What Did I Learn?

Sometimes after I come out of something that was hard, I like to spend some time looking back and thinking about what God taught me through a rough situation.  For example, we lived in northern Michigan for a hard 2 years.  I didn’t see much joy at the time.  But after moving away, I was able to look back and see specific reasons that God placed us there.


I lost my friend.  My good friend Claudia recently lost her fight with colon cancer and is now in heaven.  It was hard to watch her suffer the past few weeks and she left a pretty big hole in my life personally.  I ache when I think of her husband and 2 sons who now face life without this amazing person.  But as I move forward, I am going to try to put words together as I think through what I learned through all of this.

It ain’t over til it’s over.

Claudia was still doing kingdom work during the final couple of days of her life.  She was boldly sharing Jesus with family and friends and openly praying for people in the room who don’t yet have a relationship with Christ.  I don’t know what the end of my life will look like.  Maybe it will be similar to hers or maybe I will spend 10 years in a nursing home into my 90’s or maybe it will happen in the blink of an eye.  But through this I learned that no matter what my circumstances, I still have work to do.  God will still use me if I am willing.  I can never let myself become so self absorbed in my circumstances, that I miss opportunites for Him!

How will I handle it?

I think nothing says as much about a person’s heart as how they handle a really hard situation.  Feeling like a very healthy person and being given a diagnosis of stage IV cancer?  I would say that qualifies as such a test.  From the day of her diagnosis, up until the final days, she showed a strength that most people would not exhibit.  I’m not sure how a person without faith could ever be as “okay” with things if they were facing saying goodbye to their family, enduring a potentially painful ending, and “losing” the final 35 years of their life.  I think that non-believers are always watching to see how Christians will handle things.  If and when something truly hard happens to me, I want my faith to be evident to everyone.  But not to say “look at me and how great of a Christian I am,” but to say “Wow.  What an awesome God that gives that kind of strength and confidence!”

You never know.

In her own words, Claudia’s last week on earth was a gift.  On oxygen and struggling to breath and swallow and sometimes speak, she was able to finish her business.  Her extended family flew in and they had big dinners together, watched our church’s Easter service on a DVD together, shared lots of stories and memories and prayed together.  She had very personal and important conversations with her husband and her sons.  She gave pieces of jewelery that had special meaning to her neices.  She wrote letters to be read at different milestones in her sons’ lives.  As much pain as she increasingly was in, Claudia was able take care of business and she recognized this as a precious gift.  Truth is I might not have that final week.  A car jumps the curb tomorrow and I don’t get a week.  That lesson smacked me square between the eyes and right in the gut.  I need to live my life in such a way that if I don’t get that final week or month, I will have taken care of business.  I need to be saying certain things to people right now!  I think most of us don’t think about our mortality and foolishly believe we have plently of time to do things....someday.

My friend that I was at Jazzercize class with just 6 weeks ago is in heaven with Jesus at this very moment!  Those aren’t just words to make you feel good or a cliche.  That is absolute, amazing TRUTH.  God promises that ALL THINGS work together for good to those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.  ‘ALL THINGS’ might be really hard and painful things but when lessons can be learned and we can grow closer to Him as a result.....it IS good.

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”  2 Corinthians 4:16-18

Critical Parenting

Sometimes I wonder if other parents are like me. All of the thoughts that run through my head about my kids.....do most other parents think that way?

I know I will always be my kids’ parent, but based on the math, I definitely don’t have a lot of years left of the real hands-on, everyday, in-the-trenches stuff. I find myself looking at various traits in their lives and thinking, “Is that because of something I did or didn’t do?” Sometimes these things are good and sometimes they are not so great.

I’m not talking about major lifestyles or bad habits that my girls struggle with. But there are areas that they don’t have confidence in that make me question how we parented them. Were we too restrictive in some areas or did we not encourage certain behaviors enough? Could I have done or said things differently that would have shaped their character differently? I don’t totally beat myself up over this stuff but it is what I think about at 2am when I can’t get back to sleep.

Or maybe I am giving myself too much credit. Maybe it is more the genes they inherited which has made them who they are. (After all, I have twins who have been raised the same and have the same life experiences and yet they have very different strengths and weaknesses.) I totally see myself--the good, the bad and the ugly--in all ot them. A lot.

Or maybe it is a matter of me wanting to see them respond to situations in a way differently than they do. I think that I see the best in a particular situation, and yet they choose something different. It’s all about angles. They see something one way and I see it from further down the road of life. Life and experiences have a way of broadening your view and narrowing your focus at the same time. As a result they can miss amazing opportunities and underestimate not-so-amazing consequences.

Maybe I am just trying to learn how to parent adult or near-adult kids. When to speak up and when to shut up.

Okay, as I re-read this post, I realize I am rambling and vague and cryptic. Just stuff in my head right now. Post or delete? Post or delete? Post. Maybe it will make sense to someone.

Not So Funny. Really.

Sometimes God uses unique and unusual things to get our attention. That was the case with me this week-end. Scott’s annual Christmas party (yeah, I know...it’s February) was last night and this year they chose to have dinner and see the show at The Funny Bone at Easton. As a note, these are not my favorite nights. I am not a fan of making small talk with people I don’t know and only see once a year. So I don’t go into these evenings with the best attitude. Some years we are thrilled that we have a schedule conflict that we can’t attend the gathering, but this year it was close to home and our calendar was open. No excuse.

So we had a mediocre dinner...kind of like going to your spouse’s 20 year class reunion. He knows a bunch of people, but you really don’t. No big deal though.

Then we move into the room for the comedy show. There were probably a few hundred people in the over crowded room. Lots of drinking and definitely quite a few people who had too much to drink. In fact, the main comedian did 3 shots of tequila during his routine and that was just one of 3 shows he was doing last night.

Now, I have seen quite a few comedians over the years, primarily on cruises. I know they are going to use some colorful words and talk about some inappropriate things. But as I sat and observed both the comedians and the crowd, my heart was truly broken. The jokes were so sexually disgusting and the slander of various groups including minorities and women was frankly over the top. Things like pornography and drug use and stealing were totally celebrated. As I sat in shock at the topics, I was surrounded by hundreds of people who were having the time of their life! They laughed and cheered and high-fived each other and the comedian.

I’m sure many of these people are people who I would interact with in my day to day life. I might chat with them at my kids’ band concert or work out with them at excercise class. They might even sit down the row from me at church. I think there are so many people in our lives, especially on a casual basis, who we just don’t think about at a spiritual level. And yet, they are so far from God. Sin means very little to them and they are able to laugh and even raise their glass to it.

I think too often I am guilty of just seeing the surface of a person. I don’t care enough about their heart. I think in this situation it was easy to see the hearts of those around me. I want to be more aware of just how broken this world is and how much and how many people need Jesus.

I’m glad that sometimes God pulls me out of my safe little Christian-y world and says, “Beth! Wake up! You have got to see how lost my people are and most of all....Do something about it!!”

Okay, I know some of my friends will read this and just write me off as an overly religious prude who gets offended too easily. But that’s alright. I know there is more at play here and I also realize just how high the stakes really are.

Growing Pains

I meet weekly with some good friends in my living room to talk about books that we are reading. They are Christian non-fiction books by Francis Chan, Craig Groeschel, Chip Ingram, etc. We have amazing discussions and are able to share struggles and encourage each other in our walks with Christ and in being wives and mothers. I love these nights and I love these ladies.

I have been thinking a lot about something that seems to come up periodically in our talks. Many of these authors really challenge us to be “all in” for God. The bar is high and the examples of radical discipleship are real challenges and often far from where we live our everyday lives. Our response is often “That is awesome but I don’t even come close to that.” Or “I sometimes question if I am really a follower based on what I am reading.” Or just basically “I suck.”

Some thoughts have come to my mind as I try to process and respond to that.

• It’s a process. The examples in the books and the standards that God sets are really high. I can’t imagine living that way 100% right after being saved. I often feel led to look back and self-evaluate. Am I doing better than I was a year ago? Am I moving towards looking more and more like Christ or am I basically standing still?

• Would we really want it to be easy? Saying yes to God at the beginning is not necessarily hard. Turning every aspect of your life over to Him and submitting ALL is hard. To live every day with Him as the Lord of your finances and your time and your parenting and your marriage and your decisions is not natural. But if it was just a switch we could throw, we wouldn’t learn to depend on Him. We wouldn’t fully appreciate the process and the growth. We wouldn’t fully appreciate his grace when we turn things over to him and then take them back and then turn them back over to him, etc. etc. etc.

• More sin awareness. More grace awareness. The more I grow in my faith, the more I become aware of my sin. I am able to see it more clearly and I am more disgusted with how far short I fall from God’s mark. Sometimes I think that is why the statements above come out. We are growing and we see just how crappy we can be. BUT....the good part is that the more we see our shortcomings and our sin, the more we are thankful for God’s grace! When we are feeling really good about ourselves and our Christian life, what do we need God for? If I read books that perfectly described me and what my walk looked like, what would be the point? My Grace Group just finished a study and one of my takeaways from it was “The bigger my awarenes of my sin is, the bigger my view of the power of the cross will be in my life.”

Books and speakers and friends who challenge me to live more fully devoted to God are my favorite. If I had a choice between a sermon that made me feel all warm and fuzzy or a sermon that showed me what I am not doing well and taught me to do better....I would choose the 2^nd one every time. I love when a little seed is planted deep in my soul and I am convicted to repent or stretch myself or change or speak up.

My prayer for my friends in my living room is that they come away feeling more conviction than they do comdemnation.

Dear Teen-age Me......

As I watch my teen-age daughters go through life and become the adults they will one day be, I can’t help but think that there are lessons that I wish I could have learned back when I was a teen-ager. Sure I have tried to teach these lessons, just as I’m sure my parents tried to teach me. But you don’t listen. You have to learn for yourself through the trials and challenges of life. My kids don’t believe me when I tell them things...they think I am old fashioned or just saying things a mom should say in order to get them to behave in a certain way. But if I could have ‘gotten’ certain things way back then, I have to wonder if my life would have unfolded differently. I will write about more of these things in future blogs, but here are some that are on my heart right now.

“If God is the main thing, everything else will fall into place.”

God was part of my life when I was growing up, but I didn’t have a personal relationship with him until I was an adult. Church/Christianity was just one of the activities in my life amongst things like marching band and yearbook staff. I can’t help but think how things would have been different if my life was defined by God. If what my God thought of my everyday choices mattered more than what my friends thought. If I loved Him more than some kid I had a crush on. If getting spiritual things right was more important than grades or winning. If I was more concerned with telling people about Jesus than worrying that they thought I was cool. Am I getting all these things correctly now? No, but I am trying to live that way and I think I am improving.

“Don’t worry so much about stuff that doesn’t really matter.”

Things seem so big and daunting when you are in the middle of them, but in the big scheme of life, they aren’t. Think of things that you lost sleep worrying about, cried tears over, thought your world was going to fall apart. They don’t matter any more, do they? In fact they probably didn’t really matter a month later. Whether it was about a relationship, a big test, how you look, whatever.....it goes back to my first point...if God is the main thing, everything else will fall into place. And worry is nothing more than not trusting God. Am I getting this one right now? Nope. Still worry about things. But I think my perspective is different. I try to pray about those things rather than worry and fret. I also try to keep everything in it’s place. I think I have more wisdom about what are big things and what are little insignificant things. Worry is still worry and still wrong...but again, I am getting better.

“Sin is sin and there are consequences.”

Young people in their teens and twenties have a messed up view of their mortality. They honestly don’t think anything really bad can happen to them. Kids think dabbling in things is not dangerous. “That won’t happen to ME.” “There are plenty of people doing worse things.” But sin ALWAYS has consequences in God’s economy. Maybe you won’t die, maybe there won’t be serious physical consequences, but there will be baggage. The standard needs to stop being “just not as bad as so-and-so.” The standard is Jesus! You are not going to reach perfection, but that should be Who you imitate and strive for. I promise you that your friends will have more respect for your “no” than if you go along with whatever it is. They may not say that, and your circle of friends might shrink a little, but I don’t think you will ever regret making a right choice.

My list could go on and on....and I will revisit this in another blog.....

I'm SOOOO Bored!

“I’m bored.” I can’t tell you how often I hear these words from my kids and see it posted on their walls and hear it in their tweets. It can be less than 24 hours into summer break and they are bored. Maybe I was the same at their age...I can’t really remember. If I was the same, is it something we outgrow or when exactly did I change? I can’t remember a recent time when I was truly bored, especially to the point of complaining about it.

Maybe I am too busy to be bored. Although not as hectic as many I know, my schedule moves along at a pretty good clip. And when I do get down time, I am more than happy to read a good book, play a game on the internet, watch a movie, or simply think or pray. So possibly I don’t have the time to get bored.

Maybe I’m just weird and I’m okay with being alone in my thoughts. I don’t need to have friends around me all the time. Many a personality test have told me that I am an introvert...I get more energy from being alone than I do from surrounding myself with people.

Maybe it is a generational thing. Our kids have grown up with non-stop stimulation. Media, cell phones, computers. They have learned how to multi-task in ways that amaze me! When those things slow down or become silent, they don’t know what to do. I can’t believe I have raised 3 girls who won’t read a book unless they absolutely have to!

So all of this to say I often feel helpless in helping my kids “solve” their boredom issue. I can make suggestions until the cows come home, but nothing appeals to them.

What was the point of this blog?? Not sure.....just thinking. (all alone, but not bored!)

Happy Holidays...and other Christmas reflections.

I’ve been thinking about Christmas a bunch lately. Here are a few of my thoughts.

My friend Shannon recently posted on Facebook about Christians who get all worked up when people replace “Merry Christmas” with “Happy Holidays.” I have always inwardly cringed at the people who proclaim “Keep the Christ in Christmas,” and “Jesus is the reason for the season,” but I wasn’t always sure why. Shannon stated this so well, it is easier for me to just copy and paste her thoughts:

“Hey Christians involved in the great "Merry Christmas" vs. "Happy Holidays" debate, please stop it. The Christmas season gives us an opportunity to love people. Christ didn't come to earth to give us a holiday. He came to teach us how to love (dare I say love people who don't celebrate Christmas). And ultimately, to die for our sin (like the sin that causes us to argue about words like Christmas and Holidays). Please don't miss the opportunity to love people this Christmas. That's something that Jesus actually cared about.”

It just seems almost hypocritical to me. Why must these people supposedly fight for Jesus in this one situation, yet hardly give Him a second thought the other 11 months of the year?

This brings me to my next big thought. I don’t recall any place in the Bible that we are told to remember and celebrate annually our savior’s birthday. Communion -- definitely commanded. But a big birthday party every year that is often loosely (at best) connected to a baby in a manger? Let alone, how many people truly grasp what Jesus becoming a human really means? Do people really think that God’s intention was that we choose an arbitrary date on the calendar and each year we chop down trees and drag them into our houses, put hundreds of lights all over our houses, eat twice as much food as we need to, and spend BILLIONS of dollars that most of us can’t afford on giving gifts to people who really don’t need anything? Sometimes I just look around at it all and try to see it through God’s eyes. It really gives you a different perspective, and it is a sad one in my opinion.

Please don’t view me as just another Ebenezer Scrooge. I have lots of great Christmas memories both as a child and then with my own children. There are parts of Christmas that I still look forward to. But each year I seem to find myself stepping outside of all the merriment a little further and thinking about all of it and what it has become in our society.

In response, I try my hardest to keep my personal focus on what it means that God put skin on and came to earth in anticipation of me some day being born and needing to be rescued from my sin so that I could spend forever with Him. THAT is why I celebrate.