A New Blog

I know, I know.  I'm not the avid blogger that I imagine myself to be.  I always have the best of intentions to be a "real" writer and blog every day...but life and laziness and a million other things get in my way.  So, what should a person who is scarcely an adequate blogger do but start TWO blogs!

I love having an outlet for family and ministry updates, but I've also been looking for a way to blog through a more focused lense, something more my own.  My new blog The INTJ Life: One Woman's View of the World is a response to a blog I posted on "Written Not With Ink" last year called I'm an INTJ Woman and a Freak of Nature.  I got several responses from INTJ women who also felt just a little off center from the rest of the world and then I noticed that I got three times the views of that post than any other.  I knew I was on to something.  There may not be many of us (INTJ women that is) in the world but we sure want to know that we're not the only ones!
So, I'm going to attempt to lead a double blogging life...we'll see how it goes!

A Modern Day Plague

I'm convinced that incompetence is a plague for the modern day.

If we were in the book of Exodus, somewhere between the plagues of frogs and lice, it would read, "And then incompetence swept over the land.  When you couldn't find an item in Walmart, absolutely no one could point you in the right direction.  When you ate at a restraunt your server would inexplicably vanish, leaving you with empty drinks and no E.T.A. on your missing food.  When you tried to navigate the incredibly confusing foster care system, everyone would give you different answers to the same question...that is, if they bothered to call and tell you at all!  And there was gnashing of teeth and tearing of clothes because everyone was frustrated all the time."  Or, something like that.

Lately our journey with said foster care system has included some gnashing of teeth...although we have spared society and left our clothes untorn.  Sometimes I just reach my limit and want to yell in the halls of the court or in the isles of Walmart, "Does anyone give a crap anymore???!!"  I mean, I used to believe people who had jobs knew what they were doing.  Silly me.

Not to be melodramatic, because bad service at a restaurant is annoying but, hey, its not like I'm on the verge of starving.  But, in situations where lives hang in the balance it would be nice to know people knew what they were doing.

Today was supposed to be a big day for our family.  Instead it was frustrating and left us feeling a little shell-shocked.  I am grateful our little guy is yet too young to fully feel the emotional roller coaster like Andrew and I do.  I would never wish to change our journey, because it has brought us Little Man, but it has tested our faith and our character every step of the way.

In the face of such grand incompetence I have been forced to acknowledge two things:  I need more grace and more faith.  I need more grace/love/patience for people around me and I need more faith/trust that the Lord is bigger than any system and He is ALWAYS competent.  When I feel like running through the streets screaming, there is comfort in the knowledge that His timing is always perfect and He will never let me or Little Man down.

I'm so grateful that I don't have to go on this journey alone, because, I might go crazy (or crazier, I guess).  Love you, Andrew, and Happy Anniversary. It wasn't the day we had hoped for, but it was a day that proved God brought us together for a reason and He's not finished with us yet!

What a Savior

I don't always like the songs they play on our local Christian radio station, I mean, I may be a Mom now, but I'm not diggin' the "Mom music."  But every time I think maybe I'll listen to some other station Little Man starts singing along to the current song..."We were made to be courageous...(Casting Crowns)," "O Happy Day, Happy Day, When Jesus washed my sin away...(Fee)," and it makes it all worth it. 

The other night Little Man and I were headed to a Christmas event and Laura Story's "What a Savior" came on the radio.  He started singing along, "Jesus You are stronger/More than any other/Hallelujah what a savior."  I thought, there couldn't be a sweeter sound than my little three-year-old singing off key "hallelujah, what a savior." 

A sense of awe washed over me as I listened to the words, "What a savior."  This year I have to admit I haven't spent a lot of time dwelling on the advent season.  I haven't anticipated the coming of Christ with as much focus...life has just gotten in the way.  But just because I was too distracted to reflect deeply, doesn't take away the profound meaning of Advent and Christmas. 

Sometimes I'm too familiar with the story of a baby in a manger to be shocked by the reality of what God did!  A king, born into poverty.  A king, giving up his throne to be a helpless infant.  To think that even if he was born into the richest home, surrounded by gold and jewels and swaddled in the finest cloth it would be nothing like the glory of heaven.  And he chose to humble himself even further.  What a Savior. 

There's a verse in one of my favorite Christmas songs by Downhere, "How Many Kings" that says, "A child in a manger?/Lowly and small, the weakest of all/Unlikeliest hero, wrapped in his mother's shawl -/Just a child -/Is this who we've waited for?"

The one we have waited for...Jesus.  Not a king by earthly standards, but God, in humble flesh, who came to live and die for us and who will one day return in His full glory for those who believe in Him!

Certainly a cause to celebrate this Advent/Christmas season.  Take a moment in all the holiday rush to dwell on the miracle of Christ and let your heart say, "What a Savior!"

The Red or the Blue Pill

Some days I feel like I'm in the Matrix, not that I have any illusions that I'd look good in all black leather garb, but sometimes I feel so overwhelmed with the shocking and painful reality that the world is steeped in sin (both my own and others') that I wonder how it is even possible go on.  On days like these I wish someone was offering me the blue pill.  I want to gulp it down and return to bed, where I would wake with no knowledge of such painful truths.  It would be the easy way.

But, it is not the better way.  I think truth is the better way, no matter how painful.  Sometimes it is painful because you realize it is your own sin that is jacking up the world around you.  Other times it is the sin of others that is wreaking havoc in our lives and we are powerless to control it.  Either one puts us at a fork in the road.  Do I take the blue pill and ignore my sin?  Do I hope that this drug of complacency can numb me to the pain I feel from others?  Or, do I carefully reach for the red pill and face what God might be trying to reveal to me?  Do I decide to grow in truth whether or not others make that choice?

Clearly, the right answer is the latter choice, but it is by far the most costly.  Death of self is necessary.  Humility and determination are the only weapons we are allowed. 

Yet, sometimes I am tempted to feel that it is hopeless.  But the Lord reminds me that He is a God of restoration.  He can see inside my dark heart and inside the darkness of others' and He knows how to make it right, even if I do not.  And, ultimately, if I give myself to Christ, the joys and the suffering both will lead to being more like Him and being able to accomplish more of His purposes...and that is what the journey is all about.

I Would Like to Take a Moment to Apologize to My Mother

Humiliation.  A screaming child, head thrown back, tears streaking down his face.  People from every dining table looking at us.  I saw no faces as I walked (trying not to run in shame), just a blur of disapproval as I escorted (by escorted I mean grabbed and carried) my child through the restaurant, from the very back of the restaurant mind you, outside to a nice secluded place behind our van where I could administer proper parental attention to such a situation. 

Now any who are concerned at this point in the story, fear not.  No corporal punishment was used, but there surely was corporal punishment going on in my mind.  We had a little "Come-to-Jesus" conversation, in which I expressed my extreme disapproval for his family shaming behavior.

Apparently, our heart-to-heart in the parking lot made an impression.  "Mama, you mad?"  He asked.  Um, yes.  How ever did you pick up on that?

After a bathroom pit stop we headed back.  "Well that was humiliating," I said. "Yep" he quips. Awesome. You have no idea, child.

But, we went back to the table and he ate that freakin broccoli. "Mama angry," he told Andrew.  Thanks, Captain Obvious.

I couldn't really look anyone in the eye after that and felt much better when were able to leave the restaurant and put the whole shameful memory in the past.  However, even now I am feeling some residual second-hand embarrassment.

So, I just want to say sorry, Mom!!  It's my payback time. 

In Need of a Sabbath

Recently God has been speaking to me about renewal.  For a mountain of reasons, which I'm sure many of you could relate to, I have found myself in a desert season.  I've been burned out on ministry and bitter towards people and ultimately wanting to check out for reasons of self preservation.

At a recent retreat with other World Impact missionaries we talked about "Catching the Wave" of what God is doing in ministry: how to do it, what to do when you "wipe out," etc.  I shared with some of the missionaries that I felt like I'd already wiped out, gotten churned up in the wave, ate dirt, and am now laying on the beach, a frazzled mess, and not quite sure what to do next.  The crisis is over, but I'm feeling dazed and confused and unmotivated to jump back in.  Perhaps you can relate. 

I thought if I stepped back and took a little time to recover my energy and equilibrium would return, but instead I've gotten a little more indifferent and definitely more confused.  However, God has started to speak to me through my clouded state...as He often does in His grace.

I've told myself I'm just lazy when I don't apply myself in the Christian disciplines, or said that I just don't care about things anymore...but I think I've been naming things inappropriately, which hasn't allowed me to deal with the root issues.  It hasn't been laziness keeping me from pursuing God, so much as it has been me pulling back because I've been hurt and confused and maybe to some extent I've been blaming God.  And, I certainly care about God's Kingdom and serving in the city, but I've forgotten what I'm passionate about in the midst of trying to do everything and meet every need.

As my desert season has extended beyond the time I thought I could muster up the motivation to carry on, I've realized I just can't do it.  It's not in me, not without it being put there by God.  I always think I have to DO to fix things, but I think God is telling me to stop doing (that's what got me here in the first place) and listen and wait expectantly for the Lord to rain on my dry soul.  Hosea 6:3 puts it like this: "Let us know; let us press on to know the LORD; his going out is as sure as the dawn; he will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth.”

A sermon I listened to recently put all the things God had been speaking to me in perspective.  What I lack in my life is Sabbath.  Sure, I take days off but then I usually try to distract myself from my stress and struggles by plopping in front of the TV, or surfing the internet, or eating, or...the list goes on. But that is not the kind of sabbath God commanded us to observe.  In fact, I rarely ever think about it as a command.  It's not just that I spend more hours of my Sundays trying to "switch off" than seek the Lord, but that I don't have a life set to a rhythm of God's renewal.  I don't have a life fueled by sabbath and yet expect to find rest.  I try to do more, which results in listening less.

We live in a culture that drives us at a frantic pace, it tells us we can do it all.  But, deep down we know life isn't supposed to be like that, it just usually takes a wipe out with a mouth full of dirt for us to stop and acknowledge it. 

So, here I am.  My soul is dry.  But I am expectant.  The Lord will come to me as the the spring rains that water the earth.  There will be renewal.  But I must press on to know the Lord, and structure my life with a rhythm of sabbath. 

Perhaps you too, need more sabbath in your life?  From one dry soul seeking God's renewal to another let me suggest hitting the pause button on life, finding a quiet place and engaging with God.  A good place to start might be with a few songs that have spoken to me lately, and Darrin Patrick's sermon "Jesus & Sabbath":

House of God Forever

Not What My Hands Have Done

Jesus &Sabbath

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures.  He leads me beside still waters.  He restore my soul.

Psalm 23:1-2

Rock Opera in Heaven

I'm not normally much of a concert person.  As an INTJ I usually see concerts like this: You want me to pay what to stand next to a bunch of crazy people all up in my personal space and to hear songs I can listen to for much cheaper (and with more personal space) on a CD?  No thanks.  But, occasionally I break my concert rule when there is an artist whose music has been very meaningful to me...Jeremy Camp, Addison Road, David Crowder.  I can't really think of many others I've paid money to see in the last 10 years.

Recently, because of an unfortunate situation for some of our close friends, we inherited their tickets to the David Crowder Band concert.  I love their music and was looking forward to it, but probably not in the way the original purchasers of the tickets were.  We headed to the concert, anticipating a fun evening out.  The evening did include an awkward and uncomfortably close conversation with an odd lady sitting next to me.  How do you really make those conversations end when the person is sitting almost in your lap?  However, this was not the band's fault so I won't hold it against them.

David Crowder was just as good as I remembered.  Something I love about their music (both in concert and otherwise) is that it exudes a level of joyful praise not often found in other music.  When listening to DCB songs I feel like I'm interjected into a praise session that is contagious.  The concert was no different.

Crowder has an unassuming air, wearing jeans, a baseball cap, and his trademark beard, he led the band in a truly amazing display of God-given musical talent.  Coupling this with the lyrics on screen it made for one awesome worship service.

Halfway through the night, after beginning his song "You are my Joy", Crowder paused and told the audience, "I hope you don't mind, but we have officially entered the rock opera portion of the evening."  He explained, for those of us not really in tune with the music scene, that rock opera is full of dramatic theatrics, with big crescendos and long pauses, shredding guitar solos and songs of epic length.  I'm not really a "rocker" but how can you say no to that?

About five minutes later, with a crowd of people singing "You are my joy!" to guitar solos and an impressively crazed drummer I thought, "There will so be rock opera in heaven."  I have no idea what the extent of heaven will be but sometimes I think we bore ourselves (and others) thinking that in heaven we will stand around singing hymns (I like hymns, but for eternity?) and then maybe take a little walk through the garden...you know, a serene heaven, if not a little blah.  But, in that moment, singing that song, I felt a perfect crescendo of praise to our Father and I thought, surely this is what heaven will be like.  The glory of God is not a staid pursuit I think.  It will take more than any one genre, musical or otherwise, to fully express our praise to God.  And it is only through God that we are given the inspiration of these avenues of praise.

Does it blow anyone else's mind that God, who is the object of our praise, is also the source of our ability to praise?  No good thing that brings God glory is created apart from the breath of God.  That's a humbling thought for those of us who like to "create." 

I think worship in heaven will be one big, rock/rap/dance/folk/country/poetry/jazz/prose... extravaganza, maybe complete with a light show (God is the Father of Light after all).  Our God is a big God, with many ways of expressing His glory...I look forward to experiencing them all in heaven and am grateful when I get little tastes of them here on earth.