Breath & Bone

Tag: jesus

  • When You’ve Fed Everyone but Yourself: Learning to sit at the table with Jesus

    When You’ve Fed Everyone but Yourself: Learning to sit at the table with Jesus

    The empty plate I stare at while I’m making grilled cheese for my family laughs cruelly in my face. Feeding a family of seven takes a lot and my plate is often the last one filled, if it gets filled at all. The hollowness of that plate matches the gnawing hollowness of my soul. Starvation runs deep. My stomach gnaws at my backbone in hunger. But starvation doesn’t just extend to our physical self. You can eat three square meals a day and still be starved. Empty. Hollow. You can hear the wind whip around inside you as you realize that it’s not just your body that needs to be fed.

    Mark 6:31 says, “and He said to them ‘Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while. For many were coming and going, and the had no leisure even to eat.’” We get so busy and caught up in taking care of everything and everyone that we often forget to even exist as humans that need restoration as well. Jesus calls to us here and says that we need to come away with him so that we can finally get some of that soul nourishing peace and rest.

    Society is busy. Busy is the goal for most people. People get so busy that they often forget to do anything for themselves until they fall ill from lack of care. We give so much of ourselves to work, home, family, church, and so much more. What do we give to ourselves? We can’t always expect someone else to feed into us, after all we are told to give without expectations of something in return. So at the end of the day, we are depleted by serving others.

    We become much like Martha in Luke 10:41, we get so busy serving others we forget to take time for ourselves. Luke 10:41 says, “But the Lord answered her, ‘Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.’” Right here Jesus is answering Martha, who has been so busy preparing and serving that Lord, while her sister Mary merely sat at the feet of Jesus. Martha threw a bit of a tantrum because she was the only one doing anything to serve our most Heavenly Lord and she felt ragged and worn down. Jesus’ answer to Martha was to point out that she need not feel anxious or troubled over the serving, but that she should, like Mary, merely rest in Him. She should have followed in her sister’s example and allowed her soul to soak up the sustenance that is the Lord.

    I know how hard it is to let go of the control we feel by doing everything ourselves for everyone else. I struggle to let my kids do any of the household chores because they take forever to do it or they don’t do it the way I like. So I typically end up with all the responsibilities. But you know what happens? Momma feels overwhelmed, overstimulated, burned out, and drained of all energy.

    One thing we are called to do after we become followers of Christ is to give up that control and lay all things at the feet of Jesus. And I mean ALL control. Not all of it but this tiny little corner that I’m going to hold to. You need to really let go and let God. So letting go and sharing my responsibilities with others, despite how they do it, alleviates the busy off my soul and gives me time to rest with the Lord and refuel myself for the day. For Jeremiah 31:25 says, “For I will satisfy the weary soul, and every languishing soul I will replenish.” Jesus invites us to come to him when we feel empty and hollow. He is the living water that will sustain us. He pours into our empty cups. After all, I always say that you can’t pour from an empty cup. We must have a way to replenish what we pour out. So, let Jesus be the unending fount that keeps your soul fed and watered.

  • When God’s Timing Seems Too Slow

    When God’s Timing Seems Too Slow

    The wind whips around you and the sand settles between your toes as your sandal clad feet stand amongst the dry bones of the valley. The silence is unsettling as you wait and watch for what happens next. The sun is hidden behind raw clouds casting a dimness in the valley.

    The feeling that something important is about to happen settles in your soul but you have no idea what or when to expect it. You feel the itch to move, to look around, to seek out the answer you are waiting for.

    Waiting. The hard part about being set in this valley isn’t viewing the bones cast about you, but it’s in the stillness. It’s tough when you don’t see anything happening.

    Waiting is challenging in our current social norms. Just sitting waiting for an appointment seems like it takes forever. Waiting in line at the grocery store feels like an inconvenience. Waiting is hard, even with the gadgets we hold in our hands all day every day. The waiting we feel through our daily lives though is nothing like the waiting we feel when are forced to be still for the Lord.

    When it feels like we’ve been waiting forever we often wonder to ourselves if we’ve been forgotten about. Ever make an order at a restaurant and had to ask to make sure your order got back to the kitchen?

    Waiting on God can make us wonder if He’s forgotten about us. You know the whole, ask and you shall receive, thing? Well sometimes it feels like we must sit back on our heels and twiddle our thumbs while we wait on God to do His thing. We pray and pray and pray over a thing or situation and we hear nothing back. No confirmation that it will be ours. Not even a denial that might make us reevaluate. All we hear is the wind blowing by us in the valley.

    I’ve been placed in the valley and been made to wait just like many of us have been. I’ve been writing on and off now for several years, but I’ve prayed over and over to find a way to write in such a way that it be pleasing to God. It took a while before I figured out what God wanted me to do. At first, I thought it was to write clean romance rather than what’s popular right now but even that didn’t feel wholly right. Then I began writing about Postpartum depression and began helping people there. And I realized that that is what I wanted to do. To touch people. Then I did an exercise where I wrote my personal testimony, and I realized I could help people with it too! So after even more prayer I decided to write about how God changed my life and how He can change yours.

    Now I had to wait for this answer. It probably took a full year to hear from God. Some people wait months, others wait years. Even Ezekiel stood in silence and waited for God to speak to him about the valley he had been placed in. We can only guess at how long he stood there looking at all the skeletons around him and wondering what on earth he was doing there before God finally spoke to him. In the passage where God asks Ezekiel if these dry bones can live, we are not given any sense of timing so it could have been minutes, hours, days, etc. before God spoke to Ezekiel.

    Psalm 130:5-6 states, “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope;” (ESV). Waiting is not a negative thing, even though we often associate it with negative emotions like impatience, anxiety, and fear. Waiting is something that we are told to do Biblically. Having to wait on something or a situation is not a bad thing. It seems like some of the things I’ve had to wait for the longest have given me some of the best feelings in the world.

    Instead of getting that instant gratification that we’ve grown so used to in today’s society, waiting for something is in itself a reward. I feel like I’ve passed a test almost. Think about how Joseph had to wait for all those years in prison before he was lifted up and out of that situation. Was his faith tested in all his suffering? Yes. But Joseph’s faith never wavered. His faith and his patience were greatly rewarded. He didn’t expect instant gratification and made do with just being released from prison, but because he waited for God’s promise of good he was rewarded with a role in leadership and then finally a reunion with his family.

    It might feel impossible to wait any longer. You might feel like your patience is wearing out. Trust me, I know this feeling well. Waiting for the Lord teaches us patience and patience has never been one of my strong suits. But as I’ve grown older and closer to God, I can now see His hand in all the waiting that I’ve had to do in my life. God promises us that He has plans for us and that He has nothing but good planned for us. What God doesn’t do is tell us when everything will happen. So here we sit, asking for something, and waiting. And waiting. Some might still be waiting. But that’s okay.

    God gives us ways to be sustained and renewed. Psalm 130 tells us to seek His word to find hope. Isaiah 40:31 says, “but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint” (ESV). So here we are told that those who wait as we are instructed by God to do in certain situations will be renewed in strength. Waiting won’t feel like burden. Instead, it’s something that we’ll be able to carry on our shoulders with ease as if it was weightless.

    If you feel like your wait is taking too long, try to seek out the Lord in His word. Reading my bible often brings comfort to me that I would otherwise struggle to find. God’s word has a way of soothing my soul like nothing else does. Also, continue to pray about whatever it is you are having to wait on. God tells us that if we ask, we shall receive. We just must give up our arbitrary deadlines and schedules to embrace God’s perfect timing.

    Also, think about all the other times God has been faithful to you. What prayers has He already answered for you or others that you know? Reminders that God will pull through go a long way to stretch out my patience. Just like when I let go of the expectations that something will go a certain way with my kids my patience lasts longer and I’m far less frustrated with everything. We’ve got to really give it to God. And then we’ve got to truly let the situation out of our hands.  

    Remember, silence from the Lord DOES NOT mean that He has left you or told you no. Delay is not denial. I ask that you hold on, keep watching for answers, and dare to believe that God’s timing is perfect. What are you waiting for God to do in your valley?

  • Laid Down & Lifted Up: The Call to Obedience

    Laid Down & Lifted Up: The Call to Obedience

    The Moment Obedience Found Me

    My gut clenched, tied itself into knots, and lurched into my throat. My heart pounded erratically. Once again, I felt the pull to change. I tried desperately to ignore it. Surely what I was feeling was all in my head. The ideas and visions floating through my mind must be of my own making. I’m nothing special so how could this be God speaking to me?

    There are not very many moments in my life that I can point at and say God was speaking to me (something that I am working on changing) but the times that He was responding to me were strong and intense. I could feel a literal tugging on my soul in the direction that God wanted me to go. Like a little child pulling on the hem of my shirt I felt God pulling on the edge of my soul.

    The very first time that I can definitively say that God was calling to me was when I came back to Christ and was baptized in December of 2016. For almost a year before my surrender I tried to ignore and avoid the whisper I was hearing to come back home. At this point I was going back to church often and every message I heard seemed to boil down to that of the prodigal son that came back home to his father’s open arms. I felt connected to that image. I felt that I was that prodigal son and that God was waiting for me with open arms. All I had to do was be obedient to God and surrender to the call. The night that I was saved I remember hearing Him ask “Do you trust Me enough to let go?”.  I cried and said yes to God that night.

    My obedience wasn’t immediate. I hemmed and hawed and tried to find all the excuses I could to pass the feelings off something other than God calling to me. Now, looking back, I wonder what all I missed out on from God because of my hesitation. What blessings did I not receive because I did not immediately surrender to God’s will?

    Let me ask you this. What is God asking of you right now? Why do you hesitate to surrender to Him? What blessings might you be missing because you’re not being obedient to His call?

    What Obedience Really Means

    There is a plethora of examples of obedience in the Bible. It’s amazing to read and see God speak to His people and His people immediately lay down what they are doing and redirect their paths to God’s will. One of the stories that stands out to me the most is that of Paul. Jesus came to him while he was still called Saul and told him that he was to be a servant of the Lord and that he was to spread the good news of the Gospel among the Gentiles.

    Y’all, Paul had every excuse you could think of to say no. After all, he’d been persecuting Christians up until this point. Not just putting them in jail but seeing most executed. Saul was a man set against Christianity. Then Jesus appeared to him and immediately Paul changes to follow the will of God. He surrendered and was obedient without hesitation. And throughout the rest of his life if Paul heard God give him direction, he went. No hesitation. No excuses.

    But it wasn’t because Paul felt afraid of God but because he knew that God loved him and that everything that God had him go through was ultimately for his good. Paul knew that God’s will for him would never lead him astray. That trust, that relationship with the Lord is what gives us the assurance that we are safe in our surrender. Please note that this doesn’t mean we won’t go through trials and tribulations, after all, Paul saw many a storm in his life. But what this does mean is that through it all we have God by our side and that He will use what we suffer as a means of growth for us.

    Surrendering to God does not mean that we are waving a white flag saying we give up. God’s calling to us isn’t a battle to be won or lost. Surrendering in this case means that you are opening yourself up for all the good that God has for you to flow into you and through you so that you can fully receive the blessings He has to bestow on you.

    Our obedience to God flows not from fear but from love. John 14:15 states “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (ESV). If we love the Lord, the way we proclaim to do so then we willingly do as we are commanded by God. We do so because we love and are loved. It’s this reciprocal love that we receive when we open our arms wide, fall to our knees, and say “yes, God”. That’s all we must do to receive it. Even if your yes is whispered, He will hear. Even if you just mentally say yes, He will know.

    We don’t surrender in obedience just because we’re the “good girls” afraid to do anything wrong that might disappoint God. Rather we are the willing daughters of the King of Kings ready and willing to receive all that is rightfully ours through our surrender to God.

    Jesus, the Ultimate Surrender

    Jesus knew. Jesus knew. He knew what was coming for Him throughout His life. He walked through all the highs and lows of life knowing that He would end up on the cross. THAT is the ultimate surrender. Jesus followed God’s will for every aspect of His life. He went willingly after God’s commands but that doesn’t mean He wanted to. He struggled just like we do.

    In Luke 22:42 we see Jesus back on the Mount of Olives seeking a moment alone with His father and He prays “Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done” (ESV). Jesus doesn’t want His life to end, especially in such a horrific manner but He followed God’s commands for Him regardless. Jesus knew that by following God’s will that He would be blessed beyond measure. Jesus was set down as the right hand of God for His ultimate surrender.

    Surrendering to the will of God doesn’t take away from our lives, even if it might seem like it initially, but rather our surrender to God leads to abundant blessings. It might take a while before we reap the blessings we sow in our surrender, but God will never fail to follow through. If you’re feeling convicted about something in your life that’s the Holy Spirit speaking to you on behalf of God. Don’t ignore it. Don’t pretend it doesn’t exist. Don’t shove it down and think you’ll get to it later. Instead examine it. See what it is that God is calling you to do.

    The Weight and Wonder of Saying “Yes”

    It’s in our nature to hesitate to say yes to something we really know nothing about or don’t feel ready to do. But what if we just obeyed? What if we just opened our hands palm up and surrendered ourselves to God almighty? We should listen to His call like in Isaiah 6:8, “Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?’ And I said, ‘Here am I. Send me!’” (ESV). Radical obedience is what we should be doing. It’s what God wants from us.

    “Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship” (Romans 12:1 ESV).

    We are to lay everything down, every dream, every plan, every timeline, everything that creates us as we are, at the feet of God and LET IT GO. We are to put to death our old selves and seek out our new lives in Christ. We can’t properly do that if we don’t surrender it all to God. We can’t be made new if we won’t let go of the world.

    When It Feels Costly

    We are to live with our hands open and lifted up to God. Every time I think about this, I think about this image that I see occasionally on Facebook of a little girl holding a teddy bear telling Jesus that she doesn’t want to give up her bear because she loves it but unbeknownst to her Jesus is holding an even larger teddy bear behind His back. Surrender brings more blessings than we can even begin to comprehend.

    Obedience can be hard. It can be painful. It can be intimidating. But in the long run being disobedient will be more costly to you than giving up what God initially commands. As I sit here and type this, I think about what I’ve given up following God. I’ve lost people, I’ve given up bad habits, I’ve stepped out in faith even when I was fearful. Yes, it hurt. Yes, it was hard to let go of. But I was convicted. I was commanded. So here I sit, writing to you about how God changes lives, rather than writing what I was previously comfortable with. Here I sit with a closer relationship with God than I’ve ever had before. Which, frankly, is in itself the most rewarding thing you can have from surrender.

    Closing

    God will never fail us. When we say yes to God and step out boldly in faith He’s holding our hand the whole way. His covenant with us tells us that we are not to fear what’s coming because He has it all planned out for our good. I know it is hard to step out into the unknown. I struggle with not knowing what the plan is for me but that’s something that God already has figured out and I need to let go and let God handle the details. Surrendering is never easy, but it is so, so worth it.

    So, tell me. What is God calling you to do? Will you say yes?

  • Beauty from Ashes: Finding Purpose in Pain

    Beauty from Ashes: Finding Purpose in Pain

    The Ache of Ashes

    The rubble smolders around you as you stand among what is left of your dreams and aspirations. Debris continues to rain down as your ears ring from the explosion. Just one word, sentence, paragraph, or conversation has taken all that you’ve worked so hard for and dashed everything. You reach down to pick up a lingering page of your plans off the ground and it turns to ashes in your fingers, trickling back down to the ground.

    Dreams can often come and go but there are those that stick with us, those that we actively seek to pin down and make happen. One of mine has been to make a career out of my writing. This is something I’ve held close to my heart for decades and I’m finally making it happen, little bit by little bit. However, one sentence very nearly ended it all for me. Someone told me, “Why be a writer when AI will be doing your job in a few years anyway?” Y’all, I cried. I was driving at the time and tears just poured down my face. I had just been told what I’ve dreamed of for so long was useless and unnecessary. I felt desolate for days. I sunk into a depression. Darkness tried to engulf me. If my dream was useless then surely that meant that I was useless as well. I thought surely that there was no way that I could make writing happen for me.

    But what if it wasn’t really the end? What if it was the beginning of a holy mission?

    The Divine Exchange

    In Isaiah 61:2-3 we see how God will use the ashes, something we consider to be ugly and useless, a make them into something glorious. For all the evil that is done to us, God will use for good.

    “—to comfort all who mourn; to grant those who mourn in Zion— to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified” (ESV).

    So, rather than be left to wallow in our mourning, God will bless us with gladness, praise, righteousness, and find us the means to glorify Him in our season of mourning. We will be given the arraignments that we need to see through the darkness and see where He is working for our good.

    God doesn’t just ease the ache in passing. He wants to heal us completely from the pain. But He doesn’t just fix it for us either. Often God will have us suffer through the pain so that we can heal completely and come out of the experience with a better and different perspective on life. God doesn’t just close a wound; He creates a renewing of our souls in a holy transformation.

    The Purpose in the Pain

    Consider for a moment the story of Joseph. He went from living a good life as his father’s favored son to being thrown into a pit and sold as a slave by his brothers. After that he was imprisoned for many, many years. But God, y’all. God took all that heartache, pain, and suffering and led Joseph into a position of power and wealth. Not only did he prosper, but God made it so that he could reunite with his family in a joyous way. God doesn’t take us out of the suffering; He leads us through it to the goodness of God’s will.

    As I mentioned above, I suffered the loss of a dream. My dream was to touch people with my writing. Y’all, but God! It was probably a week later when I saw a Facebook post of an image that said something along the lines of, if God calls you to it then no one else’s opinions matter. God put this in my way so that I would see it. I sat there for a moment and really let it sink in. One of the reasons I had been so devastated by the comment about my writing being replaced by AI, and therefore why write, was because I had felt called by God to create and write for this blog in such a manner that it would not only glorify God, but to help people find there way to Him as well. So here was this message from God telling me that He had called me so no one else’s opinion mattered. I was finally able to shake off the lingering darkness and depression and feel excited and ready again to build this blog. Talk about transformation.

    Surrender: The Sacred Doorway

    Transformation takes work. It takes time. But most importantly it takes surrender. Total, absolute, all in, surrender. Yes, God will work miracles and shower us with blessings regardless but if we surrender it all to Him? Oh boy. Be prepared for an overflow of His goodness. Because really, what is it that God wants from us? He’s already provided the ultimate sacrifice so that we don’t have to provide one. He’s already granted us forgiveness and mercy through His son Jesus Christ. He’s already given us righteousness and grace. He’s already gifted us with everything that we should need. So, what do we have left that we can give Him, who already has everything? Our surrender. Our whole-hearted, absolute surrender.

    Easier said than done, though, right?

    Y’all it’ll take work. I wake up every morning and renew my surrender because I often find myself trying to take back control of whatever situation I am surrendering. Old habits die hard and this particular one for me is taking God a lot of work to chisel out. But I know that if I reset my mind, body, and soul to that of my absolute surrender every day that eventually I’ll find that I don’t need the reminder, that it will have just happened, that my heart will already have let go so that God can take care of whatever it is needing done. Let go and let God, they say. That’s all that He wants from us.

    Take your ashes, the ones left over from the destruction of your hopes and dreams and reach out and hand those over to God and watch what He can do with them. Let Him take them in hand, wipe the tears from your cheeks, and watch Him work miracles.

    God can take those ashes and reshape them, change them, and create the most beautiful object just for you. In Isaiah, we see Him hand us a crown. Can you imagine being on the receiving end of something so exquisite? Not only do we receive this gift as an object of beauty to wear but it’s symbolic of where He is placing us in life. We are the daughters of the King of Kings. Wear your crown proudly.

    Your new hopes and dreams that have been granted to you might not be exactly what you were expecting. They might be vastly different from what you had originally planned out for your life. But these are different in the most important way. These are giving to you by God. They are now your God given purpose. Your calling. Your new battle-cry for life.

    Think about a time when everything seemed crushed. Think about how it made you feel. Think about how you moved through it and came out on the other side. Now imagine how different it would have been had you gone immediately to God when life imploded. Imagine how God would have comforted you and led you through so that you were not alone. Imagine the wonderful gift created from those ashes that God could have given you. Imagine how much happier you might have been knowing that your new hopes, dreams, and goals came from God himself.

    My hope, my fervent prayer, is that moving forward in your life, my friend, that the next time you feel lost, listless, adrift, that you seek out God immediately and accept all that He has to give you.