Tag: Bible

Shame

I haven’t written in a while and I’ve been trying to decide whether I even want to start writing again. It has been easier to not write. Easier to not think about things too deeply. Easier to not expose all my faults and weaknesses to the world. 

Yesterday, things came to a head mentally, when I finally put a name to what I was feeling and what has been hindering me in many aspects of life. 

Shame.  

I have been thinking about trying to expand my piano teaching next school year. I sat down and was trying to figure out  how to write a flier of what I am offering. On a whim, I looked up some other piano teachers in the area to see how they advertised and what they offered. And as I read through some of their qualifications and expertise and experience and all that they had to offer, I found myself shutting down. What am I doing? I don’t have all those qualifications. I don’t have that kind of experience. Do I even have a right to call myself a teacher? Am I just being pretentious to think I can do this? And I closed my computer and walked away from my project. Overwhelmed with a yucky feeling of shame. Who am I? I’m nothing. 

I’ve been thinking about my blog this week. Mostly because three different people who I don’t think even read my blog that much, said something specific to me about how important it was that I was writing. And my thoughts immediately went to the realm of shame. Who am I to write a blog? I don’t have anything to say. I’ve already said whatever I had to offer, now I’m done, and writing more is just boring people. Who am I? I’m nothing. 

This morning I was catching up on the reading plan our church is doing. I was about a week behind, so I was settled in to read a good size chunk. I got to Acts 10 and the story of Peter having a vision where a big sheet descends from heaven, full of all kinds of animals, birds, reptiles etc, that the Jews were forbidden to eat in their law because they were unclean. And a voice from heaven tells Peter to kill and eat. Peter responds, “By no means Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.” Then the voice from heaven responds “What God has made clean, do not call common.” As the story progresses, we learn that this vision was to prepare Peter for the fact that the Gospel was for the Gentiles too, not just the Jews. Which, as  Gentile myself, is a pretty significant and wonderful event. 

But as I was reading, I found myself stopped abruptly, like running into a wall, when I read those words, “What God has made clean, do not call common.” Because this is what I am doing. God has said one thing about me and I’m saying the total opposite. 

I’m in a women’s Bible study right now and we are doing a study on Ephesians. We are only halfway through chapter three at the moment. But I’d like to make a non-comprehensive list of all the things God says that I am, that I’ve found just in the first couple chapters. 

I am blessed in Christ.

I am chosen in Him.

I am holy and blameless before him.

I have redemption through his blood and the forgiveness of my trespasses.

His grace is lavished on me.

I have obtained an inheritance.

I have been predestined to be to the praise of his glory.

I am sealed with the Holy Spirit.

I have been raised up with him and seated in the heavenly places.

I have been created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand.

I have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

I have been reconciled to God through the cross.

I have access to the Father.

I am a fellow citizen with the saints and a member of the household of God.

God says I have made you clean. Don’t call yourself common. 

And so I am trying. Again. To have faith (Lord strengthen my faith!). To believe I am who God says I am. 

I have adult children. I say these things to them all the time. You learn by making mistakes. Nobody expects you to be perfect, just keep trying. Of course you don’t have experience. You’re just getting started. It will come with time. Don’t worry about other people’s expectations. Just do your best. And if you fail, get up and try again. And I can say all these things to my children, because they are my kids and I know them, and I know that they are wonderful and gifted and I have all confidence that their lives are important and the things that they do, no matter how small, are all part of a bigger picture of who they are becoming and what they will do over the course of their lifetimes. 

And how much more does God see about me and who I am in Him. And he says, “What God has made clean, do not call common.” 

Who am I? In the worlds’ eyes, I don’t measure up to a lot. In my own eyes, I don’t measure up to a lot. But God. He has something different to say. 

So, I’m going to keep trying to become a better piano teacher as I gain experience over time and learn from my mistakes and keep working at improving. And I’m going to try to write more. Because it’s something God has given me to do. And I’ll trust that he knows what he is doing. 

Freedom of Choice

My kids’ memory verse this week was Matthew 24:27.  For as the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. 

Every morning this week we got in the car to drive to school. I grabbed the paper that has our weekly memory verses on it, read it out loud and we all said the verse together a couple times before I pulled out of the driveway. Just part of the normal routine. But yesterday I was struck at how important this verse is. This was vital information. My kids needed to understand how key this was to everything we do. Jesus is coming back. A day is coming where it will matter how you choose to live your life. For those who have asked for forgiveness and who are following Jesus, his return means that we finally get to be with God in all his glory and that sin and death and evil have come to an end. Paradise. But for those who choose to not follow Jesus, judgement is coming and an eternity of separation from God and all goodness. Hell. 

This made me think about Freedom of Choice. Our culture is really big on Freedom of Choice. We like to frame everything in that context. I choose to follow my heart instead of sticking out my commitments. My body, my choice. The COEXIST bumper sticker that shows symbols for all the religions. (I’ve chosen to follow this religion, and you need to respect that and live peacefully with me.) 

Free will is something that God gave us. Adam and Eve had the freedom to choose whether they wanted to follow God’s rules or not. Jesus died on the cross for everyone, but each person has to choose whether they will accept that free gift of forgiveness. 

The problem arises when people make uninformed choices. 

We start off by saying truth does not exist. Reality is fluid. My changeable emotions are the only parameter I have to determine what I should and shouldn’t do, and from that viewpoint we then treat religions like a continental breakfast. Hmm, what am I in the mood for this morning? In reality, each religion claims that they are the only way to go. Which means, either all of them are wrong or only one is right. Back in the time where rigorous study and thought were valued, many great minds tackled these questions and without fail, the Bible and Jesus withstood every critical test. The Bible is true. Jesus is the promised Jewish Messiah. He is the WAY, the TRUTH, and the LIFE. The Bible tells us that when we choose to not follow Jesus, we are ultimately choosing death and hell. 

Nowadays, we don’t take the time to think about these things. In past generations we might have had great debates over which religion is right, but now we are an overwhelmingly secular culture where everyone just does what they think is right in their own eyes. Our conversations around religion have shifted from wondering which religion is correct to now wondering how we can make sure all our religions are inclusive. (Every religion is good and it all leads to the same destination!) We coast through life. Numbed by the 24 hour entertainment with which we surround ourselves. We think that if we just don’t think about it the issue will vanish. The problem is when we don’t consciously make a decision, we go into the default decision which is to choose to follow ourselves and all our own whims and desires instead of following Jesus. We set ourselves up as our own gods. 

Thousands of years ago Joshua had a message for the Israelites. 

“Now therefore fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord. And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:14-15

You have the freedom to choose. Serve yourself or serve God. But make an informed choice. Serving yourself leads to death. Serving God leads to life. 

A Blessing for My Children

We have just finished a tough year. Last night, as I rang in the New Year with my family, I was genuinely glad that we were done with 2020. 

Last January, we had a special speaker come to our church, and he prophesied that this coming year was going to be a year of Lack. A year of Not Enough. And it would be a year where we would see that Jesus was enough. Words that turned out to be very true.

As I look back on this past year, I am still amazed that we made it through all the trials that were thrown in our path. And I start thinking about this year that we have just started. And I want to pray a blessing over my children.  

I pray that this year will be a year where you rely less on your own strength, and more on the strength that comes from God. 

I pray that this year will be a year where thankfulness becomes a habit.

I pray that this year will be a year where the entertainments of this world grow old and stale for you and instead you become captivated by the highly adventurous path of growing closer to God. 

I pray that your patience will become stronger, your kindness will become ingrained. I pray that you will gain an ability to see people through the eyes of love instead of judgement. 

I pray that your faith will grow exponentially. When problems rear their head, you will not be fazed. You will know that Your God is in control. 

I pray that Peace will be a defining part of your character. That you will seek peace with others and that God’s peace will be firmly in the center of who you are. 

I pray for Joy in the midst of hardship. I pray for love in an atmosphere of hate. I pray that God would put a passion for his Word in your hearts, that you would grow strong and firm in your knowledge of him. 

I pray that grace would lace your words and your actions. 

May this be a year, that no matter what happens in this world, on December 31st, 2021, you will look back and say, Wow, it was an amazing year. This is the year that I truly came to know that God is all that I need. 

 “May your love abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.” (Philippians 1:9-11, NIV)

With much love,

Mom

My Brain is Too Small

I’ve had a couple thoughts this week that have merged into one idea. This week I picked up one of George MacDonalds’ novels. Old-fashioned. Sometimes a bit heavy-handed with the moralizing. But a lot of wisdom packed into a little book. I’m about half-way through, still not sure if I want to commit to reading the whole book as it’s not my typical style that I enjoy. It moves slowly. But, I also find it to be soothing. I am confident that I am not going to run into any themes that go against my conscience, and I am certain that I’m going to run into ideas that make me pause and think and ponder. The insights into humanity are deep and cut right to the heart of the matter.

There is a scene in the book that stayed with me. A young boy is talking to his tutor about God, trying to understand the omniscience of God and being frustrated because he can’t wrap his mind around the idea. His tutor laughs and says he is trying to understand something that is so big it won’t fit in his brain. It’s like trying to fit 20 horses into a stable that only fits 10. This made me stop. It seems very counter-culture to me. Nowadays we like to assure our children that they can Do Anything. Be Anything. Achieve Anything. We don’t like to put any limits on our abilities. If you want to pursue that challenge, then Pursue it! I’m Confident in you! You can do Anything!! And then here in the book there is a tutor laughing at his pupil for trying to comprehend a large idea, saying his brain is not big enough to take it all in, and he should just leave it as a mystery. Hmm. I wasn’t quite sure what I thought of that.

Then this morning I sat and continued my Bible reading in the book of Revelation. There’s nothing like the book of Revelation to make you feel like your brain isn’t big enough to take in everything there is to know about God. I have read the book of Revelation several times over the years. I always get stuck. So many questions. What’s that? What does that mean? What’s going on? Why are they talking about that and then suddenly talking about this?? I’ve listened to different teachings and sermons on the book over the years and I can say that I have a couple good conclusions. God is in control. God wins in the end. God is Holy beyond my comprehension. Beyond that, everything is a little gray and fuzzy. And it occurred to me this morning, perhaps my brain is not really big enough to understand all of this fully. We’re talking about the nature of God and heaven and things in the spiritual realm. I live here on earth. My dealings are with people and the things of this world. While I am certainly supposed to grow in my knowledge of God and spiritual things, I think there is a limit to how far I can go in my understanding. How can I truly understand how heaven works until I go there? The Bible certainly drops many hints, but God never seems to think it’s important to try and spell out all the details carefully for us.

I find it a bit freeing to not have to understand everything. It’s kind of like laying down a heavy burden that I was never meant to carry. I am not saying that we should stop pursuing knowledge. I plan to continue to read Revelation and research and ask questions and understand as much of it as is possible, but it’s nice to know there are limits. Mystery is a Thing and faith makes that ok. I have faith that what the Bible says is true. I have faith that God is good. I have faith that He is in control. I will try to learn and understand everything I can, and the things I can’t understand, I can be at peace knowing that God’s got that too.

 

 

Queen Esther and Me

My name is Esther. This has always been a special part of who I am. My mom told me, years ago, that when she first got pregnant with me she knew I was a girl and my name was going to be Esther. I was named after the Esther in the Bible. She has her very own book which tells the story of the beautiful Jewish girl who is compelled to join the Mighty King’s harem when the king puts out  a search for beautiful virgins. He is looking for a new Queen and Esther ends up being the chosen one. Later, she uses her influence as Queen to save her people, the Jews, from a genocide.

I can’t tell you how many times I have read the book of Esther. Innumerable. When I was a kid my Dad set up a rule, for a time, that we had to read one chapter of the Bible before bed every night. I would often go searching for the shortest Psalm that I could find or I would head back to the book of Esther and read it again. Esther was my hero. I was her namesake. I felt a deep connection. She was beautiful and brave, a Queen, everything a little girl could hope for in a hero.

As I grew older I found some biblical historical fiction about Esther, where authors had written the story of Esther, filling in all the unknown details, and adding their own twist to the story. I loved reading these. It awakened an understanding that these people in the Bible were real people. With real emotions. Real problems. They weren’t just a flat image on a page.

Of course, as an adult, understanding Esther to be a real person has lead me to have a much darker view of the whole story. I have a good imagination. I try to imagine what it was like to live in a harem. To not have the kind of marriage that I think is normal, but instead just be one of many. What was it like to interact with an older man when she was most likely a young teenager? To interact with the most powerful man on earth when she was just a young girl from a family with no power or prestige? How did she navigate all the palace politics? What was her day-to-day living like? Did she have children? Was Vashti (the previous Queen who was dethroned) still in the harem to cause problems? After the “Happily Ever After” ending of the book of Esther, what happened then? Did she remain on good terms with the King or did he replace her with a long series of new favorites from the harem? Did she find a way to bring meaning to her life?

I have a lot of questions. Sometimes I feel myself getting a little panicky. Like the answers to these questions are tied up in my own destiny. If Esther actually lived an unhappy, unfulfilled life in the harem, what does that mean for me? What does it mean, if you are named for a hero, to find out that your hero was actually a pretty unhappy person?

In the last couple years, I have found myself getting very emotionally caught up with the stories of the women in the Bible. I find myself angry. Why did God let that woman suffer like that? Why did God allow polygamy, despite all the stories of women being hurt by it? Hagar and Sarah. Leah and Rachel. Hannah and Peninnah. Why did God allow the practice of concubines? Why were they worth so little to the men in their life? Thinking about the story of the concubine in Judges who is murdered. Why? Yes. My brain knows that when sin came in the world, all these bad things were part of that Sin. Yes. My brain knows that God has a long term plan to deal with Sin in the world that centers around his Son Jesus. Yes. I know we have free will which means that bad things are going to happen because of the consequences of our sin. I know these things, but my heart still hurts when I read about the suffering of these women. I need to know that God cared about them. That he loved them just as much as the more prominent men who carry the lead role in the story. I need to know this.

I think I need to know this because I am Esther. I am connected to these characters hidden in the pages, surfacing in between lines. I am simply a continuation of their story. I am a woman. And I need to know if I am just as important to God as the men. Am I just as significant? Am I loved? Am I important?

Today I started reading the book of Esther again. I came up with a whole new list of questions and I started googling my questions, wondering if other people had thought about these things too. I happened upon a blog written by Rachel Held Evans. I really liked what she had to say and as I read through some of her blog posts I realized that she was an author and had several interesting books. One of them really stood out to me so I got it on my Kindle and started reading it. The name of the book is A Year of Biblical Womanhood: How a Liberated Woman Found Herself Sitting on her Roof, Covering her Head, and Calling her Husband “Master”. You have to admit, it’s an intriguing title. I’m several chapters in. I feel like I’ve met my new best friend and she just doesn’t know it yet. This is not to say that I agree with everything that she says or thinks, but what I love about her is that she questions things. I resonate with her questions. I resonate with her curiosity, her desire to dig deeper.

I just want to tell you one little bit in the book. The author and a friend get together and have a little ceremony where they Remember some of the women in the bible who suffered. They remember Japheth’s daughter who was sacrificed. They remember the concubine who was murdered. They remember Hagar. They light a candle for each woman, and they manage to bring it all back to the Cross. This made me sob. These women that have somehow managed to creep off the pages of the Bible and work their way into my heart and my mind…These women are important to me. And it was like someone telling me that there was going to be a funeral and I could come and mourn, and give honor to those who had died. Have some closure. While reading her book, I felt like I was there, joining in the ceremony. Mourning alongside them.

This is a journey that I am on. What does it mean to be Esther? What does it mean to be a woman? What does it mean to be a Christian Woman? These questions. This is why I keep reading the book of Esther, and Genesis, Samuel. The book of Acts. Because their stories are my stories. Perhaps by understanding the past better, I’ll have more understanding to face the future.