Happiness Is...

Happiness is...

spring flowers!

Little bit sophisticated and a little bit wild! What's not to love?

No Tassel Turned

I think sometimes we can make the assumption that those who teach God's principles must be fairly accomplished in the spiritual realm. No one is ever perfect, but surely in order to get to the point where you are qualified to teach you more-or-less have your stuff together. Well, I hate to burst your bubble...we don't!!

I am teaching a class on forgiveness tomorrow. I have taught this session twice before and I have heard this topic taught countless times. As I sat down tonight to go over my notes and get ready I KNEW I needed to deal with some things before I could. So, in an attempt to do my best to take of my own issues of unforgiveness before I try and point others in the way they should go, I wrote down the names of those I felt I had at least a thread of unforgiveness woven thru whatever thoughts I may think toward them. Guess what?

I had to write down 5 names!!!!

Oh yeah, I really have it together alright!! One of the names I even shed some tears over because, while I want to feel forgiving toward them, I decided the act of acknowledging my desire to forgive them out of obedience to the Father might eventually lead to feeling it...because I sure don't feel it now!!

So there you have it! No tassel has been turned here yet! I am proof that you can teach on a topic and still struggle with it yourself! The Lord knows my heart, though, and He knows I truly desire to have a clean slate because it is not so much about my relationship with others as it is all about my relationship with Him!!!

Assuredly there is but one way in which to achieve what is not merely difficult but utterly against human nature: to love those who hate us, to repay their evil deeds with benefits, to return blessings for reproaches. It is that we remember not to consider men's evil intention but to look upon the image of God in them, which cancels and effaces their transgressions, and with its beauty and dignity allures us to love and embrace them.

John Calvin (1509 - 1564)

"It is critical to remember that we are most like Jesus not through our attempts to be perfect, but through our choices to forgive as we have been freely forgiven!" Jackie Kendall in her book Free Yourself to Love.

Processing

I think this may be the longest hiatus I have ever taken from this blog. I'm not sure why it has been so long since I have written because writing has always been what helped me sort out all those jumbled thoughts and kept me sane. I was thinking about it today because I decided my blog needed to be refreshed just like my house does this time of year. Why was I treating my blog like my closet? You know, that one area of my house that the messier it got and the more I ignored it the harder it was to make myself go in there and face it! Well, I think I may have actually started putting some of the pieces together.

Many times I post about things that bring me joy or cool things the Lord has been showing me. Sometimes, though, I post about struggles or things that hurt my feelings. I think I am hesitant to post some of that now because of being a pastor's wife. My desire to be real and reflect the valleys right alongside the mountain tops has not diminished. I have never wanted to portray a June Cleaver type of life. Trust me, June Cleaver I ain't! ;O) While I want those we minister to to know I have real feelings and real struggles, I am afraid that sharing certain things will cause suspicion and set the rumour mill in motion.

You see, I hate gossip. I hate assumptions. I hate when people neglect their own lives because they are so busy poking their noses into everybody else's! I so desire to stay away from feeding that at all that it has made me mute at times. It made me unable to share my heart for fear of causing dissension in the ranks...for fear of causing some to look at everyone else with suspicion, wondering who the culprit might be in my story of betrayal. I guess today I came to the conclusion that to choose to remain silent and not share the bad with the good is to stifle the passion the Lord has given me to write. You see, it caused me to shut down completely. I couldn't even share the good because at times it was so interwoven with the hurt.

I spent a portion of this evening talking to a friend I haven't seen for a while. Much has happened in my friend's life. She has experienced incredible heartache, major health issues, loss of loved ones and yet her love and passion for the Lord burns brighter than I have ever seen. She shared some of her hurt with me for it was essential to the story. She did it with care, though, so as to not throw anyone under the bus. It was a part of the stripping down process the Lord has done in her. He has allowed her to be stripped of all she leaned on and now, when left with only Him, she has found that He is enough. He is more than enough! The sharing of her betrayal was not anything either of us focused on because the Hero of her story was too evident in her words, her eyes and her peace that truly does surpass all understanding.

Phil. 1:29 (The Message) ~ There's far more to this life than trusting in Christ. There's also suffering for him. And the suffering is as much a gift as the trusting.

So I think I am back. I know I need to begin to write again. I know I need to sort out all these thoughts that compete for attention and write them down so I can move on to something else. I miss being able to share with others the beauty He brings from ashes and the joy out of pain. Life is hard. People hurt us. We bleed...but then we heal. Scars are mere evidence that healing has taken place and we all have them. Experience is sometimes a brutal teacher...but we learn.

My prayer is that those times I do feel the need to share about pain or a hurt I am wrestling with that you'll hear my heart and pray for for me without trying to fill in a list of key players to the story. The only name that matters in it all is His Name...and that is enough!

The most beautiful people are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.”

But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world. --C.S. Lewis

Lord, may I use the gift of words that You have given me in a way that honours You. May I use it to encourage and edify myself and others as we reflect on Your tender care of us. May I not allow the potential suspicion of others to cause me to become silent, for it is in the weaving together of the joy with the pain that we see Your intimate involvement in every detail of our lives.