It's all good...

I have been thinking a lot about the goodness of God recently.  It is easy to think God is good when things are good.  My life is really good right now.  My kids are happy and making quality friendships with little people who have parents that Troy and I adore.  Troy is chasing professional dreams.  He is BUSY, but he is able to focus on himself right now.  After 2 years of focusing on our children, I know he is happy to be back to a more normal schedule that allows him to focus on work and school.  I LOVE my new job...not a little - a lot.  Good people, fun tasks and laughter...I love the church.  Being there restores my soul.
But what about when life is not good?  When life is hard, do I trust in the goodness of God?  Knowing that God is good is different than feeling that God is good.  When circumstance weigh us down with stress, discontent, unhappiness, depression, frustration, despair, grief, regret, sadness, anger...do I view my life through the heart, mind and eyes of someone who knows that God is good?  That is what faith is, right?  Living life with the knowledge that God is good, that He loves you and that He wants us to know His goodness in abundance.
God is always good...but He is not always sweet.  We face bitter circumstances...life is full of hard things.  Can I believe that God is good even when He is not sweet?  When death comes, when time passes with no answer, when people I love hurt, when provision doesn't come...even then do I know that He is good?  That He is being good to me...that He is working good for me?  Do I live standing firm in the head knowledge and the heart experience that He is not only sovereign but good?
I think that is the catch, isn't it?  He is sovereign.  He reigns.  He can do all things...including change my circumstance.  How do we reconcile the sovereignty of God and the goodness of God?  I guess the answer is faith...that His way may not be our way but His way is still the best way.  God is good, all the time.  All the time...

Refiner's Fire

Here's the thing:  I absolutely want to be His totally and completely...ruined for the name of Jesus.  My desire is to live radically marked by Christ in all areas of my life.  I know that I have a long way to go...(you may even have an opinion on how I am doing in that pursuit - I think that because I certainly have an opinion on how hard I think some people who talk a big game actually follow after Jesus - which goes back to having a long way to go...)  But I am trying to consciously ask Him about everything that I do, everything that I invest myself in, every decision that I make... 
This year that has led to leaving a job and pursuing His desire for me professionally...ending a ministry...and being part of an amazing women's conference.  It has also led to an intense, sometimes painful, look at my relationships.
He has asked me to examine friendships...rekindle old friendships...free myself from feeling like I have to be friends with people who are not worth the effort...seek new, fresh friendships...pursue a deep, meaningful relationship more fully.  And I want to be His.  So I am doing it.  But it isn't easy.  He has made clear that there is a friendship I want to invest in that is not His desire for me.  He has made it crystal clear.  He has even given me a glimpse into why it will not work out the way I want it to.  I can see His way is right...but it still hurts when He reminds me.
Living for Christ is marked by sacrifice.  His way is best...always.  I think I just wish, in this case, that what I want and what He wants for me lined up.

Marriage in The Message

So...I have a love/hate relationship with The Message.  It started out as hate but as I've learned more about it the more I love the way Eugene Peterson translates ancient text.  I think that I used to view it as a paraphrase...which is really what anyone who preaches or teaches Scripture gives when they preach or teach.  I now know that Mr Peterson did not take the NIV or any other translation and paraphrase but he began with the Hebrew and Greek manuscripts and translated them into the most modern use of the English language.  I respect his hard work...but I am not going to start using it as my study Bible. 

There are some amazing word pictures in The Message...like this one I heard last night in Bible study:

It's good for a man to have a wife, and for a woman to have a husband. Sexual drives are strong, but marriage is strong enough to contain them and provide for a balanced and fulfilling sexual life in a world of sexual disorder. The marriage bed must be a place of mutuality—the husband seeking to satisfy his wife, the wife seeking to satisfy her husband. Marriage is not a place to "stand up for your rights." Marriage is a decision to serve the other, whether in bed or out. Abstaining from sex is permissible for a period of time if you both agree to it, and if it's for the purposes of prayer and fasting—but only for such times. Then come back together again. Satan has an ingenious way of tempting us when we least expect it. - 1 Corinthians 7:2-6

I love some of the phrases and pictures looking at marriage this way gives me.  Marriage is not a place to stand up for your rights...it is a decision to serve.  It paints marriage as a strong, safe place when filled with service for one another...it also reminds me that Satan is prowling around looking for an opportunity to tempt.  God's design is always perfect...even when bringing together two imperfect people.  I love that about Him.

I fall hard upon soft grace...

July 14, 2011 Just a Little Sin? Lysa TerKeurst “Joseph went after his brothers and found them near Dothan. But they saw him in the distance, and before he reached them, they plotted to kill him.” Genesis 37:17b-18 (NIV) Today, there will be a moment. No one will snap a picture of it. It probably won’t make it into the journals of those who journal. Or linger in the thoughts we carry with us to sleep tonight. It will come. It will go. It will slip by seemingly unnoticed. But its affects won’t slip. They’ll stay. And if fostered, grow to epic proportions. This moment where something creeps into our heart and pulls our focus from right to wrong. It will be just a hint of distortion. The smallest amount. But a slight and seemingly insignificant amount of skewed thought will take root. And grow. Beyond what you can even imagine. One of my favorite stories in the Bible is where Moses goes to Pharaoh and sings that song, “Oh Pharaoh, Pharaoh, woah ohhh, gotta let my people go. Huawh! Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.” Totally a loose translation, but you know what I’m talking about. But here’s an astounding chain of events to trace and consider. Why was the nation of Israel in captivity? Why was the entire nation of Israelites — all God’s people — all twelve tribes — enslaved in Egypt? As I trace this story backwards I find it’s because of one seemingly insignificant moment. The course of history was changed because a few family members got a little cranky and a little jealous of their brother Joseph. Envy and anger slipped in. Just a hint. But just enough. It doesn’t take much. Joseph was thrown in a pit and eventually sold as a slave. Years went by. Years of heartbreak and confusion passed. Eventually, Joseph landed in a position of great power in Egypt and had authority to provide food for his family. So, all 11 of his brothers and their families moved to Egypt. Joseph and his 11 brothers make up what became the 12 tribes of Israel. As these tribes multiplied they became the nation of Israel. What the brothers meant for evil, God used for good. He saved the Israelites from the famine. But there were still lasting effects of the brothers’ choices that came out years later. After Joseph died, “Then a new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power in Egypt. ‘Look,’ he said to his people, ‘the Israelites have become much too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country.’ So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh. (Exodus 1:8-11) So, the entire nation of Israel suffered oppression and slavery. Why? Because a few brothers on an ordinary day got a little jealous and allowed anger and

envy to slip in.

And the moment it slipped in, the course of history changed.

In a moment.

May we never assume our moments don’t matter. The decisions we make every second of every day matter.

There are no little moments or little sins.

There is a domino affect to it all.

So, I fall hard upon soft grace. I thank God for this realization. I ask Him to make my soul even more sensitive, more aware, more in tune to my constant need for forgiveness.

Though I am weak, I walk in the strength of utter dependence.

And I refuse to beat myself up for mistakes made yesterday. Today is a new day. A new chance to set things going in a different direction.

Joseph’s brothers had years to try and rescue Joseph — find out where he was — help him — set their past mistakes right.

Years. They had years. But they never did set about to turn things around.

Oh sweet sister don’t let today slip by.

Moments matter.

Watch for a moment today where you are given the choice to let anger, envy or something else negative slip in. Recognize it. Refute it. And replace it with God’s spirit of love.

What I Would Tell Me at 12, 15 and 18...

What I would tell the 12 year old me...

• invest your heart in people who will care for it...even if they aren't the coolest kids in school
• be nicer to John
• Jesus loves you...just like you are - you are precious and priceless to Him and He is Who matters.

What I would tell the 15 year old me...

• take your recommitment to Christ a little more seriously
• pursue one of the older girls that you look up to so much at church...she probably has great advice about the next few years
• in a few months, you will meet a boy named Robert - RUN

What I would tell the 18 year old me...

• Holiness matters.  It matters so much to God and to you later.
• skip GSU...it is a waste of your time - high school was harder
• this boy is great but won't matter near as much as the next one...the next one will become part of you

so worth the read!!!

Getting Up Again Renee Swope

“…though the righteous fall seven times, they rise again…” Proverbs 24:16a, (NIV)

I’ve always admired people who aren’t afraid to fail. You know the ones who don’t even consider defeat when they blow it; people who see a personal setback as just another goal to conquer.
I’m not always so courageous. In fact, I can be really hard on myself when I fail, and it doesn’t even have to be a biggie. You see, I have what I call a “meanie in me” who replays my mistakes over and over, reminding me of how badly I’ve disappointed someone, or how impatient I was with my husband, or how harsh I was with my kids, or all sorts of ways that I fell short that day.
But the greatest defeat comes when I allow a mistake, a bad decision, sin, or a broken relationship to convince me that I might as well give up. Perhaps you have also allowed failure to knock you down, tie you up with the ropes of regret and hold you hostage like I have.
When I surveyed over 1200 women for my upcoming book, A Confident Heart, I discovered that our past failures, and our fear of failing again, are two of the biggest triggers that make us doubt ourselves.
Today’s key verse, Proverbs 24:16, has helped me release the regret, guilt, fear and shame that have weighed me down and held me back. Take a minute to read it now and notice how it says the righteous will fall. That is right. Even those of us who have received the gift of Christ’s righteousness and redemption will fall down. But we were never intended to stay down.
Instead of giving up Jesus empowers us to get up again.
In getting up, we can apologize and ask for forgiveness. In getting up, we can choose to try again with our kids, in our jobs, in our ministries, in our marriages, and in all of our mistakes. Because we trust that although we fall, God will help us up. Listen to His promise in Psalm 37:23-24 and as you read it insert your name in the blanks: “The steps of ____________ are established by the Lord, and He delights in ____________ way. When ____________ falls, __________ will not be hurled headlong, because the Lord is the One who holds ________ hand.” (NASB)
When we get up again failure can actually help us become the confident women God created us to be because it makes us stronger and better — when we go to God for help. Failure can stretch us to do more than we think we can and push us to try other methods of doing things when one way doesn’t work.
Yes, failure can be hurtful but it can also be beneficial. Failure produces wisdom when we ask for it and maturity when we learn from it.
The truth is, following Jesus is not about avoiding failures and being perfect. It’s about accepting our weaknesses and becoming more dependent on God’s perfect love and power at work in us. So the next time you fail to be the woman He calls you to be, or the woman you expect yourself to be, ask God to remind you of this truth.
We will sometimes fail to be who we want to be but we will get closer to who we are meant to be every time we fall and then choose to take God’s hand so we can get up again!

Bummer...

So, something happened recently that hurt my feelings.  I thought about a facebook status that would reveal the hurt but not those guilty and maybe elicit comments that would encourage me, justify my hurt feelings or keep someone from doing the same thing to someone else.  I didn't take it to facebook because (as I have mentioned in blogs before) I am not fond of people who try to send messages via the facebook status.  I think it hurts the wrong people and shows some amount of cowardice...and I think I can throw down Scripture to support not airing out grievances via facebook. 
BUT that didn't keep me from coming up with the perfect status to express my thoughts and feelings.  As I over-analyzed the hurt, the people responsible and then mulled over that perfect phrase, I realized I am guilty of the very thing that hurt my feelings.
Conviction stinks...but without it, we don't grow.  We never begin to look more like Christ.  If we choose to ignore conviction or never have it, how can we claim to be in a relationship with Jesus?  A relationship is a two way street.  Conviction is the Spirit walking that street...am I going to take a walk with Him?