BIBLICAL LESSONS FROM

Help My Unbelief! ......................................................................................................................................... 4

Asset or Liability? .......................................................................................................................................... 5
Honesty? ....................................................................................................................................................... 6
Gods Will Hath No Why ............................................................................................................................... 8
Closed Doors & Open Windows .................................................................................................................... 9
Confidence in Me? ...................................................................................................................................... 10
Accepting Blame ......................................................................................................................................... 12
Receiving from Gods Hand......................................................................................................................... 14
Thankful ...................................................................................................................................................... 15
Conviction, Then Comfort ........................................................................................................................... 16
Baby, Its Time to Think............................................................................................................................... 17
God Bless Whats His Name ........................................................................................................................ 18
Quit Ye Like Men ......................................................................................................................................... 20
When I Am Afraid........................................................................................................................................ 21
Weightier Matters....................................................................................................................................... 22
Whatever Your Hand Finds ......................................................................................................................... 23
Think Soberly............................................................................................................................................... 25
Crying Over Spilt Milk.................................................................................................................................. 26
The Very, Very Beginning The Very Best Place to Start ........................................................................... 27
Meaning from the Meaningless .................................................................................................................. 29
Rising to the Occasion ................................................................................................................................. 31
Rich & Famous ............................................................................................................................................ 33
Local Urchin................................................................................................................................................. 34
Self Deprecation.......................................................................................................................................... 35
Oblivious ..................................................................................................................................................... 37
Bringing Out the Best in Others .................................................................................................................. 39
Two Become One ........................................................................................................................................ 40
Green-Eyed Monster................................................................................................................................... 42
Edelweiss..................................................................................................................................................... 44
Glory Hoarder or Passer-oner? ................................................................................................................... 45
The Right Man for the Job........................................................................................................................... 47
Sometimes Auf Wiedersehen is a Second Chance ...................................................................................... 48
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Parables....................................................................................................................................................... 50
Friend or Foe? ............................................................................................................................................. 51
Ding-Dong-Dash .......................................................................................................................................... 52
Selah Stop & ......................................................................................................................................... 54
Love is Not a Feeling, Its an Act of Your Will.............................................................................................. 55
Pink Lemonade............................................................................................................................................ 57
Mandatory Happiness ................................................................................................................................. 59
Cloistered Safety ......................................................................................................................................... 60
When God Lets You Down ......................................................................................................................... 62
The Life You Were Born to Live................................................................................................................... 63
Lies Beget More Lies ................................................................................................................................... 64
Gracious Defeat .......................................................................................................................................... 66
Love Never Fails .......................................................................................................................................... 67
Waiting for God........................................................................................................................................... 69
Hidden Talent .............................................................................................................................................. 70
I Lift Up My Eyes to the Hills ....................................................................................................................... 72
Mother, I Have Sinned ................................................................................................................................ 73
How Does God Want Me to Spend His Love? ............................................................................................. 74

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Help My Unbelief!

I celebrated Julie Andrews 80th birthday by watching The Sound of Music (TSOM). This year
(3/2/2015 to be precise) marked the 50th anniversary of this great movie. It begins with Julie Andrews
as Maria, a postulant studying to be a nun at the Nonnberg Abbey in Salzburg, singing the title song up
in Austrian mountains. Meanwhile, the sisters are trying to find Maria as she missed morning service. It
gives rise to a conversation between the Mother Abbess and the Mistress of Novices (Sister Berthe) and
the Mistress of Postulants (Sister Margaretta). Sister Bertha is not a fan of Maria. As indicated in the
picture, she hopes Marias most recent infraction has shown Mother Abbess that Maria has no future at
the abbey. I like the mothers response, I always try to keep faith in my doubts.
That response reminds me of the story of the epileptic in Mark 9. The boys father came to Jesus and
said, Teacher, I brought You my son, who has a mute spirit. And wherever it seizes him, it throws him
down; he foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid. So I spoke to Your disciples, that
they should cast it out, but they could not (vv. 17, 18). When asked how long the boy had been
tormented, the man replies: From childhood. And often he has thrown him both into the fire and into
the water to destroy him. But if You can do anything, have compassion on us and help us (vv. 21, 22).
The man had come to his last hope if Jesus didnt have compassion on them and help them, the boy
would never get better.
Jesus replied, If you believe, all things are possible to him who believes. Mark then tells us that the
man cried out, Lord, I believe; help my unbelief! (vs. 24). In his heart, he knew that Jesus could heal
his son, but he had been through so much that it was difficult not to doubt.
My NJ nieces (Emily, Aubrey and Joelle) have all gone to or are going to Warren Hills Regional High
School. Last Friday night the quarterback (Evan Murray) of their football team died as a result of injuries
suffered in the game. As a person who has a strong belief in Gods sovereignty, I know that last Friday
was the end of the days that Yahweh had fashioned for Evan before he was born (Psalm 139:16). He was
only 17 years old, but God had only ordained 17 years for him. It was God that created him with an
enlarged spleen, which made the young man susceptible to the injury he suffered. Having said that, I am

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sure if this had happened to Leah or Wesley, I would be crying out to God, Lord Jesus, I believe with all
my heart that You are in total control; help my unbelief!
Thankfully for the father of the epileptic and for us, Jesus understands the mixture of faith and unbelief
that exists in our hearts. If He only had compassion on those without doubts, we would all be without
Gods compassion. We need to understand and allow for this mixture in each other too, but at the same
time we need encourage each other that God is at work for our good, regardless of what the
circumstances seem to indicate.

Asset or Liability?

Yesterday we saw that the Mistress of Novices (Sister Berthe) was not a big fan of Maria. In reply to her
disparaging words, the Mistress of Postulants (Sister Margaretta) replied, after all, the wool of a black
sheep is just as warm. The implication being just as warm as the wool from white sheep and that Maria
didnt need to fit the standard mold for a novice (the next step up from postulant toward being a nun)
to be a good one.
The Reverend Mother than asks for input from three other sisters Catherine, Agatha and Sophia, who
(as shown in the photo) each add information regarding Maria to both the arguments of Sister Berthe
(against Maria) and Sister Margaretta (for Maria). This of course gives rise to the song How Do You
Solve a Problem like Maria?
The criticism regarding Maria include: she climbs trees, she waltzes on her way to Mass and whistles on
the stair, she sings in the abbey, shes always late for chapel, shes a flibbertigibbet, unpredictable as
weather, flighty as a feather, a demon, a pest, a whirling dervish, wild, a riddle, and a headache.
Marias praise from Sister Margaretta includes: her penitence is real, she makes people laugh, darling,
lamb, gentle, child, and an angel. The list is much shorter since Sister Margaretta is ganged up on by
four sisters.
The criticism is quite harsh coming from Sister Berthe and the others, culminating in these words, I hate
to have to say it but I very firmly feel. Maria's not an asset to the abbey.

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Not an asset? Really? I assume that the mission of the Nonnberg Abbey was to bring Gods love to the
world. Maybe Maria was not going to be a very good cloistered nun it was not the life she was born to
live. But she would certainly bring Gods love to a hurting family of eight and that help came by way of
the abbey through Maria. She was not a liability; she most certainly was an asset.
I could not help but think of these words of the Apostle Paul at the beginning of Romans 14:
Receive one who is weak in the faith, but not to disputes over doubtful things. For one believes
he may eat all things, but he who is weak eats only vegetables. Let not him who eats despise
him who does not eat, and let not him who does not eat judge him who eats; for God has
received him. Who are you to judge anothers servant? To his own master he stands or falls.
Indeed, he will be made to stand, for God is able to make him stand. (vv. 1-4)
Who are we to judge Gods servants as to whether they are an asset or a liability? If God has received
a person, who are we not to receive them? We need to be more like Sister Margaretta and see the good
in people and less like Sister Berthe who could only see the bad. We all have strengths and weaknesses.
We all have things in our personalities that people like and that people hate. But instead of focusing on
how a person may be a liability, lets focus on how, with God helping them to stand, they can be an
asset.

Honesty?

Maria is brought in by Sister Margaretta for a meeting with the Reverend Mother. She begins to confess
all her sins. One of those sins is saying everything I think or feel. Mother Abbess jokes, Some may
call that honesty. Is it honesty to say everything you think or feel? For instance, when Maria is
meeting the von Trapp children for the first time, we hear the following as they introduce themselves:
Liesl: I'm Liesl. I'm 16 years old, and I don't need a governess.
Maria: I'm glad you told me, Liesl. We'll just be good friends.
Friedrich: I'm Friedrich. I'm impossible.
Maria: Really? Who told you that, Friedrich?
Friedrich: Frulein Josephine - four governesses ago.
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Louisa: I'm Brigitta.

Maria: You didn't tell me how old you are Louisa.
Brigitta: I'm Brigitta. She's Louisa. She's 13 years old, and you're smart. I'm 10 and I think your
dress is the ugliest one I ever saw.
Kurt: Brigitta, you shouldn't say that.
Brigitta: Why not? Don't you think it's ugly?
Kurt: Of course. But Frulein Helga's was ugliest. I'm Kurt. I'm 11. I'm incorrigible.
Maria: Congratulations.
Kurt: What's "incorrigible"?
Maria: I think it means you want to be treated like a boy.
Marta: I'm Marta, and I'm going to be seven on Tuesday. I'd like a pink parasol.
Maria: Pink's my favorite color too.
Maria (now directing her words to the youngest von Trapp who is too shy to speak): Yes, you're
Gretl. And you're five years old? My, you're practically a lady.
Obviously Louisa was not being honest in her unsuccessful attempt to confuse her new governess. She
was lying her name was not Brigitta. But was Brigitta being honest by saying that Marias dress was
the ugliest that she had ever seen, even if it really was uglier than Frulein Helga's. The definition of
honest is free from fraud or deception. If the dress was the ugliest she had ever seen, then yes,
Brigitta was being honest. I guess a more important question would be, were her comments
necessary? I think Apostle Paul would say NO:
Let no corrupt word proceed from your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that
it may grant grace to the hearers. (Ephesians 4:29)
Yes, everything that we say must be free from fraud or deception it must be true. However, that is not
the only criteria for saying something. What we say must also: (1) be good, not corrupt; (2) meet a
need; (3) edify, not tear down; and, (4) bring Gods grace to the hearer. Brigittas observation
concerning Marias dress was corrupt (rotten), did not meet a need, tore down and did not bring Gods
grace. She should have kept the thought to herself. When asked why she shouldnt say it, Kurt could
have just quoted Ephesians 4:29.
Maria was right it is a sin to just say everything and anything you think. Before we speak today, we
should ask ourselves, Are these words good? Are these words going to meet a need? Are these words
edifying? Are these words conduits of Gods grace? If not, we should just keep our mouths shut until
we have something worth saying.

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Gods Will Hath No Why

This movie probably has the best line in cinema history. When asked by the Reverend Mother, what is
the most important lesson you have learned here? Maria answers, To find out what is the will of God
and do it wholeheartedly. That pretty much sums up what life is really about, which means the vast
majority of mankind really never lives.
In her book The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, which was the inspiration for Rogers and
Hammersteins The Sound of Music, Maria von Trapp entitled one of the chapters, Gods Will Hath No
Why. The most important lesson was not to find out the will of God and decide whether it fits into our
plans. Nor to find out the will of God and ask Him why do I have to do this? The most important
lesson is simple: find out the will of God and do it wholeheartedly. Just do it. In her book Maria, she
indicates that there actual conversation included the following:
Reverend Mother (RM): Tell me, Maria, I want to know how much you have learned here.
What is the most important thing in life?
Maria: The most important thing in life is to find out what is the will of God and then to go and
do it.
RM: Even if it is hard?
Maria: Of course, even if it is hard.
RM: There is a certain Baron Georg von Trapp who was here today to see me. His wife died
some years ago and he is now left with his seven motherless children. One child has barely
recovered from a severe attack of scarlet fever and now has a murmur in her heart. Therefore,
the doctors and teachers advised him to take her out of school for one year and have her
tutored at home. It seems to be the will of God that you are the one we can spare and send out
to teach little Maria (i.e., Louisa in the movie).
Maria: Send out send away! Reverend Mother! I want to stay here! I dont want to go away!
RM: Even if it is the will of God? (pp. 54, 55)

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Theres the rub. What if I was given the choice of sight or blindness and somehow I knew for certain
that it was the will of God that I be blind. What would be my choice? I love having sight, but if it was
the will of God, would it not be better to be blind?
Most of our problems can probably be traced to the fact that we know the will of God, but either dont
do it or we do it half-heartedly. Almighty God does not owe us a why; however, when we become
convinced that He is love and He is in total control, we dont need one we can do His will
wholeheartedly.

Closed Doors & Open Windows

After acknowledging the most important lesson that she had learned at the abbey was to find what is
the will of God and do it wholeheartedly, Maria and the Reverend Mother have the following
conversation:
Reverend Mother (RM): Maria, it seems to be God's will that you leave us. There is a family
near Salzburg that needs a governess for seven children.
Maria: Seven children?!
RM: Do you like children?
Maria: Well, yes, but seven!
RM: I will tell Captain von Trapp to expect you tomorrow.
Maria: Captain?
RM: A retired officer of the lmperial Navy, a fine man and a brave one. His wife died several
years ago, and he is alone with the children. I understand he has had a difficult time keeping a
governess there.
Maria: Why difficult, Reverend Mother?
RM: The Lord will show you in His own good time.
As she leaves the abbey, she reminds herself of the words of the Reverend Mother, When the Lord
closes a door, somewhere He opens a window. She had wanted to be a nun, but that was not Gods
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will for her life He closed that door and opened the window to becoming a mother to the seven
children of Georg von Trapp and eventually three additional children that they would have together.
In the Book of Revelation, one of the descriptions of Jesus is the He who opens and no one shuts, and
shuts and no one opens (3:7). I know that I have seen God close doors and open windows. In high
school, my plan was to attend Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), entering the Naval Reserve
Officers Training Corps (NROTC). The only thing that stood in the way of my plans was passing my
navy physical. Out of nowhere, I had high blood pressure the MIT-NROTC door closed. The window
that opened was Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). The most important thing about that opened
window is that it was there in my sophomore year (March 1982) that I was born again that God
Almighty granted me repentance and faith in my Lord and Savior Jesus. BTW, my blood pressure
eventually returned to normal.
After I graduated from RPI, I sent out resumes to over 80 environmental engineering firms. Out of
those 80 resumes, I got only two interviews. Out of those 2 interviews, I got only one job offer from
Wehran Engineering in Middletown, NY. That was back in November 1984. Thirty one years later I am
still with that company (although the name has changed four times). God closed 79 doors and opened 1
window. I had never heard of Middletown before (although I grew up only 1.5 hours away). But it was
there that I met and married Nancy Taylor. If I had walked through the MIT-NROTC door, I would have
still been in the Navy, far from landlocked Middletown, at the time of my wedding. I would never have
met Nancy; I never would have had the privilege of being the father of Leah and Wesley.
Its easy to get discouraged when things dont go our way. But since it is God who is closing doors and
opening windows, we should really be thankful because His way is better than our way. Also since,
no one can open doors that He has shut, we are wasting our times banging against closed doors.
Instead we should look for the window He has opened that no one can shut.

Confidence in Me?

As Maria makes her way from the Nonnberg Abbey to the Villa von Trapp, she sings the song
Confidence in Me. The song begins as follows:
What will this day be like? I wonder.
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What will my future be? I wonder.

It could be so exciting to be out in the world, to be free.
My heart should be wildly rejoicing. Oh, what's the matter with me?
I've always longed for adventure, to do the things I've never dared.
Now here I'm facing adventure, then why am I so scared?
A captain with seven children - what's so fearsome about that?
I must stop these doubts and worries, if I don't l just know I'll turn back.
I must dream of the things I am seeking, I am seeking the courage I lack.
Whats the source of courage? Are we to have confidence in ourselves, as the title of this song
suggests? We read in Psalms and Proverbs:
It is better to trust in Yahweh, than to put your confidence in man. It is better to trust in
Yahweh than to put confidence in princes. (Psalm 118:8, 9)
In the fear of Yahweh there is strong confidence, and His children will have a place of refuge.
(Proverbs 14:26)
The idea behind the Hebrew word translated confidence is holding onto something or someone by
clinging. Our courage to face the future is to be found in clinging to Yahweh, not men (including
ourselves). In the song, Maria does sing, I have confidence in sunshine, I have confidence in rain, I have
confidence that spring will come again. Ultimately these words are confidence in Yahweh who
promised Noah, While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer,
and day and night shall not cease (Genesis 8:22).
I particularly like the words regarding strength in the song that are in the photo. Although they do not
mention God, there truth is found in the Psalms:
Unless Yahweh builds the house, they labor in vain who build it;
Unless Yahweh guards the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.
It is vain for you to rise early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows;
For so He gives His beloved sleep. (127:1, 2)
For I know that Yahweh saves His anointed;
He will answer him from His holy heaven with the saving strength of His right hand.
Some trust in chariots, and some in horses.
But we will remember the name of Yahweh our God. (20:6, 7)
Strength is not found in numbers (chariots) or wealth (horses) strength is found in the sleep that
Yahweh gives to those who rest in Him. Not only are we to find the will of God and do it
wholeheartedly, but we are to do it with the strength God gives. Paul tells the Philippians, God works
in you both to will and do for His good pleasure (2:13). He provides both the willingness and the ability
to do His will. My confidence is in Him, not me.

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Accepting Blame

When Maria meets the Captain von Trapp, he explains the situation that she is walking into. Eleven
women have been in her position over a period of several years. As Gretl is 5 years old, we could
assume 11 governesses in three years - the average governess stay is only 14 weeks. Maria asks the
obvious question, Whats wrong with the children? Like many parents, who think their children are
perfect, the captain replies, Nothing wrong with the children, only the governesses.
This application of blame either on the children or the governesses misses an important person in
the equation the captain himself. The following day the captain goes to Vienna to visit Baroness von
Schraeder. While he is away, the children and Maria have a fun day frolicking in the play clothes she
made out of old drapes. They have the following conversation:
Kurt: I haven't had so much fun since we put glue on Frulein Josephine's toothbrush.
Maria: I can't understand how children as nice as you can play such tricks.
Brigitta: It's easy.
Maria: But why do it?
Liesl: How else can we get Father's attention?
While they should not have been mistreating the governesses, they had been trying to get their fathers
attention a significant part of the problem lay at his feet. When he returns with the Baroness, he and
Maria have a discussion regarding the play clothes she made, in which she brings up the problem:
Captain: Do you mean to tell me that my children have been roaming about Salzburg dressed up
in nothing but some old drapes?
Maria: Mm-hmm, and having a marvelous time
Captain: They have uniforms.
Maria: Strait-jackets, if you'll forgive me. Children can't do all the things they're supposed to if
they have to worry about spoiling their precious clothes.
Captain: They haven't complained yet.
Maria: Well, they wouldn't dare! They love you too much. They fear you too much!
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Captain: I don't wish you to discuss my children in this manner.

Maria: Well, you've got to hear from someone! You're never home long enough to know them.
Captain: I said I don't want to hear anymore from you about my children!
Maria: I know you don't, but you've got to! Now, take Liesl. She's not a child anymore, and
one of these days, you're going to wake up and find that she's a woman. You won't even know
her. And Friedrich, he's a boy, but he wants to be a man and there's no one to show him how.
Captain: Don't you dare tell me about my son.
Maria: Brigitta could tell you about him if you let her get close to you. She notices everything.
And Kurt pretends he's tough not to show how hurt he is when you brush him aside, the way
you do all of them. Louisa I don't even know about yet, but somebody has to find out about her,
and the little ones just want to be loved. Oh, please, Captain, love them! Love them all!
Captain: I don't care to hear anything further from you about my children.
Maria: I am not finished yet, Captain!
Captain: Oh, yes, you are, Captain! [pauses, then corrects himself] Frulein!
The problem was really not the children or the governesses. The problem was that Liesl, Friedrich,
Louisa, Brigitta, Kurt, Marta and Gretl needed a dad, not a naval captain. Since his wife and their mother
had died, he had shut off his love from them, kept his distance. They acted up to get his attention, but it
hadnt worked he just kept trying to find a better governess.
No one likes to be told their faults I know that I dont. However, Maria cared enough about the
children to stand up to Captain von Trapp. But this gets her temporarily fired. However, after he
hears the song she taught them, he says to her, Youre right. I dont know my children. I want you to
stay. I ask you to stay.
In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus had said:
And why do you look at the speck in your brothers eye, but do not consider the plank in your
own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, Let me remove the speck from your eye; and
look, a plank is in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and
then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brothers eye (Matthew 7:2-4).
The captain saw a lot of specks in the eyes of the eleven former governesses. However, if he had not
removed the log from his eyes, Maria likely would have been followed by another long line of ineffective
governesses. He needed to accept the blame for the situation before it got better.

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Receiving from Gods Hand

After Captain von Trapp introduces his children to Maria and she makes clear that she will not be using
or answering to a whistle, she is left to talk with the children alone. They waste no time in trying to get
rid of the twelfth governess giving her advice that they hope will get her fired. They also attempt to
scare her away with a frog placed in her pocket. And, just in case she had not gotten the message that
she was not wanted, they place a pinecone on her chair at the dinner table.
Weve already seen that the reason that they do this is that they want their father back as he has
closed off his heart to them since they remind him of his late wife. But what they dont realize is God is
at work not only to bring their father back, but to give them a mother. In her prayer that night, Maria
asks, Dear Father, now I know why You sent me here. To help these children prepare for a new
mother. And I pray this will become a happy family in Thy sight. Even Maria did not know how God was
going to work she wasnt just there to prepare the children for a new mother, but to be that mother.
Ephesians 1:11 is one of my favorite Scripture passages for Paul describes God as the One Who works
all things according to the counsel of His will. God is not just at work in the big things OR the religious
things, but all things. Job understood this, even after losing everything he had and his health, when he
said to his wife:
Shall we indeed accept good from God, and shall we not accept adversity?" (2:10)
Its not always easy to see what God is doing at the present time things may seem out of control and
He may seem absent and not at work. But Paul tells us He is always at work in all things. Both the good
and adversity that come into our lives both come from His hand. Its when we look back that we can see
the great things He was doing, when it seemed that He wasnt.
It was not a good thing that the von Trapp children lost their mother. It was not a good thing that their
father shut them out. But God was at work. They saw Maria as an intrusion and tried to get rid of her,
but she was the answer to their prayers.
So often we view our adversities as things to get out of, when in fact, adversity is the timely intrusion of
Gods sovereignty God working for our good, to conform us to the image of Jesus (Romans 8:28, 29).
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We need to accept all things that come into our lives whether we view it as good or bad as coming
from the sovereign hand of our Heavenly Father.

Thankful

Yesterday in this Sound of Music devotional series, we thought about the truth that we should receive
all things both good and adversity as coming from the hand of God. But what is our attitude in doing
so? Do we do it begrudgingly, thinking, Oh well, theres nothing I can do about it resigning to ones
fate, an impersonal force?
Maria arrives late for her first dinner at the von Trapp Villa. As soon as she sits down (after removing
the pinecone), the family starts into eating. Maria asks, Havent we forgotten to thank the Lord? They
all stop eating and bow their heads and Maria prays a very insight prayer, for what we receive, may the
Lord make us truly thankful. Since we are to receive all things as coming from the hand of God, we
are to be thankful for all things. Paul writes in 1 Thessalonians 5:
Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in
Christ Jesus for you. (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18)
Gods will an important concept in this movie includes being thankful in everything, even thankful for
everything. In his indictment against mankind, Paul says the following:
For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by
the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse,
because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but
became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. (Romans 1:20, 21)
Unthankfulness is understandable with regards to those who believe in luck or in fate or that they are
the masters of their own destiny. But if we truly believe that God is sovereign and at work in all things,
then we can be thankful for all things, since we receive them from the hand of our loving Heavenly
Father.
If there is something in our lives for which we find it difficult to be thankful, we should pray Marias
prayer, for what I have received, Lord make me truly thankful. Amen.
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Conviction, Then Comfort

After thanking the Lord for the food, Maria thanks the children for the frog that they placed in her
pocket. The word thanks has been placed in quotation marks since she was not really thanking them,
but rather trying to make them face up to their sin. She is obviously successful in drawing out guilt, as
evidenced by the crying of Louisa, Brigitta, Marta and Gretl. They had thought their pranks were funny,
but now they saw the truth.
In the lengthy discussion that Jesus has with the disciples before His arrest, He says quite a bit about the
Holy Spirit. For instance, Jesus says:
I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you always
the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither see Him nor knows Him;
but you know Him, for He dwells in you and will be in you. I will not leave you as orphans; I will
come to you. (John 14:16-18)
The Greek word translated Helper is parakletos and has the idea of someone called to ones side. It
has also been translated as comforter or advocate. In Jesus absence, the Spirit of God was coming
to dwell in them, so that they were not left alone.
With their mother gone and their father keeping his distance, the von Trapp children may very well have
felt like orphans. But if Maria was going to be their comforter, first she had to break down walls the
children had built up to keep her out. She needed to show them that their ways were wrong they
were sinning by the way that they treated governesses.
That same night that Jesus told His disciples about the divine Helper that was coming, He said to them:
I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will
not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come, He will convict
the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: of sin, because they do not believe in
Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; of judgment, because
the ruler of this world is judged. (John 16:6-11)

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Before the Holy Spirit can be our Helper, He must first convict us of our sin and its judgment, as well as,
our need for Gods righteousness. Its only after God breaks down the walls that we have built to keep
Him out, that He can come in and become a part of our life. Conviction, then comfort.

Baby, Its Time to Think

As dinner comes to a close, Captain von Trapp receives a telegram from Baroness Schraeder. When Liesl
discovers that the young man named Rolf delivered telegram, she slips out and goes to meet him near
the gazebo. It is there that they sing together the song I Am Sixteen Going on Seventeen.
Ive entitled this devotional Baby, Its Time to Think after one of Rolfs lines. Unfortunately, Liesl was
not thinking by dating Rolf. Although at the end of his part of the song he declares that he will take care
of her, in the end, Rolf is the one who turns the family into the Nazis. They say love is blind. In Liesls
case, it is also hard of hearing. In their conversation before the song, we hear:
Rolf: I could come here by mistake. With a telegram for Colonel Schneider! He's here from
Berlin staying with [the Gauleiter] No one knows he's here. Don't tell your father.
Liesl: Why not?
Rolf: Your father's so Austrian.
Liesl: We're all Austrian.
Rolf: Some think we ought to be German, and they're very mad at those who don't. They're
getting ready to Let's hope your father doesn't get into trouble.
Liesl: Don't worry. He's a big naval hero. He was even decorated by the emperor.
Rolf seems to have knowledge of the Anschluss, the Nazi takeover of Austria. In the play, Rolf mentions
the Gauleiter, which was the Nazi party leader in the region (probably Herr Zeller). I also find the
words you need someone older and wiser, telling you what to do somewhat ominous. A husband is
called to love his wife, not tell her what to do. But Liesl doesnt pick up on these things because she just
likes being in love. She doesnt think, which is a dangerous thing to do when you are on the brink.

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The Bible really does not talk about casual or recreational dating. With regards to relationships with the
opposite sex, God grants one of two gifts: (1) singleness; or, (2) husband/wife (1 Corinthians 7:1-7). I
think it is important to note that if it is a husband or wife - that this is a gift from God. Solomon writes:
He who finds a wife finds a good thing, and obtains favor from Yahweh. (Proverbs 18:22)
Houses and riches are an inheritance from fathers, but a prudent wife is from Yahweh.
(Proverbs 19:14)
At the beginning of Rolfs song, he indicates that Liesl is waiting on an empty stage for fate to turn the
light on. With that understanding about relationships (fate), it is no wonder young men and women
may worry that they will never meet the Mrs. Right or Mr. Right. If fate isnt turning the light on,
then they need to help things along dating and possibly marrying people that are not Gods best. If
God has not given a person the gift of singleness, then in His time, He will bring that other person into
their lives.
At the end of her part of the song, Liesl tells Rolf that she will depend on him. Not a good idea! Liesl, as
well as every person that has not been given the gift of singleness, needs to depend on Yahweh to turn
the light on and show them the person He has created for them to be one flesh with. Trust in Yahweh
with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He
shall direct your paths (Proverbs 3:5, 6).

God Bless Whats His Name

As Maria prepares for bed her first night at the von Trapp Villa, Frau Schmidt (the housekeeper) brings
her some fabric that the Captain has provided for her to make new dresses. They have the following
conversation:
Maria: Oh, how lovely! These will make the prettiest clothes I've ever had. Do you think he
would get me more material if I asked?
Frau Schmidt (FS): How many dresses do you need?
Maria: Not for me, for the children. I want to make them some play clothes.
FS: The von Trapp children don't play. They march.
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Maria: Surely you don't approve of that.

FS: Ever since the captain lost his poor wife he runs this house as if on one of his ships. Whistles,
orders. No more music, no more laughing. Nothing that reminds him of her. Even the children.
Maria: But that's so wrong.
FS: Oh, well.
Maria: Frau Schmidt, if I asked the captain about the material ?
FS: He's leaving in the morning.
Maria: Of course. How long will he be gone?
FS: It depends. The last time he visited the baroness, he stayed for a month. If you ask me, the
captain's thinking seriously of marrying her before summer's over.
Maria: Wonderful! The children will have a mother again.
FS: Yes. Well, good night.
If you listen to Frau Schmidts words rather than just read them, it is clear that she is not convinced that
Baroness Elsa Schraeder will be the mother the von Trapp children need. She may be a distraction for
Georg, but not a mother for Liesl, Friedrich, Louisa, Kurt, Brigitta, Marta and Gretl. Frau Schmidt does
her job with efficiency, but also with very little affection she may think that the Captain is wrong the
way he is handling his family, but does not seem overly concerned and inclined to do anything about it.
Maria, on the other hand, turns to the only one who can change things God. She doesnt know how
He will do it, but she asks that He might make the von Trapps happy again in His sight. I particularly like
her phrase, God bless whats his name, when she is unable to remember the Captains youngest sons
name (Kurt). I think it brings out a truth from the Sermon on the Mount:
When you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites. For they love to pray standing in the
synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Assuredly, I say to
you, they have their reward. But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have
shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in
secret will reward you openly. And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen
do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore do not be like them.
For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him. (Matthew 6:5-8)
Prayer is not about informing God about situations that He is not aware of. Prayer is not about telling
God how to address problems that He is unable to solve without our advice. God knew Kurts name,
even if Maria could not remember it. God knows everything about every situation on the face of the
earth and knows exactly how to work in each of those situations. He knows what we need before we
ask. So why ask? Prayer is for our sake, not Gods. Paul wrote to the Philippians:
Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your
requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will
guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. (4:6, 7)

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Prayer is the opposite of worry. We are to talk to God about everything, placing all the situations and
people in our lives in His capable hands. Notice Paul does not say that we will have Gods peace because
of the answers that we receive, but simply because weve given everything to Him in prayer.
We dont need to know everything about problems people are going through or have the answers. We
simply need to give them and their problems over to our Heavenly Father and experience the peace that
comes from knowing that He knows everything and He has everything under control.

Quit Ye Like Men

After Maria finishes her prayer, it is not long before her bedroom is filled with seven children who are
frightened by the thunder and lightning storm. The last to enter the room are the boys, Friedrich and
Kurt. They pretend that they are undaunted, not scared of the storm, but simply checking in on Maria to
make sure that she is not frightened. However, when Maria thanks Friedrich for his thoughtfulness, he
quickly denies that it was his idea, but rather his younger brothers. He wanted to make clear that he
was a real man not scared and not sensitive. After all, a real man is hard as nails and tough as steel.
It was probably what they saw in their father and they were mimicking it.
Both boys displayed the desire to put forth an independent front when they were introduced to Maria
Friedrich indicating that he was impossible and Kurt indicating that he was incorrigible.
At the end of his first letter to the church in Corinth, Paul writes:
Watch, stand fast in the faith, be brave, be strong. Let all that you do be done with love. I urge
you, brethren you know the household of Stephanas, that it is the firstfruits of Achaia, and
that they have devoted themselves to the ministry of the saints that you also submit to such,
and to everyone who works and labors with us. I am glad about the coming of Stephanas,
Fortunatus, and Achaicus, for what was lacking on your part they supplied. For they refreshed
my spirit and yours. Therefore acknowledge such men. (16:13-18)
The KJV translates be brave as quit ye like men, the title for this devotional. It is the Greek word
andrizomai. How does Paul describe being a man? Does he speak of tough, rugged individuality?
Hardly! Paul speaks of doing everything with love, devoting oneself to the ministry of others, and
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refreshing the spirit of others. The word translated refreshed is the same used by Jesus in Matthew
11, Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest (vs. 28).
Real men may or may not eat quiche; however, real men will devote themselves to loving, ministering to
and refreshing others. In short, a real man will be like Jesus.

When I Am Afraid

With all seven von Trapp children in her room, Maria sings her song Favorite Things to share with
them how she deals with times when she is afraid. Its a nice song, but I am not sure that thinking
about cream-colored ponies and crisp apple strudels, doorbells and sleigh bells and schnitzel with
noodles is really a good way to deal with fear. To be fair, Maria only mentions feeling sad or bad in
song, but it was fear of thunder and lightning that brought on the song in the first place.
In Psalm 56, David provides the only way to really deal with fear:
Be merciful to me, O God, for man would swallow me up; fighting all day he oppresses me. My
enemies would hound me all day, for there are many who fight against me, O Most High.
Whenever I am afraid, I will trust in You. In God (I will praise His word), in God I have put my
trust; I will not fear. What can flesh do to me? All day they twist my words; all their thoughts
are against me for evil. They gather together, they hide, they mark my steps, When they lie in
wait for my life.
You number my wanderings; put my tears into Your bottle; are they not in Your book? When I
cry out to You, then my enemies will turn back; this I know, because God is for me. In God (I will
praise His word), in Yahweh (I will praise His word), in God I have put my trust; I will not be
afraid. What can man do to me? Vows made to You are binding upon me, O God; I will render
praises to You, for You have delivered my soul from death. Have You not kept my feet from
falling, that I may walk before God In the light of the living? (1-13)
When speaking of being afraid, David wasnt talking about thunder and lightning, which rarely hurt
anybody - he was talking about people that wanted to kill him. David did not think about his favorite
things, rather he trusted (clung to) Yahweh. As a result of that clinging, David was not afraid of the
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many people who were against him because he was fully convinced that God was for him. In Psalm
27, David wrote, I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of Yahweh
in the land of the living (vs. 13). How do we gain that type of confidence? Maybe the answer is Pauls
version of Favorite Things:
Whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things
are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue
and if there is anything praiseworthy meditate on these things. The things which you learned
and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.
(Philippians 4:8, 9)
Is it not God who is most true, most noble, most just, most pure, most lovely, and most praiseworthy?
Should not He be the focus of our mediation? Instead of thinking about things like girls in white
dresses with blue satin sashes, snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes, we should meditate on
God and we will know His peace in the midst of times that would otherwise cause us to fear. Are we
convinced God is for us? If not, maybe we havent meditated on Him enough.

Weightier Matters

As Maria and the von Trapp children come to the end of Favorite Things, Captain von Trapp enters the
room. The children quickly line up in military fashion. Their captain, I mean father, is not happy at all.
He questions whether the new governess remembers that the children have a strict bedtime. It was
such a simple instruction so why were the children wide awake, singing and dancing in her room? I
love Marias answer she only had difficulty remembering that simple instruction during a
thunderstorm. Her main point the childrens fear was more important than their bedtime. He would
go on to say to her:
Frulein, you have managed to remember I'm leaving in the morning? Is it also possible you
remember the first rule in this house is discipline? Then I trust that before I return, you'll have
acquired some?
Very telling, first rule in the house is discipline. It would seem that the first rule should be love, not
discipline. In Matthew 23 and Luke 11, Jesus has His famous woe discourse in which He says:
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Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and
cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith.
These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. (Matthew 23:23)
But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and all manner of herbs, and pass by
justice and the love of God. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone.
(Luke 11:42)
Just like a set bedtime has somewhat important, so is tithing even if you want to take it to the point of
herbs. But the scribes and Pharisees left undone much more important matters justice, mercy, faith
and love. In Micah 6:8, the prophet also summarizes the weightier matters:
He has shown you, O man, what is good; and what Yahweh requires of you but to do justly, to
love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.
Justice, love, mercy and walking humbly with God (which is done by faith) the very same weightier
matters that Jesus mentions. Maria understood this she loved the children, even if it meant setting
aside their strict bedtime once in awhile. Love is a weightier matter than discipline (as important as it
may be).

Whatever Your Hand Finds

Maria is intent on making play clothes for the children. When the captain turns down her request for
fabric, she remembers that Frau Schmidt mentioned that her room is to receive new drapes. And so
from the old drapes, she sews seven play outfits one each for Liesl, Friedrich, Louisa, Kurt, Brigitta,
Marta and Gretl. Talk about making do with what is available. Even if I had a sewing machine, I would
not be able to do what Maria did. If I were their governess, they would have been stuck marching
around the grounds breathing deeply in their uniforms, rather than enjoying outings in Salzburg, on the
mountains, in the trees and on the river in their old drape play clothes.
King Solomon wrote:
Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work or device or
knowledge or wisdom in the grave where you are going. (Ecclesiastes 9:10)
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Another way of saying whatever your hand finds to do is whatever God has brought into your life.
Every opportunity that comes into our lives comes from the hand of God. Robert Boyd Munger wrote a
booklet entitled, My Heart Christs Home. One chapter is entitled The Workroom in which he wrote:
Before long, He (Jesus) asked, Do you have a workroom in your home? Down in the basement
of the home of my heart I had a workbench and some equipment, but I was not doing much
with it. Once in a while I would play around with a few little gadgets, but I wasn't producing
anything substantial or worthwhile. I led Him down there.
He looked over the workbench and what little talents and skills I had. He said, This is quite well
furnished. What are you producing with your life for the Kingdom of God? He looked at one or
two little toys that I had thrown together on the bench and held one up to me. Are these little
toys all that you are doing for others in your Christian life?
Well, I said, Lord, that is the best I can do. I know it isn't much, and I really want to do more,
but after all, I have no skill or strength to do more.
Would you like to do better? He asked.
Certainly, I replied.
All right, let me have your hands. Now relax in me and let my Spirit work through you. I know
that you are unskilled, clumsy and awkward, but the Holy Spirit is the Master-Worker, and if He
controls your hands and your heart, He will work through you. And so, stepping around behind
me and putting His great, strong hands over mine, controlling the tools with His skilled fingers
He began to work through me.
I hated 7th grade woodshop. When it comes to using my hands to build things, I am unskilled, clumsy
and awkward. Nothing that I made in that class lasted very long it all ended up on the scrap heap. But
how about my so-called work for God? I found Mungers account of this room to be very convicting. I
can easily see Jesus looking at my life and viewing what I have produced as little toys, not much that
really helps other people or is of lasting value. It is not supposed to be that way. We read in Scripture:
I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit, for
without Me you can do nothing. By this is My Father glorified, that you bear much fruit (John
15:5, 8)
If we are abiding in Jesus, He will be giving us the desire and ability to do what pleases the Father to
live out Ecclesiastes 9:10 while we have breath. As we bear much fruit, the Father will be exalted in our
world. What are we doing with the time, talents, gifts, money and opportunities that God has given us?
Are we playing around with a few little gadgets that are of little value to anybody OR are we walking in
the good works God has prepared for us, allowing Him to produce through us something that both
changes lives and brings Him glory?

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Think Soberly

With their old drape play clothes on, Maria and the von Trapp children take an outing into Salzburg and
its environs. While at an open fruit and vegetable market, Maria picks up four tomatoes and indicates
that she is going to juggle them. As she thinks about how to do it, she realizes that she doesnt know
how, so she puts down two tomatoes. She is very good at lot of things (i.e., at one point in jealousy,
Baroness Schraeder will say to her, My dear, is there anything you can't do?), but when it comes to
tomato juggling, she can only handle two and thats all she attempts. In fact, juggling requires that more
objects be used than hands. You can juggle two tomatoes if you are using only one hand; however,
Maria is using two hands she isnt really juggling.
In Romans 12, Paul writes:
For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself
more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a
measure of faith. For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have
the same function, so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one
another. Having then gifts differing according to the grace that is given to us, let us use them: if
prophecy, let us prophesy in proportion to our faith; or ministry, let us use it in our ministering;
he who teaches, in teaching; he who exhorts, in exhortation; he who gives, with liberality; he
who leads, with diligence; he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness. (vv. 3-8)
It is true that Paul wrote to the Philippians, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me
(4:11). However, notice Paul did not just say, I can do all things. We can only do those things that God
has called and strengthened us to do. In Romans passage, the apostle makes clear that God has given
each of us a measure of faith, which he goes on to describe as spiritual gifts (e.g., prophecy, ministry,
teaching, exhorting, giving, leading, showing mercy). In the previous lesson (Whatever Your Hand Finds
to Do), I shared that when it comes to using my hands to build things, I am unskilled, clumsy and
awkward. I am the Anti-Bezalel and the Anti-Aholiab. God has not gifted me in that area. If our church
was having a VBS that required extensive sets to be built, it would be foolish for me to take on the task,
thinking to myself I can do all things through Christ, because He has not strengthened me in that area.
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Paul says that we need to think soberly. The Greek word literally means a saved mind. Such a mind
keeps us from two extremes:
1. Thinking too highly of ourselves forgetting we can only do what we can do because God
empowered us; or,
2. Thinking too lowly of ourselves forgetting that God has indeed empowered us for His service.
If Maria had proceeded to attempt juggling four tomatoes, likely at least two of them would have ended
up smashed on the ground. However, she realized that she didnt have that gift, so she did what she
could do. We need to determine what gifts God has truly given us and then humbly use them for His
glory.

Crying Over Spilt Milk

After successfully not-juggling two tomatoes Maria throws one each to the two younger girls
Marta and Gretl. Marta catches the tomato thrown to her, but Gretl drops hers. Tears begin to well up
as she looks down at the smashed tomato. However, Maria holds up her finger and looks at Gretl
directly in the eyes as if to say, Dont cry over the dropped tomato and within a few seconds Gretls
tears turn to a smile.
We have a proverb, no use crying over spilt milk. Three and a half centuries ago, Andrew Yarranton
put it this way in his Englands Improvement by Sea and Land:
Sir, there is no crying for shed milk, that which is past cannot be recalled.
Thats the point of our proverb once something has become part of the past, there is no undoing it.
Thankfully, there are no time machines. Some people spend their entire lives asking the question,
why? As we saw in an earlier lesson (Gods Will Hath No Why), we just find out what it is and do it.
God does not owe us an explanation for what He is doing. Other people waste their lives reliving the
past and asking a different question, what if? They think of how things might have turned out if only
they had done this or not done that. The problem is its part of the past they didnt do this and they
did do that and it cannot be undone. And so they waste today, crying over yesterday.

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The Apostle Paul wrote in his letter to the Philippians:

Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those
things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward
the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Messiah Jesus. (3:13, 14)
Pauls answer to those who spend their lives living in the shame of past defeats is to forget them. BTW I think it would also be his answer to those who live in the glory of past victories. The past is not
supposed to pull us down; the high calling of God is to pull us up. Yes, there may be things we need to
learn from past defeats. There may be sin that we need to repent of. But having been taught our
lessons by God and having our pathways brought back in line with His will, we need to leave the past in
the past. You cant stretch forward when you reaching backward.
Whether Gretl cried or not OR she thought to herself if only had had concentrated better, the
smashed tomato was still going to be a smashed tomato she couldnt undo it. Her governess finger
said to her, Gretl, there is no crying for shed tomatoes, that which is past cannot be recalled. If we are
prone to reliving the past, God is saying the very same thing to us.

The Very, Very Beginning The Very Best Place to Start

As one of her gifts is singing, Maria decides to teach the von Trapp children a song to sing for Baroness
Schraeder. When they reveal that they dont know how to sing, she comes up with the well-known song
Do-Re-Mi to teach them the fundamentals of singing, which opens with, Lets start at the very
beginning, a very good place to start.
Jesus once said nearly the same thing, except He went back to the very, very beginning. In Matthew 19,
the following conversation develops between a Pharisee and Jesus:
Pharisee: Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for just any reason?
Jesus: Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning made them male and
female, and said, For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his
wife, and the two shall become one flesh? (Genesis 2:24) So then, they are no longer two but
one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.
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Pharisee: Why then did Moses command to give a certificate of divorce, and to put her away?
Jesus: Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, permitted you to divorce your wives, but
from the beginning it was not so. (vv. 3-8)
The Pharisees question may reflect the opinion of the very popular rabbi who was alive when Jesus was
a young boy, Hillel. In the Talmud (a collection of rabbinical writings), we read:
Shammai says, A man should not divorce his wife unless he has found her guilty of some
unseemly conduct, as it says, because he hath found some unseemly thing. Hillel, however
says, that he may divorce her even if she merely spoilt his food, since it says, because he hath
found some unseemly thing in her. Akiba says, he may divorce her even if he finds another
woman more beautiful than she is, as it says, it cometh to pass, if she find no favor in his eyes.
(Tractate Gittin, 90a)
Three rabbis with very different views on divorce (one [Shammai] was generally against it and two
[Hillel, Akiba] wanted to make it as easy as possible) based on Deuteronomy 24:
When a man takes a wife and marries her, and it happens that she finds no favor in his eyes
because he has found some uncleanness in her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, puts it
in her hand. (vs. 1)
Jesus did not waste time discussing what rabbis thought, but what Yahweh said at the very, very
beginning the very best place to start. Two things are clear regarding Gods view of marriage:
1. A man and a woman are joined together by God to become one flesh.
2. No man is to separate what God has joined together.
However, between Genesis 2 (when God created marriage) and Matthew 19 (when Jesus was discussing
divorce with the Pharisee), sin entered the world and God made the provisions in Deuteronomy 24. The
uncleanness cannot be referring to adultery, because this was punishable by death (e.g., Leviticus
20:10). I like what 18th century commentator John Gill writes regarding the phrase because he hath
found some uncleanness in her:
Something that he disliked, and was disagreeable to him, and which made their continuance
together in the marriage state very uncomfortable; which led him on to be very ill-natured,
severe, and cruel to her; so that her life was exposed to danger, or at least become very uneasy;
in which case a divorce was permitted, both for the badness of the man's heart, and in favor of
the woman, that she might be freed from such rigorous usage.
As Jesus said, Yahweh made provisions (in no way commanding) for divorce because of the hardness of
mens hearts. With men like Hillel wanting divorce because his wife spoiled his food and Akiba wanting
a divorce because he found a younger woman more beautiful than his wife, its no wonder God made
these provisions, as John Gill hints at, for the protection of wives being misused by their unhappy
husbands.
Jesus shows us that when we want answers we need to find out what God says, not men. Go to the One
Who was there before the very, very beginning.
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Meaning from the Meaningless

After teaching the von Trapp children the eight notes in the major scale (C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C or Do-Re-MeFa-So-La-Ti-Do), Maria teaches them to put them together into a tune. However, after they sing the
tune, Brigitta points out that So-do-la-fa-mi-do-re, So-do-la-ti-do-re-do does not mean anything.
Maria replies:
So we put in words, one word for every note, like this: When you know the notes to sing. You
can sing most anything.
Maria, in a sense, brought meaning out of the meaningless. When I googled finding meaning in a
meaningless world, the Wikipedia article on Absurdism came up, which is defined as:
A philosophical school of thought stating that the efforts of humanity to find inherent meaning
will ultimately fail and hence are absurd.
In the article, the following is stated:
As beings looking for meaning in a meaningless world, humans have three ways of resolving the
dilemma: (1) suicide; (2) religious, spiritual, or abstract belief in a transcendent realm, being, or
idea; and, (3) acceptance of the Absurd.
Thankfully most people do not choose Door #1. I would guess that most by default choose Door #3
not believing in a sovereign God or at least seeing no need for Him in their lives, they are content to
enjoy life as much as possible without the need to find ultimate meaning. However, I am a firm
believer in Door #2 I believe all the notes in my live, all the notes in the lives of my family and friends,
in fact, all the notes of human history have meaning and are under the direction of a Master Conductor
and His name is Yahweh.
When Joseph was 17 years old (Genesis 37:2), his brothers wanted to murder him because of their
fathers favoritism toward him and his pride in his dreams given to him by Yahweh. In the end, they
decided to sell him to company of Ishmaelites heading toward Egypt and to tell Jacob that his son had
been torn to pieces by a wild beast. Joseph would not see his family again until he was 39 years old. At
that time, he said to his brothers:
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But now, do not therefore be grieved or angry with yourselves because you sold me here; for
God sent me before you to preserve life. For these two years the famine has been in the land,
and there are still five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvesting. And God sent
me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth, and to save your lives by a great
deliverance. So now it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father
to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt. (44:5-8)
The brothers did the selling, but Yahweh did the sending - He was at work, even through their sin.
Seventeen years later when Jacob died, seeing that their brother was most definitely in a position to
exact revenge upon them and obviously not convinced by his words above, they sent him the following
message:
Before your father died he commanded, saying, Thus you shall say to Joseph: I beg you,
please forgive the trespass of your brothers and their sin; for they did evil to you. Now, please,
forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of your father. (50:16, 17)
Joseph meant what he had said in Genesis 44 and reiterates it in response to their message:
Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God? But as for you, you meant evil against me; but
God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive.
Now therefore, do not be afraid; I will provide for you and your little ones. (vv. 19-21)
What they meant for evil, God meant for good. Yahweh is the Great Alchemist doing something much
greater than turning base metals into silver and gold, rather He converts evil and meaningless things
into good and meaningful things. I dont believe this is an isolated case I believe that God is working
all things according to the counsel of His will. In fact, He brought the greatest good out of the greatest
evil (Acts 3:22-24; 4:27, 28).
If the notes of your life are not making sense, dont look behind Doors #1 or #3 for answers. True
meaning is only found behind Door #2 a relationship with the living God. Meaning comes not from
understanding everything that is happening, but knowing that He is at work in everything that is
happening.

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Rising to the Occasion

With his trip to Vienna complete, the Captain returns to Salzburg along with Baroness Schraeder and
their mutual friend, Herr Detweiler (whom the von Trapp children affectionately call Uncle Max).
After the Baroness admires the mountains, the Captain states that he put them up just for her. Max
then jokes, even if its to a height of 10,000 feet, Georg always believes in rising to the occasion.
Even though the phrase rising to the occasion is used only in passing and in a joking manner, Id like to
use it for this devotional. It is a phrase that means, to be able to do what is needed to done in an
unexpected difficulty, possibly to perform better than usual under such circumstances. In other
words, a persons ability emerges to meet the need of the occasion.
I thought about Esther, a young Jewish woman who was married to the Persian king Darius Hystaspes.
Her uncle Mordecai had advised her originally to hide her heritage from the king. The kings viceroy was
named Haman, of whom we read:
And all the kings servants who were within the kings gate bowed and paid homage to Haman,
for so the king had commanded concerning him. But Mordecai would not bow or pay homage.
When Haman saw that Mordecai did not bow or pay him homage, Haman was filled with
wrath. But he disdained to lay hands on Mordecai alone Haman sought to destroy all the
Jews who were throughout the whole kingdom of Ahasuerus the people of Mordecai. (3:2-6)
In his anger over Mordecais lack of homage, Haman convinced the king that the Jews represented a
threat and paid him ten thousand talents of silver* - $10 billion for the privilege of eliminating the Jews.
Mordecai asked Esther to plead for the life of her people. She replied to Mordecai:
All the kings servants and the people of the kings provinces know that any man or woman
who goes into the inner court to the king, who has not been called, he has but one law: put all
to death, except the one to whom the king holds out the golden scepter, that he may live. Yet I
myself have not been called to go in to the king these thirty days." (4:11)
Esther indicates that if she goes into see the king without being called, even though she was his queen,
she will die. In reply, Mordecai said to his niece:
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Do not think in your heart that you will escape in the kings palace any more than all the other
Jews. For if you remain completely silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the
Jews from another place, but you and your fathers house will perish. Yet who knows whether
you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this? (4:13, 14)
Although God is not mentioned in this book, the clear indication of Mordecai is that Yahweh put her in
this position for this very reason. She could sit back, hoping she would be safe as queen. Or she could
place her life on the line as Gods agent to save all Jews. In the face of death, Esther rose to the
occasion and Hamans plot was thwarted.
In the background of The Sound of Music story is what Gretl refers to as the flag with the black
spider the Nazis. I am three quarters German twelve of my sixteen great, great, grandparents were
born in Germany. The last of my direct relatives to come to America was my Nana (my fathers mother),
Margaret Peper Busch, who arrived at Ellis Island on May 17, 1923 ten years before Hitler became
chancellor. But her parents (Johann & Anna Peper, my great grandparents) and one of her sisters lived
in Germany through Hitlers reign and her brother was in the army, dying on the march to Moscow.
It has been stated that the road to Auschwitz was built by hate, but paved by indifference. In other
words, the vast majority of Germans were completely indifferent to what was happening to the Jews. I
dont know if my relatives did anything to stand against Hitlers Final Solution to the Jewish Question.
My great-grandfather and great-grandmother died in 1952 and 1947, respectively, so I never could have
spoken with them. I was only 13 years old when my Nana died and I was not thinking about such things
at that time to talk to her about it. However, a more important question is, would Donald Busch have
taken a stand? I wish I could say that I would, but I have serious doubts. Faced with possibility of death
or concentration camp, I can easily see myself remaining silent. Hitlers threat was very similar to that of
Hamans the extermination of the Jews. God could have used someone else, but He had raised Esther
for the purpose and she arose to the occasion.
When we are faced with difficult situations (i.e., God-designed situations), will we rise to the occasion or
will God need to use someone else? May it not be said of us, if you faint in the day of adversity, your
strength is small (Proverbs 24:10).
*According to Exodus 30:11-16, every male over the age of 20 years old was to give a half shekel of silver as part of
the census. According to Exodus 38, the census revealed that there were 603,550 men, which resulted in 100
talents and 1,775 shekels of silver. The 3,550 men each giving 1/2-shekel resulted in the 1,775 shekels. The
remainder 600,000 men each giving 1/2-shekel resulting in 1,000 talents shows us that a talent was worth 3,000
shekels (i.e., [600,000 men]*[0.5 shekels/man]/[100 talents]). A shekel was four days wages. Lets assume that
you get paid $10 per hour and work 8 hours per day. This would mean that the talent would be worth nearly $1
million (i.e., [3,000 shekels/talent]*[4 days/shekel]*[8 hrs/day]*[$10/hr]). Therefore, 10,000 talents would be
approximately $10 billion.

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Rich & Famous

After his joke about Georg rising to the occasion, the Captain indicates that he will take back his
invitation if the jokes do not improve. Max replies:
You didn't invite me. I invited myself. You needed a chaperone and I needed a place where the
cuisine is superb, the wine cellar unexcelled, and the price perfect.
When the baroness remarks that he is outrageous, Max retorts, Not at all. I'm a very charming
sponge. Later on at the von Trapp Villa, he will say, I like rich people, the way they live and how I live
when I'm with them. When the von Trapps are about to escape Austria, he says to Georg, I shall miss
all of you. I shall miss the money I could have made with you.
As the trio (Captain, Baroness and Max) continue the drive from Vienna to Salzburg, they hear the
Klopmann Monastery choir singing in the distance and Max expresses his hope of finding a singing group
that he can make famous at the Salzburg Folk Festival. While presently he will settle with becoming rich
by making others famous, he hopes someday also get the fame. The charming sponge wants to be
rich and famous.
Many people have the very same goal as SpongeMax SelfPromoter (my poor attempt at a SpongeBob
SquarePants analog) to become rich and famous. When Yahweh asked Solomon what he wanted, the
young son of David said:
Give me wisdom and knowledge, that I may go out and come in before this people, for who can
judge this great people of Yours? (2 Chronicles 1:10)
In reply to his request, God said to Solomon:
Because this was in your heart, and you have not asked riches or wealth or honor or the life of
your enemies, nor have you asked for long life but have asked wisdom and knowledge for
yourself, that you may judge My people over whom I have made you king wisdom and
knowledge are granted to you; and I will give you riches and wealth and honor, such as none of
the kings have had who were before you, nor shall any after you have the like. (vv. 11, 12)

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Riches and honor (fame) are not to be sought. God may grant them (1 Chronicles 29:12 both riches and
honor come from You), but they are not to be the goal of our lives. Maria von Trapp wrote the
following dedication to her book Maria:
I dedicate this book to the One who made the name Maria famous for all-time.
She recognized that she was famous only because God (not Rodgers & Hammerstein) made her famous.
For His purposes, as in the case of Maria Augusta von Trapp, God may grant a person fame and/or
fortune. However, whether His will for us includes fame and fortune OR obscurity and privation, our
aim should be to be well pleasing to Him (2 Corinthians 5:9).

Local Urchin

After discussing Herr Detweilers desire to become rich and famous, our traveling trio passes a group of
children playing in the trees. Since he has never seen his childrens old drape play clothes or them
hanging out of trees, the captain refers to the unknown children as some local urchins. The word
urchin comes from a word meaning hedgehog. It came to be used to describe a child, dressed in
dirty hand-me-downs, running rampant through city streets, having a reputation for getting into trouble,
and lacking parental support.
Based simply on their appearance and what they are doing, the captain dismisses these children with a
derogatory just some local urchins, as proper children would be wearing uniforms and breathing
deeply as they march around. Ironically, these hedgehogs are his children. Maybe the von Trapp
children would not fit the normal mold for urchin or street rats, but consider this. While they had
not been wearing rags or running rampant in Salzburg streets since their mother died, the von Trapp
children were developing a reputation for trouble as they calculated ways to get rid of governesses and
they were lacking parental support not financial, but emotional. In a sense, they were urchin, but it
had nothing to do with the old drape clothes they were wearing or the trees they were climbing.
The captains judgmental words just some local urchins were, whether he realized it or not, really a
judgment concerning his effectiveness as a father. We are often most critical and judgmental about
things that we ourselves are guilty of. The Apostle Paul writes:

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Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge
another you condemn yourself, for you who judge practice the very same things. And do you
think this, O man, you who judge those practicing such things, and doing the same that you will
escape the judgment of God? You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself?
You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? You who say, Do not commit
adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who make
your boast in the law, do you dishonor God through breaking the law? (Romans 2:1, 3, 21-23)
Black pots have a tendency to call black kettles black, without any thought that they themselves are also
black. Before we open our mouths in criticism with our finger pointed at neighbors, pastors, politicians,
teachers, co-workers, parents, children or others, we should consider what God may be saying through
those three fingers pointing back at us. The person that I should be most critical of is the person in the
mirror.

Self Deprecation

Having arrived in Salzburg, the Captain shows the Baroness around the grounds of his villa. She
indicates that it is exciting seeing him in his natural habitat. When he shrugs off the idea that he is
exciting as highly improbable, the Baroness replies, There you go, running yourself down again. I
suppose the Captain had a tendency to belittle himself (self-deprecation). I have spent a significant
portion of my life running myself down. But its not a God-honoring thing to do.
In 1942, C.S. Lewis published his Screwtape Letters a collection of letters from a higher ranking demon
named Screwtape to his lower ranking demon nephew named Wormwood. Under his uncles
mentorship, Wormwood is to work for the destruction of a person referred to as the patient. In the
14th letter, Uncle Screwtape discusses humility and pride. Its important to realize that the Enemy is
God. He writes:
By this virtue (humility), as by all the others, our Enemy wants to turn the man's attention
away from self to Him, and to the man's neighbors. All the abjection and self-hatred are
designed, in the long run, solely for this end.

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You must therefore conceal from the patient the true end of Humility. Let him think of it not as
self-forgetfulness but as a certain kind of opinion (namely, a low opinion) of his own talents and
character. Some talents, I gather, he really has. Fix in his mind the idea that humility consists in
trying to believe those talents to be less valuable than he believes them to be. By this method
thousands of humans have been brought to think that humility means pretty women trying to
believe they are ugly and clever men trying to believe they are fools. And since what they are
trying to believe may, in some cases, be manifest nonsense, they cannot succeed in believing it
and we have the chance of keeping their minds endlessly revolving on themselves in an effort to
achieve the impossible. To anticipate the Enemy's strategy, we must consider His aims. The
Enemy wants to bring the man to a state of mind in which he could design the best cathedral in
the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the, fact, without being any more (or less)
or otherwise glad at having done it than he would be if it had been done by another.
His whole effort, therefore, will be to get the man's mind off the subject of his own value
altogether. He would rather the man thought himself a great architect or a great poet and then
forgot about it, than that he should spend much time and pains trying to think himself a bad
one. Your efforts to instill either vainglory or false modesty into the patient will therefore be
met from the Enemy's side with the obvious reminder that a man is not usually called upon to
have an opinion of his own talents at all, since he can very well go on improving them to the
best of his ability without deciding on his own precise niche in the temple of Fame. You must try
to exclude this reminder from the patient's consciousness at all costs. The Enemy will also try to
render real in the patient's mind a doctrine which they all profess but find it difficult to bring
home to their feelingsthe doctrine that they did not create themselves, that their talents were
given them, and that they might as well be proud of the color of their hair. But always and by all
methods the Enemy's aim will be to get the patient's mind off such questions, and yours will be
to fix it on them.
What is said in this letter is probably the source for a quote wrongly attributed to Lewis, namely, True
humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less. True humility is not selfdeprecation, but self-forgetfulness. Its thinking about God and others and not ourselves. I like the
reference to deciding his own precise niche in the temple of Fame. A couple of lessons ago we talked
about fame and fortune. I suppose that believers whom God has granted fame (e.g., whatever they post
on Facebook is liked by ten thousand people) need to constantly remind themselves that their abilities
and wide influence are from God and not themselves and fight a constant battle with vainglory. On the
other hand, as one granted obscurity (e.g., if five people read my posts, its a lot), I am prone selfdeprecation, constantly needing to remind myself to simply be faithful in my narrow influence and not
concern myself with how many likes I get. I think of these words in a Big Daddy Weave song:
It's not about me, it's all about You
It's not about my pride, it's all about Your truth
And so right here from the start, I open up my heart
And say Lord here's every part, cause it's all about You.

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As long as I think its about me in the slightest, I am going to have this battle with pride and false
humility. It sure would be nice if I could undergo an ego-ectomy and be done with selfish Donald Busch.

Oblivious

The Captain begins to wonder where his children are, expecting that they would be there to greet the
Baroness. He leaves Elsa and Max and goes to the other side of the house, where he finds Rolf throwing
pebbles at a window (presumably Liesls). He asks a very telling question of the young man, Who are
you? Why do I find this interesting? This is the young man that his daughter is in love with and he
doesnt even know who he is. He is oblivious to what is going on in the lives of his children.
Isaac and Rebekah had twin sons Esau and Jacob. While Rebekah was pregnant, they were told very
clearly by Yahweh:
Two nations are in your womb, two peoples shall be separated from your body; one people
shall be stronger than the other, and the older shall serve the younger." (Genesis 25:23)
When the twins were born, they learned that the older was Esau and the younger was Jacob; therefore,
regardless of anything the parents did, the descendents of Esau (Edom) were going to serve the
descendents of Jacob (Israel). Just as He had sovereignly chosen Abram out of all mankind and Isaac
over Ishmael, Yahweh had sovereignly chosen Jacob over Esau. In vs. 33, Esau sells his birthright to
Jacob for a single meal - some bread and stew. In Genesis 26:34, he marries two Hittite women, who
make Rebekahs life miserable (27:46). The Hittites were among the abominable people groups that
Yahweh would one day call the Israelites to destroy (Deuteronomy 20:17).
Despite Gods sovereign choice of Jacob and Esaus character flaws, Isaac was intent on passing his
patriarchal blessing onto his older son, as Isaac loved Esau because he ate of his game (25:28). Isaac
was oblivious to what was going on in his own home. All he seemed to care about was the venison Esau
could provide him with. As a young man the age of Jesus at His crucifixion, Isaac had allowed himself to
be put on an altar by his elderly father, Abraham a true act of worship. During the intervening
century, he had fallen spiritually. It may not simply be his physical status that is being described at the
beginning of Genesis 27, His eyes were so dim that he could not see.
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After Maria and the children come out of the pond (Leopoldskroner Weiher) following their rowboat
capsizing and the children go into the house to put on dry clothes, the Captain has a discussion with
Maria (see Accepting Blame). You will remember that she says, You're never home long enough to
know them. He was oblivious since he was not handling his wifes death well.
Both Isaac and Captain von Trapp were self-absorbed (either with their appetite or grief) and unable to
see what was going on in their childrens lives. I am not writing this to judge them. I know that I can be
oblivious to the needs of my wife, my children, my mom and my friends. It is very easy to become selfabsorbed. It is why Paul needs to remind us:
Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. Let
this mind be in you which was also in Messiah Jesus. (Philippians 2:4, 5)
Regarding this passage, John Piper writes:
The word interests is a filler. In the original, its open-ended. All that is specified is your own
(something) or the others (something). So it could be, Let each of you look not only to your
own financial affairs, or your own property, or your own family, or your own health, or your own
reputation, or your own education, or your own success, or your own happinessdont just
think about that, dont just have desires about that, dont just strategize about that, dont just
work toward that; but look to the financial affairs and property and family and health, and
reputation, and education, and success, and happiness of others.
In other words, verse 4 is a way of saying the words of Jesus, Love your neighbor as you love
yourself (Matthew 22:39). That is, make the good of others the focus of your interest and
strategy and work. Find your joy in making others joyful. If you are watching television and your
child says, Would you play with me? Dont just think about how tired you are. By an act of
gospel-fashioned, Christ-exalting will, put the childs interests before the pleasures of your
relaxation.
Only God knows how many times I didnt take the time to put Leah and Wesleys interests before my
own. Theres two ways to live life: not like Jesus (oblivious to the needs of others and caught up in
ourselves) or like Jesus (focused on the needs of others). Unfortunately, all too often I have chosen the
not like Jesus path.

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Bringing Out the Best in Others

After Maria points out that the Captain is oblivious to what is going on in his childrens lives, she is
fired told to pack up her things and return to the abbey immediately. All of a sudden he hears music
coming from the house. When Maria informs him that the music is his children singing a song she
taught them to sing for the Baroness (i.e., The Sound of Music), he forgets about their argument and
hurries into the house. As he listens to his children, it is though his hardened heart melts. When Maria
had first come to the von Trapp villa and was waiting for Franz (the butler) to get the Captain, she had
opened a closed door to the ballroom and pretended to dance. When the Captain came on the scene,
he reprimanded her saying, In future, remember certain rooms in this house are not to be disturbed.
Now, his childrens singing seemed to open a door that was closed in his heart and he sings along with
them. He then hugs and laughs with them, maybe in a way they had not done in years. This was the
result of Marias work with the children while he was in Vienna.
Standing off in the shadows, Maria then prompts Gretl to give a small bouquet of Edelweiss to the
Baroness. She says to the Captain, You never told me how enchanting your children are. The eleven
previous governesses before Maria probably would not have used the word enchanting to describe
the von Trapp children. All of a sudden the Captain realizes that he just fired the one who brought
music and laughter back into his household; he admits that he behaved badly and asks her to stay
indicating she had no idea how much help she had already been.
Maria had a gift for bringing out the best in others not everybody (e.g., Sister Berthe), but most. I
think of these words of the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews:
And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the
assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so
much the more as you see the Day approaching. (10:24, 25)
The Greek word translated stir up is paroxusmos and it denotes stimulation. Now as we will see,
this can be a negative stimulation, but not here in Hebrews 10:24. Love can grow cold - it is for this
reason that we are to stir it up that love in one another that it may remain hot. This word in used two
times in the Septuagint (LXX [Deut. 29:28; Jer. 32:37]). In both instances, it is used to translate the
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Hebrew qetseph, which can mean splinter. In a sense, we are to become splinters to each other,
irritants that push one another onto greater levels of love and good works. Often you will hear people
say that they got nothing out of a Sunday morning service. This passage reminds us that when we
assemble, we are not there to get something, but rather we should be observing one another and
allowing God to use us to incite one another to growth.
Paroxusmos is used only one other time in the New Testament. Luke uses it when he writes:
Then after some days Paul said to Barnabas, Let us now go back and visit our brethren in every
city where we have preached the word of the Lord, and see how they are doing. Now Barnabas
was determined to take with them John called Mark. But Paul insisted that they should not take
with them the one who had departed from them in Pamphylia, and had not gone with them to
the work. Then the contention became so sharp (paroxusmos) that they parted from one
another. And so Barnabas took Mark and sailed to Cyprus; but Paul chose Silas and departed,
being commended by the brethren to the grace of God. And he went through Syria and Cilicia,
strengthening the churches. (Acts 15:36-41)
This is one of the saddest passages in the Book of Acts. Gods sovereign will obviously included Silas
becoming part of Pauls ministry, but also Mark being used in the future by both Peter (1 Peter 5:13)
and, even, Paul (2 Timothy 4:11). In other words, both men were right Paul was right that Mark was
not ready and Barnabas was right that God was not done with Mark. Unfortunately, they did not part
on good terms and there is no clear mention in the NT that they ever reconciled.
We are all splinters the question is whether are going to be used to bring out the best in others or
bring out the worst.

Two Become One

With Marias help, the von Trapp children put on a marionette show for their father, the Baroness and
Uncle Max called The Lonely Goatherd. A goatherd is to goats what a shepherd is to sheep. He
yodels as he watches over his goats. His loud and clear voice is heard by: (1) folks in a town that is quite
remote; (2) a prince on a bridge of a castle moat; (3) men on a road with a load to tote; (4) men in the

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midst of a table dhote; and, (5) men drinking beer with the foam afloat. They hear the yodeling but go
along unaffected by it.
Finally, one little girl in a pale pink coat hears the goatherd and she yodels back. They become a duet,
which will soon become a trio - I assume to mean that they become married and have a child. I couldnt
help but think back to Genesis 2, where we read:
And Yahweh God said, It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper
comparable to him. Out of the ground Yahweh God formed every beast of the field and every
bird of the air, and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them. And whatever Adam
called each living creature, that was its name. So Adam gave names to all cattle, to the birds of
the air, and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper comparable
to him. (vv. 18-20)
Adam was all by himself with the animals, just like the goatherd, and Yahweh indicated that it was not a
good thing. Interestingly, the Hebrew word translated alone is bad to be separated from the whole.
What whole was Adam separated from? He was separated from Team Adam & Eve. He was not
complete without her. Adam may have been surrounded by thousands of land animals and birds, but as
amazing as they all may have been, he was still alone. And so Moses continues:
And Yahweh God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept; and He took one of his
ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place. Then the rib which Yahweh God had taken from man He
made into a woman, and He brought her to the man. And Adam said: This is now bone of my
bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall
become one flesh. (vv. 21-24)
Although Rodgers and Hammerstein indicate that the goatherd and the little girl become a duet, God
indicates Adam and Eve become one flesh (i.e., 1 + 1 = 1). In fact, as we saw in Matthew 19, they were
actually joined together by Yahweh Himself. In every marriage after this, there would be a man leaving
the family he had been part of, a woman leaving the family she had been a part of and the two cleaving
together to be a new family. They may have children, but eventually those children will leave and cleave
to the ones that make them whole.
If you still have not found your other half, keep yodeling and one day, in Gods time, he or she will yodel
back.

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Green-Eyed Monster

As the family moves from the ballroom where the marionette performance occurred into the living
room, we see the first indications that the Baroness is jealous of Maria. In her book Maria von Trapp:
Beyond the Sound of Music, Candice Ransom writes regarding the real Baroness Schraeder (actually
Princess Yvonne):
That spring, Maria learned of Princess Yvonne, a distant cousin of the Barons wife, who was
coming for a visit. The housekeeper said the baron wanted to remarry, and hinted that Princess
Yvonne and the baron would probably become engaged. Maria pictured a beautiful fairy-tale
princess, sweet-natured and eager to become a mother. She was glad. The children would have
a mother again. But the children werent happy. They told Maria that their father didnt need
to marry anyone now that Maria had come. The princess arrived the next day. She greeted
Maria coolly, calling her the wonder girl shed heard about. (pg. 36)
In the movie, Maria certainly does seem like Wonder Girl she can make play clothes out of drapes,
sew her own dresses, teach children to sing (and in the case of Leisl, teach her to play the guitar), come
up with Broadway musical songs on the spot, and direct a fairly difficult marionette show. This prompts
Baroness Schraeder to say innocently to Maria, My dear, is there anything you cant do? When she
jokingly indicates that she wasnt sure if shed make a good nun, the baroness said shed be happy to
help her with that pursuit. While she knew nothing about being a nun, the baroness does work to get
Maria back to the abbey and out of the Captains life.
William Shakespeare had Iago say the following to Othello:
O, beware, my lord, of jealousy; it is the green-eyed monster which doth mock the meat it
feeds on.
Jealousy was thought to be caused by bile, which gave one a green complexion. The truth of jealousy
ruining the person who is jealous is brought out in Scripture time and again. Solomon wrote:
Wrath is cruel and anger a torrent, but who is able to stand before jealousy? (Proverbs 27:4)
Biblical characters that could not stand before jealousy include:
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1. Cain was jealous of Abel, as God accepted his brothers offering and not his, and killed him;
2. Sarah was jealous of Hagar for bearing Abraham a son and despised her and treated her harshly;
3. Josephs brothers were jealous of their fathers special treatment of him and pondered killing
him, but in the end, sold him as a slave (Acts 7:9);
4. Saul was jealous of Davids popularity and tried to track him down and kill him; and,
5. The Pharisees were jealous of Jesus and had Him crucified (Matthew 27:18).
The green-eyed monster wields it ugly head in all of us, when someone comes along that does what we
do better than we do. How do we deal with it? Obviously, the godly way is not getting rid of our rival
like Baroness Schraeder, Cain, Sarah, Josephs brothers, Saul and the Pharisees tried to do.
I think the keys to overcoming jealousy are found in these three passages:
For we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves.
But they, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves,
are not wise. (2 Corinthians 10:12)
For who makes you differ from another? And what do you have that you did not receive? Now
if you did indeed receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it? (1 Corinthians 4:7)
Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He
Himself has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you. (Hebrews 13:5)
According to the first passage, its unwise to compare ourselves against others. Why? Paul answers that
in the second passage its Gods work that makes us different. If someone is better looking than me, is
smarter than me, or has a greater influence than me, its because God made them better looking and
smarter and granted them greater influence. God has given each of us abilities and limits according to
His pleasure. And so the third passage tells us to be content with such things as we have, knowing it was
God who gave them to us.
If you are given to comparing yourself against other people and always wishing that God made you more
like so and so, stop it! He knew exactly what He was doing when He made you the way that He did.
Yahweh does not make mistakes. Instead of wasting time measuring yourself against other people (and I
have done more than my share of it), ask God to help you become the you He intended when He
created you. Many people may have more talents than we do and greater spheres of influence what
does it matter? The only thing that matters is that one day Jesus will say to you, Well done, good and
faithful servant, enter into the joy of your Lord. We need to be faithful with the abilities and sphere
that is ours, not somebody elses.
The primary reason I can be content is not only knowing that: (1) what I have is what God wants me to
have; AND, (2) what I dont have is what God doesnt want me to have, but because I have Him. The
author of Hebrews says to be content because God will never leave us or forsake us. Whether we have
beauty or not, whether we have intelligence or not, whether we have strength or not, whether we have
riches or not, whether we have fame or not, whether we have influence or not, we have Him and that
should be enough.

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Edelweiss

As they reach the living room, Uncle Max announces that he has discovered a new music group to
introduce at the Salzburg Folk Festival, namely, the von Trapp Family Singers. The Captain makes very
clear that his children will not be singing in public. Maria and the children then persuade him to sing a
song and he sings Leontopodium alpinum, well actually, Edelweiss. Later he sings this song again at
the festival, introducing it as a love song for his country Austria, with the hope that she will survive Nazi
Germany.
At my sisters church, they used to end the Sunday morning service with everybody in a large circle
singing the words in the photo to the tune of Edelweiss. I particularly like the phrase grant you peace,
perfect peace, courage in every endeavor. When the real von Trapps were leaving Austria, friends and
relatives tried to dissuade them. Maria von Trapp wrote in her book, Maria, a description of their
sentiment:
Are you crazy? Hitler has just promised a thousand years of peace. Dont you know what this
means for your children? There were untold possibilities, and here you want to tear them out
into an insecure future. This is wrong. You mustnt do it. (pg. 77)
Needless to say, Hitler did not deliver a millennium of peace instead he ruined tens of millions of lives.
But as the benediction song states, God can grant perfect peace or wholeness. The phrase comes from
the book of Isaiah:
You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in You.
Trust in Yahweh forever. For in Yahweh is everlasting strength. (26:3, 4)
The word perfect is not really in the Hebrew. Instead there is a repeating of the Hebrew word shalom
(i.e., the mind fixed on Yahweh will have shalom shalom). God promises an intense peace in the midst of
very unpeaceful circumstances. The von Trapps left Austria because their minds were stayed on Yahweh.
Maria writes:
It was the night of 12th into the 13th of March, 1938, a date we will never forget. Austria was
wiped off the map and incorporated into the Third Reich. The very next day going into town
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what a change. From every house hung a swastika flag. People on the street greeted each other
with outstretched right arm, Heil, Hitler! and one felt absolutely like one was in a foreign
country.
At first we waited for the storm to blow over. My husband did not allow the swastika around
the house or the new greeting or the new anthem to ever be heard. The pressure mounted and
our lives were threatened by the Nazis. So half a year passed, and then came the moment when
my husband called the family together and said, Now do we have to find out the will of God. Do
we want to keep our material goods, our house, our estate, our friends or do we want to keep
our spiritual goods, our faith and honor? We cannot have both any longer?
Then he looked at his children and said, Listen, you can have money today and lose it
tomorrow. The very same day you can start all over again, and that can happen more than once
to you in your lifetime. But once you have lost your honor or your faith, then you are lost.
There was no question what God wanted. As a family it was decided that we wanted to keep
Him. We understood that this meant we had to get out. (Maria, pp. 67, 68)
As they kept their eyes on Him, Yahweh granted the von Trapp family peace and courage to leave
behind everything that they had besides Him and each other. There is a little saying that goes like this,
Know God, Know Peace. No God, No Peace. If we want to know peace, it will only come as a result of
knowing and trusting God.

Glory Hoarder or Passer-oner?

Between the Maria and the childrens puppet show and the Captains singing of Edelweiss, the
attention had gotten off Baroness Schraeder. Even before Georg had started to sing, she said quietly to
Max, Why didn't you tell me to bring along my harmonica? So she had to get the attention back
where she thought it belonged on her suggesting that a grand and glorious party be given for her,
so that Georgs friends could meet her. It was all about her.
The baroness was a very shallow person; she had even said so in not so many words when she came to
the von Trapp villa. She said to Georg:

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I am amusing, I suppose. I have the finest couturier in Vienna and a glittering circle of friends. I
do give some rather gay parties. But take all that away . . . and you have just wealthy,
unattached little me.
Key phrase little me thats all that was left when you took away Viennas finest fashion designer, the
glittering circle of friends, the gay parties and the money.
Why do we love Maria and very much dislike the Baroness? When the Captain told Maria that he was
impressed with her ability to direct the marionette show, she says, Theyre your children, Captain
she passes the honor back to him. Andy Stanley in his sermon Passin It On says:
Christians believe that the potential, the ability to do great things, the talent, the discipline, the
creativity to persevere to the end of a project either in the marketplace or maybe in the arts
Christians believe that all the talent, all the ability, and even the opportunity ultimately comes
from God. We believe that every good and perfect thing comes down from our heavenly Father
(James 1:17). Christians believe that when someone gives us credit or honor for something
that we have done we should graciously accept it and then look for a way to point in the
direction of the One who ultimately deserves the credit.
We are not to be glory hounds, hogs or hoarders. We are to be glory passer-oners. Glory is a hot potato
that we should quickly get rid of, because it doesnt belong to us. In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus
said:
Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father
in heaven. (Matthew 5:16)
If people see how great we are rather than how great our Father is, we are living our life as a gloryhoarder. On a clear night, a full moon looks beautiful, but the moon is just a huge rock. Any glory that it
has belongs to the sun the star that shines so that we can see it. The difference between the sun and
the moon is infinitesimal to the difference between us and our heavenly Father. The only reason that
we have light to shine is because of Jesus work in our lives.
Are we glory hoarders (like Baroness Schraeder) or glory passer-oners (like Maria)?

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The Right Man for the Job

The Captain agrees to have the grand and glorious party for the Baroness. The von Trapp children
watch the dancing from the patio off of the ballroom. They have the following conversation:
Brigitta: The women look so beautiful.
Kurt: I think they look ugly.
Louisa: You just say that because youre scared of them.
Kurt: Silly! Only grown-up men are scared of women.
Gotta love Kurts insight. At this point, Maria shows up and the orchestra begins to play the music for
the Lndler, an Austrian folk dance, and Kurt asks her to teach it to him. It goes pretty well until they try
to turn and it is evident that Kurt is not tall enough to do the dance with his governess. At this point, his
father steps in to show him how the dance is really done. He was the right man for the job.
When I thought about that phrase (right man for the job), I thought of the first two verses of Martin
Luthers A Mighty Fortress is Our God where we read:
A mighty fortress is our God, a stronghold never failing
Our helper He amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing
For still our ancient foe conspires to work us woe
His craft and power are great and armed with cruel hate
On earth is not his equal
If we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing.
Unless God's man is on our side, the man of God's own choosing.
You ask who that may be, Christ Jesus, it is He
The Lord of Hosts, His name, from age to age the same
And He must win the battle.
Gotta love that song (it was my dads favorite). When it came to defeating Gods ancient foe (i.e., the
dragon, that serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan [Revelation 20:2]), there was no one on earth
equal to the task. The key words there are on earth. No seed of the man could do any better than
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Adam did. A man needed to come from heaven to earth that Man was the Jesus the Messiah the
seed of the woman (i.e., born of the virgin Mary) that Yahweh promised after Adams sin:
I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall
bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel." (Genesis 3:15)
At the cross, Satan would bruise Jesus heel, but Jesus would bruise his head. How? The author of
Hebrews states:
Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He (Jesus) Himself likewise
shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that
is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to
bondage. For indeed He does not give aid to angels, but He does give aid to the seed of
Abraham. Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren, that He might be a
merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of
the people. For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to aid those who are
tempted. (2:14-18)
Jesus was the right Man for the job He was able to be tempted, but also able to withstand every
temptation thrown at Him. He was able to lay down His life and die, but also able to take it back up
again and live (John 10:18). Because of Jesus cross-work, Luther could continue to write:
The Prince of Darkness grim. We tremble not for him
His rage we can endure. For lo, his doom is sure
God's word shall overthrow him.

Sometimes Auf Wiedersehen is a Second Chance

After the Captain and Maria finish dancing the Lndler, the children provide a goodbye performance for
all the guests singing So Long, Farewell. Once again, Uncle Max is impressed, thinking of all the money
he could make and stating, What theyd do at the festival! I wasnt sure how to make a lesson out of
this song until I remembered a song that I heard my NJ nieces listen to back in 2008 by Shinedown called
Second Chance. It includes these words:
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I just saw Haley's comet, shooting

She waved, said, Why are you always running in place?
Even the man in the moon disappeared somewhere in the stratosphere.
Tell my mother, tell my father, I have done the best I can
To make them realize this is my life, I hope they understand
I'm not angry, I'm just saying, sometimes goodbye is a second chance.
Until this morning, I never really understood what the song was talking about a young person that is
tired of living a life imposed on them by their parents. Their second chance to live the life they were
meant to live required them to say goodbye to those parents.
At this point in this story, the Captain has no intention of allowing his children to use their God-given
talents at the Salzburg Folk Festival. He wont change his mind until it becomes part of the plan to help
the family escape from Austria. Unless you are at a gym, always running in place (not getting
anywhere) can be very frustrating. It made me think of the commands that Paul gave to fathers at
Ephesus and Colossae:
Fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and
admonition of the Lord. (Ephesians 6:4)
Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. (Colossians 3:21)
Parents are to do all they can to encourage children to become what the Lord wants them to be not
discourage them by forcing them to become what the parents want them to be. Wesley Fleming writes
in Raising Children on Purpose:
According to the Bible, parents are to train a child according to the way God has created him to
go. They are not to impose their desires upon the children, but to discover His will for them. A
parents wishes are not always Gods will. The Bible says children are to honor their parents, not
blindly obey them.
We must be careful not to live vicariously through our children. Many armchair quarterbacks
mandate an NFL draft upon their sons. Many middle-aged moms burden their daughters with
unrealistic standards of fashion and beauty. Unreasonable parental expectations can devastate
a child who dearly wants to please her parents and simply be loved for who she is.
A parents role is not to mold but to unfold a childs potential. God gave our children unique
purposes. Who are we to suggest different ones? Our goal as parents is to help our children
discover their God-given purposes and to train them to live them out, not conform them to our
plans for the future.
Our childrens lives are ordained. Our job is to help them get onto the right page so that their
story unfolds into a beautiful future.
Are we molding our children to be what we want or are we helping them unfold Gods purposes for their
lives? If we are doing the latter, our children will never have to say Auf Wiedersehen to us as a second
chance at Gods life for them.
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Parables

Uncle Max, in hopes that Maria might be able to influence the Captain into allowing the children to sing
in the Salzburg Folk Festival, asks her to be his dinner guest. While she leaves to change her dress, Herr
Zeller (the future Gauleiter [regional Nazi party leader]) and the Captain have a discussion regarding the
impending Nazi takeover of Austria (i.e., the Anschluss). At one point, Herr Zeller thinks that the Captain
is flattering him, but in fact the he was accusing him. Thats the problem with figurative language {you
will be the entire trumpet section) it is sometimes misinterpreted.
People often say that Jesus spoke in parables to make things easier for His audience to understand.
However, this is not the case - Jesus says the very opposite. When His disciples asked why He spoke in
parables, He said:
Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them
it has not been given. For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance;
but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. Therefore I speak
to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they
understand. (Matthew 13:11-14)
Parables hid the meaning of His words to those whom God had not granted understanding. Much of the
time they had no idea what He was saying (e.g., John 10:6). If parables made things easier to
understand, why did Jesus have to explain them to the disciples, even though they had been granted the
privilege of understanding the mysteries of the kingdom of God (i.e., Mark 4:34)? There were even
times when He stated things clearly to His disciples and God hid the meaning from them:
Then He took the twelve aside and said to them, Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all
things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished. For He
will be delivered to the Gentiles and will be mocked and insulted and spit upon. They will
scourge Him and kill Him. And the third day He will rise again. But they understood none of
these things; this saying was hidden from them, and they did not know the things which were
spoken. (Luke 18:31-34)

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He couldnt have been any clearer about His death and resurrection, but at that point God did not allow
them to comprehend. If God grants understanding, we understand. If God withholds understanding,
we dont understand. Its that simple.
If we understand anything about Gods word, it is only because He gifted us understanding. We are not
wiser or smarter than others who do not perceive. As John the Baptizer said, A man can receive
nothing unless it has given to him from heaven (John 3:27). Unfortunately, knowledge often brings
pride, as Paul states:
We know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. And if anyone
thinks that he knows anything, he knows nothing yet as he ought to know. But if anyone loves
God, this one is known by Him. (1 Corinthians 8:1-3)
If knowledge does not bring a greater degree of humility and a desire to build up others in our lives, we
dont really know as we ought to know.

Friend or Foe?

As Maria goes to change her dress, Baroness Schraeder follows her under the guise of helping her. After
watching the Captain and Maria dance the Lndler earlier that evening, she realizes that they are in love
with each other. If the Baroness is to marry the Captain, she needs to get rid of Maria. This part of the
story does have its counterpart in reality. We previously quoted from Candice Ransoms book Maria von
Trapp: Beyond the Sound of Music regarding the real baroness, Princess Yvonne (see Green-Eyed
Monster). After referring to Maria as the wonder girl, we read:
Later, when the two of them were alone, the princess announced that the baron was in love
with Maria. Maria was stunned. How could this be? She was only the childrens teacher!
Yvonne reassured Maria that she still planned to marry the baron. Maria would give the
children a little party on the wedding day, since they would not be attending the ceremony.
After the honeymoon, the children would be sent to boarding school. Then Maria could return
to the Abbey, her duties completed. (pg. 36)

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Yvonne did not care if the baron loved Maria, just as Elsa did not care if the Captain loved Maria. She
needed to convince her that it was best that she return to the Abbey. Although the baroness was
pretending to help Maria find a dress, the only thing that she was really doing was helping out of the
door and out of the Captains life.
Solomon writes:
Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. (Proverbs 27:6)
Young translates the first phrase more accurately, faithful are the wounds of a lover, as the Hebrew
word for love (ahab) is used. The wounds inflicted by one who loves us are faithful, but the kisses by
one who hates us are deceitful. David writes:
Let the righteous strike me; it shall be a kindness. And let him rebuke me; it shall be as
excellent oil; let my head not refuse it. (Psalm 141:5)
Maria loved the children and for this reason, she was willing to rebuke the Captain for the way he was
treating them (see Accepting Blame). It hurt, but in the end, he admitted that it was a kindness on her
part; an excellent oil that brought healing to the house. In the previous verse, Solomon wrote:
Open rebuke is better than love carefully concealed (Proverbs 27:5)
While we shouldnt be taken in by the kisses of our enemies, neither do we need people in our lives who
love us, but not enough to rebuke us when we are wrong. The Captain was blessed to have a person
who loved him and his children enough to admonish him. As we shall see, Maria was blessed to have
such a person in the Mother Abbess in her life.
Do you have people in your life that love you enough to wound you when it is needed?

Ding-Dong-Dash

Frightened by the fact that she loves the Captain and that he may love her, Maria packs, leaves a note
and quietly makes her way back to the Abbey, while the guests are eating dinner. She does not say
goodbye to the Captain or the children. We might say that she ducked out.

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Today we have all kinds of ways to say things to people without facing them or even talking to them on
the phone:
Snail Mail
Text Message
Electronic Mail
Voice Message
Instant Message
Any Other Non Face-to-Face Method
That spells stevia a sugar substitute. It may help us to remember that there is no substitute to
actually talking to people.
From May 2008 through September 2009, I was the chairman of our churchs pastoral search
committee. After reviewing nearly 120 candidates, we reduced the list to two men. After interviewing
both men, it seemed clear to the elders that Gods direction was for us to merge with another local body
of believers. It was then my unpleasant duty to inform the second man that he was not selected. I put
off calling him for quite awhile he lived 600 hundred miles away so we couldnt meet face to face. In
the end, I used STEVIA, although I cannot remember which form. The main point was I was coward and
it was simply wrong this man of God deserved to be told the reason for our decision. We eventually
had the conversation, but I handled it badly.
When Maria left without even saying goodbye to the children that loved her, she hurt them what had
they done wrong? Her reason for leaving she missed the abbey made no sense, considering how
much fun they had together. Like me, Maria was being a coward at this point.
Jesus says something very interesting about how to handle situations where we have an issue with
another person or we know that they have an issue with us:
If you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against
you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother,
and then come and offer your gift. (Matthew 5:23, 24)
Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.
If he hears you, you have gained your brother. (Matthew 18:15)
Whether the fault is with us or the other person, we are to go to them (or phone them if there is great
distance involved). STEVIA does not allow the interacting that is needed for reconciliation to occur. And
its not only when there is fault to deal with that STEVIA should be avoided; I found the following list of
other times (having changed the word email to STEVIA):
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

If you are concerned the other person might misunderstand you dont use STEVIA
If you are angry or frustrated dont use STEVIA
If you wonder if you should send use STEVIA dont use STEVIA
If the content is critical, complicated or includes feedback dont use STEVIA
If you are trying to protect yourself from the response dont use STEVIA
If you think you might hurt the other persons feelings dont use STEVIA
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7. If you wouldnt say it to the person directly dont use STEVIA

8. If you need to apologize dont use STEVIA
9. If it is a tough conversation youd rather not have dont use STEVIA
While stevia may make a good non-caloric substitute for sugar in your coffee, when used in any of these
situations (including those Jesus spoke of in Matthew), STEVIA is sort of like the mischief night prank
Ding-Dong-Dash in which young people ring door bells and then run away frustrating homeowners.
We shouldnt duck out of difficult conversations, but have them, trusting God to deepen our
relationships as a result of them.

Selah Stop &

The Sound of Music is approximately 3 hours long; double the length of standard movies today. And
so it had an intermission/entracte a time to use the rest room or to get more popcorn. My mom said
that we went to see TSOM in the movie theater. I dont remember it at all (i.e., the first movie I
remember was Disneys The Jungle Book from 1967 when I was five). At the age of three in 1965,
however, I was probably hoping that the intermission meant the movie was over. But thankfully for the
rest of the world, it wasnt.
This made me think of the Hebrew word selah which is found only in Psalms and Habakkuk. Nineteenth
century Presbyterian preacher Thomas DeWitt Talmage wrote:
Gesenius, Tholuck and Hengstenberg agreed that this word often means a rest in the music.
God thrusts the Selah into His Bible and into our lives to make us stop and think, stop and
consider, stop and admire, stop and repent, stop and pray, stop and be sick, stop and die. It is
not the number of times that we read the Bible through that makes us intelligent in the
Scriptures. We must pause. It may take us an hour to one word. It may take a day to one verse.
It may take a year to one chapter. We must pause to measure the height, the depth, the length,
the breadth, the universe, the eternity of one passage. God tells us seventy-seven times
meditatively to pause in reading two books in the Bible, leaving to our common sense to decide
how often we ought to pause in reading the other sixty-four books of the Bible. Pause and pray
for more light. Pause and weep for our sins. Pause and absorb the strength of one promise. It is
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not the number of times you go through the Bible, but the number of times the Bible goes
through you. Pause! Reflect! Selah!
I love the last line: it is not the number of times you go through the Bible, but the number of times the
Bible goes through you. In both Selah passages in the photo, we are encouraged to be still either to
meditate or to know to allow Gods word to change us.
Interestingly during this part of the story, Maria was in seclusion not talking with any humans about
what she was going through, only as Sister Margaretta would tell Mother Abbess, She doesn't say a
word, Reverend Mother, except in prayer.

Love is Not a Feeling, Its an Act of Your Will

The second half of the movie begins with Baroness Schraeder playing ball with the von Trapp children,
her future step-children if her plans work out. However, it is clear that neither she nor any of the
children are having fun. When Max asks her how she will handle being the mother of seven children,
her answer is boarding school. You will remember that this was the real Baroness Schraeders
(Princess Yvonne [see Friend or Foe]) solution. She didnt love the children she didnt even want
them at her wedding. She wasnt interested in the package deal she just wanted their father, Georg
von Trapp.
In her book Maria, Maria von Trapp writes:
And now to make a long story short I fell in love! For the first time in my life. I fell in love
with those wonderful children. There they were from age four to fourteen two boys and five
girls. I dont know exactly how it happened, but in no time we were just one heart and one
soul. (pg. 57)
Its OK for a governess to love the children, while not being in love with the father of those children. For
example, it would have been adulterous for Mary Poppins to love George Banks, as well as, Jane and
Michael. But it is wrong for a wife to love the husband, but not his children. Continuing to quote from
Candice Ransoms book Maria von Trapp: Beyond the Sound of Music, we read about Marias feelings
when she learned Princess Yvonnes plan:
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Marias thoughts were in turmoil. She respected the baron and was fond of him, but it was the
children she loved. She couldnt believe that the baron was in love with her. And what would
become of the children? Princess Yvonne would not be a good mother. How could the children
be happy in boarding schools? (pg. 37)
This is not a post against boarding schools. I have two former Gods Backyard students, a sister and
brother, who go to boarding schools. They deeply love their parents and their parents deeply love
them. In their case, boarding school offers academic and extracurricular opportunities that they would
not have in public school. They go to boarding school because they are loved; however, the von Trapp
children would have been going to boarding school because they were in the way. If the Captain had
really felt it was the best option for his children, they would have already been in boarding schools (i.e.,
he could afford it) and he would not have dealt with the headaches of keeping a governess.
When I first became a Christian, my favorite singer was Don Francisco. He had a song entitled, Love is
not a Feeling, Its an Act of Your Will, which includes these words:
Jesus didn't die for you because it was fun
He hung there for love because it had to be done
And despite of the anguish His word was fulfilled
Love is not a feeling it's an act of your will
Love is not a feeling it's an act of your will
Im not saying that becoming a step-parent is easy, in fact, I am sure that it can be very difficult
especially if the children make clear that you will never take the place of their mother or father. You
may not feel about your future step-children the same way that you feel about your future spouse
or your own children. However, as this song points out, love is not a feeling. The Hebrew word for love
is ahab. It comes from a root meaning look toward the house". Love is a decision to cherish, provide
and protect the people God has placed in your life regardless of your feelings. Love is an act of your
will. The greatest command is found in Deuteronomy 6:
You shall love (ahab) Yahweh your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your
strength. (vs. 5)
We read nothing about loving Yahweh with all our feelings. Although in our language, heart may refer
to feelings, in Hebrew, the word heart (lebab) means the authority inside, in others words, the will.
If Baroness Schraeder really loved the Captain, then she needed to exercise her will and care for his
children, not get rid them. Maria writes the following regarding her marriage:
I really and truly was not in love. I liked him but didnt love him. However, I loved the children,
and so in a way I really married the children. (Maria, pg. 59)
Although she did not feel in love with the Captain at the beginning (i.e., we will see why she married
him), she continues, by and by I learned to love him more than I have ever loved before or after (pg.
62). She made a decision to make not only the children happy, but their father and God honored that
decision of her will.

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Pink Lemonade

As the children ask about what has happened to Frulein Maria, the three adults (Captain, Baroness and
Uncle Max) intersperse the conversation with talk about pink lemonade. In his The Ways of the Circus:
Being the Memories & Adventures of George Conklin Tamer of Lions, the author writes about his
younger brother whom he claims developed pink lemonade in 1857, after leaving the Jerry Mabie circus
over a salary dispute:
Pete did not mind taking long chances, and, besides, he had saved a little money, so he bought
a couple of mules and an old covered wagon and had enough money left to lay in a stock of
peanuts, sugar, tartaric acid, and one lemon. With this outfit he followed the circus, and every
time the tents were pitched he would mount his box and begin to sing: Here's your ice-cold
lemonade made in the shade. Stick your finger in the glass, itll freeze fast.
The lemonade sold splendidly and he could not wait on the crowd fast enough. One day he was
surrounded by a mob scrambling for the liquid refreshment, when he found that his water
supply had run out. There were no wells or springs near. He rushed all around the show for
water, but could find none. In his eagerness for it, and as a last resort, he went into the dressing
tent. Fannie Jamieson, one of the bareback riders, had just finished wringing out a pair of pink
tights. The color had run and left the water a deep pink. Without giving any explanation or
stopping to answer her questions, Pete grabbed the tub of pink water and ran. It took only a
minute to throw in some of the tartaric acid and the pieces of the property lemon, and then he
began to call out, Come quickly, buy some fine strawberry lemonade. That day his sales
doubled and from then on no first-class circus was without pink lemonade.
The recipe for circus lemonade has not changed from that day to this. A tub of water with
no particular squeamishness regarding its source tartaric acid, some sugar, enough aniline
dye to give it a rich pink, and for a finish some thin slices of lemon. The slices of lemon are
known as floaters, and any which are left in the tub at the close of a day's business, together
with those which have come back in the glasses, are carefully saved over for the next day's use.
In this way the same floaters may appear before the public a considerable number of times. The
lemonade glasses, too, by the way, like some other things in this world, are not what they
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seem. Tall and large in appearance, they give the impression of a generous drink for only a
nickel! but if examined they are found to taper very rapidly toward the base, to have extra-thick
sides, with the bottom nearer the top than it looks, and the thirsty customer actually gets no
more of the enticing pink liquid than could easily be poured into an ordinary drinking glass.
While as a usual thing there is water enough around the show for a lemonade vendor to get all
he needs without any trouble, there are times and places when it is a difficult matter and he has
to resort to various devices to obtain the necessary supply. I remember one season in California
when water was scarce and we frequently had to carry our supply from one place to another.
The lemonade man often came to me that season in great perturbation because he could
procure no water, and for a price I relieved his distress by knocking out the plug and lettering
him fill his cans from the sea lions tank. (pp. 229-231)
It may look like a tall, cool glass of strawberry lemonade but it could very well be a not so-tall, glass of
sea lion tank water with some dye from pink stockings and some lemon slices that have been in 50 other
peoples drinks. Looks can be deceiving. In his first letter to the assembly in Corinth, the Apostle Paul
wrote:
I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be
corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he who comes preaches another Jesus
whom we have not preached, or if you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or
a different gospel which you have not accepted you may well put up with it! For such are
false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ. And no wonder! For Satan
himself masquerades as an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also
masquerade as ministers of righteousness. (11:3, 4, 13-15a)
Being deceived about Jesus or the gospel by a masquerading minister of Satan is much more serious
than be deceived by a lemonade vendor. How do we avoid it? Gary Strauss writes:
It is commonly understood that when currency agents are trained to recognize counterfeit bills,
they do not spend time examining and becoming familiar with the vast array of the best samples
of the counterfeiters art. Rather, they spend many hours developing an intimate
acquaintanceship with the real thing, to quote a familiar advertising phrase. Literally, every jot
and tittle are scrupulously examined and poured over to the point that agents develop an
indelible and finely detailed mental image of both sides of the various bills that make up the U.S.
Treasury issue. Having developed such a thorough knowledge of even the minutest details, they
are prepared to spot the incredibly subtle variations from the standard of perfection, the real
thing. Thus, when these agents encounter a counterfeit bill, a careful examination can typically
result in the ready identification of the fake item, even though its degree of match with the real
might be so close that most who regularly use these bills would never suspect the truth.
Its Satans job to deceive, its our job not to be deceived by knowing Jesus and His gospel so well that
we wont fall for Satans lies.

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Mandatory Happiness

With Frulein Maria gone, the children are of course interested in who their new governess will be. The
Captain drops a bomb - they are going to have a new mother, Baroness Schraeder. They were also told
that the matter was settled and that they would be happy about it. I like what one person wrote on the
Fan Fiction website about this scene from Louisas standpoint:
Well, Louisa didnt know about her siblings, but that most certainly wasnt enough for her as
far as she was concerned, it was not all settled. As if one night of Father talking with that awful
woman could be enough to settle things. Did he think to ask his children about it, or even
consider how they might feel? Of course not! He didnt even have the decency to spring the
news in private, where they would be able to tell him what they really thought. Hed done it
with the baroness right there, so all the children could do was stare at him in stunned unbelief.
No doubt feeling the tension in their silence, Father frowned and nodded significantly toward
the baroness indicating that the children should make some overture. Liesl walked stiffly over
to her and placed a cold kiss on her cheek. Louisa and her other siblings fell into line behind her.
When it was Louisas turn, she touched her lips to the womans cheeks for a split second, then
walked away, head held high.
From the look on the childrens faces, I think this author has done an excellent job capturing their
thoughts about this news. They may have been told to be happy about it, but they most certainly were
not. The issue was most definitely not settled in their hearts. After their stiff kisses of the baroness, the
Captain says, Well, all right, all right. Run off and play. They left not to play, but rather to go see the
woman that they loved, Frulein Maria, at the Nonnberg Abbey.
One of the unalienable rights of our country is the pursuit of happiness; however, I doubt anywhere in
this country is there a law requiring happiness. The Captain could tell his children to be happy about his
selfish decision, but it was not going to change how they felt. I say selfish decision because at his
point in his life, with seven children ranging in age from 5 to 16, their needs were more important than
his (i.e., they needed a mother more than he needed a wife) and Baroness Schraeder was not going be a
good mother. His command to be happy was unfair.
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However, there is One Who can command happiness. Of course, I am speaking of God Almighty. For
instance, we read in Psalm 100:
Make a joyful shout to Yahweh, all you lands! Serve Yahweh with gladness; come before His
presence with singing. Know that Yahweh, He is God; it is He who has made us, and not we
ourselves; we are His people and the sheep of His pasture. Enter into His gates with
thanksgiving, and into His courts with praise. Be thankful to Him, and bless His name. For
Yahweh is good; His mercy is everlasting, and His truth endures to all generations.
Because Yahweh is the One who made us, is always good, is always merciful, and is always worthy of
praise and thanksgiving, He most certainly can command us to serve Him with gladness. This service
speaks of every aspect of our lives (Romans 12:1). If in the end, the Captain did marry the baroness and
the children were Jesus-followers, He could command them to be happy, even if their father really
couldnt - for God would be working it for their good, even if their father didnt care about what was
good for them. If Yahweh can work for the good of Joseph while he was sitting in a jail (Genesis 39:21),
He most certainly could do the same for the von Trapp children as they sat in boarding schools.
If you are allowing unhappiness to rule in your heart, maybe you have forgotten who made you and
what He is at work doing in your life.

Cloistered Safety

With news that the von Trapp children have come looking for Maria, Mother Abbess decides that Maria
has been in seclusion long enough and that they need to talk about what happened at the von Trapp
villa. She learns that Maria escaped a situation that she could not face. Before finding out the details
of the situation, she reminds Maria that the purpose for the Abbey, whatever it may be, is not for young
women to hide from their problems.
In Jesus high priestly prayer, He prayed for the following for His disciples:
Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father,
keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are. I
have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world,
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just as I am not of the world. I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that
You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the
world. As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. (John 17:11-18)
This portion of the prayer has four key phrases: in the world, of the world, out of the world and
into the world. The Greek word translated world is kosmos a word that often describes mankind
under Satans dominion. Gods children have been delivered from the power of darkness and conveyed
into the kingdom of the Son of His love (Colossians 1:13); therefore, they are no longer of the world.
However, He does not take them out of the world, but leaves them in the world. Why? Because He
is sending them into the world or as the Apostle Peter puts it:
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that
you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.
(1 Peter 2:9)
I dont live in a monastery, but all too often I live like a hermit in a cloister. I work from my room, I study
in my room, I write in my room. I have very little interaction with the world that Jesus has sent me into.
While Maria was hiding from her problem, it seems that the other nuns were also hiding from their
responsibility. In her book Maria, she writes the following with regards to the dress she had to where to
start her ministry at the von Trapp villa:
In our abbey it was the custom that when we entered, our worldly clothes were given to the
poor. Only the clothes from the last candidate to enter were kept in case somebody had to
leave again. The last candidates outfit was quite a sight - brown gown with latticework around
the neck and the sleeves, high black shoes with laces, and a leather hat like a firemans helmet.
When I finished dressing, the Mistress of Novices exclaimed, How very elegant. Oh how pretty.
Well, she hadnt been out in 52 years, so I suppose I must have looked to her like I was wearing
the latest fashions. (pp. 55, 56)
For more than half a century, this woman had not come outside the walls of the Nonnberg Abbey. How
could she fulfill her calling to proclaim the praises of Him who had called her out of darkness into His
marvelous light? Theres only one safe place in this world, as stated in this song by Kelly Clark Sheard:
The safest place in the whole wide world is in the will of God;
Though trials be great, and the way seems hard, it's in the will of God.
It may be on a mountain peak, or in the valley low,
But wherever it may be, if God says Go, oh, go.
The devil's loose in all the world, there's danger in the land.
The safest place in the whole wide world is in the Master's Hand.
It may be on the battlefront or in the prison walls,
But wherever it may be, if God says Go, you put your trust in Him!
Safety is not found in a cloister, but in the center of Gods will. The fear of man brings a snare, but
whoever trusts in Yahweh shall be safe (Proverbs 29:25). Are we going where God is telling us to go?

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When God Lets You Down

In the movie, Maria flees to the abbey because she was struggling with the fact that she loved the
Captain when she had already pledged her life to God as a nun. In the real story, the baron asked her to
marry him and she fled to the abbey. Candice Ransom writes in her book Maria von Trapp: Beyond the
Sound of Music:
Confused, Maria fled to the abbey. She poured out her heart to the Reverend Mother. But she
did not feel comforted by the Reverend Mothers words. The abbess told her that it was the will
of God that she marry the baron. Maria was deeply disappointed. She had planned to devote
her life to God and now she was rejected. With a heavy heart, Maria returned to the villa. (pp.
38, 39)
Maria herself writes in her book Maria:
I was in terrific inner turmoil. I felt betrayed betrayed by the One to whom I had vowed my
life and my future, whose will I was eager to do, and of whose faithfulness I was so sure. Now
He had lured me into this situation and shown me clearly that His feelings for me were not the
same as mine for Him.
Christ has given me, His bride, to the baron! I was furious and I had to tell Him so the very next
day. Around noon I stalked into our little parish church, right up front to the communion rail.
I stood there, stiff and blazing mad, and said, If any human man had done this to his bride
namely, arranged for her to marry another man while she thought he was as much in love with
her as she was with him I wouldnt think much of him. You have done just that! And You
knew that I wanted You. All right, You didnt want me. Now I dont want you anymore. I
turned around and stalked out. (pp. 59, 60)
They were married on November 26, 1927 (i.e., over ten years before the February 1938 wedding [one
month before the Anschluss] depicted in the movie). Unlike the Maria in the movie, the real-life Maria
was furious about having to marry the baron and felt rejected by God, to whom she had pledged her
life. It would not be until the Christmas Eve mass about a month later (which she attended for the

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childrens sake only) that her bitterness was dissolved and she let God and her husband into her heart.
They would actually celebrate their anniversary on Christmas Eve rather than November 26.
Since God never lets us down, this devotional should more accurately be called when it feels like God
has let you down. David felt like God let him down:
How long, O Yahweh? Will You forget me forever? How long will You hide Your face from me?
How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily? How long will my
enemy be exalted over me? (Psalm 13:1, 2)
Four times, David repeats the phrase, how long. He felt forgotten by God, given over to his enemies.
But although David is honest is expressing his frustration to Yahweh, he does not end there:
Consider and hear me, O Yahweh my God; enlighten my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death;
lest my enemy say, I have prevailed against him; lest those who trouble me rejoice when I am
moved. (vv. 3, 4)
Davids complaint turns to prayer a prayer to understand what God is up to during this period of
frustration (enlighten my eyes). And eventually his prayer turns to trust and praise.
But I have trusted in Your mercy; my heart shall rejoice in Your salvation. I will sing to Yahweh,
because He has dealt bountifully with me. (vv. 5, 6)
Protest to Prayer to Praise. What situation are you dealing with that has caused you to feel let down by
God? He can handle your protest; just dont stop there, progress to prayer and praise.

The Life You Were Born to Live

Early on in the movie, the sisters of Nonnberg Abbey sing the song How Do You Solve a Problem like
Maria? The answer turns out to be help her find the life she was born to live not as a nun, but the
mother of ten children (i.e., she and the baron would have three of their own children, in addition to the
seven from his first marriage).
When I think of living the life you were born to live, I think of two passages of Scripture:

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Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you; before you were born I sanctified you; I
ordained you a prophet to the nations. (Jeremiah 1:5)
It pleased God, who separated me from my mothers womb and called me through His grace,
to reveal His Son to me, that I might preach Him among the nations. (Galatians 2:15, 16)
Do only great prophets and apostles come forth from their mothers wombs with God-appointed
purposes? Most of us will not be as well known as Jeremiah or the Apostle Paul or be used to impact
the millions (if not billions) they touched through their ministries and writings, but it doesnt mean God
has any less a hand in our lives knowing us, forming us, setting us apart, calling us, revealing Himself
through us.
The Hebrew word translated ordained is nathan and it essentially means to give. Both Jeremiah and
Paul were gifts to their world from the hand of Yahweh. But so are you. Paul writes:
We are His workmanship, created in Messiah Jesus for good works, which God prepared
beforehand that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:10)
Walking in the good works God has prepared beforehand for us is another way of saying what the
Reverend Mother said to Maria, you have to live the life you were born to live. Life is going to be
frustrating and unfulfilling if we try to live another life. In Acts 20, as Paul was saying goodbye to the
elders from Ephesus, he said:
And see, now I go bound in the spirit to Jerusalem, not knowing the things that will happen to
me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies in every city, saying that chains and tribulations
await me. But none of these things move me; nor do I count my life dear to myself, so that I may
finish my race with joy, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the
gospel of the grace of God. (vv. 22-24)
Here the apostle describes living the life he was born to live as finishing his race and ministry given to
him by the Lord Jesus. I dont know about you, but that really sounds like living knowing the purpose
for which God created you and fulfilling that purpose.

Lies Beget More Lies

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The von Trapp children return late for dinner from their visit to the abbey. As they dont want their
father to know that they tried to talk with Frulein Maria, they begin to lie to him about where they
were:
1. Lie #1 Where were we? Uh, we went berry picking.
2. Lie #2 Oh, you want to know what kind of berries we picked, um, blueberries.
3. Lie #3 Oh, its too early for blueberries, uh, I suppose they could have been strawberries
that turned blue, seeing its been so cold lately.
4. Lie #4 You want to see the berries, uh, um, we ate them all.
One lie begets another lie, as it is often necessary to tell another lie to hide or cover-up a previous lie.
This can get quite complicated as Sir Walter Scott wrote in this epic poem Marmion:
Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive!
Liars need to have good memories to keep all their lies from being exposed, while an honest man does
not need to remember what he said previously.
In the case of the von Trapp children, their lies only temporarily cost them their dinner. Friedrichs and
Kurts lederhosen didnt even catch fire. But lying is a serious issue. Consider these two Scriptures:
God is not a man, that He should lie. (Numbers 23:19)
You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a
murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him.
When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it.
(John 8:44)
God does not lie in fact, He cannot lie (Titus 1:2). Satan only lies and is the father of every lie. Those
who tell the truth, align themselves with God. Those who tell lies, align themselves with Satan. Its
pretty clear cut.
We looked at Genesis 27 in Oblivious. It is a story of Jacobs deception of his father, Isaac. In
addressing the question of whether Yahweh blessed his deception, Dennis Leap writes in The
Philadelphia Trumpet (April 2011, Jacobs Tangled Web):
Look at the damage done by his deceit. Isaac was emotionally crushed by Jacobs actions. Esau
became so bitterly angry that he planned to assassinate Jacob after Isaac died. Jacob had to flee
for his life. He never saw his mother again; she died before he returned to Canaan.
Genesis 29-50 shows that Jacobs pain did not end there. His uncle Laban deceived him into
marrying Leah instead of Rachel. ... Laban, even after he became his father-in-law, took
advantage of Jacob, practically enslaving him for 14 years. His sons misled him to believe that
his favorite son, Joseph, was dead. When moving to Egypt to be with Joseph, Jacob confessed to
Pharaoh that his life had been very hardthe few years he lived were filled with evil (Genesis
47:9).
Lies not only beget lies, liars beget liars (i.e., for 22 yrs Josephs brothers kept the lie about his death).
Are we teaching our children & grandchildren to be truth-tellers by our truth-telling or liars by our lying?
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Gracious Defeat

At the direction of the Reverend Mother, Maria returns to the von Trapp villa. She is excited to live the
life she was born to live, possibly as the wife of Captain von Trapp and mother of Liesl, Friedrich,
Louisa, Kurt, Brigitta, Marta and Gretl. However, she is back less than 5 minutes when the children tell
her that their father is marrying Baroness Schraeder. Talk about having cold water thrown on your
dreams. How will she react? Will she be bitter? Will she go stomping back to the abbey because things
didnt go her way? Of course, she was hurt, but she sincerely wishes both Georg and Elsa a happy life
together. She indicates that she will stay on until arrangements can be made for another governess.
Maria was gracious in defeat even though:
1. That same baroness deceptively talked her into leaving in the first place; and,
2. That same baroness, upon seeing Marias return, had just said so dishonestly, Frulein Maria,
you've returned. Isn't it wonderful, Georg?
But just a few hours later, Elsa Schraeder realized that the Captain really loved Maria and not her. And
she also was gracious in defeat releasing him to marry the woman who would never be a nun. She
didnt make a big scene, but quietly stepped aside and slipped out of the lives of the von Trapp family.
Some people are poor winners they brag, boast and gloat about their victories, rubbing defeat in the
faces of their opponents. Some people are sore losers they throw things and go off on tirades about
how it was everybody elses fault, they whine and complain. I tend to be a poor loser when it comes to
watching sporting events in which I have some emotional investment (e.g., New York Yankees or Peyton
Manning are playing), so I just dont watch anymore.
I loved working in the AWANA program I loved everything about it except the Olympics, which
personally I hated. One year I volunteered to be a referee at the games. During one event, I think I
muffed a call and one of the leaders got angry with me, throwing and breaking his glasses. This was not
the real Olympics or the Super Bowl, just a local AWANA Olympics between some churches in southern
New Hampshire. Needless to say, it was the last time I ever volunteered to be a referee.
Personally, I think the best thing about sports is that it has the potential to teach children to be gracious
losers to not throw your batting helmet when you dont like a called third strike, to not complain when
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you felt like the coach didnt play you enough, to not blame a teammate who made an error for your
teams loss. We read in Proverbs:
The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from Yahweh. (16:33)
Even when you are playing Monopoly, it is Yahweh who has determined what will come up on the dice
when you throw it. Bragging in victory or whining in defeat are both wrong because they dont
acknowledge that God Almighty has determined outcome. Sometimes He has ordained that you win
and sometimes He has ordained that you lose. Bragging robs Him of glory (i.e., He gave you the talent
and strength to play in the first place) and whining is direct disobedience of His command to rejoice in
Him always.
The Captain was only going to marry one woman Maria or Baroness Schraeder. God ordained Maria to
be his wife.
And although Elsa Schraeder was an egotistical schemer, in the end, she bowed out
graciously not necessarily because she surrendered to Gods will, but she saw that she was defeated.
How do we handle defeat are we teaching the young people in our lives to be gracious losers or sore
losers?

Love Never Fails

While their parents are on their honeymoon, Uncle Max has the children practicing for the Salzburg Folk
Festival. It is during one of those trips into town that Rolf delivers his final telegram for Captain von
Trapp. He and Liesl have this conversation:
Rolf: Liesl. Liesl!
Liesl: Rolf! I'm so glad to see you. It's been su-Rolf: Good afternoon. Give this to your father as soon as he's home.
Liesl: He's on his honeymoon.
Rolf: I know.
Liesl: You do?
Rolf: We make it our business to know everything about everyone.
Liesl: Who's "we"?
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Rolf: See that he gets it.

Liesl: What is it?
Rolf: It's a telegram from Berlin.
Liesl: Don't you want to deliver it yourself?
Rolf: I'm occupied with more important matters. And your father had better be too, if he knows
whats good for him.
Liesl: But, Rolf!
This is the same young man who claimed that he was going to take care of her, while they were singing
Sixteen Going on Seventeen. Its the same young man who when faced with the decision to allow his
former girlfriends family escape, turns them into his Nazi lieutenant.
When her parents return from Paris, she sits down with her mom to talk about the hurt she is feeling
now that Rolf doesnt love her anymore. I believe the truth is Rolf never loved her in the first place
and in the end she was better off without him. How can I say that? The Apostle Paul writes the greatest
description of love in 1 Corinthians 13:
Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up;
does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice
in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures
all things. Love never fails. (vv. 4-8)
Id like to focus on that final phrase, love never fails. The Greek word translated fail is ekpipto, of
which Vine writes:
EKPIPTO to fall out, is used in the NT literally of flowers that wither in the course of nature
(James 1:11, 1 Peter 1:24); of a ship not under control (Acts 27:17, 26, 29, 32); of shackles
loosed from a prisoners wrist (Acts 12:7); figuratively, of the Word of God (the expression of His
purpose), which cannot fall away from the end to which it is set (Romans 9:6).
Paul indicates that love never falls out, just as Gods word cannot fail to accomplish the purpose for
which it is sent (Isaiah 55:10, 11). We hear about people falling out of love. But there can be no
falling out of love according to God - at least what He calls love. What the world calls love is often
very selfish all about what we can get from another person. But what God calls love is selfless its
a minute by minute decision to put the needs of another above our own. Love is not saying I love you
because the other person makes you feel great, its doing whats in the other persons best interest
because God has brought them into our lives.
If Rolf ever loved Liesl, he could never have been occupied with something more important than her. If
he viewed her as a gift from God, he wouldnt have given one seconds thought into turning in the von
Trapps to his Nazi supervisors rather he would have done all he could to help her escape or even
accepted the Captains offer to escape with them. He had, after all, promised to take care of her.
Have you bought the lie that love can fail? Feelings and passion, yes, but not love.

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Waiting for God

When Rolf stopped loving her, Liesl tells Maria that it felt like the world is ending. She thought she
had met Mr. Right and she didnt have to worry about being alone the rest of her life. But now she was
back to square one. Why is it that some people meet their soul-mate when theyre in kindergarten,
while others are left wondering if theyll ever meet their other half? The birthdays go by 18, 21, 25, 30
and 40 with no prospects. Its not just wait a year or two like Maria sings to her sixteen year old
daughter, but rather its a decade or two. It seems like everybody is paired up (yoked) except them.
Why? Isnt it God Himself that said its not good for man to be alone? Thats true, but is our greatest
need a life partner?
Augustine answered that question in to his Confessions:
You have formed us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find rest in You.
Until our hearts find their rest in the Yahweh, it doesnt matter how perfect Mr. Right or Mrs. Right
is, our hearts will remain restless. Why? Because the God-shaped vacuum in our hearts cannot be filled
by a person; it can only be filled by God Himself. Our ceaseless longing is really a longing after God. I
think of the words of the sons of Korah:
How lovely is Your tabernacle, O Yahweh of hosts! My soul longs, yes, even faints for the
courts of Yahweh; my heart and flesh cry out for the living God. (84:1, 2)
The Hebrew word for God is El and it is so insightful. Jeff Benner writes in his Ancient Hebrew
Lexicon regarding its root:
Combined the two pictographs (picture of an ox head and picture of a shepherd staff) mean
the strong authority. The yoke is understood as a staff on the shoulders in order to harness
their power for pulling loads such as a wagon or plow. Hence, the two pictographs can also
represent the ox in the yoke. Often two oxen were yoked together. An older, more
experienced ox would be teamed up (yoked) with a younger, less experienced ox. The older ox
in the yoke is the strong authority who, through the yoke, teaches the younger ox.

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That was the Hebrew view of God He was the older ox and they were the younger one. With that
understanding, think about Jesus words in Matthew 11:
Come to Me all ye who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon
you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
For My yoke is easy and My burden is light. (vv. 28-30)
Look at what Jesus says, take My yoke, learn from Me its amazing, He is telling them that He is their
God. A vibrant relationship with Him is what can eliminate the restlessness of the heart yoked to
Jesus, not to a husband or wife. The psalmists continue:
For a day in Your courts is better than a thousand. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the
house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness. For Yahweh God is a sun and a shield;
Yahweh will give grace and glory; no good thing will He withhold from those who walk
uprightly. (84:10, 11)
In His house, no good thing will be withheld. There may be things that we think we are lacking (e.g.,
boyfriend or girlfriend, husband or wife, baby, better job, better health), but if we are seeking Him
(Psalm 34:10), then we can be sure that those things would not be good for us at this point in our lives.
We can just walk with God and wait on His timing enjoying the good things He has brought into our
lives today, not worrying about what He may or may not bring into our lives tomorrow.

Hidden Talent

When Captain von Trapp does not answer his telegram regarding his commission in the navy of the
Third Reich, the Gauleiter, Herr Zeller, detains the von Trapps as he catch them trying to escape the
country. When the Captain explains that their car will not start and that they are on their way to sing at
the Salzburg Folk Festival, Herr Zeller finds it hard to believe that Captain von Trapp can sing. It turns
out to be one of his hidden talents.
In Matthew 25, we have Jesus parable of the talents:

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For the kingdom of heaven is like a man traveling to a far country, who called his own servants
and delivered his goods to them. And to one he gave five talents, to another two, and to
another one, to each according to his own ability; and immediately he went on a journey.
Then he who had received the five talents went and traded with them, and made another five
talents. And likewise he who had received two gained two more also. But he who had received
one went and dug in the ground, and hid his lords money.
After a long time the lord of those servants came and settled accounts with them. So he who
had received five talents came and brought five other talents, saying, Lord, you delivered to me
five talents; look, I have gained five more talents besides them. His lord said to him, Well
done, good and faithful servant; you were faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over
many things. Enter into the joy of your lord.
He also who had received two talents came and said, Lord, you delivered to me two talents;
look, I have gained two more talents besides them. His lord said to him, Well done, good and
faithful servant; you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things.
Enter into the joy of your lord.
Then he who had received the one talent came and said, Lord, I knew you to be a hard man,
reaping where you have not sown, and gathering where you have not scattered seed. And I was
afraid, and went and hid your talent in the ground. Look, there you have what is yours. "But his
lord answered and said to him, You wicked and lazy servant, you knew that I reap where I have
not sown, and gather where I have not scattered seed. So you ought to have deposited my
money with the bankers, and at my coming I would have received back my own with interest.
(vv. 14-27)
In a previous devotional (Rising to the Occasion), we saw that a talent was worth about $1 million.
The lord gave a lot of responsibility to all three men, based on their abilities putting them in charge of
$5 million, $2 million and $1 million of his own money. We are told that two of the men traded with the
money entrusted to them and doubled their masters money. The Greek word translated traded is
ergazomai, which is used by Paul in these passages:
Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working (ergazomai) with his hands
what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need. (Ephesians 4:28)
And whatever you do, do (ergazomai) it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men. (Colossians
3:23)
God has significantly invested in each one of us we are to use His investment for His glory and the
good of others. It is using those talents that we enter into His joy. Even though 2 talent man received
significantly less than the 5 talent man, they both had the same reward. Its not the how much God has
invested in us that determines the reward, it is our faithfulness. The 1 talent man could have had the
same reward as the 10 talent man, but he hid his talent and his master called him wicked and lazy.
Are we being faithful in using Gods investment in us or are we being lazy and hiding it? Its the
difference between knowing Jesus joy and not.
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I Lift Up My Eyes to the Hills

As the Reverend Mother says goodbye to Maria, she reminds her that she is not alone, quoting the
opening verse of Psalm 121. Here is the entire psalm:
I will lift up my eyes to the hills from whence comes my help?
My help comes from Yahweh, Who made heaven and earth.
He will not allow your foot to be moved; He who keeps you will not slumber.
Behold, He who keeps Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.
Yahweh is your keeper; Yahweh is your shade at your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
Yahweh shall preserve you from all evil; He shall preserve your soul.
Yahweh shall preserve your going out and your coming in from this time forth, and even
forevermore.
One problem is that the Reverend Mother is quoting this verse as a statement of faith God is in those
hills and He will be with you. In reality, the psalmist is asking a question. Does my help come from the
hills? We read in Jeremiah:
Truly, in vain is salvation hoped for from the hills, and from the multitude of mountains; truly,
in Yahweh our God is the salvation of Israel. (3:23)
The hills were where the high places - the shrines to false gods were built. No help was coming from the
hills. You cannot tell in English, but there is a Hebrew word that used six times, namely shamar, which is
translated keeps, keeper and preserve. It is related to the word for brier (shamiyr). Shepherds
constructed corrals of briers at night to protect the flock from predators. Yahweh is the Shepherd who
watches over His people, never once falling asleep on the job. The strength of the Third Reich may have
been after Captain von Trapp, but the One Who made heaven and earth was the Guardian of him and
his family. He would preserve them as they were going out of Austria and as they were coming into
Switzerland.
In reality, the family did not hike over the Alps to Switzerland, but took a train to Italy. They would
travel as the Trapp Family Singers from Italy to France, from France to Belgium, from Belgium to
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Holland, from Holland to Denmark, from Denmark to Sweden, from Sweden to Norway, and finally, from
Norway to the United States. God preserved all their goings out and all their comings in.
The Maker of heaven and earth is the Guardian of our souls as well.

Mother, I Have Sinned

Being warned by Rolf that the von Trapps are escaping, the Nazis leave the abbey and get into their
cars. However, the engines will not start. Why? Because the Mistress of Novices (Sister Berthe) and
the Mistress of Postulants (Sister Margaretta) sabotaged their cars removing distributor and ignition
coil. They confess their sin to the Reverend Mother. But did they really sin?
In a previous devotional (Edelweiss), we saw that the real life von Trapp had come to the conclusion
that to keep God, faith and honor, they needed to leave behind material goods, house, estate and
friends. At this point in Austrian history, the Nazis were Gods ordained authority (i.e., Romans 13:1-7; 1
Peter 2:13-17). But does that mean that they were to be obeyed without question. No! As Peter made
clear in Acts 5, there are times when:
We ought to obey God, rather than men (vs. 29)
Generally, we are called to submit to the authorities that God has placed in our lives. However, as the
apostles demonstrated when those authorities ask us to do something that God commands us not to do
or to stop doing something that God commands us to do, then we must obey God and disobey the
authority.
The sin that Sisters Margaretta and Berthe are confessing is likely stealing. Now stealing is serious, for
you shall not steal is not a command of man, but a command of Yahweh. Can you steal without
sinning? I dont think so, so I guess we need to determine if they were actually stealing?
I believe it is important that we consider the context it is not like nuns took the car parts because their
caretakers car needed them or they were running a used auto parts store on the side. Although the
Anschluss had been fairly peaceful (as Uncle Max put it), I am sure for many Austrians World War II
had begun, although it would not officially begin for another 1.5 years with German invasion of Poland.
Imagine an armed thief enters your house and God enables you to take away his gun; are you a sinner
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because you stole his weapon? Of course not! In fact, in the Mosaic Law, we have the following
provision:
If the thief is found breaking in, and he is struck so that he dies, there shall be no guilt for his
bloodshed. If the sun has risen on him, there shall be guilt for his bloodshed. (Exodus 22:2, 3a)
If an intruder was killed at night, it was not considered murder. The Nazis were using their cars to hunt
down a family that believed with all their united heart that it was Gods will that they leave. In the
movie, upon reading the telegram offering him a commission in the Navy of the Third Reich, the Captain
says to Maria, To refuse them would be fatal for all of us. And joining them would be unthinkable.
Were these godly women supposed to just standby and let the Nazis capture the von Trapp family at
best simply kidnapping the Captain or at worst killing all of them? Consider these two Scriptures:
Deliver the poor and needy; free them from the hand of the wicked. (Psalm 82:4)
Deliver those who are drawn toward death, and hold back those stumbling to the slaughter.
(Proverbs 24:11)
They were obeying Gods command to protect a family in need - helping them escape from the hand of
the wicked Nazis. Obeying God to preserve life cannot be wrong, so I dont believe that they were
stealing or sinning.

How Does God Want Me to Spend His Love?

Well, I have come to the fiftieth and final lesson in this series. Ive already pointed out that the von
Trapp family did not actually make a 200 mile trek from Salzburg to Switzerland through the Alps, but
rather took a train to Italy. However, this would not have fit very well with the reprise of the Reverend
Mothers song, Climb Every Mountain. Regarding this song, Ian Bradley writes in his Youve Got to
Have a Dream: The Message of the Musical:
There is a distinctiveness about the way the dream theme is framed here. For the Mother
Abess, the destiny that Maria must seek out and pursue is very much a God-given one. Her first
rendition of Climb Evry Mountain is preceded by the dialogue in which she tells Maria that her
love for Captain von Trapp does not mean that she loves God any less and that you must find
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the life you were born for. It is significant that Climb Evry Mountain is about finding rather
than having your dream. The dream is already there in Gods providential purposes the
human task is to identify and find it, not to construct it. The song is most emphatically not
saying what appeared as the English translation of the last line on the supertext screen during a
recent performance in Hungarian which I attended at a Budapest operetta theatre, Your lifes
calling you. So go, dream away.
As originally conceived by Hammerstein, the Mother Abbess song was in fact, about anything
but dreaming away. Initially entitling it Face Life, he outlined its theme in a note scribbled on
the manuscript of an early draft: You cant hide here. Dont think these walls shut out
problems. You have to face life wherever you are. You have to look for life, for the life you
were meant to lead. Until you find it, you are not living. (pg. 84)
Its a theme we have seen throughout this devotional determining and living out Gods providential
purpose for our lives. As the song suggests, I think that purpose will need all the love [we] can give,
every day of [our lives] for as long as we live. Why? Consider two greatest commandments:
Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is: Hear, O Israel, Yahweh our God,
Yahweh is one. And you shall love Yahweh your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with
all your mind, and with all your strength. This is the first commandment. And the second, like
it, is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater
than these. (Mark 12:29-31)
It makes sense if the two greatest commandments are all about love that Gods purpose for us will be all
about love loving Him and loving others. As the Mother Abess told Maria, You have a great capacity
to love. You must find out how God wants you to spend your love.
We often struggle with the question, What is Gods Will for My Life? Generally, we are thinking in
terms of what college should I go to?, who should I marry?, what job should I take?, or where
should I live? But until now, I never really thought of asking the much more important question, How
does God want me to spend my love?
And since God is the source of all love, I guess a better way to express the question would be, How
does God want me to spend His love? Paul writes:
The love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
(Romans 5:5)
Are we hoarders of Gods love or are we conduits of His love to a world that desperately needs. Its the
difference between existing and living.

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