Fostering T: The Aftermath

I looked down at the horse crap on my empty pant leg.  “More crap, just what I need,” I thought.  Being an amputee with an empty pant leg, I had closed my car door while unknowingly shutting my pant leg in the door of the car and then traveled all the way to Quarryville, PA that way.  I can imagine the chuckling cars behind me seeing my pant leg flapping in the wind.  If you are familiar with our area you will know the horse crap on my pantleg means I had driven over the remnants of horse droppings from an Amish horse and buggy.  As I looked down at my pant leg splattered in brown and smelling even worse I felt I had taken just about all I could handle.  Now I was to grocery shop and spend the rest of my afternoon smelling like the crap I felt like.  Great.

Just a week or so before this our foster child T was moved from our home into a hospital setting for both self-harm and assault.  I had spent 4 days with him living in the Emergency Room while the mental health team sought a therapeutic and behavioral hospital that could receive T with his particular set of circumstances and requirements.  The closest and first available that they found (6 days after our initial showing up at the Emergency Room) was in Missouri.  As I sat in his bedroom packing his bags and belongings, my heart was breaking.  I was so sad and so full of grief.  Tears poured like a river down my dry cheeks and if you know me at all you know crying is not exactly my forte.  I can handle A LOT, but this was just too much.

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I remembered how I had told so many people over the time of our fostering, “SOMEONE has to love these kids.  If God is big enough to bring these kids to us and take them away; He will be big enough to heal our hearts when they break.”  The words came so easy; walking them out was a different animal altogether.  How did we go from discussing the possibility of adoption to having him hospitalized and removed from our home in one short month? The events leading us to this place were so traumatic that it all seemed a blur.  Honestly, it still does.

Ultimately, even children have responsibility in choosing their actions.  T’s mom signed off her rights to parent him and within that next month he lost his mental capacity to deal with life.  We ran him to four or more appointments every single week, sat through tens of hours of counseling with him, and nothing seemed to help.  I understood some of his anger may have been directed at me as misplaced anger towards his mom, and we talked about that.  I explained that he could cuss at me, scream at me, punch a pillow when he was mad, anything…except attack me or himself physically, try to stab me, or sexually assault me.  He didn’t stop.  Counselor after counselor tried to make it clear that we could work through all of the abuse he suffered, the sexual behavior displayed, the anger…but he had to know he could NOT put his hands on me or commit self-harm or he would be moved to a higher level of care.  Still, T made the wrong choice.  And you know, while he did have some responsibility in this, he was only 8.  This could be any one of us or our children if raised in the particular environment and under the extreme abuse he suffered.  This could be any of us suffering malnutrition to the point that our brains stop developing correctly and we have mental illness.  Yet at the end of the day, this 8 year old was up to my chin already and going to get bigger and being an amputee I knew I could not fight him off much longer.  Besides, what if he pushed me down the steps or took me by surprise?  When we started locking our bedroom door to prevent stabbings at night I felt like I had become a prisoner in my own home and could no longer be the sole care for this child.

Being in the midst of dealing with my pain and grief was one thing, but then realizing that other people had opinions about our situation really put the icing on the cake. “When one kid is removed from their home…maybe that is the kid.  But when two kids are removed, well, is it the kids or is it them?” Well THAT I was not expecting.  THAT hurt almost as much as having this child we loved and adored and planned to adopt removed from us.  And you know what hurt even more was that it was said by a Christian, in our very own family of believers!  Ouch!  As if we didn’t already feel guilty about what happened, as if we weren’t discussing on a daily basis for hours at a time if there was anything we could have done differently.  As if we are so fickle as to simply walk away from a living and breathing child that needs a home and set of parents more than any other we have personally encountered in our entire lives?  Again, OUCH!

We felt that we had not only brought the mission field to our doorstep, but we invited it into our very own home.  We eliminated all privacy to ourselves, all chance of recharging mentally/physically and any respite, all chance of “taking a break” from the missionary work we were doing.  No chance of just showing up on a trip and leaving again. We really thought that the church and body of Christ would understand the dynamics of having the mission field in your very home more than anyone.  Clearly, we were wrong to assume.  Eight months of literal 24/7 care had brought me to a place of sheer and absolute exhaustion.  I would say that it had brought me to my knees…but on top of everything else I only have one knee!  Parenting is one thing, foster parenting extremely abused and neglected children is a different beast that combines all of the normal parenting problems and adds the manipulation, conniving, outbursts, violence, and lying that the child masterfully learned to simply stay alive in their environment prior to coming to you.  I should have been on steroids to prepare myself for this!

DSCN0146So while people began talking about our situation, I knew that legally I was not even able to say anything in my own defense.  Worse than being gossiped about, I found, was having no control to defend yourself or present the truth.  Wanting to protect the children’s privacy and honor our contract with the government I found my hands very tied for one of the first times in my life.  Back when we got married less than a month after being engaged many people gossiped about me, assuming that the rush was because I was pregnant.  It didn’t bother me  because I knew in my heart that within the standard nine months people would see we had no children and any gossip would be proven untrue.  This time, however, I really could not see justice playing out in my favor in any immediate or forthcoming capacity.

This is where a huge internal struggle came into play for me.  I removed myself from the church setting and decided my heart needed to heal.  There were three people in my life I decided that were safe to share details of the past eight months with, and seeing the entire picture those three people were able to extend grace and reassurance to my weak and fleshly soul that we had made the right choice in getting more help for T than we could provide.  I know I am well equipped in trauma education and processing trauma.  What I was not equipped in were genetically driven behavioral traits, mental illness, and, well, Kung Fu.  Fighting off physical assaults from a 12 and 8 year old really was not a good position for an amputee on crutches to be in.  Realizing my own limitation here was really a challenge for me to accept, remembering that I was not responsible for the well-being of others…God was.  Did I trust Him? Another Ouch!

The part that was pretty tough I think in this situation was knowing that it wasn’t all bad with these kids.  We had some pretty great moments, especially with T, who was with us longer.  We went on vacation with him to the Rockies and the Beach, we introduced him to eating out, he got to bowl and golf, get his first pair of cowboy boots, his first set of brand new clothes, and the little things like swimming lessons and summer camp that caused him so much joy.  He learned to climb a tree, cook a meal, play with neighbor kids, and explore nature.  Being raised neglected, we taught him how to use utensils (rather than put your face in your plate), how to use the toilet, how to bathe, how to have your hair cut the way you want it, and how to express yourself using words.  There were so many great moments with T and it was seemingly unbearable to imagine those as being “all for nothing” and “over with forever”.  We simply wanted to believe that we were more important than just a temporary provider for T.

We are still processing some of these emotions and thoughts about T.  As of the date of this writing he is still in the hospital in Missouri.  He is not doing very well, he has made some false allegations about his time with us (which were investigated and closed as untrue), he had cockroaches in his hospital room and has been moved a few times, has not had a haircut since the beginning of November, and has been making a lot of bad behavior choices.  Is this the help that we wanted for him?  No, but that is the system he is a part of.  We cannot even advocate for him any longer because we are, as I was told, “no longer a party to this case”.  Just last week we were discussing whether to get the training needed to try to get him back here in a higher level of care, yet we realized again that it is not what we are meant to do.  All that we can do is maintain contact at the extent the county (who retains custody of all four siblings) allows, support and encourage him to live the life we tried to show him, and pray for him.

dscn0098.jpgSo was it all for nothing?  Sometimes it has felt like that.  We poured heart and soul into a child and never will see the fruit of that.  Picking up the phone to hear his little voice cursing like the moon was blue, hearing his stories of fights and altercations, hearing the false allegations he has made, it feels so dark.  It feels like he has regressed back towards the environment he was removed from.  But in our hearts we have to remember that eight months to a child is a lifetime.  He had eight months of our love, our influence, our caring.  He learned what it was like to be treated like a human being for the first time in his life.  He learned what it meant for a man to go to work and for a home to have a freezer full of food, and how to grow that food in a garden.  These are not lessons he will easily forget, at least that is what I choose to believe.  However small, we stepped into the life of this child when no one else would.  We kept him for the season that God wanted us to, and we will continue to support and pray for him in the way God allows us to.  We are not as important as we think we are, unfortunately, but God has this in control.

So what about all those judgments and gossips, the ones that I can’t refute?  Even with T gone, they will think what they want to think and speak as they choose.   I need to remember that for each of these there were ten or more people in support and acting in kindness. I was vacuuming and feeling sorry for myself with this situation the other day.  I was saying, “Lord, you will get to show people that make a mockery of you one day that you are Lord of Lords, but when will these people see the truth about me?”  And it hit me, like a ton of bricks, “He remained silent” (1 Pet 2:23).  Jesus himself, the most innocent man that ever walked the earth was on trial being wrongly accused and said not one word in self defense.

Job, who suffered unbelievable hardship and strife and grief, hammered God with questions and God did not defend himself.  He simply reminded Job (paraphrased in my own interpretation) that he is the great I AM.  I remind myself of this a lot lately.  I am sad because not only have I not been able to have my own children, but now I have lost the children that I tried to parent.  But again, God is the I AM, not me.  He will work this all together for the good of those that love Him.  I believe I love him.  I believe the children we had love him too.

So, I may not have been wrong in how I navigated the system and this situation of foster care but I know one thing for sure, I am not a blameless person.  I am not perfect nor innocent.  I am not all-knowing and I did not create and knit people from the womb.  So therefore, as I stand, I will move forward resting in the truth of knowing that I am no greater than the one I follow, and do not need to defend myself.  It is a true place of peace and freedom and one that I am on foreign ground navigating.   I cannot hold my brother’s and sister’s in Christ to a standard of not judging me when I myself cannot cast the first stone.  The Lord is Just.  As long as I can stand clear before him then I must allow myself to be humbled on earth and not exalt my reputation in pride.

Ultimately, this entire experience has changed me immeasurably.  My heart used to be DSCN9599worn on my sleeve and no longer is that true.  I am no longer quick to speak, quick to agree with others, or happy to simply nod and smile even when I disagree with something.  This has made me slow to judge and quick to understand that most people can only operate in a certain capacity, and I must accept that.  It has shown me that there are people living like this, right here in Pennsylvania, and that the mission field does not have to be afar.  Petty drama and whining seem to be a new “zero tolerance” thing for me seeing how these children lived and suffered with no one interfering for 11 years.  And I now hate Evil.  Up until this point I had never truly had a hatred for evil, but now I do.  And I avoid it at all costs, wanting no part in seeing the outcome and degradation that comes from such a lifestyle.  This has been a case of watching first hand the sins of the fathers passed to the children.  It isn’t as many preach it to be (that God himself punishes children for the sins of their fathers) but rather the fathers and mothers themselves inflict the evil of their own sins on their children.  And it is the children that suffer.

So just as I was able to shop with horse crap splattered on my pant leg, smelling crappy, feeling worse,and defending it to no one;  I most assuredly can carry on and receive the next child meant to come to our home whether for a month or year or longer without defending or explaining. And I hope T never feels the need to defend or explain all of his background either, as long as he does the best he can.

T will be moving soon into a group home that is therapeutically equipped to handle his situation.  I will pray day and night for him and believe with all of my heart that the Lord will intervene in the life of this child.  Being removed from mother and left by father, may he not continue to see the consequence of their sins in his life but instead learn to experience the blessing of love.  Yet, he will have a choice, and I know one thing for sure, I do not judge him or speak ill of him no matter how he turns out.  Between the system, genetics, his upbringing, and mental capacity, I have a new respect for the term “perfect storm”.  May God be with Him.

 

Crash Course at the Ash House

I had every intention of starting to share some of the hilarious moments that we have had as a family since my last post.  But life had another idea.  Trauma reared its ugly head within our home in a way that has broken all of our hearts in an immense way.  We found there was not just physical abuse between the boys here but also verbal, emotional and sexual.  The county was gracious to allow us to keep the younger of the two boys, Little T, while the older had to be moved to a different home.

And I was relieved.  Doesn’t that sound so harsh?  If I had heard a foster mom say that before experiencing what we went through here I would have cringed.  I would have likely judged her in my naivety and I would have likely thought less of her.  Of course that is not the appropriate “Christian” response but I am being vulnerable here.  Life in our house between April and June became a horror story for me.  Mental illness was not something that I had been prepared for.  Training prepped me in trauma care, de-escalating situations effectively and quickly, understanding the youth brain as it developed under abuse and neglect.  But it did not prepare me for a true chemical imbalance (likely as genetic as situational) or for the way the state would refuse to cooperate or provide what the child needed (medication, therapy, psycho-evaluations, etc).  Physical attacks, feces on the walls, anger and hatred towards us and his brother, crisis intervention calls with me pleading for him to be admitted for all of our safety and peace, threats, sleeping with my bedroom door locked, and having Little T sleep on the couch to keep him free from abuse.  We had to move every single thing from the bedroom of this child except for the bed and his clothing for fear of him harming himself, property, or us.  It was awful to say the least.  So while I was so sad and so hurt and felt like an enormous failure when this child was transferred out my home, I was also relieved.  Finally, I could leave my bedroom unlocked when I slept.  Finally, I could wake up and make breakfast without an hour long fiasco of defiance and screaming.  Rick could work night shift and sleep past 6am without being woken to the screaming child and sounds of banging and violence in our home.  And most importantly, Little T could be safe.  He could be himself and start to experience joy, an emotion he never truly experienced before in his 7 young years.  He could sleep without unwanted touches and he could experiment and fail without mocking voices.

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Rick and Little T overlooking the Great Smokey Mts

Of course the child removed from here was conditioned to behave the way he behaved.  Of course genetics and mental illness caused me to lose the nature vs. nurture battle with him. Of course we all are so sad that he has gone.  Yet in the midst of this God has shown himself faithful.  He has allowed Little T to express himself and share some of the horror stories he had experienced.  A month or so ago we had a campfire with the neighbor kids out back.  As all kids do, they started to make up and go around the fire telling scary stories.  Little T listened for awhile to these scary stories and everyone’s responses to them.  After thirty minutes or so he decided it was his turn. Except that he told true stories.  He interpreted “scary story time” as things that happen to people that are scary or horrible.  He told the audience story after story of abuse, hardship, poverty, neglect, injury, fear, and traumatic events.  We were stunned silent.  Since then, he has started to open up to counselors and detectives alike and is choosing to use his voice to not be a victim.  I couldn’t be more proud of him as a “mom”.  Yet I wonder, what will happen to this little guy?  Will his life experiences overpower the good that we can pour into him?  If we become eligible to adopt him will he maintain the strength and willpower to swim upstream the long and arduous battle he will have before him to live a “normal” life unlike all of those in his genetic line?  Will he keep the faith and finish the race with God each step of the way?

I do not know the answer to these things.  I do know that in only four months of dealing with what every caseworker, supervisor, and counselor advises as one of the “worst cases they have ever seen” I feel like a veteran of war.  Please do not misunderstand me to minimize what war is truly like or what first respondents must deal with on a daily basis.  I simply am expressing that the level of second hand trauma I have been exposed to, on top of my own, has made a tremendous impact on me.   The way I see life now is so

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Little T and Brother watching Demo Derby at Buck

different from before being a foster parent.  The lines under my eyes and the bags from sleepless nights are visible evidence to the pain I feel in my heart.  God is good, yet we live in a fallen world.  It is much more “fallen” than I ever realized.  As one that always seeks to find justification or good in every person I encounter and give chance after chance for them to redeem themselves after a fail, I am shocked at the inexplicable evil and torture humans can subject one another to.  Not just to one another, to a child, a helpless child with no voice or self defense or way of escape.  To abuse a little child and still force them to need you to feed them, provide shelter for them, and attach to you because of those needs is unfathomable.

So while my intention was to share some of the funny things going on here…I just am not at a place to do that yet.  Right now things are just too real.  Yet, Little T is thriving here with us at this time.  He has transferred schools and is enjoying his summer break.  We are working to catch-up on some schoolwork each day and reading skills, and we are slowly introducing the idea of a good God.  (His view of God so far has consisted of him begging his mom to stop the abuse of her associate, and his mom telling him to blame “God” for bringing said abuser into her life when she was lonely.)  We planned a family road trip around Little T and exposed him to many different things in our small section of the world which he immensely enjoyed.

Parenting has been all-consuming for me as we start at zero in teaching a child everything.  How to brush your teeth, how to use a fork or spoon (no, we don’t put our whole face in our cereal bowl we have spoons), this is how to use your imagination, this is how to put your clothes on right side out, this is how you put your shoes on the right foot, here is how you wipe in the bathroom, how to not drown in a pool of water, respond in a conversation, pour a glass of milk, personal space, eat a meal with family, etc. My girlfriend told me prior to being a parent to “think of the neglected children as aliens, foreign to earth” and she was right!  The neglect and abuse has disabled these kids in every way, they know none of the basic things that we all grew up taking for granted in knowing.  It is exhausting and I have had to pull away from most of society as I invest in this child and my own self care (still being disabled) and marriage.  Beyond that there is no energy right now.  Cramming 7 years of childhood into four months was hard but not as hard as it has been for Little T.  He has grown and changed so much these four months!  Each day he has a new achievement we get to celebrate here together!

19224944_1299473296835520_2352707896941492393_nGood or bad, right or wrong, this is what life is right now for the Ash family.  We have taken the mission field and brought it not only to our front door, but invited it in as a permanent guest.  The encouragement received from those dear to us has truly, truly, kept us afloat. So if you have sent a card or something to us and I have not responded please do forgive me.  This valley is only a temporary one and we are beginning to see the crest of it alas!  I wonder if this is how God feels with us sometimes?  If He is all-consumed with pushing us towards our destiny and his purposes, no wonder he takes a sabbath rest!

 

 

It’s a…Two Boys!

It’s a girl! two BOYS!

In the past month our lives have been turned upside down.  Yes, my last post was about our journey and hopes in becoming a foster family.  That has happened.  More accurately, that bomb exploded (haha).  Instead of receiving one child under the age of five as anticipated we received a heartbreaking call and situation to take in two children seven and twelve leaving a severe setting.  Knowing we had an empty room, without hesitation, we prayed and said yes.  The boys were supposed to be coming a week out from the call but an emergency caused them to come within three days with only the clothes on their backs.

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My heart has broken and healed, torn and mended, been both helpless and helpful every single day since they have arrived here.  I have wondered if maybe in praying I did not clearly hear God, and I have fiercely advocated for these children so they can have a chance in life that they would not otherwise have.  Thinking that this would be a few hours a week of paperwork I have found no less than 4 hours on average a day of appointments, phone calls, paperwork, and advocating for them.  It has been so much more than anticipated but I am used to hard work.  I am disabled and an amputee.  Life has not been easy for me.  The difference here is that this work produces the fruit of knowing you are investing in a child’s future. It seems like a lot of my own personal life journey through trauma, disability, and education of those things has prepared me for “such a time as this”.

The first night that they arrived as they stepped out of the car into my driveway I knelt down to their level, extended my hand and said, “Hello, my name is Ashly but you can call me TT if you like.” They shoved my hand out of the way and jumped into my arms saying, “No, you will be MOM to us.” And that started my life as a parent.  No hospital, no pregnancy, no baby pictures or even knowledge of who the parents are.  No joy or smiles all around; just pain and separation, heartache and wounds both visible and invisible. I became a mother in my driveway at 8pm on a school night when two little boys that hadn’t been fed dinner and had heads full of lice jumped in my arms.

Since then life has progressed here as the world turns.  I am starting to think foster parenting would make a much better soap opera than any “World Turns” episodes. Not that I am a soap opera fan by any stretch of imagination.  I am learning that most people do NOT understand the effects of trauma, abuse, and dysregulation, but that is a topic for another time.  For now I will just say that there are a lot of frequent and extreme mood changes in (and out of) our home and lots of exaggerated emotions.  We have meltdowns when we can’t peel a banana and we curse at truck drivers that won’t honk their horn when we play with sidewalk chalk.  We are taking two completely different lifestyle environments and merging them into one that contains stability and love and boundaries and it is a beautiful thing…but not always pretty.

DSCN9590.JPGWe do not know the future of these boys or for sure how long they will remain with us but while they are with us they are our family and we are blessed to have them.  Our community has stepped up in unexpected ways through all of this.  We have had meals delivered, gift cards to help us supply these boys with clothes and educational tools/games to promote a normal life, prayers and cards and messages from far and near, and friends that have listened to me vent and cry when I needed it.  I can honestly say that no matter what the future holds for these boys they will be forever touched and changed by the normalcy of our simple life and loving people.

A lot of people ask me over and over if I am attached to them and tell me how much I will hurt when/if they leave here.  Sure, it will be hard to have them move on when the time comes. But what will happen to them if I don’t attach?  What will their future be like if they are never shown healthy attachments and love?  I trust that as hard as it will be that God will see me through my own grief and heal my heart as well as theirs when the time comes.

As I type this I am waiting for them to come home from a hard visit with their mom. A scary visit, one they were forced to. And as I see these difficult words in black and white I remind myself how blessed I am to be a part of their journey here.  How precious their hearts are and how big of a responsibility God has placed in my hands to care for the ones that are rejected.  There have been times when I haven’t felt like I had the capacity for another hard conversation, another meltdown, another episode of defiance but it isn’t about me now is it?  I sit in my own home, having been raised to appreciate rules and boundaries, raised to trust that my parents would be there and come through, leaving school each day knowing there would be food on the table and a home to go to.  I am ashamed to realize how easy it is to think that I am inconvenienced when their entire lives have been turned over and inside out.  (Of course this does not mean self-care isn’t important and it doesn’t mean that we are the right people to be with them forever.  We just know that God has them here, now, for a reason.)

So this Saturday will be a baseball game with a Foster Parent Association and we are all looking forward to the public space and networking that can happen there.  We are excited to be in a place where everyone “gets it” and there is no judgment or expectations for normalcy.  I have spent most of my life advocating and fighting for 2 Feb 2015 025 picnic.jpgmyself and the things I need as a disabled person.  While that doesn’t change, advocating and investing in the lives of the helpless is a whole new focus.  To me, that is a cause far more worthy than any other.  I am not perfect and I fail each day.  I have had to apologize more the past month than the previous seven years of marriage (maybe Rick just lets me off the hook more)! And still, in the midst of each tornado and in the middle of the innocent laughter I hear, our house is a refuge and a safe place for all of us.  We never needed to go abroad for mission work…it was brought right to our doorstep.

So that is my introduction to life as a parent so far…but there are SO many funny moments that I have been saving to share with my readers here after painting the accurate picture of what life looks like for us!  I am in the process of compiling them right now to post next time.  Having been raised with four sisters I am in a bit of a culture shock having two boys and a husband running around the house!  Tune in for some of those hilarious observations soon!

Pro-Parenting: Amputee Style

09-september-0001Well, it is official: we are licensed professional parents!  After several grueling months of paperwork, home studies, inspections, writing ten page autobiographies, trainings, and a water test (yes, really!), we received our license in the mail that we are approved Foster/Resource parents and are on the list to receive our first placement child.

For some reason, in spite of the many hours and trainings invested, it feels as if we are not one bit qualified to handle the life of a miniature human being.  While we are probably more prepared than most moms have been during nine months of pregnancy, the reality of what we are about to face truly shines light on our inadequacies.

I am sharing all of this with you because I realize this next part of my journey may change the shift of my blog a little bit.  Of course my journey with God will not change and my revelations and articles sharing those treasures will be here as well, but there may be a bit of a newer element.  There is not a single child in the foster care system that has not undergone trauma (whether in the womb or outside of the womb) and this journey will likely include skills and tactics towards healing that I stumble upon and want to share with others.  Throughout the history of my blog I have shared a lot about trauma because I am a 11-november-pam-party-053trauma survivor, and I expect that those life experiences will be ashes turned to beauty as they help a child conquer the same things.  I also expect to find a new and fresh take on amputee humor as I “mother” these children, and tap into unexplored resources and innovations to “git-r-done” with one leg around the house!  It will be a fun journey and I am excited to be able to share this with each of you as well!  (Remind me to refrain from any whining and vague poetry during those sleep-deprived hallucinatory nights!)

Our ultimate goal is to be able to give a child a forever home here with us.  Through fostering we cannot be sure if that will be the first, tenth, or twelfth child that is placed with us.  Whichever child does not end up with the luxury of returning home to their family, we do hope to adopt.  A lot of people ask me how I will deal with the grief of losing these children when they do return home and I cannot honestly say that I know how I will handle it.  It will be hard, I will cry, I will likely grieve the loss even, but I trust God.  I trust that God is bigger than my pain, and any holes that enter my heart I trust that he will heal.  I believe with all of my heart that each child that comes to this place will be a life impacted with the love and care that Christ has demonstrated to me, and will be forever touched.  Hopefully, even their first moms and dads will be too.

For many years I have had the dream of having one child of my own and fostering/adopting a second child.  After 6 years of infertility struggles and treatments we decided to move 10-oct-2016-107forward and meet God right where he has placed us.  This may mean we never have our own children, and while that hurts, I accept that. Many things in my life have been turned to ashes over the years by my own choices and things that have happened to me, but I know the word of God is true, and he promises to make beauty from ashes.  I’m turning my ashes over during this time and allowing the God of our universe to use my burning rubble and pain to bring hope and a future to the children he brings.

What a welcome start for a new year in the Ash Household!

 

 

 

Got Peace?

In our hectic lives today peace is often labeled as something that comes to us or that is granted to us.  Like a fragile glass ornament that we have to condition our lives and atmosphere around in order to see manifested.  But is that biblical?  Is that true?  Peace is manifested to us through the Holy Spirit just as the other fruits of the Spirit are:  love, joy, 03-march-2016-129piknikpatience, kindness, goodness, self-discipline.  Still, even though these are fruits of the Spirit and result from living in the Spirit, they are things that we have to work at and work out.  Peace isn’t the absence of turmoil.  Peace is rest in mind and body regardless of circumstance.  We have to work at walking in love, in joy, in self-discipline.  Why do we seem to think it should be any different with peace?

My Graham Cooke interactive journal told me to pick an attribute of God and allow my entire life to line up with that aspect.  This wasn’t to simply be an exercise it was to become a lifestyle journey.  It was a meditative and reflective journey that could take months or years to complete; one that perhaps I would finish when God penetrated every area of my life with that aspect of himself.  (If I can hold still long enough for Him to work!)  I could pick any aspect of God that I wanted to for this journey: Majesty, Creator, Beautiful One, King, Lover, Provider, Awesomeness, you name it.  If it is part of God’s character then I was given the freedom to align my life with that attribute.  I couldn’t wait to jump into this exercise and sat down to pray.  I just KNEW I was going to feel led to pick one of the truly “cool” attributes like Creator and then pump out a million crafty creations or something.  But no, I got peace.  “Are you SURE this is what you want me to look at?” I asked whined during prayer.  “Peace is so, so…so boring!”

That was a few months ago and while I’m not yet at the place of believing that Peace is the most exciting attribute of God’s character, I do believe that He is the most peaceful person I have ever met!  (If you are a follower of Graham Cooke “God is the Kindest Person I’ve Ever Met” you will get that!)  As a matter of fact, I didn’t realize just how much peace was lacking in my life until I started to consciously align each part of my life, mind, and personality with Peace.  Peace has become one of the most transforming things in my mind, dealing with past baggage, relationships, and my walk with God.

Circumstances come crashing in like waves on a stormy sea sometimes and to find peace in that moment is something that requires practice.  There is an art to being at peace.  Remember when Jesus was asleep in the boat during the storm and the disciples thought that he was out of his mind?  They thought he was a loon that didn’t care one iota for his or their lives.  But Jesus was simply at peace.  That sounds so simple but would you be the calm one in a dinghy during a storm?  Are you the calm one when life “happens” to you?  09-september-2016-054piknikWouldn’t you like to be the calm one when the waves are crashing about?  It reminds me of countless movies where the hero is always a leader centered in conscience awareness of what is going on around him.  Calculating, discerning, but never caught up in the jumble of drama.  When a hero acts, it is the right action.  A hero moves with pure and unadulterated confidence that he is doing the right thing.  A hero takes that moment of crisis to observe what is happening and contemplate; Heroes do so from a place of peace.  This can be the difference in whether a climactic battle is won or there is a disheartening defeat.

We are in a battle every day.  It doesn’t take a super-religious person to figure that one out.  Even those that do not believe in Jesus will agree they are constantly battling to keep their peace in life.  But we, as Christians, have the key to help that along.  We have the Holy Spirit and we are told by Jesus that he brings us peace.  Not a wordly peace, dependent on the absence of turmoil, but an inner calm that always operates from a place of wisdom (not towards it).  Sure, I am easily at peace when I’m on the beach under a palm tree with fresh lemon water and a good book.  But am I at peace when I am late to work, haven’t eaten breakfast, spilled coffee down my shirt, and realized my cell phone bill is paid late?  Am I at peace when there is a relational conflict?  Not always!

I’ve found the number one rule to operating in peace is pulling within.  When I feel myself begin to be rocked by the circumstances around me, whatever they may be, I pull inward first.  Circumstances happen.  Someone will say something offensive.  Someone else will try to bombard my day with gossip and drama.  There may be a phone call that wasn’t expected.  Perhaps my doctor did not have good news for me.  Maybe an unexpected car repair cost more than I budgeted for.  There can be a million and one different circumstances that will rock my world, and when that happens, I pull inside now.  I stop.  It seems so simple but it can be so hard.  Just taking a moment to surrender those circumstances to Jesus is key.  Like any recovery group will preach:  Recognizing there is a problem is the first step.  As soon as I feel in my emotions that something is not quite right I know I need to stop and surrender that to Jesus.  I may be in the middle of running out the door and simply decide if I am 30 seconds behind that is ok with me.  I close my eyes, I breathe deep, and I pull in.

What next?  Just like in Acts 2 I ask “What does this mean and what do I do?”  I’ve stopped believing that bad things that happen are blatant attacks from the “enemy” Satan.  I started to realize that there is NOTHING that can come to me that has not been filtered through my heavenly Father.  So the wrong question to ask is “why am I being attacked?”, and the right question to ask is “what is God doing in this/how will God use this?”  What negativity is happening?  I can pray for the opposite because that is moving in the opposite spirit.  What is my role in this?  This may not come to me quickly.  Often after taking my brief moment to “pull inside” and center around God and peace I have to move on with my day.  But since I did pull in and ask God for peace I can think about this in the back of my mind throughout my day.  As I am going along I think about what rocked my world and listen for answers about how to partner with God.  Having asked God what the provision is in the circumstances and praying for that to be manifested; now I can seek His heart in my own actions.  Perhaps prayer is the only thing required of me.  Perhaps there is more.  Perhaps praying for money to cover bills will not be all that is required, maybe I will need to find work.  Maybe I will need to give a gift to someone as a way to “sow” into the future.  What to do?  Ask God.  He will not be shy about putting things in your heart and mind when you ask him!  He loves us and if a circumstance has come to us that rocks our internal world then that means we need to stop and look at it.  What can we learn during this time about God?

There have been times where I was in a chaotic place and felt my own boat rock.  Not knowing how to find time to pull inside and understand my own emotions, I excused myself to the restroom.  There I was able to clearly take a moment to review the circumstances, surrender them to God, and ask “What does this mean and what do I do?”  In one situation the Lord was clear “I’m working in their lives, you are done here, go home.”  Whatever the reason I was there, the Lord was clear that day he didn’t need me any longer and I was to remove myself from the chaos.  This was a great exercise in stepping inside of the Spirit and bringing peace (on earth as it is in heaven) into manifestation as I left.

Through lining my life up with peace I have also stumbled across some very simple things that have happened and left my emotions tattered and battered about.  This has required me to take the same actions.  Recognizing this and surrendering to God.  Pulling in, and asking “what does this mean and what do I do?”  A few times I was led to process something from the past.  A hospital smell that triggered my emotions to go awry needed to be processed and prayed about.  A fear of sharing a swimming lane had me feeling a bit wonkly until I stopped and asked God about it, to which I realized I was afraid of being kicked in my stump (yes it has happened before).  Sometimes being and operating in peace is as simple as recognizing (with God) why we feel a certain way.

We can’t control what happens around us all of the time.  We can very rarely make demands for peace in our daily lives.  Kids scream, spouses have attitudes, people can be selfish.  But we can choose peace.  “He who dwells in the safety of the Most High will be sheltered” (Ps 91).  Notice, one must choose to dwell in that place of the Spirit in order for the benefits to flow.  Fern from Discovering MErcy once told me, “Ashly, boundaries are not to keep others out they are to keep you in.  Otherwise you will run all over the place like liquefied jello.”  This wisdom is a great visual of choosing to operate in peace.  We must set boundaries within ourselves so that we retreat to the Spirit of God and to our inner sanctuary regardless of what is happening on the outside.  We must, in wisdom, allow God’s view of a situation become our own so that we know what lines must be drawn so that we do not lose our own peace.

Peace is given as a gift from Jesus.  But like all beautifully wrapped gifts, we must choose to unwrap it in order to receive it.  This takes practice.  You do not have to teach a child to be greedy; he already knows that, you have to teach a child to share. Not being swept up in the chaos around us and the drama comes most naturally as our emotions charge ahead and our hearts struggle through the mire and mess; but operating from a place of peace must be practiced and taught.

When God promotes growth in one area, Graham Cooke teaches, we need to upgrade other areas of our lives.  Nothing can stay the same when you are growing in the Lord.  In aligning my life with peace I quickly came to realize that there were areas of my life that needed to 10 Oct 2016 020.jpgchange in order for me to continue in that peace.  I needed to pray and seek God in each area of my life that I lost peace.  It was a long process but it was one that I found had ripple effects!  God placed his finger in my life on Peace, but as I have worked on choosing peace I have increased joy, kindness, patience, self-discipline, and more!

Limiting time with chaotic people was one change needed and painfully implemented. I find chaotic people entertaining sometimes and in a way soothing because I can get lost in their own drama and not think about my own problems.  That had to stop.  Not freaking out over every bit of yard work and housework that wasn’t done was a must.  (In being in an anxious place about my house and yard work I created a restless environment for my husband and he would spend all his spare time working here instead of getting much needed rest and connection time in our marriage.)  Mastering some of my food cravings became a critical part of me living in peace.  I could not run to the store or a restaurant when I had a craving for a meal (no matter how busy or tired I was) because that was robbing my peace.  I had to choose healthy intake of food which would allow my joints and pain to cease so I could feel more at peace.  In making the choice to do without and operate self-discipline over my body (while at first I struggled largely), I ultimately gained peace and felt better physically (with healthy choices) which also generated an even deeper level of peace.  A financial budget was implemented in our home so that I would not be robbed of peace each month when paying the bills.  I suddenly knew what we had, where it went, and where it needed to go.  This returned the fruit of peace!

God is the most Peaceful person I have ever met.  He has all the answers!  All of the small things that I never thought were affecting my quality of life, when brought in prayer, were taken care of.  God didn’t “fix” everything for me; rather He showed me one thing at a time and gave me solutions for those things.  The above paragraph seems like small and logical changes that I implemented immediately.  Truthfully, each one of those things took days and weeks of working out on my end.  I would recognize the lack of peace, write about it, pray about it, think about it, pray about it more, then implement what God laid on my heart to do.  Each thing has been an intense journey with God.  But all of the “problems” that I mentioned here ultimately taught me so much about God!  I no longer hesitate to ask Him to help me with simple problems.  I know how incredibly intelligent He is and I want His friendship all the time.  He is always chuckling and smiling when I am about to split the ends of my own hair with anxiety!  Peace I give to you, he says.

Peace is the attribute that God has his finger on in my life right now.  He is in process of upgrading other areas of my life even as I write this.  It isn’t over, and I am glad that I haven’t arrived because I am having the time of my life. Sleeping at night comes so easily when you are at peace and know that God has every single thing under control (so you don’t have to).  Embracing this process for me has been an upgrade in my life as well.  Sometimes I just want to get things over with so badly that I forget that it isn’t about the destination with God, it’s about the journey.  We all know the ending.  In a blink of an eye we will be changed.  But we don’t know the twists and turns we will pass on the way.  We don’t know which little houses we will pass, which rolling hills we will drive over, which pastures will contain scenery we will want to ingrain in our minds forever.

While God has my life lining up with Peace, what does He have his finger on in your life?  Take a moment and ask Him.  Ask God what attribute of His personality He wants to teach you about.  What area does he want to cultivate relationship with you in right now?  And be ready for the answer…because it will rock your world!

Snowy Wonder

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There is no feeling quite as this

Of cozy and warmth, feelings of bliss

The snow that tumbles in each snowflake

As in my kitchen I long to bake

The earth is quiet in expectation

As snow blankets this part of the nation

I stand face up and full of worship

As praise pours forth in small clips

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The pine trees laden with the weight

As I go forth through the frozen gate

To walk in the snow and hear the crunch

Lift up my mittens, grab flakes by the bunch

The silence that is echoed by purity

Reminds me of grace and being set free

To be captive by nature and standing still

To realize the depth of freezing chill

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Many who cannot appreciate seasons

Even if they have several reasons

Cannot deny the beauty that falls

Or resent the rest brought on by stalls

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Tracking the prints of deer in our woods

To stop and stand where the buck stood

His perspective through my eyes

I listen as the squirrels play and cry

The excitement shown in snow adventures

Simply cannot be easily measured

by Ashly Ash

Just being me…leads to breakthrough?

You haven’t heard as much from me on my blog lately.  I have been on a personal journey.  I’m growing in a new way and it is so exciting!  You see, throughout my blogging history I always maintain a few filters before posting an article.  There are goals and ways I wish to convey myself to you.  I will share them briefly here with emphasis on the last one, which is where my journey is going right now. 09-september-2016-245piknik

All creation leaps with Joy!

First of all I want you, my reader, to receive a message that resonates within your heart.  I want to relate to each of you in a way that is real and genuine.  It really irritates me when people spiritualize everything in life.  I went through a period where every struggle I went through was accompanied by the phrase “God is good all the time, though!”  Sure, that statement may be true but that doesn’t deal with the reality that life can be hard and difficult to work through.  I feel it kind of trivializes reality and betrays our right to have heart feelings.  It even sets an undertone of bitterness and disappointment (if God cared  he would do more).   In my writing I want to be real and tell you when life sucks.  I want you to hear and connect with your own heart when you hear mine.  This is a journey we are on together and it is not my job to boss you around or tell you that what you are going through is or isn’t devastating.  It’s not my job to tell you how to be a better Christian, if there is such a thing.  My job is to walk alongside you.  Christians ARE the church.  We don’t “act like the church” any more than I can try to “act like an Ashly”.  I simply AM Ashly.  Likewise, we ARE the church and I seek that through relationship and development in my love for Christ and each of you.

Secondly, I seek to educate and inform, as well as provide tools and framework for real life scenarios that you may be facing.  A lot of what I use will contain examples from my own life.  (I don’t think my loved ones would appreciate me posting their dirt here so that resigns me to using my own.) There have been a number of folks that have mistaken my writing as a way for me to work through my own problems.  That is not true. I write only about things that I have worked out and thought about, written in my journal, and then compiled into an article.  The articles I write sit on my desk for sometimes months at a time before being published.  It isn’t fair for me to want to bring you closer to God in ways that I haven’t walked yet myself.  Dealing with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder has pushed me to continue educating myself in tools for dealing with life.  This includes counseling, reading, following bible based scholars, and lots of trial/error in my own life.  The things I learn and implement, I pass along to you so you may draw in closer to your first love, Jesus.

Lastly, I have found in my own journey that shame and guilt and directives do NOT accomplish or reflect God’s heart.  Having had absolutely NO success with those things being pushed on me I work diligently to be sure my writing does not reflect shame or guilt or directives.  Do I write appeals to the heart, pleading for growth?  Yes, sometimes I do.  Do I bring reassurance and God’s word into my articles?  Yes, I do.  But I do not ever want to use shame or guilt as a motivator or as an undertone.  I want you to see the unconditional and unending love that Jesus has for each of us.  I want to help show you what receiving that love looks like on a day to day basis and the breakthrough/heart changes that will undoubtedly and unreservedly result from it.

So having had these filters and parameters set in my writing for the past few years, I have found myself on the peculiar journey I am now.  I felt the Lord nudging me at the beginning of the year to look at the amount of shame and guilt that was in my own life.  Shame and guilt are everywhere and our culture sure isn’t shy about shaming us into bigger homes, more education, higher incomes,  and better bodies.  But so do many church institutions use religious shaming.  A lot of our relationships result in tension and shame, so do our commitments.  Brene Brown wrote a book called “Daring Greatly” about being free from shame, but still I didn’t seem to find what I was looking for.  Shame still resonated in my life, I still was anxious a lot, tense over relationships, guilty over commitments, ashamed when I wasn’t at church.  09-september-2016-103piknikWhile I strove and attempted to keep shame and guilt out of my own life I read a book that completely turned my current thinking upside down on the matter.  The book is called, “So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore” by Wayne Jacobson.  It is a short and simple book that was written in simple conversation format and was handed to me by my sister.  My expectations were zero to nil as I sneered at the title.  But this book flipped me upside down as I found it was not about church at all and rather about shame and condemnation being motivators.

See, in my journey of ridding shame and condemnation from my life I set a few standards for myself.  I wanted to take this seriously since I felt God put it on my heart.  So I started to do all the right things.  I had an “accountability partner” and a checklist.  Each day at the end of the day I would check off and make notes about whether or not I fell into shameful thinking that day and how I should have prevented it.  Did I eat something then feel bad about it?  No check-off today!  Did someone say something that made me feel overly obligated to them rather than God?  Shameful thinking!  Little did I know, the creation of this “law/standard” in my life to help me be rid of shame, coupled with a task-oriented  system actually set me up stronger under the very system of shame I was trying to break free of! I was writing each night about how I fell into shame and guilt during that day and all the while I am making these notes I am feeling…you got it….SHAME and GUILT!  Can you say counterproductive?

I felt the Lord release me from this checklist and this standard I set.  Gently I felt lead to read back through my journal for the year and right in January I wrote to myself about receiving grace and deleting shame “find freedom from the law by just being ME with Jesus this year”.  (Like in Romans 8, the “law” is sin and death, clouded in shame and condemnation which we are set free from because of the cross.)  And there my journey truly began with me laying down my agenda for ridding my life of shame-based thinking and embarking on a new path.  I found that path impacted every area of my life.

We have these ideas of how “church” should be operated.  We have these ideas of how other people need to live to be healthy and free.  We think it is our job to tell people how to live.  We know church is a building and that requires commitment.  We have these ideas of how leadership should lead and how often we need to have meetings.  We believe if we just stop sinning our lives will be great.   All of these ideas breed disappointment, expectations, shame, guilt, and condemnation.  It is wrong.  Suddenly in order to be loved and accepted by one another and by God we believe have to be x, y, z.  This is simply not true.

In my last article I wrote about God setting me free from over spiritualizing things that are out of control.  The example in the article that I gave was the freeing realization that having a disability and not having insurance coverage for a fake leg to walk on does not mean that God loves me less.   I discussed how so many people (including myself) express that if I were in a better place spiritually, prayed more, had more faith, that God would bless me with a fake leg.  Since I now don’t have one because insurance doesn’t cover what I need there must be something wrong with my faith and me; or to state this more bluntly:  God loves me conditionally.

No, friends.  God loves us unconditionally.  He loves us right where we are.   Sin isn’t the issue with God.  Sin is dealt with on the cross.  Once and for all!  God is not obsessed with our shortcomings (or perceived faults) like we are.  God is not obsessed with giving us what we think we need in order for us to love him.  He gives us enough for today, every day.  He gives us the perfect amount and we need to trust him to know best.  God is also not obsessed with the shortcomings we see in others!  I will go so far as to venture and say when we are trying to fix or change the shortcomings of others we are simply trying to avoid the emptiness we feel in our own hearts.

We have to be comfortable and trust God enough to let him work his process in others.  We don’t need to step in and give directives and tell someone else how to change.  I know this to be true because I have a very personal experience with this from long ago.  When I was self-medicating PTSD symptoms  with drugs and alcohol I went to see a counselor that operated in the true love of Christ.  She said,“I am not here to give you directives.  I am not here to tell you to don’t do drugs and steer clear of alcohol.  If you want that, there are meetings for that.  Keep doing whatever you are doing.  My job is to help you recognize the system of drugs for what it is, destructive self medicating,and to know your own heart and God’s love to find why you turn to them in the first place. You will be free from drugs and alcohol, of that I have no doubt.”  Within a few months I was free from my addictions without a single rehabilitation effort or extreme withdrawal symptom.  I simply slowly stopped turning to drugs and alcohol because I did not need them.  I wasn’t shamed into quitting.  I wasn’t condemned for using.  Fern from Discovering MErcy helped me to recognize the drugs and alcohol for what they were: destruction.  Then she helped me find self-worth in God’s love to want to choose what is best for me.  That was true freedom for me.  Being in a place where I was journeying alongside of someone that showed me God’s love and never once did she (or God) keep tabs on my shortcomings.

Fern taught me to take the moral load off of things.  I never understood what she was doing until the past few months.  She was removing the shame and condemnation.  By not focusing on the fog of sin and the moral weight of my behavior I was free to get in touch with my own heart and turn to Jesus.  I could see there were underlying reasons for my choices.  But she ignored my behavior and went for my heart.  Like Bryan Post says, “Ignore the lie not the child” (when a child lies, he explains, it is fear-based and to ignore the behavior to get to the heart of the child and figure out the fear will help the child regulate. He advises to completely ignore the behavior of the lie.  Fix WHY they lie not the lie itself.)  Jesus was given the authority to fill the holes and heal my heart; once the shame and condemnation fog was lifted I could receive that healing and I didn’t do a single thing to make it happen!  I was just being me!  Without the weight of the shame and self condemnation  .

Here are some excerpts from the book “So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore” by Wayne Jacobsen to give you a nice screen-shot capture of what my journey of “just being me” is looking like right now:

“…respect the process God uses to bring people into truth.  I’m not talking about different things being true for different people, but about people discovering that truth in different time frames.  If we hold people accountable, they will never learn to live in love.  We’ll reward those who are better at putting on a front and miss those who are in the real struggle of learning to live in Jesus.

 …when are you going to get past the mistaken notion that Christianity is about ethics?

 …walking toward him is walking away from sin.  The better you know him the freer from it you will be.  But you can’t walk away from sin, Jake.  Not in your own strength!  Everything he wants to do in you will get done as you learn to live in his love.  Every act of sin results from your mistrust of his love intentions for you.  We sin to fill up broken places, to try to fight for what we think is best for us, or by reacting to our guilt and shame.  Once you discover how much he loves you, all that changes.  As you grow in trusting him, you will find yourself increasingly free from sin.

…When we hold one another accountable we are really usurping God’s place.  It’s why we end up hurting one another so deeply.  When we make commitments that we can live up to only for a brief period, our guilt multiplies when we fail.  Upset that God doesn’t do more to help us, we usually end up medicating our guilt with something like drugs, alcohol, food, shopping, or anything else that dulls the pain, or it creeps out of us through anger or lust.

 …Paul recognized there are three roads in this life, when most of us only recognize two.  We tend to think of our lives as a choice between doing bad and doing good.  Paul saw two different ways we could try to do good—one makes us work hard to submit to God’s rules.  That one fails every time.  Even when he described himself as following all of God’s rules externally he also called himself the worst sinner alive because of the hate and anger in his heart.  Sure he could conform his outward behavior to fit the rules but it only pushed his problems deeper.  He was, you remember, out killing God’s people in God’s name.”

In this journey I am reveling in God’s love and learning how to trust God with every single thing in my life.  He is teaching me to stop making commitments that my heart is not into and that will drag me into shame and guilt when I can’t keep them.  He is showing me how 09-september-2016-1001to not beat myself up over my own shortcomings, reflecting and mulling over how to change them.  Rather than wasting my time in a vicious cycle of obligations I haven’t been called to I am simply reading about His promises and His love for me.  My shortcomings will be ironed out as God’s love expands in my heart.  And you know what else I noticed?  I don’t see other people’s shortcomings as much either.  Why?  I am focused on Jesus and how he is moving in my life and others’ lives. In love there is no such place for analyzing others, there is only walking with others without controlling them but pointing them to God’s love for them.

Moving out of shame and guilt also allows for vulnerability in a way that I have not yet experienced in life.  I am free to be myself.  More accurately, as I move into God’s love and assurance (and stop caring about what image I project and what others think) I am getting to know my own heart!  Rather than conforming to what is the “right way” I can simply be me.  Now that is something God can work with.  He can’t work with illusions and with “right actions” because they are just that…illusions and fronts.  They aren’t real.  God can work with a broken soul and someone that doesn’t always make the right choices.

Am I there yet?  Haha…nope.  I’m not sure I shall ever arrive until Jesus returns.  But during this time I am writing a little less on my blog as I allow some of these things to be ironed out within me.  There must be less of my agenda and more of Him in each article and each moment of my life.  My writing must come alongside each of you and bless you in your journey without stipulations.

In Revelations 2:2-4 Jesus says to the people of Ephesus:

“I know how many good things you are doing. I have watched your hard work and your patience; I know you don’t tolerate sin among your members, and you have carefully examined the claims of those who say they are apostles but aren’t. You have found out how they lie. You have patiently suffered for me without quitting.  ‘Yet there is one thing wrong; you don’t love me as at first!’”

I want to love Jesus with a fire that blazes and  a spark that ignites others the same way.  I don’t care if my actions are not perfect or if I fail as long as I am being true to my heart and receiving his love and in love with him.  My joy must be contagious to every one that I encounter because that is a fruit of the spirit.  My trust must run so deep that I never encourage others with saying the right things that are empty like “we live by faith not by sight” when they are struggling.  I desire to exhort and encourage from a place that aligns others with the majesty and love of God for them.  Yes, this journey is still in process but it will be worth all the treasure earth can yield.

 

 

 

I Ain’t Got a Leg to Stand on…

I Ain’t Got a Leg to Stand on…

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If you have followed my blog for any amount of time you know the struggle with my leg.  Not my real one, my fake one.  I truly do not even understand how something that isn’t even real can constantly send you such unhealthy vibes.  First I have a leg, and then I don’t.  Insurance pays for all of my leg, and then they rescind that idea and will pay for none.  I find a doctor and then find out it was a scam.  In one article I am praising God for giving me a leg and then being squashed and discouraged the next when insurance informs me that they won’t pay for it going forward.  Yikes!  I’m tired of talking about it and I know you all must be ready to scream, “MOVE ON!”  It is absolute emotional/physical torture re-adjusting my lifestyle based on whether or not I have a fake leg financially paid for.

Just to be clear on where we are in the slump; Right now, as of today, as of this hour, I have a leg that is too big for me since I’ve lost weight using it and it needs repairs that insurance will not pay to have completed.  I do wear my leg once in awhile for things that are impertinent to have two legs for (as if it ever were not a priority!) such as vacuuming, grocery shopping, etc.  When this leg breaks, as of right now that is it, no more fake leg until I can muster up another way to get it paid for.**

But a few months ago when I was so angry about the latest slump that came along I prayed about it and decided that it was not going to define me.  Usually I judge myself and I hear others say things that reflect the idea that my faith and spirituality are linked to God providing a fake leg.  It’s as if having a fake leg is a way to measure God’s happiness with me and my performance.  If I am doing well then God gives me a leg.  I must be doing all the right “spiritual” things and praying right if I have a leg.  I’ve been rewarded a little treat, a fake leg, for being a good girl.  But it just hit me the other month that this simply isn’t true.  God gives everyone else two legs without them ever lifting a finger (or a bible study or a prayer meet, just sayin’!) in the womb!  So why would my receiving a fake leg be some sort of indicator as to my spiritual health?  My fake leg is not a stamp of God’s approval of my behavior.  God promises to provide for our needs, who says this is an absolute need every step of the way?  (Pun intended)

 “And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.  No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  Romans 8:38-39 (NLT)

 In our weaknesses He is made strong.  God sees the “holes” that we need filled and He alone will fill them.  Our weaknesses are sometimes allowed to be there so that He simply can be that for us.  As parents we sometimes allow our children to struggle to open a jar of jelly, even if we know they can’t do it alone.  Why do we do this?  We let them build their strength, we let them learn to persevere and work for what they want; we let them learn how to ask for help.  We also need God’s help in certain areas of our lives and it is OK to rely8-august-5 on Him.  It is OK if he doesn’t give us super strength to open every jar of jelly that we want to open on the first try.   It doesn’t mean we are lacking in faith any more than it is the child’s fault for not being strong enough to open the new jar of jelly!  Would you yell at the child trying to open the jar “Have faith!  Try harder!  You aren’t praying enough!”?  It is not the child’s fault, the child simply is afflicted with condition called “being a child”.  Then parents step in according to their measure of strength (a condition called “adulting”) and open the jar if the child needs it open.  It is OK to be God’s kid and to not have every single external area of our life under control.  That’s how God gets to be God.  It is how he gets to show us that He has us in the palm of His hand.  I’m saying that sometimes we think we need the jelly jar opened and we really don’t!

 “Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death?  ….No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.”  Romans 8:35,37(NLT)

 When I have a fake leg that is working well for me and paid for; that’s great.  When I don’t I feel strongly that I should research and do my part, then leave it in God’s hands.  He isn’t angry at me or unhappy with me on one leg verses two.  It isn’t that God doesn’t understand my struggle without a leg.  He simply sometimes “allows in His wisdom what He could easily prevent with His power” (Graham Cooke).   Parents, in their wisdom, sometimes allow kids struggle without success opening the jelly jar before supper even though they could easily prevent that suffering with the power in their hands and arms.  Not every jelly jar should be opened when we want it opened.

I was pretty surprised a few months ago when I was praying about this and praying about where to turn next to look for insurance coverage for my leg.  I was so blessed God dismissed the debt owed on my current leg (insurance miraculously paid the balance) but was so adamant that because He removed that debt I would find coverage for the repairs I knew I was about to need.  I was praying hard and searching everywhere.  One morning I felt the Lord speak to me so clearly.  He reminded me of the words in my testimony, “THIS BATTLE IS NOT YOURS, QUIT FIGHTING.”  “What?!  It isn’t mine?  Am I to lay down and take this?!” I thought.  “If you aren’t providing this then I clearly need to do more and make sure it is provided for me!”  But that was it.  God was silent.  He had spoken His piece and left me to align the rest of my being with that peace.

Of course, as I wrestled with what He had spoken to me I realized that perhaps, just maybe, God did know something that I didn’t.  Maybe He knows the Hip Disartic socket would not be good for my body long term. Perhaps He has something lined up in the future that requires for me to walk this trail for now.  What if He knows that my body, being under extreme stress whenever in the leg, will break down because of that stress?  Maybe I will not be able to reach people or spark healing in hearts on two legs like I can on one?  Perhaps my reliance on Him and inability to be super-active on two legs keeps me focused on writing and the life of stillness I so firmly believe in.  Who knows? I sure don’t.  But God does.  I felt that I was to let this battle rest for a bit and realign my self-worth with being God’s child.

 “ Since I know it is all for Christ’s good, I am quite happy about ‘the thorn,’ and about insults and hardships, persecutions and difficulties; for when I am weak, then I am strong—the less I have, the more I depend on him.”  2 Corinthians 12:10 (MSG)

 Yet I hear well-meaning friends and strangers tell me over and over “well if your faith is in the right place God will provide you a leg.”  What a bunch of baloney!  God doesn’t have to

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That look when you realize you are believing a lie!

make me look normal to prove that He loves me and is a good provider.  He doesn’t have to open the jelly jar for me every time I want Him to.  He is God and I trust Him to guide me where there are “thorns” and “holes” in my physique and daily lifestyle to be what I need.

Sometimes we so easily look at the things we are going through and the things that other people are going through and we are quick to pass judgment.  It is easy to see someone that has an obvious “hole” in their life and assume that is their own weakness.  It is easy to assume they aren’t doing enough to fix their life.  It can be even easier to give them directives in what we think they should do, not considering what God may want for them.  What if God keeps that hole there in their life?  What if God is working and doing something there that is far greater than the very best they could do in full strength?  Maybe their faith is extremely strong and resilient as they focus on treasure in heaven and the things God calls them to rather than filling in all the materialistic “holes” in their life.

I’m not advocating for laziness.  I’m not advocating for being a victim.  I am advocating for reality.  Real Christians do not always get what they want.  God does not always hand us the Jelly Jar already opened.  He builds strength and character in us by allowing us to try opening it ourselves.  It doesn’t mean we are societal weak or losers, it just means that He is honing our strength.  That strength may not be physical, but I can promise you that the internal strength of resilience, self-discipline, and character building are much more valuable than having two legs to stand on.  Regardless of where we are in our journey, God’s love is not dependent on our performance.

Since aligning myself with the reality that my relationship with God has nothing to do with whether or not I have a fake leg to stand on, I’ve noticed ways that I too have pushed wrong thinking on others in the same way it has been done to me.  “Pray every day for God to heal you,” I have “encouraged” friends that are ailing.  “Surely God will not allow for this to continue, read scripture and surround yourself with truth,” I’ve been found saying.  “They really need to get X area of their life under a tighter rein if they call themselves Christian,” I’ve caught myself thinking.  No, Ashly.  Those words are not inspired by the Holy Spirit when the thinking behind them is aligned with performance-based love.  They are instead subtle arrows of shame directed at the hearts of my loved ones whispering “you must do more, you must be more, God won’t love you unless you are better”.

09-september-2016-131piknikShame and condemnation are very bitter roots that take hold and affect our whole person.  It is so freeing now to think about my leg without falling into shameful thinking and keeping scores of my shortcomings.  Remembering that Christ died once for all sin (1 Peter 3:18) is an antidote to condemnation.  Knowing that nothing can separate us from God’s love (Romans 8:35) is freedom from shame.

I may not have a leg to stand on…but I know the One who does!

 

 

*Reflective Moments:

  •  Do you tie your identity and acceptance from God with your behavior?  In what ways?
  •  When you notice faults in others do you immediately criticize or “encourage” that person to do x,y,z?
  •  Do you believe that a person’s level of exterior success is a direct indicator of God being pleased with them?
  •  Are you always telling your friends what they “ought to do about X”, or do you spend your time loving and encouraging them in the fruits of the Spirit (Galatians 5)
  •  How can you allow your choices and emotions to line up and be “ok” with your weaknesses?
  •  Do you have any “Jelly Jars” you are trying to open without God’s help?   Do you have “Jelly Jars” that you want open that maybe God isn’t ready to open?

*If you are an amputee and know the struggle of having your identity and self-worth tied up in prosthetic provision I would love to hear your story below!  If you are a “regular person”, as I call all two-legged friends, but have found performance-based love an obstacle in your journey with God please let me know!  I want to hear from everyone!

(**Please do not write to me about the million and one insurance and protesting options out there because – believe me –  I have and continue researching, have done this for 27 years, and am well networked with people that know this game.)

 

 

Amputee Stories from the Gym

07 july 021

Since I began exercising at the YMCA nearly a year ago I have gathered many stories and interesting moments along the way there.  When you have one leg and are new to a place you quickly become a superstar and everyone learns your name…or at least that you are the “girl with one leg”.  It has been very interesting and I’m learning to take it all with a grain of salt because soon the novelty of my awesomeness will wear off and I’ll be back to depending on comments from you, dear readers, for encouragement!

This collection is for humor and irony only.  Please do not feel sorry for me or apologize for fellow two-leggers.  Just read it, chuckle with me, and walk away with a smile today!

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There was a woman that approached me one day and stopped me from walking on the treadmill.  You could see that I had only one leg, she said, but she still wanted to introduce herself to me.  She then asked if I was a native citizen.  Mmmm…is there another planet that contains civilizations of deformed people?  Perhaps Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, and Amputees are from Planet X?  While I was trying to tie all of this together in my mind she hurriedly explained that I simply look very exotic and she thought perhaps I was Egyptian, Muslim, or Indian.  This only caused further awkwardness in my face as my mind attempted to understand how it was that this lady considered “Muslim” a race of people rather than a religion.  Exotic looking…is that a compliment or a freak show?  I never did figure this one out and whenever I see this (confused) citizen I find myself becoming engrossed in my workout in a whole new way!

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The next week I noticed there was a man there that would always go out of his way to talk to me.  He was very kind and I noticed he would begin to use exercise machines near me each day so we could chat.  It was great to chat a bit about the day, about God, and then move on to focus on our workouts.  I thought I had a real buddy there.  Within a week I started to wonder if this new pal of mine actually knew I had one leg or not.  It reminded me of back when I used to date as a teenager (and used a prosthesis full time) because there was constantly this cloud overhead about when to have “the talk”.  One would think that “the talk” would and should involve things like sexually transmitted diseases, past marriages, serial murdering, etc.  But amputation also seems to fall into this category for most one-legged people trying to date. (I actually just read a “Dear Abby” column by an amputee a few weeks ago in the Lancaster Newspaper asking when the right time was to tell a date about the fake!)

Of course, I found the movie Deuce Bigalow quite horrifying as a teenager because the woman never told her boyfriend she was an amputee until quite an awkward bedroom scene where the leg fell off into his hands.  The horrors!  (I think I was the only one in the movie theater NOT laughing that day as I realized the truth behind it.)  I started to realize that the same “full disclosure” was interestingly flowing now into formed friendships as well.  Mmmm…when is the right time to tell a new workout pal that I am an amputee, I wondered.  The next day it was taken care of for me.  My pal was waiting for me at the end of the hallway and I was running behind.  I came out of the pool area into the hall to give a heads up looking a bit like a drowned and very wet rat.  Having just left the pool, of course, I had my crutches and no leg on.  I smiled and before I could get a word out he was gone!  Gone!  He snatched his gym bag shot out the door.  The EXIT door.He left the YMCA right there in front of me.  I have seen this “pal” since but he will not make eye contact or even talk to me.  While this is overtly rude of him and I should probably hold him accountable for this extremely ignorant behavior, I think I will much rather to wait until we pass in the hallway and then jump at him and say “Boo!!!”

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I asked and the gym decided to give me a little room for privacy and changing.  A room that I could leave my prosthesis in and have privacy to change without the outright stares of others.  After countless stares and questions from women and children in the locker room I was quite relieved for this small mercy.  They hung a key in the office and let me know it would work on any of the four private family changing rooms.  No, not the case.  The key apparently only worked on ONE of the four doors mentioned.  But not knowing that I changed by hap chance in a different room one day.  I had gotten dressed at home and put my leg on, went to the gym, took my leg off, put my bathing suit on, came out of the room, and the door would not lock.  Well I couldn’t very well leave my leg and clothes in the room for anyone to walk in on while I1098401_436921399757385_2012399883_n swam!  (I could envision kids playing with my leg or adults screaming with shock when entering!)

I went to the office and found a young man on duty.  Geez, this gets better and better, I thought, No women on duty.  Asking this fellow to come and check the door for me was bad enough, but when he also couldn’t get the door to lock I knew I was doomed.  He told me to change rooms.  There is no way I’m going to undress again, put my leg on, move my stuff ten whole feet, take my leg off, and redress into my bathing suit AGAIN then do it one more time when I get out of the pool, I fumed.  All of which made me blurt out to the poor twenty-something guy “Hey, you have to carry my stuff…and my leg to the other room.”  The poor guy went white.  He was already white but when it dawned on him what I was asking the blood drained out of his face.  He was standing there looking at a replica of a real leg, with pants and shoes still attached, and now a strange lady was demanding he touch it?  She wanted him to move her body parts?  Poor guy, I felt bad for him and was beet red myself, but I knew this was the only option and he couldn’t say no.  He approached my leg gently and asked, “ok, so how do I do this?” to which I snapped, “You just pick it up, man, c’mon it’s not that hard and it will give you a great dinner time story for later…please!”  He graciously, albeit so awkwardly, did end up moving my leg for me and there were many awkward weeks of downcast-eyed “hellos” after this until my husband went with me to the gym one day and personally thanked him.  Now all is good.  I guess the bonding of manhood with my husband over a strange leg somehow helped this kid realize that if my husband can do it every day that he could do it just once.

I would like to tell you that was the only time that ever happened but it did happen again.  The next time my little office buddy was not around and I ended up having one of the lifeguards help me, a guy in his forties.  He was a little more mature about it and was eager to help a beautiful damsel in distress which helped me save a little face.  Most women seek help with doors or changing tires, I need my leg handled.  Eh, to each her own, right?

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Having strange men carry my leg around did lead me to the more rational conclusion that I should probably change back to the general locker room again.  In my mind I figured that if I kept running into these locked room problems sooner or later the guys would wonder if I had ulterior motives to having my leg handled.  I most certainly did not, but people are strange when it comes to this stuff!  (Even in the restrooms if a woman is heading to my stall and sees I just came out and have one leg she will often change stalls or wait for a different one to become available.  That makes no sense, to be afraid of a toilet used by a one-legged person, but whatever.)  So I shifted back to the Ladies’ Locker room and decided to suck it up as much as possible.

One of my favorite stories after making the switch was of a little girl.  See, when I take my leg off it is too big to fit in one of the lockers so I have to set it in a corner next to where I place my belongings while I swim.  I leave the pants and shoe on (as mentioned).  One afternoon as I came back from my swim I walked in behind a young girl, maybe three years old.  She came around the corner and looked at my leg and screamed.  She doubled over at the waist and groaned, “NO, NO, NO, NOT AGAIN, NOT ANOTHER ONE!!”  Her earnestness was so sincere and her (more than slightly) embarrassed mother explained that her daughter assumed there must be multiple people randomly leaving their body parts around, she didn’t understand it was not real, and seriously thought that people were losing their legs.  I absolutely loved this young girl’s perspective and wish that I could trade all of the rude ladies’ comments for the purity in heart of this darling who cried out in distress and pain for anthers loss!

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There have also been a few times on the treadmill that I have been walking happily along and then realized that my pants are around my knees!  Having my entire waist and thigh wrapped in the plastic of the leg I don’t always feel when my pants are no longer in the position that they should be.  I’m constantly making sure I’m not walking around like a side-winder.  The embarrassment is so deep and the flush that it brings to my neck and face is one that rivals that of an oompa loompa (or perhaps Donald Trump in the very least)!  It happened again when I was out in my front yard raking the lawn and a few people drove by the house beeping at me.  I was feeling so happy and waving as I contemplated who they may be and why so many seemed to know me that day.  Of course a few moments later I looked down and realized that with my pants around my knees they may not (hopefully did not) know me at all!  If you ever see me with my pants down please be confident that I am not flirting with you!

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A year later:  Now, in to going to the YMCA, I’m no longer really a novelty.  It has been quite a relief though I am forced to look elsewhere for wonderful stories! There are still some rude people and I get a lot of questions from people like “where is your leg, why aren’t you wearing it, can I watch you get dressed and put it on?” One day though, just once, I think I will approach one of the two legged people and ask if I can watch them get dressed with two legs and let the chips fall where they may!

Do You Want To Be GREAT?

Do You Want To Be GREAT?

This was written in honor of our small group.  I have enjoyed growing with each of you and learned so much from you in the way of praising God, accountability, self-discipline, and growth.  Blessings to each of you!

*If you are approaching this as a devotional I suggest reading Hebrews 11-12:4 prior to reading this article.

 08 August 1Growing in the Lord is so much fun.  It really is, even though all of the obstacles that spur this kind of growth are absolutely detestable.  I heard someone preach a long, long time ago about embracing the journey just as much as the destination.  While this will never be true for me when I’m earthly traveling, I think I do finally understand this in the sense of spiritual traveling.  After all, my destination is heaven and 99.999% of my life will be traveling towards that!  Being content here just as the Apostle Paul was is pretty critical to receiving joy.

 “I’ve learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances. I’m just as happy with little as with much, with much as with little.” Philippians 4:11-13 MSG

 I have been keeping an open eye out for ways that my life is mediocre lately.  I’ve been looking a lot at Hebrews 11, the great “Hall of Faith”, and recognizing that all of those mentioned in that chapter showed no hint of mediocrity in their life and faith.  They were not “lukewarm” people of God.  As I prayed about this and thought about these men and women of great faith the desire within me grew to become a woman of great faith.  I’m not content just traveling through this life, tossing my baggage onto the claim turnstiles, and waiting in line to be checked at customs.  Nah, that’s not what I want.  I want to make waves, to travel in different ways and not the same way every time. Sometimes I want to lose my luggage and have an adventure with that.   I want to be smiling and joyful every time I encounter a new part of the journey.  Truly, I want to be God’s hands and feet on earth and allow Jesus to look down on me and say “that is a woman of faith”.  I want to go deeper, be disciplined, and catch fire in a way that my passion soars and ignites everyone I encounter.

 What is the antidote for mediocrity?  I’m sure there are many but one of the main ones I have been looking at is self-control.  I don’t mean the kind of shaming and condemning self-control like avoiding the cookie jars before dinner, though that could be a real part of it for some, I’m talking about the true fruit of the spirit.  The kind of self-discipline that develops true spiritual warriors.  God is our Father and teaches us how to self-discipline and live in a way that we do not feed our wants constantly but learn to endure.

 “The worst thing we can do to our children—apart from not loving and believing them—is not to shape their lives in a disciplined manner.  There is no greatness apart from self-control.  Development that does not include personal government will only guarantee our mediocrity.”  (Graham Cooke, Qualities of a Spiritual Warrior, p 29)

 I have never thought of the Israelite's wandering the desert as lacking self-control but in the same book, Qualities of a Spiritual Warrior, Graham Cooke points this out.  He explains (paraphrased) that God had a few choices in dealing with them before they entered the Promised Land.  God could: 1. let them continue into the promised land and become slaughtered because their faith was not in God, 2. allow them to return to Egypt where they more than likely would be slaughtered to set a precedent that Pharaoh doesn’t mess around with escaped slaves, or 3. Take them back to the desert where they could work on self-discipline and training their minds in the way of faith and their children’s minds as well before returning to conquer the land given to them.  Embracing this viewpoint, we see that God wasn’t punishing or condemning the Israelites by having them walk through the desert for another forty years but rather he was saving them!  He was growing them and their children.  It was allowing the older generation to change their minds and die in freedom while pushing their children to possess and receive the fullness of God’s goodness.  It was training for reigning at its best!

 Our attitudes when we face obstacles and difficult circumstances reveal a lot about our own self-discipline.  Are we at peace?  Do we rest in God?  Do we step back and wait to hear what God says about the situation or do we allow our emotions to wreak havoc in our lives and use our words to speak death instead of life?

 “Do not be quick with your mouth; do not be hasty in your heart to utter anything before God.  God is in heaven and you are on earth, so let your 07 July 2016 096words be few.” Ecclesiastes 5:2

 How do we become great men and women of faith?  It starts with self-discipline I believe.  It takes discipline to rein in our thoughts.  Discipline to study, truly study, the word of God on a deep level.  We operate in discipline to align our thoughts with who God is for us in our situation rather than allow negativity to be enthroned.  Disciplining and exhibiting self-control in our own lives to be stewards of the things God has given to us (our bodies and health, our relationships, our words, our careers, our finances) allows us to fully worship God without interference.  Our faith can be properly placed in the great I AM when we are equipped to endure all things.

 In Hebrews 11 we read that none of those listed received the promises they were living for. Yet their faith never wavered and they endured.  Noah, when being mocked and laughed at, required self-discipline to continue building an ark that no one had even heard of and he continued in this for 120 years!  Most people give up on a project after a month or two; can you imagine sticking to something for 120 years?  Moses was raised and lived in the palace of Pharaoh his entire life and refused to be identified as anything other than one of God’s people.  From a young age he made a choice and through self-control and faith stood in it.  How about the verse (Heb 11:37) where some were actually sawed in half and never lost their faith?  Now that is faith and endurance!  It is not possible to have endured those things without a strong sense of self-control and discipline!

 “David won and established the kingdom because he had warriors around him, men who knew how to endure.  Living in caves, moving around the wilderness, constantly being hounded and pursued by a megalomaniac and his army.  Living rough, eating rations, going hungry, never sleeping in the same place for too long—it toughened them up.  They learned how to persevere, how to persist in a cause.  They were faithful men—loyal to the king, dangerous against the enemy.  Many Christians cannot tell the difference between warfare, adversity, the work of the Cross, and training for reigning.  They don’t persist; they crumble.  An instant society depletes our strength.  People are in huge amounts of debt because they cannot wait; they have no patience to save money, then purchase.  They mortgage their future to buy trinkets in the present and then declare that god is providing, which may be true.  I mean, MasterCard sound spiritual.  A Visa gives you permission to enter, I suppose.  Servicing the debt denies us true flexibility to serve the Lord.  We are trapped in the model home that we didn’t really need, surrounded by remotes, but with no control over our destiny.  To say yes to Jesus we must also say no to something else.  A YES is always accompanied by a NO.”  (Graham Cooke, Qualities of a Spiritual Warrior, p.73)

 If this isn’t convicting, my friend, what is?  We are so used to putting it all on God and saying “let it go and let God deal with it” that we forget to use the brains that God gave us to use!  We forget that He gave us talents and we are not to bury them!  (Don't Bury Your Talent - Verses and Article Here)

 I don’t want to be a mediocre or lukewarm Christian, do you?  Do you want to stand there on judgment day and know that every bit of what Christ died for was put to use in your own life?  I want to stand there in humility and honesty, knowing that I myself am worth nothing, and tell my Savior that what He did give me I loved him for and invested into the kingdom.  I want to tell him that I did the best I could with my finances, my health, my words, and my marriage.  Not because I am ashamed or condemned but because He died for me to live a better life than the condemned and shamed.

“ God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God.  Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.  For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.” Ephesians 2:8-10 MSG

07 July 2016 175Self-control isn’t about taking credit or earning our way into heaven.  It isn’t about living guilt free or even keeping a clean slate before heaven (our sins were covered once and for all at the cross).  (Hebrews 10)  It is about the process of enjoying our life here on earth in the fullest.  It is about doing the “good things he planned for us long ago” that we may fulfill our true purposes.  We enjoy self-control because of the fruit that produces alongside of it:  kindness, peace, patience, joy, love, goodness, gentleness.  (Galatians 5:22-23)

Go deeper, be disciplined, and catch fire in a way that ignites all those you encounter.  Allow your journey to be one that prepares you for greatness.  Take each day in stride to know your choice of self-control and standing in faith are setting you up for greatness.  Step back in each difficult circumstance and find out what provision God has placed there for you to help you endure and eventually overcome.  It is there, I promise.  God will not abandon us to find our way alone.  But being at peace and listening for what He gives us in each circumstance, then praying that into place in faith, will grow you and stretch you beyond your wildest dreams.

“So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded.  You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.” Hebrews 10:35-36 NIV