Roller Coasters of Life

Okay, so sometimes I think our God has a warped sense of humor. Here I am, four months pregnant (read: emotionally insane), currently without a place to call home, and on an adventure with my amazing husband to find a job since he happened to find out that he was laid off from work the same week we found out we were going to have a baby. Oh goodness, have the last few months been a ROLLER COASTER! (Did I mention that I HATE roller coasters?) They make me feel like I am going to throw up and have a heart attack at the same time...and that was before I was pregnant!

So over the past few months I have been mad at God, sad at God, joyful that he is the one in charge, and confused at what the heck he is doing. On good days I have felt peace in his sovereignty and a deep sense that he is my provider and will provide the things that are most important--even if they don't match up with my list of what's important. The thing is, as I am learning to be real with God about what I am feeling, I sense his pleasure in my honesty. I felt blocked in my relationship with God for a while, and once I finally stopped feeling sorry for myself long enough to let God know that I felt hurt and alone, he reminded me that he was right there with me through each up and down.

Thank you God that you NEVER let go. Holding onto this truth has helped me weather so many storms! I am growing and learning so much through this time of uncertainty. And each day God provides someone or something to remind me that this is a really cool time...I can't lean on my own understanding or depend on myself. I have to trust God and depend on Him to meet my needs. I might sound semi-delusional but honestly, there is something really neat about that!

So today must be one of those good days because I can say with integrity and truth, here's to the adventure! Keep them coming God, because I am finding that when you have me in uncomfortable situations I see your open arms more clearly. And there is nothing to do but jump into them.

He Never Lets Go

Wow, some weeks are so loopy I don't know whether I want to laugh or cry...I think my husband must think I am insane! Thankfully, he has chosen to love me through better...or worse. And some weeks...the weeks I think we might need to buy flood insurance due to my overabundance of tear-duct action...I am really glad we threw in that "for worse" part. I am so thankful for my husband's unconditional love and support...yet even more so I am stunned and amazed at my God's unconditional love and support. In the darkest of hours when I wonder if I will ever again see the light of the sun or feel the warmth of its rays, He is not far off. My prayer this morning was, "God, please bring spring soon!" and my heart ached not just for the physical and tangible signs of spring but for a spring of the soul. I was aching for the dark days of winter to come to an end, longing for new blossoms to spring up in my heart and for my soul to gush forth with springs of fresh water, thawed from its winter hibernation. Oh the picture of it stirs me to the very core! I have a longing and an anticipation so strong for God to bring life to my half-frozen spirit! And I know He will! But...I have to pause for a minute and accept the season I am in right now as one I can learn and grow from as well. I was watching "The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe" earlier today and was reminded of the line from C.S. Lewis's acclaimed novel that in Narnia there was a season where it was "Always winter and never Christmas". Hmm...I can resonate with that feeling. For me it hasn't lasted forever, but there are seasons when it feels like the winters of my soul are long and dark and never-ending and all I want is to see the buds of spring. That is where my heart is at this very moment, and yet I feel in my chest that God is saying, "Don't rush into spring so fast that you disregard the gifts I have left you in winter. There will be a time for spring, do not fear, but I am with you in winter's dark days to hold and protect and guide you...let me." Thank you Jesus. Thank you that you are with me through all seasons and all storms. Thank you for reminders of your love and grace along the way. Thank you that you give me a remnant of hope when I need it most and hold my hand when I want to give up. Thank you for cheerleaders on this earth, and thank you that when the cheers are muffled by the noise of the chaos around me you never let go.

Fresh Artistry

See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.

~Isaiah 43:19

There is something about the new year that gives me butterflies! Am I alone in this? It's like there is this fresh new canvas and newly bought paints and at this moment anything is possible. It amazes me that in reality, our God says that each day is a new canvas that has been washed clean by His blood. Each day we can submit ourselves to be washed clean by the One who knows how we got each bruise and gash and scar. I am humbled and amazed that the King of Kings would deign to get on his hands and knees and wash the dirt that has been caked on our lives. What's more, he doesn't just wash the dirt that others have thrown at us or bind only the wounds that have been caused by those around us, he just as willingly and just as gently washes each gash that is there because of our own doing. Maybe it was caused by bad judgment, maybe we intentionally walked down a path we knew would have thorns but chose to go anyway...whatever the reason for our wounds, our God looks into our souls with those gentle eyes and scrubs us clean, binds us up, and makes us whole. How could we not want to give Him our whole lives?

This January I have been thinking about what I want the new year to look like. For starters, I love this Isaiah 43 verse...in fact all of Isaiah 43 stirs up something in my heart that says, "Yes! Bring it on!" There is something so powerful and empowering about these truths that God speaks, "Forget the former things, do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing...I am making a way in the wilderness." God wants us to accept His gift of a fresh canvas and new paints. He wants us to join him in the epic adventure of seeking him and living life with him. It is not forced on us, we could go our own way and continue to wander around in the desert. We could seek fulfilment in whatever we think might bring life...but we will not find it. We could stay locked in our closets of bitterness and anger, refusing to believe that anything good could be made of our circumstances. And if we do, we will continue to believe that and continue to wither. Or, we could step into trust and believe that there is newness and there is life and there is purpose beyond what we can see. That is my choice this new year. And by choosing that, by choosing Jesus, I have shed the weight of all the extra baggage that built up over the last year. Let God find a home for all that...maybe there is a dumpsite on the outskirts of heaven that he deposits the junk we are ready to let go. So go ahead God, take it all away so that I have the energy to laugh and love and live for you. I am ready for you to start a colorful creation on the fresh canvas of my life. Just make sure when you have completed it God, to sign it with your name.



Trusting in the Fog

"He is in our tomorrows, and it is tomorrow that fills people with fear. Yet God is already there. All the tomorows of our life have to pass through Him before they can get to us." ~F.B. Meyer

Jesus, sometimes it is hard for me to trust that you are in my today...let alone my tomorrow. I know in my head that you are here...but if I am going to be honest, sometimes my heart, well, it doubts. Thank you for the reminder that you not only plan my paths but you also stand at the finish line and cheer me on. Someday, on a day ordained by you God,  I will run that last stretch, through the finish line of grace and into your outstretched arms. Until that day, may you help me God, to live each day for you, and with you. Thank you. ~

Why are we so afraid of pain, of discomfort, of having things not work out according to our plan? It is such a human thing, fear, and yet how much lighter might we feel if we actually did take the burden off of our shoulders and lay it at the foot of the cross? A butterfly has to go through much pain, groaning, and travail if it is to become the georgeous creation it was intended to be. We too must accept the pain, suffering, and anguish, if we are to become the sure-footed, confidant in our God, graceful, hopeful, and at peace beings that we were created to be. Romans 8:18 says that our light and momentary sufferings--though they seem to be great--are nothing at all compared to the glory God wants to reveal in us. Yet so many churches, books, and sermons skirt around the issue of pain and suffering because it makes us uncomfortable. I too, so often sidestep discussions of pain because, I confess, there is a part of me that fears that it "won't make God look good". As if He is not a big enough God to take care of Himself? Am I so great that I should step in and be His liason? He has called me to be His ambassador, yes, and yet the expectation would be that I speak truth--not that I butter the truth up and cover it in sugar. His way is always best.

There is a story, told by Homera Homer-Dixon, which can be found in the devotional Streams in the Desert: A child of God was once overwhelmed by a number of afflictions tormenting her. As she walked past a vineyard during the rich glow of autumn she noticed its untrimmed appearance and the abundant number of leaves still on the vine. The entire scene appeared unkept. While she pondered the sight, the heavenly gardener whispered this, "My dear child, are you questioning the number of trials in your life? Rememer the vineyard and learn from it. The gardener stops pruning and trimming the vine only when he expects nothing more from the vine during that season. He leaves it alone because its fruitfulnes is gone and further effort now would yield no profit. Do you now want me to stop pruning your life? Shall I leave you alone? Then her comforted heart cried, "No!"

It is so often in the midst of the fog and the rain, when trees are crashing around me and I am soaked to the bone that I am finally able to cry from the depth of my being, "God, I need you!" And He answers. It is not always through a ceasing of rain, as I might have hoped, but He shows that He is there and that He will be there through whatever storms life might bring. Admittedly, there are times that I find myself in the midst of a storm and all I can do is scream at Him, "I don't want this! Not this...anything but this!" Like an angry child, my wounded heart wants to cry, "I hate you! Leave me alone! You don't understand!" And yet He is the parent who's love never fails--He understands our pain and even allows for it to be directed at Him. We can be real with him.

I don't know what the future holds...Job wasn't expecting his whole world to be turned upside down in the blink of an eye, but it was. What I do know, and the only thing I can cling to, is that God is real, God is near, and God's love never fails. May I remember that when the storms come, the skies grow dark, and I lose sight of everything I know to be true. God is God, and I belong to Him. 

God, My Princess Shoes Aren't Fitting Right!

Swirling skirts and dancing shoes, sparkly tiarras and painted nails--the stuff of a little girl's dreams. When I was a young girl, all I needed for a day of adventure was my big black trunk full of dress-up clothes and a few pieces of my mom's makeup. I was set! I was a beautiful princess, and was loved and admired by the whole land! Big poofy dresses with tights and shiny shoes and I was the luckiest girl alive!

And then came junior high. Acne and uncontrollable hair snuffed out my dreams of being a beautiful princess. What had I been thinking? I was more like the ugly stepsister! So into the garage went the twirly dresses and pretty shoes. Out came big baggy sweatshirts, ponytails, and anything I could get my hands on to cover up the fact that I was not a princess after all. My goal became to be "the invisible girl". The dramatic saga of junior high friendships and who-is-friends-with-who today was the last straw. I knew it, I was ugly, unloved, and worthless.

High school came along and with it the awareness that wearing less clothes meant more attention from the fellas. My fragile ego slowly began to shrug off the baggy sweatshirts and replace them with provocative and way-too-revealing clothing (should those really be in the shorts section...I think maybe they are supposed to go in the underwear section...there can't be enough material there to be considered shorts!) The new wardrobe appeared to work...I had the eye of several males--but quickly learned that having their eye was not having their heart, and my heart was not what they were looking at!

The young girl who had been a beautiful and confident princess had been lost. Where was she? Who was she? She had been loved and worthy of love. She had been beautiful and full of life. She had known who she was and, even though she didn't know anything about God at the time, she had, in a way, had a sense of WHO'S she was as well. She knew that she was worth something. And then, along the way, somehow...she forgot. Just as many women forget, and live a lifetime of trying to either earn love or hide from it.

But the truth of who I was, under all of this hiding or flaunting, did not change. The truth is that I was made in the image of God. The truth is that He created me and knit me together while I was still in the womb! Think of those knitting club members--they put hours and hours of work into creating a masterpiece of color and craftsmanship...just as our God has put His time and energy into creating each one of us, His masterpiece. So many many times us women live like we are scrap material, worthy of being thrown in the trash, or at best maybe we could be thrown in the scrap pile until some use might be found for us. Daughters of God, this is not so! Our destiny does not lie in worthlessness, nor does it lie in being used for somebody else's gain. Our destiny is far closer to what we used to believe about ourselves. That we are princesses. That we are royalty.

"All glorious is the princess within her chamber; her gown is interwoven with gold. In embroidered garments she is led to the king...led in with joy and gladness"(Psalm 45:13, 14a, 15a) This princess is you! She is me! She is each one of us hand-crafted and beautiful women who is being led toward her King--toward her God. Imagine a bride on her wedding day, glowing and radiant--she is the reason everybody stands when the wedding march starts, and her Lover is the one who awaits her at the alter. Your lover awaits you at the alter as well. Your God stands longingly, seeing your beauty and gloriousness--you are His bride! 

We may know this in our minds, but so often this truth does not make the journey into the depths of our hearts. We can hear that we are valued, loved, and sought by our God...but sometimes we don't see it playing out in our lives quite the way we imagined it. Hurtful things are said or done by those who were supposed to protect us, grief and loss smack us across the face when we least expect it and we are left with numbness and pain. The day-to-day sameness of life and stressors of just trying to survive overwhelm our sense of purpose and identity...and we are lost at sea with amnesia. We don't remember that we are princesses, we may even roll our eyes and scoff at the idea, we just need to get through the day!

Even so, our God waits. Scattered throughout the Old Testament, God asks His people, "How long?" Through Moses, God asks Pharoah, "How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me?" (Exodus 10:3) To Moses God asks, "How long will you refuse to keep my commandments and instructions?" (Exodus 16:28) In Numbers 14:27 God asks, "How long will this wicked community grumble against me?" And in Joshua, God lays it on the young man's heart to ask the people how long they will wait before they enter the land that God has given them. There are numerous other accounts of God waiting on His people and hoping that they will choose Him over their own fears, anxieties, or selfish agenda.

The question then is, will you? Will you choose Him even though you cannot see beyond the hour and do not know what your day will hold? Will you choose Him and believe that you are more than you believe about yourself? Will you choose Him and begin to live as the princess you were created to be? I must confess that I have many days I still forget whose I am--in fact, sometimes months go by and I feel much more like a dust-covered peasant woman than anything resembling royalty. And sometimes life gets so overwhelming that I would much rather wear a big baggy sweatshirt and tuck my head in it like a turtle than hold my head high and choose to believe that God will get me through the storm. It is a journey, learning to believe that we are daughters of the King. It is an adventure, seeking out God's truth in the chaos of our lives and believing in spite of all that we see, that God is not holding out on us and that we are being sought after.

Our Jesus' love is so intense for us, that He gave His very life so we could become His bride. His love was as strong as death, His love conquers anything that we can throw at it--whether it be infidelity, self-protection, pride, our own gain, or apathy. Our God's love burns like a blazing fire and nothing can put it out. No storm can drown it and no monsoon can wash it away. Nothing can overcome and nothing can compare to the love that is in Christ Jesus, to the love that God desires to pour on you as His bride. So may we drop our fears and failure, drop our "wish I could be more..." and our "why is life so hard" and accept the hand of our Jesus. He is waiting.

"Place me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm; for love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave. It burns like blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot wash it away. If one were to give all the wealth of his house for love, it would be utterly scorned." ~Song of Songs 8:6-7 

Far To Easily Pleased

What is the purpose of desire? Is it put in us by the Creator or is it something that is born of our self-centered focus? Through it, do we honor God? Or through it, do we spit in His face? C.S. Lewis writes, in The Weight of Glory, "Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinate joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at sea. We are far too easily pleased."

My heart resounds with that message. Yes! We are far too easily pleased. Yes! We spend our energy and time either pursuing or trying our hardest to abstain from drink, sex, ambition, and all that is considered "worldly". Whether it is in the pursuit or refrain from such things, it is so half-hearted! Why do those who don't know God point their fingers and shake their heads at followers of Jesus? It is because we have so often missed the mark of what it means to live Christ and have become adept and checking off a list of do's and don't. Is that what being a follower of Christ has come to? Is it a list? There has to be more. My entire being aches for there to be more!

If my desire is something I try to suppress, than I am missing the purpose of what God hopes for me, what He has planned for me. We were made for desire. We were made to be more than half-hearted beings. We were made to live a life of passion and desire and reckless abandon. God created that ability within us because He knew that it was only in the act of handing that desire back to Him that we would be overcome by Him. Elizabeth Elliot writes, in her book Passion and Purity that it is not in the erradication of our desires that we will find a life pleasing to God, but it is in the submission of our desires to God. "How would we learn to submit to the authority of Christ," she asks, "if we have nothing to submit?" In our true desire, our desire for the One who created within us the ability to burn with desire, we find true fulfilment. It is in pouring our all into that--into Jesus Christ--that we will find a purpose.

The catch is that often our half-hearted desires are for silly things that have no lasting value. We throw ourselves into whims because they give us a moment's pleasure. And we don't see that over the horizon life is so much more full! What is the object of our desire? WHO is the object of our desire? "Whom have I in heaven but you? Earth has nothing I desire apart from you!" (Psalm 73:25) Each and every desire we have apart from God is just a shadow of what true fulfillment can be. We are so often like the church in Laodicia whom God speaks to in Revelation 3:14-22. We are neither hot nor cold, we have no passion and our desires are lukewarm. We go about our days doing this and not doing that, making and spending money, trying to keep an even keel. And our God says, "Is this what I came for? Don't you thirst for more, deep down? Are you fulfilled by stuff or by checklists or by looking like you have things together?"

I for one will shout loudly, "No!" I for one will stand up and say that my desires are so often too weak. I am far too easily pleased. But the thing is, I am not even really pleased because I know that this is not what Christ came for. This is not what I was created for. Yet somehow I have lost sight that my God has created me to be passionate, desirous of Him, a woman of lived-out faith! It stirs something deep within my soul that has been sleeping. Awake, my soul! Stop sleep-walking through your life! If and when there are true desires that tear at the soul, let us pour those desires out as a fragrant offering before our God and see what He will do. He is a God who longs to do more than give us temporal pleasures. He is a God who longs to bring us to a place where we trust Him enough with the most difficult things in our lives to say, "Yes God, I even give you this." It is there that He will meet us every time.

This Fickle Heart of Mine Belongs to You

"If you could love me as a wife, and for my wedding gift, your life--should that be all I'd ever need? Or is there more I'm looking for?" ~Derek Webb (from the song Wedding Dress)

Something about the thought of absolutely unconditional love makes my heart soar. I love to read the stories of the broken throughout scripture, and to see God come down and wade in the mud with His people--I love to see Him wade in the mud with me. Because the truth is, as much as my heart belongs to Jesus and I want a vibrant Christ-filled life...often I find myself wading through the sewers of life and I think, "Well, this is it, God is definately not going to come for me down here. I have gone too far and become too soiled. I'm covered in the excrements of myself and those around me. I have to find my own way out of this one." And then, in the middle of my thoughts, Jesus steps up, wipes a bit of mud off my face, and takes my dirty hand saying, "Come with me." And He doesn't say it with an air of superiority or an exhasperated "of course, she's done it again" look. It is love that pours forth from His eyes and it is love that compels Him to intentionally step into the dung that we have named our own. What love is this?

I look at the stories throughout scripture that reflect this love of God and I am in awe. Consider Rahab--a prostitute in a town who detests God and His people. This woman has made some serious wealth off of selling her body and using her body for power. At first glance this is not the kind of woman you want your son to bring home...but God reveals Himself to her through two spies who come to her brothel to hide from the police, she ends up expressing faith in God and becoming the great-great (add a few more greats in there for good measure) grandmother to Jesus! Woah! (That can be found in Joshua 2-6 by the way).

As if that isn't enough of a picture of God's endless love, the book of Hosea will just about knock your socks off! God tells this man Hosea to go and marry this lady named Gomer...an adulterous woman. Right up front God is clear on the type of woman He wants for Hosea, not a sweet church-going, even-tempered woman...an unfaithful, fickle wanderer! (I might be questioning whether I had heard the voice of God accurately at that point.) Hosea goes, though, out of obedience to God, and marries Gomer. She ends up having three children and it seems a bit unclear whether these are Hosea's children or whether they are another man's children. Regardless, after these three kiddos are born she takes off, sleeps her way around, and ends up somehow basically owned by another man. At this point if I was Hosea I think I would be saying my farewells to Gomer. But he doesn't. He goes out, finds her, and pays the guy she's hooking up with so that she can go back with Hosea. Talk about a daytime soap opera! God uses this whole relationship between Hosea and Gomer to basically say to His people, "This is what you are doing to me...you are unfaithful wanderers who have sold yourself to another...and yet I am coming for you and I will buy you out of the hands you have sold yourselves into."

Can I just take a minute to pause and let that sink in. My God, who has offered everything to me, who has even given His life for me...my Jesus will come looking for me when I become disinterested in Him and run off into the arms of whatever waits around the corner. I spit in my God's face and prostitute myself to pride, self-righteousness, busyness, lust, my own agenda, worry, hatred toward another, even thinking I can do it on my own...and God is right there in the muck with me, and He is not mad and disgusted. He is gently saying, "Please come back my love, this is no place for you--there is no love for you here from these things. Find your rest and your home in my love, come to me."

What love is this? This is the love of my Jesus, and no matter how many times I wander--my heart and my very being belong to Him. He is the washer of my dirtiness, the healer of my self-inflicted wounds, and the binder of my broken bones (usually caused from tripping over hazards that I have put in my very path). Thank you God, for being the lover of my slowly-being-healed-by-you soul. This fickle heart of mine belongs to you.

Wedding Dress Lyrics (from the albumn She Must and Shall Go Free by Derek Webb)

If you could love me as a wife, and for my wedding gift, your life--should that be all I'd ever need? Or is there more I'm looking for? And should I read between the lines, and look for blessings in disguise--to make me handsome, rich, and wise--is that really what you want? I am a whore I do confess, I put you on just like a wedding dress and I run down the aisle, I run down the aisle. I'm a prodigal with no way home, but I put you on just like a ring of gold and I run down the aisle, I run down the aisle to you. So could you love this bastard child? Though I don't trust you to provide. With one hand in a pot of gold, and the other in your side. I am so easily satisified by the call of lovers so less wild, that I would take a little cash over your very flesh and blood. Money cannot buy a husband's jealous eye when you have knowingly deceived his wife. I  am a whore I do confess, I put you on just like a wedding dress and I run down the aisle, I run down the aisle. I'm a prodigal with no way home, but I put you on just like a ring of gold and I run down the aisle, I run down the aisle to you.