SHOULDER TO SHOULDER #135 ---- 8/14/00
Posted by: lifeunlimited <lifeunlimited@...>
As We fight The Good Fight
SHOULDER TO SHOULDER #135 ---- 8/14/00
TITLE: "Loosen Your Grip"
My Dear Friend and Partner in the Cause of the Kingdom:
It seems that I write you while away from home almost as often as from
the comforts of our little house in the woods. Today is another "away"
letter, this time coming from Des Moines, Iowa. Last week and the week
before I wrote from Kansas City, MO. In coming weeks I will be writing
from Texas, Bosnia, Croatia, England, and other sites.
I'm actually beginning this letter in LaGrange, just minutes from Mark
Twain country in northeastern Missouri . . . . . and am now concluding it
in a Quality Inn Motel late Sunday night in Des Moines.
Before sharing my heart about a special matter, let me note a couple of
. . . .
HOUSEKEEPING ITEMS:
1. Thank you, thank you, thank you! So many readers sent words of
sympathy, support, and encouragement over my Mother's recent death. And,
thank you especially for comments about last week's letter, "Destined For
Greatness". I am convinced every one of us has been destined for
greatness.
Not that we will be famous, but God intends only greatness for each one
of His children. My Mother was one of the greatest. As I wrote last
week, her heritage prepared her for greatness, her heart was hungry from
an early age for great things, and her life consequentially manifested
greatness in everything she did throughout her lifetime.
2. Only because a large number of people inquired about whether or not
there was a place for memorial gifts in her honor, I include the
following information.
There has been, in fact, the creation of the "Elaine Tolliver Memorial
Missions Fund", managed by our own ministry, Life Unlimited Ministries.
As you may recall from last week's letter, Mother had a passion for
loving, ministering to, and sharing the Gospel with people. She was
especially excited over every effort we made to minister in the Balkans.
This fund will be used exclusively to support missionary endeavors in
eastern Europe, a place dear to her heart because of her own heritage and
also because of our ongoing ministry there. Any tax deductible
contribution to that fund should be made out to Life Unlimited
Ministries, with "Elaine Tolliver Memorial Missions Fund" OR "Memorial
Missions Fund" on the memo line. Send it to Life Unlimited Ministries at
6630 SE 951 Rd., Collins, MO 64738.
THINGS HELD DEAR:
Life has not prepared Jo Ann and me for the series of events that have
happened to us in recent months, and continue to happen. So much
pertains to our family.
A little over a year ago, while we were in Croatia, Jo Ann's father went
home to be with the Lord. One year to the day, our eleventh grandchild,
JoyLinn Rose Reynolds, was born, again while we were on the way home from
another trip to Bosnia and Croatia.
Last November my Mother had the first of three major life-threatening
episodes that put her in the Intensive Care Unit of the hospital. Even
though she had been suffering from various serious diseases for years,
these events brought us face to face with her mortality for the first
time in over 25 years.
This past March our daughter Cheri and her husband, Bob, adopted two more
children from Russia, making their quiver full of five from that former
Communist country.
Seven weeks ago, as I noted, little JoyLinn was born.
Four weeks ago, a daughter estranged from our family for over four years,
reestablished contact shortly after my Mother entered the hospital for
the final time.
Two weeks ago, my Mother went home to be with the Lord. During that time
the ice was broken and the reconciliation process was begun with our
estranged daughter. (We rejoice and praise God for that!)
Yesterday morning we had a special baby dedication for little JoyLinn.
Last night we participated in a commissioning service for our oldest
daughter and her family as they go to South America as career
missionaries. This coming Wednesday we will see them off at the airport.
So ---- what's the point?
There are some things we should hold dear, and family is one of those
things. Perhaps no blessing is greater apart from our salvation than
that of family.
And, yet, I look back over my early years in the ministry and see a
pattern that is far too frequently seen today ---- ministers taking their
families for granted, and even sometimes allowing their commitment to
ministry end up destroying their families.
At the risk of sounding like a heretic to some, I unequivocally declare
that your family is the most precious human commodity you have, my
friend. So, cherish them. Love them. Care for them.
Hold them dear to your heart ---- and show it.
HELD TOO TIGHT:
All the while we should hold them dear, we must not hold them too
tightly. Jo Ann and I sometimes feel a little "guilty" when we see so
many friends in ministry who have terrible struggles with their children.
Apart from our one daughter the past four years, we've never had to deal
with such things. And that has seen a significant breakthrough just
recently.
When we talk with those friends who have had some type of heartbreak in
their home, we find that it often has been because they had too tight a
grip on either their ministry or their children.
One the one hand, their false sense of "ministry at all cost" had caused
them to hang too tightly to their ministry ---- as if that were some sort
of badge of honor for their sacrifice in serving Jesus. What I've
personally concluded out of my own life, is that such a tight grip was
actually the result of either a major sense of insecurity or a rebellious
act of wanting to be in control.
On the other hand, their expectations for their children were so geared
toward perfection that they tried to force their kids to be what they
thought others expected them to be. After all, no minister wants to be
known as the parent of a rebellious or immoral child. That doesn't look
good on the report.
In either case, it is evident that these friends held too tight a grip on
something ---- either their ministry or their family ---- because of some
distorted sense of insecurity and needing to prove something to someone.
Chuck Swindoll's great book, "Strengthening Your Grip" notwithstanding,
it is easy to hang onto something so intensely that you destroy it.
I remember a story from years ago about two mischievous boys who came to
a wise old man, hands behind their backs, and one of them asked, "Old
man, what do I have in my hand?"
After a few moments, the old man said, "Why, you have a bird in your
hand."
Surprised that he knew, the boy then asked, "Is it dead or alive, old
man?"
The wise gentleman knew that if he said it was dead, the boy would
release it into the air, but if he said it was alive, he would crush it
to death in his grip.
He replied, "As you will, my child ---- as you will."
Friend, you have within your power the ability to either crush your
ministry to death, or likewise crush your family ---- simply by hanging
on too hard. Make sure they are not held too tight. Take it from me
---- I've done both, and it isn't worth the cost.
LOOSEN YOUR GRIP:
Over the past three weeks, Jo Ann and I have been faced with two
occasions that required us to loosen our grip.
1. One was the death of my Mother. She and Dad had just gone with us
four weeks ago to select an apartment for them to move into not far from
our home. Then, our of nowhere we discovered her leukemia. It was
totally unexpected, and was a shock.
When the doctor's report came back as beyond doubt, we realized she might
have anywhere from weeks to perhaps a year. We were not prepared to see
her die within twelve days from the time she was diagnosed with the
disease. We thought we had more time than that.
The Tuesday that we visited in the hospital we sent Dad home for some
rest. An hour later the nurse informed us that the pulmonary specialist
would be up to her room soon. He arrived with two messages. One was
that he wanted Mother moved to Intensive Care where she could be
monitored more closely. The other which he spoke to me was that she was
going to have to decide whether or not she wanted artificial life support
because he wasn't even certain she'd make it through the night. He
wanted that decision made while she was capable.
I called Dad and had him talk with the doctor. Dad returned to the
hospital and was waiting in ICU when we got down there. He, Jo Ann and I
talked with Mother and told her the situation. She was very objective
and not overly distressed over the news, though she did keep hoping
against hope that there might be another option.
There was none.
When I assured her that we would take care of Dad and that he would get
through this ordeal, she resigned herself to the inevitable and
instructed the doctor, "no life support system".
When we reviewed the truth of a future reunion, she turned to Dad and
said, "just don't be too long."
She had to loosen her grip.
The next night it was my turn.
By this time the hourly doses of morphine had pretty well knocked Mother
out of sense of consciousness and ability to communicate ---- she slept
constantly.
Our third daughter and her family traveled well past Midnight in order to
see her one more time. The nursing staff compassionately allowed all
five great grandchildren and Cheri and Bob into the room. They stroked
her hands, touched her cheeks, kissed her, sang to her, and prayed for
her. It was a special moment ---- one which at least visible evidence
gave no sign that she knew they were there.
They left the hospital about 2:30 that morning. Dad and I stayed.
The head nurse came in and announced that he didn't think it would be
much longer.
We sat and watched her breathing grow more shallow and erratic, as the
monitors indicated the continued drop in oxygen level of the blood, the
diminishing blood pressure, and the wild fibrillation of her heart. I
held her hand; it was as cold as ice.
At one moment I had total peace, and at another I wanted to shout, "Wait!
I've changed my mind! She can't go! Save her!"
It was an ongoing battle of tightening the grip and loosening the grip.
Finally, I knew I had to release her emotionally as I had already done
spiritually and intellectually.
It was time to loosen the grip ---- and let her fly away, free for the
first time in 60 years.
2. The second experience took place last night as we shared in the
commissioning of our eldest daughter and her family to the foreign
mission field. Now, we had done that before. It seems our son-in-law,
Kevin, keeps taking our little girl to the world's most dangerous cities
to minister---- Pnong Phen, Bogota, and now Medellin, three of the ten
most dangerous cities in the world.
We had to loosen our grip every time.
But that wasn't the first time. We'd done it to two other daughters who
served in foreign missions, and we had done it years ago when the four of
them were still very young and we were considering the call to missions
ourselves.
It never gets easy.
But, last night, as I spoke briefly to about 600 or 700 people, God
reminded me again that the safest place for our children to ever be is in
the center of His will. However, if that is to happen, we must loosen
our grip.
LESSONS LEARNED:
When I was a small boy on the farm in southern Illinois, I remember a day
when I found myself stranded up in a huge Mulberry tree, yelling for my
Uncle Russell to rescue me. I had climbed up, but could not reverse the
process. By the time he answered my cry, I was hanging upside down by
legs and arms, totally unable to move either up or down.
As he stood directly under me, just a few feet away, he said, "Turn loose
and I'll catch you."
I said, "O.K." ---- and hung there.
He repeated his instruction.
I repeated my agreement ---- and hung there.
Finally, he said, "If you'll just turn loose, I'm here to catch you."
I said, "I'm Trying to turn loose!"
I laugh at that now, because I understand that the thing that kept me
from turning loose was the trying.
It's always the "trying" that keeps our grip on things so tight.
It's just another way of saying, "I'm Trying to Trust!"
You either trust, ---- or you don't.
Paul said it in a little different way when he told Timothy, "The servant
of the Lord shall not strive." I learned years ago that if I find myself
"striving" with a situation or a problem, it a good bet that I'm not
trusting Him with it ---- otherwise I'd not be striving.
God has showed me three things about my grip on things.
1. First, it's a matter of trust. Keeping a firm grip on things
indicates I'm not really trusting God in that situation ---- I really
don't believe He can, or I really don't believe He will, deal with it.
2. Second, it's a matter of control. While I may believe He can and
Will, but I may not be willing to be satisfied with the outcome ---- it
may be different than what I want. For whatever reason, I still want to
be in control.
3. Finally, both trust and control function on three levels ----
intellectual, emotional, and volitional. And, while I may have gained
the victory in my mind, my emotions or my will may be still resisting the
command to loosen my grip.
So ---- how is it with you, friend? Is there a situation where you've
tightened your grip? If so, I'd suspect you've got a battle with trust,
or with control.
Are you afraid the deacons or elders may fire you if you loosen your
grip? Are you afraid your spouse may leave you if you loosen your grip
and put them in God's care? Are you afraid your future may disappear if
you loosen your grip and stop climbing the ladder?
Take it from one who knows ---- you sleep much better when you have
loosened your grip, especially as it pertains to the things and people
you hold most dear.
I hated to lose my Mother ---- but I'd rather have done that than to have
seen her suffer the excrusiating pain she would have endured from her
other illnesses in years ahead. I hate to see our daughter leave, but
I'd hate more to see her stay, knowing that's not where she would have
belonged.
Things you hold dearest must be released ---- you must loosen your grip.
I hope you can do that, my friend, on anything to which you are clinging
too tightly.
In His Bond of Love,
Bob Tolliver ---- (Rom 1:11-12)
Copyright August, 2000. All rights reserved.
We'd love to hear from you. Drop us a note with reports, observations,
prayer requests, etc.
If this letter has blessed you and you know of someone else who needs to
be encouraged, feel free to forward it in its entirety to all such people
you know.
If you would like a list of past issues which you could receive upon
request, just let us know.
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Hang in there! I'm with you!
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