Bible

declaration, God is my hope

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I want the Lord to be my SOLE source of hope in this life.How could my life change if I could realize this one truth? I wrote this declaration (or prayer), straight from scripture, to challenge myself to believe it. To absorb this truth until I can live it out.

Because of what Christ has done, I believe in God. It was God who raised him from the dead. And it was God who gave him glory. So my faith and hope are in God. 1 Peter 1.21 God lives forever! I can run to him for safety.  His powerful arms are always there to carry me. Deuteronomy 33.27 My God will meet all my needs. He will meet them in keeping with his wonderful riches that come to me because I belong to Christ Jesus. Philippians 4.19 A noble woman puts on strength and honor as if they were her clothes.  She can laugh at the days that are coming. Oh Lord, let me be like her. Proverbs 31.25 I have seen your power and your glory. Your love is better than life. I will bring glory to you with my lips. I will praise you as long as I live. Psalm 63.2-4 I will put God’s kingdom first. Do what he wants me to do. Then all of those things I need will also be given to me. I won’t worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Matthew 6.33-34 I will not be afraid. I will not be put to shame anymore.  I will not be afraid of being dishonored. God made me. He is now my husband. His name is The Lord Who Rules Over All. He is the Holy One of Israel. He has set me free. He is the God of the whole earth. He will show me his loving concern. His faithful love will continue forever. Isaiah 54.4-5, 8

Singleness and Self Discipline

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The self control you exhibit in your life as a single person will directly impact your ability to exhibit self control within your marriage someday.

Remaining faithful in marriage requires restraint, control, intention. If we live frivolously before marriage then the shift to faithfulness and monogamy will be a sharp transition.

Those who remain faithful to their spouses for life do so not because of love, but because of commitment. They choose to stay devoted. Choose to honor each other, in word and deed…and body. And oh, how sweet, is a marriage built on honor and trust and commitment (those, I hear, have the best sex!). 

So now, in my own life, I choose to honor my husband with my body BEFORE I have even met him. I do not sleep around. I don’t even mess around. Not because I am not tempted and do not have my own desires. But because I want to tell him, someday, that I chose a life of faithfulness to him over the fleeting pleasures offered today. And when I meet him, I pray God gives me the strength to honor him with my body while we date. And will sustain that grace to honor him with my body the rest of my life in marriage.

I see my time of singleness, right now, as my training ground. I am disciplining my flesh for marriage. Think of it this way…if you are 25 when you marry you have had about 10 years of “practice” and behavioral habits that you take into your marriage. What are you going to use that time for? Is there something you are doing in your life right now that you KNOW is a bad habit that you cannot take into marriage? Why not work to discipline yourself now, before marriage. Choose to be honoring to your future marriage…today.

Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral. Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.” Hebrews 13.3-5, quoting Deuteronomy 31.6

The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace. Numbers 6.24-26 (Aaronic blessing)

Check out Sacred Search by Gary Thomas (which prompted the thoughts above. Gary shares it in a much more witty and straightforward way than I previously experienced. I recommend his book. If you are already married, and a woman, check out Sacred Influence.)

humility, the evasive little booger

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I’ve been learning difficult lessons on humility lately. Which, as the blog name suggests, can sometimes feel like its hard to put my finger on. However, I hope in sharing my struggle, and my honest reality with pride and selfishness, that I can convey the hope found in the Lord’s faithfulness. (FYI, there are no more booger references in this post, it just seemed an appropriate title…but the further I contemplated taking the analogy, the less comfortable with the concept I became…I’ll leave you to your own imagination, lol)

I am in a season of being humbled. And it is the most painful season with the Lord that I’ve been through yet. But it is also the most wonderful. Because part of being humbled is having to break off my selfishness and my judgement and pride. So I’m learning, more than ever, how to balance confidence in who I am and the gifts the Lord has created me with naturally with not taking myself too seriously. RT Kendall defines pride as taking oneself too seriously. For example, getting frustrated that I’m not getting the attention I deserve or the affirmation for my awesome skills or other similar things is a sign that I’m taking myself too seriously. Jeremy Taylor challenges that we should know our own unworthiness, and then it is easier when others don’t value us enough because we already knew the truth! Like I said before, it is a balance. I want to know who I am in Christ, but not be pious about it. Be confident in my abilities, but need the affirmations of MEN less and GOD more.

Let me be more plain (transparent). For years, I have KNOWN that pride was an issue for me. Whether it was a therapist, professor, roommate, or mentor, I have been told over and over, for years, that I have an issue with pride. Which always frustrated me! Pride isn’t like other sins that are easy to point out and know how to fix. Pride is clever and crafty and feels genuine. I didn’t know how to identify the difference in healthy confident thoughts and prideful ones. So, as all treacherous growth stories start, I asked the Lord to show me what pride looks like. I prayed and asked for clarity. And the Lord, in his vast amounts of grace and wisdom, did not open my eyes immediately to my pride. Instead, he has taken me on a 6 year journey to discover it. However, last summer I took a GIANT leap forward in finally seeing what other people see.

I was knocked out of my ivory tower and slammed face first into the ground. Maybe the Lord decided to take a giant leap forward in the lesson. Or maybe he just got tired of my stubbornest and decided I needed a bigger push. Whatever the case, I experienced something that I have never experienced before. (I’m leaving out the physical/natural story and focusing on the spiritual aspect of this story…so I hope I can communicate clearly). The Lord, for the first time I can EVER recall in my life, allowed me to see my own sin. And he did so by showing me his faithfulness. His holiness. His purity. And for some reason, the veil was pulled back and I saw the ugliness in my own heart. I really DID think I was better than other people. I really DID think the rules didn’t apply to me. I realized my own selfish motives, selfish desires, manipulative ways, and it was sickening. God’s faithfulness was the most important aspect of it all. He loved me and chose me and he never left my side. He just finally decided to open my eyes to the reality that was within me. And the Lord, in a sweet way, kept saying what RT Kendall says in his book “get over yourself!” So many situations that used to get me upset and annoy me about other people was all about ME anyway! “They didn’t give me credit for that, I worked hard on that!” or “Wow, that person really sucks. I know I could have done that better.” and on and on and on the idiotic thoughts ran through my brain.

But back to God’s faithfulness. I’m sharing because upon reflection the other day of my continued struggle not to get upset and to seek clarity when I’m upset, the Lord’s faithfulness was revealed to me in a new way.  When I am offended, or upset, or frustrated at others, my course of action is to sit and write in my journal. I do so with the expectation that the Lord will guide my writings, which always start selfishly and angrily, and I allow the Lord to guide my thoughts to his Truth about me and the situation. So, recently, I was writing out my anger in my journal and a prayer was formed. This prayer was formed from the reflection on the joy to be taken in the pain/suffering which the Lord is allowing me to process. Because the fact that life has been difficult, and I am not able to react and think like I did before, is a sign of the Lord’s faithfulness to complete the work he has started in me!! He began the process of rooting out my pride and selfishness and he is going to see it through! So, here is my prayer, which I hope encourages anyone else that is in a difficult season of growth:

>>Be faithful to the work you began in me. Break me. Do not release me Father. Hold fast. Hold tight. Be faithful. Break me. Break me Father. Be faithful to what you started. Do not release me until you are done with me. I release the comforts and affirmation I seek from others and want only what you have to say and offer. I want only what you say and think of me to define me. Forgive me for being so easily swayed. Forgive me for caring about these other things. Forgive me for being so easily offended. You are the most glorious, most beautiful, most trustworthy and I settle into you and what you think of me. You alone define me. You alone humble me. You alone can raise me up. I will wait. I will trust. I will listen. You alone are good.<<

God was promising me that he will not desert me. When he started rooting out my pride, he knew it would take YEARS! He will never get fed up and say “oh, you stubborn senseless woman! how many times must I repeat myself? How many times must I give you chance after chance to show me you are listening?? I am done with you!” No, he will never and has never said that.

If you have ever been trained in restraining children, then you know something that is important to know BEFORE you restrain a child. If a child is having a fit and is uncontrollable, then you can take the child, if they are small enough, and sit cross legged on the floor and hold them tight and close to you in your lap. And you must hold this pose until the child is calm and safe (for both themselves and other children that may be around them). However, if the child is stubborn and persistent enough, and are adamant about being “released,” then they may pee on you to try and force you to release them. Knowing this ahead of time is important, because you do not need to move or get up until the child is calm and safe. If you were not expecting it, then you might overreact.

So, when I take a child and hold them tight and sit down, I know that no matter what that child says or does, that I will persist to keep them safe until it is the right time to release them. And while I’m holding them, do you know what I do? I calm my breathing. I speak truth over them and tell them how wonderful they are. And I tell them they are safe. And loved. And I may sing a song and rock them until they relax and surrender. And you know what? That is exactly how Father God deals with my outburst and anger and stubbornness. And nothing I do will surprise him and force him to release me. NOTHING I do can remove me from the protective, loving, hand of God.  No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. – Romans 8: 37-39  He even sings over us!! The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.” – Zephaniah 3.17

He is faithful. He is good. When there is nothing good in me. I cannot strive in my flesh and make him more faithful. I cannot ignore him and make him less faithful. I can scream and cry and kick and even pee in his lap, and it will not change his faithfulness. He started this work in me and he will see it through. He loves me too much to let go until he is done. Because he is good. Here is a scripture that embodies the lesson he taught me that day:

I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now,  being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.… And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight,so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God. – Philippians 1: 3-6,9-11

God feels….

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Recently, I was discussing this latest blog topic with a friend of mine. And I was passionately sharing how God is never disappointed in us because he is never surprised by our sinfulness. He looked right at me and asked “then what does he feel when we sin?” I’ll admit, in that moment, I did not have a brilliant answer. I said, “sad, i guess”….but even as I spoke the simple answer, the joy in my declaration of his lack is disappointment faded and my mind began to ponder this question. What does he feel when we make these mistakes?

I heard an amazing quote once: EXPECTATIONS ARE PREMEDITATED OFFENSES.

This quote goes right along with the point I was trying to make about how God differs from humans. In our daily lives, we get disappointed in people all the time, and most times, as the quote above states, it is because we had an expectation of behavior that did not occur in reality. “I thought you were going to call” or “i can’t believe you thought that would be okay” or “why didn’t you …..”  You see, if you really look at most of our frustrations with other people, they start with US, they start when we project expectations on others and when those are not met then we get hurt or frustrated or angry.

I’m not saying there isn’t a good place for expectations. Because obviously there is!!! We expect people to wear clothes, show up to work/school, respect each other…etc. I’m just saying, many offenses are birthed out of unrealistic expectations or even just miss communicated expectations. And I pray God gives us more grace to understand how different we are and have patience for our differences. Diversity is part of the beauty in God’s creation.

Anyway, that was just for some clarity and observation that we humans and God differ in the area of disappointment because God doesn’t live in the limited space of time and sinfulness that we do. But the questions remains….what does he feel?

The question itself implies a lot about what my friend believes….and I agree with him on this note: GOD FEELS. Here are a few examples in scripture: He is grieved (Psalm 78.40), angry (Deuteronomy 1.37), pleased (1 Kings 3.10), joyful (Zephaniah 3.17), and moved by pity (Judges 2.18). (side note: in Hebrew, the same word is used for grieved and pity, as seen in the list above, and it means to be sorry or console oneself, regret, be comforted. It is used many times in the Old Testament to show both God and people changing their minds / emotions about situations….may have to research and write a blog on that word! It looks interesting….) Anyway, there are many references in scripture about the emotions of God (has anyone read about the exodus?? The interactions between the Lord and Moses have always made me smile and wonder about how emotional God can be!).

Others believe that the emotions of the Lord as presented in scripture are figurative, relating it to the emotional equivalent of anthropomorphisms (there’s my big word for the day, it means giving physical attributes to God: hands of God (Exodus 15.17), feet (1 Kings 5.3), eyes (2 Chronicles 16.9) etc) Also, I found there is a word for describing the emotions of God, which is anthropopathisms. Now you are fully equipped to go sound super intelligent today by working that into random conversation! Don’t say I never gave you anything!! haha

The point is not that we have fancy words for how we talk about God (altho that is kind of fun) but that we, as readers of scripture, have to decide if we are projecting our humanity ONTO God, or if we are discovering the nature of God within ourselves as found in scripture. Does God feel pity? Get angry? Regret? Because some would say that saying “the hand of God” is the same as saying “the anger of God”…that neither one really exist, they are just words scripture uses to describe God at a given moment.

The fear, on our part, may be that if we attribute emotions, as a whole, to God, then we wonder if He is also moody and unpredictable in the same way we are! The balance, in my opinion, is to realize that God FEELS many of the same emotions we do but He is not wallowing in the sinfulness that we are. I would argue that feelings are part of his nature that He breathed into Adam and Eve and that He is the original source of all genuine and good emotions. And the negative ones that we have to deal with are the result of the fallen world we live in (fear, doubt, envy, jealousy…).

I had a professor once that said “The day God gave man free will was the day he opened a wound that would never heal.” That was probably the first time I remember thinking about how our actions affect God. That statement troubled me deeply. I don’t believe in the full extent of what he was saying, but its an interesting, and necessary, thought for believers. How do our actions / choices affect God?

Because we are broken and bruised people, then for many, our mental picture of God is so skewed and distorted. Some may see him as a distant, angry, zeus-like, dictator, etc. So the purpose in communicating God’s lack of disappointment was meant to encourage those who have this feeling, and even those who just struggle to feel the need to perform for God’s love (don’t we all?!), that his love is not dependent on our actions. ……….. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8.38-39) ………. But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast (Ephesians 2.4-9) ……… But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us (Romans 5.8).

You can decide for yourself what God feels when you sin. But for me, the most moving factor to remember is that no matter what I DO and no matter what HE FEELS …. He loves me. He loves me the same yesterday, today, and forever. He loved me before I ever existed. He knew the worst thing I would ever do, the most selfish moment on earth that I would ever have, and He looked through the lattice of time and said “I choose her” and “I love her” and nothing I ever do can separate me from His love. The more I accept His perfect love, the more I am changed for the better. Sin is not dissipated because I don’t want to hurt God’s feelings. That may feel like a motivation, but it is shallow and incomplete. I am deterred from my selfishness because there is someone more beautiful and desirable than anything on earth that tries to distract me from Him. And by staring into the eyes of perfection and grace, into the eyes of my heavenly Father, I am able to become more of who He created me to be and turn away from my selfish ways.

Prayer from John 18:6

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I began to think on a verse during corporate worship yesterday:
John 18:3-6 Judas then, having received the Roman cohort and officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, came there with lanterns and torches and weapons. So Jesus, knowing all the things that were coming upon Him, went forth and said to them, “Whom do you seek?” They answered Him, “Jesus the Nazarene.” He said to them, “I am He.” So when He said to them, “I am He,” they drew back and fell to the ground.

The Lord gave me a prayer, which I wrote down, and want to share with you in regards to these verses. I hope it brings you hope and encouragement, as it did for me.

Oh, Father, let us cry out to you, let us proclaim who you are and search for you as the soldiers and disciples did. No matter what reason we seek Him. Whether we seek Him to blame Him, or judge Him, or follow Him, or betray Him. Let us all, for whatever reason, search and cry out “Jesus of Nazareth!” and let Him turn and respond, “I AM” and let the GLORY of that realization FALL on us. Let us have no power or resolve or fear or doubt or rationality or knowledge that would allow us to stand and process that realization. But let us have no strength to stand in the reality of who you are, in all your majesty. Let us fall, and rest, in your GLORY, that truth and peace and strength may engulf us and the I AM that is I AM will the the realest thing we have ever known.

The ark of Moses?

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Recently someone asked me “what is the Hebrew word for Noah’s Ark in the Old Testament?” This simple question led me to the most interesting discovery.

The immediate answer is tevah (pronounced tay-vah) in Hebrew.  Genesis 6.13-14 says “And God said to Noah, “The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold, I will destroy them with the earth.  Make yourself an ark (tevah) of gopher wood; make rooms in the ark (tevah), and cover it inside and outside with pitch. (NKJV)”

So I ventured, as I normally do, to look at other times this Hebrew word is used in scripture. Is this the same word as for the Ark of the Covenant? No. Is this a word for boat or vessel? No.  Is this word used anywhere else in scripture? Yes!

Only one other story uses tevah and it is found in the story of baby Moses. Exodus 2.3 ” But when she could no longer hide him, she took an ark (tevah) of bulrushes for him, daubed it with asphalt and pitch, put the child in it, and laid it in the reeds by the river’s bank. (NKJV)” Most translations will translate the word “basket” with footnotes to “chest or ark” at the bottom of the page.

So at this point, we ask ourselves, what was the writer thinking when he recorded this story? What did he want us to recall or know when reading about baby Moses? More plainly stated: why this word in these stories?!

For a side note: Traditionally, Moses recorded the first five books (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy) called the Pentateuch or Torah and are believed to be given to Moses by God. Scholars believe, however, that these books are a composition made over the years. This is not a teaching about authorship, so that is all I will say about that. What is significant for our purposes is to note that the same person who recorded the story of Noah either also recorded the story of Moses OR was familiar with the story of Noah when the story of Moses was written.  So….back to the train of thought …

Tevah comes from an Egyptian word that means box or chest. This same word is used for coffin (recall the pharaohs that were buried with lots of treasure).

There are some obvious similarities in the stories of Noah and baby Moses:

  • water – the threat to their lives
  • ark (tevah) – the box they were placed in
  • pitch – used to seal/protect from the water, the work of each builder to ensure the box would survive!
  • impending doom – from the water
  • salvation – they were both saved from the instrument of their death (the water)
  • deliverance – both men were deliverers! Noah was the instrument of deliverance for mankind and animals, and as an adult, Moses brings the Israelites out of Egypt (and ultimately THROUGH the same water he should have died in! Come on, that’s good stuff!).

These boxes were built by human hands with FAITH that a divine hand would guide them to safety.

Hebrews 11.7 By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

1 Peter 3.18-22 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit, by whom also He went and preached to the spirits in prison, who formerly were disobedient, when once the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water.  There is also an antitype which now saves us—baptism (not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, angels and authorities and powers having been made subject to Him.

These stories represent early pictures of salvation. Today, we practice baptism as a symbol of our salvation, that we ourselves are drawn out of the water and saved by the same divine hand.

I can’t help but picture us today, building our boxes and laying on the pitch (real thick!) but at some point we have to settle in and trust the hand of God to guide us and trust Him to bring about, not only his salvation in us, but deliverance for others through us.