I get down, He lifts me up...

"This valley is so deep, I can barley see the sun, I cry out for mercy Lord, and You lift me up again!" I so enjoy Audio Adrenaline. I actually like a whole lot of Christian bands, but this just happens to be the song I'm listening to right now (titled "Get Down" for those that are curious).

Gosh, where to start on what God has been showing me and teaching me lately. I'll start out by saying that I will not make a sweeping generalization, because the only person I know how anything feels like is me, so if this speaks to your heart, praise the Lord! If it doesn't, then maybe this will expand your thinking and bring someone else to mind!

So, when I am purposeful about getting in the Word, spending time in silence (mind and mouth silence - hard to do - trust me - I know) just listening for God to speak into me, praying, and being in community with other believers (not just the kind you pass in the hallway at church on your way to Mi Cocina or McDonalds), I grow....A LOT. This is why it is sometimes hard for me to post a blog because I don't know what to say or how to express what God has impressed on my heart.

Frankly, I also pray before posting so I can make sure that my words are salt and light and not death and destruction.

So tonight a thought occurred to me that may offend some, but, well, "In this world you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world." John 16:33. That's something my son learned and memorized from church. I LOVE that he is doing scripture memorization! It encourages me to learn with him! It also helps him hide God's Word in his heart for those times of trouble!

On with it then. "Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will." Romans 12:2 - NIV(1984). A thought occurred to me as I was churning on this tonight. How EASY is it for non-believers to blend in with this world. And how pitifully hard it is for Jesus seeking people to move through this world. Impacting this world for God's glory (and trying to figure out how to not take credit for every good thing in our lives - something that ever Christian I know struggles with - even if it is once every ten years or so ;) )

God asks His people to not conform to the patterns of this world. What are the patterns? (Forgive me if I side-step some hot button current affairs in this list): Vulgarity, addiction, obesity, self-centeredness, judgmental attitudes, self-serving attitudes (maybe goes along with self-centered?)....and the list goes on. As a Christian, I am called to be selfless, loving, caring, and be salt and light to the world around me. One by one, God is so very graciously working my addictions out of me. I don't hardly drink (and I no longer find any fun in being drunk), I have not smoked in 5 months and a 1 day as of today (!!!!), I have overcome the cycle of loneliness, and God is working on a list of other things with me, but today I feel more hopeful than I think I ever have in those other things.

Why? Because last night I came to realize that I don't have to be ashamed for my shortfalls. I'm not ashamed because I am finally opening my eyes nice and wide to the fact that I HAVE faults and that God loves me enough to work through them with me...and that He is PATIENT. I also realize that shame isn't from God. It's not. Shame is from the enemy that wants to keep rubbing my face in the same excrement to remind me, "Remember what you did?" "Remember those horrible things you said?" "God can't love someone like you that has all these faults, that has done all these things." "Remember what that person did to you? How can you forgive them??"

No, shame and regret are not emotions from God. How do I know? Because God loves. Above all, He is love. I'm not saying that God isn't vengeful, because, OH BOY - I have read most of the Old Testament as well as most of the New Testament and I have a very healthy fear of God's vengeance (especially when it comes to willfull sinning), but I have seen too many things work out in my life to be anything but grateful for God's grace and love for me. I can't deny it. Had I gotten what I deserved, I certainly wouldn't be sitting where I am with the son that I have and the things that I have and the amazing friends that I have. Because I don't deserve ANY of it. Having this realization, "things" have started having less and less hold on me. I'd rather just have the bare necessities, knowing that others were able to have because of my giving it up.

I guess I've started worshiping the Creator over the created. :) God gives us stuff because He knows that stuff makes us happy. This fallen world just perverts it into making idols out of "stuff" and distracting us from God's good, pleasing and perfect will.

"A big big house, with lots and lots of room. A big big table, with lots and lots of food. A big big yard, where we can play football. A big big house...It's my Father's house." I love that I am ending this post on this song. Another Audio Adrenalin song at that! ("Big House"). I love that I serve a God that loves. A God that extends Grace. A God that is patient. A God that wants only His good and perfect name to be glorified, and not a fallible human to be glorified.

God bless each of you my friends!

Comparisons

As I sit here and contemplate something God just opened my eyes to recently, I wonder if I have done a post about this in the past. I'll have to go back and look later. I don't want that post (if one does, in fact, exist) to alter this one. I have recently discovered that I went from comparing myself physically (which, to some extent, I still do) to other people, to comparing myself spiritually to those in my small group. Why do I do that? I think it's just human nature, and it is also because I look up to those in my group. I adore each of them and they make me want to be a better person, to grow my faith, but then something this morning kind of altered that. I was talking to one of my friends (whom also happens to be my son's mentor) while we were waiting for my son's Kindergarten Award ceremony to being, and he was sharing with me what was going on in his world and I was thinking, "Oh my goodness, should I be doing the same thing?!?" And that's when the thought occurred to me: Why am I comparing myself and my spiritual growth and spiritual walk to flawed human beings? I love each of them like I have loved few others in my life, but they are, for all intended purposes, wonderfully flawed and beautifully made that way. I then started asking myself: Well, if you shouldn't put compare yourself to them, who SHOULD you compare yourself to? Well, the honest answer is quite easy: Jesus. I say this with a lot of weight behind it. Some people may read this and think that I hope to achieve perfection. I don't. I'm flesh and blood and born in sin and will die a sinner, but a reformed sinner, someone who is, hopefully, striving to get the sin out of my life every day. Some days I will fail. Other days I will fail miserably. And I will have some victories mixed in there as well, but I strive to not let my sin go unchecked because I have seen what that does and, well, let me just say that you will never know the hurt that your sin can cause in others if left unchecked and free to grow. So, today, I am making a concerted effort to not compare myself to anyone other than what Jesus did while He was here. And every day I pray that my life will be a bright shining beacon for the lost and the seeking, reflecting God's grace, because I can honestly say that where I am in life now is ONLY because of God's grace, and not because of anyone else or anything that I have done. All for Him - Brandy

No Duty To Sin

Okay, let me kind of recap what I have been up to the last couple of months. God has been helping me discover things about myself and my life that I needed to remove so I could have a more authentic relationship with Him. One of those things - well, I guess this is less like showing me what I need to remove (which He has already helped me through), but more of a refinement of that lesson. The lesson I am talking about is loneliness. For...gosh...probably since puberty, I went through seasons of feeling lonely. If I was with someone when this season hit, it always spelled trouble for the relationship. The guy was never good enough. He could have been the most amazing and giving and sensitive guy on the planet, and he couldn't "fix" me. When it got bad enough, when the pressure of me making the poor guys perform to make me happy coupled with their feelings of inadequacy collided, well, the relationship ended and it was usually quite poorly. Related to this, something came across my mind yesterday - much thanks to John Piper. In this sermon, he stated, “Sin is what you do when your heart is not satisfied with God. No one sins out of duty. We sin because it holds out some promise of happiness. That promise enslaves us until we believe God is more to be desired than life itself.” (you can find the sermon here: http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/sermons/no-one-will-take-your-joy-from-you Can anyone say PROFOUND?!?!? Seriously, I stopped sewing, rewound it, and listened again...and then again. And then I wrote it down. Now, since this is still very fresh in my brain, I may not expand on it all that well, but I'm going to give it a shot anyway. What is sin? Anything that takes your affections away from God. Food, sex, drugs, alcohol, video games, sleep, friends, family (yes, I said it), movies, sports, clothes, makeup, cars, partying, working out, laziness, money, jobs, volunteering, people pleasing....there are probably just as many to list as there are people that exist, these are just the ones that come to mind immediately. Let me take an example from my own life: Being in a relationship. Okay, God made us relational people. He created Adam, but Adam being alone wasn't good, so God created a helpmate, Eve. And things were perfect, and then they weren't. Some people in the Bible (take Paul for example) were meant to be alone. Not that they were ALONE alone, because they were relational to other people on a non-romantic level, but they were alone in the relationship department. And they were satisfied with that because they could serve the Lord without hindrance. Now, that is the right way to look at not being in a relationship. And then there is me who went through seasons of loneliness because I saw that I was alone and I felt like my "situation" (aka: my LIFE) was broken. For three months, God took me through my past and was gracious enough to show me why men in the past RAN FOR THEIR LIVES from me. Seriously, I can't say that I blame them after examining my past behavior. Needy, empty, and broken. Kind of like a train wreck with less steel involved. But then He did something even more amazing. He showed me that my life without the circumstances DOES MATTER! That I have a life that doesn't revolve around anyone or anything! And He even showed me how the life I have is beneficial. I don't have to ask for permission to quilt, I don't have anyone else to make plans for me, I don't have to deal with the finances of two people, the stresses of two people, cleaning up after more people, cooking for more people, the dreaded "in-law's", etc... I quilt when I am able (which is fairly frequently), I only have to clean up after my son and I, cook for my son and I, and I can volunteer whenever I want. Sweet set up! Does this mean that I want to be single for the rest of my life? No. God put it in me from a very young age that I want to get married, however I am not going to allow that feeling to override my love and devotion to Him. I know that there is no man on this planet that can sustain me like God can. To refine that a little more, while I will go on dates from time to time, if the guy that I am on a date with isn't as strong in his faith as I am, or stronger, I won't go on a second date with him. Though it would feel good to my flesh to keep the dude around, I know that, ultimately, it wouldn't work out. The next sin that I am working on? Food. Overeating, to be exact. This is something that is new for me to work on, but I have a feeling that God will get me through it just as He got me through loneliness. The more I allow Him to change me, the more I trust Him to do so lovingly. So, overeating will be the next area of my life that I ask God to work on with me. And I could go on and on, but I fear this is already a long enough post. I will leave you here, praying that the words I was inspired to write will help you start down the path of understanding what may be hindering you from getting out of the pit you are in and moving on to the next amazing time in your life. Much love Brandy

Irrational Fears Much?

This is something that I have only recently decided, "I need to get this out in the open so God can cover it." Not that I haven't known this scripture, but here it is in reference:

"For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest; nor is anything secret except to come to light." Mark 4:22

So, when my son was born, I very much did not feel like his mom, though I carried him internally as God knit him together. There may have been many reasons for this, but, after reflecting on it, it was probably because I realized that I am the sole support of this child - emotional, physical, mental. All of it, ultimately (and in the eyes of the law), lands on me. His male genetic donor said from the very outset that he has no interest in having anything to do with either of us.

Cool. He stayed in California. My son and I moved to Texas when I was six and a half months pregnant, where he was born just two short months later.

Not only did I not feel like his mom, I was also quite scared of him. Not that he wasn't a good baby. He was actually an amazing baby!! Seriously, God orchestrated it to what I could handle. My son was also extremely beautiful to me. I'm guessing most people have this same feeling when it comes to their children, but I now TRULY understand "horribly beautiful". Looking at him freaked me out because he was just SO beautiful that it overwhelmed me. The love I had for that little form was just as scary and big.

Here comes the irrational fear (as though the above wasn't irrational enough!). I fear(ed?) that I would raise a son that would end up being a serial murder. Why? I honestly couldn't tell you why. Maybe it is my love of CSI and Law and Order and reading medical thrillers and documentaries on serial killers (I was a morbid teenager). But I honestly feared that.

I want my son to be balanced. I want him to be able to blend in with any crowd, but also be that beacon of light for God. Not the weird kid that walks around screaming "JEZABELL!!!" at girls who are kissing their boyfriends (or random men, as the case may be) and throwing Bibles at them.

I think in a way, all parents fear raising a child that doesn't succeed. People tell me, "My child is the SMARTEST!" And I am so thankful God blessed them with an incredibly intelligent child! This world needs deep thinkers, just like it needs people with a heart. My son isn't going to win a Nobel Peace prize by the time he's 10 (unless it is in hugging!). He has average intelligence, however his heart is just absolutely mind-blowing and inspiring. It helps that he's awfully cute, but I have to push him in his studies.

And sometimes I have to catch myself comparing him to other people's amazingly intelligent children. "Well, shouldn't he be able to do long division by now? He's six after all!"

That is why I have begun the process of collecting letters from those that are close to him, all telling him what is RIGHT with him. This world is just so messed up and so very "What can you do for me?" and "How much can you earn?" and "How can you make it better/faster/easier/lighter/etc..?" That has led to a lot of messed up people because no one truly knows what is right with them. They keep changing, hoping that who they are going to become is going to be okay or acceptable.

I dealt with that all my life, until a couple of weeks ago. God is just so good and so merciful! I have been wondering when who I am was going to be good enough to those around me. God showed me that who I am really is good enough and there is nothing I have to change to be better or gain acceptance. Not that this gives me license to walk around showing my butt and being arrogant or proud, "Well, this is me and if you don't like it, you can go *&^% yourself!" It gives me the ability to be humble about who I am, to show my true self without fear of rejection, to just be the humble, grace-given beggar who is trying to show other beggars where food is. (The definition of what a Christian is according to one of my very sweet friends and volleyball players during that season.)

So there it is, published for the world to see. It makes me giggle now that I re-read it, but I also can't deny those emotions, and I'm kind of tired of carrying them around.

And they are now planted at the foot of Jesus' cross...where they belong.

God bless you my friends!