My mouth hung open. I stared at the woman walking past me. It was not polite to stare (I know, okay!), but I forgot that my mouth was still hanging open.
I had just worked out at the gym. My muscles were getting EVEN stronger! For example, this time I didn’t have to go to the far edge of the gym to find lighter weights than the ones our instructor set out for the group class.
Have you tried every other path to success, friend? There is only one more way to try!
We are serving up some previously published articles for you to feast on this week, while our family is on spring break in Victoria, Canada.
Goodbye, winter! Hello, flowers! Victoria has regular spring flowers, like these daffodils, found in the rest of Canada, albeit a bit earlier that the rest of us.
(Who CARES?)
But they also have bushes of things like these already in bloom, flaunting us.
And while we’re chatting, do you want another cookie and to join me in playing a game on my iPad, friend?
The sun peeked through the darkness.
The storm was lifting. Hope filled the air along with the fresh scent of life, stirring, awakening with the rain. It was a new season.
Today.
Join people in over fifty countries who read this to gain valuable life wisdom! (Or maybe they’re just laughing at me? . . . Whatever!)
I stretched, removed the covers from my bed and sat up, looking around me blankly. What would this new day, this new season bring, now that this storm was lifting, I wondered? I poured my coffee and asked these questions of God, and his whisperings startled me.
There is so much in my life that He is longing to awaken. How about in yours?
Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new. It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it?
And how do we awaken, if we, like Sleeping Beauty, have been spiritually resting for a few years?
Try this: As the song below plays1 and as you sit with your morning coffee, pondering this new day or this new season, what stirrings in the dry soil of your heart, of seeds coming to life, do you sense?
Oh! And she sings of repentance in this song, but I wouldn’t recommend THAT or anything! In my humble opinion, there doesn’t seem to generally be any need to travel down any spiritual path as far as repentance would take us.
Please!
I definitely recommend turning back and hanging out with the rest of us who don’t want to walk THAT far! And anyway, the part of the song about repentance doesn’t apply to me, thankfully! (It may, however, apply to you, of course.)
True repentance [is] not merely . . . sorrow over sin, but . . . a “sweet sorrow” arising from a new, awakened delight in the beauty of God.2
1 She’s a little serious in this song. You’ll want to offer her a cookie and tell her, “Hey, Lady! Relax a bit!” (At least I do.) The point is that it’s good to wake up spiritually. She gets that part, so we can at least learn that bit from her!
2 And may you awake a little more with each poke repentance gives our sleeping form, friend.
Well, there was a bit more as she explained it to me. The plant was in winter. All that could be seen were a few sticks for branches poking above the ground.
Join people in over fifty countries who read this to gain valuable life wisdom! (Or maybe they’re just laughing at me? . . . Whatever!)
Sounded like my life in that moment.
“But spring is coming,” she encouraged me.
I picked up my discouragement and continued walking on the ill-trodden path that God seemed to be leading me down, wondering if, sometime in the future, there would be life above the snow.
The word “establish” kept coming to my mind as I prayed. What needed to be established? Holy Spirit also seemed to be nudging me to write. Now, I had always written copiously in journals, but I would never think of sharing my written thoughts with others!
“Who would read such neurotic pretensions?” I asked myself. Certainly not me! I looked at my piles of completed journals, all of them unopened and unread, even by me.
Keep writing, God seemed to encourage me.
The first time I sat at my desk and tried to write something I intended to publish, it was like the seat of my office chair was on fire – It was so uncomfortable. I couldn’t sit there! Only a pompous, inflated prig would would presume she had something to say to another!
But it’s essential to fit in with others, so, of course, I pretended1 to be a pretentious know-it-all with an inflated ego so I would have something to write about!
And then I pressed publish.
The simple reality is that if you ever want to do anything significant for the Kingdom, you will have to overcome fear and internal resistance. If could be fear of the unknown, fear of what others will think2, fear of harm or injury3, fear of failure, fear that you’re not ready or equipped for the task. There is ALWAYS fear.
And so, to return to the start of this article, “A winter season,” she had suggested that day.
“Establishing,” God had seemed to be whispering in my prayers. Establishing a habit of pressing “Publish” and letting my words be carried off on the wind. I was learning not to care what others thought about the things that deeply mattered to me.
I was learning to listen to His voice and to dance in joy with Him.
And when the amaryllis, the lilac, and the peony bloomed that spring after a decade or more of relative death, I looked back in awe at where He has been leading me.
And he reminds us that spring, the season of blooming and life, always follows winter, as we rest in Him.
Is this an establishing season for you, friend? May your roots grow deep as you trust that “if you’re not done working, God, I’m not done waiting,” as the song below sings. As the song below also sings, “Though the winter is long, even richer, the harvest it brings,” after a moment of silent reflection and thanksgiving, consider asking God, “What new thing are you trying to water in this season, God, and how can I best be obedient to Your gentle nudge in a new direction?
Oh, and the question is not so much, “Where will you go?” or “What will you do?” but “Who will you become?”
And so, what is a simple habit to find our identity? We obey His promptings from our prayer times. Then we wait and trust that life sprouts.
Because spring always comes with new life.
Just as rain and snow descend from the skies and don’t go back until they’ve watered the earth, doing their work of making things grow and blossom, producing seed for farmers and food for the hungry, so will the words that come out of my mouth not come back empty-handed. They’ll do the work I sent them to do, they’ll complete the assignment I gave them.
3 I definitely fear that, but thankfully, I am pretty safe at home writing on my computer in my safe little town in Canada with all the doors and windows locked! (Just in case.)
Sit by me, friend! Even if I forget to say something useful, we can have a great chat!
I looked out my window that day and saw something surprising in our overgrown “flower” patch.
This flower was so entangled in the weeds that I had to cut back the surrounding greenery to snap a photo.
I knew God was speaking through this flower and will explain why soon. But I also wondered, “What are You saying?” I felt confused, which is usually how I feel when Holy Spirit seems to be nudging.
Sit by me, friend! I found some hope to share today!
I was startled when I saw it.
It was a mundane circumstance for those without eyes to appreciate it.
But my heart quickened many beats. God seemed to be whispering in the ordinary, calling me to see something more profound than this mundane object. Would I have ears to hear? Did I have time to listen? Was I too busy to notice?
With desperation, I can ALMOST (!) hear you, then, asking me, “What is this one unknown truth that makes my plant (I.e., life!) flourish?”
Great question! I’m glad you asked (me!)!
It’s the following truth:
Join people in over fifty countries who read this to gain valuable life wisdom! (Or maybe they’re just laughing at me? . . . Whatever!)
God has terrible math skills!
And so, in today’s article, we will:
Prove that God (sometimes!) has terrible math skills.
Explain how God’s bad math skills will help you to soar in your life!
You’re welcome!
Good luck!
Part 1
“How can I have the MOST productive, important life?” I asked God over and over.
Not that I am neurotic or anything, but I obviously asked this only so I could best help others thrive!
Well, that part came a bit later (it’s still coming a bit), but the point is that we ALL want to be IMPORTANT and AMAZING, if we push past the clutter of our words that we try to make ourselves believe when people are listening to us.
When I had my first child, I was almost immediately asked by a helpful (?) family member what everyone else was thinking: “Can you earn more money if you get someone else to take care for your baby, versus if you do it?” (I.e., He was basically asking me something like, “Do you have more earning potential than an unskilled nine-year old?”) Yes!
I did!
“Then you’ll put your kid in daycare,” his brain automatically assumed. He was talking without thinking. Makes sense!
The math adds up!
But then it seemed God was asking me to care for and then homeschool our two1 kids for twenty years.
Dr. Robertson McQuilkin, a prominent author, educator, and former president of Columbia Bible College and Seminary, famously resigned from his prestigious position in 1990 to become the full-time caregiver for his wife, Muriel, who was suffering from early-onset Alzheimer’s disease.
And so, how do God’s bad math skills help you to soar in your life?
For one, you can write online (if God is calling you to do this2). And then, you can write online with confidence! And if only ONE person (your mom?) reads your stuff, then you can still trust that your life is amazing!
I can trust that my small life, in the palm of His hand, is stewarded well as I do my best, falling as I go, to walk along the path He chooses for me because God carries the responsibility for what exactly a life well lived consists of!
So you can relax and follow God, and not care so much about what everyone else thinks of you or about boring stuff like whether your life is a good use of time, as valued by something as dumb as math skills! And that is freeing (once you can become socially adjusted enough not to care what others think of you, which took me twenty years3). But the IDEA is freeing once I can finally trust that my life has value as I trust Him to lead me!
And one day, I sensed in the depths of my heart God comforting me by whispering something along the lines of:
2 If you are a Christian who believes EXACTLY the same stuff as me, then You should be writing online, too! At least that’s what I think: We need more people to spout off and to say things just like I would, and to be exactly like me, is basically what I believe, though I would say that in a more nuanced way, if I were ever to mention that above a whisper.
4 Would I believe Him? Well, that’s for next time. But know that I did (!) start writing online! And then, my Mom even read what I wrote once! And now, even YOU read it! (More on why or if that matters another time.)
Shhh. . . Can you hear your heart speak what can’t be said, friend?
I have some permanent lines on my face as I’ve gotten (a bit!) older. I like the horizontal “smile lines” on the edges of my face. I also have vertical lines between my eyebrows.
I got those because I have been confused most of my life.
It’s NOT that I ever get angry! I’m mad that you think that! Anyway, the article below shows one of the ways I felt (a bit!) confused at times.
And oh!
This article is one of the crowd favorites, so I’m sure there MUST BE some wisdom in the confusion! May you gain more insight as you read, even if you feel a bit more confused at first, too! I hope this helps you!
As mentioned last time, I may not write QUITE as many new articles in the next while because I have to get my youngest kid ready to move out.1
Please “enjoy” reading about and laughing (at THEM, not ME!) in this previously published article.
You weren’t paying enough attention last time anyway, so you might as well reread it!
My family, it seems, is seeking some sort of revenge because of the embarrassing things I wrote about them and posted on the internet this week. But I don’t think that kind of attitude is a very Christian response! We are supposed to forgive those who wrong us! Wait – Let me find the right Bible passage to support my cause.
Restoring Life 