Receiving Love

The second half of June I spiraled into the blahs. It’s been a long while since I’ve really been up to writing. I’ve got no “good” excuses.: I’m wrestling through some tough stuff, letting go of some dreams--- well at least learning to hold them loosely. I'm trying to stop pouting about things I cannot change---


As I look at all I feel I’ve lost this year I’m trying to stay soft toward the Spirit. I’m still asking God, “What do you want to do with my life?”

1. But I’m angry.

2. And I find myself half-believing that His answer will make me miserable.

3. So I’m not listening very well.

It’s weird that I get so pigheadedly obstinate with God because besides the fact that Jesus saved my soul by dying on the cross [which ought to silence any complaints that well-up concerning the difficulty of following Him], He has blessed my life in some major ways.

(1) My husband, Tim is the most wonderful man on the face of the planet and (2) work is going great.

“Honestly” I chide myself, “ I ought to be ecstatically happy—I one of those rare people who loves her job and her marriage .“

But often the reverse is true. Every morning I think about how grateful I “ought to be” that I have Tim and my job at Disability Supports and it depresses me. I like to blame it on a chemical imbalance, but truth be told I’m just struggling through plain old impatience, frustration, and doubts about God’s generosity— because I am not satisfied with the wonderful life I have…

This Saturday the sermon was about not wasting our lives and the rewards we will receive in heaven if we become sold-out followers of Christ in this life. I wrestled with it. I have so many passions in me--- I dream of showing the love of Christ in huge ways, in deep ways, but I feel like these passions have been put on pause. God has given me small things:

• Love your husband deeply—be completely honest with him.

• Love the women you serve well --- learn how to communicate my compassion, my value of them, my heart in language that will speak to their hearts.

• Love your church and your community ---leave the prison anxiety has built for you and risk rejection.

• Love me--- trust my love when I hold in my hand the good things you are looking to for life, Wait for me.

My heart responds,

“Oh God- I’m waiting. I’m loving with all that is in me…Is it enough?”

I hurt.

Deep inside I ache.

There is so much grief in waiting on God… there is grief in letting go of smaller dreams to embrace something scary and uncertain…

Something way too big to do on your own.
Something that will require time
and trusting God’s love to cover your broken best effort.

I’m trying to keep perspective. Trying to reframe the circumstances of this process taking place in me:

Could it be possible that the ache—the blah is a part of the grieving stage of faith? Maybe I need to grieve to face what following God in will cost me. Maybe grief will lead to my whole heart embracing His way at all costs. Maybe I am okay today… Maybe God is catching every tear I shed over letting go of my-way in a bottle. Maybe Jesus sees me in the moment of death and weeps…

Maybe God [instead of viewing all this hurting inside me as failure] sees the love that keeps me clingy with desperate hope that “I will not be God’s first failure” as the truest profession of my love.

Here’s hoping right?

Yesterday I listened to a sermon entitled “Obstacles to Receiving Love” from the Greater Boston Vineyard Fellowship that cut me to the core. I made Tim listen again this morning and poured out all the ways that it connected with where I am, “I feel like a heel that receiving love has been such a struggle for me. I make you tell me you love me at least 20 times a day. I have been going off and on to the same church for four years and I am just now getting involved. I don’t keep in contact with friends and family because even when they call me I am afraid that I may return their calls at an inconvenient time. I feel like my skin is protected by a shell of glass and whenever love is poured on it rolls off like rain on the window pain. I’m dying for water, but nothing gets through. I see our marriage changing this, but so slowly…"

The sermon ended with some take home points which I have adopted of as goals for however long this season lasts:

(1) Be open with your pain.

(2) Listen to others pain.

(3) Treat anxiety and self-opposition as problems to be brought to Jesus

(4) Meditate on Scriptures that describe Gods passionate love for you.

(5) Making peace with the circumstances of your childhood.

I desperately want to be satisfied with the Jesus I meet today, but I need His grace to shatter the glass that has encased me. I believe Grace will. I am meditating on truth to ease the pain of waiting. Specifically these promises have become lifelines.

Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. (Philip 4.6-7)

Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. (James 4. 8a)

My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. (James 1.2-4)

Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. (1 Pet 5.6-7)

And for now this is me. Praying. Hoping. Broken. True.