Rejection is hard.
But you know what, it’s for our benefit sometimes. It humbles us, it refines us, and it grows our character - if we let it. I’m no stranger to rejection, especially when it comes to my dreams. American Idol, X-Factor, ministry teams in college: all “no” for me. Does that mean I can’t sing? A few years ago, that’s what I thought it meant. There were lessons in each of those let-downs that I needed to learn, and God was so faithful to mature me through that season. Because of those rejections, I learned what worship is truly about, and now I can lead from a place of true joy and humility when I take the platform each week. In order to make me more like Christ, I needed to experience those hurts. I no longer have a dream to be the next Lauren Daigle, but I’m using that gift God gave me for HIS glory every week. Life looks different now, but I still have dreams: to write a book, Bible studies, and maybe even host a podcast one day?! But I’ve been really wrestling with it, wanting to honor God’s plan for my life and make much of HIM, not myself. I’ve been wrestling with discernment about what is that line between pursuing my goals with ambition versus just trying to promote myself & make things happen that aren’t God’s best for me. A few weeks ago, I stepped out of my comfort zone & submitted some work to a blog that I absolutely adore & highly respect. I poured my heart into the story I wrote, and yesterday I found out they decided it wasn’t for them. And you know what? It hurts! But I’m not going to let this rejection crush me as others have. I'm not going to ask, "Does this mean I can't write?" I now know my worth is not in my abilities. My worth doesn’t come from comments on my blog or likes on my photos or even my role as a wife & mom. It comes from being created in the image of Almighty God. I used to claim my identity through my accomplishments, but now I know Jesus Christ has already accomplished everything for me on the cross. Praise God! I don’t need to be a published author to complete God’s purpose for my life. If He hands that opportunity to me, I’ll be grateful for the chance to steward it well. If He doesn’t, then I’m okay. It just means I have a different role to play in His story. These ordinary tasks of wiping bottoms and being used as a human chew toy and cleaning toilets and instilling truth into little souls through just being present are SO significant. They are full of meaning. I've already been given my biggest dream, and I never for one second take the gift of her for granted. Ada is all about climbing and standing these days. As I was writing this, she had pulled herself up on the ottoman, peering over her little hands to smile at me. Still pretty wobbly in her new skill, she took a nice tumble moments later. Instinctively, I comforted her as I helped her back to her feet and said, “It’s okay, Ada! Let’s try again. You’re doing so good! When we fall down, we just have to get back up and try again.” And of course, as the words left my mouth, the Lord whispered in my spirit, “That’s right, sweet girl. Just get up and try again.”
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Raise your hand if you wash your hair at least once a week…
Yeah, me either. It’s cool guys, it’s cool. Other than the fact that it’s just difficult to shower when you’re in the middle of baby land, that postpartum hair loss struggle & regrowth is a REAL ISSUE. Nobody prepared me for the small lion’s mane currently growing around my face like a deranged halo. No one told me how clumps of my hair would fall out every time I brush it or run my hands through it while trying to get all the shampoo out. Please tell me I’m not the only one who sticks the hair to the shower wall to get it off my hand. Like, what else are you supposed to do?! Anyway, as I was going through my weekly shower ritual, I started to reflect & babble about random things to the Lord as my thoughts wandered, as I often do. I’ve been pretty stressed out about several personal things recently. Compared to some of the trials I know other people in my church & community are facing, these “issues” of mine are small. The problem with that outlook is that I tend to allow the small difficulties to build up internally, never sharing my needs. {Classic Enneagram 2 move over here, haha}. But back to the hair on my shower wall. As Jesus and I were talking about some of my recent anxiety triggers, the Holy Spirit brought to mind a Scripture I learned long ago: "Aren't five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one sparrow is forgotten by God. Even the hairs of your head have all been counted. So do not be afraid; you are worth much more than many sparrows!" -Luke 12:6-7, GNT Honestly, standing there peeling tiny hairs off my hands, feeling their annoyance even when I can't see exactly where they are (you know the feeling!), I was struck by the truth tucked into these two small verses. These are words spoken directly from Jesus' mouth, so we know they're important. Isn't that idea wild? Like, there's 7.6 billion people in the world, and God knows each of us so intimately that He keeps track of the number of hairs on our heads. I can't even count how many I've lost in the past five minutes, yet He has been consistently been aware of that number, because He is omniscient, and He cares. Did you catch that? He cares. Even about the "small" things I'm sweating. So, why should I be afraid? Have I forgotten my worth? Do I believe I am more valuable than some birds? Do I trust that God will provide for all of my true needs? (Ps. 34:10, Phil. 4:19) Yeah, I know, all that from some hair clumps on my shower wall. *shrugs* Lord, you are Jehovah-Jireh, my Provider. I confess to you that I've failed to trust that part of your character recently. Forgive me for my unbelief. Thank you for reminding me of who you are, and who I am because of you. I have never lacked for what I truly need. You are faithful! Thank you for your loving-kindness towards me, and for the special attention you give to knowing every part of me; down to the always-changing number of hairs on my head. You amaze me, Father. Help me not to be afraid. Strengthen me with the truth of your promises, that I might exude confidence in you for your glory. I love you. In Jesus' name, Amen. No, I’m not pregnant.
Although that would be pretty interesting considering that Ada Bee is only {almost} four months old, haha. God has been stirring our hearts for his beloved in a big way. He’s spoken clearly to both my husband and I, extending an invitation to join Him on an incredible & wild new journey. Saying yes will change everything in our lives, rearrange our schedules and our home, uproot our normal, disrupt our comfort, infringe on our privacy, challenge our faith, and change us forever: F O S T E R C A R E . I want to pause in this moment and make it very clear that my intention for this post is to make much of Christ. I’m sharing this because we need prayer & support from the body of believers, not because I want you to applaud me. I do not deserve any praise. Matter of fact, the flesh in me wants nothing to do with foster care. The flesh in me wants to keep my handsome hubby and sweet new baby inside a well-manicured bubble for the rest of our lives, where we’ll remain happy & comfortable & safe. There’s just one issue with that plan- following Jesus isn’t comfortable or safe. In Luke 9:23, Jesus says that in order to follow him, we have to deny ourselves - our selfish desires, our comforts, our plans to remain unharmed - daily. The Christian life was never intended to be easy. Following Jesus was never supposed to look like warm cookies coming out of the oven, 2.5 kids, a dog, and a white picket fence out in comfortable suburbia while the rest of the world remains dead to their sins & we stand idly by without sharing the cure. This is our temporary home, and it’s not about us. I’m reminded of Matthew 14:22-33, where the story of Jesus walking on water is told. I’m going to recap quickly: Jesus had just finished performing the miracle of feeding 5,000 people with a meager five loaves of bread and two fish. Before going up on the mountain to pray and get refreshed, he sends his disciples on ahead to cross the sea without him. While they are smack dad in the middle of the water, a massive storm blows in. The wind & waves are going nuts, and then all of a sudden, the disciples see a man walking on top of the water, unfazed! They think it’s a ghost and start freaking out. {Spoiler alert: It’s Jesus}. Jesus tells his disciples not to be afraid; it’s just him. I feel like Peter does exactly what I would do in this situation, and says: {my paraphrase} “okay, Lord, if it’s really you out there, tell me to come walk on the water with you. You’re doing something radical, and I want to get in on the action.” Jesus’ invitation is so simple: “Come.” And so, Peter steps out in faith. He WALKS ON WATER. I think sometimes when I read the Bible, I miss the reality of some of the key points. Like, humans CANNOT walk on water. It’s physically freakin’ impossible! How crazy is it that Peter actually did this through God’s power? SO CRAZY. Pretty quickly, Peter shows his humanity by taking his eyes off Jesus to look around at the storm, and he begins to sink into the sea. He cries out to Jesus to save him, and of course, he does, leaving Peter with this question: “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” Peter and Jesus head back to the boat and join all the other disciples. Jesus calms the storm, and everyone in the boat worships him, recognizing that he is truly the Son of God. Seriously, what an accurate depiction of my heart during this season - knowing that God is inviting me to take part in something bigger than myself; something that is impossible without him; something that requires me to step out of my boat of comfort and risk it all. And though I can see Jesus in the midst of the storm, I am still oh so afraid of what’s to come - the new relationships to navigate with case workers and biological parents, the potential behavioral or physical issues in a child entrusted to us, the heartbreak of investing & loving a baby as our own only to have him or her separated from us again. Like Peter, I know I’ll begin to sink under the weight of trying to carry the burden by my own strength, only to cry out, “Lord, save me!” and he will. He will immediately grab my hand and bring me to safety, challenging me once again for my lack of faith; asking, “Daughter, why did you doubt?" And all of these confusing, hard, extraordinarily beautiful things will surely bring me to my knees in worship of the Son of God. You might be wondering why we’ve decided to step out of the boat. Why are we doing this? The answer is simple: The need is great. God’s called us all to do hard things. And, quite simply, we have an extra bed. Jordan and I wanted to share this news with all of you because we need your prayers and your loving support. I don’t know how we’re going to do this without the body of Christ walking alongside us. I don’t think we can, and I don’t think we’re meant to. We need ya’ll, and so do these kids without a home. I believe with all my heart that if you are a true follower of Jesus, you have a part to play in orphan care. You can read more about that from my post back in November here. So, friend, here’s a personal invitation from me to you: come join us at the rest of these training sessions at our church if you’re local. Just show up, and pray for God to reveal his plans for your role as you learn more about the need. If you’re not in Roanoke, VA, get in touch with your city’s Department of Social Services. Ask your church what they’re doing to advocate for the oppressed and neglected. Jesus is calling, “Come.” So, fluff those pillows on your extra bed. Step out of the boat with me. When my husband texted me and said “Hey babe, I’m giving a homeless guy a ride. I’ll be home soon” I didn’t bat an eyelash because that’s just like him. I also trust my man to make wise decisions. I prayed for his safety {of course} and then patiently waited for him to get home so I could hear the story.
The young man he helped out walked into our church at what just so happened to be the middle of worship rehearsal on Thursday night. He was simply in a situation he never thought he’d be in. He’d been walking for two days without food or water with all of his belongings strapped to his back. He’d been sleeping in the woods on the side of the road. He didn’t want money, but only asked to borrow my husband’s phone to make a call. In addition to that phone call, he was given a full belly, a pair of brand new boots, a gift card for food the next day, and “oh yeah, I hope you’re not mad, but I put him up in a hotel for the night.” I’m sharing this story because, yeah I’m a proud wife & want to lift up my man. But I’m also sharing it because I hope it might challenge you as much as it did me. I don’t know about y’all, but I’m really good at halfheartedly asking the Lord to “present me with opportunities to share Christ with someone” and “set up a divine appointment for me today,” and then chickening out when He actually does it. I’ve mastered the pattern of “seeing needs” and quite frankly, ignoring them, but patting myself on the back because “at least I noticed! God opened my eyes!” Geez, what a load of crap. I need to do better than that. We need to do better. With all the violence and hatred that’s prevalent in our society today, people often talk about how the world is dying. The world isn’t continually “dying around us” in sin. IT’S ALREADY DEAD. Dead and damned and without the hope of Christ the Living God who has overcome. How’s that for a dose of reality? God placed this person in front of my husband; but my husband still had to make the decision to act. God worked it out so that the pair of hiking boots {still in the box!} in my husband's office were the exact size shoe of his new friend; but he still had to offer them as a gift. God allowed the drive-through to take an unexpected 20 minutes, which gave my husband a chance to share his testimony & the good news of Jesus Christ; but he still had to be bold enough to use his words. Living on mission isn’t all about the “wow God” stories of radical obedience like this one. More often than not, it’s a consistent commitment of saying simple yesses. Yes to what brings life. Yes to what magnifies light. Yes to things that will hold eternal significance. No to self and all the other distractions. Let’s go beyond “seeing needs.” Let’s see needs and MEET THEM to the best of our ability, even if it inconveniences us or means we’ve got 60 less bucks to spend that month. The Holy Spirit will be our barometer for discernment on whether a situation is dangerous or not. Friends, Christ IS returning. The cancer of sin is always bringing destruction in the world. Why do we continue to harbor the cure inside the safety of our pretty “Christian” communities? We must share Jesus. “Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!” -1 Corinthians 9:16 New Year’s Eve has always been one of my favorite nights of the year. Call me a slave to the cliche, but there’s something about the clean slate of a new calendar year {new, cute planners, helllloooo} and the inherent fresh start that always makes me feel so inspired!
Even though I love NYE, I’ve never been a huge “resolutions” girl. I just don’t really believe in them. For me, they’re not healthy, because resolutions kind of have a pass or fail verdict attached to them. Let’s be honest, most of the time, it’s failure. Instead, I’m big on reflections. With each new year, I love to reflect on what worked, what didn’t work, and how I want to G R O W in the next season. Striving for growth isn’t only healthy, but biblical! We are commanded all throughout Scripture to grow in grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, for His glory (2 Peter 3:18). Jesus himself was also portrayed as an example of continual growth in Luke 2:52; “And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.” Over the past few years, the idea of a “Word for the Year” has become popular. I’m a massive fan of this idea, but I’ve never participated in it, simply because I've never felt the Lord speak to me specifically about it! I didn’t just want to pick a random inspirational word and then try to craft some uber-spiritual reasoning behind it. If I was going to have a word for the year, I wanted it to be genuine. All of that being said, this is the FIRST year I’ve heard specifically from the Lord about my “word,” and I’m really pumped about it! STEADY. steady (adjective): direct or sure in movement; firm in position; showing little variation or fluctuation; not easily disturbed or upset; constant in feeling, principle, purpose, or attachment synonyms: unfaltering, fixed, stable, dependable The Lord gave me the word “steady” after reflecting on Jeremiah 17:7-8 for the past several months, which declares, “Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD. He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.” These verses encapsulate my #1 goal for motherhood: trusting the Lord. Simple concept, right? You’d think it’d be pretty easy to execute. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned about myself over the past few years after stepping into adulthood, it’s how little I truly trust the Lord on a consistent basis. So often, I am just flat out terrible at it. I want to control everything in my life, freak out over the smallest hiccups, and let fear & anxiety rule me far too often…each of which are signs that I’m not truly trusting God, but instead myself, my abilities, my circumstances, or my people. Walking into motherhood, that’s a MASSIVE red flag of sin that shows up on my radar. When I think about 20+ years from now and how I want my adult children to remember me, I desire for one of the first thoughts to pop into their minds to be: “No matter what happened, we always knew that mom trusted God. Even when things were hard or didn’t make sense, mom reminded us that God was good, His character could be trusted, and to place our hope in His sovereignty. We knew she really believed it, because she was steady in her faith and her actions proved her vigilant in her pursuit of Him, always.” If my children remember some version of that about me, then I will know that I’ve done my job exemplifying a life that honors Christ to them. That’s what I want my legacy to be to them. So, how do I get there? Well, I guess I ought to start by uprooting the sin of distrust in my heart through the power of the Holy Spirit! I guess I better strive to be like the tree described in Jeremiah - rooted in the water of life that the Word of God gives, clinging to it for nourishment & refreshment; unafraid of heated circumstances or dry seasons in my life, because I’ll have my trust in the Lord. I’ll continue to bear good fruits of the Spirit, and remain fresh because Christ will be my all. And whew, as a new mom, won’t that be KEY? If there’s any time in one’s life where things probably feel unsteady, overly emotional, confusing, frustrating, and easily upsetting, I imagine it’s got to be when you become a parent for the first time. So, I’m committing to the Lord that I’ll grow in 2018 by remaining steady. This won’t be possible without Him, of course. It goes against all natural parts of my flesh. But by His power, and for His glory, I believe He will help me to remain a steady mom, even as I embrace the chaos and the unknown of bringing a little one into this messy world. Cheers to 2018, friends! I’d love to hear YOUR “words” or reflections for growth in the Lord this year. May we seek to know and love Christ more every day. I feel like the only appropriate way to approach such a weighty subject is with the Word of God:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace. -Ephesians 1:3-7 Context, context, context: In the two verses just before this passage, we are given important information. The book of Ephesians is a letter written by the apostle Paul to...you guessed it...the Ephesians. More specifically though, he says that he’s writing to the saints and those who are faithful to Christ Jesus in Ephesus, aka believers. SO, while there’s a lot to unpack in the passage of Scripture above, we must remember that the intended audience for these words are those who have already confessed faith in Jesus Christ, declaring Him as their Lord and Savior. That will also be my intention for this post - I’m primarily speaking to believers for this one. November is National Adoption Month, and I can think of no better week to talk about my passion for adoption than this one, as we celebrate Thanksgiving! Before opening up about my own thoughts and desires concerning adoption, I feel compelled to recognize that it was first created and ordained by God, not man (John 1:3). Therefore, JESUS gets all the glory for adoption, not the parents. It's not about us! The central idea of adoption is simply beautiful to me - that an individual or a family would willingly agree to take a stranger into their home and immediately call them their own child, regardless of any struggles, past experiences, or difficulties that child has faced, committing to love and care for them as their own flesh and blood for a lifetime. I don’t know how anyone can dwell on the gravity of that type of decision and not feel emotional about it! What’s even more stunning to me though, is that I have experienced this type of love firsthand! Glance back up at the passage from Ephesians, and let the insanity of grace wash over you, believer. GOD has done just that for YOU, and for ME. Before the foundation of the world, He chose us, with all of our baggage, to become his children through the blood of Jesus Christ! We have been ADOPTED in the most literal way! Since about my junior year of high school, I’ve known that I felt called to adopt a child one day. When I started dating my husband seriously, we had the typical conversations about what we envisioned our life & family to look like, and I discovered that he also had the same desire before meeting me! It was super exciting, and one of the many confirmations the Lord sent my way that this man was the man I wanted to build the rest of my life with. I’ll be completely honest and say that we still don’t know exactly what that is going to look like for us. Will we adopt internationally, through foster care, or through a private domestic situation? Will it be one child, or a set of four siblings? Will it be a baby, a toddler, or a teenager? Will we have all of our own biological children first? I have absolutely no idea, but I can tell you with confidence that I trust God is writing our adoption story, and we are open to whenever and however He wants to reveal it to us. And we are pumped about it; fully ready to say YES when that opportunity comes our way. Now that you know all of that about me, I have something to say. I have a strong conviction that if you are a true believer in Jesus Christ, (1) understanding how you have been adopted by God (Rom. 8:14-17; Gal. 4:4-7; 2 Cor. 6:18), (2) understanding the command by God to care for the fatherless that is clearly all over Scripture (Prov. 31:8-9; Ps. 82:3; Matt. 25:40; James 1:27; Deut 14:27-29), and (3) understanding the overwhelming need to help orphans both in our own backyards and all across the globe, how can you NOT pray and consider adoption? Please notice what I didn’t say. I didn’t say “Every Christian should adopt, period. If you don’t, you’re sinning.” What I did say was that every Christian should pray about adoption. Some people ask, why adopt? But honestly, that’s the wrong question. The question for us, as believers, should be, why not? I don’t necessarily believe that every Christian is called to adopt a child. I believe there are some legitimate reasons why certain families might choose not to - maybe age, medical conditions, marital instability, etc. But with that, I also believe there’s a large chunk of us American Christian families that are flat out too fearful, selfish, and/or comfortable with our perfect little lives to make a difference in a crisis that breaks God’s heart, and that’s pretty sad. So, I must ask you, reader, have you ever prayed about what your role in adoption and foster care should be? I mean, really prayed. Not just the casual “Lord, break my heart for what breaks yours and show me if I’m supposed to do something about this pain I’m seeing on my 15th mission trip to an orphanage.” No no, I mean have you sought God earnestly for a consistent, extended period of time, specifically asking Him not IF you should play a part, but HOW you should. Because the reality is, as Christians, we are commanded to care for the fatherless. It’s not an option, it’s a command. The intricacies of that are going to look different for all of us, but I believe with all my heart that we can do more than what we’re willing to do right now. We’re just either too scared or flat out unwilling to ask the Lord to give us a task that might make us step outside of our comfort zone. Maybe you’re really not called to adopt. That’s between you and the Lord, and I won’t argue with you about it. But maybe you are called to be a foster parent for a specific season of life. Or maybe you’re called to provide emotional support to a family who fosters and is having a difficult time. Maybe the Lord wants to use you to make a significant financial contribution towards a friend’s adoption, something more than the $20 you spent without thinking to buy a t-shirt they were selling. There’s a multitude of ways that we can step up as Christians surrounding adoption and foster care, and our creative God will certainly be faithful to show us our role when we humbly and diligently seek His wisdom. Sometime within the next 24 hours of you reading this {if you’re reading when I’ve initially posted} you’re going to be sitting around a table full of warm, delicious food, and likely many family members, remarking to each other how thankful you are for all you’ve been blessed with. My prayer is that while we enjoy the blessings and praise God for them, our thoughts will also turn towards the orphan who has no one to hug this Thanksgiving, and will eat the same dinner they do every day, because the orphanage never has sufficient funds to care for them all. I pray that our hearts will break for the child in our own city that’s stuck in yet another terrible, unloving, possibly abusive foster care situation, simply because the person that was next on the list to take them in wasn’t someone who knew the saving power of Jesus Christ like you do. Christians, we can’t celebrate another Thanksgiving in our beautiful homes with full bellies and full hearts, unwilling to pray the scary prayer that God might ask us to do something just a little bit radical for the Kingdom, and continue to call ourselves true believers. That’s just not what following Jesus is about. It’s about going out into a broken, lost, and dying world & sharing with them the glorious truth of the Gospel that changes lives through whatever means necessary - adoption included. So, here’s my challenge to us {including myself in this!}: Let’s commit to pray for five minutes every day about what God’s role for us is in all of this, from Thanksgiving until December 31, 2017. Just give the Lord five minutes a day for the last few weeks of this year and ask Him to wreck your heart with HIS plan for your life. Who knows, maybe He’s writing a story for you that you didn’t know existed. Maybe He’s just been waiting on you to ask Him to reveal it ♥ Happy Thanksgiving, and blessings! The double-edged sword of a holiday that comes once a year is just around the corner...Thanksgiving.
...which also means Black Friday. The increasing irony of sharing a meal with family, remembering all we've been blessed with and are grateful for, then turning around to immediately sell our souls to the snare of materialism never ceases to amaze me. At least a few years ago we got a full 24-hours to be "thankful" before the pandemonium began, but not anymore. Shoot, for some stores, "Black Friday" begins before Thanksgiving! I'm not saying I'm above it! I'm as guilty as the rest of ya'll, especially this year. We've got a baby on board, and there are some large items that we still need {can I even use that word, need?}. I'm hoping to get some great deals on Black Friday too! On the flip side, because we've got a baby on board, I've been spending a lot of time recently meditating on what it means to cultivate a grateful heart. I mean, what it really means. I want to be a mom that models contentment & generosity to her children, but that sure as heck doesn't come naturally to me, especially when I walk through Target. Can I get an amen & a cheers with our Starbucks cups all around? I don't know what it is about Target, ya'll, but it just slays me every time. I turn into a nasty little green-eyed monster in that place, looking at all the pretty things & feeling a sudden urge to max out the Red card and completely redecorate my entire house. It's a force to be reckoned with. Here's the thing: while I mean all of the above in a half-joking, lighthearted way, it's the opposite of lighthearted at the core. It's a worldly attitude. It's not of Christ. It's sinful, and it needs to be uprooted in us. But how? As I've considered what it looks like to cultivate a truly grateful heart, I think it comes back to a simple belief about who I think God is. Do I believe He will provide for me, or don't I? See, when I'm constantly seeking - for more stuff, for affirmation, for the deepest desires of my heart that have yet to be fulfilled - I'm not exemplifying that I believe God will provide for my needs. Did you catch that? For my needs. Not that He'll provide for all my wants, or make my life go exactly the way I've planned it. The Lord is not my genie or my fairy godmother, and this life isn't about me at all. He is the One and only Sovereign God of the universe, King of kings, Creator and Sustainer of all life itself, and I best know my place and fall on my face and worship Him. Yet as much as He is above me (Is. 55:8-9), He is also still near to me (Ps. 145:18), loving and providing for me as a father does for his daughter (Jer. 31:3; Matt. 6:25-32). When I grasp that and believe it about Him, it's changes my perspective on Thanksgiving. You see, it shouldn't even be as basic as being grateful and appreciative of all the simple blessings we have, like food, shelter, clean water, clothes, family, freedom, etc. {even though those are great things to remember!} Instead, the core of my thanksgiving should be rooted in the sheer glory of God's holiness. It's because of who HE is and knowing Him personally that we have the ability to say as Paul did, "I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation" (Phil. 4:12). He is the source. He is the prize. He is everything we need, and He knows the details of the provisions we currently lack in our lives. We can trust that He's good & faithful, holding it all together, and running the show according to His perfect will. To have a relationship with THAT God, well, that's more fulfilling than any amount of trips to Target can ever be. Lord Jesus, help this to mark our hearts in a new way this Thanksgiving, for Your glory. I'm gonna shoot straight: It's been a really, really difficult week.
Last Monday, some close friends experienced a truly unimaginable loss. It's not my story to tell, so I am going to respectfully decline sharing any details, but I want to stop right now and implore you, reader: If you are a follower of Christ, please pray for my friends. God knows their names & their need. Thank you! While I can't and won't pretend to understand even a semblance of the pain they are going through, I can still say with confidence that I am absolutely heartbroken along with my friends. I have been grieving, and I have been a wreck. I have not been "okay." I have been clinging to the truth of God's character, meditating on these exact sentences through a situation that I can't understand cognitively: "God is still good. God is still loving. God is still trustworthy." There have been moments this week where that's all I've had the strength to say. My prayers have sounded a lot like this: "Lord...*and a long silence*...I don't know what to say right now. You promise in Romans 8 that the Spirit helps us in our weakness, interceding for us according to the will of God with groanings too deep for words. I need you to do that for me now." And then I'll continue to sit in numbed silence, or give my anxious hands another load of laundry to do. It's OKAY to not be "okay." It's okay to be heavy of heart. "The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit." (Psalm 34:18). We live in a fallen world, and pain happens. We can be sad. Jesus grieved loss too (John 11). BUT, if we want true peace, we must run to God, not away from Him in the midst of our hurting. About three days ago, I stumbled upon James 5:16 for the first time in a while, which says: "Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working." I immediately felt convicted, and when my husband walked in the door from work later, I cried as I confessed my greatest sin of the week - lack of trusting in God, resulting in paralyzing fear. I said the words out loud to him that had been ruminating in my heart on a 24/7 loop since the moment I heard bad news about our friends: "I am petrified of losing her." Mommy-hood at any stage, including pregnancy, can easily become riddled by fear over a multitude of various things. But to be honest, until this week, losing Ada at this point, in my third trimester, was kind of off my radar. It's crazy how in mere seconds of vulnerability, the enemy can pinpoint your weak spots and poison you with his deception. And my sin has been giving in to his lies, letting them rule me instead of the truth & peace of Christ. I've been paralyzed by fear this week, paranoid for every 5 minutes that go by where I don't feel my daughter move, using all my willpower to not google every new pain in my belly, all while truly grieving a broken heart, feeling the heaviest guilt for being pregnant, trying to still rejoice over this season in my life, and beating myself up for being stressed out because I know "that's not good for the baby either." Yet in all this, I'm SUPER thankful, because I have been in this place of darkness before, and this time, I recognize it. This time, I'm using the tools I've learned from my previous pit, and in the powerful name of Jesus Christ I proclaim that I WILL NOT STAY HERE. So as I close, I'm letting you in on my plan of attack. It's the same method I learned in Christian counseling years ago, and it brought me out of the darkness before. I'm going to find as many Scriptures as it takes on fear, God's nearness, God's love, and God's faithfulness, and I'm going to write them on little cards. I'm going to post those cards EVERYWHERE, all over our house, where I'll see them constantly, and I am going to drill those truths into my heart and mind, speaking God's WORD over my fear. And I am believing that once again, the Lord will be faithful to complete the good work in me that He has begun. My hope is built on Christ alone. Will you pray for me as Jesus and I fight this fear together? I'd be so grateful if you would. Here's to a better week ahead! |
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Ashley Setterlind: Jesus lover, wife, new mama to a baby girl. Archives
October 2018
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