broken.

"The Lord is near to the brokenhearted 

and saves the crushed in spirit."

Psalm 34:18

Isn't that what we all hate to be? It's what we fear the most. To lose all sense of direction and concreteness about anything. When the questions mount up thick and drip into each other making clarity obsolete. When going through the motions is like murder on your soul and body. People around you stay silent because they don't really know what to say... so they speak no words, making you believe in your broken state that maybe your crazy.. and if you really believed God you'd be ok, because He loves you and knows the plans for you, not to harm or hurt you. You pour scripture into your soul.. hoping beyond reason that maybe something will stick and you will be "better" or maybe get enough courage to at least take a shower.

You are broken.

You yell and question God at these times, "If you really really loved me.. " Feeling dictates your motions and motions dictate your feelings.. it's a never ending cycle of pain, and you just want off. You just want this to be happening to anyone but you.. so you can play the silent one, the one that is oblivious to the pain that you carry. 

And you know deep down that there is joy somewhere, but you can't see it, feel it, even if it came knocking on your door dressed in a maid's outfit ready to scrub toilets you wouldn't see it. 

Joy is illusive. It's so far from the concept of living that you can't even grasp that thought, so you keep walking, feeling, living.. sorda.

There is another side to being broken. The one I can see now. 2 years ago, if you would have told me this I would have told you to "go to hell, and take your cat with you."  

The opposite of broken.. is not fixed.

It's learning. 

Learning to lean on Him, learning that people really do care about you, Learning that everything about anything can be found in the Word. Learning to shower again while crying, Learning that you really are loved so much by a God who created you. Learning that He wants to be your joy. Learning to feel, and move on. Learning to say goodbye to old hurts and hangups. Learning to see Him through different colored glasses. Learning to open your mouth when He wants to feed you. Learning the difference between mercy and grace, joy and pain, obedience and trust. 

Learning that although you are broken.. you have roots that are anchored into a God so big that he'd never let you go. He can't.. He lives inside you. 

It may be the hardest thing you'll ever do. Learning to focus on the learning instead of concentrating on the broken, and you might think I'm losing it, but really.. the bigger picture is that your not totally broken.. your just learning the deep deep things of God, and from someone who has walked through a season of brokeness.. hang on, learn to lean and walk on. I'm thinking God has for you bigger things that what you can even conceive. 

maturing approval.

He ran up to me to show me his fingers. 

 Normally he wants nothing to do with my antics to get him involved, but today it's different.

Joy spreads across his face and he yells at his mom, 

who is walking the baby in a stroller around the track while we play. 

"Mom, look at me!" 

and I wonder if those around me can hear my thoughts.

Do we ever stop wanting approval of people who love us?

Do we ever get to old to stop waving our

 smudgy little fingers in the face of those who care..

"Look at me."

Does the need for approval just translate into

 please confirm that you love me? 

or the need to know what your doing is important?

 What does it look like to outgrow this 3 year old "look at me" mentality?

What does a life that looks for no approval actually look like? 

Does God even expect us to live without getting approval from humans no matter what our age?

and the questions keep mounting. 

There was this guy in the Bible, John the Baptist.. you know the one, that guy who dressed funny and ate bugs, and had the awesome responsibility of telling people that the Savior was coming.  Long story very short.. Toward the end of his life on earth he was thrown in prison and it was there in prison he hears through the grapevine that Jesus is walking around raising people from the dead... and John the Baptist wants to know if this is the Savior who he was telling everyone about. So, he sends some folks to go check out the story.

Well, Jesus confirms to John's people that He is the One and then John's messengers high tailed it back to John in prison.  So, after John's people leave.. Jesus says this to those around him.

 "I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John, 

Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he."

Luke 7:28

Approval. Yes, John you did a great job. I see you, and John didn't even get to hear it..  I'm sure there was but minutes between verses in this book of the Bible. Minutes that would have made a difference between what John's people heard, and what they didn't.. so why didn't God let  them stay long enough to hear Jesus's words about John? 

In the search for answers you stumble on the greatest gift.. the uncovering of something so beautiful that your glad you asked the hard questions.  You find a faith that is living and breathing. A faith in a God who wants to hold you so close that people see Him, not you.. so he gets the glory. God wants us to know that approval is the lesser and  just knowing that Jesus is alive, active and here is enough.

but when your 3, you don't have the maturity to know this...

the limited donkey gig.

Enter: Balaam.   Know him?

He's the man who was riding the donkey who talked in the bible. In the book of Numbers to be exact. Ok, so he was a major fence sitter. Profiting from both good and evil deeds.. a soothsayer. He used words to get his point across. Imagine my surprise when God woke me up out of a dead sleep to remind me that donkey's do indeed talk.

My biggest question was... why do I have to study Balaam? the talking donkey gig is so overused.

A bit perturbed, I go on the hunt.. bring out the big books that the Lead Singer has on the shelves that are full of print that you have to be super human to read it's so small. And I find something so cool.. that I just have to share it with you.

The donkey... was a female.

not what you expected?

Welcome to my world. Here I was hoping that God had this amazing adventure in this story in Numbers, and all I come away with so far is that Balaam's donkey was a girl. God impresses on my heart to dig further.. look closer.

Well, female donkeys are loyal, almost always doing exactly what they are "told." They are hard workers and very very strong. They will do anything for you, even keeping you from harm... they are that loyal, but as far as I know, they don't normally talk.. oh and they are called jennys.

"And the donkey saw the angel of the Lord standing in the road, with a drawn sword in his hand." 

Numbers 22:23

The donkey. She saw and she did something. She ran off the road, she ran into a cliff, she unintentionally hurt the man she carried... to save him from what she thought was a danger.

And Balaam responded in anger, harsh words. physical abuse.

That's when the donkey talked. 

"What have I done to you, 

that you have stuck me these three times?"

and Balaam answered her.

Have you ever thought it weird that Balaam talked back to his donkey? He didn't stop and say.. "Wow my donkey just talked..." Balaam had lost it, he wasn't even thinking clearly.

 God in all his wisdom and glory came and showed Himself strong.

"Then the Lord, opened the eyes of Balaam, 

and and he saw the angel of the Lord 

standing in the way, with his drawn sword in his hand, 

and he bowed down and fell on his face."

It's not as cold outside as it has been, and the snow capped parking lots are melting back into form and function. He has come to make things new. He in His great splendor designed creation so that life wouldn't be a vast tundra of frozen forever. He uses whatever possible to melt whatever He wants.. so that the beauty underneath can be uncovered and seen. He even uses talking donkeys, which I'm certain the sex of the animal is not the point.

The story of Balaam goes on of course, God filled him with His words

Balaam needed a major heart and behavior melt so dramatic that it altered his course so that God could shine His glory. How fun to know that God would use any means possible to get to us. He loves us that much. His Words are that important.


I stand back, looking into the Words of the Creator, and I breathe Him in deep, and my heart melts once again. He would use anything. Anything.

How often do I limit Him?

Rescued.

I'm not even supposed to be there. My dad wanted to call and tell us to stay home. Ice, sleet, rain, bipolar weather, the game changer? It's Sunday. The day we fellowship on purpose with brothers and sister's who believe and walk the same road. I want to be there, I don't want to miss. I live for the weekly bread that I get to share with my family. 

Two services in, I find myself outside trying yet again to capture Glory in a lens. 

I search. I comb my heart for anything He'd not want to stand next to.  

Stones. Frozen stones that beg me to tell the story that I don't even know myself.  A mini alter to Him? Stones of remembrance? For all I know some child probably was playing and these are stones for a battle, hidden while the enemy lurks about in nearness.

and I want to pick one up and hurl it at him, the enemy. I get so sick of his games. his lies, his tendency to dress things in light only to be uncovered and shown for the crap it really is. I hate that my heart is forced to hate anything so dark. 

My sweet mom used to tell us girls when we'd scream at each other in those years between, "You don't hate anything."  

Yes mom, yes I do.

I hate evil.

I hate what it does to families, to parents,  to churches, to marriages, to siblings, to businesses, to me.

I hate that it hits me when I least expect it and alters my thinking. I hate that it seems to win in those moments.  I hate that feeling of letting God down in the important moments. The moments that matter.

My heart is bare open before Him, the One that matters, and I'm getting a free facial from the ice that is pelting my skin.  "May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience." I step knee deep in a snow drift. 

The reality of my journey is interrupted by the Word from Colossians 1:11.  The Word that loves, the Word that overcame evil, so that we wouldn't have to carry it. Endurance and patience, they go together. They can't be separated. The evidence of maturity. The holding of Love so close that evil has no room to grow. The endurance and patience that holds on even when evil is lurking right around the next isle. 

"For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.. another verse from the same book hits me as I write. We are rescued. Evil has no hold on us... ever. 

This is what my brothers and sister were telling me when the words from their daily bread hit my ears this morning. Walking in the wee morning hours praying, reading and studying prayer, recording truth onto a CD so lives can be changed.. It's all rock throwing at evil... It rings true in my heart and I hear for the umpteenth time that learning to walk this road takes time and energy, a community to belong to,  and of course endurance and patience.

The world needs more rock throwers.