Grace That Is Sufficient, Faith That Is Persistent

Have you ever heard a story that just sticks with you—kind of lingering in the back of your mind like a hum? 

A friend of mine was singing at her new church this past weekend, so a few of us went to the Sunday morning service and shared some encouragement with her. The message was a series of vignettes that highlighted the power of God to intervene in situations, and to expand our faith as He keeps His promises. 

One of the featured stories was about a man in Oklahoma who happened to turn on the television and stop to watch a reality show about convicted criminals serving time in prison. The Oklahoma man was led to pray for one prisoner in particular—a young man who was serving a sentence miles and miles away in a California prison. For two years, the Oklahoma man obeyed the word that he was given from God, and he persisted in praying faithfully for the young inmate. 

Then, one Sunday morning, without any particular reason, the Oklahoma man happened to look down the aisle in his Oklahoma church. Just a few seats down, in the very same row, sat the young inmate from the TV show! From that time forward, God made a way for a discipling relationship between the two men. Willing obedience to a mysterious urging from the Spirit created a path to ministry. 

Wow! Obedience brought the men blessing and God received the glory.

In the two days since I heard that story, my mind has returned to it numerous times...probably because of how familiar I am with the strange exhilaration of receiving a very clear call from God. 

Nearly four years ago, God spoke very clearly to my heart and laid a powerful calling upon it to share His love and a very particular promise with a sister in Christ. 

The terrain of that calling has included lush, fertile plains of joy and peace as well as dry, depleted deserts of grief and sorrow...and every topography in between. Yet, by His grace, my young daughter and I have remained convicted to pray for our dear one daily and to demonstrate God's love joyfully and creatively. 

It's been a time of enormous spiritual growth even in the midst of many challenges and much pruning all around. However, there's also been a lot of waiting in the dark with only little sparks of light here and there.

This morning I found myself whispering to God inaudibly, "Please...please can I have a sign from you that my breakthrough—my look down the aisle—is coming...that our blessing and hope is coming soon?" 

Then I felt myself backspacing in my silent moment of prayer. I had nearly asked for just some small sign, but what I wanted with all my heart was an enormous sign, the breakthrough itself! Swift, immediate, bold blessing. That's what I was after down deep in my heart. 

Even so, I felt hesitant to ask for more. God had heard my heart; within moments a friend messaged me to say she'd seen some robins in a park where I often take nature photos. 

Robins are very special in South Florida, and extremely special in our hearts. They symbolize the life of someone very precious to us—someone now in heaven. After several years of not seeing the robin migration come through South Florida, this year God showered us in robins right after the New Year. We had to drive a few hours to find them, but they were singing and bobbing all around us that day. We held onto the joy and promise of that sighting for weeks afterward.

Two robins in a bird bath: Rockledge, FL - January 5, 2013

Robin on the roof of a garage: Rockledge, FL - January 5, 2013

Receiving the news that there were some robins around town—particularly when the joy of our January blessing was becoming somewhat difficult to fix upon—my heart washed with fresh hope. Maybe my look down the aisle was, as my daughter believes, right around the corner and coming our way soon! 

I set out for the park with camera and binoculars in hand so that I could document this blessing that would lead soon to our fully answered prayer. 

But when I arrived at the park and began looking around, the familiar doubt—in myself, in my calling, and even in God—began to stir. I walked and looked for more than two hours, but I could not find the robins.

Somewhere along the way my mind began drifting in and out of despair to Scripture, spiritual songs, and hymns of the faith. The words kept coming and swirling about me like a tornado in slow motion. I half expected to see Dorothy and Toto!

Does the hawk fly by your wisdom...Consider the birds of the air...Consider the lilies of the field...Are not two sparrows sold for a penny...How much more will your Father who is in Heaven give good things to those who ask Him...Grace that is greater than all my sin...Your grace is enough for me...

Roaming aimlessly around the park looking for robins, and trying to cling to hope and faith for my miraculous answer to prayer, I could not help interrogating my spirit. 

Did I really believe those words? Did I really believe that the God who provides for the red shouldered hawk and the flowers I was photographing would also see me through the calling He gave me? Would He really comfort and heal the heart of our dear one? Would He move the mountains, make the crooked straight, and be faithful to reconcile and restore our beautiful sisterhood? Was His grace REALLY sufficient for me?

I looked all around. 

Could I accept as sufficient the grace of simply knowing the robins were there in the park with me...somewhere...even if I could not see them?

Could I rejoice in the blessing of bees drinking nectar?

The blessing of marsh rabbits nibbling the grass? 

Insects morphing into beautiful moths and butterflies?

Wood storks fishing in the swamp?

The red shouldered hawk scanning his territory?

The crab spider waiting patiently?

If I tell others how God's grace and sufficiency is evidenced in nature, am I not responsible for taking those words to heart and trusting in their truth? 

Wasn't the grace and promise all around me with the robins I couldn't see? I knew I couldn't deny God's presence and goodness in all I was seeing, so I had to acknowledge His presence and goodness in all that I could not yet see.

I wish I could tell you that I left the park feeling fulfilled and encouraged. My heart was still aching for our dear one...and for our look down the aisle. 

I still longed to return home and find her at my doorstep ready with one of her warm hugs and a reaffirmation of our God-ordained bond. But even in my longing and impatience, I knew I had been given the grace to remain obedient to my calling and to love faithfully and whole heartedly.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7

New International Version (NIV)

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Ruth 1:16-18

New American Standard Bible (NASB)
¹⁶ But Ruth said, “Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you; for where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. ¹⁷ Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. Thus may the Lord do to me, and worse, if anything but death parts you and me.”¹⁸ When she saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more to her.

Dude, What Would Happen?

DWWH? is a reality-style TV show on the Cartoon Network. It features three teenage "dudes" who play out the sort of Phineas and Ferb-esque antics that are so often in the highlight reels of anyone who ever had a brother. Typically, each episode is concept/theme based. Experiments ramp up one from another in order to see just how far the dudes can push their schemes without actually delving into the realm of education. It's sort of like "what would happen" if Bill And Ted's Excellent Adventure and Ferris Bueller's Day Off were spliced together as a single, ridiculous film.

This morning, I was praying with one of my dear prayer partners, and the Spirit guided me to pray over the way people treat her, and the way ambivalence and disregard seem to be increasing even among Christians and leaders who should know better. You know...the folks you'd expect to sound the alarms when the This Present Darkness culture rises around them. But not so much.

Somehow, biblical leadership often mingles with pop-psychology, and we find more and more written about how to increase self and expand territory, outreach, influence, productivity, and bottom line. The study of genuine humility scarcely exists in the popular realms. That makes me think about baseball. Ya..baseball...Babe Ruth, home runs, if you build it He will come, and all that good stuff.

There's not as much out there helping folks learn how to play what baseball coaching legend, Jim Leyland is famous for...the principle he uses to produce successful teams. It's called small ball—the emphasis on consistently getting runners on base and moving them systematically around the bases to score runs. The "heavy hitters" are surely welcomed when the bases are loaded, but they aren't necessarily the ideal because they tend to have a fairly high percentage of strike outs. Their fame and power can come at the expense of the team's ability to afford consistent, lesser-known, skill players. Their fame can compromise long-range team outcomes, especially if they go into a slump, find themselves in trouble with the law, get injured, or are found to be using performance-enhancing drugs. I won't spend the time here, but those metaphors apply in Christian leadership.

And that's what got me to wondering...

Dude, what would happen if—in this age of small groups, church planting, and pastor/CEO ministry, in this climate of leadership development, cross/intra-cultural outreach, and in the face of contemporary psychology influencing the supernatural realm of ministry—we went back to the essentials and basics—the small ball disciplines within our faith?

What would happen is the notion of Servant Leadership became less of a methodology and more of an instinctual lifestyle built on faith and obedience? What if there were a series of airport security style spiritual portals through which we had to pass successfully in order to move beyond the "small" world of consistently treating our family and friends in a Christ-like manner before we moved on to larger playing fields?

Of course, so often the learning is in the leading. While many a "great" leader has been quietly humbled at home, PLENTY have been humbled on a grand, public scale. But the realm of the nefarious is in the reality of the devil's own brand of small ball. There are many leaders—highly effective evangelical drones flying under radar—who unwittingly expand the territory of darkness by maintaining little idolatrous outposts—those protected, No Trespassing areas where they passively permit themselves to keep a campfire burning—the zones that allow for private worship of  "It'sJustHowI'mWired" idols.

Of course, we all have such outposts that enable (if not empower) us to act smug and passé (even slightly braggadocious) about being less compassionate, less wholehearted, less transparent, or even less honest than we ought to be...even through we insist that it's our business to disciple others. So let me pause here and say this very clearly because this ain't baseball, it's  the heavenly realm.

Idols are dangerous...really, Really, REALLY dangerous!

Idols bring unwanted consequences, painful set-backs, and worst of all...God's wrath. The harboring  of idols pretty much always involves brutality and death before it's all over. Is it any wonder, then, that the very first commandment is essentially an insistence upon the foundation of idol-free living—nothing that gets in the way of loving/obeying God completely? (See Deuteronomy 6:4-5.)

Look at the historical accounts of idol trouble throughout Scripture, and at best you find limited effectiveness (1 Kings 16:27) and at worst you see God's vengeance (Nahum 1:2).Our secret idol camps keep us at work with our enemy the devil...fanning the flames of disobedience, cultivating and justifying our own disobedience, and by default (one way or another) replicating our crimes against God through the spiritual DNA we pass as we lead and disciple.

Dude, that stuff is dangerous! 

Dudes and Dudettes... let's decide today to engage in the child-like wonder and enthusiasm of finding out "what would happen" if we shut down our secret (though the people closest to you know they are not so secret) camps of idolatry in our lives that give us permission to treat others with less respect, dignity, courtesy, attention, interest, reciprocity, kindness, love, generosity, grace, forgiveness, etc than we have received ourselves from Christ. Let the campfire go out and move on to a closer walk with Jesus.

So, Dude, if we find out that shutting down Camp Annie's Secret Idols (you choose your own camp name) makes it harder for us to have a broader outreach...well, it's probably not what you want to hear, but I'd say that it means we're probably at the right place on the map. We're in Camp Small Ball re-learning (or perhaps learning for the very first time) what it means to really live in a perpetual state of John 3:30 and to keep the bases loaded, and the runs coming in consistently. In the long run, that's far better rather than having a few heavy hitting games where our own legends are made. We need to play consistently in those every day small ball games where HIS Name gets all the honor, praise, and glory.

Dude, what would happen if you sent yourself down to the minors?

Closer Than They Appear

It's an interesting paradox...the way(s) some life events leave you very much in need of human companionship, compassion, and understanding yet also have a way of leaving you desirous of no such thing. You just want to be left alone...well...at least I do. 

Though I'm typically friendly and open when I encounter new people, my overall nature is extraordinarily introverted, so high levels of tension, stress, anxiety, or grief will drive me quickly inward. You will never see me at things like divorce care, grief share, 12 steps, life skills—nothing that involves putting my "stuff" or my inner life up for group conversation. Yeesh! Makes me bristle just thinking about it!

But when I think about my social circles of neighbors, co-workers, and even close friends then I can see the ways in which my tendency to withdraw—though it has some valuable benefits found only in the stillness of solitude—has a way of distorting how I feel and think...how I see not only my circumstances, but the people around me. When solitude slips into a propensity toward isolation, everyone and everything looks different to me...dangerous, intrusive, and untrustworthy. Distant.

It's a slow fade from solitude to isolation, but (for me) it almost always begins with a tendency toward negativity and ascribing questionable motives to even the people closest to me...perhaps especially the people closest to me. For example, if they are enthusiastic about something, then I am apathetic at best, and all out discouraging at worst. "Why do you want to go to that? You're not gonna like it." "Don't invite ____ _______. He/she is too _____ and then we'll have to _______." In sum, I turn even the simplest things into a burden and a criticism.

Of course, I don't realize I'm doing it at first, but by the time I do the darkness has settled in and I no longer care or have strength to combat it. In due time, everything is distorted, and I have all but completely lost not only my redeeming outlook on life and my interest in others, but also my hope and my joy in living. I have no expectations for anything other than a dark life of strife, sorrow, and betrayal in a world marked by sin. It's not pretty...unless you count pretty negative.

Plenty of people come to such a place in the midst of trying times, but as a woman of faith with a mission and a ministry, God keeps it impressed upon my heart that I have a responsibility to dig my way out and get back on the path of redemption. Sadly, that doesn't always mean I come quickly or quietly. Surrendering to God means vulnerability all over the place, and who can stomach that when they're already in a dark place? 

So I have learned how to let my sin and darkness fly under radar—saying and doing just enough of the right things to keep from arousing too much suspicion. But eventually even that breaks down. The "Enter At Your Own Risk" sign begins to flash above my head.

You can only imagine how these behaviors begin to inbreed...and the mutant products of conception they yield. My relationships with self, others, and God all become tenuous. Some ultimately grow troubled, and it is my fault. I'm ashamed to admit that everyone suffers the consequences of my isolation whether I realize it or not. And ultimately, if it gets bad enough, I don't really care.

I make this confession knowing full well that it exposes a darker side of myself—one that isn't very attractive—but I share it knowing with certainty that many other people struggle similarly. And anyway,at the end of the day, this pattern replicates the trouble that came with the first human sin...a belief in the lies that told to us in our darkness.

The best wisdom that was ever shared with me was four simple words: Don't believe the lies. These are the lies that erupt like weeds from the first moment I begin to converse with the darkness and discount the Truth. From that moment on, I begin buying stock in lies—creating options to purchase a full blown campground of lies where I put up my tent and 1 Corinthians 10:13 is left at the curb like trash.

1 Corinthians 10:13

New King James Version (NKJV)

¹³ No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.

The way out is always in the Word, in confession, and in repentance. The lies cannot stand in the light of the Truth found in Scripture. The Truth has much power in its confession/expression/profession, but most importantly in its movement in the opposite direction of the lies...repentance. A half turn will never cut it. What's required is a full sprint away from the darkness—a sprint where we are shouting the Truth the whole way, crying out to the Savior for rescue. He will always come.

When we flee from what is evil and cling to what is good we begin to see God's love, and the people and circumstances He brings into our lives, as much closer, safer, and truer than we see them when we looking at them through the side view mirrors. We use the mirrors to avoid collisions with people and feelings that want to know us. But these are also collisions with love and grace...truth and peace...hope and joy, so...don't believe the lies.

The Trouble with Forward

While I was driving to work this morning my thoughts turned to a number of people and situations in my life that might be best categorized as stuck. Each stuck scenario I considered had its roots in some very deep grief. Grief for past wounds. Grief for abuses suffered. Grief for betrayals. Grief for broken marriages. Grief for broken relationships. Grief for wayward children. Grief for deceased parents, siblings, family, and friends. And, what I consider to be the absolute worst grief of all, grief for children who have died. So many wounds to the soul.

"No wonder so many of us seem to be stuck, or operating in a sort of surreal, frame-by-frame slow motion," I thought.There's a heck of a lot of grieving going on."

It's not like me to be prescriptive when God gives me an insight, so I don't claim to have a cure for stuckness. In fact, though it may just be me protecting my own "right" and propensity to be stuck, I can't help thinking that getting unstuck has more to do with a combination of things coming together at just the right time, rather than any single action or determination of the will. But if I were to make any valuable contribution to the pool of wisdom on unsticking and moving forward, I'd have to say that a significant part of the trouble we have (or at least I have) with moving forward is really our perception of what forward is and entails.

When we're stuck we often create unwittingly an inaccurate pathology of forward. The smallest steps away from an uninterrupted relationship with grief—pulling away from grief's perpetual hold upon our thoughts, decisions, actions, reactions, relationships, spirit, soul, health, energy, etc—seem to trigger a belief that forward means, among other things, fast forward. And the thing is, fast forward anxiety makes a TON of assumptions and presuppositions that do more to add weight to the pain and suffering of grief than to help us see the next step, take the next breath, or face the next day. Fast forward anxiety propels the vortex of fear that whirls so violently when we come face-to-face with precisely how much in this life is out of our control.

Fast forward anxiety operates under the assumption that something beloved, important, incomplete, or necessary will be left behind and cause us more trouble and pain later. It presupposes how we will feel in each yet-to-be-experienced moment, and says that all painful feelings, thoughts, and experiences MUST be avoided. Fast forward anxiety also presupposes that all the new (and probably normal) anxieties that emerge will make things impossibly worse and hinder a more timely effort to disentangle from grief later. 

For example, fast forward reasons that if someone sees us enjoying ourselves they will believe we are "over it" and fully able to participate in "normal" life again. What fast forward anxiety doesn't tell us is that we have the ability to say, "Hey, I'm just trying this out today. It's exhausting. I can't promise you I'll feel like doing it again soon."  Fast forward anxiety decides in advance to tell no one about its assumption because it doesn't want to be questioned or challenged. Fast forward anxiety says that if we expose it to others they will trip some sort of mine that makes everything worse. I would venture to say that fast forward anxiety tells the greatest lie of disempowerment: If you move forward, you will lose control.

Of course, the irony is that the situations that lead us into the deepest griefs are very often the sites where we learn that so little of life is ever fully within our control in the first place. The situations and occurrences that trigger the most disabling griefs are very often a tangled web of things that operate from both within and without our control. A spouse cheats. Health fails. An abuse takes place. Someone dies. Someone leaves. Something ends. The lies of grief speak fragments of truth into a network of reality that has many complex contributors operating outside our control. Fast forward anxiety, then, is birthed out of that same flawed system where bits of truth are caught up in half-truths and all-out lies of the mind, and the darkness of the spirit. It draws us away from God and love and hope and people...life.

Real "forward" is probably best characterized as something other than linear progress. Real forward is more like journeying. Whenever we journey we never travel entirely alone, no matter who or what we choose or do not choose to take with us. We can push away from the people and places that trigger our pain, but the fact is that memories—faces, places, histories, events, etc—tag along with us anyway. So does God. And because God is our constant companion, even amid our most profound grief—a time when He seems most veiled—we can put fast forward anxiety in its place...behind God, not ahead or instead of Him. Over and over and over again in the Bible, God tells us not to fear. Anxiety and God don't mix.

The call to fearlessness tells me that the one who knows me best of all because He "formed my inward parts [and] knitted me together in my mother's womb" knows that He has made a way for me to be unafraid.

He has given us the best and most immutable motive/reason to be unafraid...because He is with us. His very presence in our lives—with us—means that there is no basis for buddying-up with fear...in fact, it's kinda disobedient and adds to our troubles. (And I'm not just talking to my sisters and brothers here, by the way. I'm talking to me...the Disobedience Cover Girl (ok...middle aged woman...Ugh! Whatever!).

At the end of the day, the trouble with forward isn't really trouble at all; it's a plain fact. Whether we stay stuck, move backward, move forward, go in circles, rock side-to-side, jump up and down, or roll over and play dead, the one earthly life that we have been given continues on its linear progression, and (like it or not) we go with it. The sights we see are the variables that we can and must influence by fleeing from fear, because fear is about punishment and imprisonment, not reconciliation and freedom.

What a waste, then, to give fear the reins and allow it to entrench us in all the angriest, darkest, loneliest, and most misbegotten sites of grief rather than the inexpressibly beautiful ones— the places where we find that we can love God and enjoy Him forever in the here and now, by loving others and by forgiving and reconciling with both the living and the dead, and all the skeletons in our closets. 

Whatever we grieve and lose, God also provides us with a treasure trove of healing gifts and comforts and people to help us access the realms of gratitude, peace, and  joy that make the journey forward a journey that is safer, more tolerable, often interesting, and nearer to the Savior than if we pitch our tents in fear and camp among the people who allow us to live there rent-free, and without responsibility.

1 Corinthians 10:13

Amplified Bible (AMP)

¹³ For no temptation (no trial regarded as enticing to sin), [no matter how it comes or where it leads] has overtaken you and laid hold on you that is not common to man [that is, no temptation or trial has come to you that is beyond human resistance and that is not adjusted and adapted and belonging to human experience, and such as man can bear]. But God is faithful [to His Word and to His compassionate nature], and He [can be trusted] not to let you be tempted and tried and assayed beyond your ability and strength of resistance and power to endure, but with the temptation He will [always] also provide the way out (the means of escape to a landing place), that you may be capable and strong and powerful to bear up under it patiently.

Indispensable. Non-disposable.

Ecclesiastes 4:9-12

New Living Translation (NLT)

⁹ Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed. ¹⁰ If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble.¹¹ Likewise, two people lying close together can keep each other warm. But how can one be warm alone? ¹² A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken.

Perhaps one of the greatest challenges in human relationships, maybe most particularly in our harried, 21st century lives, is appreciating the people God brings into our lives--those who are absolutely indispensable...NON-disposable. 

Most of us don't wake up in the morning planning to discount our fellow human beings, but with so many demands upon our lives, so little time, and SOOOO much popular wisdom (even in evangelical circles) encouraging a "me first" way of life, it's easy to let some of the most important, yet often invisible, people in our lives go unnoticed, unappreciated--perhaps casually thanked, but essentially dismissed. None of us wants to admit it...but we all do it. And THAT really is NOT OK!

Some of us don't have to do much thinking about who the under-appreciated people are in our lives, because conscience throbs at the sound of their names. But even if we can call them to mind before reading the end of this sentence, it's worth performing a little gratitude test to get a complete picture.

I stumbled upon the appreciation test while my job was in jeopardy some time ago. My boss at that time--someone whose methods of encouragement and inspiration required a good bit of imagination--was holding my job in the balance and challenging me to prove myself indispensable to the organization so that I would not become disposable...unemployed. Let me say that my self-esteem absolutely plummeted as I tried to process the fact that I'd been deemed dispensable and so the most disposable among an already skeletal staff.  It wasn't until God intervened, in ways I could not have predicted, that I gained the insight and the confidence I needed to fight for my job.

In the throes of my self-pity, self-righteousness, and despair, I'd failed to be my own best advocate. I'd already discounted the long chain of mostly unseen contributions that I'd taken on and sustained throughout the course of my employment. My contributions ran the gamut from crafting executive level documents, to forging connections with other organizations, to taking on jobs no one else was interested in, to actually cleaning the bathrooms! And there were a whole host of small things I was doing on an individual level for other staff members--things for which I sought no public acknowledgment, but believed to be valuable because they were investments of time, talents, and treasures that enabled them to deliver their best work.

Throughout my Christian walk, I'd been consistently taught the importance of selflessness, humility, and un-lauded service and generosity as hallmarks of Christ's likeness. So in an effort to truly live as one willing to be a suffering servant, I'd learned to swallow my pride more often than not--finding myself again and again on my knees repenting of anything that appeared to me as the desire to be recognized and appreciated.

As noble (or martyred...?) as that might seem, I was failing in one extremely important way. I had no confidence...no genuine assurance of my significance through Christ, or sense of any real value that my work and ministry added to the lives of others.  I'd been silently and unwittingly choking to death on the reality of being human...the daily assaults upon my dignity, worth, and purpose by others struggling in the same tangled web. Where was the line, I wondered, between Christ-like humility and and my unavoidable humanity?

While endeavoring to live my faith and be like Jesus, I lost the confidence I needed to walk tall in my job, share my ideas with conviction, and demonstrate my worth to the organization. I didn't know how to fight for my job when the time came, so all I had was a  prayer closet filled with the brittle bones of my pride, and the raw flesh of my perceived insignificance. I'd forgotten to bring out of that closet the confidence that comes with knowing who I am in Christ. I forgot to carry the words of Jesus out with me from the closet into the workplace and all my relationships.

Luke 12:6-7

English Standard Version (ESV)

⁶ Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God.⁷ Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.

But the reminder of my worth to Jesus was not the only lesson I'd learned when I'd suddenly been shoved to the threshold of looming disaster and unemployment. I also had the chance to think about the invisible, indispensable people in my own life--the folks who never ask for my time, treasures, or talents, but continuously gave me theirs. I had to take a good hard look at how much appreciation and gratitude I'd expressed (and genuinely felt) for people who were invisible...the ones who pray regularly for me and my family, who are the first to jump in and help with some time-consuming, unrewarding, and unglorious chore again and again and again, the ones whose greatest demands upon my life are the hope for simple acts of listening, and who keep secret their longing to be included in meaningful parts of my life and assured that their contributions to my success, safety, and well-being are meaningful.

I discovered that I'd developed my own casual habits of dismissive and ungrateful behavior. And while I'd never said to someone, "Prove to me that you are indispensable, or I will dispose of you," I certainly found that I'd treated some pretty indispensable people as if they were entirely disposable. My gratitude was scarcely measurable in relation to what I'd been receiving. I was no more generous or inspiring than the boss who'd left me feeling so worthless.

I'm not here to lay on the guilt, but I challenge you to do two things the next time you're feeling unappreciated. First, pray for insight and revelation as you search the scriptures for evidence of your value and purpose in life. Do you truly find your greatest worth and sense of significance in Christ? Or are you depending mostly upon the assurances of your worth from others whose good opinion you seek? Next, dig deeper and ask God to show you the invisible people in your life...the ones you treat as disposable, but who are part of an important, invisible network of support that God has crafted to keep you from falling. It isn't enough to simply drop them a note of appreciation (though that's a start). Create opportunities for them to enjoy some of the first fruits of your time and talents. Share your treasures...most of those treasures are things like your confidence, vulnerability, and family. Overlook the ways in which they may not fit in with your other friends and fans. Forgive their weaknesses, short-comings, awkwardness, and mistakes, and focus on their consistent contributions. Build them up and allow them to become visible and equal among the important people in your life. Whether you realize it or not, these people are indispensable to your success, your safety, and your well-being. They are non-disposable.

Puzzled

I'm sure plenty of folks think I'm na·ïve (at best) and maybe a little up-tight, and undoubtedly there are a few folks who would say I'm judgmental and prudish. What's a gal to do?  I am what I am...whatever that is.

Mostly, I'm a sinner saved by grace.  Whew!

And often what I am is puzzled. I think too much.

OK, granted...I'm a high "i" on the Myers Briggs Type Indicator--pretty gosh darn introverted (despite what anyone thinks or says) so I'm comfortable spending time alone with myself and my thoughts. Maybe I spend a little too much solo time, but typically the decisions I make, the conclusions I draw, and even the judgments I decide to reserve have been carefully considered...very often put to prayer.

But enough about me.

The thing is, it's election time, and not to be self-focused, BUT, I'm also smack-dab in the middle of child-rearing time. In my economy, that means it's serious thinking time!

Serious ACTION time! REALLY SERIOUS PRAYER TIME!

There's a here-and-now that's in trouble, and a future hanging in the balance--for my nation, for humanity...and for the little girl I've devoted my life to loving and protecting.  Seriously...am I the only one who's feeling an overwhelming sense of responsibility???

So what I'm wondering so much lately is why folks don't seem to be putting all of the pieces together.

I find the disconnect most evident among my Christian peers and friends, and in my own life. Why, I wonder, do we seem to have this adjustable sensibility that can get its knickers all in a twist about gay marriage and abortion, but not about things that hit super close to home...like ethics, personal accountability, modesty, purity, reverence, humility, loyalty, respect, honesty, etc? I'm not even going to ask about the pursuit of holiness!  Here's who I am there: FAIL!

But here's where I want to be...

So, I ask myself: 

Why are things like self-examination, self-control, self-sacrifice, etc seemingly secondary to public outrage over the sins of others? How can it be that these aspects of public and private life are SO out-of-sync with both the logic and the mysteries of faith that so few people seem to be making the critical connections that have tremendous power to move the hand of God to heal our families, our souls, and our nation?

I can't speak for anyone else, but when I read 2 Chronicles 7:14 my first instinct is never to look outward at my country or my community. To my mind, this verse smacks of a call to self-reflection that leads to personal repentance...on a wide scale! I get convicted.

If Christians put the pieces together it is likely that the picture of responsibility for so much public dissatisfaction will become clearest in our own homes.

We preach abstinence in our churches, but do we instill a preference for modesty into our children? Do we insist on modesty and model it? Do we ask ourselves what modesty should really look like?

OK...I do NOT expect my daughter to walk around in the equivalent of a body bag in order to protect her from being objectified and sexualized. I cannot honestly say to her that wearing a one piece bathing suit, as opposed to a tankini, or a bikini, will assure her of sexual respect or personal dignity.  But I can teach her about the attitudes that her fashion choices project, and how these attitudes can become a slippery slope...personally and for girls who aren't even born yet!

I can teach her that the fashion choices we make in our home have dramatic social power to maintain modesty, or expand its boundaries.

I can also teach her that she can join all the city-wide and church-wide initiatives to feed the homeless, stop abortion, protect marriage, improve entertainment, and end human trafficking, but if she isn't first feeding her next door neighbor, engaging in healthy relationships, treating others with dignity, forgiving others, reconciling relationships, loving her enemies, governing her thoughts--her tongue, her actions--and living a winsome life for Christ inside her home...then little by little she is receiving less of God's best. She becomes a less authentic model of the way of life she claims as best for everyone.  When she's old enough to vote, her decisions will become increasingly against this or that position rather than for God's standard.

Believe it or not, 12-year-olds are capable of having deep moral and ethical discussions. I dare you to try and bring candy from home into a movie you attend with my child. (SHE was the one to challenge ME about the M & Ms tucked into my purse!)  :-/

Am I the perfect model of what I preach? Nooooooo! Not by a long shot! Am I some amazing Christian mom who has it all together?

<Insert my gagging gasp and guilty expression here!>

As a Christian woman who chose divorce to solve a marital problem (even though it was a very big and complicated problem) I humbly and sadly confess that I failed to uphold my own values. There's a high cost associated with that failure. I don't take it lightly. I work hard to set as much of it right as I can, and take the brunt of the consequences as much as it is humanly possible. It's not perfect. I deserve no applause. 

But failure in one area of my life doesn't have to be a wide open door to social or spiritual ambivalence. Sin never has to be a prison. Our heavenly Father is always ready to hear our humble confessions, and walk with us away from the ways of spiritual and societal death!

If we want to restore and cash-in on our founding fathers' faith, then we have to examine the ways in which our personal lives fail to reflect their values...publicly and privately.

God's "if my people" call to prayer, humility, and repentance is the call for a gut level plea for Him to guide ME away from the things like godless and irreverent entertainment, immodest dress, unedifying talk, clickish friendships, unforgiveness, financial irresponsibility, workplace laziness, personal entitlement, and relational strife that make ME a hypocrite of the highest order before God and man. It's not a call for Pharisees and hypocrites to demand more of others while perched upon a stump of faux-piety.

God's offer says that if His people--all of us who bear the name Christian--cry out in humble prayer that MUST result in personal confession, repentance, and soul-level willingness to change...THEN He will hear all of our cries for restoration of the values we say we hold high (a land governed by His laws) and He will set things aright and heal our land.

Should we be concerned about political wranglings that influence social norms and the resulting government of our nation?  You betchya! Christianity is NOT a call to social in-action or silence.

But if we genuinely desire a national turn toward one nation under God, then we need to first ensure that we are living personally under God ourselves. That's how strength in numbers works from a heavenly perspective...one by one, home by home, clan by clan, community by community, city by city, state by state...

Never doubt the depths of grass roots, or their strength.

What We Say to Dogs

...What They Hear

When Christian folks start working the (biblical) "S"ubmission word around Facebook, I can't seem to just say nothing. This failure to shut up is probably...well...a failure. 


Oh well. 


OK, so here's the deal with me and the whole submission thing in a nutshell:


It sounded good when I was a newlywed Christian woman and heard Bunny Wilson talk about her book Liberated through Submission: God's Design for Freedom in All Relationships. 


Honestly, she was so engaging, and what she said sounded reasonable enough...and then life got real...really, really, real. None of your business. Just spot me some belief for now.


IMHO: a gal can suck up a whole lotta submission, and probably put up with a whole lotta crap in the process, provided it has nothing much to do with sex or money. 


Show me a Christian wife who's been "yes, Dear-ing" her way through a serious financial crisis of her husband's making, or a one who has been treated like a receptacle for her husband's sex drive, and I will point out the well-worn paths between the psychotherapist's office, the church leader's office, the doctor's office, and the lawyer's office. 


NOTE: These are the paths where zombie wives are staggering and gasping for a life of biblical faith to make sense of their experience, but often find themselves betrayed, broken, confused, crushed, and demoralized. 


But that's just me. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe. 


And I digress...

Let me dive into this conversation again, only this time from the point on the continuum where my thoughts began this afternoon.


If you follow any of the prominent folks in the Christian blogosphere, you may have read a few that are published through The Gospel Coalition--a pretty conservative Christian organization that generally seems to know and write well for their reading audience. But, of course, sometimes writers misjudge their readership...and that seems to have happened on July 13th...big time.


Blogger, Jared Wilson, left quite a few jaws dropped and fists up with his commentary on biblical submission. They finally closed the comments on his post. 


Ya. It got pretty intense.


I'm too tired to take on Jared Wilson's entire argument, and the wealth of responses from readers and bloggers like Rachel Held Evans. (If you're really interested in this topic, and a savvy Googler, you can find the follow-up posts, and a few others, but the two I've linked here should keep you going for awhile.) However, I need to confess up front that I'm sympathetic (to greater and lesser extents) with several diverse points of view that were shared in their conversations. For this reason, I feel rather fair and just in sharing my views.

Confession over. Now my visceral response: 

Jared Wilson! 
What the heck is the matter with you?

<Insert my dope slap here>

I have trouble wrapping my head around how anyone could fail to realize IN ADVANCE that the following statement would send quite a few folks blasting off from the blogosphere into the stratosphere:


"A man penetrates, conquers, colonizes, plants. A woman receives, surrenders, accepts."

And now...My open response to Jared Wilson...sans gagging noises

DUDE! 


You can concoct all of the biblical doctrine and theory you want, but I can't even type that quote from you without throwing up in my mouth! 


Your ideas may play in a Peoria where no women have ever been violated or subjugated, but gimme a fricken break!


Let me offer some sisterly advice...  


When you start throwing around words like penetrates, conquers, colonizes, and plants...you lose me before I can ever even THINK about receives, surrenders, and accepts!!! 


There is NO "BENIGN" THEORY in the world that can divest the baggage of penetrates, conquers, and colonizes enough for most of us to choke down what you wrote, let alone keep it down. 


Umm...sorry (kinda...not really). Just being honest. Please pass the Emetrol.


Granted, not all women (THANK GOD) hold the distinction of being a survivor of incest, child abuse, domestic violence, rape, emotional abuse, and spiritual abuse. What can I say? I'm special.


Even so, I can virtually guarantee that among survivors of any one of those horrors, there are surely few (if any) who would be prepared to congratulate you on your spiritual insightfulness. 

Penetrates, conquers, colonizes, and plants MY EYE!

Seriously, I'm not one to promote cowing to pressure, especially since you really seem quite convicted and convinced of your correctness. 


Uummm...but what you wrote wasn't exactly Luther's treatise nailed to the church door. Just sayin'

When you get a pile of folks riled up into Linda Blair mode...well...that might be your cue from Mr. DeMille to BACK DOWN. 


Maybe go pray...a lot.


It seems as though it never even occurred to you that what you've written might be read by someone like me...a devout Christian woman who sat in "counseling" meetings and listened politely while a pastor whose biblical authority I was TRYING HARD to submit to endeavored to convince me that I had to suck up my (ex)husband's live run of your PCCP/RSA theory. Pardon the run-on. Feeling sick all over again.


Ahem...


You might also want to check in on how many women (a rough estimate will do) have found themselves betrayed by their own kind...Christian girlfriends, family members, and counselors who either can't comprehend their own screwed up spiritual circumstances, or have been bullied (or brainwashed) into buying the kinda stuff you're selling. These are the things that women often do to maintain spiritual community, or to survive in a patriarchal environment, but I suspect you don't know that.

I could go on and on...but I won't.

I will, however, say that I'm neither a dyed in the wool egalitarian, or a true blue complementation. I'm not fully convinced of either view...and I don't underestimate my human propensity to stumble within my own beliefs even if I held firmly to one or the other. I'm probably just a humanitarian. I hate to see people treated badly. I love to see people treated with love, dignity, and respect.


So here's the deal... 

Apologize, for crying out loud!

...not for the fact that you were misunderstood, but for the part that only you can own...the fact that you were so busy being right that you didn't seem to care who you hurt among your Christian sisters. Enough already! Snap out of it!

Here is what a real apology might look like, as modeled by Tim Challies to Ann Voskamp. 


See what you can come up with to do your part in cleaning up some of the barf so many of us have hurled. 


Vulgar sentiment...? Ya...but I'm guessing that a little genuine humility from you will inspire a whole lot more humility from me.  You want to lead women, right?


So go ahead and lead. Please. I insist. Who knows? I might even help you with your chores. That's my job anyway...isn't it?