Tag Archives: faith

The Hard Days

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This week we had a couple rough start mornings followed by a rough practice with my daughter’s team I coach where my own daughter kept interrupting when I was trying to keep the girl’s attention. Then I heard from my sitter that my younger daughter had a hard time listening.

We got home, had a family meeting, enacted some consequences and had a much better morning. Then this morning happened.

I had texted my husband last night while he was coaching my daughter’s soccer practice, to get some cash out at the ATM because my oldest needed some tomorrow for school (why oh why are there SO many events in the last 2 months of school?!) and we needed it for various other things coming up, like paying our sitter for the practices I coach to watch my other kids.

Anyway, said daughter who is not supposed to be on phones or devices at all this week was using his phone to practice her songs for her music field trip coming up. So he missed my text, didn’t get cash out and this morning I had to scramble to get it together.

Then I tried sending an email to the parents of the girls I coach and it wasn’t working from my phone, I tried using my computer and it died and the charger apparently no longer is working. I was thoroughly frustrated before 7 am.

My daughter started asking me random irrelevant questions as I’m trying to get everyone out the door and I got very short with her. Then I felt terrible about it.

From talking to other moms, I know for a fact that my experience is not unique to only me. We all have date like this and they tend to make us feel like complete failures.

The truth IS that raising kids today is so much different than it’s ever been before. Some of it, we put on ourselves, for sure, but some of it, is just that our culture is so different too. Technology makes it different. I could probably write a book (if I had the time, ha!) on just how different it is raising kids now than it was when I was a kid.

My point is this. If you are a parent that is trying to raise your kids counter-culturally, it’s going to be very difficult. It’s hard to be involved with your kids and take an active role parenting them. You’re going to slip up and you’re going to mess up. Ultimately though, being involved is what’s important.

I’ve been thinking about running lately and why I love it so much. It’s not always easy to put into words but I’m trying because these girls I coach, I really want to give them the gift of running.

There are days that I am excited to run. The sun is shining and the weather is perfect. Then there are days when the wind chill is -10 and it’s a blizzard. Or the rain is just pouring down and it’s not a warm rain. On these days, I can’t exactly say that it’s easy to get out there. But when I do, when I’m gritting through the elements or fighting off a virus or dealing with sore muscles, or…or…or, any time it’s not all flowers or rainbows, THOSE are the runs that empower me.

It’s not something you can experience in a video game. The feeling of your body, being pounded by the elements and getting through it, one step at a time. The confidence you feel afterwards is invigorating.

It’s the same with faith. It’s usually when we’re in the eye of the storm that our faith blossoms the most, not during times of plenty.

So parents, if you’re struggling and feeling defeated, take heart. Gritting through these difficult times is helping you grow. Putting in the hard work now, digging in, and showing your family that you’re in it, no matter what shows them the depth of your love for them. Keep failing and learning and picking yourself back up.

When tragedy breaks our hearts

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I had stayed away from news and social media all day because we were busy getting ready for spring break. It wasn’t until I finally sat down at the end of the evening to quickly check something on Facebook until I saw some posts about Nashville.

When things like this happen I get very quiet within myself. It’s like I have no words, even in my own head. And I pray. And I feel so upset. Upset becomes a physical feeling.

I know that in the aftermath of this tragedy, there will be a whole lot of noise. Politicians will push their politics as the answer and people will get nasty with each other arguing their different views on who’s at fault and what the solution is.

It’s actually quite sickening how the evil that caused the tragedy in the first place, settles into our hearts and enjoys the division and hate it sows among us.

And people will blame God or say it’s evidence of no God, or one who allows such horrible things to happen. Even some true believers may find themselves shaken and asking why oh why this happens.

I don’t have all the answers to life’s big questions but I DO know why this happens. It happens because our world is so, so broken. It was NEVER supposed to be this way.

Back in the Garden, Adam and Eve had everything they wanted and were like children. God only warned them that if they ate the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they would surely die.

Think about it. They were naked and unashamed and had no knowledge of good and evil in the Garden. It was safe there. They were as children, being cared for by a loving father.

Then the tempter lied to them and told them they surely would not die, but would be like God. This broke everything. But God still loved them. He made them leave the Garden, because He didn’t want them to live forever in such a cursed, and broken world, and He doesn’t want us to live here forever either.

This world is cursed with the most terrible evil, but it’s not where we live forever. He sent His own Son to die an excruciating death so that we may have everlasting life outside of this broken world.

Why though, would He allow such terrible things to happen to His children? I DON’T know why some people die and others do not. I know I’ve followed many children that have had or have cancer. Many of these families have incredibly strong faith. Some of these children are healed and the families give all glory to God for their healing and other children are healed in Heaven.

I’ve witnessed these families that have had to say goodbye have incredible faith that’s just astounding. Even some of these precious children often showcase incredible faith that many adults do not possess. I don’t know why some are healed and some are not. Nor do I know why Jesus chose Lazarus to bring back to life.

I do know that Jesus, cried out to His Father to take this cup from Him. Yet, Jesus was still obedient to the Father, and succeeded where Adam and Eve had failed, allowing all believers to live in peace with the Father for all of eternity.

I do believe these children are there now. Their families still go through incredible, incredible pain here. My heartbreak is with them. Why must they live the rest of their days here with this pain? I don’t know the answer to that. But I do believe they will see their child again. God says that every tear will be wiped away and I believe it. But they need people to surround them in love, not hate.

When terrible acts happen here, we don’t fight evil with more evil. We fight evil with love. What can we do to put more love into this world? We shouldn’t try to spear people with our words and our opinions. Because it is not flesh that we fight against.

When the noise gets loud over this tragedy around you, don’t add to the evil. When you hear people screaming about why God would allow such terrible things to happen, take them to the cross. Spread truth and life where death and lies live. Pray. Pray for mercy on our nation and our world.

There’s a true story that is not mine to share but someday I need to. It’s too long to put here but I hold that story up in my heart and bring it to mind in times like these. It reminds me that these children are safe. I believe that with my whole heart.

Love and pray for your enemies. When evil tries to knock you off your path, go right back to the cross. Hold Jesus’s sacrifice in your heart and remember Jesus’s words to the thief, “I tell you the truth, today you will be with Me in paradise.”

When you feel defeated

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Sometimes, we hope and pray so hard for something good, and it seems like the answer is no. What do we do? How do we move forward when things feel so hopeless.

“For My ways are not your ways”

“Father, if there is any other way, please take this cup…Your will be done.”

I’ve been in this place before and it’s one of the more unpleasant places. You put in all the hard work, were best suited for that promotion and it didn’t happen. You trained so hard for that race and your workouts were all showing you should be more than able to hit that goal, but race day comes and you fail miserably. Why did I even bother?

I remember going through some of the secondary infertility we experienced and feeling so hopeful going into a month that everything was done “right” only to stare in anger at yet another negative pregnancy test.

Sometimes it’s even bigger than that. Sometimes it’s in regards to laws and policies that leave you feeling completely gutted.

In all these situations, it felt like you did what you were supposed to do, but didn’t get the results. It’s hard to not feel like it’s a judgement of you personally. It’s hard to not be angry. It’s hard to not feel hopeless or wonder why you should put yourself out there emotionally ever again.

Take heart. Jesus was preaching in a corrupt Roman Empire. And word spread quickly of His teachings and His healing and He even was said to be the long awaited Messiah prophesied. People were full of hope. Hope that He, like Moses would lead the people out of oppression.

When He rode a donkey, people waved palms, fulfilling yet another prophesy. Yet He was murdered. Not only that but He was mocked and humiliated. Stripped down naked. The people who truly believed He was the Messiah must have wondered why He didn’t free Himself from the cross and end it all there. Instead, He allowed it to occur.

Can you imagine what the believers must have been feeling? I can. I can feel it. They were hopeless. It would seem that the naysayers were right all along. They were made out to be fools and conspiracy theorists. But this wasn’t the end of the story.

Jesus rose on the third day. And on the day of Pentecost was the birth of Christianity. A fire that still burns brightly today. The Bible is still the bestselling book of all time.

It’s hard not to feel dismayed, hopeless, broken or even humiliated when we think we’ve been defeated. I urge you to remember that the story is not over. Sometimes God is working something even bigger and better in our moments that feel like defeat.

Don’t give in to feeling hopeless. Sing praises and be joyful even in your suffering. The enemy wants us feeling broken and defeated. But we have a strength that they can’t take away.

Encourage each other. Get back up and joyfully do the work. Pray. Love. Rejoice in your sorrows and let the flame within you shine all the brighter. Laugh when you are mocked. Don’t allow yourself to be humiliated. Be brave like Daniel going into the flaming furnace, saying “even if God doesn’t get me out of this, He is still God!”

If you want to change the world, go home and love your family. Love your community. Love your enemy.

The split road

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I was out running with my dog this morning and suddenly he started acting strange. He’s always either running a bit in front of me or directly at my side. He’s never running behind me unless he’s taking a quick pee and then he sprints to catch up.

He was definitely trotting behind me. I called to him and yet he still kept back a bit. Puzzled, I started to look around. That’s when I saw it.

We were jogging down a long country road where you could see much more than a mile into the distance. Looking straight on you could see a cloudy sky, mostly heavy shades of vanilla. To the left, there was a wide open field and a mostly light sky and you could actually see the sun rays poking through the clouds. It looked beautiful and for some reason seeing rays of light poking through the clouds like that always makes me feel God’s presence.

The view to our right was another story. The sky was so dark it seemed nearly black. Heavy storm clouds were creating this ominous feeling. It was after looking at that sky that I noticed the strong wind.

I had checked the forecast before going out and there was a good chance of rain but I didn’t see any storms. It certainly looked like a storm and I figured it was scaring my dog.

I looked back to the left. Peaceful. Beautiful. Calm. I looked again to the right. Dark. Stormy. Frightening.

Suddenly I noticed I had picked up the pace. If I continued running forward, I’d eventually run away from that dark sky but it was going to take a while. What if a bad storm did come on suddenly when we were out here? I looked around. There were plenty of barns we could duck into.

I looked again at the rays of light poking through the clouds on my left and prayed quickly that He would keep us safe. I focused on that light and calm and I wasn’t afraid. When I looked at the dark sky and how much further I had to run, I felt more anxious.

I knew I needed to just trust and feel confident that things were under control. When I focused on the light, it was easier. When I focused on the dark, it was easy to let the fear creep in.

And isn’t this the way it is in life? When we focus on our fears, our doubts, our insecurities, the what if’s in life, that’s all we can see. How long till we out run the storm?

When we set our confidence on the light, we see all the safe places we can shelter if need be, but don’t focus on that too much. We keep going on, confident, and secure that our path is the right one and it’s going to get us where we need to be.

Eventually, it started raining and the wind started really blowing against us. I got my dog back to my side and encouraged him that it was ok. He seemed to do better knowing I was not afraid.

We made it back and there never ended up being any thunderstorms, just rain and wind.

But storms can happen any time so it’s best to be prepared for them. If they do catch you by surprise, know where to look to keep you safe and secure. Feel confident in the light.

Exodus part 3

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The first part of this post can be found here, and the second part here.

So we left off with God showing up to Moses in the fields he’s working for his father in law Jethro, a priest of many gods. Moses is married to Jethro’s daughter and they have two children. As far as we can tell, Moses is living a happy, simple life.

God says incredible things to Moses. He says that He’s heard the cries of His people and has compassion on them and plans to lead them out of slavery with Moses’s help. And how does Moses respond? Like a noble leader who is brave and ready and honored to do his part for the good of his people? No.

Moses basically tells God that he’s not up to the challenge and he comes up with plenty of excuses why he can’t do it.

And I have to wonder, even though Moses doesn’t SAY he is comfortable in his life and just doesn’t WANT to, if that’s more or less what was going on in his heart. And far be it for me to judge Moses for this. I can only try to imagine myself, while washing dishes one day hearing the voice of God telling me these things and thinking I wouldn’t respond the same way.

So it gets me back to what I really wanted to write about as the thoughts came together for me while reading in Exodus this time. How often are we unwilling to do what we should do because it seems overly burdensome in our comfortable lives we lead?

I know for me personally, several years ago I would NEVER have shared my thoughts on faith publicly because I was worried about the way I would be perceived by my peers. But sometimes we get to a place where we realize we have to speak out and believe that God will be with us when we do. This is also spiritual maturity. The story of Moses is also a great story that illustrates spiritual maturity.

So going back to Moses; To all his objections, God tells him that He will be with him. Yet Moses still resists. This kindles God’s anger.

How often have we been there? We feel this tugging in our soul. We KNOW that God wants us to do something that is for our good but we resist. We come up with excuses because it’s hard. For me, there are so many times in life I’ve been where Moses was. One time was when I knew I needed to read the Bible every day to grow spiritually but it seemed like I didn’t have the time. I had all these excuses. I don’t have more hours in my day now than I did back then, but I finally made reading in my Bible daily my priority.

There’s someone in my life that I won’t name that confessed they wanted to give up drinking. Not permanently but for a period of time to try to rid themselves of the crutch it had become. Yet, the night before they intended to give it up, they wanted to have a few drinks, and this was how I knew they weren’t serious. It’s why the sign “free beer tomorrow” is so funny. Because it’s easy to say you’re going to do something hard tomorrow but it’s hard to start today. I told this person if they felt they needed to remove alcohol as a spiritual road block, if they were serious, they would start today. By thinking you need “one last fix”, I don’t really believe someone’s heart is really prepared to let that thing go.

With the addiction that ruined the relationship I had with someone in my family I could very easily see this struggle. I honestly don’t think he wanted to be a slave to alcohol. Yet he could never seem to get to the point where he could put in the hard work today. The alcohol was too much of a comfort to him and even though God would be with him, he couldn’t let go of the bondage it kept him in.

So, again we go back to Moses. God is angry with him, but tells him that his brother Aaron can be the one to speak since one of Moses’s excuses was that he was a poor speaker. God also tells him that all the men that wanted to kill him for his murder of the Egyptian are now dead.

So Moses takes his wife and kids and starts heading back to Egypt. Here it gets interesting again. It says on the way that the Lord met Moses again and sought to kill him. Why??

Well, we see next in the text that Zipporah, his wife, took a sharp stone and cut off the foreskin of her son, and threw it at Moses feet and said, “Surely a bloody husband ART thou to me.” So God let Moses go, and then Zipporah says, “A bloody husband THOU ART.” Because of the circumcision.

The first time I read this, I was wondering what in the world was happening! I searched out some help online and think I understand it better today. I think it’s another example of where Moses was spiritually at this time.

It was already a custom among Israelites to circumcise their men. The book of Genesis talks about Circumcision of males by their 8th day of birth as part of the Abrahamic covenant with God. So the fact that Moses had moved off to Midian and had children there but had not circumcised his own son yet, seems like it became a problem.

We can’t tell from the text if God had told him to do this and Moses disobeyed or put it off or what. What we do see is that Moses’s disobedience was literally killing him. His wife, though not one of God’s people herself, was quick to act to save her husband by performing the Circumcision on her son. And her act did save Moses.

Sometimes our actions or inactions are so destructive to us that people outside our faith can plainly see it too. Moses had a long way to grow spiritually, but we can see throughout his life, God was with him, putting many people in his life (regardless of whether or not they were Israelites or not) that helped him along.