There's been some mistake...

See, I'm really only 29. By some magical mistake, though, some friends of mine thought they should throw a 20 year high school reunion tonight. I decided to take pity on all the old people that they are and go. You know, for their sake. So this is in honor of that. And please be jealous of the perm. It's SO fabulous....

Pay me my money!

My nephew taught a 3 year old Zane to say that, and he spent a week going around holding out his hand, yelling at us, "Pay me my money!" It was funny while it lasted, which thankfully, wasn't long.

I've struggled with this whole allowance thing for awhile. Poor Laney. I kept putting it off with her, saying, "I'll get to it. Not yet. Hang in there. I'll get to it..." for years. I wanted to get that whole thing going, but just couldn't figure out what my hold up was.

Finally my sweet girl asked me yet again, and I knew it was time to figure it out. I asked for opinions on Facebook, (hush) and the responses I got were varied and pretty passionate (but totally kind). Seems like money, politics and religion are always things that get people chatting. I liked the responses, and really read and thought about them all, but sadly, nothing there really struck a chord with me. 

I knew without a doubt that I didn't want allowance and chores connected at all. A long time ago, a super wise lady said, "Helping families help each other." Want to ask my kids how many times I quote that to them? My kids do things around the house for the benefit of us all, to honor and glorify God and to show Him that we are thankful and care for what He has blessed us with. (This is hugely convicting to me as I plan my own housekeeping schedule for the school year. How can I teach this to my kids when the house is a wreck?) 

My kids are getting more responsibilities this school year. And it's going to stretch them. But honestly I do need help, and they can step up. I'm careful to thank them and give them appropriate praise, but I don't reward chores. (Or good behavior. I'm so passionate about that. We all obey rules, as unto God, and your reward is the knowledge that you are obeying the most Holy God. No M&M charts here.) 

The one exception is when my kids have twice raised money for mission projects. Then I gave them chores that were usually my chores as a way to earn money. That was great on some many levels. They didn't keep the money, and I got help! But I was not going to do that for usual chores. I knew that. 

Then I thought, in that vein, since my kids liked that, maybe we could have a standing mission project to raise money for. I even considered letting the kids take responsibility for the Compassion Kids we already sponsor for the each of them. They pray for them and write them letters, so why let not let them take over that responsibility?  I don't have a good peace about that, for what ever reason. Maybe I don't want them to resent those kids for "making" them have to do extra chores? I don't know. Still kicking that around.

I also couldn't get around the fact that I wasn't comfortable with the concept of an allowance in the first place. 

I had to ask myself a question. "Why do they need an allowance?"

The resounding response from others has been, "So they can learn to manage their money." 

Really? They need money? 

Uh oh. This is going to get ugly, but as I pondered this endlessly, I couldn't get past that issue. Why give kids money? So they learn to give, spend and save. 

*sigh* 

Okay. I want my kids to give. That's the only stinking reason I can find within my self for earning money. To give it away. (The first person that says the word "shoes" gets punched in the face.) And to care for your family, obviously. But that's the point. The kids don't have to take care of themselves. We do that for them. They do give. They love to give. Really. So I don't want to mess with that.

Spend? Nope. I want to delay as long as possible the correlation that money is meant to be acquired so that it can be spent on tangible goods for ones self. Now I fully get the irony here. I am the WORST at that. Really. Even with Zane's birthday, he got money and we spent it on him. And I know it was his birthday and the givers of that money wanted him to do that. But nowhere did I say, "Hey, buddy, why don't we share this money with Bayan?"  (his Compassion Kid) Why didn't I do that? Because I still have SO much here to learn. Because I'm still trying to undo years and years of bad behavior with money. 

The only reason I can see for my kids getting money to spend is to spend it on "stuff" they want. I hate that. They have enough stuff. (Don't remind me I have enough shoes. I'm sensitive. I might cry.) And we do buy them "stuff" occasionally, but honestly they rarely ask for it. (Okay, fine. When they go to Target, it's like they've never EVER seen a toy, and the purchase of a toy is all that stands between them and certain death. Mainly the little one, but all of them to a degree. And we do love the Dollar Spot. *sigh*) I try to limit commercials to try to help with this. I don't know. We do talk so much about stuff and how we just don't need any more. 

Ugh. I'm getting bogged down just trying to get all that out.

Save. Here's where the firestorm will start. I hate saving. I have for years. And years. Yes, we do have two savings accounts. And one of them recently got wiped out due to Laney's curriculum and "the weekend." (And the other is in danger at the present time also.) And yes, that makes makes me panic a bit, which further shows me that I'm not fully dependent on Christ. But I don't save for college. (They'll get scholarships or work to pay for their own college. If I were a millionaire, that would still be the case. I have about 15 reasons for that, if you're interested.) We don't save for retirement. Is God going to stop providing for me at some miraculous age? (That's a whole other post too...)  I just can't find a scriptural reason to save tons of money. (The "being a good steward" doesn't cut it with me.) Especially when you're 6. Unless you want to save it up and then give it all away.

Good grief.

I'm not even making sense to myself. :)

So I bounced all this around in my head. And I wanted so badly to hear another human say, "Oh, I agree." Because I'm weak and selfish that way. 

And then it happened. 

I was talking to a friend whose upbringing I really respect. I asked her about allowances when she was growing up and she responded, "Oh, we didn't get allowances. We didn't need them." I squealed, at least on the inside. (I didn't want to scare her.) She elaborated and literally expressed everything I had been thinking in my head.

Now I totally get the danger of searching out people who just back up what you are already thinking, but honestly, that's not my MO. I absolutely love finding someone who thinks differently than me, and then arguing the heck out of a subject, so I can learn. (Don't I sound like the most magnificent friend? No, I don't do this all the time. Just with the people who will play with me this way. I do like to talk about things my friends and I agree on, but not as much:) ) 

In this instance, though, it was the Holy Spirit that had put these things deep in me, and because they seemed so much to go against the norm, I really wanted someone to echo what I was feeling on the inside, purely for selfish reasons. And I feel good about all of this now. No allowances.

When my kids do "need" money, I'll be there, to help them. When they get jobs, and responsibilities, I'll teach them. It won't be "too late." And here's my conviction. Where there is privilege and no responsibility, disaster occurs.  Being given money is a privilege, especially if you look around our world and see the poverty in it. Why were we born in this prosperous country? Why will my kids not know hunger or thirst? Why will they never be with out health care? Why will they never really want for any basic necessity? It's a privilege to have money, and until my kids can fully grasp that concept, they won't manage any money. 

I'm so desperate to raise children who solely have the thoughts and will of God in their hearts. In the midst of a country full of capitalism and the pursuit of the dollar and the white picket fence, I want my kids to get it. Really get it. And until they are fully ready to get it, I'l teach them, from the Word and the Spirit, about money, without having actual money. Does it seem weird and hard? Yes. Have you met Jesus? Do any of His ways seem easy? No. And I'm glad.

Am I preaching to myself here? yes. (WHO keeps saying the word "shoes" to me? Stop it!) I'm so horrible at this. And I'm begging God to continue to reform me in this area. Begging. And He is. 

Really, it's no big deal that I don't, and won't, give my kids an allowance. It's just another way where God as said to ME and ME alone to do this. If God is telling you to give your kids $20 a week, then rock on with that obedience to Him. We are each raising radically different children, and our Father is teaching us how to raise those kids, so we walk in obedience to that Voice. Each one of us. That's why our parenting styles look so differently from each other. Our kids are unique. Apart from what Scripture instructs all of us, what we do with and for our kids is as weird as our own kids are. (Mine are super weird.) That's why you can't compare or contrast. That's why we keep our eyes on Christ and walk in obedience to what HE says, even when it looks so SO different from what others are doing or what the world is doing.

Whew. I feel better. I felt like I needed to justify to the world why my kids don't get an allowance. :) Very simply, it's because God said so. For us. 

And I didn't buy any shoes this week. So there. 

Make your outsides match

This one is painfully honest. Not one I really wanted to write, but I’ve so realized especially lately that so many are struggling in some of the same ways. When I’m too quiet and don’t share the hard stuff, I feel like I’m withholding an opportunity to provide someone with an “I’m not the only one” moment. And sometimes, that’s all you need. To know that you’re not the only one.

I’ve never really struggled with anxiety. Surely nothing to do with me or how great (or not) I am, it’s just not something that physiologically I ever dealt with.

Yep. You saw it coming. Until now.

*sigh* I get it. I really do. Maybe this is another thing for me to experience so that I’ll be able to I say to someone, “I know how you feel…” and I’ll really mean it. Whatever the reason, it’s not fun.

I had a moment last week when I actually thought, “Okay, which doctor do I call to ask for some meds.” It was like an out of body experience. Me, the girl who doesn’t even like to take ibuprofen. I don’t think I would have actually called, because the fact is, I’m more scared of meds than I am of anything else I would deal with. But the fact that I even thought that was a bit of a… surprise.

It was like my body was telling my brain that we had some issues we needed to address. I’m usually an “ignore it and it will go away” kind of person. If you just stay busy enough, everything will right itself. 

This philosophy has served me well at times and been destructive at others.

Notwithstanding all that, I knew that I needed to do something. Or at least admit that I needed to admit that I felt, um… stressed. To say the least. This actually went beyond stressed, but I’m not up for describing it in it’s entirety.

But come on. What human doesn’t? The more I talk with people, the more I realize that this isn’t unusual. We all have big stuff going on. I’m too tired to even list all that we deal with. It’s just huge, big and giant stuff that seems to overshadow everything else in life.

So the bottom line, before I draw out this post and further avoid all that I need to be doing, is this:

I don’t need meds. (And I’m not going to open that statement up for discussion.) I am dealing with more anxiety than I have ever dealt with in my life. So what to do?

Here’s where it is for me. You know that movie with Sandra Bullock, “28 Days”? Where she goes to rehab? (Hush. That’s not where this is going either.) During treatment they have to learn to pick up a horses’ hoof. I’m not sure exactly why. Go watch it and let me know. The point is this: At the end of the movie, she’s picking up a horses’ hoof, and someone asks her why. She responds with the statement that she’s just trying to make her outsides match her insides. (And yes, I had to watch it on Netflix instant streaming so I’d get the quote right.) So this is the silly quote that rang around in my head the rest of last week.

What could my outsides do that will make my insides feel better?

The things that I know make me whole. (You know I’m serious when I start bullet pointing thing.)

• Getting up early and spending quiet time in the Word.
• Exercise, which also provides quiet time in prayer, reflection on the Word, and praise.
• More prayer
• More praise
• Meditating on Scripture. Saying it over and over again. Praying scripture. Keeping my Bible open, rereading it all through out the day.
• Things that are productive - ie. Getting the house clean and organized.

My point is that my insides don’t want to do any of that stuff. My insides want to stay up late watching tv, sleep late, play on the computer all day and eat tons of unhealthy food. That’s how my flesh wants to deal with stress. I know by now, now that I’m old, that those aren’t the ways to deal with anything.

Those things make the anxiety worse. And then they pile guilt on top of everything else.

So since I can’t depend on my fickle insides, it’s up to the outside of me to be responsible. Do the things that I know are healthy for me. Not give in to the fleshly ways to deal with the hard. The difficult. The things that make me want to get outside of my skin. You know, those.

As Christ helps along my outsides, my insides will follow. (They don’t have a choice.) And then, whether or not I feel like doing what’s right, since my bossy outsides are doing the right things, and making good choices, perhaps my insides will get on board.

Because really, we (my inside and my outside) have too much important stuff to do to be all mired down and wallowing in stress and anxiety. I think (and here’s where you sound the crazy alarm) that maybe Satan just wanted to try this out on me to see whether or not it could get to me. And it did. But I’m learning to deal with it so that it won’t be a weapon in his arsenal anymore. Or at least not a very effective one.

I so don’t even want to post this. I’d rather write a post about cute shoes. I’m resisting the urge to delete this one and replace it with an entire post about shoes. I won’t though, because it’s important. And the next post is going to be worse than this one. I’m really looking forward to that one. *insert sarcasm*

My outside is off to clean the bathroom. My insides will probably sit here for another hour, or four.

Thoughts on the "weekend"

That’s how it will be known from now on. “The weekend.” 

I’ve thought a lot about what all I did wrong during that weekend. Determined to learn from it all, I’ve thought a lot about it all the last couple of days. 

I tried to sweep the last of the glass up from the drive way today, and instead of sweeping it up, the broom just kind of scattered it. I was reduced to picking up every single shard from the concrete. In the heat. I was not happy. I’m sure there is some huge spiritual connotation there, but really, I just thought about how much of a mess one simple little accident caused. 

You know, kind of like sin.

I know that I’m stubborn. I’ve been told that by no less that 1.3 million people. I also think I can do anything I put my mind to. Obviously that doesn’t always work out. I think that’s why I hated this all so much. Rarely does my determination backfire. That’s a pride issue, for sure, but I know my stubbornness and drive do come in handy from time to time. I think the key is the wisdom to know when to stand strong and when not to.

Okay. That.

I also lost my joy. That’s been the hardest thing. At one point, after a brief lecture from my husband about keeping a good attitude, I retorted with a pretty crude comeback, to which he responded, “I see we still have our sense of humor…” Um, whatever. I didn’t even care that I had a bad attitude. And I quickly lost my sense of humor. I’ve apologized to God and asked Him to forgive me. Oh the illusive joy. Why do you escape me so?

I read something in my study time this morning that really rocked me. It was about Amos (yes, I know I’m behind. Hush.) and the statement was basically that we as Christians don’t want to go to Heaven to finally see our Savior’s face as much as we want to leave here and escape all the turmoil. 

I was taken back by that. When do I express a longing for Heaven mostly? Why when things are hard here. When things are oppressive, hard, neverending heavy issues surrounding every waking moment. Then I say, “THAT’S IT.” Take me home.

Never in the midst of a perfectly wonderful day, or a wonderful time, do I say, “Enough, Lord. Take me home.” 

The closest I come to it is when I truly spend time in praise and worship, and then I really just feel the inescapable urge to see His face. But then I remember all the people that don’t know Him, and I want to stay a little long, no matter how hard it is, to try to help reach them. For Him.

So how does this tie into my weekend? I read this a bit ago, and it stung a bit:

“For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin- real life. But there was always some obstacle in the way, something to
be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time still to be
served, or a debt to be paid. Then life would begin. At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life.”~Alfred D. Souza         

To me, it’s a sad commentary on life. The life without the joy of Christ. But even with Christ, which one of us has the perfectly wonderful, blemish free life? I don’t know those people. 

The goal of my heart is to live through the struggles, through “the weekends” and through all that life brings and give Him glory and praise. To be wise in the viewing of the situation. To be thankful for the chance to suffer. 

(Of course I read Romans 5 Monday. Accidentally, of course. Who wants to read that right after “the weekend”? More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, ⁴and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, ⁵and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. Romans 5:3-4)

But also I want to purposely express my desire to see my Father and my Savior face to face. Of course, when I was walking this morning, this precious old hymn came on. I love that my church sings hymns from time to time. I wish we sang them more. I adore them, and hate that this particular one seems to be limited to funerals more than anything. It was this verse of “It is Well with my Soul” that made my heart soar this morning:

“And Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight,
The clouds be rolled back as a scroll;
The trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend,
Even so, it is well with my soul.”

I mean, come on!!! That will encourage the heart that’s down trodden. Even the one that’s had a “weekend.” 

Yep, even that one.

And How Was Your Weekend?

I hate complaining. 

 

I really do. 

 

I’m totally okay with sharing your heart about a difficult circumstance, situation or incident, but I don’t like whining or sniveling. I really try to avoid it in all my “social media,” but I do realize that I fail and whine miserably sometimes.

I read something a while back on Twitter, and it made me really mad. I wanted to blog it out, but it was one of those that got away. The person Tweeted something along the lines that we have done a great job of making caricatures of ourselves (online, I mean). Since I try to avoid a lot of negativity, what kind of Pollyanna caricature have I made of myself? I think maybe I’ve done a bit of a disservice too, because twice in the last couple of weeks people have made wildly inaccurate statements about me and my life. I was shocked, really. I thought, “Oh gosh, have I put that kind of pseudo-perfection aura out there?” Those that know me well probably just snorted out loud. There is not one shred of perfection anywhere near me. Christ is and remains the only good thing about me.

Anyway, I think I’m rather self deprecating and honest. Maybe I’m not so. Maybe with the attempt to be positive, I’ve created a caricature of myself. Or maybe not.

I definitely have the rambling thing down pat. (And the overthinking thing too.)

I said all that to say that I really do hate to complain. And I’m really not complaining here. I think I’m processing. Outwardly. Again. And being honest.

 

No Pollyanna here.

I was really excited about doing Vacation Bible School this week. I love kids, I miss being with them and I love this sort of thing. I was pretty busy last week getting everything done so that this week could be just VBS, and that’s it. Saturday was a day that I was just going to finish up the last minute stuff. 

 

Things were going along so very well, until about 3 o’clock.

A few weeks ago the hydraulics on the van’s back lift quit working. I was fine with using my vice grips to hold the door open, being the country girl that I am. (fine. used to be) I knew I’d be using the van a lot this week, and I really needed that door to work. I was super proud of myself, since last week, I went to two different auto parts stores and found the parts I needed. Allen said he’d help me replace them, and I assured him that I’d been told that it was a really easy job.

So. As I was in the garage waiting for Allen to finish up what he was working on and come outside, I decided to go ahead and get a jump start on our project. I was simply poking around, looking for where I needed to unscrew the lifts from the body of the van, when the lift popped off the van and the door smashed down. I partially got myself out of the way just as the door slammed down, tearing the vice grips off the prop, causing the back windshield to smash. Into a million pieces. At least.

I spare you all the details, but I spent a good hour in the floor of the kitchen sobbing. I couldn’t believe it. My arm was in bad shape and I had a few cuts here and there from the flying glass. My mom came and looked at my arm, and we all decided to wait until Monday to go see the doctor. She brought me a wrist support thingie, and after she wrapped it up, I had to face the facts that my arm might really be broken.

I’ve never had a broken anything. So break an arm now? 

 

Oh, did I mention it was my right hand? 

 

Yeah, it was.

I fell apart a bit. I was mad. At myself. I was mad at the stupid van. The van I didn’t even want. My old van never would have tried to cut me in half. It’s back door worked fine. (Yes, ten other things on it were broken, but that back door was in perfect shape.) I was mad because I realized again how much I hate accidents, because they are things I have no control over. I really hate that. I could not fathom how I was going to spend six weeks in a cast. I was not happy. And I knew that now I couldn’t do VBS. I didn’t know how long it would take to get the van fixed. I didn’t know if my arm was broken. I was mad about that. 

 

I really wanted to do VBS.

Sunday I managed to get myself ready for church with my left hand. (Try brushing your teeth with your left hand. Go ahead. Try. Unless you’re left handed, in which case you should try with your right hand.) We also had our small group get together after church. I was excited about that, aside from it being *outside,* but I was dreading having to fess up to my impulsiveness almost killing me. It was, in fact, fine. Another lady there had broken her arm, and we laughed talking about all the things it’s impossible to do with one hand, never mind using the left hand for everything. 

 

It was good to spend time with our small group, too, which I love dearly.

After our get together, we piled back into Allen’s car, hot, sweaty and ready to get home. We were all cranky, and even though I mostly have pretty great kids, smashing them in the back of Allen’s car brings out the very worst in them. We had to go pick up a new phone for Allen. 

 

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that. His “everything that has to do with work in the whole world is on this phone” phone quit working on Saturday. 

 

Before the Big Disaster. 

 

So we had to go get a new phone.

As we come out of the phone place, we pile our hot sweaty selves back in the car, and the car. won’t. start. I’d love to say that we dissolved into a fit of “what else can happen this weekend?” laughter. But we didn’t. 

 

The kids and I paced up and down the hot, sweaty sidewalk while some kind soul came and jumped us off.

And then we went home and had a great rest of the day. Right? N.o.p.e.

As we came to a stop sign a couple of block from the house, the car just quit. Stopped. Turned off. Refused to turn over. Just clicking noises.  And there was still no “haha can you believe this?” laughter.

 

I actually would have most liked being able to say, chop some wood, at that point. 

 

Or sledgehammer some old drywall in a remodeling project. 

 

Or use a punching bag for the first time in my life.

A nice man with a mullet pulled up to help us. Now I include that little factoid because I actually admire a man who can rock a mullet. Nothing says, “I don’t care what the world thinks, I wear my hair the way I want to” like a mullet. 

 

It would be like me rocking out some Mom Jeans. (Go ahead and Google it. ) Or some retro 90’s hair. Or something like that. So I like mullets. I admire the men who wear them proudly. I could use a dose of “I don’t care what you think, I’m wearing this.” 

 

No actually, maybe I have enough of that…

So anyway, Jay, aka Mr. Mullet, gets out in the blazing heat and tries so hard to get us jumped off. He tried for a good fifteen minutes. Finally he and Allen decide to push the car out of the way and Jay would take us home. 

 

We pile in the back of the Blazer he drove and Jay apologized for not having any air (which he really hated, since he was remodeling a house right around the corner and he’d been driving around a bit and it was weird because he saw two girls broken down just yesterday right where we were, since he passes by there every day on this way from the house he’s remodeling and he used to run motorcross but he didn’t know anything about those bikes, he just had mechanics, which is weird, since he knows a pretty good bit about cars, but he drove those motorcycles a long time ago and didn’t all this land used to be dairy farm land? He could have sworn it was, but he couldn’t be sure since he moved to Panama City in 1995 and just had to move back because of the economy and…) 

 

Did I mention we were only about 1/100th of a mile from home? As we pull up on front of the house, Jay side swiped our mail box, and Allen said later had our mail box gone flying across the yard, he would have been convinced that we were firmly intrenched in the midst of a Chevy Chase movie.

 

Thankfully the mailbox swayed but held firm. 

 

Sweet Jay was still talking as we piled out of his Blazer. 

 

I briefly thought that Jay might be lonely, and I hoped he knew Jesus. 

 

He was the kindest stranger I’d met in a while.

Allen called a wrecker service, climbed into our hoopty of a van with no rear window and went off to meet the wrecker. Luckily there is a garage literally next to our neighborhood (paints a nice picture, doesn’t it? I promise, it’s not as bad as it sounds) so the towing bill wasn’t too *coughcough* bad. 

 

Ironically the mechanic was at the shop doing something random, so Allen got to talk to him. He promised to get on it first thing Monday morning. 

 

(My contribution to help this whole situation was just getting in the bed, pulling the covers up to my eyeballs and watching old episodes of “Wipeout.”)

I don’t think I’ve ever been so ready for a weekend to be over. 

 

Allen wryly said it was all because he was actually home on a weekend. 

 

I sweetly asked him if he minded going back to work so we could avoid any additional drama. 

 

Against my better judgement, I decided not to go back to bed at 7 pm to thwart anymore catastrophe. We watched “Book of Eli,” which was good, and I made it to bed with no more issues. 

 

Whew.

Monday was as full of promise as the last two days had been of turmoil. Allen’s car was a quirky issue that was easy to fix, so that was good. My arm turned out not to be broken, which is most awesome. I did have a briefly awkward moment with the nurse, though, who just before she began taking the x-rays of my arm asked if I was going to have any more children. I just looked at her blankly, completely unable to answer that question. As I stumbled around, trying to think of why in the world that question threw me so, she quipped, “Let’s just tie this lead apron around your waist and protect those eggs just in case, shall we?” 

 

It was one of those moments where a thousand thoughts flew into my head at the exact same time. The first thought that squeezed itself into first place was, “Do you have a lead apron to wrap around my head? I do use my brain, believe it or not…” 

 

Why was she only worried about my ovaries? 

 

Does radiation not affect my beating heart too? Oh, anyway…

The arm’s not broken. Only bruised. Which is a miracle straight from God.

 

I did hesitate when the doctor asked me if I wanted any pain meds. (I’m kidding, Mom.) I said no. He did say that he wished he could write a note to our insurance company and tell them that we’ve met some sort of magical deductible with him these last two months. 

 

Wishful thinking.

 

Good thing I covered up those ovaries. I may need to sell them to pay all these medical bills…

The van also now has new glass in it too. That’s good. And I drug my mother out with me yesterday to replace the hydraulic lifts that caused all this mess in the first place. 

 

She was less than excited.

 

I think her exact words were, “Did you not learn what God was trying to teach you the first time this didn’t work out?” I shushed her and sure enough, we replaced the dang things. I made me more mad at how easy the whole thing was. 

 

Or should have been.

So that leaves me with what do I learn from all this? 

 

What the heck is the take away?

 

I cannot let this weekend go without learning at least ten things. I’m going to ponder this and come back tomorrow.

I did literally almost snicker out loud at the bank Monday morning, when the unsuspecting bank teller pertly asked, “And how was your weekend?” I sufficed with a quick, “Oh, fine. How was yours?”

 

I should send her the link to this post.

And oh, and if you made it through this whole thing, you get a prize. Seriously. You are awesome.

A grungy christian -Part 2

So the challenge was, for a bit, to get comfortable with what I had spent a decade doing. The temptation was to sweep it under a run and pretend it didn't happen. 

That was kind of hard to do. Even with church. As I had left church, we dressed up, sang hymns, had an invitation and two services on Sunday.

When I came back, people wore jeans, we sang songs from an overhead that weren't in a hymnal, there was no invitation, one service, and *gasp* people drank coffee in church. It was weird, but, okay. I can hang with this. 

Not so easy to again identify with the people there. I wasn't like them. It was disconcerting, to say the least. By God's grace, I made friends. Good friends. Sister-type friends.

That was good. And they really didn't care that the fact that I had once been white cardigan and pink nail polish but it had faded to leather and black nail polish. Now I was some sort of odd concoction of the both of them. 

That was good. The acceptance, I mean.

As I pondered this all yesterday, I had a strange thought. I wonder if my insistence on being {dressing and otherwise} different is a way of separating myself from those "normal" Christians. Eh, that's probably a stretch, but I guess part of me thinks that if I put on Dockers and Sperrys or a linen sundress and sensible shoes, someone might mistake me for a person that didn't have a decade of debauchery. 

And I know there's a fine line here. I certainly don't want to advertise my plethora of sins. I don't want to encourage bad behavior. That's not true. I don't want to encourage sin. So I'm still trying to find the fine line between honesty and making people feel uncomfortable.

It kind of happened last week. There were a bunch of us singing some song I didn't know. Something about "My Father's House." I took issue with the song because it insinuates that in Heaven, there will be football. I looked at my friend, incredulously, and said, "I was assured that there would in fact be NO football in Heaven." 

He laughed and commented that he couldn't believe that I hadn't heard that song before. "It's from the 90's..." he said. 

"Oh, that explains it," I replied. "I was too busy dancing on bars to know anything about that."

He raised his eyebrows and appraised me slightly, trying to decide of I was serious or not. I didn't push it. No need to. But it's true. I'm probably not going to get any jokes or references to anything 90's-DC Talk, Rich Mullins, Michael English (I had to Google and see who he was and what happened to him)  and I'm sure there is more. I'm slightly caught up on Rich Mullins, which is a great thing.

The flip side, though, is what got me started on all this. I opened the door slightly on what I've been through with a friend recently, and she unleashed with a flood of confession, feelings and desperate pleas for prayer. I was quite taken back, since I wasn't sure exactly how my tale of my past was going to be received. It provided her with some sort of reassurance that I wasn't going to judge or condemn her. Um, yeah, I'm really not going to do that. I'm going to take us always back to Scripture, but that's it. It was precious, though, for me to see this in action. I think it makes me feel "safe."

So I've continued to ponder how to continue on in this. To be used most fully by Christ, for the spread of His gospel and glory. To use it all, so that it won't be a waste. I know that it wasn't God's will, that time spent away from Him, but I also know that it made me who I am-able to identify with those that others would not. Not that this makes me better than some other Christ follower out there making a difference. Just different. 

I'm not proud of those years, but I'm also learning not to be ashamed of them. Not promote them, but humbly tell of God's great rescue of me. Not make people feel comfortable about them, but felt reassured by my experiences. And listen, those years make me very secure in my walk with Christ. I've been out there, and I don't want to go back. I've lived not seeking His face, and I honestly don't have a desire to ever be there again. I lived through it once. That's enough.

So maybe I need to take my friend's advice and just file all this under "Grace" and be done with it. But that still doesn't feel right. I don't want to chew over this forever, but I'm determined to use it. How ever He leads. 

I still prefer my black nail polish to frosty pink,  but I do have a cashmere sweater. And it's black. :) 

A grungy Christian

"She was the kind of girl who wore white cashmere cardigans and frosted pink nail polish..." 

It was my junior year in high school. We were on choir tour, on our way to Houston, Texas, by way of churches in Mississippi and Louisiana. We spent a lot of time on a bus. Tons. It was worth it. It was the first time , and only, so far, I got to visit New Orleans. I think it was the last time I've been west of Alabama, actually. *sigh* 

Being the book worm I am, my best friend and I spent most of that time on the bus reading. I'll never forget something my friend read aloud to me- Something so small and seemingly insignificant at the time. I don't recall the book even. But it stuck in my head... After she read the above sentence to me, she literally exclaimed with pride, "Amy, that's us!" Ha. It was, too. I was firmly in the midst of my run as a "good girl."

And that run would last a bit longer. But not much.

Where did I go wrong? That's another post for another time. Where I am today is learning how to live with those bad choices and see how they fit into my walk with Christ now.

See, here's the thing. I made some bad decisions. Like 7 year's worth. I normally just call it the "decade of debauchery" because that feels right. It was a time where I hedonistically lived how I wanted to. It wasn't pretty.

Since I've come home to my Father's open embrace, so much like that prodigal son, I've wrestled with where to shelve that decade. In the "live and learn" section of life? In the "eternal regret" section? Or in the "ministry opportunities" section? Much like a favorite book, I take the book of the shelf, from one section, hold it, flip through it and then shelve it in a different section.

It can be exhausting. 

I had a conversation about all this with a preacher friend, and his response was, "Grace is a fix all." 

That was it. It made me kind of mad. I spend 7 years out of the will of God and you want to repair it with "Grace is a fix all?"

Huh. And no. I mean, kind of. But not really. It's not that easy for me. Right or wrong.

I promised God that I wouldn't apologize for those years any more. I didn't want to cheapen the forgiveness found there. But I'm still remorseful. I still hate it. I still wish I could have stayed "good" - You know, gone to a Christian college, married my first boyfriend without having ever kissed him, had a baby straight away, all the while serving in the church nursery. 

Or something like that.

But here is where I ended up yesterday, in the solitude of my van with the "Eclipse" soundtrack blaring:

Was it in God's plan for me to fail miserably for a decade? Nope. Is He going to use it now? Yep. In a huge way. 

I was on the way to the doctor, for strep. The illustrious strep that has chased my family in circles for a month now. So I was on the way to the doctor, and what I really wanted was a doctor who knew what strep was, how bad it feels and how to make it better. A doctor that had experienced strep, so he'd feel the urgency to heal it. 

Not a doctor who had never had it and but had read about it and knew how to heal it.

Small difference, but huge.

Maybe that's a bad analogy, but it's all I could come up with in my sickly haze. 

So here it is. As the view of God's plan for ministry for me starts to barely come into focus around the edges, I see a bit of where this is going to fit in.

I don't have the power to heal, obviously, but I can point to the One who does heal. Because He healed me.

more tomorrow...