Once More With Purpose

To those who were actually reading this blog, I apologize for abandoning it. I have now decided to take it up again, but this time with purpose.

It was pointed out to me before that some of my rambling was really directionless complaining, and I agree that at times this was definitely the case. I haven't been writing because I haven't had anything to write about, or at least nothing positive and uplifting to say. I have for the past 5 or 6 months been going through a rather tough time of soul searching and only recently have I come to some clarity in my life.

I have decided to re-purpose this blog to discuss the personal and spiritual growth in my life. I recently made a very public declaration on Facebook of my re-dedication of my life to Christ. Many congratulated me, but only a few actually asked me what it was about and what I meant. So, here is the explanation of the struggle that I have been going through for many years now and the growing pains that have helped me to develop to the point I'm at right now.

Wresting With God

Like Jacob wrestled with God for an entire night and was finally blessed in the morning, I too have been wrestling with God intensely for the past few weeks, and they have felt like a torment and an incredible struggle; nights filled with tears and questions instead of sleep. However, I feel like the sun is finally rising and I am coming to clarity, understanding, and perhaps like Jacob, even a blessing.

The questions plaguing me were put into motion from a Bible conference that I attended where the topic of discussion was Colossians 3. I didn’t see at the time how this topic would so greatly impact my spiritual life, especially because it seemed to be something that I had heard many times before. It didn’t begin to work exactly right away, but it was at work within me.

There are two specific things from this conference that stuck out to me. One had to do with my preoccupations. One brother asked “what are you thinking about when you can’t sleep at night?” As sleep is a large problem in my life, I considered this thought. What were the thoughts plaguing my mind in times when I couldn’t sleep? What was I preoccupied with? And the brother challenged that this seemingly wasted time could be used productively in prayer; not only prayer for oneself and the thoughts keeping them awake, but in prayer for the saints and the assembly. I thought this was a pretty positive message, and so it lingered in my mind.

The second message that stuck with me was a moment that caught all of us off guard. A brother asked us “do you stink?” Of course we all looked at each other like we wanted confirmation that everyone heard the same thing. The brother repeated the question and then asked “have you really died with Christ?” The analogy was simple, if a body has died it gives off an odor, so likewise then, if we have truly died with Christ, is it evident in our lives…are we giving off a theoretical odor?

This thought was memorable, mostly because it was presented in a bizarre way, but it would eventually lead me to my confrontation with God. I didn’t initially dwell on this point right away, it was only after considering areas of my life that I wasn’t completely satisfied with – those pesky preoccupations that keep me awake at night – that this point came back around full circle.

After this conference, I was a witness to a friend’s budding new and beautiful relationship, one that is completely Christ centered and better than she had ever imagined for herself. I was naturally torn between sheer happiness for her and the inevitable selfish moment where I wonder why this particular blessing seems to be given to everyone else around me while it continues to allude me. I began to seriously consider what it was that I was doing wrong. In two specific areas of my life I have earnestly sought for progress and I have been at a standstill: my love life and my career. I then got frustrated and reached out to God, yes in tears, and asked him “why Lord? You know me better than I know myself and you know all of my needs and desires. Why are you withholding these things from me? What am I doing wrong or what do you want me to learn first before you bless these areas of my life?”

I was filled with a lot of doubt and insecurity around the subject, even to the point of thinking maybe this was God’s way of punishing me for past wrong-doing. I had heard from a Christian friend once that God disciplines us in two ways: he either gives us something difficult to deal with, some sort of trial, or he takes something away from us. This idea plagued my thoughts, even though I wasn’t completely convinced in its truth. I was exceedingly worried that perhaps God would take away from me the one thing that I wanted the most. This inevitably made me call into question everything I thought I knew about my savior and how he dealt with me. I felt conflicted, frightened, and alone.

Although I had heard from the friend who was blissful in the beginnings of love that God knew what she wanted and needed and he wanted the best for her, I was doubting that God had the same interests in my life. It wasn’t until an impromptu ministry meeting after a regular Tuesday night prayer meeting where I got my answer: “This I know, that God is for me” (Psalm 56:9). The loving father is for us, not against us. The only person who is against us and does not want the best for us is….us….if we become more interested in settling than waiting on the Lord.

I think that as much of a blessing as it is to grow up in the assembly and in a Christian home where we study the word, it leaves us open and susceptible to one great weakness: that everything we have heard our entire lives is stuff that we ‘know’ but not necessarily that we ‘believe’ or ‘understand’ in a practical way. Let me clarify that.

There are scriptures that many of us know by heart: “I will not leave you nor forsake you” (Joshua 1:5), “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:33), “Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart” (Psalm 37:4), “In all your ways acknowledge him and he will direct your path” (Proverbs 3:6).

We have heard all of these verses before, but what do they really mean to us? How do we understand them and how do we practically apply them in our lives? What does it really mean to ‘seek first the kingdom of God’ or to ‘delight in the Lord’?

After considering these verses, which are the basic foundation to my Christian life, I was forced to consider another important verse, which brings us full circle back around to this conference on Colossians 3 that I didn’t think really impacted me all that deeply. The verse is Luke 9: 23, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.”

What does it really mean to take up your cross? And this is when the brother’s question of whether we stink came back to me. To take up your cross means to die with Christ as he died on the cross. Ok, that we pretty much knew from Sunday school. However, what does it mean to take up your cross daily?

It is amazing how one little word can completely change your perspective on a verse, on a concept, sometimes on everything you think you know. So this got me thinking, what does it really mean to die with Christ or to give our lives to Christ? My clarity comes with this word daily: to die in Christ or to die with Christ is a daily exercise to surrender your life to him. It is not a onetime moment of salvation.

When we are young we are often told that all we need is to believe. This is how I governed my entire Christian walk up until now. I am a Christian because I believe that Jesus Christ died for my sins. That is the foundation; however, I didn’t take it much further than that. I knew that I should live a life pleasing to him, and if I am being honest much of my life was not pleasing to him, but beyond that, Christianity and faith was all based on belief.

I have now come to a new realization. Christianity and being a disciple of Christ is not merely about believing. Just as Christ gave his life for us, so too must we give our lives to him. And as I have just pointed out, this is a daily exercise, not a onetime moment of salvation. Giving my life to Christ is more than accepting him as my savior and fitting him into my life with bible readings and prayer…it means completely giving up my life to Christ and allowing him to be the author of my story. It means coming to him with every decision and waiting on him instead of making my own decisions and asking for him to bless them. It means making him the center of my life instead of myself. This DOES NOT come naturally to us. After all, it is our lives…why wouldn’t we be at the center or be the main character of our own lives? The answer is actually quite simple, because once you give your life to Christ, it is no longer yours, it is his. How come this moment of clarity came to me so late in life when it was repeated about a million times in Sunday school and asked in every conference I attended: “does your life belong to Christ?” Does it BELONG to him? I can’t really answer why this has come to me so late, but I am just glad that I can see it now.

Once I had this moment of clarity, that I needed to surrender all areas of my life to God and completely trust in him, I was in for another struggle and many more sleepless nights filled with tears and prayer. I am a control freak, it is one of my biggest weaknesses. I can’t stand not being in control and not knowing what comes next, so to stop trying to do everything on my own and trust God to do it is a very hard step for me. To trust that God has my best interests in mind and have faith that he will do all things well is incredibly difficult, but incredibly necessary. 

I have seen nothing but failure in my career and love life while I was trying to do it on my own, all the while thinking I was on the right track and asking God for answers and help. So what was I doing wrong? I was trying to write my own story instead of letting God be the author of my life.

I was also focused on myself instead of on God. I would look around and see all of the people who I went to school with getting great jobs, one of them my dream job that I had applied for 7 times! And I would see all of the people I had grown up with all finding ‘the one’ and getting married, and I couldn’t help but have the childish response “God, when is it my turn?”

Of course in my mind I know that I shouldn’t be looking around at anyone else, and when I do the waves threaten to drown me. Like Peter on the water, I know I need to look only to Christ, but this is much more difficult in practice than in concept. It’s difficult not to see everyone else’s success and happiness and it’s difficult not to want it too. It’s even difficult, at least for me, not to get frustrated with God when what you want seems to be forever out of reach.

I have a bad habit that I have become aware of which continuously plunges me into familiar murky waters. This habit is to let my guard down and not guard my heart when it comes to having friendships with guys and tends to leave me teetering on the edge of deeper feelings and brings up old fears and insecurities. When someone comes along who is nice and sweet and a good Christian guy, and I start to wonder…“could this be him?” and then I spiral into a bout of insecurities surrounding my fear of rejection, of getting hurt again, and of all of the reasons why I am not good enough (but that is a subject for a different post). I don’t think the question of "could this be him" is in itself wrong, but perhaps my point of view is. I’m looking at a guy and what I deem are attractive qualities for what I want in a future husband instead of looking to God. And here come the waves. 

I have no answers for how to not notice someone and how to not develop feelings for someone. This I leave with God and hope that he can show me the answers in time. I do know, however, that what I have done in the past hasn’t worked and it was time for a change.

As difficult as it was to go through failure and heart ache, I think these failures worked in an important way to allow me to finally see that I hadn’t completely given these areas of my life to God, even though I thought that I had. There are certain areas of our lives where God won’t let us succeed unless we give him complete control, and if we insist on doing it our own way, then we haven’t really succeeded, but have settled for less than what God had in mind for us.

I used to think that God had more important things to deal with than to care about something as small as my career and love life. But consider this, if someone loves someone else so much that they are willing to give their life for the person…do you really think there is anything about that person and any part of that person’s life that would not be of interest to the one who sacrificed? How could I possibly think that God would die for me and then not care about my life? The thought even now makes me sad. When I wasn’t getting any answers from God and felt completely alone and lost, I sometimes wondered whether he even cared about me; like a girl sitting at home on a Friday night waiting for a guy to call who clearly has no interest in her. How foolish and ashamed I feel now for thinking that way.

I realized that at the points in my life when it felt like God didn't care and had stopped speaking to me, it was really I who had stopped speaking to him and seeking him first. I had gotten to a point where my spiritual life had become a routine and became stagnant without growth. This is a dangerous place for a Christian to be. I felt like God was far from helping me and felt alone and angry, but really I was far from him. I was not acknowledging him in all that I did...I was doing everything on my own and he was an afterthought. My thoughts and time were consumed with school and career, in themselves not bad things, but they became what I put all of my thoughts and energy into. I really only thought of God when something wasn't going right, which is selfish and immature. He did not have the preeminence in my life. As I started coming back into a personal relationship with God, it was painful, but there cannot be growth without pain. Like when you are a child and your whole body aches from growing pains; it's painful, but necessary. I still don't have any answers and I still have a lot of growing to do, but at least I am looking in the right direction now. 

It is never easy when we need answers to something and we feel like we aren’t getting them. Patience and waiting on the Lord has never been my strong suit. Of course I want what God has planned for me because I know it will be better than anything that I have imagined for myself, but, and here comes the inevitable ‘what if’questions that plague me….what if I have to wait too long? What if I already screwed up too much? Or the scariest 'what if', what if God has called me to a life of singleness to serve him? From my current standpoint as a 26 year old woman that is a scary thought because I have wanted for my entire life to get married, to love someone and be loved in return. And unfortunately, I think that I am too weak to be alone for the rest of my life and be happy with it, even if God is always with me. So what if God plans to give me the ultimate challenge and wants me to find complete happiness and fulfillment in only him? My selfish human brain considers this possibility terrifying. Perhaps as I grow in faith and maturity this could change, or perhaps in my heart of hearts I know the answer.

I can’t be sure if a life of singleness is what has been planned for me or not, but mostly I believe it is not, and here is why. If God knows me better than I know myself and he is aware of all of my needs and desires, I don’t think he would withhold from me forever one of my deepest desire, and I don’t think he would put such a deeply rooted desire in me for marriage if his plan all along was that I stay single. I could be wrong, but I believe that he knows me; he knows what I want and need and he wants me to be happy. He just wants to be involved and be the one writing my story, and he wants to be at the center of that story. 

I may not have really figured anything out yet, but I'm no longer wrestling: my restless heart has found rest in him. And for now, for me, this is enough. Of course this is just a small glimpse into the struggles that I have been going through and it really only scratches the surface, but is what is going on in this ordinary person's not so extraordinary life.