Galations 6:4. No Comparing

 I can honestly say that I have mostly stopped comparing myself to other women. I read blogs about the biggest mistakes that women make and comparing is always one of them. I think to myself, "I haven't done that in a while, I'm doing pretty well." But the Holy Spirit convicts, and He convicted me. When I said that I don't compare myself to other women, that is true, but only in the superficial sense of the word. I try to avoid the comparisons of looks, style, possessions, raising children, husbands, experiences, etc. But there is a type of comparison and envy that I struggle with, and that is the spiritual one.

 

 I often think of others gifts and personality and long to be like "her." I want to know the Bible like she does. I want to have such a clear vision of God's plan for me, and she makes it look easy. I want the always joyful, bubbly personality that makes it so visible that she is following God. I have prayed about jealousy and the root of these desires. I believe that there is a sincere longing for a closer walk with God, but also a selfish desire to be viewed as "godly" by others. Over the past few weeks, several truths have been revealed to me:

• I have to put in the work

• God has made me with unique gifts

• Every gift is important and has it's place

• God created my personality

Put in the Work

 

 In Lysa TerKeurst's book Unglued, she states that envy often arises from another person being successful in an area that we wish to be successful. I have found this to be true in the activity of running. Yes, running. I see posts of what I consider to be amazing runners. Moms, women with many kids and responsibilities, and they are fast. I wish I was that fast. But if I am honest with myself, I can wish all I want, but I don't put in as much work as they do. I run occasionally and expect to get faster and better.

 The same is true in my spiritual life. If I only pray occasionally and only pick up my Bible every once in a while, I can not logically expect to grow in the Lord. Then I see others moving forward and wonder why I am not like her. We must put in the work. Just like with exercise, when we start seeing results, the work becomes joy.

 

I Have Unique Gifts

 Even with much more work in the area of running, I will never be as fast as an Olympian. I wasn't created for that. Some people are born with a natural athletic gift. When we are born into the kingdom of God, we are given gifts.

 1 Corinthians 12:4 states "There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them." The same idea is reiterated in 1 Corinthians 12:11 "All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he distributes them to each one, just as he determines." The gifts are distributed by the Holy Spirit at the moment we invite Christ into our lives. They are different, but each one important.

 

Every Gift is Important

 1 Corinthians 12 is an amazing chapter on the gifts given by the Holy Spirit. We need each other in the body of Christ. Every single member is important and cannot function without the others. If you are a hand, do not waste your energy trying to be an eye. This will result in frustration and missing the calling of God for your life. Of utmost importance is chapter 13 of 1 Corinthians. Whatever your gift might be, if you do it without love, it is useless. "And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love." (1 Corinthians 13:13)

 

God Made Me

 Psalm 139 says "you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well." If you are churched, this verse is familiar and maybe committed to memory. Don't lose the truth that God works wonderful miracles in the womb, and each one of us is precisely who He meant for us to be.

 I can have joy and love for others in my heart and still be a quiet spirit. I was not created to be a bubbly, outgoing woman. Christ knows my heart and what I am doing in his name and to make him known. I desire to have that personality because at 32 years old, I still want to be popular. God knows that I can't handle popular, so He designed me this way. It's okay to not be the smiley, bouncy, outwardly cheerful one in the group. We need those women, and they need us.

Pride Comes Before the Fall

 I just love the Bible. It is an amazing story of an amazing God who saved us from eternal separation from Him. That is the greatest, most life changing story in all of history. The Bible is also filled with great wisdom that many people quote without even realizing from where the quote came. For instance, this verse:

 

Pride goes before destruction,
    and haughtiness before a fall. Proverbs 16:18 (NLT)

 

First pride, then the crash—
    the bigger the ego, the harder the fall. (The Message)

 

 That is the TRUTH. I am guilty of living it out far too often. I've recently been reading, studying, and preparing for leading a study based on Lysa TerKeurst's Unglued. Pause for a moment: this book is outstanding for those who struggle with letting their feelings rip through others OR silently swallowing true feelings only to have them lose relationships based on false peace. God showed me this was the study for me in the most unexpected way.

 

 It was the day of the spring program for my older son. He was dressed and prepped and oh so handsome. On special days, I put a paste-like substance in his hair that we call "banana head." He likes to "help." A tiny bit, that is what he is allowed to put on his hair. A tiny bit turned into a glob when I wasn't looking and I let those words fly. The stress of re-washing and drying his hair was just too much for me in that moment. Now most moms probably don't tell their son that his hair is ruined and ugly...but we've all had bad mornings. I admit that shortly before this I rejected the idea of leading the Unglued study because I basically told God, "I got this. On my own, I got it." WRONG.

 

 Through the study I have been slowly making progress. Imperfect progress. I've been learning that I can never change on my own. God has been changing me. In fact, just Wednesday night, I realized that I had so much patience with the boys. I hadn't yelled in a few days, and it was a genuine patience and a heart of grace. "I got this."

 

 Wednesday night, I'm sure you can guess what happened. The fall. Baby was awake the entire night. Screaming. I had no idea what was going on, as he has been sleeping all night for over a year. I tried and tried to put him back in bed, but he was not having it. I prayed and sang and I fully leaned on God. I was still feeling pretty good about myself. Until I finally got in the bed and let my husband have it. He suggested that I do something different during the day. How dare he?! But it was me, I came unglued.

 

 The common thread in these cases is this: I thought I had it on my own. The truth is, no matter what the struggle, we will never "get it" on our own. Daily it is a surrender to the God who holds the world in his hands. I am still learning that I am not adequate to live this life on my own. I am not equipped without my Savior. I'll keep trying to take control, and He will keep showing me that it is not mine to take. But through all of this, I will make progress. Imperfect progress.

Boys Will Be Curious

Boys Will Be Boys Gross Curious

 My sweet son, G, has serious ear issues. The very first time we were aware of his "issues" was when he woke up with brown-tinted ooze coming out of his ear. He was nearly one year old and never had a fever, pulled at his ears, or had any other indicator of an ear infection. Mother's Day 2010, I was paged away from church to take care of my baby, who had a 102 temp. It was his ears. Again. He was on some kind of antibiotic for more than six weeks. I preferred tubes, but the ENT was a little more conservative and he wanted to wait it out. When G's ear drum perforated while on strong antibiotics, we scheduled surgery. All went well and he had no infections for three years...

 Then, this past February, he woke up once again with a soaking wet, nasty pillow case and fluid draining from his ear. I actually first noticed something was not right because he was covered in hives (another post in itself). A ten day course of antibiotics and he was good to go...for about a month. Then it happened again. (This child has an incredible tolerance for pain- they should do some research on him). Back to the ENT we went.
 

 This time around, the ENT doc. suggested his adenoids come out. I was expecting that. The main warning from the doctor was this: "his breath will be really bad." "Okay," I replied. "No, I mean, really bad. It's bad. Horrible." The doctor was serious about this bad breath warning. We scheduled the surgery.
 

 When the day came for my nearly four year old to have surgery, I was nervous. My brain, being saturated with statistics (most of which I make up), knew the chances of something going wrong were tiny. But my doubting, faith-lacking part of the brain wouldn't shut up. So I went to the surgery center armed.   

 We waited and waited and waited. We waited so long that I started to do squats in the pre-op area. We may have even spent some time speaking with accents or sticking surgery bear's head out of the curtain as nurses were walking by. (We now have two surgery bears. G wants more. I do not.)Then they took him back and we waited some more.

 

 

 They brought G out from recovery and I was positive they had switched him with a look-a-like demon child. He was screaming, crying, sometimes flopping around like a fish. When we asked him what was wrong he mostly said "I DON'T KNOW!" And the breath. Oh my, there is a reason the doctor warned us multiple times about that. Burnt flesh. That's all I will say. When we got home, he was peacefully sleeping and loudly snoring. He recovered very quickly and was off to school after a day.

 

 We informed the teachers of his procedure and I wrote a note explaining the death breath. Five days after his surgery, the school called me. I didn't get to the phone in time. Then my husband called: "We need to go get G from school." My mind ran away with itself. Does he have a fever? An infection? Is he bleeding? Will he need an emergency surgery?! No, none of those. It was this:

 

 If you are having trouble seeing that, it says "bead." G stuck a bead up his nose. It turned out that we didn't have to pick him up at school because he was able to huff and puff and blow the bead out. The paramedics then gave him a stuffed bear for being so brave (just what we needed). G proceeded to tell his friends that "if you put a bead in your nose, you will get a bear!" I, personally, think this bear was a punishment for his behavior. We lovingly refer to him as "scary beary."