Maybe He could just waive His hands

Warren, Axl and I had dinner at an Italian restaurant one day last week, all of us, all THREE of us ate off the menu, no smuggled in chicken nuggets involved. This one sentence alone is worthy of an entire post of praise. We experienced a small miracle in our family and an answer to long-term prayer. Family dinners aren’t always spiritual experiences, but that night was delightful.

Axl is our five-year-old little boy and while he has good five-year-old boy manners, he doesn’t always meet the mommy standard. So, once again, I reminded him that if someone, in this case the lovely waitress, speaks to him he should drop everything, look at them, and speak back. Exasperated, I said, “What can I do to help you remember this? Do you need to go to bed early, lose a toy? What would help you?” Axl’s very serious reply was, “I don’t know, maybe you could just waive your hands to remind me.” At which point, he demonstrated the very lively hand motions that would no doubt capture his attention and not so subtly say, “Hey, this is one of those times when I need you to do the right thing.” I tried to explain the fullness of my meaning through my laughter, but the moment had passed.

I think Axl was really on to something. Wouldn’t it be so nice if Heavenly hands could just reach down and waive back and forth to get our attention? “Hey, this person needs to hear about My forgiveness today.” “Hey, this is one of those times when people are taking note of your reaction – Do the right thing.” Or “Hey, this is the way to go, turn now.” The thing is, while we may not see lively hand motions from above, the Holy Spirit is the internal equivalent. The Bible teaches that He leads (Luke 4:1), empowers (Acts 1:8), and instructs (Acts 1:2) us.

One of my favorite verses, Isaiah 30:21 says, “Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, ‘This is the way; walk in it.’” I know that this reality is available to me, but I don’t always take advantage of it. The reasons are numerous, but they all lead back to my lifeline of prayer. When we accept Christ as our savior, we are indwelt with the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:37-39). We have all of Him that we are ever going to get, the only variable is how much of us is He going to get. We have to allow ourselves to be close enough to Him, so that when He whispers in our ear, “This one. She needs to hear about Me.”, we are in tune enough to recognize His voice and trust that He’s waving His Heavenly hands. A very dear friend and mentor once told me that it resembled phone conversations with a friend. If you speak to someone often, you recognize the voice right away. If you don’t speak to them often, their voice is unfamiliar and strange. The same is true with the Holy Spirit.

Over the years, I’ve struggled with prayer. Sometimes it just plain stresses me out. I start to pray for the struggles in my own life, then the needs of my family, this country, this world, and I get overwhelmed and then, I quit. I think, God knows the needs; He doesn’t need me to point them out, and with that I can avoid the stress. The Bible’s instruction contradicts that line of reasoning. Yes, God does know the needs, and while He doesn’t need me to point them out He has called, commanded me as a believer to bring them to Him, to leave the stress at His feet (2 Chronicles 7:14, Mark 11:23-35). Communication is the key to any great relationship, the relationship we have with Jesus is no different.

Axl was right, waiving hands are an effective prompt to capture someone’s attention, but it’s the internal still small voice of God that believers rely on for direction. In the same way Axl will mature and learn to rely less on parental prompts, believers grow and mature in their faith, recognizing with greater clarity the guidance of the Holy Spirit. 

With much love,

I'll Have What She's Having

Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking, and envying each other. Galatians 5:25-26

Remember that great scene from When Harry Met Sally where Sally, Meg Ryan, is in the deli having lunch with Harry, Billy Crystal, and she very dramatically acts out an – I obviously didn’t think through this – hmmm, all out “ physical peak” (that’s an actual synonym from a real thesaurus).  Then, the lady sitting beside her tells the waiter, “I’ll have what she’s having.”

Do you ever do that? Get a glimpse of someone else’s world and think ohhh, “I’ll have what she’s having.” I know I do. The problem is that we never get the back-story, the real story of what’s behind the beautiful picture. We forget that every well put together life has its messy parts. Take Sally for instance, she appears to be carefree, at the height of physical joy and happiness. As viewers, however, we know that Sally is alone and in the midst of a desperate search to find love and meaning. Her reality is the complete opposite of the glimpse that the lady from the deli witnesses in their brief encounter.

I have a couple of blogs that I check in on periodically, women who are great storytellers and whose humor I can really relate to. A couple of weeks ago I was making the rounds, and I noticed that one of these great blog posts had 38 comments. 38. I wanted 38 comments, and before I knew it, I wanted her blog, her graphics, her ministry, her speaking topics, her followers. “I’ll have what she’s having thank you very much.”

I'm sure that I've mentioned before and will again that I’m pretty very moody, and this is the kind of thing that sends me into a nose dive, tail spin, all things bad kind of a mood. I had a pity party, everyone invited/forced to attend if you live in my house. I knew nothing about this woman’s life, her struggles, or her family, yet I had this vision of her highly successful, wonderful life full of wit and wisdom. Why does God need me when He has her?

Eventually, I snapped back into reality and realized that I had been a blogger for all of 5 minutes. I’d made 3 posts and had told exactly 3 people that a blog with my name attached to it even existed. Of those 3, maybe two could have told you the name and only 1 had ever read a single word that had been written here. I am proud to say that that number has now doubled.

I was at a speaking conference recently, and many of the speakers there talked about each individual’s sphere of influence. I was reminded of that. God has placed me here in this community, in this ministry, to reach the people that He puts in my path. Jeremiah 29:11 says, “I know the plans I have for you…” I want those plans, the plans He has for me, even if that includes a blog with 0 comments, maybe 2 comments, okay 0 comments, but 2 would be nice. 


With much love,


Tonya

Loving the Unlovely

We all know that if you pray for patience you better mean it, because God is going to lovingly try your last nerve. What about praying for humility? Be serious about this one too, because again God is going to lovingly supply you with an opportunity to make a fool of yourself. He knows, like we know, that we learn from experience. I can tell Axl how to ride a bike, but until he experiences it he can't possibly know how to do it. I don't need to point out the obvious correlation between falling off the bike and falling in our attempts to be patient and humble do I? I didn't think so.

Okay, so what about this prayer, "God help me to love like you love." This has been my prayer recently, because like I stated yesterday, I often don't, um honestly that should read, don't often react with love. Of course, I'm a sentimental sap who cries at gymnastics, but I struggle with loving the unlovely. You know the ones who drive slow in the left lane, mumble at the drive thru, and text while they're walking. While these things may make the most loving person frustrated, they send me into a tirade causing my heart to blacken and my mouth to light up. Seriously, waiter's, clerks, old ladies and small children (I kid with the last two...kind of) they don't see a lot of Jesus in me. My prayer has been that my mouth and my attitude would become so disgusting to me that I would have no choice but to respond differently, to respond with love. Now, maybe you all knew this and didn't share it with me (we'll deal with that later) or maybe you too had no idea that when you pray this prayer God will lovingly bring every unlovely person within a 10 mile radius into your path on a daily basis.

Now, what do you do with such a warning? My advice - completely disregard it. Be prepared, but don't let it stand in your way of seeking to love others like He does. One amazing thing that has happened over the last few week is that I have become very aware of all the times that I am being unlovely to my Jesus throughout the day. I remember that He is loving me in the midst of it and it reminds me that if He, perfect, holy, God can love me while engaging in the activities that sent Him to a cross then I can certainly love the lady driving 5 miles UNDER the speed limit making me 6 minutes late to the encounter I have planned with the man at Burger King who will struggle to hear me say "Whopper."

In giving me so many opportunities to practice loving more like Him, I have had some successes. Warren and Axl are probably sad that they missed them...I kid I kid. My attitude and my mouth are becoming disgusting to me, and my heart is stretching as I give more of it to the Holy Spirit. And like the song says I know that, "He's still working on me, to make me what I ought to be. How loving and patient He must be, 'cause He's still working on me." Thank you Jesus for that.

With much love,

Tonya

Sometimes the Devil Uses Strollers...Wait. Is that appropriate?

Last Monday Axl became a gymnast. He's done t-ball, soccer, and tumbling, but the one thing he's always wanted to try was gymnastics. So, when his first class finally arrived we were so excited that we could have done cartwheels all the way there. That is if either one of us knew how to do cartwheels. When we walked in - late - all the good seats for spectating were taken so I took my position in an inconspicuous corner, sure I was standing, but I could see all the stations. Honestly, I had the best seat space in the house, that is, until daddy with the stroller and no apparent spectator etiquette showed up. So as you can imagine, stroller daddy came and stood right in front of me. I dashed and darted from side to side, but there was no shaking him. He mirrored my every move. He was good. So,while Axl was high flying and propelling his little body into a large pit of foam, I was playing defense, working for every sneak peek of his attempts. I might add that he was quite good, and you have to know that I teared up thinking "I'll remember this day - his first day - when he accepts his first Olympic gold medal." 


As my frustration increased, so did my exaggerated body movements which paled in comparison to my elevated sighs and huffs. The man didn't notice. I looked around. Surely someone else was catching the injustice that was being done here. If I could just make eye contact with someone then I could give them the look. You know the one that says, "Can you believe the nerve of this person?" I always respond, "I'm with ya sista" when I get the look. Where was my person? Who was with me on this? No one. No one else noticed, because they were all sitting quietly in their seats watching their gymnasts - they had arrived on time. At this point, he was stealing my joy and I had gone into the bad place. 


I left there realizing that stroller daddy was a lot like the devil. I know that sounds harsh, but I'm speaking figuratively here, well mostly. He will get in our way, mirror our moves, forcing us to play defense, unless we choose to go on the offense, which I could have very easily done by switching sides of the room. Instead, I chose to stay put, battling toe to toe with a person who had no regard for my well being. One significant difference between stroller daddy and the devil - admittedly there are many - is that the daddy didn't intend to do me harm or to steal my joy, that cannot be said for the devil. Scripture makes it clear that the devil not only means to do me harm, he seeks to steal, kill, and destroy. He is constantly looking for ways to get in my path, blocking my eyes from resting on the Father in the same way this oblivious man was blocking my eyes from Axl. 


I can huff, puff, mope and moan about all the ways the devil seeks to rob me of the peace and joy that I have in the Father or I can equip myself for battle, knowing that I don't have to face him alone. I struggle with this. I am easily agitated and my reactions often times don't reflect my Jesus. My continuing prayer is that Jesus will gently remind me that the devil delights in my playing defense alone. He loves using everyday inconsiderations to mess with me and as a result rob Jesus of the Glory that is rightfully His when I react with love and patience. 


It would just be easier if Jesus could keep all the rude people away from me, but since that's currently not His plan I'm taking more deep breathes, reflecting often on James 1:19-27 , and taking a book to gymnastics tonight.


With much love,


Tonya