the worship of heartbreak ...

so i was journaling during service today, and not exactly paying full attention to the sermon. sorry steve :)

during worship, a lot of the songs were about praising God in the midst of trials, and i was thinking about how i’ve really been enjoying a time of relative calm. but at the same time i noted a sense of detachment. don’t get me wrong - i’m incredibly grateful, but i wasn’t jumping for joy on the inside like i should be. as i looked around me, surrounded by all these amazing friends - and couples - my eyes filled with tears and i quickly realized what was going on. sometimes, being alone just sucks.

it’s amazing how full, and yet how full of longing a heart can be at the same time. as i’ve talked to friends about the difficulties of joining two lives together, and watched a friend who is a little older than i am prepare for her own marriage, i’m seeing how it becomes harder to incorporate someone else into your life the longer you wait.

right about the time that i had this thought, one of the elders got up and shared a quote from john newton, the end of which is “i’m not what i once was.”

the bottom line is that God’s timing is perfect. if He’s asking you to wait, then it’s for a reason. if He’s asking you to wait on a relationship later than when it would be ‘easier’ from a practical standpoint, then there’s a work that needs to be completed first. for me, i know that God has been healing things that would have made a relationship very challenging. (of course i know there will still be challenges, but it’s always advantageous to go in with the fewest number of foreseeable difficulties.)

in the meantime, God has shown me Himself in the relationships He has placed in my life. and He is showing and growing His desires for me in a mate through those relationships. unfortunately, it almost makes it hurt worse - having something so good and tasting something so close - yet not having the complete fulfillment.

i don’t really have a resolution for these thoughts tonight, other than this. i was feeling a bit guilty about not being tuned into the sermon. but i was listening enough for God to highlight one of the scriptures.

“true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. the Father is looking for those who will worship Him that way.” (John 4:23)

God asks that we worship Him from our spirit, and in complete honesty. just like the samaritan woman from the same chapter of john, He knows our hearts and He knows our stories. He just wants us to come to Him for the water that will bring life to our souls. i know therein lies the resolution for my deepest longings ... sometimes it just takes some time for that water to makes its way down through the cracks in my heart.

so i really was paying attention. to the sermon that God had for me. can’t beat that :)

let them fail ...

excuse me while i step up onto my soapbox for a few minutes. within a 24-hour period, i had two conversations and watched one movie that highlighted our society’s increasing desire to make life easy for its children. this sounds like a noble cause. but at what cost?

the trend was just beginning to grow in popularity when i was in high school. my graduating class was the first without a valedictorian speech, a decision that irked my friends and i to no end. and it’s only gotten worse since then. heaven forbid we acknowledge extraordinary achievement at the risk of making the rest of us feel less able.

we don’t use red pens. we don’t cross out wrong answers. and zeroes definitely aren’t permissible. everyone gets as many chances as it takes to avoid looking like a failure. everyone makes the team. and parents are ever-ready to come to their child’s rescue at the slightest hint of difficulty.

because, of course, we know that in the real world no one ever fails. everyone always wins. everyone is the same. and life is definitely fair.

the movie i watched was about the life of helen keller. after she went deaf and blind, her parents felt so bad for her that they didn’t enforce any limits or discipline. her father just couldn’t handle seeing his daughter cry. then they hired annie sullivan. she knew that it would take hard work - and a lot of tears - for helen to learn. to grow. to become an adult.

what disservice are we doing our children when we shield them from the inevitable pain of life. they’re going to learn that life is not fair. we can only protect them for so long. and the longer we try to protect them, the more harsh the wake-up call is going to be.

james 1:2-4 says that we should “consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”

it says when, not if, we face trials. if we teach our children to avoid, instead of embrace, the trials that WILL come their way, then they’re not going to develop perseverance. when they go out into the world, they will be immature and incomplete, lacking the tools they need to fend for themselves.

just think about all the things that helen keller never would have accomplished if she had never been allowed to experience pain - never challenged to learn and function as a member of society. just think about all the things that our children will never accomplish if we don’t allow them to experience the pain of failure and unfairness.

the thing about learning from your mistakes, is that you have to actually make them in order to learn from them. do we believe our children are strong enough ... are we strong enough ... to let them make their own mistakes?

choosing to choose ...

a friend and i were chatting about the journey of ‘figuring it out‘ within the context of relationship, and i was reminded of this journal entry from several years ago. (yes, that means i’m cheating, but i think it is relevant right now for many people i know, and bears repeating.)

the beauty of love is “giving someone else a safe place in which to grow.” what greater love than that of God, as outlined in John 1.

1How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. 2Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is … 11This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another … 16This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers … 18Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. 19This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence.

We know that we belong to the truth and our hearts can rest in His presence when our actions are guided by love, by a genuine laying down of our lives. This call to sacrifice ourselves, our identities, is pretty scary … until we remember that we are children of God and that our true identities will only be revealed when He is revealed.

My head is trying to figure out how all this plays into happily-ever-after. In the days of arranged marriages, I’m sure there were many not-so-happy women, but they still chose to love. That’s pretty convicting in today’s society. We get to pick, and we still choose not to love the one’s we have chosen. This just goes to highlight the fact that maybe it’s not about happiness or comfort or even a feeling.

What?!? Love NOT a feeling?!?

Yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s about a commitment, a covenant.

We’re blessed that we get to let the feeling of love play a part in our decision. Or maybe it’s a curse, because we so confuse the feeling of love for the calling of love that when the former is gone, we believe the calling has been removed, or wonder if we missed it in the first place. What if the feeling is what is supposed to result from our answer to the calling?

And since we’ve strayed from the days of arranged marriages, how does one now go about choosing? Perhaps the key lies in that word … it is not in the choice, but in the choosing once the choice has been made. You choose to choose to love the person you chose every day and it is, in that, that happiness, comfort, and the feelings of love are found.

God in 'sex & the city' - part 3

in my final installment, carrie calls her boyfriend to apologize after.

Okay, well, um … I just wanted to say that I’m sorry. This is hard. 

We’re going to run into stuff that’s hard. That’s why I was trying to help. 

Well, I know. I know that. But if you start helping me, and then I get used to having that help …

Yeah …

Well … No good can come of that. I mean, then what happens when, you know, you’re not around one day? 

Where am I going?

Well I don’t know. You could be out of town. Or you could be busy. Or things fall apart. We could fall apart.

I know that.

Well then what?

Then I guess we’d be a couple of sad Macs.

*Laughs*
After all, computers crash, people die, relationships fall apart. The best we can do is breathe, and reboot. And when that fails, a little gizmo called a zip drive can provide a surprising amount of comfort. So can a boyfriend, if you can learn to let him.

one of the biggest lessons i’ve been learning lately is that hard stuff and change is okay. sure, that seems like a no-brainer, but when you haven’t had the greatest experiences of dealing with the hard stuff in relationships, the idea of facing it and walking through it and coming out on the other side still together is pretty revolutionary. and when every change felt like your world being turned upside down, it takes a while to understand that different isn’t bad ... it’s just different.

if you’re in relationship with people (aka if you’re alive), then hard stuff is going to happen and things aren’t going to stay the same forever. but that doesn’t mean you should avoid relationship for the sake of avoiding hard stuff or change. relationship involves letting others in and being willing to accept their help. it takes a lot of trust to put your hand into the hand of another. that means learning to walk through the hard stuff together. and it also means being okay if they’re not there someday, for whatever reason, to hold your hand anymore.

neither one is easy. but it makes us stronger.

it makes us stronger to rely on others.

two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: if either of them falls down, one can help the other up. but pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. but how can one keep warm alone? though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. (ecclesiastes 4: 9-12)

and it makes us stronger to have a firm foundation in times of change.

God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging. (psalm 46: 1-2)

so breathe. reboot. remember your foundation. and make the most out of the moments that you have.

God in 'sex & the city' - part 2

well, i have now written every day for over three weeks straight. and more in one month than in the previous two years combined. God. is. good.

in celebration, here is my second installment of “God in ‘sex and the city’”.

carrie returns to the computer store, only to discover that all they could recover from her hard drive was a bunch of gobbledegook (ps. i will have you know that my word processor just recognized that word!). she, of course, is devastated.

And here’s what we could recover from your hard drive …

(There it was. My past. It was a mess.)

Now, we can replace your motherboard. But you HAVE to get yourself a backup system … Start saving. Next time you won’t lose everything.

writing is my longest and deepest passion. i asked for writing homework in kindergarten. i had a story published in 2nd grade. i wrote poetry prolifically in 5th and 6th grade. i even enjoyed using papers as a way to express my beliefs in junior high, high school and college. but somewhere along the way i lost sight of the love that had been placed within me. writing had been my voice, and i was allowing myself to be silenced.

that silence gave satan a lot of room to start talking, and as i started listening, i - like the israelites - quickly forgot so much of what God had given me throughout the years - truths, promises, insights. and also like the israelites, forgetting = wandering. time and time again, i was sidetracked, sideways, and ultimately sidelined in my relationships with others, with God, and with His plans for me.

in the past few months, i felt God challenging me to start looking back through my journals at all the things He had done and said ... and finally start doing something with them. through Bible study, what people shared at church and prayed over me ... and ‘sex and the city’ ... i knew that God was drawing a line in the sand.

it was now or never.

if i didn’t put a backup system into place, i was headed for a full-on crash. but if i started saving, then the next time satan started trying to speak his lies, i wouldn’t lose everything like i had so many times before. i don’t know where this journey is taking me. so often i have let the not knowing keep me from doing anything at all. but now all i know is that i just need to be faithful in the one step that has been placed before me.

what has God said to and done for you in the past that you may have forgotten along the way? when presented yet again with the dilemma of not having enough bread, the disciples doubted, forgetting the miracles that Jesus had already performed.

do you not yet see or understand? do you have a hardened heart? HAVING EYES, DO YOU NOT SEE? AND HAVING EARS, DO YOU NOT HEAR? and do you not remember? (mark 8:18)

don’t allow a lack of memory to keep you from operating in the fulness of what God has for you.

for we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them. (ephesians 2:10)

clean slates ...

one of my favorite things about my job is a child’s incredible ability to wipe the slate clean.

yesterday ended in a full-on battle of the wills with one of my kiddos, and him screaming at the top of his lungs that i was no longer his friend. today was probably the best day we’ve had yet.

1 corinthians 13:5 & 7 says that love “is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. it always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

at what age do we start keeping score? when do the offenses start piling up so high that we can’t get past them quite so easily? how do we get to the place of no longer being able to look at our current circumstances without first putting them through the filter of past experiences? why do we make others pay for our own sins and mistakes, fears and scars, or those of someone else?

when do we stop loving the way that God created us to love? the way that He loves us?

as far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. (psalm 103:12)

He has removed our transgressions from us. what right have we to hold another’s transgressions against them?

the faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. great is His faithfulness; His mercies begin afresh each morning. (lamentations 3:22-23)

i cannot tell you how incredibly thankful i am for this promise - to know that when i wake up my slate is wiped clean and that God is ready and waiting to make this our best day yet. He doesn’t remember the bad things that happened yesterday, and neither should we. and because He doesn’t remember, He also won’t remind us of them. He only wants us to come to Him with a completely clear conscience and climb in His lap, just like a child coming to her daddy, not letting fear or shame hinder our relationship.

but Jesus called the children to Him and said, “let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” (luke 18:16-17)

the kingdom of God is a clean slate, and God’s love is the great eraser. as we go through a day, our slates may get marked up, but God’s love is right behind to wipe them clean. and because of His love in us, we have also been given an eraser to wipe away the marks left by other people.

this could be your best day yet. will you start wiping?

God in 'sex & the city' - part 1

i have a confession.

my name is christine and i like reruns of ‘sex and the city’.

don’t judge.

i watch them on tbs, so they are much more tame than the original hbo version. that’s not to say i will give it a glowing, family-friendly endorsement. but i cannot tell you how many times i have turned on an episode, only to have it speak to whatever i’m dealing with at the time. what can i say, when carrie slips into writer mode, she has some really wise and insightful things to offer. plus, she’s a writer, so it has that added draw.

about 6 weeks ago, i was having a really difficult week and flipped on the tv to help me focus on my work (aka distract me from what was going on in my head). i landed in the middle of an episode of ‘sex & the city’, and within 5 minutes it addressed every single one of the issues i had been fighting with all night.

everyone got a kick out of my resulting facebook status. “nothing like an episode of ‘sex & the city’ to provide a rhema word.” i figure that if God could speak through balaam’s donkey, He can speak through anything.

thank God for my friend’s dvr so i could press pause and copy down the dialogue. there was a lot of good material, so i’ll just include the first part tonight. carrie’s computer had crashed and she was fighting with her boyfriend over not having backed it up.

I have my own system. It works just fine.

*Laughs* Oh, yeah right! You sure about that?

Yeah, I am. I’m not ready for a new computer ... My whole life was on that computer.

Oh I get it. It’s all you. I’m not a part of any of this …

I gave you my keys! What more do you want?!

Your keys?! Oh great. So now I can get into your front door. *Points at heart* How do I get into there? Huh?

I’m sorry. But I’ve been taking care of myself for a really long time. You may not like it, but this is how I deal with things.

*Returns key*

ouch.

opening your heart. letting people in. letting go of control. and of your past.

all things that i needed to be reminded of that night. God is always speaking - whether through His Word, the Holy Spirit, other people, or circumstances - to anyone who is willing to listen ... and even to those who are not quite ready. He is a gentleman and will never force Himself upon us. but He also knows exactly how to break through our guarded exterior and reach directly to the deepest parts of our hearts. He is a personal God, and will meet you right when and where you need it most.

acknowledge the God of your father, and serve Him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the LORD searches every heart and understands every desire and every thought. if you seek him, He will be found by you. (1 chronicles 28:9)

where’s the most random place you can find God this week? :)

remembering ...

being reminded of the entrepreneurial endeavors that i undertook one summer 13 years ago.

pulling out an old journal from when i first moved to nashville 6 years ago.

getting an unexpected call from a friend i haven’t talked to in a long while, and reminiscing about when we met 9 years ago.

thinking about the possibility of catching up with friends from all over the country, much like we did 4 years ago.

nothing like a little walk down memory lane on a quiet sunday evening.

how have i changed? how have i stayed the same? has anything changed that needed to stay the same, and has anything stayed the same that needed to be changed? what have i let slip away, and what have i willingly (and necessarily) let go?

a lesson in focusing on what is important today, and not worrying about the rest.

a visionary. a teacher. a writer. creative. passionate. love the Lord, and my friends, and music.

i know i am not the same person that i was when i came here. i am so thankful for the grace and mercy and forgiveness that has made such a transformation possible.

looking back can be such a powerful tool. i have always related to the israelites and their chronic forgetfulness. i would be interested to count the number of times that their story of deliverance is recounted. and still they forgot. their forgetfulness causes them to wander in the desert for 40 extra years. then they get a second chance. they come to the jordan and are again faced with the opportunity to cross over. this time they choose to remember, and believe, all that God has done for them. then joshua has one man from each of the 12 tribes pick up a stone from the center of the river and set them up as a memorial of their crossing. that way, in the future when their children asked them what the stones meant, they could tell them about what God had done.

we, too, need stones of remembrance. how quickly we can forget all that God has said and done. and when we forget, we wander. but if we have stones - tangible representations of God in our lives along the way - it gives us the courage to keep going, to cross over when presented with a new and exciting, yet scary, opportunity.

where have you been? where are you now? what are your stones of remembrance? what is God asking you to step out into?

only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them fade from your heart as long as you live. teach them to your children and to their children after them. (deuteronomy 4:9)

the fire of praise ...

i worked outside for a good part of the day, taking trees that had been cleared and throwing them into a huge brush fire.


it’s funny because this morning in the car, some of us were reading proverbs 27, and i was particularly struck by verse 21:

fire tests the purity of silver and gold, but a person is tested by being praised.

there is no doubt that we feel the fire of life’s hardships - the pain of loss, the challenge of trusting when we don’t understand. but praise?

yes. and even more so. God wants to know how we will handle the fire of being in the limelight. will we keep it for ourselves or will we give it back to Him?

in acts 14, paul and barnabas heal a man with crippled feet. when the people saw what had happened, they believed that “these men are gods in human form!” and tried offering sacrifices to them. “but when the apostles barnabas and paul heard what was happening, they tore their clothing in dismay and ran out among the people, shouting, ‘friends, why are you doing this? we are merely human beings—just like you! we have come to bring you the Good News that you should turn from these worthless things and turn to the living God.’” (vv. 14 - 15)

that’s not to say that we should take on false humility. it’s okay to recognize and stand confidently in the gifts that we’ve been given. but when they are recognized by others, we need to make sure that we don’t ever let it go to our heads, forgetting for a second why we have them.

pride goes before destruction, and haughtiness before a fall. better to live humbly with the poor than to share plunder with the proud. (proverbs 16:18-19)

you see, when we are prideful, we are taking something that does not belong to us, just like plunder. i don’t know about you, but i’d much rather have what God has given me than what i can take from the world.

that brush fire got pretty darn hot today. i didn’t want to stand close to it for any longer than i absolutely had to. i don’t want to stand near the fire of the trials that God allows any longer than i have to, either. but our “God is faithful; He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. and WHEN [not if] you are tempted, He will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.” (1 corinthians 10:13) the faster we take that way out, the faster we get to step away from the fire.

really, praise is like the fire. will we be captivated by the flames, only to be burned? or will we acknowledge their beauty, but quickly turn our backs on the danger and return our focus to the source of all fire, heat & light? in the end, God’s praise is the only kind that matters. i choose the originator, not the imitator.

my name is dulcinea!

tonight i went to see my friend’s [show-stealing ;)] performance in ‘man of la mancha’. i’m pretty sure the last time i read the book or saw the play was for 9th grade spanish, so i had only a very vague recollection of the story going in. it’s funny how much more of an impact something can have when you’re not required to do it for a grade. there were so many awesome spiritual analogies and applications that i could spend at least a whole month going through them all, but i’ll just start with the one that struck me the most.

in the story, there is a less-than wholesome barmaid named aldonza. the men want her only for what she can offer them, and while she largely rejects their advances, it is clear that she has come to see herself as nothing more than a lowly “kitchen scullion”.

then don quixote enters the picture.

upon meeting her, he refers to her as a “sweet lady ... fair virgin” and insists on calling her dulcinea. “i have sought thee, sung thee, dreamed thee ... and the world shall know thy glory.” later on, quixote’s squire addresses her as a “most lovely sovereign and highborn lady ... fairest of the fair, purest of the pure, incomparable dulcinea.” she cannot fathom why he would ever say these things about her, to which the squire replies, “knights have their own language for everything ... and it’s better not to ask questions. it only gets you into trouble.” over time, aldonza begins to accept and step into her identity as dulcinea. but then some men take advantage of her and she slips back into seeing herself as nothing more than a “kitchen slut, reeking of sweat, born on a dung heap to die on a dung heap.” she would rather hold on to her anger than open herself up to the pain of tenderness. “i’m only aldonza the whore.” but don quixote is unrelenting. “now and forever you are milady, dulcinea.” in the end, she cannot deny the power of the things that he has spoken over her life. she is asked, “is it so important?”

“everything. my whole life. you spoke to me. and everything was ... different.”

someone refers to her as aldonza and she corrects them. “my name is dulcinea.”

that is how it is for us. we are nothing more than lowly kitchen scullions.

then God enters the picture.

He calls us lovely, sovereign, highborn, fair, pure and incomparable. He gives us a new name.

never again will you be called “the forsaken city” or “the desolate land.” your new name will be “the city of God’s delight” and “the bride of God,” for the Lord delights in you and will claim you as His bride. (isaiah 62:4)

we can try and deny that those things are true, but He has a language all His own and arguing with God only gets us into trouble. as you begin to accept and step into your identity in Christ, don’t expect it to come without contention. that is when you must cling to it all the more. let go of your anger over past hurts and open your heart to the possibility of a love greater than you’ve ever known. God will be unrelenting in His pursuit, until you are able to fully accept that what He says is true. when that happens, your whole life will be changed and you can proudly proclaim ...

my name is dulcinea!

H. U. G. S.

after my post on tuesday, i couldn’t help but pull out an acrostic poem that i wrote back in 6th grade.

H - eavenly angel wings
disguised as
earthly friendships
U - nderstanding
willingness
with arms open wide
G - iving your heart
and a listening ear
to lean on
S - mile impressions
wrapped in a
warm tight squeeze

i then started thinking about how hugs are not once mentioned in the bible. the only time the word appears is in job 24:8, referencing the poor hugging rocks in search of shelter. not exactly warm and fuzzy. i am not a theologian by any stretch of the imagination, but i’ll have to do some research on why that is. for now, my random ponderings will have to suffice.

dictionary.com defines a hug as “to clasp tightly in the arms, especially with affection; embrace; to cling firmly or fondly to, cherish; to keep close to.” based on that, and all of the things from my poem that a hug communicates, then i guess you would say that hugs are an implicit scriptural concept. in addition, the words cling or hold fast do appear many times.

it is both a command ...

joshua tells the israelites to “cling tightly to the Lord your God as you have done until now.” (joshua 23:8)

and a necessity ...

david declares, “i cling to You; Your strong right hand holds me securely.” (psalm 63:8)

it is the assurance of having someone on your side, being confident of your standing, and empowered to go out and continue fighting.

therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place ... let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith ... let us HOLD FAST the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful; and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another. (hebrews 10: 19a, 22a, 23-25a)

ultimately, we need not hug - cling to - a person, but to what we believe. once we are fully convinced of that, then we are able to encourage others - through a word, a smile ... or a hug :)

background music ...

when heading out on a run the other morning, i was frustrated to discover that my headphones had ceased functioning properly. all of the music was still coming through, but not the main vocals. i decided to wear them anyway, figuring that the music would still keep me going, which it did. between the background vocals and knowing all the songs that came on, i could still fill in most of the lyrics in my head. but not all of them. and sometimes the background vocals threw me off. it just wasn’t the same. i imagined that if i listened to the songs without the vocals for long enough, i would soon forget most of the words entirely, and the songs would certainly lose their power.

it’s like trying to do religion instead of relationship.

the background music - going to church, reading your bible, doing and saying the right things - will certainly keep you going for a while. between hearing it from other people, and what you’ve learned from being at church, you can still come up with a ‘sunday school answer’ for most questions. but not all of them. sometimes what you hear from other people will throw you off. it’s just not the same as hearing God’s voice first-hand. if you keep trying to make it through life on just the background music, coming up with the right answers will become much more difficult. you’ll start to forget what God has said, and His power will no longer have as much of an impact in your life.

it’s not enough to just know about God. God desires that we actually know Him. He desires a personal, intimate relationship with each and every one of us. zephaniah 3:17 tells us that “He will rejoice over you with singing.” but so often we get so caught up in the rules - in having the right answer - that God’s voice gets cut out of our lives. we’re running to the beat, but missing the melody. it‘s not that the background music isn’t important - we need the fellowship of other believers, to be connected to God’s Word, and to be walking in obedience. it just can’t be the only thing. the background music is what brings fulness to the melody line, not the other way around.

what are you listening to? WHO are you listening to? don’t let going through the motions, anything, or anyone keep you from hearing or make you forget God’s voice in your life. for in that voice is the promise of power, security, and eternal life.

my sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. no one can snatch them away from me, for my Father has given them to me, and He is more powerful than anyone else. no one can snatch them from the Father’s hand. (john 10:27-29)

sometimes you just need a snuggle ...

this is the first full week of school for kindergartners where i work. they’re in a new place, with a ton of other new people - really loud people, a ton of new rules to remember, and for some of them, this is the first time away from their parents. i would be crying, too.

oh, wait. i am.

yesterday i noticed a little friend crying on the playground. on top of everything else, this friend also hardly speaks a lick of english. poor thing. i got the teacher’s attention, and she came and sat with her student for a while. then, just as we were getting ready to go back in, the little friend hopped up and started playing again.

sometimes you just need a snuggle.



at the end of a long, hard day, how much of a difference does it make to see a smiling face, to be greeted with a hug, or to hear someone say ‘i love you’? how much better does it make things to just sit and rest in the presence of someone who makes you feel completely secure.

for thus says the LORD, “behold, i extend peace to her like a river ... “as one whom his mother comforts, so I will comfort you.” (isaiah 66: 12-13)

human connection is absolutely critical. without it, children in orphanages fail to thrive. in genesis 2:18, God makes woman for man because He recognizes that “it is not good for man to be alone.” there’s no getting around the fact that we need each other.

but human connection is not always available. and it is never perfect. it is therefore so comforting to know that God has promised to give us peace and comfort.

be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. and the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (philippians 4: 6-7)

and if we have God, then we are called to extend the comfort that He has given to us.

the Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me, for the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to comfort the brokenhearted and to proclaim that captives will be released and prisoners will be freed. (isaiah 61:1)

will you be that smile, that hug, that expression of love to someone today?

digging wells - part 2 ...

okay. been otherwise inspired the past couple of days, but didn’t forget about this one.

then isaac dug again the wells of water which had been dug in the days of his father abraham, for the philistines had stopped them up after the death of abraham; and he gave them the same names which his father had given them. but when isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found there a well of flowing water, the herdsmen of gerar quarreled with the herdsmen of isaac, saying, “the water is ours!” so he named the well esek, because they contended with him. then they dug another well, and they quarreled over it too, so he named it sitnah. he moved away from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it; so he named it rehoboth, for he said, “at last the LORD has made room for us, and we will be fruitful in the land.”

this passage from genesis 26 has become one of my favorites in the past couple of years as i have watched God unearth old wells, and take me to new ones, free from strife.

the first set of wells represent parts of your past that have been stopped up. like i mentioned in part 1, burying an issue doesn’t make it go away. isaac had to go back and reopen his father’s wells in order to fully move on. it’s no accident that these wells had been filled in after the death of abraham - the father of israel’s promise. how often, after season’s of great promise and faith, does satan love to come in and try to stop up our life source, keeping us from taking an honest look at our past, and making us forget who we are and what has been spoken.

once isaac had uncovered the old wells, he kept the name his father had given them. he knew that things from your past need to stay there. a stagnant well isn’t going to start flowing freely just because you change its name. that‘s not to say that the process of digging up the old wells wasn’t important, for it was in doing so that they uncovered the new wells of flowing water. but it’s probably not going to be easy. isaac’s servants were digging in the valley. digging up old stuff is hard work, and it will likely take you to some low places.

unfortunately, the new wells you discover will also probably not be without contention. there was a great debate over the first two wells of flowing water that isaac’s servants uncovered. if satan has been taking up residence in an area of your life for quite some time, don’t expect him to give up territory without a fight. but don’t quit digging. there was no quarrel over the third well that they dug, and they named it rehoboth, which means wide spaces.

if we are willing to do the work of uncovering old wells from our past, digging new wells to find flowing water, and fighting for what is ours until there is no more debate, then we can be assured that God will bring us to a place of rest and fruitfulness in Him.

the Lord is my shepherd; i have all that i need. He lets me rest in green meadows; He leads me beside peaceful streams. He renews my strength ... even when i walk through the darkest valley, i will not be afraid, for You are close beside me ... you prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies. You honor me by anointing my head with oil. my cup overflows with blessings. surely Your goodness and unfailing love will pursue me all the days of my life, and i will live in the house of the Lord forever. (psalm 23:1-3a, 4a, 5-6)

why did the cricket cross the road?

with yesterday’s entry, i had posted more in one month (and consecutively, to boot) than i had in all of either 2009 or 2010. with today’s entry, i have posted more in 2011 than in both previous years combined!

it is no longer i who live, but Christ who lives in me. so i live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. (galatians 2:20)

it’s pretty amazing what can happen when you are [finally] fully assured of your calling and step out in obedience. that’s not to say that i will never face writer’s block or get bogged down by my busy schedule, but i have been absolutely blown away by how easily the past 12 days have come. after all my stops and starts in the past, it feels good to have found some sure-footing with my writing.

it reminds me of the cricket we saw yesterday on our run (apparently sundays are going to be ‘lessons learned from bugs’ :) we were on a paved road with pretty large aggregate. this cricket started hopping across in front of us, but because the road was so bumpy, every time he landed he had to resituate and get his legs back under him before he could jump again. i immediately got this picture of us going through life.

john 16:33 tells us that “here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows.” you will inevitably face bumps in the road. the question is, what will you do with them? if that cricket had given up after stumbling a few times, he never would have made it to the other side of the road. in the same way, we can’t give up when bumps in the road cause us to lose our footing. we have to get back up, realign ourselves with God’s direction for our life, and keep going. there’s a beautiful grassy field of promise waiting just for us. bumps can either get in our way, or they can serve as launching pads to take us to the next place.

what if i had given up after any one of my writing setbacks? ‘oh, i obviously can’t stick with it, so why bother trying?’ i bother trying because staying in the middle of the road means baking in the hot sun or getting run over by a truck. if the israelites had never crossed over into the promised land, they would have continued wandering in the desert like after the first time they were supposed to cross over, or they would have been washed away with the torrent of water by staying stuck in the middle of the jordan.

i don’t know about you, but none of those options sound very appealing to me.

God’s promise of entering His rest still stands, so we ought to tremble with fear that some of you might fail to experience it ... so let us do our best to enter that rest. but if we disobey God, as the people of israel did, we will fall. (hebrews 4:1 & 11)

your rest is waiting. keep jumping.