Resolution

I spent time reflecting on last year and decided there was much I would do differently. Regret is too strong a word and I've tangled with guilt too many times to dwell; however, I do want to learn. If 2010 was a year of remorse & redemption, then 2011 was a year of chiseling. My heels were plowed into my own self-will, and refused to yield much ground to change.

For lack of better elocution: It's time for fear and my own rebellion to cease getting in the way of what God is trying to do with my life. 

This brought me to James, which is a book that I avoided because reading it always left me feeling like a terrible Christian. (Again, the guilt.) I was reading through it last week, struggling with the same "not quite measuring up" feelings, when two unexpected verses dripped all through the cracks and dryness of performance and saturated my soul with hope:

"Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom; 

because judgement without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. 

Mercy triumphs over judgement!" 

James 2.12 (NIV)

And the Holy Spirit tucked His finger under my chin, lifted my head to gaze at Christ and said:

"This especially applies to you, dear one." 

I cannot express how that truth shakes the core of me & how if I understood this fully, it would completely change how I treat God, my husband, my friends & family, complete strangers, and particularly myself. I don't believe James unintentionally wrote about a law that breathes freedom in the midst of his exhortations toward action.

Have you ever met someone who has taken the truth of what Christ did and allowed it to radically change them? I mean deeply shake up and turn over all of their conceptions of who they are, and who others are, in light of Christ?

It is after this last year that I realized I am most definitely not one of those people and I absolutely long to be; and, that I cannot be one of those people, those God-bringers, on my own.

They not only speak and act as if they will be judged by the law that brings freedom, but they understand that they will be judged and it doesn't scare them.

It doesn't scare them because they have allowed the Gospel to instill the truth that Christ really has taken care of all of it and they fling their world-weary souls on their Savior and never look back.

Oh, to be one of them.

Rather than one of those waiting in fear & anxiety for the other shoe to drop, because surely the words "Judge" and "Lover" cannot be synonymous, ...

... or those who assume in hard-heartedness that such a love could not exist, that One who claims to be a source of complete freedom, but requires so much, cannot be trusted ...

... instead, to be among the joyful who run into the throne room of Christ and throw their arms around their Lawgiver, because they understood and have been longing to finally be restored to the One who judged them with mercy. 

Who gave them living water that they drank of & in turn, lavished on others.
Who gave them unshakable security & refreshing humility that they accepted & in turn, loved people deeply.
Who erased the striving, fear, guilt & shame that they learned not to run back to & in turn, were living testimonies of being more than conquerors.


To become one of these is a resolution worth keeping. 

Falling into Grace

It's cold cool!

This morning I sat down with my coffee & the book of Ephesians and soaked in Autumn. Texas can have a pretty long fall season, actually. I remember Thanksgivings growing up where Autumn was slow in leaving & winter dragged her feet; thus, they were too warm for sweaters & jeans. (A fortunate thing, if you saw some of the matching sweater combos my mom had us wear back in the day.)

I'm more motivated to decorate for this season than most. Kyle & I are still in the stage where Christmas is at either parents, so any decorating outside of baking Christmas cookies.... well, there isn't really any decorating outside of baking Christmas cookies. (Sacrilege for some; but, friendly to our newly-married budget for us.) 

So I went to HEB yesterday for the first time in two weeks. Holding out until we were reduced to toast & questionable leftovers that had been forgotten in the back of the fridge because, though I love cooking & baking, grocery shopping in a college town is always a giant pain. 

Needless to say, my fall decorating started with the impulsive purchase of a cinderella pumpkin that is now awkwardly sitting on a trunk in our living room, because it is too big to go anywhere else. I'm still figuring out what to do with it. 

I was pretty proud of the centerpiece I came up with, though: 

Pretty simple, but for me this is about twenty million steps in a good direction. 

In college, out of the four girls who lived in the house, my level of domesticity was by far the lowest. Meals consisted of Rice-A-Roni & frozen peas; clean clothes were dumped in a pile & stayed there until I picked something up, wore it, and moved it to the "not clean anymore" pile; and Hobby Lobby might as well have been a curse word. 

I was pleasantly surprised when, after getting married, I had a better knack for domestic things than expected. My husband was probably more pleasantly surprised; especially when he found out I was, in fact, cleaner than him. A fact he somehow missed in college.  

Also, I have a post rolling around in my head that has something to do with grace, the fruit of self-control, & what completely surrendering to Christ really looks like. It may also have a hint of what being completely secure would actually do to me & how I want to look away when God turns my head toward injustices... but I'm so grateful He won't let me.

More later! 

Change.... Ew

I wrote this back in September and forgot to post it. After reading, I thought it still worth sharing. 

Kyle & I have been back in town for a few weeks. Many people have asked me how it feels to be back, and trust me when I say that I can't imagine being anywhere else. I know that God brought us here.

But....

Look, the thing is not EVERYONE in their twenties is super-okay with change. In fact, I have this theory that very few of us deal with it in a healthy way. The results are horn-rimmed glasses & movies like Reality Bites. 

It has been difficult for me to be in this town as a married full-time ministry... person. Operating as an adult in a college town is a whole different ball game than living in one as a student. 

Maybe it has the feel of learning how to play your favorite song on an instrument you've never picked up before. I wouldn't know because I don't play instruments, but it seems fitting. 

Last night our church had a leadership meeting, and for awhile I began reminisce/throw a pity party and think of all the people that I've served with over the past four years that I miss. Somewhere in the middle of my thinking I felt God nudging me to look around the room and look at the people who were there. I have this tendency to become very selfish when I'm moping, and God graciously tucked His finger under my chin and lifted it so I could see that there were people around me. People that He placed me here to encourage & serve & love. 

It's not like God magically took all of my angst away. This morning I woke up feeling frustrated again because it's our day off and I wanted to instantly have plans with people, but I don't. Then I read Luke 9 this morning. 

"Yet another said, 'I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home. Jesus said to him, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God." (vs. 61-62)

I don't think Jesus was being a heartless jerk to the person He was speaking to in this verse, because I know He is not one. However, I do think that He recognized a pretty practical truth that my mind understands but my heart is having trouble grasping. A truth that I think several people have morphed into a "self-help" kind of pep-talk, because many others besides me don't get it either. 

God calls us to constantly change. We are not meant to be static creations, but rather be continually pressing into His Person and allowing His holiness to change us. "Further up & further in!" as C.S. Lewis puts it. 

I believe as humans, we recognize our need to grow & change, but it seems like we either refuse to do so (because change is scary) and wind up bitter and cynical that life is not what we thought it would be, or disillusioned and living in a dreamworld. 

We also attempt to make the source of our change something besides God. We trade out cars, or houses, or jobs, or friendships, or spouses, or we buy new clothes, or we chronically diet. We try new restaurants, new movies, new books, new hairstyles, etc. It's like we're scared of what might happen, or what we might feel, if we just sit still for two seconds. 

All the while not realizing that the only source that ourselves were made to fit into is One whose character answers are deepest fears. 

God is unchanging. We can rest & trust & depend on Him. He will never morph into something that He isn't right now. For me this is huge. I am one of those who refuses to change because change is scary. How can I have a guarantee that people will like who I change into? What if I have to let go of something that I really, really, really love? He answers that by being our Rock, our Stronghold. 

God is also deeper and wider than we will ever have time to explore. He can, inexplicably, be one person's rock while He is another's raging river. He will lay one person by a stream of water and walk another through the valley of the shadow of death. He is the source that will meet all our needs, even when our needs change.

And yet I still cling to the familiar & safe like a small child. Sometimes I think the only reason I stopped carrying around a blankie (besides being socially awkward) is that I'm able to trade it out for other things as I get older.

Thankfully, on top of being simultaneously unchanging & a catalyst for change, God is also very, very.... very patient.