Beth Moore Giveaway!

From now until January 14th (I think) Beth Moore is giving away 14 of her titles! What a great way to feed your soul on 2014! You can find these ebooks at Amazon.com or Christianbook.com and download to your kindle or other e-reader or tablet (with the right apps).

Hurry! Don't miss this!

Romans 12:2

I wanted to just jot down an insight I was kicked in the head with recently about this verse. Seriously, it was one of those 'DUH!' moments when I had to ask myself why I never saw that before. It's such a well-known and much-loved verse (though usually only quoted halfway).

"And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." - Romans 12:2

Our worldly mind cannot comprehend the will of GOD. We have to be renewed (constantly) to ever truly know what is good and pleasing to HIM. Without letting HIM renew our minds, we cannot truthfully trust ourselves to make the GODly decision. Our minds without HIM will never be able to do it.

Just a thought...

Benefits of a Small Church

We moved to a church in a much smaller town about a month ago.  There are no kids there and no band and yet, they have so much to offer! 

I hadn't realized how much I was hiding in the crowd.  Able to mask myself from going deeper with the Lord by serving (nursery, youth, prayer teams), I loved GOD but let my relationship go on cruise control. I wasn't fake, but I wasn't growing or challenging myself either.

So when worship is canned (from a recorded song played through the computer) you have to dig deep to get something out of it.  Either dig deep or get nothing. No musician is there to take you a little way into the throne room. It's you and GOD, all or nothing...no more room for just coasting.

The pastor looks you in the eye personally in a small church. In a crowd he may never see you, but with fewer people to hide among, he is talking just to you. No avoidance.

I would rather be here than anywhere else right now.

Surrender and Discipline

Today at church was one of those days when GOD really got my attention...no kidding.  I hadn't even truly realized just how far apart from HIM I had gotten.  I mean, how far from GOD can you go when you are in church every Sunday and your husband is the youth pastor?  But I had forgotten how big, how wonderful, how mighty, how awesome...how magnanimous our GOD is!  Opening song: Awesome GOD.

"The judgment and wrath HE poured out on Sodom
The mercy and grace HE gave us at the cross
I hope we have not too quickly forgotten
that our GOD is an awesome GOD"

So that got my toes curling with the power of GOD speaking directly to my soul like a giant "HELLO"!  And that was just the beginning.  Next song: From The Inside Out

"A thousand times I've failed
Still your mercy remains
Should I stumble again
Still I'm caught in your grace
Everlasting, your light will shine when all else fades
Never ending, your glory goes beyond all fame"

That was my answer.  And I went on to sing:

"Your will above all else
My purpose remains
The art of losing myself in bringing you praise"

The call to go deeper...HIS deep calling to my deep asking for me to give my all.  So I surrendered.

"In my heart, in my soul
I give you control
Consume me from the inside out
Let justice and praise
Become my embrace
To love you from the inside out"

No more shallow relationship with HIM.  No more hiding behind all the good things I have been doing to serve HIM.  HE wants my heart!  HE wants to be more to me than anything else, and all I have to do is simply let (allow, concede, enable, endorse, give, permit) it to happen.  I don't have to take any action at all...I surrender.

Surrender.

The sermon did not deal with surrendering.  That part had already happened during worship.  The pastor spoke on what comes after surrender happens.  Good intentions aren't enough.  Focus.  Plan.  Be Intent.  Discipline yourself.  Live as if GOD has given you a direct order (because HE has!) 

I stayed away from any resolutions this year, but GOD has directed me anyway.  Fresh starts and new beginnings...I guess moving to a new city wasn't enough.  HE is always calling deeper, not to demand more from you, but to have more of you.

We are okay, GOD and me.  And today is the new start to a very beautiful new level of relationship.

I Blame Eve...

Through the generations, we've all shaken our heads at the way things are and wondered why. I can remember asking my mom as a four year old who didn't want meatloaf for dinner, "Why do we have to eat?" My mother's reply?..."Because Eve chose to eat an apple and now we all have to eat things we don't want." That may not be theologically sound, but when my daughter refused to put on her jammies and reminded me that Eve was naked in the garden, I had to carry on the blame game..."She ate the apple, honey, and now we all have to wear clothes." It started the process in my life of blaming Eve for pretty much everything I had no control over.

 And then I saw this book by Susanna Foth Aughtmon...'I Blame Eve: Freedom from Perfectionism, Control Issues & the Tendency to Listen to Talking Snakes' and I knew she was reading my mail. I had already found her blog and fallen in love with her writing style. (Check out 'Confessions of a Tired Supergirl' and you'll see exactly what I mean.) But when I saw her book and what it was about, it brought to mind all of those conversations like the ones I mentioned before in which I blamed Eve for everything from eating and wearing clothes to cramps and pain in labor and (if I'm being honest) even my husband's (few) occasions of not listening to me. (Yes honey, I am a blessed woman, it has only been a few.)

 Heartfelt and endearing, Susanna opens my eyes to a new perspective of Eve and I may be more like her than I imagined. I want things. I have dreams and goals for my life. I have made plans for how I will get there. And I have had most of those plans go horribly awry. GOD has better plans, and I, like my umpteen-greats grandma Eve, thought I could hurry them along or do it my way, without depending on GOD. How easy it would be for me, having read this book and gained new understanding, to bite the apple if I thought I could know as much as GOD and have an actual peer to peer conversation with HIM. Kinda Like this..."GOD, that waiting thing doesn't make any sense. You want it for them, they want it, just give it to them already!" To which He would reply, "Of course, you're right! What was I thinking?" Yeah, that would be my apple! (You can say it...impatient much?)

But with poetry of words and spirit, Susanna sums up the real result of Eve's dissatisfaction with her life and her desire for equality with GOD. "With one bite, everything that was good and right in Eve's life began to break down. Every aspect of her heart, soul, mind, and body was affected by the choice she made. ... Every corner of her life became less than it was created to be as sin seeped in, coloring the edges and hardening the corners. ... There would now be pain where there had never been pain before, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. This is the legacy that is handed down to us." She traded unity with GOD for what she thought would be equality, an ability to take control for herself. It leaves you mourning for our dear sister, who was no more or less a woman than we are today.

Thankfully, Susanna doesn't leave it there. With personal examples and poignant perspective, she gives practical solutions for letting go and surrendering to GOD's plan of grace and forgiveness. I recommend this book for any and all women everywhere. It will open eyes and change perspectives, allowing for the ability to let go of the pressures to perform. I may still blame Eve the next time I get hormonally weepy at a commercial, but I will know the freedom that allows me to let go of the need to get in GOD's way when HE needs my tears for something else.

Be sure to check out Susanna's blog too!

www.tiredsupergirl.blogspot.com

Old Pictures

I was looking at my baby on his birthday and wondered where the time has gone (he turned 10)! I know I still baby him in small ways that I shouldn't, like finishing his chores when they get halfway done and then forgotten, but I can't seem to let go of mothering him.

There's something about knowing a person for years that can make it really difficult to allow them to change. That can work for the good in some ways, like I don't even notice my husband's increasing grays (he tells me they are there, but I really don't notice them), but I think this easy acceptance mostly hurts relationships.

I think of the person I was 10 years ago and believe me, I thank GOD I am no longer that person! I am wiser, more confident, and more experienced than I was then and I wouldn't want to go back for anything (even for the 50 fewer pounds, before the pregnancy). But sometimes I think people still see that young woman and expect less from me than I can really offer. Then I deliver less and how can I live up to the fullness of my potential that way?

It can work the other way too, with my own perspective skewed. I especially see this with the teens I work with. The teenager is so suddenly different from who they were just a year ago, with different drives, different goals, different friends, different emotions (and different bodies!) that it can be nearly impossible to keep up with the changes. Not only that, but parents can get reminiscent and desire to keep their little ones little. (Perhaps with persistent mothering...) They fail to see the changes that occur. My dad carried a picture of me when I was three until I was a senior in high school. (I think I was the one who finally took it out!)

So carrying an old mental photograph of someone doesn't allow them room to grow or to be different from who they used to be. It can work in salvation too. When someone belongs to Jesus, all of a sudden they are new, all the old is gone! But now they have to fight those old pictures that people around them are holding onto. It takes time for new mental pictures to be developed, and we have to be patient and open enough to allow those around us to change.

(So for me, no more helicopter mothering...hover, hover, hover...and I will have to take some pictures out of my wallet...)

The Sound of Listening

I had an interesting dream the other night. It was this prestigious music audition and everyone was trying to be accepted into this amazing symphony. We were told the piece we were all to play was 'Mary Had A Little Lamb'. Of course, that is a very simple selection for such an important audition, but we weren't going to ruin our chances of acceptance by pointing that out to our judges, and we certainly weren't going to take it upon ourselves to play something other than the appointed piece. Everyone ahead of me played the familiar tune and did so flawlessly.

When my turn came, I made my way to the music stand on the stage and began to play the childhood melody, but became confused when I noticed the piece on the stand was different from what I was expected to play. I tried to reconcile the two melodies, but found it was impossible to do so. I questioned everything at the point: had everyone else just ignored the sheet music? Were they too scared to play what was right in front of them? Were they just trying to do as they were told and refused to even look at the written notes? What exactly was I supposed to be doing? It became clear very quickly that I had to make a choice - do what was expected and what everyone else had done, or choose to play the music in front of me. I woke up before I saw the choice I made.

I would love to say I played the music on the stand, but from what I saw, it was a bunch of boring whole notes tied to half notes with long rests in a chain that seemed to go on indefinitely. Who wants to play something that just drags? But then, who wants to be like everyone else? Sound like everyone else? No, that's not appealing in a universe where GOD made everyone unique. But how scary is it to diverge from the accepted path, the familiar song, especially when every note is being weighed and judged?

Sometimes we find ourselves in that place where the norm is no longer good enough. What worked in the past will no longer be acceptable, and what everyone else does is not what we should be doing. It's that kind of challenge that stretches us and takes us up to that next level. And I think GOD is gracious enough to stretch us with whole notes rather than requesting "Flight of the Bumblebee" on our first solo trek into the realm of new things. (Plus, holding when we want to burst ahead grows trust on HIM, our conductor, to take us to the right place at the right time.)

I am pondering all of this as I am sidelined to my easy chair after knee surgery. Talk about a holding pattern! I am frustrated and want to go, but being forced to wait for the right time. Guess I needed to learn this lesson twice. (Hmpph!) And rest!