It makes me look rather flibberty-jibbet and totally unpredictable and not dependable. ugh.
Confession? I didn’t like the ‘comparison-itis’ or the slimy, gossipy feeling I had when I clicked off social media or the lack of consistent authenticity in real-life vs. on-line life. So I deactivated. For my mental and emotional health. For protection.
So. Why try it again?
One, I am looking for community with other writers, heart-stirrers, and word-warriors. I have questions and concerns. I want to know if there are other’s who struggle with the pride and insecurity that seem to plague me and if I’m alone and how someone else worked through it. I need your stories.
Two, there’s the message within me to call hearts out to perceive their brokenness as something beautiful if placed in the hands of Jesus. And there are a lot of other word-warriors proclaiming this truth. I want to know them so we can join our voices together to proclaim truth and freedom and grace and love.
I cannot tell you how many tears I have shed over social media and really? Isn’t that absolutely stupid? It’s real and raw and pretty messy. And social media is neat and tidy and putting our best foot forward. First impressions are everything. Help?
Two years ago, the Lord broke me free from the chain of the people-approval-seeking-junkie label I have worn my entire life and since that freedom day I have been learning to live free. It’s hard. I accepted the freedom breaking on the condition that God would show me how to live without that noose wrapped around my neck because what’s the point of freedom if I’m not going to live free?
So…
Social Media. It’s stirring things long buried.
My twelve-year-old self is screaming, ‘Danger! Danger! One day you will wake up and everyone will hate you.’
My 20-year-old self is whispering, ‘If you be what they want you to be, you will be liked and accepted.’
My 30-year-old self is whispering, ‘Rejection is going to follow you all the days of your life.’
My 37-year-old self is whispering, ‘You’ve been set free. Trust God. Please him–his voice is all that matters. ‘
My current-year-old self is whispering, ‘This is stinking hard, I don’t know how to do this, I am too weak to live free.’
Which brings me to today–staring down my fears that social media is stirring:
To my twelve-year-old self I say: ‘Sweet thing, you need to forgive those girls who rejected you and abandoned your friendship because of a lie told about you. You know the truth. Jesus knows the truth and you are justified through him. Not every girl or woman is going to be like that crowd of friends.
To my 20-year-old self I say: ‘You can try to please everyone, but you will lose yourself along the way and losing yourself to people makes it really hard to lose yourself in God.’
To my 30-year-old self I say: ‘Rejection is a part of life, but it doesn’t have to define you or control you.’
To my 37-year-old self I say: ‘The brokenness and pain was worth the freedom!’
To my current-year-old self I say: ‘The Holy Spirit will give you power to live, only do not be afraid. Look to your God and listen to him. Listen for him and trust him to light the way for the next step. Be faithful and consistent in what he has given you to do.’
God is showing me how to live in the freedom that being the apple of his eye brings. It’s not without trepidation but I am trusting him to hold me close to his heart. Maybe you have voices in your head too–the kind that are tied to events in your past that affect how you make decisions in your present relationships.
Do you have fears that you wrestle with in your relationships, online or in real life? How are you overcoming them?
We can say we believe, but do we? When the way grows rough and the storm looms close do we believe as much as we did when the way was smooth and the skies clear? When it feels like you cannot catch your breath because the waves are crashing with increasing ferocity, do you believe with the same amount of fervor as when the water was as smooth as glass?
This question comes up to haunt me in the night. It hounds me when I am trapped in shame. It challenges my desperation. It ramrods my pride.
Yet, belief was the key to the sick woman and the synagogue ruler. It was their belief that fueled their desperation. It was their belief that prompted their seeking Jesus. Belief fueled their reception of their personal miracle.
Belief.
There were those in the synagogue leader’s and the woman’s life that did not believe that healing could come. Think of the woman: she spent all she had searching for health through the hands of mere men and instead of getting better she grew worse. She was probably written off as a lost cause and there was no one left to believe that she would be restored. Think of Jairus: his daughter was still alive when he fell at Jesus’ feet begging for Jesus to come and heal his daughter, yet, when Jesus finally arrived, Jairus’ daughter was dead. There was no hope because there was no life.
There have been and probably always will be those folks in my life who challenge my belief in my Jesus. There will be those that will tell me to stop bothering Jesus with the request that obviously is dead. I have those kind of latent dreams that I wonder if they will ever happen in this world. But the dreams persist and I hear Jesus tell me, just as he told Jairus: ‘Don’t be afraid, just believe.’
In that statement, Jairus had to choose who he was going to believe. Would he believe his friends and family or would he believe Jesus? Can you imagine the single-mindedness of Jairus as he walked those last, long, short steps to his home? Can you imagine the battle within his heart and what his mind was telling him? His heart is telling him to believe and reverberating through his mind is the news that his daughter is dead. Whose voice will be louder? Jesus or the crowd?
This is the challenge that I face. Will I let Jesus’ voice be louder in my mind and heart or will I let the crowd of doubt and logic drown it?
It wasn’t logical that by just one touch of Jesus’ hem would the woman be healed. It wasn’t logical that a child could be raised from the dead. There is no human logic that could explain or support a healing touch.
But what part of Jesus follows our human logic? I have experienced a peace that makes no sense when I look at the circumstances in my life. I have experienced the courage to take the next step to tear down idols that prevent the people I serve from growing in their worship experience. I have experienced freedom from the approval seeking junkie I once was.
These things are unexplainable outside the power of the touch of Jesus in my life.Will you believe? Will you be desperate? Will you seek out the presence of Jesus in your life? If you can, if you will to, you might experience miracles in your life that defy our human logic as well. And that is a very exciting place to be.
It’s one of those emotions that I try to avoid at all costs. Desperation reeks of humiliation. If I’m desperate for something then I have to embrace/admit the truth that I don’t know everything. I have to accept the fact that I cannot do something on my own. Hmm….shouldn’t I already know this? I like to be good at what I’m good at and leave it at that. But it’s those times when I try something new and have a good experience, which in turn reveals that all of a sudden I am in over my head and I want to back pedal and I find that there is no way back, but only the way through. It’s times like these that I am desperate.
Desperate to not look like the fool. Desperate to impress. Desperate that I won’t. Desperate to not fail. Desperate to know the outcome. Desperate.
It’s a state of mind and heart I try to avoid.
But…..
What if?
What if I have it all wrong? What if desperation is actually a good thing?
What if desperation positions my heart to receive the power of Christ in my life?
Multiple times this week the Lord has brought the story of ‘a dead girl and a sick woman’ to mind. It is found in three out of the four gospels. Matthew 9:18-26, Mark 5:21-42, and Luke 8:40-55 if you would like to read it.
These passages showcase two very different people. We have the woman–‘unclean’, isolated, bereft of physical touch, broke, bearing the burden to announce her uncleanness wherever she went to protect the integrity of other’s cleanness. Then we have the man–synagogue ruler, wealthy, respected, keeper of the rules, and well-known.
Two different people from two very different walks of life yet they shared a desperation. Each was desperate for Jesus.
In their desperation they received. They received life from Jesus.
Sustaining life.
Physical life.
Emotional life.
Spiritual life.
Could it be that what matters most in Kingdom Economy is desperation, not position or lack thereof, but a desperation for God himself?
This is desperation that we should never be ashamed of. This should be desperation that we cultivate. This desperation is life-giving desperation. Desperation for God himself.
I am desperate. I am desperate for God to come into my circumstance. God is attracted to a humble heart and if my heart is desperate then I come to him in humility, eyes open waiting to see him move, arms open to receive whatever he wants me to receive, and finally to have my desperation met.
