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Sunday, April 28, 2013

Sliced Bread vs. The Bread of Life


BACKGROUND:

Earlier this week I was speaking to a mentor about divorce in situations where there has been emotional and physical abuse. A question had been raised in my heart during the Divorce Care study.

I have been experiencing this feeling of (what I thought was) compassion that was getting in the way of my resolve to divorce Kip. "What is driving it?", he asked. "Is it worry about what others might think, or is it concern for his welfare?"

I had to answer "a little bit of both". How can I divorce a virtual invalid?  (note:  He's not an invalid per say, however, he does have a significant amount of alcohol induced dementia and may not recover)

My mentor then talked about a beautiful masterpiece (our marriage) that was torn into two pieces by Kip's violence, and how it seemed to him that I was using all this effort to try to make my half fit the half Kip destroyed.  (yeah, that hit me)

...And then truth set me free. I remembered his mother telling me that the reason he was heavily medicated was because of continued violence in the hospital. How can I think of fighting my terror of him just to go put myself in danger??

...and the realization that my history of being abused was affecting my thoughts and actions.  I was romanticizing his condition.

We prayed and each hung up the phone....and I read in Romans 8 as I was then encouraged to do.

With a wild hair I go to The Message to see how it is translated there.

Romans 8:12-15
So don't you see that we don't owe this old do- it- yourself life one red cent. There's nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God's Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go!
This resurrection life you received from God is not a timid, grave- tending life. It's adventurously expectant, greeting God with a childlike "What's next, Papa?"

The romanticizing I was doing was "do-it-yourself" wisdom....that didn't come from Abba.

HERE'S WHERE THE BREAD COMES IN
The truth of what my friend was telling me, and what scripture showed me continued to take root in my heart until Saturday after I closed the store and went across the street to buy some groceries.  I approached the aisle I had avoided for almost a year since I realized that sliced bread (of all things) was a trauma trigger.  I had been making sandwiches for my lunch the night Kip snapped and unleashed all of his anger on my heart with his words, threatened to kill me and shoved me repeatedly into counters, walls, doors, and to the ground.

You know, and I know, that making a sandwich had nothing to do with Kip. I was just part of the background that triggered the memory.  "the best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life..." echoed in my heart. It was time to let that truth displace the roots of fear that have controlled me and kept me from making any kind of sandwich for almost 18 months.

So there I am at the grocery store on a Saturday night, gingerly approaching the bread aisle.  (do the other shoppers have a clue about how fast my heart is racing?)  It seemed like it took forever to choose a brand that I never purchased during my marriage to Kip. It then, took the same amount of time to resolve to *not* purchase ice cream. (I wasn't successful with putting orchid #6 back in the flower dept, though...baby steps?)

And on the way home...I wept.  I was numb, going through the motions, while I made pimento cheese, numb as I spread it on the bread, and then, for a brief moment, filled with sorrow as I toasted it on the grill press.

Just to be able to eat it, I had to cut it in a way I never have before.   Victory?  Yeah...sort of....keep reading.

Afterwards, no amount of anesthetic activities (episode after episode on Netflix, York Peppermint Patties, mind numbing electronic solitaire ...) made it work.  So, I stayed numb until I fell asleep.

5:00am. I'm awake after a school based nightmare. Do I go to Abba with my fears?  No. I watch another episode on NetFlix and doze.

My 9:30, time to leave the house for church alarm goes off. I haven't even showered. Somehow I made it to church. I'm offered communion, everyone else has finished. I see the bread, and my heart melts.  The numbness melts away.

My body was broken making a sandwich. Jesus was broken like he fortold during the Last Supper when he took the bread and broke, giving thanks. He suffered, and He gave me hope by becoming the Bread of Life. Here was life being presented to me after an evening and morning of choosing death.

Romans 8:7-10
Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing. And God isn't pleased at being ignored.
But if God himself has taken up residence in your life, you can hardly be thinking more of yourself than of him. Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the Spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells-- even though you still experience all the limitations of sin-- you yourself experience life on God's terms.

I'm surrendering again. I still have wounds that need to be sacrificed. I still need to remember how helpless I am without Jesus.

...and there's still an awful lot of bread left, and it still looks a bit bigger than life. (even though it isn't)

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Swollen Feet


As I sat here on the couch in the all too familiar position with my ankle and foot wrapped and propped, I needed courage. I needed up lifting. I thought I needed comfort.

I turned back to Deuteronomy because I was so encouraged by what I had seen there earlier in the week.

This is the first and maybe only verse I saw:

Deuteronomy 8:4
Your clothing did not wear out on you and your foot did not swell these forty years.

Kip's last and most physically damaging attack was just days before my 40th birthday. That was the night I received the injury to my ankle - over a year and a half ago.

"...and your foot did not swell these 40 years."

So my first, and decidedly wrong thought was "What!?! I turn 40 and now, God, you are suddenly going to remove your protection?? Really?!"

what I may also have been thinking was "Don't you love me?"

I know my thinking is wrong. I know I'm not being rational.  But I can't convince my heart of that yet.

This morning, I am awake quite early. I know I need to give scriptures another shot...but I'm not ready. Maybe I can listen to an audio version? I have James and the two letters to the Thessalonians on my iPod.

I laugh now at how quickly I dismissed James. (How quickly I forget!). I thought "There is NO WAY I'm listening to that!" and speedily clicked on the Thessalonians file.

James has a reputation for being harsh. I still was longing for the coddling of a sweet, comforting, feel good passage.  Surely Thessalonians would fit the bill.

I don't think I really listened to it. My heart was still closed. But I did think through and list the facts- even if my heart didn't believe, my head still knows that the truth will set me free.

1. God didn't want me to have a sprained ankle that still wouldn't be healed 18 months later.
2. He is good, period.
3. God's character never changes.
4. There is bitterness and contempt in my heart.

As I went about my incredibly busy day, I had to stop from time to time to remember breathe. In those moments, I thought about my list.

It wasn't until 7 tonight, as I was talking things through with my counselor that my heart and thoughts finally collided.

As I ticked off my list to him, confessing my sin, he commented on how it made him think of a passage in ...

wait for it....James!

I know. Right?

Looking for the verse, I scanned chapter 1 and began reading out loud here:

James 1:12-17
Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him.

The immediacy of my conviction was heart breaking. I could barely see what I was reading through my tears.

If you are reading this, I have trusted you with the knowledge of the incredibly painful and traumatizing trials that Abba has brought me through in my marriage. You know of the intense emotional abuse and the final physical beating that caused me to flee my home. You know of the struggles I have had with fear and having to create a safety plan. And you also know of the many incredible ways that Abba has nested me, cared for me, and provided for me as he helped me to withstand my trials.

James 1:13-15
Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

I was convicted of the way my heart blamed God for this continued reminder of my hurt. I so long to start completely over with a clean slate. No more trauma triggers, no more painful memories, no more brokenness. I'm certain if I lived in another time, I would be one of those ladies who medicinally took opium - more to escape and forget. But I'm actually grateful I was born in a time that domestic abuse is known about. I knew to get out. I knew the cycle wouldn't stop if I became more of a doormat to keep from triggering one of his rages. I'm grateful there are people around me who are aware of domestic abuse who didn't condemn me for leaving, but instead offered me the safe haven of their friendship and support.

God isn't vindictive.

And at the same time, He isn't an enabling God. I wanted spiritual comfort food when I turned to scripture last night. I wanted the equivalent of spiritual cheesecake dripping with hot fudge.

Abba knew, is his loving wisdom that I needed James chapter 1.

James 1:16-17
Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.

So, I'm grateful for this thorn, this swollen ankle that hurts every afternoon. I'm grateful for the way it makes me rest at the end of the day by putting my feet up.  Putting my feet up sets the scene for taking the time to listen to my heart - to get it in a position to receive the good and perfect gifts Father has for me...in all of their forms.

Sunday, April 14, 2013

My One Desire



I have my weekend alarm set to go off at 8:27 a.m - 3 hours later than my weekday alarm. This morning, when Misty Edwards first sang "All consuming fire / You're my one desire-" I quickly hit the snooze button saying angrily in my head "No you're not! My one desire is to sleep!"

And with that statement, it was as if I had slapped the face of Jesus-hard.

I finally got to church (30 minutes late!) and took these sermon notes:
VC Sermon Notes - 4/14/13
Confessions

Deuteronomy 7:17-21
“If you say in your heart, ‘These nations are greater than I. How can I dispossess them? ’ you shall not be afraid of them but you shall remember what the Lord your God did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt, the great trials that your eyes saw, the signs, the wonders, the mighty hand, and the outstretched arm, by which the Lord your God brought you out. So will the Lord your God do to all the peoples of whom you are afraid. Moreover, the Lord your God will send hornets among them, until those who are left and hide themselves from you are destroyed. You shall not be in dread of them, for the Lord your God is in your midst, a great and awesome God.

My giants in the land:
Idolatry - wanting to feel better
(Ice cream, laziness)
Not trusting God
Ingratitude
Forgiveness
Fear

Just like The Lord helped His children remove the giants from their land "little by little", He will never forsake me in this life process of sanctification.

Deuteronomy 7:21-22
You shall not be in dread of them, for the Lord your God is in your midst, a great and awesome God. The Lord your God will clear away these nations before you little by little. You may not make an end of them at once, lest the wild beasts grow too numerous for you.

I promise I was listening to the sermon while I read on ahead and discovered how Abba would get me through this 'terrible two' quality in my heart:

Deuteronomy 8:2-3
And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Praying that I will hunger and thirst for righteousness, manna and living water - and that my one desire would be to press in closer to the One who saved me because of His beautiful gift of grace.

Thursday, April 4, 2013

I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Ice Cream

I have a confession. I love BlueBell Ice Cream, especially Pralines and Cream and Mint Chocolate Chip. I adore any brand of Coffee flavored creamy goodness. Ben and Jerry's Chunky Monkey is another staple; and when I really want to be pampered, Talenti's mint gelato is the gift in a reusable plastic jar that keeps on giving.

After a rough day at school (and there have been many of them the last few months) I would long for that moment of indulgence at the end of the day. It became a ritual. I'd nuke the carton just a few seconds to soften it and release the flavors, dish up several spoonfuls in my favorite coffee cup, then curl up on my cushy sofa with a super soft fleece blanket. It got to where I skipped supper all together - and on the worst of nights I'd have two cupfuls. In a bind, a mint chocolate cookie Cook Out milk shake would do...I'd order chicken strips as a pretend supper, but we all know what I was actually getting.

You get the point. You might also get why I felt this year was the year to give up something for Lent. In giving up ice cream, I found a challenge greater than I had experienced. I was so bent on feeling good. I had become so good at numbing the pain of my shattered marriage, that when my anesthesia was removed, I became so much more aware of the contrast.

I became more aware, too, of how often I would seek to get lost in that fun, overwhelmed full feeling where everything is intensely beautiful and exciting. The same feelings I got from my ice cream addiction, I find in other places.

Through choosing gratitude in all things, I realize now that there are two types of these orgasms of the heart.

There's the empty kind that comes from escape. Escape through ice cream. Escape through decorating. Escape through yarn. Escape through blaming. Avoidance through busy-ness, through procrastination and the adrenaline rush of 'catching up'.

And there's a *full* but sometimes sad kind that is found during worship and that comes only through sober surrender and the long exhale of discipline.

Surrender to the things I avoid.

Surrender to the challenges I long to escape.

Surrendering to my limitations, my hurts.

I don't have what it takes to survive in and of myself. I don't have what it takes to feel better in the midst of my hurts. I only have access to The One who had mercy on me, the One whose heart is filled to the brim with grace and undeserved adoration.

I only have Emmanuel.

He is the quieter, longer lasting, sunrise beam that warms my heart from within, filled with momentum and desire...and sometimes earth shattering tears.

I love how I feel when I get that perfect bowl of ice cream. Decorating my haven is a sometimes exciting pastime. There is nothing wrong with fully and completely enjoying these. Abba made us to enjoy His creation. He gives us these joys as His Blessing.

But as Buechner points out in his book The Magnificent Defeat, when I choose to steal those blessings like Jacob did with his father, even honey tastes bitter. Jacob lost his relationship with his brother when he stole his blessing and birthright. In contrast, the blessing Jacob begged for and received after wrestling with God all night was so much sweeter, and it was come by honestly.

Song of Songs 2:3-7

As an apple tree among the trees of the forest,
so is my beloved among the young men.
With great delight I sat in his shadow,
and his fruit was sweet to my taste.
He brought me to the banqueting house,
and his banner over me was love.
Sustain me with raisins;
refresh me with apples,
for I am sick with love.
His left hand is under my head,
and his right hand embraces me!
I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
by the gazelles or the does of the field,
that you not stir up or awaken love
until it pleases.

May I seek to stir up blessings only through the struggle to press in to my Savior in the midst of my struggles, rather than to indulge and escape.