Worship Matters, The Collective Identity of the Church, Part 2

In my last post, The Collective Identity of the Church, Part 1, I introduced to you the idea that the members of the Christian Church must understand ourselves not as individuals, but each as part of the collective reality of the Church. I emphasized that we must surrender our need for individual identity and validation and adopt instead the collective identity of the church. 

Today I want to connect the claims I made in that post with Biblical evidence of the Church's identity as the particular and set-apart people of God, making connections between the New Testament Church and the Old Testament people of Israel and exploring the imagery of the Church as a Body. I want to help you see the collective nature of our identity, and the importance of living into that collective identity.

1 Peter 2:4-10—The Church and OT Israel

In his first epistle, the Apostle Peter provides a solid foundation for the Church’s understanding of its identity as a collective entity. The recipients of the letter were believers who had been scattered throughout the region of Asia Minor and subjected to various trials and tribulations, and were questioning the Gospel and their inclusion in the Church. Peter wrote in order to establish and affirm these believers' self-understanding as the people of God, with this being the dominant theme of 1 Peter 2:4-10. The believers needed to remember who they were. The imagery used in this text, particularly in verses nine and ten, points back to the collective identity of the Jewish people as the chosen nation of Israel and ties the identity of the Church to the identity of Israel in significant ways.

Peter writes in 1 Peter 2:9: “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” The connection to Exodus 19:5-6 is obvious, even with only a quick glance at the Old Testament text: “Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation…” Any in Peter’s audience who were Jewish in their spiritual and national heritage would have heard those descriptors—chosen people, royal priesthood, holy nation, and special possession—and would have immediately made the association with the Mosaic covenant, with God’s setting apart of the Israelite nation for a particular and holy purpose. Peter’s use of this imagery asserts that “the Christian Church has now inherited the peculiar character and privileges of Israel.”(1)  Namely, they would have understood that the Church as a collective whole was the holy, set-apart people of God. 

Paul's teaching in Galatians chapters three and four reinforces Peter's claim that the Church is the continuation of the people of Israel. In these chapters, Paul describes the Law (i.e., the Mosaic Law) as the “guardian” over the children of Israel, given to provide instruction and training until the time was right for Israel to receive the inheritance as fully adopted sons (and daughters). This adoption was accomplished through the redemption of Christ, and Paul addresses the believers in Galatia as those who have received the inheritance.

In this text, Paul uses imagery of childhood and immaturity. Galatians 4:3 says, “…when we were underage…” or “when we were children,” communicating the idea of an underage person who can’t make decisions for himself or herself because they lack the maturity and the authority to do so. This “minor”—i.e., Israel—was still in need of the supervision and care of the guardian. However, by the redemptive work of Christ, this underage heir was brought into fullness of maturity and with that maturity came the full inheritance of sonship.  This “heir” is now known as the Church.  The essential identity of the people has not changed; it has only grown into its mature realization through the power of Christ.

The Body of Christ

The next piece that needs to be connected is the imagery Paul uses multiple times to depict the New Testament Church, which is that of a body. It is common among Christians to refer to the Church universal as "the body of Christ," and it is not unusual even for an individual congregation to refer to itself as the "local body." It is an image that we are so accustomed to using, though, that I fear we've become blind to what it actually represents.

Paul briefly utilizes the image of a body in reference to the church in his letters to the Romans, Ephesians, and Colossians, but it is in his first letter to the Corinthians that he provides the most detailed application. First Corinthians 12:12-14 reads, “Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many.” The image continues through the end of chapter twelve, discussing the role and value of the distinct aspects of the body, but also reminding the readers that even with those distinctions, the body functions as a whole. 

As a body, the Church as a whole is meant to function as if it is itself an individual, not as a collection of individuals. Dietrich Bonhoeffer calls this the “collective person,”(2)  and describes how this type of community has an identity distinct from the identities of the individuals who form it. The identity of the “collective person” of the Church is two-fold: First, it was and has always been the reality revealed by God.  God created the Church as a communal (a.k.a. collective) reality from the beginning. Second, the Church is specifically identified as the “Body of Christ.” This insinuates much more than membership in a group of people for whom faith in Christ is a common denominator. Bonhoeffer takes the image a step further, claiming that the identity of the “collective person” of the Church is that of Christ himself. “Bonhoeffer asserted that from the sinful individuals who comprise this assembly God forges a new creation that constitutes the collective person, Jesus Christ…Christ existing in the form of church-community.”(3) The identity of the Church, as a “collective person,” is Christ himself revealed in the here and now. 

Paul uses this collective image of the body to represent the Church in order to move believers’ understanding of their own identity away from one of individual autonomy and toward the reality that they are now part of this wonderful and singular identity. Each individual has value and place within the collective body, but that value is intricately connected to their inclusion in the body. Individual identity is secondary to corporate identity.  Paul exhorts believers to recognize that every element of the body is necessary and desired so that no one part is excluded or cut off by another. Wrapped in this message is an exhortation for today’s Church to understand themselves in light of the whole body and to stop acting in ways that inadvertently amputate themselves from it. 

Why It Matters

Maybe you're wondering why this conversation even matters. Why is it so important that Christ followers understand themselves in light of the entire Body rather than as one of the individuals who comprises that body? What's the big deal?

The significance of this conversation lies in the fact that an improper understanding of identity shifts our understanding of the Gospel itself, moving it drastically off-center. An individualistic view of self narrows our view of God's salvation, puts constraints and limitations on His goodness and mercy, and replaces Jesus with "self" as the main character in God's story. 

These repercussions of individualism should be sobering enough on their own, but they produce additional consequences that are just as grievous. When God's people view themselves only as individuals and neglect the collective nature of our identity, we become our own roadblock to fulfilling the purpose and calling of the Church. We become entangled in ourselves and our own affairs, and fail to live out the Good News of Christ in and for the world. We cannot "act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God" if we are primarily focused on ourselves and the way Christ benefits us.

What we believe—about ourselves, about God, and about the Church—matters. 

In my next post, I will explore these implications of individualism more thoroughly and share with you why I am so passionate about shifting our perspective toward a collective mindset.

Until next time, grace and peace to you and yours.

________________________

1. E.G. Selwyn. The First Epistle of St Peter, (New York: Macmillan & Co, 1955), 278.

2. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Sanctorum Communio: A Theological Study of the Sociology of the Church, ed. Clifford J. Green, trans. Reinhard Krauss and Nancy Lukens (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1998), 103-105. 

3. Craig L. Nessan, “What If the Church Really is the Body of Christ?,” Dialog: A Journal of Theology 51, no. 1 (2012): 45.

Think First

I’ve been lost in my own thoughts a great deal of late, wrestling with what the media is telling me is happening in the world and in my country, knowing that the media only ever provides a strongly biased report from one angle or another and that I can never really know the truth of what is happening. The only thing I am absolutely sure of is that chaos, anger, and a huge portion of emotionally charged rhetoric has become the status-quo for the American public in the twenty-first century.

It is difficult in the midst of so much noise to distinguish the voice of God.

How do we discern truth from pseudo-truth? How do we filter out the silt in order to find gems? Better yet, how do we know conclusively that we’ve found gold and not fool’s gold?

For some reason, the chorus of the old 80’s song Listen to Your Heart by Roxette has been playing on repeat in my mind for the last couple of weeks. I can guarantee you, the lyrics to that song are not true gold; they do not provide the kind of advice we should rely on as we’re trying to sort through the cacophony of information that accosts us from every angle.

Jeremiah 17:9 is often quoted as a warning against trusting your heart. “The heart is deceitful above all things…” “Heart” in this context, particularly considering the Hebrew concept of personhood, is a reference to much more than just a person’s emotions. Verse ten clarifies the concept when it partners “heart” with a Hebrew word that the NIV has translated as “mind,” but really comes closer to meaning “inner person.” Paired together, we can understand that the innerworkings of a person—both thoughts and emotions—are interconnected rather than disconnected one from the other. So while it’s not 100% false that a person’s emotions shouldn’t necessarily be trusted to lead in decision-making, they are not fully distinct from a person’s thoughts.

So can a person’s thoughts be trusted, either?

Romans 12:2 puts a stronger value on the intellectual aspect of human personhood: “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.” How do we discern what is truth? Well, it appears that engaging our intellect is a key element of the process.

Here’s where I’m going to bring a little bit of philosophy into the conversation. St. Thomas Aquinas (13^th Century Italian monk) was both a theologian and a philosopher. His greatest theological work, Summa Theologiae, contains no fewer than 3,000 pages, and details his ethical theory known as Natural Law Theory. Part of that theory is the claim that humankind is created with an inherent purpose, or telos, which is to “live according to reason.”

In other words, we were created to be thinkers. To use our brains.

When you go to church, use your intellectual capacity to discern whether what you are hearing aligns with Scripture. But also, use that same intellect to discern whether the lyrics you’re singing have that same theological accuracy and depth. (In other words, don’t turn your brain off when the music starts.)

When you open your social media app and read a post or watch a video, utilize your ability to reason out whether what you are reading and seeing is true, how much bias it might contain, and how it is designed to enflame emotions before you allow yourself to respond or react to it.

When you encounter new information or just a new presentation of information, before you allow your emotions to react, allow your mind to sift through and separate truth from non-truth.

Emotions don’t need to be ignored or completely disregarded, but they definitely should be tempered by intellect.

But now let me give some qualification to this entire conversation. Remember that Jeremiah 17 shows us that at some level, a person’s thoughts are as fallible as his or her emotions.

Let’s go back to Romans 12:2 – “…be transformed by the renewing of your mind…”

While Aquinas taught that humans are created with a natural reasoning capacity and that certain "moral codes” are built into the human makeup, Romans 12:2 tells us that we have to do the work of educating our minds in order to have the framework from which to discern God’s will. Our minds are flooded every day with information, so we have to be purposeful about absorbing and assimilating the right kind of information. If we want to be able to distinguish truth from untruth, we have to know the characteristics of truth; we cannot simply decide from our own thoughts what we believe should be true and what shouldn’t.

Renew your mind. Through reading and study of Scripture. Through listening to trusted teachers of the Word. Through conversations with other believers who are also engaged in the same practices. Through willfully choosing to let your mind be formed in the ways of Christ.

“Do not conform to the pattern of this world…” Don’t allow yourself to become a person of empty, emotionally driven, reactive rhetoric.

“…but be transformed by the renewing of your mind…” Do allow your mind, your thought patterns, your worldview, your perspective to be formed by Scripture and by the wisdom of others who are sincerely engaging the Word.

“…Then…” (and only then) “…you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

The Moment That Changes Everything

There are moments in history that define each one of us, moments that completely change the course of our lives.  Whether they are marked by a decision or an event or an encounter, our lives look drastically different than they did the moment before.

Think about the day you got married or the day you held your child for the first time, about how much your life changed that day.  Life would never be the same from that point, would it?  Good or bad, there was no going back to life as it was before.

Think about life before 9/11.  What was life like on September 10^th, 2001?  Very different than September 12^th, for sure.

One event, and the course of an entire nation was re-routed.

One moment and everything changed.

One moment of weakness, one swallowed lie, one bite of forbidden fruit.  Sin found its way into humanity and the world was changed forever.

One choice by a man named Cain to bring not the best and first of his crops – just “some” – to make an offering to his Creator.  The choice to keep the best for himself and make an offering not out of faith in God to provide, but rather an offering out of the leftovers.  The choice to stand proudly before God, angry that his offering wasn’t found acceptable, rather than submit in humility and repentance.

This choice would change Cain’s life drastically.  The anger that began as a small seed that day grew in his heart like the wheat that he had sown in his field.  It matured into full-grown hatred, strong enough to lead him to murder his own brother.  Again, when given the opportunity by God to confess his wrongdoing, he stood proudly and defiantly before his Maker and confessed nothing

And so the consequence: the once highly successful farmer would no longer be able to coax even the scantest crop from the ground, and instead would spend the rest of his days a wanderer.  His family, too, would be sentenced to wander with him.  No home, no livelihood.  Just wandering.

But the effects of Cain’s choices didn’t end with him or his immediate family.  Several generations later, one of Cain’s offspring would become himself a murderer and proudly claim a promise God had made to Cain as his own.  It started with one choice, but the ripples of that choice continued to spread.

How different would Cain’s life have been had he chosen that day to bring the first and best of his crops as an offering?  Or if, when God disapproved of the offering, he had reacted with humility or remorse? How would his story have gone then?

Maybe there is a moment in your own life that very distinctly divides it into “before” and “after.”  Maybe it was put there by your own choice, or perhaps it was handed to you by someone else. Regardless, it changed your story.  There’s no going back, no matter how much you wish you could.

One moment and everything changed.

But there is another moment in history that can change your story again.  Oh, it won’t undo what has already been done; it won’t erase history.  But it will rob your history of its power to dictate your future. Indeed, it will redeem your history and make your story one of beauty and grace.

I’m talking, of course, about Jesus.  About the moment that he stepped back out of the grave and crushed the power of sin and death.  Forever.  I’m talking about that moment when you encountered Him – or will encounter Him – and He began to re-write your story.

One moment with Jesus and your life will never be the same.

Will it be 9/11 kind of change? Probably not in the world’s eyes. But to you…yeah, it’s that big. The difference, my friend, is that instead of looking back with nostalgia or regret or sadness, you’ll be looking to the future with anticipation, hope and joy.

Jesus.  He changes everything.

And what a wonderful thing it is when He does.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.  The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. ~ 2 Corinthians 5:17

Press On

Hello, friend.  How's your walk going this summer?  Is there a spring in your step and a song on your lips?  Are you walking side-by-side with the Spirit, enjoying His company as you walk, taking your cues from Him?  That is such a sweet and joyous place to be, even if the road you're traveling is a little rocky.

Or are you weary and worn out from your journey, beaten up by the storms you have weathered recently?  Have the demands of the journey sapped your strength and squelched your desire to keep going?  Have you lost sight of the Spirit, leaving you feeling lost and ready to give up?

Oh, my friend, if this is where you are, let me encourage you with a piece of Scripture that the Lord has pressed upon my heart these last few months.  For I have walked where you are now walking.  I have felt in my bones and in the deepest part of my being the weariness that you now feel.  I have known what it is like to be discouraged to the point of giving up, to feel as though I have given every ounce of what I had to give. 

I, like you, have been worn out, lost and hopeless.

Praise God that He has promised never to leave us, never to abandon us!  And praise Him all the more that He is a God who keeps His promises!

EVERY. TIME.

Here is the promise He led me to, the promise I have clung to and that has become my anchor these past few months:

Hosea 6:3 ~

Acknowledge the Lord.

Press on to acknowledge Him. (italics mine)

As surely as the sun rises in the east, He will appear.

He will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth.

"Acknowledge the Lord.  Press on to acknowledge Him."  In the midst of our trials, our weariness, we must continue to acknowledge the Lord.  To confess with our lips that he is GOD, the King of Kings, the Ruler of all.  To live in obedience to His leading.  Even when our hearts don't want to join in, we must continue to acknowledge Him.

But it won't be easy.

Why else would there be a need to "press on to acknowledge Him?"  To press on: to keep going even when we think we can't.  To muscle our way through the exhaustion.  To keep putting one foot in front of the other, even when our legs are aching and weak.

I used to be a jogger.  I loved to go out for a two or three mile (sometimes more!) jog.  Some days were hard, though, and I would hit a point where I didn't think I could go another ten feet, let alone another mile.  It was like I hit an invisible wall that was trying to press me backwards.  But I learned to keep pushing - to press on - and break through that wall.  I almost always ended up going farther than I thought was possible.

"Pressing on" is not easy.  To press on in our faith we must be intentional.  We have to choose to continue to acknowledge God.  We have to do it on purpose.  It will require energy that we think we don't have.  It will require that we refocus our thoughts so they dwell on who God is rather than our circumstances.  To "press on" is hard work.

But here is the promise that follows this difficult instruction:  "As surely as the sun rises in the east, He will appear.  He will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth."

Press on and you will see God.  Press on and He will appear.  He will not stay hidden - you can count on it, just as surely as you can count on the sun coming up in the east! 

God WILL appear!

And when He does, He will bring refreshment to your life just as the rain brings refreshment to the earth. 

No, more than that - He will bring renewal.  He will bring LIFE.  Just as the rain brings life to the seemingly dead plants in springtime, so will God bring LIFE to your weary soul.

He will come, and He will bring new life.  That's a promise you can cling to, a promise that you can anchor your faith to.  It is a promise God will keep.

Last spring I was led to this verse as I prepared to teach at a women's tea at a local church.  I loved the verse and what it promised, but little did I know that God would prove Himself true to this promise in the months to come.  I had no idea how desperately I would need this promise.  I still marvel at how God works to provide for His children, how He planted that verse in my head well in advance of the time I would need it as an anchor in my heart.

My family has experienced some circumstances this summer that truly tested our faith.  They pushed us to the point of mental, emotional and spiritual weariness where we felt as though our feet were made of lead and we were unable to drag them forward for even one more step.  But in those days and weeks, God reminded me of Hosea 6:3, (in fact, it rarely left my mind!)  and my husband and I - on behalf of our family - continued to press on in our faith.

Still, we are continuing to press on.  But let me tell you, we have begun to see the Son rising in our home! The Spirit has begun to reign in our family and we see evidence of new life in every corner!

God is faithful, my friend.  Be encouraged today as you press on to acknowledge Him, that He is a God who is true to His Word.  Keep pressing on and know that "as surely as the sun rises in the east, He WILL appear."

The Playdough Principle: Five (Short) Lessons On How To Be Playdough

Yesterday I introduced you to "The Playdough Principle," the idea that when we face adversity, we should be moldable (like playdough) and allow God to use those difficult circumstances to shape us into His own image.

But how do we allow ourselves to be clay in the hands of our Father?  How do we make ourselves soft and pliable in His hands?   

To understand that, I want to turn to a story in the Old Testament about a trio of men named Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego.  We find their story in Daniel 3.  Now, these men were Jews living in exile in Babylon.  God has blessed them and their fellow Israelite, Daniel, so that they have been appointed to high positions under King Nebuchadnezzar.  The King is so highly impressed with himself that he has erected a ninety foot tall statue of himself, and he has ordered that everyone in the kingdom must bow down and worship it.  But these God-fearing men refused to bow down to anyone other than God, even under threat of execution.  When questioned by the king, this was their reply (found in verses 16-18): “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you.  If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God whom we serve is able to save us.  He will rescue us from your power, Your Majesty.  But even if he doesn’t, we want to make it clear to you, Your Majesty, that we will never serve your gods or worship the gold statue you have set up.”

So, lesson number one from these men: We must be steadfast in our dedication to the Lord.  Hebrews 12:2 says “We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith…”  When hard times come your way, you may be tempted to do a couple of things:  You may want to blame God, or you may start thinking that perhaps He is not as all-powerful as you once believed.  Those two are very deep issues that take a lot of digging to deal with.  But trust me in this, we are shown over and over in Scripture that God has power above all and over all, and He is a compassionate God whose desire is not to harm you, but to help you grow into the likeness of His Son.   James 1:13-15 reminds us that God does NOT tempt us, so don’t allow yourself to be swayed into that sort of thinking, either.  Instead, keep your eyes, your heart and your mind focused on Jesus.  Immerse yourself in God’s Word and plant it in your heart so that when the enemy tries to pull you away from Christ, you will remain steadfast in your faith.  Do not let the enemy bully you or frighten you into turning away from God.

Lesson number two: We must be intentional in our obedience to God.  Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were not nonchalant in any way as they refused to worship Nebuchadnezzar’s idol, nor did they hope to just “fly under the radar.”  They were prominent men in Babylon, so they lived their lives in the public eye and were intentional in their obedience to God’s command not to worship any god but Himself.  We, too, must be purposeful in searching out and obeying God’s directions for us.  When you’re in the middle of adversity, ask yourself, “What does God want me to learn from this?  How does He want me to react?”  And then do your very best to be obedient to what He reveals to you.  Sometimes – many times – that means choosing to act in direct opposition to our instinct or to what our flesh cries out for.  Perhaps you have been hurt deeply by a friend or a loved one, maybe even your spouse.  Everything in you tells you to lash out at them and hurt them in retaliation, but the Spirit is guiding you to forgive.  Maybe you’re struggling in your relationship with the Lord, doubting His presence in your life and you really just want to walk away.  Instead, you continue to pick up your Bible and read His Word simply out of obedience.  Maybe there’s a temptation in your life that you really, really want to cave in to, and you have to make a choice – to yield to the Spirit or give in to the flesh.  We must be intentional in our obedience to God.

Lesson number three: TRUST.  Boy, this can be a hard one.  We have been taught not to trust anyone other than ourselves, because eventually, in one way or another, everyone else will let us down.  But we serve a God who will NEVER let us down.  Deuteronomy 31:8 says, “Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord will personally go ahead of you.  He will be with you; He will neither fail you nor abandon you.”

Romans 8:31-39 says, “…If God is for us, who can ever be against us?  Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else?  Who dares accuse us whom God has chosen for his own? No one—for God himself has given us right standing with himself.  Who then will condemn us? No one—for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand, pleading for us.  Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death?  (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”)  No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.  And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.  No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

We can TRUST God, the same way that Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego trusted God.  They boldly stated their faith in Him when they told Nebuchadnezzar that even if he should throw them in the fiery furnace, God would rescue them.  And they were steadfast enough in that faith that they knew He was still the One, True God even if He chose NOT to rescue them.  (Dan 3:17-18) 

Lesson number four: Recognize that God is with us in the midst of our trials.  When our three friends in Babylon refused to bow down to the king’s statue, Ole Nebby flew into a rage.  He ordered the heat of the furnace to be intensified seven times hotter than normal.  It was so hot that the soldiers who threw Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego into the furnace were killed themselves, just standing next to the entrance.  But when King Nebby looked into the furnace, he was quite surprised to see the three men standing unharmed and accompanied by a fourth!  It is believed by many scholars that this fourth man was Jesus, Himself!  God is with us, even amidst our troubles! I want you to notice that God didn’t come to rescue Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego BEFORE they were thrown into the fire.  He didn’t come to keep them out of the fire, but to go through the fire with them.  God doesn’t promise to keep us out of the fire, but He has given us His Spirit, who lives in us and is our constant companion, to walk with us through the fire.  In John 14:16-17, Jesus tells His followers this: “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Advocate who will never leave you.  He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth.”  

Take a minute and picture God's hand wrapped tightly around you.  Not just holding your hand, but all of you.  You are safe there.  No matter what happens, God will never let go of you, neither on purpose nor by accident.  You can never "slip" from His grasp, and He will never intentionally let you fall.  Nor can any circumstance pull you from His grip.  You are completely safe.

Now, picture yourself holding on to a rope that is fraying and about to break, torn to shreds by the trials in your life.  In fact, it is holding on only by a thread, and you are desperately trying to cling to the rope, hoping against hope that it will hold up under your weight.  Now, look down and see that you are resting securely in the palm of God's hand.  Sometimes we are so desperately afraid of falling and we are trying so hard to hold ourselves up that we don't realize we just need to let go and trust God to hold on to us.  Sure, the trials will come and they will be bitter.  But God's hand will always be there.  And He's a BIG God; He cannot be tumbled by the trials of this world.  Of that you can be sure.

I want you to see one other thing.  Notice that the hand that holds you bears the scar of a deep wound.  The hand that holds you belongs to a God who loves you so completely that He would stop at nothing, even death on a cross, to rescue you.  The hand that holds you is that of a God who has suffered just as we have -- physically, emotionally, relationally -- and understands what it means to stare death in the face.  The hand that holds you is steady and strong, yet compassionate and caring.  In it you can place your whole trust and find the solace that your soul longs for.  Friend, when you belong to Jesus, you are safe.  Always.  Even when the world around you is a fiery furnace of trials.

Lesson number five: Rest assured that God will use our trials for His glory.  When Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego stepped out of the furnace unharmed, the king was absolutely amazed to see that not even a hair on their head was singed.  As a result, he began to praise God throughout his kingdom, and he even promoted the three men to higher positions of authority.  When you allow God to bring you through a fiery situation and you hold steadfastly to your faith in Him, other people WILL notice.  Not only will you be changed, but your witness may bring salvation into the life of others.  How awesome is that! 

So…we want to be Playdough, not elastic.  We want our trials to stretch us, but not just leave us unchanged.  We want to be stretched and molded into the image of God’s Son.  In order to be Playdough, we need to work to attain these characteristics: We must be steadfast in our faith; we must be intentional in our obedience to God’s instructions for us; we must allow ourselves to trust God, knowing that He will never fail us; we must recognize that God is with us even in the middle of our hard times; and we can rest on the fact that God will use our trials for His glory.  Be Playdough, my friends, and let God use the adversity in your life to make you into the perfect image of His Son.

Finding Your Way Out of the Desert

I grew up in a little farm town in South Central Kansas.  Even so, deep down I'm a city girl.  Maybe not "big city," but certainly not "roughing it in the wild," either.   I was even a Girl Scout for most of my elementary school years.  Still, I'd rather sleep under a ceiling fan than the stars and go swimming in the city pool rather than the river.

If I ever truly got lost in the wilderness, I'd be sunk.

Fortunately, surviving a spiritual desert doesn't involve lighting a fire with no matches or using the position of the sun to figure out which direction I'm going.

It does, however, involve a huge amount of persistence and tenacity.

For the past couple of days we've talked about different reasons we might end up in a spiritual desert.  Tonight I want to give you some practical steps you can take when you're in such a place that will help you to find your way out with your faith intact.

First, like I wrote in The Desert of Bad Choices, you have to find out if it is your own sin that has driven you into the desert.  It's like ruling out an empty gas tank in your car before you decide the engine is broken.  You have to start there, or nothing else you do will ever help you move forward.  So start by asking God if there is any unconfessed sin that stands between you and Him. If He reveals anything to you, confess it and receive His forgiveness.  I believe you will never fully experience God's healing waters until you do.

The next instruction I would offer is this: Keep acknowledging God as your Lord.  Even when you don't have that emotional pull, that desire rooted in your heart to worship Him, do it anyway.  Call upon your head knowledge and your previous experience that tells you God is who He says He is, even if your heart doesn't agree for the time being.

Hosea 6:3 says this:

"Let us acknowledge the Lord; let us press on to acknowledge Him.  As surely as the sun rises, He will appear; He will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth."

"Let us press on to acknowledge Him..."  This is where that tenacity comes in.  Sometimes acknowledging God in our most desolate times take intentionality and hard work.  But when we continue to faithfully acknowledge God as the Lord of our hearts and our minds and our souls and even our bodies - Lord of all that we are and all that we do - even when we aren't experiencing emotional closeness with Him, we will eventually see Him.  And when we find Him, we will find refreshment and rejuvenation just as the earth feels when the spring rains shower down on it.

Press on to acknowledge the Lord.

Keep seeking the Lord.  Don't give up and decide that He is not to be found.

David, the one called a man after God's own heart, experienced desert times.  He wrote in Psalm 61:1

"You, God are my God, earnestly I seek You.  I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water."

David's soul was thirsty for God's presence, and so he was earnestly seeking Him.

Be persistent as you keep seeking the Lord.

One way you can do this is by continuing in your spiritual disciplines.  Keep your habit of reading the Bible, praying, meditating, fasting, meeting together with believers.  If you haven't established these habits, now is a great time to start!  Let the habit bridge the gap between those times when your heart feels fully invested.  It may feel as if things become a little more ritual than heartfelt - even a bit like you're just going through the motions.  But the fact that you are continuing in the practice of nourishing yourself spiritually will keep you from withering and wasting away in the heat of your spiritual desert.

Continue to give God praise, even when you feel distant from Him.  Go back to Psalm 61.  Immediately after David declared that His soul was parched with thirst for God, He wrote this:

"I have seen You in the sanctuary and beheld Your power and Your glory.  Because Your love is better than life, my lips will glorify You.  I will praise You as long as I live, and in Your name I will lift up my hands.  I will be fully satisfied as with the riches of foods; with singing lips my mouth will praise You."

Even when David felt distant from the God he was seeking, he continued to sing praises.  He recalled the things God had revealed to him.  He reminded himself of the goodness of God.

And last, focus your heart and your mind on Jesus rather than your circumstances.  Ask Him over and over to be the light that leads you out of the wilderness.  Join with David in this prayer, found in Psalm 43:3-4 -

"Send out Your light and Your truth; let them guide me.  Let them lead me to Your holy mountain, to the place where You live.  There I will go to the altar of God, to God - the source of all my joy.  I will praise You with my harp O God, my God!"

Jesus said in John 8:12, "I am the light of the world.  Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."

And in John 14:6 He said, "I am the way and the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me."

And don't forget Jesus' promise in John 4:14 - "Those who drink the water I give them will never be thirsty again.  It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life."

Jesus is the Truth that we can cling to when we feel lost in a spiritual desert.  He is the way to the Father, He is the pillar that will lead us out of darkness and into the light of our Father's presence.  He is the One that will give us that eternal, life-giving spring of water welling up and overflowing in us.

Deserts are pretty awful places to be, on foot and in spirit.  When we're in a spiritual desert, we long for those mountain-top experiences.  We long to feel the closeness of God, to overflow with the joy of His presence.

But I believe it is in the desert where our character is truly shaped into that which more closely resembles His.  It is there that we learn to trust Him regardless of what our emotions tell us.  It is there that we learn to depend on Him for every ounce of nourishment.  It is in the desert that we learn to work hard in our pursuit of Him, and it is only by experiencing the desert that we fully understand and appreciate the cooling refreshment that His Spirit brings.

Deserts are inevitable, but not fatal.  When you find yourself in the middle of a spiritual desert, don't give up.  Keep seeking God, and trust that He will carry you through to the other side where you can sink in to the coolness of His Spirit and enjoy the refreshment that only He can bring.

In the Desert Part 2: The Desert of Adversity

Hello again, my friend.  I'm so glad you came back to walk with me another day.  This week we're talking about Deserts on My Heart.  If you're joining us for the first time, you might want to head over to this post: Deserts.  Or if you missed yesterday's post, you can find it here: The Desert of Bad Choices.
 
Today we're going to take the heat off of ourselves for a bit and look at how sometimes we end up in a spiritual desert not because of our own choices, but because of the actions of someone or something else.

People - often people we love and trust - hurt us, betray us, anger us, disappoint us.  And in the midst of these hurtful circumstances, we can sometimes find ourselves feeling cut off from God, left to deal with life on our own.

I'd like you to meet one of my favorite minor characters in the Old Testament.  I adore her story because she gave God a name that has become very dear to me: The God Who Sees Me.  Her name is Hagar.  She was the maidservant of Sarai and she was pushed into the desert by her mistress not once in her lifetime, but twice.

You see, Sarai was promised that she and her husband Abram would have a son that would one day become a great nation.  The problem was that Sarai was barren.  No babies in her foreseeable future.  And rather than wait on God to fulfill His promise in His own way, Sarai took matters into her own hands.  She offered her maidservant, Hagar, to Abram and told him to sire a child with her.

After the child was conceived, Hagar began to resent her mistress.

Can you blame her?  She didn't choose to be Abram's wife; Sarai didn't bother to ask Hagar before she gave her to Abram.  And yet she was forced to conceive and carry this child.

And then there was Sarai... She had her own basket full of resentment!  I think as she watched the belly of her maidservant swell with the child that should have been her own, Sarai began to despise the young woman.  Every milestone in Hagar's pregnancy must have been a harsh reminder of her own barrenness.  Resentment and hatred must have grown in Sarai as she watched - in her estimation - the promise God had made to her come to fruition in the womb of another woman.

And so the Scripture says that Sarai mistreated Hagar until the servant girl fled to the desert.  An angel of the Lord found her there and spoke to her, and it was then that Hagar gave God the name El Roi, the God Who Sees Me, because He saw her in the wilderness and spoke to her there.  He made a promise to her that her son would be the father of a great nation himself, and He sent her back to Abram and Sarai.

Now fast forward thirteen or fourteen years.  Hagar had returned to her mistress and had given birth to Ishmael who was now a young teenager.  God had visited Abram and made a covenant with him, changing his name to Abraham and Sarai's to Sarah.  He had fulfilled His promise to bring them a son, and Sarah bore Isaac.  Isaac was old enough to be weaned so his father held a great feast of celebration.  Ishmael, being the shining example of a fourteen year old boy, began to mock his little brother, and Sarah witnessed it.

And boy, do you wanna talk about mad!  You do NOT mess with Mama's little man!  Finally, after watching her husband interact with that other boy for more than a decade, she had a son of her own and she certainly would not tolerate such behavior.  So she marched herself over to Abraham and demanded that the boy and his mother be sent away.

I picture Abraham taking a deep breath as his wife ranted, and then letting it out in a long, slow sigh as he watched her stomp away in a huff.  And then sadly, he turned to go find his firstborn son and the boy's mother and tell them they had to leave.

Early the next morning, he gave Hagar and Ishmael some food and water and sent them on their way.  They wandered in the desert of Beersheba until their supply of water was gone.  Unable to watch her son wither and die, Hagar sat him down under a bush and walked far enough away that she couldn't see him and sat down herself.  She began to weep as she realized they were both going to die.

We do that too, don't we?  When life gets too overwhelming, when we can't seem to find our way out of the desert?  When we're hurt and alone and feeling abandoned?  I know I have days like that.

But do you know what?  God didn't leave Hagar and Ishmael to die in the desert.  He heard them crying and He called out to them.  Even though they weren't crying out to Him - they were just wallowing in their sorrow - He heard them and He cared for them.  He spoke to them.  The first time God spoke to Hagar in the desert, she named Him El Roi.  I think the second time God spoke to her in the desert, she recognized the voice of her El Roi and she knew she was safe in His care, even in the wilderness.  And when He told her to get up and go back to her son, she didn't argue or tell Him why it was no use.  She simply obeyed.

And it was then that God opened her eyes so she could see the water well He had provided, full of life-giving water to sustain herself and her son.

Sometimes we are sentenced to spend time in the desert not because of our own sins or our own wanderings, but because someone or something else pushes us there.  Perhaps a spouse betrays us, a child rebels, a friend gossips.  Maybe someone we love lost their life far too soon, or we lost a job and don't know how we'll put food on the table.  Maybe someone we looked up to as a spiritual leader betrayed us.

Or if you're like me, maybe the pressures of life just get so burdensome that you can't find a way out from under them.

So many painful circumstances that we endure in our lifetime can push us to a place where we feel alone, separated from God.

Hopeless.

Be we, like Hagar, are never alone in the desert, even if we can't hear or feel the presence of God.  We are never without hope.  Isaiah 41:17 says,

"The poor and needy search for water, but there is none; their tongues are parched with thirst.  But I the Lord will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them.  I will open up rivers for them on the high plateaus.  I will give them fountains of water in the valleys.  I will fill the desert with pools of water.  Rivers fed by springs will flow across the parched ground."

Hagar survived her time in the desert because God provided for her, and He will do the same for us.  When we listen for His voice and obey when He speaks, God is faithful to provide.  He will flood our thirsty souls with His presence and satisfy our longing for Him.

Jesus said in John 4:14, "Those who drink the water I give them will never be thirsty again.  It becomes a fresh, bubbling spring within them, giving them eternal life."  When we find ourselves in a spiritual desert, we can trust that Jesus will provide His life-giving water for our souls.  We can know that He won't allow us to wither and die in the heat of the sun.

There is a God Who Sees Us, an El Roi, who will rescue us in the desert.  Trust Him.  Know you are safe with Him.  Wait for Him.

Tomorrow, we get practical and talk about some things we can do to find our way out of a spiritual desert.  Hope you'll come back and talk with me some more!

In the Desert Part 1: The Desert of Bad Choices

Yesterday we talked about spiritual deserts, about how sometimes our faith begins to look a little like the Sahara.  (If you missed it, start here: Deserts.)

A spiritual desert is a pretty difficult place to be, and one that we'd rather pass through as quickly as possible.  It's certainly not a place we'd like to linger.

Let me give you fair warning: the way out of the desert is not often an easy road to tread. 

But it is a road that you will be glad you traveled once you're back in the mountains.

So let's put on our walking shoes and get moving.

When we find ourselves lost in a spiritual desert, I believe there's one place that we have to start or we will never find our way out.  We have to start with ourselves.

Sometimes we find ourselves in a spiritual desert because of our own bad choices.  Our own sin.  While it is true that nothing in all of creation can come between us and God, I do believe that our sin can.  Sin stands as a barrier between our hearts and God, preventing fellowship and communion with Him.  Until we remove that barrier, nothing we do or say will ever move us out of the desert.  Sin will instead sentence us to wander in the desert, unable to experience the live-giving presence of God and the blessings He has planned for us.

We see this most clearly demonstrated in the book of Numbers.  After rescuing the Israelites from slavery in Egypt and proving His power by defeating the Egyptian army, God asked that one man from each tribe of Israel spy out the land He promised to give them.  He promised that He would enable and equip His people to conquer Canaan and it's ungodly inhabitants, and yet ten of the spies came back and convinced the people that what God had promised them they could do, could not in fact be done.

The people even went so far as to cry out that they wished they could return to Egypt.  After God rescued them there!

And so, because of their sin, God made His chosen people wander in the desert for forty years.  Numbers 14:34 record these words spoken by God to the people of Israel: "For forty years...you will suffer for your sins and know what it is like to have me against you."  In Numbers 32 we read that the entire generation of people had to die before any of God's people were allowed out of the desert.

The good news is that we aren't sentenced to die in the wilderness like the Israelites.  Acts 3:19 tells us that when we repent of our sins, when we confess them before God, they will be wiped away.  Literally, they will be erased.  Gone.  No trace of them left.

And once we have repented of our sins and they have been wiped away, the Scripture says the Lord will bring us a time of refreshment.  The Greek word for refreshment (anapsyxis) carries with it the idea of relief of cooling.

Like sitting down in your air-conditioned living room with a glass of iced tea or lemonade after spending a hot July afternoon in your garden.

Ahhh...  Can you feel it?  How good it feels to get out of the sun and to feel that cool air on your face?

Not only does God erase the sin that stands between us and Him, but He also provides relief from the heat of the desert sun.  He soothes our parched souls with the water of His presence.

Pretty amazing, don't you think?

So the first thing we need to do when we find ourselves in this figurative desert is to ask God if there is any unconfessed sin in our life that is standing between us and Him, and then listen to what He says in response.  He might show us in the form of a picture or a memory, or He might speak words that seem nearly audible.  Maybe He'll speak directly to our heart.  However He tells us, once He reveals any sin in our life, we must confess it to Him.  We need to confess our desire to have that sin removed from us and ask Him to receive it.

Don't wander in the desert because you don't want to own up to your own bad choices. Don't let guilt or pride or stubbornness convince you to hold on to your sins.  Confess them before the Lord!  I believe you will never fully experience God's healing waters until you do this.

See, I warned you that this might not be an easy road to walk.  But hang with me, my friend, because it will be worth every step.  In the end, when you can sink into the coolness of God's presence and rest your weary soul, you will be ever so glad you took this journey.

Tomorrow: The Desert of Adversity

Deserts

When I think of a desert, I usually picture something like this:

Or maybe something like this:

No matter which desert you're thinking of, one thing is consistent: deserts are dry.  Whether they're hot or cold (yes, I learned that there are even cold deserts!), sandy or rocky, in Africa or North America, every desert on this earth is dry.

But have you ever thought that sometimes a desert looks more like this?

In this kind of desert it is a person's soul that is dry rather than the climate.  It is a place where we find ourselves beaten by the winds of discouragement and scorched by the cruelty of our world.  It is a place where we thirst for renewal and refreshment in God's presence, but sometimes we just can't seem to find Him.

A spiritual desert is a difficult place to be, and if you've ever found yourself in one you know that life can start to feel a little hopeless.

As if you will die of thirst before it is ever quenched.

King David knew what it was like to be in a desert.  He wrote these words in Psalm 61:1 -- 

You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water.

Can you relate?  Do you know what it feels like for your spirit to be parched with thirst for His presence?

I know I do.  I know I've had times when God has seemed so very distant, where it feels like I can't take one more step without Him and yet no matter how hard I try, my heart can't find Him.

Hopeless.

And yet I am able to write this today because God has proven again and again that we are never, ever without hope.  No matter how desolate life feels, our God still reigns.  Even when we feel so very distant from our Heavenly Father, we can be assured that we will never be completely separated from Him.  Romans 8:35-39 assures us that nothing in all of creation can separate us from the love of God, which is in Jesus.  And when our spirits long for the cooling water of His presence, we can draw on His promise in Isaiah 43:20 ~ I will make rivers in the dry wasteland where my people can be refreshed.

A spiritual desert does not have to be a place where our faith shrivels and dies.

Instead, it can be a place where our faith is made stronger, where our character is shaped more fully into that of our Father.  A place we learn to work hard in our pursuit of God. 

Over the next few days I'm going to share a couple of posts with you that talk about spiritual deserts.  We're going to talk about why we end up there, and how we can find our way out safely on the other side.  I hope you will journey with me.

See you tomorrow.

Marathon Parenting

Once upon a time I was working my way toward becoming a long distance runner.  After the birth of my fourth child I decided it was time to get in shape, and my best friend convinced me to start running with her. Eventually she convinced me to run a 5K race with her.  I thought she was crazy, but I agreed to do it and so we started training.

The first few weeks of training were miserable.  We would start to jog and immediately my lungs would start screaming at me.  With gasping breaths I begged Kathy to let me stop.  But she wouldn't do it.  She pushed me to make it to the end of the block, and then to the next mailbox.  Every day the goals got a little farther apart and she pushed me to run a little bit harder.  After what felt like months (but was probably only weeks) she was cheering me on as I finished my first mile.  Soon we were running side by side on the treadmills at the gym and I was the one encouraging her to go one more minute, to finish one more quarter mile.  By the time we ran the 5K, she urged me to run on without her, and I completed the 3.1 miles several minutes ahead of her.  One thing is for sure: I could never have accomplished any of it without her support.

Training for that race was hard work.  It was exhausting and painful, and sometimes I just wanted to give up.

I've been thinking this week how much my job as a parent is like training for that race.

It's exhausting and it's certainly not easy.  Sometimes it's discouraging and downright heartbreaking.  There are times when I pray with desperate, gasping breaths, begging God for a break.  Times when I am weary and feel unable to take one more step, let alone go another mile.

And God reminds me: this race we're running, it's not just a 5K.  The finish line is not waiting three miles down the road.

No, the race we're running as parents is definitely a marathon.  And lest I become even more discouraged, He reminded me of this:

...but those who hope in the Lord
    will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
    they will run and not grow weary,
    they will walk and not be faint.

~Isaiah 40:31

The hardest work of parenting, I think, isn't teaching my children the difference between right or wrong, or even teaching them to be nice to their siblings.  The most difficult part of parenting is consistently and diligently shaping their character so that it reflects the character of God.  It is enforcing Godly boundaries even when my children don't seem to respond with anything but disdain for me when I do.  It is waiting on God and trusting Him to form the hearts of these precious young people in His own time.

I want the race to be over after just a few miles, with a quick sprint to the finish line.

God says it takes a lifetime.

I don't think I can run this race.

But God says I can, and here's how:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us,  fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before Him He endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.  Consider Him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. ~ Hebrews 12:1-3

Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful.     ~ Hebrews 10:23

When Kathy and I first began training for our race, she would pick out a mailbox or a street sign down the road and push me to make it at least that far. As I was running I would fix my gaze on that goal, determined to make it without giving up.  That goal - that mailbox or sign post - gave me hope.  Without it, I stared ahead at what seemed like an endless road that I knew I couldn't conquer.  

Jesus is my goal, my hope in this parenting marathon.  When I'm feeling overwhelmed by the road ahead of me, it's because I've taken my eyes off of Him and focused instead on the challenges and difficulties of being a parent.  When I am weary and want to quit, it's time to realign my heart and mind so that they are fixed on my Savior.  In Him I will find the energy and strength to press forward.  He is my hope that I will make it to the finish line, and He will be faithful to see me through.

I'm no marathon runner.  In fact, I'm not even a 5K runner any more.  But I am the parent of four very special people who need me to press on in this race.  Even if they don't understand or appreciate how I'm running it, they need me to keep on.

And so I will continue putting one foot in front of the other, eyes and heart fixed on Jesus, determined to go the distance.

Crock-Pot Marriage

It's been almost a year now since I entered the work force full time after having been a stay-at-home mom for more than a decade.  It has been a challenge to continue taking care of my husband and four kids the way I want to, stay involved in the life of my church family, and put in 40+ hours a week as a bank teller.  It has been exhausting and thrilling and full of life lessons.

One thing I have learned is to let go of some things.

Things like the housecleaning.  My kiddos have all learned to do chores.  I've learned to let their best effort be good enough, even though the work may not be done the way I would have done it.

Things like meal planning and prep.  When I stayed at home with my babies, I loved to cook and almost always had a balanced, home-cooked meal on the table by 5:00 in the evening.  Now I have become quite proficient at throwing something in the crock-pot on my lunch hour in the hopes that it will be edible at some point before bedtime.

I love my crock-pot recipes.  They're quick to assemble and then I can just walk away and let the appliance do all the work.

I was thinking today how nice it would be if relationships worked the same way.  Especially marriages.  Wouldn't it be nice if we could just find a mate with the right "ingredients" and then just let the marriage simmer for a few decades?

Alas, it is not to be.  No, marriages take a more hands-on approach for sure.  And although there are hundreds of articles out there that tell you otherwise, there really isn't even a fail-proof recipe, no step-by-step instructions to follow that will guarantee the success of your marriage relationship.

Which is ironic, considering the title of one of my previous posts, The Recipe For Love.

I do believe, however, that the Bible gives us the basic ingredients.

Mark 12:30 tells us to love the Lord with our heart, soul, mind and strength.  I believe this tells us that were were created to love in four very distinct and significant ways:
We love with our hearts...emotionally.
We love with our souls...spiritually.
We love with our minds...cognitively or intellectually.
We love with our strength...physically.

These four "ingredients" - emotional love, spiritual love, intellectual love, and physical love - are the basis for lasting and fulfilling marriage.  But they aren't simple ingredients that we can just toss into the relationship and then walk away.  We have to tend to them, sometimes stirring them gently and other times kneading them with a firm hand.  It takes work to make these ingredients come together into something delicious and satisfying.

In the coming weeks I will address each ingredient individually.  I will talk about what it means to love your spouse emotionally, spiritually, intellectually and physically.  I will give some practical suggestions.  I will open the Word and show you how God loves His own bride, the church, in each of these ways.  And I hope you will be encouraged to love your spouse a little more deeply, and little more fully.

Let's save the crock-pots for dinner and learn to be a gourmet chef when it comes to our marriages.

Link: Love...With All Your Heart

Why I Don't Like Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day is just a few days away.  Have you made your plans yet for that special "someone" in your life?  Do you have your mushy, we're-so-perfect-for-each-other card all signed and ready to go?  Are you prepared to feel gloriously and giddy in love for a day?

Confession: I don't really like Valentine's Day.  (Sorry, Honey.)

In fact, some years I'd prefer just to skip it altogether.

It might have something to do with the fact that my first and last children have birthdays just before and after Valentine's Day, so I'm always too preoccupied with plans to celebrate those instead of focusing on my husband.  I'm usually exhausted and just a little crabby by the time February 14th rolls around.

But really, I think it has more to do with the fact that I simply cannot manufacture lovey-dovey, over-the-top romantic feelings just because the calendar tells me I should.

Don't get me wrong, I adore my husband.  I love him with all my heart.  Every day. 

Even when I don't like him very much.

I think I just heard you gasp.  "What?  Did you just put it in writing that you don't always like your husband?"

Well, YES.

Some days he makes me crazy.  And I do the same to him!  It's OKAY!  It's part of spending your entire adult life with someone.  Some days you can't get enough of him (or her), and some days you're ready to send him away on a vacation...by himself!

Why?  Because no matter how much you love a person, that person never was and never will be perfect.  And neither will you.  The key is learning to be okay with that reality.

Like so many other people, when Scott and I got married, I had grand visions of how perfectly happy we would be together.  We would live in complete harmony every day.  No conflict, no friction, just bliss.  We would truly be the very first "perfect couple."

This misguided vision assumed a couple of things.  First, that I would bring no flaws into the marriage with me.  Apparently there was nothing objectionable about me, nothing Scott should ever find fault with.  And if there was anything objectionable about Scott, he should quickly alter it so as to meet my expectations.  It also assumed that in each other, Scott and I would find everything we would ever need to be happy and fulfilled.

We say things to each other when we're in love, absurd things that we then print in Valentine's Day and Anniversary cards.  Things like, "you complete me," and "you're perfect for me."

It has been a hard lesson for me to learn that I will never be able to "complete" my husband, nor will he do that for me.  No matter how much we love each other and no matter how hard we want it to be true, our spouses cannot fulfill every need in our lives.  They just can't.

They weren't meant to.

Because the only place we will ever find completion is in Christ. (Check out Colossians 2:9-10.)

And when we expect our spouse to do the work in us that only Jesus can do, we set them up for failure.  We create an environment for our marriage where brokenness and imperfections aren't allowed.  Our spouse is no longer "safe" to bring his humanness, his flaws, to the relationship and know that he will still be loved.  And we carry the pretense that we, ourselves, bring nothing but perfection to the table, thus leaving a good portion of ourselves outside in the cold.

Intimacy - true emotional, spiritual intimacy - cannot take place when we will not or cannot bring our whole person safely into the marriage.

Thankfully, God is teaching me a new reality for marriage.

The truth is, my husband will stumble.  Because he is human, because sin too often finds a way to seep in, because we still function in a broken world.  Because this side of heaven, my husband will never be perfect.

And neither will I.  I will fail more times than I would like to imagine or admit.

But the reality that I am learning to live in is one where it's okay for Scott to be imperfect. It's okay for me to admit that I have flaws.  We can even expect each other to have faults, to experience failures.  And we can decide to love each other, faults and all.  Not in spite of our failures, but through our failures.  As Casting Crowns puts it, we can be "broken together."

I cannot describe to you how I felt the day this truth crystallized in my mind.  (But I'm gonna try!)  It was like stepping outside into the sun after being trapped inside for a week, like leaving the office on Friday evening before a week of vacation.  I imagine it was something like my teacher-husband feels on the first day of summer break.  Freedom!

Suddenly I didn't feel confined by the need to make my husband conform to my ideals. Nor did I want to pretend that I am always right or even always lovable.  Suddenly it felt safe to be real.  And it felt really great to know that I can bring all my imperfections to my marriage and that I can invite my husband to do the same, and that together as one flesh we can do life together.  We can help each other through the hard times and celebrate with one another through the good.

This, my friends is LOVE.

(By the way, this isn't as new of a concept as I make it out to be.  Check out what Paul had to say on the subject in Colossians 3:12-15.)

So, back to Valentine's Day.  I'm still not a fan of the so-called "holiday," and I just can't bring myself to buy Scott some cheesy, sentimental card.  But I am looking forward to spending some quality time with him.  And I may have something a little silly-romantic up my sleeve.

Maybe.

(Love you, Scott. :) )

I.HATE.MONDAYS

"I.HATE.MONDAYS."

My ten-year-old son grumbled those words to me a couple of weeks back when I shook him and told him it was time to get out of bed.  I've gotta say...I agree.

I.HATE.MONDAYS, TOO.

Have you ever had a day like the one I did today?

It was a Monday in every stereotypical fashion, full of disappointments and frustrations, stresses and challenges.  Nothing earth-shattering or life-changing.  Just an accumulation of small things that made me want to come home, crawl in my bed and pull the covers up over my face. 

And then stay there until Friday.

I'm tempted to wallow in my failures, to walk away from the challenges instead of finding a way to conquer them, to complain to God about how hard my day has been, to villainize the people who added to my stress.

Or maybe just hide from them and hope they all go away.

Life doesn't work that way, though.  At least not the kind of life that I am called to in Christ.

When I wallow in my struggles, when I roll around in them and let them cover up all that is good in myself or in my life, I give them far too much control over my emotions and my self-esteem.  I give these negative experiences authority that they don't deserve; I give my shortcomings the power to define who I am.  I have to be purposeful in reminding myself that I am not defined by my failures, but by the grace that God has poured out on me through His Son, Jesus.  1 John 3:1 says, "See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!"

I am more than my mess-ups.  I am a child of the God of the Universe, and I am loved mightily by Him.

When I walk away from the challenges that life throws at me, I walk away from opportunities to allow God's power to reign in and through me.  I deny the Holy Spirit the chance to guide me and stretch me, to mold me into a woman that more closely resembles Himself.  I also confess with my actions that I have little faith in the power of my Savior.  In Philippians 4:13 - an often quoted verse - Paul claims that through Christ he can endure any situation, no matter how challenging.  When I give up because circumstances get a little uncomfortable or intimidating, it's as if I perceive the situation to be bigger than my God.

When I complain to God about the stress of my day, do I take into consideration all the blessings that have been wedged in between the irritations? (James 1:2 even describes trials as a blessing because they create in us maturity of faith and character!)  Do I look around at the people in my little world who are truly suffering in BIG ways, just to put my own troubles into perspective?  Am I honestly following Paul's instructions in Philippians 4:8 that teach us how to focus our thoughts on good and lovely things?  Or those in 1 Thessalonians 5 that tell us to give thanks in every circumstance? 

I think not.

And when I tell my husband about all the awful people that I encountered through the day, when I recount all the many offenses I've endured... 
 
Well, now I've set myself up as the judge, the one worthy of defining the worth and position of someone else.  James 4:11-12 says, "Do not speak evil against one another, brothers. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?"

Yes, who am I to judge?  Instead, Jesus Himself instructs me to do this: "But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you..." (Matthew 5:44)

Sigh.

Can't I just stay under the covers and hide?  

In John 10:10 Jesus declares that He has come to bring us life "to the full."  Somehow I don't think hiding beneath my pillow is the kind of full life that He was speaking of.

A full life has many ups and downs, even when we're walking with Jesus the entire way.  The difference He creates isn't an absence of frustrations or failures, but a different way of handling them.  We can be confident - even in the face of our own shortcomings - that we are valuable and loved members of God's family.  We can depend on the power of the Holy Spirit to help us thrive in any challenging situation, and even see it as a blessing along the way.  And those awful people who we just want to cut to shreds with our words...they become instead the object of our prayers.

Life does look a little different from that perspective, doesn't it?  Maybe Mondays don't have to be so rotten after all.

I'm still hoping for a better day tomorrow...

A Tribute To My Dad

Today is Father's Day.  Being the fabulous daughter that I am, I neglected to do so much as send a card to my dad.  What use is a card, anyway?  It expresses my supposed thoughts towards my dad, only in someone else's words.  And after it sits on a counter or desk somewhere for a couple of days it just goes in the trash, anyway. 

Thinking that my own words might do a better job of articulating how I feel about my dad, I opted to share them here.

If you haven't had the pleasure of knowing my dad, I must say that the loss truly is yours.  My dad is an amazing man.  No, he's not rich or famous or even overly charismatic.  Meeting him won't leave you stunned and speechless.

But knowing him will bless your life incredibly.

When people ask me about my dad, I smile as I recall the many days we spent in the backyard throwing a softball back and forth.  How many times did he have to let himself out through the gate to retrieve a ball I had launched over the fence?  And then there was the day he was trying to teach me how to pitch...

I'm sure he must have been angry about that broken window, but I truly don't remember.

I remember riding behind him on the motorcycle, feeling the world rush by yet knowing I was completely safe with him controlling the bike.

SAFE.

Yes, my dad was always my safe place.  Whether I was hurt or scared or sick, my daddy's lap was the safest place in the world.  I can even remember curling up against him on the couch as a teenager when I had taken too much antibiotic and my stomach felt like it was trying out for the Olympic gymnastics team.  And then there were the times that I knew I had messed up, when I knew I was in TROUBLE.  Still, my dad was a safe place to turn, to confess my wrongdoing.  There was no fortress on earth as safe as my dad's presence.

But the one thing I always tell people about my dad when they ask is this:  My dad has been, and still continues to be, the best living example of Jesus that I have ever met.  I have watched him give and give and give of himself to the people around him, never asking for anything in return.  I have watched him grieve when his children are hurting.  He has walked with integrity and righteousness, and expected my brother and me to do the same.  I have felt his wrath when I have stepped out of line, but always, always felt the forgiveness and acceptance along with the punishment.  He has pointed me to our Heavenly Father with his words and actions alike.

My dad will never write a book or deliver a sermon filled with eloquent words.  That's just not who he is.  But my dad has painted a picture of Jesus with his life that - to me - is beyond parallel.

Thank you, Dad, for loving Jesus enough to be Him in my life.  Love you.

A New Name

Photo Credit: http://eq5.net/narnia/fourchildren.html

Last week was Spring Break for our family, so the kiddos got to stay up a little later at night and sleep a little later in the morning.  Since we had a few extra minutes in the evenings that weren't filled with choosing clothes for the next morning or finishing up homework, I decided to spend extra time reading to my three youngest kids each night.  (My thirteen year-old seems to think he's outgrown this kind of thing...)  We started the book The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis.

It's one of my favorites and I've read it to all four of my kids now.

But no matter how many times I read that wonderful story, when I come to the chapter when the White Witch kills Aslan, I can barely continue reading out loud because my throat tightens and my eyes fill to the brim with tears.

And I have a rule: No matter what time of evening it is, we absolutely CANNOT stop with that chapter.  We simply must read on to hear how Aslan defeats the evil and comes back to life, stronger than ever.

Such a beautiful retelling of how our Savior, Jesus, defeated our enemy and rose from the grave.

But that's not the only part that gets me.

Every time I read the chapter that describes how Aslan crowns the four children as Kings and Queens of Narnia, and then a few pages over where Lewis tells of the new names the Narnians have given their royal family, the tears just can't be held back.

Peter the Magnificent.  Susan the Gentle.  Edmund the Just.  And Lucy the Valiant.

New names describing their character as Kings and Queens of Narnia.  Character that was developed only after their very close and very personal encounter with the one High King, Aslan.

Names are important, you know.  Names in the Bible were often chosen for their meaning, sometimes because of a specific promise regarding the child, sometimes because of how the parents felt regarding the birth of said child.  Several times God bestowed new names on His children because He had a new purpose for their life.

The story of Jacob lately has captivated my mind because of what God did when He changed his name to Israel.  I mentioned in my last post, Wrestling With God, how the Lord changed Jacob's name -- which meant "deceiver" -- to Israel, which meant "one who persevered with God."  From that point on this man was no longer called or known by his weakness -- the sin of deception; now he would be known for his strength -- holding on to God.

We once had a name that bespoke our character: Sinner.  Romans 3:23 says that we have all sinned.  But the day we entered into a covenant relationship with Jesus, He gave us a new name: Beloved.  And He shared even His own name with us: CHRISTian.

We were once known for our weakness: our sin.

Now we are known for our strength: Christ.

When Satan tries to call you by your old name, remind him that you no longer answer to it.  Remind him of what we are told in Ephesians 1:13 -- that God has identified us as HIS by placing His own Spirit within us.

The name "Sinner" no longer applies.

My friend, you have been given a beautiful new name by the King of Kings.  No, you are probably not a King or Queen in this world, but you are the child of the King.  He has crowned you as His royal prince (or princess!) and has named you according to the purpose He has for you.  No longer shall you bow your head in defeat, but you shall raise your head in triumph as you carry His Son, the Christ, into the world.

Go, and wear your name well Christian!