learning to be loved

That’s it. That’s all.

I thought at first that it must be something else. Surely, I had graduated into some grand schoolroom of sanctification where the Divine teacher would impress on me some glistening truth from the upper echelons of spirituality. Bring on the faith PhD.

So when my life pretty much imploded these last several months, I was ready. Just show me, God. You have my attention. What do I need to learn? What’s next? What’s the step? Where’s the light?

Silence.

And one temp job ended. And another one ended. And finding a new place to live was like pulling teeth. And the bills were looming. And nothing was working out. Nothing. And my responsibilities were mounding. And my autoimmune flared up so bad...

And no lesson.

And no light.

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Receiving love has never been easy. All this insecure cracks open like a fresh break in a life-long wound. They don’t mean it. Surely, there’s an ulterior motive. Surely, they feel obligated. These must be empty words. Platitudes. These must be acts of pity. Best just to dismiss it. Shrug it off. Don’t believe it. You know who you are, and you are all unloveliness. They must see that… It has always been this way. With people. With God. I’d rather not consider love. Give it out? Oh yes. Let it in? No thank you.

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God demonstrated His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. This was the greatest act of love in all of history. A one-time, winner-takes-all event that shifted the very plates of eternity in our favor. But He has not stopped demonstrating His love.

I know this. Because God has been so loving me. A love that has not allowed me to do, or move forward quickly, or figure out the last few months. A love that will not let me go since everything started to spin. He’s used people I least expected, and circumstances that sound made-up, and the simple pages of my small, brown Bible. He has beset me behind and before and laid his hand on me. He has covered me close under His wing. He has carried me as a lamb. And underneath these thrilling yet vague statements, rest dozens of concrete examples that would leave you shocked. In the ending of my job, friendships, home, everything normal...new mercies daily. In the beginning of my new job, home, friendships…the mercies have not stopped. I cannot stop them. Like a healing balm pressed into every slash of my insecure, He has made me to know His love.

Friends, I have never felt so whole.

You see, sometimes demonstrating His loving-kindness, or goodness, or provision, or mercy toward us is more a priority to God than showing us the next step or teaching us the next truth. Sometimes it’s simply more about Him than us. And we may receive that love without fearing we will miss His direction. A quiet, basking in the glow of His care. Like a child who knows to do nothing more.

Sometimes the lesson is learning to be loved.  

how I can fit through a doggie door and how God fits us in life

I noticed something when a gathering of average-sized people hung out at my place the other day. They didn’t fit. Never thought of my 700sq. ft. rental as small or considered that everything in my home is to scale before that day. When you’re 4’11” and less than 115lbs soaking wet, you just naturally look for homes, furniture, appliances, stuff… that fits.

You also look for places you can fit. Maybe this harks back to countless frenzied hide-and-seek games from childhood. But I think mostly it’s about doing something unique to me. Doing something that fits me. Thus, the doggie door pic. I couldn’t resist. And this got me thinking. We are always looking for where we fit in life. Do I fit with this person? Do I fit this ministry? Am I a good fit for this job? And we can draw great comfort and courage from these guiding principles of how God fits us in life.

God can fit us for what’s next even through unfavorable circumstances. Think Joseph in the OT. Being sold into slavery by your own brothers is pretty bad, folks. But what appears to be the worst possible defining moment of his life becomes the very circumstance that catapults him to incredible human success and usefulness to God.

Ruth walks into a strange land as a childless widow hanging on the arm of her childless, widowed, bitter mother-in-law. Beth’s commentary? Is no bueno for Ruth. And yet, in just a few chapters, she’s married to a wealthy, righteous man, with child, and fit into the line of Christ. Could not have predicted that one. And neither could Ruth.

God may fit us where we initially think we fit the least. Think Naaman’s little servant girl. Think Esther. Think Daniel. The newly converted Saul of Tarsus…Yeah, they didn’t really seem to fit in where God placed them. And yet, we look back and marvel at how they did.

God will fit us where it glorifies Him the most. God is most concerned for His glory. That’s His motive in all His works. He’s in it for His name’s sake. And to bring Him the greatest glory possible with our vapor-wisp lives is our deepest longing this side of Heaven. We can rest confident that God’s going to fit us where we can.

God will go with us wherever He fits us. When my congregation was asked to share their favorite promises a few weeks ago, I was not surprised this one was first: ‘I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.’ It should be. If I have God, I have joy that cannot be quenched. If I have God, I have strength for anything. If I have God, I have a peace that cannot be explained. If I have God, I have satisfaction. If I have God, I can endure, conquer, rest, be bold, love…I can do all and be all that I should through Him. In a way, God’s presence makes me a perfect fit wherever I find myself.

God will fit us according to our desires and personality. The One who knows our past, body, thoughts, movements, and loves is the One who is ordering our steps. He has promised to bring delight to me through that ordering, and to grant the desires of my heart as I delight in Him. There is no other way to parse those promises. The God who has full knowledge of me, uses that to work all things together for me. In other words, His intimate acquaintance with who I am guides God’s actions towards me. He will not call me to serve Him in accounting (which I strongly dislike and abhor and have no skill in), when I love to worship Him through writing and music. He’ll probably never call me to minister in a village of introverts. I would hurt them. You get the point.

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So, assuming God has more important things to fit us for than going through doggie doors, take heart. He is the God who fits.  And He is ours.

Beth

three anchors for hard times

We just want security.

Something or someone to turn to when life spooks and won't be saddled or led about anymore. Someone who will always be there unchanging and expected when life is not. Some safety net to catch the free fall.

You see, I left my job last week. A move as necessary and right as it was difficult and unexpected. You're just going to have to take that at face value. And this is how I found myself thinking after that.

I just want security. A few grand in the bank would do the trick. The assurance that no one need help me. The confidence that I can maintain the quality of my current lifestyle. The security of knowing nothing more needs to change right now. I just want security. A knowledge of what's next would be enough. To know what's on the other side of this 'in-between' time. A move? A new career? A person? More of the same? I can weather anything if I know what's next. I just want security, folks. A spouse would do just fine. Someone 'for me' no matter what happens. Someone to speak truth into my life when I'm at home in the quiet evening hours. Someone whose love and support were embodied in a...um...I don't know, a body? And words of commitment, compassion, and confidence whispered gentle when the world stops speaking that way. 

And we just want something to hold onto.

But as wonderful as those would be, they are not that secure. Riches are uncertain. The future is always shifting. No person is strong enough to hold the weight of my life. God knew that before I reached that conclusion a few days ago. And He led me to His Word instead. You see, there’s nothing more secure than the mind of God towards me. So here’s what I’ve been clinging to the last week. Three passages. Three anchors. Security for all my insecure.

The Love of God

At the end of Romans 8, Paul asks this question: What can separate us from the love of God? (yes, I mentioned this last week.) And then he lists all these things that do separate us. From each other. From stuff in this world. From life. He concludes, “but none of these things can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Security. An anchor in the storm. My Saviour’s love for me is a “tie that naught can sever.”

The knowledge of His will

In Colossians 1 Paul prays that the believers “be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing…” I may not have a knowledge of what’s next but I can have a knowledge of what’s now. To know how to walk this ‘in-between’ in a worthy way that will bring Him pleasure. He will give me light to do what pleases Him today. All I need do is ask. That’s what Paul is doing. And that’s security, folks. A present and perfect anchor.

The sovereign hand of God

David constructs the first half of Psalm 37 in a fascinating way. We find God mowing down and cutting off the workers of iniquity and evil schemers. We find Him feeding His people, granting their desires, and enabling them to move forward on their way. We find a justice and a care that works outside human possibility. And sandwiched in the middle, we find this command: Rest, wait patiently, and do not fret. Why? Because God’s got this, folks. He works justice when we cannot. He provides for us what we cannot. He’s sovereignly at work for our benefit. And I can rest in that and patiently wait for it to come about. And it will. It’s the mind of my God toward me.

There is no anchor more secure.

Beth

this I know

Here’s a bit of very bad poetry for you, friends. But it is an accurate reflection of what God has been teaching me this week, and it kept clamoring to come out in rhyme and meter.

 So I gave in. Que sera, sera. Be merciful.

This week I had to make a big decision quickly and unexpectedly. And I found myself frustrated with God that He would put me in that position without a thorough understanding of why. Especially when the decision appeared to be unfavorable for me. And that’s when He reminded me that, well, that’s exactly what faith is. 

What I know about my God and my relationship with Him is more than enough to support the questions that are not yet answered. Abraham believed this about God. And so can I. Despite how things appear. 

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I do not know how faith can look

Like the closing of a well-loved book

A sudden end to familiar joys,

A snuffing of a current hope.

But while I live, I do know this:

My Lord is mine and I am His.

I do not know how faith can sound

Like a shaking voice over flooding ground

A surging change beneath my feet

A wave of fearful strength and loud.

But this I know while life shall last:

I cling to Christ, and He holds me fast.

I do not know how faith can taste

Like a bitter sop pressed to my face

A drink that I would never choose,

A paradox of sovereign grace.

But this I know and am secure:

My love is His, and His love endures.

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And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Rom. 8:28, 38-39

Beth 

the God of maps

One small woman. Alone. At dusk. Standing on the edge of a seething traffic surge of jeepnees, motorcycles, buses, taxis, cars, trucks, and various chickens. It’s deafening loud. A swirl of foreign smells whips her damp hair. In her hand is a cellphone blinking ‘low-batt.’ She’s the only white person in sight. Glowing like a tiny beacon against the gathering dark.

She’s lost. Standing on one of the largest traffic patterns in Metro Manila, she’s lost, and alone, and her phone is dying, and every pore is sweating, and her heart is pounding, and her mind is forgetting every wisp of Filipino she may have thought she knew. And it’s getting darker. No one in the great wide world knows where she is at that moment. No one but the ones perched suspiciously along the sidewalk crunching beneath her feet.

Her phone dies.

To keep walking the circumference of the great Quezon Circle is her only option. Correction: she must keep walking forward along the Circle. For a backtrack to where her jeepnee dumped her out would be like greeting the growing number of sidewalk-perchers with a loud, “hey there, I don’t know what I’m doing or where I’m going, but I’m small, and young, and foreign and carrying a purse...”

In Quezon City, Manila all major road arteries dump into “The Circle.” It’s like a huge wheel hub (miles in circumference?) with spokes. You squint your eyes (to dim your peripheral vision lest you lose your nerve) and honk your horn on repeat to merge onto the Circle. You exit the same. A veritable “traffic tango” of epic proportions plays out in between.

She’s walking the edge of that. Hoping for a familiar landmark to appear. Hoping to reach the next road spoke on the wheel. And as she walks she prays. God, you are right here with me, right now. Thank you. You are sovereign, and have promised to care for me. I’m asking for wisdom to know what to do next, and protection, and a safe return home.

A bright yellow taxi cab screeches to a halt beside her. She dives inside. He has a kind, concerned face. Listens to her stumbling, vague directions quietly. To this day she is sure he took the fastest route and charged her an honest fee.

She hadn’t considered that angels could be Filipino before.

She walked (a bit shaky) into her church’s Wednesday night prayer meeting less than 30min. later. Sat down on the solid wood pew while the service began in front of her. And like a tsunami, the weight of that evening came crashing down around her. Crushing her with what did, what could have, and what didn’t.

And as those around her begin to sing, she prays in frustration and defeat. God, if I just had a map. I’m so visual. If I could just see the landmarks along the Circle. If I could know the road spoke names and their order…Hot tears form.

She grabs her hymnal and a folded, half sheet of paper flutters down. Mindlessly, she stoops to pick it up and unfolds it.

A map. Of the Circle. With all the spoke names. With major landmarks. Uncluttered. In clear, bold print.

………………………………………

Years pass. She’s still often alone. Still wonders where to go and what to do in life sometimes. There are dark days. There are anxious prayers. She gets confused, and forges off the path laid out for her. She’s overwhelmed with what has and what hasn’t, and what might in her life.

But she carries deep within her heart a sparkling truth undimmed by time.

Her God is the God of maps.

Beth

a fledgling writer writes on writing

It’s God’s opening act. We find it in the very first verse of the first book in our Bibles. As if He can’t wait to get to it. In the very beginning, God created. And, as human beings, we’re the only part of His creation made in His likeness. In the image of God created He him…as the King James so puts it.

This is important.

Because part of bearing His image is that we also create.  We create with words, and our own hands, and thoughts, and ideas. We create with solutions, and music, and technology, and medicine, and art, and food…We create because we are patterned after the Creator. All of us.

Now look closer and you’ll find a clear-defined difference between God and the world He has made in Genesis. He forms it, and makes it function. He tells His creation to and not to. He rules over it and controls it. He determines its boundaries, and He sits outside them.

It’s still the same today. Whether man chooses to accept it or not, in Him and by Him and for Him were all things made. We have our being—our identity, in Our Creator, and this world only makes sense when we accept His interpretation of it. When we find ourselves in Him.  It’s always that way with created things. To think the opposite is ridiculous. God finding His identity in us? Of course not. He made us.  

I promise you this has to do with writing. I promise.

You see, we easily forget, as mini-creators, what we make is not our identity.

Bingo.

So what’s it look like to find my identity in what I create?

 1.  It looks like me hating to have anyone touch my writing. The word edit is bad enough. The word editor? Nightmarish. Hives. Hyperventilation. Nervous twitch. Heartburn. Flutterings.

     2.  It looks like a deep groan, or lashing words when someone changes what I’ve created. Like mourning the loss of something I birthed. (not to be dramatic or anything)

     3.  It looks like inflated sense of worth when someone compliments my work, and a fast, deflated depression when someone criticizes it.

     4. It looks like avoiding collaborative writing opportunities like the plague. Not that I’ve ever caught myself thinking, I will NEVER write another VBS Bible curriculum or Christmas Program… But by it’s very nature, ministry is collaborative—an expression of the body of Christ and it’s various members. And that’s gonna rough if you find you in your work and watch it altered into an us. 

    5. It looks like avoiding growth and change in what I make even if it would be for the better.

    6. It looks like only inclining my ear towards those who flatter what I’ve made.

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We create. Because we’re made in the image of God, the great Creator. But we must also ‘sit outside the boundaries’ of what we make. It’s important because our true identity is found in our God. And in Christ, we are valued at much greater than the sparrows and lilies. A worth down to the very number of our strands of hair, and measured in the precious, shed blood of the Lamb of God.

So I write. Infant words. But they will grow and mature as I continue to create. And I do not have to fear this. I don’t have to shun those things and people who will come alongside me, and help me better on the way. Because my Creator is my identity. I am in Him and for Him. Nothing can mar the stamp of that image. And our work may well glorify Him as it reflects Him.

For from the very beginning, God created.

Beth

the single and the no

It all started with me complaining (I’ll wait while you pick yourself off the floor) to my Pastor’s wife (a cardinal sin for sure) at prayer meeting (well this is off to a good start…).

A single has no one to tell them ‘no.’ And ‘caring for the things of the Lord’ is so broad in it’s scope. Much harder to discern than ‘caring for the things of her husband…’ We bear the full weight of discerning whether the opportunities constantly being presented to us are truly God’s will or not. There’s no one sitting next to us saying, “honey, you can’t take that on right now.” And when we do say no, people wonder what we are doing with all our single freedoms and resources…

My Pastor’s wife doesn’t pull any punches, folks. She spoke truth. And although it was much more gracious than this, it sounded a lot like, ‘you don’t need someone else to discern God’s will, and you can and must discern God’s will as a single.’

Bah humbug.

I didn’t want to hear that.

And then a couple weeks ago, something fantastical happened. People I’ve prayed would seek me out, did. New ministries were presented. I found myself in homes I’d never been in…I booked and double, and triple booked every evening of the week for two weeks. This, on top of a fulltime job, music rehearsals, writing, lesson prep, eating, sleeping, cooking, cleaning etc. Things just blew up in these here parts. And I thought perhaps I’d gone to Heaven and didn’t realize it. I was even taking phone calls in the bathtub, y’all.  In short, it was awesome. I mean that.

But it unraveled fast. I found myself exhausted, frustrated, anxious, numb, my autoimmune flared up…and for the first time in a long time, I found myself cringing as I read the Word.

"Come unto me, all ye that labour, and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me: for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."  Matt.11

Well, that’s not my reality. I am labored and weighted down by all these good things. There’s nothing easy and light about this. Ministry is hard. It’s too much. Rest? Hah.

It’s true. My life had become too heavy. Because I was trying to carry a yoke of my own making.  Matthew says God creates a perfectly fitted yoke to our individual abilities and strength, so that it may be borne well with His enabling (think easy and light.) And underneath His yoke, there is always enough rest. That’s the whole reason for this passage! My Heavenly Father is concerned for me. He knows my frame. He carefully considers what I am made of.  And He will not even throw out a bruised reed, or extinguish a smoking flax. My God is bent on gentleness. He does not smash His children under heavy things.

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So singles must grow skilled at discerning God’s yoke, and well-practiced in the art of saying ‘wait while I discern’ and ‘no.’ This is necessary. Not because we lack a spouse to guide us. Not because others constantly hurl opportunities our way. Not because we don’t absolutely love filling our lives with people...

I must learn because my God cares for me. Little Beth. With her large passion and humungous ideas. And her little strength, and small skills in her small hand. He is concerned that I be able to bear the pressure and responsibility of all that my heart wants to do for Him. Single friend? Look a little deeper and you’ll find worth, and value, and a rich, satisfying Divine love in this passage.

And you’ll find a why for when you must say no.

Beth