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The big picture

31 Dec

Since it’s New Year’s Eve, I figured I might as well do the quintessential blog post: reminiscing about 2010 and looking forward to 2011.

2010 was a hard year for me but because of that, it was also life-changing. From March until last week, I had a job that constantly pushed me beyond my comfort zone, challenged me in ways I have never before been challenged, and forced me to run to God every day to maintain my sanity and character. I can look back on this past year and see God’s faithfulness and steadfast love everywhere.

I learned that I rely on my own ability to get things done instead of trusting in God and His timing and plan. I found that I often “feel responsible” for things and that prevents me from letting God be responsible. God showed me that my claiming responsibility is what stresses me out. I need to be faithful in what I can control but the overarching theme and thought of my life needs to be trust in God for all of the mundane, practical details, as well as the big picture items.

Work-wise, I learned that I do not do well working from home. I like an office. I like interaction with people. I like unexpected interruptions (self, remember this when they happen!). I also learned that I like change but only in the context of routine. I am much more happier doing tedious administrative tasks than I am managing big picture things. I am a details person. The job I am doing in the church office right now is exactly what I enjoy doing. (As such, I am really hoping that they hire me full-time! But more on that another time.)

Through numerous coffee dates with my good friend Cathy, I have also learned a lot about what it means to be victorious in Christ. I have made huge progress in my long struggle with loathing myself and constantly seeing sin. Through talking with Cathy, reading books, and insight from the Holy Spirit, I have seen that resting in the cross doesn’t mean I ignore my sin – it means the cross is bigger than my sin. Enjoying who God has made me to be doesn’t mean I enjoy the sins I commit – it means that I am able to trust God to conform me to Christ and unveil to me and others who I really am.

In short, as I look back on 2010, I praise God for His work in my life. I struggled, I failed, I didn’t believe, I didn’t trust, I handled situations poorly. But God brought me through it all. I honestly can say that I wouldn’t have made it without Him. The thing I love the most about going through struggles like this is very simple: when I have a good day, when I feel joyful and peaceful, I know that is from God. He is the source of that feeling. And I feel so immensely blessed by Him. I wouldn’t feel that way had I not gone through a very rough year of a lot of bad days.

As I look forward to 2011, I have to admit that I hope it is easier than 2010 was. But I also hope that God does just as much work in my life. So I will, with His help, joyfully accept whatever means God employs to bring about that sanctification.

I am hoping to find a job (whether at the church or elsewhere) that fits me well. After having a job that I pretty much hated in every aspect, I no longer underestimate what a job can do to your entire well-being. Right now, though, I am very content with working part-time at the church. I got a lot of things crossed off my To-Do List this week!

I am also hoping to write a lot. Being a writer is my dream. I just read in John Eldredge’s book Walking With God, “More often that not this awakening of desire is an invitation from God to seek what we’ve given up as lost, an invitation to try again.” So I’m going to respond to God’s invitation and try again.

Spiritually, I want to pursue an even deeper, more intimate relationship with Christ, as described in Eldredge’s book that I just read. I want to be so close to Christ that I can hear him speak to me. That I seek His opinion on every decision, that I walk with Him all day, every day. It’s a lofty goal. But a very rewarding one. And even a little progress is better than none! I also want to be more intentional about reading – I have averaged about 15 books a year for the past 3 years. I want to increase that to 25 or so. But I also don’t want to burn through books so fast that I don’t remember anything. Kind of defeats the point of reading. So 25 is a loose goal.

Emotionally, I want to be more open and vulnerable in my marriage. I just recently realized that a lot my spiritual battles this year I fought alone. I didn’t let Travis know that I was struggling so much. And when I think about why, I see pride everywhere. With God, I can admit that I’m weak and pathetic. With Travis, I can’t. I think this emotional withholding from Travis has bigger implications and effects than I can even recognize right now. So I want to grow in being vulnerable and humble with Travis.

And finally, blog-wise, I think I am going to change my blog title again. When I changed it from Learning and Loving It to Joy in Being Broken, I was in the midst of my struggle with hating myself because I was so focused on my sins and failures. I thought that God was teaching me to find joy in Him even despite hating myself. As I’ve grown and understood more truth this year, I believe that we don’t find joy in being broken – we find joy in God healing us. We are broken as sinners – we are healed as God’s beloved children. We find joy as we see the cross conquer our sinful natures, as we find freedom from the things that bind us, as we anticipate heaven and perfection.

I haven’t yet decided what my new blog title will be. I’ve thought about something like “More Than Ordinary” to reflect my desire to live a life that rises above the status quo to glorify God. I’ve also thought about something incorporating the idea of being healed through the cross or discovering truth. I’m totally open to suggestions!

All that to say, I’m excited for a new year! Happy New Year to all of you!

reminiscing

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Unfettered Joy

21 Dec

I just took my dog Katy for a walk and as I felt the sun on my face and the cool breeze on my face, I also felt something I haven’t felt in a quite a while: unfettered joy.

As I walked along the familiar streets, watching Katy’s ears cutely bounce up and down as they do, I had complete joy. As I type these words, I still have complete joy. It’s amazing!

And I know it’s from God. I’ve been reading Walking With God by John Eldredge and it has really changed the way I think about my relationship with God. There are a lot of things I could mention but I’ll just focus on one: spending time listening to God in my quiet times. When I first became a Christian, I soaked up everything I could about the Bible. I spent hours reading and studying it. I prayed little. Over the past year, I have started praying a lot more. I pray out loud most of the time – a lot of times, I do it in the car instead of listening to the radio. I still do both of those but now I’m learning to listen. To not just tell God my side of the story but to hear Him speak directly to me. (If you want to know more, read the book.)

But this morning, as I was writing about the things the book had brought to my attention about myself, I felt myself getting anxious about spending so much time with God because I had planned on starting work at 8:00 and it was now past that time. One of the thoughts Eldredge writes in his book is looking at the fruit of a thought or action in your life – you can determine where it came from (God or Satan) by looking at what the outcome is in your life. Well, the outcome of whatever I was worrying about was anxiety – definitely from Satan. So I asked God, “Why am I always anxious when I’m spending time with you in the morning?”

This what I discovered:

“Even though I have been praying more often and being mindful of God throughout the day, I have been asking God’s blessing and strength on all the things that I have undertaken. I view my life as my responsibility – I need to make it count. I view each day that way and am stressed out as a result. I need to trust God that He will get done in my life (and every day) what He wants to get done. He is the One sanctifying me. I just need to follow His lead, cooperate with what He is doing. I had made an agreement that God wouldn’t help me so I had to do it myself. I wanted so much to be holy but felt like I continued to fail, so instead of waiting on God to help me, I forged ahead and tried to make myself holy. But here’s the great part: It’s not up to me!”

This was the little dark cloud hanging over my head that wouldn’t let me have complete joy. I still thought everything was up to me. I felt responsible for everything in my life. For making it all work. For making it count. For becoming Christ-like. But now I see that I can relax and just follow Christ’s lead. He knows what I need, better than I do. He will guide me into the areas of my life that I need to work on. I just need to rest in His finished work and in His promise that He will sanctify me.

As I am experiencing this joy, I am very thankful – thankful that God has shown me He cares about my joy, cares about my understanding of what Jesus has done for me. In this process of sanctification, He isn’t helping me – I am helping Him. He is the One doing all the work – I’m just cooperating. God is awesome.

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Understanding joy

20 Dec

Yesterday in church, it dawned on me that I have been viewing my sins, failures, weaknesses and such as bigger than the Cross. I have been prevented from being joyful because while the gospel indeed is incredible, my sins and failures are still there. And in an effort to maintain mindfulness of my sinfulness, I have been living in light of my pathetic-ness, rather than in the light of the gospel of Christ’s sufficiency.

I had an idea of an illustration for this. I actually drew it and if our printer/scanner was working, I would totally scan it and insert it into this post but alas, I’ll just have to describe it. The first picture is entitled “My perception of my sin” and it’s a giant boulder and peeking around the top and sides, you can vaguely see a cross in the background. The second picture is entitled “Reality of my sin in the gospel” and it’s a giant cross, with a tiny little pebble in front of it. The gospel – Christ’s atoning death and resurrection motivated by love for me – is so much bigger than my sin, shortcomings, and failed attempts at being who God says I am.

When I stop looking at myself, I can see the lie of “You have nothing to be joyful about” for what it is. No, in my sinfulness and failures, I don’t have much to be joyful about. But when I turn and look at Jesus, I see that I have everything in the world to be joyful about. Christ is so much bigger than me! Christ’s sufficiency is enough for all of my lack. I don’t have to go through life bemoaning how much I suck. I can focus on my victorious life in Christ. The hard, tough, icky stuff doesn’t go away overnight but I can view myself as a conqueror of my old nature in Christ.

That’s something else I realized – I have been thinking that sanctification is something I need to do. I need to sanctify myself. That’s part of being a Christian, right – crucifying the old self and its fleshly desires? But 1 Thessalonians 5 says that God is the One who sanctifies us – “He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.” I have been taking the responsibility of my holiness upon myself. What a task!! No wonder I have felt overwhelmed and completely incapable!! How can one who is unholy make oneself holy? Answer: They can’t. Only Another Who is holy can make me holy.

I still feel slightly confused but I am thrilled that God has shown me that I can be completely, utterly, 110% joyful in Christ, not because I’ve achieved anything or reached my goal, but because of what Christ has done for me. The gospel is the reason for our joy. And even our sin and failures should not take that away from us.

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Who am I?

16 Dec

For the past couple of weeks, I have been thinking a lot about who I am. The job I’ve had with this race company has revealed to me that things I thought I knew about myself weren’t correct.

For instance, I thought I liked constant change because the jobs I have enjoyed most have been different every day. But this job made me realize that I only like constant change within structure – like different tasks within a 9 to 5 job. I also thought that I liked independence in my work. And I do to a certain extent but I mostly enjoy being assigned specific tasks to complete on a daily basis. I like administrative tasks. I like things that require being detail-oriented. I even enjoy tedious tasks. I did not know this.

These realizations are interesting to me because I thought I knew myself. These discoveries surprised me, which surprises me even more. It’s a weird thing, not knowing yourself. Definitely a result of the fall. While I find reassurance in the knowledge that at least God knows me, I also want to know myself.

As a Christian, I feel like this task is 1,000 times harder than it would be as an unbeliever. I am constantly wondering “Is this thing that I’m doing who I am or is it sinful?” I am at times a morbidly introspective person. I analyze everything. I can’t turn my brain off. So I feel like I have all these ideas and thoughts swirling around in my head and I can’t figure out what is truth and what is a lie, what is me and what is culture or what I think I should be.

I thought that maybe a personality test would help me figure out who I am, since my own mind is of no help. After reading my friend B’s post about personality tests, I took the Basic Personality Test. But during the test, I found myself stumped on several questions – I didn’t know the answer. They say that your first gut reaction is the right one but I didn’t have a gut reaction to either answer. “You tell me,” I wanted to say. I don’t even know myself well enough to take a personality test!

I’ve heard it said that it’s not about who you are, it’s about Whose you are. I’m not sure I entirely agree. Yes, it is a good thing to remind ourselves that God loves us, it’s His opinion that matters, and that we don’t need to be famous or important in the world’s eyes to be precious to God. But if we are supposed to become who we truly are in Christ, if we are supposed to become what we already are, it would help to know what that “what” and “who” are, specifically for us as individuals. I mean, isn’t that the point of personality tests? They’re to help you to discover what your strengths are, for the purpose of cultivating and exercising them.

I’ve always been an analytical person (or I least I think I have…), trying to figure out the meaning and purpose of things. But it feels like my brain has been on overdrive for the past 6 months. I can’t stop thinking. I can’t accept anything without understanding it first, and since there are so many thoughts in my head, I can’t think about one thing long enough to thoroughly understand it, so I can only understand things partially and therefore only accept things partially. I am left with questions and theories half-answered and half-proven, the other half a question mark hanging in the air. Just this week, after volunteering at the church, I drove home joyful from doing something I enjoyed. But I was only 99% joyful. I was fettered by something I couldn’t put my finger on. Even now, I can’t put my finger on it. There’s something unresolved. Something keeping me from being completely enjoying my reality in any certain moment or place. Something hindering the completeness of my joy.

Even my interpretation of this situation conjures up various thoughts in my head. Maybe this is the way it’s supposed to be, since we won’t have full knowledge until heaven. But the way this is makes it hard for me to have joy. Plus, I’m exhausted from thinking, analyzing, trying to figure things out. I just want to accept something and move on, for once! Maybe I’m the perpetrator of this condition – I’m the one reading books, searching for answers. I’m the one entertaining and pursuing all of these different ideas at once. I’m the one continuing the attempt to quell the voice inside of me crying out for answers. I’m the one still listening, still hoping, still yearning for truth.

I have no answers. And if your gut reaction is to say that all the answers are in the Bible, I’ll say to you that it’s not that easy. Believe me, if it were that easy, all my questions would be satisfied. Yes, the answers are in the Bible. But they’re not obvious. And the mystery of the Christian life, added to all of the lies I’ve believed, our culture’s influence, and my own habit of spiraled thinking, makes it near impossible to sort out all of the thoughts in my head.

My only hope in all of this is that God has the answers. He knows what I’m struggling through, will give me insight and clarity when I need it, and is the One who is causing me to wrestle through all of these thoughts, issues, doubts, fears, and ideas – and that for a reason. He is doing something in me. Even when it feels like I’ll never sort it all out, that I’ll never truly understand, I can rest in knowing that God knows me, God is for me, and God will lead me into truth, whenever He wills. What would I do without God?!?!?

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Imperfect is good enough.

9 Dec

Like many women, I struggle with an all-or-nothing mentality. Especially around this time of year when I feel like there is so much to do and so little time! Add to that a job I hate and a beach vacation the first week of January (who’s in bikini shape right after Christmas!?!?) and you’ve got a recipe for stress and many woe-is-me days.

I’ve been slightly on an emotional edge the past few days… ok, the past week… ok, the past month… ok, really since I knew I wanted to quit my job but couldn’t (which has been since the end of October). And I disliked my job long before that. Maybe I’m being a big baby, maybe I’m concentrating too much on the negatives, maybe I just need to buck up and stop complaining. I’m pretty sure all of those things are true. But the reality of the situation has not gone away – I have a really hard time being happy when I have a job I hate. And when I say hate, I mean that the very thought of doing any kind of work even remotely related to my job makes me cringe inside. I mean that I clock 3-4 hours a day by sheer grit and willpower, not because there’s even an inkling of enjoyment in it for me. I mean that I can be happy about something, smiling and skipping down the street, then I remember my job and dark rain clouds roll over my joy.

Anyway, take that whole situation and add in trying to care about my job just even a little, trusting God with getting a new job, making dinner for friends, wrapping presents, writing Christmas cards, mailing presents, decorating the house, being a hostess for a Christmas tea at church, getting in biking shape and all the other things I think I “should” be doing (like reading more, baking Christmas cookies, chitchatting with our neighbors, posting stuff to sell on ebay, and the other 25 things on my to-do list). Just a tad bit overwhelming.

I’m not writing all this to show how much more I do than anyone else. In fact, I’m pretty sure that most women out there are busier than I am. But I think we all have this tendency to think that we have to do it all perfectly, or we might as well do none of it. At least that’s my temptation. If I allow myself to get so overwhelmed that I can see there’s even the possibility of failure, I want to collapse in a heap on the floor and weep. “Why is life so hard?” I ask myself.

Well, because I’m making it that way. Instead of making these unrealistic standards, like I have to have Christmas decorations that look like they’re straight from Martha Stewart, or I need to healthy all day long and I’m never going to eat chocolate again, or I need to read a book a week, or I can never watch TV because that is wasting time that could be spent doing some productive, I need to remind myself that imperfection is good enough.

Instead of looking at the entire mountain of things to do and feeling completely paralyzed or depressed, I need to just take one thing, one manageable thing that I can do right then and do it. It may be as small as putting away a book. It could be doing the dishes, or accomplishing one step of Christmas cards, or reading just a couple verses from the Bible. And I’ve found that once I’ve gotten over the initial panic of “I can’t do all this!”, I get into the groove and accomplish more than I expected.

I also need to let go of this idea that everything has to be perfect. My Christmas decorations can have a quirky doesn’t-quite-go-together kind of feel. I can do the exercises at the gym that I know how to do instead of following the newest “Bikini Body in 28 Days!” routine that involves twisting, pulling, jumping, and screaming (that might just be my version). I can read a few pages of a book before falling asleep at night. I can let the dishes pile up in the sink and do them tomorrow.

At the core of all of this is a belief that God is the one who has everything under control. He is the one who makes it all happen, not me. It is also believing that these things I have decided that I “have to do” don’t add or subtract anything to His love for me. He loves me the most He ever will right now, because He loves me with the same love with which He loves His Son, Jesus. Did you know that it actually says that in the Bible? John 17:23 says …”that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.” That’s amazing.

It is Christ’s perfection that frees us to be imperfect, to be human, to not have it all together. That doesn’t mean we don’t try to do our best. It means we don’t get discouraged by failure or depressed by overwhelming odds. We should walk through this victorious, knowing that “steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord.” How I need so desperately to believe that truth in this season of my life! It is so easy to let these slight and momentary afflictions take my eyes off God and His sovereign goodness. But I mustn’t. I must keep looking to Him, trusting in Him, resting in Him. “I lift my eyes to the hills; where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.”

In the midst of the hustle and bustle of the holiday season, of the things you feel weighing you down with their urgency and importance, look to Christ and his perfection. Be content with your own unique human imperfection, remembering that “our sufficiency is from God.”

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Celebrating Christmas in Faith

5 Dec

I had a visit from the local Jehovah’s Witnesses yesterday. They were bringing around the new issue of the magazine their religious organization publishes and this one was on The Truth About Christmas. While some of their beliefs are so ridiculous that they’re actually funny, I do think that as a Christian who claims to believe the truth, I shouldn’t be opposed to reading about and understanding other religions. My experience thus far is that salvation by faith alone in grace alone continues to win (and I believe it will continue to do so).

But nevertheless, I listened to the Witnesses’ spiel about Christmas and how it should not be celebrated by Christians. They said Christ commands us to celebrate His death, not His birth. Which I have to agree that Christ did indeed command us to celebrate His death (through communion) but where I disagree is that Christ commanded us to not celebrate His birth. It isn’t in the Bible.

The next reason why they said we shouldn’t celebrate Christmas is because the magi were actually astrologers and that was a profession detestable to God. Moreover, the star of Bethlehem was actually a “sinister device of Satan” because it was used 1) to lead the wise men to Herod 2) to lead them to Christ and 3) instead of angels like God did for the shepherds. So the wise men were pawns in Satan’s grand scheme to  kill Jesus and they… were unsuccessful. I’m confused… why is that a reason we shouldn’t celebrate Christmas? And even if all that is true, why then did the magi travel 800-900 miles to see Jesus, only to worship Him and bring Him expensive gifts? The logic here is falling short, I think.

The final reason why they said we shouldn’t celebrate Christmas is because it is usually accompanied by overeating, imbibing, partying, dancing and not just giving gifts but exchanging gifts. Now, I have to agree somewhat with this statement. I do think that our secular culture does indeed take this time of year as an excuse for an endless number of holiday parties, resulting in many a person getting sloshed and stuffed. The culture also uses this time of year to keep the American marketplace in the black (Black Friday is no secret) and gift giving has become more of a “must” instead of a suggestion or option. I will give them that.

But I don’t agree that Christmas has to be celebrated that way. In fact, when Travis and I have kids, I am going to be very careful about teaching our kids the real meaning of Christmas, making sure they understand the privilege of receiving presents (and those in appropriate amounts), and not deceiving them by saying there’s a Santa. But even now when we don’t have kids, I feel that I keep the real meaning of Christmas in mind and that it’s not just about tinsel, cookies, and holiday lights (though those are great accompaniments), but it’s about Christ becoming flesh and dwelling among us – an AMAZING TRUTH!!

As a Christian who wants to live a life glorifying to God, I don’t want to just dismiss these statements by the Jehovah’s Witnesses as stupid and legalistic. If that is really what the Bible says, then I have to accept that and repent. But after study, I believe that the Bible doesn’t say anything about not celebrating Christmas (though its roots are a pagan holiday). In fact, I feel there are many verses that say it’s up to the individual and their personal convictions from the Spirit (1 Corinthians 10:23-31; Galatians 5:1; Colossians 2:16-23; 1 Timothy 4:1-5). For some Christians, it may be wrong to celebrate Christmas. They might not be able to do it in faith (“in faith” meaning they believe it is pleasing to God and have no doubts) and if they can’t, they shouldn’t. But for those of us who are focusing on the real meaning and cause of celebration of Christmas, and are doing so in faith, Christmas is a wonderful time of year that should (and can) be received with thanksgiving.

I, personally, am very thankful for this time of year and believe that celebrating Christ’s entrance into the world (and being humbled by the fact that GOD became MAN) is very pleasing to God.

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Where’s the line?

30 Nov

This past weekend when we were with Travis’ family, he made some comments about me that I didn’t appreciate (nor did I think they were true). Since we drove back, I took the liberty of bringing the biggest suitcase we own – all of my big cozy sweaters take up a lot of room! And since I can’t wear them in Denver (it’s never cold enough), I figured that I might as well bring them back to Minnesota where it was cold enough.

Well, apparently this just proved to Travis something he had suspected all along – I am your typical woman packer. You’ve seen her at the airport. 5 suitcases and a tote bag that all match. She has to put them on the dolly because there are too many to carry. You wonder as she walks by “Why on earth does she need that much luggage? I hope she’s moving somewhere for several years.”

Ok, I can guarantee that I’m not that bad. I am actually able to carry on my suitcase for 99% of the flights we go on now (Mexico in January will be an exception). I leave my beauty products at home when they are bigger than 3 oz. I plan on wearing the same pair of pants more than once (gasp!). I bring one pair of shoes that will go with everything I packed (and usually try to keep all my clothes to either a goes-with-brown or a goes-with-black palette). I’m being creative so that I can carry on and please Travis. Do I not deserve some credit here?

[For the record, Travis does acknowledge and appreciate my efforts to carry on my luggage for flights. The comments he makes are playful in nature.]

Another comment that Travis made was when he was going through some clothes that no longer fit his younger (by 10 years!) brother, that his mom thought would fit Travis. “I need some more work shirts,” he said, “because Kathy keeps throwing mine away.” Now, that comment would probably irritate me even if it were true, but the thing is, it’s NOT! I have not thrown away even ONE of Travis’ work shirts and honestly, I have no idea where that comment even came from. Whatever, DEAR.

This blog is not a husband rant. Rather, these funny situations have highlighted a few things for me. One, I continue to struggle with the idea of being misunderstood. These comments that Travis makes are, from his perspective, all in good fun and aren’t intended to be criticizing, mean or derogatory. But I struggle with taking them in stride. Not because I think Travis really thinks that I’m materialistic or am on a warpath against his work shirts but because they are contradictory to who I think I am.

You see, I can’t handle being labeled materialistic. Mostly because I believe that I am not materialistic. Or at least I’m trying hard enough to not be materialistic that I think I’ve earned getting rid of that label. Ok, so maybe in contrast to Travis, I am slightly materialistic. But he drools over tools the same way I drool over new sweaters. Just saying…

Nonetheless, I have identified myself as “not materialistic.” I have also identified myself as supporting my husband’s ruggedness, which means dirty work shirts, tattered jeans, and shoes with holes in them. I just won’t support him in public. 😉

So Travis’ comments bother me because I feel like I’m being misunderstood. That’s not how I really am! I have to prove to you that I’m not like that! But that is not the way of Christ – He allowed people to form wrong impressions of Him. He knew who He was and didn’t need other people to understand Him.

His comments have also shown me another instance of where there is a fine line between an action being in faith and an action being a sin. Travis isn’t the only person who makes comments like that. I know someone else who likes to point out idiosyncrasies and quirky behaviors in front of other people… me.

I’ve been known to rib Travis about his attire selections or preferences. Or about something stupid he did. Or his hair. Or his hobo socks. Any of his quirks have been fair game.

But there is a line. I have to say that sometimes I make jokes at Travis’ expense because I’m actually a little bit mad or annoyed at him. Or I secretly hope that somehow, my comment will get him to change. Or I need other people to understand that I did NOT let my husband out of the house dressed that way. In short, those jokes often come out of lack of respect for Travis – and that is unacceptable.

I’ve often felt like my jokes go over the line – and I’ve asked Travis if it bothers him. He has repeatedly said no, that he actually thinks they’re kind of funny. But they just don’t sit right with me. And when I brought up my struggle with the comments that Travis made this past weekend about me, he seemed surprised that they bothered me so much (especially since I make those kind of jokes about him right back).

Which shows me that while I do believe Travis can make those jokes in faith (he is a chronic jokester, after all), I cannot. I want our marriage to faithfully represent the love of Christ for His church and am not sure that my witty comments about Trav’s mullet haircut serve that purpose. If Travis thinks joking about my need to match my shoes to my shirt can represent that love, more power to him (and more grace to me!). But, as with a lot of things in the Christian life, there’s a line between good, clean fun and sin masquerading as a joke.

So where is that line? What is ok to joke about, and what isn’t? How much time should you spend doing things for other people, and how much time should you spend on yourself? What about money – how much should you keep and how much should you give away? How much time should you spend at your job? How much time should you spend getting ready in the morning? What size of house should you have? How new of a car?

All of these are amoral things in and of themselves – and no matter how much I read and study, I cannot find any concrete criteria to answer these questions.

That’s because there is none. If the Christian life had rules, it would cease to be based in freedom. If God didn’t give us choices, we couldn’t choose to love Him over worldly things. The line between freedom and sin is a thin one, one wrought by the Spirit in our hearts. Sin is indicated by the Spirit’s conviction in our hearts. Freedom is characterized by joy. I keep looking for the line, asking God to just tell me already what He wants from me.

God is telling me what He wants. The absence of a concrete line is God’s way of telling me that He wants a relationship with me, instead of me just obeying a bunch of rules. Since there is no determined criteria, I have to stay in tune with the Spirit through an intimate relationship with God and let my heart and convictions indicate to me where the line is for me.

So, to stay on the freedom side of the line, I am going to respond to the Spirit’s conviction and try to stop poking fun at Travis in front of other people. I want to respect him and support him, no matter how ridiculous or silly I think he is! Like I mentioned in a recent blog post, I am also going to stop shopping for myself, since the Spirit has convicted me that I have an inordinate amount of clothing. I am also praying for the grace to respond to other convictions given by the Spirit.

Here’s to walking the line!

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Changing “I can’t” to “I can”

19 Nov

The title to this blog post might sound like some self-help mumbo jumbo but let me assure you it’s not. I rejoice that this is a real spiritual truth. The statement might be the same in either case but the basis behind the idea is completely different. With self-help, you chant this mantra to yourself, trying to change the way you approach life without any solid reason to expect life to be any different. Nothing guarantees things will change once you start to “look on the bright side of things.” (Optimism only gets you so far.)

But with God, this is a profound life-changing realization.

Let me explain:

This past Wednesday, I had my job interview at our church (I’m applying to work in the office). I learned that they are going to announce the open positions at the church meeting this Sunday to see if anyone else is interested and are hoping to make a decision in time for the new person to start at the beginning of the year. Which means I am going to have to keep working my current job for potentially the next month and a half.

My first reaction upon learning this was no different than my reaction when I first heard that YCS was willing to keep me on until the end of December: “I can’t handle another 2 months of this job! I need out NOW!”

In the past few weeks, I have noticed that I think this kind of thing a lot. When presented with a task that I’d rather not do, whether it be cleaning the house or making dinner, I think, “I just can’t do that right now. I don’t have the energy for it. I’m so tired.” When confronted with my own sin, and feeling like a failure yet again, I think, “I can’t be a good Christian. I can’t be loving and selfless. I’m never going to be the kind of person I want to be.”

This defeatist mentality is sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy. The more I feel like a failure, the more I fail – because I don’t believe that I have the power to change. I am just a victim of myself. And if God doesn’t magically change me, I’m doomed to being this way the rest of my life.

But that was not the way the Apostle Paul approached things. He had the same frustration with his flesh – “For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out” (Romans 7:18). Paul was frustrated at his inability to do what he wanted to do, but he recognized that there was a separation between his true self and his flesh. His true self delighted in the law of God but his flesh was waging war against his spirit and making him captive to the law of sin.

I have been trapped there. The sins and failures of my flesh have been making me a captive, robbing me of my understanding of God and the gospel. I have fallen prey to the lie that it is not just my flesh committing those sins – it’s me. I am the bad person, the failure, the hopeless sinner. There is nothing good in me, period. These lies pull me down into a dark pit, the light of God’s glory and love growing continually dimmer and smaller. “Who will rescue me, liberate me, free me from this body of death?”

The glorious answer is, Christ! Christ rescues me, liberates me, frees me from myself. From my sins, my failures, and my mistakes. Moreover, He not only forgives me and wipes my slate clean, He also gives me a new spirit and a new heart, enabling me to conquer my sin and live a victorious life. Now, in Christ, I can say that I am not a constant failure. I don’t have to question my every motive and intention – because I am redeemed, I have good desires. I love God. I delight in the law of God. I am a godly woman. I am a loving person. I am selfless and sacrificing. I, the chosen and beloved, am being conformed to the image of Christ.

I learned recently that because these things are all God’s will for me, I can pray for them with authority – meaning, I can ask in prayer and believe that I have received them (James 1:5). God will not withhold His love, His patience, His wisdom from me. “No good thing does He withhold from those who walk uprightly” (Psalm 84:11).

It has helped me immensely to see the power available to me through the Spirit because of Christ’s resurrection. His death provided salvation – His resurrection now provides the power for sanctification. Instead of being riddled with thoughts about how “I can’t” be the person I want to be, I now live in the power that I CAN change, I CAN be the person God has called me to be, I CAN live for His glory and make Him proud. I have the same power living in me that raised Christ from the dead!!

While I still believe that God doesn’t want us to feel good about ourselves apart from Christ (because we would be deceiving ourselves into thinking we don’t need a Savior), I do believe that as redeemed children of God, we are called to feel positive, hopeful and encouraged about who we are in Christ. After all, it doesn’t seem right that we should constantly loathe and despise the temple of the Holy Spirit. If God loves us as He sees us in Christ, we should love ourselves in Christ.

Christ Himself uses victory as motivation for perseverance: “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). Just like Christ’s triumph over evil should give us hope despite evil in the world, our new natures in Christ should give us hope despite our sinful flesh. Because we are guaranteed progress in the Christian life if we so desire it, because we have the resurrection power of the Holy Spirit aiding our efforts, we should be all the more motivated to strive after godliness and holiness.

“And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord'” (1 Corinthians 1:30).

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Seeing through the lies

5 Nov

This week started off rough. I was still struggling with not liking my job and feeling too disinterested and exhausted to do anything besides eke out some work and then read or watch TV. Naturally, I felt guilty at this lack of productivity – “just one more way I suck,” I thought.

After women’s group on Wednesday, I drove home crying. I just couldn’t understand why I felt so tired and lethargic. Why I couldn’t even muster up the strength to hope in God or have faith that things would get better. I had hit rock bottom and couldn’t do anything but stay there, calling out to God for Him to rescue me.

Well, no surprise, He did. Yesterday morning, I read Philippians 3:12-14 where Paul talks about not being perfect but pressing on, forgetting what lies behind and straining toward what lies ahead. I realized that I have been drowning in discouragement and despair because I have been focusing on my failures, resulting in either feelings of defeat or self-pity.

I have been believing lies in pretty much every area of my life:

When I see something I haven’t done, Satan takes that failure and says “See? You’ll never change. You just suck too much.”

He uses my stress to say “See? You can’t handle this. It’d be easier to just give up and watch TV all day instead.”

Satan takes my desire for rest and relaxation, turns it into feelings of laziness and says  “See? This is all you’re good at. Look at how much other people accomplish – you’re pathetic.”

Satan takes my spirit’s desire for Christ-likeness and says “Don’t even try. It’ll never happen. You’re incapable of living that way.”

Satan takes any glimmer of hope or joy and snuffs it out saying “That doesn’t make any difference – look at all the other areas in your life right now that suck. You have absolutely no reason to be happy or hopeful.”

And even after recognizing this yesterday morning, and feeling hopeful that I can finally combat these negative emotions because I know the root and cause of them, Satan says “You can’t fight this. You’re too weak, too tired, too pathetic. You disgust me.”

These lies are so subtle because they’re based in truth. I am incapable of changing and being like Christ in and of myself. I have failed to live the life I feel God has called me to. But I can’t stay there and focus on that. I have to move on, to focus on what I can now be in Christ, what He makes me capable of.

These are some of the truths I am using to combat these lies:

1. I am not hopeless or without hope – GOD is my hope.

2. I am indeed powerless to change myself but GOD IS NOT – He is for me and is working in me according to His perfect will.

3. My past failures have nothing to say about my present worth or future potential – only the CROSS of Christ does.

4. I am free to enjoy life and find joy in God and His blessings because I am freed from my sin and failures. “The glory of God is man fully alive.”

These truths have helped me see that when I snap at Travis, instead of beating myself up and lamenting that I’ll never be a good wife, I need to turn to God in prayer, acknowledge that I sinned and ask Him to give me grace to be a better wife.  I need to have faith in God to make me be who He says I can be in His Son, and not dwell on all the ways I don’t measure up. I can find motivation and energy to fight against sin and for joy in the victory that Christ has already won against sin and death. I am fighting a winning battle. There is guaranteed victory, and even guaranteed progress.

I am still working through the implications of these truths and I’m sure I won’t be completely free from the temptation to believe the lies for a while. They had pervaded practically every facet of my life. But Christ dwells in my heart through faith so I have confidence that He will give me the grace to believe His truths and to fight for joy.

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Happiness is from God.

18 Oct

Yesterday, I would have had reason for being frustrated. Travis’ mom, dad and brother are out here for elk hunting and I, for the 3rd year in a row, have to miss the majority of their stay because of work. This year, I had to leave on Sunday morning in order to leave for Vegas – we’re putting on our last race of the season, Pumpkinman, this coming Saturday. I am SO ready for this season to be over and to have some time to relax and not feel the temptation to be stressed out.

But yesterday, as we were driving through the mountains on I-70, I couldn’t help but feel joy at the beauty and freshness of the fall day. Granted, it’s still in the 60s, even in the mountains, but it’s about as near fall as Colorado gets at this time of year.

As I felt that joy, that lightness of spirit, that hope in the future and rest in the present, I realized that I had not had that feeling in a VERY long time. And it dawned on me: joy is from the Lord. I do not have joy in this life, I do not have rest, peace, or hope, without Jesus working it in me. I can finally thank the Lord for all the trials and dark nights I have gone through in the past year because I see now that I do not have hope or joy in this life if it isn’t in the Lord.

A similar thing happened to me in my marriage. During our first year, I grew very bitter toward Travis due to a long stretch of misunderstandings and different affection styles. I was often dismayed and broken over my lack of love for Travis. What I had though would be an exciting time of life was really just… HARD. And while I remained committed to Travis and our marriage, I didn’t feel love for him.

Thanks to God and His work in my life, that has changed immensely. I am more in love with Travis now than I was when we got married and I now recognize that the love I feel for him is totally a gift from God. I do not have love in my heart naturally, not in the face of trials, struggles, frustrations and annoyances. Like in the song, Jesus My Only Hope: “Though I am dry and barren, By grace this love springs forth.” But it took me going through that period of dryness, of lovelessness, to recognize that my love for my husband is totally from God.

It’s good for God to redirect my focus like this – from looking into my own heart and wondering why it’s so barren, from looking at my circumstances and wondering why they don’t make me feel blessed, from looking at others who seem so happy and wondering why I can’t be more like them – to HIM. God is my joy. God is my meaning and reason for living. God is my strength. God is my help. God is my planner. God is my life.

I can finally notice the changing colors on the trees and bask in the sunshine and crisp fall air while finding joy in the little things of life because I am trusting God with the bigger things. Like my friend Katie Stromwall said, “He gets glory through our trust.” If I am truly desiring to glorify God with my life, I will trust Him.

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