Subtle Cues

"Don't tell the horse walk...just think walk," said Jill.
The student looked dubious, but sat, heels against the horse quiet and still, and thought "walk."  Lady walked forward.
"That's creepy!" she said, "How does she do that!?" She repeated the thought commands a few times and Lady always moved forward at the approporiate time.
"Subtle body language is cuing her," said Jill, "She can tell when you shift your weight slightly, lean forward, or turn your hips. The horses here can read the body cues, but they are lesson horses. They know most of the people on them are students who don't know what their bodies are cuing the horse to do so most of the time they ignore those cues with students."
Subtlety in cues. This is something I could use some work on. I am definitely a more "smack you over the head with a message" sort of person. There is a lot to be said for subtlety.

I think God is a subtle God. He doesn't have to be. He can part the Red Sea, make a bush burn without being consumed, turn water into wine, walk on water, raise the dead....but most of the time, He is less obvious. Why? I am always wondering why. If the goal is to draw the world to Him, why not smack us all over the head with His presence?

There is a story in the book of Luke in the Bible of a man condemned to Hell who begs for just a drop of water from Abraham, who he sees in Heaven. If he can't be given that, he begs that God would warn his loved ones so that they don't end up in the same place as he.
Abraham tells the tormented soul that they have been warned- they have the warnings of the Bible prophets.
The tormented man cries out that they won't listen to that, but they would listen if someone from the dead goes to warn them. Abraham tells the man, if they don't heed the warnings of the prophets, they will not listen even if someone rises from the dead.

Subtle cues matter. And they are always there but maybe we have learned to ignore them. And worse still, we miss the big smack you over the head cues as well with hearts hardened in disbelief.

"I feel so bad for her!" cried the rider.
"It's ok," said Jill, "When you learn how to let your body relax and just do what you subconciously know to do, she will respond and you won't need to force her at all."

Luke 16:
¹⁹ “There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. ²⁰ At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores ²¹ and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.
   ²² “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. ²³ In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. ²⁴ So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’
   ²⁵ “But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. ²⁶ And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’
   ²⁷ “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, ²⁸ for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’
   ²⁹ “Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’
   ³⁰ “‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’
   ³¹ “He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”

Overcoming Limitations

The tennis ball lobbed back and forth, baseline to baseline of the court. I stopped and watched, amazed. Normally, tennis on our nearby courts doesn't transfix me, but this little game did. Both contestants were in wheelchairs. How on earth are they getting the power to smack the ball so hard when they are unable to use any power but the strength of their arm? I put my whole body momentum and force behind my shots! And how are they able to zip around the court quickly enough to reach the shot in the first place?

One man saw me watching as he paused to retrieve a ball. I waved. He waved back and returned to his game. I walked on, inspired. Never succumb to limitations. So many can be overcome.

That afternoon my trebuchet team gathered at Josh's house again. They spent four hours brainstorming and tinkering.
"When we go to Nationals," began Josh.
"Nationals?" I said, "We have to win at States to do that."
"I know," he said, "I intend to. Well at least to medal."
Now I know that means their trebuchet has to fire projectiles three times, if not four times, further than it currently is.... but I had the vision of tennis players in wheelchairs that stilled my pessimism.

They came up with ingenious ideas which I cannot divulge in case the spies for teams throughout the world are hitting the blogosphere. They spent four hours. Darkness descended, and we were still firing the trebuchet into the night while the little sisters begged us to go home so they could go to bed. I don't know if all the effort made significant changes or not. But I do know that something special had happened to my team that had just missed medaling in this event at the regional competition. They realized how close they were to victory. And they were perhaps even seized by the scientific fever, the desire to understand, to explore, to figure out, to find the elegant solution that had eluded them....well ok. Maybe not. Maybe it was just the allure of round shiny medals on satin hung around their necks. But someday, they would look back on it all and realize they had learned something too, and that was the more valued prize of the whole shebang.

Asherel and I are studying the book of Philippians, and she asked me about a portion of a verse that puzzled her.
"What does it mean in Phillipians 2:10, that every knee shall bow to Christ, even those under the earth?"

I love Asherel's questions. They are often about phrases I have glossed over in my own reading.
"Well, if you look at the whole verse, it says at the name of Jesus, all will ultimately worship him, whether in heaven, on earth, or under earth. I presume it means hell. Ultimately, even those who rejected Him and turned their backs on Him will see that He is indeed who He claimed to be. They make a conscious decision to reject Him, but even in the torment of Hell, the further torment of seeing the truth of the One they did not want to believe in will perhaps be the worst torment of all. But no one ends up there that doesn't want to be there. God desires that everyone would come to Him.  So if we believe that, what is the message for us today, in how we live?"
"We should tell others," she said.
"And even further, what should we do to be able to tell others well?"
"We need to be gracious," she said, "And prepared."
"And that is what this whole life of education is about," I told her, "You never ever know when something you have learned will be useful. So learn all you can, absorb all you can, while you are young and your brain that is so strong and gifted can do so. You never know when some fact, some experience, something you learned may make a difference."

Maybe my team is just finding out about how to pound out every imperfection of a flinging machine. But maybe, just maybe, they are also finding out how to squeeze every bit of knowledge out of an experience that someday they may be quite unexpectedly called upon to use.  You just never know where life will take you and what strengths or wisdom or character you will have to have developed to follow the path you will need to follow. You never know when some idea, or fact, or experience, may tip the scale and usher someone from a descent into Hell the other way.  I closed my eyes and saw tennis players in wheelchairs, laughing in the sunlit court.

Philippians 2: 9-13
 ⁹ Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
   and gave him the name that is above every name,
¹⁰ that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
   in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
¹¹ and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
   to the glory of God the Father.

 ¹² Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, ¹³ for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.