False First - Earned

Whatever the case, he wanted to follow Jesus, just not first.  We're not any different.  If we were honest with ourselves, could we fill in what it is that we put a higher priority on than God?

"Lord, first let me earn my way to you."

Then I can properly follow.  Once I have fixed my faults and cleaned myself up a bit.  Spent a little time on self-improvement.  I can't stand to be in your presence in my present stage.  I must do something first to earn my healing.

First

I feel like a lot of us hear “first fruits going to God” from the Bible and it translates into the idea of giving 10% of our income back to God by tithing.  The money is supposed to go first, ahead of other spending or budget concerns. 

God has given us stewardship of much more than just money, however.  Every Christian is created with skills and abilities and given spiritual gifts by God, different things that they are meant to use to help others as we follow Him.  There are times, though, when following God as our first plan of action becomes a challenge for us.

“[Jesus] said to another man, “Follow me.”

But he replied, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.”

Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” - Luke 9:59-60

At first glance it looks like Jesus is being pretty harsh; is there really such fault in wanting to care for loved ones?  But perhaps he has simply put his finger on the exact stumbling block for this particular man.  Maybe the man’s father had not just died, but instead the man meant that he wanted to wait until his father grew older and passed away before he joined Jesus.  

Whatever the case, he wanted to follow Jesus, just not first. 

We're not any different.  If we were honest with ourselves, could we fill in what it is that we put a higher priority on than God?  

What's our own  “Lord, first let me ____________________”?

Lesser

I want to help people.  I don't want my husband, or sister, or mom, best friend, etc. to struggle through anything.  I am a do-er, a fixer, I want to swoop in and enact some power that I think I have and cease their struggle.  Kind of like a spiritual ninja.

I'm 100% sure that there are times when God calls me to act in assistance of someone else.  I have no doubt that he works through us in the lives of those around us in real and powerful ways.

However....

It is a dangerous thing to try to remove someone else's struggles.  This is where the built-in necessity of God in our lives comes in.  If we're not connected to him with our ears open for his direction, we can go wildly outside of what he desires.  If God tells me to help someone, I'd do well to obey.  But if that wasn't his instruction, I'd better come to a screeching halt.

I was reading a Bible study today and this section reached out and grabbed my face with both hands:

"When we jump in to rescue our floundering [loved one]...when we enable, we volunteer to become a lesser refuge for that person."*

My intentions may be good, but the same loving God - who allows me to struggle sometimes in order to grow my faith in him and to strengthen me spiritually - wants that exact thing for the people we care about.  When the storm comes, he is the refuge that we should seek.  We need to get out of the way so that others can find it also.  Why on earth would we present ourselves as a substitute for all he is - restorer, healer, savior, peace, love and so much more?

Our own offer of rest and security, our so-thought "refuge," is so much the lesser.

*"Trust Training" by Dionne Carpenter

Overarching Issue

I haven’t had a hard life: I have good parents and family, became a Christian at a young age, and have not faced the outward trials that many others have.

Inward, however, has been a different story for me. My battle has always been a war within myself.  I understand when people express their pain and it comes out jumbled and everything at once. Often we cannot separate one aspect of our lives from another; when we hurt in one we hurt in many. Especially when the framework we normally place our lives in – our God – is the thing that is shaking. Most of the time it is our own thoughts that poison us.

All those things are screaming around our minds and no matter what direction we look, we have lost hope. We have lost joy and peace. I do not want to oversimplify or invalidate the struggle.  However, the overarching issue is just one thing.

Freedom. We have been saved, but somehow we are captive still. And it’s time for that to change.

Even Us

Wouldn't it be a release to know that we don't have to produce every second of every day?  Forget every day, even every week or month?

Doesn't something in us just ache for a cycle that follows harshness with a new something, a new chance, new...hope...

Every time I hear or read something about seasons of our spiritual life, it hits me hard in the gut.  Wouldn't that be just too good to be true, the idea that we don't always spiritually need to go-go-go, to look good, to make things happen.  These ideas about God that would be too good to be true, sometimes I want them so badly I try to will them into existence.

I am desperate for them to be true.

What relief I would find if there were times when I just needed to hold onto the roots of my faith, not look good, not produce fruit - just survive and feed from those roots - and that would be ok.

(Written 6 months later)

But then again, maybe I'm not trusting God enough to sustain me even in the moments when I am desperately tired and hungry.  Perhaps I need to believe that I can be used in any moment, despite myself.  It could be that the rougher and uglier we are, the more God's power is evident by showing he can give life to and through even us.

Wait

In December, Shawn got a job offer from the amazing church where we now serve.  It seemed like things were finally falling into place.  The same month, I slipped and fell on some ice, something I'd done a dozen times before.  This time, however, a simple accident produced what my physical therapist described as a "severe trauma injury" to my back; "almost exactly what you would see if you had been in a high-speed car accident."  Muscle and nerve pain in my back, hips, and legs.

So while some things were moving forward (new job, start in 8 weeks!  new place to live, move in 6!), others came to a screaming halt.

There were hopes and plans for things that I wanted for my life, for our life, that suddenly were not options because of the physical limitation.  I do my exercises, I do my stretches, and I am improving, but there is nothing I can do to make this move faster.  No pill to take, no work-out to do, no doctor to see, that will make swift my healing.  And while we should expect a full recovery, a complete resolution of symptoms and pain could take up to two years.  Hopes: deferred.

Some days I boil inside with frustration.  Others, my spirit sits quietly. At first the stillness was pure self-preservation; I could not sustain that burn of anger without feeling damage.  Then it became almost a habit, and amazingly enough, the fury in it doesn't show up most days.

The unexpected blessing is that God is allowing me to be a small part of some crazy things that he is doing in the lives of people around me.  I know it's not for me - it's for them and their lives and families - but somehow he has built a promise in it for me, too.  "Look what I can do," he tells me.  "In a place where you all thought hope was gone, I have brought it back to life."

So I wait, everyday attempting to transfer my hopes for Jesus to carry in his capable hands.  And remember, when doubt sometimes bites at the edges of my mind, I do not know yet how this story ends...

Rough Draft

I spent some time with a few close friends this past weekend.  They are the friends I don't see all the time, but when we do it's awesome.  We spend the whole day (if we can get it) catching up, laughing ourselves sick in the stomach (yes, still in our 30's), and talking over struggles (going through life together).  It's a little bit of everything and it's one of my favorite relationship dynamics in my life.

This past weekend 3 of the 4 of us were traveling to visit the 4th who was having a last hurrah before spending several months out of the country (our Christian-gypsy-free-spirit-missions-traveler-friend).  At one point during the visit, one of the others asked me how my 31 Project was going.  I cringed a little, because I'm not exactly where I want to be.  I've made progress, but I'm not where I should be with only 4 months left until my deadline (birthday number 32).  Interestingly enough, blogging has been my lowest numbered achievement so far.  I told this to my friend who asked, and she immediately zeroed in on it.  "Are you the type who won't post something unless you think it's profound?"  she posed.

And that's exactly it.  I hesitate to write just to write.  I want it to mean something, to be creative, unique, perfect...or at least, perfect in my own estimation (darn type-a perfectionism rearing it's ugly head).  That's not the point, though.  If I want this to become a habit, if I write because I love to write and hope to share out of my experiences in life, then I just have to do it, "profound," or not.

Side note: I seriously don't think I'm thebomb.com (1998 called and want's it's catchphrase back!), but I do hold myself so an impossibly high standard.  Just so, carefully crafted, only draft (forget rough draft, revision, and final), done right the first time, or not worth doing.

As I sat there, instantly the thought popped into my head that this is exactly what I do in life, too.  If I can't go into it knowing that it will go well (being able to craft an experience into what I want it to be), then I don't want to try it.  So I'm sitting at home, not doing things, and not even writing either, because I'm too afraid.  As one of my college roommates would say: "lame-sauce!"

We look at rough drafts as inferior, sometimes.  But isn't that what life is?  One rough draft after another.  And there is such value there; after all, without the rough draft, where would it all begin?

AR - I just want you to know that I didn't make any edits after initially typing this - viva the rough draft!  And I'm terrified...have grace for typos ;).

Small

I like words.  I like big ones, interesting ones, ones that so precisely mean what I want to get across; delightful accuracy that paints just the right picture.

However, my favorites are the small ones: "yet" & "but" are tiny of form while still casting a big shadow:

"All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else.

But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved."  (Ephesians 2:3-5 NRSV).

"Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls,

yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior.  The Sovereign Lord is my strength."  (Hakakkuk 3:18-19 NIV).

True, the picture is not the same without the bigger words.  They are heavier and anchor the passage:  "children of wrath;" "rich in mercy;" "dead in trespasses;" "God my Savior;" "Sovereign Lord."

Yet the source of impact is much smaller.  Such a brief puff of air in the lungs, and it arrives.  It's seems to rest so lightly.

But it's the tipping point, it changes everything.

"But God..."

"Yet I will..."