Gleanings: Grumbling. . .

For You It's Sin, For Me It's Service

"I’m not a grumbler, a complainer, and it’s a good thing, too, because complaining is one of those sins that I find especially offensive. Jerry Bridges counts it as one of Evangelicalism’s “respectable sin,” one that falls under our collective radar. He is probably right. But I’m onto it. I can spot it blindfolded at a hundred yards."

Tim Challies hits this one rather slyly on the head. . . Read the rest at challies.com: For You It's Sin, For Me It's Service

Heart Boundaries

It is important for us as single people to set boundaries on our emotions, as the writer of Proverbs says, “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life” (Prov. 4:23). We must guard our hearts carefully or we will end up giving bits of them away.

Our emotions belong first and foremost to God, then to ourselves, family and friends. We give them. They are not taken from us and we are not owed anything for giving them–we give them as a gift. We do not need to feel obligated to give them out willy-nilly. We must not prostitute our emotions. It may seem crude to put it that way, but so often (in my case anyway) we waste our affection on “puppy-love” relationships and infatuations that go nowhere. And when these infatuations finally die off, we find ourselves looking for another place to dump our affections, only to discover we are again wasting our time, our love. We have invested a part of our hearts in the “relationship”, reciprocated or not, and we can’t get it back.

We are not heart whole anymore. Every time our “crush” dies, part of our heart dies with it. We have emotional hang ups that can last our life time.

It is right to desire a relationship with a “Significant Other,” God created us with longings for a soul mate(“It is not good that the man should be alone” Gen 2:18), but it is not right to begrudge others their relationships and the affection that that involves. As a single person, we must give our whole heart to God. Our affection is not to be engaged elsewhere–especially not brooding and being discontent with the situation God has set us in.

Our job as a single person is to keep our emotions unattached until God brings us into contact with our future spouse. This, of course, depends on His will regarding our lives: if we are meant to be single, we will be. We cannot try and “help” God to find us a soul mate. We need to take our lesson from Abraham, and not try and fulfill God’s promises for Him (ie. Hagar and Ishmael).

We must wait in God, place our trust in Him. This does not mean we are waiting for something, such as proof that our waiting for a Significant Other will pay out in the end. We must wait and trust that He will do what is best for us–not that He will do what we think is best for us.

Oswald Chambers said (My Utmost for His Highest), that the first type (waiting for a sign) of “[w]aiting for God is incarnate unbelief, it means that I have no faith in Him; I wait for Him to do something in me that I may trust in that…. It is a question of faith in God–the rarest thing; we have faith only in our feelings.”

This is such a common trap. We cannot rely upon our feelings–they are much too fleeting. We cannot place our hope in another mere human. We need Someone more to have real faith in or we are lost. We will drown in the surf of our surging emotions if we do not have a Rock to cling to in their midst.

But when he saw that the wind was boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink he cried out, saying, “Lord, save me!”
And immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and caught him, and said to him, “O you of little faith, why did you doubt?” 
Matt 14:30-31

And yet God works in us, despite our questioning and doubts. We must be careful that we are not only buoyed up by our feelings, but by true faith and trust in Christ.

Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised).Hebrews 10:23 

The Choice to Fear or. . .

Unless I have had sometime to think about it and get used to the idea, I don't like change. I've been like this since day one apparently, since my poor mother tells me that when I was about four or five, if she didn't lay out all the possible variables in our itinerary for a day of shopping in advance, I would have a meltdown. What do you mean we have to go to The Bay because Sears didn't have the right shoes? You didn't tell me that! But, but, but --aaaah! I just couldn't handle the change.

Not liking change also means I am a worrier. If I don't know how things are going to play out in a future event or activity, I worry. Not in a "oh dear, life as I know it is ending" kind of style, but I anxiously try to anticipate every possible outcome, attempting to prepare myself for any eventuality.

Evidently, it is a deeply embedded part of my character and part of being a strong introvert. However, I think it is also a bad spiritual habit. This was drawn to my attention in a powerful way by the book I have been reading the last couple weeks. The following quote really struck a chord with me:

Not knowing is hard. . . . The fact of the matter is that we find questions of the future hard to deal with because we find it difficult to trust God. The One that we have said we've put our trust in knows everything about the future because he controls every aspect of it. Our fear of the future exposes the struggle we have to trust him and, in trusting him, to rest in his guidance and care, even though we don't really know what is coming next. Awe of God really is the only way to be free of fear of what is coming next. When my trust in God is greater than my fear of the unknown, I will be able to rest, even though I don't have a clue what will greet me around the corner.
. . .
Because we all tend at points to suffer from God amnesia, because we live in a fallen world, and because we do not write our own stories, being ruled by fear is always a clear and present danger. (Paul Tripp, Dangerous Calling 134-5)

I think that a lot of the time we react to things in our lives in our "default" setting, this state of "God amnesia," rather than choosing to trust in God's providence and sovereignty over our lives. It is a choice to trust Him.

Paul Tripp points out a few pages later, that we too often look "horizontally . . . for what can only be found vertically." He says that we are in "a glory war, a battle for what glory will rule [our] hearts and, in so doing, control [our] choices, words, and behaviors" (139-40).

Every time I default to worrying incessantly or choose to bring my fear of not-knowing and change (again and again) to the God who controls every detail of my existence and the existence of the universe, my choice is part of this glory war. It might not be that I recognize that this is a choice. Habits are habits, after all. Unless I choose to change (oh the irony!) my habits, I will be sabotaging my Christian walk with my choice to operate in my default setting.

I have to consciously choose to trust that God has planned what is best for me. I can't run ahead of Him and try to anticipate what He is doing. If I do not live in the physical and spiritual "now" where He has placed me, I am trying to take over His role as Omniscient God.

I am called to be a follower, not a leader; I am Christ's disciple, not His master. He is the Shepherd; I am His sheep. I need to cultivate a habit of trust in God's unfailing love for His people. 

As Moses said the Israelites before they crossed the Jordan, "It is the LORD who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed." (Deuteronomy 31:8 ESV)

Christ said, “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.”

(John 14:1-4 ESV)

Christ has gone before me and has prepared a place; God will fulfill His purpose for me (Ps 138:8). I do not need to worry about will come. It is all taken care of.

Beginnings

Beginnings are always difficult.

I find it difficult to know how to start off this blog. It takes a bit of courage to make the first mark on a piece of fresh white paper, a bit of daring to throw that pebble into the glassy pond and disturb the water.

I know (sort of) what I will be using it to think about, but I find it difficult to just jump in.
I've been feeling quite pensive and introspective lately, contemplative, and that doesn't make it easier to write "Post Number One."  Contemplation makes me feel I should be profound, but I have nothing really to be profound about, which makes it mere posturing, which I don't think is attractive.

I value honesty, but at the same time don't want to be sharing too much. I'm a private sort of person and while I'd like to share my ideas and and writings and interests, it is quite scary to expose them to the scrutiny and whims of others, even in the relative anonymity of the internet. I share only carefully selected and edited snippets of me, but they are still me. And "me" is a hodge-podge of insecurities and foibles and endless searching for identity.

I could keep a blog of "things", while still never really giving an accurate or even panoramic view of who I am. I could say I am a writer, a sister, a daughter, a teacher, a learner, a singer--oh, any number of titles and skills and states of being, but none of these will truly tell you who I am. I can tell you my age, weight, and shoe size, but you won't have any true understanding of what makes me tick.

It is easy to put on a persona, but not so easy to be real. Being real is scary, is messy, is very, very hard.

I can't promise to always be real on this blog or even to always be completely frank, but I'll try to share a bit of the hope that I've found, the anchor of my soul in all of the rough seas and the tedious doldrums that being real entails.