sarahisawriter

So I Started A Prayer Journal

Sat, 11 May 2013 11:47:00 -0700

“Start a prayer journal.”

This was something God told me to do at the beginning of 2013.

“Okay God,” I thought, “I can do that.”

For the record, telling God “I can do that” and actually doing it are two completely different things.

January came and went. No prayer journal. February came and went. No prayer journal. March and April rolled around. If you guessed “still no prayer journal,” you’re a winner. Finally, May arrived, and with it, a heaping dose of conviction.

“It’s May. You still haven’t started the prayer journal.”

God. He can be so bossy sometimes.

It’s not like I wasn’t praying. I prayed all the time. If anything, He should’ve been sick of hearing from me. And why exactly did I need to start a prayer journal again?

“Because your prayers aren’t being deliberate. It’s not how much your praying, it’s how you’re praying. Start acting like your words mean something. Start praying like I can actually do what you‘re praying for.”

I love it when Jesus acknowledges me as if I think He can’t hear what I’m saying inside my head… and the revelation, waterworks and repentance that always seems to follow.

I was struck by that statement. Hard. What I think struck me the most though, was that deep down, I had already known it: God and I had a communication issue.

It wasn’t so much a matter of not communicating, but HOW I communicated. Certain words He spoke began to haunt me. “Your prayers aren’t being deliberate… Start acting like your words mean something… Start praying like I can actually do what you‘re praying for.”

I began to see my prayer life for what it was—boring, repetitive and sorely tedious. I started to feel like there was more to it, platforms I wasn’t giving Him, miracles I wasn’t allowing Him the chance to perform. I was offering prayer, but underestimating His power. My words were dry and without an ounce of deliberation. Something was missing.

You might wonder, what does a dry, un-deliberate prayer look like:

Hey Jesus,
It’s me again. You know, we spoke yesterday? I just wanted to say thanks for being awesome. Because You are n’ stuff. I pray for Bob, Lord. He’s having kidney trouble. Bless Bob. Bless Bob’s kidney. Oh yeah, I almost flipped off this one guy in traffic today. He cut me off. I just wanted to apologize for that. Even if He would’ve deserved it. Well, thanks again, Jesus. Talk to You tonight. I mean, maybe. I can’t promise I won’t fall asleep or anything. You grant rest to the weary. You understand.
Amen.

…can any of y’all relate?

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying God discounts any sort of prayer. Long or short, elegant or clumsy, He doesn’t care. Heck, some of Jesus’ most powerful prayers were three words long. Three. Measly Words. What Jesus understood though, was that it’s not about the words you speak or the time you spend in prayer, it’s about the heart and devotion behind it.

Like any relationship, marital, familial, business or whatever, communication is key. You can’t sit down with someone, halfheartedly connect, and expect the relationship to grow. It’s a process of opening your heart and being honest with the other person, good, bad and ugly.

Picture it this way: You’re out to dinner with someone and trying to start a conversation.

You: How was your day?
Other Person: Bad.
You: Oh. What are you going to order?
Other Person: Food.
You: Did I do something wrong?
Other Person: Yes.

Make sense? Conversation is happening, yes, but nothing is progressing or being born from it. Something is missing, and it’s that very same something my prayers were missing, the key element to strong communication: Detail.

Details are how you get to know other people, connect with them, find what makes them tick and understand what’s going on in their lives.

Detail is as essential to a relationship as it is to prayer.

I’m one of the most detailed people you’ll ever met. You can’t ask me a simple question without getting a ten minute response. (Some of you can attest to this.) I’m all about the who, what, where, when, why, how, and what they were wearing. It’s ALWAYS a novel with me. So why on earth should my prayer life be any different?

If I really believe I’m talking to God in prayer, God as in the Almighty Maker of the universe and everything in it, why I do cut and run? Why do I keep my prayers dry and uninteresting? Doesn’t the Creator of every detail known to man care more about the little things than I do?

Is our prayer life, or lack thereof, a matter of just being lazy, or is it a painstakingly silent notion we posses that maybe God doesn’t care? After all, He IS a busy guy. Why would He take the time to be concerned about our requests?

Say I were to die, and miraculously, I came back to life a few minutes later, and say while I was dead, I went to heaven. If you were to ask me what heaven was like, I don’t think “cool” would justify as a worthy answer. You’d wanna know exactly what heaven was like! The colors, the smells, the sounds, who was there, what God looked like and more. You’d want more than a dry and uninteresting “cool.” You’d want detail.

The same way you’d want detail about heaven, God wants detail from you.

Psalm 139:17-18 says “Your thoughts are precious to me. They are so many! If I could count them, they would be more than all the grains of sand.”

This implies two things. Not only does God not “not care” about us, but His thought process towards us is precious. He’s never had an ugly thought about us! He’s not annoyed or bothered by our prayers. He doesn’t get angry when we approach Him or think we’re being demanding or ungrateful (though we can be—that’s another blog.)

It says He thinks about us more than all the sand on earth. I’d be Captain Obvious if I said how innumerable that number would be. That’s not the most amazing part. What is, is that that same innumerable number is how much He thinks us every SECOND of every DAY. And we think He doesn’t care about details?

Earlier in Psalm 139:4, it says “You know what I’m going to say long before I say it.”

What amazes me about prayer, is that we have a God who already knows every part of our lives inside and out (Psalm 44:21), yet He still wants to hear from us. All those details we think are too petty, the prayers we’re afraid He won’t listen to, He already knows them. Nothing is coming as a surprise to Him, but He wants it to come from you. He desires to hear YOUR voice.

It’s almost like being a little kid at Disney World, describing everything to your parents as if they’re not even there. They’re seeing the same exact things you are, nothing you’re telling them is new information, but there is something so much sweeter about the detailed excitement pouring from five-year-old you than what they already know (“Precious are His thoughts toward us…”)

So I started a prayer journal.

As I began to document prayers, I felt the Holy Spirit prompting me to not leave out any details. I need to tell God exactly what I was praying for. Not just a detached dry prayer, but a deliberate detailed prayer. God desires my honesty just as much as I desire His truth. Our bond grows only when we can be that open with one another.

God wants me to trust Him to do crazy things. He wants to prove that He’s capable of more than some chills on Sunday morning that produce applause. He wants to answers prayers so specific, that there is no way I can look at the situation and not say “Only God could have done this.” We’d be astounded at what kind of miracles could happen in our lives if we prayed like our words actually possessed power.

If you’re anything like myself and you find prayer can become a habitual routine rather than an open forum, begin to stretch yourself. Talk to God. Isn’t that what prayer really is? It’s a relationship. Be honest, be open, be deliberate. Come to Him with what’s on your heart. Don’t be afraid to offend Him. If anything, you’re handing Him the platform to show up and show off. Give Him that opportunity. Give Him the details.

“Prayer is not monologue, but dialogue.” —Andrew Murray

Valentines, Vampires and Jesus

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 00:23:00 -0800

NOTE: I originality posted this a year ago on another website. I felt like it was worth repurposing. :)

The new year is in full swing. The tress have been taken down, the confetti has been swept and the glorified gopher has seen his shadow. All of this can only mean one thing: It’s almost Valentines Day.

If you’re anything like me, this was one of your FAVORITE days of the year when you were a kid. I went to public school till I was in 4th grade, and each year, my teachers would hold a Valentines Day party in class that consisted of dye your teeth red cupcakes and corn syrup, also known as fruit punch..

While I loved all the treats, my favorite part was the long awaited valentine exchange. We’d always make these cute little “mailboxes” for our valentines, and during the party, we were free to get up and “deliver“ them to one another. Once school was over and all of us were bouncing off the ceilings, we could take the mailboxes home and read the cards given to us.

I took my Valentines Day cards seriously. I went out of my way to make sure each of my cards were perfect, from the stickers I used on the outside, to color appropriate blue and pink sparkle gel pens for boys and girls. It gave me crazy joy when I was finally able to pass those cards out in class. Knowing how ridiculously hard I had worked on them, seeing the smile on someone’s face as they open and read the card made it all worth it.

Ever since I was young, I loved the romance behind Valentines Day. It was a day full of sweet, innocent little gestures such as candy and notes that showed my friends and loved ones how much I cared for them—who knew a Spongebob Squarepants card could pack such a punch?

Problem is, as we get older, our idea of romance beings to evolve. It stops becoming something sweet and innocent. It’s no longer about cute mailboxes or teeth-rotting cupcakes. It’s takes on a new meaning.

I made friends with a guy at the job I working for a year ago. He wasn’t a Christian, but he was willing to talk about God. A few days before Valentines Day, he asked me if I had any plans. He knew my views on waiting and purity and was honestly rather stunned when I told him about it (imagine that), so I don’t think he took it as much of a surprise when I smiled and told him “not this year.”

“Ha,” he laughed, “I think the whole thing is a joke.”

“Oh great, ”I thought, “here comes an ‘I Hate Valentines Day’ speech…”

And it was just that. He began to tell me the whole day was a waste of time, stress, and money. He said we’d be far better off without it. I just stood there with a smile plastered my face, nodding as I listened, all while thinking to myself, “Please just shut up.”

“What about you?” he finally stated, “I’ll bet when you get married you’re gonna want a teddy bear or something huh? Come on, be honest, you’re gonna expect something from your husband.”

Something about that statement stuck with me the rest of that afternoon. I HATED what he had to say. I needed to remember that his views on love weren’t coming from a Christ-centered perspective, but as much as I hated to admit it, he did have a point.

I’m not against wanting anything for Valentines Day. As a matter of fact, the answer to his question is yes. When I get married, I would LOVE for my husband to buy me flowers and candy, teddy bears and all that cute stuff. I wouldn’t complain if he wrote me an ooey-gooey love song and gave me a letter with his sweet sentiments in it. I am a romantic at heart. I don’t think this comes as a shock to any of you (and if it is, where have you been?)

See, it’s easy to get caught up in all that stuff, and when I say that stuff, I mean the stuff, and that’s where the problem lies. Romance, in our culture, is less about relationship and more about fulfilling wants.

It happens in Hollywood all the time. It’s just so glamorous, we see it as this epic love story for the ages. Beautiful young girl meet emotional brooding bad boy, emotional brooding bad boy is so dang emotional and broody that the beautiful young girl can’t resist him, emotional brooding bad boy sweeps the girl off her feet and rocks the beautiful young girl’s world for one night. Then beautiful young girl and emotional broody bad boy part ways forever and always remember those few special moments they shared together.

Oh, and did I mention the emotional brooding bad boy was a vampire? Because he was a vampire. The end.

Even before I was a believer, I didn’t get this. As much of a romantic as I was and am, I NEVER made the connection. This is just one example of how the world has manipulated love. The whole “I” want to be happy thing. It’s selfish, and it is NOT how God created love to work.

Romance, in it’s purest and rawest state, is about giving, NOT getting. Do I love teddy bears and gushy love songs? Absolutely, but if I am more interested in getting those things from the guy I’m gonna marry than to make sure I am loving him as I am called to love him, there’s no point to it. I don’t want my marriage to be two people just fulfilling a bunch of wants. I want it to be a fun, beautiful and yes, romantic, God-centered relationship. That kind of bond can only be made when two people want to commit to giving everything to each other, and not just making it a day-to-day matter of paying dues.

We ALL want something more. We all crave relationship that includes sacrifice. Because if life was merely about fulfilling the wants, we all would have settled for sleeping with the vampire a long time ago. (Yes. I did say that.)

Remember those 2nd grade Valentines Day cards? Remember how they used to make you feel when you gave them away? Sure, it was nice to get a few, but don’t you remember the giddy feeling you’d have when a friend opened their card for the first time? It’s a moment of pure selflessness. What you had didn’t matter as much as what you gave them. That’s what true love looks like.

God is the ultimate author of romance. When you think of how much He cares for us, it blows your mind. We as a human race are a bunch of conceded, prideful screw up’s who deserve so much less than what we‘re given. We spat in His Son’s face, rejected His compassion and hung Him naked on a tree in the middle of public. We stuck dirty nails into His hands, shoved needles into His skull and laughed like He was some pathetic animal as we watched Him suffer and die.

Yet He loves us, and not only that, He purses us. He wants a relationship with us.

Jesus was the ultimate gift of love. God laid His broken and bleeding heart out on the table for you just to prove that He’d give anything to take care if you for the rest of your life. To say that He’d save you (John 3:16-17), redeem you (Galatians 3:13), restore you (Jeremiah 15:19), value you (1 Samuel 26:24), help you (Isaiah 41:10), provide for you (2 Corinthians 8:9), bless you (Genesis 12:2), and above all, love you (1 John 4:16).

Christ desires to passionately romance your heart every single moment of every single day. As if what He’s done isn’t enough, He wants to do more for you. His CONSTANT motive isn’t to fulfill His agenda, regardless of how much He deserves it. It’s to give to you because you are His and He wants to endlessly remind you how priceless you are to Him. This is the way love is meant to be mirrored.

Valentines Day is almost here. Perhaps you are one of those people who dreads this day because you feel alone and all your friends are out on hot air balloon rides with their significant others while rainbows fill the sky and baby angels appear from the clouds playing harps. Yet you’re at home. Reading this blog. In your pajamas. Eating ramen. Seriously considering sending yourself flowers.

Turn around. Jesus is pouring His heart for you, literally, and He’s asking you to be His. Your day will come. Baby angels and rainbows are in your future, but in this moment, God wants you to treasure the time with Him as He lavishes you with His love.

Think of how God selflessly wins your heart and begin to genuinely give that love away, not just on Valentines Day, but every day. Now excuse me. I have some Spongbob cards to write.

Not-So Precious Moments

Sun, 06 Jan 2013 15:55:00 -0800

Don’t you just love it when you’re meditating on something you read in the bible and God smacks you upside the head to drive the point home?

Christmas was several weeks ago. As an early Christmas present, I got an amazing new bible that offers theological commentary on scriptures. As Christmas Eve dawned, I spent the early portion of the evening sitting in my room and reading the story of Jesus’ birth. Cliché, but in a world full of materialism, it NEVER hurts to focus on why we celebrate in the first place.

I got to Matthew 1, which offers a brief account of the story and began to read through the genealogy of Jesus. While Joseph wasn’t Jesus’ biological father, he was born into his family and had the honor of raising Him as his own Son. As the chapter begins, we start reading about the bloodline that led to Joseph.

It all starts with Abram (later renamed Abraham.) No surprise there, but as the lineage continues, I couldn’t help but notice that this “awesome new bible” was offering a little more commentary than I was used to seeing. After Abraham was Isaac, after Isaac was Jacob, but then we get to one of Jacob’s 12 sons, Judah.

Now, most of the time, we skim past the genealogies quickly to get to the “meaty” stuff. Little do we realize, there is A LOT of meaty stuff in the genealogies…

The commentary beside the scripture noted that Tamar was the mother of Judah’s two kids. “Seems innocent enough,” I thought to myself, “I don’t see why they’d feel the need to point that out, but whatever.” Curiosity got the best of me, so I flipped over to Genesis 38 and started reading the account of Judah and Tamar. Turns out, Tamar was Judah’s daughter-in-law. “Okay,” I thought, “that kinda weird.”

Ha. Ha-ha. Hahahahaha. It gets better.

Tamar was married to one of Judah’s sons, but because this son was so wicked in the eyes of God, he ended up dying without having any kids, which back in that day, was a huge deal. Judah then told his second son to marry Tamar, that she might get pregnant and have a baby in honor of his brother.

I’m gonna let you read Genesis 38:9-10 to find out what happens. No really. Go read it. Then try telling me the bible is boring.

In a nutshell, Tamar wasn’t getting pregnant anytime soon. As this all unfolded, Judah’s wife dies, and he starts to get lonely. VERY lonely. Instead of joining a nice single seniors group at his church, he decides he’s gonna go solicit some street woman for sex. *Facepalm*

Little does he realize that the woman he’s soliciting is actually Tamar dressed like a harlot. Tired of being embarrassed by the fact that she’s a childless widow and having a deep hatred for her father-in-law, she decided to get back at him by having his baby. Long story short, she gets pregnant, he finds out it was his daughter-in-law, barfs (I would assume) and then she goes on to have twins.

“Ooooooookay,” I nodded, “onto the next part of this genealogy, please.”

As the family lineage continues in Matthew, you don’t go much further before you get to another slice of commentary pointing out that Rahab—the Canaanite prostitute who helped the children of Israel—was Boaz’s mother.

“How did I NOT know that?” I thought, shocked, as I went on reading. Boaz married Ruth, together they had Obed, Obed had Jesse and Jesse had David. No real shocker there either. Then it goes on to point out yet another stark reminder…

“David gave birth to Solomon through his wife Bathsheba, who was married to Uriah but she had an affair with David, so David had Uriah killed.”

This was starting to sound less and less like the bible and more like an episode of Maury Povich.

David’s story isn’t unfamiliar. He screwed up big time and paid the price for it. Yet even after what he did, he was still a man after God’s own heart and God forgave him, because of that, his son Solomon was born and became the King. Regardless, Solomon screwed up too and ended up causing a whole bunch of ruckus in the kingdom. So much so, that when HIS son became King, the kingdom split in two. *Facepalm*

The lineage goes on, and finally, through a lengthy list of corrupt Kings and shady figures, we finally get to Joseph—the adoptive father of Jesus.

“Well, that was a painful journey towards Christmas,” I sighed, sipping my cocca and singing jolly carols.

Skip ahead a few weeks. I’m reading through this same commentary bible when I get to Genesis 12, where it talks about Abram and Sarai leaving their home to go to Canaan as God had instructed them to. In the commentary bracket, it talks about how Abram told his wife to pretend she was his sister, because if the brute inhabitants of the land saw how beautiful she was and knew he was married to her, they’d kill him so they could have her.

“Which wasn’t really a lie,” the commentary stated, “seeing as in Genesis 20, Abram admits that he and Sarai really are half siblings. Same father, different mother.”

SHUT. THE FRONT. DOOR.

Okay. For realsies? I’ve read Genesis dozens of times. How did I miss that they were related?! It’s not like it makes a difference now, but still? *Facepalm*

As I pondered on this, the Christmas episode with the genealogies came flooding back to me, and I began thinking…

Thought #1: “You will NEVER, EVER, EVER see these things in a Precious Moments Bible.”

Thought #2: “Jesus, You came from a REALLY screwed up family.”

That’s when it hit me: Maybe that was the point.

I find it funny that God used some of the most un-precious moments in history to lead us to the most precious moment in of all… Jesus being born. His bloodline included harlots, hookers, murderers, thieves, liars, backstabbers, drunks and slanderers. Then there was Jesus. Perfect, spotless, sinless Jesus. Who came to die, and not only redeem the lives of everyone who called upon Him, but redeemed His own bloodline in the process. (Don’t you just love how God does that?!)

Jesus had the ultimate dysfunctional family. Chances are, you can relate. Maybe not as drastic as some, but you’ve probably seen a few rotten seeds fall from the family tree. It doesn’t matter. God doesn’t care where you come from. Just like Jesus, redemption starts with you.

It doesn’t matter what legacy you come from, you don’t have to be who the people before you were. God made you with a specific plan (John 15:16). You serve an incredible purpose because you are loved by an incredible God. All it takes is one choice… to live that purpose you were created for.

God can take the ugliest thing and make it new and beautiful (Romans 8:28). You have the ability to revolutionize the path of generations. Much like the redemption that took place from the garden to the cross, one healthy seed from a decaying tree changes everything.

Oh, I Just Can’t Wait To Be King...

Mon, 17 Dec 2012 19:12:00 -0800

God likes to throw stuff on me when I’m not expecting it.

Case: I was walking through a bookstore a few days ago, minding my own business, admiring the breathtaking stained glass windows on the ceiling, when I heard a distinctly prophetic word come from out of nowhere.

“Even the King had to wait to be King.”

*Crickets*

…yeah, that was my reaction too.

I spent the next several minutes sitting down behind one of the tables in the coffee shop of said bookstore, praying and trying to capture what exactly that phrase meant. Soaking in the silence of the quaint shop, suddenly, it hit me.

David. The King was David.

And in an instant, I had one of those breakdown, no way, “Really, God? Here and NOW?” moments where I had to fight back tears and swallow my skeptical, stubborn and unbelieving pride.

There are major moments in the life of David we focus on because they teach us so much about his character. Being a shepherd boy, slaying Goliath, running from Saul, being crowed, screwing up royally with Bathsheba (no pun intended), and ultimately, handing off the throne to his son, Solomon.These are all great moments—some remarkable and some shameful—but I think we ignore a major season in his life that he walked through, just because the bible doesn’t but a big red circle around it like most of the others.

The season where David served.

Saul was King over Israel at this point. He started off a relatively great guy, but over the course of his reign, things began to deteriorate. More so, his relationship with God began to deteriorate. The crown got to his head (another unintentional pun), and before long, he was making his own decisions. Defying what God was telling him to do over what was more profitable in his own sight. It says God even went so far as to regret making Saul the King of Israel.

You’ve gotta be doing something pretty dang horrible for God to regret using you.

Not wanting a man like this to rule over His people, God sent His servant Samuel on a journey to find and anoint a new King, a King who would do right in the sight of God and obey His commandments. So Samuel gets to Bethlehem and finds a guy named Jesse who has four sons. Jesse introduces his three eldest boys to Samuel first. All three of them are mighty, rugged, Kingly looking guys who seemed like they’d do an excellent job representing the throne (then again, at this point, anyone was lookin’ better than Saul.)

God denied the three men, and told Samuel that He wasn’t interested in a man who looked like a King, He wanted someone who had the heart of a King… His heart.

Samuel is then led to Jesse’s youngest son, a shepherd named David. Taking one look at David, Samuel was probably unimpressed. Unlike his older, masculine, war-torn brothers, David was a teenage pretty boy who played the harp and to sang to sheep. What made him different than his brothers however, was that unlike them, he was relentlessly pursing God. He was hungry on a daily basis to become more like Him, and reckless in following His commandments.

Taking a flask of oil, Samuel then anointed David as King over all Israel. The Spirit of God that had once rested upon Saul, was transferred in that moment to the young shepherd boy from Bethlehem.

Here is where the story gets me.

Although David was technically in command, it would be another few decades before he ever sat on a throne, wore a crown or was acknowledged by the Israelites as their King. In-between herding the sheep and heralding the monarchy, there was a silent season of servitude.

David played several roles in Saul’s kingdom shortly after he was anointed. He became the private musician to a restless Saul after the Spirit of God left him (for David, ironically), and after he bravely went up and killed Goliath, he spent the next several years as the general in Saul’s military. Everyone loved David. Saul’s kingdom, Saul’s army, Saul’s kids, everyone that is, except Saul himself.

Numerous times, Saul tried to have him killed and make it look like an accident. Attempts that were, not surprisingly, unsuccessful. Still, David honored his King, and most importantly, honored his God. David was aware of who he was. There was no mistaking the Spirit of God was upon him and that one day, he’d rule over Israel, but until that day, he’d selflessly serve King Saul at whatever capacity he could, even if that King Saul wasn’t really the King at all.

David’s story mirrors that of another King who faced a lagging delay between His anointing and His throne. This King however, was the King of Kings. Jesus.

Jesus was born to be King over all the world, replacing a realm of darkness thousands of years in the making. Just hours after being born, shepherds worshiped Him, and at age 30, after being baptized, the same Spirit of God that rested upon his ancestor, David, rested upon Him as well. You’d think, after all his, He would have taken His rightful place at the right hand of God.

You’d be wrong.

Although He was King, the throne tarried. For three years, He spent His life serving others. Healing the sick, talking to the misfits and preaching to the masses. He was loved, He was hated and He was humble. He washed the feet of those He called ‘brothers’ and was turned upon by the very ones who called Him ‘Master.’ You can’t help but wonder as He hung upon that broken and bloody cross, dying in the most torturous way man could imagine, if He thought He might have missed something. The belly of hell screamed His name, mocking His crown, saying His efforts had been in vain.

“You are no King”, I can imagine the demons laughed. Hope for humanity, and the throne, seemed lost.

Plot twist: The battle wasn’t over.

Just as God finally removed Saul from the picture, He removed death from that of Jesus’. By rising again three days later, Jesus took his rightful place as King. The kingdom of darkness trembled as it collapsed to the ground in reverence of its new Authority. Death had lost and redemption had been found. Once more, the rightful King ruled over all the earth. As He still does.

This relates to us in SO many ways.

God hardly ever hands His promises over as soon as He makes them. For reasons we can only see in hindsight, He makes us wait for them. Just like the time between the anointing and the throne, there is a period of servitude we’re called to. A period that can be both beautiful and uncomfortable, a period where it hurts, a period where we have to serve “Kings” who are far from noble to us.

It’s in our patience, that those demons try to tell us the same thing they told Jesus in that we’re foolish. We begin to doubt God and question His faithfulness. We argue with ourselves and wonder if the promise we cling to—the invisible throne awaiting us—is even worth it.

No good thing comes overnight. When a promise is made, there is almost always a prerequisite, especially with God.

Habakkuk 2:3 says “For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it will speak, and it will not lie. Though it tarries, wait for it, because it will surely come.”

Though your promise lags, and you find yourself in a season where you’re smack dab in-between your past and your future, do not let go of the hope God has given you. In the end, it will speak so much louder than any whispering demon or unruly predecessor.

God will do what He says He’ll do. Though you wait, He moves. And the throne awaits.

Jesus, Drudgery and George Bailey

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 17:36:00 -0800

It starts to happen when you lose perspective on what matters.

Discouragement. Discouragement over drudgery.

If you’re anything like me, you’re a dreamer. Not just a dreamer, but a BIG dreamer. The thought of just writing the book doesn’t satisfy me. I wanna write the book, sell a million copies, cast the movie and plan the soundtrack.

I dream big. I dream big, because I want to do big things God.

You might think, “There’s nothing wrong with wanting to do big things for God.” And you’d be right. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with it.

The problem begins when we slip into divine discontentment. The time between our big dreams, and our mundane reality.

I broke down while washing the dishes a few days ago. Big, snotty, ugly cry and all.

“This isn’t right!” I’d tell myself, “I need to be doing so much more! I need to be doing something important! I need to be winning souls! I need to be moving mountains! I need to be serving God!”

Yet there I was—no book, no movie— standing over a sink of hot, soapy water, wondering where the heck in my mere 21-years I’d gone wrong with my life.

“This isn’t the plan. Wasn’t I supposed to do something significant by now? What about all those scriptures that say I’m not too young? Or that nothing is impossible? What about all the Joseph’s and David’s and Esther’s who changed the world? God, I feel like I’m failing You.”

I looked at the mundane list of things around me that needed to be done that day—washing the dishes, sorting the laundry, cleaning the toilet— and never before had I felt like such a disappointment in the eyes of God.

I felt like George Bailey.

“It’s A Wonderful Life” is pretty much my favorite movie. I could seriously sit down and watch it every night for the rest of my life and not get tired of it, and it’s not just because Jimmy and Donna are ah-freaking-dorable.

The character of George Bailey wanted to do something big and important with his life. He wanted to travel the world and build enormous skyscrapers that changed the face of the world, but somewhere along the way, he got sucked into a life he hated. His good spirited nature led him to a life full of ordinary tasks. Tasks he never pictured himself doing, tasks that were, in his eyes, unimportant.

He, much like myself, fancied his life worthless.

After wrestling with suicide and a divine appointment, what I love about the end of the film is that what the audience sees in George Bailey the entire movie, he finally sees in himself. He realizes that had he not done all those so-called “unimportant” tasks, the world, or at least a small portion of it, wouldn’t have been the same. He HAD in fact done something big and important with his life, and it wasn’t by traveling the world or building an enormous skyscraper either—it was by simply serving those around him through the smallest of chores.

In Matthew 25, Jesus tells the story of a master who is leaving for a long trip, so he entrusts three of his servants with his money, each of them given an amount that matched their abilities. The first two men invested their money wisely, and were able to give their master twice as much in return. The third man however, the one given the least amount of money, buried it for the fear he might lose it. When the master returned, he was furious because of this lazy servant’s lack of profit.

The master ultimately took the remainder of his money and cast the servant into the darkness, saying, “To those who use well what they are given, even more will be given.”

We often dedicate our gifts and talents to use for the glory of God, and that’s great, but how often do we offer our time and ability to really get down and dirty and SERVE Him?

Jesus was the ultimate example of this. Yes, He did something big and important with His life, He DIED for us, but His life wasn’t just one epic moment of sacrifice. It was a continuous series of menial serving that led Him to the ultimate goal of changing the world.

It was doing the dishes. It was sorting the laundry. It was scrubbing the toilets.

I’ve challenged myself with this question: Am I going to settle for discontentment in the mundane, or am I going to thank God for the opportunity to serve by getting into the dirt and washing the feet of those around me?

This doesn’t mean you have to give up your dreams. God won’t give you a desire just to ruthlessly rip it out and see you suffer. He’s asking us, while we wait in the drab, uncomfortable middle-ground between our dreams and our reality, to be like those who didn’t loose heart and received all that was promised to them,

—Like Joseph, who became a leader after he was a prisoner
—Like David, who became King after he was a shepherd
—Like Esther, who became a Queen after she was a orphan
—Like Jesus, who became a Savior after being a servant.

“I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble.”
—Helen Keller

How I Fell In Love With A Power Ranger (And Some Stuff About Finding Myself)

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 16:22:00 -0800

I found out who I was this year.

Okay, so we’re all constantly finding out “who we are” in a sense, but I believe this was my crucial year. This was the year I got comfortable in my own skin, when I found out who I was and started to embrace it rather than change it to fit some preconceived idea of who people thought I was… who I thought I was.

Ever since I was little, I always had some sort of underlying identity crisis.

I was always the nerdy, quiet, contemplative girl who laughed at things other people didn’t find funny. I was awkward and goofy, at times clumsy and unrefined. I immersed myself in writing stories and had a passion for music that went way beyond “Hey, this is a good song—wanna go get some lunch?”

I cried when something simple made me sad, asked inappropriate questions at inconvenient times and always had a flair for all things romantic (I was madly in love with my stuffed red Power Ranger till I was around six. I showered him in love and kisses, but sadly, the relationship broke down due to lack of communication. I let him down gently.)

Needless to say, I was quickly written off as “the weird one” throughout the years. Because of the insecurity it caused, I became really shy. Sure, I was desperate to fit in like all pre-teen girls, but kept a lot of who I really was buried underneath, fearing once people found out what I was really like, they’d reject me for it.

So I buried… and buried… and buried some more.

Contrary to what you might think, once I gave my life to Christ, the burying didn’t stop. If anything, it got worse.

While I knew I was a new creation, and that God’s love had set me free, somehow, I was still bound by opinion. I lived in fear of myself. The parts of me I’d been burying alive were the parts screaming to get out, but I couldn’t do it.

What if people didn’t like me? What if I wound up alone? I knew God was with me. I’d read scripture after scripture telling me He’d never leave me or forsake me. But sometimes, I think we don’t believe it’s enough. Whether or not we want to admit it—we all crave to be desired.

I come from a family that’s had it’s fair share of issues. Jail, drugs, alcohol, divorce, and teen pregnancy just to name a few. They run rampant. It’s the norm. It’s expected. It’s the legacy.

And then there’s me. Sarah. That shy, quiet Jesus Freak girl. The one who doesn’t party, drink, smoke, sleep around, and has this crazy idea to become a writer, have a family and live a good life.

I know. Radical idea, right?

I remember one conversation with my Cousin when I was around 16 or 17. The family was discussing how I’d managed to stay out of trouble—a foreign concept to them. His exact words were: “It’ll happen. Sarah will screw up and party just like we all did. You watch.”

That wrecked me. I went home and cried for hours. My own “family” had no faith in who I was. The little difference I tried to show them—the little of ME I tried to show them—they thought it was a joke. Just like I feared everyone would. The burying began again. My personality, my dreams, my ambitions, and yes, even my faith.

Christ had made me free, I had no doubt about that, but now I was now the one holding myself back.

God began chipping away at me from that point forward. I was the marble and He was Sculptor. He saw the statue underneath the layers of fear and rejection, and ready or not, He was gonna make me see it too.

Slowly, He chipped. Minute after minute, day after day, year after year. As He carefully sculpted, my icy exterior started to shatter. I began to get a little friendlier, a little louder, a little more giggly and open hearted.

My identity crisis was ending, but it wasn’t going out without one spectacle of a finale.

The news of my parents divorce late last year came as no surprise to me. If anything, I’d been expecting it for awhile. What I wasn’t expecting however, was HOW it would happen. Hearing the news that your mom and dad are splitting up after 20 years of a loveless marriage is hard enough. Hearing that they were already well involved in seeing other people? That hurt. That REALLY hurt.

This is really hard for me to write. This is stuff I swore to myself I’d never share. Ever. But perhaps in sharing how God dug me up from a self-made grave, it’s time I stopped burying the truth.

I was mad. I was upset. I wanted to scream. I wanted to throw things. I wanted there to be rain and hail and tornadoes and misery. I wanted everything around me to reflect how I was feeling—dead.

Ready for the kicker? I wasn’t mad at them, as much as I was scared for myself.

“Nice to know the family legacy of screwing your life up hasn’t gone away,” I thought to myself not too long after everything unfolded. I laid there on my bed at 1:00 am. Thinking, crying, trying to pray, but unable to find words that expressed how I truly felt.

“What if my Cousin was right?” I continued thinking, “what this is all there is for me? What if being an unhappy failure is what my future holds? What if I’m never happy? What if I follow their path? What if I trip and can’t muster the strength to get back up? What if God has given up on me?”

I squeezed my pillows tighter as I dug my head deeper and breathed. I swallowed hard as a I held back more sobs and just tried to sleep. Still burying… even until the very end.

“You’re NOT them.”

I heard it again.

“You’re NOT them.”

I silenced my tears for the next several moments as I heard the still, small voice of the Holy Spirit began to gently speak words that have forever pierced the deepest parts of my heart…

“You’re NOT them. You’re not their legacy. You’re not who other people say you are. You’re not who other people think you are. Nothing anyone ever says or does can change the plans I have for you. You are who I say you are. You are who I made you to be. You are Sarah. You are a princess. You are MINE.”

In that moment, God’s gloves came off. He was through daintily chipping away. It was like He’d taken an ax and had begun to smash and rip at the marble block that held me inside. He was crying with me, trying to get me to come out, trying to make me see who I was and how much I meant to Him. Begging me to open my eyes see everything He had planed for me, wanting me to know my true worth. I could almost hear Him screaming “DON’T YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I LOVE YOU?! I NEED YOU TO BE YOU! I NEED YOU TO LIVE AGAIN!”

Something broke lose in me that night. Though it took a moment of ugly thrashing, the sculpture had been completed. The part of me that had been shoveling dirt onto my private little coffin for years finally got tired, and the part that had been buried finally mustered enough strength to raise her hands and begin to claw her way out.

The next morning when I woke up and looked in a mirror, it was like I was seeing myself again for the first time in a long time. Nothing on the outside had changed, but inside, I knew I was alive again. I was me again. The parts of myself I was scared to show were breaking through. Who I was, all my quirks and oddities, the things that made me “me.”

“What if no one likes me?” the insecure part of me whispered, staring at the shovel she’d chosen to release.

“Even if everyone else hates you, I made you, I love you, I want you. That’s all that matters.”

And in that moment, it was.

I’ve changed a lot this year. The shyness, the fear of opinion, it slowly erodes as I climb out and live life again. Sure, I’m still nerdy and contemplative, quiet at times and completely obnoxious at others, obsessed with music and sappy romance—minus the Power Ranger—but that’s who I am. It’s who I’m created to be.

It’s taken me 21 years, but I’m not ashamed of it anymore. I don’t make excuses or try to hide it. I don’t fear being myself anymore, the only thing I fear is being someone I’m not. I don’t have to live up to someone else’s idea of a legacy. Their expectations are not mine to keep—I have my own legacy—my own destiny to fulfill.

Life was never meant to be a game of hide and seek. If Adam taught us anything in the garden, it was that it doesn’t matter how ashamed you are or how much you hate yourself, God still sees you, He loves you, He wants you, and even when you’re at your ugliest, He pursues you.

Do me a favor: Stop burying.

Stop putting to death the person God has made you to be because you’re scared of rejection or failure, or both. God is the ultimate Author of unusual. Nothing about your personality is coming as a surprise to Him. No manmade path you’re expected to follow can overshadow the road He’s paved before you.

He made you. He loves you. He wants you. That’s all that matters.

Sins and Stones

Mon, 19 Nov 2012 00:00:00 -0800

So here’s the deal. I was reading my bible recently when something jumped off the page and smacked me in the mouth.

It was the story of the woman who was caught in adultery found in John 8.

In the story, Jesus was sitting in the temple teaching, when the scribes and Pharisees came in with a women who’d been caught having an affair, asking what they should do with her. Jesus acted as if He hadn’t heard a word they said and finally responded by telling them that those among them who’d never committed a sin would be allowed to cast the first stone at her.

Needless to say, no one was throwing any stones. Slowly, as their consciences convicted them, they each left the temple one by one, till all who were left were Jesus and the woman. When Jesus asked her who among them was left, she looked up and replied “no one.”

What Jesus said next is what gets me…

“I don’t condemn you either. Now go and sin no more.”

Ugh. Hurts, doesn’t it?

What hurts?

You know! That thing! What Jesus just said!

???

Okay, fine. I’ll admit. When you breeze through it, there’s nothing really mind blowing about that statement. But that’s just it. The Word of God isn’t meant to be “breezed” through. It’s meant to be processed. I’ve read this passage of scripture a bajillion times and never realized how potent its impact is.

Let’s rewind here for a minute. Here you have Jesus—Son of God—sitting in the temple, preaching and minding His own business, when suddenly, the scribes and Pharisees come busting in like a bunch of fools dragging some mysterious woman in by the heels.

“Hey Jesus!” One of them cries out, “we just caught this chick cheating on her husband! You claim to be holy, what do You think we should do about it?!”

Clearly being sarcastic, they were just itching to hear what this wacko religious guy had to say about her. After all, He did claim to be “God.”

Meanwhile, you can imagine this woman was embarrassed. No, no, no, MORTIFIED. She hadn’t just been found having in affair… she was found “in the act.”

This is the ultimate tale of “the hand getting caught in the cookie jar.”

She was probably hysterical as the men threw her at Jesus’ feet and waited for Him to make a false move that would discredit His flawless character. In those days, getting caught having an extramarital affair wasn’t like it is today. It’s wasn’t glamorized by Hollywood. Back then, if you were caught cheating, you were disgraced in front of your entire town, and at times, even killed. This woman, ashamed and humiliated, was probably also fearing for her life.

Jesus was weird. Which is what makes Him so attractive to a fellow weirdo like me. He knelt down in the sand, took a finger and pretended to draw in the sand.

“What is He doing?” I picture the temple goers thinking as Jesus tilted His head and began to speak.

“If you want to kill her, you can kill her, but only the people in this room who’ve never sinned can throw the stones.”

I supposed things got quiet at this point. How many people in that room had committed different sins that were just as inexcusable as that woman? The pride that had filled their hearts moments before suddenly drained away and they were faced with the doings of their mistakes—mistakes that they too deserved to be punished for—mistakes they didn’t want to face. So one by one, they walked away.

I can’t imagine it took long for the room to clear out, the woman still sobbing on the floor feeling sorrowful and guilty, trying to catch her breath and control her tears. Once all was clear, Jesus stood to His feet and asked the hysterical woman, “Who in here has chosen to condemn you?”

Her face lit up in shock as the tears suddenly stopped flowing. No one was in the room. No one was there to stone her. Her eyes beamed with a glimmer of hope, realizing in that moment that she wasn’t going to die.

“No one, Lord” she responded humbly.

“I don’t condemn you either” Jesus nodded, “now go and sin no more.”

GAH! EVERY TIME!

Still lost?

How Jesus reacted in this story wasn’t condoning the woman’s actions. Surely He didn’t like what she had done, but at the same time, He didn’t punish her for it. He forgave her and extended the God given gift of freedom—both literally in saving her life, and spiritually in saving her soul.

As many times as I’d read the line “go and sin no more”, it never stood out to me till that moment. So often, we accept the gift of God’s grace and treat it like it’s an option. We “go”, but we don’t “sin no more.” We claim the freedom, but we continue to walk in the chains that hold us captive.

Jesus never said “go and do what you want as long as you apologize for it afterwards,” He said “go and sin NO MORE.” As in, “stop it”, as in “knock it off”, as in “WALK AWAY.”

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying perfection is what Jesus was asking for. People sin, some worse than others, in the end, it all leads to the same fate. What Jesus was trying to get across is our need as saved souls to walk in holiness. To willingly walk away from the things that would try to ensnare us and choose to live our lives moving in a backwards direction. Only in that backwards state of living will we find true life and freedom. Jesus was well aware of this, hence “sin no more.”

The thing about God’s grace that’s so radical is that it’s completely unfair. As many times as we screw up, He forgives us, but at the same time, God’s not a slot machine—He’s not meant to be played. The key to walking in holiness is the sincerity of our hearts.

When you ask for forgiveness, are you asking with the intent to turn away from that sin, or slather some thick religious frosting over it and attempt to smooth things over with God so He’ll “let you get away with it”?

Intense, right?

It’s so easy to abuse God’s grace. It’s easy, because it’s right in front of our faces. He offers it so willingly it’s ridiculous. But abusing grace and experiencing grace are two completely different things. Just like this woman in the story, God didn’t just save us FROM something, He saved us FOR something. He forgave us and gave us mercy and grace we didn’t deserve, but with that came an “and”—not an “or”—and that “and” was to “sin no more.”

I’m not saying it’s easy. There is a lot of yucky stuff out there people can get trapped in, but if you can just muster the sheer will to walk away and take the first step that says you REFUSE to be bound, the journey to that “go” freedom God offers you truly begins, and you begin to experience it—and life—to its completely ridiculous fullness.

—Sarah

That Year End Blog Thing

Wed, 07 Nov 2012 10:13:00 -0800

It’s become an annual tradition for me to gather a few of my thoughts from “the year that was” and compile them into a blog during the last several weeks of the year. It’s a tradition that I’ve enjoyed and it’s a tradition that has helped me to look back and see how faithful God has been

But something happened last year. I broke the tradition. I didn’t do it.

Why?

There are a lengthy list of reasons, but I’m gonna be straight with you: It was because I was waiting. Waiting for 2012. Waiting to do it this year. Why?

Because this was my glue year.

Yes. Glue.

An explanation, you ask? Certainly.

The latter half of 2011 was by far the hardest season I have ever experienced. I was stuck working at a job I hated with bosses who hated me, my relationship with my sister was dissolving, I began having severe late night panic attacks for no reason, and to add the cherry to the top of the “Life Sucks“ Sundae, my parents decided to drop the bomb in December that they were divorcing—Merry Christmas!

For three months of my life, I felt like I was walked through life without oxygen. Each day was a daily fight for survival. I faked breathing. I faked it well. Well enough for no one to notice, but inside, I was suffocating. I couldn’t tell anyone what I was going through. I couldn’t tell anyone how numb I was, how trapped I felt, how it took everything in me not to cry myself to sleep every night. So I sucked it up and held it in. I felt angry, I felt embarrassed… I felt dead.

2012 couldn’t come fast enough.

I remember spending the last few moments of 2011 just staring at the clock in the living room. Staring. Waiting for that nightmare of a year to be over. The clock ticked with each passing second, till finally, it buzzed at the stroke of midnight. I could hear my neighbors cheering from their houses as the New Years Celebration blared on the television.

And I sat there. Crying my eyes out. It felt like a one ton weight had been lifted off my shoulders. It was finished. Somehow, I knew, I could just feel it. That season, that hard, horrible, miserable season was over. I’d walked through the darkest valley I’d ever walked through, and out of nowhere, I began to see a shimmering beam of sun—the light at the end of the tunnel.

“Now it’s time to put you back together again” I could hear God quietly whisper to my heart.

And with that, I knew: 2012 was going to be a year of restoration. My year of broken pieces being put back together again… my year of “glue.”

Slowly, and I mean VERY slowly, things began to get better. The wounds started to heal and the scars, while still raw to the touch, were carving a beautiful pattern of hope only God Himself could design.

My panic attacks went away. I began spending more time with God, praying fervently, seeking Him more intently, I was blessed with multiple opportunities to do what I love regarding writing and music—two of the very tools God has used to save my life. My sister and I grew closer out of the tight-lipped familial brokenness. From the very first second of the new year, I could literally feel God piecing me back together, bit by broken bit.

Now here I am, 12 months later, a living mosaic. A testament to what God will do with a life when you allow Him to completely shatter your life and put it back together again.

Life is still different. Very different. I left the job that made me miserable and didn’t look back, choosing to step out in faith to purse writing and music as a full time passion. My parents divorce was finalized, dad moved out, and mom started dating. Things are new. Things are weird, and if I were being totally honest, I’m still not okay with it.

But I’m still growing. And God is still gluing.

I’m in awe of everything He’s done over the last several months. He’s presented opportunities I never could have imagined, answered prayers I thought I’d never see, and shown me truth far greater than my understanding. He’s mended friendship I once thought I’d lost, and brought new and incredible people into my life to encourage, inspire and challenge me at just the right time. So perfect in fact, it’s almost comical. He’s given me hope. Restored my faith, reawakened my sense of desire, calmed the winds and stilled the seas.

For the first time in a long time, I’m content with the chaos. And I’m at peace.

Our God is an Artist. An abstract Artist. You give Him blue and pink, and somehow, He’ll make yellow. His ways are higher than ours. We don’t always understand how He works—or WHY He works.

I didn’t voluntarily ask for Him to take my life and smash it into a million pieces. I was comfortable where I was… I was safe. But then God asked me to surrender that safety and comfort. He asked me to allow Him to work in my life and not worry about the outcome. He asked me to trust Him. He never promised it wouldn’t be painful… but neither was the cross where Jesus was asked to surrender His own life to be shattered. What God does promise, is that we’ll be okay. He’ll resurrect the broken pieces. He’ll crate new life out of the once ruins of death.

I don’t know what 2013 holds for me. Part of me loves the idea that a great mystery awaits me, while the other half is scared silly. I don’t know what I’ll do, where I’ll go, who I’ll meet or what I’ll accomplish. And while part of me longs for familiarity, I have to rest in knowing God won’t leave me. He leads me through the blindness of night and into great and marvelous light.

As I walk, I dream. I pray. I wait. I trust that God knows the desires of my heart greater than I do, I trust that He placed those longings there for a reason and that He’ll get me there… no matter what the route may be.

I don’t know what kind of year you’ve had. Maybe 2012 has been awesome for you. It’s been one of those years where it’s all been good (which isn’t a bad thing mind you. Give thanks, for God grants seasons of serenity.) Or maybe your year was my 2011. Your year of brokenness, your year of pain, your year of repeatedly having to eat the “Life Sucks” Sundae.

This is my truth for you: It gets better. As cliché and phony and Christian as it sounds… it DOES get better.

You WILL smile again. The tears WILL stop. The cuts WILL heal. Love WILL overcome. God WILL put all the broken pieces back together again. Your life, much like mine, will be a mosaic that exists and displays His glory.

“Safe? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course He isn’t safe. But He’s good. He’s the King I tell you.” — C.S. Lewis

—Sarah

Purity, Popularity & Some More Thoughts On Penny Pinching

Sun, 02 Sep 2012 21:07:00 -0700

.
I posted a blog a few weeks ago talking about how purity is like penny-pinching, and how practicing modesty can be compared to saving your money for something you really want. I received some great feedback from it and felt humbled that God had used it to encourage so many people.

But if you’re anything like me, God likes to have you dwell on stuff for awhile. And awhile longer. And awhile longer.

Until here I am again.

One of the things I briefly mentioned in the last blog was that penny-pinching, or purity for that matter, isn’t popular, but that it’s worth it. As I sat and pondered that statement, a thought occurred to me:

There is always a battle before the happy ending.

“What does that mean?” you might wonder, “And what does it have to do with penny-pinching?”

Everything. And a lot more than you might think.

I remember one incident in particular that happened years ago—several. As a matter of fact? I was just a kid.

I was just starting preschool. I was a bumbling, bright eyed four-year-old who had an obsession with jean skirts and dug holes in sandboxes to try and get to China. I was sitting on the jungle gym that warm Fall day when an older boy, I’d say second grade, walked up to me.

“I like you” he boldly proclaimed with a sneaky smile.

I didn’t understand what that meant. He liked me. That was cool. I liked a lot of stuff too. Car rides, Disney movies, dolls.

What he meant by he “liked” me didn’t really sink in till he leaned in a few seconds later and attempted to kiss me.

I snapped. Well, as much as four-year-old could snap.

I shrieked with my little voice and ran up to the top of the jungle gym cowering in fear. Imagine my surprise when this boy and his friends began climbing after me! I shrieked again as I mounted off the other side of the bars and began running for my life.

“Just let me kiss you!” he shouted behind me, “you KNOW you want to…”

Did I? Because my initial reaction to scream bloody murder hinted otherwise.

He chased me around the playground for 15 minutes. I don’t think I ever moved so quickly in my entire life. The boy wouldn’t stop till he got his kiss, but I wasn’t giving up without a fight. I finally climbed up into the treehouse that hung high above the school, I couldn’t believe my tiny little legs had made it all the way up! I stuck my head out the window and panicked when I saw that this boy and his friends had found me and were climbing up too!

“We’re coming for yoooooooooou!” he sung immaturely.

Surely, this was the end. I was petrified.

Suddenly, as if the clouds opened and the heavens sounded with a mighty trump, the school bell rang, and like that, all of the teachers began to gather their students and lead them back into their classrooms—including the second grader and his friends.

While I was thankful the boys were gone, something very important was missing: ME.

I was so shaken by what had happened, I had no intention on leaving that treehouse. No one noticed I was missing at all. I sat in that treehouse for the rest of the day until school let out and I was nowhere to be found… oops.

I broke out in tears when my teacher finally found me. I looked all around, weary of that boy, scared he was gonna jump out of the corner like the boogie man and come after me again. As I clung to her leg and told her what had happened between large gulps and sighs, she looked down at me sweetly and cupped my face as she spoke these words:

“Sarah, he just wanted to kiss you. Why are you acting like such a baby about this?”

Uhh, maybe because I still technically WAS one?

My teachers words rung in my head on the way home that day as I swung my legs in my carseat, finally happy to feel safe again. Had she really thought I’d been a baby about it?

When I got older, I found out a phone conversation had taken place after school that day addressing the matter, a phone call where my teacher stated, “Boys are curious. We don’t punish curiosity. Sarah needs to learn to suck it up and experience these things.”

Needless to say, I never returned to that preschool again.

Regardless of what my teacher had said to me, and despite my clueless adolescence, something deep down knew she was wrong. That boy was mean and rough and dirty… and he had ugly shoes too! I never believed boys had cooties, after all, most of my friends were boys. Still, I had this sense inside of me that a kiss was a special thing, and mine didn’t belong to him.

This is all so intellectual for a four-year-old, but I always was a strange child. I played in dirt, talked to plants and was scared of the Barney theme song. I was an enigma.

I’d like to think God had a hand in that whole situation. Sure it’s funny and I can look back and laugh, but even then, He was keeping my heart safe. He gave me the good sense to know when to run—literally.

See, before I was even five, I practiced purity, and before I was even five, it was STILL unpopular.

Life is a lot like this scenario. You may not be leaping jungle gyms to get away from assertive second graders or get called out by preschool teachers, but there are people out there who want to take advantage of you, and the even sadder reality, there are people out there who don’t understand why you won’t jump at the chance.

A few years back, I got a message from some stranger on MySpace (you know, the thing that was popular before Facebook) asking if I was interested in being “friends with benefits.” He even had the nerve to asked where I lived so we could “hook up.” HA! What on earth gave this dude the impression I’d be remotely interested in that idea—the scriptures on my profile? I was shocked!

An even bigger shock however, was how someone I knew reacted when I recalled the tale, chuckling about how silly it was. She wasn’t laughing.

“You didn’t do it?!” her eyes lit up in disbelief, “I would! I seriously can’t believe you said no!”

I seriously couldn’t believe she’d thought I would say yes.

Titus 1:15-16 says, “To those who are pure, all things are pure, but to those who are tainted, stained, and unbelieving, nothing is pure because their minds and their consciences are polluted. They claim, ‘I know God’, but their actions are a slap to His face.”

Welcome to the state of the world.

To a culture where pleasure is a mouse click away, they don’t understand why we live the way we do. They don’t understand why we wait till we’re married to have sex, they don’t understand why we practice things like modesty and self-respect, and they don’t understand why we should believe in something like fidelity when there is “so much out there” to experience. They don’t get. And if I were being brutally honest, I think sometimes, we don’t get it either.

We think “purity” is just this clean, abstinent thing we do because God tells us to. Like He got bored when He created us and chose to entertain Himself by giving us all these desires, only to tell us we can’t use them and see us squirm, and heaven forbid we disobey and get struck by a bolt of lightning. You know how He does that… (not.)

Has it ever occurred to you that perhaps God tells His people to practice purity, because there is more to pleasure than just feeling good? Could it be that He knows something we don’t? That possibly following His way of doing things will leave us with a deeper satisfaction? Could it be that maybe, just maybe, purity isn’t about being held back from something great, but holding out for something better?

Contrary to the image pop culture has given Him, God is not a cosmic killjoy. He didn’t give us the longing to want to love and be loved for no reason. God, believe it or not, gave us desire. He doesn’t tell us to walk in purity to kill it, rather, He tells us to walk in purity to control it. He knows the atmosphere in which those desires are not only meant to be used, but best experienced.

That doesn’t sound like a cosmic killjoy to me.

Purity isn’t going to be popular. It never has been, it never will be. As a matter of fact, as the world grows darker, the more hated it will become. But no good thing ever came without opposition.

You WILL be mocked because you object to a stranger’s steamy pass. You WILL be criticized for saying “no” to someone because you have a standard you refuse to compromise. You WILL be called a prude (among other things) for not wanting to partake in some of the popular trends your friends are into because you believe there’s something worth more. And yes, you WILL get a few weird stares when you run up the treehouse and refuse to kiss the second grade boy because you know he’s not “the one” (past the hormonal surge, I’m sure he was a nice boy, just not the boy for me.)

There is always a battle before the happy ending. A few dragons need to die before you get to the top of the tower, but what waits in the tower for you, is what makes every fire, every fight and every test worthwhile. It’s the beautiful result, it what makes the journey worth waiting for—it’s what makes the story worth telling.

Xoxo,
—Sarah

Ebenezer, iPhones & Penny-Pinching Modesty

Thu, 23 Aug 2012 01:28:00 -0700

“I feel sorry for you.”

These five words have caused me to take the path of rebellion.

Before you go calling a Priest, let me clarify: This “rebellion” isn’t as scandalous as it you may think. As a matter of fact, it’s quite the opposite.

I’m not sure if you notice, but it gets hot during the Summer. Like… really hot. Especially in Southern California, where it seems like we’re breaking heat records left and right every day. Me? I’m not a heat person. I’ve NEVER been a heat person. As a matter of fact, the moment the temperature shoots past 78, I swear I’m “dying” (go ahead and call me high maintenance, I just don’t like being hot.)

It was pushing 95 in sunny So Cal a few weeks ago, and even with all the desk fans, iced tea and opened windows a girl could have, I still felt like I was melting. Seeing the kids across the street playing in the sprinklers was near torture. I was *this* close from asking if I could join them.

In an effort to beat the heat, I decided to go out. Anything was better than sitting in a hot, air condition-less room. So I threw a t-shirt, some capri’s and flip flops and headed out.

T-shirt. Capri’s. Flip flops. Remember that.

“Aren’t you hot?!” someone I knew and ran into who knows my hatred for heat asked me as they saw me wiping sweat from my forehead (I’m being honest here, not glamorous.)

“Sorta”, I downplayed it. I might have been quote-on-quote “dying,” but didn’t wanna make a fuss about it.

“Why didn’t you wear something else today then?” she laughed pointing to my apparently foolish get-up.

I shrugged, “I like this outfit.”

“I feel sorry for you” she spat venomously.

I shrugged again, “ because… ?”

“Because you think you have to be freaking modest all the time. It’s ridiculous. Seriously, who cares if people look at you as long as you’re comfortable?”

Ouch.

It’s not like I was in a parka. Recap: T-shirt. Capri’s. Flip flops.

Call me crazy, but in my book, that’s normal Californian Summer attire.

And there I was… being called “ridiculously” modest.

In that moment, I could have done several things. Admitted she was right, fought with her, or just gone home discouraged, but I didn’t do any of that. Instead, I walked away and stewed in thought for several minutes, as I’m known to do. Rather than sit there and try to puff myself back up after her harsh putdown, I stopped and began to think about her, err, “helpful” advice.

“You think you have to be freaking modest all the time. It’s ridiculous… who cares if people look at you as long as you’re comfortable?”

Most of you already know exactly where I’m going with this.

Truth is, I’m probably more modest at times then I need to be. I always have a sweater on hand or wear an undershirt in case I feel like I’m pushing it a little—but since when did that become a bad thing?

When I got home that day and began to think about this more, God gave me a remarkable thought: Purity is a lot like penny-pinching.

In most cases, penny-pinching is frowned upon. We’re called to give freely and not be completely self-serving with the material things God gives us, and while it’s one thing to want to spend your money wisely, it’s another to be Ebenezer Scrooge. Still, the more I thought about it, the more I realized how right God was (imagine that.)

Has there ever been a time that you wanted something so much, you decided you were going to work hard and saving your money to get it? In this case, let’s say it’s an iPhone. With every passing paycheck, you set aside a certain amount of money and look forward to being a few bucks closer to your reward.

Here’s the funny thing about saving money: It’s hard. You think it wouldn’t be. Shove $5 bucks in a coffee can every week until you get the iPhone you’ve been drooling over, but it seems like there are always obstacles hindering the saving process, and they come in all shapes and sizes:

First, you have the people telling you that saving your money is dumb. That the iPhone isn’t worth it, and you should just spend your money on something else. Then you have the people who spend their money frivolously and don’t understand the concept of saving, “why wait for THAT when you can have THIS now?” they laugh. And of course, there are always those unexpected expenses—the broken washer, your kid needs braces—these and more being a string of fiscal setbacks.

Yet somehow, after weeks, months, maybe even a year of saving, you FINALLY get that iPhone. And not only is it everything you’d hoped it would be, it’s the brand spanking new model with the screen that’s two fourths of a centimeter larger with a higher color resolution! (Seriously Apple addicts, is it really all that amazing?)

Suddenly, all the saving and setbacks you encountered were worth it because, at last, you have what you’ve been waiting for in the palm of hand—your iPhone.

Anyone else seeing the comparison here?

I feel like what I’m about to say relates to everyone, but girls, I especially want you to pay close attention.

The world doesn’t understand modesty. The word alone is foreign. What was once a creation set apart by the beautiful mystery of our bodies has slowly become how much we can show and still get away with it. We display what was meant to be sacred, we care less about the value of our bodies as long as we look and feel sexy. It’s this cultural machine that keeps telling us we can cross lines and raise eyebrows without compromising ourselves. It‘s a lie—and we fall for it.

I’m a girl. Desiring to be wanted is embedded in my nature. That’s not a sin. God made girls to be fought for. But so often as women, I think we’ll compromise the precious process of being fought for, for the practice of being hunted. We want the attention, exposing a little more of ourselves will do the trick, and dang it, why does it feel SO good to get a second glance?!

(I’m aware this on the grittier side. My apologies. I never said this was an easy subject…)

“Who cares if people look at you as long as you’re comfortable?”

She made a point. Being immodest—being “comfortable”? That’s easy. It involves less work, less thought, and less effort. The attention feels good, and the perks of being a little more outwardly “friendly” can be really temping.

But walking in modesty—being a “penny-pincher”? Now that takes faith. Why?

—Because it means you actually believe you’re worth something (Psalm 139:13).
—It means you take God seriously when He says He bought your body with a price and you should honor Him with it (1 Corinthians 6:20.)
—It means you understand beauty is more than just an outward thing and are more concerned with the condition of your spirit (1 Peter 3:3-4.)
—It means you take control of your desire to get that stupid second glance because you care more about the integrity of another man’s heart than what your willing to show him (2 Corinthians 6:3.)
—And yes, it means you know your body is a gift to be given to and experienced by one man—your husband—in your marriage, and you believe he’s worth saving everything for, just as you expect him to believe the same about you (Hebrews 13:4.)

Friends, my question to you is this: What matters more to you—what you can have now, or the iPhone?

In choosing to live a life of modesty, whether it be outward or even spiritually, you’re gonna face opposition. The choice to save yourself for what really matters is weird to a world that doesn’t wait for anything. It ain’t easy, it ain’t wildly advocated, and it certainly ain’t popular… but it IS worth it. Oh man, is it worth it.

To live as a penny-pincher in world that spends everything the second they get it is one of the most unlikely paths of “rebellion” you could take. It’s what I’ve chosen to do. Will you?

Xoxo,
—Sarah

The Boorish Brothers, The Perverted Prince & Leaving A Legacy

Mon, 13 Aug 2012 00:04:00 -0700

I’m about to say something every Christian has thought but very few have admitted: There are some parts of the bible I really, really don’t like.

Now, before ya’ll watch the lightning bolt come down and strike me dead, let me explain: Just because we really, really don’t like certain parts of the bible, it doesn’t make them bad. As a matter of fact, some of these really, really bad parts are actually some of the most beneficial, it just takes having to choke them down sometimes to fully understand their significance.

I flipped open my bible recently and decided to spend some solid quality time with God… which I shoulda known would lead to something interesting. I began silently praying, “God, whatever You want to show me this morning, may it be something that impacts my life and helps me to fall more in love with You.”

Be careful what you pray for.

There I was. Bible, journal and a warm cup of coffee, half awake and expecting to maybe read a Psalm, heck, I’d even be okay with a Proverb, yet as I began dabbling through the thin pages, I soon found myself in the book of Genesis. As I glanced down, I felt the strong urge that I was supposed to stay on the page I had turned to.

“Okay, Lord”, I thought, “if this is where You want me this morning, I’ll read here.”

Be careful what you agree to.

I had opened to Genesis 34. It’s not a popular passage. You won’t see it mounted as wall art and you certainly won’t hear it taught in Sunday School. It’s one of those PG-13 passages of scripture. You know, the ones we read past quickly because we don’t wanna feel awkward and admit that this type of controversial stuff is actually in the bible.

I had the sudden feeling God was about to totally blow my mind with what I was about to read, what I didn’t expect however, was just how brutally honest what He was about to show me was going to be.

The story starts off with Dinah, the only daughter born to Jacob—Abraham’s grandson. Dinah was out visiting some friends when a guy by the name of Shechem, a Prince from a not-too-distant land, saw her from afar and thought she was attractive. Being a Prince and used to getting whatever he wanted, the wheels in his head starting turning… fast.

“Okay, God, I think this would be a good place to stop”, I chuckled nervously as I read the rest of the story quickly and tucked my finger underneath the pages of Psalms, ready to flip over to something a little more friendly…

“Keeping reading.”

Access denied.

Prince Shechem’s next move is far from royally noble: He kidnaps Dinah and rapes her. And as if that weren’t bad enough, it says that he then spoke kindly to her and tried make her fall in love with him.

—Brutally Honest, Provocative Statement—

Last time I checked, when a girl is abducted by some psycho stalker and forced to have sex against her will, there is a 100% chance she won’t “love” him back. Flowers and nice words won’t fix the fact that he’s a perv.

—End of Brutally Honest, Provocative Statement—

After this happened, Shechem goes to his dad and tells him to connect with Dinah’s father because he wants to marry her. (Could this story get ANY creepier?!)

When Jacob found out what had happened to his daughter, he tried to stay calm (dad’s, imagine this is YOUR daughter, would you really try to stay calm?) What really appalls me however, is that when Shechem and his father come to Jacob to discus the possibility of marriage, Jacob is actually interested!

“I want your daughter” Shechem the Crazy Stalker says, “as a matter of fact? Why don’t we make this a merger? Your people and our people. We can form an alliance and make one land. You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. Whatever it takes, just let me have Dinah. I’ll even be willing to pay for her. Just name your price. I‘m good for it.”

At this point—sound the trumpets—we finally have the voices of reason: Dinah’s older brothers.

They were ticked. REALLY ticked. Unlike their father, they were shocked and angry at what was happening. Their sister had been kidnapped and raped, and on top of it, and their father was actually considering SELLING her to her attacker for profit?

This, my friends, was an episode of Jerry Springer waiting to happen.

Dinah’s brother’s weren’t going to take this sitting down. While the offer looked appealing to their father, they weren’t looking at this as an accusation of goods, they were looking at this as their baby sister in trouble and needing help. They took the matter into their own hands.

“We’ll let you have our sister on one condition”, the boys deceitfully bartered, “every man in your city must be circumcised as we are. It’s what our God expects of us, we shouldn’t expect any less from you, especially if we‘re gonna form a partnership.”

Shechem agreed and sent word to every man living in his city that they must be circumcised. “These are wealthy and prosperous people we‘re dealing with” he decreed, “and partnering with them would be beneficial to us in multiple ways.”

Lust, lies and politics. It was like modern day Washington D.C. circa 5000 B.C.

One little fact Shechem overlooked however? You don’t mess with a girl who has older brothers—they’ll jack you up.

A few days after all the men in the city were circumcised, while they were all “still sore” (hahaha… I’m sorry… that’s funny), Simeon and Levi, the two brothers who made the dishonest treaty, rode into the city like a boss and not only killed Prince Shechem and his father, but ALL of the men in the city, rescuing their imprisoned sister in the process. Later on, it says that the rest of her brothers then came and looted the town of all their goods, as if to say, “that’ll teach you to mess with us!”

Once the dust had settled and Jacob got wind of what his sons had done, he was furious. “Do you even KNOW who you’re dealing with?” he argued, “you screwed up a good deal! The people of that land are stronger and have bigger armies than I do! I’m just one man! Surely, they will kill me because of your boorish actions!”

The story ends with Simeon and Levi offering in Dinah’s defense, what is quite possibly one of the most controversial quotes in the entire bible: “Our sister isn’t a whore. We refuse to sell her like she is one.”

The end. Goodnight, kids. Sweet dreams!

I was angry with what I had just read. It was ugly, horrifying and tragic. All I could think in that moment as was, “God, what was the point of THAT?”

I read on, hoping I could find some valid argument that perhaps Dinah had found some sort of emotional healing. I even skimmed over the next few chapters and thought maybe I could find something that said Jacob came to his senses and realized what he was going to do was wrong. I read, and read… and found nothing.

I fully believe there is nothing in the bible that God doesn’t have there for a reason, but in that moment, I wanted to scream. “I don’t understand this” I prayed silently, “I don’t understand why You’d even want me to read this, but please, give me some sort of clarity…”

Access granted.

“Sarah, if you could say anything about Jacob’s character in this story, what would it be?”

I snorted, “He was selfish”, I spout without thinking twice, “I mean, selling Dinah, possibly forming a merger with people who worshiped foreign gods, what was he thinking?! Why wasn’t he there for his own daughter?! Why did her brothers do what he should have done?! Why was he more concerned with his own popularity than what really mattered?!”

Just like that, I was convicted. By my own words no less. Bravo, Lord. Bravo.

Why WAS he more concerned with his own popularity than what really mattered?

Jacob is easily one of the most scandalous figures in biblical history. He lied, he cheated, he stole, in a nutshell, he did a lot of stuff that makes you cringe—like the day after his wedding when he expected to wake up next to Rachel and saw Leah—surprise!

As hard as it is to admit, the truth is, we’re all like Jacob in the sense that we are in a daily battle between legacy and reputation.

Jacob had two options. In a situation where he SHOULD have said no, rescued his daughter and protected the heritage she carried by bearing his name, let alone his own flesh and blood, he saw something more beneficially intriguing. He stopped looking at what he had, and began to look at what he could have. Money, power, prestige, all the things GOD had promised to give Him, yet the temptation to go and get them on his own hung right in front of his face and he almost took it. Talk about gaining the whole world and losing your soul. (Thank God for those barbaric brothers. We may not like the way they handled it, but boy, did they become heroes in this case.)

While we may not be faced with the same temptations Jacob was, we certainly face our fair share of them. Every. Single. Day.

We live in a microwave generation. It’s easy to have what we want. Press a button and boom, instant gratification, but in a world that constantly cries “EASY”, God challenges us to go against the flow and live backwards. He says the hard way of doing things is the only way we will truly be satisfied. While a microwave dinner might taste good, you’re gonna be hungry an hour later. It will never fill you the same way a slow cooked meal will. There’s something to chew on—pun totally intended.

A reputation is an easy thing to control. It allows you call the shots, as long as the result glorifies you. But a legacy? Man, that takes a lot of character, a lot of faith, and yes, a lot of HARD work. Either you can choose to take what you have, honor God with it and see Him make it fruitful, or you can see what you don’t have and acquire it on your own.

Reputation or legacy. What matters more? Who you are, or who you were?

God’s grace is insane, isn’t it? Despite all the ugly choices Jacob made in his life, God still chose to use him. Heck, thousands of years later, Jesus was born into his family. How’s THAT for undeserving? Through his sin and messiness, God had a plan for him. What hope that should give us!

No matter our selfishness, God loves us anyway and desires to use us as a living example of His graciousness. This doesn’t mean He approves of our selfishness, but it does means He loves regardless of it. Seeing His completely selfless love for us in that way should cause us to selflessly live our lives the same—leaving a legacy that shows we cared more about who were than what we were.

“A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you and were helped by you will remember you when forget-me-not’s have withered. Carve your name on hearts, not on marble.”
—Spurgeon

Xoxo,
Sarah

Lay Down Your Cherries

Fri, 10 Aug 2012 09:37:00 -0700

“He needs to be willing to give me his cherries.”

…and that’s how this whole thing started.

One of my friends posted a status on Facebook about how she and one of her guy friends went out and got milkshakes, and how he offered to give her the cherry off the top of his. Seeing as the cherry on top is my favorite part of the “milkshake experience”, I was, oddly, blown away.

“Who just gives the cherry away?!” I thought to myself, “doesn’t he know that’s the best part?!”

Fact: I tend to overthink stuff. A LOT. While this practice of overthinking often times lands people in trouble, I’ve found it to be a clever way God chooses to speak to me. This being no exception.

I thought on…

“Well, I guess if he knew she liked the cherry, I could see why he’d offer it to her… that’s actually sweet of him to do that for her… REALLY sweet… like, über, mondo, ‘you’re my hero’ sweet… huh… the cherry on top of the milkshake…that IS my favorite part… no one ever offers me their cherry… even IF they know it’s my favorite… it’s gotta take an amazing person to do that… REALLY amazing… like, über, mondo ‘you’re my hero’ amazing…”

(See what I mean?)

“You know, Lord”, I silently thought to the Almighty Creator of the Universe, “I’d really like it if the guy I’m gonna marry offered me the cherry from the top of his milkshake… it would be super romantic…”

Yes, I really did say all this. Again, OVERTHINKER.

I began to feel silly a few seconds later. Out of all the things on earth I could have prayed for in that moment, I choose to pray a completely insignificant prayer regarding my future husband. As a matter of fact? It was straight up petty.

Here’s something I’ve learned in my relationship with the Lord: He cares about petty prayers. He doesn’t like to be treated like some unattached genie, but He’s also highly insulted when we think He’s too big to care about the tiniest desires of our hearts. Sometimes, it the tiniest things that prove how much He loves us.

Which leads me right back to the cherry.

“You want the man you are going to marry to give you the cherry off the top of milkshake?”

“Yeah!” I thought confidently, “He needs to be willing to give me his cherries.”

“So, you want him to lay down all of his cherries as a loving sacrifice for you?”

I scratched my head and raised an eyebrow, “Well there’s no need to get all ‘deep’ about it, Lord, but yeah, I guess that’s what I want.”

“Then why won’t you lay yours down for Me?”

“Huh?”

“Sarah, the cherries in your life, why won’t you let Me have them?”

This “little thought” had gone from cute to convicting quickly. I knew what He was saying. I knew exactly what He was saying, and boy, did it hurt.

We all have “cherries” in our lives—things we love, things we’re passionate about, things we cling to. These cherries aren’t necessarily bad things, as a matter of fact, they can be great. But every once in awhile, we’ll come across another type of cherry, I guess you could call it a rotten cherry. Problem is, we don’t know it’s rotten till after we’ve tasted it.

One of my cherries is something I’ve battled with my entire life: Comfort.

We as a human race are creatures of comfort. We like easy, we like familiar, we like safe. Thing is, a life worth living is never going to thrive when its sole purpose is comfort. Nothing in life worth having ever comes easy, nothing in life worth experiencing is going to be familiar, and nothing in life worth doing is certainly ever going to be safe.

We as Christians are called to live the most unconventionally “dangerous” lives imaginable. Lives set on risks and chances, faith and believing. Yet so often, we don’t. We sit back and settle for the mundane because we’re too afraid of what might happen, too afraid that we might fail. Dare I say it, we’re too afraid God is gonna let us down.

So we stay safe… we stay familiar… we stay comfortable…

I stay comfortable.

A few weeks back, God began doing a lot of new stuff in my heart. Planting new desires, showing me new paths to take, and revealing some drastic changes He wanted me to make. Yet in old Sarah fashion, as God began to show me all of His plans, all of His marvelous, wonderful, extravagant plans, I mentally did what I always do—I made it a fairy tale.

“That would be so amazing IF it happened! Wouldn’t that be great IF it were true? What a beautiful IDEA that is.”

I sit back. And I let life more abundantly pass me by. I’m comfortable. And I don’t move. I don’t follow the plans, I don’t have faith, and I don’t take the risks, because heaven forbid I fall on my butt and learn something about having to trust God in the process…

See, God never said life more abundantly would be easy—He only said it would be worth it. (Hebrews 6:10-12)

Comfort is my cherry. And in that moment, God was asking me to do the unthinkable: He wanted me to give it to Him. He wanted me to take something I loved so much and hand it over like it was no big deal. The thought terrified me! All I could see in that moment was a giant, gaping hole where my cherry used to be… my precious, delicious cherry.

“Why do you really want your husband to give you the cherry, Sarah?”

Thanks, Jesus. Really. Your previous statement wasn’t challenging enough?

I began thinking—as I’m good at doing—and settled on an answer.

“I guess it really has nothing to do with the cherry itself”, I thought, “I mean really, it’s a flipping cherry. I can go buy a jar full of ‘em. I think what would make it ‘romantic’ is that he WANTS to give it to me. He knows how much I love it and wants to selflessly give it to me. In the end, the cherry has nothing to do with it, it has everything to do with deepening our relationship. Making it more intimate and taking it to another level.”

Ouch, Jesus. Ouch.

God wasn’t asking me to lay down my “cherry” because He liked to see me squirm, He wasn’t doing it because He wanted to see me have a mental breakdown, as much as I’ve selfishly accused Him of it in the past. He was asking me to lay my cherry down so our relationship would be taken to the next level—from glory to glory, from faith to faith.

Holding on to comfort not only hinders me from living the abundant life God has for me, but shows Him that I am unwilling to grow in my relationship with Him. Real faith is messy. As much as we’d like to see instantaneous results (and sometimes they do happen), it’s the process of letting go that deepens our walk with Him. It grows our love, it furthers our trust, it makes each and every second we spend following Him more beautiful.

“By this we know real love, because [Jesus] laid down His life for us.” —1 John 3:16

Newsflash: Jesus had to lay down His cherry too. It was His own life.

I can’t imagine making the decision to die for a bunch of ungrateful sinners was easy. Especially with the foreknowledge that we’d not only leave Him hanging there—literally—but that we’d eventually reject Him, hate Him, mock Him, and deny Him for doing it. Granted, He was fully God, but He was also fully man, and the same vengeful, self-serving thoughts that would run through our carnal minds in a situation like that most likely ran through His, the only difference is, He didn’t act on them. That’s what made Him the Christ.

Jesus saw everything that could possibly go wrong happen before His very eyes, but He still chose to take the nails. Why? Because He too realized: Real faith is messy. He knew that wasn’t gonna see the results laying down His life would bring right away as He hung there mutilated on a cross. He had to choose to trust and believe that the mercy and grace He so desperately longed to offer us would be the mercy and grace we’d one day come to Him and crave.

The result of Jesus laying down His proverbial “cherry” was this: Us having deep, intimate relationship with God.

Hmm, that sounds familiar.

My question for you today is this: What cherries in YOUR life do you need to lay down? What is it you’re clinging to so tightly that you’re missing out on the abundant life God has for you? Is it fear? Doubt? Worry? Comfort? Whatever it is, God is ever so quietly whispering in your ear today to just let it go. He has something so amazing for you, but you’ll never have it if you’re not willing to press towards it.

Sacrifice the cherry. Love Him more than you love it. It won’t always be easy (after all, the cherry is the best part!), but the love and the deepening of the relationship you’ll build with Him from it will last far longer than any tart kiss from a cherry ever will.

Xoxo,
—Sarah

That One Time Sarah Was A Legalist…

Fri, 13 Jul 2012 20:06:00 -0700

This is the story of a girl named Legalistic Sarah, and how she got her butt kicked to the curb and died. (This story is about me, by the way.)

Well, obviously, I’m still here, and I’m clearly not dead, so you might be thinking right about now, “has she lost her mind?”

A long time ago. That’s not the point.

This is a blog I’ve been wanting to write for a very long time, but for one reason or another, never did. Perhaps it’s because it’s such a touchy subject for people, perhaps it’s because God has laid it on my heart to talk about other things. Whatever the reason was before, I feel like God is telling me now is the time. So sit back, relax, grab a bowl of popcorn, and possibly, prepare for a little conviction…

I became EXTREMELY conservative after I became a Christian. I say extremely because, while I still consider myself pretty conservative, I went through a brief period where I thought absolutely everything was evil.

I’m an “all or nothing” type of a gal. Always have been. Before Christ? Everything was permissible in my book. If it felt good, do it. If it looked good, watch it. If it sounded good, listen to it. Get the picture? But after I came to faith, my mind did a total turnover. Suddenly, life was one big sin party and I was the annoying tattle-tale neighbor who called the cops to break it up—even if said party was the church picnic.

No movies, no TV, no music, no books, nothing fun of any sort. Just sit in church. Singing hymns. Being “joyful” always. Forever.

It didn’t take long for me to catch on: that’s not real life, and it’s most certainly not how God works.

What I didn’t understand was, while there is a definite grey, it doesn’t mean everything white is black. Movies, TV, music, books, all these things aren’t bad, but there are versions of them that are. Variations of them that slowly erode our lives bit by bit till we’re worn down into a mushy minded puddle of cultural soup. No longer thinking for ourselves, and basing all of our decisions solely on what we want, rather than the benefit of others.

It’s not the stuff that’s bad—it’s the way we use it.

Which brings me right back to my story.

Legalistic Sarah walked into a Christian bookstore for the first time when she was 15. At the time, it was conveniently located directly across the street from her church, and being bored after service one night, she decided to go check it out. She spent most of her time looking through the wall art and various little figurines, not giving much of a mind to anything else… the thought that she never ever bothered to look at the music makes her shudder now… seriously… what the heck was wrong with her?!?!

*Ahem* …that’s another blog.

Moving past the figurines, I discovered rows and rows of books I’d never read by authors I’d never heard of (what was an “allegory” anyway?) Passing the kids books, gliding over the teen reads and skimming over the parenting section, I stumbled across that tiny little one section row that they always seems to stick in the front of the store for some reason: “Sex and Marriage.”

Legalistic Sarah’s eyes popped out of her head.

“Whaaaaaaaaaaaa?” I thought to myself, “isn’t this supposed to be a ‘Christian’ bookstore? Is this even allowed?!”

Legalistic Sarah had the right mind to go grab one of these so-called “books,” shove it in the cashiers face and tell her they were all going to hell. (Okay, I’m exaggerating, but to say I was stunned wouldn’t even be scratching the service.)

I was mad to see those books there. Mad because, in my boggled little mind, I had only ever seen the topic of sex, even marriage, presented in some warped or perverted light, and there was no way anything these books had to say would remotely change my mind… or so I thought.

I can just imagine God was up in heaven laughing at my hard-headed reaction and thinking, “Kid, if only you knew the heart for this stuff I’m about to give you…”

I’m about to make a statement you may or may not agree with: I believe legalism can sometimes be born out of fear. Fear that you’ve blown something too badly on the other side of the spectrum, and you shouldn’t be allowed to enjoy that something again, even if the way you enjoy that something now is God’s way of enjoying it. So making that something “off limits” is the only way to somehow heal from the pain the wrong way of doing that something caused you.

I say this, because that was me.

I thank God He never allowed me to do anything I would’ve seriously regretted, but I did have a fair share of regrets for some of the other stuff I’d caved to “B.C.” In a lot of ways, I grew up faster than I should have, and for the longest time, I beat myself up because of it. All the things I’d let my eyes see, stuff I’d let my ears hear, certain things that would come out of my mouth, and worse, spill out of my pen—I knew better and didn’t care. I was insecure, and the only way to numb that was to try and seriously make myself believe that life was about me.

Thankfully, it didn’t work.

I’d like to say when I got saved, suddenly everything was all cool, but I’d be lying. I knew without a doubt God had forgiven me, but forgiving myself was a process. Day by day and layer by layer for what felt like an eternity, God began to rid my mind of guilt and regret. He was replacing it with healing and love that was so incredibly purifying and liberating, that at times, I felt like I was a totally new person, and I was—becoming one anyway.

One day, several months into this whole “walking with God” thing, it hit me. It hit me hard: I was okay.

I had finally forgiven myself. Those scars, which for so long, I hid or denied altogether, I could look at them again. And the most amazing part, was that I could look at them and not see pain. Rather, I saw the beauty of how God had healed them and was already using them to bring that same beautiful healing into the lives of others.

My mind did another turnover that day.

Legalistic Sarah got booted to the door. She was ready to enjoy life again. Only this time, she was gonna enjoy life with God’s boundaries in place and know that the only reason He’d set them up, was so that she wouldn’t have to trudge through those ugly waters ever again. She could experience true freedom and everything that comes along with it.

And I have. And I still am.

I honestly believe the reason so many Christians in our society act legalistic is because, like me, they can’t forgive themselves. And while they’re a lot of well meaning people out there who are trying to do the right thing and live rightly before God, the fact is this: legalism isn’t a relationship with Christ, it’s religion at it’s best. It’s living in fear of God like He’s the monster under your bed, ready to eat you when you make one false move. There is no love in that, there is no mercy in that, there is no grace in that. It voids the sacrifice of Jesus and places the atonement of sins into your own hands.

God gave us boundaries, yes, but it’s so we can LIVE life to the fullest. Not shunning fun like it’s the plague, but knowing the right way to experience it. The way that’ll leave you still feeling good about it tonight, tomorrow, heck, even 60 years from now. You will never experience that kind of life by living outside those boundaries… but you’ll also never experience that life by creating false boundaries either.

Self-hatred sucks. Trust me. One of the enemy’s favorite tools is to try and make us live our lives pressed up against the wall because we don’t think we’re worthy enough to experience the metaphorical dance floor that is life. But on a dance floor that has all sorts of foolishness going on *COUGH*IwouldsaybumpingandgrindingbutImtryingtokeepthisPG*COUGH*, God needs us to be the ones out there dancing for a better cause. But it starts with getting off the wall and actually believing God wants you out there… because He does.

It doesn’t matter what you’ve done. If God has forgiven you, you’re forgiven. Allow Him to help you let go of whatever tells you otherwise and start to live like it.

Xoxo,
—Sarah

Girls, Gardeners and God

Sun, 24 Jun 2012 21:30:00 -0700

“Water, Protect, Tend, Communicate, Nurture.”

These are the five words God gave me as I was falling asleep not too long ago.

I had no clue what they meant or why He’d given them to me. I just knew that randomly, five big words zipped across my mind. I was too drowsy to get up and write them down, so I figured I’d let it go, write them down in the morning and pray about it then.

Shows you how well God knows me: I NEVER remember anything I think about before I go to sleep. I always wake up and the first thing on my mind is coffee. So you can imagine how hard it was to sleep with these five words dancing around my mind. It was like God wasn’t gonna let me forget about them.

I popped my eyes open with an agitated sigh and sat up to pray, “alright, Lord, it’s past Midnight anyway. Lay it on me.” I sat and listened for a response for a moment.

“These are the five things you need to cultivate a rosebush.”

I raised an eyebrow sluggishly, “seriously, God? You’re keeping me up to talk about a rosebush? This couldn’t wait till, I dunno, never?”

“Think about those words,” He continued, “‘Water, Protect, Tend, Communicate, Nurture.’ What else does that sound like to you?”

“You obviously don’t see how tired I am,” I argued with the Creator of the universe, “my brain shut off around 30 minutes ago.”

I’m thankful I have a God who still loves me when I’m stubborn.

“Water, Protect, Tend, Communicate, Nurture. Pray this for your husband. And tell girls this is what they need to be looking for in their husbands too. Goodnight.”

…I’m also thankful I have a God who gets my sarcasm and still makes His point.

After this, I really found it hard to sleep. All I could think about was the comparison God has just given me. Five minutes before, I just wanted to shut down for the night, and now here I was, sitting and contemplating one of the biggest things God has ever shown me regarding relationships (don’t you love how He does that?)

Ladies… you want your husband to be a gardener.

“Like, the dudes who come and mow my lawn every Saturday?”

Not exactly (unless that’s what your interested in, then by all means, pray away.) I’m talking more of a spiritual gardener.

Girls, I hope you don’t mind, but for this, I’m going to compare you to a bush.

“Pssh, how come he gets to be a gardener and I have to be some foliage?”

You’re not just any bush. You’re a bush with one, bright, beautifully red rose. One singular flower that makes this bush set apart from all of the other bushes on the planet.

“Better.”

As I’ve taken the time to study and meditate on these five words, I think I understand what God said when He told me that the ability to ‘Water, Protect, Tend, Communicate, and Nurture’ were five things we need to be looking for and praying about for our future husbands.

Water. Nothing can live without water. Especially a flower. It might be able to get by for a little while, but within days, the flower’s fragile nature due to the dehydration will begin to rot it from its inside out. Before long, it will be crusty, wilty and decaying. It’s the gardeners responsibility to make sure that his flower stays watered, because with adequate hydration, it will thrive and maintain it’s beauty.

Ephesians 5 talks about how a husband is supposed to love his wife, and how part of that is washing her in the water of the Word. It took me YEARS to understand that concept. Mostly because I had no clue what that meant. That was until, the light bulb went off over my head one day.

God didn’t mean to literally wash her (because for years, I was thinking the dude was gonna have to wash my hair every night.) Rather, it means to spiritually cleanse her by making sure she stays in the Word of God and that she’s growing in her knowledge of Christ and His love for her. This is the first and most important thing we need to be looking for.

Girls, this might be a hard one to swallow, but you want a guy who loves God more than he loves you. You want a guy who is so passionate about serving and knowing our Creator, that He won’t rest until he lets you know what God is doing. It’s his fire for God that makes him the leader of your family, it’s his fire for God that fuels your fire for Him too, but the coolest part, it’s his fire for God that helps him to love you as incredibly as he does.

So often, we think God and romance don’t mix. Not true. God’s the ultimate cultivator of romance. If He’s not, then what was the Cross? Yes, it was atonement of sins and yes it was bridging the gap between God and man, but it was also the most fanatical and loving thing any man has ever done for another human being. It was the biggest sacrifice a Groom has given to His bride… EVER.

When he puts God first, just as we should in everything we do, it enhances everything else. It makes the way he loves you greater because he knows what ultimate love looks like and wants you to know it too.

Protect. A good gardener knows that there are dangers out there that would try and harm his flower. From bugs who can’t wait to dig their claws into the flower and start chomping away, to people who would casually walk by and pick the flower for selfish gain. The gardener will go to great lengths to protect his flower, but he won’t get paranoid about it. He’ll take healthy precautions to make sure it’s okay. He would sacrifice whatever time and effort it took to keep his flower safe.

We live in a world that cheapens us girls like were some sort of Dollar Store souvenir you can throw around and care less if it gets broken. Like we’re supposed to be so dang solid and independent, that we can do anything with anyone and not have our emotions get in the way (yeah right.)

There are a lot of people out there who could care less if they hurt us, as long as they get what they want in the name of pleasure… but your husband is not one of them.

You want a guy who will protect your heart like it was his. You want a guy who would sacrifice anything to help you be what you are called to be. You want a guy who, before you’re married, helps hold you to such a high standard of purity before God that it is anything but “normal.”

You want a guy who, once you are married, does anything and everything to protect you—physically, spiritually and emotionally. You want a guy who doesn’t get jealous every time you speak to another man (unless you give him good reason to… that’s another blog…) but trusts you entirely, and desires to, wholesomely, shepherd the depths of your heart closer to his.

You want a guy who would die for you the same way Christ died for the Church. Who would go to crazy lengths to let you know how he’ll never let you go.

Girls, it’s about time we had the nerve to uncomplicated this one.

Tend. He’s well aware that his flower grows thorns. These thrones can be hurtful and damaging to the gardener and those around him. But being the great gardener he is, he knows how to tend to his plant without hurting it or himself in the process. He slowly, carefully and lovingly smoothes out the rough corners that would make his flower less than beautiful, making it a sight to behold.

This can be a controversial one.

I watched an old 1940’s movie once that was about a newlywed couple and the unexpected struggles they encountered in the early months of their marriage. While the it was a comedy and I enjoyed the refreshingly clever and clean humor within the story, one thing about it didn’t make me laugh: one of the clear points made in the film was that a man had the right to hit his wife if she got out of line.

I understand this was around the 1950’s when the mentality of men beating their wives as a form of leadership was all the rage, but it still doesn’t make it okay. This whole thing was taken, ironically, from scripture where it says women should call their husbands ‘Lord’ like Sarah did to Abraham. While I can see misunderstanding, they were dead wrong in thinking what they were doing was okay. The whole point of that scripture was about one thing: respect. Sarah respected Abraham. She acknowledged him as her husband and treated him as the leader of the house.

So what exactly does it meant to “tend” then?

You know that old 80’s song, “Every Rose Has Its Thorn”? While the song might suck, the statement is true. We as women have the occasional tendency to act awful towards other people. Trust me. I can attest to this. A lot of the time, we like to write it off as our gender and the way we process things. And while, granted, we are wired differently, this doesn’t give us the right to be bratty balls of PMS all our lives. (Yeah, I went there.) We’re capable of more than that.

To tend means that a husband isn’t afraid to tell his wife she’s acting out of line, but he doesn’t do it by hurting her physically or emotionally. Like a good gardener, he helps her to smooth out her rough edges and help her become the flawless flower she was meant to be. He’s willing to do whatever it takes… even if it means being there when her thorns are the sharpest.

Yeah, it’s not always gonna be comfortable. Their job is basically telling a fight dog to stop fighting, but it’s worth it. I pray that if I EVER started to act like a knifing little heathen (and yes women, we can be at times, I‘ll be the first to admit it) my husband would have the nerve to tell me to knock it off, but not in a way that domineers me, in a way that gently leads me and helps me to better myself. I pray we would all be humble enough to receive that correction from anyone.

(Some of you girls don’t like this one. Like it anyway. You want a man of integrity.)

Communicate. Gardeners will know when something is wrong with their flower and attempt to fix it before it’s too late. Whether it be lack of food, soil or whatever, he’ll stop and do whatever it takes to save it.

When I was little, I developed a green thumb and planted a lima bean plant. We were learning about plants in kindergarten and overhead my teacher say one day, that some people say talking to their plants helped them to grow. This fascinated my little mind, so every day for the next few weeks„ I went home from school and talked to my lima bean plant. I talked to it about everything. Homework. My shoes. TV. Barbies. Everything.

While I’m not sure if talking to it helped the lima beans grow any faster, it helped me grow a crucial skill: communication. Not so much in speaking, as much as it did in the art of paying attention. Being out there every day gabbing away caused me to notice if the plant was thirsty or in need of shade. Talking to it helped me to see what it needed, if that makes any sense.

You won’t ever hear a plant talk back (at least, I hope you don’t) but this rings ever true for us.

You want a husband who will communicate with you, in the good times and in the bad. You don’t just want a guy who will say cute and funny stuff and then close up when something is bothering him. Same goes for you. Because if he can’t be honest about what he’s feeling, he won’t be honest enough to notice if you’re not feeling right yourself. Communication opens the doorway to what each other needs, and helps establish the grounds to get it to one another.

Nurture. What’s all the work for if a gardener can’t stop and enjoy the flower he’s cultivating? Enjoying it’s beauty, its fragrance, knowing its history and continuing with a passion to see the flower bloom and grow stronger with each passing season… that’s what makes hard work worth it.

Girls, you want, no, you deserve a man who desires to show you how loved you are.

We’re all a little bit different. If you’re like me, you’re waiting for the Prince Charming type. You know, the guy who will come and sweep you off your feet every day with sweet words and loving actions (hey… don’t knock it… this is MY dream…) others of you? You might just want a chill dude who likes hanging out on the couch, talking about some of the same stuff you like and who genuinely loves spending time with you —I’d be down with that too. The point being, he enjoys your company and wants you to know it.

Marriage isn’t all sunshine and kittens. It takes a lot of hard work to make a marriage stay strong, but if all you do it work, work, work at it, it leaves you no time to enjoy each other and the bond God is strengthening between the two of you. The tough stuff makes the great stuff really, really great. You want a guy who is willing to work at it so you can both relish in it.

Girls, there are a lot of things you need to be praying for when it comes to the guys you are going to marry, but I fully believe these are five areas where God does NOT want to us to compromise.

Christ is the perfect example of a man who illustrates these five traits. And while no man is ever gonna be Jesus, He set that example for us in what to look for. He set that example for us to remind us how precious we are and of how much worth we have. God wants to give us something so great, but it starts with coming to Him and saying you will not settle for anything less than someone who will water, protect, tend, communicate with and nurture you the same way a good gardener waters, protects, tends, communicates with and nurtures his own garden. High standards give God the platform to do big miracles.

I want to challenge all of you girls out there reading this to start making these five things your prayer for your future husband. Guys are living in a world that’s throwing just as much at them as it is you, but if you want them to stand for you, it starts with you standing for them.

Be a rose that awaits the cultivation of the one who has been looking for it. Then and only then will you bloom the way you’ve been designed to… and the fragrance you offer will be sweet.

Xoxo,
—Sarah

That One Blog Where Jesus Told You To Shut Up…

Mon, 04 Jun 2012 20:54:00 -0700

I’m sick and tied of comparing myself to other people.

I don’t normally begin my blogs with a statement like that, but I’m so dang stirred up about this, I just needed to say it.

Now, forgive me if it feels like I go into third person with this a few times. Honestly, I think I’m preaching this one to myself more than to others.

Comparison is something I’ve struggled with ever since I was little. I remember going into a Daisy Scouts orientation meeting when I was 5-years-old and some of the other girls had Sky Dancers. (Shoutout to my fellow 90’s kids who remember Sky Dancers. Everyone else? Google it.)

I ALWAYS wanted a Sky Dancer, but unfortunately, they were one of those toys only the kids with “the rich parents” could afford. I remember one time when McDonalds were giving away Sky Dancers in their happy meals. I ate that night looking forward the moment I’d open up the bright red box and see my long awaited prize… only to find out they’d accidentally given me a Hot Wheels toy instead. That hurt my pride a little.

I remember seeing all the other girls in the room and how they all played together, excluding me from their circle because I didn’t have a Sky Dancer to play with, and they certainly weren’t about to fork over one of theirs. They were all popular, pretty, older girls who had the cool toys I wanted, and there I was, a pudgy five-year-old loner with a 1-inch hot rod.

I think that was the day my infatuation with comparison began. I saw the other Daisy Scouts and began to feel really low on myself, like I wasn’t up to par. “Why can’t I have a Sky Dancer?” I thought, “Why can’t I be pretty and have friends like they do?”

I could give you nine billion other stories like this from my childhood. I struggled with insecurity from a very young age and it wasn’t a fun path to take. I didn’t have anyone there who told me I was good enough, that I needed to be okay with being me and that God loved me regardless of what I did or didn’t have. I was one of those kids who had to learn those lessons the hard way.

Thankfully however, God got a hold of my heart.

While a lot of my insecurities went away over time, I’ve always secretly held on to my compulsive need to compare myself to others.

“She’s skinnier than me.”
“She’s prettier than me.”
“He’s accomplished more than I have.”
“He has more talent than me.”
“Everybody loves them more.”
“I’m not nearly as big of an asset as they are.”

I do this. All. The. Stinking. Time. And I hate it.

And the worst part is, I do it with EVERYTHING. To the point that if I read something by another writer who writes something more profound with better execution than I do, I immediately write my own material off as crap.

“What I’m saying isn’t nearly as crucial as what they’re saying,,” I quietly succumb to my thoughts, “they’ve gone to collage… they’ve been doing this longer… people know who they are… they have more to offer… I don’t even know why I try.”

There have been so many times in the past when I’ve complemented someone on a great accomplishment, then secretly cried myself to sleep because deep down, there is that little voice telling me I will never be as good as them.That’s is as honest as it gets, folks.

I let comparison dictate my life. That was until, God recently gave me a divine kick in the pants.

I was reading in John 21. This was right after Jesus has resurrected. Peter and a few of the other disciples were spending the day fishing when suddenly, Jesus appeared to them. There is great bit of dialogue that happens between the five of them, but for the sake of my point, I’m gonna to skip to the last portion of the story.

Jesus has just asked Peter if He loved Him three times, and all three times, Peter said yes. Knowing his answer wasn’t going to change, Jesus begins to tell Peter of some of the things he’s going to be faced with in life, but ends His edification with two words: “Follow Me.”

This is where things get interesting…

Peter and John, another one of Jesus’ disciples, always had this weird, macho-man competition between the two of them as to which one loved Jesus more. It’s actually rather comical. John refers to himself throughout the New Testament as “the disciple Jesus loved,” implying his role was of more importance, especially when it involved Peter, whom he frequently called “the OTHER disciple.” Chapter after chapter, you’ll read about their subtle rivalry, my favorite coming in the form of when “the beloved disciple outran the OTHER disciple to get to Jesus first” —classic.

After Jesus had spoken, Peter looked over at John who sat across from him in silence. Insecurity crept in fast as Peter glanced at Jesus and asked, “but what about John? What’s he gonna do?”

Jesus looked at Peter and firmly responded, “if John were to live until My second coming, why should you care? You follow Me.”

“Yikes,” I thought to myself as I read, “don’t You think You were a little harsh, Jesus? I mean, it was a simple question, and You basically told him to shut up and follow You regardless of what John was called to do…”

I could almost feel God smile as I heard His one word response:

“Exactly.”

It was like a 50 foot wave suddenly crashed on shore, sweeping me out from under my feet. In that moment, I realized something I had common with Peter: we both compared ourselves to other people.

“Jesus loves John more,” Peter would silently say to himself, “everyone knows he’s better… Jesus has known him longer… he’s closer to Him… his calling means more than mine does… I don’t even know why I try.”

Sound familiar?

Jesus was amazing, in that He had a way of being totally harsh while still being completely loving. He never said anything that wasn’t for the greater good of the other person, even when it didn’t come in the form of sunshine and rainbows.

I re-read this passage over and over and over that morning The words of Jesus began to be carved into head as tears fell down my cheeks. It was is if every time I read, the more personal it become for me.

Jesus wasn’t telling Peter that John was better him, or that his calling was in any way superior to his, He was telling Peter that John was different. His calling was different. Different doesn’t mean better… it just means different.

You have a right hand and a left hand. Both hands are crucial aspects of your life. Can you imagine what would happen if your left hand decided to stop working because it thought you favored the right hand more? That’s preposterous! You NEED both hands. They both do an equal amount of work…but it’s different work.

John went on to do incredible things for the Kingdom of God, but so did Peter. He did absolutely INSANE works and performed miracles he never could have thought. He traveled around the world and spoke in dozens of churches before multitudes of people, winning thousands of souls for Christ. Can you imagine what would have happened if Peter just gave into insecurity that day? Let comparison get the best of him? Allow that little voice to say “you’ll never be as good as John”?

Comparison is sympathetic selfishness.

To hold yourself to somebody else’s standard —a standard you were never meant to meet— is the epitome of self-centeredness. It makes life about what I can do rather than what God can do through me.

When Jesus told Peter to follow Him, He was saying to follow Him and be who God had created Him to be, living the life He created him to live. Peter was not born to be a carbon copy of John, Peter was born to be Peter… you were born to be you… Sarah was born to be Sarah.

I may not be a skinny as some girls, nor may I ever be as pretty,. There might be people out there who accomplish more than I will and have more talent than me. There is always going be someone who writes something better than the way I wrote it, but you know what? I’m exactly who God has created me to be, and for the first time in my life, I’m starting to be okay it. To say that I’m worth less because my calling is different than yours is the biggest slap in the face I could ever give God.

I’m not saying I’m great at this. There are still times when I look at someone in all their glory and wonder “God, how can You use ME?”, but that’s when I need to remember the words of Jesus: “you follow Me.”

I’m not them, and they’re not me. Though the jobs might be similar or even the same, how God uses me is completely different than how He uses them. We’re two completely different hands connected to the same body. We perform different tasks and are used for varying things, not one of us is better, we’re both 100% necessary to complete the mission we’re here for.

I know I’m not the only one who struggles with this. One of the greatest tools Satan uses is insecurity. He is fully aware of what we’re capable of when we allow ourselves to follow God’s plan for our lives… why else would he feel so threatened?

Jesus, in all His power and passion for you, is asking you to do one thing: SHUT UP.

Stop comparing yourselves to other people! You are here to do remarkable things by being exactly who He made you to be, and not somebody else. Don’t look at what other people have and have accomplished and see yourself as any less. You are you, and you are the only you who is able to do what God has enabled you to do.

Xoxo,
—Sarah

Be Still AND Know

Sat, 05 May 2012 21:55:00 -0700

I had an interesting moment with God recently.

It was Saturday. It was the first Saturday in a month where I was able to sleep in, and a big deal because Saturday’s are the only day during the week I’m able to sleep in. I figured I’d take advantage of having a rare lazy Saturday by staying up later on Friday night to accomplish a few tasks. I stayed up past Midnight and looked forward to sleeping in for awhile the next morning.

Skip ahead a few hours.

I crack open my eyes at the first sight of sun pouring through my window. I groggily leaned over to my floor and picked up my cell phone to check the time, hoping I’d finally caught up on my sleep after a crazy busy few weeks of late nights and early mornings.

It was 7:00 am.

“Noooooo” I quietly groaned.

I have this weird thing where once I’m awake in the morning, I can’t get back to sleep. It’s like my body’s own personal alarm clock that screams at me to get up and get ready for work.

Only it wasn’t time for work. It was Saturday. And I was exhausted.

“That was a good idea while it lasted,” I thought to myself, “maybe I can just lay here for awhile with my eyes shut and at least pretend. Fake rest is better than no rest at all…”

As I laid there, I grabbed my sheets, pulled them over to my face and rolled over with my eyes tightly shut. Perhaps pretending to sleep would trick my body into thinking I wasn’t really as exhausted as I felt.

At least that’s what I told myself.

I decided to take the opportunity while all was so peaceful and silent to just listen for the voice of the Lord and see if He had anything to say to me. Often times, His voice rings the loudest when I’m completely still and give Him the opportunity to speak.

So I laid there. And laid there. And laid there. And laid there.

Then, after five minutes of laying there… nothing happened.

“Well if You aren’t gonna say anything God, can You at least sprinkle some magic dust and help me get back to sleep or something?”

I was frustrated.

I figured I stay there and wallow in apathy for at least ten more minutes, then grab myself a cup of coffee and at least attempt to do something productive with my morning —if it was totally necessary that I was awake to see it.

“I love you.”

I suddenly popped one eye open.

After trying to hear the voice of the Lord for several minutes without anything, this was a pretty off the wall statement.

“Umm, thank You?” I thought.

“I love you.”

Again with the randomness.

“That’s really nice Lord,” I said, “really, it is. But I wasn’t really looking for a warm fuzzy this morning. I was kinda hoping You could tell me something important, You know… like the meaning of life or who let the dogs out…”

I heard His voice one last time.

“You are Mine. And I love you.”

…the third time was the charm.

A few random tears rolled down my cheeks as I lie there and felt the presence of God sweep over me. It was like in that moment, I felt what God was saying to me. I felt how special I was, I felt how valued I am. As exhausted and frustrated as I was, in an instant, it was drained away and peace began to flow as I simply allowed the love of God to permeate my life.

So peaceful in fact, that I did something I never, ever do… fell back asleep.

When I woke up a few hours later, feeling much better than I had earlier that morning, it was suddenly like I understood why I’d been awake in the first place. It wasn’t because my body wanted me to get ready for work. Rather, it was because God needed to send me a very powerful message.

When’s the last time you stopped and allowed to God to say He loves you?

We as Christians talk about God’s love all the time. We read books about it, go to church and sing songs about how much He loves us, but really, when is the last time you took time out to just stop, let God say “I love you,” and actually soak in it?

Here I was, trying to live out Psalm 46:10, taking time to be still and gain more understanding of God , when the truth was? I was just being still. I wasn’t really desiring to know anything. Well, nothing I was expecting anyway.

I think that’s our problem at times. We expect God’s divine revelation in life to be some huge ordeal. Like the heavens need to open up, angels need to appear and trumpets need to blast. Not saying that kind of stuff can’t happen, heaven forbid (knowing God’s sense of humor, He’d do it too just to show me up. He’s been known to do that from time to time.)

Honestly though, I think sometimes, the biggest lessons in life come in the smallest packages. The ones we tend to overlook because we’re too busy waiting for the angels and the trumpets.

“I love you.”

That was it. Just one small whisper from God to me. No bells. No whistles. No angels or trumpets. Just three little words. One tender and intimate moment with my Heavenly Father, in which, He just wanted me to be reminded of how much He cherishes me.

I know that God loves me. It’s not even a question in my mind. I can say this, because for the longest time, I fought it. I ran from God for 15 years because I thought all He wanted to do was punish me for all the mistakes I’d made. In my ignorant understanding of who He was, I thought for certain He was gonna strike me down. Little did I know, that by running, I was only striking myself down.

When I finally tasted God’s love for me, His radical, unchanging, and passionate love for me, I never turned back.

Still, I think at times, it can become so dull to us. We know that He loves us, so we don’t really listen for it anymore. When we hear someone say “Jesus loves you,” we say Amen and move on. We don’t stop to think about the absolutely insane reality that “Jesus LOVES you” —a perfect Savior without blemish loves little ol’ screwed up you.

We can be still and STILL not know.

We can understand that God loves us and still not get it. And while we, on this side of heaven, will never fully understand how much He loves us, we are so quick to become numb to it. To not let it set something off in our hearts when we hear “God loves you,” I’m not talking about fabricating emotions, I’m talking about a true understanding of who He is in our lives.

Growing up, a father can tell his daughter she’s beautiful every single day, but when she’s a teenager and struggles with accepting her image, it doesn’t mean anything. She’s become dazed to hearing it, even though it’s the truth. This doesn’t mean he should stop telling his daughter she’s beautiful. This isn’t a failure to parent on the side of the father… it’s a lack of understanding on the side of his daughter. She hears it, but doesn’t hear it. She’s knows it, but still doesn’t know.

God wants you to know that He loves you. And not just know it, but KNOW it.

Know it to the point that you can’t help but react with gratitude every time you hear it. It may not involve mass hysteria and tears every single time, but if God’s still, small whisper can come without angels and trumpets, can not our understanding of who He is?

A great husband doesn’t just tell his wife he loves her on birthdays and anniversaries. He tells her all the time, and if his wife truly grasps that he means it, it causes a response, a connection, an understanding that this whole “love” thing he has for her isn’t going to change.

It’s that same notion, I believe God was showing me I woke up while lying in bed looking like a burrito. He LOVED me. And when I stopped and just allowed Him to tell me, without thinking it had to be some big ordeal, my closeness of who He was as my Father intensified. For the first time in a long time, I was still AND I knew, not just one over the other.

God is always waiting to tell you He loves you. It’s not a matter of hearing it, it’s a matter when you do hear it, will you believe it?

I challenge you to set aside time in your day, EVERY day, to just stop and let God love on you. It doesn’t have a be some giant parade. It can be in the car, or at school, it can even be rolled up in bed. It’s just being still, KNOWING His love for you and receiving it like the gift it is.

Xoxo,
—Sarah

Doughnuts With David

Thu, 03 May 2012 19:20:00 -0700

I had a huge revelation the other day.

It’s all about saying “NO.”

I mean, of course I’ve always known it was all about saying “no,” but I think I finally get why.

Let me put this puppy in reverse for a few minutes so you can see where I’m coming from…

I was in prayer a few days ago when I felt God prompting me to fast from food the next morning until Noon. “Okay God” I smiled, “that’s not a problem.”

I woke up that day and only one thing was on my mind: I wanted a doughnut. I mean, I REALLY wanted a doughnut. I starting thinking about the doughnut shop down the street and literally starting drooling. As I got out of bed and walked out to the kitchen, my mind wandered to a far away land filled with warm chocolate doughnuts. I wondered if I had time to make it down to the shop before my shift at work started that morning…

Then it hit me: I was fasting till Noon.

Suddenly, that delightful doughnut began to look demonic. I looked at the clock praying that I’d somehow slept in five extra hours, that maybe it was 11:59 and I could just hop in the car and go grab a doughnut.

It was 6:15. It was gonna be a long morning.

“Come on” I said to myself, “you NEVER have this issue. What’s the deal today?”

I got to work that morning trying to keep the stupid doughnut off my mind. I mean really, besides the fact that I’d promised God I would spend that morning in prayer, it’s not like I really needed a doughnut. It was fattening and sugary just plain not good for me.

“Yeah” I nodded to myself, “I don’t need some stupid doughnut!”

That worked out well. For about ten minutes. Then, wouldn’t you know it, one of my co-workers walked into work with a treat for the other employees…. you can guess what it was.

Yup. A hot pink box full of a dozen freshly made warm, chocolate doughnuts.

That’s when it hit me: I was being tempted. With a DOUGHNUT of all things!

I began to think that maybe, the enemy didn’t want me fasting because God was getting ready to tell me something that required my full attention… and boy, was I right.

Temptation is ugly. Even the word “temptation” is ugly. I think the ugliest example of temptation we have the bible comes in 2 Samuel 11, where it talks about David and Bathsheba.

I’m gonna get real with you: I couldn’t read this story for years after I became a Christian. It always broke my heart and left me angry. David was one of the first biblical figures I really had an interest in learning about. Growing up in Sunday School, I’d always heard King David was “a man after God’s own heart,” but wasn’t till I began seeking after God’s own heart myself, that I could really connect with him. Hearing the stories about of how he rose from being a neglected child to slaying Goliath to becoming the King of Israel —his was the true underdog story! And coming from an underdog mindset myself, I couldn’t help but love the guy!

But then, came 2 Samuel 11. Ugh… 2 Samuel 11…

David is King at this point. He has all the money, prestige, power and control any man could ever ask for. He’s got a family, a grand palace and a kingdom that adores him. The dude could do no wrong. It all didn’t come overnight however. It came after many, many years of tirelessly obeying, trusting and seeking the voice of God.

Which kiiiiiinda makes me wonder what in the world happened next…

David was walking on the roof of the palace one day when he saw a girl in one of the houses below taking a bath. This would have been a good time for him to close his eyes, turn away, go inside and watch some SportsCenter, but alas, he didn’t. He looked over at one of his assistants and asked who the girl was. They said “that’s Bathsheba. She’s married to one of your solders, Uriah.”

He asked one of his messengers to bring Bathsheba to the kingdom, and ultimately, they did something they’d both regret.

A few weeks went by, the two of them pretending nothing happened, when all the sudden, David gets a bombshell: Bathsheba is pregnant…. and he’s the baby daddy.

Let’s just say I’m happy shows like “Maury” didn’t exist back then. I can see the episode now…

“Bathsheain’tplayin! YOU’RE THE FATHER! DNA Tests Revealed!”

David freaked. At this point, he wasn’t as bothered by the fact he’d sinned against God, than that he’d done something wrong against one of his friends and now he needed to clean it up. FAST.

“Bring Uriah out of the battlefront” David laughed nervously to one of his servants, “ya know, I haven’t seen him in a while, thought it might be nice to catch up and let the dude have a breather.”

Uriah was one of David’s Mighty Men. He was one of the most loyal, faithful and trustworthy solders in the world. He would have happily taken a bullet for David had he a barrel pressed against his chest.

And here was David —jacking around with his wife.

“Uriah,” David looked at his friend over dinner, “you work SO hard! Why don’t you go home for a few days, huh? I got this! You go ahead and clean yourself up, lounge on the hammock, catch up on your Facebook notifications and spend some time with that delightful Bathsheba of yours.”

Code Name: “I need you to go home and have sex with your wife. That way, then when she tells you she’s having a baby, you think it’s yours.”

Harsh ya’ll, but factual.

The next day came and went and one of David’s servants came to him spazing out. Uriah never went home that night. He went back to the military command post and stayed there with his army buddies.

“What the heck?!” David asked Uriah as he brought him back to the palace that night, “I give you two weeks paid vacation to go spend with your hot wife, uhh, I mean, your darling companion, and you go back to the war?!”

Uriah shook his head, Sir,” he stated, “those men are out there every day risking their lives for this country. They are my partners and my friends. Who would I be to just go home and laze around? There is work to do, and I will NOT stop till this war is finished.”

Uriah was legit. REALLY legit. Which made me even more ticked at David.

David’s first plan didn’t work, so he moved on to Plan B —he asked Uriah over for dinner again, got him nice and drunk, then told him go home. “Surely this will work” he thought to himself.

Yet again however, Uriah didn’t go home. He went back and stayed the night with his war partners. (Although, I can imagine he had a pretty wicked headache the next day…)

Time was ticking. Bathsheba was getting nervous. People were starting to ask questions. David was at the brink of his desperation. To him, there was only one option left.

“Send Uriah back into the battle,” David commanded his chief solder, Joab, “but put him in the place where the battle is fiercest and then abandon him. I want him dead.”

Joab did just that. He waited till the battle got the ugliest, then told all but Uriah to leave —he was murdered brutally in a matter of seconds.

“Tell David about the battle we just fought” Joab told David’s messenger, “tell him it was bloody, brutal and we lost a few key men, but also tell him Uriah is dead.”

David was furious when he heard about the fight. “Why in the world did you do this?! Why did you go that way?! Why were those men on the frontlines?!” he screamed, “don’t you want to win this war?!”

“Your Highness,” the messenger said softly, “you should also know… Uriah is dead.”

What David says next leaves me in tears every time I read this story.

“Oh” he acted shocked, “well, you know how war is. Don’t be too upset about it. You win some, you lose some. There are 1000 other men like Uriah out there. You can’t go crying over spilt milk.”

After it happened, Bathsheba lost it. She mourned for her husband, but because of the situation, she couldn’t grieve for long. Within days, she and David were married, and a few months later, had their son.

The very first time I heard this story, whatever respect I had for David went down the toilet.

“Man after God’s own heart, pssh,” I’d think to myself, “That’s really honorable, God..”

I stayed mad at David for awhile (yes, it is possible to get mad at biblical characters.) Even when I’d go to read some of his triumphant feats, I’d secretly roll my eyes and think of what a loser he was… I’m just being honest with you.

Thankfully as of late, God has changed my heart.

I was flipping through my bible recently when I landed across 2 Samuel 11. I sneered. This was the LAST thing I wanted to read, but I figured if God has led me to it, I’d give Him the benefit of the doubt. As I read on, I remembered why it grieved me so much. It’s such a horrible story. The fact that it actually happened makes it even worse. This wasn’t just some movie… it was reality.

“She could have said no.”

I listened to the voice of the Lord and did a double take, “huh?”

“Bathsheba could have said no. David could have to.”

Like so many times with God, I had a Mack Truck moment.

We give David a lot of flack for what he did. Granted, it sucks. He messed up big time and that’s non-avoidable, but much like every good story, it has two sides. The second was of a young girl who had just as big a role in this as her counterpart. Her name was Bathsheba —and she could have “NO.”

“No” to what?

“No” to the handsome young King who made a pass at her, “No” to the choice to be unfaithful to her husband, “No” to the idea of hiding what she’d done, and “No” to the fact that getting rid of him was the only way out.

I got over my bitterness of this story that day. I got over what David had done. I realized that, although it took he and Bathsheba’s child dying to realize what he’d done was wrong, he repented and God had forgiven him. This didn’t mean things just got better, as a matter of fact, David faced endless family issues after it had hapened. There was arrogance amongst his wives, which led to division amongst his kids, heck, his son raped his own half-sister. How screwed up can you get?

There were generational consequences because of his selfish actions that are clear throughout the bible, but I think because of it, it made him even more of a man after God’s own heart. He no longer wanted to be like God, he NEEDED to be. God was the only way He was gonna get through it.

This story isn’t in the bible to show us how “perfect” we think we are, nor to make us think David was wicked. Rather, it’s there to sober us. To show us that it doesn’t matter how long we’ve been Christians, that we are STILL gonna be tempted and we STILL need to turn away from it. We might not face as many challenges as David had to afterwards, but NOTHING is worth the pain you face from surrendering to a moment of weakness.

See, temptation isn’t all about what comes at you. It’s how you RESPOND to it. You can either run to it, or run FROM it.

“You make it sound so simple” you laugh.

No offence but: IT IS, DUH!

1 Corinthians 10:13 states it the best: “no temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man, but God is faithful, and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation, He will also provide a way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.”

“Why does He allow us to be temped at all?” you might wonder, “why does He wants us to love Him so much but allows us to face so much crap?”

Think you’re alone? Let’s look at one more story…

After Jesus was baptized, God led Him out to the wilderness to be tempted for 40 days and 40 nights. Uh-huh. God allowed JESUS to be tempted. Even as a man born to be sinless, He still faced the option of sinning.

“Hey, psst, Jesus!” the devil whispered one day as He walked through the wilderness, “I know You’re kinda doing the whole ‘wilderness fast’ for the next 40 days, but I’ll tell you what, You bow down and worship me, and I’ll give You bread to eat.”

Yes. The devil offered Him a doughnut.

“Yo, back off, dude” Jesus responded, “it is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes out of God’s mouth. That’s the real quencher.”

The escape God has given us to run from temptation is HIS WORD. It’s the Bible, it’s His promises, it’s His voice, it’s everything He is.

This is a personal one for me every day in a lot of areas, namely relationships. As a girl, I have two options: I can either throw myself at every cryptic wink a guy offers me and regret what I‘ve done the next day, OR? I can trust God for the man He has promised to bring me, do things His way and have an awesome marriage full of unforgettable moments.

Granted, one sounds easier and the other sounds fairy tale-ish, but God never said the choice would make sense. That’s why He calls us to have FAITH.

The reason temptation exists is for us to chose in whom we will place our faith.

Knowing all Jesus endured for me just so I could have what God has promised me, His way is what I pick.

Every time you say “NO” to temptation, you’re choosing the better “YES.”

What has your number? What tempts you and makes you think twice about where you need to be? For some of you it’s money, or lust, or control, heck, it might even be a doughnut.

I challenge you to remember what God has done for you, what He’s sworn to give you, and to run the opposite way when anything less than that would try to call you out. You have the ability to say “NO,” even when it’s tough. He’s given you an escape… I dare you to use it.

Xoxo,
—Sarah

The Blind Girl In The White Dress

Tue, 01 May 2012 17:59:00 -0700

I’ve been talking a lot about faith lately. Maybe it’s because God has been dealing with me on the subject for awhile now. I think I’ve realized unlike ever before in my walk with God how much I still have to learn about walking by faith.

A big thing He’s shown me?

Faith is a lot like blind girl in the white dress.

…and no, that’s NOT the name of the current #1 teen horror flick at the box office.

In Genesis 24, you have the story of how Isaac married his wife, Rebekah. It’s not a very prolific event in the bible, and if anything, we tend to read past it quickly so we can move on to the scandalous life of their son, Jacob. However, I was reading this story a few years ago when I was shaken to the core by what God revealed to me. My faith journey hasn’t been the same since.

Here you have Abraham, Isaac’s father. Abraham’s wife Sarah had recently passed away, and with that, came the realization that he wasn’t going to be around much longer himself (the dude was 140-years-old—the morgue was on standby.)

Wanting his son to carry on the family lineage, Abraham summoned his servant—let’s call him Bill—and told him to go out and find Isaac a wife. Bill scratched his head, “Uhh, are you sure I’m the guy for this job? I mean, can’t he just go out the Canaanite nightclub like all the other guys his age and meet a girl there?”

Abraham refused. He gave Bill specific instructions on where to go find her and what her family background should look like. Not wanting to disappoint his master (or get smite) he mounted on his camel and set off on a divine version of “The Dating Game.”

When he finally got to the area where Abraham had told him to go, he hopped off his camel and took a seat in the middle the field.

“What am I doing?” I can imagine he looked up at God and said, “do I look like cupid? How in the heck am I supposed to do this?!” Bill shuffled his feet in the dirt for a few moments before looking up and continuing with his prayer, “tell you what God, how’s about You make this job easy for me? The first girl who comes up with some water for me and the camel will be the kid’s wife. Deal?”

Never pray a prayer thinking God won’t take it seriously.

Stuck in the middle of nowhere, before Bill even got a chance to say ‘Amen’, out of the blue, a beautiful young girl carrying a jug of water named Rebekah came rushing up to him and asked if he and his camel needed something to drink.

“Well that was quick” Bill prayed softly.

Bill needed more information on the girl before he went any further. He reached down into his pocket as Rebekah finished watering the camel and pulled out a shiny gold nose ring (that’s rock and roll) and some bracelets to offer her. “Who’s family are you from? Do you have a place where I can stay for the night?”

As she replied with all the specific answers Abraham was looking for, he was convinced this was the girl God had for Isaac.

Rebekah ran home to inform her family of the man who needed a place to stay for the night. Keep in mind, she still had no clue this dude was planning to marry her off. She just thought she was doing the guy a favor.

When Rebekah’s older brother, Laban saw her sister covered with the bling-bling Bill had given her for the water, he began to question Bill’s motives. He quickly ran out to the field to ask him what was up, and if he really needed help or if he was trying to mess with his sister. Bill gave him the whole story, from Abraham’s mandate to the crazy prayer God instantaneously answered.

As Laban listened, he couldn’t believe how God had worked everything out.

“I guess it doesn’t really matter how I feel about all this”, he shrugged, “God is the one who set this all up. If He wants Rebekah to go with you and marry your master’s son, so be it.”

Laban took Bill back to their home and told his parents the whole story. They were overwhelmed that God would choose their daughter for such an incredible honor and began to shower her with precious gold and silver family heirlooms to prepare for her departure.

You can imagine at this point Rebekah, who still didn’t know what was happening, thought to herself, “Man, I need to help out hobo’s more often!”

Bill stayed the night at her house, and the next morning, peeked his head into her parents room to let them know he was ready to go. Rebekah‘s mom‘s heart was suddenly torn. She ran up to him and began to beg, “Please, let us have some more time with our daughter? Ten days? Just so we can get things in order? You know, say goodbye? Order the KitchenAid Stand-Mixer for their apartment?”

Bill looked at the woman as he glanced at this watch, he was already off schedule as it was. “Look”, he said, “12 hours ago you were all for this. I don’t have time for you to have separation anxiety. My master is gonna croak any second and this needs to get done. I don’t want to disappoint him…. or get smite.”

Her mother scoffed, “Well then, how about we just ask Rebekah and see what she thinks?”

Good call on mom‘s part. Considering Rebekah was the one who was getting married and everything…

They finally spilt the beans to Rebekah and told her that if she was to go and get married, the decision needed to be made right there.

Without any hesitation whatsoever, Rebekah looked up at Bill and said three little words: “I will go.”

Her family blessed and prayed over her before they saw her off and tearfully said their goodbye’s, knowing their daughter was being sent by God on an assignment that was much bigger than themselves.

Here’s where it gets good.

Isaac went out that night to pray in the field. Minding his own business, he saw his dad’s servant riding up in the distance.

Rebekah squinted as she looked ahead, “Who is that?” she asked innocently.

Bill pointed, “My master.”

She gasped and took out a veil to cover herself before he saw her. Back then, that was proper pre-wedding agenda (this is where we get the whole “the bride should never see the groom before the wedding” thing… FYI.)

As they rode forth, Bill dismounted and gave Isaac the whole story from start to finish, and without the slightest argument, Isaac and Rebekah, who’d never ever seen, spoken or heard of each other till that day, were married.

Here’s where the unequivocal romantic in me gushes over this story: It says that after Isaac married her, he loved her.

One thing about the book of Genesis that is vastly different than the rest of the bible is that marriage, at that time anyway, was often used to just to populate. You never read how a guy bought a girl flowers, told her she was beautiful and won her heart. Instead, it was generic:

Guy meets girl. Guy marries girl. Guy gets girl pregnant. Girl has son. Son meets girl. Son marries girl. Bible lists 100 unpronounceable names. And on goes the circle of life.

Notice here though, it doesn’t say they got married, had kids and moved on… it says he loved her.

Interesting.

“What does this have to do with faith?” you might be wondering.

Good question.

“I Will Go” and “He Loved Her” go hand-in-hand.

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

Allow me to elaborate here for a bit.

Imagine you’re led into a room. What’s inside that room is beyond your wildest imagination. Everything you could ever ask for is in that room. The catch? The room is pitch black. You can’t even see your hand in front of your face. When you’re in that room, you’re basically blind. God tells you everything in that room can be yours, but you NEED to follow the sound of His voice to get you to the light switch so you can know what’s inside. It’s a dark process, and sometimes, even a scary one. At times you’ll, wish God will just flip the light switch Himself and save you from walking any further in the dark, and other times, you’re not sure you’ll ever get to the light switch at all. But you know that if you were to stop following the sound of His voice, you might turn a wrong corner and end up hurting yourself.

The process of being led to the light switch is faith. And Rebekah part in this story is that of being led in the dark.

Can you imagine if some random dude waltzed up to you and was like, “Hey! Guess what?! God has chosen you to marry my boss’s kid! And the wedding is tonight! You in?!”

…you’d call the cops.

But here was Rebekah. A girl from a normal home, living a normal life, when suddenly, it got dark. Here was something incredible placed before her, and in that moment, she was asked to follow God’s voice.

Saying “I Will Go” took faith.

She had NO clue who Isaac was. He could have been haughty, selfish, unfaithful, greedy, and yes, maybe even slightly unattractive. He could have been mean, vile, slanderous and hurt her horribly. In a nutshell, he could have been worst man in the world. But instead of trusting reason, she followed God’s voice. Waiting ten days wasn’t even an option. She was willing to risk EVERYTHING to follow what He was calling her to do. And because she boldly followed that voice in the dark, in matter of hours, she went from being Rebekah, the low-class farm girl from Podunk, USA, to being the Rebekah, the bride in white… daughter-in-law of one of the wealthiest, most prosperous and favored men who ever walked this earth.

Isaac is what was inside the dark room.

To have a husband in those times was one thing, but to have a husband who LOVED you? That was extraordinary. If you read on, you’ll even see that never once does it ever mention Isaac had any concubines. The only girl his heart ever belonged to was Rebekah. Imagine how that amazed other women in that culture!

“Dang,” they’d shake their heads, “That girl must have done something right in the sight of God to deserve that.”

And she did. She walked by faith, and in return, she got a husband who was more than she could have ever asked for.

How willing are YOU to blindly follow God’s voice in the dark to get what‘s inside the room?

I don’t know what God has promised you or what He called you to. It might be a job, it might a raise, or a car, it might be a spouse, or a child, or a ministry, or anything else. Whatever it is, in order to get it, God is asking you to walk by faith. He’s asking you to get uncomfortable and allow Him to navigate you through the dark to the light switch so you can have every good thing that lies inside.

No, it won’t be easy, no, it won’t always look like you’re gonna make it and yes, there will be times when following your own path (like taking a SHORTCUT) will look like a better option. But if you can muster the vision enough to remember why you’re in that dark room to begin with, every blind step you take in faith, leads to what’s worth it.

Isaac and Rebekah had a happy ending. How much darkness are you willing to endure for yours?

Xoxo,
—Sarah

Side Street Faith

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 22:12:00 -0700

If there is anything I’ve come to realize in my walk with God, it’s this: There are always two roads: freeways and side streets.

Let me back this up a bit.

I had to run an errand in Downtown L.A. a few weeks ago. L.A. traffic is the worst. Not wanting to get lost, I did a MapQuest for directions on the location, trying to see which would be the quickest route, and of course, it was the I-5 freeway. Just for fun (and because I was bored) I decided to look up the alternative route, the side street route.

The side street route is self-explanatory. You avoid freeways/highways altogether and take neighborhood streets to get to your final destination. I looked it up and was pleasantly surprised. Thinking it would read something along the lines of two hours, the readout was 50 minutes.

As temping as it looked, I glanced over the freeway directions once more. The perks were obvious. Not only did it save me gas, it was a FAR shorter drive, getting me home well before 6:00 pm, unlike the other directions. The choice seemed obvious. Take the easy road. Take the freeway. So I did.

Well, somewhere in the middle of my genius planning I forgot one tinsie, weensy detail. I was leaving at 5:00 pm. Landing me right in the middle of Los Angeles rush hour traffic. For those of you who’ve never been to Southern California and driven on the I-5 after 5:00 pm, let me explain it to you…

“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Get it?

As soon as I hit Hollywood Boulevard, things got worse. It was opening night for a brand new play at the Pantages Theater starring Elton John. By the look of the traffic, all of Southern California and all of Southern California’s mama came out to the show.

It took me 40 minutes to get two miles down the street to my destination.

40. Stinking. Minutes.

By the time I was back on the road, I wasn’t in a very good mood. I was tired, sick of traffic, and all I wanted was to have a warm shower and a comfy bed to fall asleep in, but the test of my patience wasn’t over.

I’d somehow hoped that the traffic on the opposite side of the freeway had cleared up a bit in the 40. Stinking. Minutes I’d spent driving two miles down Hollywood Blvd.

“Besides” I thought to myself, “it’s 7:00 pm now, all the rush hour traffic HAS to be gone at this point.”

In nutshell, it was a four roundtrip journey.

By the time I FINALLY plopped down on my bed exhausted and in tears, it was 10:00 pm. I immediately began kicking myself for not planning better. I should have KNOWN the freeway would be that miserable and just taken the side streets like I knew I should. Had I just made the extra effort in gas and time, I would have been home two hours earlier, but instead, my night was ruined.

I think the same way I approached the convenience of the freeway, is the same way we tend to approach faith sometimes.

Faith isn’t an easy thing. When God gives you a promise, it all seems good for awhile. You serve Him, trust Him, obey Him, but then time starts to go on. Five minutes go buy and you’re still not married. An hour ticks past and your cancer still isn’t gone. Suddenly, the promise of what seemed so tangible only minutes before starts to look farther and farther away from your grasp.

Then other people get involved. Believing in God for something you can’t see looks really, really stupid to the rest of the world and they have no problem telling you so. It’s incredibly easy to get discouraged, especially when all they see you doing is waiting.

That’s where the fork in road comes in, and you have two options: you can either choose to wait as long as it takes or take matters into your own hands. It’s the time spent on side streets or the convenience found on the freeway. The biggest example we have of this in the bible is found with Abraham and Sarah.

One night when Abraham was around 75-years-old, God totally and completely rocked his world. God promised him that he would have an heir and that his descendants would be more in number than the starts of the sky (that’s a lot, in case you were wondering.)

Here’s the deal: Abraham and Sarah had been married for a long time, and in all the years they’d been married, she was barren. No matter what she did, she just wasn’t able to get pregnant. Back then, if you couldn’t have a baby, people looked at you funny. They thought you or your parents had committed a sin so vile, God took the privilege away from you… talk about religion.

You can imagine the gossip Sarah had to endure during those years of being childless. Women mocked her, men made up vicious rumors, and now here was God, the Creator of the universe, telling them that they were not only going to have a baby, but that they were going to have a baby when they were super ancient.

…I’m just keeping it real.

That’s two strikes. Not only was she barren, but even if she COULD have kids, she couldn’t anymore. This is where God required them to have faith.

I can imagine the first few weeks were easy, maybe even a month or two after, but somewhere along the journey, things began to grow dim. Faith got harder, waiting became an emotional chore rather than a beautiful promise.

11 years of side streets went by. Then they ran into a freeway.

Sarah had a maidservant named Hagar. One day, Sarah got a bright idea that if Abraham and Hagar tried to have a baby, maybe she would feel like it was her own. 50 years of barrenness was enough, and 11 added years of humiliation had driven her to the breaking point. To her, this only way of taking care of the issue.

Can you imagine?! I mean really, let’s stop and think about this for a moment….

A woman sits down with her husband after dinner one night and says they needs to have an important talk. He looks at her with concern thinking something’s wrong so he listens. She explains that since they’ve tried to have a baby for years with no results, that her best friend was upstairs waiting for him in the bedroom, so he needs go sleep with her so that maybe she can get pregnant and they can raise the baby.

“So you just go upstairs and I’ll wait down here” she says, “and we’ll see what happens.”

He shrugs, “If you say so. Give us ten minutes.”

…I’m just keeping it real.

This, my friends, is total and complete desperation.

Low and behold, a few months later, Hagar is having baby. And now not only is Sarah STILL barren, but Hager gets on her high horse and starts MOCKING her because Abraham was able to get her pregnant and not Sarah.

I can imagine things got all ghetto fabulous right around there.

I feel for Sarah in this position. I really do, and not just because has a cool name. Yet at the same time, one things FLASHES across my mind…

You are ALWAYS bound to have traffic on a freeway. No matter how convenient it looks when your hopping on the entrance, you are gonna run into sorrow, whether it’s immediate, or later on.

Sure, Abraham and Sarah “had a son” now, but it didn’t feel right. It wasn’t “their” son, it wasn’t “their” promise, and although the kid didn’t do anything wrong, he ultimately wasn’t gonna be the heir that was promised to Abraham.

If I were God? I would have given up on them 9 months and 10 minutes before.

…I’m just keeping it real.

Thankfully, I’m not God, and He, rich in mercy and grace, wasn’t through with them yet.

When Abraham was 99, God came to him again and laid it out straight (because obviously, the subtle stuff wasn’t working.) He told Abraham that he would have a son who would establish his covenant with God… and it would be with his WIFE. Granted, they were both older than dirt at that point, but God once again, asked them to have faith. He asked them to take the side streets.

“Yeah, riiiiiight” Sarah laughed.

God doesn’t take being mocked too lightly.

“Why is she laughing?” He asked Abraham.

Sarah freaked out, “Pssh, I wasn’t laughing at YOU” she brushed it off with a nervous chuckle, “I was laughing at something funny Steve said on American Idol, Lord.”

And then God said something He would say to us many, many, MANY times again in the future…

“Is there anything that is ‘too hard’ for Me to do?”

Something shifted in their faith that day. Something about taking the side streets looked so amazing that they wanted nothing else but to let go and let God work, no matter how long it took to get them where they needed to be. They didn’t just ‘have faith’ it would happen anymore… they had faith in Who they were trusting.

One year of unshakable faith later, Abraham and Sarah, 80 and 100 respectfully, got pregnant. And 9 months later, they finally had Isaac… their promise

No matter who you are, no matter what God has promised you, and no matter how big what you’re believing Him for is, one thing is certain. There are always two roads: freeways and side streets.

Freeways are ALWAYS going to be there. Freeways are easy, freeways are convenient, and everywhere you turn, freeways are gonna tempt you, but the promise NEVER comes with convenience. It NEVER has.

What Jesus endured on the cross for us was the farthest thing from “convenient.” He could have been hit a few times and asked some angels to come and get Him, but He didn’t. God’s promise to save us came through a bloody, broken and costly side street. It took time, it took effort, it took strength, and it stripped Him of His dignity.

Yet He did it. And because He did it, we can have life today.

Side streets are never going to be easy. They can be fun, they can be an adventure, they can be exciting and scary and wonderful, but they will never, ever be easy. But they’re worth it. Oh, are they worth it.

What has God promised you? Whatever it is… He’s asking you today to stop hoping it might happen, and to put your faith in Him who MAKES it happen.

He’s asking you to stop looking at the shortcuts that whisper your name, the large, luxurious freeway overpasses that promise pleasure but lead to pain, and instead, He’s asking you and to look at the gritty side streets—HIS directions—and muster the faith to see beyond the effort it‘ll take, to the big, beautiful God given promise that lies at the end of your journey.

Sarah and Abraham eventually saw it. Will you?

20 1/2

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 20:39:00 -0700

I recently celebrated my 20 ½ birthday.

Yes, 20 ½

“That whole half birthday thing is cute when you’re five. Don’t you think you’re a little old for that?”

My thoughts exactly.

I can’t really explain it, but I think this whole “getting older” thing has finally started to catch up with me.

For the last few years, I mentally thought I was still a 16-year-old, but something in me shifted recently. It’s like I finally realized how I old I really am. Not that it’s OLD, but it’s certainly not 16. Sometimes, I think our age hits us at different times. (Hence, 40-year-olds who suddenly realize they’re not 25 and go through their midlife crisis by buying a Harley and joining the circus.)

I think what shocked me isn’t necessarily that I’m 20, rather, that this October, I’ll be 21.

This is gonna sound silly, but for the longest time, the thought of turning 21 scared me.

I had a phone conversation with my grandma on my last birthday. It went a little something like this:

Grandma: So you’re 20 now?
Me: Yeah
Grandma: Do you feel any older?
Me: Not really .
Grandma: Well you know what comes next, right?
Me: Umm…
Grandma: The BIG birthday.
Me: Uhh…
Grandma: …you finally get to go out and celebrate your freedom!

And there it was: “Freedom.”

First of all, if this was the same “freedom” I was supposed to experience at 18, I didn’t feel it. And second of all, this was awkward because it was basically GRANDMA telling me to go out and “get jiggy wit’ it.”

I have a cousin who had a big blowout in Vegas when she turned 21. It was the birthday she had been looking forward to for years, and when the day finally came, she flew out with her family to celebrate her “freedom.”

AKA—she spend three days in nightclubs getting wasted. Aaaaand some other things I won’t talk about…

I wasn’t invited. I don’t think I missed much.

To my cousin, being a 21-year-old “grown up” meant going out and doing stuff that was expected of her. Thinking if she accomplished it, she’d finally reach a place of maturity she’d been longing for all her life

I remembered Grandma’s conversation… and I froze.

Was that REALLY what she expected of me?

My cousin wasn’t that type of person. She went to an upscale collage, got straight A’s, had a well paying job, a nice car, and a fancy place to live, but something about the idea of being 21 made her snap, and all of the sudden, this “freedom” gave her access to an untouched world of “adulthood” that made everything worthwhile in her life seem small.

What is it about 21 that suddenly makes people throw away their morals? Like it’s okay to become a completely different person because you’re, quote-on-quote, “grown up” and can do whatever you want?

What IS “grown up” anyway? Why does it take on different meanings throughout our lives? When you’re five, it’s sitting without a booster seat, when you’re ten, it’s going to the movies by yourself, when you’re 13, it’s owning a cell phone, when you’re 16, it’s driving a car, when you’re 17, it’s graduating high school, when you’re 18, it’s having a job, moving out and going to collage. It goes on and on…

For girls, “growing up” is often associated with being wanted. We want people to accept us, long for us and love us, and that’s OKAY. God made women to be fought for, our weakness is what makes us beautiful, but it’s so easy to get taken advantage of in that weakness when we don’t realize WHY that weakness exists in the first place. And for guys, it’s all about validation. This world doesn’t consider them “men” till they do something outwardly significant with their lives. It’s about how much money they make, how many girls they sleep with, how high ranking their social position is, whatever.

It seems like people NEVER really “grow up”, do they? There is always something bigger and better to achieve before they hit that sought after milestone.

I believe the question BEGS to be asked: Is being a grown up merely completing something, or is it a nonstop journey of becoming the person you were Created to be?

Living is a series of life-altering moments. From conception to the grave. It’s not about getting somewhere in hopes that you’ll feel something that makes your life worth while, rather, it’s experiencing every moment for the good, bad, beautiful and ugly it is and growing FROM it, rather than just reaching it.

One of these life-altering moments came for me not too long ago when I had a sudden epiphany:

I am an unusual girl.

“What took you so long to figure that out? I already know this …”

Granted, I know I’m weird, but along the lines of thinking about all this “growing up” stuff, I began to mentally evaluate my life.

I don’t live the life of an average 20-year-old:

—I don’t drink, smoke, or do drugs (unless you count coffee, in which case, I need some serious help.)
—I don’t cuss (and I force myself not to when I’m in traffic.)
—I refuse to flaunt my body for attention by wearing skimpy clothing (or lack thereof.)
—I’m waiting till I’m married to have sex (yeah, we exist.)
—I’ve never gone out partying on the weekends (unless you wanna count that 8th grade formal I went to at City Hall when I was 13, but I didn’t feel comfortable and left after ten minutes. Again… unusual.)

I don’t say all of this to brag about how perfect I am. Because trust me, I’m not even halfway there. Let’s not even get into my ability to hold a grudge, judgmental attitude, control issues, pride, and temper (…did I mention I HATE traffic?)

I share all this to show you who I’ve decided to be.

See, all these things I choose to practice are things that the world sees as stuff I’m missing out on. Tasks that somehow “delay” me from reaching maturity, when the truth is, in living this way, God is allowing me to grow FROM the experiences, and not just check them off some list.

21 is a big deal. With it comes a lot of freedom. A lot of wonderful, exciting and scary freedom. It would be very easy for me to express my “freedom” and “experience” things the way most 21-year-olds are expected to… but I refuse to trade the freedom I’ve found in Christ and His promises for me over the false freedom the world says will help me “experience life.”

My worth, my identity and who I am as a woman is found in Christ and Him alone. He defines who I am. And it’s because I’ve allowed HIM to define me, that I can go out and live the abundant life He died for me to have. To be the crazy, passionate, nerdy, random, romantic, bible thumping and completely unusual girl that I am… giving my life away to others and taking part the life they have to share.

I’m a work in progress, we all are, but when we allow false standards to define who we are, we’re completely missing out.

Being a “grown up” isn’t found in what you have or haven’t experienced, it’s about living the life you were intended to and living it extraordinarily—learning, loving, moving forward, moving on and everything in between.

Turning 21, or getting older for that matter, doesn’t scare me anymore. Not like it used to. In realizing who I am, in all my unusual quirks, I’m also deciding who I don’t want to be. I don’t want to be someone who feels the need to succumb to stereotypes just to make myself feel like I’m worth something. I already am worth something… I’m priceless… the blood of Jesus proved that. And even on days when I really feel like a weirdo (which is about every waking second of my life), I need to remind myself of this.

I don’t know who you are, how old you are or what place in your life your in. Maybe you’re younger and this adult stuff hasn’t effected you yet, maybe you’re way past 21 and STILL feel like your being told to grow up, or maybe you’re like me, and you’re realizing what growing up really means… I dare you to live life unusually.

I dare you to go against everything this world says will make you something, and begin to discover who it is God made you to be. HE is the one who defines who you are. And once you do, begin to live it out in all of it’s amazing, incredible, and yes, unusual splendor. Become who you were created to be and truly experience life as the gift it is… growing every step of the way.

Xoxo,
—Sarah