Proverbs 3:1-8 (NIV)                                                                                                                                     [1] My son, do not forget my teaching, but keep my commands in your heart, [2] for they will prolong your life many years and bring you peace and prosperity. [3] Let love and faithfulness never leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. [4] Then you will win favor and a good name in the sight of God and man. [5] Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; [6] in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. [7] Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and shun evil. [8] This will bring health to your body and nourishment to your bones.

Asking for help has always been difficult for me. I don’t like to inconvenience others. I often find it easier (quicker) to just do things myself, rather than coordinating with others.  Sometimes I just plain get so engrossed in what I’m doing that the thought of asking for help won’t even occur to me, even if I need it. Just ask anyone who has ever seen me in “action” at work…I’ll be so engrossed in a spreadsheet that I’ll be completely oblivious to the world beyond my office door! God help you if you trip and break a leg in front of my office…you may end up laying there until someone more observant happens to walk by! I jest…but only slightly.

I wasn’t raised to ask for help. My parents would ask for prayer, but they rarely asked for help (from people). They specialized in asking God and waiting in faith. People would never know my family’s specific needs. But it was often people that God would use to meet our needs.

Growing up I heard stories like the anonymous woman who knocked on my parents’ door one day. She was grocery shopping when she heard God whispering in her ear. By the time she was at the checkout counter she knew that the groceries in her cart were not hers, but that she needed to deliver them to a family in need. A family she had not yet met. God led her to our home and this faithful woman knocked on our door and simply told my mom that God had laid it on her heart to deliver these groceries to us. She said when she saw our house, she knew she was at the right home. And people wonder why I believe in miracles! Over and over again God took care of my family because of my parents’ faith…and because God loves His children.

Another example from before I was born. My dad wasn’t yet saved, but mom had already accepted Jesus as her Lord and Savior. Dad couldn’t find work and they had run out of money. At this point they had 4 children. My middle sister was a baby and they had run out of milk. Mom decided to pray. Then she went outside and there in the yard was a dime. A dime is inconsequential to us today…not even enough to get something from a gum-ball machine anymore. But in 1956 a dime was enough to buy milk for a baby. God met her need and my mom always remembered God’s gracious gift.

When I was in high school I wanted to take the Drivers’ Ed course, but there was no way my parents could afford the fee. It was only about $70 back then, but it may as well have been $1000. I just accepted the fact that I wouldn’t be able to go. However, God had other plans. I came home from school a few days before the registration fee was due and tucked into the doorframe was an unmarked, white envelope. When I opened it, there was a short note and exactly the cash I needed to pay for Drivers’ Ed. My parents didn’t recognize the handwriting. No one I asked admitted to giving me the money. To this day, I have no idea who put the money there for me.  Whoever it was, they heard God’s voice, obeyed and blessed a young girl. Through their obedience, God taught me a lesson in faith. I have always remembered God’s gracious gift.

In my youth I learned to trust God. I don’t know why I would ever have let go of that childlike faith.  As an adult I found it increasingly difficult to trust God with certain things in life. Especially the people I loved the most, like my husband, my son, my daughter.

After TJ’s TBI I prayed pretty much constantly (see Jesus Left the 99 to Find Me, 3/22/15). But I wasn’t praying in faith. If I had been, I would have had peace. If I would have been praying in faith, I wouldn’t have taken control. I wouldn’t have grown hard hearted. Praying in faith involves more than just begging God for what I want from Him. It means trusting Him for His will to be done. It includes trusting God even if His answer is not exactly what I want. It is to rest in His care as I trust Him to take care of the situation. It means that I  will still love God, even if the answer is no.

God had answered my prayers and healed TJ’s mind and I continued walking away from Him. I said last week that I knew it was a miracle when God restored my husband’s ability to think clearly. At that point we were beyond hope. Neural pathways that had been torn apart upon impact had healed as much as they were going to. From that point forward it was a matter of retraining the brain to work differently. You never get back what you lose. But, God had graciously given back to me the man I married. What did I do with His miracle? I thanked God, sure! But, I also continued to walk away from Him as I made choices without seeking His guidance. I quit listening to His voice and I become an island. I didn’t trust God to hold up the weight of my world. The one I trusted was me.

I started trusting ‘me’ because, although God healed TJ’s mind, He didn’t completely heal the man. My husband was still disabled. Injured. His injury occurred while he was training for Special Forces.  SF was the fast track to getting the additional medical training he needed to become a doctor and he knew he needed to be stronger if he hoped to pass the physical exam.  TJ’s dreams were dashed on the day of the accident.

It is hard to watch the person you love mourn loss. TJ lost the career he loved in an instant. Not only that, he lost the ability to provide for his family. We are thankful for his retirement pay, but any man will tell you it’s not the same. Men are wired to earn a good living and take care of the family. If he loses that ability he can get lost. TJ grieved his loss and I grieved with him.

Since then, he and I both have learned so many lessons about relying on God. Trusting God when He says that all things work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28). We needed to learn these lessons because we were both proud.  But, in those first few years we didn’t get it. Why would God rob us of these dreams we had?  They were good dreams, weren’t they?

So I became the strong one.  I took on that role and ran with it…ran in my own strength. Ran away from God. When I was an island, I was proud of my independence. I had never really practiced independence before the Army years and I found that I liked it. I really liked tapping into my inner strength. I was in control and it felt good. A strong woman doesn’t need help. (Or so we think).

I didn’t realize that while I was exercising my independence I was actually pushing God away. I still went to church every Sunday, I talked like a Christian, I knew what I believed.  I thought I was ok. Granted, I knew that I wasn’t picking up my Bible very often…but, I was still praying.  I knew that my prayers mostly consisted of me begging for miracles and not me seeking God…but I still believed.  I believed in God , but I wasn’t allowing Him to comfort and help me…but I didn’t need it, really. I was strong. Independent. I was in control…right?

As I learned to stand on my own two feet, my relationship with Jesus grew cold. I felt it, but didn’t realize the gravity of it until that day on the 2nd floor of my home when God made me feel the depth of my loneliness. His silence was overwhelming. It was like a vacuum that sucked me into the black hole of my isolation…a place without God. I couldn’t find my way out. My relationship with Jesus was broken and all I could do was beg Him to pull me out and change my heart.

In those moments, I feared I was lost. Had I blasphemed the Holy Spirit? No one had ever adequately explained those verses to me (Jesus’ words: Mark 3:29; Luke 12:10) What did it mean? In the months that followed my fear was ever present and God wasn’t speaking. Was I one of the ones who met the criteria in Hebrews?

Hebrews 6:4-8 (NIV)                                                                                                                                     [4] It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, [5] who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age [6] and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace. [7] Land that drinks in the rain often falling on it and that produces a crop useful to those for whom it is farmed receives the blessing of God. [8] But land that produces thorns and thistles is worthless and is in danger of being cursed. In the end it will be burned.

Was I cursed? Just waiting to be burned?  Had I crucified the Son of God all over again when I walked away from Him?

This week I watched an older Tenth Avenue North Concert on YouTube. In it Mike Donehey sang a prelude to one of their more popular songs. I have never heard it in any other video I’ve seen, so it caught my attention. It’s a beautiful piece. It has powerful words that cause you to search the heart. I ended up listening to a line, shutting down YouTube, opening up Notes and typing the words…then back to the video to listen to the next line, etc…I didn’t want to misquote. This short little musical prelude perfectly described what I felt on the day God opened my eyes to my loneliness. Mike sang: “Lord, I’ve run to the pretty things. The pretty things. And I…I…I’ve been deceived. I’ve been deceived. Oh God, could you tell me is there hope for me? Hope for me? Oh Lord, could I be redeemed?”

What is your “pretty thing”? Mine seems to be my will. My stubborn will. When I don’t freely give my will to God, I become hard hearted. When I hush His voice, I harden my own heart. When I harden my heart God has to work in the extreme to get my attention, because I am stubborn. My will, when I own it, is strong.

This is what was happening in December…me, stubbornly hanging onto my will, repeating history, again. (How many times do I have to learn this same lesson God?) 20 years ago my ‘baggage’ was bigger and God had to be much, much more harsh with me to get me to hear Him. It took months of feeling the isolation of my island before I could see the depth of my sin and seek His forgiveness and restoration. In December my baggage was much smaller, just a hidden chamber in my heart. But my grip was just as tight. This time God was not silent, thankfully He kept gently speaking to me. The only time He was silent was when He had to cut open my heart and release all that pain I was hiding. When He did that, He gave me ample time to look right at it and see everything that I had been trying to hide from Him (see Trusting God with My Heart, 3/1/15). Until I could see it for what it was worth, I wouldn’t be willing to let go. He brought me to my knees with that same pain and when I cried out to Him, He started speaking again, until I heard, believed, and accepted His words.

“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” –Romans 5:8 (NASB)

“He (God, the Father) made Him (Jesus) who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” –2 Corinthians 5:21 (NASB)

I find God’s faithfulness to be amazing! He is faithful when we are unfaithful. Romans 6:23 tells us that the wages of our sin is death. We deserve death for our rebellion and sin. But, Jesus willfully took on the sin of this world and died in our place. He died so I can live. He paid the price for my sin.   He did so in obedience to the Father but also because of His love for me.  Jesus freely gave His life for me…and you.

Jesus will not easily let go of the one who wanders away from Him. Whenever I think of the depth of His love for me, I am amazed. I am humbled by His love. I believe in free will. And as such, I understand the consequences of my sin. This is why God’s gift is so overwhelming to me. His forgiveness. His grace. I didn’t deserve a second chance after I allowed my heart to harden against Him. I didn’t deserve a third chance after I carefully partitioned a sin-room in the center of my heart…a place where He was not invited. But Jesus never let me go. Because Of His love, He pursued me and drew me back to Him. After that second chance I was thankful that God would leave the 99 to find me.  But I still didn’t understand grace. After this third chance, after filling me with His presence and His joy, I am finally beginning to understand His grace. It is causing me to want to seek Him more…to be in His presence. It is making me bold. It is changing me and I like it. I am eternally thankful for His redemption.

Tenth Avenue North has a song called Forgive Me.  There are really great word pictures in this song. When we choose to ignore Jesus, we are choosing the more difficult path.  The one that leaves us wanting.  But, He is the Light for my foolish heart.

I hear You calling out my name Lord,                                                                                                     But I can’t look You in the eye.                                                                                                                    So I, I just stay away.                                                                                                                                        I tried and tasted what’s forbidden,                                                                                                        And it filled me with delight.                                                                                                                     But now, I’m still hungry Inside.

Oh God, I let intruders into the garden of my soul.                                                                          Foxes are running wild.                                                                                                                                   I thought You were holding out on me now,                                                                                            To keep me from being free.                                                                                                                    How could I have been so wrong?  

Forgive me, forgive me Lord For living like I’m not Yours.                                                                     I forget how kind You are. You’re the light for my foolish heart.