An Angry Dream

Last night I was studying the original Greek for this text and looking up verses trying to find another angle to write about. The best biblical translation I found was “is not easily provoked”. But more in depth study brought me to an interesting definition for this Greek word “provoke”. It has more feeling to it than just being annoyed or impatient. The word itself was defined like this: to arouse anger, provoke, irritate, to incite ("jab") someone and stimulate their feelings, become emotionally provoked (upset, roused to anger), getting to someone, spurring someone to action.

Spurring someone to action. Our anger does spur us into action, doesn’t it? Anger can make us want to punch something, yell loudly, leave, or if you're like me, you’ll cry (and maybe do those other things too.)

I wrote down all the things I studied, but then walked away and asked God to give me some kind of revelation about what it means that Love is Not Easily Angered. Here’s what happened:

I had one of those dreams that was so intense I still believed it to be true even after I woke up.  In my dream, my husband was being a total jerk. My children and I were being attacked and instead of helping us, he acted like I was overreacting. We kept fighting and fighting and he was just so obviously wrong. I was furious. I had every right to be. I might have even punched him in the face. I at least thought about it. I started wondering what was wrong with him. Eventually, I took our kids and left, and told him I didn’t want to hear from him until he was ready to apologize.

At this point I half woke up.  I was so angry with him because it felt so real, I refused to roll over to hug him and let the relief of reality pour in. I decided to stay angry, and stay where I was in bed with my back to him. Somehow I was back in the dream, right where I had left him, and the ground began to make metallic clinking sounds. I looked down to see what it was, and realized... I was in chains.

God spoke immediately to my heart: “THIS IS THE RESULT OF CHOOSING ANGER.”

WHOA. I had every right to be angry, believe me, if I went into the details of the dream, you would agree. I was in the right. I could even go so far as to say I was “righteous.” My righteous anger was in full gear, protecting my children and everything that was good in the world. But when I decided to WALK in anger, instead of love, I found myself immediately in chains.

The bible says, “in your anger, do not sin.” (Ephesians 4:26) The actual emotion of anger itself is not a sin. It’s okay to be mad. It’s okay to be angry when someone hurts you. Even Jesus was angry a few times. But what are you going to do with it? You have a choice to make, to act in your anger and pain, or to act in Love. God allows us this choice, because without choice, there would be no true love. If we choose incorrectly, we set out to punish the person who caused our pain, but instead, we punish ourselves. We lock ourselves into chains that immobilize us and keep us living in fear, far from love.

I do NOT want to live in chains. The good news is that God doesn’t want me to either.

He’s rooting for me. He’s rooting for you. He’s there to show us how to walk in Love, even when we’re hurt and angry.

This is tough. It goes against our human nature. There is a part of us that doesn’t want to be taken advantage of, or to let things go, or to forgive. We believe that if we do, we’ll be teaching people they can constantly sin against us. If someone hurts me, I have to punish them, rebuke them, convict them so that they learn not to do it anymore. We fear that if we love people the way God calls us to, our lives will be worse and we’ll be in constant pain. So we do not love, because…we fear those things.

The reason we believe this is because, I think, it’s partly true. BUT God calls us to walk this way anyway. Think about it. Jesus could have lived differently on earth. He could have followed the law like the Pharisees instead of following the Love of the Father. But He chose love. He understood the HEART of the law, because He understood the Father, and He walked according to what the law was actually about...Love. This drove the religious people crazy. He chose Love, so He suffered and died for it.

It’s possible that some of our choosing Love may actually cause us pain. We may suffer for it. But I’m certain in the New Testament Jesus says a few times that we will need to take up our own cross. He promises some tough stuff for those who walk in the truth, doesn’t He?

The other side of it is that, this fear isn’t based entirely on truth. We can not “convict” other people for the pain they cause us. Only the Holy Spirit can convict a heart. When we think we’re “convicting” or “helping”, usually we’re rebuking and judging. Mostly, this pushes someone farther away, because we’re not being loving, and they know it. So in actuality, the only way to stop this vicious cycle is by loving someone, praying for them, and allowing the Holy Spirit to do the work in their hearts that will show them how to love better. Eventually they may love you in such a way that it doesn’t hurt anymore.

We are afraid that when the bible says "Love COVERS sin" (also called grace), it means that "Love ACCEPTS sin" (also called tolerance), but this is NOT the case. Accepting sin and saying it's okay based on a “tolerance” outlook is not the same as covering sin based in love. We’ll talk more about this next week.

We’ve talked about fear. We know we need to choose to live in love and not fear. James gave us a really great way to walk in this when he said in his letter, “perfect love casts out all fear.” If I take up my cross, and give up all my “rights” and start walking in love, my fear of being hurt and taken advantage of will start to fade away. If I really walk in love, I won’t be able to walk in fear. I’ll have to let it all go, because I’ve chosen the Way of Love, and Love casts out fear. Then, when I'm really loving God and those around me, I might encourage them to do the same.

**I feel the need to point out that if you're in an abusive situation, I'm not encouraging you to cover someone else's sin to the point of your physical detriment. You can love and give grace from a distance when safety is at stake.**

Week 8: Love is Not Easily Angered

This is an interesting one. Maybe you don’t find yourself to be a very angry person or at least you’re not ‘quick to anger’. But there is another translation you may have read: Love is not 'quick to offense' or ‘easily offended’. I am brought back to Week 6 “Love is Not Rude” because this is the other side of being offended. ‘Love is Not Rude’ means that if I love, I shouldn’t be doing inappropriate or offensive things. I know, trust me, I’m trying. But on the other hand, it also means that I won’t be easily offended by rude and inappropriate things people do. Right?

I wish everyone loved me with this love, because I’m so rude and inappropriate and try so hard not to be. I choose to believe that God is changing my heart, and that there is no condemnation in Christ Jesus, so He is shaping my heart in His perfect love so that eventually I will never offend or hurt anyone. But until then, will you love me with the love that covers my imperfections? Will you love me so much that when I do something offensive, you stop and think about what I meant, or how I could have said it differently, or think about the fact that maybe I truly didn’t know it was offensive? In Week 6, we talked about how if you don’t know something is offensive, it’s not unloving to do it.  But if you KNOW it’s offensive and do it anyway, THAT is unloving. (Remember men judge the actions, but God judges the heart.) So if I do something that hurts your feelings, but I honestly didn’t know, your love actually needs to cover me and be stronger than your hurt. I’m NOT saying your hurt doesn’t matter. I know it does! I am always so sorry when I’ve offended someone. I DO NOT want to hurt you! Your pain is real and totally valid. But sometimes, our love for others has to be greater than the pain they cause us. I’m not talking about sticking around with an abusive person. I’m talking about not being easily offended by things that rub you the wrong way.

I’m speaking from the perspective of the offender here because typically this is the way it goes for me. It’s not that I’m never offended, I am OCCASIONALLY on the defense of this. When I am, I really try to think about it and give the other person the benefit of the doubt. What did they mean when they said that? Were they just trying to be funny? Did they know that would hurt my feelings? Usually, I can find a valid reason to not be mad at that person. I can chalk it up to different personality, different communication style, etc. But once in a while, I honestly will think you’ve done something purposefully to hurt my feelings, and then I may be offended.

Wouldn’t it be great if we all stopped doing things that hurt other people?

Absolutely!  (I think that’s why Week 6 comes first, it’s better to just not offend people.)

But wouldn’t it also be great if we stopped being offended or angry at the things other people do?

We find this problem heightened in the church. We’re supposed to love each other right? Jesus says the world will know we’re His disciples by our love for each other. The 6th step is to not be a jerk (Week 6), but if I AM a jerk, how many times should you forgive me? Up to 7 times? Remember when Peter asks Jesus this question and Jesus shakes his head and says something like, “dude, not 7 times! Try 70 times 7!” Meaning, don’t count the amount of times, just let it go.

Must I insert here the famous song from Frozen “Let it Go”?

A very wise man once taught in our church about being easily offended. He said to let an offense roll off you “like water off a duck’s back”. If you’re an established FOH member, you’ll remember this teaching by these simple words: “quack, quack”.

Quack, quack, like water off a duck’s back. People are going to be stupid. They’re going to offend you, hurt your feelings, and even be inappropriate and rude. It’s not loving of them, so you have every worldly right to be offended. But do you know what God says? God says love is not easily angered or easily offended. So do you have every spiritual right to be offended? Sometimes, yes. But most of the time, let’s be honest…No. If we really loved each other, we’d see past imperfections, focusing on the good, and loving anyway.

I’m sure you can list my imperfections. I can probably list yours. But our relationships are only going to work if we focus on the good in each other. When my husband does something that drives me crazy, I remind myself of all the wonderful things he does. I do this because I LOVE HIM. And since we’re all supposed to love each other, we should be doing this for EVERYONE. Does this mean never pointing out a fault? Not necessarily. If you really love me and bring something to my attention that I did wrong, I will try to listen to it and take it to heart. But if you bring something to me that I did wrong because you’re angry with me, how do you think I’ll react? Probably not great. Speaking truth is important, but it’s completely useless (like a clanging symbol) unless I’m speaking the truth IN LOVE. 

This week, let’s look at areas where we’re easily angered or offended. Let’s forgive people who offend us. And please keep in mind, that others may still be working on Week 6 and allowing God to work in their hearts so that they offend less. Please remember when I do something rude that I really love you, and am trying to love you the way God commands me to. And then when you’re offended by me, I’ll remember that you love me, and I’ll forgive you for not covering my faults.

Why God-Seeking is the only way that works

I’ve been doing a lot of soul-searching lately. Partly because of this 15 Weeks to Love campaign, but also partly because, well, I’m a woman. I have questions running through the back of my mind like, “what do I want out of life?” and “what will make me happy?” These questions can have positive impacts on our lives, but let’s face it, they are the epitome of self-seeking. It can’t be a coincidence that I find myself struggling with them this week. The problem is, I really can’t answer the questions, so I find myself getting depressed and sinking down into myself. "I don’t even know what I want?!" (typical woman). I can think of a handful of areas I may have pursued in life if I hadn’t fallen in love and had crazy-cool kids. I may have been a missionary in Africa, I may have pursued singing and song-writing, I may have pursued my interest for language and would be able to speak fluently in several languages by now. Being married and having kids didn’t keep me from these things, I WANTED to be married and have a family. I’m not sure why I think about what I would have done if I wasn’t. But even if I was able to pursue those things now, with a husband and kids, I’m still not sure they would make me happy.

So last night, I finally decided to ask God to come in and help me with all these thoughts and struggles. When I did, I realized God was showing me that no matter what I choose, I’ll never really be happy or fulfilled unless it’s what God wants for me.  What I TRULY want is more of God and to fulfill His calling and purposes for my life. This is the only way that works.

Let me explain. We know that following our every desire and whim doesn’t actually make us happy. Look at Hollywood. The rich and famous either have or can obtain everything they want but they’re not actually happy. You can’t argue with me on this, we all know it.

But sometimes what we do is swing the pendulum to other side, thinking that if we live for OTHERS (or Others-Seeking), we’ll be truly satisfied. Let me explain why this doesn’t work. When I live to serve others, ignoring my desires in order to help someone else (we call this ‘shoving it down’) my desires tend to get hungrier and hungrier until one day I snap and do something crazy with all the desire I have inside me. Shoving your own desire down or ignoring it does not make it go away. It starves your desire and makes it uncontrollable.

When I seek God with my desires, or when I’m God-seeking, do you know what happens? My desires don’t get shoved down, they get brought to the surface, they get filled with His Spirit, and HIS desires start to take shape in me. My desires become the desires of my Beloved. I don’t have to control them or contain them or push them down, because they are Good and Fulfilling and Satisfying.

Do you see the difference? I can’t ignore my soul-searching questions. Maybe I can for a time by distracting myself with something else. But they’ll keep coming back. And if I keep ignoring them, my once-healthy desire may lead me astray because of its desperation to fulfill itself. But when I bring my questions and desires to God, instead of getting shoved down, they get amplified in such a way that I realize I will never be satisfied unless I’m walking out my desires WITH My Love right beside me.

Being in love may help us understand this concept. I really want to go to Venice someday, really, really, really. But I wouldn’t imagine going by myself, I want to go with the love of my life! The trip would be infinitely better if I went with my husband, enjoying everything together, making beautiful memories, sight-seeing with two perspectives, and getting to taste two meals at each restaurant instead of one. Isn’t it always better when we’re together? If I went by myself, I could still have fun, but there would be a tinge of sadness in each moment that I couldn’t share my joy with someone else.

This is what God does with my desires. When I bring them to God, He seems to actually intensify my desires to show me that they will only be satisfied if I walk them out WITH HIM.

Sometimes this is painful or uncomfortable. I have to be vulnerable and express my heart, I have to allow Him into areas I may have ignored for a long time, or things I may be afraid or ashamed of, but I have to do it. Because, as you can see, God-seeking is the only way that works.

When our service to others is actually selfish

Have you ever found yourself serving someone else or doing a nice deed for someone, and then realize that you actually did it for yourself? (You’ll know if afterwards you feel empty or even disappointed.) Or have you ever received a gift from someone, or had someone do something nice for you, and it seemed weird or out of place? When I analyze these situations, sometimes it’s because the person wanted to help me out of a desire to fill their own needs, not out of an overflow of love for me.

We do this. We serve and serve and get ourselves tired. Why are we tired? Because we’re not serving in love. We’re serving because we’re seeking our own approval, our own accomplishment, our own satisfaction at a job well done.

I hate to break it to you, I hate to break it to myself, but this is self-seeking.

Should I stop feeding the poor? No. Should I stop serving others? No. But at the same time, can I at least look at why I do the things I do?

Sometimes our acts of kindness or thinking of others is actually selfish. Ouch.

Is it better to not serve or think of others? No, I still think it’s better to serve, but be careful. If you get yourself all tired out for God (also known as Christian-burn-out), you’ll end up full of regret, possibly far away from God, and maybe even confused about why people don’t repay all your good deeds.

We see this in the church all the time.

Because we live in fear, not love. We try to follow the Word, do the right thing, serve others, etc, from a place of fear. If we actually loved, we’d serve with a different attitude. We’d be content, at rest, and not constantly searching for the next person to help and rescue and save. We’d be patiently waiting for instructions from God, AND since we’d be resting, we would be free to hear his direction and ready to go when it comes.

I don’t know how not-being-selfish turned into rest. Something which, by the way, God commands for us. It’s even in the 10 commandments. Weird. It’s right in there along with murder, stealing, coveting, adultery….how weird to also command rest. Maybe it’s important.

You would think the opposite of SELF-seeking would be OTHERS-seeking. But it’s not. The opposite of SELF-seeking is GOD-seeking, and there is an infinite amount of rest in that.

Jesus said the greatest commandment is to "love God will all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength." (Luke 10:27) He could have just said love God with your heart, soul, mind and strength, but he repeated himself and added all those extra words because he was emphasizing the point. It was important! He said the second commandment is to "love your neighbor as yourself." So if our main focus and goal is to serve others, I think we’re actually missing a big piece. The only solution to self-seeking is to love God with all our strength, or in other words, be God-seeking, and THEN to love others as ourselves. It’s interesting that He doesn’t tell us to take our love for God and also love others with that same love. He says to love others as we would love ourselves. God is still priority here. So if I’m serving someone else, I really want to look at my heart and ask myself if I’m serving them because I want some kind of recognition, because it seems nice or right, or if I’m serving them because I love God so much!

It’s weird. I know. Go ahead and keep on serving, serving is good, but be aware of your heart. Is your love for God consuming all of your mind and soul and heart and strength? Because that should be priority, and it’s our only way to truly combat selfishness.

Week 7: Love is Not Self-Seeking

I love this word seeking. It’s implying more than just selfishness. The seeking to me implies a constant search, one that is never satisfied. If I’m self-seeking, I’m constantly looking for things to make me happy, to complete me, to fill my needs. I am not content or at peace, instead I need to constantly fill my own desires at every moment. This is selfishness, yes. Putting my own needs first. But there is more here. Sometimes we can excuse selfishness because it’s necessary to life and makes sense. For instance, take the airplane safety drill: you must put on your own oxygen mask before helping others. I find this funny, as if I need to be told in a sure-death scenario to take care of myself before helping someone else. This is one rule I’m sure to follow. I’m positive I’d put my own mask on and get myself ready for impact, and then IF I had time leftover to spare I MIGHT think about the other passengers on the plane. But even then, probably not. I’d most likely think of my family, how much I’LL miss them, how said I WILL BE that I don’t get to live the rest of my life. Right? I’ll be thinking of myself, and if you’re a normal human being, you probably would too.

The Greek word in 1 Corinthians 13:5 has really got me thinking about the word seeking. The actual word “zeteo” is not only I seek or search for, but also desire, demand and require. That’s interesting. Some people “require” things from you and it makes you feel uncomfortable. Sometimes they demand. Sometimes we require people to treat us a certain way, or even demand it. The definition of the word is this: to seek by inquiring; to investigate, to reach a binding resolution; to search, "getting to the bottom of a matter.” It’s kind of like not giving up until you get what you want. And in this case, the “what you want” is something for yourself, for your own gain or pleasure. There is a strong amount of effort shown here, it’s a seeking, a striving, a continual trying to obtain “the things of its own”.

We’re all basically selfish. We know that. If you don’t know it, you’re probably not a parent. But someday if you ARE a parent, you will find out how selfish you are. Recently a good friend of mine had a baby and blogged about her discovery in this area. Check it out. I love it because she’s a really practical and compassionate person. So she knew what it was going to be like, and it still came as a shock. It always does.

We’re born selfish, and there are probably some scientific reasons for this, like in order to stay alive and survive we need these instincts. A baby pretty much needs to cry to inform you of all of its needs (and then some). This is definitely self-seeking. They usually don’t stop until you’ve given them what they need. But this is important to their well-being. If they never cried, we may not know when to feed them, or when to stop feeding them. You get the idea. There is an amount of self-seeking that is healthy, like eating when you’re hungry, or drinking when you’re thirsty, otherwise, you’ll die.

But this doesn’t excuse all the rest of our selfishness. You know, the other 99.999% of the times we’re self-seeking. I would say for most of us in America, all of our basic needs are being met on a daily basis. We aren’t usually going hungry (skipping a meal once in a while because of too much work does not count), most of us have shelter and beds and transportation and healthy water and a whole plethora of other stuff on top of this list that we think we need but don’t really need in order to survive. 

I don’t think Paul is saying “Love doesn’t eat when it’s hungry”. I think Paul is talking about something much deeper and more meaningful. He’s saying “Love isn’t constantly searching to please its own desires. It’s content, thankful, and it’s calm and peaceful enough to see when others have a need, ready to be able to fill that need if God desires Love to do so.” Love is not consumed with itself. It’s not consumed with getting enough done in the day so that it feels accomplished, it’s not consumed with making as much money as possible, it’s not consumed with making sure it eats better than everyone else from fear of cancer, it’s not consumed with plans for the future, worries about tomorrow, events and gatherings and groups and getting in all those yoga classes because my body isn’t what it used to be. Love is not consumed with anything but loving and pleasing God, therefore it’s ready to be patient, to serve, to rejoice with truth, to not lose faith, to always hope, to always endure because it’s not caught up in all the other stuff that we strive for day after day, moment after moment, that ironically drags us far away from what we really need and want! Love is a movement, love is messy, but love is also At Rest because love is not striving to fulfill itself. And the funny part is, once we stop striving to fulfill ourselves, we’ll actually be in a place where we can be fulfilled. “Cease striving, and know that I am God.” This verse in Colossians says it all. God doesn’t just say “stop worrying”. God also adds “I’m God. You’re not. You can rest now.” Love is Not Self-Seeking because “Love is At Rest.” That’s my goal for this week: to be at rest. Will you join me?

What’s the Big Deal?

I am wondering why Paul felt that the word rude or inappropriate was so important to the list of love attributes. It seems like a small thing, and this week I didn’t have to think about it much, which is saying a lot, since I would tend to consider myself an inappropriate person. For instance, I don’t seem to pick up on normal social cues, which puts me in awkward situations more than I would like. I also seem to cross the line when I’m in a group setting, and just in general, I find being inappropriate quite humorous. With all of that being said, I don’t feel that I struggled this week with being rude. At least, not to your face.

I may not have said the wrong thing or acted unbecomingly, but in my heart, or to my husband, or to my close friends, I may have complained about you. I may have said something rude about you, or thought of something I wish I could tell you because you’re messing it up. I may have even said that you’re not thankful enough for me and all that I do for you. All of those things (although hidden to most) are rude and inappropriate and unbecoming. When I talk about someone, I look bad. I become a gossip and an untrustworthy, un-LOVING person. The exact opposite of a Christ-follower.

So I find myself once again at the place between “acting in love” and “being in love”. How sad would this whole campaign be if it only taught me how to act out love but not to actually love. If I’m only cross-checking my actions and how I’ve affected others, and never actually looked at my heart, what have I gained? I keep coming back to the heart. It has to come from my heart first. But how?

First and foremost, I am praying. I am asking God constantly to change my heart, mold me, shape me, to give me His love. This whole 15 weeks may be in vain if it doesn’t start with His love and grace taking shape within me.

Week 6: Love is Not Rude

Love is not rude, or does not act unbecomingly. In other words it is proper, fitting and appropriate. Maybe this week will help us to understand what it means to ‘speak the truth in love’ (Ephesians 4:15). Speak the truth when it’s fitting or appropriate, not necessarily any time I want to spit out the harsh truth. Love in such a way that brings you and others honor, not shame. When I say something that hurts someone else (even though it may be true), it brings shame to my life. I look bad. I look judgmental. AND I make God look bad. But when I act truly loving, God honors me and I show God’s glory in my life.

Love does not seek to cause problems or to belittle others. Love chooses appropriate actions and responses that HELP others. I LOVE the word chooses. Love is a choice. Love is not how we feel (although sometimes we do feel love) but love goes deeper.  Love is a constant choosing to love another person, which is why we make vows on our wedding day. We are vowing to love our spouse even when we don’t feel love towards them. We are vowing to make the choices that love, protect, honor, and encourage our spouse even when they don’t deserve it. We are vowing that we will make the CHOICE to love, in richer or poorer, sickness or health, or whatever else life throws our way.

The problem I find with rudeness or improper behavior is that it changes culturally and generationally. Something that is inappropriate in Sweden may be culturally normal here. Something that would have caused gasps 50 years ago may be completely acceptable now. So by what basis do we judge our propriety?

Like every other aspect of love, I am learning that it seems to be a matter of the heart. It doesn’t seem to necessarily be about the action, but more about the motive behind the action. For instance the Pharisees followed every law and were completely obedient, but Jesus said their hearts were far from God. He called them a brood of vipers! Their actions were honorable, but their hearts were proud. They weren’t following the law out of their love for God or others, they were following the law because they thought they were better than everyone else and more deserving of honor. This type of heart does not put you in good-standing with God. He seems more concerned with our motives: “People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart." 1 Samuel 16:7

I’m saying all this because, to me, it directly relates to understanding the heart of “Love is not rude.” I might be rude unintentionally in another culture, simply because of my lack of knowledge about that culture. That doesn’t mean I have been unloving. If someone teaches me what is rude and I do it anyway, that is unloving.

I think we can look at it like this. Have you ever heard yourself or someone else say, “I don’t mean to be rude but…” or following up an inappropriate statement with “no offense!” Sometimes we KNOW we’re being rude. Sometimes we know something is inappropriate but we do it anyway. Why? What is our motive? We have to look at the heart. Am I trying to impress you? Am I trying to get you to think I’m funny? Am I being too honest because I actually want to point our your flaws and puff myself up? Am I trying to draw attention to myself?

This week, as I think about behavior that is unbecoming, inappropriate or rude, I want to look at my heart. I want God to show me when I’m thinking of myself more than others.  I want to learn how to be polite, not because I want to be a better person, but because I want to LOVE more. I want to learn how to love, and how to exude Jesus and the Love of my Father so that it is attractive to others. I think the point here is that being rude or inappropriate is really unattractive, and DOES NOT bring others into the Love of Christ. It turns them AWAY from you, and the miracle of the Good News that you carry every day. We want to draw people in to this Gift, this Love, not turn them away or put a bad taste in their mouth...which is exactly what Rudeness does.

Pride Mountain

This week has made me tired. I have been open to God showing me pride in my own life, because pride tends to blind us to itself. So this week, I was asking God to show me where I struggled with pride but didn’t know it. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I am now officially blown away. I have some serious issues. I need help. I already knew this, trust me, but this week God showed me something that I have struggled with forever. It was already there, and I’ve even seen it before, but this week, God showed me a mountain in my life.

I’m too hard on myself. I have very high standards, and I’m constantly not living up to them. Since I’ve learned a little about grace in my walk, I’ve changed my standards…for everyone else. I can now give grace to others and not desire them to live up to my standards. This was really necessary, trust me, I love so much more deeply now that I’m not afraid of everyone doing everything imperfectly.

But it isn’t ending there. I’ve been in pain this week. I’ve been exhausted. Partly because I’ve been searching and listening and open to God. But mostly because I feel like pride is so deep and so huge that I’ll never stop dealing with it. It is a huge mountain towering in front of me, I see no way through it or around it.

The good part is that God says if I have faith even as small as a mustard seed, I can tell this mountain to throw itself into the sea, and it will.

Not by my might or power, but by God’s Spirit. His will, His grace, His salvation. He isn’t just saving me from death or hell, sometimes He’s also saving me from…me.

We sing a song in our church called Centuries that has a lyric, “What can man to do me?” It’s a beautiful song about resting in God and finding peace in Him alone. As we sang it today, I realized that the “man” in that line is really me. I am my own worst enemy. I am the mountain that stops me from being who I really am. I am the mountain that keeps me from pursuing and chasing the Wild Love I so desire.

But I am also the mustard seed. I can have faith that moves the mountain through Christ in me.

My new prayer is from another song we sing by Ember Days, “Oh, move the mountains, oh, part the seas, Lord. You healed the lepers when they called Your name. You heal the broken, so will You heal me?”

I don’t know how to walk in grace towards myself. It’s something my pride won’t allow me to do, because I like being right and I like being ‘above reproach’ and I want to live to a higher calling because I think that’s what God wants for me. But when I live this way based on pride, I’m missing the entire point of God’s love and grace to His creation.

It’s also not working. This is another realization that has really depressed me this week. Being really hard on myself, beating myself up, and constantly trying to force myself to be better is not actually working. Sure, I can bite my tongue once in a while, but I still say stupid things that hurt people. Sure, I can be a little more patient when there’s a stupid driver in front of me, but I still burst out at my children sometimes. Sure, I can make a list of ways that I’m thankful, but I still analyze my actions constantly and come out six feet under. I don’t want to live like that anymore, because it’s not helping me be a better person. I have to go back to the beginning: live in love, not fear. I have to believe that the more I love God and the more I understand His love for me, the better person I will become. “Seek first the Kingdom of God, and all else will be added to you.” If my desire is to do what God wants me to do, and to understand His love, and to pursue Him, He can help me to see the truth about myself, and to accept who I am - not trying to be more than I am, but resting in the fact that He Is.

We heard at church today that some mountains simply crumble and fall into the sea, but some mountains erode slowly during different storms. I’ve seen God erode my mountain during a storm, but I find myself building it back up again. After all, it’s familiar, it’s safe, I’m not sure what will happen when I can’t hide behind it anymore. But I think I am now determined to let the storms come and erode this mountain. I’m determined to destroy the tools and materials that help me build it back up. I’m determined to believe so strongly in God’s power and grace that He can remove this mountain. Even Pride Mountain.

The Opposite of Pride (Part 2)

Humility. For me, it may be one of the most complicated subjects in the bible. We know we need to be humble. But somewhere along the lines, we settle for something that looks and feels like humility, but really is not.  Part of it is the “victim” mentality that you may have read in the last post written by Heather Slagsvol. She gives such great insight into this “false humility” and I’m so grateful for her thoughts. It’s easier to seem humble when we’re constantly the victim, when bad things are always happening “to” us by others in all their pride and selfishness.

But then there’s this other part: the people who actually see themselves as unworthy or having no value. This is NOT true humility. But it’s certainly a tricky one because Philippians talks about Jesus’s humility which is SO CLOSE to ours that it’s no wonder we get it confused.

Here’s what it says:
“Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”

Jesus is kind of looking at Himself as less than He really is here, right? He’s thinking about others as more important than himself (He’s Jesus, so this is obviously not true in the grand scheme of things). He’s not looking at Himself as equal to God (even though He was God in the flesh), but He emptied Himself (He became nothing) even to the point of being a lowly bond-servant (or slave). This is so incredible, because in that time a bond-servant was someone who was indebted to their master. Jesus literally became a slave to all of those that He loved.

This is a struggle for us, so imagine the struggle it was for the Jews, who were waiting for a mighty and powerful King to come and set everything right. Instead, Jesus came as a slave to all mankind, taking on their debts as His own and giving them everything, even to the point of death.

This is humility.

Doesn’t it seem like if we just keep looking down on ourselves and saying we’re nothing and constantly serving that we will be truly humble?

Somehow, this doesn’t add up. There’s more here than just the actions of humility. We also have to look at His heart. Jesus did all of these things because HE TRULY LOVED. He was lowly and humble because He knew the bigger picture, He knew what He had to do to draw us back to Him.

When I’m “humble”, looking down on myself, or wearing myself thin in my servitude to others, I have to look at myself and ask, “WHY?” Why am I doing it? Am I doing this so that others will lift me back up? Am I doing it to prove my worth by my work or deeds? Am I doing it because I want others to love me? Am I doing it because it’s the right thing to do?

It must be more than that. My humility, my laying down my life for someone else, my thinking of others as more highly than myself, MUST originate in love. It must NOT originate from sense of duty or thoughts of “I SHOULD”. True humility can only work because I honestly and fully LOVE the Savior of my soul and all the other children He’s created. If my heart begins with love, I believe I can be truly humble, not just walking in some ‘substitute humility’ that exhausts and cripples me.

A Friend's Take on Pride

By Heather Slagsvol. Posted with permission. 

Week 5: Pride (and some boasting, too)

The theme of this week has been weighing on my heart since JJ introduced it, which is funny because I felt like pride was one of the last things I struggled with (hmm…maybe that should have been an instant heads up). I know that I don’t boast about talents or abilities…wait….I THOUGHT I didn’t boast about talents and abilities because I was looking at it from the wrong angle, but today I feel like God revealed something to me about myself. Let me try to walk you through the thought process I had today.

Something happened to me that occurs on a daily basis. I thought that someone had responded to me in a way that was harsher or less sensitive than I would have liked. Yes, this literally happens to me every day. Today was different though, because almost immediately instead of thinking, “Why are people always so mean to me?” I thought, “Why do I always take things the wrong way?” and I immediately thought about 15 Weeks to Love, and what JJ had introduced about pride. So, I got out my computer and looked up the definition of pride. I really thought I knew what it meant, but I wanted to see if there was anything in there that I had missed. The definition that first popped up said, “a dignified or becoming sense of what is due to oneself or one’s position and character.” Simple enough. But that word “becoming” kept sticking out to me. While I also know what it means, I decided to look that word up too to see if anything new stuck out. “Becoming: to give a pleasing effect.” There it is. “To give a pleasing effect”.  It immediately hit me, let me explain….

I am ALWAYS taking things the wrong way. ALWAYS. Too short of a response, an honest answer, something less than I had expected…something that doesn’t give me a “pleasing effect”…

Could it be pride that causes me to think I deserve a specific response from people? I think I actually believe that people constantly mistreat me or take advantage of me on purpose, that I am unappreciated or not respected enough. But in all honesty, if I really think about it, I have only been TRULY treated that way a few times in my life. I am really good at making myself the victim in any situation. I say a nasty thing about someone, and instantly, I blame them. “Well, they are always doing 'this or that' to me”. “Well, I let it bubble up for too long, they are just so MEAN!” I always try to be the innocent one. ALWAYS. I think I believe that I deserve a certain sort of treatment from people...(“a sense of what is DUE to one’s self”). If that’s not pride I don’t know what is.

Since pride is directly related to boasting I decided to go back to last week’s blog entry about it. Oh man. JJ wrote about “boasting in our weaknesses”. There it is. I think that I am “weak” and sweet, and kind, and nice, and blah blah blah, and while I really do try to practice those character traits, I think I have convinced myself that I am never the opposite of those things. It sounds so unbecoming when I say it out loud.

Here are some of my actual go-to statements:
“I always try so hard to be nice….”
“I’m not saying I want or need something in return from them, but….”
“I just feel like we do so much, but….”
“It just seems like we are so unappreciated…..”
(I say “we” because I often suck my poor husband into my crazy.)

All of these statements are my natural defenses, my immediate responses...and they reek of pride and false humility.

Who do I think I am? Jesus?

I am not perfect.
Sometimes I am mean.
I say things about other people that I shouldn’t.
I judge.
I blame others when I respond the wrong way.
I’m not always nice…
or kind…..

….Wow. It really feels good to say those things. I know who I aim to be. And I am not trying to beat myself down or condemn myself for the things I do wrong, because I don’t think that’s right either. But I finally feel like this MAJOR part of my life is starting to make sense. I can only be all the things I want to be through Jesus anyway. I need to step back and take responsibility for my own actions and stop blaming others. I also need to stop thinking that I deserve a specific sort of treatment from people…

I do struggle with pride.

By Heather Slagsvol. Posted with permission.

The Opposite of Pride (Part 1)

In order to truly not be proud I need to instead be humble. But how do I walk in true humility?

First of all, to combat pride we should be aware of a few things:

• We were made from dust.
• We would not be here if it wasn’t for our Perfect Creator.
• We can’t be “good” and make it to heaven on our own.
• Nothing we do can wash us clean and make us spotless before God.
• All the things I know about God have only been ‘revealed’ to me by God Himself.

My kids recently were taught the difference between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ at a summer camp. I get the 5-year-old’s interpretation from whatever bible teaching they just heard, which gives me a very simplified version, I’m sure. However, they explained to me that “sin” or doing something bad is like throwing dirt on a clean shirt. Ok, that sounds right. But do you know what my son said next? He asked me if being good made his shirt clean again? I stopped to think. I had to tell him the truth. “No, you will never be able to clean your own shirt. Only Jesus can make you clean.”

Isn’t that a little humbling?

There is no amount of service, kindness, patience, good deeds, feeding the poor, helping widows, etc, that makes you clean in God’s eyes.  The good thing is that…He cleans us. He sacrificed His own self to clean us and make us right with Him.

If I could walk in this every day, I would be sure to be humble. But I might also feel like nothing, and my life might seem purposeless. Is that true humility?

We need to be careful with pride not to swing the pendulum all the way to other side. Let’s talk about false humility later.

For now, would you join me this week? Would you seek God about areas you may be dealing with pride and not even know?

Tell me what you find out about pride and humility, and let’s walk in this together.

Week 5: Love is Not Proud

I’m seeing three different translations with three different words: proud, arrogant, and rude.  So what does this verse really mean?

The Greek word here means to be puffed up, to bear one’s self loftily.  I’m beginning to see a pattern. These love attributes keep coming down to one thing: Not Self. This study in love is continually showing me that I’m not to focus on myself but instead be concerned with others. Pride is thinking about myself, more highly than I should, and more often than I should. Love is thinking about others, how to serve more, how to help better, how to love fully. Love is also surrendering to God and allowing Him to show me who I am, rather than trying to figure it out in my own strength.

Often times pride stems from insecurity, just like boasting (see Week 4). Because I’m beaten down or have a low self-esteem, I will tend to exaggerate my strengths until it becomes annoying how wonderful I think I am. Some people are even completely blind to their pride, not realizing that their talents are not actually talents at all. Have you ever watched the American Idol try-outs? These people are so blind. They are trying out on American Idol, which means they think they are one of the top singers in the country! Some of them are literally tone-deaf, meaning they can’t even tell which note they are singing. I’m sorry, but no matter how many times your mom told you that you were awesome, I can’t help but wonder if there is some pride in there somewhere, blinding you to the truth.

Which leads me to my next point. We all have some blind spots, don’t we?

I’m absolutely certain there is something in my life that I carry around in pride that I shouldn’t. This week, I’m praying that God will show me. I’m praying that He’ll open my eyes, and show me a weakness I may be overlooking. It might hurt. A lot. Or maybe God will start showing me how much He loves me, and then it won’t hurt so bad when He tells me something I should have already known. He’s good like that.

You know what humbles me at least once a month? Something stupid I said. I say the dumbest things. I say things that are so mean, so hurtful, so idiotic. I usually don’t mean it the way I said it, I just come off really bad. In my head, it sounds like a totally normal and reasonable thing to say, (and maybe kind of funny) but then when it’s out loud, I realize I have offended someone. In high school, this was a talent. I got a lot of laughs from constantly spewing out mean and funny things. As an adult, it’s completely humbling. I wish I didn’t say things that made me want to punch myself in the face. I wish I didn’t say things that made me have to go to that person and apologize and hope they don’t hate me forever. I love people, and I’m trying to show everyone that love, but I’m constantly failing miserably. Why does this keep happening?

Maybe God is trying to get to something in me. Maybe this is my blind spot. I don’t fully understand what it is yet. But as we ask God to speak to us and show us our pride, be open to seeing patterns of pain in your own life. If you hear yourself saying, “Why does this keep happening to me?” you may want to look at your heart…you might find out it’s your own fault. And I bet that pride is blinding you to seeing the truth.

Pride is good at that.

But love is good at setting us free and bringing us to the truth. Thank God that love is also patient, so it never tires of trying to set us free and bring us into the truth, even when we keep ignoring it.

Thank God for Love, to combat all our weaknesses, stupidity, and pride.

Did I Boast Less?

It’s coming to the end of Week 4 and I’ve only written one post about “Not Boasting”.  This is partly because it’s pretty self-explanatory and I haven’t found many angles to write about. But did I find myself boasting less? Did I find myself listening more? I think I tried a little harder to be more aware of what others wanted to say. But I’m not sure I really got the whole point of not boasting. So let’s look at what the bible says about it.

Paul talks about boasting a lot in his second letter to the Corinthians. I think this is funny, because as you know his first letter to the Corinthians includes the whole basis of this campaign, the 15 Love attributes that we are following. So I think it’s a little funny that in his second letter, he had to dive into detail here about boasting, when he made it clear that love does not boast. He says in Chapter 10 verse 17, “If you want to boast, boast only about the Lord.”  Translating to JJ language: “Can’t you go a few minutes without boasting?! Geez, if you absolutely HAVE to boast, at least boast about your God!”

I DON’T think the point is that it’s good to walk around boasting about God (remember how annoying bragging can be?), but I think the point is that if you can’t stop yourself from boasting, at least boast about something that makes sense to boast about, like for instance, the Creator of all living things?

If I walk around boasting about God constantly, I don’t think I’m necessarily in the clear.

Then in Chapter 11 verse 30, Paul starts talking about how if the Corinthians feel the need to MAKE Paul boast, he’ll only boast about his weaknesses. He justifies this by showing that in his weakness, He shows God’s glory. But he’s saying he’ll do this because they are forcing him to boast. (It’s a complicated letter, Paul gets pretty worked up and VERY sarcastic in here, have a read.)

So can I safely boast about God and my weaknesses? The bible makes me think that it’s at least SAFER than boasting about myself. But I still don’t think God wants us to do it.

When Paul wrote that ‘Love does not Boast’, he actually meant that we just shouldn’t boast. Period. Walking around and saying every weakness we have (boasting in weaknesses), or constantly praising God out loud for all to hear (boasting in God) isn’t necessarily a welcoming, inviting, loving thing to do. It basically turns people off to you and God. I don’t think God likes it when we make Him look bad.

Please don’t get me wrong, I love worshiping God and praising Him. I’m always trying to be more thankful and acknowledge all the amazing gifts He’s given me. But if I’m constantly telling you about how wonderful God is, doesn’t it kind of feel like I’m trying too hard to make him look good? And doesn’t that kind of make him look bad?

Think about it like this. You’re single and a friend calls to tell you how PERFECT this one guy is (she’s trying to set you up again). She goes on and on about him, most likely exaggerating...doesn’t it turn you off a little? I mean come on, she’s just trying too hard to make him sound good.

I don’t think God wants to be that guy.

I think God can show how awesome He is without our boasting.

But remember, if you HAVE to boast, at least boast about God.

Tomorrow we start Week 5, 'Love is Not Proud'. Boasting and Pride go well together, so we can look at this like an extension of Week 4. Yay!