Christmas joy demands more than gifts.
More than romance or even family.
It’s a symbol of a new beginning—
A wakeup call to see in a new way.
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I have been praying a lot recently for God’s voice on matters in my life, rather than relying on my logic or experience. I tend to want to figure something out, thinking that I solve problems by making them make sense. But I have been meditating a lot on Proverbs 3:5-6, and realizing that’s exactly the opposite of what God wants me to do.
The thing is, no matter how much I know or think through something, it often is never going to make sense, and I will be limited in my ideas by my own creativity. If I, instead, trust Him completely and don’t rely on my own opinions, He promises to guide and lead. This isn’t about gathering more information about God, but rather going deeper in intimacy in relationship with Him.
This means that no matter what the situation, you are not limited to your perspective or what you can figure out about it. Rather, we get to rise above the circumstance, and see things from His perspective as we are already seated with Him in the heavenlies (Eph 3:1-2) What seems true right now is only a fraction of the truth, and we get to trust Him to guide us in all truth. He cares deeply for us, and His main goal in this life is that we go deeper in knowing Him—deeper in intimacy with our Father.
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I have spoken to several people through the years who are staring death in the face. I always want to ask them about it—how do you die well? How do you walk towards what feels like the biggest fear in life? What does God speak to you in those raw and vulnerable moments?
In the last email I received from my friend Debbie as she was put on hospice care, she said “Lots of emotions, lots of decisions, lots of walking uncharted territory with fear and trembling. But as always our God has proven himself faithful, he has proven himself to be true. It is so amazing to have the privilege of walking this journey. And I never, ever, ever thought I would say that about this cancer journey. God is good.”
That’s right—she just called walking a cancer journey a privilege. My response at the time was to look at my own circumstances and wonder how on earth they were a privilege? If she could see this, though, could I also?
The thing that Debbie understood, and so many others who are teaching me about dying, is that we are always dying physically, and it’s what we do with the life that we have that matters. She chose to count it as a privilege, and to squeeze out every drop of joy and peace from relationship with Jesus in the meantime. She saw the suffering, the pain, the separation as a chance to deeply taste the higher truth of God’s love through it all.
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Today has been a hard day. Some days just feel darker, harder to hold on to hope. So much pain and fear threaten to choke me, drowning out the joy and peace. I can’t stop the tears as they pour from my eyes, uncontrollable cracks everywhere as my heart breaks again. Why are we so messy? Where is the hope? Where is the relief?
My body feels as though it might split in half. Fear closes a tight fist around my heart and I can’t breathe. It feels like someone turned out the light in the world, and I’m stumbling in the dark trying not to fall off a cliff.
And then. A little glimmer. I watch my daughter as she turns her face toward the rainstorm and keep playing rather than run for cover. Her smile grows and she is so brave and strong. Her freedom is contagious. She finds joy after a day full of pain and heartache. Light is not gone! She runs soaking wet through the pouring rain to play with her friends.
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I have recently seen many people posting about what 2016 was like for them, considering it’s 10 years ago now. So, I began to remember what that particular year meant to me.
2016 was a rough year. God was moving me, and I didn’t want to go. I had a 3-year-old and a 5-year-old, and no thoughts whatsoever about starting my own nonprofit and going it alone. I wanted sameness and the legacy I knew, and God was ready to push me into the deep end and show me He could carry me through.
I remember sitting by a fire on a camping trip in Moab with my family, begging God to change it. But also finally settling that if this was the new direction, I would know him more deeply in it. And boy, was that ever true.
I was choosing loss of security as I saw it, loss of the legacy I thought I was to carry, and loss of comfort. I was choosing to burn my future (as I had planned it in my mind) to the ground. And although I didn’t know it yet, I was choosing an adventure that would bless me in ways I could not imagine.
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Have you ever thought about how loving yourself (which is commanded when Scripture several times says to love your neighbor as yourself) is actually an incredibly humble stance in life? Let me repeat that. Loving yourself is humble.
Here’s why I think so—I think you can only love yourself when you see who Jesus made you to be, and start to accept the love He has for you. Love is demonstrated, and He demonstrates this love all the time. The danger comes when we try to perform or deserve love. We try to measure our worth by what we do or how “good” we are. God doesn’t love us because we have measured up to a standard in some way. In fact, He says we all fell short of the standard. And yet. He still chose to love us.
When we fail over and over, we assume that God will get sick of us sometime. The problem is that He didn’t start with loving us because of our successes. He loved us before we loved Him—before we could see Him as anything but an enemy. He calls to us in love constantly, regardless of our behavior.
