Faith and Love

I think I --like so many others-- have had a wrong view of pain and God's love.

"Now I know faith is not a fire, as much as it is a glow,

 A quite lovely burning underneath the snow.

And it's not too much-it's just enough to get me home.

'Cause love moves slow."

 -Audrey Assad lyrics to "Slow"

For me, it is hard to see pain and suffering in others lives.  It is also hard to understand why I have to experience hurt.  If we have excepted Christ in our lives and God really does exist then why do we have to see evil and experience hurt. Doesn't God love us? Doesn't He know how this is hurting His children?

As a matter of fact, He does.  A perfect and holy God made Himself human (Jesus), so that He could experience pain. He didn't have to do that, but He wanted to show His great love by joining us in the suffering.  He experienced suffering and pain because of His love for us.

So my heart breaks at the pain I see around me and as my heart breaks, I am learning the amount of faith I am going to need to make it through this life. Evil lives on earth.  As long as it exists on earth, there will be suffering.  God has chosen me, a weak servant, to step into the pain and suffering and be a light.  As I do this, He will draw me closer to Himself.  Pain and suffering force to me to have faith that there is something better, there has to be a reason for it.  If there is not a reason for it, then hopelessness will flood my heart.  I will be consumed by despair.  

Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. 

Hebrews 11:1

In the face of pain and suffering I will choose to seek a deeper understanding of God's love.  I will choose to believe that as I experience heart break and wait for healing, Jesus is right beside me. Jesus can relate to my waiting. Jesus is waiting for the day when I get to come home to Heaven and see Him face to face.  He is preparing me for that day through the trials, because through every trial I learn a greater depth to His love.  A little bit of a Heaven on earth when trials are overcome. He is cleansing me for the day when I will be found perfect in His sight.

For that day, I wait.  I have faith, full confidence, in the fact that the day will come when I will see God face to face. For that day, I wait in eager expectation, knowing that every trial faced on earth will have been worth it.  If I seek Him in faith, I will slowly learn the depth of His love.

Un-wanted

Please please read this...it's so heartbreakingly good!!

Adorned

"Now I am Yours and You are mine
And nothing now can break the bonds of love
We are joined together now"

I am at the beginning of a new season. I love new seasons because I get take all the past lessons I have learned and apply them to the new challenges that God brings my way.  This semester I will be doing an internship at a family counseling center.  Honestly, I was really nervous about this because I knew I would see children and families who are struggling.  If you know me, you know I have a very compassionate heart (aka...I cry a lot when I see hurting people).  I kept asking God if I was really able to handle seeing all that I will see. I doubted my own ability to handle having my heart broken everyday by the situations I see.

To my questioning God gently responded that I am His and He is mine. (see quoted lyric above ;)) This means that in everything I see, He will be right next to me holding me. 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 He will never allow me to see more than I handle.  God even challenged me to look for Him in every situation.  I think this will cause me to have a completely different outlook on situations that look harsh from my normal point of view, and to see things from God's perspective.

This new perspective that I will hopefully gain will be beneficial in whatever God has for me in the future.  For the direction in which my life is headed, it seems that seeing hurting people will likely be part of it (and I secretly really hope it does).  And again, at realizing this my first response is to fear.  And yet again, God gently challenges me.  Because my life is Jesus' now, I am to be His hand and feet.  Well, Jesus loved the hurting, embraced them, and administered healing.  If I chose not to go where Jesus is calling me, then my relationship with Him will suffer. I won't be able to see Him and learn about Him the way He desires for me to.  So, this is me stepping forward into brokenness looking for Jesus, dying to myself, and allowing Him to make my ugly heart something beautiful.  It will not be an easy road , but I know that as I walk, I will fall even more in love with Him as I learn more about His love for sinners, of which I am the worst (1 Tim. 1:15).

“I, the LORD, have called you in righteousness;
   I will take hold of your hand.
 I will keep you and will make you
   to be a covenant for the people
   and a light for the Gentiles,
   to open eyes that are blind,
   to free captives from prison
   and to release from the dungeon 

   those who sit in darkness. 

       Isaiah 42:6-7

'What I Want You To Know'

I read this on another blog and wanted to share.  I just copy and pasted it below, but here is the link too! http://www.rageagainsttheminivan.com/2011/12/what-i-want-you-to-know-how-church.html

"What I want you to know is that the way the church views sexual abuse and teaches (or lack thereof) its congregation about how to handle sexual abuse is often misguided and misconstrued. I want you to know that our lack of understanding as Christians fills me with an unholy rage. Childhoods are being ripped away.

Every 2 minutes (in the United States alone) someone is sexually assaulted.  I have visited well over 15 churches throughout the course of my lifetime. Of all my visits, only 2 churches have discussed the ramifications of sexual abuse and how we, as Christians, should react. Unfortunately, I know more women who have been sexually abused than I can count on one hand. Does anyone else sense just how devastating that is? Of all the women I know who were sexually abused, all but one experienced the sexual abuse during childhood. Two of them had perpetrators were well-revered members of their church communities. Two of these brave women told me that the abuse they suffered is the reason they don't believe in God. After all, what kind of a loving Creator would allow such atrocities to happen to such innocence?"

"The most angering experience I had in a church was when I visited one in Chicago while an undergrad. One of the first sermons I attended discussed sexual abuse. At first it was pretty on-par with what I believe. By the conclusion, he entirely lost me: "Both the sexual abuser and the abused need to ask for God's forgiveness for their sins. The victim's body is a temple and by being abused they have desecrated their temple. Therefore they need to seek God's forgiveness for the sins against their body." I think I was in shock. I didn't know how to process it. It tore my heart in two."

"If I could go back, the things I would say to this man. Is the body a temple? Yes. Do you honestly believe God would expect a victim of sexual abuse to ask for forgiveness for "their role in the act"? No way. I can assure you that no sexual abuse victim was a willing participant. That's why it's called abuse. This pastor was so ignorant of the ramifications of abuse. I will forever regret not speaking out because I truly believe his words were not God's. I've witnessed the heartbreak. I've cried with the victims. The pain is insurmountable. Sexual abuse is devastating."

"So, as a church, what can we do? We need to discuss it. Silence just reaffirms the victim's mentality that it was somehow their fault when it so clearly wasn't. We need to develop a deeper understanding of it so that when we do discuss it we do not speak damaging, unholy words. We need to provide sexual abuse victims resources to cope with their trauma. But most importantly, we need to love the victims and support them unconditionally: we need to show them Christ's love. It's not our job to make anyone believe in God. However, I truly believe that if we personify Christ's love that so many more will want to seek Him out. I also believe that true and total healing can only be found in Christ. And sexual abuse victims need total healing more than just about anyone I've ever met."

"One Thousand Gifts"

I have been reading this book called "One Thousand Gifts" by Ann Voskamp.  God has shown me so much through this book.  The truths God showed me in this book are what helped me get through this past semester.  The book walks the reader threw Ann's life as she learns to see God in EVERYTHING.  She begins by making a list of all the things she is thankful for.  But this is not just a list of the typical things we always thank God for on the surface (good health, or family or friends). Not that these are not amazing blessings, but she takes it one step deeper and sees the beauty that God lays before her in every day that she missed before.  To see this beauty she has to slow down and take in every moment. The sound of children laughing, smell of flowers, sight of a bird are things that God uses to draw her into Himself.

Coming into this past semester with so much on my plate, I knew I was going to have to slow my mind down and look for God in the little things.  Otherwise I will be running from thing to thing not really serving God in any of it. When I looked for God He showed up.  He captured my heart in ways I can scare explain.  

In the book, she faces challenges such as seeing what to be thankful for in suffering and pain.  She begins to see how giving thanks for the suffering transforms it into something beautiful. Then she talks about how Jesus gives thanks and it transforms things.   

"Because eucharisteo (thanksgiving) is how Jesus, at the Last Supper, showed us to transfigure all things-- take the pain that is given, give thanks for it, and transform it into a joy that fulfills all emptiness. I have glimpsed it: This, is hard eucharisteo.  The hard discipline to lean into the ugly and whisper thanks to transfigure it into beauty.  The hard discipline to give thanks for all things at all times because HE is all good."


The lessons God has taught me in this book are powerful and I will use them in the future as He challenges me. 


You can check out her blog here. Or buy her book here.

A year ago...

A year ago I started this blog.  As I was reading what I have written the past year I am amazed.  Amazed at what I was saying, amazed at what God has taught me, and amazed at the way my life has changed.  A theme seems to continue to come up...waiting for God's timing.  Seriously, for all you who have read this from the beginning..why didn't you tell me a whine way to much about waiting on God.  Accountability people! (Natalie? Where are you at? ;)) In some ways I feel like waiting on God's timing is something I will always be learning because I am REALLY bad at it.  However, along with my whining, are stories of God's faithfulness and lessons learned.

The following are my own words from past posts:

 

1)"All in all, I know that so far I have done what God has set in place for me to do. It is not what I first desired, but I have decided to embrace God's timing and trust that He knows what He is doing." 

2)Through the waiting I am determined to see God in everything, no matter where I am at.

Trusting God means:

• not having all the answers (sometimes it seems like you have no answers at all), but being okay with it
• stepping out in faith not knowing what He has in store, but being excited about it anyway
• Changes come so that we continue to realize the blessings we have and to draw us nearer to God

3)"I keep praying that I would see God's work. I think that when I live life uncomfortably He will have more of an opportunity to do just that. He will also reveal Himself and bring glory to His name through every situation. Isn't that why I am here in the first place, to glorify His name??"

 My comments to them now:

1) "Embrace God's timing and trust that He knows what He is doing." That sounds wise...maybe I should take my own advice huh?

2)You know it kinda stings to read your own words.  Your own words can cut straight to your heart..wow!

3) Living life uncomfortably ha!...bet I didn't know a year later I would be a senior living in the dorms again!

Overall...The Holy Spirit in my wrote those words, not the fleshy part of me...that's for sure!

I definitely did not know the full consequences of some prayers prayed, but they would definitely explain some life circumstances I find myself in currently.  WARNING! Be careful what you pray for...God's serious about the "ask and ye shall receive" thing!

As soon as I finish writing the above statement and I am now thinking..I would totally do it again because even though it was hard and really sucked at times..it was still SO WORTH IT! I know so much more about God now. And I will definitely continue to pray the dangerous prayers because God has stolen my heart.  It is His and nothing can seperate us now. My heart is His and its deepest desire will always be to bring glory to His name no matter the cost.

"For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. " Romans 8:38 

So I am bracing myself for another year of joy and heartache.  Knowing God will reveal Himself even more this year than last year.  He will break my heart for what breaks His (this is how He gets me to do the crazy things..haha).  I ball my eyes out and ask what can I do...He is in control from there. 

Thanks for reading this and all the other posts! Be prepared for another year full of stories about God's goodness, with hints of whining about waiting (sorry people...I'm a work in progress!) 

Letting Him Love Me

Confession: Even feeling God's love after the last post I am still struggling to let God love me. Yup, I can write that and still be defiant towards God.  I am not perfect.

I know God wants to fully love me, but I a feeling of intense unworthiness.  At the very core of me, I know that whatever He gives me I am bound to mess up.  So why give it to me? Why does a Holy God put His Holy Spirit in a body that is bound to disgrace it? The answer came at Salt Company last Thursday.

Drew talked about the glory of God.  He said we are made to worship God and bring glory to His name.  That is our whole purpose.  To illustrate this Drew created this picture:

Imagine that there is car coming towards a bridge.  One side is you and on the other is Jesus.  God has to decide which one to hit: me or Jesus, God's perfect son (the one who has never disgraced God's name).  I know that God will choose to hit Jesus. What I saw in the picture in my head was me trying to run over in front of Jesus, so that God would not have to kill Him.  I am the unworthy one, so I should be the one to die. However, by my interference I am not letting God's full glory be shown.  If God had hit me or like the Bible says, leave us in our sin, then His full power would never be revealed.  But by letting us crucify His Son, then He could show His power by bringing His Son back to life. 

Light bulb!! I am here on this earth to bring God glory.  By rejecting His love or not letting Him fully reveal Himself to/in me because I feel undeserving I am not letting Him show His full glory.  As He sanctifies me I am to share what He does.  I am to tell of His works. My life is to reflect His work.  In being honest about my weakness, God's strength will be shown.

God wants to use me to bring Him glory and it is difficult to do that if I am pushing His love away.  Truthfully, I am still working out the details, but if I can bring Him glory by letting Him love me then I want to be all about that!

 ¹ But now, this is what the LORD says—
   he who created you, Jacob,
   he who formed you, Israel: “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
   I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
² When you pass through the waters,
   I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
   they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
   you will not be burned;
   the flames will not set you ablaze.
³ For I am the LORD your God,
   the Holy One of Israel, your Savior;
I give Egypt for your ransom,
   Cush and Seba in your stead.
⁴ Since you are precious and honored in my sight,
   and because I love you,
I will give people in exchange for you,
   nations in exchange for your life.
⁵ Do not be afraid, for I am with you;
   I will bring your children from the east
   and gather you from the west.
⁶ I will say to the north, ‘Give them up!’
   and to the south, ‘Do not hold them back.’
Bring my sons from afar
   and my daughters from the ends of the earth—
⁷ everyone who is called by my name,
   whom I created for my glory,
   whom I formed and made.” 

Isaiah 43:1-7