You can't just add water

"Your people shall be volunteers in the day of Your power; in the beauties of holiness, from the womb of the morning, You have the dew of Your youth." (Psalm 110:3)

This Bible verse will be my latest treasure hunt. Every time I read it, I go, "What?" I have no idea what it's saying. I'm not even really sure what it's saying in the context of the rest of the psalm, which is about God ruling over His enemies. Um... "volunteers" like the people at church who wear badges and shake your hand when you walk through the door, or "volunteers" like college students who show up to pick up trash along the highway, or "volunteers" like people who have just been drafted into an army? If I try to read it in its original Hebrew, will it make sense then? Or will it just be funky-weird artsy poetry like just another song that some beatnik would read at a coffeeshop... in addition to being sharper than a two-edged sword?

God is cool like that. At least, I can say from experience that He's cool like that with me. I'll be just reading my Bible, minding my own business, and then suddenly it's as if He throws a rock at my window. SHATTER! There's no way that can be fixed with superglue. You just need to replace the entire window.

Or I'll be just living life, minding my own business, and then suddenly it's as if He throws a rock at my window. WORLD-SHATTER! While you're waiting for the glass to be replaced, you could just duct-tape some cellophane or maybe a garbage bag over your glassless window, but it wouldn't keep you warm at night.

So, if you hear a crazy cat lady screaming, "WHAT?" in the middle of the night through her glassless window, it's me.

Speaking of the crazy cat lady, here's a snapshot of a typical scene in my home. I'll be just living life, minding my own business, checking out the internet on my computer, and then suddenly my little cat Choochie appears. She knows she's welcome to (unless I'm trying to work on something important). She's mine. She's family. She can snuggle with me pretty much anytime she wants.

How much more, then, the God of the universe who is the Lord of my life? He's more than welcome to be that close to me. In fact, I hope He comes even closer than that. I hope He's already been making Himself at home in the deepest parts of my insides.

Choochie and I haven't always been as close as we are today. When I first met her, I wasn't even all that impressed by her. But now I love her so much that I ache at the thought of anything happening to her. I would take a zillion bullets for her. And she's just a cat.

But she's my cat. I've known her for a decade and a half. Our relationship didn't just happen overnight.

Have you ever needed to whip up a meal in a hurry? Just add water: instant soup. Just add water: instant coffee. Or did you ever used to play with those creepy miniature water toys in the 1980s? Just add water: instant huge water toy.

But there are some things that just can't be microwaved. (Or maybe you could microwave them, but they would taste soggy and gross.) There are some things that can't be rushed. You can't just add water to everything and expect it to be instantly wonderful. Some things must take time -- lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of time -- to grow and develop. A healthy relationship is one of them.

I think sometimes the deepest relationships involve the craziest code words. If I were to tell you, "Exit, exit," you'd probably look at me funny. (You'd probably go, "What?") But when I tell Choochie, "Exit, exit," she knows exactly what I mean. She knows that she must leave the room. This comes in handy when you have two cats who need to be fed in separate rooms because they're on completely different diets. My other cat Macho understands the same command. If "Exit, exit," doesn't work, I'll say something like, "Let me whisk you," and then I'll pick Choochie up and literally whisk her into the next room while she trill-protests. Yes, I am a cat herder.

And, of course, my relationship with my cats is sort of like God's relationship with me. He probably has to talk to me a little bit differently than He talks to everybody else. (And not just with me. He probably treats everybody that way.)

About a dozen years ago, I was worshiping at church on a Sunday morning. During one of the songs, God told me, "You're a groovy chick." This touched me so deeply that I began to cry (in a good way). I am not making this up.

Some time afterwards, I told my mentor/leader about this incident. She said, "That just shows that God speaks to everyone differently. He called you 'a groovy chick,' and it made you cry. If He had called me 'a groovy chick,' He would have offended me." Indeed.

Stuff like that happens to me all the time. God talks to me in a way that I need to hear all the time. And our relationship isn't just add water: instant closeness.

The other weekend while I was driving around by myself and feeling sad and lonely, God comforted me by saying, "No one's going to take you away from Me. That's all I care about." Yes, His words truly ministered to me. I am not making this up.

Last night, I decided to watch a movie from my old taped-from-cable VHS collection. The Champ is a 1979 remake -- a major tearjerker. It's about a troubled ex-boxer and his little boy. During one scene, after the dad returns home from jail -- where he went after he got in a fistfight with someone who was trying to collect a gambling debt -- he tells his little boy, "You know what you are?" And his 8-year-old son answers, "A pain in the [bleep]." Then they both hug while the orchestral music plays dramatically. The dad tells his little boy, "I love you so much," and you can tell when you're watching it that he really means it.

I was totally bawling like a baby. I thought about my earthly ex-father -- the professor who would whisk me away when I was about 4 years old so that he could study me linguistically -- and about how he treated me more like a science experiment than a little girl. While I was watching this touching movie scene with this dysfunctional dad who obviously loved his little boy, I thought to myself, "I'll never have that." And God threw a rock at my window and said, "Whatever. You have Me now." Yes, while I was sitting there totally bawling like a baby, His words truly ministered to me. We were relating to each other like an old married couple watching an old movie together on the couch on a Saturday night. I am not making this up.

Just because you are genetically related to somebody doesn't mean that you will automatically have just add water: instant relationship. It doesn't work that way. Deep, close relationships take time to grow and develop.

This is something that I have learned the hard way. But I think it's been an expensive, precious lesson to learn -- and nobody can take it away from me.

So, the "volunteers" from "the womb of the morning" in Psalm 110:3...

What?

I don't know yet, but I hope to find out. I don't think I'll be able to just add water: instant revelation. I'll probably need to spend some time and some love. And I'm very OK with that.