls the butler's words to her: "Trust me; I'm your father." He hadn't been saying that just to fool her; he really meant it. We need to remember always too to trust God; He's our Father!

"Though he slay me, yet will I trust him" (Job 13:15a)

"Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. (Ps. 103:13)

NOT INSIGNIFICANT...

I thought it was rather insignificant. A conversation I'd had with my cousin, well, I wasn't very good in my Japanese either, so I didn't think it was worth posting about so was going to skip the incident and looked for the next thing to show online readers.

ANSWER IT JUNE!

But the next morning, when my cellphone rang, somehow, the Holy Spirit nudged me something strong like I had to pick up right away, didn't dare let it go to the answering machine. When I picked up, it was the cousin I'd just been reading about.

It felt like God was underlining and putting everything she said in all caps.

That conversation was almost 50 years ago? I'll share excerpts from it:

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I'd opened my Bible to a favorite Psalm and taken it to my saved but deeply depressed cousin, saying to her in my poor Japanese (I hadn't gone to language school yet): "This scripture helps me. When I look at myself, I get depressed. Because I'm a sinner, of course I'm very bad." Was she understanding what I was trying to say? "But when I look up at God like this, I am helped." That was the best I could do then.

But at that time, Rumiko had looked down at the Bible and began reading the words of Psalm 42. Tears fell from her eyes, and she whispered, "This is really good," as she left the room, still reading. "Have you ever wanted to go to Bible School?" I mused out loud, seeing the way she loved the Word.

7-year-old Rumiko

Grampa Nagata, who died several years earlier, had led Rumiko to Christ when she was a little girl. Altho' he died brokenhearted because she had drifted far from God, she'd come back and began changing from barely surviving to living abundantly. Soon Rumiko found herself fulfilling Grampa's dream and...going to Bible School!

Rumiko helping my mom and her sisters

In this week's phone call, Rumiko said the one thing she remembers about that talk 50 years ago was my asking, "Rumiko, have you thought about Bible School?" She says that's when she started really thinking about it. That talk was insignificant, I thought; you never know what God can use.

WHAT HAPPENED TO KITTY？

What happened to Kitty?

Well, you may remember in my June 11 post, the letter referred to my skin sensitivity to mosquitos bites, some scarring into appearance of whip welts. I found out flea bites had a similar effect, and as soon as I saw the heat flaring under my skin, I nearly panicked I would see again what I thought I'd gotten away from when we moved out of that termite-infested house....

Right about then, that Kitty heard its former owners calling and went back, it seemed, because it simply vanished. (That's the explanation Kinya gives me, but I have this feeling HE had a big part in making sure it found its way home, when he saw my fleabite reaction.)

At any rate, a month after the leaving of the cat and of the unwelcome little visitors it brought with it...my ankles look MUCH better, and I am surprised at how good I feel about it all.

I thought I wanted a stray cat. But I realize God knew better. Sometimes we think we want something, but when we don't get it, it's probably because God knows better?

(For me, right now, honestly, I think I'd be much too busy writing to spend time with Kitty, and God knew this would be happening.)