Early Spring

One of my newest hellebores, starting to bloom.

We may be on the verge of a new world war,

but the sun shone strong and the temperature climbed to nearly 71 degrees,

on the last day of February!

It was my first dirty-fingernailed gardening day of the year.

I weeded around our sweet tea olive shrubs,

hoping the weed growing there is not one that sprouts back

if only a minuscule portion of its threadlike root is left behind.

How much easier it is to grow weeds than plants.

How much easier it is to cultivate bad habits than good ones.

I triumphantly transplanted two hyssops

that grew from seed last year in the Mother Berm.

The Mother Berm is doing what I hoped;

I can hardly believe it.

Simple things in a complex world.

Beautiful things that might easily be crushed under a heavy tread

as the world degenerates.

I have no plan except to throw myself on the merciful power of God

and stock my purse with a small packet of 

aspirin/acetaminophen/ibuprofen, cough drops, bandaids, sani-wipes, 

and arnica gel.

Spring is always a time of hope.

Blessed baby leaves emerging from the base of a perennial,

always a reminder of the resilience of life,

the will to come back,

the will to go on,

the search for our source and our destiny.

Confidence?

Every year since 2015, I have chosen a word to focus on.  To be strictly accurate, sometimes it has been a few words.  I call them Words of the Year.  I don't do New Year's Resolutions.  I do New Year's Words.  This is an exercise in learning, in mindfulness, and in examining my heart.  I am thankful to the Lord for giving me the idea and helping me grow through it. 

Many of these words hang with me: humility, abide, listen.  The process teaches me about important ideas and goals.  I have never mastered one of my year's words, although God has taught me much along the way.  I don't discard my words at the end of a year.  I keep them, like a list in my pocket.  I could, literally, write them into a list for my pocket, but I would lose the list, so I catalog them here.  I revisit them every so often, not probably often enough, but always in January.

Here is the history of my words-of-the-year:

2015--Peace

2016--Restoration (which changed to Goodness, Mercy and Unfailing Love)

2017--Faith and Gratitude (which grew to encompass Joy)

2018--I tried to make my words Power and Glory; however, God said, "Okay, but I actually want you to consider Humility.  Looking at my power and glory will help you understand humility."

Looking back, I can see that a fundamental shift occurred in 2018.  

I began this exercise in 2015, in response to a heartbreaking relational issue and family crisis.  Peace was what I wanted--peace among the members of my family, and freedom from worry and fear in my heart.  God responded gently, patiently, and let me spend a year seeking peace.  

I petulantly chose Restoration in 2016, because I was tired of waiting, tired of living in a broken place, impatient for things to be fixed and finished.  The Lord moved me in a different direction, redirecting my focus to Goodness, Mercy and Unfailing Love--He wanted me to look up at Him, not around at my circumstances.  

I made a step of progress in 2017, as I started to understand the importance of not simply "picking a word," but asking the Lord what He wanted me to work on and learn.  He led me to pursue Faith and Gratitude that year, then kindly, generously demonstrated to me that His path is the path of Joy.  

Nevertheless, in 2018, I tried again to take the helm.  I decided it was time for God to act, to show His Power and Glory, time for Him to fix my problems and give me a comfortable life.  He did show His power, by unmistakably letting me know that Humility was what I really needed.  My power and glory verse, 1 Chronicles 29:11, makes me grateful to be humble.

I never finished with humility.  I'm still pondering it, still learning about it.  Some days I stand in awe of the beauty of humility, and some days I stand in terror of the process of learning it.  Since 2018, I have tried (not necessarily successfully, but with conscious effort) to set aside my own goals, my own ideas of what life should look like, and especially my own timelines.  I have tried to entrust everything to God and be thankful that He is in control.  I have a prayer that helps me when I pray it: "Thank you Lord Jesus, that I can trust you because you are faithful, and good, and able to do all that you purpose and promise to do, through your almighty power."  

2019--I was not done with Humility.  My words that year were Humility, Love and Acceptance, but mostly Humility, because Humility is Love and Acceptance.  Particularly, Humility is loving people sacrificially by putting their interests above your own, and Humility is accepting what God brings into your life with faith that He is good, wise, and faithful, and can be trusted when nothing seems to make sense.

2020--Abide.  This was a good word, something that really cannot happen apart from humility.  I need to abide in Christ, and I need Him to abide in me.  Neither can happen when I cling to pride.  

2021--Listen.  This was an important word.  2021 showed me how much I fail to listen.  I also learned more about my lack of humility, as--in trying to improve as a listener--I also became more aware of other people's poor listening.

It's discouraging to me when I try to grow in a particular area, and then find myself noticing how others around me lack growth in the same area.  So much pride.  I can hardly wait to get to heaven and be completely relieved of this monkey on my back, this stinking pride that refuses to let go.

For the past two years, we have quarantined.  I have not made many friends in my new state.  We go to church, but have not forged relationships there, throughout a year of attending.  Granted, we often attend through zoom, and when we go in person, we wear masks.  Our other social contact comes through neighborhood and family.  We have met some sweet neighbors, outside in our neighborhood.  We see my son and his wife and their baby.  Occasionally we visit or are visited by family from out of state.  But it has been a quiet and lonely two years, even for me, a hard-core introvert.  Always skittish of people, I think I have developed some deep fears of people during this hiatus from the discipline of regularly challenging myself to leave my home and participate in the social landscape.

Because of these fears and anxieties, because sitting at home is akin to Abiding, and not talking is something like Listening, I thought perhaps God wanted me to consider the word Confidence this year.  I thought He might want me to walk more confidently as His child, in confidence that He loves me, will never forsake me, will complete His good work in me.

Then on New Year's Eve, something happened that rocked me violently.  Whatever confidence I had that God was working in me, growing me, forgiving me, and possibly beginning to bear fruit through me, whatever hopes I had that He was accomplishing anything in me, were attacked and battered.  Accusations assailed me and cut my legs out from under me, knocked the wind from my lungs: You will never be worthy.  You are a farce, a hypocrite.  You have failed, and your failures will never be undone.  You are awkward, an embarrassment, but even more than that, you are evil.  You are guilty.  It's all your fault, and you should be ashamed.  I looked back through years of old prayer journals.  The handwriting, the words looked like someone else's, or like lies.  Who are you, to think God would hear those prayers?  You think you know Jesus so well, and love Him so much.  But nobody who loved Jesus would do the things you've done.  You are despicable.

I know that some of these thoughts are accusations from the accuser, from the devil.  I know that they are not all true.  But the devil is a clever liar.  He doesn't tell far-fetched lies.  He tells lies that can easily be confused with the truth; that is why his deceptions are successful.  I am awkward and do stupid things.  I do have a track record of failures.  I am guilty of sin.  From these truths, it is a quick and easy slide to believing that I am beyond the grace of God's forgiveness, and that none of my spiritual growth could possibly be authentic.

They often say that unforgiveness only hurts the person who refuses to forgive, and I do not know why they say such a thing.  Unforgiveness deeply hurts anyone who is longing for forgiveness and reconciliation, and finds them unattainable.  When people withhold forgiveness from each other, it makes God's forgiveness very difficult to conceive.  How can I decide to walk in the freedom and grace of God's forgiveness, if someone next to me on earth insists that I am unforgivable?

Why did this happen on the eve of my starting a year with the word Confidence?  Literally, that is when it happened.  I thought I would wake up on January 1 with the word Confidence, and move to get up and out, carrying the light of Christ to places that need Him, because of His power at work within me (Ephesians 3:16, 20).  Yet, on December 31, I was struck a blow that made me more inclined than ever to stay in my house, in my bed, with a blanket pulled up over my head.

I do not know if Confidence is the word God has for me this year or not.  In the past, when I missed the right word, Jesus gently changed me mid-course.  So it's okay; I can start with Confidence and trust the Lord to lead me where He wants me to go.  

As I ponder it, I am frightened to think of Confidence being my word, because so often God works in us through creating oppositional circumstances.  For instance, we learn patience by enduring circumstances that make us feel impatient.  We learn trust by being afraid.  We learn joy by finding it in the middle of our sorrows, losses and lack.  I can surmise that learning Confidence will come through being mocked and scorned.  Well, if that is the case, maybe I did choose the right word, and God started me off on it a day early?

The plan was for Confidence to be the word of 2022.

The scripture, as of now, is 

~ 2 Corinthians 3:4-6 ~

Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God.  

Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, 

but our sufficiency is from God, 

who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, 

not of the letter, but of the Spirit.  

For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

In other words, through Christ's unfathomable love, demonstrated on the cross, we have access to the Spirit of God, who lives in us, imparts life to us, and makes us sufficient to be His temple and participate in His ministry of lovingly offering life to all who will come.  This is our confidence.

Holiday Cooking notes

 Christmas Pie Recipe

1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup cocoa

1 cup sugar

1 Tbsp molasses (pour and guess; not fussy)

1/2 tsp. salt

1 Tbsp. vanilla (pour and guess)

3 eggs

splash of heavy cream (only if Lu won't be eating it)

Melt butter.  Stir in cocoa, sugar, molasses, salt and vanilla.  Whisk in eggs, one at a time.  Pour into crust.  Bake at 350 for 32 minutes.  Center does not need to be set; it will set as it cools.

* * * * * * *

Gluten free pie crust

1/2 cup rolled oats

1 and 1/2 cups almond flour

1/2 tsp. salt

2 Tbsp butter

1 egg

Pulse oats in food processor until quite fine (this is actually much better than oat flour, in this recipe).  Add the rest of the ingredients and process until it forms a ball.  Remove to pie plate and shape into crust using fingers and/or a roller (I sometimes use a small cylindrical glass).

* * * * * * *

Christmas Soup

Use whatever ingredients you have on hand--

For example: leftover frozen broth, onions, celery, peppers, potatoes, sweet potatoes, squash, kale, spinach, carrots, chicken or beef, pinto and/or black beans, frozen mixed vegetables, frozen corn, frozen peas, etc.

Cook the onions hard in some butter or olive oil, until they are caramelized.  (If you are using raw meat, add diced chunks at this point, and brown up with the onion--add in a bunch of seasoning and let the flavors sear into the meat. Remove the meat to a separate pot and slow-simmer in broth while you work on cooking down and pureeing the stock vegetables.)

Add whatever other vegetables you want in a puree--usually the ones that aren't very nicely textured when cooked, like celery and peppers, plus some sweet potato for thickness and depth--plus a bunch of broth. Cook until very soft and then thoroughly puree. Add the stuff you want to be in chunks and simmer until tender.

Add broth or cooking wine if needed for consistency.  Boxed is fine.

Taste and correct seasoning.  Use about 1 Tbsp salt (less with salted cooking wine) for a large pot of soup, and work from there.  Spices can vary from curry seasonings to Italian seasoning to sage and thyme, depending on your ingredients and your mood.  Garlic is good with everything.

Fixing flavor:  add molasses for depth, lemon (zest and/or juice) and/or cayenne for kick, garlic is always nice.  Black pepper sometimes does wonders.  Celery seed can also add depth.  If you think it needs salt but are afraid to add more, offer grated Parmesan to sprinkle on the soup when you serve it.  Between Parmesan and molasses, you can basically fix anything.

* * * * * * *

Christmas Eve Menu

• soup
• crackers
• charcuterie
• crudite
• cookies or chocolates

A Year of Listening

 

My word for the year this year has been Listening.

It's hard, listening.  Sometimes all I seem to hear is the ticking of the clock, the roar of the water heater revving up, the rumbling of heavy construction equipment a half mile away, installing a new neighborhood in what used to be a pine forest, but is now a roadbed surrounded by crushed logs, pungent with the sharp fragrance of spilled sap.

Sometimes I listen with serious attention, and find myself drawn in to what someone else is expressing.  But then I burst in to "help" finish a sentence or complete a thought.  I forget the boundary between "me" and "you," and become offensively assumptive, imagining that we share the same thoughts and understanding.

Sometimes I try to listen by waiting, but after waiting for a very long time, I realize that the other person is not thinking about responding to me and has actually moved on to ponder something totally unrelated. This produces feelings of having been violated, a mingled sense of shame, pain and outrage that I must then try to master with grace that does not originate inside me.  This kind of waiting and listening is painful, but valuable in that it shows me things I never realized about the absence of connection, things I never knew back in the days when I prattled away unhindered, under the assumption that I was heard and understood by sympathetic ears.

I've learned that when I listen, I must consciously work to understand how the other person is different from me, and how those differences affect our perceptions.  I was under the mistaken impression that it was a gracious thing to assume that we are alike, that others understand in the same way I do.  No.  We must allow for differences, strive to understand them, and refrain from judging them.  An apple is not an orange; that is all.  Two delicious fruits, one full of vitamin C, the other replete with pectin and fiber.  We need each other, and we desperately need to learn from one another.  When we shut ourselves off from learning from someone, nobody knows how far the damaging ripples spread throughout humanity.

Personally, I feel most listened to when someone asks me questions.  I love when someone asks me questions.  I am not talking about interrogating questions or accusing questions, of course.  But when someone asks me how I feel about something, or what my opinion is about something, or whether I've had experience with something, these things make me feel seen, valued, loved.  While it is important not to project my feelings onto others, not to assume that others feel the same way I feel, I think perhaps other people might also enjoy being conversationally probed by someone who is interested in hearing what they have to say.

To that end, I have compiled a list of conversation questions.  If you are shy, like I am, if you struggle to get a conversation going, if you freeze up in the moment when you most wish you could graciously say something to put others at ease, perhaps you will find this list useful.  I have actually picked the most innocent of these questions, printed them out on strips of paper, and tucked them into a little cream pitcher that sits on a decorative cupboard in my kitchen.  When conversation lags, I can say, "Let's play the question game!  Do you want to pick a question, or should I?"  Obviously, I find this "game" very enjoyable.  But based on the responses of others, I think they like it, too.  Even the most reluctant are beginning to trust that this is not a threatening pursuit.  It gives us a chance to slow down and listen to each other, learn a little about each other, and grow closer together.

Conversation questions:

1.  What was the last really funny thing that happened to you, or that you saw happen?

2.  What makes you feel safe?

3.  What makes you feel happy?

4.  What have been the highest and lowest points of your life?

5.  How much of someone's personality do you think is molded by culture?

6.  What are the most important morals for the people of a culture to embrace?

7.  What is a miracle that happens every day?

8.  What is the purpose of art in a society?  Are there multiple purposes?

9.  Describe what a perfect city would be like.

10.  Who do you know who is living life to the fullest, and what is the hallmark of this?

11.  How are emotions useful?  Are they necessary for survival?

12.  What is a goal you want to achieve in life?  (Complete the sentence: "I could die happy if...")

13.  What is the best fiction book you ever read and what did you like about it?

14.  What is the best non-fiction book you ever read, and what did you like about it?

15.  Describe a fun adventure you once had with a good friend.

16.  Tell about an experience you once had when you felt very afraid.

17.  What are you thankful for today?

18.  Share how you structure your day.

19.  What do you hope for?

20.  What is your favorite way to spend two hours on a Saturday afternoon?

21.  What would you like to accomplish in the next year?  How could you plan to make it happen?

22.  What is one thing you could do in the next 24 hours that would feel good to get done?

23.  If someone gave you $200 and a day of freedom, what would you do?

24.  What is your favorite outfit or article of clothing to wear?

25.  In your home, where is your favorite place to be?

26.  What concern is heavy on your heart?

27.  Do you have a dream?  What is it?  ("dream" in any sense of the word you choose)

28.  Do you have a recurring dream?

29.  What is your favorite food, flavor or beverage?

30.  Tell about your favorite pet.  If you have never had a pet, tell about what you'd like in a pet, or why you choose not to have one.

31.  What is your favorite animal?

32.  Is there a place somewhere that you associate with particularly happy feelings?

33.  Whose life do you admire, or whom do you aspire to be like?

34.  Tell about something kind someone did for you once, and what your response was.

35.  Who, among those you know, is most like Jesus?

36.  Describe the positive growth you have observed in someone who is present here, now.

37.  Who have you seen use their abilities and resources generously and sacrificially to serve others?

38.  Describe what the ideal president of the United States would be like.

39.  Describe what an ideal pastor would be like.

40.  Describe what an ideal church would be like.

41.  What is humility and why is it so hard?

42.  Describe the ideal family.

43.  What priorities make life better, and what priorities are damaging?  (Try to think of 2-3 for each category... or this question could be expanded and used as a group brainstorm, but be sure to listen and acknowledge everyone's contribution.)

44.  What is the difference between sympathy and empathy?

45.  What are you afraid of?

46.  What are you looking forward to?

47.  What do you like to eat for Christmas dinner?

48.  Why is it easy to see pride in others, but difficult to recognize it in ourselves?

49.  Tell something about the best vacation/trip you ever took.

50.  What makes life meaningful?

Thankful

What a blessing

that God gives us so much grace.

I am thankful that God gives us more grace than we give one another.

God always forgives.  

His arms are always open to us when we come to Him with our regrets.

People may criticize us, judge us, and condemn us,

but God desires only to heal and restore us.  

God always looks at us with an eye to what we are becoming, under the healing power of His love.  He is outside of time, so He sees what we will be, in eternity, in all our perfection and glory, the completed remedy of the sacrifice of Christ who poured out His life so we could live.

All the time God is working with us, forming and shaping us according to His design and plan, He knows the beauty of the impending outcome.  It is His outcome.  It is good.  He knows the plans He has for us, plans to prosper and not to harm.  He is full of steadfast love and faithfulness.  He is for us.  He will not leave us, nor will He forsake us.  He will take every bad thing that touches one of His children, and use it for a good purpose, to bring about a good result.

It will be okay.  It is all going to be okay.

In eternity, I will be perfect.  I will never sin, or make a mistake, or act in a selfish, unloving way.  And neither will you.  And neither will anybody else who enters the Kingdom of God.  There will be absolutely no risk that any of us will hurt one another or be hurt by one another, 

because we will be made perfect 

in love, 

for love.  

From every cell of our beings, we will only desire what is good for ourselves and for one another.  We will be enthralled with the glory of one another's perfection--never jealous--because we will see how God has planned and fit everything into a stunning design of cooperative, productive, fulfilling, all-surpassing benefit for all.

In the miracle of God's Kingdom, nobody's good will ever come at the expense of someone else's good.  Rather, all our good will cumulatively compound together to make more goodness for everyone.  The joy will crescendo into infinity.

This is my hope, my reward, my promise from God,
and the reason my heart can be grateful.

Trust in the root

 

Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, 

so walk in Him, 

rooted and built up in Him 

and established in the faith, 

just as you were taught, 

abounding in thanksgiving.

~Colossians 2:6-7

"Trust in the roots."

These words have echoed in my mind on a number of occasions this summer.

We started the season with two very late killing frosts.  Aside from one of six marigold seedlings out of a six-pack, everything survived the freezes.  Although things were delayed, they were coming back.  As I worked to encourage growth, the words emerged into my consciousness: "Trust in the roots."

Then, in the second week of May, we experienced a micro-burst tornado, which dumped truckloads of hail on my gardens, stripping newly sprouted lilies and shredding hostas.  I was sad, but I soldiered on, trimming dead leaves, feeding with SuperThrive, watering, cultivating, and above all, praying.  "Please," I said to the Lord.  "Trust in the roots," I heard in reply.

In mid-June, we hired landscapers to mulch for us.  They used a technique I had never seen nor heard of.  It involved using turbo-powered blowers to clear old mulch and fallen plant parts out of the beds, followed by dumping large quantities of mulch right on top of everything, and using the same turbo blowers to blow the new mulch back until the plants appeared again.  Except, as tender, weather-damaged perennials (and a few annuals), many of them stayed under the thick layer of bark chips until the landscapers left and I carefully worked them free, lifting them with trembling fingers.  Some never appeared again.

It has been a rough year for the flowers.  

One plant seemed to be thriving in spite of it all, a pink agastache.

I thought, "This is a good plant, beautiful and tough.  I would like to have three of them in this front bed."

Even then, damage was happening; the leaves started showing white markings almost as soon as the blossoms came out.  But I didn't figure it out until after I came home after a week away.

Upon arriving home, I went out to check on my plants.  The agastache was crispy and actively dropping leaves.  My heart sickened.  

I didn't know what it was.  It looked like it could be anything from root rot to dehydration, or a disease or a bug.  After much examination and reading, I determined that it was spider mites and began treating aggressively with neem oil.  

The dead parts of the plant stayed dead.  Infested leaves dried up and fell off.  But that voice kept telling me, "Trust in the roots.  Trust in the roots."  Since it was spider mites, and not root rot, there was hope.

Over time, I noticed that new growth was indeed coming up from the base of the plant, from the roots.  My agastache will not look good this year, but there is solid reason to hope that it will do much better next year.  This was not a good season; it was not one of flourishing.  But next summer could be much better.

It makes me think of people who falter in their faith.  In a very rough season, it may appear that faith has failed, departed altogether.  This is when we have to trust in the roots.  Truths taught long ago have a way of settling quietly under the refuse of false presumptions during a bad season, but that does not mean they are gone, only buried by careless, even angry and destructive winds of wayward ideas.  But the truth will emerge, by the grace of God, in His perfect time.  A barren season does not mean the end of life, but it does mean that when life re-emerges, we will celebrate all the more.

Some of my annuals fizzled in the heat of August, leaves browning, stems lying prone on the ground.  Now that September has brought cooler temperatures and shorter days, new shoots emerge from the bases of these plants, lush and green.  Autumn buds are forming.  Again, it's the roots.

...that according to the riches of His glory

He may grant you to be strengthened with power

through His Spirit in your inner being,

so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--

that you, being rooted and grounded in love,

may have strength to comprehend

with all the saints

what is the breadth and length and height and depth,

and to know the love of Christ

that surpasses knowledge

that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

~Ephesians 3:16-19

Jesus, Immanuel, never leaves nor forsakes His people.  He will be with us forever.  May the power of His precious Holy Spirit overcome all the evil and falsehood, all the doubts and despair.  May He open the eyes of the blind, unstop the ears of the deaf, and communicate the wonderful truth of who He is, the glorious life He has for us.

May those who are bent and broken under an unfruitful season find their cure in Jesus who loves us and gave Himself for us.  May those who have gone astray in their spirits come back to understanding and stand in awe of the Lord who created and redeemed them.

The root is Christ, and Christ is God, and God is love.

Trust in the root.

Japanese beetles and the mercy of God

 I hate Japanese beetles with an ungodly hatred.

When I see them gnawing on my plants, forcing their stupid, elliptical, black bodies of destruction into what was, a few hours ago, a gorgeous rose just beginning to shyly unfurl, I feel physical distress, heat boiling up in my jaw and nausea in my throat.  The back of my neck and my arms prickle as I remember the feeling of their tiny barbed legs between my fingers when I have sometimes desperately reached to pick them off and crush them.  My head literally pounds, my heart races and my breathing accelerates.  I run for the garage to search for a cure.

Neem oil does not bother them a bit.

This is a rose leaf after Japanese beetles savaged it.

A cluster of Japanese beetles ravages what was recently 

a glorious white chiffon Rose of Sharon blossom.

One day, in a panic, since nothing else was working and Japanese beetles were swarming thick on a defenseless potted rose, I grabbed a can of Cutter aerosol insect repellant, the kind you spray on yourself before you go out into the deep woods.  I sprayed the rose with Cutter until liquid trickled down in rivulets.  The beetles left, but the next day most of the leaves on the rose turned crunchy brown. 

And this is the thing.

It is very hard to kill only the Japanese beetles.  When I try to kill them, I am always at risk of killing something else along with them.

Last year, the potted tomato plant on my deck grew large and lush, but did not produce any tomatoes.  When I told my dad, he asked, "Do you have any bees?"  As far as I could tell, all the bees were in the front yard with the zinnias, so we carried the tomato pot around to the front and let it sit among the zinnias for a few days (much to the consternation of our HOA administrators).  We moved it back to the deck, and it grew one tomato.

This year, I tried to plant a row of pollinator plants along the back of the deck, to help the tomatoes along.  Trouble is, it has been a battle trying to protect the flowers from slugs, snails, and Japanese beetles (and careless landscapers who nearly killed the whole row with mulch and turbo blowers, but that is a different story).  There are products, insecticides, which would kill the beetles.  But if I use them, they will kill the bees, too, and the dragonflies and the butterflies.  Since the whole purpose of the flowers is to bring pollinators to my tomatoes, I cannot take an action that would kill the pollinators.

So what does one do?  I read forums of what others do, and they say, over and again, you can't get rid of Japanese beetles.  You just have to figure out how to mitigate the damage. 

While I garden, I ruminate, and this is perhaps why I love gardening.

When I battle Japanese beetles, I sometimes think about God, and sin, and how very much God hates sin.  God hates sin because of what it does to people, His Creation, just the way I hate Japanese beetles because of what they do to my garden.

And yet, I have to let the Japanese beetles go.  I cannot attack and lay them waste, or I will devastate the rest of what I am working to accomplish.  This is not to say that I ignore the beetles, only that I will not be completely eradicating them any time soon.

Similarly, God is patient, waiting for the right time to eradicate evil. He allows it to exist temporarily, because it would damage His other purposes if He were to wipe it out immediately.

Jesus told a parable about this in Matthew 13:

The Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in a field.  But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away.  When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared.

The owner's servants came to him and said, "Sir, didn't you sow good seed in your field?  Where then did the weeds come from?"

"An enemy did this," he replied.

The servants asked him, "Do you want us to go and pull them up?"

"No," he answered, "because while you are pulling up the weeds, you may root up the wheat with them.  Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time, I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn."

Matthew 13:24-30 NIV

Why is there evil and suffering, sorrow and pain? Because the enemy of God planted a selfish, God-doubting thought in the mind of Eve, and she acted on it, and Adam joined her, and sin has plagued the world ever since.  God will eradicate sin at just the right time, but because He is loving and merciful, and wants to give many, many people many, many opportunities to be saved, He is waiting patiently.  When God destroys sin, He will also necessarily destroy all those who cling to sin, who insist on wrapping up in it.  This is why God waits so patiently for people to turn from sin and come to Him for freedom and cleansing.  "The Lord is not slow in keeping His promises as some understand slowness.  He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance," 2 Peter 3:9.

The mercy of God waits, and mitigates the troubles of His children with the presence of His Holy Spirit and the power of His perfect promises.

They say you can hand-pick Japanese beetles off your beloved plants.  You're supposed to do it at dawn or dusk, and carry a bucket of soapy water to drop them into.  To me, this is an overwhelming and unpalatable chore.  So many beetles, so full of sticky prickles between my fingertips, and a host of them are on the top of the crepe myrtle tree where I could never reach or climb.  I do not go that far to take care of my plants.  But God goes to all lengths to help us escape the power of evil.  He is never overwhelmed, exhausted or discouraged.  Though He waits, He constantly mitigates.  This is the nature of our wonderful heavenly Father.  May we praise Him forever.