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Sometimes I feel like Jacob from the OT- the one whom God changed his name to Israel..

He wandered from a known place- the comforts of what was familiar and safe at home– to unknown places -waiting and working for years without receiving the bounty for which he worked.

Yet God said- I am with you and will watch over you where ever you go.

And to this part I will cling- I will not leave you until I have done what I promised you.

Genesis 28:15

A favorite scripture is Isaiah 61:2 where it is written that the pain of Israel (God’s chosen people) will one day be removed…this was a prophesy of Jesus as well and includes ALL of God’s people- the Jew and the Gentile alike…which means you and me.

When the pain of their -or our- suffering is removed they will be given a gift of beauty for ashes.

My Joyce Meyer devotional, Closer to God Each Day, writes “allow the Holy Spirit to blow away the ashes and replace those ashes with beauty”.

The word picture that gave me is not what I previously saw when meditating on this passage before.

My pain, my sorrow, my struggle are like me being in a fire to refine me.

What is left, what is burnt off, are the ashes- follow me?

The ashes of my pain need to blow away for the beauty beneath to be revealed.

If your house is as dusty as mine then you can visualize this… See a piece of furniture forgotten and covered under a thick layer of dust. When you take out the Pledge and dust cloth and put in a little elbow grease, the dust is gone and the furniture looks brand new.

I have to let the ashes of my pain to be refined before they blow away…meaning I have to feel the suffering first.

Then, here is the interesting part, I have to let the Holy Spirit remove the ashes for the exchange.

Sounds easy, right?

I think, though, that I sit in the ashes longer than necessary and refuse to be cleaned.

Why?

I don’t really know for sure but maybe because I want some kind of earthly justifice or justification for what has hurt me before I let the beauty show…I would rather sit dirty and wait to be proven right then just be cleaned to look brand new.

How’s that for convicting?

Joyce finishes with this thought: ” God has the same good plan for you that He had the moment you arrived on this planet…This is a new day…Your future has no room in it for your past…It is time to go forward!”

It is time for beauty instead of ashes.

Isaiah 43 says these great words~Forget what happened before and do not think about the past. Look at the new thing I am going to do! It is already happening! Don’t you see it?? I will make a road in the desert and rivers in dry land!

If my weakness is that I am a people pleaser then my natural tendency will be to try to manage what makes me feel weak on my own..I will try to be strong where I feel weak SO I don’t feel weak.

Goodness..does that thought even make sense??

I am trying to work something through so please hang with me…

His grace is sufficient IN MY WEAKNESS- that’s what the Word says. It is where I feel weak that I need to lean into God FOR His strength to shine.

When I keep trying to figure out what to do, how to do it, when to do it- I am not exactly leaning into God’s strength- that is me micro-managing (searching for my own strength where I feel weak).

And I wonder why I am in turmoil.

So…what is LEANING INTO GOD’S STRENGTH?

What does His sufficient grace look like in my weakness?

It must be the opposite of what I am doing, right? Because what I’m doing is NOT working.

If I am trying to figure out what to do all the time and when to correct whatever is supposedly wrong then maybe I need to stop doing that.

If that causes my anxiety to rise..that’s where I cast my cares and be anxious about nothing.

-Let the Word empower me,huh?-

When I am spinning on a hamster wheel wanting someone to explain to me why they don’t like me anymore- just so I can correct whatever it is I have supposedly done so they do like me??- I need to check my heart…I need to pray for any thing unclean IN ME to be removed…and leave that supposed wrong to the Lord until that person seeks me out in search of either furthered conflict or reconciliation.

Not every time did I DO SOMETHING wrong…it can be perception of my choices that someone feels is wrong…It does not mean I AM BAD or WRONG..

And do I really need people who don’t agree with me to agree with me all the time?

Do I really need people who don’t want to ask me questions, don’t want to see my perspective, don’t want to trust my heart’s choices, and who do want to be angry at me or blame me to suddenly stand up and say “oh, gee Amy…I now understand and support you”??

Is that what I need?

That sounds crazy.

No wonder my husband- precious man- looks at me like I am nuts when I keep trying to maneuver around so people will like me.

If someone feels I have wronged them, is it my job to correct that thought? Or is it up to them to seek reconciliation with me since it is their perception that I have wronged them with malicious intent?

The people pleaser says it is my job..but is it??

I am to be a GOD PLEASER…have I pleased the Lord in my circumstance? I believe I have.

And if they too feel they have as well..then it is up to the Lord to judge us both, right?

Leave it at His feet Amy.

The opposite of what I normally do…don’t act- be patient and pray. Don’t fix- pray and be patient. Don’t worry- pray and be patient.

Goodness. I sense a theme.

2 things I am not doing..praying and being patient.

Hmmm.

I may be onto something.

The apostle Paul’s letter to the church of Ephasis is pretty powerful but one verse is standing out to me today. It precedes the Armor of God- which is something I should be wearing daily!

Ephesians 6:13 reads to therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.

I am thinking of times where I feel like I have been in a battle…times where I have felt, and blogged, that I was battle worn or weary..

I know I credited the Lord for the strength to endure the struggle, but it is the after that I am thinking about.

What do I do?

The battle is over, the struggle appears to have ceased or abated temporarily….I am exhausted in that moment.

I fall down in relief.

I lay down to rest.

I collapse to rejuvenate.

Sound familiar?

Sound appealing???

However, per this passage, I am told to stand when everything is done.

Excuse me?

Keep standing?!

In reflection on this I am beginning to see something…in my rest, my collapse, my timeout – my guard goes down.

How many times after a trial have I felt empowered by the Holy Spirit only to have a wave of shame and doubt sweep over me in the aftermath?

Suddenly, I question everything the Lord has carried me through: did I do that right, should I have said that, what if I…it is an endless interview inside my head.

Perhaps…PERHAPS, if I stayed standing and stayed prepared that would not happen.

The enemy is always waiting to pounce and he knows our weak side…he knows we are battle ready but he also knows that we get battle worn.

The war continues after a battle…and the spiritual war for our souls will continue until Christ returns…so the enemy will not stop attacking.

The Bible (I do not actually know where at the moment so feel free to help a girl out) tells us to stay alert. Jesus actually talks about robbers sneaking around, the devil is a thief that kills and destroys..evil doesn’t come when we are awake-it comes when we rest…and even, ESPECIALLY, at that time we are to be ready.

In my weakness He is strongest- right?

In my battle weary, exhausted, mom’s- heart -just- aches moments I am weak…that is when I desire rest and refreshing for my soul.

That is when I need to keep standing.

I wrote this 4 years ago but it has so much meaning to me still today that I chose to update it and share it…

9 years ago today, my family was robbed of a precious sister, mother, friend, and daughter by alcoholism.

She was so much more than the disease that took her from us!

Since then, my eyes have been forced open to the brokenness that exists in this world we live that feeds into the desire to escape.

Before her death, I lived in a way that reflected an acceptance to “this is as good as it gets, so it doesn’t matter what I choose to do in excess”…be it drinking, eating, shopping, tuning out to the world around me with technology…

Well if that’s as good as it got, her death and therefore life, shouldn’t resonate an impact on me.

What she did, DID matter…who she WAS meant something…

Her legacy is NOT the alcoholism that took her zest for life, love, and laughing.

Her legacy IS her life, that showed us how to be parents when we had no one to watch do it, who had such pride in the nursing care she provided to her patients; her love, that made me feel like I was her sister, that loved her brother more than her own life, that wanted nothing more than to please her parents, who worried how well of a job she was doing at raising her kids; her laughing so loud it made you uncomfortable because people would turn and stare, her ability to get everyone to do the silliest things on a dancefloor, play on slip and slides, cartwheels in the yard, dance parties in the garage…

My life matters.

Your life matters.

Our choices matter to those around us and someone is always watching..be it our children or a stranger on the street.

Alcoholism still plagues my family: it is always hanging in the corner of my mind where deep fear likes to hide and it most certainly likes to surface and challenge us…

For me, because of what we lost, I was forced to look for meaning into her life, my life, life in general.

I found hope, healing, and peace in the Lord who comforted me when nothing else could.

I found restoration and forgiveness in my home because of the unending love He has shown me no matter what wrongs I have done which helps me to forgive the hurts I too have received.

I found a release for my fears because I know who has won the final victory and there is nothing my Savior can’t overcome.

My eyes are open: I am continuing to choose to learn lessons from all my experiences, I love more deeply and simply…

I am not perfect, I will continue to struggle as long as sin is still present in this world…but my sister taught me to ask for help, to not live alone and closed off, to enjoy life and not reside in despair, that I don’t have to be perfect because perfection is unattainable and soul crushing..I just have to be the person I alone was created to be in His image….thank you Dee.

My pastor said we should take time for self reflection in his sermon yesterday…that is not a new habit for me.

I either reflect or overanalyze on a daily basis depending on your perspective or definition of reflection!

However, today is a day of reflection for sure.

The anniversary of the death of my sister in law is quickly approaching and that day marks a pinnacle moment for me: it was the day the scales fell off my eyes and I could suddenly see this fallen world in which we live.

I did not understand or like what I saw or felt…but I was forever changed regardless.

Since that day almost 9 years ago I have never been blind again. Instead, more and more light has been shown into the darkness around me which has allowed me to see even more clearly.

I have been made acutely aware of the hurts of this world…talk about wishing for a shut-off valve some days.

I have attempted to fix them (massive fail), carry them (crushing burden), and ignore them (didn’t work) from time to time…still do- I am totally human after all.

What I have found to be the most beneficial though is to be there in the hurt with someone.

Just be there.

Don’t leave them alone in that pit of darkness and pain.

But I am only one person- so it can be a daunting task to undertake as the need is great for comfort…especially when the darkness also shadows me and I desire comfort too.

But, as with the story of the boy and the starfish, if I can help this one then I have completed my purpose.

So, as August approaches, I am sitting on the edge of a new journey.

Today I receive the official and public announcement of recommendation to continue ministering to those hurting given by the Church of the Nazarene.

To those unfamiliar it may seem foolish to need a recommendation or to require any kind of written permission or authority, but to proclaim the Gospel there should be some guidelines and structure to ensure accountability, accuracy, authority, and integrity.

This is not a path for everyone…and I have been called to walk it.

Therefore, there is a process that ultimately leads to ordination.

Today, my process commences.

My “home page” for this blog declares a Scripture that speaks to my journey as if I wrote it myself instead of King David thousands of years ago~Psalm 40:2-3

He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the muck and mire; He set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He out a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and out their trust in God.

On so many levels this is me.

I was in a pit; sticky, dirty, and stuck. It was dark in the depths of it and I could not see anything around me. When I looked up to finally see the light of HOPE I was pulled out. But, better than that good news, is that I was placed on a firm foundation, a rock, where my footing became secure finally.

On account of that reality I sing a new song: I speak differently because I am different.

And perhaps many will be changed because of it too.

It is a good day to reflect on that.

I must ask:

Are you in a pit?

Do you see the light of hope?

Are you on a firm foundation?

If not, why not?

Be secure in knowing that even if you fall back into the pit, dangle into it, dance around it He will lift you out again and again.

The firmer your feet become on the Rock the sooner you will grasp onto that hope that continually lifts your head.

Psalm 42:

As the deer pants for streams of water so my soul longs for you, O God.

My tears have been my food day and night, while men say to me”where is your God?”

Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me??

Put your hope in God,

For I will yet praise Him- my Savior and my God.

Treading water sounds tiring.

As a person who enjoys a good “float” as opposed to actually swimming, treading water seems like alot of effort to go nowhere.

When I did a simple Google search on the subject, I found that treading water is considered a great exercise.

Working hard to go nowhere is a super calorie burning, weight loss achieving, low -impact -so -less -joint damage occurs, muscle strengthening activity…

Interesting….and still sounds exhausting.

Have you ever had to tread water?

A sweet teenager told me she had to do it for 2 minutes before getting the hard-earned, all-important “deep end” wrist band at a camp.

2 minutes of keeping herself afloat while not going anywhere– because THAT, of course, would be called swimming and being able to swim apparently does not mean you could survive in the deep end if necessary.

Let me get this straight: the power needed for the breast stroke, the balance required for the back stroke, the essential air capacity in underwater swimming are all unequal to life saving when compared to treading water.

Going nowhere sounds nuts; but it gets you into the deep end??

I pause here to reflect on that…

There has to be something to treading water for it to be so overall beneficial, right?

Apparently, it strengthens me without straining me.

In our faith walk we are usually in a state of motion- either we feel we are growing in our faith (moving forward) or we have slidden back (moved backward or away from God/faith).

We have all heard of plateau’s in a weight loss journey and have also had the same analogy applied to faith too…there are those frustrating times in both where we feel we are stagnant, in a valley, wandering the wilderness…in a time where progress does not seem to be made and we are going nowhere.

In weight loss, this is the time most people quit. The massive frustration a person feels when “doing everything right but nothing seems to be happening” is excruciating.

I think our faith life can be the same.

We go to church, we tithe, we read our Bibles, we pray (sorta), we listen to Jesus music often, we hang out with church-folk…we do what we always did but the result just is not the same.

Lately, I find I am distracted and that is seriously affecting me spiritually.

Frankly, the brokenness of this world has impacted me on so many sides that I feel like I now have spiritual ADHD.

The intensity and passion in my time with the Lord has waned due to battle fatigue.

However, I keep doing what I have always done..trying to hang on and stay the course…searching for that zeal that had consumed me in the past. I see glimpses of it, go to reach for it, and get T-boned in my effort by something else.

Therefore, I feel like I am staying still with zero forward motion…but my efforts are also keeping me from moving backward.

I seem to stay still. For months now.

I. Am. Treading. Water.

Biblical water analogies are fantastic- waves crashing over you with some small or big like situations, walking on water with our eyes on Christ, keeping your eyes above the waves so you don’t go under….

I feel connected to the refreshing power and cleansing ability of water so this subject makes sense to me.

Am I gaining strength in my efforts without being strained?

It is a perspective I have not processed before as all I see is the lack of progress.

But what I am doing is treading water with this motivation in mind:

Stay the course.

Keep moving while not going out of my way to get hurt needlessly (the theory of “no pain no gain” does not appeal to me).

Breathe steady, deep, and calm.

Stay focused.

Do not look too far ahead or behind (the edge of the pool in front of me, out of reach, seems far away: which is frustrating if that is what I am focused on- the purpose is NOT the edge of the pool but the action of treading water…ugh. That’s deep and I don’t like that revelation.)

Do not panic.

Continue doing what it is you know to do.

Trust that those “2 minutes” will be up and the deep-end wrist band will have been earned.

You do know that, to God, a day is like 10,000 years right? His “2 minutes” could last a while…

Imagine the strength gained…

I am being hit with some random/not random Bible verses today.

When that happens, I tend to believe that God is confirming something to me…normally it is a way to tell me to “hang on”; “trust Me”, “I’ve got this”; “I’ve always had this”; “I see you”…

And I have only made it through one devotional book and 2 Bible verses….hang on to your hats folks!

#1 from Jesus Calling:

“Anxiety stems from asking the wrong question: “If such and such happens, can I handle it?” The true question is not whether you can cope with whatever happens, but whether you and I together can handle anything that occurs.”

If you follow me at all either here or on social media, you should see how applicable that is for me lately!

But, that is not all of it!

The devotion takes me to Psalm 5:3 which is what becomes #2:

In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation.

Great verse, yes…but it is what I wrote in the margin that got me…a year ago, 3/19/2017, I wrote that I feared I had a Crohn’s stricture…considering recent events, I think I sensed what was beginning to happen to my body that culminated in the current condition I am now living with.

Instead of making me angry, I truly can say that I feel like I am being told that the Lord knew and knows what is going on…I have not been left alone in this and I won’t be abandoned to it.

Moving on to my Twitter post of last night…We are camping as a family and had a really good day. I highly anticipate having another really good day again today and tomorrow- there is no reason to suggest otherwise!

That being said, with a full and thankful heart, I tweeted that in my time of drought it feels like I have been given a glass of water…that the Lord is faithful to provide what we need when we continue to seek Him.

You know how refreshing a whole glass of water is when you are absolutely parched???

That is how good yesterday felt!

So the “drought” and the “drink” was the analogy I chose to Tweet.

#3, therefore, is Psalm 63:1 (ready today)~

O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water.

Seriously, I can’t make this up! The timing, the thought process- all the Lord.

Talk about feeling refreshed.

I am not sure where to start with this one….They say (whoever “they” are) you should then start at the beginning…hmmph. I don’t know about that.

Maybe the present is best then.

I currently sitting in a recliner while a medication is being infused into my system that brags of “positive effects” on my disease while admitting to a list a mile long of negative potentials that could also occur.

It is not like a chemo where all the good cells get destroyed along with the cancer cells, but it is like being pumped full of some kind of toxin that should make me feel better as long as I don’t feel worse from the side effects first.

I am being introduced to the new reality of biologic living.

Not to sound overly dramatic, but I am literally sitting in a chair where I have given permission for my immune system to become compromised in order for my autoimmune system to work and my Crohn’s disease to be effectively managed.

I am not being cured – I am being treated.

I am officially attached to an infusion center for the rest of my life.

Wow.

Many people have bigger struggles in their life…but this is huge for me.

Other people do this sort of thing…not me.

As with so many other blasted areas in my life right now, I am sitting here shaking my head wondering how on earth have I gotten here to this place??

Leading up to this day of infusion, I have traveled through many different stages to get me towards acceptance…denial (no way am I really this sick); anger (I cannot and will not believe this is my life); sadness (the amount of tears I have cried could fill a Great Lake); and finally acceptance ( I will do what needs to be done).

Too much information may be coming!!!

So, as previously mentioned, I have Crohn’s disease. As a 14 year old all that meant was that I had stomach pains all the time and needed to go to the doctor a lot to figure out what was wrong.

At the diagnosis, it meant I had something wrong with me that I never wanted tot talk to anyone else about EVER.

“Why did you miss so much school last week Amy?”

You really think I was going to tell the cute boy from 9th grade English that I missed school because of my bowel disease????

Trust me that has NOT changed even though about 3 decades have since passed!

Crohn’s disease -in a nutshell- means I have an irritated and potentially angry GI tract that becomes inflamed which causes severe to moderate pain with poor absorption of essential nutrients.

Frankly, my stomach hurts 24/7…all the time…every day for 30 years.

I just get used to it.

When it gets to the point of me complaining of discomfort then it means that things are pretty darn bad. If I get scared because of the pain or other symptoms it is because it has gotten pretty darn bad. If I start to talk about the fact that I even have Crohn’s it is because things have gotten pretty darn bad.

Here I am. A pretty hot mess.

I have a chronic illness that I cannot hide, contain, or control.

The other day, my new friend -Felix Fistula – decided to let me know he was going to hang around for a while…the fun thing about fistula’s is that they like to come and go completely unwelcome and unannounced.

His arrival sunk me into the reality of where I am going to be for the rest of my life…spending quality time in an infusion chair.

Now, I highly anticipate that the fistula will heal (hopefully soon!) and I am claiming against possible side effects from this medication that is treating me, but I will be doing this kind of treatment every 8 weeks for the rest of my life. I may not need oral or topical medication anymore (praise the Lord for that small mercy) but I will need an IV plus 1-3 hours of my time every 2 months to achieve and maintain remission.

Upon arrival to the infusion office, I could feel the pressure of tears threatening to make their appearance…and then the headache came as I suppressed them- unwillingly to show weakness at the surface level.

I don’t think I said “I don’t want to do this” today, but there was that blasted “how is this happening” question formulating in my sadness…in my acceptance.

After an escape to the restroom to release the steam out of my teapot (yes, that means to cry), I sat back in my chair and decided to just be there.

This is where I am.

Wishing for something different will not change my situation so I might as well figure out how to be in my situation.

When it was done, my “ride” (she knows who she is 😉) said “well, now that’s over”.

We were able to have a good discussion where we could both say “no, this is where it begins”.

I guess that means I did start at the beginning after all.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding~Proverbs 3:5.

1 Chronicles 16:12 ~Remember what He has done.

It’s where we go from here.

Jesus Calling by Sarah Young writes this morning that it is impossible to thank God and to curse Him at the same time.

Often, we are tempted (and succumb to it) to complain how we feel God is treating us.

Sometimes it is an all out scream of why are You doing this???? Do something!! Stop this!!

Sometimes it is in more subtle complaining: I don’t like this, I won’t do it, I can’t do it.

There are so many times over the last few months that I have been near paralyzed by the reality that all this has happened to me.

When, in all truth, things have affected me, crashed into my world even, but not all of it has happened to me.

But I still complain in the fear.

I wallow in the hurts.

I sit in the frustration.

I whine about the unknown.

I tremble through the doubt.

I toy with anger…bitterness…

Frankly, I have shook my fist in God’s face and basically told Him that I thought my way was better therefore suggesting He did not know what He was doing.

How is that for honesty??

Read my last few blogs if you doubt my sincerity…it is all in there…veiled but there.

Now, I am incredibly grateful to serve a God who allows my honesty. He appreciates the way I cast my cares onto Him. He understands my heart even when I do not understand -or trust- His.

The Psalms are filled with the same expressions I have stated…most of them were written by a man who is described as a guy after God’s own heart…How would that be for an epitaph about someone who seemed to question God continuously??

Even though my expressions of discontent are allowed, understood, and even accepted I am told there is a better way..

Philippians 4:4-7~

Rejoice in the Lord…let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything but in everything present your requests to God with thanksgiving. And then the peace of God – that transcends all understanding- will guard your mind and heart in Jesus.

Many times I have read this passage and broke it apart. I saw rejoice in the Lord always and said “yup- amen..Good plan”.

Separate phrase would then be to offer thanks for what troubles me so I can have peace…Little more difficult but I am willing to do what I must do…right?

Then why am I complaining and not saying thanks when life is more difficult than I desire it to be? Where exactly is my peace because I am not feeling peaceful here??

Rejoice in the Lord…be joyful for who He is…the Giver, not the gift…the Savior, the Healer, the Comfort…

Joy is a fruit of the spirit that comes out of love for the Lord…it is not a spirit of happy, it runs so much deeper than a pleasant enjoyment of circumstances and defies fluctuations of weather that affects my mood for the day.

Stay gentle in the trial…be kind…self-controlled…

Yep- another fruit..

Pray and tell God what bothers me…am I really being honest with Him? If I am not joyful in Him can I honestly say I am really talking to Him or just throwing demands at Him??

And then peace will be mine…a peace that guards my heart and mind…Not a problem resolution, not a situational fix, not suddenly getting my way…But a peace that settles my pounding heart in the storm and refocuses my mind against lies that say I am ruined, I am terrible, things will never get better, I will not survive this pain, God doesn’t love me like I think He should…

How do I get this peace?

I rejoice and then I can be gentle and sense the nearness of God…I trust Him enough to be thankful for what He is doing in me, around me, and in those so severely affected by their raging battles and then an unexplainable peace will be given to me.

Repeat process.

To keep the peace I must keep doing my part…intentionally…all day…all night.

Rejoice. Be gentle. Be honest. Be thankful.

Accept the peace that is offered by rejoicing, being gentle in a way that others notice it while in my own suffering, and be thankful in my pain…

Repeat.

It is redundant, repetitive, and sounds oh so easy….

But it is the hardest thing to do when life is hard and hurts.

In verse 12, Paul writes that he has learned the secret of being content in every and any situation…

He rejoiced. He stayed gentle. He told God what he wanted and trusted God to give him what he needed. He stayed thankful…even when beaten, rejected, cold, hungry, and imprisoned.

What a challenge to live…but isn’t peace of mind and heart worth it?