My Crush and me

Do you have a crush?

Ha that's a fun question to ask! No I don't mean like Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie I mean like an "in-awe-of" crush. I ask because I do. There is a Chrisitian speaker that blows my mind. I get SO exctied when I find that he is going to be speaking. I have to admit that I'm a bit like a teenage girl at a boy-band concert. Many know if this crush I speak of and can attest it that. I choose not to name him just incase one day, by some very off chance, he sumbles upon my ramblings and sees that. I'm mean how embarrassing would that be?!?!

Now, I'm positive that if I walked up to him and said, "His name here I am so in awe of your speaking and your testimony" he would be so very humble and pass the glory to God. Most of those doing God's work would do just that. They stay firmly behind the cover of Jesus, because really why would anyone want to step out from behind His glory and show our true sinful filth?

There are many women (and men too but mostly ladies) in my life that I admire and look up to, not quite the crush stage, but highly esteem. I often find myself comparing me to them, seeing if I measure up. Usually I get a big red FAIL stamp. I haven't prayed enough, or read the bible everyday, shown the right Godly attitude and well you get the point. I end up feeling miserable and at the bottom of a very steep seemingly insurmountable hill. I wonder, do they look at others thinking those same things?


All this leads me to my very favorite verse. It scrolled across my thoughts. It is Zephaniah 3:17 (I like to change the you's to me's to make it personal):

"The Lord my God is with me,

He is MIGHTY to save.

He will take great delight in me,

He will quiet me with His love,

He will rejoice over me with singing."

Not only does He SAVE me but I delight Him. He will quiet me, and here I'm all wrapped up about being such a loud person, God can take care of that.

Then when I'm quiet (finally) He SINGS. Can you imagine? WOW! If that isn't a pick-me-up then I need some serious intervention!

This verse insists that I stop my ridiculous comparison of myself. God loves ME. The talkative, loud-laughing, ocd, just-as-I-am ME! So I'm gonna keep my crush and keep looking up to those amazing women in my life while assuring myself that I don't have to measure up to them I've got my own height chart.

Provoking e-mail

Recently a friend of mine sent me a devotion from Alicia Britt Cole's newest devotional, Intimate Conversations titled "wiggle worms". It was delightful and thought provoking to read. I replied with many thoughts began pouring from my brain through my fingers. I share this thinking that others are in the same boat of thought as we:

The devotion made me think of my favorite verse: Zephaniah 3:17 “The LORD your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing." He will quiet us, whether we want Him to or not. Coming to kiss the feet of Mercy, I lay every burden down at the foot of the cross. We don’t have to go great lengths to find Him, He is right there; in the sunlight spilling over the horizon, the laughter of a tickled child, in the tears of someone who has felt the loss of a loved one, in the sighs of the downtrodden, HE IS THERE. Don’t worry about getting to Him, just go.
 

I definitely agree with “going slower to get deeper”. How many of our greatest relationships have happened in an hour, a day, a week? My count is still at zero for that timeline. Life is filled with interruptions, daily necessities and requirements and obligations that take our attention to something else. If my days are consumed with so many different interruptions how am I ever going to be able to go deeper in, well, anything? But we love that instant gratification so much it’s hard to not keep doing more and more because we get that feel good/done good euphoria when we do. We like drive through because we feed the hunger right away. We like internet because it tells us everything – where to go, how to get there, how much it will cost, how Aunt Fran is doing, what the lyrics are to Chantilly Lace, and so on. We speed, text, e-mail, take digital photographs, seemingly in a constant state of fast forward! 

How many people plant a tomato plant versus going to the store to buy some from Tempe, AZ? We don’t want to wait for the fruits of our labor we’d rather pick up a container of fruit salad. So that’s my “permission” to you to let go of things, savor the growth time and process from dormancy through growth to maturity.

As for "churchy" things, "churchiness" to me is often a synonym for busyness! I know that if God has something I need to know I’m pretty sure that doing more or less "churchy" things will not help nor hinder His objectives. It’s IS hard to say no to the good things: MOPS, music/worship, Sunday school, AWANA’s, dinner groups, homecare groups, womens events, youth group, and many many more. All of these have great things to offer to help MY spiritual goals/walk, but there is too much of a good thing. Let me interject here that God doesn't need any teachers aids but my human brain does. I have to be careful that I don’t let others “expectations” supersede those that God has for me.
 
I feel crazy and disheveled most of the time. Spastically making it from one thing to the next but I'm working on paring down my obligations and know that God is there, waiting with open arms for me to rest awhile.

Through the eyes of a parent

As a mom of two so many things I have read in the bible have come back to me on a new plane of understanding. Through out the majority of my Christian experience I've heard God referred to as my Father and me has His child. Never before had this idea become really real to me until I became a mother. Free will, love, grace, forgiveness, sorrow, pain, and joy are just a handful of my new understandings.

When Caitlyn came into our life, we got this little wiggly, sleepy, hungry, person who we loved with out anyone asking us to. Then...we went home. I soon learned that in addition to all that I now had someone that screamed at me (with our provocation mind you), threw up on me, striped my sleep from me (just when I could once again sleep on my tummy), pulled at my hair, and more. I was supposed to be in love with this, this, this terror? Yet unquestionably I was and am. God’s love for me is so much more than the love I have for Caitlyn and Joslyn. It supersedes anything my human brain can fathom yet I know it to be true, He tells me over and over in the bible. The same goes for forgiveness. When I lash out a God, when I try to be the boss ~ and fail miserably, He forgives me. The bible tells me that “Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” Lamentations 3:22-23. How’s that from a book with the name of Lamentations?

Of course Caitlyn and Joslyn have now graduated onto much greater frustrations: temper tantrums, the word no, biting, selective hearing, screaming louder with words…you get the idea and probably have been on the front lines in your own battle. Caitlyn likes to say, “I won’t do it again mommy” when we discuss her bad choices. How I wish that were true, that she could magically just not disobey ever again. But I tell her ok and I tell her I forgive her, because I do. When they’ve damaged someone's belongings her dad and I get to take the responsibility of replacing or fixing them, this is where grace comes in. Yes I explain to her we need to apologize and if she can help in fixing I expect that of her. But ultimately she doesn’t have any money to pay for a broken toy or the skill to mend something. I step in and take that consequence. Jesus plays that part for me. God requires PERFECTION, no less. I have no way of becoming perfect. None. Period. So Jesus steps in and takes care of it for me. He steps in front of my sin and covers it. Do I deserve it? Nope, I’m a sinner and that is quite the opposite of perfection. Do my girls deserve me to take care of some situations? Nope but I do it because I love them.

Another thing I've heard spoken of frequently was free will. I just thought, “Well duh He’d be a crummy God if He just made me do what ever He wanted.” I never fathomed how incredibly hard that is. This light bulb moment hit me like a ton of bricks one day when Caitlyn was angry at me for stopping her from touching my parents wood stove. This is their sole source of heat in the winter so on really cold days it sometimes reaches 400 or 500 degrees. That day it wasn’t near that warm but warm enough to really hurt. As Caitlyn headed towards the stove with whatever idea in her head I quickly stopped her and expressed what a bad choice that would be. God tells us over and over the things not to do because they will hurt us, but we keep going. Unlike me, God doesn’t reach out and stop us because He gives us that freedom to choose. Oh how His heart must break when He watches as His child runs and touches that stove, that thing He tells us not to do. But on the other hand how much more does His heart swell with pride when we chose to love Him? I know how happy I get when my girls make good choices or I get a great report from our nanny.

So as you journey through this path of parenting think of God on that plane. Don’t buy into the doubts about God forgiveness and if you are loveable or if you deserve it. Look at your child tonight, think of how much you love them and what you would do for them and what you’ve forgiven. Then know that God connection to you is so much greater than that!