Single Pringles, I Have Good News!

Two Reese’s cups and a Pepsi. That’s all I had for lunch almost every day in high school. At 120 lbs, I thought I was fat. This was just the beginning of my journey through some major insecurities. I went from hating my body to flaunting it, then straight on to shame and self-loathing. Freshman year, I wore clothing that revealed too much. By junior year, I was wearing clothing that revealed absolutely nothing. Baggy jeans, oversized t-shirts … I didn’t want people to see my body, or the shape of it. I hated myself.

I’ve carried this obsession into my adult life. I gained a lot of weight during my pregnancies and never got rid of it. At one point, I had turned my self-loathing into a love affair with Little Debbie’s and lost control pretty quickly. I have since worked hard to turn a lot of the carnage into muscle, but the scale hasn’t budged in a while. That’s hard.

It’s not just my body image that I obsess about. I rarely leave the house without make-up these days. I used to not wear it at all, in the ultimate act of defiance against humanity. Now, I can’t bring myself to not wear it because I feel really ugly without it. I know it’s a problem. I admitted this obsession to my daughter thinking I was telling her some deep, dark secret about myself and she shrugged her shoulders and said, “Yeah, I know.” I think – I mean worry – about what I look like all the time. I’m single and I worry about being alone after my kids move out, and although I know this single season is God’s time alone with me, I worry it’s void of male interest because I’m abhorrently ugly. If for no other reason than that people are obsessed with straight teeth, and I don’t have a perfect smile. I see a guy I am interested in and put “the face” on because I can’t smile without feeling really self-conscious. I’m sorry to admit that.

It’s not just a carnal obsession with what’s on the outside. I worry that the inside is just as ugly and repulsive. I know who I am and what my heart is capable of feeling. I hear the thoughts inside my head loud and clear. I know myself. I also know this obsession is stupid and sinful. I took it the Lord in prayer a few weeks ago and left it with him. The Holy Spirit shared something with me that liberated me:

“Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting. But a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised” (Proverbs 31:30). I’ve read that many times, but the Holy Spirit mentioned it again the other day and asked me why I would waste so much time worrying about something that is so trivial and momentary.

“Well, because I want to be attractive to a man of God. He has to be attracted first, right?”

Guys, just stick with me. This was a learning moment that sounds so stupid, but I am sharing it just in case there are others out there silently suffering the same obsession.

The Holy Spirit answered me. “You do not want a man to be attracted to something as short-lived as your looks. You can’t hold on to it in your own strength, and it won’t last forever. A man of God will be attracted to so much more than your looks. He’ll see Christ in you and be drawn to the Christ he’s already fallen in love with that lives inside of you and shines through you.”

“And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever increasing glory, which comes from the Lord” (2 Cor. 3:18).

That took a ton of pressure off.

Instead of worrying about all the physical attributes I think a man of God is interested in, I can put all our energies into what I love most: knowing Jesus. As I spend time in prayer and in the Word, basking in His glorious being, I am transformed. That’s a biblical promise!

I used to pray “God, if this guy isn’t godly, let him be repulsed by me.” Turns out, I wasn’t too far from the truth of how this all works. A man of God will be attracted to the Christ in me, while a man of the world will be repulsed, just as a man of the world is repulsed by Christ. Now, though, I don’t have to worry about this whole process of attraction because a man after God’s own heart cannot fail to see the resemblance between me and my Father. I pray that if you have similar thoughts about yourself, you take hold of this truth and let it set you free.

You are God’s Masterpiece

I often date alone. Just me. And when I date myself, my favorite place to go is the art museum. It’s unanimous among the one of us, no vote is necessary and this is where I found myself last Saturday. After dressing to impress (myself) and having a tasty Chick-fil-A lunch with my sister and her family (who showed up unexpectedly outside my left window on the highway), I parted ways and headed into the city solo. I just needed to be alone in a crowd for a while, to hear my heart and listen for the still, small voice of the Holy Spirit. My soul needed to soak in something beautiful, and the art museum brings all of these components together in a very rapturous way.

The paintings are my favorite. Statues take a very close second, but I could look at paintings for hours and never get bored. I’m not a big fan of abstracts, though. It’s the portraits, landscapes and still-lifes. The mimicry of reality. It’s amazing to me how an artist can capture and detail so much of a moment, when so many moments pass me by unnoticed. This wonder inspired me to pull out my notebook and I began to consider the artist.

The artist’s eyes see things for what they really are. Captures things often overlooked in the bustle of living. The artist notices detail in the background and gives as much attention to painting the background as he or she gives to the focal point. Speaking of focal point: the artist knows how to create one. Though painting a moment of life, there’s still this subtle creativity pointing the observer’s attention to what the artist is intentionally conveying. Emotions, for instance. Or the intricacies of lace, depicting the frailty of wealth. How variations of light touch a surface, and how brokenness can be beautiful. The vastness of space, depths of emptiness, the many multi-facets of life happening all in the same moment. The artist sees it all, and delicately lays it plain before the observer.

Psalms 139 paints God as an artist. “For you created my inmost being, you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be” (Psalm 139: 13-16).

The Lord himself tells Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart…” (Jeremiah 1:5).

The artist conceptualizes every aspect of the finished product before he or she begins. God did that. He thought about you and I. Who we would become. What we might do in life. Our interests. Our faults. How brokenness might affect us. What we might consider lovely or distasteful. How light and darkness will change us. What facet of life we might choose to focus on; the things that are important to us. Then He spent time passionately crafting us from simple clay into complex beings whose sole purpose is to glorify Him. And somehow, we do. We glorify Him by allowing Him to create a focal point in our life. We glorify Him in the way we handle variations of light and darkness. We glorify Him despite what is going on in the background of the moments He stitches together. “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 2:10).

The Greek word for “masterpiece” is poema. Now He’s speaking my language! For Van Gogh and Monet, theirs was the painting. Beethoven and Mozart created musical masterpieces. Fitzgerald and Doyle crafted stories. God created all of them! And if they are capable of so much, so are we, for we are formed of the same dust in the same hands!

I also considered how intimately the artist must know His work as it materializes from a mere thought to a finished work. As sharers in His work, shouldn’t we also know His works very intimately? How, you ask? By speaking always of it with the Master. By seeking His wisdom in understanding those around us. In asking God to unveil our eyes so we can see things as He does. In order to reach others as Jesus did, we must understand their backgrounds, the darkness they have known, the way light changed their surfaces and how brokenness affected their hearts and minds. We can only know these things through the intimate revelation God gives. Intimacy is not trivial. It’s born over time. Therefore, if we want to be effective for Christ, we must give Him our time and attention. Not thinking of ourselves and how we might benefit at His feet, but looking adoringly at our Lord as we wait for Him to touch us, speak to us and send us in His power to touch the world around us.

Carl Gustav Carus, a German painter and close friend of Goethe, left a piece of wisdom for us to ponder many years later. As I reflect on my relationship with the Lord, I would like to offer it as the formula for this intimacy. “You lose yourself in boundless space … your ego vanishes; you are nothing, God is all.” This boundless space he is referring to is our times in the desert of life. Like Jesus, led by the Spirit into the wilderness, we are brought out away from everything that might hinder our attentions from receiving and left there to wrestle with God. Honore de Balzac once wrote that the desert “is God without mankind.” There, in that unhindered place, we get to know God so intimately. We get to know the discomfort of being alone with Him. If you have never been uncomfortable under the Spirit, I doubt that you have ever been alone with God. It’s so necessary, though, if you want to know His will and remain closely in step with Him. Don’t run away from those moments of lonely dependence on God for companionship. So many of us want to fill that void with another when in reality, that can be times of sweet communion with the Holy Spirit you might otherwise never know. Bask in the presence of God there in the secret place. Then you can do the good works God prepared for you beforehand with all the wisdom and knowledge you need to succeed as God intended, and bring great glory to His name. As His masterpiece.

 

Awakening Love

“I will get up and go about the city … I will search for the one my heart loves. (3:2)”

From the mouth of a woman in love, Solomon’s Shulamite admits her own weakness: her desire. Without realizing it, she is driven along by desire to chase a sight of the man she loves. It’s the middle of the night! I just love the Song of Solomon. It’s everything a good love story should be. Two people pursuing one another and confident in each other. Able to trust and not afraid. In fact, do you know what’s missing in the Songs of Solomon? Indication of insecurities. I know why too. Check out this verse that echoes throughout: “Daughters of Jerusalem, I charge you, do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires.” At this very moment, every part of me is screaming, “it’s so hard not too!”

It’s electric. How do you stop a current so strong when it’s pulsing through every part of you? How do you keep passion at bay when it’s literally grasping for a spark to ignite it? And then, once it’s been ignited, how do you keep it to yourself? I wonder, how often do we do this to ourselves? How often do we awaken love and then suffer the insecurities that come along with our haste? Sometimes, flowing with the stream of our emotions it seems that the desires of our hearts have materialized and we want so badly to reach out and take it. Is that the proper response? Would God have us to wait? Is there a better way than to grab hold of it now?

I look at the advice of the Shulamite, who was completely confident in Solomon’s love for her. She’s not fighting herself. There’s no inner dialogue of fear going on. She’s not afraid of rejection. She trusts that he is as completely engulfed in their love. She boasts of it. Her secret worth our awe: “Do not awaken love until it so desires.”

I have struggled with this verse. Perhaps that’s why I am still entertaining such fears and insecurities in this area of my life. I dissected it today, and here’s what I see: The word “it” here refers to “love”, right? First John 4:8 says “…God is love.” Therefore, we are admonished to not awaken love until God desires. The Shulamite is no idiot. She knows the heart of a woman well. One minute, she’s in bed, the next, she is aimlessly wondering the streets looking for her man, trying to catch his eye. She has a longing for him that is steering her. Basically, what she’s saying to us is, “Get it under control, girl. Wait on God!” Our insecurities are a direct result of chasing after things that the Lord never intended for us. Relationships come and go and leave these nasty marks on our hearts. And then, when the guy comes along who intends to sweep us off our feet, we struggle to allow him to pursue us. Once love has truly been awakened, we hesitate.

I don’t know how many times I have looked to Heaven and cried, “Daddy, save me!” And He just looks at me and smiles in pity. “Daughter, can you trust me?” And that’s the problem. My insecurities even mar my relationship with my Heavenly Father. No matter what comes out of my mouth, the truth is that if I can’t wait for Him to put a man in my life who is led by His spirit to love me, I clearly do not trust Him in this. Dear God, how I want to.

Father,
You do not lie and you have spoken sweet blessings and promises into my heart. Help me not to pursue them, but to pursue you and allow your gifts and blessings to overtake me. Lord, help me to trust your Spirit to bring this man, and help me to not entertain my own fears and insecurities. I want to be secure in his love, just like I am secure in yours. Once again, I ask you to hold my heart until he asks you for it. And may there be no striving as you awaken this love in us. Thank you, Daddy, for your word which brings life. I love you for it.

PS. Here’s a little nugget for the weary women who don’t think men pursue: “I went down to the grove of nut trees to look at the new growth in the valley … Before I realized it, my desire set me among the royal chariots of my people. 6:11-12)” Straight from the mouth of Solomon, he was also driven by desire at times. Let God do His thing and trust Him in it!

Date Night

A night of divine inspiration, a night with The Father’s blessing. A date night with The One I married, my Jesus. It doesn’t happen often. After all, I have two kids who are always here with me. But it seems as they get older and the distance between us gradually increases with their natural desire for autonomy drawing them steadily farther from my arms, I find myself alone more often. Last night, my daughter went to her friend’s, my son to his and I realized I had been blessed with time to catch up on my relationship with Christ.

My first impulse is to fill the void: call up a friend, make my way to a crowded place and wile away the hours until morning with loads of espresso. But yesterday evening, I sensed a purpose in my night. It was time to reignite the passion between us. After a quick nap, I got up and got ready for the evening. I put on my best, grabbed Jesus: The One and Only by Beth Moore and headed out the door for dinner and a movie.

After going to the theater and picking up a ticket for the late viewing of Oz, the Great and Powerful, I headed to my favorite restaurant for a delicious Mexican dinner. The moment I got there, a dear couple that I go to church with spotted me and motioned me over. They were kind enough to ask if I wanted to join them, and though I really didn’t want to put them off, I had a purpose to my evening that could not be forfeited in exchange for good conversation. I begged them to forgive me for putting them off, and went to sit down with my Love. I basked in His presence through dinner, learning more of Him as I read a few chapters of my book. After dinner, I grabbed an espresso to get me through the movie and headed over to the theater, still early for my movie. I sat in the lobby and listened to His sweet voice speak to me through the pages of the book, revealing more and more of himself as I waited for the movie to start.

After the movie, I went home and laid in bed for an hour or so, still talking to Him. Finally, I went to bed in the wee hours of the morning, my heart filled with peace and a renewed delight in Christ. Date nights are so wonderful!