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Do It Anyway

faith

This article first appeared in The Southeast Outlook: Faith to do it anyway.

Sometimes I think I try to fit Jesus into my world instead of fitting into His. It’s sort of like me letting Him be a part of my everyday life. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but what if He wants me to be in His world instead? I think that’s where reading the gospels comes into play.

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I was recently mediating on the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000 in the book of Mark, chapter six. We’ve all heard the story many times before but this time I decided to imagine I was there watching. What would it have been like to have been an eyewitness, one among the crowd that day, listening to Jesus teach and watching Him perform this miracle?

As I imagined the scene, I couldn’t help but notice that the disciples were looking a little haggard. The day was growing long; the sun steadily moving across the sky toward the west. The disciples knew the people must be getting hungry. They had listened for hours as Jesus taught with authority. The disciples had watched Him walk among the crowd, touching their heads affectionately as He passed by. It had been quite a day, but the disciples felt like it was time to wrap it up.

The crowd seemed restless. Parents wanting to tend to their families, to make sure the children were properly fed before making the trek home. But the pull to stay was strong. They didn’t want to miss a word of what was being said by this man who spoke with such gentleness and love. So, they lingered just a little longer.

Finally, by silent consent, the disciples gathered around Jesus to tell Him of their concerns for the people. Jesus was moved. He smiled at the disciples and His eyes lit up while He listened. He liked what He was hearing. He liked that this chosen group of loyal friends had compassion on the people who had thronged to hear Him speak.

What happened next took the disciples by surprise. Jesus told them to feed this mass of people. They looked at each other bewildered. Feed 5,000 people? Did Jesus just say what they thought He said? Jesus wanted them to feed all these people with a mere five loaves of bread and two fishes?

It’s not that they thought Jesus couldn’t do this thing He proposed. After all, they had been around long enough to know that He could heal the sick and raise the dead. But feeding a hungry throng of people? They had expected Jesus to dismiss the crowd instead, telling them it was time to go home and tend to their families. They expected Jesus to bid them farewell and call it a day.
But He didn’t. So, these men who had chosen to leave their former lives and follow Jesus, began the task at hand, to feed the people in attendance. Because that’s what they had signed up for, to follow Him wherever He went and to do whatever He said. Jesus knew they surely had doubts and questions, but they did what He asked of them anyway.

How great a faith, to do it anyway.

Jesus knew all of these things. He understood that they had doubts. He knew they had questions. But I got the feeling that this was about more than just feeding the hungry mob of people. This was about the disciples and their faint in Him. Isn’t it always about more than just one thing? Jesus is a multi-tasker when it comes to loving us well.
I imagined Jesus’ heart filling with love for the disciples as He watched them act in simple obedience. He knew they needed to do the things that seemed outlandish to them. He knew it was in the doing that would cause their faith in Him to grow. He knew they needed to have doubts and questions but do it anyway.

Then, as I continued to imagine being there that day among the people, watching the disciples do what Jesus had instructed them to do, I felt Jesus inviting me to do the same. It was more than an invitation though. He was encouraging me to do what the disciples were doing, even in the midst of my doubts and questions, to trust Him. To go ahead and do it anyway.

He has met me many times just for being willing to do what He asked of me. Just for being willing. It wasn’t because I had such great faith in Him to show up in my life and make it all better. It was because I had doubts and questions but did what He asked me to do anyway.

He meets us where we are, in the messiness of life, with all our doubts and questions in His ability to make all things new.

But He does it anyway.

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Unscathed

marriage

It’s like a mirage, an oasis in a dry desert land, this promise of fulfillment and the quenching of the parched, never-ending thirst. It’s an empty hope. A false pledge for a better life, a new beginning with a new person. A new family even?

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This place-the place of hoping for a different life besides the one you have now. As if you could simply discard all the problems and troubles and boldly walk away unscathed.

It’s a lie from the pit of hell.

You can’t escape the things that are within you. You may be able to temporary shed them while you chase after the yonder thing that shines.

You can’t escape the things that happened to you either. Trying to bury them deep within, as if they aren’t real. They only exist in the dark place that you’ve chosen to avoid, at all costs. And it does cost. Dearly. Deeply. Desperately.

It’s only by the Grace of God that we, along with a trusted tribe, are able to work through the unspeakable. The inexcusable. The secret places that we loathe. Exchanging beauty for the ashes we donned, and the garment of praise instead of a spirit of heaviness so burdensome you can barely breathe. That’s the outcome of trusting God with it all. Leaving it in His capable hands.

We try to carry the load all by ourselves, as if it’s a badge of merit, a notch in our life belt. It’s a carefully crafted deception that we’ve somehow earned a better place in life, or even heaven, when our time comes. But it’s a false sense of nobility.

There’s only One Noble.

The sacrifices we make are trumped by the One sacrifice He made. One sacrifice that lasts throughout eternity.

We were never meant to earn our way. We were designed to accept His.

None of us escape this life unscathed.

Hope.

True Hope.

Everlasting Hope.

Jesus.

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Who Are We Really?

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Who are we really?

I am currently listening to the audio book I Thought It Was Just Me by Brene Brown. She is a research professor at the University of Houston. She studies shame and the effects that we carry with us because of the shame messages we receive often beginning in childhood.

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She wrote this book, based on interviews she conducted with hundreds of women, in hopes of helping us all to recognize the many ways we are influenced by shame, especially the subtle ways via television, magazines and social media. She writes about ways we can alter those shame messages so we can be fully present in our relationships with those we care about.

She shared about a class she teaches for women only at the university. She asks them each to bring in their favorite fashion magazines. She supplies paper, scissors and glue and then instructs them to go through the magazines and find pictures that represent the way they want to look, including clothes, make-up, hair styles and all the body parts, making a collage with the chosen pictures.

These students eagerly cut and paste the perfect images that represent the way they each want to look. This part of the exercise is easy. Once complete they move on to the second half of the activity. She then tells them to look through the magazines and find pictures that represent how they really look. What they are wearing, how they did their hair and all the body parts. This half proves to be an exercise in futility. Some only find a pair of shoes to glue on the paper.

 

Who are we really?

Not the beautifully coiffed women portrayed on television. Not the perfectly sized and put together women who appear on the covers of these favorite magazines. Not the carefully chosen moments we see on social media feeds of the rich and famous, or even those we know personally.

Who are they really?

And then it hit me… this isn’t solely a woman issue. It’s a human issue. We long for our relationships to be like those unattainable ones we see in Hallmark movies or read about in the many romance novels, all the while knowing it isn’t reality, yet hoping that maybe it is…

Who are we really?

The perfect marriages-the couples always smiling and having fun together, traveling, driving nice cars, living in lovely homes? The put-together families-happy mothers, fathers and kids-who seem to have it all together all the time? The women who appear to effortlessly manage the monotony of the not-so-glamorous parts of mothering with the daily demands of careers, even in the most trying of times? The fathers and husbands who are attentive and fully present at the end of each long day?

Who are we really?

Certainly not the people manufactured by our modern culture. Shine it up and polish it to perfection and then roll it out, minute by minute, in hopes that woman and men, the world over will buy into the fallacy without question.

Who are we really?

We are unique, and beautifully created to be who God designed us to be. We are individuals, valuable and cherished by the Father who knows us intimately and loves us immensely. To be anything less is to dishonor ourselves, our God and our families.

Who are we really?

Spending time getting to know ourselves as we come to know God is the only way of finding the answer.

 

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A Tale Of Two Brothers

Family

I can never let this day pass without acknowledging these very two very important people in my life. This event forever reshaped my family. I am posting it again (for the fourth time, I think).

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So much pain and suffering all around. The recent Oklahoma tornado victims so prevalent in our minds still; personal losses having nothing to do with natural disasters; and broken homes. The Manchester incident is the most present, mind-boggling, senseless act of violence that has left the world reeling and wondering.

(Those events happened several years ago now. So many more things happen every day. We have become accustomed to these things that we only allow ourselves to be touched briefly and on the surface.)

Life, in all it’s pain and glory, happening all around.

For some people it’s total devastation; for others incredible joy. Lives forever altered, shattered and broken; or put back together because of a wondrous miracles.

This post, this week, seems fitting:

May 24, 1980 was one such day for my family. My youngest brother turned eight on May 23, 1980. My oldest brother and his newly acquired wife along with me and my husband of two months, all gathered at my parents’ home to celebrate my little brother Daryl, who was an unexpected miracle himself. After dinner, cake and presents, my eighteen year old brother left to go hang with some friends.

I am forever thankful for that time we all had together that evening, because we had no idea he would never return home.

The early morning phone call on May 24th rocked my world when my dad called to tell us my eighteen year old little brother Stevie, had died in a car accident.

What followed was a year of intense pain; the grief and sorrow so tangible. I never knew grief could be so physical.

I remember the shock and denial, intermittently laced with a fragile hope that it was all a horrible mistake.

How could my brother be gone?

How can life be so normal and change so drastically in a moment so brief it is but a wisp of time?

Every year for the past thirty-three years, (39 now) within minutes of each other, we celebrate the birth of my youngest brother- a talented, funny, loving friend, husband, father, and so much more, while silently missing my other little brother who left this world far too early, by human standards anyway.

Happy Birthday, little brother!

I love you both.

I will miss you always.

Those three statements blending together; one no greater or less than the other.

All true.

And forever interwoven.

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On Being Strong

faith

Around four years ago I wrote a post titled Don’t Tell Me I’m Strong. Just last week someone left a remark. It’s amazing the power of words, and the amplification by the Internet. Add the Jesus factor and the possibilities are endless.

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This is how that post started: “Don’t tell me I’m strong”, I heard myself say as I sat and talked with a group of people. “I’m not sure why, but it really pisses me off”. This became a new topic of discussion as we delved a little deeper, because others were identifying and agreeing that they weren’t that thrilled with hearing those words either.

You can read the entire post by clicking here.

Here is the comment that was left last week: Thank you. My child was stillborn nine weeks ago and I’m so f’ing tired of people telling me that “I’m strong.” “You’re so strong” it makes me want to punch them in the face. I mean, it’s definitely better than them not saying anything, I appreciate that they’re trying to be encouraging… but it makes me really angry. I actually had to look and see if anyone else felt the same.

I was struck with the fact that this woman had those same feelings but had never heard anyone else express them, so she did what anyone living in the twenty-first century would do…she Googled it. And she found my post. There is such a comfort in knowing that someone “gets us”, understands exactly how we feel, even if this person is halfway across the country or even the world.

The power of “Yeah, me too” is so impactful. It brings connection. What greater purpose is there in telling your story?

I was also struck with another thing…no man is an island. There is nothing new under the sun. We all think we’re so different (not in a good way), that no one else has ever felt the way we’ve felt, or experienced the things we have. To some extent this is true. Every story is different. Every life is unique. Human nature, however, is pretty universal.

The feelings of connection and belonging are huge. Don’t be afraid to tell your story. You never know who’s life it might touch in a way that no one else, or any other story could.

We have commonalities. If you have had a thought or feeling that seems different, chances are someone else has thought and felt the same as you.

People want, maybe even need to hear; “Yeah, me too”.

Don’t be afraid to be vulnerable with a person who has earned the right to hear your story. Vulnerability can dispel loneliness and bring a feeling of belonging and worth.

Let them be where they are. Don’t try to change or fix.

Instead, listen with the heart of the Father.

And pray.

 

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God, Then Change Me

faith

Marriage is an interesting thing to me. I am captivated by couples who look like they know what they’re doing when it comes to relationships. And not only that, it looks like they are actually enjoying what they have and each other.

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When I read Chapter 15, as I mentioned in Favorite Authors, in Richard Paul Evans’ newest novel; The Road Home, I was intrigued.  Here are a few excerpts that caught my attention:

“I enjoyed watching the two of them Interact. There was something intriguing about their relationship. Maybe it was something as simple as the fact that they liked each other.” 

That’s what I’m talking about. You can always tell when a couple enjoys each other. Not because they have to. Not because they are working hard to make it work. They simply enjoy being together.

“As the evening drew on, I asked Norm, ‘How long have you been married?’

‘Forever’, he said.

‘Judy reached over and slapped his leg. ‘Thirty-five years.’

‘Thirty-five years, I echoed. ‘You seem like you have a good marriage.’

‘I kind of like the guy,’ Judy said. Then she added, ‘Wasn’t always that way.’

He sighed. ‘That’s for sure.’

‘Really?’ I asked.

‘For years the wife and I struggled.’

‘That’s an understatement,’ she said, smiling slightly.

Norm groaned. ‘Seems the longer we were married the more difficult things got. The tension between us got so bad that whenever I’d go away on business it was a relief, for both of us. At least while I was gone. ‘Course, we always paid for it on reentry.’

‘I was on the road, in Toledo, when things came to a head. We had just had another big fight on the phone and Judy had hung up on me. I was alone and frustrated and angry.’

‘That’s when I turned to God. Or turned on God. Maybe shouting at God isn’t prayer, maybe it is–but whatever I was enagged in I’ll never forget it. I was standing in the shower of a Motel 6, yelling at God that I couldn’t do it anymore. As much as I hated the idea of divorce, the pain of being together was just too much.

Finally, I just sat down in the shower and began to cry. That’s when a voice said to me, You can’t change her. You can only change yourself. At that moment I thought, If I can’t change her, God, then change me. I prayed late into the night. I prayed the next day on the drive home. I prayed as I walked in the door to a cold wife who barely even acknowledged me.

That night, as we lay in our bed, inches from each other yet miles apart, I knew what I had to do.

The next morning I rolled over in bed next to Judy and said, ‘How can I make your day better?”

The dialogue goes on for a little longer. In a nutshell, Judy was skeptical, to say the least. Norm continued to ask her the same question every day until she got it. From that point on their relationship grew.

First of all, I get that this is fiction. I also understand how over simplified this is. Real life is way more complicated. But what if it wasn’t? What if it doesn’t have to be?

There are lots of marriages with lots of different issues, in varying degrees of severity. But what if it was as simple as treating others how we want to be treated? Just like the Bible states, only in different words (Mark 12:30-31.)

When my kids where little, I used to ask them what the most important thing was. The answer, which they came to know, was relationships. They came to understand that if they treated others how they wanted to be treated, their lives, and more importantly their relationships, would go more smoothly.

I get that this snippet from a novel is trite, but what if it carries some weight?

It could be a great mantra, a way of life, to put others needs above your own, especially when it comes to close relationships. But we can’t just try it. It has to become a way of life.

“God, then change me.”

 

By

Favortie Authors

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I am a reader from way back. I still have some of the first books I owned as a child. One of my favorites was called Laurie and the Yellow Curtains. I’m sure you can guess why. I love the feel of a book in my hands. I love the illustrations of a good children’s book. I love everything about books.

I have my favorite authors. A few favorites who are gone now’: Phyllis Whitney, Victoria Holt and Dorothy Eden. Since they no longer write, at least not this side of heaven, I have moved on to writers who still produce books on a regular basis. I am drawn to simplistic tales of life, family and love. A few of my current favorite authors are: Kristy Cambron. I know her! We’re friends and we get to have about forty-five minutes every Saturday night before church. Kristy is the women’s ministry leader at Southeast Christian Church. She spins an excellent tale, beautifully weaving together a historical era in time with a particular person as the subject. I just finished The Illusionist before I start on her Castle Trilogy. If you don’t know her works you should totally check her out. Tell her I sent you!

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Then there is an old favorite, Debbie Macomber. Truthfully I have been reading her since I was a young adult. We sort of grew up together. She has created towns and families who have become like friends. I had the amazing privilege of visiting her town where the series Cedar Cove was brought to life. I even had the distinct honor of having lunch with her in her very quaint restaurant and gift shop. I wrote about it here. If you’ve never read her and you like simple, quaint tales of life, Debbie knows how to bring that to life. She recently launched an online magazine.

Susan Wiggs is another favorite. I collect all of her books, along with Debbie Macomber’s, Luanne Rice books and…Nicolas Sparks, although his penchant for a death or sad ending has me a bit apprehensive but I continue to read because he pens a good tale.

Another on of my favs is Richard Paul Evans. That’s the reason for this blog post. I am reading his latest and last in his Broken Road Trilogy. I just finished chapter 15. I knew I needed to take a break and write before I read another word. This tale is about a man who walks along historic Route 66. I adore Route 66. I had the opportunity of making the trek from Saint Louis to Chicago, where is ends a few years back. Travelling Route 66 is a bit challenging these day because the road is closed in parts, overgrown and covered with an bigger better interstate. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for advancements in travel. I use interstates, but there’s just something about that golden area and the sights you see along the way. The stories they tell as they stand abandoned and empty for years. Whole towns dead because of the rerouting of that scenic and historic byway.

I wanted to share parts of chapter 15 with you. It’s about marriage, another thing that intrigues me for more reasons than I have time to go into in this post.

I’ll post it next time!

 

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When We Don’t Understand

faith

As long as we have breath within us there will be times when we don’t understand.

Several weeks ago on a Monday morning I learned of two tragedies that had occurred to people I know. One was the heart attack and near death of a young man, a man who wasn’t even forty years old. And the other thing was about fifty-eight year old Greg. He had just learned that he had an inoperable brain tumor.

Today that young man, husband and father of four, has recovered and is doing well. This family now approaches life with trepidation but gratefulness for what God did in their lives and what He continues to do as they trust each day to His will for them all.

As long as we have breath within us there will be times when we don’t understand.

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Greg’s funeral was Thursday. It was well-attended. He was loved by many. He served faithfully and had the kind of laugh that was infectious for all of those around him. He would go out of his way to ask about your life and find words to encourage and inspire.

These are moments when we don’t understand-the life-changing outcome for both families, only different.

 

I read of the passing of Rachel Held Evans on Saturday morning. I didn’t know her personally, but I read a few posts on different social media sites that intrigued me to go find out who she was. This woman, wife and mother of young children, suddenly showed symptoms that were troubling to the doctors. She was placed in a medically induced coma where she stayed until she couldn’t stay any longer. As they took her off the meds that were keeping the seizures at bay, she began to seize and her brain began to swell and… there was nothing they could do.

More moments when we don’t understand.

Life is filled with times when we don’t understand. These are just a few of the latest. I could tell you about the brother who was a husband to an expecting wife, a father of young children and a successful businessman. He died of a business related accident.

I could tell you of a grieving widow who is raising her grandchild alone now. Her son, her only child, has entered her home to destroyed heirlooms and wreak havoc, and he is threatening to kill her. She doesn’t understand why or what is going on.

I could tell you of a friend whose fourteen year old child was just released from a stay in a hospital. He was there because he was contemplating suicide.

Those are few a happenings that I know about. You know about others. No sense or reasons can make the pain go away. No words can change the lives of those who have been affected by a sudden chain of events which leaves them in a realm of despair.

When we don’t understand we try to make sense. We try to explain. We try to reason. Futile acts. Nothing can change what has been done.

People survive. People go on to live in such a way that others marvel.

There is no explanation for any of this.

There is only Jesus and the hope of eternal life.

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About Grace

faith

This article appeared in The Southeast Outlook. I am humbled.

Have you ever struggled with grace? I do at times and I’ve been a Christian most of my life. I came to know Jesus as my personal savior when I was eleven years old. I was raised in church. I went to Sunday School, VBS and all the extra meetings in between. I knew all about God and Jesus. I heard all the Bible stories while growing up. I was well versed in the ways of churchdom.

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But don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to give you the impression that I was a saint. During my teen years, I was rebellious. I remember coming home many nights after partying with my friends. I would sit on my bed smoking a cigarette, flipping through the pages of my Bible-The Way -which was the Bible to read back in the day if you were young. I remember praying; thanking God for my salvation through Jesus. I told Him I loved Him, and I would serve Him…one day, but not just yet. I had parties to attend and friends to hang with, but not to worry. I would be all in…one day.

That paragraph may be the very definition of grace. God didn’t turn His back on me then in all my teenage audacity. That is unconditional, unfailing love from a compassionate and merciful Father. I could stop right here, grace defined, but let’s talk a little more about grace.

After all these years, I still don’t fully understand grace. I get the concept. I know that Jesus paid a price for all mankind; those who have gone before us, and those yet to be born. I know that grace is unmerited favor with God. I didn’t earn it. I don’t deserve it. Grace is a gift freely given by the Father, because of the sacrifice of the Son.
Wikipedia defines grace as ‘…the divine influence which operates in humans to regenerate and sanctify, and to impart strength to endure trial and resist temptation; and as an individual virtue or excellence of divine origin”.
That definition sounds very ethereal, like it’s not even attainable by humans. And that sort of makes sense to me because grace is in total opposition of how we live today. Our worthiness is based on what we do and who we are, or better yet, who others think we are and who we present to the world via our social media feeds. In a nutshell, our worthiness depends on us and has little to do with grace.

We learn at an early age that we need to measure up. There is a standard; an unspoken set of rules (or sometimes spoken) about what we need to do, or be, or achieve, to be worthy, to be enough to deserve all the things we have or are trying to become.

Even when I come face-to-face with grace, like those times as a teen, or these days, when I catch a tiny glimpse of what grace really is, when I feel the overwhelming love of God that leaves me in awe, my thinking eventually goes back to; “Am I enough”? Like my value depends on me.

I listen as others talk around the topic of grace. It almost seems as if we reserve grace for the “churchy” aspects of our lives, that it doesn’t fit into everyday living. I can only conclude that we don’t understand the magnitude of that one small word.

I read Grace is Greater by Kyle Idleman, the senior pastor of Southeast Christian Church when it was published. That book was a hard read for me. It’s grace, right? Why should that be a hard subject to read about? But it was. I would read a small section and then I would have to step away in order to grasp what I had just read and how it impacts my life as a child of God. Don’t get me wrong, Grace is Greater helped shed some light on the topic, but for me, I always (unconsciously) go back to core beliefs about who I think I am. And when that happens, I never measure up. There’s always someone better, stronger, smarter…

Sometimes I compare the other way. I might find a person who isn’t doing life as well as I did in one area or another. There’s danger in comparing. For one thing, it simply isn’t true. I don’t know what I think I know. I only know what I see, and I assume the rest. And for another thing, that’s not how my Father operates or wants me to conduct my life. He doesn’t compare me to someone else in a negative or positive way. If He isn’t comparing us to each other then why do we?

Maybe understanding what grace isn’t has helped me better understand what grace is. When I have questions about grace, I stop trying to figure it out and simply put my trust in the One who is Higher than I, the One who is Holy. The One who is all-knowing, and unconditionally loving– ALWAYS.
I once heard Chip Ingram in one of his broadcasts on Living on the Edge, say this about grace; “Perhaps it (grace) describes everything God is, in every work that Jesus did on the cross on our behalf”. It still doesn’t totally define grace, but it helps me to rest in Him.

I located Grace is Greater from my bookshelf recently and thumbed through it to see what stood out at me when I read the book in 2017 – what I had highlighted and underlined. Although Idleman doesn’t really define the word, what he says paints a beautiful picture of grace. I found these excerpts in the introduction of the book Grace is Greater. “I tend to think grace is best and most fully understood not by way of explanation alone but through experience.” And this; “Jesus, on the other hand, never used the word grace. Instead he showed us what it looked like.”

When I don’t totally get this thing called grace, maybe all I really need to do is look to the cross and see the pain and suffering Jesus experienced for me and for you, knowing that He chose to endure the shame and bare the sin of the world in that small span of time, so we could live with Him forever. I can choose to believe what the Bible says about grace and learn by experience. Looking at the cross helps me better understand how that one small word makes all the difference.

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Between the Cross and the Empyt Tomb

faith

Do you ever tire of other people’s junk? Yeah, me too. But if I’m totally honest, what I’m really tired of, is my own.

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Today I have a new struggle. It’s not new exactly. I’ve just become acutely aware of it. Perhaps that isn’t the correct terminology either. I’m aware of this acute mindset that I have never really owned. Today I want to own it. I want to accept it. I want to embrace it for all it’s worth and allow God to use it to weave me into His plans and purposes for my life.

In the book The Gift of Being Yourself; The Sacred Call to Self-Discovery by David G. Benner, he shared these words: “Thomas a Kempis said, ‘A humble self-knowledge is a surer way to God than a search after deep learning”. And “Augustine’s prayer; ‘Grant, Lord, that I may know myself that I may know thee’. It seems that self-discovery is God inspired. Why does that surprise me?

I trust my life to Jesus Christ, and the lives of those I love. I know I ultimately have no control over what happens to me or those I hold dear. I attempt to do the next thing that I feel I am supposed to do and trust God with the outcome.

But here’s the thing…I actually trust God with the outcome that I want, but not simply want or desire but expect. And if I don’t get what I think I deserve (for too many reasons to list here) then I am hurled into a maelstrom of emotions that engulf me and threaten my mental and emotional well-being.

I want what I want, and I want it now. It’s a common thing among mortals. I also want the outcome to be precisely how I envision….to bring glory to God, of course. After all, wanting to bring God glory is an honorable thing to strive for. How can anyone fault us for that?

Reading these words gives me a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Writing them is even worse. Writing them makes them mine. Writing them causes me to see myself for exactly who I am, and exactly who I am at this very moment, doesn’t offer much peace or joy.

But there is reason to hope! Let’s not forget the Easter season and all that it represents. The very existence of spring, with it’s newness; it’s vibrant and lush facades, is what enables hope in the first place. But beyond that, way above all that we see and know with our senses is Jesus. Good Friday, the beginning of Hope Eternal, looked upon with such reverence and sadness for what the Savior of the World endured. But if not for Friday, there would be no Sunday! Neither of these acts are more important than the other. Both were necessary for the Redemption of all mankind. Both are reasons to celebrate.

No, I didn’t switch gears. These things go together. I have neglected to blend the two in my life–the redemptive work of what Jesus did on the cross and when He rose from the grave, with the way I conduct my life on a daily basis.

I am on a path, a journey that can sometimes bring more pain than I feel I can bare; the journey to let God write the story He wants to tell with my life. That’s not the hard part though. The most difficult piece of this puzzle is to not only be content, but to live in the freedom of the outcome He has planned for me.

And that’s where I often get stuck.

But not today. Because I have been made aware.

Our journeys aren’t really about the outcome. They are about how we respond, how we allow God to use us as instruments for His purpose, even if we don’t understand. Even if we don’t like it. Even when what we are experiencing are the results of the actions and choices of others. It’s always about allowing our lives to point to His grace, sufficiency and love.

Let this day mark the new beginning, this day between the cross and the empty tomb. Let today be known in my life, (and perhaps in yours too?) as the first step of not only letting God write His story with my life, but to give Him the ending as well.

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