There's a verse in Psalms that says " You know me inside and out. You hold me together. You never fail to stand me tall in Your presence so I can look You in the eye" (Psalm 41:11-12).
I stinkin love that verse. It brings me to my knees every time I reflect on the fact that my Jesus knows me inside and out. He knows every depth of my heart. He knows the good. He knows the bad. He knows the fears, the secrets, the passions, the dreams. He knows it all and He loves me despite it all. And not only does He know every detail of my life, but He holds me together.
In my brokenness, He's a mender. In my hurting, He's a healer. In my changing circumstances, He is constant. In my weakness, He's my strength. And when everythings falling apart, He is the one holding it together. He never fails to stand me tall in His presence so I can look Him in the eye. He. Never. Fails.
Never failing is something that I know nothing about because my life is saturated with times that I have failed. When I reflect on those times, there is a reoccurring theme- I'm relying completely on my individual efforts and I'm failing to look to the One who never fails.
There was a moment this winter that I felt Jesus used as a gentle reminder to whisper to my heart to look to Him when I'm stuck. The irony being that I was literally stuck. As I was backing out of a driveway one of the few days it actually snowed this winter, I backed off the driveway and into the yard, where a friend and I then remained for the next two hours.
It was after a church event so there were several other people there, who attempted to help us get back onto the driveway. Everytime we pushed and the car budged, it seemed like we were about to be free from being stuck, but everytime it resulted in the car sliding deeper into the mud-snow concoction that had been created by our human efforts. We ended up more stuck and upon realizing that the circumstances were too hard for us to be successful, the other people left.
My friend ended up calling her father who in turn called a tow truck, which came to the rescue. What stuck out to me about the tow truck getting us out the bind was that in order to do so, we had to be lifted up. He connected his tow truck machine device to my car and raised us up onto the back of his truck in order to remove us from the place where we were stuck. It required us to look up. To stop trying with our human efforts, and look up and trust that where we were looking was the solution. The tow trunk didn't fail.
When we stopped trying and we looked up, we were able to stop singing that we were " stuck in a moment that we can't get out of" because we were out of it. In that two hour moment, I felt that Jesus was whispering to me that the reason I keep falling back into places I feel stuck is because I'm relying on my human efforts. I'm pushing and I'm pulling and I think I am budging, only to find out that I'm stuck deeper than I was before. BUT, if I stop trying and look to the One who wants to lift me up, He is able and equipped and He will come.
Thinking back on the moment again, I notice a few more things. The people left, but the tow truck was always there waiting to be called upon. And once everyone was gone, and I finally called upon the tow truck, it came. And when it came, the driver didn't ask questions about how come I was stuck or what I did to get there, His concern was to get me out of that place and back on track.
....how cool is it that Jesus is an even better rescuer than a tow truck? How cool is it that He made a way for us that doesn't require looking up a number in the yellow pages? How cool is that He is equipped and able, that He is a God who comes? That He pulls us out of the mud when we're stuck and sets us back on the right track?
Too stinkin cool.
DISARRAY-ED: learning to trust the One who brings chaos back into order
Thursday, March 22, 2012
Friday, March 9, 2012
Throwing Back the Bottle
Want to know what drives me absolutely bonkers?!
Double-asking. I work in an after-school program that kids come to after school (Imagine that) and I am always amazed when I watch a kid ask one counselor to do something, hear the counselor tell them no, and then watch the kid go ask another counselor the same thing. I find myself wondering what's going on in that kid's mind that they think this is going to fly. The obvious answer is that in the moment all the kid wants is their want to be met and if one person isn't meeting it, then maybe someone else will. For some reason, this annoys me to no end.
That was until yesterday, when I realized I am a double-asker. I subscribe to that ideology everyday- that I want my wants meant so if you're not going to meet them, then I will seek out someone who will. The worser (I know that's not a word, but I like it) part being that most often it looks and sounds something like this:
Me: "Dear Jesus, thank you that You are the God of all comforts. Please, extend that comfort to me..."(silently adding, oh and please make sure it's the kind of comfort that I want).
And then even though the Bible states that when we ask, we shall receive and that God is in fact the God of all comforts and that He is always with us and never will forsake us, meaning that the God of all comforts is with me, comforting me. right then in my asking. Closer than my breath, I still turn to people or to things because my want wasn't met the way I want it to be met.
So I double-ask. I ask friends or family or seek comfort in things.
Now, don't get me wrong, I know the Bible says much about sharing our burdens with others and the importance of fellowship, community, and the like, but more than that, it says that our focus should be on God and Him alone.
Yesterday, I had the privilege of chatting with a friend and in the chatting, he brought up an analogy. I am paraphrasing and making the analogy less specific to me, but you'll get it. He said that when we are babies (young,weak, helpless),we look to our parents to feed us. We can't get what we need without our parents in that moment, but when we're five, we are more idependent. Now, we're masters of forks and spoons and know how to ask for seconds of macaroni and cheese. We grow.
But what if we were five, and we were still being fed the bottle? Not only is that creating a culture of dependency, when the bottle gets taken away, we're gonna be quite upset. For the last five years, someone has been giving us what we need, whenever we needed it and now we're expected to make moves all by ourselves. Whaaaat? We don't recognize that the parents are still in the picture, their role has just changed because they are asking us to do some work. But they are still in the picture- they are still there if we need our hot diggity dog cut into pieces or the corn cut off the cob.
You're probably wondering, what does that have to do with anything else that I have written. I wondered that myself for a second, but it is my assertion that this is exactly what happens when we double-ask God. We ask God for something and He assures us that His promises for us our good and His plans for us are better than we can imagine, but He's requiring that in that we work. We have to use the fork and the spoon to get the food to our mouth. But we want to be bottle fed, so we turn to our friends and we turn to things and we double ask.
The problem with this is that we're turning to people and things and people and things don't last. Eventually, there is going to be a time where people and things aren't an option in a certain situation and if we haven't weened ourselves off the bottle, we're going to be hungry.
This challenges my mind to the tenth power (yes, sometimes I talk in mathmatical terms. Don't judge me). I'm not even sure how to conclude these thoughts because if I am being honest, so often I am looking for the bottle. When I don't know what to do or what steps to take, I want someone to tell me. In their telling me, I am essentially asking them to give me a bottle-which, mind you, boggles my stinkin mind because who wants a bottle, when they can have steak? That's quite the leap...bottle to steak...maybe, I'll try baby food first. On second thought, that steak sounds really good...
And for all of you who read this cause you thought "throwing back the bottle" was referring to a time where I threw back a few bottles.....well, you just been played. :)
Double-asking. I work in an after-school program that kids come to after school (Imagine that) and I am always amazed when I watch a kid ask one counselor to do something, hear the counselor tell them no, and then watch the kid go ask another counselor the same thing. I find myself wondering what's going on in that kid's mind that they think this is going to fly. The obvious answer is that in the moment all the kid wants is their want to be met and if one person isn't meeting it, then maybe someone else will. For some reason, this annoys me to no end.
That was until yesterday, when I realized I am a double-asker. I subscribe to that ideology everyday- that I want my wants meant so if you're not going to meet them, then I will seek out someone who will. The worser (I know that's not a word, but I like it) part being that most often it looks and sounds something like this:
Me: "Dear Jesus, thank you that You are the God of all comforts. Please, extend that comfort to me..."(silently adding, oh and please make sure it's the kind of comfort that I want).
And then even though the Bible states that when we ask, we shall receive and that God is in fact the God of all comforts and that He is always with us and never will forsake us, meaning that the God of all comforts is with me, comforting me. right then in my asking. Closer than my breath, I still turn to people or to things because my want wasn't met the way I want it to be met.
So I double-ask. I ask friends or family or seek comfort in things.
Now, don't get me wrong, I know the Bible says much about sharing our burdens with others and the importance of fellowship, community, and the like, but more than that, it says that our focus should be on God and Him alone.
Yesterday, I had the privilege of chatting with a friend and in the chatting, he brought up an analogy. I am paraphrasing and making the analogy less specific to me, but you'll get it. He said that when we are babies (young,weak, helpless),we look to our parents to feed us. We can't get what we need without our parents in that moment, but when we're five, we are more idependent. Now, we're masters of forks and spoons and know how to ask for seconds of macaroni and cheese. We grow.
But what if we were five, and we were still being fed the bottle? Not only is that creating a culture of dependency, when the bottle gets taken away, we're gonna be quite upset. For the last five years, someone has been giving us what we need, whenever we needed it and now we're expected to make moves all by ourselves. Whaaaat? We don't recognize that the parents are still in the picture, their role has just changed because they are asking us to do some work. But they are still in the picture- they are still there if we need our hot diggity dog cut into pieces or the corn cut off the cob.
You're probably wondering, what does that have to do with anything else that I have written. I wondered that myself for a second, but it is my assertion that this is exactly what happens when we double-ask God. We ask God for something and He assures us that His promises for us our good and His plans for us are better than we can imagine, but He's requiring that in that we work. We have to use the fork and the spoon to get the food to our mouth. But we want to be bottle fed, so we turn to our friends and we turn to things and we double ask.
The problem with this is that we're turning to people and things and people and things don't last. Eventually, there is going to be a time where people and things aren't an option in a certain situation and if we haven't weened ourselves off the bottle, we're going to be hungry.
This challenges my mind to the tenth power (yes, sometimes I talk in mathmatical terms. Don't judge me). I'm not even sure how to conclude these thoughts because if I am being honest, so often I am looking for the bottle. When I don't know what to do or what steps to take, I want someone to tell me. In their telling me, I am essentially asking them to give me a bottle-which, mind you, boggles my stinkin mind because who wants a bottle, when they can have steak? That's quite the leap...bottle to steak...maybe, I'll try baby food first. On second thought, that steak sounds really good...
And for all of you who read this cause you thought "throwing back the bottle" was referring to a time where I threw back a few bottles.....well, you just been played. :)
Saturday, March 3, 2012
"It's Gonna Be Worth it All"
When I think of the act of waiting, the first thought that comes to my mind does not shout "yes! I love waiting. I hope I get to do that today." Nor is that my second or third thought. Okay, I never have that thought, except when I'm thinking about thoughts I don't have when I am waiting: case in point.
Notice how I used the phrase act of waiting, rather than just waiting, because waiting is a type of action. It's a choice. You can choose to wait in line for 30 minutes at Wal-mart or you can go to Target. (Wait...that's not waiting...). A better example might be, you can jump in line at the biggest, baddest roller coaster Disney World has to offer and wait the estimated wait time or you can not ride the ride. You either choose to wait or you don't.
I'll be the first to tell you that I hate waiting. I am an outcome orientated person, rather than a process orientated one. I want to see the start and the end and I want to get there. I want to Pass Go and collect the $200 dollars, rather than hit up Reading Railroad and Visit Jail along the way. In some scenarios, this can be accomplished. I can type into MapQuest directions and logically be told how to get from point A to point B, but on a much larger scale, life looks a little bit more like point A to point B to point C back to point A to point D. In other words, life is a process. A process that includes waiting.
Did I mention I hate waiting?
As I make that proclamation, the question that comes to my mind is "why?" Why do I hate waiting so much? While I don't know the answer in completion, I think it has something to do with the fact that waiting is often aligned with hopeful expectation. Waiting to hear back from the employer is aligned with the hope that you got the job. Waiting to pick up your friend from the airport is aligned with the excited expectation of seeing them. Waiting the three weeks of work before you go on vacation is aligned with the expectation of what a vacation entails.
Waiting comes at a cost, so we wait for things we deem worth it. Hopeful expectation is hard to hold onto as waiting ensues. Sometimes expectatons change. Sometimes hope is lost. Sometimes while we are waiting, point D goes back to point A and point B is no longer anywhere in sight. I'm not sure if I mentioned it yet, but sometimes I just plain hate waiting.
Pardon my vagueness and lack of details, but I have been waiting for something for several years and I am still in waiting. I'm not sure how long I will be in the season of waiting, but I can assure you, it's where my tent is currently pitched. It's frustrating because I feel like I should be a professional waiter (not to be confused with the people who bring you your meals at restaurants, I'd be even more terrible at that), but I'm not. I'm far from it. I throw temper tantrums when I'm so close to getting my yellow peg into my home base and from out of nowhere, the opponent says "sorry" and I'm suddenly back to start. And let me tell you, I can throw a mean temper tantrum.
If I am being completely honest with you, I wait poorly more than I wait well. Instead of remembering that waiting is an act that is bringing me to the end, I focus on the fact that a wait is a wait is a wait. The only thing that shakes me out of it is the fact that people don't wait for things that aren't worth it to them and if it's worth it to you, it's worth waiting for.
Maybe that's what makes waiting so hard. The things that we wait for are things that that we want, things that we believe are better than our present. I would argue that this fact alone is the reason why when we wait, we should wait on the One who doesn't just believe for what is better than our present, He knows it because He designed it. He knows where point A is going to lead and He know how's it eventually going to get to Z and beyond (He's a limitless God, after all). There's a verse in Psalm 77 that I love. Verse 19 says "Your road led through the sea, your pathway through the mighty waters-- a pathway no one knew was there." I love that because I can only see the path that I want to see, but He sees the pathway that I need. He sees the paths that I don't even know about. And He loves me. He is not careless with my path because He knows that every step on the path that He has set before me is an opportunity for His glory to be revealed, for Him to be reflected. And since He is not a God who is able to reflect anything that is not good, His path for me must be good.
And all He asks me to do is to wait on Him.
I know I've mentioned this, but I hate waiting. However, if waiting is so hard because we wait for things that are worth it, I can not think of anything that is more worth the wait
.
Notice how I used the phrase act of waiting, rather than just waiting, because waiting is a type of action. It's a choice. You can choose to wait in line for 30 minutes at Wal-mart or you can go to Target. (Wait...that's not waiting...). A better example might be, you can jump in line at the biggest, baddest roller coaster Disney World has to offer and wait the estimated wait time or you can not ride the ride. You either choose to wait or you don't.
I'll be the first to tell you that I hate waiting. I am an outcome orientated person, rather than a process orientated one. I want to see the start and the end and I want to get there. I want to Pass Go and collect the $200 dollars, rather than hit up Reading Railroad and Visit Jail along the way. In some scenarios, this can be accomplished. I can type into MapQuest directions and logically be told how to get from point A to point B, but on a much larger scale, life looks a little bit more like point A to point B to point C back to point A to point D. In other words, life is a process. A process that includes waiting.
Did I mention I hate waiting?
As I make that proclamation, the question that comes to my mind is "why?" Why do I hate waiting so much? While I don't know the answer in completion, I think it has something to do with the fact that waiting is often aligned with hopeful expectation. Waiting to hear back from the employer is aligned with the hope that you got the job. Waiting to pick up your friend from the airport is aligned with the excited expectation of seeing them. Waiting the three weeks of work before you go on vacation is aligned with the expectation of what a vacation entails.
Waiting comes at a cost, so we wait for things we deem worth it. Hopeful expectation is hard to hold onto as waiting ensues. Sometimes expectatons change. Sometimes hope is lost. Sometimes while we are waiting, point D goes back to point A and point B is no longer anywhere in sight. I'm not sure if I mentioned it yet, but sometimes I just plain hate waiting.
Pardon my vagueness and lack of details, but I have been waiting for something for several years and I am still in waiting. I'm not sure how long I will be in the season of waiting, but I can assure you, it's where my tent is currently pitched. It's frustrating because I feel like I should be a professional waiter (not to be confused with the people who bring you your meals at restaurants, I'd be even more terrible at that), but I'm not. I'm far from it. I throw temper tantrums when I'm so close to getting my yellow peg into my home base and from out of nowhere, the opponent says "sorry" and I'm suddenly back to start. And let me tell you, I can throw a mean temper tantrum.
If I am being completely honest with you, I wait poorly more than I wait well. Instead of remembering that waiting is an act that is bringing me to the end, I focus on the fact that a wait is a wait is a wait. The only thing that shakes me out of it is the fact that people don't wait for things that aren't worth it to them and if it's worth it to you, it's worth waiting for.
Maybe that's what makes waiting so hard. The things that we wait for are things that that we want, things that we believe are better than our present. I would argue that this fact alone is the reason why when we wait, we should wait on the One who doesn't just believe for what is better than our present, He knows it because He designed it. He knows where point A is going to lead and He know how's it eventually going to get to Z and beyond (He's a limitless God, after all). There's a verse in Psalm 77 that I love. Verse 19 says "Your road led through the sea, your pathway through the mighty waters-- a pathway no one knew was there." I love that because I can only see the path that I want to see, but He sees the pathway that I need. He sees the paths that I don't even know about. And He loves me. He is not careless with my path because He knows that every step on the path that He has set before me is an opportunity for His glory to be revealed, for Him to be reflected. And since He is not a God who is able to reflect anything that is not good, His path for me must be good.
And all He asks me to do is to wait on Him.
I know I've mentioned this, but I hate waiting. However, if waiting is so hard because we wait for things that are worth it, I can not think of anything that is more worth the wait
.
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