along came a spider...

A few weeks ago I had one of the most frightening experiences that I can remember. It was a relatively small experience by most standards and certainly wasn’t comparable to a near-death collision or escaping a burning building, but for me, it was very, very scary. In fact, it was the first time that I have ever literally been physically paralyzed by fear.

I was home alone with my kids and Jeffrey was out of town. We were getting ready to go to church and things were going very well. Once I had showered and dressed, I headed out of my room intent on going to the bathroom to dry my hair. I walked into the hallway and saw, to my horror, the biggest spider that I’ve ever seen in real life. It was between the bathroom and me, and its body was the size of a matchbox car. Now, before you are tempted to think that I’m exaggerating, let me assure you that I’m dead serious. I actually blinked several times to be sure that my eyes were not deceiving me. As I stood there gaping at it, I had several thoughts in rapid-fire succession: “What do I do now?” “Is it alive?” (It immediately began walking and I was then quite sure that it was, in fact, alive.) “How dare Jeffrey be out of town when I am here in fear for my life?” “If I just close my eyes and ignore it, will it disappear?” “What do I do if it starts walking toward where my kids are sleeping?” As I was trying to sort through all of these thoughts I was having, Jack (5 yrs) came out of the room and I screamed, “Stop!” I mean, he was walking right toward it! He stopped, very obediently, looked down and said in his very sweet little voice, “Mommy? Are you gonna kill that?” I said, “Well, buddy, I want to, but I don’t know how!” He responded, “Just step on it.” It was at that moment that I realized it. I was completely paralyzed. No matter how much I mustered up the courage, I literally could not propel myself forward to step on the thing. I was overcome by fear. Then, my knight in shining armor spoke. “Mommy, I’ll step on it for you if I can have my shoes.” The amount of relief that flooded through me as a result of my little boy’s statement was amazing. Someone was going to help me!

I obediently went and retrieved the shoes and he put them on. Then, without a moment’s hesitation, he started walking toward the dreadful thing. I was cheering him on with all of the encouragement I could scrounge up. As he neared the spider, my cheering got louder. Then, he stepped on it. That’s when the horror really began. At the moment his foot clamped down on that spider, HUNDREDS of little spider babies ran out in all directions fleeing for their lives. The screaming really began then! Except for Jack. As I’m running around like a crazy person, he’s perfectly calm and saying “that’s weird!” and then, “oh man, I really don’t want the spider to stick to the bottom of my shoe. I hate it when that happens!” The only thing I could find was Lysol.  I grabbed it and immediately began drowning every spider baby I could see. I’m quite certain some got away and will come back to haunt me later, but I thoroughly drowned all of the ones in my sight.

I’m not gonna lie…we were late for church and for the entire rest of that day and the next, I would involuntarily shudder and gag. I have also begun to compulsively check every inch of the floor before walking into the hallway or our bathroom or bedrooms. She had been there, so it wasn’t hard for me to believe that her little arachnid brothers would come looking for her soon! I will probably look around for spiders for a long time. Perilous experiences tend to have that effect on you.

A day or two later as I was recounting the story to Jeffrey, the Holy Spirit started using it as an object lesson for me. On a side note, I’ve asked God to teach me object lessons using some means other than flesh-eating diseases and large scary bugs from here on out…but, I digress.

I realized this wasn’t the first time I’d been paralyzed by fear, as I’d first thought. Some years ago, I was facing the giant spider of poor choices and flesh-satisfying sin. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I needed to get rid of it. I knew that ignoring it would not make it go away and that even if it disappeared in the present, then just like the spider, I would never know when it would show up in the future to taunt me. The only way to get rid of it for good was to kill it. Much like the spider, I even knew HOW to kill the sin, but could not seem to muster up the courage to do it. I was paralyzed. Let’s be clear here…I wasn’t somehow confused about what I was doing or in some state of total delusion as to whether it was wrong. But, I have a very adept way of downplaying and minimizing things, as well as talking myself into believing that I had things under control. In this situation, before I knew it, my downplaying, minimizing and rationalizing had set me looking smack in the face of the biggest, scariest, pregnant spiritual spider that I’d ever encountered. Interestingly, many of the thoughts that I had about the physical spider also applied to this spiritual one. “What will I do if it starts walking toward my husband or children?” You see, as much as we like to deceive ourselves and believe that our struggles don’t impact those around us, that is just simply not true. I knew that if I didn’t get a grip, it wouldn’t be long until my selfishness began to negatively impact my husband and children and those around me that I called friends, not to mention the ministries that God had called us to. Pretty soon, it became clear to me that even though closing my eyes and pretending it didn’t exist and/or just walking back into my life, waiting five minutes and then going back out to hope it had disappeared were FAR more appealing, they were not, in fact, lasting solutions. My only option was to KILL it.

Much like my dance with the spider, some of our dances with sin threaten to absolutely paralyze us into mind-numbing fear. As much as we’d like to fancy ourselves strong and resilient and able to handle anything, there is an enemy out there who’s dead-set on our demise…and he’s done his homework. But, greater than our enemy is the God who’s created us, knows every intimate thing about us, and also knows when we’re unable to walk forward ourselves. He’s already sent His Spirit and His Word to warn, comfort, re-direct, rebuke and restore us, but in some cases, He sends along an earthly knight in shining armor. My knight in shining armor came in the form of my best friend. I couldn’t talk to anyone and was afraid to be candid with even her for fear of rejection or judgment. But, none of those horrible things happened. In fact, I found in her a person who was willing to say “are you gonna kill that?” and then was willing to walk along with me and help me stomp on it. Unfortunately, much like the spider, stomping on sin unleashes many consequences, to be sure. Sometimes the consequences scatter in all directions and you feel like a crazy person running around to drown them all. But, by the grace of God and the help of a brother or sister in Christ, victory is completely possible! It is amazing grace, by the way. Though the hundreds of little baby spiders seemed almost too much to manage, I shudder to think what I would have been dealing with had she been allowed to grow those things to maturity and actually give birth to them! I’m sure you can guess that the same is also true with sin. The consequences that come from a decision to eradicate sin are far less future-destroying than allowing sin to grow and give birth. Death is all that follows at that point.

In the same way that I look around for spiders almost compulsively, I am extremely sensitive to situations that even hint at the area in which I struggle. I’m sure to most people who’ve encountered it, it seems like an exaggerated response and an overly protective and guarded one at that. I’m okay with it. They’ve not been where I’ve been and I hope they never are. I’m sure there will come a day when I don’t look for giant, pregnant spiders around every corner, but one single sighting will instantaneously take me back to that day. I honestly hope there’s never a day that I grow a little more comfortable about what I’ve walked through. I hope any mention of similar scenarios or struggles of others bring me immediately to a place of desperation for people to find deliverance and I pray that God gives me the chance to invest in others out of the overflow of the grace extended to me.

What about you? What are you rationalizing, controlling, or explaining away? What instantly comes to mind if you stop and spend five minutes stilling your heart before the Lord? That’s where the battle needs to begin. Ask God to send you help. He will be faithful to do so. Dive into His word and find hope. There is rest to be found when we finally face scary sin head on and stomp it to death.

“In temptation our theology becomes cloudy. The truth is, there’s no such thing as a private moment. God is always watching.” Randy Alcorn

“We fear the consequences of confession because we’ve yet to experience the consequences of concealment.” Andy Stanley

“But each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.” James 1:14-15

“…but where sin increased, grace increased all the more.” Romans 5:20b

“If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But, if we walk in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” I John 1:6-9

peace.

weeds, wounds & wonder...

The other day I decided it was time to weed the backyard. It's not a particularly hard job as the yard is smaller than a postage stamp and is mostly decorative rocks. Or at least I THOUGHT it wasn't a particularly hard job...

You'd think that with no lawn and therefore no grass in the backyard, it wouldn't be a place weeds would frequent. Well, you'd be wrong. As I got out there, got down into it and took a look around, there were weeds everywhere. I mean, everywhere. They were popping up through every little nook and cranny. I started pulling and before I knew it, a quick "pull some weeds here and there while I talk on the phone" job turned into "spend the entire afternoon pulling weeds and get the last of it done before the sun goes down" job. It wasn't exactly how I'd planned to spend my day, but some really cool things took place during my unplanned day.

My kids realized what I was doing and all three of them came running out of the house and started asking "Mommy, can I help? Can I help?' Of course I was thrilled to have any help whatsoever, so I explained that we were pulling out anything that was green and that we had to be sure to get the roots. You can imagine that with an 8 year old, 5 year old and 3 year old pulling weeds, "thorough" was not a very prominent concept. They did their best, but no matter what part of the yard I put them in and asked them to take care of, they'd eventually gravitate to where I was. They wanted to pull weeds right beside me and didn't want to handle things on their own. Though it wasn't as productive as I would've liked, or as time-efficient, I eventually realized that God had put these little weed-pullers right beside me to teach me some things.

The first thing that He reminded me was that I ought to be quite grateful for three kids who even wanted to spend time right beside their mommy. There might come a day when these moments wouldn't be so prominent. I very quickly told my frustration and my desire to be efficient, quick and task-oriented to shut up and take a hike. As the kids pulled weeds around me, Jack became very confused as to the reason that we were pulling up the flowers. "Mommy, this is not a weed, right, because it's so pretty!" "No, Jack, that IS a weed and we have to pull it. It disguises itself as a pretty flower so we'll think it's pretty, but all the while it is choking out the good flowers around it!" Jack pulled the "pretty flower" out of the ground and said "huh...well, it might be pretty on top, but the roots are just as ugly as ever!" It doesn't take a genius to know what God was teaching me there...

If I look at my life from the level of my back porch, I might tend to think I'm doing okay. I mean, I love God, I love my family, I don't break the law, I'm a nice person, I do christian things and people probably generally think well of me. If I actually come off the back porch and get down into my life though, I realize that there are weeds everywhere. There are the obvious ones that I know shouldn't be there: gossip, critical spirit, ungratefulness, pride and the like. But then, there are the ones that disguise themselves as pretty, or funny, or harmless. They're the ones that if I don't police and stay on top of, they'll choke out the holiness process. It's the tv shows I get addicted to that not only have nothing God-glorifying in them, they are replete with the things grieve the Spirit of God. It's the music that my flesh LOVES, but that, if I'm honest, is not glorifying to Christ and contradicts the things that I would say are precious to me, like purity. It's the movies that, as a follower of Christ, I really have no business going to because I can tell even from the previews that I'll have to lay my standards down along with the money I'm called to steward in order to see the thing.

Sometimes the hardest part of this whole "life-weeding" process is that what God's calling me to weed out of my life, may not be what He's calling other believers to weed out of theirs. It's easy to judge my holiness by that of other believers and say "well, I mean, EVERYONE watches that show and loves it!" or "come on...everybody thinks that's funny...it doesn't mean we'd actually DO it..." but God doesn't ask me to judge what He's calling me to by the standards of believers around me. He asks me to judge my holiness by HIS holiness and by what His Spirit convicts me of. He asks me to obey, not to bargain with Him. He says that I will be blessed if I obey, not if I give a very well-crafted reason why, in this relevant culture, things are just different...

The other thing He reminded me of is that I'm not allowed to judge other believers by MY standards as much as I'm not allowed to judge myself by THEIR standards. My responsibility is to take care of the weeds in my life as God reveals them to me. My standard is the conviction of the Spirit and the words of scripture. My responsibility is to my Lord. Back to the yard...

At some point during the weeding process, I brushed against poison oak. I had no clue that it had happened, but you can believe that I knew it a few days later! In retrospect, I can see that I did not take the proper precautions before the weeding process to ensure that I wasn't exposed, but sometimes we have to learn lessons like this the hard way. The worst part of the poison oak? It morphed into a severe staph infection. Yep. If it can happen, it will probably happen to me. Here's a pic...

Not long after that pic was taken, the whole arm began to swell. You couldn't even recognize the bones in my elbow or wrist, or what the arm even used to look like! I ended up with an emergency doctor visit, shot and more potent prescription medications than I've been on in quite a while. I'd like to tell you that I wasn't able to make a huge spiritual application from this experience, but you know better, don't you?

Unfortunately, there have been times in my life when I did not take the precautions necessary to avoid exposure and I paid for it dearly. Only in the last few months do I feel like I'm on the other side of quite a long and arduous journey as a result of not weeding like I should and not avoiding some plants altogether! God, in His mercy, used the poison oak and resulting staph infection to tenderly remind me that there are some things that you can't just pull out by the roots and throw away. Sometimes, it gets all over you anyway. In severe cases, no amount of medication or cream makes it feel better. It requires professional assistance to eradicate it. I don't like how I feel when I'm struggling and I especially don't like that I don't recognize myself anymore. In my life, even though I know all of these things, sometimes I still think I can be around the things that have bested me in the past. I don't know if it's a desire to prove I'm okay, or what, but I'm realizing that keeping any shred of the things that have infected me in the past, (be it unhealthy relationships, poor attitudes, bad habits or toxic environments) is about as ridiculous as keeping a poison oak plant in a vase on the kitchen table, but resolving not to touch it. The only way for me to keep from being infected is to avoid it all together.

Unfortunately, the poison oak episode has left me with my first substantial scar. I've never really had any scars up to this point. The pain is gone, the medication regimen is over and the shot did it's job. But, I'm left with a reminder of my little dance with the forbidden plant. Though it's ugly and won't be the most attractive accessory to my sleeveless summer wardrobe, it's also a stark reminder of God's grace to me. I look at it and realize all that He's rescued me from and I'm reminded of the value of weeding regulary and avoiding some things altogether.

But that's not all He taught me that day. As I was down in the weeds pulling and sweating and feeling like it would never be done, my kids suddenly yelled, "MOMMY!!!!!!!!!! Look what we found!!!" I went over and noticed that they'd found the most intricately designed amazing little snail. They were enraptured. They practically had their noses to the ground marveling at the little creature. I admit it...I was amazed too. As he inched along and pulled into his shell and back out again, I explained that he had a little slime all over his body that helped him get around and get into and out of his shell. Sure enough, while we watched, little white foam came out when he pulled into the shell. Really quietly, Jack said "God's so cool." He was right. God is SO cool. Sometimes I get so wrapped up in the junk that's in my life and needs to be weeded that I feel like it will never be done and I completely fail to see all the wonder of God around me.

It's true that on this side of eternity it will never all be done. It's also true that every single time I obey Him, I progress further along in the process He's taking me through to conform me to the image of His Son. I can't get so bogged down in the weeding that I miss the wonder of Him though. He's in every morning that I wake up, He's in every smile of my children. He's in every single little detail of my day, down to the white foam on the smallest snail. As the children and I looked around, we suddenly realized that there were about 30 more snails all over the ground, on the posts of our deck and all underneath. They were everywhere! We'd just been so busy weeding that we'd missed it.

As we finished up for the day, I realized that I'm a lot like my kids. I want to stick close to my Father while He points out what needs to be weeded. I also realized that I'm not the only one pulling stuff out. He's right there with me. Lastly, I realized that He wants me to be just as amazed at His handiwork as they are, and that if I look with eyes to see, He'll show me that His wonder is all around me.

peace.

a call to adulterers...

Either adultery is becoming an alarming trend or I'm just noticing it more. Two particular adulterers have made the headlines in recent months...Tiger Woods and Jesse James. We've got movies like "It's Complicated" hailing all the fun of being the "other woman" and endless tv shows involving plots where "he's sleeping with her, but married to her" or "they're married, but in constant angst because of the other people they'd rather be with" and most of us find ourselves somehow rooting for the secretive affair. I did notice something interesting in human behavior recently, though. When the Tiger Woods scandal broke, and even more so when the Jesse James news broke, public disgust and outrage at these two men was palpable. Why? Why was this the public's response? These men were only doing what the people in the movies we pay to see and the tv shows we schedule our lives around are doing. What makes it worse? Oh....because it's REAL. The deception is real, the betrayal is real, the lies are real, the pain is real, the devastation is real. And...if you've ever experienced the NON-hollywood version of adultery, or if it's ever touched someone close to you, or perhaps even you, you find yourself never looking at it quite the same way again.

I've been pondering this a lot lately for some reason, and the Lord has just not let me get comfortable with the "well...that's too bad...glad it isn't me!" response. The funny thing that I've heard and that I've even said is "how could Tiger cheat on Elin? She's beautiful!" or "How stupid is Jesse to cheat on Sandra Bullock? She's like the nicest, most beautiful, talented person ever! What an idiot!" The obvious inference is that we could understand the affair more if the wife were ugly or mean...right? WRONG! But, we've managed to make it okay to cheat on spouses as long as the story-line is crafted perfectly and we can identify with the angst, oh, and as long as it doesn't touch us specifically. Even more interesting is how we're willing to give some latitude for "those heathens" who cheat, (because we don't expect any more from them?) but are ready to crucify christians, or God forbid, spiritual leaders who commit adultery. "How DARE they?" "How stupid do you have to be?" "Oh, the poor wife/husband and kids." "How dare they continue to lead people while they were neck-deep in sin?" "Can't trust ANYONE these days apparently..." "BOYCOT them!"

Sorry if this seems to hit too close to home. Stick with me, though. In our lives, we have probably been touched directly by situations where a spouse has gone outside the boundaries of their marriage and committed adultery. We've probably encountered pastors, speakers, worship leaders, small group leaders, friends and the like who've had their lives drastically impacted by this particular sin. Lately, I've been finding myself wondering WHY this seems to be so prominent and what if any response God wants from me. I think there are several reasons and one very appropriate response.

I believe that one of the reasons that adultery seems more prominent is because of the sheer availability of other people AND the details of their lives. Facebook, Twitter and MySpace have brought this idea of social-networking to the forefront of our culture. It's never been easier to find out all you do (and sometimes do not) want to know about someone and their family. Though I'm an avid user of both facebook and twitter, there are certain things that I just will not post. It's not necessary and invites a level of familiarity that can quickly breed unhealthy relating with others. Cell phones, text messages, instant messaging and all manner of social networking provides a quick and easy way to lead a completely separate life. Accessibility is high and accountability is low. We as believers would do well to take a good hard look at the social networking in our lives and that of our children. Do we have the amount of boundaries that we should? Have we let any boundaries begin to crumble? Let's shore them up!!

Another huge reason I believe this is becoming more prominent is because we look at the boundaries usually placed on male-female relationships as antiquated and outdated. Even I, who used to be a strict "never ride in the car with a man who's not my husband" supporter have found myself saying "awww...it's not a big deal with him. Nothing would EVER happen with him..." It's become increasingly clear to me in the last year that the boundaries with other males in my life that I had let slide need to be re-instated with a vengeance! With everything from text messages to car rides, there is NO male with whom I need to be carrying on a close relationship separate from my husband! ZERO.

There are a million other reasons (the total depravity of our society, the influence of tv, movies and music, etc.) that contribute to this, but I think the most impactful thing I've been walking through lately is God's very clear direction to me on my response.

Basically, I'm an adulterer. And, what's worse, I'm an adulterer multiple times over. I'm the bride of the living God, Creator of the entire universe, and I cheat on Him regularly. If you're saying to yourself "I cannot believe she went there..." just hold on...'cause I'm REALLY going to go there now.

I have a LIST of things in black and white in a letter from my husband that He's asked me not only not to engage in, but to totally expel from my life. Hold on, I have the list right here...

"sexual immorality, all impurity and covetousness must not even be named among you...let there be no filthiness, nor foolish talk nor crude joking...take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them...be holy in all your conduct...be holy as I am holy...be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to become angry...put away all filthiness...bridle your tongue...do not speak evil against one another...abstain from passions of the flesh...be self-controlled and sober-minded...do not love the world or the things in the world...abhor what is evil...cling to what is good...make no provision for the flesh or it's desires...flee from sexual immorality...glorify God with your body."

It's a very long letter, but those are some of the highlights. The point being, as I was asking God how people could engage in adultery with so much "going" for them and how believers could do it when they know it's wrong, I was struck by the response from Him in my spirit: "The same way you do. You let your defenses down little by little until you're engaged in sin before you know it. You become hardened and desensitized and then you wonder how you got there." He's right. And it's true. That's EXACTLY what happens. Nobody seems to ever wake up one morning and go, "ya know...it's time for a change...I think I'm going to cheat on my husband today." In much the same way, I don't wake up and think "how can I dishonor God and cheat on Him today?" Yet, if I'm not careful, and sometimes even when I am, it happens. I've noticed that it happens MORE regularly when certain areas of my life begin to be allowed to run themselves.

For instance, if I don't determine what I'm going to do with my time, my time determines my day for me. The first thing to get skipped? My time with God.

If I don't determine a standard of what I will and will not watch on television, before I know it, I'm knee-deep in plot lines of shows FULL of the very things God's asked me to FLEE from in my life. Interestingly enough, those shows then begin to determine my time and I plan things around being able to watch them, facebook about them and talk about the characters as though they're personal friends. (Because this one is particularly hard for me, I have this verse in a picture frame right beside my cable box: "I will walk in my house with blameless heart, I will set before my eyes no vile thing." Psalm 101:2-3)

If I don't set the tone in some of my conversations and make a conscious decision to avoid foul-language and off color commentary, those conversations almost automatically descend down that rabbit hole.

There are a million other examples, but let's just say that the Holy Spirit didn't have to reach very far to find ways that I violate my covenant with my God and flirt with the things I should most certainly avoid. It didn't take long for Him to turn "how could he cheat on Sandra Bullock? What an idiot!" into "You have the most beautiful One in all the world in Me, and that doesn't stop you..."

I'm an adulterer. The fact of the matter is, we all are. Some of us have unfortunately experienced the physical ramifications of earthly adultery, but we all experience the spiritual ramifications of our adultery on an almost daily basis. I think God wants us to wake up! This is a wake up call to adulterers. It's time to start viewing the "freedoms" of our life though a stricter grid. It's time to get serious about not blending in with the world and instead being set apart as a holy people. It's time to read God's Word and apply it instead of making excuses about it's cultural irrelevance or outdated ideals. It's time to be okay with not being on the bandwagon of the latest shows or music. It's time to stop taking advantage of the limitless grace of God by cheating on Him and then thinking He should be happy with our church attendance, christian CDs, tithing and small group outings. It's time to wake up.

I have a new found sympathy for my brothers and sisters in Christ who are suffering through the ramifactions of adultery. And I have a newly burdened heart to intercede heavily for them. I hope that your response to similar situations that you know of is an immediate drop to your knees to intercede for those involved and beg that God's glory be revealed in the midst of it. Any response that doesn't point right back to Christ is probably the wrong one. I also have an uncomfortably clear picture of the depths of my own tendency to wander both from my husband and from my God. I want a sealed heart. I don't want it open to any influences that would try to lead me astray. I don't really even care if I am "in" or "cool" or "culturally in tune" any longer. It's not worth my sanctification. It's going to take some seriously devoted work on my part and some much needed mercy and grace available to me only through the cross of Christ, my beloved, who died for me. "Be holy in all you do." If He tells me to do it, then I can assume He will give me the power necessary to achieve it. And when I fail, I am promised grace and mercy as my reward for repentance and contrition. Truly amazing grace.

Oh to grace, how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be
Let thy goodness like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to Thee
Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for Thy courts above

peace.

bunk beds, junk bowls & other musings...

So, for the last two months, my life has been pretty well consumed with purging, organizing, packing and moving. What started as a "hmmm...I wonder if we could ever get out of this house and this suffocating mortgage..." conversation with Jeffrey turned into renters for our house and a new house in the mountains for us to rent for $1300 a month less than we were paying on our house. God's provision was evident and now we are moved in, relatively unpacked, we've painted all of the living spaces in my favorite colors, we're close to our dear friends, living on the seventh hole of the golf course and loving the peace, the quiet and most of all, the amazing and sovereign provision of God. Along with this journey has come much time to think and process amongst the craziness of it all.

Our previous house was about 2800 square feet and the house we are living in now is 1900 square feet. We've gone from 5 bedrooms to 3, from multiple living spaces to 1 living space and from being able to be separated in the house to pretty much living on top of one another. There's some adjusting to do! We had to get rid of a lot of stuff and FAST. We had a garage sale, took countless trips to Goodwill and made what seemed like even more trips to the dump. How did we accumulate so much stuff??? Amazingly, the garage at our new house is still FULL of even more stuff that I can't wait to rid us of. It seems to never end. "Why am I keeping this?" "Why have I moved this same item, in this same box, to every house we've ever lived in?" "How many times am I going to move this before I actually OPEN it?" Though I'm tempted to think that I'm the only one who's having these questions, I've been assured through this process that I'm not. I can tell you this though...I WILL NOT REST UNTIL IT IS PURGED!

My children have had to make the adjustment from each having their own rooms and a separate playroom to all sharing a room and not having a playroom at all. We had a big long talk about why Mommy and Daddy were moving us, how fortunate they were to all get to room together and what fun it was going to be. You know what? It's actually worked! They haven't even had a hiccup. The best part? BUNK BEDS. I am now the world's foremost endorser of bunk beds. Whenever you find yourself with a space issue, I recommend them. Whenever you need to make a rooming situation fun, they're your go-to. When you can't spread out, spread up! Maggie and Jack are in bunk beds and Ali's little toddler bed is close by. There wasn't even an argument about who was going to have the top bunk. They had a little meeting and decided amongst themselves without a bit of arguing. We have three chests of drawers in there and a closet. That's about all that will fit in the room and it looks so cute. Now, before you think that I'm bragging about the fact that I have the world's most well-adjusted and perfect children...let me assure you...I am :-)

Through this process I've realized that I can live with SO MUCH LESS. We don't even miss all of the things we sold, donated and trashed. I can't even tell you what most of it was! Amazingly, I've never gone to look for something only to realize that I got rid of it. That's how much stuff we had and didn't need. And we still do. I have to tell you that much like a good book that you can't put down, or the inability to eat only one potato chip, the purging process is quite addicting. It's the good kind of addicting though because it elevates more and more the things that are truly important and diminishes quickly the junk and trash.

Speaking of junk...

We've had a red bowl on our counter for the past three years. It sat right in the middle of the bar, right in the middle of our kitchen and it matched perfectly. It's from Crate and Barrel and it's one of my favorite items. It's purpose has been to act as a catch-all for junk. You see, I'm pretty compulsively neat, but living with four other people who are not has made me find ways to compromise and adjust. One of those ways was by having a junk bowl. I can't stand little things lying around here and there. The way that I broke the family of that habit was by giving them a place for those things to go. EVERYTHING has at some point spent a period of time in the junk bowl. Paperclips, loose change, Ali's hair bows, Maggie's pencils, old receipts, gum wrappers, fast food restaurant toys that nobody really wants, chapstick, guitar picks, Jack's matchbox cars, CDs with no cases, lose keys...you name it, it's spent time in the junk bowl. Then, we moved.

The junk bowl has yet to be unpacked. It also has nowhere to be in the new kitchen. The counter space is such that there's no central place for it. We've lived here two weeks now, and you know what? We haven't missed it! Things actually get thrown away or put where they're supposed to go when there's no junk bowl. I don't get to a point every month or so where I have to spend 20 minutes cleaning out the bowl and putting everything where it goes or throwing it out. I'm loving the prospect of using the bowl for what it was actually intended for. FOOD!

There's a spiritual application here of course. Surely you knew there would be. I've realized that I have junk bowls in my life. Areas that I don't clean out regularly. I let junk build up in these areas that should've been thrown away long ago. We all have them, I think. Friends that we freely gossip with, those that we let our foul language loose around, food that we know we shouldn't eat but overindulge in instead, disrespectful attitudes and speech that we use with our spouses, but wouldn't ever expose to others. All of these are junk bowls and they're unnecessary. Whereas in the physical sense, my junk bowl caused me to have to spend more time than necessary sorting through it all, spiritually speaking, a junk bowl can keep us from the level of intimacy with Christ that we should strive for and it gives Satan a pre-determined area (or areas) of weakness in our lives. It opens us up to temptation and short-circuits the holiness process.

I'm taking steps to get rid of the spiritual junk bowls as surely as I got rid of the physical one. I'm asking the Holy Spirit to convict me of things BEFORE I throw them in my spiritual junk bowl. Dealing with them as they come and throwing them into the trash eliminates the possibility of keeping them around. I'm far from having this process completed and probably always will be. I can already see the benefits though. Do you have any junk bowls? I recommend getting rid of them. We can and should live with so much less junk. I think I'll go make some salad in my favorite red bowl....if i can just find which box it's in...

peace.

homemade sin...

As I was growing up in the south, I would hear the phrase "that is as ugly as homemade sin." I eventually got to the point that I said it as well in response to things that I found genuinely ugly, like crimped hair, polyester bedspreads or anything bedazzled. The other day, as I was thinking it quite arrogantly about something, I felt that familiar pause in my spirit. "What does that even mean?", I thought. Is it ugly as homemade sin as opposed to drive through sin, or sin that you buy at the Cheesecake Factory? Usually, something homemade is something that a lot of time and effort has gone into and it's far superior to the drive through, or even the Cheesecake Factory. Why is homemade sin therefore the worst kind of ugly? Then, it hit me.

It really is. You see, my homemade sins are the ones that I've cooked up all for myself and taken a lot of time with. They're not my drive through sins of impatience and minor road rage or even my Cheesecake Factory brand of sins such as gossip disguised as concern or a critical spirit disguised as expertise and helpful feedback. They are my well-crafted and well-protected sins. They are the ones that I take great pains to make sure no one discovers. They are the ones that I harbor, justify and argue with the Holy Spirit over when He starts to get too close to them. They are my homemade sins, and they are indeed the ugliest kind.

As is often the case with a homemade item of any kind, the more time you spend with something, the more attached you are to it. The more time you spend with it, the more you know the ins and outs of it and the more you know something, the harder it is for you to let someone else have it. The truth about homemade sin is that Someone else does want it.

In any pursuit of holiness, the time will eventually come when the flashlight comes out and the darkness runs for cover. For me, this process has been a lot like the housework I've done lately. You see, I LOVE a clean house. I can't handle mess. Clutter makes me insane. So...I keep the public areas of my house pretty picked up and clean all the time. Air fresheners are plugged in, scented candles are lit, the pillows on the couch are fluffed and placed just so and everything has to be in this state before I can go to sleep at night. Let's be honest...with three small children this is no easy task, but I simply don't function correctly if it's not done. There's only one problem. Though there may not be any clutter on the outside, there's PLENTY on the inside. Junk drawers, crammed closets, catch-all bins and toy-paloozas exist in all the places you can't readily see. In fact, only if someone went poking around would they find these places. They're well hidden. I know they're there and for awhile, I can ignore them. Lately though, they've been driving me crazy and the clean-out of all of the unseen places has begun. It's so liberating! Bags and bags and bags and bags of toys, clothes and trash have left my house headed for Goodwill and in some cases, the dump. What a great feeling! The cleanup is far from complete, but progress is being made.

I'm sure you can guess where this analogy is headed. Pursuing holiness means a relentless clean-out of the unseen places in my heart as well. You may not know they're there, but I do, and so does my Pursuer. I keep a pretty put-together thing going on the outside. Wife, mom, singer, writer, friend...I wear all of those things and keep everything fluffed and placed exactly where it should be for the most part. Sure, I struggle with drive through and Cheesecake Factory sins, but hey...who doesn't? The good thing is, I keep the homemade sins tucked neatly away where only someone who went poking around would find them. My problem now? Someone is poking. The same Someone who made me unsatisfied with my casual hybrid of holiness is now poking into the dark corners and the crammed closets of my heart. Seems He isn't satisfied with me just looking clean...He actually wants me to BE clean. It turns out that just like a junk-filled house isn't actually clean, neither is a junk-filled heart. In fact, it's ugly as homemade sin. The good news is that the clean-out of the ugly places has begun. It's so liberating! Step by step obedience has been required and hard things have been asked of me. But, by God's grace, some things have gone to the dump.

Try as I might, I will never fully grasp the grace of God for me. The fact that He knows intimately all of the corners of my dirty heart and then washes them with His blood and calls me CLEAN is unfathomable to me. The fact that He knows just how white-knuckled my grasp is on some of this junk and that He still ever so gently points in their direction and says "You want to be holy as I am holy? That has to go." but He doesn't get mad or frustrated or grow weary of my selective hearing. I am overwhelmed as I think about how far I have to go, but I am so comforted by God's promises in His Word concerning my heart when I let Him have His way with it. By the way...His promises are for your heart too.

"The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick; who can understand it?" Jeremiah 17:9

"I will give you a new heart and will put a new spirit within you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and will give you a heart of flesh." Ezekiel 36:26

peace.

"right"eous indignation...

Thanks to those of you that have come along on the journey so far and have sent emails, texts or left comments on the blog. Very humbling. Very encouraging. You are loved.

So...anywho...

One of the things that I get the privilege of doing each year is registration for the Passion Conferences that take place each January. Passion is an amazing movement geared toward college students and helping them discover how to live for the fame and renown of Jesus on their campuses and in their worlds. If you don't know about Passion, get to know it! www.268generation.com.

Passion registration entails what you might imagine that it does...making sure that the students get checked in and get the information that they need when they arrive to the conference. But, beforehand, I get the opportunity to answer emails for about five months leading up to the conference. I get to walk alongside these students and their adult leaders and help provide them with everything they need for a smooth process leading up to the conference. It truly is one of the great joys of my life because I'm a "fixer" by nature. Usually, in a few sentences, I can fix whatever their issue is and provide them with a measure of relief. I get to serve them and I love it. Occasionally though, there's one that stumps me.

Passion historically has a "who's who" of worship leaders and communicators that are part of the event. The thing I LOVE about Passion's heartbeat though, is that it's not about the worship leaders and communicators. It's about Jesus. Even though we are very blessed to have them join us, we are also highly aware of the ease with which something like this can be attended for the sole purpose of seeing one of these great people and nothing more. With that in mind, we made the decision a long time ago that though we would publicize who'd be joining us for each Passion event, we wouldn't be publicizing the exact times during the event that they would be speaking or leading worship. For the most part, this has never been an issue. Until this year.

So...I get an email one day from an attendee who wants to know who's speaking when and who's leading worship when. I sent my normal response thanking him for the question, but letting him know that we do not publicize that information ahead of time, but that he could be assured that he'd experience it all. He wrote back and informed me he wasn't interested in experiencing it all, he was interested in experiencing who he wanted to experience when he wanted to experience them and furthermore, he wanted to give the entire college group he was bringing the same option. I sent one more gracious email saying that unfortunately, we wouldn't be able to provide that and he began to get a little bit more forceful at that point. "Why do you care? You have our money, what does it matter to you who we want to see and when? It's our right, and frankly, you shouldn't be withholding that information." I managed one more gracious email. (See, one problem with being a verbal processor is that sometimes my verbal process is better left unprocessed. I could tell that there was only a short amount of time before my responses would no longer be gracious.) My last response basically said that I would be happy to do anything further that I could and to please let me know if there was any other way that I could assist him. He popped off with one more retort.

I was INCENSED. My family was in town for Christmas and they got the full benefit of my indignation and hearing what I would've said had I sent one more email. How dare he? How dare he intimate that all we cared about was the money? Did he know NOTHING of why we exist? What was his problem? All the work we were doing, all the sacrifice to provide something that would change lives through the power of Jesus? The event doesn't even MAKE money. That's the funny thing. He has the audacity to want to pick and choose things as if it's all about him? I stewed for several hours. Then, a day or so ago, God, in His wisdom brought it all back to my remembrance. I began to start getting worked up again and He so gently nudged, "not much different than how you've approached me all these years..."

GULP. "WHAT? You must be kidding me, Lord! The guy completely missed the point!"

"Exactly."

"I don't think I like where this is headed."

"I knew you wouldn't."

Gracious. If there's one thing that God is with me, and with us all, it's gracious. He knows exactly how to speak through His Spirit and when. He knows exactly how we need to be approached and when, and when it's time, His method is above all, gracious. Gracious - "Of a merciful or compassionate nature". Yep, that about sums it up.

He so graciously began to convict me through His Spirit of the ways in which I'd done NO differently than this man I was so "right"eously indignant over.

"My child, you signed up for this life and meant well, but you didn't want to attend the whole thing. You wanted the high profile parts. The easy parts. You didn't want the day-to-day ramifications of holiness." This is not what I want to hear. "You wanted the conferences, the camps, the church attendance, the fame when it was easy and the anonymity when it was hard. You wanted to wear the WWJD bracelet and sign the "True Love Waits" card, you wanted to go to the conferences, hear the great speakers and worship leaders, raise your hands, cry the tears and be affected for a few days. You wanted all the glamor and none of the gore. Unfortunately, that's not what it means to identify with me." I was speechless. It started all snapping into SHARP focus.

I had never audibly said it out loud, but I had acted the same way as this guy. I "bought my ticket" when I became a christian. I meant well and was sincere. I knew what I was doing, but I didn't grasp the full scope. I had gone along and treated God as someone who had my money and shouldn't care when I attended. God would have been well within his rights to respond much like I did..."How dare you? How dare you intimate that all I care about is your "decision" for me? Do you know nothing of why I exist or why I created you to exist? Do you have no concept of what I've sacrificed for you?" and yet here I've been continuing on in my casual christian life as if to say "I don't want to experience it all. I want to experience what I want to experience when I want to experience it."

This realization has been uncomfortable at best. This pursuit of holiness I'm on is NOT going to be glamorous. I can feel it already. I can't somehow go "all in" with Christ and continue my affair with the world. I can't.

I never heard back from that guy. I don't know if he came to Passion or didn't. I hope he came, stayed, and was changed, but I'm not sure I'll ever know that. One thing I DO know...He came across my path sovereignly and God used that experience and my response to push me further down this road. I don't know what it's going to look like from here. I don't know the things in my world which will need to go...though I know there will be some. All I do know is that this is the road I'm supposed to be on. What about you?

peace.

and so it begins...

Well, this is one of those things that's probably been a long time coming, but just wasn't the right thing before now. A blog. My issues with blogging exist on several levels and are some of what has kept me silent in this arena of cyberspace before now. First and foremost, we talk FAR more than we listen already, and this forum provides for that freely. Secondly, many of us talk before we stop to think and once it's written and "out there" it's a bit more difficult to be conscientious of how we are impacting others with our sometimes well-meaning, but poorly delivered speech. Thirdly, the direct warning in Proverbs haunts me regularly and provides an appropriate level of fear for diving into this. "When words are many, sin is not absent, but he who holds his tongue is wise." Proverbs 10:19. So, it is with much trepidation, but also with some expectancy that I venture into this area of "free speech".

It's no surprise to you, I'm sure, that God has created each of us differently. Many of us are verbal processors, while others of us are silent and reflective generally. Some of us are emotional and passionate outwardly, while others of us tend to simmer and stew at a slow boil beneath the surface. ALL of us however were created in the image of God, with a capacity for adoration and glorification of Him and, for those of us who've been redeemed, sanctified and justified by the blood of His Son, we are commanded to pursue holiness. It's not something that we get to elect like the courses we'll take in college or the amount of co-pay we want on our insurance. It's a command. "Just as He who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written, 'Be holy, because I am holy.'" 1 Peter 1:15-16.

These verses have begun to absolutely shake me to the very core of who I am, disrupt my casual christianity and leave me stripped down and bare before their very simple words. BE HOLY. That's the reason for this blog. See, I am a verbal processor and over the last year (or three!), God's taken me on a very painful, very eye-opening, very humbling and very restorative journey. I'm nowhere NEAR the end of it and won't be until the day I close my eyes in death and open them in His presence. But, I believe the time has come to "go public" with the journey in hopes that maybe you'll journey with me and we can learn together what it looks like to BE HOLY in the 21st century. I have a feeling it won't look at all like I've let it look thus far. Pursuit. "an effort to secure or attain. quest. any occupation or pastime in which a person is engaged regularly or customarily." This is my holiness pursuit.

peace.