274: hurry up vs. wisdom

One of my 4th graders this week said that he wished engagement wasn't a thing, that you just were married. I hear ya, boy. 

But life is more nuanced than that, isn't it?

Arranged marriage is great if you are willing to play Russian roulette on the rest of your life.

Skipping the dating process and marrying someone who seems great on first glance without taking the time to get to know them seems easier if you're willing to risk all because you're impatient and scared of what you might learn.

Bypassing engagement sounds carefree if you don't realize that sometimes the period between wanting all your dreams to come true and when all your dreams will come true--that middle "promise" period--can shake the tree hard, sifting whether there is fruit among the hopeful leaves.

So yes, 9 year old boy, sometimes it would be nice if engagement wasn't a thing. But any time you have a waiting period in life--singleness, dating, engagement--you are blessed with the opportunity to double-check what it is you're waiting for, and if the destination will be as glorious as you've dreamed up in your head. Time draws thoughts out of you that a rushed series of events cannot. Get wisdom, get understanding is the Scriptural command, not hurry up and get this show on the road, no matter how much we think that hurrying would give us all we want more than the counsel of wisdom would. 

267: Letting Go of the Unknown

I wrote the following a week or so ago and sent the draft to a small chat group. Someone strongly encouraged me to publish it because she resonated with the concept and wanted to share it with her readers. So here are my thoughts from then, with a couple edits.

The journey from singleness to union is not what I would have expected. I would have thought that once you "arrive" at having found the one and fallen in love, that all former memories would pale in comparison. They'd practically disappear.

But, like a friend once told me, saying yes to one thing means saying no to another.

As someone who holds on to memories and clings to journals as mementos of who I have been, I find myself betwixt mourning what will never be again and embracing the fulfillment of all my hopes.

The other day I was thinking about how fun some past camping trips have been. But you know what was scintillating about some of those trips with other young people? Heading out of your tent to head to the campground bathroom in the early morning, knowing that few people have had the privilege of seeing you with sleepy eyes and messy hair, but feeling awfully scandalous (scandalously delighted) if the guy you have a crush on sees you. Or coming back from the shower with your hair wet and him seeing you. It's that hint of what you've always wanted--marriage with someone permanent--but it's like the whiff of chocolate chip cookies. You don't get the cookies, but the whiff excites you. But in marriage it seems like I'll get all the cookies. It seems like the teasing of the senses will be absent. I'll have someone who already sees me in my disheveled morning state every day, without the enticement from a chance meeting while camping.

Meet-ups too have lost their glow. The best part of meet-ups is the thrill of when someone you like makes eye contact, or talks with you, or when you serendipitously on-purpose find yourself sitting next to them or in their vicinity. But with marriage, you literally never experience the thrill of a slight acknowledgement from your crush ever again. Those 30 seconds of eye contact that you experienced at 17 years old that you STILL remember because it was so life momentous? In marriage, you don't experience the wondering what may happen: Will he contact you? What does this text mean? Could he like you back? The solidity of reality takes away the wisp of non-reality.

All we've wanted as women is certainty and a love of our own. But all we've known is uncertainty and the hope for something more. I feel a little bit of loss letting go of the hope in exchange for the reality. Hope projects fantasy on an un-actual future. Reality incorporates two people's current emotions, abilities, and mass and volume states, to create something that is very concrete and less ethereal than the hope that has kept me warm every day as a single.

I think I may need a rest-in-peace moment for all I've had...or haven't had.

248: Valentines Day post

I brought the Sunday school kiddos (all 1 of them, and then another joined us) into the sanctuary for worship this morning. We were singing "At the cross You beckon me, You draw me gently to my knees." It's not my favorite song, lyrics-wise. But two sections popped out to me and set me really thinking.

"On it my Savior, both bruised and crushed

Showed that God is love and God is just"

Ack! I love SO much that God is BOTH of those things and not just one. There is such fullness in knowing that God is not just loving, but that He is powerful and that He doesn't put up with garbage (not my usual terminology, but it suits). He doesn't put up with the wicked coming against Him as though they can fight against the Almighty God of the Universe and win.

But, that doesn't have anything to do with Valentines Day.

The second part that stuck out was, "wholly surrendered."

It resonated with what I was pouring out to the Lord while the songs were being sung.

This hope of a relationship all us single girls hold--it's fragile. I have been through "failed" relationships. It HURTS. A couple have broken me. I've been through other circumstances too. I've felt the deep darkness of a black hole when my world rocked with new, unexpected information.

It makes me want to wrap myself up, build my castle walls, and look with a very, very wary eye at hope of a relationship. Mmhm. Yeah, you can feel slightly elated, but I wouldn't count on it happening for nothin'.

(Every time I hear of a single I know online getting into a relationship I'm like, mmm...probably won't last. I mean it's great, but statistically...)

And that's not right (well, at least the hopeless-kind of skepticism I direct at myself). That's being governed by fear and skepticism instead of hope. It sounds like self-protection, but it is not healthy.

The thing is, even if I'm never in another reciprocal relationship (because we all know non-reciprocal, unrequited "relationships" will continue to happen cuz they're our life-blood :-P). Or even if I'm in a relationship that bombs out. Or if I'm not. No matter if I'm single for the rest of my days--WHATEVER, and I mean WHATEVER the future holds as far as companionship and marriage--I have hope.

You know that hurt and black hole I mentioned before? I know I've blogged about this before. Those experiences--those experiences of pain and tears and cannot-Cannot-CANNOT--I am so so so thankful for them.

Because they have PROVEN God's faithfulness. They have PROVEN that life will not end in pain. They have PROVEN that I have hope on the other side of brokenness. They are my guarantee that even if I fall onto the shards of shattered expectations again--if I let myself open up and I'm shattered--that my life is not over. He will get me through. His plans for me are not through. I am held in hands that redeem. I am held in hands that can use me. That to live is Christ and to die is gain, and, as another song goes, "In the hands of our Redeemer, nothing is wasted."

(Y'all. If I ever do get married and have kids, I want to name one something like "faithfulness." Like "Fidelidad" or "Leal.")

Anyway, so this Valentines Day, I'm trying not to focus on the ROMANCE (in big, fluffy letters) of the holiday. Because, discontentment is painful too. :-P I am embracing the holiday (girls partayyy!). And I'm focusing on NOT clinging to expectations--positive OR negative--but clinging to God's goodness and faithfulness no matter what.

Valentines Post 2018
Valentines Post 2017

205: bit by the autumn love bug

I've been bit.

Bit by the autumn love bug.

I can't blame it all on autumn, but the fact is, Friday was the first day of fall and Saturday morning I could feel it. The wistfulness of fall. The happiness of cool mornings, colorful scarves, pumpkin spice. The hope of . . . something new.

Funny how winter is all about death and darkness, but I always see fall as the coming of all things cozy and romantic.

Like big band music or Michael O'Brien's Something About Us love song album.

Long sweaters.

Apple crisp, apple pie, apple cider, Apple Hill.

My friend sent me a Scripture today. "May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope."

Our hope is so much more than circumstance-based.

And sometimes I get so focused on someone I think I want--John Yates of Faith Bible Institute says, "the object of our desires becomes the focus of our hearts."

But what does a focused lens do? What does the sun do when it narrows in on a magnifying glass? It sets fire to the leaf underneath it, or so I'm told. It destroys.

I love autumn. I love romance. I love the hope of something new, something more.

I know well the mesmerizing agony of making an unattainable human the object of my desires.

Is it sin? I cannot say beyond how God convicts me. Not for all people at every time, otherwise how on earth would anyone ever get married? (but not via the inordinate, idolatry kind of desiring!)

But there is a time to step back from the magnifying glass, gaze at the falling leaves around, feel the surge of romance in the chilly air, set your face to the warmth of the light, and say, "You are my God and You alone. With You is the fountain of life. At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore."

And go forth and enjoy the season.

And maybe, if you feel the freedom to do so, breathe in the hope of the unknown too.

167: time passed; could be my fault; yet God worked

Singleness. It bites ya every once in awhile.

In your less than strong moments, do you ever wonder if it's your fault that you're single? Do you wonder if you messed it up when you were younger? If you were too PICKY (that word :/)? If you didn't put yourself out there enough? Considering my own possible guilt in the matter usually brings anger and hot tears. As if everyone else stumbled on the magic formula while I sabotaged myself.

Even if I did sabotage myself, it wasn't from willfulness. If I "missed out" on a crush some decade or so ago, it was because I didn't know how to bring attraction to myself (still don't!). If I "missed out" on some potentially amazing guy in my 20s, it's because I didn't know that I could give a guy a chance (ie. not snub) unless he was 90-100% marriage material.

The fact is I was not ready earlier. I don't mean God waits until you're "ready," but I can't deny that God has done His work in the years of my singleness, as I know He is still doing, and will continue to do in my singleness. What lessons have I learned as a single, sparing me the pain or disillusionment of learning it while married? Maybe if I had learned about the fallen nature of human beings through my husband instead of through my single relationships I would have become disillusioned about the beauty of marriage. Sometimes I feel this hunger for a guy that is often really hunger for God--I wonder if I had married before realizing that was spiritual hunger if I would have drained my husband dry with possessiveness before realizing I just needed God time. What if I had encountered my own impatience in parenting instead of in teaching? I probably would have been disillusioned again, and my life dreams would have spiraled, instead of accepting that I'm a sinner in need of sanctification.

I accept the blessing of learning some things while a single, not because it is a superior, or inferior, blessing, but because it is my blessing. My lot. My gift.

I'm going to keep messing up in this whole pursuing, being pursued, and being involved in relationships thing. I take comfort in knowing I will have run the race well if I let God do His work in me, circumstances be what they may.

166: intentionality and information dump

"To everything there is a season,

A time for every purpose under heaven" (Ecc 3:1)

I'm really feeling this in my life right now.

Last year I taught with a friend whose word for the year was "intentionality." She wanted to teach with intentionality. That was great for her. I was just enjoying my first year feeling like I might know what I'm doing.

But my Lord seems to have led me into a season the last few months of living intentionally. Who do I want to be? Not in the future, but now? How do I want to live? Not when I have a husband, but now? What are my ideals? And can I work to attain them?

Here's how that's been fleshing out for me.

I'm exercising three days a week. That's...unheard of. I'm doing Jazzercise, sometimes with a friend, sometimes on my own. And I'm paying top dollar for membership. Money is a great motivator.... So is the thought of being able to offer an active, healthy person to my future husband, if God so brings that about. And also, this is how I want to live. And instead of being conquered by my laziness, I'm finally feeling the satisfaction of living how I want to live, even as the muscles ache and the sweat drips down my neck.

I'm trying to keep my room neater. It's embarassing how much a single girl will let the one room of the house that she has sole jurisdiction over fall apart around her. I'm not sure why keeping a neat room has never been a priority. My parents are both very tidy people. Perhaps it's been a way to do my own thing. Perhaps it's been because I'd rather do other things instead. Perhaps I thought it impossible to take charge of this area of my life and so gave in to how I didn't mind living (aka messy). Now, don't get me wrong, as I type, my bed isn't even made, and it's 8:20pm. But I have been trying more, not for my mom's sake like I used to (sometimes walking by my room would start to drive her crazy), but because I want to start living neater now, as a single. It's an intentional choice. And I enjoy the satisfaction of actually accomplishing the pick-up that isn't always easy to do in my little over-stuffed room.

I'm trying to do better at controlling my sugar and media intake. I'm failing in the latter. And I'm only just beginning to have some success in the sugar department. Little steps. Dark chocolate doesn't count. Don't judge.

I'm trying to become the person I want to be, against the desires of the flesh.

In some areas, areas I know I will fall without help, I've sought accountability. And it has helped!

Insert clarification: I am not doing nothing with my life. I am an elementary teacher with a combination grades class. It's more than a job, it's my life. It's not like I'm bumming it at home, eating brownies on the floor of a cluttered room while watching back-to-back Hallmark movies.

At least not during the school day.

In the last week I've applied for a graduate program through Liberty University. I filled out the application 3 years ago, and it went inactive from lack of follow-thru (and funds). But now I've reapplied, registered, and am about to do "financial check-in." It's finally the season to start clumping down the cash to move myself forward career-wise. I don't know, maybe the man of my dreams will propose and I'll be married before two classes are even out of the way. But I'm not being held back by my hopes for marriage anymore. Unless God directs me to wait, to not spend the money and take the class, I will be taking my first class for a Master of Arts in Teaching starting the 21st of this month. Craziness.

I'll admit, part of the motivation is so when people ask what's going on in my life, I can actually sound like I'm moving forward in some area. But I also need this degree to have better job-opportunities in the future. I'm excited to learn the content, and I've been planning on going back for a Masters since I graduated in 2009. So this is really an intentional step in fulfilling my dream.

The one area that I am not being intentional in is finding a guy. I am not doing online dating. And there's absolutely no logical reason! (Well, except that I'm not sure that's the best venue for me.) I am completely in favor of online dating. But I have no peace from the Lord that I should do so now in this season. I have no peace even to Facebook message a guy I'm interested in getting to know. Do I think that would be wrong? Not at all. But to everything there is a season. And I know today is not that season.

So that's what's been going on with me. Got to put it all out on the Internet, right? *wry grin*

Well, maybe not everything.

Incoming Selfie Alert....

There we go.

165: Vday and faith

 

"For the Lord is,

He is able

He is faithful

Higher than the mountains that I face

Every season, I will press on

For God alone, is on the throne" (Kari Jobe)

 

Surviving singleness is a lot about faith.

I'm sure every season is about faith, but I'm not walking other seasons, I'm walking the path of singleness, so this is what I know.

I'm surviving (and thriving) this Valentines Day because of faith.

Because I have lived 30 years with my Lord and have grown (at least for this moment) in my trust in Him.

Psalm 135:6 - "Whatever the LORD pleases He does".

He is able, He is faithful. Whatever He purposes, He does. I plant my feet here and declare that what God purposes, He can do. He can do the impossible (ie. getting me married). And I pray for the impossible. I hope for the impossible. I believe in Him and His ability to do the impossible.

This Valentines Day I am not embracing resignation. I am embracing hope. But, more satisfying, I am embracing my Lord, declaring that knowing Him is primary and believing in Him is my peace.

Singleness is about faith. Faith that following Him is more fulfilling and more peaceful than longing after something else ad infinitum to my heart's misery. Believing that if He takes something way it is only because He has something better. He is something better.

Believing that even though I cannot predict the future, control the future, or manipulate the future, I can be excited about what God might do (even if unrelated to my relationship status), because my God does the unthinkable!

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for,

the evidence of things not seen." (Heb. 11:1)



150: active or dormant?

I'm afraid.

Sometimes I have strong desires.

And other times, those desires lessen.

And sometimes, I have strong desires that I'm afraid to let lessen. I cling to them as my own, as part of what I want, and I'm afraid that if I let those desires lessen then...

What am I afraid of?

I'm afraid that if I get the opportunity to do what I've always wanted to do, that I'll bypass the opportunity because I won't realize its enormous value anymore because I've stopped wanting it so much.

The other week I had to deal with this. Because I have such a bad memory, I was afraid if I didn't hold onto these feelings, that if xyz opportunity did arise, I would forget what a good thing it was and not respond appropriately. So, driving home from work one eve, I decided that I would just have to trust God. I told Him that if He wanted this opportunity to come, He would have to resurrect the feelings at that time. I would stop trying to grasp for a hold on them. (And later He did seem to confirm that He was capable of doing so)

Today I saw 9 month old baby pics on Facebook. Lately I've realized my desire for kids is waning, and I am so afraid to let that desire go. I don't want to be that person that doesn't want kids. I don't want to be that older single for whom it doesn't matter anymore if she does or doesn't have children. I don't want to wake up when it's too late and say, "What have I done to myself?" (as if wanting something means I'll get it and not wanting something means I won't get it).

But maybe when desires fade, they simply become dormant. They do not vanish, poof, nope, don't care anymore. They just lie dormant until God and circumstances resurrect them.

Lord, You know the dreams of my heart. Give me the perfect balance of action to reach those dreams and allowing those dreams to sink into inactivity for a season.

Anyway, tis the thoughts of my heart right now.

147: scary scary word

Partway into this LadyM's Distractions blog venture, I started struggling with the Lord. Most of it centered around prolonged agony singleness, but some of the background for the struggle included events my family had endured that had messed up our little unit pretty bad. So I've been struggling and questioning and getting bitter over and wrestling with this idea of God's sovereignty versus our foolish choices, outside circumstances, and fallen world.

But like I said, most of it came down to the issues of "Why am I not married?" "Why didn't I get to be married at 21 like I had expected?" "I need my own home, but I can't have it. *grumble, grumble*" "God, I really want someone to encourage me spiritually." "I want someone to hold me. That's how YOU made me." "Lord, why can't I just have someone to talk to? I'm lonely. Didn't You say it's not good for man to be alone?"

Anyway.

I am thankful I belong to a God who lets us wrestle with Him.

"Righteous are You, O LORD, when I plead with You;

Yet let me talk with You about Your judgments." (Jeremiah 12:1)

If I were to go back and counsel myself, I'm not sure I would feed myself any platitudes, true though they may be. I think I would tell myself to do exactly what I did. Wrestle it out. Better to wrestle it out in the presence of the Lord than to ignore the questions and pretend like everything was okay when it was becoming increasingly not okay.

I would say to myself, "Wrestle it out with the Lord, and then, (to quote Jen Hatmaker from the If 2015 conference) 'Give your heart permission to trust Him.'"

After I sweated it out, I was stripped to the point of making a decision--either to trust or continue to question.

I THINK, by God's grace, I have chosen to trust.

At least for today.

I have chosen something else. It's a scary, scary word. But it's something that as soon as I started transitioning over to it, I wished I had done so years ago.

I chose "acceptance."

I started accepting that I am single, and may be indefinitely, and may be forever.

I couldn't do the wait on the Lord thing anymore. I couldn't WAIT for what God had not promised me.

With acceptance has come the freedom to examine my life as if it's not on the cusp of change. That's how I've always lived my life--as if I could get married soon and will need to alter my habits to accommodate another person so . . . I'm waiting. But if I'm accepting that my present life is my life? Then I have the freedom, and the responsibility, to create new habits and paint my world the way that I want it to be, because change isn't around the corner.

That thought process is probably unique to me, but that's how this little brain works.

The funny thing is, even in the acceptance, I feel hope and freedom to pray for a husband. Acceptance didn't take that away.

 

Stay tuned for an upcoming post about the faith I have to keep coming back to amid this acceptance.

145: but if You had come

The Bible lesson at school today was from Lazarus. And this is what I heard:

Mary and Martha sent to Jesus that their brother Lazarus was sick. They wanted Him to come heal Lazarus. But Jesus did not come. 

God had a bigger plan for Lazarus than healing him. God had a bigger plan than doing what Mary and Martha wanted.

So Jesus stayed away and let Lazarus die.

Did I hear that? Sometimes God has a bigger plan. Sometimes God says "no." Sometimes God is putting together an undeniable display of His glory.

I've been struggling the last few days with not getting something I wanted. It wasn't even something I thought God didn't want me to have.

So I say to the Lord, "I believe Your plan is good." And for the breath of a moment the skies clear and I can envision God doing His great work regardless of my recent hope and disappointment. For a moment I believe, and it is enough. Then the heavens close, and I repeat the words again. I do not feel the rapture of God's goodness, but now is the time to walk by faith, not by sight.

I believe Your ways are above my ways, and I believe in the goodness of You and Your plan.

I wonder if maybe these closed doors aren't the rude slamming in my face that they sometimes seem. Maybe they are more like God ensuring that I stay in His plan. I am moving forward like I ought, and He is making sure I don't unknowingly stray off His unknown path for me. His staff guiding me.

Your kingdom come. Your will be done.

Keep reminding myself. Keep believing. Keep looking heavenward.

130: waiting (Dietrich Bonhoeffer)

my love bug

ChristianAudio's free audiobook of the month for December was God is in the Manger by Dietrich
Bonhoeffer. So I downloaded it but didn't really do anything with it. Until the last few days.

Wow.

So I bring you a quote from Week One, Day Two. For more information about Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I recommend Focus on the Family Radio Theatre's dramatization of his life. And, fyi, this month's free audiobook at christianaudio.com is C.H. Spurgeon's Morning and Evening devotional.

Now to the quote!

"Celebrating Advent means being able to wait. Waiting is an art that our impatient age has forgotten. It wants to break open the ripe fruit when it has hardly finished planting the shoot. But all too often the greedy eyes are only deceived. The fruit that seemed so precious is still green on the inside, and the disrespectful hands ungratefully toss aside what has so disappointed them.

Whoever does not know the austere blessedness of waiting, that is, of hopefully doing without, will never experience the full blessing of fulfillment. Those who do not know how it feels to struggle anxiously with the deepest questions of life, of their life, and to patiently look forward with anticipation until the truth is revealed, cannot even dream of the splendor of the moment in which clarity is illuminated for them; and for those who do not want to win the friendship and love of another person, who do not expectantly open up their soul to the soul of the other person, until friendship and love come, until they make their entrance, for such people the deepest blessing of the one life of two intertwined souls will remain forever hidden. For the greatest, most profound, tenderest things in the world, we must wait. . . .

'. . . . We shall both experience a few dark hours. Why should we disguise that from each other? We shall ponder the incomprehensibility of our lot, and be assailed by the questions of "why?" over and above the darkness already enshrouding humanity, we should be subjected to the bitter anguish of a separation whose purpose we fail to understand; and then, just when everything is bearing down on us to such an extent that we can scarcely withstand it, the Christmas message comes to tell us that all our ideas are wrong, and that what we take to be evil and dark is really good and light because it comes from God. Our eyes are at fault. That is all. God is in the manger. . . . No evil can befall us. Whatever men may do to us, they cannot but serve the God who is secretly revealed as love and rules the world and our lives.' Letter to fiance Maria . . . from prison, December 13, 1943."

--Dietrich Bonhoeffer, God is in the Manger

last sunset of 2014, Mexico