doubt

Not Sought After

courage, doubt, Faith, Prayer, rest, Stillness, Teaching, Trust, Uncategorized

I almost hurried to finish what I only had one day to complete. It would be my first time not submitting, my first time not trying, my first time not getting all optimistic and hopeful that this time I’d surely be selected.

“Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭27:14‬ ‭NLT‬

Almost midnight, I get a message with just a question, “What has become of “Colors”?

Accountability, an unexpected “ding” and my reply was ready. “Work in progress. Truly.”

He replied with thumbs up.

The message sent by someone maybe seeming an unlikely supporter, wise one, writerly and truthful.

He’d read the first chapter of “Colors” as he calls the book, and he understood clearly when I spoke strongly of wanting not to be just a cute little inspirational writer, I wanted to be true, honest, brave.

All those things and now, most of all though humble and hopeful.

Closer to me and my story for them, for others, for God.

Ready to convey Hope and Healed in a way others see healing as not just possible but potential and probable.

So, I didn’t submit for the fourth time (actually, maybe fifth) to the well known platform for Christian women writers.

I wasn’t prompted by God with anything to say. I knew the words would be just mine and they’d be impulsively conjured up and confident only in me, not Him.

Yesterday, I told someone I’d always found humility to be tough, tough for people who have already had such a hard time with finding themselves worthy.

It can be so conflicting sometimes to believe in good things, to believe ourselves deserving and hear voices that shout loudly inside that warn of pride.

Thinking less of ourselves does not mean thinking ourselves less than what God says.

Maybe humility is simply thinking more of the me God sees and knowing oh, my lord how much more that is, and is not pride it’s just believing without stopping believing.

I decided I make humility harder than it is.

When all it is, is focus, keeping right my focus. Humility is simply modesty aligned with prayer and an open mind to God’s ways more than mine.

Unexpected encounters are the confirmation of why the best things are never sought, always unexpected.

It’s our seeking that leads to pride, the seeking that starts with hope, starts with maybe just an innocent sweet yearning for good.

We might even call it God’s blessing because we know He loves to bless His children.

But, we’re human. We get off track, get impatient over the wait. Insecure over our worthiness.

We get driven and determined over what started as a meek imploring, hope for something to quickly off the rails crashing towards an object or accomplishment that we can NOT live without.

If it doesn’t happen this time or doesn’t happen at all, who am I now?

Who was I ever to God?

We ignore God maybe, then. We begin to believe we should have it, whatever the it is and our motives change.

Our motives change from humility to pride.

No longer do we want what God wants.

We want what we want.

And if we’re not alerted by our soul’s stirring, we act impulsively, we react from our ingratitude for what hasn’t happened yet.

Because we’re human and we can make our way work, we decide to handle the matter, we get things done!

So, two encounters unexpected last night. Two people sought me out in a noisy boisterous crowd.

The first to tell me she starts every day with my Instagram post. I hugged her and I hugged her again. Such a small offering, a few words, maybe a paragraph that’s all I give.

We hugged again and I told her, “It’s just God every morning speaking straight to me and I just share it.”

She smiled as if she saw that, she saw that

I’m imperfect and seeking.

The best place to be.

Humility is no more than that.

The more we find God, the less we look elsewhere for our worth.

Another person, I believe maybe four hugs this time we shared. Overwhelmed and feeling guilty, she decided to resign from our Board of Directors.

I told her I would miss her, I understood, I still hoped to see her.

My husband was standing with us and she told him she just “felt so guilty” about all the things she should do but, she knew she couldn’t.

He pointed towards me and said, “She knows.”

Then she told us what her husband said to her, a comfort and confirmation.

“If you’re feeling guilty it’s not because of you, that feeling, that discomfort, it’s God trying to tell you something.”

Esssentially, her guilt and her discomfort were negative emotions and God never wants us to feel badly about ourselves. He wants us to come to Him to ask for understanding, for guidance, for ways forward.

We don’t need to make tough decisions on our own, they’re always going to leave us conflicted, angry, resentful and divided unless we align with Him, diligent in prayer.

Closer to knowing Him, His ways, His will.

I told her I’d just come to this truth recently, that God does not bring us guilt, doubt, dismay.

We are human in this human and imperfect world. We grasp for understanding when we’re not capable of ever understanding all.

We grasp for what measures our success and what we gauge our contentment by.

Our grasping is always striving, never submission, never settled and waiting for what comes when it is

Not sought after.

The deadline came and passed for the submission. A half-hearted morning prayer was uttered that day “God, give me words that mean in courage.”

Moments, really were all that happened between the reluctant ask and the confident decision, not now, not hurried, not for you, Lisa Anne, not for you.

Because all of my encounters with people and places and platforms that hold my words close and up for others to read have thus far been unexpectedly given, I am completely sure they came from God.

Humility is most of all, prayer and patience. Closer to being the one He knows and Has wonderful unsought after plans for.

Prayer and patience…

Aunt Boo

Acquiescing

courage, doubt, Faith, grace, Labradors, mercy, Peace, Prayer, rest, Serving, Stillness, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder

“So the Lord must wait for you to come to him so he can show you his love and compassion. For the Lord is a faithful God. Blessed are those who wait for his help.”

‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭30:18‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Of all the things I love, I love to catch him thinking.

Waiting.

Something I heard the other day about dogs, I still don’t believe. I believe it was a well known speaker/preacher and he was talking about us in the world and oh, I don’t remember.

He was trying to amuse us I think, comparing man to dog, interjecting a point to cause a chuckle, caused me to ponder, I might have even tilted my head to the side, possible eye roll. (?) My facial experiences have a mind of their own.

For the life of me, I can’t remember where or who or why he said what he did.

But, I do remember he said that dogs don’t have thoughts and don’t really have roles or purposes on the earth like we do.

Expectations like being kind, loving, non-judgmental, welcoming to those in need and serving where God places us to serve and doing so without demand or self-seeking.

I was thinking this morning about my prayer yesterday. It was uncomplicated and it was almost happened upon, unsolicited, unquestionable.

A prayer of surrender, which is typically oh, here I go attempting again to be everything for everyone so that I can say my all is everyone’s all and take what you need because I have everything I need.

Work, commitment, a task…surrender has always felt like work.

Never felt like open ended sentence, open minded acceptance.

the action of surrendering.

synonyms

capitulation, submission, yielding, succumbing, acquiescence; fall, defeat, resignation

“the ordeal ended with their peaceful surrender”

What came from my heart yesterday was a sureness of God being purposeful in my life, an acknowledgment that He always has been; but, now an acceptance of this truth and a joining in of my part.

My prayer, simple:

I surrender to your preparing, Lord.

I am acquiescing. I am subtle in my surrender, accepting, allowing, waiting with calm and quiet confidence.

Lord, I am acquiescing.

What a beautiful word, the thought of it, a new favorite.

acquiesced; acquiescing

: to accept, comply, or submit tacitly or passively

The morning told me right away, your sleep was more settled and you are slightly changing, surrendered still, not striving and stressing. Continue here.

Colt waits for me to rise from my morning place.

He expects my rising slowly for a second cup of coffee and his food poured and fresh water given.

He waits. He knows my lingering, accepts it and joins in the mood. He sits for a minute, oblivious to me and looks towards the morning, surrendered to our day.

The day that has become his, this I for one believe, he’s happily thinking.

Colt and I, acquiescing.

Linking up with Jennifer Dukes Lee at Tell His Story here: http://jenniferdukeslee.com/jesus-really-enough-2/

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Bare Branches and Strong Spines

bravery, courage, doubt, Faith, grace, mercy, Peace, praise, Prayer, rest, Stillness, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

“You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book?”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭56:8‬ ‭ESV‬‬

The tree limbs are starkly dark. There’s no denying the contrast against the clarity of cloudless day.

It seems the season has come early and the barren aged tree is ragged, unadorned, and the limbs exposed.

I was drawn towards the blackness of branch, the hard and seemingly morbid lack of promise for new.

Surrounded by delicate fragile blooms of white, pink, yellow popping forth from little green capsules of petal, my gaze rested, enthralled by the trees still winter barren.

The thought of it wouldn’t let me go, I’d promised a friend a Bible and then it just became sort of an oh well, nice thought… I don’t think she really expected it kinda thing.

And I said shame on me to ignore such a simple request, to let it fade into the place of “just a thought” suggestions, hopes, pleasant ideas.

How shallow and self-absorbed I felt.

So, I made my way back to the mega store with the discount everything and perused the shelves immediately inside the doors.

Children’s books about bunnies, books with spaces to fill in color, cookbooks, romance, how-to do anything books and Bibles.

I was looking for the Bible with the robins and sparrows on its cover, pretty colors subtle with brown of feather, coral on bellies and touches of blue on wings.

It was not there. I scanned over about a hundred covers, collecting titles I’d heard of, wondered about, decided to keep four with me.

Similar assertions they all made, promises that might be inside the pages, chapters all exploring doubts and fear and failures.

New writers writing about old things in hopefully new ways.

For a moment I considered, “Are we all just a community of tortured and tragic souls?”

Women who believe in Jesus but struggle to believe in ourselves?

Does every single book attempt to affirm for us what in our hearts we know but lose our grips on, occasionally needing to hold on again and longer?

Do we need to be broken so that we can remember His brokenness?

Do we need to be lost and looking all over the place, bumping into people and places here on earth, never fitting in and then remembering oh, my heavens…we were made for heaven, not here?

I sat at my desk the other morning, feeling as if all I do amounts to nothing and stuffing down my frustrations over people and things not measuring up as they should.

I thought about my longing to write, my assurance of God wanting me to write about the “lost years” and the women who never considered me a lost cause.

I resented my days filled to the brim, my heart ached with guilt that I might never finish my telling and it becoming memoir bound together and held by strong spine.

I was afraid of not fulfilling God’s purpose.

The thing He named my treasure.

Then, I sat in the empty space of my large office, on my desk are little vignettes on either corner, newly picked petals and a painting I’m saving for someone, paperweight, a penny on heads and I remembered.

God sees what you don’t say, Lisa.

There’s not a fear he doesn’t know, not a sorrow he can’t understand.

There’s no disappointment He’s not abreast of and hoping you’ll hold on through.

There’s no struggle He does not see.

I thought of the books I’d purchased.

One about freedom, one about being the you God made you to be, one, by Rev. Billy Graham and the last one about leaving the childhood church scarred to find the grown-up church of mercy, grace, of Jesus.

So, I reconsidered my concern over all the books about walking a walk of faith that included all the trips and falls and failures.

I reconsidered how that might be too much. I realized it can never be enough.

Never enough likeminded souls seeking a closer walk with Jesus.

Never enough joining of hands and hearts to say, I understand, it’s progress not perfection and let me tell you how far I fell before I figured how to stand again.

I thought of David again, how he struggled with being chosen to be a fighter. I thought of the emotional cries for help, pleas for rescue as well as his praises to God for provision.

The Book of Psalms, a menagerie of misery and yet, innumerable expressions of praise.

The Book, like the ones on my shelf, stories of struggling people turned toward God.

Maybe we need even more stories.

Maybe mine.

“For you have delivered my soul from death, yes, my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of life.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭56:13‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Almost 30 years ago, a friend had mercy on me. She said she “wasn’t gonna let me go.”

Today, she got a Bible in the mail.

There were no tiny birds on its cover; instead, the teeny tiniest little flowers scattered on pale green stems.

I found the ribbon inside and marked the place, added in light pencil, an angel in the margin, then ever so faintly, I circled the number of the promise.

The one she loves most.

God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved; God will help her when morning dawns.

Psalms‬ ‭46:5‬ ‭ESV‬‬

God in my midst, I’ll not be moved. My help comes with every new morning.

Joy, strength, quiet beginnings and chances again made new.

Morning.

I’m linking this post up with Jennifer Dukes Lee at Tell His Story. If you ever struggle with what it means to leave your past behind, Jennifer’s truth on how Jesus feels about our past gives s new perspective. Three words I’ll hold onto, “Keep your mat.”

http://jenniferdukeslee.com/dont-hide-scars/