Hey there, friends!
I don’t know about you but this year has already put me through the ringer. Just a little cliff note version for ya…
- We got sick in the beginning of December and also brought home a puppy (the same day Emma woke up with a fever).
- I had a terrible reaction to an antibiotic for the illness I was dealing with STILL at Christmas (I’ll spare you the details).
- My husband had a cyst removed off his back and had stitches for a week and a half.
- I had my liver biopsied, bottomed out in recovery (like 30bpm heart rate and ridiculously low BP), great fun. And the pain lasted for about 9 days.
- Took a trip to the ER because that pain wasn’t subsiding… can’t wait to get that bill.
- Emma took a trip to the ER because she’s been dealing with headaches after preschool/family gatherings and getting flu like symptoms and fatigue.
And it’s literally January 22.
Forget the fact that I still had a home to run, toilets to clean, laundry to do and food to make.
But friends, this is life.
Well, I mean, it’s not like this extra stuff that went on is super common and fun, but sucky circumstances and trials and suffering are just part of this side of heaven. Thank GOD we have hope in Christ, right? I mean, if I didn’t have Jesus I’m not sure I’d have survived the last month and half of my life because it was a freaking WAR ZONE.
Okay, so I actually didn’t write this blog post to only fill you in on why I haven’t written lately - I do have something much more encouraging to share with you. We’re going to talk about God’s purpose in creating us and how we have an opportunity to embrace that purpose when we live for Christ.
Alright, here we go! A few days ago, I lost my mind on my oldest daughter. Probably the worst I ever have in her four and a half years of life. It was awful. I hurt her little heart to the point that she was afraid to come near me. The hatred in my heart was real. I didn’t hate her, but her poor behavior elicited a hatred in me that had been suppressed from past childhood experiences (I didn’t know that at the time btw… it came later as I was bawling on my floor asking God why I’m such a mean and awful mother - I’m not either of those things ps. but I’ll get there). And so I “popped my top” to put it mildly.
Fast forward to me bawling. My kids are strapped in their chairs eating lunch. I quietly get up, hide where they can’t see me, fall to my knees and ask God why He made me this way and why I was so triggered by my daughters behavior. Without exposing my daughter here, the long and short of it is this - when I asked God why I was triggered, memories of my childhood flooded my mind. Times when I wasn’t heard. Times when my feelings were mocked and ignored. So is this my daughters fault that I responded this way? Of course not. Is it even my fault? Yes to the extent that I made the choice to freak out, but no to the extent that had I not faced those problems as a child, my reaction may not have been so strong. I didn’t know why I was freaking out so bad, all I knew was that I was raging with anger and wanted someone to know it.
Encouraged yet?
Ha! I’m getting there, but I needed to preface. So, why the heck did I tell you all of that?
Because later that night (after asking my daughter and the Lord for forgiveness) as I was reading my Bible, God laid something beautiful on my heart…
When I reacted so harshly to my daughter, I had slipped back into my old self. The new creation I am in Christ had taken a back seat.
Ephesians 4:22,24 says, “throw off your old sinful nature and your former way of life, which is corrupted by lust and deception. Put on your new nature, created to be like God—truly righteous and holy.”
What I did, and what I’ve been doing for I don’t even know how long, is simply putting the new me in Christ over top of the old me… I didn’t actually take the old self off first.
The verse above is a call to action… “throw off” and “put on.” Nothing about who we were gets to stick around once Christ enters our hearts And we’re new in Him.
Who I was as a little girl - the one who was hurt deeply by people in her life - is the one who came out of me when I blew up at my daughter. Had I taken that old self off (reconciled with my past and forgiven those who hurt me), I would’ve responded in love with authority to my daughters behavior as her mother (the new me in Christ). I am not a mean or bad mother. I am, however, in need of reconciling and forgiving things and people of my past so I can live fully in the newness Christs sacrifice offers me.
I feel like there is a common misconception that believing in Jesus brings forth an amnesia of past pain - that all of the sudden you’re a care free, untouchable, happy little light of Christ, unaffected by the past or any current, difficult life circumstances.
That isn’t so. I’m sorry if you thought that’s what life with Jesus is supposed to be like. It’s not. Life is still hard. We’re still sinners. We’re still struggling with our past. And we’re always in need of Gods love for us. We need Him. All of the time.
The difference, though, is HOPE. The difference is, life with Christ gives you new eyes to see that the old you isn’t who God intended for you to be.
Let’s take a look at Isaiah 49:1-4. I’m going to bold the key points I want you take away and then list them in bullet form.
“Listen to me, all you in distant lands! Pay attention, you who are far away! The Lord called me before my birth; from within the womb he called me by name. He made my words of judgment as sharp as a sword. He has hidden me in the shadow of his hand. I am like a sharp arrow in his quiver. He said to me, “You are my servant, Israel, and you will bring me glory.” I replied, “But my work seems so useless! I have spent my strength for nothing and to no purpose. Yet I leave it all in the Lord’s hand; I will trust God for my reward.””
So here we have it…
“The Lord called me before my birth; from within the womb he called me by name…”
“He said to me, ‘You are my servant, Israel, and you will bring me glory.’”
“I replied, ‘But my work seems so useless! I have spent my strength for nothing and to no purpose.’”
“I say, ‘Yet I leave it all in the Lord’s hand; I will trust God for my reward.’”
Friends, remember this. First, God called you. He created you for HIS glory and HIS purpose. Your life experiences are not what define you, but what He will use to shine through you as a new creation in Christ Jesus.
Secondly, He has declared that you will bring Him glory. If you have committed your life to Christ, the glory is already His. How you live in Him magnifies that glory.
Third, can we just pause for and second? When I read the line “but my work seems so useless! I have spent my strength for nothing and to no purpose,” I felt that in my bones. Being a mama is harrrrdddd. Living in the mundane day in and day out? How could I possibly be doing anything useful for Him? Laundry? Dishes? Wiping poopy butts? Surely this isn’t for the Kingdom. Except it IS. And so are the dance parties to The Descendants, the snuggles, the tickles, the chasing, the laughter, and the midnight kisses. When we’re putting on that new self in Christ each morning, everything we do day in and day out is for His Kingdom.
And last, we’re told to “leave it all in Gods hands.” Who are we to decide what’s mundane and what’s worthy of being called extraordinary? Who are we to decide if what we do every day is less effective for the Kingdom then the FBI agent busting up a human trafficking ring? (ps. Go read “A Distant Shore” by Karen Kingsbury). We all have been created for a purpose to be used by Him for His kingdom. Given gifts that will bless those around us.
Ephesians 2:8-10 says, “God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it. For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.”
Sweet friends, we are HIS masterpiece. We did absolutely nothing to exist. We didn’t get to choose the life we are living, but we get to choose how we live it. We get to decide if we keep the old self on and throw the new on top pretending we’re fine, or if we actively wake up each day and take the old self off and put the new self on wholly and completely.
I don’t know about you, but I want to wake up each morning and take off the old self and put on the new so the new can penetrate the skin where the old self used to be. I want to walk into my days knowing that He called me from inside my mothers womb to be His, to work and move through my day for His glory, doing and accomplishing the tasks and loving the people that He destined for me long, long ago.
If I can take that truth with me when the waves rise, I may toss and turn over the waves, but I won’t drown. Because my eyes will be on Him and the old me won’t be weighing me down.
I hope by this point, you’re feeling encouraged.
I love you,
Rachael
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