healing

Baggage Part II: Polaroids of the Past

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If you’ve lived long enough to make at least one incredibly stupid decision, you’ve got some of these. Maybe you’re like me with lots of small regrets, moments of time captured in your mind as clear as the images on a polaroid.

They call it flash bulb memory, where you can remember every single detail of a certain moment in time where something in your life changed. Those happen in good moments, in tragic moments, and most of all, in moments where you and I screwed up.

Maybe you are like me and have been carrying around a suitcase full of those images for years. The suitcase keeps getting heavier and heavier as you compile more polaroids of shame and guilt. More moments you would give anything to go back and undo.

Jesus wants those polaroids. Not for the reasons you think. He’s not going to be shocked or surprised by what He sees. He knows about each and every one. In fact, He was there when they happened.

He wants all of these pictures, not to hold them over your head every day or to make you feel perpetually ashamed. He wants to take them from you and case them as far away from you as possible. As far as the east is from the west. As far as the heavens are above the earth.

I am not my mistakes. Neither are you. Who I was in my weakest moments is not who I am. The way you acted all those years ago isn’t really you anymore. If anyone is in Christ, he or she is a brand new creation. Not a better you, but a completely new you.

It’s time to stop being weighed down by the past and start walking in the freedom that comes with new mercies and clean slates each morning. It’s time to really live in the freedom Christ purchased for us, the condemnation-free life that is now ours.

Baggage Part I: Letting Go

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Who doesn’t have baggage? I certainly know I do. I’m pretty sure anyone who is over the age of 5 and who still has a pulse has accumulated some kind of baggage over the years.

What is my baggage? Probably right now, I’m carrying around the constant need to be validated, affirmed, approved, and liked every single moment.

I find myself at the end of conversations thinking I’ve said or texted the absolute wrong thing and ruined the relationship. Things like, “Did I really just end the conversation with ‘Text me’? Is it even possible for there to be a lamer ending to a conversation?”

I think I let go of a little bit of my baggage tonight. I think I’ve finally come to the point where I may not trust myself to keep my relationships alive, but I know that God will keep the right people in my life for as long as they need to be there.

I’ve mentioned before that I am a work in progress. I’m 4o and my dating history reads like a black comedy or a tragedy (either one works, so take your pick). I haven’t had a real girlfriend since I was 5 (her name was Carrie, by the way).

I think I’m more comfortable with my own path and not trying to hijack God’s plan for someone else. I’m learning to enjoy the process and the journey and not be so OCD about the destination.

I think I’m learning that I don’t have to be clever or witty (or even overly coherent) for God to speak through me.

I’m finally learning to be patient with my own process and who I am becoming. I’m more patient with the shortcomings of others, because I’ve seen so much of my own and I’ve seen how very strong God can be in my weakness.

What is your baggage? You have a choice. You can either hold on to your shame and guilt and fear and anger or you can hold onto Jesus, but you can’t hold on to both. And yes, I borrowed that one from Mike Glenn.

You don’t have to carry that baggage forever. You don’t have to let it define you or be a pemanent part of your wardrobe. It all begins with saying, “I can’t do this anymore. I need you, Jesus, to take this and carry it for me.” It may be a process, but it’s so much fun to feel the weight fall off.

May you find that what you’ve carried all this time is one day no longer a part of you. May you find more and more freedom in Christ. May you hear and believe the words at this very moment that “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Amen.

I Know: Living in Captivity

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“I know what I’m doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for” (Jeremiah 29:11)

Lots of people quote the above as their favorite verse. Lots of people go even further and call it their life verse, me being one of them. It’s nice to know that God’s got your future in His hands.

But when you look at the context, this is written to people in captivity who are longing for home. The funny part is that they are longing for a home they’ve never seen, but only heard stories about.

Many of us feel like captives. Maybe you feel trapped in a job you don’t like, but you’re afraid to step out in a bad economy and look for new work, so you stay and stress and count the minutes to the end of every day.

Maybe you feel like your family doesn’t know or appreciate you. Maybe you feel like your spouse is always tearing you down and never offering anything positive. Maybe you’ve being going to a church for a while and you still feel like a stranger and an outsider.

Maybe you feel like your friends have all moved on and left you behind in your pain. Maybe you had your romantic hopes dashed yet again and feel even less desirable than ever.

Read the first part of the verse. God knows. He’s aware of your distress. He sees the tears you cry in the dark when you’re alone and feels the pain that hides behind the facade of a smile.

He has a plan for you. He has a dream for you that is bigger than you but that you get to be a part of. He has a future for you that is as wide-open and free as His amazing grace.

I love how one author said that when you are in a dark place, listen very carefully because God has a special and very precious word for you that you won’t be able to receive any other way.

Jesus knows what it feels like to be alone and forsaken. That’s why He said He would never to either to you. Ever.

Keep trusting and keep believing, even when you don’t feel like it. Keep clinging to Jesus. If all you can pray is “Help me,” keep praying that over and over until it becomes your mantra.

I have never known a storm that didn’t leave a rainbow or a night that didn’t turn into day. Your time is coming and God’s got good things coming your way. Hold on.

Don’t Give Up

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This is a word for the faint-hearted and down-trodden. Don’t give up.

You may be close to giving up or throwing in the towel or calling it quits, but don’t.

You may think the storm will never abate and the sky will always be filled with dark and ominous clouds and the sun will never come out again, but it will.

Your marriage may be hanging on by the slimmest of threads. You may dread getting up each morning and going to your job. You may sometimes wonder how your life came to seem so hopeless.

But don’t give up.

You may not think anyone sees or cares, but God does. And He’s already at work.

Somedays, it feels like you’re swimming upstream and wearing yourself out while getting nowhere, but God is leading you to a place that you don’t yet know but once you get there, it will all have been worth it.

Just trust God and take the next step. That’s all.

Take it from someone who’s been there. It will get better.

 

Naked

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At Kairos, Mike Glenn spoke about how Adam and Eve were naked in the Garden of Eden and unashamed. That got me thinking. How great would it be if we were all naked?

I don’t mean naked in the sense of those movies they show late at night on those pay cable channels with the cheesy background music. Not that I would know anything at all about those kinds of movies.

I mean naked where there are no masks and no facades, no faking or pretending. Where you and I can truly be ourselves, with baggage and scars and hang-ups and be accepted as we are.

A good marriage is one where each person can truly be naked and unashamed; that is, each is genuine and authentic and real and honest and vulnerable and forgiving. That’s what I long for some day.

I think the Church is also a good place for people to be truly themselves. Where you can confess to one another and not be ostracized for it. Where you are allowed to be weak and doubting and insecure and temptation-prone and still belong. Where you’re family.

The nearer you draw to God, the more you are able to be your true self, the one God made you to be and the one He is transforming you into. You worry less and less about the opinions of others and are more comfortable standing outside the popular opinions and trends.

I still love the fact that Jesus saw me at my worst and set His love on me in that moment when I couldn’t possibly be more messed up. I love how He’s seen all the hidden sins and vile thoughts and ugly attitudes and His love for me has not diminished one bit (and it never will).

My prayer for you is that you can come before God completely naked and not hiding behind religious pretense and holy words and find shelter in His love.

A Prayer for Those Who Grieve

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I found a beautiful prayer for those who have lost loved ones and still feel the void where that person used to be. It doesn’t matter whether the loved one was a few minutes old or 100 years old. The loss still hurts. So hopefully this will being you comfort:

“We seem to give her back to thee, dear God, who gavest her to us.

Yet, as thou didst not lose her in giving

So we have not lost her by her return.

Not as the world giveth, gavest thou, O lover of souls

What thou givest, thou takest not away.

For what is thine is our always, if we are thine

And life is eternal

And love is immortal

And death is only a horizon

And a horizon is nothing save the limit of our sight.

Lift us up, O God, that we may see further,

Cleanse our eyes so that we may see more clearly,

Draw us closer to thyself that we may know ourselves nearer to our beloved who art with thee.

And while thy Son prepareth a place for us

Prepare us for that happy place,

That where they are and thou are we too may be,

Through the same Jesus Christ, our Lord. “

Amen.

The Kingdom of God

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The Kingdom of God is like a grain of mustard, so very small in the hand, yet when planted, it becomes a tree that fills the heavens and where all the birds come to find rest amidst its branches.

The Kingdom of God is like a small pinch of leaven in a vast amount of dough that eventually penetrates every part as it causes the dough to rise.

The Kingdom of God is men and women leaving positions of importance and luxury to go live among the outcast as missionaries and bring hope to the once hopeless.

The Kingdom of God is those who leave father and mother and family and go to a strange land with only the promise of God to guide them.

The Kingdom of God is those who overcome because their testimony, the blood of the Lamb, and the fact that they were willing to give up everything, including their own lives, to gain a thousand times more in the Life to come.

The Kingdom of God is Jesus inviting all the Peters of the world, those ashamed of their betrayal and moral failures and wreckage their lives have become, and says to them, “I am entrusting My work in your hands  and giving you a new story to tell, the most  fantastic and the truest story you will ever hear.”

The Kingdom of God is the lame and the beggars and the outcasts and the nobodies of the world being chosen to the best party ever thrown, one that will never end and will only keep getting better.

The Kingdom of God is two or more, gathered in the name of Jesus, whether in a multi-million dollar church campus or in a tin hut with a dirt floor.

The Kingdom of God is here and it is advancing. No power in hell or on earth will ever be able to stop it, because nothing is more powerful than love. And Love has come and His name is Jesus.

The Kingdom of God is God ruling in the hearts of His people, taking broken lives and making them whole, taking stained souls and making them clean, taking shame and turning it to praise, taking mourning and turning it to dancing, taking ashes and turning them into beauty.

The Kingdom of God on its way and at the same time, the Kingdom of God is already here.

The Kingdom of God is NOW.

My Favorite Bible

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I have to admit it. I have an addiction. Of all things, I’m addicted to collecting Bibles, particularly the pocket-sized ones. So far, I have a NASB, ESV, NIV, RSV, NRSV, HCSB, NLT, KJV, NKJV, NCV, CEV, ASV, Amplified, Pbillips, and the Message. That’s a lot of initials. And a lot of Bibles.

My favorite Bible that I own didn’t cost very much. It looks like it didn’t cost very much. But I love it.

It’s a Greek-English Interlinear Bible with the Revised Standard Version on the side margins. That means it has the Greek text and underneath each Greek word is the closest English word. It’s as literal a translation as you can get.

It takes a bit of getting used to, as the word order in Greek sentences isn’t always structured like it is in English. Often, the most important words come first, not the usual subject-verb-type structure.

For me, it is as close as I get to reading the original Greek New Testament. I can still sound out the Greek words, but I’d be lost without those little English words underneath.

The point of all that is for you to find the one you like and read it. It could be a literal translation or one of those dynamic equivalents, which are “thought for thought,” rather than “word for word.” Heck, it could even be a paraphrase, like the infamous Message version by Eugene Peterson.

Just find one that speaks to you, that makes the Word of God come alive to you and makes you fall in love with it. Find one that won’t be just mere words on a page, but words that change your life.

I heard once that if you have a Bible that’s falling apart, it usually means that your life isn’t. I don’t mean bad things never happen when you’re soaked in Scripture, but you have a solid foundation from which to anchor down in the stormy seasons of life.

By the way, my Bible doesn’t look anywhere as good as the Bible in this picture. But what matters is what’s inside. Kinda the same for you and me, don’t ya think?

Hugo: Finding the Key to Life

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“Maybe that’s why a broken machine always makes me a little sad, because it isn’t able to do what it was meant to do… Maybe it’s the same with people. If you lose your purpose… it’s like you’re broken” (A quote from the movie Hugo).

I really liked the movie Hugo. It’s about a boy who lives in a train station and who is extremely adept at fixing things, trying to figure out how to fix one particular machine and retrieve his father’s last message to him. It spoke to me on a deep spiritual level, which is rare for anything that comes out of Hollywood.

If you believe the Bible (and I do), then you’ve read the part where we’re called sinners. All of us. It means we’ve missed the mark. We’ve set aside God’s agenda for our own. We’ve lost our purpose and we’re broken.

We each have a hole we’re trying to fill. Almost like the machine man in the movie Hugo that required a heart-shaped key. We need something (or someone) who can fill the hole and turn our hearts right-side up again.

Only the Creator knows His own creation and how best to fix it. Better yet, the Creator became one of His own creation to be the Key that fills the empty space inside all of us. Only the One who made us can truly name our future and call our purpose out of us.

I know I’m still broken and on some days, it shows. I also know my Creator is fixing me and restoring my identity and my purpose. I love that I get to be a part of Him fixing and restoring the broken lives of other people and helping them find purpose and meaning.

I still believe that no one is too broken for God to fix and there is no one that God can’t redeem and use to do amazing things. Look at me. Look at you. Look at any of the works in progress the Bible calls saints.

It’s not too good to be true. It’s too good not to be true. Believe it.