Christian Life

The Time Machine: November is Sad for Some

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The Time Machine series features posts from years past.

When we set our clocks back this past weekend, I remembered why I struggle so much in November. It’s cold, dark, and Christmas is still two months away. About four years ago, I wrote this post to encourage my own heart, and yours too.

***

We’re heading into a tough month.  For many people, depression spikes in November.  Did you know that?  If you struggle with depression, that is not news to you.  The clocks go back, and for some reason, our feelings of hope go with it.

Maybe it’s because we finally notice just how DARK it is outside.  And the days just get shorter and shorter, until just before Christmas, the brightest of celebrations.

Less daylight really DOES make a difference to our hearts.  In these coming days, I will be praying:

“Father help my heart believe
That your love is singing over me.”
-Steven Curtis Chapman, from his song Love Take Me Over

For His purposes (which so far have not been made known to me), God has seen fit to allow me to experience bouts of depression.  And November has been one of those months that has, historically, been difficult.  It’s kind of funny, I guess, because I REALLY don’t like to appear weak.  I am the “gal with a plan”, so to speak.  And I really would rather seem like I’ve got a handle on things.

The truth is, HE’s got a handle on things.  And that is so precious to me in the deepest part of my soul.  I am not just praying for deliverance from the struggle, I am also praying for faithfulness through it.  Because after all, He is WITH me – and that is the truth, no matter what my negative thoughts may say.

Zephaniah 3:17 (NIV)

The Lord your God is with you,
    the Mighty Warrior who saves.
He will take great delight in you;
    in his love he will no longer rebuke you,
    but will rejoice over you with singing.

november afternoon

November afternoon

The Time Machine: The God Who Protects

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The Time Machine series features posts from years past.

Today I chose this short word of encouragement that I shared in March 2012 on my radio show. I hope it brings some encouragement if you’re facing a dark season.

***

It’s amazing to think that the God of the universe is involved with His creation!  We see this over and over again with the way God interacts with the nation of Israel in the Old Testament.  In this Isaiah passage, we see a side of God that is so loving – an amazing Heavenly Father and powerful Protector!

Isaiah 43:1-2 (NIV)

“But now, this is what the LORD says—
he who created you, Jacob,
he who formed you, Israel:
‘Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
I have summoned you by name; you are mine.
When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze’.”

BillyWilsonflickr

Image: “Ripple”, Billy Wilson, Flickr

I Need a Do-Over

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Saturday, 8pm.

I need a do-over.

The last half of this day didn’t exactly go as I was hoping. Things just kept coming up that weren’t in the plan, you know? Conflict. Cranky baby. Crazy kids. And then, the broken sink.

Feels like the past 12 hours were a total write-off! My heart is heavy tonight and I am struggling to remember if there was, in fact, anything good about this day. It’s easy to let times like this make me feel like a failure.

Then I remember Grover’s bad day.

Once I was reading a Sesame Street book to the kids about Grover having a bad day. Everything went wrong for him. He was late for playgroup, he forgot his lunch and the other monsters wouldn’t let him play football! And after school, he dropped his ice cream on the ground.

When he got home, his mom asked him how his day was and he just crumpled into her lap and told her all the things that had gone wrong. Then she said something that stuck with me: “Don’t let a bad day make you feel bad about yourself.”

How easy is it to take a tough day and turn it into a test of our competence? Those feelings of failure can seep into our hearts, making it difficult to be thankful for the things we have right in front of us. Whenever I feel like this I remember something my husband came up with about a year ago. I was having a similar kind of moment where all I wanted to do was grumble with a capital G every day all day long. It was becoming a pattern for me – a default attitude that needed to go.

“What can I do?” I asked.

“How about this: every day, find two different ways to worship God, help someone, and write down twenty things to be thankful for,” he suggested. “And each day’s list has to be different than the day before.”

“Twenty things!?” I raised an eyebrow. It was a good idea, but I was skeptical.

The first two parts came easily – the worshipping and the helping. And then, the list. I thought, There’s no way I can write down twenty things to be thankful for! But I’ll try.

Numbers one through five were the regular things you thank God for – family, shelter, provision and such. As the list grew, I began to dig a bit deeper into the things that I had in my life to be grateful for. The higher I counted, the more my attitude shifted. By number twenty, I was thanking the Lord for the difficult day itself, because I realized days like this really help me grow in ways I can’t even see at the time.

Back to Saturday night. Was there anything in this day to be thankful for? Of course there was!

A visit to the store with our cutie pie kids!

Lunch and lively conversation with friends.

A teenage niece who likes to babysit our girls so we could enjoy said lunch kid-free (besides the baby)!

Hearing our girls playing together with such incredible imagination and creativity.

Baby smiles and chatter that literally melted my heart and filled me with joy.

And my husband! Hearts-for-eyes for that guy, I’ll tell you! Just all the things about him!

Well, I think I just found my do-over.

 ***

Count your blessings

Name them one by one

Count your many blessings

See what God has done!

leaves and shoes

 

The Time Machine: Restoring the Ruin

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The Time Machine is a series that features posts from years past.

Today I’m sharing something from March 2014. At the time I was highlighting Scripture on the radio each day leading up to Easter. This particular insight encouraged my heart this week!

***

Jesus read Isaiah 61 aloud in the synagogue (Luke 4:14-30), and then declared that it had been fulfilled in Him.

Isaiah 61:1-3 (NIV)

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me,
    because the Lord has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
    to proclaim freedom for the captives
    and release from darkness for the prisoners,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor
    and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,  
     and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
    instead of ashes,
the oil of joy
    instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
    instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
    a planting of the Lord
    for the display of his splendor.  

Beauty instead of ashes.  

Joy instead of mourning.

Praise instead of despair.  

Ever felt like everything you’ve ever worked for and loved has been burned to the ground?  

Ever lost something so incredibly precious that you can’t eat or sleep, and you’re seriously considering if it’s worth going on?  

Ever been filled with a sense that nothing will ever change, and you’re stuck where you are forever with no way out?  

Then you know.  

You understand.  

This news is very, very good.  And this news is for you.   

Jesus has come to turn the shattered places into wonders of beauty, joy and praise.

Restoring the ruin.  Hope in human form. 

Might seem impossible from where you’re kneeling, but He is the One moves when we simply can’t.

clouds

I caught a glimpse of these clouds one day and was stunned!

How do you raise kids who love Jesus?

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“Fall is the beautiful-est season!” my 4 year old declared from the back of the van. We took the long way to Grandma’s house the other day, past a natural area that comes alive with colour at this time of the year. You wouldn’t believe the fiery oranges, deep reds, dark purples, and shades of bright yellow set against the browns and greens of the hillside and the glorious deep blue of the fall sky above.

Incredible.

My eyes are drinking this in. I can’t get enough! Every year I forget just how amazing it is, and every year I’m stunned by the gorgeous palette around me. Little creeks and hillsides next to freeways go completely unnoticed until Fall, when they shout their presence with incredible beauty. Ditches and groves that were so ordinary just a few weeks ago now catch my eye and amaze me.

I am a “noticer” of nature. In spring, it’s the return of the robins and the buds on the trees. In summer, I wait for our roses to bloom and for thunderstorms to shake the house. In winter, I love the way the snow sometimes falls in huge peaceful flakes, and the way the stars twinkle on a cold, crisp night. Right now, it’s technicolor trees and vivid sunrises and sunsets.

I purposely point them out to the kids.

Last week we happened to be out past bedtime, as the sun was setting. “Look at those colours, girls! That’s amazing! God is such an incredible artist!” I said. I snapped a photo with my phone from the passenger seat.

fall sunset 1

They gasped, eyes wide in wonder.

“Wow!”

“It’s so beautiful!”

“It’s dark outside!” Our 2 year old was worried. “Why’s it so dark?” (We assured her it was alright, and that we were safe.)

They pick pretty rocks from the driveway for their rock collections. They are dazzled by dandelions. And pinecones are perfection.

I can see them becoming “noticers”, and my heart is so full!

I remind them that God made all of this and He made them too.  I tell them that God is the MOST creative of all, and that He gave them their creativity. I want them to see that He is not silent and uninvolved. I want them to know He is real, and that He draws near, even in everyday things.

How do you raise kids who love Jesus? Ultimately, the choice to love and follow Him is up to them, as they grow and discover who He is. But I am learning that they’re watching how their parents interact with God and each other, listening to the things we say and putting the pieces together about Him by their experiences with us.

It really gets me, you know? I think of all the mistakes I’ve made with the kids and I wonder if even those things can be made into something beautiful in our family’s life. But I am trusting that God knows how to untangle my mess and work it into a gorgeous tapestry of His faithfulness for each of my kids.

They need to know that worship is more than Sunday morning songs and stories, and that the beauty of creation is meaningful because of Who it reveals.

We worship God inside AND outside church walls, right smack in the middle of all the ordinary.

 

When Things Are Just Too Much

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How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? – Psalm 13:1

lightning

Late summer lightning

What do you do when the bottom falls out? When things go so completely wrong that it seems impossible that God is still involved in the situation? What do you do when you know He is powerful to stop something from happening, or to clear an obstacle, but He simply does not do either one?

I want to believe that somehow, all my faithfulness to Him will be rewarded with health, long life, stability, finances and human love on this side of eternity. I want to think that if I’m good to Him, He will be good to me in the way that I think is right and good and worth my effort, here and now in this life.

But I know that’s not true. In my heart I know the real rewards are yet to come.

This is one of the hardest things about following Jesus. God is good, yet bad things still happen, and it’s even more difficult when bad things happen to good people. I know that God can intervene and change the outcome of any situation, and yet sometimes He doesn’t. I grieve losses and disappointments and wonder why He doesn’t just make it all go away.

I was thinking about this the other day  when I read something that struck me. It was from Pastor Timothy Keller, who has taught extensively about suffering and the Christian worldview. He said, “The best people often have terrible lives. Job is one example and Jesus—the ultimate ‘Job,’ the only truly innocent sufferer—is another.”

Not very comforting, and yet completely satisfying all at the same time. If even Jesus suffered, why do we think that we will not? We’ve been fed this line that if we are faithful to Him, He will be faithful to us with material blessings and protection. Maybe a nice house and a car, a good marriage with wonderful kids, a full bank account, our health and a great job that will fill our desire to make an impact – our “calling”, as it were. Kind of like karma – be good and good things will come.

Except that’s not how it works. Jesus said, “In this world you will have trouble…”

Not that we go looking for it; we don’t have to. In certain seasons of life, it finds us. And it doesn’t make sense. It feels unfair. It hurts.

Earlier this month, we lost an incredible evangelist and passionate teacher. Nabeel Qureshi’s life and books have impacted thousands of people around the world! This guy loved Jesus. He was willing to give up everything for the sake of the cross. Surely he would be healed of his sudden stomach cancer diagnosis! Surely God would do a miracle in his life to show His power and glory! Thousands of people prayed for healing. Thousands of voices lifted morning after morning, night after night – asking Jesus to remove the cancer in this young husband and father and give him a bright future as an author, teacher and speaker.

The answer came on September 16th, 2017 as Nabeel was welcomed into eternal life with Jesus.  We know he is experiencing the incredible joy of seeing the Lord face to face! But we can’t help but ask the question, “why Lord?”

Why do we have to suffer? Why do good guys have to die?

We were watching Bambi with the kids a few weekends ago and our four and a half year old was horrified by the very idea that the storyteller would include the part about Bambi’s mom being shot by a hunter.

Her face was stricken with a mix of confusion and fear as she cried out, “WHY?! WHY DID THEY EVEN PUT THAT IN THERE?!”

I know, right?!  I feel like that every time something nasty comes my way.

We think we’ve got things covered, but when something goes sideways we face the reality that we are not in charge.  That phone call. That doctor’s appointment. That work meeting. The economy. The weather. The timing of a particular moment. In just seconds, we are driven to our knees with shock, grief and fear.

And rightly so. In the moment it is so difficult to understand why or even how something like this would happen.

Here’s the amazing thing. When suffering comes, we are not expected to fold our hands and shrug our shoulders and say, “oh well, it’s God’s will”. We are free to wail and grieve. We are allowed to cry out to the Lord from the depths of our hearts. We can run to Him to be held, comforted, reminded of who He is – the God who redeems and restores our lives for all eternity!

Suffering takes our faith to depths we’ve only heard about in stories and testimonies. Places we will not go on our own. Places that bring us into a closeness with Jesus we’ve never had before, as we share in His sufferings.

Author Ann Voskamp says, “When we know Christ, we always know how things are going to go — always for our good and always for His glory.”

We don’t have to explain it away, because we have a Saviour who suffered too. A Savior who bore our sin, shame, pain and grief, who died a brutal death, forsaken by all. And He is the very same Savior who came to life again, breaking death’s power for all eternity.

When we see God for who He really is, even in the middle of the darkest of nights, we come to understand that He really is the One who holds it all together. We begin to see that God is working all things for our eternal good – and for His glory. These sufferings are temporary. He is eternal. With our trust placed in Jesus, our future is secure, free from suffering and filled with hope.

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”

2 Corinthians 4:16-18 (NIV)