Always reminding

I write on trust and struggle hard to live what I write. The practice isn't easy and a life long with patterns of distrust is hard to change. One day is easier then the previous and yet the next is harder then before. It comes and goes... this nailing of new habits. Some days I wake up, hammer in hand and ready to pound. Other days I wake and I don't even look at the hammer, the old habit looks far too enticing. Sure some days I just forget, while other days I chose to forget. A text from a friend, a verse sent to my inbox.... gentle reminders that I do not fight the battle alone, because He is always there... always reminding.

Surely the righteous will never be shaken; they will be remembered forever. They will have no fear of bad news; their hearts are steadfast, trusting in the LORD. Their hearts are secure, they will have no fear; in the end they will look in triumph on their foes. 

Psalm 112:6-8

The fight for a blessing

In the first few pages of chapter 7 from Ann's book I read this quote that Ann so beautifully states, "That God tries to gently drive the words of Caussade from the knowing of my head to the bleeding of my heart." Oh how I long for the knowledge that sits in the brain to make its way into the veins. To live the knowledge... the yes.... that my head knows. The quote is strong, makes me think hard, and I want this quote to make it all the way down to the heart, and I want my heart to pump it to ever corner of my being.

"You would be very ashamed if you knew what the experiences you call setbacks, upheavals, pointless disturbances, and tedious annoyances really are. You would realize that your complaints about them are nothing more nor less than blasphemies - though that never occurs to you. Nothing happens to you expect by the will of God, and yet (God's) beloved children curse it because they do not know it for what it is." 

If I cling to that truth... that all is His will.... then I will see Him in everything. And then I read this, "I'm blind to joy's well every time I really don't want it." So I don't see joy because I chose not to, never because it isn't there. Joy.... grace.... God..... is always there, but I don't always want to see Him. She takes it a step further. When we reject joy it is not just joy we are rejecting. It is Him, the giver of joy, that we ultimately reject. And when we reject Him we are really saying that don't want God. Never will He withhold joy from our lives, we withhold it from ourselves.

I read on..... she tells the story of Jacob. Oh how I love the story of Jacob, I am a Jacob. Jacob the rusher, the one who believed the lie that He wouldn't fulfill His promise. Jacob, the man who thought God needed help. And Jacob, the one known for his fight with an angel.

"All that while Jacob hadn't known who he was wrestling. Just a man in the dark, a man he couldn't see. And in the black, all that night, it was the face of God over him that he was struggling again. God is behind the faces."

He is behind it all... even in the dark He is there. It is up to us to seek out His face. And sometimes we have to fight for the blessings.... fight through the dark in order to reach the light. 


* I wrote about chapter 6 here
* All quotes are from Ann Voskamp's book One Thousand Gifts

Stumbling but never falling

The battle rages on and I hear of a brother who, like me, is fighting that hard fight of wanting what you can't have.

Wanting what you know won't fulfill but craving it still. 

The words that I hear others say don't sit well... and I realize how quickly we forget just how hard the battle is when we aren't fighting it.

A text is sent to that brother and he, like me admits that he is living the no and admits that he knows better. Yet that flesh rages hard and he is drawn to the dark.

I don't give him a lecture, like I'm sure everyone else does, after all who am I to lecture a rebel.

Instead I let him know that he is not alone is his fight... that all of us have been there, and will be there.

Rebellion manifest itself differently in each of us but essentially it is the same battle.... to want what we can't have.... to believe a lie that He withholds good from us... and that we are better off without Him. And from the outside it sounds ridiculous, after all who are we to think that the Almighty doesn't know better, and who are we that we deserve any good.

But when the flesh rages our minds are corrupted, lies take root, and they impair any rational thinking.

It is so unlike me to not have advice to give.... to not know the answer.... but maybe that is where He wants me. To realize that I don't have any answers, that it's not my place to have the answers, and as desperate as I am for answers there aren't any. And that maybe the place He wants me at is at a stand still... to realize that my life is nothing, that I cannot exist without Him.

So I end the conversation with a brother with no sound advice... no words of wisdom on how to get back on his feet.... but I reminded him that he is loved.... and that he is wanted. And there is one thing I know and that is that running doesn't work.... it is far better to fight, even if it means fighting against the very force that gives you breath. And I tell him to come back to us and to show his face... but he says he doesn't want to be fake, to pretend that everything is alright when what he did last night was so wrong.

Isn't that what the enemy wants... for us to think that what we did last night was worse then what our friends did last night, and that if we show our face to them that they will see through the facade and see the selfishness and ugliness that really makes up who we are?

We forget that the blood didn't just wash away our past but it washes away our future.... that never again are we seen as ugly.... no matter what we did last night. Once we are covered we are covered, and nothing we can do will ever change that.

We forget that real living means living the yes... even when we feel dirty. After all everyone of us did something last night that we shouldn't have. We all struggle, we all mess up, we are all sinners.

And even now as I sit her and write this He reminds me that we all struggle. The phone vibrates and an email is received.... a verse sent to my inbox at just the right moment.

Though they stumble, they will never fall, for the Lord holds them by the hand.

Psalm 37:24

Yes we will stumble, we will fail, we will feel defeated. But we will never fall. We will never be cast away from the One who loves. He holds our hand. Even when we stumble, even when we pull away, He holds on tight. There is no way to escape Him, no words can make Him loosen His grip..... and I sure am thankful for that.

The fight

The day came.... I knew it would... but I had wished it wouldn't.

I desperately wanted to run.... but I can't, because of all the things I am, a runner is not one of them.

However I am a fighter. A stubborn and rebellious fighter who does not back down easily.

I looked her in the eyes, I cannot hide from her. She sees my jaw rigorously set and those fists clenched tight. I get ready to fight, to defend. But she doesn't suit up, refuses to fight, because she knows that it would do no good. She simply asks one question..... Why?

Tears fill my eyes because I cannot answer. She knows, I know she knows yet the words stay inside.

Because locking them up and keeping them in keeps me from getting hurt..... right???

If I don't feel, if I don't think, if I stuff it all away then I don't have to deal with the hurt... with the pain.

and i don't want to hurt anymore

I want to do things my way.... because my way won't hurt..... at least that's the lie I have been living.

I want to run.... really..... I really want to run. I want to leave this all behind and do life a different way. I even told Him to go away.... and I meant it.

The Father hears His daughter's cries and they break His heart.... I know yet still I let the words come out.

I have desperately tried to pry His hands away. I screamed and yelled, begging Him to just let me go. I dug in my nails and watched Him bleed, yet He still hung on. Tears streaming down His face but His arms never relented.

Later that evening she asks if I'm okay... if what she said made me mad at her? Yes, it did make me mad, but I tell her no, because really I'm not mad at her.... I'm mad at myself. It is I that went down this path, it is I that has chosen to believe the lies.


The long drive home is not a quiet one. A favorite band's new album is blaring over the speakers, lyrics washing over because these guys write about feelings and how they control us, how they deceive us, and they are uncomfortably  honest.

And as the tears roll down I hear their words, and yes I feel abandoned, I feel forgotten but it was I that tried to live without. I suffocated myself. And yes the words buried beneath describe me, I'm being buried by me... my own selfishness is desperately trying to choke the life out of me. I tell myself to run yet there is something that keeps my feet locked. Of all the thoughts that course through my brain I know that I cannot run from Him. I may not like what He says, I may not like the direction, the way this path makes me feel, but I know that I do not exist without Him.

As I got up to leave she asked if I was going to run... she knows I want to.
I shook my head.... no, I'm not going to run, because I am a fighter.