In my weakness I am strong

And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure.  Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me.  And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.  Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Cor 12:7-10)

It’s a little weird for me to be writing about this when I’m in such a good place, but in my weakness God will reveal Himself strong, so why not now?  I am a firm believer that we all have a ‘thorn in the flesh.’  We all have something that keeps us from trusting too much in our own strength.  For some it might be physical, a condition that keeps you from doing certain physical activities.  An example would be arthritis or fibromyalgia.  For some it might be an inclination toward a certain behavior that we have to constantly resist.  This would include addiction (and some other things that I would rather not get into right now).  For me it is depression.

I’ve written about my struggles with depression in the past, but I don’t think that I’ve written about this aspect of it.  If I have, just skip reading this post.  Anyway, I’ve gone through different phases of my life where I have felt (about to my depression, not necessarily while I’m depressed) confused (why do I feel this way?), frustrated (I wish I could just make it go away), angry (why do I have this problem and others don’t?), hopeful (that I can overcome it), hopeless (that it will beat me), or any number of other things.  While I’m depressed I also experience most of those feelings (except for probably hope), but while I am not (like right now), I can look at it more objectively and see it for what it is, a weakness.

Now, I’m not talking here about feeling depressed.  I’m talking about depression, the thing that I have struggled with my whole life that pops up unexpectedly and takes me out of commission, sometimes for extended periods of time and often with no obvious reason.  I’m talking about the kind of depression that makes you think, “If I didn’t think it was wrong, I might consider ending my life right now.”  I haven’t been there in a while, several years actually, but it has gone through my mind in the past.  It’s more than just feeling sad, it is feeling despair.

I used to just put up with it.  I would struggle through, making everyone in my life (especially my hubby) miserable, and eventually (sometimes days, sometimes weeks later) it would pass and I would be back to my regular self again.  Several years ago (I’d say about four years now), though, I decided that enough was enough, I got some counseling and started taking anti-depressants.

Now, I know that there are people out there that think that anti-depressants don’t work, that they are over prescribed, that they are a cop out, or any number of other things.  I just want to say this: if you haven’t been there, then you don’t know how it feels.  This is a real condition with real symptoms and real effects on my very real life and family.  The medication helps me to feel normal, not my real (depressed) normal, but normal the way that everyone else feels it.

So, since I know how people feel about taking medication for depression, I sometimes go through periods when I want to stop taking it.  I start thinking that I should trust God to help me through the depression.  Let me make sure that I say this in a way that you understand: THAT NEVER WORKS OUT.  Some people can probably manage their depression without medication, but I am not one of them.  It isn’t that I don’t trust God, it’s just that I know that God knows about this and I think He is okay with me not feeling that way.  Again, if you haven’t experienced it, you might not understand just how bad it is.

I talk to my husband about this sometimes and he always encourages me this way, “Nobody would ever suggest to a diabetic that they stop taking insulin, but they think it’s okay to tell somebody with depression to stop taking the medication that helps them function normally.  You need to take your medication” (not a direct quote).  He also has a physical condition, that unless you know him you would probably never know about, for which he takes medication regularly, so it does help coming from him (also I know he loves me, so that helps, too).

Getting back to my original point, I know that this is a weakness.  I know that God knows about it.  I know that God uses my weaknesses (there are definitely others) for His glory.  And when I remember these things, I can even be thankful for the “thorn in my flesh.”  God is good and He works all things for good of those who love Him.  (Romans 8:28)

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You can run (well, maybe YOU can)

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. (2 Cor 5:17)

I’ve spent the last ten years running from the person that I used to be.  I’m embarrassed by that person and try to leave her in the past, but she keeps catching up with me.  I don’t know how well I can describe the differences between the person that I am now and that person, but I’ll try (without going into too much detail, since I try to keep my posts family friendly for the most part).

Here are some things that I wasn’t.  I wasn’t nice.  I wasn’t loyal.  I wasn’t lovable or loving.  I wasn’t a good friend.  I wasn’t confident.  I wasn’t responsible.  I wasn’t realistic (though I thought I was).

And now some things that I was.  I was stupid.  I was lost.  I was scared.  I was foolish.  I was wrong (though I thought I was right).  I was trouble.

Of all the things that I did back then, I am most embarrassed by the fact that I led others down the same path that I was on.  It was a path of destruction and I thought that it was the way to go.  I think I truly believed that it was the only way (or at least I convinced myself of that).  I made some really bad decisions because I had abandoned God as a teen and so thought that I was the only one I had to answer to.  The foolishness of my youth!

I know that at least some of the changes that have happened in me have come about just due to aging and learning more about myself and the world around me.  I know, though, that the biggest thing that impacted my life and changed me (most definitely for the better) was gaining a relationship with Jesus.

It wasn’t easy.  Despite the fact that I didn’t like myself, I still ran into a lot of pride obstacles.  I won’t get into the details of how I overcame that pride, except to say that I couldn’t have done anything without my (now) husband–and, of course, without the help of the Holy Spirit.

Some things haven’t changed.  I’m still honest (and it is still sometimes to a fault).  I’m still disorganized.  I’m still hilarious (at least according to my hubby and my kids).  I still love music, though my relationship with it has changed.  I still struggle with depression, though it is less frequent now.  I still care deeply about the things that I am involved in (whatever that might be at a given time).  I still hold myself to high standards (and I still sometimes impose those standards on others).  I still make mistakes (more often than I like to admit).

So, for those of you who knew me back then, please take the time to get to know the new me.  I am an infinitely more likable person now than I was then.  I am, after all, a new creation.

A good idea, but is God in it?

I just want to start by saying that I love my husband.  He isn’t always as open as I am with this kind of stuff, but he is an amazing man of God and I am so thankful for him.  He always has a word for me just when I need it.  I don’t want to get too gushy and embarrass him, so I’ll just leave it at that.

Now that that has been said, here’s what I’m really thinking about.  My church was formed about three years ago to reach the people of Smithfield, UT and northern Cache County for Christ.  It isn’t an easy thing to do because of the dominant LDS culture.  So, I have been thinking and praying about how to reach out to the people around me who I love since 2008, but even more so since my oldest child was born.    We even moved here from Logan, UT (only about an eight mile move) so we could be closer to the people of Smithfield.

The thing is, though, until recently I haven’t found a way to reach the people around me.  I am by nature introverted, so it isn’t easy for me to meet new people (I think I wrote about this before).  I had been hearing from a lot of friends around the country about a group called MOPS.  So many women all over were being blessed by this ministry that I decided to look for a MOPS group locally so that I could join.  Well, it turns out the closest MOPS group is about 45 miles away, so I started thinking that I should start a group here.  I started telling my husband about it and got an information packet.  I even contacted our pastor to see if it was something that our church would support.  Everybody seemed to think it was a good idea.  And that is when my hubby spoke a word to me that cut me to the core.

We were laying in bed and he said, “Have you prayed about this?”  Ouch.  I assured him that I had, while at the same time thinking that I probably hadn’t prayed about it as much as I should have.  “Why?” I asked.  And he said that his Sunday school lesson had been about when David decided to build a temple for God, but God told him not to and that his son would do it.  To put it in simple terms, David wanted to do something good, but it wasn’t for him to do, so God said no.  It’s not that what David wanted to do was wrong.  In fact, it was a good thing and something that God wanted, just not then and not from him.

So, here comes the application part: there are lots of good things that we can do in the name of the Kingdom, but if we ask God He might say no.  Don’t take it as a sign that what you wanted to do was wrong, though, because it might just be the wrong time or it might be for somebody else to do.  Just make sure you keep plugged in with God so that if He doesn’t want you to do something (or if He does) you’ll know.

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Nothing new

That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
And there is nothing new under the sun.
Is there anything of which it may be said,
“ See, this is new”?
It has already been in ancient times before us.
There is no remembrance of former things,
Nor will there be any remembrance of things that are to come
By those who will come after. (Ecclesiastes 1:9-11)

I like blogging.  It gives me something to do that doesn’t involve watching television (which usually means PBS cartoons).  I have to admit, however, that I am probably more forgetful than most, so a lot of the ideas that I have usually don’t make it here.  So, I was sitting around wanting to write something (and not remembering all of those things that came to mind to write about today) and decided to see if anything in the news was blog-worthy.  As usual inspiration struck in a way that was barely related to what I was doing, but since I was sitting here at my computer I didn’t have time to forget it.  Here goes.

I clicked on the “latest headlines” feed at the top of my browser and a list of recent news items popped up.  I started scrolling through looking for something that would catch my interest when the words, “blah, blah, blah,” started running through my head.  I was struck by the incredible sameness of all the news stories.  That isn’t to say that they were all about the same thing, in fact, somewhat remarkably there were not two articles on the same subject in the portion of the list that I read.

No, the sameness that I’m talking about is the type that Solomon spoke of in Ecclesiastes when he said that “there is nothing new under the sun.”  Although the stories are different in detail, there is a painfully repetitious feel to them.  Somebody got murdered or died.  Some politician or other celebrity did something scandalous.  Some sports team defeated (or was defeated by) some other sports team, possibly unexpectedly.  Something happened in the economy, which was either good or bad.  Lather, rinse, repeat.

These things have been happening throughout all of history, from Adam and Eve in the Garden (deception), to Cain and Abel (murder), to Sodom and Gomorrah (sexual sin), to the grumbling and golden calves of the Israelites (see the entire Old Testament, but especially Exodus), to Samson (pride), to idolizing religion (the Pharisees and Saducees of the Gospels), . . . the list could go on and on.  And those are just some of the examples in the Bible.  Just think about all of the things that have happened in the last two thousand years.  But, as you are thinking of them, notice how they are all the same things, over and over.

That was foretold in Ecclesiastes, though, as well.  Not only is there nothing new, but we are also doomed to forget the things that have come before.  Ecclesiastes 1:11 states, “There is no remembrance of former things, Nor will there be any remembrance of things that are to come By those who will come after.”  I don’t know why we think that things have always been the way they are (take, for instance, the general public’s insistence that we cannot live without entitlement programs, when most have only existed since 1944).  So, there’s nothing new, but we are doomed to repeat it because we don’t remember what has come before.

That is why I generally avoid reading the news, watching the news, talking about the news.  It’s all the same and it’s depressing.  I don’t really need another reason to get depressed.  Why then, you say, did I look to the news feed for inspiration?  Well, like I said, I really wanted to write something.  And here it is.  Something.

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Overcoming the temptation to complain

James 1:13-15–Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone.  But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.  Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.

1 Cor 10:13–No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.

Today I started reading Job in my One-Year Bible plan and it got me thinking, as so many things do.  The thought that I had was, “What right do I have to complain about anything?”  Here was a man that was so righteous that God boasted about him to Satan–twice.  And yet, despite his righteousness (or, more accurately, because of it), God allows everything to be taken from him just to prove to Satan that his love for God is real.

I am, by nature, a complainer.  I have gotten better in recent years, but the fact remains that I complain about a lot of things that I shouldn’t.  When I look at Job, however, it puts things in perspective.  I have never suffered loss like this, and I might never experience that kind of loss.  Yet this man who lost everything held firm to his faith.  When things are not going the way I want them to go it is really tempting to start complaining.  I usually keep my complaints these days to myself (although I often share them with my hubby, who, by the way is amazing), but God knows about the grumbling in my heart.

Over the past ten or so years I have matured in my Christian faith and have overcome many of my former temptations, but this is one that still has a pretty good hold on me.  I know that, compared to some other sins it might seem minor, but I don’t believe there is a “sin ranking” in which some sins are bad and some are worse.  I think that sin is sin.  If I lie, I might as well have murdered somebody because I broke the rules and that means that I deserve death (praise God that Jesus paid for my sins).

So, the next time the temptation arises to start complaining about my circumstances, I am going to a) remember Job, b) remember to thank Jesus for paying the price for my sins, c) remember that temptation comes from me turning away from God and leads to sin (James 1:13-15), and d) remember to ask God to show me the escape route (1 Cor 10:13).  Or, at least that’s what I intend to do.

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An angel of light?

So, here’s one of those things that I meant when I said I have different beliefs than some people who might be reading this.  I am a born-again Christian, so I do not believe that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God.  I do not pretend to have an exhaustive knowledge of all things LDS, but I’m going to periodically post here about how my views are different from my LDS neighbors.  I welcome comments expanding on anything that I say here.

2 Cor 11:13-15–For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, masquerading as apostles of Christ.  And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.  It is not surprising, then, if his servants masquerade as servants of righteousness. Their end will be what their actions deserve.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was born out of a vision that Joseph Smith received in 1820.  Here is a summary of that vision and a second vision from the website whatmormonsbelieve.org:

In the spring of 1820, Joseph Smith was searching for a church to join. There was a great religious revival in the region of New York in which he lived. He read a passage in the Bible that encouraged any lacking wisdom to ask of God. Joseph went to a secluded grove of trees to pray aloud and ask God which of the many churches were correct. When he began his prayer, an evil power possessed him and prevented his prayer. After a struggle against the dark presence, a light appeared over Joseph’s head which he described as brighter than the sun. It descended until it was just above him. In it he saw two personages of glory. One of them spoke, saying “Joseph, this is my Beloved Son. Hear Him!” Joseph asked which of all the churches was correct and they told him to join none of them, for the true Church of Christ was not on the earth. There were many other things that they spoke of which Joseph never revealed.

. . . On the twenty-first of September, Joseph Smith received another visitation, this time from the Angel Moroni and his work as a prophet of God began. Through him, the Lord accomplished a great deal. The Book of Mormon was brought forth, the restoring of the priesthood to the earth, the revealing of gospel truths, the organization of the true Church of Jesus Christ, and the salvation of the dead commenced in the Mormon temple.

I have several concerns about the vision that Joseph Smith experienced that lead me to believe that it did not come from God.

First, I assume that the “passage in the Bible that encouraged any lacking wisdom to ask of God” mentioned above is James 1:5, which states, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.”  This is a Biblical truth, but there is more to it than that.  The complete passage says,

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.  But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind.  For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord;  he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. (James 1:5-8)

So, if you lack wisdom, by all means ask God for wisdom.  However, don’t think that God will give you the answer if you ask from a doubting heart.  I don’t know what Joseph Smith’s heart condition was at the time, only God does, but I cannot assume that the answer he received came from God simply because he claimed James 1:5.  In Matthew 4:1-11 Satan quotes Scripture, as well, but “even demons believe–and tremble!” (James 2:19).  Claiming that Scripture led you to a conclusion does not mean that it was from God.  Biblical passages have been used to justify slavery, abortion clinic bombings, the burning of the Quran and any number of other acts.  I’m not trying to compare Joseph Smith to these others, I’m just saying that quoting Scripture doesn’t make something right or true.

So, the next thing is that he goes to a secluded grove of trees to pray (kudos to him for praying in private like we are told to do) and, “when he began his prayer, an evil power possessed him and prevented his prayer.”  I’m sure that there are those who claim that this is similar to Jesus’ temptation in the desert, but I see several key differences.  First, Jesus was never possessed by an evil spirit during his temptation.  He was tempted, but not possessed.  He remained in control of Himself and was never under the control of the devil.  Also, of all the demon possessions I have read about in the Bible none of them were overcome by the possessed individual himself.  All were cast out by somebody else (Jesus, disciples, prophets in the Old Testament; Saul’s demon was cast out whenever David played the harp for him).  None of them leave when the person possessed casts them out of themselves by sheer strength of will.  I might be reading too much into this, but I suspect that it is not possible to harness the power of God necessary to cast out a demon while one is possessed.  So, I suspect that if Joseph Smith was in fact possessed by an evil power, said power was not cast out, but remained and influenced his perception of the events that would follow.  He also may have been allowed to give false prophecy in order to bring about God’s Will in some situation, but I cannot say that definitively.

The next thing that happened is, “a light appeared over Joseph’s head which he described as brighter than the sun. . . In it he saw two personages of glory. One of them spoke, saying ‘Joseph, this is my Beloved Son. Hear Him!'”  And this takes me back to 2 Cor 11:13-15.  Paul says that even the devil can masquerade as an angel of light.  How do we know if the spirit that appeared to Joseph Smith is from God?  We are to test the spirits, and any spirit that does not confess that Jesus is God and came in the flesh is not of God.  You can read here that followers of Joseph Smith, that is members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints [LDS], believe that Jesus is one of many spirit children born of God the Father and his goddess wife.  He is the literal physical and spiritual son of God, according to the LDS, and “lived a sinless life and therefore was worthy to atone for the sins of all.”  Born-again Christians believe that Jesus was God who was came in the flesh and is worthy to atone for our sins because He is God, not because he lived a perfect life.  He lived a perfect life, but it is because He is and was and always will be God, not so that He could become like God.  So, if the spirits that appeared to Joseph Smith preached a different Jesus, then they are not of God.

There it is, in a nutshell.  I don’t believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, therefore, I do not believe his teachings.  It’s pretty simple.  I understand that some people believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and so follow his teachings.  I do not.

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Unashamed

Mark 8:34-38–When He had called the people to Himself, with His disciples also, He said to them, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it.  For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?  Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?  For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”

I’m an introvert.  I’ve always been more comfortable in my own head than anywhere else.  I also, however, long to be known.  That’s why this comes easily.  It’s like letting people in without having to admit to myself that I’m doing it.

That being said, fulfilling the Great Commission does not come easily for me.  Sharing the gospel is not difficult for me because I am ashamed, but because I am not bold.  I don’t want Jesus to be ashamed of me, so I need to remember that He did not give me a “spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline” (2 Tim 1:7).

So, here it is: I know that I have different beliefs from some of those who might be reading this, but I am claiming the power that God has given me to speak boldly in His name for, “The LORD is my helper; I will not fear.  What can man do to me?” (Psalm 118:6).  I won’t be like those Pharisees who believed, but did not confess Him; who, “loved the praise of men more than the praise of God” (John 12:43).  Feel free to disagree, but know that I fear God more than any man, so I will not be shaken.

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My spiritual act of Worship

Romans 12:1–Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual (or reasonable) act of worship.

Sometimes we are called to do things in God’s kingdom that aren’t very glamorous.  I have been in our church’s nursery for the last two-and-a-half-ish years with my two kids and sometimes I struggle with it.  Some days I sit around having a pity party saying to myself, “Why won’t anybody minister to me?”  Or, “Who’s going to serve me?  Somebody needs to take care of Stacy.”  I claim 1 Cor 12:26, “If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it,” and say, “I’m suffering, so we are all suffering, right?”  This causes feelings of resentment and usually takes me into a period of depression.

I have a different attitude lately, though, and it has been a refreshing change.  You see, if you read the whole chapter, you see there is more to it than that.   Verses 4-6 say, “There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit.   There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord.  There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men.”  So, I don’t need to expect somebody else to do the same things that God has called me to do.  I shouldn’t expect a hand to be an eye, nor should I expect and ear to be a foot.

So, being in the church nursery with my kids is my spiritual act of worship (one of them).  I have been guilty of having the thought, “Why do I even go to church?  I don’t get to worship with anybody else, so I might as well stay home.”  However, I know in my heart that I go because I want to worship God.  I am worshiping Him in a different way, but that doesn’t make it any less acceptable to Him.  As long as I have this attitude, cleaning can be an act of worship, weeding my lawn (which I should do more often), making dinner, buying groceries . . . whatever I have to do can be an act of worship.  I don’t always have the right attitude, but I do more often now than I used to.  A living sacrifice has to live.  It isn’t always exciting, but God accepts it all the same.

Pulling the Weeds

So, I confess, I have not been that good about pulling the weeds this year as I should be.  I got the dandelions in the backyard pulled, but the front yard is full of them.  I would feel bad about it if my neighbors took care of their yards, but they don’t (or at least not to Smithfield standards).  The real problem, though, is the morning glory.  Yikes, that stuff grows fast and is quickly taking over the lawn (there’s still more lawn here, though, than we had at our house in Logan).  I was pulling some of that yesterday and it got me thinking . . .

You know the parable of the sower?  [See the explanation of this parable here.]  The seed that is sown among thorns represents those who hear the word, but are distracted by what the world has to offer (money, things, pride, in a nutshell: sin).  They hear the word, but it has no chance to take root and produce fruit because other things get in the way.

At least some sin, though, is something that can be good in the right context, but is harmful when it is misplaced (the same has been said about weeds, they are just flowers that grow in the wrong place).  [Side note: that concept is not a new one, but I can’t remember where I read it, so I can’t cite my source . . . sorry.]  For instance, fornication (sex outside of marriage) is sin, not because of what it is, but because of what it isn’t.  It isn’t in the right context, that is, between a husband and wife, so it is harmful (the same is true of any sexual sin).  Money in itself is not bad, but if it becomes more important than it should be (that is, more important than God, a.k.a. idolatry), then it becomes evil.  Note that in 1 Tim 6:10, Paul says that love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.  Money isn’t evil, it’s what we do (or don’t do) with it that is evil.  We are the evil ones; money is a neutral object (I learned that from Financial Peace University, a class I would recommend to everyone).

What is getting in the way of you producing fruit today?  Is your religion getting between you and a relationship with God?  Is it money?  A relationship?  Your kids or spouse?  What is holding you back today?  Put first things first.  If you get into a right relationship with God, you will see that the quality of your relationships can become better, your feelings about money will change, your feelings about others and yourself will change . . . take it from me, everything will change.  Take some time to get right with the God of the universe and see what He can do in your life today.  If you don’t know Him, ask me to introduce you.  I promise you won’t be disappointed.

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When we all do our part

This week in my One-Year Bible reading plan I’ve been reading Nehemiah.  It’s one of those books of the Bible that could be really boring, what with the lists of people and all, but I learned something really interesting.  I learned what God can do when we are one in spirit (as we are told to be).  It isn’t actually a new lesson, but one of my favorite quotes from Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis is this, “We need to be reminded more often than we need to be instructed.”  So, that being said, here’s a reminder for us all.

In Nehemiah 3 (one of those lists of people that I mentioned), God tells us about how the Israelites who return from Babylon work together to rebuild the wall around Jerusalem.  It doesn’t say that the builders work, it says everybody works to rebuild the wall.  The perfumers and the priests, men and women, leaders and servants.  They all worked together to rebuild the wall.  Not only that, but they completed the repairs in 52 days, which is a very short time when you consider that they had half of the people guarding against attacks throughout the day and the rest were carrying weapons while they worked.  Also, I have seen teams of people working with modern equipment take more than six months to build one house, but these people built the wall around an entire city in less than two months (admittedly they had a lot more people working on this than a typical home construction crew, but I think the point remains valid).

What are we, as God’s people, not doing because we don’t think we can?  How many things could we do if we worked together and trusted God to provide for His work?  From Phil 4:13 I know that “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”  How much more so when we work together for a common goal?

Related articles

• Are We Great Followers? (johnnybullard.wordpress.com)
• Someone Spiked My Lunch With Passion! (christinepechstein.wordpress.com)

Older and Wiser

There is a They Might Be Giants song that has the line, “I was young and foolish then, I feel old and foolish now.”  I quote it occasionally, despite the fact that nobody I say it to probably knows what I’m talking about (I do it with random movie quotes, too).  Today, though, I feel older, wiser, and significantly more blessed.  Let me explain.

I have been a Christian for a little under ten years.  Before that, I was not very Christ-like.  I made a lot of stupid mistakes.  I did a lot of things that I’m not proud of.  One of the things that I regret most about my past is that I was unable to let people know the real me.  I’m sure there are reasons for this (I made some excuses for it here).  The point is that I had a lot of people who I considered friends who didn’t really know me.  I probably didn’t get to know them as well as I should have, either.

Since my conversion (November 2001), though, I have strongly desired deep, intimate relationships, but I have found only a very few in that time.  Recently, however, I have gotten back into contact with at least one person from my college years and it has been such a blessing.  It is funny how God can take something so broken and turn it into something so beautiful.

That’s what He does, though, as it says in 2 Cor 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”  My broken relationships, my broken self, everything has been made new.  The old things have passed away, not in that they are now gone, but in that they are of a different (and I would say better) character.

So, to my old friends I say, come and know me better now.  To those who knew me, but not well,  I say, come and know me in a new way.  To those who never knew me I say, all the better since you have nothing to overcome in our relationship.  I truly desire to be an open book, so ask away.  No reasonable question will go unanswered if you sincerely want to know the real me.

Some thoughts on the old me

After reading my old blog, which I did while moving some of the old posts here, I am shocked at how much has changed in the last four years.  Really, I’m shocked by how much I have changed.  Here are a few thoughts about that.

First, as a general rule I didn’t a) use people’s names (I blogged about the reason for this in a post that I didn’t move over…basically, it’s because I didn’t want anybody finding out anything about you that that they didn’t know because of me), or b) link to anything.  Well, if you read this post, then you know that I’m not afraid of links anymore.  I probably still won’t use people’s names, but that is just out of habit.

Second, in this post I reference an R-rated movie (gasp!).  I don’t think I’ve watched an R movie since Seth has been able to communicate with me (even just pointing and grunting).  For one thing, he’s a little parrot.  For another, I have chosen to get closer to God by removing negative influences in my life.  I don’t watch R movies or equivalent TV, go out drinking and partying, I’m far less rude (although I still struggle with this one), and I’m generally more selective in my entertainment choices.  Some might say that I got boring (they are probably right), but I genuinely try to care more about what God thinks of me than what people think of me.  (This post kind of foreshadows this change.)

Something that hasn’t changed is that I still struggle with depression, but not as frequently or as hard.  Here I talk about being a spiritual roller coaster, but that is far less common, too.  Part of that is that I have grown in my faith (something that has come from more regular Bible study and prayer…although I still don’t pray as often as I think I should).  The other part, though, is that I started taking medication for my depression.  I know that a lot of people have strong feelings about depression and medication.  I put off taking anything for my depression for more than ten years from when I started struggling with it, but I look back on that as a lot of time wasted.  I won’t go back to feeling like that.  (I don’t think that all of that time was wasted, just the time in that period that I spent feeling depressed.)  For more thoughts on depression, check out this post.  For examples of how I get when I’m depressed, check out this post and this post.

There are a lot of other things that I could say, but it isn’t necessary.  I’m still basically the same person.  I like to read, be with my family, get close to God.  I still struggle with how to be a good wife, how to minister to those around me, how to keep my attitude in check.  I still try to be an open book, but that book is still being edited.  I’m sure in a few years I’ll look back on these posts with the same amazement at how far I’ve come.  That’s the beauty of the whole blogging thing, it’s like a journal that I actually go back and read occasionally.

The Thing About Being An Open Book . . . (June 2007)

. . . is that people are more inclined to read you. And, the thing about having more people read you, is that they want to edit you and change you to match what is written in their book. Let me explain.

I’ve been having conversations with my co-worker about the differences in our beliefs. He is LDS and I am a born-again Christian. The conversations start out as just, “what do you believe about this?” and become, “but what about this? What about this? Haven’t you read this?”

I’m not God, so, not being God, I am not in the business of changing people’s hearts. I know that only God can do that. So, I talk to people about my faith, but not to convince them of anything or change their minds, just to present new possibilities, plant seeds. It seems, though, that whenever I do that, the person I’m talking to tries to start arguing and tries to change my mind about whatever it is that I am telling them I believe.

For instance, I told my co-worker something that I believe, he told me what he thought on the subject, I told him I disagreed because the Bible says nothing about whatever it was he was talking about, and his reply was, “well, what is faith?” as in, you should just have faith that what I’m saying is true. Pish Posh. He wanted me to have faith that what he believes was true, but not to have faith that what I believe was true. Now that is a contradiction if ever I heard one.

Don’t worry, though, my book is being rewritten, but by God, not by other books. Only one book can change my heart, and that is God’s Book, His Living Word. I will not be tossed about by the waves, but will stand strong on the Rock of my salvation. Praise the Lord that He is good and faithful and will bring to completion the work He began in me. And pray, for those whose names are not written on the palm of His hand that they will have soft hearts, open eyes, receptive ears and they will turn and be healed.

Sabbath Rest (June 2007)

I love discovering things in the Bible. The Holy Spirit has really been making scripture come alive to me lately. It’s funny how you can read something a million times, but the million-and-first time you read it, you see something that you hadn’t before. Anyway, God reveals so many things to me lately that I don’t know where to begin. This is just one lesson that he has taught me.

I was reading Isaiah 58 in the Message (love the Message) and came across this passage:

“If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
and the LORD’s holy day honorable,
and if you honor it by not going your own way
and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
then you will find your joy in the LORD . . .” (Isaiah 58:13-14, NIV)

“If you watch your step on the Sabbath
and don’t use my holy day for personal advantage,
If you treat the Sabbath as a day of joy,
God’s holy day as a celebration,
If you honor it by refusing ‘business as usual,’
making money, running here and there—
Then you’ll be free to enjoy God! . . .” (Isaiah 58:13-14, the Message)

Do you see what I mean? The Message says the same thing, but makes the meaning so much clearer. Anyway, about the meaning. The Israelites looked at this passage and saw, “Don’t do anything on the Sabbath.” However, I think it is pretty clear that what the passage says is, “Don’t do anything for personal gain on the Sabbath.” Making dinner, cleaning house, visiting friends and family, helping your neighbor move, these weren’t allowed on the Sabbath, but why? Matthew 12:10-12 says, “and a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, they asked him, ‘Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?’ He said to them, ‘If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable is a man than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.'” (NIV). Do good on the Sabbath. Set aside one day for the Lord that doesn’t involve work, but don’t forgo doing good. The Sabbath rest isn’t about doing nothing, it’s about doing what is good and right and pleasing to God.

Anyway, I know it isn’t a huge revelation, I just always find it interesting when I discover passages that I know the Israelites misunderstood. Jesus came here and clarified so much of what was said in the Old Testament. He didn’t change it, there wasn’t anything that He said that contradicted the Old Testament. He simply revealed the true meaning. I find that fascinating. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, anybody who thinks that the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament are different, or that God somehow changed between them, isn’t reading the same Bible that I’m reading.

An Open Book (June 2007)

I’ve felt challenged lately to really tell people the things that are happening in my life that really matter. It’s so easy when somebody says, “how are you doing?” to just tell them about work, or what you did over the weekend, or how your family is. How much better would it be, though, if we could all tell people exactly what is happening in our lives, good or bad, on a more personal level?

There are all kinds of passages in the Bible that talk about the heart. I think that one of the most misunderstood is Proverbs 4:23, which says, ” Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.” I am a person who naturally puts up barriers between myself and others out of fear that I will be hurt. There are so many things wrong with that attitude that I won’t even go into it now, but, suffice it to say that barriers are not what this passage is talking about. So many people look at this as a command to keep ourselves separated from others, but I think that it is talking about keeping sin out of our hearts. Phillipians 4:4-7 states:

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

This passage tells me that the peace of God, which is the fruit of the Spirit, will guard my heart and my mind. I don’t need to guard it, God will do it for me. If I am in God’s will, He will guard my heart from sin, but not necessarily from pain. That’s where the peace comes in. One cannot possibly live or affect those around him without taking some risks, without the possibility of getting hurt.

I want people to know the real me. I would love for them to see all of my faults and see that my strength comes from my God. Why would I hide that? In my weakness He is strong. I should celebrate my faults because they allow God’s glory to be revealed in my life. I’m not saying it’s easy, nor am I saying that I am at the point where I am a totally open book. I’m just saying that I’ve been letting my guard down a little more often lately and it feels like the right thing to do.

God Is Love (May 2007)

Ever since my experience on Sunday, I have been really, really excited about reading my Bible. I don’t remember a time when I was so hungry for God’s Word as I am right now. I sit down with my Bible (I’m reading the Message right now, but it’s a One-Year-Bible version…I love it) and I say to God, “what do you have for me today?” I’ve been reading 2 Kings and have seen God’s grace in that, which is something that I hadn’t noticed before and I think most people miss. Israel sins, God gets angry. Cause, effect. Then God lets them go their own way, not because He wants to leave them, but because He wants Israel to return. He wants to forgive and He does.

People who claim that the God of the Old Testament is a different God from the one in the New Testament have never really read either with the right frame of mind. You see, God is Love throughout both. Those who have children will probably understand this more than those who don’t, but sometimes you have to discipline a person, not despite the fact that you love them, but because of it. Sometimes you also have to let a person make their own decisions, even if you know them to be mistakes. [Side note: I read an article a year or so ago about a psychological study. The study showed that your brain has the same reactions when you see somebody else make a mistake as it has when you yourself make a mistake. That’s why it’s so hard to watch somebody else mess up.] That’s what God does with His people. They sin and He disciplines them. They decide to go their own way and He lets them in the hopes that they will come back. It’s because He loves them, not because He is vengeful. Don’t get me wrong, He is just. He just isn’t wrong.

Strength For Today And Bright Hope For Tomorrow (May 2007)

My intial conversion to Christianity was marked by huge, unrealistic promises that I made to God. I will read my Bible every day. I will spend x amount of time in prayer every day. I will never sin again. Etc. Because they were unrealistic demands that I was making of myself, I inevitably failed. I would then turn on myself, because that’s what I do best, and call myself a bad Christian, a bad person, a bad wife, etc. I would then recover from my broken promises, only to make more promises that I would then proceed to break. Lather, rinse, repeat.

I’m calling yesterday my “second conversion.” I can’t really explain what was different about what happened to me yesterday in comparison with other times that I have strayed and then returned. I do know the difference, it’s just hard to put into words. You see, it happened quite suddenly, without any advance notice. No warning, whatsoever. I was in church and we were singing, I don’t even remember the song, but I know it was totally unrelated to the thought that came into my head, which is the one that I wrote about yesterday. I was totally convicted by the Holy Spirit in a way that I haven’t really experienced before. It was like my entire life up to that point had been a dream and I was only just awakening unto reality. Everything became so clear. I suddenly got this strong urge to do more for my God, more for His Kingdom. It was like nothing else mattered anymore, as long as I could be close to Him. The sermon that followed oddly echoed the feeling that I was having about doing more for Him. I saw the insignificance of the things that I had been making a priority in my life. I saw things from a totally different perspective.

I mean, really, I saw everything in my life differently. I saw all of the ways that I wasn’t being a helper to my husband, but, instead of getting depressed and beating myself up (my usual reaction), I looked for things in my life that I could change to help him more. I saw the importance of meeting his needs and measured that against the things keeping me from doing so and I saw that those other things didn’t stack up. I saw opportunities to serve my God where before I had only seen opportunities to participate in something. I saw light where there had previously been darkness.

The most significant difference between this time and all the others is my lack of promises. I will try to do all of those things that I have promised God so many times before that I would do. I won’t lie to Him, though, and tell Him that I’ll never fail, that I’ll do something every day, that I’ll stay strong. I’m relying on Him more today than I ever have to simply provide me with whatever I need to make it through today. I don’t need to know what is going to happen tomorrow. Today has enough worry of its own.

The Gentle Slope, Soft Underfoot, Without Sudden Turnings, Without Milestones, Without Signposts (May 2007)

It’s always a shock to me when I realize the depth of the deception that I have become entrenched in. I allow myself to believe the lies that Satan tempts me with and turn, ever so gradually, away from the One True God. Satan inevitably takes it one step too far, though, and I am made aware of my situation. When that happens, I have only to repent and am back on the path of righteousness. Allow me to explain.

In C.S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters (a wonderfully written and thoroughly enlightening read), there are essentially three characters. One is a man, newly a Christian, who is being tempted by the second, Wormwood. Wormwood’s uncle, Screwtape, is the third character. It is Wormwood’s job to tempt the man so that he eventually ends up in Hell. Screwtape offers advice to Wormwood on how to do it. The whole book is written as only Screwtape’s side of the pair’s correspondence. I have to say, it is brilliant. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants some insight into how they can avoid Satan’s trap.

Moving on, Wormwood has managed to get the man involved with a group of friends who are “worldly,” that is, they drink too much, they are materialists, they are vain, they are flippant, etc. However, at the same time, the man is still going to church and still fancies himself a Christian. He is gently sliding away from God, due to his discomfort with the two parallel lives he is living, though he does not realize it because he is not aware of his indiscretions. He thinks his choices are minor and excusable, but they are leading down the gentle path toward Hell. The man, unconsciously, wants Wormwood to tempt him away from real contact with God, because he feels the discomfort caused by his dual-lives, but does not want to deal with it. Therefore he looks for any excuse to avoid praying or spending time in the Word or being with real Christians. This is what Screwtape says about that:

As this condition becomes more fully established, you will be gradually freed from the tiresome business of providing Pleasures as temptations. As the uneasiness and his reluctance to face it cut him off more and more from all real happiness, and as habit renders the pleasures of vanity and excitement and flippancy at once less pleasant and harder to forego (for that is what habit fortunately does to a pleasure) you will find that anything or nothing is sufficient to attract his wandering attention. You no longer need a good book, which he really likes, to keep him from his prayers or his work or his sleep; a column of advertisements in yesterday’s paper will do. You can make him waste his time not only in conversation he enjoys with people whom he likes, but in conversations with those he cares nothing about on subjects that bore him. You can make him do nothing at all for long periods. You can keep him up late at night, not roistering, but staring at a dead fire in a cold room. All the healthy and out-going activities which we want him to avoid can be inhibited and nothing given in return, so that at least he may say, as one of my own patients said on his arrival down here, ‘I now see that I spent most of my life in doing neither what I ought nor what I like.’ . . . You will say that these are very small sins; and doubtless like all young tempters, you are anxious to be able to report spectacular wickedness. But do remember, the onlly thing that matters is the extent to which you separate the man from the Enemy. It does not matter how small the sins are provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and out into the Nothing. Murder is no better than cards if cards can do the trick (Lewis, Screwtape Letters, 2001, HarperCollins: San Francisco, pp. 59-61).

You see, Satan has led me on a path away from God, but with only small sins, so that I did not notice. I looked for any excuse not to spend time with my God, and at first was only tempted by things I enjoyed; but eventually I was given nothing in place of my God, and that was enough. I long to be the person that God wants me to be, and now I realize how far I have strayed. I know, though, that I am forgiven already, before I even wrote any of this, because of Christ’s death on the cross and God’s complete and abundant grace. The path to Hell is an easy one, a gentle slope . . . I’m sharing this so that hopefully others will come to see that they are on that gentle slope, and will turn and be healed.

Is It Worth It? (Mar 2007)

Money in and of itself is not evil. It’s the things that you do with it, or fail to do with it, that make it good or bad. It’s the way that its use makes you feel that determines money’s worth. So, having said that, I hate money. I wish there were no such thing. Why can’t we go back to a bartering system? I mean, I really hate it. If it wasn’t for money issues getting in the way, I would be able to fulfill my purpose in life. I accept the fact that I brought the trouble on myself by making poor money decisions in the past, but had there not been money before, I would not have made those decisions that led me to where I am today. But there is a greater underlying problem here that I have not mentioned. Is it worth sacrificing even a few months’ happiness in order to achieve financial freedom? I would say that if that means that money no longer holds me hostage, it probably is worth it, but I’m not sure. I am a slave to money now, and that suffering makes it hard to breathe. I know that the suffering is short term, and also that it is the solution to my woes, but is it worth it? Is it worth it to cause strife inside of me and in my marriage, even for a short time? Is it worth the pain? Sure, I’m going to be free, but at what cost?

Where did this come from, you ask? Well, as you probably know, I have two jobs and hate them both. One is extremely boring because there is no stimulation. The other is extremely stressful because I’m not very good at it. Neither one is fulfilling on any level. So, do I keep my two jobs that I can’t stand and are slowly killing my spirit only because it is the fastest way to reach my goal of financial freedom? Or, throwing those things aside, do I give up on the fast track to financial peace and go now to find something that will be more fulfilling and rewarding? If I keep going on the current road, I will achieve my goal, but who will I be when I reach it? Will there be anything left in me of value? On the other hand, if I leave this path and find something more fulfilling, I will be postponing my freedom from financial bondage even longer than I was before I got on the fast track.

The question is really this: I know that the end I am trying to reach is where God wants me, I’m just not certain of the path that He would have me take to get there. Would He have me arrive quickly, but broken? Or would He have me arrive more slowly, but possibly with more (or better) character? I cannot see the path laid out for me. I do not know where to go from here. I only know that I am hurting and I want the pain to stop. What is it that God would have me learn from this? Is it perseverance through the suffering? Or, is it patience in the waiting? Both are things that I lack, so maybe it’s both. Please pray for me that God would reveal His plan. Even one step, the next step, being revealed would be encouraging. Please, God, don’t leave me in this darkness.

What is Your Purpose? (Mar 2007)

I’m a firm believer that everyone has a purpose in this life, as well as a purpose within the Kingdom of God. Some people have one or the other figured out. For some they might both be the same thing. Personally, I feel like I know what mine is, but circumstances keep me from fulfilling it. It took me a long time to figure out what my purpose in this life is. I’ve always envied those who knew why they were here since they were twelve years old (my sister) or even those who figured it out in high school/college (my husband). I never was one of those people who had a lot of direction. I talked before about how I want to have a baby, but let me elaborate on that some more.

When I was younger, high school and college mostly, I was a huge feminist. I was never going to get married, I was never going to have kids, I was going to have some important career and be a “new woman.” I’m serious about this. I didn’t learn how to cook when my mom and grandma were teaching my sister, because I wasn’t going to do those girly things. I didn’t dress like a woman. I didn’t do girly things like crafts or watch girly movies (I still don’t really do that very often…unless I have a friend who wants to see a girly movie). Anything that was associated with the word “woman” was off-limits. That changed a very little bit in college when I joined a sorority (actually, it was a woman’s fraternity, but let’s not get too technical here), but I still was very independent and played men more than they played me (you should have seen the reaction when a guy who thought he was dating me saw me with somebody else…highly entertaining). I still didn’t have any direction, but I did know where I wasn’t going, which was into the kitchen.

After I graduated from college, though, a lot of things changed all at once. I met a man who I actually cared about and who was unlike any man I had ever met. He liked me for me, despite all of my faults (and there were and still are a lot of them). I realized that my life was empty and that the hole that I was filling with beer and men could only be filled with the love of Jesus. I married that man (gasp) and began a life with him that was unlike any I had ever planned. I’d say probably the winter after we got married I started itching for a baby. That was a feeling I had never felt before and it was one that has waxed and waned since then, but is pretty constantly there now. At that point I was still thinking “family + career,” despite the fact that I still had no idea what that career would be. I was still a very strong feminist at that point and was pretty resentful when anybody tried to put me in the woman’s camp. I was empowered and wasn’t going to have anybody telling me what a woman was. During the four years since then, though, things have changed.

I bounced around from one job to the next (six jobs in four and a half years) trying to find something that would fulfill me. Some of the things that I’ve done have been boring, some have been hard, none have been fulfilling. While I was home visiting family in January, though, I came to the realization that no J O B is going to satisfy me, because I’m meant to be a mom. I think that I had known that for a long time, but kept trying to deny it, which is why I tried a lot of things like going back to school and trying new jobs that I thought would fulfill me. No matter what happens, though, I end up at the same point: I want to be a mom. Now the feminists out there are probably saying that I’m taking a step backward, but I would ask you this: is it any less empowering to choose to be a mother than it is to choose to be a lawyer? If I am the one making that choice and it isn’t being forced on me, then I am no less empowered than the woman doctor, the woman factory worker, the woman physicist. The thing that I have learned lately, the thing that I have been seeing for so long, but could not quite make out until recently, is that just because something is traditionally feminine, doesn’t make it bad. The truth is, I love to cook, I love to knit, I love to be a wife, and I will love being a mom.

So, having said all of that, this is where the depression kicks in. I am kept from fulfilling my purpose in life by circumstances. Bad decisions from my past led to huge amounts of debt that now needs to be paid off before I can stop working. Hence the new job. I mentioned before that I was going to have to quit my job that I liked for something that I probably wouldn’t. Well, I did just that and now I am more miserable than I would have been if I had just stuck with the old one and paid off the loans in fifteen months. Now I’ll pay off the debt faster, but at what price? The whole process is destroying me and putting a huge strain on my marriage. Not to mention the fact that, since I can’t work the number of hours that I need to in order to achieve my six-to-nine month pay off goal, I’m no better off than I was before. I mean, it’s not worth it to have a job I hate for an entire year. The truth is, I don’t hate my new job, I’m just not very good at it, which is very discouraging and makes me want to give up on the whole thing. I’m the kind of person who doesn’t really like doing things that I’m not good at. The problem is that the kind of things I am good at (or would be good at if I tried them) are not the kinds of things that pay well.

So, here I am. Unfulfilled, destroying the man that I love, and getting nowhere in the process. I’m the kind of person who needs a cause (a Persister, if that means anything to any of you), but I have none right now. My family is my cause, but I’m far away from my relatives and am kept from starting my family here. I blame myself and nobody else for my circumstances, because if I had made better decisions in my past, then I wouldn’t be stuck right now. That’s what it’s like, being stuck in a hole, one so deep that I can’t get out. In my head I know that there is an end to all of this and that the hole is getting gradually shallower all the time, but my heart has never been one to listen to my head. My heart only sees the immediate future and that looks grim. It’s like going into a really long tunnel. I know that I will come out on the other side, but I can’t see the light from where I am right now.

The Thing About Depression (Mar 2007)

1. When you tell somebody that you are depressed, they try to cheer you up. Depression isn’t always something that you can will your way out of. It’s a deep, dark whole, so sometimes you need somebody to help you out. All those people standing above yelling at you to just get out of the whole aren’t really helping all that much. Throw me a rope instead of just telling me to try harder.

2. It makes you stop doing things that you enjoy. Personally, when I am depressed, I have almost no energy. When I do have energy, I don’t want to spend it on doing anything that I don’t have to do. I eat a lot, watch TV, sleep, etc. I don’t talk to my friends, I don’t pursue my hobbies, I don’t do anything fun or rewarding. I just mope around and try to share my misery with anybody who I trust enough to share it with.

3. People can’t see it, so they don’t always know that there is something wrong. They say that cancer is the silent killer, but I would say that depression is, as well. On one side, it makes it easy to hide from people you don’t want to know about it, but on the other, people who have never experienced it can never understand when you do decide that there is somebody who you want to know about it.

4. It looks different in every individual. Personally, I tend to hide it from most people, so you probably wouldn’t know that I was depressed unless you were actually there when my defenses broke down, or unless I actually told you that I was depressed. The average person that I encounter everyday would never have a clue.

5. Since it is different for every individual, there isn’t one catchall solution. For some people counselling is enough. For others it is just a matter of changing your thought patterns. For others medications work. For still others depression treatments might include (gasp) shock therapy (known to work for individuals with major depression). Personally, I’ve tried the first and second options with mixed results. Maybe it’s time to try medication.

6. You often don’t want to ask for help. You think yourself unworthy or you think that nothing can help you. You also can’t help anybody else because you are broken, so when people come to you with their problems, there isn’t much that you can do. You can’t get help and you can’t give it.

7. It makes your thoughts scattered. It is extremely hard to focus when you are dying inside. When all you think about all the time is how unloveable, unworthy, stupid, useless, ugly you are, there isn’t a lot of space in there for anything else. If one’s work requires a lot of brain capacity, it’s difficult to do when you are feeling like this. That’s why the sleeping and TV, things that require no brain activity at all. Depression is an emotional issue, but it effects every other aspect of your life as well.

Anyway, there’s a lot more, but I don’t have it in me to go into any of the other stuff right now. Suffice it to say, I am not well. I need help, but don’t know where to get it. Pray for me.

I Am An Island (Jan 2007)

Well, I may have just alienated myself from one of my only friends here in Logan. I don’t know what is wrong with me. I can’t let people get close to me. It’s amazing to me that I was ever able to let somebody get close enough to marry me. I think that because he saw a lot of my crazy early on and didn’t run away, I probably realized that I shouldn’t let him go. I’m trying to think of why I isolate myself and I know some of the root causes, but not all of them. First, I can’t relate to other people because I operate on a different level (that isn’t conceit, it’s just true) and probably in a different way. That led me to develop poor social skills, or none at all. Second, when I was young I had many instances of being hurt by somebody I cared about. I don’t want to blame my social problems on others, but twice in my youth I finally let myself be friends with someone and then moved away (and when you are a young child moving away means that your friendship is over…or at least in my experience it was). When I was very young I would allow myself to get attached to my dad and then he would disappear (this happened multiple times…I’m not angry about it anymore and have forgiven him…I’m even starting to have a relationship with him…I’m just saying that there were lasting effects that came from that experience that are still in operation today). Multiple times I would let somebody in only to find out from another source that they were talking about me behind my back. Third, I have and have always had low self-esteem. This makes it so that when I do find somebody that likes me and that I like, I don’t actually believe that they like me (or that I’m likeable), so I can’t trust them to know the me that is inside. So there I am. I am a rock, I am an island. Luckily I have a husband who loves me despite my crazy and a sister who grew up with my crazy, so I can be real with them. Plus, Jesus knew about my crazy before I was born and He loved me anyway, because of who I really am, not because of anything I do or say.

Mini-crisis (Jan 2007)

Okay, so that thing that I couldn’t talk about before, I talked to my husband, so I can elaborate now. Here goes: I want to have a baby. However, I know that my husband wants to pay off our debt before we start having kids. At our current rate of repayment we will have all of our loans (except the house) paid off in fifteen months. That is just too long for me. So, I need to increase my cash flow in order to pay off the debt faster. Here’s the crisis, though: I like my job. I really like my job and I’m pretty good at it. I don’t want to quit my job, but I will probably have to. My options are a.) quit my current job (which I like) and get a job that pays more (and probably I won’t like as much), or b.) keep my job and get a second job to supplement my current income. Neither option appeals to me, so it’s hard to figure out what to do. I don’t want to quit my job, but I can hardly handle working forty hours a week, let alone sixty with a second job. I know what I have to do, I just don’t want to do it.

Here’s the thing: I know this is the right thing to do. I went home to visit family and prayed a lot about how I want to be on the same page as my husband as far as starting a family is concerned. I prayed that God would change my husband’s heart if he was wrong and change mine if I was. He changed both. My husband is more open to having children now and I am willing to wait until our loans are paid off (as long as I can speed up the process). I’m not entirely happy with it, but he’s unwilling to budge and arguing is useless because it gets us nowhere. So, that’s where I am. Pray for me that God would lead me in the right direction as far as which jobs to apply for and such. It’s been a while since I have felt like I am in God’s will, but I’m very sure about this. I know it’s what He wants (both being debt-free and being one in spirit with my husband). I could use some encouragement, though, and strength. Guidance, too. Pretty much, I need a lot of help to really make this happen.

Home Sweet Home (Jan 2007)

Actually, I haven’t lived here full-time for almost ten years, but it’s still home to me. When I was checking in at the airport the lady said, “You’re going to Detroit?” And I said, “That’s where I’m from.” Of course, you can’t say that you’re from Utah until your family has lived there for at least six generations, so I live there, I’m not from there.

I always have some anxiety about coming home. The whole time I lived here in Michigan, I was a different person than the one I became when I moved away to Utah. When I come here all the old junk that I thought was gone comes back. Maybe it is gone, it’s gone to Michigan where I can pick it up every time I visit. Anyway, I kind of had a breakthrough with the whole thing when I actually told my mom and step-dad about it. It’s been a little better since then. I’ve been able to have a conversation without snapping at anybody. I also tried to talk to them about Financial Peace and my step-dad was interested, but my mom thought it was, “the easy way out.” She couldn’t be more wrong, but I told her that I wasn’t going to give her advice that she didn’t want, so I dropped it. It hurts me to come here because they are hurting so much and they don’t want the kind of help that I can give them. All I can do is pray for them because they won’t let me do anything else.

On a brighter note, the baby is SO cute. He is 9 lbs. 4 oz. now, which is up from 8 lbs. 8 oz a week ago. He’s really good and hardly ever cries, except when he’s hungry and when he’s naked, which for whatever reason he really hates. He’s so young that he mostly just sleeps, so he’s really easy to take care of, which is why I could do so yesterday when my sister needed a nap. I love him already and I’m really, really sad that I have to miss him growing up. Really sad. When I see kids only once every two years they don’t even know who I am when they see me. I have to miss all of their growing up. My family is really close and it kind of upsets me that I have to miss everything that is happening in everybody’s lives. I’m upset that I couldn’t be here when the baby was born. I’m upset that I’ll miss all the milestones in his life. I miss my family already and I’m still here with them.

Liberal or Christian, But Not Both (Dec 2006)

I’m just going to come out and say it. I’m (gasp) a liberal. I was born that way and have always had a liberal agenda. I don’t see anything good in the conservative agenda and will fight it every step of the way. Here’s the problem: I’m also a Christian. Yikes! I know there are people out there who would say that you can’t be both, but I would argue differently. I would say that Conservatives are distorting Jesus’ message by focusing on issues like abortion and homosexuality, while ignoring human rights, stewardship of our planet, etc. [Incidentally, much worse versions of abortion and homosexuality were occuring in Jesus’ time, but He never mentions them, instead focusing on meeting the needs of those who were suffering.] Don’t misunderstand me, the liberals miss the boat, too, in that they ignore people of faith all together. There is no place in this world that is completely comfortable for a person like me who is a person of faith and social justice. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. I wouldn’t want to be completely comfortable in this world. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’m not supposed to be.

Here’s what prompted me to write about this. I was reading a review of the documentary “Jesus Camp.” It’s about a fundamentalist Christian camp where preteens go and absorb Christian doctrine along with conservative political propaganda. Now when people review this movie they take one of two stances: 1. they talk about how sad it is that the children are being brainwashed and say it’s a great eye-opening movie, or 2. they start bad-mouthing liberals and talk about how the world needs more Christian values. The non-Christians are compassionate, while the Christians are spewing hate at homosexuals and liberals. It actually hurts me when people act like that on several levels. First, I’m a liberal and when they bad-mouth liberals they are talking about me. They assume that all liberals are god-hating, Christian-hating atheists. I don’t attack them, but they bash me into the ground. Second, the people making those statements are the Christians. Love the sinner, hate the sin. Don’t attack the people who do things you agree with, fight against the darkness in this world. By being so hateful they are turning people away from the one thing that can save them from eternal torment and suffering. Jesus loves people. All people. Third, people assume that all Christians are hate-spewing conservatives, which breaks my heart. I think it was DC Talk that said the number one cause of atheism is Christians. We should be turning people on to the everlasting, ever-present love of Jesus, not pushing them further away from eternal salvation.

I think there are a lot of people out there calling themselves Christians who are reading a different Bible from the one I have. Mine tells me to love the Lord my God and love my neighbor as myself. Nowhere in there does it tell me to hijack a political party and turn Jesus into a political platform. And it certainly doesn’t tell me to attack anybody. Fight darkness, don’t spread it.