Thank you for the comments and encouragements regarding the Hard Questions I've been working through in the last year. Instead of replying to comments and keeping the dialogue in the comment section of that post, I am going to dialogue it out a little more here in another post (maybe a few; we'll see).
First, let me start by saying that I wasn't sure what to think of the articles I read by Stand To Reason. I'm the kind of person that reads things at face value. I'm a sucker. I'm completely naive on some things. If you want to find a gullable person to believe your latest prank, come find me. I don't like sarcasm for that reason. I am too often the brunt of the joke because I want to believe people.
Therefore, when I read things, I usually take them for what they are. I'm not the skeptical reader. I don't begin to analyze things right away and immediately let my hairs get bristled. So, when I read the articles, the arguments seemed to be reasonable. There was Scripture to back it up. The author was logical.
Most importantly, I think the enemy was at work.
I say that last line because the articles made me question something I had recently spent a great deal of time teaching. That teaching time encouraged me and many others. It had me thinking about other opportunities to teach. I think the enemy didn't like that and used the open window of opportunity to throw more doubt my say.
I'm not someone who thinks there is a devil around every corner. I don't think every bad thing that happens to us is orchestrate by our enemy. However, I do believe we ignore the unseen kingdom way too often. We don't utilize the power we've been given or claim the victory that is ours.
To answer some of my questions:
My friend Lisa made some great comments about God leading people throughout Scripture. She cited the biblical examples of the 12 disciples, the apostle Paul, the prophet Elisha, David, Moses, and Joseph (OT) who were all called specifically by God to do a task and go to a specific place and leave where they were living.
My friend, D, referred to 2 Peter 1:10 --a Scripture that's often been quoted in relation to a specific task/job (aka: calling). That's exactly what I've wrestled with throughout the last several years. If we read the Scripture in context, he is clearly talking about our election as saints and our calling to be followers of Christ. I think we have to be careful not to take Scriptures out of context to meet a need we have or to say what we want to hear.
My friend Deanna and I have been corresponding further about this issue. A few things she pointed out (also via her dad, who is a good friend of ours as well) is the fact that the articles use a lot of what Scriptures don't say to make a point. You can't really make a point about something by pointing out what's not there. In any court of law, you must prove things beyond a reasonable doubt by providing concrete evidence. You will never convict someone of a crime by just showing what evidence is not in existence. Great point!
Scripture doesn't say for us to do A then B then C and we'll get D...the voice of God. But, it is full of examples of personal relationships, as my friend Summur pointed out in her comment. George, Deanna's dad, pointed out the principle of "first mention" in Scripture. I've learned about that from Beth Moore studies I've done in the past. Basically, that principle says that the way we learn about something is by looking at the first time it's mentioned in Scripture. That usually tells us its meaning. In the case of our relationship with God, we go back to the garden in Genesis. God created man to have a personal, interactive relationship with Him. It was tainted by the fall. Jesus redeemed that and through Him, we can have that relationship with our Father again.
Right now, I think I'm at the point of looking most specifically at the issue of accountability.
I can't say that reading these articles and having these overarching questions in my mind has shaken my firm belief that God has spoken to me and led me personally throughout the last two decades of my life. I know God. I know Him personally. It would take a lot more blog posts to try and articulate how I know it. But, I know it. And, throughout the last year, I haven't stopped believing it.
I think what I've been most concerned about is when someone invokes "God told me...", it puts up a wall that immediately eliminates our ability to hold one another accountable. It's like the trump card.
Maybe that's what my issue is after all.
It has become so commonplace in the church to talk about God's leading of us personally that we've stopped being accountable to one another with our actions. Where is the balance?
Friday, January 6, 2012
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
Some Hard Questions - Join Me
Parts of this post have been in "edit" mode for almost two months.
I decided it was time to finally make them a reality.
The very long post of yesterday with tons of Christmas pictures had to be posted in a somewhat timely manner and I find I don't ever really type what I want to say on here, so this post is just going to be more "rough draft" than even my unpolished normal writing.
Where to begin?
Let me start with saying I have always had a love/hate relationship with social media, specifically blogs and Facebook. So much of what we see is just the beautiful, what-I-want-you-to-see stuff of life. If you struggle with jealousy or envy or feeling sorry for yourself or have hormonal days, then you've probably sat in front of a computer screen, stared at what someone posted, and felt worse about your own life or circumstances.
We all have an image in our mind of what life should be like, what we'd like to be doing or see happening, and it's usually beautiful. We see someone else's beautiful when our life isn't so lovely and envy it. Sometimes it sends us even farther into the valley.
I recently joined Pinterest. Mostly, I was searching for hairstyles and liked the ease of looking through pictures others had pinned with the keywords "short hair".
Pinterest...another social media for me to love and hate.
December is a time when social media can be particularly hard for me. I want to do these cutesy crafts and projects with my kids. I want to have a lovely decorated house. I want to make this season meaningful for my family. I want.... want, want, want. Oh, Pinterest makes the wanting more easy to see!
But, this post isn't about social media. Really, it isn't.
My life isn't a storybook. It's beautiful and fabulous and lovely and full of amazing gifts God has given me. Five people surround me daily to prove God's goodness to me.
But, this December, I found myself not feeling "ready" for Christmas. For the life of me, I could not get myself to a place of emotionally and spiritually being "there". I can't put my finger on it. I've discussed it with a few people and suggested maybe it's hormones (highly likely), the adjustment of having a baby again (highly likely), or spiritual (placing my stock here most).
I'll probably blog a little more about the first two later. But, right now, I just want to share something that has caused me much anguish and questioning this last year.
Last fall (2010), a series of events happened that caused me to step back from my life and start to look at things, seemingly, from a different point of view. I never really wrapped my brain around all of it and then my life turned again as Jett was born. [Not like I hadn't had three kiddos before him, but I forgot how enveloping babyhood is.] So, I ended up spending most of 2011 asking some hard questions of God and never really getting answers. I still don't feel like I've dug in enough to His Word or Him, in general, to get the answers. I feel like I've been busy surviving and trying to scrape together bits of what I felt like I used to have together...namely managing my house and family.
So, as I start 2012, it's really just a continuation of these lingering questions.
Here they are:
--where in Scripture to we see the idea of a "calling", specifically as it relates to vocation?
--does God lead us/"call us" to specific tasks? do those change? is there an overarching "calling" on our life as believers?
--does God speak to us, in a conversational way? where do we see that Biblically?
Some of these questions arose as friends walked through trials, changes came that were out of my control or influence, and I began reading some things.
I read the book Just Do Something: A Liberating Approach to Finding God's Will by Kevin DeYoung. Whew. It challenged me. It got me thinking.
Then, I read an article published by Stand To Reason. Since the article was part one of a three part series, I was sort of left hanging until the second article came out in the summer and then finally the third one was published in November. [Link to STR articles. Solid Ground is their monthly newsletter/article. This is the archives homepage. You can read each of the three articles. They are PDF articles, so there isn't a way to link to a webpage other than this. They are titled "Does God Whisper, Parts 1, 2, 3".]
I'm putting all this out there in blogland hoping someone will take time to read the articles and give me some feedback. I have printed copies that I'm currently re-reading. My plan is to dig into them and really seek the Lord this month.
I'd welcome your thoughts.
I decided it was time to finally make them a reality.
The very long post of yesterday with tons of Christmas pictures had to be posted in a somewhat timely manner and I find I don't ever really type what I want to say on here, so this post is just going to be more "rough draft" than even my unpolished normal writing.
Where to begin?
Let me start with saying I have always had a love/hate relationship with social media, specifically blogs and Facebook. So much of what we see is just the beautiful, what-I-want-you-to-see stuff of life. If you struggle with jealousy or envy or feeling sorry for yourself or have hormonal days, then you've probably sat in front of a computer screen, stared at what someone posted, and felt worse about your own life or circumstances.
We all have an image in our mind of what life should be like, what we'd like to be doing or see happening, and it's usually beautiful. We see someone else's beautiful when our life isn't so lovely and envy it. Sometimes it sends us even farther into the valley.
I recently joined Pinterest. Mostly, I was searching for hairstyles and liked the ease of looking through pictures others had pinned with the keywords "short hair".
Pinterest...another social media for me to love and hate.
December is a time when social media can be particularly hard for me. I want to do these cutesy crafts and projects with my kids. I want to have a lovely decorated house. I want to make this season meaningful for my family. I want.... want, want, want. Oh, Pinterest makes the wanting more easy to see!
But, this post isn't about social media. Really, it isn't.
My life isn't a storybook. It's beautiful and fabulous and lovely and full of amazing gifts God has given me. Five people surround me daily to prove God's goodness to me.
But, this December, I found myself not feeling "ready" for Christmas. For the life of me, I could not get myself to a place of emotionally and spiritually being "there". I can't put my finger on it. I've discussed it with a few people and suggested maybe it's hormones (highly likely), the adjustment of having a baby again (highly likely), or spiritual (placing my stock here most).
I'll probably blog a little more about the first two later. But, right now, I just want to share something that has caused me much anguish and questioning this last year.
Last fall (2010), a series of events happened that caused me to step back from my life and start to look at things, seemingly, from a different point of view. I never really wrapped my brain around all of it and then my life turned again as Jett was born. [Not like I hadn't had three kiddos before him, but I forgot how enveloping babyhood is.] So, I ended up spending most of 2011 asking some hard questions of God and never really getting answers. I still don't feel like I've dug in enough to His Word or Him, in general, to get the answers. I feel like I've been busy surviving and trying to scrape together bits of what I felt like I used to have together...namely managing my house and family.
So, as I start 2012, it's really just a continuation of these lingering questions.
Here they are:
--where in Scripture to we see the idea of a "calling", specifically as it relates to vocation?
--does God lead us/"call us" to specific tasks? do those change? is there an overarching "calling" on our life as believers?
--does God speak to us, in a conversational way? where do we see that Biblically?
Some of these questions arose as friends walked through trials, changes came that were out of my control or influence, and I began reading some things.
I read the book Just Do Something: A Liberating Approach to Finding God's Will by Kevin DeYoung. Whew. It challenged me. It got me thinking.
Then, I read an article published by Stand To Reason. Since the article was part one of a three part series, I was sort of left hanging until the second article came out in the summer and then finally the third one was published in November. [Link to STR articles. Solid Ground is their monthly newsletter/article. This is the archives homepage. You can read each of the three articles. They are PDF articles, so there isn't a way to link to a webpage other than this. They are titled "Does God Whisper, Parts 1, 2, 3".]
I'm putting all this out there in blogland hoping someone will take time to read the articles and give me some feedback. I have printed copies that I'm currently re-reading. My plan is to dig into them and really seek the Lord this month.
I'd welcome your thoughts.
Monday, January 2, 2012
Christmas Celebrations - very long with pictures
My mom arrived late Wednesday night to spend Christmas with us. Joel worked on Thursday, then got a half day off on Friday. Our wonderful friends, Jim and Pam, came over on Friday for some lunch and hanging out.
Pam even brought the lunch with her! She made a delicious calzone-type filling with chicken and then had the kids help her use crescent rolls to form the "wreath" of yumminess.
It was nice to have a relaxing and festive lunch with our family. Pam and Jim are our kids' "Texas grandparents" and spoil them rotten. It's such a blessing to have older adults in our lives to dote on our kids, but also encourage, lead, and challenge Joel and me. The day was especially sweet for me as my mom was here with us too!
This is to prove I was there. They also brought gifts for the kids.
Jett was a little interested in opening his gift...a soft book with rattles on it.
Rylee LOVED her new chapter book! And, the twins liked their books about character.
I was playing with the flash on my Nikon, trying to soften it. Then, Jett got very interested in being the subject.
Christmas Eve was spent in jammies wrapping gifts (for me), cutting blocks of wood and making a last-minute gift (for Joel), and playing with Nana (for all our kids). Joel's cousin, Chris, arrived in the early afternoon. Then, we headed to church for the 4:30 service.
We enjoyed going to Olive Garden for Christmas Eve dinner. It was a delicious treat for all of us! The kids discovered a love for OG this summer.
I forgot to take pics during our dining experience, so I snapped a few shots as we were preparing to head home (yep, a few were in the loo).
Christmas morning brought squeals of delight!
Our kids open their stockings first. Well, first they ran to look at all the gifts that had been placed around the Christmas tree!
Then, they went to unload their stockings.
Jett wasn't interested in his own stocking, but he liked exploring the contents of Asa and Jenna's.
I didn't film our annual hunt for baby Jesus because I was feeding Jett. But, once the kids found all the figurines for our 6 nativity sets and Jesus was, indeed, in the manger, we read about the birth of Christ in Luke chapter 2. Then...we shared presents!
The kids helped bring the gifts from the front living room back to the respective recipient in the back living room. We took turns going around watching the kids open each gift. I really liked how it helped them focus on who gave each one and really checking it out before tearing into their next package.
One of my absolute favorite parts of Christmas morning is watching the kids open the gifts they got from their siblings. The giver is usually just as excited as the one receiving!
In this case, Rylee was thrilled that Jenna and Asa picked out the jewelry box she had been asking for!
Jett got a few wrapped gifts, but he had the most fun emptying the used paper from a big box we put it in.
Jenna has been asking for a pair of binoculars since we used a set while camping back in May. She was beyond excited that our church family in Pennsylvania would send her some for Christmas! And, I love to hear her say "binoclears" just slightly wrong.
Asa had a completely Star Wars and Lego Christmas. He got seven sets of Legos and loved every single tiny piece!
Asa also got this giant "tinkertoy" set. It's wood corner pieces and pvc pipes that he can configure into a tent of his choosing. Then, you throw a sheet over it and ta-da have a fort!
I finally put the camera away and stopped taking pictures of everyone opening gifts. I wanted to enjoy the moment and figured the photos end up looking pretty much the same anyway.
We went to church (which I absolutely loved, by the way). I think we should have a church service EVERY Christmas Day. I mean, hello?! What exactly are we celebrating? It was splendid.
Sharing the joy with friends is always fun!
After going to church and having lunch, the kids pulled out their new gadgets and got busy.
They also enjoyed some time in front of various screens.
We gave Uncle Chris a picture frame with the kids' handprints. This photo will go in the middle.
And, Nana was busy filming the excitement, reading with kiddos (that's her and Rylee above), helping care for Jett, and cooking. We all agreed her visit was way too short!
And, seriously. I am blessed. Just look at this handsome man who loves Jesus and his family and is this good lookin' to boot!
Pam even brought the lunch with her! She made a delicious calzone-type filling with chicken and then had the kids help her use crescent rolls to form the "wreath" of yumminess.
It was nice to have a relaxing and festive lunch with our family. Pam and Jim are our kids' "Texas grandparents" and spoil them rotten. It's such a blessing to have older adults in our lives to dote on our kids, but also encourage, lead, and challenge Joel and me. The day was especially sweet for me as my mom was here with us too!
This is to prove I was there. They also brought gifts for the kids.
Jett was a little interested in opening his gift...a soft book with rattles on it.
Rylee LOVED her new chapter book! And, the twins liked their books about character.
I was playing with the flash on my Nikon, trying to soften it. Then, Jett got very interested in being the subject.
Christmas Eve was spent in jammies wrapping gifts (for me), cutting blocks of wood and making a last-minute gift (for Joel), and playing with Nana (for all our kids). Joel's cousin, Chris, arrived in the early afternoon. Then, we headed to church for the 4:30 service.
We enjoyed going to Olive Garden for Christmas Eve dinner. It was a delicious treat for all of us! The kids discovered a love for OG this summer.
I forgot to take pics during our dining experience, so I snapped a few shots as we were preparing to head home (yep, a few were in the loo).
Christmas morning brought squeals of delight!
Our kids open their stockings first. Well, first they ran to look at all the gifts that had been placed around the Christmas tree!
Then, they went to unload their stockings.
Jett wasn't interested in his own stocking, but he liked exploring the contents of Asa and Jenna's.
I didn't film our annual hunt for baby Jesus because I was feeding Jett. But, once the kids found all the figurines for our 6 nativity sets and Jesus was, indeed, in the manger, we read about the birth of Christ in Luke chapter 2. Then...we shared presents!
The kids helped bring the gifts from the front living room back to the respective recipient in the back living room. We took turns going around watching the kids open each gift. I really liked how it helped them focus on who gave each one and really checking it out before tearing into their next package.
One of my absolute favorite parts of Christmas morning is watching the kids open the gifts they got from their siblings. The giver is usually just as excited as the one receiving!
In this case, Rylee was thrilled that Jenna and Asa picked out the jewelry box she had been asking for!
Jett got a few wrapped gifts, but he had the most fun emptying the used paper from a big box we put it in.
Jenna has been asking for a pair of binoculars since we used a set while camping back in May. She was beyond excited that our church family in Pennsylvania would send her some for Christmas! And, I love to hear her say "binoclears" just slightly wrong.
Asa had a completely Star Wars and Lego Christmas. He got seven sets of Legos and loved every single tiny piece!
Asa also got this giant "tinkertoy" set. It's wood corner pieces and pvc pipes that he can configure into a tent of his choosing. Then, you throw a sheet over it and ta-da have a fort!
I finally put the camera away and stopped taking pictures of everyone opening gifts. I wanted to enjoy the moment and figured the photos end up looking pretty much the same anyway.
We went to church (which I absolutely loved, by the way). I think we should have a church service EVERY Christmas Day. I mean, hello?! What exactly are we celebrating? It was splendid.
Sharing the joy with friends is always fun!
After going to church and having lunch, the kids pulled out their new gadgets and got busy.
They also enjoyed some time in front of various screens.
We gave Uncle Chris a picture frame with the kids' handprints. This photo will go in the middle.
And, Nana was busy filming the excitement, reading with kiddos (that's her and Rylee above), helping care for Jett, and cooking. We all agreed her visit was way too short!
And, seriously. I am blessed. Just look at this handsome man who loves Jesus and his family and is this good lookin' to boot!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)