Learning when to just pause and look around

I love how timely the Lord is when it comes to things He is trying to teach us.  This whole year the Lord has really been changing my perspective on how I look not only at my life but life in general.  I have been amazed at the things that are becoming less important to me and things that I continue to become more passionate about.

This past Sunday we went to church with my sister at her church, which is is the church I grew up in here in Salt Lake.  However, the church is so very different then it was when I attended almost 13+ years ago.  As we sat and enjoyed the worship and the sermon the Lord really grabbed me with one passage the Pastor was teaching out of.

"He who is holy, who is true, who has the key of David, 

who opens and no one will shut, 

and who shuts and no one opens, says this..."   

Revelation 3:7b

In this verse the Bible is talking about the Lord and the fact that only the Lord has the ability to truly open a "door" or close a "door".  This verse is also talking about that when the Lord decides to open or close a door nothing we or anyone else can do to change the Lord's decision.  What struck me about this verse was when the Pastor began talking about where the Lord has each of us in our lives.  We may be in the middle of a rough patch and so desperately want to change our circumstances or we may be in a period where we feel truly blessed and don't want anything to change.  In either circumstance it does not matter how much we pray, ask or beg, if the Lord has us in that place for a reason then our circumstances may just remain the same.  Many times we don't like that answer, but as I listened I heard the Lord point out to me that He may be waiting for me to learn something, interact with someone, change something about myself or just realize that there are times we need to wait and trust Him and Him alone.

I know the thought of not truly being in control is not a happy thought,  trust me there are times where I am a complete control freak.  However, I am learning more and more that many times my perspective on my circumstances is not the Lord's perspective.  I am also learning that many times the Lord is waiting for me to pause from my selfish perspective and allow him to show me his perspective.  When I allow that to happen it never fails to amaze me that I have missed something or am about to miss an opportunity to bless someone else.

We may not like where we are, we may not like our job, we may not like _______ (fill in the blank) but when the Lord has something he wants to show or teach us this verse reminds us that nothing we can do will change our circumstances until the Lord is ready to change them.  Many times I think he just wants us to pause from ourselves because he has something for us to do and we are letting our selfish nature get in the way.  Our life and society has programmed us to be even more selfish than we realize and I think many times the Lord has to yank our chains to get us to stop and look up.  I don't want to live my life at such a great speed that I miss an opportunity to share the love of Jesus with someone.  I don't want to miss an opportunity to teach my girls to see God moving and working in the world around them.  Our children follow our examples and if we are so caught up in ourselves that we miss what God is doing around us, our children will end up behaving the same way.

The other day when I was thinking about my blog title I realized that part of my desire in living off the beaten path is helping not only myself but my girls to realize that there is so much is this world that is not important. There are so  many things that the enemy will use to distract us from ministry opportunities the Lord has put right in front of our noses.  Most of all I want my girls to know that this world is not our home and we are only here for a temporary period of time.  When I am before the Lord I not only want the Lord to look at me and say well done good and faithful servant, but I want to know I did all I could for my girls to receive the same statement.  May our lives be such that no matter our circumstances, no matter how much we want them to change or not change, I want people to look at me and see the love of Jesus in all I say and do.

So if you are struggling, remember that if you keep asking the Lord to change your circumstances and they are not changing, pause because there might just be something He is trying to show you.

Needing a Change of Perspective

Tomorrow I get the privilege of traveling home to visit with my family in Utah for 2 weeks.  My girls love this trip because they not only get to see their grandparents but they get time with their aunts, uncle and cousins.  My girls have discovered that extended family is a wonderful thing.  I am excited to see my family but I am also excited for the change in perspective this trip always gives me.

I have lived more of my adult life in the Bible belt then I have lived in Utah, but I am amazed at how the years I lived in Utah have had a greater impact on my walk with Christ than any of the years in the Bible belt.  I attended college in Texas and Oklahoma and then in 2001 I moved to TN where I still live with my amazing family.  Now, please hear me when I say that I do love living in the south and know my family will remain in the south.  Craig and I eventually want to push further south to South Carolina.  However, no matter how long I live in the south there will always be a struggle for me in my Christian walk.

I knew when I left for college that moving south would mean not only more Christian churches but "big" churches and I was so excited.  I was tired of attending a small church with limited activities and where everybody truly knew everything about everybody...or so it felt.  As I have grown into an adult and now a parent there are things about ministry you find in the west I so desperately miss.  I miss the sense of urgency and the creativity that ministry requires.  I grew up driving 30+ minutes to get to my church and here I am spoiled to live 7 minutes from my current church and have numerous choices even closer.  Here if I wanted my girls could attend a VBS almost every week during the summer because so many are offered and yet in Utah depending where you live there are only a small handful available.  Most churches out west would not know what to do with the 300+ children my church had at VBS and they will celebrate the 25+ they may have.

My heart for ministry was born through mission trips through out Utah, Idaho and the Montana Bitter Root Valley.  I traveled with a group out of Mississippi and we would help small churches hold VBS and would sometimes have a revival at the same time.  Some of these churches were lucky if they could purchase the Sunday School Material they needed, the buildings would have 5 to 6 classrooms for the entire church and they could not find many volunteers because there just were not many.  It was through these trips I learned how to truly be the hands and feet of Christ.  I learned how to share the love of Jesus with people who really knew nothing about the Bible but came because there was an event in the city park.  These were places where some people traveled a distance to get to the 1 or 2 Christian churches in the entire town.

I have learned that in the south it is really easy for me to develop a "Country Club" attitude when it comes to church and ministry.  It is easy for me to just expect my church to provide these ministries each week...why well because that is what they are supposed to do.  That is why we have all the staff members we have, that is why we have the giant building we have, that is why we have all the resources we have...isn't it?

This summer my Pastor did something that I struggled with at first.  He was discontinuing our Sunday night services in the summer for our members to go out in their community and be intentional to minister in their homes on those evenings.  The ministry side of my heart loved this, but the selfish side did not like not being able to attend church with Craig at night since he works on shift during the day.  As my trip home has approached I have started to wonder if I have begun to develop a "country club" mentality where I am paying too much attention to what my church can do for me, instead of what I can do with my church to further the gospel.

I am looking forward to attending church for 2 weeks in a small Utah church.  It won't be big like TN standards and it won't be fancy either but I do know it will be filled with people who desperately want to grow in their walk with Christ and want to minister to the many dying people who are living all around them.  It is time for a change of perspective.  My prayer is that through this trip the Lord would speak to my heart, hone my focus and most of all reignite a sense of urgency for the gospel that I just don't feel here in TN.  I don't want to be comfortable in my walk with the Lord, I want to be driven, challenged and  motivated to  step out and strive to really make a daily difference for the Lord in all I say and do.  I am excited to share with you on this journey and I continue to get off the freeway of live and learn to truly live off the beaten path.

The Hand of the Lord

This morning I watched a video on Facebook that caught my attention.  The purpose of the video was to easily explain the current and ongoing problems in the Middle East. It is a really great video that does explain the problem in very simple terms, but what I got out of the video is not what I think was their goal.  I saw the hand of the Lord.  Here is the video, take a look.              

                   

In Genesis 15:5-7 the Lord give Abram a promise.

He (God) took him (Abram) outside and said, "Look up at the sky and count the stars- if indeed you can count them."  Then he (God) said to him (Abram), "So shall your offspring be." Abram believed the Lord, and he (God) credited it to him (Abram) as righteousness.  

Then in Exodus 3:8 the Lord spoke to Moses and said:

The Lord said, "I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and have given heed to their cry because of their task masters, for I am aware of their sufferings. So, I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanite, and the Hittite and the Amorite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite."

Lastly in Joshua 1:1-9 the Lord spoke to Joshua and said:

After the death of Moses the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua son of Nun, Moses’ aide: “Moses my servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them—to the Israelites. I will give you every place where you set your foot, as I promised Moses. Your territory will extend from the desert to Lebanon, and from the great river, the Euphrates—all the Hittite country—to the Mediterranean Sea in the west. No one will be able to stand against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you. Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people to inherit the land I swore to their ancestors to give them.

“Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go. Keep this Book of the Law always on your lips; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful. Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”

As I went back this morning and read these passages and thought about the journey of the Isrealites throughout the Old Testament and then the people we read about in the New Testament I was amazed.  Thousands of years ago the Lord chose this small people group to be set apart as his children.  He taught them, guided them, disciplined them and always protected them.  It did not matter who came against them whether it was the Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Romans or the Palestinians today; this people group has always been protected by God.  As I watched the video I loved how you can see that throughout history the Lord has not allowed ANYONE to destroy or wipe out his people.  Many have tried and some like Hitler truly did unspeakable damage, yet this small people group remains.

Do I like what I hear and read in the news about the conflicts in the Middle East...I do not.  What I do know is this, no matter what any country tries to do, the Jewish nation will always remain.  That is a promise of our God and in this video we can see proof of that promise.  What an encouragement when we as children of God are discouraged.  We may not like the road we are walking, we may not like the lessons the Lord wants us to learn, but we know that as a child of the King of Kings we will always be loved and our Lord will always keep his promises to us.

We as Christians not only need to be praying for the nation of Israel but we need to thank the Lord for how through their continued protection you can see the hand of God working today.  Whether this world wants to see it or not the Lord is doing amazing and mighty things in this world around us that are being broadcast daily on TV.  My prayer is that the Lord would open opportunities for his light and glory to shine as we strive to share his love and salvation to a lost and dying world. And I will continue to smile each time a country fails to destroy the Jewish nation knowing that they are one underdog that will always win!

Tripping Over My Own Humanity

I love and hate when I have "big" moments with God.  I love how the move and change me.  I love how in those moments I can feel His presence literally right beside me.  On the other hand, I do not like the transition back into my life.  I would love to live my life completely in those moments, but we all know that everyone must come down from the mountain top.  Boy, did I come down today.

This morning I saw an ad for student loan assistance programs.  This new payment we are facing as much as I hate it, is still sitting in the back of my mind.  So with out pausing I began investigating if we qualified for any assistance.  As I was talking to the Rep and giving him all the information he needed to access my information, he could not.  He would read it back to me and yet it would not be accessed.  He gave me a number to call and verify my access information and loan information.  I called that number they verified everything was correct and accessible on the federal database.

So, I called the Rep back and again he still could not access my information.  It did not matter what he or his supervisor tried, my information was not accessible.  If they can't access that information then my current payment status cannot be changed. (Insert God's voice here)

"I thought you trusted me?"

Here is where I realize how I have just stumbled right over my humanity just like Abraham did with Hagar.  Just like Abraham God proved that nothing I try will achieve His purpose.  As I sat and journaled about my morning the following song phrase began to repeat in my head...

"...they (I) are weak, but He is strong."

I realized that I am very weak.  Letting go of control like this is not in my nature.  Sitting before the Lord and giving Him control is not a one time thing but for me a all the time thing.  Without the Lord's forgiveness and unending grace I would really be in trouble.  To be honest I was not sure if I was going to blog about this and then I realized that one of my goals in learning to live off the beaten path is true and honest transparency.  I don't want people to look at me and think, wow she has it all together because I don't.  My life is messing, flawed and I stumble over my humanity way more than I would like but my goal with this blog is to give encouragement that perfection is not required in this life.  The Lord does not expect perfection and does not require it from us.  He gave us his precious son so that through Jesus we would gain perfection.  The Lord knows we will fail and that our humanity would get in the way a lot, which is why His love and grace are unending.

I want to encourage you that if you are struggling, I understand.  I encourage you to do what I was reminded to do.  When I am weak and my humanity is getting in the way, I need to keep my Lord's words on my lips.  I need to take up my sword (the Bible) and speak it out. So, today I want to encourage you to do the same and remember that when we are weak...He is there to be strong for us.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart

    and lean not on your own understanding;

6 

in all your ways submit to him,

    and he will make your paths straight.

Proverbs 3:5-6

Of Course I Trust You Lord...

We all know that life is full of surprises.  Many times we find ourselves wishing if things would just smooth out that life would be a little easier.  I am one of those people who catches myself saying, "If only...would happen"  or "If only we could...then".  I have been in this mode for the past several days because we received some unexpected news.

For the first time in a while we finally reached a point budget wise where we were getting ahead, excited about how we have been cutting our spending and it was finally showing through in our goal to get out of debt.  Then I received a letter from the company that holds my graduate loans.  The company is adjusting my payments and they are tripling the payment.  My payment was at a lower income sensitive rate and now they are shifting it back to the normal rate...the size of a car payment rate.  So my brain naturally begins to spin looking for ways to problem solve this issue but at the same time saying " I trust you Lord".  Then Sunday came and I went to church...

I was excited to meet the Lord in church but was not expecting the greeting I received.  Our Pastor opened his sermon with a picture of the Grand Canyon.

These give you an idea of what the Grand Canyon looks like if you have not seen it and they truly do not do it justice.  Then he showed us a picture of the small ditch in his front yard for rainwater to run through.  The below picture is not his ditch but it give you an idea of the comparison.

Our Pastor then began to talk about the greatness of God and now he not only made the Grand Canyon, but everything in this world, everything in the galaxy and everything in the universe.  As I am listening to this all I can hear in my head is the Lord saying to me, "If am this big...why won't you trust me?"

In the Sunday school class that morning I help teach we talked with our students about how God knew them before they were ever born or created.  Our verse was Jeremiah 1:5.

“I knew you before I formed you in your mother’s womb.

    Before you were born I set you apart

    and appointed you as my prophet to the nations.”

As we talked about this verse to our students, we wanted them to see how big God really is.  I loved the look on their faces when we told them God knew if they would marry, who their spouse would be, if they would have any children and what their grand children would be like.  Our God is that big!  So as I am sitting in church listening to the Pastor talk about how big God is and the Lord reminds me of our Sunday school class just before worship.  At this point if our church was a pentecostal style church, I swear I would have been prostrate in the aisle.

Do I trust the Lord?  Do I really trust the Lord?  I told myself, yes I do trust you Lord!  Then the Pastor began to talk about the story of Abraham and Sarah, where they said they trusted God for a son but decided they needed to help find a solution to God's promise.  Again, it was a moment where I could hear the Lord saying...really you trust me...how is that list in your head coming?

This was the point in the service it took everything in me to not be goo on the floor begging God for forgiveness.  You see, I was not trusting Him.  I have been trying to figure out what else out of our budget we cut, yet I realized he did not want me to cut anything else because He wants to solve this problem.  The Lord knew back when He was teaching Abraham that this letter about my loan money would show up last Thursday.  He knew exactly how much it would be.  He knew that it would feel impossible to me.  He knew this!  That is how big our God is.

So I did the only thing I knew to do.  During the prayer time I went to the altar, knelt before my God and just released all that is in my heart.  Do I feel better, absolutely!  I am full of peace.  Do I know how we are going to make this work budget wise...nope.  What I do know is this, my God reminded me that He is in charge, all this is His and I need to take care of what is in front of me right now and leave the rest of the details to Him.

 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Matthew 11:28-30