A friend of mine gave me a very interesting analogy for her life. She said she was like a clay pot that had been broken. All the bigger pieces can be glued back together again, but some of that pot has been shattered to dust. It can't be retrieved and glued back in with the rest.
I really like that analogy, especially if you take it one step further.
When the clay pot of your life is broken, it happens right there in front of your Creator. He picks up the bigger pieces and lovingly sets them back on his workbench then he sweeps up the dust, sifting it carefully to keep only the parts of you, not the rubbish that might have been mixed in with it. He saves that dust in a little bin, safe from the wind that would blow it away. He loving begins to piece the pot back together again.
Sometimes you're going to resist his work and fall apart before he's done, but he's not going to quit. He'll pick up the pieces again, but this time there won't be as much dust left because the glue he's using is going to shield the edges of your broken pot.
Eventually he's going to have the big pieces all put back together again. Sure enough, there are still cracks and even some gaping holes in the pot, but the Potter isn't done yet. He takes that dust of your life that he's saved, mixes it with some special clay made of love, joy, peace and goodness then adds a bit of water that pours from his own side. With the paste he creates, he carefully and expertly fills in all those cracks and holes, working until everything is filled in. He smooths it, blending it carefully so that the new clay perfectly lays over the broken pot that is now no longer broken.
But the Potter's not done yet. Now he glazes the newly made pot with the Spirit of life then thrusts it into fiery trials. When the pot comes out of the fire, it is stronger, better than it was before it was ever broken. It now also has character that it didn't have before, a unique beauty unlike any other pot in the Potter's shed.
If that pot gets broken again, or even just chipped or cracked, the Potter will again fix the pot, each time making it even more beautiful.
The only role the pot has to play is to submit to the Potter's hands. If the pot resists, it will continue to break apart and crumble. Eventually it will be gone, lost for all eternity because it rejected its Creator's love.
Will you accept the work of the Potter, or will you resist, rejecting the love that can make you new again?
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Monday, August 29, 2011
The Garbage of Life
Last night at church one of the men gave an analogy about the junk from our past and the junk in a garbage dump. It went something like this:
When rubbish is downloaded into a dump, it's packed down into layer upon layer. The more time passes, the more the garbage shifts and compacts. If there was something you needed to get out of the dump that was deposited even just months before, it's already been buried by a small mountain of other garbage. You'll have to root around down there until you hook onto it, but when you try to pull it out, it's going to be caught on a whole lot of other rubbish. Some of that rubbish will stick with it and come out when it does, but other rubbish will be tangled with something else that keeps any of the rubbish from coming up out of the dump with any ease.
When we try to get to the source of negative thinking in our lives, we'll usually find that's hard to do. We can identify a certain memory that contributed to something - let's say self doubt. So someone remembers that her father repeatedly told her that she couldn't do anything by herself. She's found the rubbish that's the source of her current problems and she forgives it. It's done, over with, gone.
Not even! That rubbish is hooked onto something else. Maybe her mom wouldn't ever let her help with any of the household chores. That's going to be a real hard one to find because she doesn't even recognize it as a negative thing!
So the point is that most of us live on a garbage dump of a past. God will help us get out all the garbage, but it's going to take time and a lot of patient work. It's worth the effort. What you need to do is keep a focus on the end goal - a new life as a truly joyful person.
Be forewarned though, once you've asked God to start the process, he's not going to quit, no matter how much you whine when thing get stinky down in the dump. Learn to plug your nose and keep at it. Someday you'll have a beautiful, sweet smelling flower garden.
When rubbish is downloaded into a dump, it's packed down into layer upon layer. The more time passes, the more the garbage shifts and compacts. If there was something you needed to get out of the dump that was deposited even just months before, it's already been buried by a small mountain of other garbage. You'll have to root around down there until you hook onto it, but when you try to pull it out, it's going to be caught on a whole lot of other rubbish. Some of that rubbish will stick with it and come out when it does, but other rubbish will be tangled with something else that keeps any of the rubbish from coming up out of the dump with any ease.
When we try to get to the source of negative thinking in our lives, we'll usually find that's hard to do. We can identify a certain memory that contributed to something - let's say self doubt. So someone remembers that her father repeatedly told her that she couldn't do anything by herself. She's found the rubbish that's the source of her current problems and she forgives it. It's done, over with, gone.
Not even! That rubbish is hooked onto something else. Maybe her mom wouldn't ever let her help with any of the household chores. That's going to be a real hard one to find because she doesn't even recognize it as a negative thing!
So the point is that most of us live on a garbage dump of a past. God will help us get out all the garbage, but it's going to take time and a lot of patient work. It's worth the effort. What you need to do is keep a focus on the end goal - a new life as a truly joyful person.
Be forewarned though, once you've asked God to start the process, he's not going to quit, no matter how much you whine when thing get stinky down in the dump. Learn to plug your nose and keep at it. Someday you'll have a beautiful, sweet smelling flower garden.
Friday, August 26, 2011
A Restore File
Isn't it amazing how difficult life gets with technology? We always think about things being easier than they were even fifty years ago but sometimes they get harder, especially when technology goes awry. Computers are both the bane of my existence and what makes my current 'career' possible. Using my buddy InDesign, I can lay out books with much more ease then old Ben Franklin ever dreamt of (and he was quite a dreamer), but when the computer crashes, life becomes so hard!
I've spent the last two days trying to keep up with the things I need to do while I recovered from the ravages of a possessed computer. Thankfully I do very good backups these days. In fact, I'm almost compulsive about it. As long as there were no gremlins getting their hot little hands into things while I was backing up, I haven't lost even one word of my work. And I've literally written hundreds of thousands of words.
While I backup my files, I haven't yet figured out how to do that restore thing on the computer, if it's even still possible with the new operating systems. (There are so many features of the old system that I liked that are now gone. It would figure that they would think things that made working on the computer easier would be unwanted features. They 'improved' the ease of copying and moving files right out of existence!) If I can figure out that restore thing, I won't have as much trouble reloading programs next time my computer needs surgery.
On the other hand, isn't it just like life to have a hard time restoring things after they go south? When we sin, there isn't a 'restore file' that will allow us to wipe out all our troubles and start over like nothing ever happened. Just like with a computer without a restore file, we have to painstakingly find all the things that need to be set right. It can take a long time. Even when you think you've handled everything, something else pops up that you're missing, weeks or even months later.
Computer problems can be greatly reduced with a judicious use of time and resources. Virus checkers, spyware killers and system optimizing will help you keep thing operating well for a long time. In life, regular prayer, bible study and fellowship with other believers will keep you growing and much safer from the attacks of the malicious unseen forces who want to mess up your life just because they can.
I don't know about you, but I've certainly learned that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. I'm glad that my crashes aren't as spectacular as they used to be. But if something does happen and my whole life crashes like a six year old computer, even though I may have to deal with consequences, God does have a restore file that will make me new again.
I've spent the last two days trying to keep up with the things I need to do while I recovered from the ravages of a possessed computer. Thankfully I do very good backups these days. In fact, I'm almost compulsive about it. As long as there were no gremlins getting their hot little hands into things while I was backing up, I haven't lost even one word of my work. And I've literally written hundreds of thousands of words.
While I backup my files, I haven't yet figured out how to do that restore thing on the computer, if it's even still possible with the new operating systems. (There are so many features of the old system that I liked that are now gone. It would figure that they would think things that made working on the computer easier would be unwanted features. They 'improved' the ease of copying and moving files right out of existence!) If I can figure out that restore thing, I won't have as much trouble reloading programs next time my computer needs surgery.
On the other hand, isn't it just like life to have a hard time restoring things after they go south? When we sin, there isn't a 'restore file' that will allow us to wipe out all our troubles and start over like nothing ever happened. Just like with a computer without a restore file, we have to painstakingly find all the things that need to be set right. It can take a long time. Even when you think you've handled everything, something else pops up that you're missing, weeks or even months later.
Computer problems can be greatly reduced with a judicious use of time and resources. Virus checkers, spyware killers and system optimizing will help you keep thing operating well for a long time. In life, regular prayer, bible study and fellowship with other believers will keep you growing and much safer from the attacks of the malicious unseen forces who want to mess up your life just because they can.
I don't know about you, but I've certainly learned that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. I'm glad that my crashes aren't as spectacular as they used to be. But if something does happen and my whole life crashes like a six year old computer, even though I may have to deal with consequences, God does have a restore file that will make me new again.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
The Joy of Writing
I love being a writer! It's got to be the coolest job ever. One of the neatest things about it is that none of my dreams need ever be wasted.
You remember how when you were a kid, you dreamed all kinds of stuff? You'd travel, be a fireman, a soldier, a cowboy, whatever. You dreamed so many things (and hopefully still do) that you couldn't possibly do them all.
I will never accomplish all my dreams. There are just too many of them. But now my dreams get new life in my books. Sometimes something happens, either in my life or in the world at large, that really bugs me. I get to take that event, wonder what could have happened if someone who was really in tune with God was there to change the outcome, then I get to make it happen in a story.
I believe that as Christians we can affect the world around us in a very real way. Part of it is just being open to whatever wonders God wants to unfold in your life. Part of it is becoming aware of ways that God can work through you.
So, last year there was a story (or two or three) about a bank robbery and I wondered what if God had put someone in the bank who would bring God's presence to the situation? So I wrote that what if. What if God put someone in a position to stop a domestic terrorist-type attack? What if God asked someone to witness to a serial rapist? What if God used a young man to make an abusive womanizer realize he wasn't much of a man?
What could you do with your life if you opened it up to God's possibilities? Whose life could you save if you were a willing vessel? It isn't necessarily going to be something big and newsworthy like stopping a school shooting, but I guarantee you this - if you open yourself to God's possibilities, at some point in time he will use you to affect a potentially ugly situation. If you let him, God will show you how to write a story that will glorify him.
You remember how when you were a kid, you dreamed all kinds of stuff? You'd travel, be a fireman, a soldier, a cowboy, whatever. You dreamed so many things (and hopefully still do) that you couldn't possibly do them all.
I will never accomplish all my dreams. There are just too many of them. But now my dreams get new life in my books. Sometimes something happens, either in my life or in the world at large, that really bugs me. I get to take that event, wonder what could have happened if someone who was really in tune with God was there to change the outcome, then I get to make it happen in a story.
I believe that as Christians we can affect the world around us in a very real way. Part of it is just being open to whatever wonders God wants to unfold in your life. Part of it is becoming aware of ways that God can work through you.
So, last year there was a story (or two or three) about a bank robbery and I wondered what if God had put someone in the bank who would bring God's presence to the situation? So I wrote that what if. What if God put someone in a position to stop a domestic terrorist-type attack? What if God asked someone to witness to a serial rapist? What if God used a young man to make an abusive womanizer realize he wasn't much of a man?
What could you do with your life if you opened it up to God's possibilities? Whose life could you save if you were a willing vessel? It isn't necessarily going to be something big and newsworthy like stopping a school shooting, but I guarantee you this - if you open yourself to God's possibilities, at some point in time he will use you to affect a potentially ugly situation. If you let him, God will show you how to write a story that will glorify him.
Friday, August 19, 2011
Angry with God
I don't know if you've ever been angry with God or not, but I'll confess that I have. It's not a matter of not believing in him anymore. I knew he was God, but I just didn't like the way he did things.
Some of my characters get angry with God too. At the beginning of Seasons of Change, Heather was angry at God because of all the bad things that had happened to her and her family. She still loved God but she wasn't talking to him. She doesn't actively disbelieve his goodness, but she does let him know she's mad at him.
In A Cord of Three, Ted is angry at God, also because of some bad things that happened to him and his family. However, he's decided he doesn't love God and that God doesn't love him.
Of course, through the events in their respective books, both Heather and Ted begin to get past their anger. When Ted's approaching that point of letting go of the past, he tells his dad he's not a godly man. His dad points out that Job complained about God, accused God of picking on him and told him in no uncertain terms that he wasn't being fair to Job. God never told anyone that Job was unrighteous. In fact, he said Job was righteous, even after getting angry at God.
Ted asks, "Are you saying it's okay to be angry at God?"
His dad says, "That depends on what you mean by 'okay' Son. If you mean okay as in it's a good place to be, then no, it's not okay. If you mean okay as in God isn't going to quit loving you because you're angry, then yeah, it's okay to be angry. The key is to get to the place where you're finally willing to hear God reassure you that he is God and that he knows what he's doing."
When you get angry with God, do you tell him you're angry and let him gently show you the truth, or do you pout and sulk and try to pretend like he won't know anything's up if you don't say anything (like we sometimes do with our earthly parents)?
You may as well get it off your chest. God knows exactly what you're thinking, but as long as you hold onto it, he can't fully deal with it. When you trust him enough to tell him you're angry, you take a huge step forward in your spiritual 'IQ.'
The next time you start to feel angry at God, why not try telling him so? The sooner you unload that anger, the more likely you are to sin not. Don't keep it. Give it to God where it belongs.
Some of my characters get angry with God too. At the beginning of Seasons of Change, Heather was angry at God because of all the bad things that had happened to her and her family. She still loved God but she wasn't talking to him. She doesn't actively disbelieve his goodness, but she does let him know she's mad at him.
In A Cord of Three, Ted is angry at God, also because of some bad things that happened to him and his family. However, he's decided he doesn't love God and that God doesn't love him.
Of course, through the events in their respective books, both Heather and Ted begin to get past their anger. When Ted's approaching that point of letting go of the past, he tells his dad he's not a godly man. His dad points out that Job complained about God, accused God of picking on him and told him in no uncertain terms that he wasn't being fair to Job. God never told anyone that Job was unrighteous. In fact, he said Job was righteous, even after getting angry at God.
Ted asks, "Are you saying it's okay to be angry at God?"
His dad says, "That depends on what you mean by 'okay' Son. If you mean okay as in it's a good place to be, then no, it's not okay. If you mean okay as in God isn't going to quit loving you because you're angry, then yeah, it's okay to be angry. The key is to get to the place where you're finally willing to hear God reassure you that he is God and that he knows what he's doing."
When you get angry with God, do you tell him you're angry and let him gently show you the truth, or do you pout and sulk and try to pretend like he won't know anything's up if you don't say anything (like we sometimes do with our earthly parents)?
You may as well get it off your chest. God knows exactly what you're thinking, but as long as you hold onto it, he can't fully deal with it. When you trust him enough to tell him you're angry, you take a huge step forward in your spiritual 'IQ.'
The next time you start to feel angry at God, why not try telling him so? The sooner you unload that anger, the more likely you are to sin not. Don't keep it. Give it to God where it belongs.
Thursday, August 18, 2011
On Doubts and The Truth
In my book The Blessed Winter, Greg, the central character of The Shepherd Series who's the pillar of faith for his family, doubts himself and his calling from the Lord. Without revealing details in case someone who's reading this hasn't read the book and wants to, I feel the need to explore something he says during his time of doubt.
"It's me who's weak and wrong, not God. What if I've been wrong about me all along? What if everything I've ever believed I heard from God wasn't from him at all but was my own selfish desire? ... What if I'm stubborn, selfish and self-righteous? And if I don't know how to hear God's voice after twenty years as a Christian ... If I've been wrong, then I don't know how to hear God so I'm not going to know when he speaks to me as he tries to change me. ... So this is it. This is all I get to be, the messed up screwball with no past and no future. What good am I to anyone?"
I wonder sometimes how many Christians, even Billy-Graham-like 'pillars of the faith,' sometimes feel this way.
Curiously, I think that maybe only those who do know the Lord will question themselves enough to doubt like this. In my experience, those who are stubborn, selfish and self-righteous never doubt themselves! They 'know' that they know the Lord better than anyone else.
It isn't the doubts that are the problem, it's what you do with them. A few chapters later, Greg tells one of his friends: "In everything God loves us and he goes with us. Nothing we do can destroy his love for us, nothing we go through makes him leave us. We have to hold our feelings up to that truth and bring them in line with it rather than trying to rewrite the truth based on our feelings."
Feelings can lie to us, tell us things about ourselves that aren't true. God himself has said that you are of great value to him. Even if you have messed up, he's going to redeem that, turn it around to his glory.
So when you have doubts about yourself and your calling from the Lord, remember what you know about God. Write yourself a psalm listing the ways God has already shown his love for you and his calling on you. Don't just include the wonderful things of the bible, include the wonderful personal experiences that you've had. Confront your doubts with the Truth. Let that Truth reveal any legitimate issues that you need to face and work with God to fix them, but never, ever embrace doubt about your usefulness to God and his kingdom. If you are his child, you definitely have a place in his plan.
"It's me who's weak and wrong, not God. What if I've been wrong about me all along? What if everything I've ever believed I heard from God wasn't from him at all but was my own selfish desire? ... What if I'm stubborn, selfish and self-righteous? And if I don't know how to hear God's voice after twenty years as a Christian ... If I've been wrong, then I don't know how to hear God so I'm not going to know when he speaks to me as he tries to change me. ... So this is it. This is all I get to be, the messed up screwball with no past and no future. What good am I to anyone?"
I wonder sometimes how many Christians, even Billy-Graham-like 'pillars of the faith,' sometimes feel this way.
Curiously, I think that maybe only those who do know the Lord will question themselves enough to doubt like this. In my experience, those who are stubborn, selfish and self-righteous never doubt themselves! They 'know' that they know the Lord better than anyone else.
It isn't the doubts that are the problem, it's what you do with them. A few chapters later, Greg tells one of his friends: "In everything God loves us and he goes with us. Nothing we do can destroy his love for us, nothing we go through makes him leave us. We have to hold our feelings up to that truth and bring them in line with it rather than trying to rewrite the truth based on our feelings."
Feelings can lie to us, tell us things about ourselves that aren't true. God himself has said that you are of great value to him. Even if you have messed up, he's going to redeem that, turn it around to his glory.
So when you have doubts about yourself and your calling from the Lord, remember what you know about God. Write yourself a psalm listing the ways God has already shown his love for you and his calling on you. Don't just include the wonderful things of the bible, include the wonderful personal experiences that you've had. Confront your doubts with the Truth. Let that Truth reveal any legitimate issues that you need to face and work with God to fix them, but never, ever embrace doubt about your usefulness to God and his kingdom. If you are his child, you definitely have a place in his plan.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Physical, Emotional or Spiritual
We have three basic types of problems that we face in life - physical, emotional or spiritual.
A physical problem would be something like a broken leg. An emotional problem could be a low self-image. A spiritual problem is something like unforgiveness.
Except it's not that simple! I think in actuality this is more accurate:
physical problem = emotional problem = spiritual problem
We've heard a lot about how our physical body is affected by our emotions and our spirit. If you harbor unforgiveness, it can make you physically ill with things like ulcers. If you have a low self-image it might cause things like stress headaches. If you have a broken leg, it can make you miserable and angry. But those things don't necessarily happen. There are plenty people who have physical ailments that don't get them "down" emotionally, and some people are physically healthy while they harbor unforgiveness. But every single physical or emotional problem affects your spirit.
Right now are you frowning or staring thoughtfully at your computer screen? I hope you're doing one or the other because that means I'm challenging you to think about something you haven't thought about before.
What I said was every single physical or emotional problem affects your spirit. Note that I did not say that every physical or emotional problem causes a spiritual problem. That would not be true. My original statement is. Why do I say that? Romans 5:1-5
"Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us."
See how "hope" is a spiritual thing? Where does hope come from? Character, which comes from perseverance, which comes through suffering!
In every kind of suffering, your spirit will be affected. You will either accept the growth toward hope that God wants to use your suffering for and have a spiritual blessings, or you will reject the growth and have a spiritual problem.
You cannot by sheer force of will refuse to let an emotional or physical problem affect your spirit, you can only choose whether the effect will be a blessing or a problem!
If you want to choose the blessing, it's a simple (but not easy) matter of turning to God in trust. Allow him to show you what he wants you to learn and let your character grow.
Or you can snap and growl and bite the hand that blesses you, blaming God for your suffering and watch your problem grow.
Which will you choose, the blessing or the problem?
A physical problem would be something like a broken leg. An emotional problem could be a low self-image. A spiritual problem is something like unforgiveness.
Except it's not that simple! I think in actuality this is more accurate:
physical problem = emotional problem = spiritual problem
We've heard a lot about how our physical body is affected by our emotions and our spirit. If you harbor unforgiveness, it can make you physically ill with things like ulcers. If you have a low self-image it might cause things like stress headaches. If you have a broken leg, it can make you miserable and angry. But those things don't necessarily happen. There are plenty people who have physical ailments that don't get them "down" emotionally, and some people are physically healthy while they harbor unforgiveness. But every single physical or emotional problem affects your spirit.
Right now are you frowning or staring thoughtfully at your computer screen? I hope you're doing one or the other because that means I'm challenging you to think about something you haven't thought about before.
What I said was every single physical or emotional problem affects your spirit. Note that I did not say that every physical or emotional problem causes a spiritual problem. That would not be true. My original statement is. Why do I say that? Romans 5:1-5
"Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us."
See how "hope" is a spiritual thing? Where does hope come from? Character, which comes from perseverance, which comes through suffering!
In every kind of suffering, your spirit will be affected. You will either accept the growth toward hope that God wants to use your suffering for and have a spiritual blessings, or you will reject the growth and have a spiritual problem.
You cannot by sheer force of will refuse to let an emotional or physical problem affect your spirit, you can only choose whether the effect will be a blessing or a problem!
If you want to choose the blessing, it's a simple (but not easy) matter of turning to God in trust. Allow him to show you what he wants you to learn and let your character grow.
Or you can snap and growl and bite the hand that blesses you, blaming God for your suffering and watch your problem grow.
Which will you choose, the blessing or the problem?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)