O death, where is your sting?

October 22, 2015. Missed calls and texts from my friends, Jake and Tyler. A call to Kylie. Messages from Kasey. It hit me like a blow to the chest. Michael, my (foster) brother died in a car accident while making a delivery for work.

I remember the pain and confusion that I felt. He’s not really dead. They’re talking about somebody else that I don’t know. Since then, I’ve had dreams and seen visions of loved ones or myself suffering in bizarre accidents and tasting the bitterness of death. I have been wrestling with the pain of death ever since I saw Michael’s body in his casket before his memorial service. It did not look like him. The preservation process made him look like a 50 year old puffy man and it put me in a weird place. 

Michael was young, in his early twenties, had two kids and a brand new wife of a month. He had a new step daughter, and a baby on the way that was only a few weeks along when he left this earth. It was really sad to lose someone who had become a “brother” to me, and I couldn’t imagine what his kids and Kylie, Kasey, and Keegan were feeling. 

It got me wondering and imagining myself in their shoes. Since Michael died, I’ve met my fiancé and we have been planning our wedding for November 12. What if he dies unexpectedly a month after we get married? What if we have kids and he dies and I have to take care of them by myself? These types of thoughts have not been good for me, but have been there nonetheless. Michael’s death caused a stirring in my heart that I believe is from God, to teach me more of who He is.

Now, almost a year later, I feel confident enough to write some of these things down. I’ve been so scared of death this last year, and the fear of it has prevented me from being totally open about what it’s been doing to me. To reiterate the importance of prayer, community, and a rootedness in God’s word, it has fulfilled it purpose plus more. 

The truth is that the scary visions i’ve been imagining and the thoughts of death have been driven by fear, and fear is not from God. Death is not supposed to be scary, but rather one of the important parts of life. As 1 Corinthians 15 tells us, “It was sin that made death so frightening and law-code guilt that gave sin its leverage”. I have been frightened of death because I am a sinful human who needs a savior everyday. My savior does not want me to carry the burden of fear! It has been His work since the beginning of time, that we humans would not be burdened by death and fear of it. Remembering this truth has released me into the freedom of a life confident in the promises of God. 

Apparently I had not yet handed over this burden of fear to Jesus. Yes, the death of someone we are close to does sting. But that sting does not have to stick around, much like the sting of a bandaid getting ripped off of our skin, but that has brought healing to us. Death of one person can be turned into new and abundant life for others. I have learned this in my life since Michael’s death, and more importantly I remember even more so the life that Jesus gives us all by the death that He defeated. These are all things that Jesus conquered death for, and it has been easy for me to lose sight of.

Speaking of new life, it is being formed in the relationship between the mothers of two of Michael’s children. They have decided that even though their kids will grow up without their dad, they could have a relationship with each other. They are meeting together to work on bringing the kids together—I praise God for this and am eager to see the new life that God brings to them, even through the loss of their earthly father. Kylie and Keegan, things have not been easy for you andI am proud to know you both. 

I pray for Khataya, Michael’s daughter and my first ever “niece” that her story would be one that she grows up to tell others about. I pray that through her earthly loss, her Heavenly Father will transform her heart in beautiful ways and that many, many people would come to know Him because she chose to let life in through Michael’s death. 

I pray that I would have the boldness to tell of God’s story through Michael’s death. That God desires for none of his children to suffer death and fear of it. Although death is inevitable to humans, it does not have to be the end to our story and that Jesus has in fact written the rest for us. I pray that I would keep these things in mind, that “to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21) and that my life is not for my own sake, but for the sake of Christ. 

The truth is that what is written will come true, and death will be swallowed up in victory. He promises us in Hosea 13, “I will deliver them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death. Where, O death, are your plagues? Where o grave, is your destruction?” 

The following is a script of what I spoke at Michael’s funeral: 

“I’m one of us that was fortunate to call Mike a brother. I never REALLY knew what love for a “brother” outside of blood relation was until Michael entered my life and became like family. I know that is a treasure so many of us can share together because of his life. Let’s always remember how he might want us to continue on in that love for each other—that comes from our heavenly Father. 

There are two Bible verses that I had recently posted on Facebook that Michael had clicked “like” on. In prayer, an idea came over me that God wanted me to share those two verses right now, and it would be almost as if I were able to ask Mike what he wanted me to share, and those two things would be it. 

The first one is from 1 John. “Let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth”. Perhaps Michael wants us all to remember to live this out, and to not lose sight of it.

The second one was something Jesus said. “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children.” I wish I knew the exact reasons why Michael liked this verse. I would give anything to ask him what it means to him and hear his voice when he responded. I bet that he would talk about his own precious children and how he knew what love is because of them. how they are his whole world and how being a daddy was his most important role in life. 

I thank God for blessing us with the gift of knowing and loving Michael during his short stay on earth. My prayer is that God will take the pain from Michael’s death and turn it into something beautiful in each of our lives. My prayer is also that each of us would know the love of our savior Jesus, whose love is stronger than death and whose promises can drive out fear of the unknown.

Michael, we love you, we are so proud of the daddy and husband you were, and we thank you for making each of our lives all the better because you were a part of it.”

To be treasured

If you know me very well you know my heart for learning and teaching about God's heart for sex. In reading and talking with a dear friend tonight, I ran back into this truth nugget: "'keep your distance,' I say to women. Recognize that fundamental anomaly of human nature, that we prize what we cannot easily get. We take for granted, we even come to despise, that which costs us no effort. The bicycle given for Christmas will not be prized like the bicycle bought with the money earned by delivering newspapers for two or three years." -Elisabeth Elliot 

God will bless us for waiting on his timing. He will also plant seeds of lasting, unshakeable peace in our hearts knowing that the gift was given to Him first, then our beloved. Waiting for this gift will create a holy and beautiful treasure for us to keep in our hearts for the duration of our time on earth. 

This is not a rule He made just to make ourselves more righteous than the next person. Rather, it is because the One who created us and desires to be with us forever knows the distraction and spiritual barriers that are put in place when we put the desires of our flesh before the desire to know Him more. It can eat at our hearts to the point of desperation if we try to ignore it; and he is willing to let pain strip our lives of that which keeps us from Him. For me, this was all a good reminder that only Jesus, not marriage, sex, or any fleshly desire fulfilled will satisfy the deepest desires of our hearts.

“As for me, may I never boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of that cross, my interest in this world has been crucified, and the world’s interest in me has also died.”

Galatians 6:14

Courage to wait

"Desperately, helplessly, longingly, I cried:

Quietly, patiently, lovingly God replied.

I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate,

and the Master so gently said, "Child, you must wait."

Wait: verb. to stay where one is or delay action until a particular time or until something else happens; to stay in place in expectation of: 

We wait in lines. We wait to cross the street. We wait for life transformation. We wait for someone else to apologize. We wait for the movie to start. We wait for healing. We wait for our ships to come in. We wait for love. We wait...

Waiting is the worst. It is burdensome, tiring, and often to no avail. Not to mention how hard it is to hold on to hope when we seem to be stuck somewhere, forced to wait. When there are no signs of anything changing, and the helpless feeling that creeps up on us because no matter how hard we try, nothing is giving way. Sometimes it downright stings. Waiting is difficult because it goes against almost every human inclination for instant gratification, status, greed, fear, jealousy and self-worship. The urges for those things often are not worth fighting against because of the pain it inflicts on our hearts to trust in something that we can't see.

"for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. we wait with eager hope..." Romans 8:23

So many times I have found myself wondering where I could ever find hope during the waiting process. I wonder if i will just spend my life waiting and then die, and never get what I want for my life. And then of course, I'll have to pretend to be happy for everyone around me when they get all the things that are being kept from me.

 

And then I look to the heart of Jesus. My heart grieves because of my own selfishness and unwillingness to be patient. He knows what I want, but He has something better in mind. 

"...and i grumbled to God, 'So I'm waiting..for what?!"

he seemed, then, to kneel, and his eyes wept with mine,

and He tenderly said, 'I would give you a sign.

I could shake the heavens, and darken the sun.

I could raise the dead and cause mountains to run.

All you seek, I could give, and pleased you would be. 

You would have what you want--but you wouldn't know Me."

The thing is, He knows our hearts. He knows the pain and scars, he knows what brings us joy. On top of all of that, he knows what we need, when we need it, and is glad to give in His timing. He is good to remind us that we are not writing our own stories. If we hope for something, it may be that He wants to give it to us in a matter of time. It may also (and most often) be that He has something totally different for us. If I received everything I prayed for when I prayed for it, I would have been held back from things that are far greater than anything I could have asked for or imagined--experiences and relationships that have shown me the depths of His love. He witholds certain things because He desperately wants us to know Him more.

"The depth that's beyond getting just what you asked

Of an infinite God, who makes what you have last.

'You'd never know, should your pain quickly flee, 

What it means that, 'my grace is sufficient for thee.'"

He alone is the author of life. If we can grasp His immense love for us and acknowledge that He is the source of everything good, wise, and loving, then we can find rest in waiting. Not because we like to, but because we can wholeheartedly trust Him who is calling us to wait. And because He promises in His word that He will help us in the process. He entrusts us with His truth, to be diligent to pursue it, and in return trust Him with our lives.

"If we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. and the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness." Romans 8:25-26

There is a lot of unknown associated with waiting, but take heart in this promise: the unknown to us is fully known by Him. The less we have in front of us, the more unknown there is and therefore more room for His far greater work to be done. 

"And though oft' may My answers seem terribly late,

My most precious answer of all is still, 'Wait'". 

what i want you to know

                                               

you're my friend, and i love you, and i want you to have a better understanding of why i had to turn down your invitation.

Let me start with this: my whole world was turned upside down my senior year of high school. I met a man who accepted me and gave me hope for a happy future. Prior to meeting him, I had reached a point in my life where because of some decisions i made, I felt guilty and shameful and that my life was hopeless. But he told me, among many other things, that those ways i had felt no longer had to define me or have an influence over where my life was headed. 

As you may have guessed, the man I am talking about is Jesus. I don't mean the distant Jesus you envision when you see church pews and hear organ hymns one hour a week, who turns up his nose to sinners and despises sloppy clothing. I am talking about the one who knows and loves me and you, who takes us as we are. He took my hand as I reached out for his and he changed my heart. He showed me my true worth and what he sees in me. One of the main things he taught me, and continues to pour into me, was the truth about sex. It made me want to change my life. It is the reason why I choose to stay away from things like 50 Shades of Grey and house parties for selling sex toys. 

For a more thorough picture of what He has taught me about sex, I would love for you to read my previous blog post, reached at this link: http://adreamofanairstream.blogspot.com/2014/02/why-i-want-to-wait-til-im-married.html if you opted out of reading it, let me just make one thing clear--that I don't hate sex, it is indeed a good thing, but only within a certain context. 

but for right now I want to piggy back off of that post. my convictions from what Jesus has taught me have led me to fight to save sex until marriage. It is a tough battle! That doesn't mean that I want to condemn you for not doing the same, but it does mean that I have to make choices that are not always easy or popular to make. 

I am in love with the heart of Jesus. I believe that what he is offering the world is worth every sacrifice we can make to be a part of it. I believe his Word is without error and is a mighty strong power. And because sex (in the right context) allows us to so intimately experience God's blessings to us, there is another strong power at work doing whatever it can to distort and confuse the world's views on the subject. That resistance is an attempt to stop us from knowing and following God...ultimately trying to keep us from spending forever with the one who made us and loves us. 

I have been reading a book called God in a Brothel by Daniel Walker and I am learning just how badly sex is being distorted in the world. Millions of young women and children as young as 5 years old are being robbed of their innocence through sex slavery, human trafficking and forced prostitution. Men with money from all over the world are so obsessed and bound by sexual desires that they exploit fellow human beings in the worst way possible and most of the time don't give it any second thought. Disease, unwanted pregnancy, emotional damage, and loss of livelihood are all consequences that the victims are facing for something they are forced into. All because people want sex so bad that they are willing to go those lengths to get it. 

My heart shatters the more I read and hear about this dark, evil force. As a follower of Jesus I can only imagine the heartbreak he feels for the world. I want to stand up against this evil and do anything I can to push back against its rapid growth. I believe that I can make a difference with the decisions I make for my life. and you could argue that there are big differences between the distortion of sex through human trafficking and what's going on in our lives. I would argue back with this: God's heart breaks just as much for anybody who takes part in sexual activity (willingly or unwillingly) that is not within the sacred covenant of marriage. 

what are the parameters of sexual sin? if we were to ask Jesus, he'd say something like, "if you so much as look at a person with lust you have already crossed the line" (Matthew 27-28). the definition is  pretty cut and dry in the bible. any activitity--mentally, emotionally, physically with someone who is not your spouse is sexual sin.

as for masturbation (which, from what i hear, is encouraged most at 'passion parties') let me ask you, is it not sex that one performs with one self? Let me offer you this: God made sex for a husband and a wife, not a man/woman with his/her self. it was given to us humans to enjoy "being fruitful and multiplying (Genesis 1:28)" and we most certainly cannot be fruitful and multiply with ourselves. Herein lies the evidence i have gathered, which convinces me that masturbation falls under the category of sexual sin. 

Though the world may call masturbation "healthy", God says that it is not. It is actually quite the opposite. It damages us as people because it becomes a force in our life that we may feel like we "need" more and more. Not only that, but it will be baggage that we take with us into our marriages. If we are the ones who provide ourselves with sexual pleasure, it will be a struggle to hand that position over to our spouses, who it was supposed to belong to in the first place. I want to do all I can to preserve that precious gift that my husband will one day receive! 

Sexual sin will damage our relationship with our spouses--but more pressing is the damage it does between us and God. The reason that God hates sin is not because it makes us unloveable--he loves us no matter what. He hates sin because it tears us away from him. He hates it because it gets in the way of what he wills for us. He wants us to know true love, freedom, and the ability to love others the way he loves us. In Christ, we are able to experience the depths of those gifts as well as recognize that which interferes with receiving them. For me, the way the world offers sex is a big interference. In order to fight for my offering to God of abstinence until marriage, I have to say no to anything that does not line up with what he has taught me about sex. 

"We know that we are from God,

and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. 

And we know that the Son of God has come 

and has given us understanding, 

so that we may know him who is true; 

and we are in him who is true,

in his Son Jesus Christ. 

He is the true God and eternal life." (1 John 5:19-20 ESV)

i have come to know these things to be true, and sweeter to my soul than anything else that this world offers. My hope is that my motives are a little more clear to you and anyone else who might not understand <3 

why i want to wait til i'm married

this is my attempt to explain why i choose to wait til i'm married to have sex. 

for those of you in my life who have communicated to me that you're not sure why God would want people to wait to have sex. for those of you, like me, who have ever seriously wondered why he would tell us not to partake in such a wonderful thing.

there is an increasing, poisonous, "Christian" tolerance toward couples living together before they're married. i am not casting judgment toward anyone who chooses to live and/or have sex with people who are not their spouse. But God has a role for each of us in His plan of redemption for us, His people. 

that being said:

i want to point out that God made the "family unit" to be the first and foremost representation and demonstration of his love in this world. when you reflect on a lot of issues in the world and America, they stem from lack of a solid family unit. God made men and women to live together as such: the father leads the household and serves his wife, who is the mother of his children. The mother serves her husband with reverence for God and in doing so, their children see first hand what God's love is like and the foundations for their lives are built on it. i learned at one point that the best way for a father to love his children is to love their mother. and i say "amen" to that. 


when fathers or mothers are absent, when they're not fully committed to each other, when their relationships are not built on the foundation of God's word, the "family unit" becomes a playground for a very present enemy who thrives on feeding lies into human hearts. Lies about love, truth, and life. It causes us to turn to other things (people, appearance, status, substances) to fill the void we develop from not having that as a foundation. too many of us, as much as we may fight it, know the effect of these lies all too well. 

Song of Solomon advises us, "Don’t excite love, don’t stir it up, until the time is ripe—and you’re ready." and not for nothing. I believe that behind this huge lack in the world is the driving force of sex as it was not intended to be. Here’s the good news--we can choose to not give the enemy that kind of foothold in our lives. it is possible. "because you belong to Christ Jesus, the power of the life-giving spirit has freed you from the power of the sin that leads to death". Romans 8:2.

Now onto the juicy stuff…

People have said “you don’t know what you’re missing out on” by choosing not to have sex before I’m married. Brothers and sisters, I’m speaking from experience. All of this is coming from a heart that, once upon a time, was consumed with an unhealthy desire to fill my need to be loved by another person. Please believe me when I say, I know how real the struggle is! I know the temporary high of having connected with a person on such a deep level. I loved having sex with my boyfriend of my younger years. If we love each other, it’s okay--God gave us each other, so we can do what we want, right? WRONG. 

Well, we can do what we want. But not if we are reaching to know the fullness of God’s love. When we want to love another person more than we want to love God, as you can imagine, our hearts are on the really wrong track. Err go the struggle. 

I caught wind of God’s truth, and by His grace I grabbed onto it and ran with it, mainly because I was forced to. Here’s what happened:

I was so caught up in wanting my boyfriend to love me that I lost my grip on reality. I heard that having sex outside of marriage was bad so I wanted us to stop, but he wasn’t with it so we started hitting the brakes on our relationship. I was convinced that this was temporary and we were going to be together forever once he started thinking clearly. Looking back, I can only imagine that God’s thoughts were, “enough! You give me no choice but to tear you apart so I can put you back together again”. So God assigned a huge fish to swallow me (Jonah and the whale reference). that is a metaphor for God allowing something really bad to happen in my life so that he could get my attention, speak to me, and redirect me. Still, I thought I was meant to be with this guy. I put everything else aside and put my hope in my future with him. 

Then one day he told me about how he was having a baby with another girl. A short lived, not-even-together type of thing. I felt like I had nothing. I knew it was over. I loved him more than anything and now Everything I had hoped for was ripped away. Torn. Broken. Seemingly beyond repair. But it had to happen.

I share that story so that I have some credibility on this topic. I understand that not all sex before marriage and premature commitment ends up in a sudden catastrophe like it did for me. But I do believe whole heartedly that it eventually will. It will turn our lives into something God never intended them to be. And that is not what he desires for us. He has given us His word, his spirit and His son to help us live a life that overcomes the world’s standards and glorify his name.

sex is good. sex is holy. sex is one of God's greatest gifts to his beloved children. Sex fills our desire to be loved in the most intimate way by another person. here's the kicker: it was meant for husband and wife, the physical, more literal sense of "becoming one" with your spouse. anything else is wrong, and against the will of God for relationship between a man and a woman.

You see, God made your body. He looks at you with love and adoration, because you are his. He wants to bless you with sex. He made it for you to enjoy in the fullest. But he wants to give it to you in a safe place so it can’t be mistreated. That safe place is a God-appointed, sacred, covenantal relationship with your spouse. Because of the tremendous joy and relationship with God that is possible through sex with your spouse, the enemy is doing everything in his power to destroy it. And we feel the ramifications of it all over the world. “The enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I come so you can have real and eternal life, more and better life than you ever dreamed of” John 10:10.

Here’s the scripture that a majority of my view is based on:  

God honored the Master’s body by raising it from the grave. He’ll treat yours with the same resurrection power. Until that time, remember that your bodies are created with the same dignity as the Master’s body. You wouldn’t take the Master’s body off to a whorehouse, would you? I should hope not. There’s more to sex than mere skin on skin. Sex is as much spiritual mystery as physical fact. As written in Scripture, “The two become one.” Since we want to become spiritually one with the Master, we must not pursue the kind of sex that avoids commitment and intimacy, leaving us more lonely than ever—the kind of sex that can never “become one.” There is a sense in which sexual sins are different from all others. In sexual sin we violate the sacredness of our own bodies, these bodies that were made for God-given and God-modeled love, for “becoming one” with another. Or didn’t you realize that your body is a sacred place, the place of the Holy Spirit? Don’t you see that you can’t live however you please, squandering what God paid such a high price for? The physical part of you is not some piece of property belonging to the spiritual part of you. God owns the whole works. So let people see God in and through. Now, getting down to the questions you asked in your letter to me. First, Is it a good thing to have sexual relations? Certainly—but only within a certain context. It’s good for a man to have a wife, and for a woman to have a husband. Sexual drives are strong, but marriage is strong enough to contain them and provide for a balanced and fulfilling sexual life in a world of sexual disorder. The marriage bed must be a place of mutuality—the husband seeking to satisfy his wife, the wife seeking to satisfy her husband.  1 corinthians 6:14-7:4

I have come to know that there is a greater joy in life than what this world offers. I am waiting to have sex with my husband because I want to honor God. I want to find out what life is like on His terms. According to his word, those terms bring promise and life that we could never attain by doing it on our own. It takes patience and discipline. I don’t want to miss out on what He has planned for me. And honestly, its really hard to keep up with. The world makes relationships look so captivating, so fulfilling, and even though I know it’s not what God wants for me sometimes settling seems a lot better than waiting.

But I can “be of good cheer” because of promises that are bigger than what I think I’m missing out on. God delivered me, made me new, so that my past decisions and way of life no longer define who I am. God took my brokenness, my faults, and my huge mess-ups and showed me the power of his forgiveness. The power of his love for us is held in Christ. It didn't matter how far gone I was, how lost i was, or how many wrong things i did.
My identity is in Christ, whose spirit compels me and gives me the strength to face this battle. And nothing in this world can separate me from the love he has for me (Romans 8). 

There is a sweet victory in Jesus that he desires all of us to have. 

My prayer is that my story and lessons learned will fan the flame into more hearts. If you feel God nudging you to change your ways, give him the reins. If he has allowed something really painful to happen to you, don’t harden your heart toward what God is doing in you.

Surrendering to Him is one of the hardest things to live out. But from our pain, confusion, and heartache can come our most powerful ministry. His ultimate work is to connect all humans in love. and there is a desire that he develops in us during painful times to relate to and love others who have yet to receive that love. When we have known the great pain of heartache and struggle, given to God we have known the greater power His son Jesus has to heal us and bring us new life.

If you feel like you’re settling in any area of your life, you probably are, and again I say, God does not desire that for you. Let him prepare your heart too, because allowing Him to change your life always comes with a LOT of resistance. But behold, He is alive and well and still doing his great work “For I am going to do something in your days that you would not believe, even if you were told.” Habakkuk 1:5

Surround yourself with truth in the form of God’s word and his praying people. He promises in Jeremiah 29 that you will find him when you seek him with your whole heart, “And you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free” John 8:32

and the Son has set me free, and I am free indeed. 

less and less asleep

I want my future husband to be a blessing to me. More than that, I hope to be a blessing to him.

I want to have an answer for every friend, aunt, and stranger when they ask me "why aren't you married?" More than that, I hope that my landing point is not marriage but Christ Himself (there's my answer to their question).

"For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God." (Ephesians 3:14-19)

I really do have a desire to get married. But I think I've finally reached a point where I can honestly, from my heart, say that I am filled with joy at the thought of my singleness. I'm being made more and more aware of how huge of a blessing it is.

I'm learning that I can be fulfilled and have joy even if I desire a different circumstance. It's more than knowing the concept--I actually, in my being, am so filled with joy. Sometimes my eyes well up when I think about where the Lord has placed me. (I know i'm a cheeseball)

Frequently in the past, I have wanted God to just send me my husband and let me be married and experience Him through my marriage relationship. I'd get frustrated because there would be absolutely nothing happening that was answering my prayer the way I wanted it to. I'm learning now that begging God to "get me out of this season" builds toward not appreciating what He is doing in my life. It's okay to have the desire to get married because I believe that desire is from Him. But it's not okay to want it at the expense of the present work going on in me.

Psalm 46:10-- "Be still and know that I am God" in my blog about Ruth and Esther, I pondered the concept of having strength in being still. I am finding that being still before the Lord most often means to be content, to find joy in where you are, and offer your situation back to Him, and wait on Him for what your life is becoming. For me, this means that I am to practice being outward focused. Being single allows me a LOT of time to spend with others, praying for others, and helping whenever I can. And I find "stillness" in that.

I HAVE TO TRUST THAT YOU ARE NOT HOLDING SOMETHING FROM ME BY KEEPING ME SINGLE.

I also have the chance to be faithful to my future husband before we are even together. I CAN live this love story before the relationship starts. I can continue to let God's healing happen in my heart from the unfaithfulness I had lived out in the past. I can and choose to hold onto the healing He has brought & the new person He has made me into. 2 Corinthians 5:17 absolutely rings true to me--"If anyone is in Christ, the old has died, the new has come". I rejoice in this because I get another chance to do it right. I'm sure taking it. 

"Those who look to Him are radiant and their faces will never be ashamed" Psalm 34:5

LORD, HELP ME TO ALWAYS LOOK TO YOU TO FIND FULFILLMENT. REMIND ME WHO I AM IN YOU. MAKE ME RADIANT WITH YOUR TRUTH, INSIDE AND OUT. THANK YOU FOR THE BODY OF CHRIST, WHOM I GET TO DELIGHT IN BY JOINING TOGETHER TO SEEK YOU. YOUR WILL, AND NOT MINE, BE DONE IN MY LIFE.

attachment

When I was attending Grace University, I had this really cool professor who said one night something along the lines of, "if you're bored, it has less to do with a lack of things to do and more to do with flawed character". It hit me in the heart and has always stuck with me. 

And I think most of us, if we are studying the things of God, have heard and know the truth that anxiety and worry result from a lack of trust in God. Also something that can make you really examine your heart. 

Mark 10:22 says "the man's face clouded over. this was the last thing he expected to hear, and he walked off with a heavy  heart. he was holding on tight to a lot of things, and not about to let go." because Jesus had just got done telling him that he needed to sell everything he owned and give it to the poor. Verse 22, his response, is a result of a lifetime of "security" in wealth and rule. 

Anthony de Mello, as quoted by Rob Bell in "Sex God" (and pointed out to me by a brother) says about Mark 10:22: 

"And here is something else to ponder on: Each time you are anxious and afraid, it is because you may lose or fail to get the object of your attachment, isn't it? And each time you feel jealous, isn't it because someone may make off with what you are attached to? And almost all your anger comes from someone standing in the way of your attachment, doesn't it? And see how paranoid you become when your attachment is threatened - you cannot think objectively; your whole vision becomes distorted, doesn't it? And every time you feel bored, isn't it because you are not getting a sufficient supply of what you believe will make you happy, of what you are attached to? And when you are depressed and miserable, the cause is there for all to see: Life is not giving you what you have convinced yourself you cannot be happy without. Almost every negative emotion you experience is the direct outcome of an attachment. 

Remember how heart broken you once were, how you were certain you never would be happy again because you lost someone or something that was so precious to you? But then what happened? Time passed and you learned to get on pretty well, did you not? That should have alerted you to the falseness of your belief, to the trick your programmed mind was playing on you."

What a beautifully written truth. 

Lord, if I am anxious and afraid, remind me that I will never be forsaken by you. When I am jealous, remind me that I am letting myself get attached to the wrong thing. In times of anger, show me that nothing and no one can separate me from you--which is reason enough to be overfilled with joy and forgiveness. Lord, let my focus be on you, especially in times of drought so that my vision stays clear. When I feel bored, remind me of the wonders that time with You holds. When I am tempted to let depression in, remind me that I don't need whatever it is I think I need. John 3:30--Less of me, more of you.