Caleb Friedrich

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Time For A Faith Lift

By: Caleb Friedrich for his grandma, Dian Ritter Enright

Written on February 28, 2021

Published on March 7, 2021 in Monday’s Pub in the “Time For A Faith Lift” column

Last weekend, our family went to visit our grandma for the first time since her fall. My brother Joshua, my sister Noel, and I attempted to sled, but much of the snow had melted. However, my brother and I did manage to build a snowman. When we returned to visit Grandma the next weekend, all that was left was two tiny clumps of snow and two long sticks which had once been arms.

We were able to visit with our uncle, Chris Ritter, who graciously spent the week helping to take care of Grandma. This past week was the first time that Uncle Chris was able to meet with great-nephew Zion. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic we have not been able to get all of our family together to see the baby. He will turn one year old in March, and we hope that this year of his life will lead to more meetings and visits with his family members.

When we drove to Ullin to visit Grandma, we drove out to see the construction on the new Cache Chapel UMC building. Progress is being made. Although my family and I live in Missouri, we have made many wonderful memories at Cache Chapel. We have attended and volunteered at vacation Bible schools, enjoyed many great dinners in the church basement, and have loved taking part in the annual Cache Chapel Christmas service. It is always a blessing to worship with my relatives and with my fellow members of the family of God, and we look forward to worshipping in the new building.

Given the difficulty that my grandma has undergone in the past few weeks, as well as the struggles we have all experienced over the past year, we have been challenged to look at the suffering in the world and try to make some sense of it. I want to share two Christian reflections on suffering that I hope will be a help. This is by no means meant to be a complete commentary on the subject, rather, I pray that these will be words of wisdom and hope as we live in a world that is difficult and troubled.

1. God is with us in suffering.

As Christians, we do not have a God who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses and struggles (Hebrews 4:15.) Unique among the religions of the world, Christianity claims that God experienced the suffering, rejection, torture, and pain of mankind firsthand in Jesus Christ, who is fully-God and fully-man. We may never know why God allows specific times of suffering in each of our lives, but by looking at the cross we know what the reason is not. God is not allowing suffering because He is distant and remote from it; He experienced it firsthand. God is not allowing suffering because He does not love us; look at the cross and see what lengths He went through for love.

Jesus is Immanuel, God with us (Matthew 1:22-23.) He suffered with us as a man, and now He is with us in our suffering through His Spirit (Romans 8:26-27.) The prophet Isaiah called Jesus both the “Man of sorrows” (Isaiah 53:3) and the “Prince of peace” (Isaiah 9:6.) It is only because of the suffering of Jesus that we can know God and experience the comfort of His love (Philippians 4:7.)

2. Our Suffering Will Produce a Greater Glory

Christians not only have the comfort of God being with us in our current suffering, but we also have the hope of resurrection. Unlike other worldviews which say that there is no life after death, or there is a disembodied All-soul, or we will receive the consolation for our good works and moral efforts, the Bible shows that there will be restoration in the new heaven and the new earth. Not only will all suffering and evil be undone and repaired, but our eventual glory and joy will somehow become even better for it.

To quote Dr. Tim Keller (who in turn quotes J.R.R. Tolkien):

Just after the climax of the trilogy The Lord of the Rings, Sam Gamgee discovers that his friend Gandalf was not dead (as he thought) but alive. He cries, “I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself! Is everything sad going to come untrue?” The answer of Christianity to that question is – yes. Everything sad is going to come untrue and it will somehow be greater for having once been broken and lost.

This does not mean that Christians are so focused on the future glory that we are ignorant or indifferent to the suffering of the world. We are called to “weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15.) We are called to comfort others in their suffering and show the love of the Comforter by working to relieve the suffering of those around us and working to end injustice and suffering in the world (2 Corinthians 1:4). Ultimately, Christians have the hope that God will one day set all things right.

God is with us now in our suffering; He will work through us to stop the suffering of others; and one day, He will set all things right.

Thought for the week: “They say of some temporal suffering, ‘No future bliss can make up for it,’ not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory.” – C. S. Lewis

Introduce Yourself (Example Post)

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.

Why do this?

Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
Because it will help you focus your own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
What topics do you think you’ll write about?
Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.

Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.

When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.

Introduce Yourself (Example Post)

This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.

Why do this?

Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
Because it will help you focus your own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.

The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.

To help you get started, here are a few questions:

Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
What topics do you think you’ll write about?
Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

My 20 Favorite Songs in 2020

These are the twenty songs that became my favorites during 2020.

Disclaimer: Please note that by including these songs in my list I am not endorsing any or all of the language, political stances, or messages of these songs. These are simply songs that, for various reasons, resonated with me this year.

I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For (Live/Choir Version) – U2
Blackbird – The Beatles (I also love Cory Asbury’s cover of this song on YouTube)
You Hold It All Together – Maverick City Music x UPPERROOM
Hand of God (Outro) – Jon Bellion
With or Without You – U2
Everything I Am (feat. DJ Premier) – Kanye West
Let It Be – The Beatles
Sigh No More – Mumford and Sons
Roll Away Your Stone – Mumford and Sons
Hey Jude – The Beatles
Wanted Man (Live From the Woods) – NEEDTOBREATHE
Graves into Gardens (Live) – Elevation Worship & Brandon Lake
Dear Theodosia (feat. Ben Folds) – Regina Spektor
One Tree Hill – U2
Good Morning – Kanye West
Father Stretch – Sunday Service Choir
Starts and Ends (Live) – Hillsong UNITED
My Heart Your Home (feat. Alton Eugene & Chandler Moore) – Maverick City Music
Landslide (Remastered) – Fleetwood Mac
Is He Worthy/ Agnus Dei/ We Fall Down (feat. Chandler Moore & Nate Moore) – Maverick City Music

Top 10 Books of 2020

This is my list of the top 10 books that I read in 2020.

Disclaimer: Please note that I am not endorsing all decisions or opinions of the authors by including them in this list.

1. The Great Divorce – C.S. Lewis
The Great Divorce is best book that I read in 2020. This book gave me a picture of what it could look like to exist as an eternal being. In this book the narrator visits Hell and finds that the doors are locked from the inside. People from Heaven come down and try to convince the people in Hell to leave. C.S. Lewis gives tremendous insight in this book about the nature of human hope, desire, and the ultimate love in which each human heart seeks to find rest.

Quote from the book:

…it begins with a grumbling mood, and yourself still distinct from it: perhaps criticizing it. And yourself, in a dark hour, may will that mood, embrace it. Ye can repent and come out of it again. But there may come a day when you can do that no longer. Then there will be no you left to criticize the mood, nor even to enjoy it, but just the grumble itself going on forever like a machine.

2. The Horse and His Boy – C.S. Lewis

This is one of my all-time favorite books. I have read this book several times, but it was especially important reading in 2020 because I wrote a literary analysis of this book for my undergraduate honors research project for the Jane Stephens Honors Program at Southeast Missouri State University. This, my favorite of the Narnia books, is a great adventure story that also gives a picture of God’s providence and comfort throughout the troubles and dangers of life.

Quote from the book:

“Myself,” said the Voice, very deep and low so that the earth shook: and again “Myself,” loud and clear and gay: and then the third time “Myself,” whispered so softly you could hardly hear it, and yet it seemed to come from all round you as if the leaves rustled with it.

Shasta was no longer afraid that the Voice belonged to something that would eat him, nor that it was the voice of a ghost. But a new and different sort of trembling came over him. Yet he felt glad too.

3. Prayer – Tim Keller

I found this book quite difficult to read, and not always extremely compelling. However, I have started a consistent daily time of prayer by applying what I learned from this book. Dr. Keller is very thorough in his research and bibliography. He not only gives his own personal opinion on prayer, but he also offers a comprehensive view on many Christian teachings on prayer.

Additionally, I want to reference Dr. Tim Keller’s sermons on prayer which can be found via podcast at Gospel in Life. These sermons were also informative and helpful, especially after I had finished reading the book and needed encouragement in continuing a habit of daily prayer.

Quote from the book:

Praying is rowing, and sometimes it is like rowing in the dark – you won’t feel that you are making any progress at all. Yet you are, and when the winds rise again, and they surely will, you will sail again before them.

4. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King – J.R.R. Tolkien

Reading The Lord of the Rings this year was a really fun experience. I had previously read the series when I was in the fourth grader. At that time, I found the story very epic, but felt like the books were long and a bit dull. Rereading the series as an adult, I loved Tolkien’s style and didn’t find it dull or too long. His style, characters, story, and the overarching world of Middle-Earth gives the reader an incredible feeling of heroism in the face of hopelessness.

Quote from the book:

Pity filled his heart and great wonder, and suddenly the slow-kindled courage of his race awoke. He clenched his hand. She should not die, so fair, so desperate! At least she should not die alone, unaided.

5. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers – J.R.R. Tolkien

I debated whether to put The Two Towers or the Return of the King as the higher of the two The Lord of the Rings books in this list. Both are excellent and choosing The Return of the King over The Two Towers is no slight on this volume. The Two Towers has the iconic scene of the chase of the three hunters, one of my favorite scenes from the whole series. As I said previously, rereading this series as an adult was great and they are so much better than I remembered.

Quote from the book:

There are some things that it is better to begin than to refuse, even though the end may be dark. [Aragorn]

6. Who is This Man – John Ortberg

This book was another that I reread this year. Despite his recent mistakes and controversy, I have been and continue to be a fan of John Ortberg’s writing. This book in particular examines the influence that the life of Jesus of Nazareth has had on the history of the world and asks the reader to think on the question, “Who is this man?”

Quote from the book:

Maybe his [Jesus] place in history is a remarkable accident. But maybe it isn’t.

7. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader – C.S. Lewis

This is my second favorite of The Chronicles of Narnia books, and it is the fifth in the series. This book has some of my favorite images from the world of Narnia, including the Dufflepuds, Eustace as a dragon, and the picture in the bedroom. C.S. Lewis had an incredible ability to showcase truths in ways that are simple to understand for both adults and children.

Quote from the book:

Shall I ever be able to read that story again, the one I couldn’t remember? Will you tell it to me, Aslan? Oh do, do, do. [Lucy Pevensie]

Indeed, yes, I will tell it to you for years and years. [Aslan]

8. A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens

This book is a classic. I read it for the first-time last Christmas, but I enjoyed it so much that I had to read it again this Christmas season. Dickens’ story is short, but extremely moving. Scrooge is first a hateful character, then nearly a sympathetic one, and finally a transformed one. Perhaps I’m just too sentimental, but I feel a tremendous warmth and Christmas cheer as Scrooge becomes a man who “knew how to keep Christmas well.”

Quote from the book:

He told me, coming home, that he hoped that people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see. [Bob Cratchit speaking of Tiny Tim]

9. The Screwtape Letters – C.S. Lewis

Again, a C.S. Lewis classic appears on my list. This book is insightful, funny, and convicting all at once. One criticism of this book that I have heard is that it seems to push a platonic view that God and the devils are only concerned with the state of a person’s soul and not concerned with what is going on in the world. Despite this criticism, I highly recommend reading this book and dwelling on what it shows.

Quote from the book:

When He [God] talks of their losing their selves, He means only abandoning the clamour of self-will; once they have done that, He really gives them back all their personality, and boasts (I am afraid, sincerely) that when they are wholly His they will be more themselves than ever.

10. Seven Women – Eric Metaxes

This is best biography that I read this year. It tells the stories of seven great women from the past 600 years: Joan of Arc, Susanna Wesley, Hannah More, Saint Maria of Paris, Corrie ten Boom, Rosa Parks, and Mother Teresa. Metaxes does not present an unbiased historical view of these women. However, he does present the stories of these women in a way that is compelling and inspiring.

Quote from the book:

Mother Teresa was considered a saint because she was seen to personify an ideal: to love God, and to love one’s neighbor. And yet, what she did was so simple that each one of us can do it – in fact, must do it, if we are to obey the command of Christ: to feed the hungry, care for the sick, invite the stranger in, clothe the naked, visit those in prison, and quench the thirst of those who simply need a cup of water.