Pinky Swear

My apologies for not updating more quickly on Romans. I still have my materials, so that will hopefully be coming out soon. But this morning's thought was far too pressing of a matter for me to not write it for the sake of continuing a story line.

I was thinking back on choices I've made and how God uses the bits and pieces of our lives to weave this overall picture of grace and forgiveness. And I thought of specific moments when I didn't believe what God was saying. When, for some reason, I did not think He was serious or fully aware of the situation. The first time, my answer was, "Well, okay, I guess I can deal with that." The second time, my answer was, "Oh, well, you must have just meant that first time. So now I'm in the clear, right?" ....................................why did I think that?

It seems to me that this is a part of the human condition. Why do we not take God at His Word? Why don't we believe what He says? I think we often hear Him and think that the truth He gives us is conditional or temporary. Our God does not change - His character is everlasting; so why do we think that His will for us is so flexible? When we receive a message from the Holy Spirit telling us to avoid this-that-or-the-other-thing, we are quick to say yes. For that moment. But if the same principle comes up later in a different scenario, then the truth of God's Word does not change. Yet we look at it and say that it's not the same, or it doesn't apply to this instance. Or we say, "God, you've asked for this part of who I am, for me to surrender this entire aspect. Here, take it. I give it freely. But surely you didn't mean for this section of this part. That doesn't fall under the scope of what you've asked for."

God is not human. He doesn't go back on what He says. If we stop believing the veracity and endurance of what He has said to us, then not only are we robbing ourselves of the blessing of obedience, but we are qualifying God as less than Holy. Who are we to say that God didn't mean it? Why don't we trust Him when He says He's got our best interests at heart, and the things that He tells us are to bring about the best possible outcome for us? He does not fail us. When we give ourselves into His keeping, we don't get to pick and choose when to listen. Being a living sacrifice means that you do not keep your own identity - you become the necessary thing to that which you are sacrificing. We are His children and His identifiable Body to a world in need of His mercy and grace and UNADULTERATED LOVE, yet as we go out into this world, we so often turn back and say, "Are you sure? That can't be right." How does that show our faith? How does that justify us to unbelievers who do not think that this figurehead can be trusted?

There are always places where we keep God's Word contained and specifically designated. One of mine was "No Houghton boys." It took many years for me to believe that when God said that to me, He meant it. Always. Not just in one circumstance. When God says "Love others," He means all others. When God says "Do not lust," He means with anyone. When He says "Give me your burdens," He means all of them. When He asks, "Be mine completely?" He means every part of you. He's not trying to trick you, to play mind games, to trap you into something later. When God tells you something - believe it.

God is not a man, so he does not lie.
He is not human, so he does not change his mind.
Has he ever spoken and failed to act?
Has he ever promised and not carried it through?

- Numbers 23:19

Romans, part one

A couple of weeks ago, I was asked to present Romans 8 during a Holiness meeting as the Scripture basis for the message. To prepare for this undertaking, I tried to get a gestalt of the first seven chapters in order to better understand the message of chapter 8. My notes are a little discombobulated, so please be patient if my ramblings don't quite make sense. I promise, there was a point behind all of them.

At the start of the letter, Paul chooses in his intro to make declarative statements about who the Roman believers are, so that anyone reading would not misinterpret what they believe and with whom they aligned themselves. They are a part of an epic story of LOVE and POWER that holds heavy ramifications throughout the ages. Paul takes a moment to let them in on the knowledge of their effectiveness as believers throughout a wide geographical region, before he reveals his prayers for them. And as we know from the book of James, the prayers of a righteous man are powerful and effective.

As I kept reading, this is what I understood:
We have an instinctual knowledge of right and wrong as the result of sin, and God's anger at sin remains. Along with this knowledge, being created in the image of God gives us a propensity towards seeing His fingerprints on the world around us. Therefore, we know right and wrong, and we KNOW God, so we are in no way cleared from the guilt that accompanies sin (before forgiveness). One aspect of wickedness is not separate from the other aspects - one sin is not on a different level from another; if a little sin is there, you are sinful, and other sins and lies to deceive your heart will come after the first like a flood. When you're not focusing on the true nature of god, your thoughts and actions become the opposite of His will. God's calling for you is derived from His character. KNOW JESUS.

In Search of Love

I have often thought of things that I wanted to post here in the past few months. I've neglected to do so because most of what I've been pondering or have felt I have discovered has felt very personal in nature, and I thought it would be more advantageous of me to keep it to myself and 'ponder these things in my heart' instead. Perhaps I'll find myself writing out some of these things in the days to come.

However, I've been thinking about what's going to happen in the coming months. I'll be working at a summer camp as part of the Christian Education staff. Every day, I'll be teaching children in the Jesus And Me time, as well as helping out with the other curriculum for the camp. The thoughts have been swirling around my mind about what I'm going to try to instill in these kids and what sort of action I need to take so that my every day appearance supports the lessons that I'll be teaching.

There are so many things that I want to say! So many values I want to give them! But there's no way I can cram them all into one summer. And if I teach one lesson one week, then those kids don't get the lesson for the next week, nor do the next week's kids get the previous week's lesson. Okay, that may not seem like a tragedy, but I really want to fulfill this position to the best of my abilities. Therefore, I've been looking for an overall theme from which to grab lessons. The more that I dwell on it, the more one solitary answer keeps coming back to me: Love.

Now, I must admit that I do not understand love. I utilize love and I receive love as best I can, but, like most people, I do not have the comprehension needed to fully take in the true meaning of love. For the past six months, I've been in a relationship with a great man, and we've been learning what love means. Now, we are both dynamic individuals, and therefore have found that love often includes disagreements and exists in spite of argumentation. But our affection for each other remains, and our love is merely mortal. Think of the capacity of God's Love beyond that!

So, this summer, I will be doing a study on Love. I've been working through God's characteristics and God's love for us for a while, but I want to go deeper. I want to wade through the waters of the overwhelming LOVE that God has for us. And the more I know it, the more I can enact it, and the more ably I'll be able to teach it. Or at least show it. I'm not quite sure how that works yet. But I am excited to find out!

Some potential sources I hope to use:
C. S. Lewis - The Four Loves
Francine Rivers - Redeeming Love
The four Gospels
Hosea
Genesis
C. S. Lewis - Mere Christianity
Paul Young - The Shack

Let me know if you have any other suggestions. And pray for me. =)

Tasteless Words

As is usual for me, I learned something the other day through words. I cannot believe how etymologically-centered I am at times. I spell words in my head as I speak and listen, so if I process something with a homophone or just the wrong word entirely, I become very confused very quickly until my brain can correct itself (with what looks like a dictionary in my visuospatial sketchpad). Hopefully, this gives you some sort of idea how strikingly words affect my thinking.


In talking with a friend of mine, the conversation took itself towards a vague reference of physical pain. Well, this was not really suitable for me, so I decided to redirect. Because the conversation was over the internet, I could quite easily play with the words in my head. So I added a letter, and turned the verb from "tased" to "tasted". Now, as you may have been able to see coming, this turned the conversation into something that was ... less than desirable for a moment.

And as I continued the conversation with my friend, on a completely different topic, I realized what I had done. I had actively chosen to speak in a manner that was somewhat dirty than to focus on pain. I desired so much to divert from the subject of pain that I defamed my character. After thinking about this for a while, I still have no clue why I did that! I trust the friend with whom I was speaking; it's not like I was trying to protect myself from anything. Yet there was something that was so incredibly strong pulling me away from the conversation about pain.


When is it okay to decide that it is better for me to be less reputable than the person I aim to be in order to avoid discomfort? This ties in to peer pressure, of course, but I want to focus more on the fact that this friend had to see a lesser version of myself because I didn't want to experience pain in the interaction with this person. I showed an ugly part of me that I am not proud of and try to improve about myself. All for the sake of hiding what I saw as a vulnerable part of who I am - a sensitivity to pain. It's also a possibility that who I was talking to made a difference; I had no desire to associate this person with any additional pain in our relationship.

But I made a terrible mistake. I sacrificed an opportunity for me to share with this friend a part of who I am, whether I like that trait or not. I gave up a chance at communally sharing in responsibility over words and thoughts, and I denied it to save face. The horrible part is that I didn't save face at all; to me, I lost more giving up dignity than giving up the secrecy of this discomfort.

As much as I love words, everything about them, and the quantity in which I use them, I must keep in mind that they are precious. They can protect or destroy any part of you, and not always coming from someone else. They represent who you are. Be careful.

If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. - James 1:26

Tough Love

What is love?

That's actually been a running joke among some people I know. But I ask it today without the mocking voice and with sincere intent. What is it? What does it look like? How is it expressed? Does it last? Can we depend on it? Can we embody it? Can we only tap into it once in a while?
I found out recently that a friend of mine is in the process of divorce. He's not that old, and not been married that long. I don't know any of the details. But I know I used to look at him and say to myself, 'he knows what love is.' And right now my heart aches for him.

Isn't it surprising how the people we depend on for certain things or look up to in certain situations can be just like us? Shaky. Unreliable. Unsure. Hurting.

If love is patient, and love is kind, not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude, not insisting on its own way or irritable or resentful, not rejoicing in wrongdoing but in truth, bearing all things, believing all things, hoping all things, enduring all thing, and NEVER ENDING..... what does that look like? That is not me. I am many of those nots and not enough of those is-s. It is not you. I'm sure you have the trait that is opposite of at least one of these characteristics.

God is love. Yes, I understand this, as much as my mortal mind will allow me to do so. But we are not God. And I'm not trying to limit the power of Christ within us by any means; I am, however, trying to be realistic in pointing out our human nature.
I am fearful of never being able to experience love. Maybe more specifically, I am fearful of putting my trust in love the way that humans express it. To overgeneralize to the point of falsehood: I do not trust God's followers. I trust LOVE Himself; I pour myself to Him because I know that He will not let me down. But I find myself guarded to the 'little Christs', the 'little Loves'.
Because quite honestly, we fail.

The more I watch us fail at practicing love, the more fearful I get. The more guarded I become. I've built high walls around my heart so that the only communication that happens is vertical. I've shut off the possibility of being vulnerable with other people; maybe not completely, but enough that I've begun to notice just how distant I've become. I was listening to a sermon last night that said that when you form a friendship, you are risking getting hurt. And the deeper that friendship is, the more hurt you will be by betrayal. Look at Jesus and Judas. He brought Judas into the twelve, He gave him the money box (trust), He washed his feet (servanthood), and He gave him the bread dipped in wine (the sign in ancient times of the host finding great value in someone, considering them highly favored and special to them, a good friend).

And Christ handed him that bread knowing that a mere moment later, he would leave and get everything together to turn Him over. Ultimate betrayal. And..... He did it anyway.

Today especially I have a hard time feeling love. Life's like that, right? When everything hits you at once and you just don't know how else to respond. I do not want to love anyway. I do not want to give off huge parts of myself that put me at risk for great hurt. Because human love is unreliable. From anyone. (Except sometimes moms.)

But it's the greatest commandment. Love the Lord your God with all of you. And the second is like it, not underneath it or its afterthought: love your neighbor as yourself. And if I value my own heart enough to be hesitant of what I put out there, I should also value someone else's heart enough not to be the cause of that betrayal, right?

Love is hard. But love is asked of us. And I have to believe that somehow it's worth it.

Intellectual Scripture

I'm visiting my sister at college. Not that this is unusual for me; I've been up to visit at least half a dozen times since August. But, as I'm sure every graduate who returns can agree, it is much different in many aspects than the time you spent there yourself.

I was in the shower this morning, of all places, and someone had put up a devotional on the wall. First of all, I think that's fantastic, and wish I would have thought of it while I was in the dorms. Secondly, the author said that she had been, "reading a little A.W. Tozer", which made me giggle, because it is my firm belief that Tozer writes nothing that is "little". Everything I ever seem to read of his is mind-blowing and inspirational. So I had a small chuckle at this.

But my third point is my strongest one. I read the devotional, liked it, tried to think about it while in the shower. The author seemed to start out with strong language to me, and I appreciated her style. (And I keep using the feminine pronouns because it's an all-girls dorm, and I am pretty sure no guys would go in to put devos in the girls' showers. I would find that entirely creepy.) It wasn't until a few minutes later did I realize that I had read the devotional without looking at the Scripture at the top. And the strong intro was really only an extension of the Scripture.

I had to stand still for a moment, with hot water pouring down my back and ask myself, "What does that say about me?" Let me explain: I consider myself an intellectual enthusiast. While I may think that I hold some amount of intellect, I am more interested in the pursuit of intellect, and the discussions that I feel perpetuate a growth in knowledge and express evidence of it. So, I was quite excited to hear someone else's thoughts about the content matter. So excited, in fact, that I paid no attention to the Scriptural basis for the thoughts.

Since when have I decided that there are parts of Scripture that are 'less intelligent' than others? This particular passage was a section from the psalms; did I somehow think that it was less important than what was written by this girl? It's not like I didn't see it; it was a paragraph in italics at the top of the page. If I want a chunk of Scripture that I can really dig into, I head to the New Testament, and I'll save the Psalms for an emotional catharsis. Where did I learn how to categorize Scripture like that and not allow the full impact of God's Word to transcend my mental boundaries? This is only one of those things that is running through my mind at a fast pace and causing me a little bit of grief today.

Geez, way to go, self. Now knock it off.

Idols and Shadows

I decided that I needed to write again. However, in trying to settle on a topic, I ended up looking back to my last post to see what I had written. After going through it, here I sit, on my bed, my eyes overflowing with tears.

I confess, that effort to live out sanctification has failed over the past few months.

It seems as though whenever I put something ahead of God, it ends up being people instead of things. Idolatry is not meant purely for golden calves, as Sunday school may have had us believing as young children. But I seem to make idols out of the people that I interact with, placing my relationships with others above my relationship with the Lord. And I'm afraid that concerning the lesson I learned, I did not treasure it in my heart as I should have.
I had said yes to God, and I had meant yes. But the circumstances that came after that decision caused me to act as though I had said no. And I didn't realize it. I did not look critically enough at the way that I was living in regards to the whole situation to see what I was doing. And with the fact that it revolved around others, leads me to ponder the concept of love.

I've been thinking lately a lot about the concept of loving others, and what that looks like. Partially inspired by the thought of love languages, I've realized that the way that I try to show love to others is more the way that I want love to be shown to me, and not necessarily the way that they would like to receive love. I know, this sounds kinda weird, but if you understand what I'm talking about, then you can understand how this is potentially a huge topic to dwell on. There are some people with whom I am hyper-aware of how I treat them. Past experience has taught me that my attention needs to be direct to the words that I choose to use and the tones that I emphasize. How I talk to one of my sisters, for example, cannot be echoed in how I talk to another, and both of these may be different than how I talk to the third. Everyone receives words and acts of love differently. So how can I show that?

On the other side of things....how can I show love to God? For One who epitomizes the word, whose very existence is its definition, is reflecting Him how I show Him I love Him? Seems that way to me. Huh - look at that. One sentence, and I may have an answer for once.

But here's the catch. To reflect God, to show our love for Him in reverent adoration, both to Him and to others, we must know who He is. What He stands for, what characteristics abound in His being. Same with others; in order to see how they love and receive likewise, we must know them. Who they are, what they stand for, what their characteristics are. This takes time. This takes purposeful relationship building. And in trying to develop that, it seemed to me that I had lost sight of the Foundational Relationship, the one essential both to my own survival, but also to that of my friendships. Knowing and reflecting Christ is the best jump-start to any relationship. And by forgetting Him, I had allowed my other relationships to crumble.

"The dearest friend on earth is a mere shadow compared to Jesus Christ."
- Oswald Chambers