Insecurity {A Journal Entry}

While disclaimers are not really my thing, I will make a slight disclaimer right now. Today’s topic may come very close to home for some people, and goodness knows it was close to me for a long time. I hope this entry does a little shaking of your thoughts, and maybe counters some beliefs you might not have even known you believe.
This is journal entry which comes from my personal time with the Lord. I am struck by the words in II Corinthians 2 when Paul says that we are not unaware of the devil’s schemes, because honestly, sometimes I do feel like I am unaware. Like when I realize I am holding two conflicting beliefs in my head, accepting them both as truth or unavoidable realities, never thinking that while one is true, the other is actually a lie. Yes, sometimes I am too unaware.
 Introduction and disclaimer out of the way, today let’s have a little dialogue on the subject of insecurity.

{Begin Journal Entry}

On my almost daily bike ride today I hit the road and breathed a sigh. My morning was spent with women I know well. Women I have been and should be comfortable with. So then, why the sigh?
Why did my being by myself in the middle of nowhere come as a relief? There shouldn’t have been any tension in me.
As I was pedaling I realized that I had been feeling insecure. Wondering if I was OK, too much, too showy. Feeling the need to prove that I really had been doing and still was doing something with my life.
You know, when I am by myself, I like me. I don’t question me. I don’t have to explain myself. I am not insecure when I am just by myself.
Insecurity. Hmmm. What an interesting concept.

There was a pause in my thought.
“Insecurity isn’t actually real, is it, Lord? There is no such thing as insecurity. It’s all a lie. A scheme.”
The term “insecurity” in itself implies that one has the ability to not be secure.
But when, in the history of all mankind, has a person not stood, ever so secure, in one camp or another? And it’s as simple as that. The Bible is very clear that there are in fact ONLY two potential camps.
There are believers in Jesus Christ. And there are non-believers in Jesus Christ (I John 5:11-12. And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have his life).
And what are some basic truths about the only two camps?

Believers

Loved By God.
In Communion with God.
Holy Spirit in you.
Eternity Secured in Heaven.
Free Gift of God Received.
Due Punishment transferred to Jesus.

Non-Beleivers
Loved By God.
Not in communion with God.
Holy Spirit Not in you.
Eternity secured in total eternal destruction, where but for the grace of God calling you to his Son, will be your end.
Free gift of God thus far rejected.
Punishment in waiting due to rejection of truth.

I am sure I could go on and on. Notice that all is true and secure in the non-believers’ column apart from one caveat that could change things (i.e. the accepting of the grace of God through Jesus’ substitutionary atonement and surrendering your life to Jesus’ rule), in which IF changed they would then be securely launched into the other camp.

So all people, all the time, across centuries and nations and cultures, are securely in one camp or the other, which makes the concept that INSECURITY is possible completely false.
I am not (nor is anyone) insecure. I never have been, nor ever will be, because IT. IS. NOT. POSSIBLE.
What in the world then are all of these feelings?

If they are not based in truth, and they most of the time do not happen when I am by myself, but rather when I am with people, what is it about people that makes someone feel insecure?
It’s based on opinions. Their opinions. Of me, in particular.
Insecurity is felt when people’s opinions are valued. And not just valued, but valued more than the truth. The truth in those columns.
See, I can feel insecure about how I look. I can feel insecure about my performance, or feeling as if there is a lack in my performance, or feeling as if I failed, but does any of that change any truth about me? Does it affect any one of those things on that list? Can I make Jesus love me less, will the Holy Spirit be removed from me, did I all of the sudden not receive God’s grace? Can anything I do change the truth?
Nope.
Absolutely not.
So if truths cannot be changed, then all insecurities I feel about said things are based, not in truth (which cannot be changed because it is SECURE), but in opinions. And ONLY—the opinions of others. Not God’s opinions. God’s opinion of me does not change.
I can’t do anything to gain or lose his love. I can grieve the Holy Spirit, but those are all based on SPIRITUAL things, not on the external things, which is where my insecurities lie.
Feelings of insecurity which have no basis in truth (for where a person stands is WHERE THEY STAND) come when I value someone’s opinion of me more than the truth of how God sees me.

The book of Galatians speaks a lot about this.

Galatians 1:6 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel.
*And a different gospel, a different set of truths, is no gospel, is no truth at all.

Galatians 1:10 Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ.
*It’s like he is saying, “What? Am I going to tell you what you want to hear just to please you, or am I going to tell you the truth? If I tell you what you want—or change my gospel—I am no longer a servant of Christ. I will live to please God before trying to please you.”

Galatians 2:4 …some false brothers had infiltrated our ranks to spy on the freedom we have in Christ Jesus and to make us slaves.
*See, freedom is not a natural thing; freedom only comes in Christ. And people who are not free hate those who are. They want us to be slaves with them.

VS 5. We did not give into them for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might remain with you.
*The un-free, the bound, the insecure ones, want to give me a different gospel. A different truth. An insecurity.

VS 6. As for those who seemed to be important—whatever they were makes no difference to me; God does not judge by external appearances.
*The “important ones” can make false judgments. Those whose opinions “matter” still can’t judge the heart—so even their opinions can be wrong! How exhausting to base your life and “security” on unsound judgments! Whose opinions mean anything now??!?!

Galatians 2:12-14a Before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group. The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray. When I saw that they were not acting in line with the truth of the gospel…
*Peter was afraid of THEIR OPINION! The opinion of those who belonged to the circumcision---the “right” ones. His insecurities changed his ministry to the Gentiles because he was afraid what the wrongly-judgmental would think of him. What a loss!! What a waste of time!
Having those feelings was “not acting in line with the truth of the gospel.” The truth he wasn’t in line with was that GOD JUDGES, and Gentiles need Jesus, which is the base of all ministry.

2:20 The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
*How can one feel insecure!?!? Not only is every human SECURELY WHERE THEY ARE, the I, one counted among the believers, have been loved with an everlasting love and DIED FOR!!!

VS 16. Know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ.
*A life lived in a faith that justifies, placed in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me, leaves no room for insecurity, and no legitimate place for valuing someone else’s potentially wrong opinion.

Now that is big time, kids.

Schemes are real.

Insecurity is fake.

Hey devil, I’m onto you. Your schemes aren’t going to work anymore. I am no longer unaware.

About a burning fire.

Settling in takes time, I am finding. How does one acquire so many things over the years? Speaking of things, I love coats. It turns out that I bought/acquired 8 more coats in the last couple years of my life. And to think that I have moved them, along with bucket loads of other things, how many times! I must be out of my mind.

But no longer. I refuse to move it all again.

Here is the first load off to Goodwill. More to go, no doubt.

What an interesting concept. Sending things away. Things I brought in at one time, but no longer a necessity, or were a bad idea in the first place, or had simply run its course. I even came across a few clothes, and I would term them my “grubbies” (you know, the ones you mow the lawn in and paint walls in) that were too far gone to give to Goodwill, but not good enough at being bad enough to keep. What is a person to do? Well, if I you live in the country, and I do, you burn them, along with the rest of your trash.

I had never done this before.

There was no other option. I was going to burn the clothes. The grubbies. The has-beens.

How strange. I started the fire and all seemed to change.
God-invented science took over.
Laws of Thermodynamics.
They burned.
They became ash.
They were no more.
How quickly they were gone.

Things of this world are absolutely fleeting. Disposable. Easily destroyed by fire. Or moths. Or rust.

Able to be dissolved in an instant.    

No wonder Jesus tells us to store up for ourselves treasure in heaven. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. One day, the Bible says, ALL OF IT will burn. And what a sad day it will be for you if your life consisted of the temporal, that which burns, rather than the eternal. I don’t want to find myself in that group. I don’t want my sin to be trust in the temporal. I don’t want to have tight grips on things of this world. I want to have a tight grip on God, the only one who is saving me from all the fires.

Last night I was unpacking some clothes and putting them away in a dresser drawer. Without any notice I was overcome by this feeling. A feeling of failure or un-success. Why, you might ask? Well, this was the first time I had put clothes away in a dresser for more than three years.

My “last life” was always on the go. Packing suitcases multiple times a week. Never unpacking. Being so mobile that it wouldn’t have even been smart for me to have a dresser; so I didn’t.

Now though, well, now I have a dresser. With clothes in it.

This is not to say that I won’t be packing suitcases any time soon---I will next week---but this season is going to be a little more settled (I think), a little less mobile (I think). I should be breathing a sigh of relief, and truly I am. Being on the go wears you out. This is coming as a nice break. How unexpected then to be feeling failure. I could almost hear something saying to me, “Oh look, all of that coming and going didn’t produce anything. You didn’t succeed. It was all for naught. It didn’t even really happen. It was all a dream. You are right back where you started. You haven’t gained any ground.”

 Do you ever feel like what you have done was in vain? Or that it didn’t produce what you thought it would? It gave you the unexpected? It was a sad moment of those thoughts I was having.

I was mulling that around in my head, wondering if there really was anything different, or if I truly was right where I had started, if any of it had even happened at all or if it all was just a dream.

Feeling weighted down, I finished the task at hand.

“Lord, did any of that really happen? Am I actually a different person now? Did I really gain all of those things? Was I really in those places?”
Soberly I walked into my closet and something caught my attention. There before me was a row of coats.

“Yeah,” Jesus said, “It all really happened. You were in those places, you did gain all of those experiences and things. And look, you’ve got the coats to prove it.”

I smiled. And thanked the Lord for a tangible reminder.

Seek the LORD while he may be found;
call on him while he is near.
⁷ Let the wicked forsake their ways
and the unrighteous their thoughts.
Let them turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on them,
and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

⁸ “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,”
declares the LORD.
⁹ “As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
¹⁰ As the rain and the snow
come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,
¹¹ so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

¹² You will go out in joy
and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and hills
will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the field
will clap their hands.
¹³ Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper,
and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.
This will be for the LORD’s renown,
for an everlasting sign,
that will endure forever.”
Isaiah 55.

Store up your treasures in heaven, wolfies. There is no fire that can touch them there.

Foolishness.

Do you ever feel like you have been the fool? About whatever kind of situation or circumstance?

 I was praying about something yesterday and said, “Lord, I just don’t want to be foolish.”

That verse from Psalm 14 came to my mind, “A fool says in his heart there is no God.”

In the past I would have written off that verse, thinking that it is only for those who don’t believe in God. And I believe in God. Boy, do I ever. So clearly I can skip over it and apply it to somebody else’s life. Right? Call THEM foolish since it doesn’t apply to me?

I was rolling it around in my head as I was driving back from yet again another weekend away.  What does life look like for those who don’t believe in God? What do I do differently than them? Sometimes I fear that I have been a Christian for so long that I can’t understand anymore what it is like to think outside the bounds of God. Does that make sense? Like I don’t know how to operate without him anymore. Therefore, I spent the better part of my drive pondering this. “How does someone who says ‘There is no God’ operate?”

The first thing I thought is that they probably try to take life into their own hands. They try to create their destinies. They also probably try to earn people’s love and attention, not knowing that there is Love out there that they don’t have to merit, that they don’t have to work for. I can imagine there would be striving for those who have goals. There is also fear and anxiety mixed in for those who don’t ever think those said goals will be reached; or they fear the roadblocks in their way.

I suppose I could go on and on about the differences, but I do think these are pretty major.

Could it then be liberally said the fool (the one who says in his heart there is no God) “takes their life into their own hands,” or “The fool creates his own destiny.” “The fool tries to earn love.” “The fool is full of striving; and full of fear.”

When I put it in those terms, I don’t like that verse so much. It becomes a little more applicable. A little too much about me, for, if I am being honest, I can put my name from time to time right where “fool” is. “Bethany tries to take her life into her own hands.” “Bethany tries to create her own destiny.” “Bethany tries to earn love.” “Bethany is full of striving; and full of fear.”

Can any of you relate?

Some of you might look at that list and say, “Well Bethany, you are not saying that there is no God by doing those things! You just have some insecurities, just like everyone.” But isn’t that a false reassurance? If the person who says there is no God does those things, then isn’t that what I am saying by doing those things, too? For isn’t doing those things really a show that I am not trusting God in that situation?

I’m not trusting God, therefore I take my life into my own hands.
I’m not trusting God, therefore I fear.
Or what if I am simply not happy with life’s current circumstances? Overall, I really do believe God to be sovereign and good, but right now…well…I would just like to think this is an accident. What if my attitude is that? Am I really trusting that God, in his GOD-ness, has me where he has me right now? In the situations and places and times?

How many situations do I look at and, even if I don’t admit it, I really do believe THERE IS NO GOD THERE? “There is no God in that situation?”

So I take matters into my own hands. Or do nothing.

I have a lot of people in my life who I look at and feel very much like “There is no God there.” It’s a hopeless setting. They will never know Jesus, I fear.

Or what about those things you want to see brought to completion or resolution or released from bondage maybe, but you fear the odds of that happening are about as bad as trying to get a camel through the eye of a needle? Do we look at that and think He is not there? It has not crossed his desk? It will never happen?

How often do we truly believe that about relationships, jobs, futures, circumstances, business dealings, bondages, etc. that there is no God there? He is not in it. He is not moving there; he has either left it or was never present.
Does anybody else ever feel like that or am I totally alone in this?

It’s foolishness. My foolishness. Our foolishness. To claim that God is not in something or he is not involved in something, that he doesn’t see something, is to deny the essence of his character.

Because he is Omnipresent; in all places.
Omnipotent; all powerful.
Omniscient; all knowing.

The fool says in his heart there is no God. They say there is no God in life. In situations. In circumstances.

The fool is one who denies God’s character in one aspect or many.
Do I trust enough to say that God, in his GOD-ness, has me where he has me right now?
We are never more foolish than when we stop trusting God and take matters into our own hands; when our life shows that we believe there is no God there.

A new kind of missionary.

Before some of you stop reading, let me just say this: I need an open mind from you today. Hear me out.

Ok, that aside.

I love hardcore music. I know, I know. Not quite what you might have expected.

Hardcore, metal core, death core, two-step, different bands fall into different categories and I like all of it. Now why, you might ask, do I like this kind of music? In being the good Christian woman I am trying to be, I am going to play the blame game.
I blame my family.
My family listened to everything when I was growing up. From  Boston and The BeeGees, to the Spinners and Carly Simon, to Celine Dion and Barry Manilow, to Chicago and the Temptations.
If it was on the radio, on any kind of station, after 1960…well…I’ve got it covered.
Music was on all the time in my house when I was growing up. Every single room had its own stereo, it was always on in the car. We had “family” songs that meant something special to all of us, and our father made all of us kids be musical, in some form or another.  Music was BIG.

 It was no shock to any of us, then, when my brothers started listening to “harder” genres of music. Of course my mother wanted to know right from the get-go what the lyrics were. That was her thing: lyrics. She only let us listen to things with not-bad lyrics. She was happy, then, when the boys had some stuff with good lyrics. And even though it might have been a little harder than we were used to, it was better than what everyone else was listening to in the weight room after sports practices. So they got away with it.

 Now let me get off this little Life History lesson. I know there are a lot of theories or philosophies or doctrines about music out there. I, however, was unaware that there were until about two years ago. Style of music, beats, rhythms, drums, there was never an issue with in my house. Why? Because, there really isn’t anything about those philosophies in the Bible. Some of those doctrines start off with a good idea, but I do fear that the baby gets thrown out with the bath-water sometimes.

And speaking of babies that get thrown out: Hardcore music.

People cringe, people rant and rave, they claim it’s devil music, full of hateful lyrics and sin everywhere. And a lot of it is devil music. Most of it is hateful and sin everywhere. But has the thought ever occurred to you that there are a lot of KIDS who listen to that
“devil music” and ONLY that devil music? Like kids in your neighborhood, or in your daughters’ school, or in your house?  And what are we as Christians doing about those kids, about this culture, which is right down the street? We send missionaries to China and India and Papua New Guinea, but are we willing to send missionaries here? To THIS unreached people group? Do we care enough to care about those souls? Or do we even KNOW that this group exists?!

This culture of kids tends to live this music. They breathe it in and eat it up and talk about it and listen to it and reside in its culture. All of their friends are in it, too. It is a place for them to belong. And most of them don’t love Jesus. Or don’t know Jesus. Or have never heard of Jesus.

These kids tend to look like this:

 Now, some of these boys are Christians. And some of these boys are not. But they all kind of look the same because that’s the point. The Hardcore culture does not, in general, believe in church, especially GOING to a church. They tend to not believe in fake things, or hypocrisy, and they say that’s what church is, that’s what Christians are. So some Christians have taken it upon themselves to go and BE church to these kids. To minister to this culture where it is at. Making relationships with them, looking and dressing like them, building trust with them, and eventually starting conversations with them, once they see that these Christians aren’t “like all the rest,” that these Christians are real.

There is controversy around this style of music. It has been said that it is making these kids “hard,” but can we really blame the hardness of some people on a drum beat? Let’s be honest, it’s a little bit of a cop-out. Music doesn’t make you something, music brings out something. Music has a tendency to bring to the surface things that are already in you, and I don’t care WHAT style of music we are talking about. My question to all of you then is how are we going to address the “hardness” in this culture? How are we going to reach this people group? They are not only across oceans or in far jungles. They are next door, they are in our schools, they are in our houses, and we cannot turn our heads any longer.

Do me a favor and read these lyrics. And then, for those of you who have your minds set on what “Christian music” should and should not sound like, tell me what’s not Christian about this.

Nothing to Hide, by the band A Past Unknown:
Perfect, I can’t quite seem to add up to Your means of being Holy. Do you still see me when I curse, backbite, try to run and hide? Say I’m something that I’m not, fooling everyone.

Hypocrite, take it in, you’re dead before My eyes. Perfect, you faker, I see who you are, you cannot hide.

Is there no sympathy? My lips are quick to speak. In selfishness I do what I want until the end.

Blinded, my way I can’t see, my way is right to me, in the end, my way is death.

My way wretched, my way misled, taste the poison I am spoon fed.

I need Your sympathy, my wretched self deserves nothing. Teach me Your ways, be my everything, You will see the death of me.

My way is not what I want, body shaking, sick to the core. A hypocrite deserving of death, do you see how wretched I am?

Are you like me? Are you filthy? Sin in the blood? Guilty like the rest of us? Selfish we are looking out for one, if I say I’m blameless I’m deceiving myself. I am wretched, I am misled, I need Your grace, will you take this from me?

And now, watch this video. This is at a concert of these new kinds of missionaries, singing the lyrics you just read:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8el_WCbJIU

 I know that this is not all of your cup of tea. I know this is not what you want to hear every day. But I do want you to be aware of what is going on. And I am not asking you to adopt this style of music to your playlists, but I am asking you to support this ministry. Without bands going into this genre and singing Christian lyrics and forming relationships with this culture, they will remain unreached, untouched and unsaved, and I believe that the church will be held to blame. This is a part of “all the world” we are to make disciples in and personal preference has no place in deeming some cultures acceptable or unacceptable to be reached. Jesus died for all of these kids and all of these bands. Christians need to be there to tell them that.

Polar Bears.

This weekend was a bridal shower in Minneapolis for one of my besties (the bride is in the middle)!

College besties.

 I zipped into the cities on Friday, had some catch-up time with a friend,

 (this is at Café Latte in St. Paul. Don’t ever let anyone tell you Café Latte is something more than a glamorous cafeteria, because it’s not. It’s a glamorous cafeteria. There are even food trays. I mean, “what do they think we are, dumb or something?” {Name that movie} They do, however, have really GLAMOROUS food. Like this salted caramel tres leche cake.), then I hopped over to another friends where I spent the rest of the evening with her and her hubby.

Love them!!

Woke up at their house to my first cup of French-press coffee and this guy:

 Part fox, part dog. Only half tamed. And I like him a lot.

 And speaking of tamed animals. Yesterday, before I left the cities, I met up with another friend and we went to the zoo. Now, I have never been one much for zoos. We never really went when I was a kid and I have only gone twice in my adult life before yesterday. I don’t know, they just don’t do it for me usually. I kind of think, “If I want to see a lion, I will go to Africa. What’s the big deal?”

My sentiments were much the same yesterday.

All the animals just seem a little….bored.

I mean, check out this orangutan:

Non-plussed. Being stared at like he is some kind of freak show.

 And look at these mammoths.

Polar bears. One of the deadliest creatures on earth.

But wait a second? Is that polar bear playing with….what is that…..is that a plastic pickle?!?!

 Kind of out of place, isn’t it?

Trust me, I think they realize that those white garbage cans in the background are not blocks of ice that just fell off an iceberg.

As I was watching them, 5 inches away from my face, separated only by a thick piece of glass, all I could think was, “This is not their home. And they absolutely know it.”
I couldn’t help but think these things again and again as I watched a tiger lying on the grass, all the trees around him fenced off so he couldn’t climb them. Or when those giraffes were licking the side of the building, because there just wasn’t a whole lot else going on.

The seals seemed perfectly fine, loving to entertain the masses. Happy as clams.

 But the penguins also knew that, even though there was a mural behind them of Antarctica, this was no Antarctica.

As my brain kept running, I immediately thought, “This earth isn’t really my home either, is it? But which am I like, the polar bears and penguins, or the seals?”

I say it in my head, I hear it in church, and I read it in my Bible, “This is not my home,” but, if I am being honest, I think I really feel like the seals do. Most of the time I think earth is just peachy, the cat’s meow, my stage to entertain….my home.  This is where I am comfortable. I am comfortable in glamorous cafeterias and drinking French press and going to bridal showers.

But the issue is….I don’t really WANT to be like the seals. I don't want to be duped into thinking that this little pool of a world is the ocean, you know? I want to be like the polar bears and the terribly bored orangutans: always aware that the mural painted on the wall is just an image, not the real thing, and constantly knowing that, because of Jesus, this earth and this life, is not it!

We were created for bigger forests, wolfies. Don't get too comfortable.

"Goodbye for Now."

I moved yesterday.

 
I cried for about half an hour after saying “Goodbye for now” to Al and Ella.
Oh those two. What little life-changers they are. Or as they would like me to say, “We don’t change lives. God changes lives. Sometimes he just uses his people.”
There is truth in that.

The beauty of “moving-tears” is that they mean you are going to miss something. That something was sweet or good or beneficial. It’s better than the opposite, which I have known as well. The “GET ME OUT OF HERE” squeals and smiles as you blaze out of town in an I’m-never-coming-back kind of fashion. Those really are miserable. If nothing else it says, “All was not well while I was here.”

So I can smile about the tears.

In thinking more about moving away or moving on and looking back with subsequent crying, I realized that I was not crying because I was sad. Oh sure, over the course of the whole process I did cry some of those tears, the ones that showed I was sad to go, but the ones I shed in my car yesterday? Those were thankful ones.

Thankful that I had the last few years in the first place. Thankful that God DID use his people to heal some of my wounds and show to me his various kinds of grace (I Peter 4:10), thankful that I was taken in, without questions, thankful that I now know what it is to be loved first, just like the Bible says that we love God because he first loved us. I rejoice greatly that I had that time, thanking him over and over again that the girl who moved out….was not the same girl that moved in.

And so my prayer was this: Let not your grace be to me without effect.

I pray the changes that were made are lasting changes. I pray that, like all those beautiful people I grew to love, that my life will show God’s various grace to others. That it all took hold. That it wasn’t in vain, in naught. Let me be not the same.

 All that said, I don’t really know what comes next. I mean, I have summer plans, but beyond that, I have no vision yet. Things have not been revealed. So here is to not knowing what’s coming, but to knowing the only thing I have realized I do know: God will be good. And he will be here.

 Some of these pictures will be repeats, but these are my favorites from life’s last “season.”

One of my many weddings from last summer.

Al and Ella's driveway. Love that place!

In San Antonio, Texas. I was eating crabcakes.

For photoshoots.

Teaching the unflexible how to do a pilates move :)

My running buddies. Lucy and Ethel.

We're opposites. Dark and blue. Light and brown.

The Swag and Buckle.

Besties.

Me and my assistant!

On the Mighty Mississippi, thank you very much.

Looking at mountains.

Patience.

With moving come lots of thoughts about time.
“Oh my gosh I can’t believe I am already leaving!”
“Oh my goodness I can’t believe I have been here this long!”

“What in the world will the NEXT few years bring?!”

“How long will I be at my next spot?”
“I will be 70 before I know it, won’t I?”
“How in the world can life go any faster than it already is, but people tell me it does!”
“Am I learning what I needed to learn in this season?”
“I don’t have much time left!”

 I hope you are all imagining me very frazzled, with my curly hair all askew and some type of fiery fear in my eyes. Because that is pretty much the case.

Or at least until I get a reality check and calm myself down.

Yes, life goes fast, and yes, I will be 70 next week, and maybe I am not learning everything that God wanted me to, but….alas…..God is patient. He will work what he wants to work in this next 70-year-week.

*take a deep breath*

*Sigh*

*Move on with my day*

This year I have been taking a book of the New Testament and reading pretty much the whole thing every day for a month. Mind you, I have stuck to the books that are shorter than 6 chapters, and mind you, I have really only gotten through a whole book in one day maybe 5 times. And it’s April. I’m batting like 75 right now. Out of a thousand.

But I like doing it this way. April has brought me to II Peter because March took me to I Peter.

(I believe in doing things in order.)
II Peter is rocking my world. It leaves me thinking about it all day long.
Because I have been thinking about moving and thinking about time, it was really applicable to me when I came to II Peter 3, verses 8-9. At first glance it seems a little out of place, but at second glance I think it is right where it needs to be.

Verse 8-9: But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

*End quote.

On a side note, people have used this to back up their thoughts that in Genesis 1 a “day” could have meant something different than 24 hours. “Because, after all,” they say, “A day is like a thousand years to the Lord.”

Um. No.

Sorry, Charlie. Scripture taken out of context can’t be used to back up your personal preference. That’s not how Bible interpretation works. God doesn’t exist in time, but Moses, who wrote Genesis, did.

 Ok, so God exists outside of time. Look at it this way: I make a lot of salads, but it doesn’t mean that I LIVE in salad. It means that it’s something I made. It’s the same with God. He exists apart from that which he made.

Hmmm…All that considered, isn’t it interesting that it says that “He is patient” with us?

Doesn’t patience have something to do with time? But God doesn’t exist in time. But he is patient.
You and I exist in time.
And yet we hate “being patient.” We humans have a complex towards waiting. We like to see results fast. Praying for someone’s salvation for 40 years seems like a long time. Too long. It’s not worth our patience, we think. We want the plan to go faster.

Well, let me ask you this:

What if 40 years to us is just the extent of patience God has to that person we are praying for? Like, God’s patience took 40 years?

Don’t we want to be in God’s plan? And don’t we want that person to come to repentance, no matter how long we pray?

 Back to the passage. The first verses talk about how God created the world, and the later verses talk about how he will destroy the world, and right there in the middle, are these two little verses that say history past as well as days to come, are nothing. Time is nothing to God. All this world is nothing. But what is something to God, is his plan. His plan for people; His plan for repentance.

Some of us long so much for Christ to come, for everything to be made right. We want it to get here soon. But what if his speeding things up meant that you and I didn’t get “finished”? Would we really be wanting the world to be right if the end found the hearts of you and me and our loved ones unrepentant? Are we ready for the consequences of God moving quickly with us hanging in the balance?

God is patient with us. He doesn’t have to be. Our life is nothing. It is here today, gone tomorrow. I am 20-something today and will be 70 tomorrow. He doesn’t have to pay attention to us. He doesn’t have to work out his plan in us. He could be more preoccupied with the earth, and how it came, and how it will go.

But he isn’t. His plans are for people. He is patient with US.

Patience is not something that exists only inside of time.

Patience is God doing his work.
He is not slow, as we understand slow. He is not wasting time.

And aren’t we glad that God is patient with us?

What if he wasn’t?

I think I would have spiritual whiplash. What if he tried to break you of every single bondage and misconception and lie you believed in one day? In the course of one hour?

I can hardly handle him using two years to get me over 3 issues, I can’t imagine if he tried to go any faster! I struggled for 10 years with something until just this last year when finally I didn’t anymore. 10 years! One issue!
Looking back, I see all along that 10 years was how long I needed. It doesn’t matter to God that even if I live to be 100 he took 10% of my life to get me over one issue. He is working his plan in me.

God doesn’t care about time, he is unfolding his plan. And it will unfold; and it will go the way he wants it to.

The beginning of the world and the end of the world seem like they should be much bigger consequence to God than my little heart. But it’s not. All of that coming and going stuff is really just the frame he has set up to do his work on people in.

 Isn’t that the most incredible thing? The fact that we are his plan—our repentance is his plan?! And all of the world will disappear when God’s plan is done. When he no longer shows patience.

God, the One who exists outside of time- the One who has patience outside of time-has patience towards people who are here today, gone tomorrow—people with very little time.

What a big God. And what a plan it must be.

A headboard tale.

The day after tomorrow I am moving.

I hate running those kinds of figures through my head.
I hate moving.
It’s not even so much as the packing and the carrying and the carrying and the unpacking. It’s the leaving.
I hate leaving.
Well, leaving when what I have been in has been good.
And this last season of my life falls under that category.  

It’s not as if all of my circumstances here have been wonderful. It’s not as if there has been no stress, or crying, or tiredness, or weariness. I have experienced all of those in more abundance than I maybe had any other time before. It’s just that I still found Jesus in all of that. Or that he showed up in all of it.

I had to say goodbye-to-living-in-close-proximity to my “second family” yesterday. It was very appropriate that we all went traipsing about through fields filled with somewhat too friendly cows after Easter dinner. Nature walks have a tendency of bringing things full circle.

I have adopted them as sisters. I don't know if I have told them that yet.

To fend off any rogue cattle. Or to pull girls who don't want to get their shoes wet across streams.

Good thing I don't go anywhere without boots. I'm not kidding.

Naturally we all started singing "Climb Every Mountain" from The Sound of Music.

I love these people.

If you have people in your life whom you love and who love you and who you don’t have to explain yourself to, take my advice and don’t ever let them go.
God will minister himself to you through them in more ways than you will ever know.

 Anyway.

 I could regale you with all kinds of tales of how God has been faithful to me in this time of my life, but I won’t bore you with so many of those. Not tonight, anyway. There is really just one that I want to tell you about, because this is the one that made me cry the hardest.

 One day in my last season of life I was doing devotions, praying over my next move (which would bring me to where I have been for the past few years) and I just felt the Lord say, “If there were little things you would like to have at the new place, what would they be?”

His question caught me a little off guard because A. I don’t really believe in praying for frivolous things and B. This was such a very odd question. What should I answer?
After thinking for a while this picture came to my mind. I had been doing a lot of design type things and had fallen in love with cool headboards on beds. And so, in the spirit of frivolity, I thought what better thing would there be to pray for than a cool headboard?
So I did.
“Lord, I would really like a cool headboard.”

 I had long forgotten about this prayer until one day this last summer. I was praying in my room (which was furnished when I moved in----another good God story), thanking the Lord for bringing me to this house, blessing me with all of this unmerited favor, just looking around at all the pretty things I got to see every day when I looked at my bed, and God said to me, “Do you remember when you prayed for that headboard?”

 Hot tears welled up in my eyes and then started spilling down my cheeks.

I hadn’t thought about that prayer for years.

Do you ever feel like you do that? Pray for something, ask for something, only to have already moved on to praying for your next “need” to not even see when he answers that first prayer??! And worse yet, to have forgotten so long ago that you don’t even thank him for doing what he did when he does it?!

Those hot tears were a reminder of my forgetfulness and his faithfulness.

See, this is the headboard that came with the furnished room:

Let me just explain the gravity of this situation:

I HAD BEEN SLEEPING UNDER A 6-FOOT TALL, SOLID WOOD HEADBOARD FOR A YEAR AND A HALF.

And had no idea.

 In my forgetfulness I had never thanked him for it because I DIDN’T REMEMBER that I had prayed for it.
Terrible, huh?
This week especially I have a hard time looking at it and not crying.
Isn’t that the way God works? Using some inanimate object to teach you something totally revolutionary about Himself?

 Like how, he doesn’t forget.

 I love that about him.

He who implants the ear DOES hear. He hears the prayers of the righteous. And then he never forgets.

Death in His Grave.

I have had a lot of thoughts this week. But none of them were very Easter-y.
I have been thinking a lot about how when the end comes, all things that we see will be shaken, and the only things that will be left are those which God caused to stand in the first place. So really, everything we see, all the things we can touch, all objects inanimate, they all will burn. They are all fake. They will not last.
I guess I have been thinking about the future things.
Which makes me so very happy that in the past Jesus did what he did; went to that cross. So that today, and in the future, he can make me stand, and then do what he is going to do. Shake things.

I don't know if any of you are familiar with John Mark McMillan. He wrote "How He Loves," but I personally think that "How He Loves" is no way near his best song.
On this Easter weekend, I will grace you with his "Easter" song.
Listen. Enjoy. Accept Jesus. Be Grateful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uypAK-Kepq8

Happy Easter, wolfies.

Home again, home again.

Hi Wolfies!
I am back from another trip!
I love to travel. Can any of you tell?
I was talking to a cousin on the phone this morning and I said to her, "Yeah...um...visiting people. It's what I do."
Oh Goodness.
This summer is going to be jammed with a lot of that "visiting." I don't know if I will have time to breathe or not.
Here are some snapshots of this past week.

Talk about updating the status of your mocha. This coffee shop menu is on flat-screen TVs. That seems a little excessive.

This was quite the goodbye. I have never before been tied up because they didn't want us to leave.

I love fur.
I won't tell you how many fur coats I own.

Here I am, yet again, scraping a plate clean. However, this time it had carried coconut cream pie. HOMEMADE coconut cream pie.
It made that strawberry shake I talked about taste like....well....it made it taste not good, let's just say that.

I'm not kidding.
And this trip was not to England.
All I want to know is how do I get a job here being a maid?

Ah yes, there we are, the travellers.

You know, I was thinking when I was there. It would be easy for me, especially in these times of hopping from one place to the next with seemingly no breaks in between, to just kind of "check things off the list." I could say:
Go to Colorado-check.
Move things to my new house-check.
Go to Arkansas-check.
Move totally into new house-check.
Go to Minneapolis-check.
Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera- check.

But I don't want to do that. And I don't want my life to be a list of things that I just check off, always looking for what comes next. I want to just say, "Today I am in Arkansas," or "Right now I am packing suitcases," or "At this moment I am eating breakfast." I want to be very aware of WHERE I AM, and WHAT I AM DOING, not wishing it away, or always looking to the next season of life.
What with all of my coming and going it is easy for me to think that my life is always shifting, that nothing seems constant; these are the "unknown days," I could think. But as I was pondering that I realized that these are not the unknown days.
These are the "Pre-Written Days."

Pslam 139: 16 All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

Isn't there some comfort in that?! These days are not my "unstable" days. These are days where I just keep walking in paths already laid.
When I am older and all of my running about days are done, the stories I will tell THEN, God already knows NOW. He knows what's coming. He was their Author.
And so today, as I am sitting here on this bed, I want to be aware of the present grace that God is giving. Grace isn't just for Sunday mornings or nights that are trying and sad. Grace is for Tuesday afternoons. God is always giving grace.
And this summer especially I want to be aware of that present grace on these pre-written days.