Author: justlearningtolean

Just a sinner saved by grace ....

Jehovah Shalom, The Lord is My Peace

~ justlearningtolean ~ 2 Comments

You know, until the Lord takes you through deep waters, I think most of us remain in that place where Paul described the early believers in I Cor 13, “When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things.” Until you have had your faith tested and you have been tried by fire, you tend to lean on your own sufficiency.

But in those great periods of suffering come your deepest growth, depth of understanding and surrender are developed and refined, if indeed you learn to choose to surrender to Him. It is my confession that I am still a baby in so many more aspects of my Christian life than I’d care to admit. When life has been easy, I have been a rock. I knew the biblical answers. I had confidence in my God and Lord, so I believed. But when suffering came, I was shaken. I found my faith was only strong when things were going well. But I became distraught when things weren’t going well for me or weren’t under my control. I hope I’m not the only one who can admit to this. God has NOT been my peace, my ability to control the various aspects of my life was my peace.

This year, I believe God has been asking me to make Him my peace. My “Jehovah Shalom.” Things have been so out of control this year. In fact, even for the 12 years prior, when I “knew” clinical depression. Talk about a lack of peace which comes from inside the raging storm of my mind!!!! Then He took that weight from me (it appears) but replaced it with great physical suffering. Out of the frying pan and into the fire.

During my years with depression, I came to see it as God asking me to surrender control of my mind and even my ability to act and think in a holy way (as if any of us are capable of being sinless creatures no matter how hard we try on our own). I was hopelessly under the control of something that I couldn’t beat into submission; I could not squash it down with a power of my will. It became an exercise of humility and surrender under the mighty hand of God, and a new perspective of God’s reminder to me that His ways are not our ways and our thoughts are not His thoughts. He was in this, yes, even in this!

I think I’ve grown in this area of allowing God to be my Jehovah Shalom this year. I’m probably more like a pre-schooler now. I pray I am underestimating it but I know my human heart, my self-reliant, self-sufficient human heart.

This entry is getting long so I’ll begin to bring it to a close. On this journey we’re on, this journey we make in the grace of our Savior, can you relate to my confession? Is your “peace” in how good you feel your life is going right now? Or is it in Jehovah Shalom, the God of Peace?

Just this past year, I was introduced to a new Christian musician who has ministered to my spirit so much. Many of Shannon Wexelberg’s songs speak of worship and surrender and touch me deeply. Meditating on the Word of God for me often comes attached to music; me and King David. Our spirits commune with the Lord through His gift of music. Music is the vehicle that opens up our hardened hearts, brings us to a place where we willingly let down our guard and then delivers us with a contrite spirit right into the presence of God, where He can start whittling away at our character and our self-sufficiency and self-righteousness.


This morning, I was listening to Shannon Wexelberg’s album, “I Have a Song” when one of her songs began (“Jehovah Shalom”) and I found myself in honest reflection, “Is God my Jehovah Shalom?” I know I want Him to be! I know it takes a confidence that flows out of the very heart of God Himself, from His Spirit, but also a surrender of my own weak spirit to His Holy Spirit’s control. Scripture tells us that His Spirit helps us in our weaknesses and He also promises that if we ask anything according to His will, He will do it. Sometimes we don’t know for sure what the will of God is (so we can have the confidence to pray expectantly to receive what we ask for), but I do know this: it IS the will of God that I make my God my Jehovah Shalom and I’m longing to make Him my Jehovah Shalom. My prayer is from the words of this song, “Jehovah Shalom.”

Jehovah Shalom (by Shannon Wexelberg) (watch a lyric video on YouTube)

“Jehovah Shalom, Jehovah Shalom, You are my peace. You are my peace! In the darkness, Your presence wraps around me like a blanket of rest that covers me. When my heart is overwhelmed, You’re my comfort and my help. You are with me…. When the pain of my yesterday is before me, and the fear of the future floods my soul, You are singing over me deliverance and healing. You’ll never let me go. Jehovah Shalom, Jehovah Shalom, You are my peace. You are my peace. Your spirit soothes me, fills and renews me. I am completely in need of You! Jehovah Shalom, Jehovah Shalom, You are my peace. Yes, You are my peace. Jehovah Shalom, Jehovah Shalom, oh You are, You are my peace!”

I say, Selah! And I echo the psalmist’s prayer, “Lord, let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.”  Psalm 19:14

 Judges 6:24 “And Gideon built an altar to the Lord there and named it Yahweh-Shalom (which means “The Lord is Peace”).”

You can find Shannon Wexelberg’s music on both Amazon and iTunes. This song is on her “I Have a Song” cd (Amazon link or ITunes link). Another of my favorites is her “Take Heart” cd (Amazon link or iTunes link).

The Sacrifice of Listening

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comforting-hands

I’ve recently been reminded of how hard it is to witness someone’s pain, hardships, trials, sufferings. It’s hard being a member of their inner circle of friends and family who are aware of the suffering and not know how to handle it.

What do we say? What don’t we say? Should we share a Bible verse to encourage them? Should we send them a link to a web page? What gift can we give to make them feel better? Should we help them analyze their situation so they might have a better perspective (well, more often than not, we believe they should share OURS). I think you get the idea…

And what if their pain results in our pain? What if their fears only spread fear on to us? What if their unknown future becomes our unknown future? If we enter into their pain, it is likely going to weigh on us, mentally, emotionally, physically. There’s no easy way to sugarcoat it: sometimes loving someone becomes just plain difficult. Just reading 1 Corinthians 13 makes it obvious how far short we all fall to loving like Jesus loves or wants us to love.

The topic I want to briefly discuss is listening. Listening to the hurts, the sadness, the laments of people going through trials is tough. It’s so hard to emotionally invest in someone else’s pain by listening, by simply being present. Presence with them, listening to their laments, is a labor of love. It is a  great sacrifice of love.

But one of our worst tendencies is to think that it is our right or maybe our duty (tough love), to help them through it or over it. We tend to think they need our insight or our answers or our analysis, for their own good.

But consider Job’s friends: After Job started complaining to them about his suffering, Job’s friends basically said, “ENOUGH! Stop talking! I can’t keep listening to this! You are making me angry. In fact, your laments just make God angry.” However, interestingly enough, in the end, it was God who reprimanded these same friends for their lack of compassion and their judgmental attitudes.

Job’s friends basically said, “ENOUGH!
Stop talking! I can’t keep listening to this!”

Scripture tells us how the conversation went:

“Then Eliphaz the Temanite replied to Job:
2 “Will you be patient and let me say a word?
For who could keep from speaking out?
3 “In the past you have encouraged many people;
you have strengthened those who were weak.
4 Your words have supported those who were falling;
you encouraged those with shaky knees.
5 But now when trouble strikes, you lose heart.
You are terrified when it touches you.
6 Doesn’t your reverence for God give you confidence?
Doesn’t your life of integrity give you hope?” (Eliphaz- Job 4:1-6)

“Then Zophar the Naamathite replied to Job:
“2 Shouldn’t someone answer this torrent of words?
 Is a person proved innocent just by a lot of talking?
3 Should I remain silent while you babble on? 
When you mock God, shouldn’t someone make you ashamed?” (Zophar- Job 11:1-3)

My friend, Steve Siler, wrote a beautiful song about listening many years back. Mr. Siler knew this VERY important principle when he wrote this piece. If you visit this link, you can listen to it, too. (Scroll down the page and click on the preview link.) I pray that you will let it touch your heart. Let it sink down and marinate in your soul.

There are people out there who just want to be loved. Sometimes, they need space. Let them have it. Sometimes they will ask you for advise and counsel, but be careful… are they really asking or are they doing self-reflection and trying to sort things out on their own? Whatever the scenario, it takes real godly wisdom, spiritual discernment and restraint to know when to just sit quietly beside them when they turn to us and begin to speak. More often than not, what they really need is for us to just LISTEN and be present with them.

One of my favorite lines from the song is, “Sometimes, the greatest gift of all is presence in the front row of the sacred concert where you played the music of your soul.”

When people give you an audience in the sacred concert of their souls, practice presence instead of speaking. Hear them instead of sharing. Listen instead of breaking your uncomfortable silence. Your friends will thank you.

“Listening” (Steve Siler, MusicForTheSoul.org)

“You came to me. Said you needed someone to talk to.
Had a secret that was tearing you apart.
Couldn’t look me in the eye.
Wasn’t easy for you to speak it
And share these pieces of your broken heart.
Before I knew it, I heard myself talking…
Making your story about ME.

I wasn’t listening. I wasn’t hearing you.
Too caught up in myself to put you first.
I wasn’t listening. I wasn’t with you in the moment.
You didn’t need my vain and empty words.
Silence and a shoulder, that was what was missing.
Forgive me, I wasn’t listening. 

I spoke too soon, so uncomfortable with questions.
Couldn’t stand to let your pain speak unopposed.
When you needed a nod of reassurance,
When ‘nothing’ would have been the thing to say.

I wasn’t listening. I wasn’t hearing you.
Giving you the same old answers I’ve rehearsed.
I wasn’t listening. I wasn’t with you in the moment.
Oh, you didn’t need my vain and empty words.

Sometimes, the greatest gift of all … is presence.
In the front row of the sacred concert
Where you played the music of your soul.
I wasn’t listening. I wasn’t hearing you.
I didn’t give you the attention you deserved.
I wasn’t listening. I wasn’t with you in the moment.
You didn’t need my vain and empty words.
Silence and a shoulder, that was what was missing.
Forgive me, I wasn’t listening.
Forgive me, I wasn’t listening.”

Things I’m Learning from Facebook | by Sandi Patty

~ justlearningtolean ~ Leave a comment

The following blog by Sandi Patty was written so well and touches upon a principle that I am VERY, VERY passionate about that I felt I would just re-blog it today. However, at the end I do want to share Jason Gray’s song: “Holding The Key.” Have you ever considered that YOU may be holding the key to someone feeling loved, feeling cared about, feeling encouraged, feeling lifted up in prayer, feeling grace applied to them, feeling unashamed, feeling like they belong, feeling the arms of God Himself around them, feeling set free? 

SP_Facebook_Blog

“Last week, we posted a very simple question on Facebook: “How can we pray for you today?” I have to say that I truly wasn’t expecting the response and I have spent the last several days trying to find words for my heart that has been deeply moved. I have read each and every one and have been praying over each person as I read.

I have been moved by many things —

– the level of honesty.

– the tremendous needs in our brothers and sisters.

– there is a level of authenticity that exists on Facebook.

– there is a freedom to speak deep personal truth.

– there is a need for each of us to share our hurts.

– it is a clear reminder that we are not alone in our pain.

And it makes me pause to be puzzled at this thought… Why do we seem to feel more freedom to be open, raw and honest on Facebook, than we feel the freedom to be vulnerable in our church?  

It seems to me that one of the very things we desperately need in our church community is a space of grace to be real. It’s very hard to be real. I honestly spent the first many years of my life trying to pretend I had it all together — that I was perfect… my life was perfect. But truly, I was just hiding behind that mask of pretense. And then I fell… HARD! And made choices that people quickly surmised — “She is FAR from perfect.”

But can I tell you, since that day, when I said, “I don’t care what people find out about me, I don’t care to whom I share the truth of my wounded-ness and wrong choices, I don’t care if it costs me my career… the ONLY thing that matters, is to be right and clean before the Lord. So I will be bold and I will be honest, truthful and confess…” When I got to that place in my life to FULLY surrender, THAT is when true freedom began to plant its seed in my heart.

I felt that same sense of freedom on Facebook, as I read through message after message of gut level authenticity. I have come to believe this with my whole heart: Where there is truth (and often that truth is about ourselves and so hard to bear), there is freedom. Jesus says “The truth will set you free” (John 8:31-32). That truth is God’s Word, but that truth is also about the honesty of our heart. Where there is truth, there is freedom, and where there is freedom, there is GOD, right smack dab in the middle! Because He is TRUTH and FREEDOM!

So, here is what I’m learning from FACEBOOK ––

  1. We so desperately need community –– people to come along side and walk with us; people to whom we can simply say, “Here is where I am today; I just wanted someone to know.”
  2. Oh, how I pray that our churches will not only have a sanctuary but that churches can be a sanctuary! A safe place to cry out, “No I’m not okay! I just need someone to know!”
  3. We are not alone. While our hurts and wounds are unique to us, there are others who share similar pain. So often, it just helps me to know I am not alone.
  4. WE NEED EACH OTHER. It’s that simple.
  5. Keep sharing your story. In the pages of my own story, there are chapters I’d like to rip out. But I find that it is within those very pages, I have seen God most at work.

Lastly, I want to share one of the sweetest verses I have found in the past few weeks.

Romans 15:13 (ESV):
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.

Be encouraged my friends — there is a hope that awaits us.  Be encouraged, today!

– Sandi via Things I’m Learning from Facebook | Sandi Patty.

 Now, listen prayerfully to Jason’s Gray words.

“Holding the Key”  by Jason Gray

My Psalm of Lament … Or My song of Surrender

~ justlearningtolean ~ 1 Comment

Doesn’t it just figure? A little more than two months ago, I felt led to start a blog to write down what God was teaching me, the insights that I was receiving especially during my morning walks when my mind was clear and the blood was vigorously pumping through my brain. Since I am now aging at a seemingly very high rate of speed, my mind is often foggy. Walking, for me, is like a whole new world opens up to me… Remember the movie, “Limitless”? When the main character is given a new test drug, he can instantly see and wisely act upon situations which come up in life with so much clarity and insight, learning at incredible speeds, understanding depths of what he never could have possibly fathomed before. It changed his life as long as he kept taking the drug.

However, since the week AFTER I published my first two-part blog, the ability to get out and walk was ripped away. In fact, my ability to get out of the house and get off the couch was ripped away. So, as I stare at that “write a new blog” icon on my desktop every morning from my ‘prison’ on this couch, I am so frustrated that I am soooo lost for ANYTHING to say. My world has been turned upside down and what little tiny victories I may have begun to experience in a 12 year season of incredible emotional and often physical torment, my mind, my will, my emotions are slogging through mire and muck that has left me devoid of knowing what the heck God is trying to teach me during this season in which the physical pain and emotional discouragement have been ramped up ten-fold.

So, I’m not here to share anything profound today. I’m simply here to say, “I’m feeling lost.” What little speck of the peace of God that He had graciously given me (well, let’s say what he allowed me to accept and surrender to as I began to see God’s hand in things) has now been taken away, too. Trial upon trial, sadness upon sadness, ongoing helplessness, but instead of allowing it to ease up, God has sovereignly added all the more. And I just don’t understand it. So, I’m still here but I’m not sure what I can say right now. I’m waiting to see a glimmer of insight that God might be willing to shed on my situation so that I know in what context I should seek to find out what God wants to teach me and show me about Himself. And, to be truthful, I guess I’m a little afraid that if I blog out any answers, insights or little victories, the next day will prove how naive I was and how weak I really am.

But today as I have finished reading through the book of Psalms (this past month), I’m reminded of the quote that while you are in the hallway of God’s will for you (waiting for doors to open and close), “praise Him in the hallway”. That one I get. One does not have to read the psalms for more than a few minutes to find the psalmists’ cries for help in the midst of dire circumstances and yet they finalize their psalm with “God is still good. God is still faithful. God knows us and loves us. Therefore, I will still sing to Him and still praise Him.” They don’t put stipulations on that praise; they just choose to praise Him regardless! Period! I’ve tried to exercise that power of choice during this period.

Because of the last twelve years of God’s classroom for me, I have wrestled through similar times of trying to figure out what God wants me to learn. I have learned and now even counsel others, “what good could possibly come from fighting with the Lord, from resisting Him, from becoming angry with Him, from trying to retake back your former life which He has taken away?” We, my friends, are NOT in control down here on earth, no matter what you may otherwise convince yourself of. “Resistance is futile.”

So what have I counseled in the past, then? Fall back into the torrential river of God’s sovereign will for you. Stop floundering and grasping for every twig and log and life-preserver and any other potential lifesaving object that you think you could save YOURSELF with. If God has willed it, you will never escape it if He has divinely determined that it will happen this way. Oh sure, you may feel like you are accomplishing something, that you are “doing your part,” that you are doing spiritual warfare even and taking the bull by the horns and shouting cursings at Satan for attacking your life. But I ask you, as in the case of Job, if Satan is restricted by God Himself, then to whom are you really shouting cursings? What I am really struggling to discern is, at what point does that human/divine cooperation become a fist in the face of a loving, sovereign God who has purposely pushed you so far over the bank of that mighty rushing river that you could not possibly stand or even rescue yourself?

The only thing I have learned in the last 12 years is to choose to surrender to God’s hand. That is something I am struggling to do right now though because I’m not sure what it is I am surrendering to this time. 😦 Frankly, as I have become accustomed to practicing this in one arena of my life (after many years of resisting-at times kicking and screaming), this particular situation has left me bewildered, not really knowing what surrender looks like in this situation.

My challenge to others has become: Do the trust exercise so many group team-building programs do: back up to the Lord Who stands behind, before, beside, above and below you, and fall backwards in an act of trust and surrender. He WILL CATCH YOU, one way or another! What that looks like is not for you to know. Surrender to the rushing torrential river! He is God! If He carries you downstream and leaves you terribly bruised and scarred, He is God. It is His right. If He snatches you right out of danger, He is all-powerful God. It is His right. If He puts you in the safety of a raft and let’s you ride it out down the frightening river but safe from all harm, it is His prerogative. He is God.

But to stand on the banks and argue and wrestle with God?!?!?! That, my friends, is foolishness. I believe the greatest act of worship is SURRENDER to Almighty God! Win, lose or fail? It’s not under our control, but in the hands of the One who holds us in His hands. Yep, we may be the one who has to suffer the repercussions of surrender but no less than the one who chooses to not surrender. So, why fight and argue with Him? It is arrogant and self-reliant. It is useless.

So, where does that leave me today as I continue to suffer with a medical condition that leaves me anxious, fearful, not knowing what the cost will be this time…? I don’t know! 😦 Do I pray more? Do I plead for His mercy? Do I ask in faith for His healing? For twelve years I have sought the Lord to remove from me my “thorn in the flesh” (the pre-existing one) and He has chosen to NOT remove it (I’ve stopped asking knowing that God knows my heart for healing but my spirit tells me to choose to echo, “My grace is sufficient for you.”) It has taken a long time to accept this thorn and weave it into my daily life allowing it to be turned around for the glory of the Lord. Do I dare ask Him to take this one away? Is my lesson, to always accept the Lord’s thorns in the flesh? Is my lesson, this time, to ask Him in faith for healing as He really does want to heal me this time? Is this lesson, it isn’t about me, it is about God’s glory? Is this lesson, it really is about God’s glory and He wants to heal Me but wants me to ask Him to? Is it about joining my Christian brothers and sisters together around me to exercise theirs and my faith in our Healing God, woven into the body of Christ, submitting myself to their intercession on my behalf because that is the way God designed the church to work? Is this a lesson about patience and waiting in the dark? Is it about “being still” when humanly I want to struggle free?

I don’t know the purpose of this trial right now. And each morning and all through the day, I anxiously try to discern and submit to the hand of God, yet also asking for wisdom to wisely decide which decisions and paths to choose. Talk about win, lose or draw… My emotions wildly throw me into a tornado of thoughts and choices and outcomes all day long. At any given moment, I may be at peace or in panic? I may be decisive or feel lost in choices that I am completely unqualified to make. I may be surrendered or I may be clawing for the shore. I may trust that God is the Greatest Physician or I may be fearful of all the physicians out there “practicing medicine and screwing up people’s lives and bodies.” I may be asking for God to take away excruciating pain or simply be asking the Lord to comfort me in all my afflictions.

Do you see why I feel like I have nothing to say? I feel lost!!! I want to do what God wants me to do! I want to trust that no matter what happens to me God will have accomplished His perfect will! I want to be found faithful in my trials and tribulations! I want the Lord to be able to say, “well done my good and faithful servant, enter into my peace.” I want to be faithful in bringing my requests before Him with thanksgiving and leaving them at the foot of the Master, no matter the outcome. Yet, I’m a poor example of that when I can’t stay in one frame of mind for more than 15 minutes sometimes. I confess, I’m just lost right now.

There! That is my blog entry! A big honest mess of questions and inner struggles. May the God of all comfort and peace grant me the courage and perseverance to stay the course and wait on Him to deliver or not. I challenge myself today, “Be still and wait in on the Lord.”

I’ll Play My Drum For Him… (Part Two)

~ justlearningtolean ~ Leave a comment
image

Have you ever had to give a loved one LESS than you would have liked to have given?

At Christmas, while others are giving name brand name clothes, high-end electronics, expensive toys, etc., you are giving out dish towels and hand made jars of hot coca mix or cake mixes? Although you had to make your choice of gifts because of your lack of means, it likely left you a bit embarrassed and ashamed. It wasn’t any FAULT of your own, but you FELT feelings of shame. Granted, I have met ‘cheapskates’, that regardless of means, we just know they chose to spend as little as humanly possible on others as it is just their nature. I know that sounds judgmental but I think we all know those people who are just plain ‘stingy’. I guess that is why we hate to give small, insignificant gifts… because of how we will be perceived by those around us, particularly by the recipient of our gifts.

As a side note but actually quite relevant to this discussion, ‘shame’ is a powerful emotion. One doesn’t even have to be guilty of anything to FEEL ashamed. Do you know how many poor souls there are in this world who have been ‘shamed’ or told (or experienced) they were insignificant? Guilty vs innocent is a matter of ‘doing wrong or doing right.’ However, what happens when a person has had their character or their actions defined (labeled) as “wrong” or “ugly” or with impure motives – labeled ‘guilty’ – but those accusers have been false and unkind and have had their own skewed motives of advancing themselves at the cost of another’s own view of themselves?

In fact, I’ll go one step further… one who innately has a low opinion of themselves will almost always, if they are being honest, redefine themselves negatively regardless of how the people in their lives try to convince them of their worth. Their own opinion of themselves isn’t based on reality but on their own ‘worse case scenario’ image of their life in their own skewed mind. (Sorry, I got off on a tangent that I am rather passionate about. I told you, I am a VERY passionate person… And I’m not necessarily talking about an ‘affectionate’ person. I’m talking about the other word: ‘passionate.’)

Back to considering my Savior, Jesus! Back to my introspection. “What is MY gift to Jesus?” What about all my gifts of service to Jesus and for Jesus’ sake (both duty and genuine adoration)? Naively as a teenager, when I committed my life to serving Jesus and committed, with my husband-to-be, to go into FULL-TIME ministry, with reckless abandon and no holds barred, I certainly expected my life to have looked differently by now (talk about rose-colored glasses)! I won’t detail what I pictured our lives to look like today, but I’m sure you can imagine some scenarios. Although I obviously didn’t dream that our lives or our gifts of service would appear as lofty as the wise-men with their gifts of “gold, frankincense and myrrh,” I certainly thought that it would feel a bit more significant than the poor drummer boy who had nothing to offer the king but his frail little self and a simple song on the simple little instrument he carried on his person.

But what if God has NEVER been impressed with MY gifts of service? What if MY road of struggling to MAKE Him and KEEP Him happy with MY life (what could possibly be wrong with trying to please HIM, right?)….
was inadvertently more about validating MY life, MY character, MY gifts, MY duty, MY single-hearted, one-way love and adoration of HIM?
***Did you notice how many times I highlighted MY???***

I think that we believers in Jesus Christ have kind of a God-complex about ourselves: we often struggle to EARN and PROVE our worthiness to God, to become more holy (aren’t we commanded to be ‘more holy’?) as if we are attempting to elevate ourselves to this higher dimension of God’s favor, to look around us and compare ourselves to others (“well, I’m definitely more holy than these people beneath me”), and we seriously think that when we get to heaven, God is going to rate us and pat us on the head and say, “wow, I’m so proud of the holiness you achieved.”

To be honest, I have become so consumed with the sovereignty of God in my life. I won’t give away topics of future posts, but my life has had its exhausting share of hardships, health issues, failed dreams, ministries that have failed to take hold and ministries that God, in HIS sovereignty has allowed to be ripped out from under us. It has been an exhausting life trying to balance the weight of all the needs of the people we have been called to be responsible for (marriage, children, family, the people in our church as well as others God put in our path to whom to minister, and the list goes on) and all the things and duties to which God called us (my husband’s full time secular job, the tent-making pastoral ministries that were always “full time” even when many might have considered them “part time,” our home’s maintenance, the projects that had to be done NOW, the responsibilities of being a member of an extended family and contributing to their needs as well, and that list is just the tip of the iceberg). I’m sure every person in the world has their own overwhelming pressures and burdens, maybe more, that weigh heavily on their lives).

Let me get to the point before I lose you all. You see? This is what I firmly believe: God, in His sovereignty gives and takes away. If you have wonderful health, He has given it. If you have poor health, He has given it. If your burden is heavy with responsibilities (IF He has indeed called you to these – but that is a topic for another day), then He has given it. If you have lost your job or are no longer in a past ministry, He has taken it. I DO believe God does discipline for OUR own good SOME-times (but those who believe that this is ALWAYS the reason should listen to that song, “you’re so vain, I bet you think this ‘song’ is about you”)!

However, most of the time, I REALLY believe
He is the divine superintendent of His own glory.

He does things (sometimes things that don’t make sense to us because of our depravity), that have its ultimate culmination in HIS glory. In fact, we may live and die and never know WHY God did or allowed things in our lifetime. But God, being outside of time, has a plan. And God will ultimately use ALL the events that he orchestrates and allows to bring HIM glory!

(And He should, by the way! He has that right! HE IS GOD!)

So, consider your ‘blessings’. Consider your sufferings. Consider your responsibilities. Consider your limitations. Is God not the author and finisher of our faith? Isn’t He the ONE Who gives all our ‘gifts’ to us in the first place? It’s like when we used to give our kids $20 to go into the dollar store so they could buy us Christmas gifts. They bought our gifts with the money we gave them.

The question then is this:
Are you ok with THAT? Are you ok with
how God has sovereignly orchestrated your life?

Are you ok with both the ‘nice’ gifts He has given you and the miseries He has allowed to come upon you (both burdens AND sufferings)? The apostle Paul said it this way:

“And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am (He is) strong.” 2 Cor. 12:9-10

“But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves; we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body…… For all things are for your sakes, so that the grace which is spreading to more and more people may cause the giving of thanks to abound TO THE GLORY OF GOD.” (2 Cor. 4:7-10,15)

“Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am.” (Phil. 4:11)

imagesNow, let’s journey back to the manger…..
(Close your eyes…. are you there?)
Do you see yourself in the image of the lofty wise men with their very impressive, costly gifts? Do you see yourself in the lowly curious shepherds, or in Joseph, or Mary? Or, if you are honest with yourself, do you see yourself more as that fictitious ‘little drummer boy’? You have no impressive gifts to bring your King? All you have is your person, your heart and whatever ‘song’ HE HAS GIVEN YOU RIGHT NOW with which you can RETURN TO HIM as praise?

Now…. I’ll ask you again. Are you satisfied and content with your gift to Jesus, those gifts however large or small He has entrusted to you that you are RIGHT NOW able to bring to your King? I declare, I am!!! And…. even when I forget these important principles and feel like slinking away in shame and defeat at my seeming unworthiness, I CHOOSE to return to this theoretical manger again and humbly remember the divine orchestrator of my life and I affirm again:

“I am content with my humble gift to Him!
Pa-rum-pa-pum-pum!”

I’ll Play My Drum For Him … (Part One)

~ justlearningtolean ~ Leave a comment

719rCnKK9KL._SY355_During this holiday season, reminders of Christmas are all around: lit trees, decorations all around, my little village is up, festive music can often be heard throughout the house and nativity scenes (both large and small) have been placed in prominent places as a constant reminder of the Reason for the season amid all the other ‘noise.’

So, as I am trying to integrate Christmas music and meditation into my day, I have transitioned to adding Christmas music to my morning walk playlists. Personally,  I have found that when I’m walking, whether the fresh air or the exercise or just the lack of other ‘noise,’ my ever more foggy brain clears up and if only for 45 min, I can think deeply, meditate and let the insights just flow. My playlists are diverse from Evie (1970’s pop) to Josh Groban to Bing Crosby to contemporary Christian. But the songs like “Where’s the line to see Jesus?” (Becky Kelley) and “Happy Birthday, Jesus” (Heather Henry) and “Mary’s Prayer” (Bebo Norman) and “Mary, Did You Know?” (Buddy Greene) leave me terribly emotional, weeping emotional.

Now, anyone who knows me knows I am a sentimental crier; the old cotton commercial could make me cry for Pete’s sake. Sappy movies? Don’t even get me started. So, when a worship song touches me deeply, the neighbors driving by might find me absolutely sobbing.

People who know me have described me as a deeply ‘passionate’ person (I’ve never known whether to take that as a compliment or a criticism…. It certainly has been both a blessing and a curse for me), a driven ‘can do’ person (not in recent years, for sure), an empathetic sensitive person, but I hope everyone that has known me well would say that I have always been passionate about holy living and living a life of integrity, no matter what the personal cost, even when the controversy around us has at times been intense.

Yesterday, as I was walking, my mind drifted back to that Bethlehem scene again. I wondered what gift(s) I might have been found giving the baby King Jesus if I had been aware of Who He was, the God of all creation, come down to earth on a mission to live among humanity, then die for the sins of mankind, MY sins. I considered all the ‘gifts’ I have aspired to give HIM during my Christian life; frankly, I wasn’t impressed.

As I look back at my life, from the time I was in high school till now, I have spent so much energy in my life trying to please God, represent Him well, serve Him with my gifts, and challenge others to live their lives single-mindedly for the Master. Now, as admirable as that may sound, these attempts have been met with very mixed results and responses, some positive and some negative. I don’t want to sound all negative and down on myself with a distasteful false humility. That’s not what this is about. I have just been more willing to be transparent and introspective in the last 5-6 years.

So, today I want to focus my attention on my OWN assessment of my ‘gifts’ to God, my trying to please Him, my attempts to live holy and godly in this present world in a manner worthy of the gospel of my Savior. I am faced with verses like, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.” (Titus 2:11-14).

Wow! I come away with my head down with a sense of regret at the disappointment I feel I might be to my Lord; that’s how it feels more and more these days. So many perceived failures, so many misunderstandings, so often have I fallen short of the holiness I strove for, so little to show for all my years on this earth. My life has certainly NOT turned out how I had dreamed it would as a young adult passionate about ministry and service and a living life fully committed to Christ.

Now I want to stop right here and clarify something as I bet many friends and acquaintances will assume that my self-analysis is pretty hyper-critical, exaggerated for attention, a type of self loathing, etc. Facebook is the perfect place for people to throw out a “whoa is me” and wait to get ‘patted on the back’ which is their true intent: to have people who know them (or barely know them) reassure them of their goodness and value. These status updates are really about looking for attention. PLEASE don’t comment about any perceived goodness or value on my behalf!!! While I might appreciate your intent, it will completely miss the point I am trying to make. Scripture is the ONLY lens with which to view oneself and in that I fall miserably short! I hope this clarifies my point.

 “There is none righteous!
There is none that seeks after God.”
Scripture likens our righteousness
to “filthy rags.”
“The heart is deceitful and
desperately wicked…” (Jeremiah).
Ecclesiastes reminds us that “all is vanity.”
The apostle Paul, who had the right
to claim his service was really worth
something great instead said that it was
nothing compared to the glory of God.
(Read Phil. 3 )

Yet, as I look back over my life, I have tried SO HARD to bring gifts of “gold, frankincense and myrrh” with my life (my very BEST! No, let’s be more precise, I’ve wanted to be PERFECT, yep, that’s the word)! In fact, how immature and arrogant for anyone to think that perfection and holiness are attainable in these bodies! So, if I am honest, I haven’t brought much but wood, hay and stubble. How can one who has spent her life so driven, a perfectionist by nature, so sure of how to live this Christian life ‘correctly’ (the worst arrogance imaginable), so impassioned to serve Him with the core of her being, and so ministry-minded get to the latter days in her life and determine that she’s doesn’t have much to show for it????

Truth is, I feel more like the fictional ‘little drummer boy’ than one of the great wise men of the Bible. I guess the questions for today are these: Am I ok with that? Should I be ok with that? More importantly, what does my Savior think of that, the One I have committed my life to loving and serving? Can I (and should I) be content if all I ever bring to my King is a ‘simple song’ after spending my whole life TRYING and STRIVING to make my life a sweet smelling sacrifice of frankincense to give my King?

(Part 2 to come…..)