Epic Failures; Epic Grace

August 13, 2014August 13, 20142 Comments

Mom Failures.

I’ve had them, had some doozies actually.

Anyone else?

There was the year my oldest daughter had been pestering me all week with her chattery excitement about an upcoming birthday party for a friend. The day of the party, I told her it was time to go and double-checked the invitation on the way out the door. That’s when I found out that the party actually ended at 2:00, not began at 2:00. She had missed it completely. We drove anyway just to bring our present and apologize, but everyone was already gone.

I had one tearful extrovert of a 5-year-old that day.

And it was my fault. My own failure that had ruined her super-exciting day.

I apologized a million times and it still didn’t feel like enough. I took her to one of those play places with a million bouncy inflatables and she had the most fun jumping herself into exhaustion, but I still knew the truth—I had failed.

“Bad moments don’t make bad mamas!” That’s what Lysa TerKeurst says.

She’s right, of course. One missed birthday party doesn’t define me, doesn’t stuff me into a box of rejection or label me as a Failure-With-a-Capital-F.

But in that moment, it’s so hard to soak in any grace when your soul is rock-hard with shame.

And when you mess it all up, all those other mistakes come crashing right back down on your head from the places you’ve shelved them. Pretty soon, you’re covered in the trash of remembered failure.

You always….You never…..

We hear the absolute declarations that we simply are not good enough, our own voice of condemnation echoing in our own head and heart.

You always make a mess of things.

You never get it right.

You’re always so stupid, so flaky, so forgetful, so short-tempered….

You’ll never be as good as she is…

God can’t use you.

Chris Tiegreen writes:

We are apt to think that failure disqualifies us from serving God well. To the contrary, sometimes it is the only thing that does qualify us. It removes any pretense of self-reliance. Like a phoenix rising, we ascend from the ashes of our own undoing, testifying to the resurrecting power of God. From failure to forgiveness, weakness to strength, death to life—it’s God’s way. Remember that the next time you despair over your failures (365 Pocket Devotions).

We’re mess-ups, all of us. Somehow, some way, at some time, we’re going to fail.

That’s why we need grace, after all. That’s why we needed a Savior: because on our own, we’ll never be perfect, never good enough, never all right.

But there’s Jesus, not just ready to pour out forgiveness afterward; He prays for us in advance.

Jesus looked right at Simon Peter sitting at the Passover Meal, that Last Supper, and said:

“But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers” (Luke 22:32 NIV).

What grace is this?

Before Peter ever denied Christ, Jesus had been praying for him.

Before Peter’s sin, Jesus already assured him of restoration, promising not just that he would “turn back,” but that Peter could be the one to “strengthen your brothers.”

Jesus promised Peter, “After you’ve failed and you’ve returned to me, I can still use you. More than that, that’s WHEN I can use you.”

Sometimes our own failure makes us most useful to God.

When we receive grace, we learn to give grace.

When we are at our weakest, we learn to rely on His strength and not our own (2 Corinthians 12:9).

Maybe we don’t see the hope right away, not with the mess lying fresh all around us. It’s hard to see beauty in all those ashes. Hard to see grace in the hard and mercy in the difficult.

But the Psalmist wrote:

The Lord helps the fallen
and lifts those bent beneath their loads
(Psalm 145:114 NLT).

Have you tripped up? Have you fallen? Have you crashed headlong into that dark pit?

Do you feel weighed down by the load of shame and guilt and condemnation?

The Lord is there to help you and to hold you up.

Give what’s broken to Him and let Him bring you to something new, something beautiful, and something for your good.

Heather King is a wife, mom, Bible Study teacher, writer and worship leader. Most importantly, she is a Christ follower with a desire to help others apply the Bible to everyday life with all its mess, noise, and busyness. Her book, Ask Me Anything, Lord: Opening Our Hearts to God’s Questions, is available now! To read more devotionals by Heather King, click here.

This is the Word I Have to Write on a Flashcard to Learn

August 8, 2014August 4, 20141 Comment

I’ve said, “No” a lot this summer, not always, but more often than usual for me.

Maybe it’s this rambunctious explorer of a baby boy who is helping me learn this. “No, no,” I say as he reaches for the oven, the lightsocket, the cord, the speck on the carpet. Some days it feels like I’ve said it fifty-billion times by the time my husband comes home and then he joins in the chorus.

All this practice is helping me say “no” in other ways.

“No” to swimming lessons. “No” to three of the week-long day-camps my kids attended and enjoyed last year. “No” to summer dance classes. “No” to governor’s school. “No” to a host of other exciting, wonderful, and fulfilling lessons, camps, clubs, or groups.

I still mumble it when I say it, scared to offend or disappoint. It’s as if this word is unfamiliar, a foreign-sounding syllable that I’ve handwritten on a flashcard so I can practice making it part of my working vocabulary.

And it does take practice.

“Nnnnnnn….oooooooooo”

“N….o….”

Picture by Viktor Hanacek; picjumbo.com

“No.”

There. I said it.

It takes wisdom, too. Sometimes God wants me to say, ‘Yes.’ It’s yes to His plans for me, yes to obedience and loving others.

Sometimes, though, His best for me and my family is ‘no’ because we can’t actually do everything. We can’t even do every good thing.

God only equips us to do what He’s called us to do. Not more or less than that.

The competitive girl in me grits those teeth hard. I listen to the moms around me who did all of this and more. I feel like the only one.

I read the email in my inbox the night after I say “no,” the email that tells me my daughter really should do this….. because she really needs two classes, not just one.

I waver and question and doubt my decision. Maybe I should change my mind?

I worry and fret a bit. What if my girls fall behind? What if they forget over this summer hiatus? What if all their friends make all this progress and what if I’m robbing them of the lessons they need to reach their potential?

But I think of my daughter, this over-achieving, go-getter, organized, competitive, ambitious girl. She had huddled next to me in the middle of last year’s breathless rush and whispered to me right then, “Mom, I want to take the summer off.”

So, we made tough choices. Maybe we didn’t always get it right. Maybe we did. We narrowed things down. We inserted weeks off in between weeks of activity. We’ve left room to enjoy the last days before school starts.

We said, “no” so we could say “yes” to rest, family, breathing room, friends, flexibility, time together, free time, play time, and creative time.

This weekend, I finished up my school supply shopping. Fall nips at my heels even now; I feel it in the restless stirring of my soul and in the way I desperately cling to these final joys of summer because I know they will not last.

Once that school year begins, we’ll still need to say, ‘no’ at times. Yet, school is school; homework and projects aren’t my choice. Church activities are church activities. The job is the job. The schedule is the schedule, and with four young kids and activities of our own, my husband and I simply will be busy.

All this year, I’m pursuing the presence of Christ and this month that means I’m Learning to Say “No” so that I can carry some of that discipline and that wisdom into the school year. It’s balance that I’ll need, knowing what is “yes” and what is “no” when fall begins.

Because what my soul needs is Jesus. What my family needs is Jesus. Not competition or races or achievements or getting ahead.

We. Need. Him.

The Psalmist wrote:

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? (Psalm 42:2 NIV).

I could throw back glass after glass of activity, and of ‘going’ and ‘doing’ to try to quench this desperate thirst, but it’d be like chugging sea water. I’d still thirst for Him, for that Living Water that flows only in His presence.

Sometimes others won’t understand. Some will think I’m too busy. Others will think I’m not busy enough.

Yet, it’s God’s face I’m seeking and it’s His opinion of me that matters. It’s His voice I need to obey; His wisdom I need to seek; His footsteps I need to follow.

Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it” (Isaiah 30:21 NIV).

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Learn to Say, ‘No?’

What My Monday Soul Needs to Know

August 4, 2014August 4, 20141 Comment

My resolution for Monday:

Photo by just2shutter; 123rf.com

To breathe in and breathe out, deep taking in of peace and pushing out of contentment. No catching my breath in anxiety, hyperventilating stress, and rushing to the point of breathless exhaustion.

Just breathe. Move through the day without giving into the push, push, push of “faster, more, do, accomplish, check off the list, get it done.” Walk as I vacuum, walk as I put away the clothes. Make that phone call without simultaneously folding underwear and t-shirts.

And spend time with Jesus for relationship not for task-completion.

The temptation is there, of course. It’s the curse of Monday. All of the spillover from last week, the messages to read through and answer after taking a Sabbath from all of that “connection” over the weekend, and the new tasks ahead clamor at me for attention.

What was that email I needed to send?
Wasn’t there someone I needed to call?
Was I behind on my reading, my commitments?
Didn’t I need to print this for the week and pack that for tonight and fill out that form and mail back that letter?

It’s a million tiny things nipping at the heels of my Jesus-focused life, yipping and yapping until I turn my attention from Him.

And then when I do sit down to rest at His feet, dear Father, oh my Father, I am so thankful to be in Your presence ….

Still I fail. Still I pop up every few minutes for the ding of the laundry and the starting of the meal, and the reminder of something else needing to be done.

My time with Him becomes stilted, becomes stale, becomes necessary without being the fresh oxygen in my soul I need for very survival and beyond that, the abundant life He promises. Necessary only because it’s an assignment, like homework for school.

It’s more like: Read the assigned Bible reading. Check. Read the passage in the study for this week’s group discussion. Check. Complete the other Bible study . . . while interrupted and racing against the clock:

Must…..finish…..so…..I…..can….check….this….off…..my…..list….and……do…..other…..things.

I wonder if He’d prefer if I just skipped it all rather than flop down at this kitchen table half-hearted and thinking about 50 things clearly more important than He is to me in that moment.

This isn’t relationship. This is business.

In his book, Prayer, Richard J. Foster wrote:

“Today the heart of God is an open wound of love. He aches over our distance and preoccupation. He mourns that we do not draw near to him. He grieves that we have forgotten him. He weeps over our obsession with muchness and manyness. He longs for our presence…

We do not need to be shy. He invites us into the living room of his heart, where we can put on old slippers and share freely. he invites us into the kitchen of his friendship, where chatter and batter mix in good fun. He invites us into the dining room of his strength, where we can feast to our heart’s delight….” (p. 1)

Maybe that’s my problem. I’ve been barely acknowledging His presence at times at my kitchen table. Perhaps I should take up His invitation to hang out in His kitchen. To eat in His presence and share in good company and the intimacy of friendship, not on my terms, but at His offering.

At the Last Supper, the apostle John leaned against Jesus, drew in close and rested against the Savior, even while realizing that Jesus was about to be betrayed (John 13:25).

Why be more like Peter, who in shame and frustration, perhaps even anger at the destruction of his plans and agenda, certainly in fear…”followed him (Jesus) at a distance” (Matthew 26:58) after Christ’s arrest.

Sure, I’m always following, I’m a faithful kind of girl, trailing after God always. But sometimes I’m just stepping into the imprint of His footsteps rather than walking by His side, following out of obedience only, mostly out of distracted busyness and duty.

This year, I’m pursuing the presence of Christ. In August, that means I’m learning to say, ‘no.’ I’m saying it today: “No” to the stress of do and do. “No” to hyperventilating heaviness of breathless rush.

Today I resolve to breathe in and breathe out, to linger here at the table with Jesus and lean into His presence. No rushing up from the meal to pursue my own agenda. No skimming through the page of Scripture to get to the end of the assigned reading.

Leaning into Jesus. Breathing in and breathing out. Then walking side by side with Him into my day, not tripping along behind: holding His hand and chatting along the journey.

Originally published October 15, 2012

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Learn When to Say, ‘No?’

How Many Seashells Did I Bring Home from Vacation?

July 30, 2014July 28, 2014Leave a comment

They busied themselves with buckets and shovels, patting sand into castle walls and adding shells and seaweed for decor.

I took this one moment, after my daughters had bounced in the waves and come out with their hair stringy and wet, and now here as they settled on a project. They exchanged ideas. What if we….? How about we….?

They assigned tasks. I’ll build here while you build there….

I left the three executive sand architects and walked there along the ocean, passing by families huddled under beach umbrellas. Even so, I felt the quiet of alone. Something about that ocean, that pounding out of the waves like the steadiness of a heartbeat, so dependable, so regular, so beyond our understanding.

I glanced out over that rolling water and then focused on the wet sand beneath my feet, on the seaweed and the shells carried to shore.

You can’t walk steady on a beach, not without effort. You walk and then pause for treasure. A curved shell, a whole shell, a tiny shell, a colorful shell. I palmed them as I strolled.

Treasure here. Treasure there.

Walk. Pause for shell. Walk. Pause for shell. Walk. Pause for shell.

It took discipline to force my eyes up. Stop looking at the ground. Stop scanning the sand for one more beach memento.

Don’t look so hard for treasure that you miss the grand display of God’s glory right there beside you.

I’m looking for tiny seashells and this ocean keeps hitting that shore with wave after wave. in this vast display of His power, this roaring declaration of praise:

Glory to God! Glory to God! He is great beyond words. He is powerful. He is faithful, steady and certain. He is beyond understanding.

The Psalmist wrote it:

Mightier than the thunder of the great waters,
mightier than the breakers of the sea—
the Lord on high is mighty (Psalm 93:4 NIV).

Maybe I’m a treasure-hunter every day. Head down. Eyes to the ground. I’m looking for the prize, the takeaway, the gift I can grip into my hands and the one that digs into the flesh of my palm.

Maybe that’s me.

Maybe I’m scanning and scanning for blessing and it’s an obsession really, perhaps even an addiction because I can dash off a glance at the ocean of glory beside me but it’s quick and I worry, “What am I missing?” So, I drop my head down again to look for results.

And maybe what I’m missing is seeing Him, seeing His glory, sensing the full weight of His presence and lingering there, not rushing away to do and do, or find and find, or receive and receive.

I had to slip away from the everyday life to discover this obsession of seeking God’s activity instead of His face, seeking His blessing instead of His presence, seeking His gifts instead of simply seeking Him.

Because there’s just something plain-out broken in a girl who would rather look for a tiny seashell covered in sand than looking across the ocean.

And here I am at home, and I’m feeling that pressure to pray for results, pray for answers, for help, deliverance, provision, direction, favor, blessing.

So, I discipline my needy heart.

Hush. Be still. Bring it to Jesus and trust Him.

And this:

Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need (Mathew 6:33 NLT).

So we must seek God’s face and not just His hand. We seek His presence, not just His gifts. We seek who He is, not just what He can do.

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Retreat and Refresh?

The Top 10 Best Things About Hotels (Says the Mom Away From Home)

July 25, 2014July 14, 2014Leave a comment

10. When there’s a problem, someone else has to fix it! No breaking out the tools when something is wrong. One word to a hotel staff member and within five minutes the handyman shows up with his own tool box.

9. How excited your kids get about every little thing: There’s a tiny refrigerator!! And a microwave!!! And a TV!!!! And a couch with a pull psalm39-6 -out bed!!! There’s a closet!!! And a bathroom!!! Everything is more exciting in a hotel room. Add in some luxuries like a hotel swimming pool, electronic key cards, and elevators with buttons to push, and you have kid-paradise.

8. Styrofoam cups with lids: Our hotel has a little hospitality bar in the lobby with packets of tea, hot cocoa, creamer, sugar and more. One night after swimming in the pool, I grabbed some hot chocolate packets as a treat for the girls. The best part? The cups they supplied came with plastic lids. Hot cocoa at home ALWAYS involves huge messes and near-industrial-sized spill clean-up. Why didn’t I think of travel mugs with lids long ago?

7. The Indoor Pool: We don’t the fanciest hotel with the most expensive amenities available; we just need access to an indoor pool. Happiest kids ever.

6. Short-Order Cook Breakfasts: At home, I sometimes feel like I should snap my hair into a bun, tuck a pencil behind my ear, don an apron and take down breakfast orders in a tiny notebook. At the hotel, we had buffet-style breakfasts where everyone found something yummy—well, except for the child who prefers breakfast at home with her favorite cereal every . . . . single . . . . day.

5. Someone else washes all the towels and sheets.

4. Someone else vacuums the floor.

3. Someone else washes the dishes.

2. Someone else scrubs the toilets. Sensing a trend here? I sure did. We’ve tried stay-cations before, but do you know what I still have to do then? That’s right—laundry, dishes, cooking, and general clean up. For a few days in the hotel, I picked up mess but never once pulled out the bleach or loaded a dishwasher or washing machine. Of course, we carried home a trash bag full of laundry that I washed the night we got home, but I had a few days of respite.

1. Being together: Our house is pretty small, so it’s not like we spread out and never see each other when we’re home. Still, there’s something special about experiencing time together without my husband heading off to work, propping up our feet and watching a movie together, making plans for the day, and sharing in a nighttime snack.

School starts up for the year far too soon. So does ballet, play practice, activities at church and more.

When life gets packed so full, it’s so hard to appreciate every little thing—like escalators and the electronic keys in hotels and cocoa cups with spill-proof lids. We lose child-like wonder and excitement about the little things

Almost ten years ago, I held my first baby girl in a hospital room and now, after what seems like a blink of the eyes, I’m about to send her off to fourth grade.

How does it all happen so fast? How do we miss so much?

In her book, A Sudden Glory, Sharon Jaynes says:

“The travesty is that we allow the busyness of life to crowd out the Source of life. As the Psalmist wrote, ‘We are merely moving shadows, and all our busy rushing ends in nothing’ (Psalm 39:6 NLT).”

All this month, I’m learning to Retreat and Refresh so I can pursue the presence of God. And I’m thinking of Moses, who prayed: “Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom” (Psalm 90:12).

We can pray the same.

Lord, help us to number our days. Help us to make each one count. Don’t let a single one slip by us unnoticed and unappreciated.

Don’t let us ever miss or skip time—One, two . . . twenty . . .fifty–and not be able to account for the days in between.

Don’t let us get so wrapped up in doing laundry and dishes that we forget to thank you for the clothes and food you’ve given us.

Help us not to get so focused on the minutiae of everyday worries and stressors that we forget to have joy.

Show us how to slow down each day, rest, pay attention—yes, notice Your grace, Your beauty, and the gifts You’ve placed in our lives.

To sit with our children a moment longer. Linger over a cup of tea. Breathe in the scent of a garden. Notice the beauty. Enjoy deep down the laughter of our children.

Amen.

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Retreat and Refresh?

Originally posted August 31, 2012

Dear Catherine: Why You’ll Get a Stethoscope for your Fifth Birthday

July 23, 2014July 23, 20146 Comments

Dear Catherine,

You’ve been asking me for months for a stethoscope for your birthday. A REAL one. One that allows you to hear your actual heart beating actual beats.

I’m not surprised. You’ve been telling me for two years that you want to be a nurse or a doctor when you grow up.

I know how these things work. Kids might spin through a dozen potential occupations by the time they enter college and then change their major five times as an undergraduate and still go on to graduate school uncertain about their future.

But this is your constant so far. And I see it in you, that remarkable blend of gentle compassion and courage that you’d need to care for others.

So, I bought you that stethoscope and I made sure it was pink, your favorite color.

It’s because I’ll probably call you “Baby Girl” even when you get married and when you cradle your own newborns and even when you watch your children get married and then gaze on your grandchildren.

You will always be “Baby Girl” to this momma of three stair-step daughters.

Yet, here you are five years old. Somehow you’ve grown in a flash and now you’re headed off to kindergarten. You’re always pushing and pushing to grow taller, to learn more, to be bigger, to get older. As distant as it seems now, that future isn’t so far off and, oh, “Baby Girl,” I want to help you become all that God intends for you to be.

Maybe, just maybe, you’ll need that stethoscope.

In a month-and-a-half, I’ll no longer be the one person you spend most of your time with. You’ll be sitting in classrooms, learning from teachers, making friends and standing your ground when kids are mean.

I’ll miss you so.

But you are ready.

You picked out your outer space backpack covered in sparkly stars. You’ve toted that new backpack and the matching lunchbox all around town ever since we bought it.

You’ve cheerfully done what you call “my homework” every day this summer, running through a series of activities you picked out yourself to practice math and reading and then playing a tune on the piano.

You’ve read me those books aloud and we’ve cheered you right on as you learn new words.

More than that, you’ve bounced into offices and classrooms with confidence and excitement. You’re not afraid of school buses, classrooms, or hallways, not the cafeteria or making new friends.

That’s the courage and the bravery in you.

Others may first see your gentleness and sweet spirit. You’re a bucket of joy, just spilling out enthusiasm all over the place. You’re quick to clap your hands and explode into a crazy story about something that made you laugh. You’ll jump and dance and your eyes grow five times their normal size when you’re excited and you wave your hands wildly when you talk to us at the dinner table.

But oh, girl, you’re a powerhouse of strength and resolve, standing up for what is right against kids who are far older and bigger than you and who try to manipulate you or even say they hate you. It’s already begun and you’re already standing ground. Catherineballet

We gave you the name Catherine, a woman of strength and authority. You are that.

Yet, your name means “Pure.” You keep asking me what that means exactly. Pure. That’s hard to define for a five-year-old girl.

I tell you how it’s loving what God loves and hating what God hates. It’s being passionate for what’s right and good and true. It’s running far away from sin and when you do mess up, it’s running right back to Jesus with a heart of true repentance because you want so much to please Him.

You are that, too. Your name is a perfect fit.

You are always thinking about God and you are quick to pray. You have compassion for the hurting and you are a gentle and thoughtful friend. You are fun and you are funny. You are strong and gentle at the same time.

For your fifth birthday, Baby Girl, I pray this for you:

Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God (Matthew 5:8 NIV).

Love,
~mom~

We are Staycation Failures

July 21, 2014July 15, 2014Leave a comment

A few years ago, my husband and I realized we had to take a few days off of work. Both of us. At the same time.

This probably doesn’t sound exciting, but to us this was revolutionary.

We didn’t go away. We didn’t take vacations. We didn’t take time off other than for dental appointments or to have a baby.

But since a vacation away wasn’t in the budget, we decided to try the wonderful trend of stay-cationing.

We know plenty of friends who staycation successfully. They have a fabulous time visiting all the places within an hour of home that no one local ever takes the time to visit.

We, however, had a whopping failure of a week. By Friday, we had both ended up working. We had answered the phone and ended up in ministry meetings. We still went to all the normal activities at church and in the community. We did all the normal chores with all the normal responsibilities and hadn’t even slept in because we had young kids and they don’t know how to do that.

We need to get away, really away. We need to retreat, to shake off the daily and reconnect with each other and with beauty and rest and with the eternal.

Oswald Chambers wrote:

“Whenever anything begins to disintegrate your life with Jesus Christ, turn to Him at once, asking Him to re-establish your rest.”

It’s all of the daily life choices and battles that chip away at our faith. We’re distracted. We’re annoyed. We’re confused. We’re tired.

Jesus said, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). Over time, I feel it, the weariness, the burdens. They accumulate over days and months.

Daily quiet times help. I temporarily rest at His feet and toss the bundles I’m carrying to the side. But, I leap up from the table after time in the Word and it’s back to phone calls and emails, carpooling, activities, planning and laundry.

And the thing about daily life is that it is . . . daily.

Shocking revelation, I know. But it’s not just the motion that tires me over time; it’s the perpetual motion.

It’s rising every morning to empty the dishwasher and reload it . . . . again.
Making beds, packing lunches, toasting bread and pouring milk . . . again.
Tossing clothes into the washer and grabbing towels out of the dryer . . . again.
Cleaning dried-on toothpaste off the bathroom walls . . . again.

Eventually I need more than a temporary refresher. I need to retreat from it all to re-establish rest. In Mark 6:31, it says,

Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”

This month, I’m pursuing the presence of God by learning to Retreat and Refresh, and it’s then I re-align my focus.

The thing about being bogged down in the daily is that our definition of crisis begins to distort.

In the past few months, I’ve lain awake for hours in the middle of the night over minor worries that have turned into a crisis of anxiety.

Patsy Clairmont wrote, “At times, trusting God in the minutiae of life is as difficult as trusting him for a walking-on-water miracle.”

I’m tossing and turning at night because I’ve gripped my hand around each of these issues so tight God can’t pry my fingers off with a crowbar. My knuckles are white.

So I am removing myself from this close-up perspective of my life where the tiniest anomaly blips onto my radar as if it’s the end of the world. I’m putting aside the to-do list that runs my life like a drill sergeant. For this week, I’ll stop staring at my life and lift my head up instead to see Jesus.

In Psalm 3, David wrote, “But you, O Lord, are a shield for me; My glory and the one who lifts up my head.”

Instead of going through life shoulders hunched, head down, eyes staring at circumstances, I’m asking that God lift up my head so I can see His face, see His eyes of love and grace, see the reminder in the palm of His hands that He’s going to do everything imaginable and more to take care of me.

In that same Psalm, David also wrote: “Salvation belongs to the Lord” (verse 8). This “salvation” means “deliverance from the immediate pressure” he was feeling.

One of the meanings of this Hebrew word for salvation is “room to breathe.”

Sometimes the daily grind is suffocating and busyness knocks the wind out of me. I need deliverance from the immediate pressures that monopolize my attention and salvation from the stresses that take my breath away.

I’m leaving so I can find room to breathe.

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Retreat and Refresh?

Announcing a Winner and Redefining Gentleness

July 18, 2014Leave a comment

Last week, I announced that I’d be giving away a copy of Mary Ann Froehlich’s book, Courageous Gentleness, and today I’m announcing the winner! I used a random number generator to chose the winner from the comments you shared and the winner is: Lisa Preuett. Congratulations! I’ll get the book on out to you!

*******************************************************************************************

“Mom, why do turtles have shells?”

My youngest daughter draped herself across the sofa, seemingly inert and bored, but truly thinking about the great mysteries of the world.

“The shell keeps their soft body safe and protected.”

“Oh. Okay, mom.”

So far, so good. Her questions simple, her mind and heart trusting and easily satisfied by easy answers.

My middle daughter was never so quick to accept and move on. A conversation with her could go something like this:

“Mom, why do turtles have shells?”
“To protect their soft bodies from harm.”
“Why are they in danger and need protection?”
“Other animals might try to catch and eat them, or they might be stepped on or run over…“
“Why do some animals like to eat turtles?
“Some animals are herbivores and eat only plants and some are carnivores and eat meat. Turtles are meat.”
“Why do animals eat other animals?”
“Because after the fall in the garden of Eden….”

Falling back on theology or “because God said so” became my frequent defensive position.

This curiosity about the world, I love. This exploring and questioning and wondering “what if” and “how come”–while it occasionally makes me explode and bluster out “because God made it that way” or “because I said”– ultimately I appreciate.

Ultimately I understand.

I’m a questioner, too. I want to know “why” and “how come” and “what about” and “why not?” I want to pester God with question after question like a three-year-old first discovering the world around her.

More than that, more than asking God true and honest questions, I nag and whine and push and nudge.

Oh, and it’s even more than that. I’ve been Jacob up all night wrestling the angel of the Lord. I’ve locked my grip with God’s and fought hard for what I thought constituted a blessing, for a victory, for triumph over circumstances and over the Enemy who’s been battering at the walls of my life.

Yes, I’ve pummeled the chest of Christ with my fists, fighting and demanding, manipulating even, making promises, issuing threats, and crying for mercy, help, deliverance—for rescue.

I’m being honest with Him, I tell myself, and honesty is something God treasures in us. He never asks us to fake it or play happy-faced Christian when life is a mess and this mask we wear becomes increasingly ill-fitting.

God desires truth. Job, Habakkuk, David, Asaph, Elijah, Jonah, Mary and Martha laid their complaints before God, plead their case, and He listened and answered with awe-inspiring mercy.

He didn’t strike them down with lightning. He let them empty out hearts filled with fear, hurt and anger and then He answered, not always in the way they expected or wanted, but still He met them in the place of pain and questioning and carried them on out.

Now, though, I’ve been studying the fruit of the Spirit and found I didn’t really get it before.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23, NIV).

Gentleness is on that list. All those years of sermons and Sunday school lessons and I thought this meant “being nice, not hurting others with our words, kindness and tact.”

The Message translation however, describes gentleness as: “not needing to force our way in life.”

Is this Gentleness?

In Living Beyond Yourself: Exploring the Fruit of the Spirit, Beth Moore defines the root word here “praotes” as “the complete surrender to God’s will and way in your life. The term basically means to stop fighting God” (p. 178).

Gentleness is submission to God, His will and His way, His plan and His timing and all He has determined for us.

It means dropping to our knees and pouring out the honest struggles of our heart, but deciding at last, “Not my will, but yours be done.”

It’s singing with true conviction, “Have Thine own way, Lord,” and “I surrender all.”

No more fighting God.

How then can I still be honest with Him? How can a prize-fighter like me lower the hands and open the fists, cease fighting and nagging and choose instead to trust?

There is my answer in the verse itself, “but the fruit of the Spirit is…” not the fruit of my own discipline or maturity, strength or ability.

This is what the Spirit at work and alive within me does—the impossible, the new, the Christ-like—As I yield and grow in the Spirit, so slowly I trust more, believe more, fall in love with Jesus more and understand how much He loves me more.

And I stop fighting Him.

I drop the knee, I bow the head, I cry the tear, I confess the pain, I trust my God and the Spirit works out Gentleness in me.

How to Take a Spiritual Retreat When You Can’t Get Away

July 16, 2014July 16, 20145 Comments

I’ve always needed to retreat spiritually, to run away for an afternoon or spend a weekend away in quiet.

I’m an introvert and a workaholic. I’ll fill up every available space in my day with to-do list items and then crash from the emotional overload from the noise.

I must get away in order to be healthy: spiritually, emotionally, physically. My sanity and spiritual well-being pretty much depend on my escaping periodically to drink deep of quiet and solitude.

That was true before I had kids.

Now I have four little people who don’t fully understand the sacredness of “Mommy Time Out” at the kitchen table with my tea and my Bible.

When I sit down, alarms go off all over my house that only children can hear. It’s a secret alert system that lets them know, “Mom is about to sit down. Quick, find something to ask her for!!”

Just when I need to retreat the most in life is when it’s hardest to get away.

My husband sweetly holds down the fort so I can go for a walk. But I sneak in the door sheepishly and guiltily after an hour because he has paced the house with the fussy baby and played referee in a sibling squabble. After just one hour without mom, my house has turned into a wrestling arena.

When I was in college, I read a book that still sits dog-eared, highlighted, underlined, and Post-it note-covered on my shelf called Quiet Places: A Woman’s Guide to Personal Retreat by Jane Rubeitta.

This month, I’m learning to Retreat and Refresh in order to pursue the presence of God, so I’ve pulled my worn copy of her book down off its treasured place on my bookshelf and am reading it through slow again. songofsolomon2, photo from PicJumbo.com

But this time I’m reading her book as a mom with 4 kids, not a single college girl who could “retreat” simply by trekking from the campus parking lot to my first class of the day.

How exactly do you take a retreat when you can barely slip away for 60 minutes after dinner?

Let’s be honest. There’s no easy answer here. I’m not going to pretend and push a heavy burden of “you must get away even when it’s hard” down on your shoulders.

Some of you are single moms or homeschooling moms and I feel so whiny complaining about how hard it is for me when I think of what it costs you to retreat for a few short minutes.

Yet, time away with God is what we crave, what our souls need so that we don’t suffocate and die from spiritual dehydration.

The truth is some of these ideas will work for you and some won’t. Some you can fit in when school is in session if you don’t home-school. Some of them require effort and help from a spouse or a friend.

Here are some ways to take a spiritual retreat without breaking the bank or staying away overnight:

Spend some time in your garden.
Take a walk alone.
Exercise without watching TV.
Take an afternoon field trip: Visit the library, a museum, botanical garden, the beach, or a bookstore for an afternoon, but go by yourself. Sit and read. Walk a little. Journal some, read some, rest a lot.
Slow down with some fast food: Meet up with God for a date, just the two of you. Treat yourself to an ice cream sundae or a cup of coffee. Sit in the corner booth by yourself with your Bible. The only words you say to another human that day might be, “I’ll have one scoop of chocolate, please.”
Take a bubble bath—just be sure to lock the bathroom door so little ones can’t continue to pester you long after they are supposed to be in bed
Early morning cuppa: I’m not one to wake early before my kids. I’m a young mom and sometimes snagging a few more minutes of sleep in the morning is the most spiritual, holy thing I can do. But every so often, an early rise for a quiet time on your back deck before the little ones emerge from their beds is worth it.
Mommy time out: When you simply cannot get away, a Mommy Time Out is worth a try. Set the timer in the kitchen and announce that mommy is unavailable for 15 minutes unless there’s an emergency. This takes training! Everything seems like an emergency to a four-year-old. Keep on trying, redirecting and training until your children understand the sacredness of the Mommy Time Out and then treat them to a game of Candy Land or a special snack when they’ve given you the time you need.

How do you “retreat and refresh?” Do you have any ideas for how to take a spiritual retreat without going away overnight?

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Retreat and Refresh?

Would you like some pizza with that doctrine?

July 14, 2014July 14, 2014Leave a comment

She’s a four-year-old chowing down on pizza and breadsticks and prodding us with deep theological questions in between bites.

Where does God live? She drops it casually into family chatter just like “What are we doing tomorrow?” or “Can I have some more lemonade, please?”

Then she returns to the task at hand: Munch, munch, munch.

I nudge my husband’s elbow. Pass. Your turn.

So, he walks her through theology and doctrine right there as she slurps through her straw. God is omnipresent, everywhere and always there.

I mean what country does He live in? Munch, munch, munch.

He doesn’t live in a country, but there is one special place where he is present and that is Heaven.

And His angels?

Yes, and the angels.

I think He has 61 angels.

He has lots of angels. Lots and lots.

Like 61?

Well…..

But she’s distracted now and that moment when you feel like your child’s faith is that moldable clay in your parental hands has passed. She heard it—God is everywhere. He is always with you.

Christian parenting 101 pop quiz over.

She may think He has only 61 angels, but one lesson at a time.

I’ve been spending all year pursuing God’s presence right here in this minivan life, so her question lingers, bouncing around in my head and heart.

Where does God live?

Right here. Always with me. Here in this place and that. Here in the stress and the rush. Here in the quiet corner I’ve sneaked into to hide away from the noise.

I can nod my head right along with the lesson I know so well, and yet still I choose to pursue more.

It might even seem like a fruitless endeavor. Why pursue God’s presence when His presence is here, always here? He will never leave you nor forsake you. He will not abandon you.

I know how it goes.

I’ve felt the difference, though, between knowing God is with you while you fill that dishwasher up with bowls from breakfast and when you’re passing back the snacks in the minivan while zipping from school to ballet class and then to church.

And that moment when you don’t want to move because God’s presence is so heavy in this place, you feel the Holy Spirit’s fingers leaving deep impressions on your spirit, and you simply not walk away from this very second the same as you were just the second before.

Israel saw the difference. God was with them as they pounded out those bricks in Egypt. Four-hundred years of slavery and He never abandoned them. He was there all the time.

Yet, they headed out of that bondage and into the desert, stopping at that holy mountain where God’s presence came down in power.

On the morning of the third day there were thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast, so that all the people in the camp trembled. Then Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God, and they took their stand at the foot of the mountain. Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke because the Lord had descended on it in fire. The smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain trembled greatly. And as the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him in thunder. The Lord came down on Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain. And the Lord called Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up.

God came down to that mountain.

And Moses went up.

Chris Tiegreen says it this way:

This is a graphic picture of the distinction between God’s general Presence and His manifest Presence…..there are times when He is more present, when He manifests Himself uniquely, when He becomes more obvious that nature’s designs or a whispering voice. Sometimes God shows up.

All this month, I’m pursuing God’s presence by Retreating and Refreshing. Because sometimes we have to escape the everyday rhythms of life in order to breathe in and out the presence of God.

After all, Moses had to go up on that mountain.

I need to go, as well.

So, we pray:

God, come down to us, we pray. Bring the full weight of Your glory here so we can see you.

And then sometimes we need to shake off the daily grind, walk away from the ordinary, and go up on that mountain ourselves.

To read more about this 12-month journey of pursuing the presence of Christ, you can follow the links below! Won’t you join me this month as I ‘Retreat and Refresh?

Heather C. King – Room to Breathe

"He's solid rock under my feet, breathing room for my soul" Psalm 62:1-2 (MSG).

Tag: devotions for moms

Epic Failures; Epic Grace

This is the Word I Have to Write on a Flashcard to Learn

What My Monday Soul Needs to Know

How Many Seashells Did I Bring Home from Vacation?

The Top 10 Best Things About Hotels (Says the Mom Away From Home)

Dear Catherine: Why You’ll Get a Stethoscope for your Fifth Birthday

We are Staycation Failures

Announcing a Winner and Redefining Gentleness

How to Take a Spiritual Retreat When You Can’t Get Away

Would you like some pizza with that doctrine?

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today:

My devotional for today: