Chapter 7 - I Want to Quit

I (P.T.) would be lying if I said this past season has been easy.

And this season has been anything but short. But I'm learning the value of the long game.

Bonnie and I wrote several blog posts last Fall detailing our path of obedience that led to tight financial times, and ultimately the faith-decision to sell our house. Now, a year later, our situation isn't really all that different financially (though we have a small sum sitting in savings earmarked for a down payment on a house)--we're paying slightly less than we were to be in a 4 bedroom house, only now we're living in a 3 bedroom apartment.

Yeah. Had LOTS of questions about that on moving day (and since). Some not so nice questions. THAT? That is where we're supposed to bring home our baby girl? A tiny room full of boxes and a pack-n-play instead of a Pinterested-out nursery? THEY? They who are younger than me or "less responsible" than me, or "less faithful" than me...THEY get a nice new house? THIS? This is how much we're supposed to pay to NOT be in a house and throwing rent money down the drain? This is your promise of blessing for us? Our crossing of the Jordan miraculous moment? It doesn't feel so...miraculous.

I may have mentioned this before, but man...I've never so closely identified with the whining children of Israel. Back in Egypt we had a swimming pool right across the street! And neighborhood friends for the kids! Enough kitchen cabinets to hold all our stuff! And a walk-in closet! Manna...again?!

Questions led to complaining. Complaining led to doubts. Doubts led to frustration. Frustration led to anger. Anger led to apathy. And after apathy? Well...

I wanted to quit.

Not quit my job. Not quit my marriage or my family. I wanted to quit this whole Jesus thing. This whole faith thing.

For the first time in my life I actually had to wrestle with doubt. I mean really wrestle. I had never used the term "crisis-of-faith" to describe any juncture of my life. But that's where I was. Distant. Cold. Apathetic. Showing up to church on Sunday and not even being able (or wanting) to sing the words on the screen for the most part. Hurt. Feeling betrayed. It wasn't that I didn't love God, I didn't even LIKE God.

But a pivotal moment came several months ago as I'm preparing to teach a class on the life of Jesus at the college (yeah, God was STILL using me to lead others even when I was at a low point myself--cause if He can't use jacked up people...who's left?). I was teaching on John chapter 6 where Jesus has just fed 5,000 men. The crowd rallies around Jesus to make Him their king, but Jesus says in no uncertain terms what it will take to actually follow Him and the crowd promptly disperses. So Jesus looks at Peter and asks, "You, too? Wanna jump ship and bail on me, Peter?"
To which Peter in essence replies, "If not You...who? If not this...what? You've got everything I actually need."

That line of questioning revealed my rock bottom moment.

Because I had found it easy to complain about how bad our circumstances were, or how unfair God was being, or how I deserved more or at the least better...until I had to consider the alternative. If I'm not following Jesus...who am I following? What am I putting my hope in? Who or what could really...truly bring me joy and satisfaction that at my core I know can only be found in Jesus? I may not like my situation...but it's better than any alternative I can think of.

I won't say that since then things have been perfect. Or that I have all the answers to my questions. But there's been a gradual increase in peace and contentment. A shift in perspective. A change in desires at a fundamental level.

If you asked me on move-in day back in early December 2016 what my primary goal was, it would have been to get out of the apartment as soon as possible. I didn't really even want to put anything up on the walls (and may not have except that we were running out of room in our tiny little storage unit). Several weeks ago, however, I made a list of the things I want, and a house ranked 7th. No question it's still a desire of my heart...it's just taken a back seat to things of greater worth.

This, to me, is the gold behind Ephesians 3:20. Not that when it says God can do immeasurably more than all I ask or imagine it means that if I can imagine a 4 bedroom, craftsman style, split-master house with a bonus room in the right neighborhood close to the boys' schools that God can turn around and give us a 5(!) bedroom house. And that under the carpet there's original oak floors and behind the wallpaper there's #shiplap--immeasurably more! It's about Him loving me in unimaginably big ways even when I couldn't imagine what He was up to. It's about Him removing from me the things I had imagined were what I really wanted and replacing them with things that actually bring about hope and life. It's about Him bringing me to the end of me to increase my capacity for more of Him.

20-21 God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us. (MSG)

So I don't have immeasurably more house right now (certainly not in my closet!). I don't have immeasurably more in my bank account (because I can imagine a lot!). I don't even have immeasurably more answers about what to do next. But I'm gaining immeasurably more peace and understanding. I'm gaining immeasurably more freedom. I'm gaining immeasurably more passion. I'm gaining immeasurably more than I could ask or imagine.

And it's taken a while to get there (or awhile...you grammar nerds can work that out amongst yourselves).

But in the course of this long season, this quote from John Wood Oman has reverberated to my core:
"To deliver the soul from the sin which is its ruin and bestow on it the holiness which is its health and peace, is the end of all God's dealings with his children; and precisely because he cannot merely impose, but must enable us to attain it ourselves, if we are to really have the liberty of His children, the way He must take is long and arduous."

The long game.

Kinda like the 40-year wandering Israelites I've been so readily able to identify with.

4 For everything that was written in the past [including that story about the wandering Israelites] was written to teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope. (Romans 15:4 NIV)

Hope that I now have. Hope that I will actually be able to quit this year--to quit walking in fear and doubt. Quit walking in bondage to the number in our savings account. Quit wondering if He's actually good enough or strong enough or even paying attention to our situation.

And as far as our housing situation goes...I definitely still feel like we're still wandering in the wilderness (we just re-upped our apartment lease for another year a few weeks ago). Surviving on manna. Believing there is a land (house) that has been promised to us on the other side of the desert. But I'm looking to follow the cloud by day and fire by night and see where He takes us rather than striving for solutions on my own.

2-6 This is the way God put it:

“They found grace out in the desert,
  these people who survived the killing.
Israel, out looking for a place to rest,
  met God out looking for them!”
God told them, “I’ve never quit loving you and never will.
  Expect love, love, and more love!
And so now I’ll start over with you and build you up again,
  dear virgin Israel.
You’ll resume your singing,
  grabbing tambourines and joining the dance.
You’ll go back to your old work of planting vineyards
  on the Samaritan hillsides,
And sit back and enjoy the fruit—
  oh, how you’ll enjoy those harvests!
The time’s coming when watchmen will call out
  from the hilltops of Ephraim:
‘On your feet! Let’s go to Zion,
  go to meet our God!’” (Jeremiah 31:2-6 MSG)

Chapter 6 - Faking My Faith and Feeling All The Feels

Today I'm getting really vulnerable and letting you in on the harder parts of this journey. This year has been hard. It's  been filled with emotions. It's been battling through those emotions and wrestling down my actual faith to find joy in the hard times. I'm not talking about this beautiful baby whose name literally means "Brings Joy". I'm talking about in life, in the hard things, in the emotions. This little baby brings lots of laughs and love into our home, but she doesn't put money in the bank account and she doesn't help us find a house we can afford. She does quite the opposite, and if I'm really honest and vulnerable I've resented that a little...and then there's the loads of guilt that come just for thinking that. But she's cute and she's wonderful, so I push those emotions aside and choose joy.

"Rejoice in the Lord always! I say it again, rejoice!" (Philippians 4:4) The Bible tells us to rejoice 216 times. Paul even says to rejoice in our suffering. In our house we use the phrase "Choose Joy!" when things don't go our way, or we are upset about something. We step back, look at the big picture, remembering we still have LOTS to be thankful for, and decide we can choose joy. I just never realized it's a faith step, not a way to control your emotions.

That's actually what I've always done. I've just pushed those hard and not so fun to deal with emotions to the side so the joy could win out, but it's been a hard year. I don't want to admit it's been a hard year, but I don't want to fake it any more. When I step back to look at the big picture I have struggled to find what it is I'm thankful for. Like I said, this precious cuddly baby brought with it resentment and guilt, so if that sweet smile couldn't help me wholeheartedly choose joy what would?

Faith is my strength, my spiritual gift, and it seemed as though it had run out. Choosing joy was an act of faith, but I had not realized that's ultimately what I was doing, because it always came easy. Then God said quit your job, sell your house...all of which we've done before and He's always come through, but this time it's different. This time it did't go as I expected. This time I obeyed and put myself and my family in a position where if he didn't come through, we wouldn't be able to make it...that's big faith, right? Well, we set it up, step by step we've followed what he told us to do, we took a leap of faith, and it's felt a lot like this...

When I first caught  this on video I laughed until I almost peed my pants. (I was 9 months pregnant at the time.) However, at some point later that night, about the 100th time I watched it, my laughter turned into tears as I realized that's how I felt about our leap of faith. We took the leap for me to quit my job 2 years ago. We did as he said and took a big leap as we sold our house not knowing what was next. We anticipated our miracle. We watched and waited for the expected "what only God can do" end to our story, but it didn't come. The week before we closed on our house last December, we went out and rented the cheapest apartment we could find, only to be paying the same amount we would have been paying to stay in our beautiful home. Not only did it not make sense, but it hurt.

As I watched that video that night after everyone had gone to bed, I began to realize the reason the emotions had been so hard to control and simply choose joy was because I felt like God was the one who let me down. I couldn't simply push those feelings aside and choose joy. That was an act of faith, and my faith was jarred. To choose joy now was to fake my faith, and I felt it. I felt fake.

I felt fake in my quiet times, I felt fake in my answer to people when they asked "how are you?". I felt fake in my response to people as they made comments like "aren't you just loving being a girl mom?" I've never had to fake it before. I've always just believed God and taken him at his word, but how do I do that now when I feel like he pulled the ground out from under me?

Well, I can't say there's a formula for that, and I can't say I've done it well. What I can say is I've stopped pushing the feelings aside, and I've laid them all out before God. I've fought my way through them. I've felt a little like a two year old throwing a temper tantrum, and even at times a teenager fighting for my independence. Then there are the moments that I feel like a scared and sad little girl curling up in her daddy's lap to cry it out and try to gain understanding. I can say I relate to all the seemingly wishy-washy Psalms of David as he lashes out to God in the same breath as he states the truth about who he knows God to be. Although I have felt like I've had to fake my faith. I have never doubted who God is. Knowing he could simply answer all my questions with Isaiah 55:9 "my ways are higher than your ways..." I fought to understand what it is I actually believe through all the feelings.

It all comes down to this...My God didn't fail me. My faith didn't even fail me. My expectations did. Every time I've taken big steps of faith God has answered how I expected. This time he is doing immeasurably more than I can ask or imagine; it just looks different than I expected.

A few months ago I was singing worship songs to the Lord and I realized in all this emotion I've been waging war against my faith with, I was singing the words, but I wasn't feeling it wholeheartedly. I felt sad and repentant that I haven't been filled with faith during this season, that I, in fact, have been faith-less in the aftermath of my emotions and struggled to see all the things I have to actually be thankful for and choose joy. It was in the quiet moment between me and my Father where I simply heard him say, "Take the space you need. Feel it all out. I'm not upset about it. I am here. I am still at work.I love you more than you will ever be able to understand."

Fighting my way through these feelings has been one of the hardest things I've ever done, but I'm picking myself up again and holding tight to my faith. I'm still working on removing my expectations, but I'm learning to hope again, not in what God can do for me, but in HIM ALONE.

"I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit."  Romans 15:13

Choose Joy! 

...as an act of faith, not as a way to control your emotions. 

No plan of mine ever lead to this...

A break in the story of our journey to tell you this quick little note.

I sat and held my precious baby girl the other day and just wept with the thought, "no plan of mine ever lead to this."

Man, isn't that the truth behind Ephesians 3:20, "Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than we can ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us."

I stared at that face through watery eyes and for a few minutes thought through all the things I had imagined on this journey; for ministry, family, goals...paths I had laid out in my head, even though God told me not to, and not a single one of them EVER had me snuggling another newborn baby in my arms.

In that precious moment of revelation, I heard the sweet, gentle voice of the Lord say to me. "If following me one step at a time got you to here, you can trust me that the unknown steps ahead of you will lead to another beautiful moment you can't come up with on your own."

Another message of trust. Another way the Lord has so gently told me to trust him as I follow after him wholeheartedly only knowing the one next step in front of me. Sometimes those steps are simple (call that girl you don't know and ask her to coffee) and sometimes they feel like giant leaps of faith (quit your job, move halfway across the country, quit another job, sell your house...).

I don't know what my 5 year plan is, or what I want my life to look like in 10 years (or even what we will do when our lease is up in July). I do know today I am called to SEEK, SERVE and LOVE.

1. SEEK His face
2. SERVE my family well
3. LOVE the people in front of me

Each day can be difficult to determine what steps to take, so for now this is my guide, my filter as I prioritize and plan. And I look forward to another day, somewhere down an unexpected path, that I can joyfully say "no plan of mine ever lead to this."