Daughter of God

At that time Jesus came from Nazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. As Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and the Spirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.” (Mark 1:9-11)

Our church Minister has been away on Sabbatical for the last three months. He came back yesterday. Yay! I have missed his sermons.

Last night he preached on the verses above. And the message hit me like a tonne of bricks. A new lesson in the lesson that has been ongoing since last summer. The theme: I am free to be me. Why? Because I am God’s daughter, whom He loves, with whom He is well pleased.

The message above was God’s message to Jesus, but it applies to me too, and the explanation for that is here:

For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. (Romans 8:15-16)

When I committed my life to Christ my sins were washed clean. Because of Jesus’ sacrifice for me, I am now a daughter of God. He loves me and He is pleased with me. I could write more, go into the complexities of this theology but I won’t. You know why? Because this is difficult enough for me to wrap my head around.

My mood has slipped slightly. I have slipped into some old thought patterns, allowed one person to impact my self-esteem in a way which has made me disappointed in myself.

Cocky, eh? Thinking that because I’ve been stable for a little while maybe I don’t need to be so vigilant against negative thought patterns. Yep, new beginning an’ all that. Stable mood, fresh insights…

But I suppose this is the real test. To cling to the truth when my brain tells me it’s not true. I am God’s daughter, He loves me, He is pleased with me. Not because of anything I have done, but because of what Christ did for me. What liberating truth.

Good Friday

Long, rambling post coming up. Grab yourselves a coffee and get comfy.

Hubby and I went swimming with my family yesterday. I jumped off the top diving board! I was absolutely crapping myself but I did it. Now, this may not seem like anything much to you, but it is a lot to me. I was a wimp of a child, as my mother frequently points out. I hated swings, slides, fireworks… you name it, I was scared of it. But yesterday I climbed to the top diving board and willingly jumped off it. Yay me!

And you know what I realised? I enjoyed the experience because it is nice to have a definable fear that I can overcome. As opposed to the constant nameless fears that I live with each day, that cause my heart to race and haunt my sleep.

My sister jumped of the second diving board, but she didn’t manage the top one. She enjoys the adrenaline rush that comes with doing something frightening. I do not enjoy this rush. But I do enjoy the rush that comes after, the rush of triumph, the rush of a fear beaten into submission. What’s next? Skydiving?

My mum said she will never call me a wimp again.

After swimming we went back to my mum’s house and celebrated my sister’s birthday. Naturally, I laughed and joked and made everybody giggle. That’s my role. Even when I don’t feel like it. I didn’t feel like it yesterday. I just wanted to be left alone. I did enjoy myself, but it was a strain to be the person they expect. Towards the end of the evening the cracks were showing. I had a couple of glasses of wine. My movements and speech became more erratic.

I had realised over the course of the day how different I am. Other people don’t have constant crises of identity, other people are not emotionally incontinent. They don’t spend their lives like this, with every small step being such bloody hard work. I realised how normal my life has become to me, that I don’t even notice my differences most of the time. But other people do. Even my own family, the people who supposedly know me best, don’t know how to take me. When I become “difficult” they withdraw from me, break eye-contact, and just wait for the storm to pass. They can’t take charge, they can’t rescue me, throw me a rope and help me out of the hole I have created for myself. They just watch.

They like the bright, bubbly, sparkly Karita. I hide the other Karita from them as much as possible. But sometimes she decides to show up anyway, and she embarrasses us all.

They don’t get it, how can they? They can’t possibly understand that this is not fun for me. This is not fun. This is a nightmare that I sometimes wonder if I will ever wake up from.

Shattered
Like a windowpane
Broken by a stone
Each tiny piece of me lies alone

And scattered
Far beyond repair
All my shiny dreams
Just lying there

I’m broken, but I’m laughing
It’s the sound of falling glass
I hope that you won’t mind if I should cry,
In public, while I wait for this to pass

‘Cause sweet darling I’m shattered
Into fragments cold and gray
Sweep the pieces all away
Then no one will ever know how much it mattered
Something deep inside of me
Shattered

[Linda Ronstadt]

On the way home I cried.

But I believe that there is hope. Over the last couple of weeks my Bible readings have been from this passage:

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going.”

Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”

[John 14: 1-7]

Over and over again I come to these verses. So I have looked at them and tried to understand. I won’t go into it all now, but I will just show you something I read last night:

Fear moistens our palms, buckles our knees and chokes our breath. Debilitating fear makes cowards of even the strongest and most powerful warriors. Some try to fight their fears by ignoring them. Others mask their fears through anesthesia (alcohol and drugs) or false bravado (pretending that all is well). Some respond by rushing recklessly into danger. But the answer, the effective antidote to fear, comes from knowing the truth and knowing what lies ahead, down the path.

Jesus told his disciples that he was the Truth (John 14: 6) and that heaven awaited all who trusted in him (John 14: 1-4). Thus they need not fear, regardless of their circumstances, pressures and troubles. Certainly these young men didn’t know the future, but they knew the one who did – and he promised them peace.

What fears steal your hope and keep you awake at night? Trust the Saviour, and sleep like a baby.

[Dave Veerman]

Yesterday the heavy weight of my broken mind came crashing in on me, bringing with it fear. I don’t know how long it will take me to come to terms with this illness, or how long it will take me to learn to manage it. I am afraid of my future. I don’t know how to be around people. I don’t know who I am. I am scared of my next depressive episode and where it will lead me.

But this I know, He heals the brokenhearted,
And stays our sin, and calms our lurking fear,
And lifts the burden from the heavy laden,
For yet the Saviour, Saviour of the world is here.

[I cannot tell, Londonderry Air]

I will cling to the truth that my Saviour teaches me. He knows me. He loves me. He paid the ultimate price for me. He brought me back to himself. And one day he will lead me home.

I’m Sorry

2008. What a year. We’re almost at the end of it and I feel scattered. I even have trouble writing because my thoughts have been thrown far and wide. What has happened to me this year? Who have I become? Or am I still the same? All the things that used to be so important to me – what has happened to them?

I just wrote a whole post reviewing the events of this year, but I have deleted it because, let’s face it, it was rubbish. I was bored reading it, why would I inflict it on anyone else? Linear thinking, and writing, isn’t really my style.

You know what really happened this year? Apart from all the mental instability, I mean. I lost sight of God. I may even have stopped looking for Him. This hit me on Christmas Eve. I wasn’t really feeling it this year, hardly surprising given that I had been alternately in bed or with my head down the loo in the run-up to the festive season. But on Christmas Eve I curled up with my duvet to watch Carols from Kings. This is a beautiful, traditional carol service. As I sat there I felt peace flood through me.

Christmas isn’t about the tree, or the presents, or the food, or even the family. It’s about the fact that the God who created the whole universe left the splendour of heaven to live as a human, to join us in our filth. It’s about the fact that God gave Himself to us as a free gift. He was poor, he was abandoned, beaten, mocked and killed. For me. Christmas isn’t about a little baby in a manger with a halo round his head. Christmas is about the Almighty God becoming a baby and landing in a filthy stable because nobody had room for Him.

On Christmas Eve this hit me like a ton of bricks. God became a man for me. God died for me. He took my filth, my sin, my rebellion, and He died for it. I deserve the wrath of God to land on me for every mean thing I have done in my life. But instead I get to be free! Christ is alive today, standing next to the Father, and one day I will stand before Him, clean in His sight, all because of what Jesus did for me.

And what do I do with this knowledge? Nothing. I haven’t rejected it, no, nothing as openly sinful as that. Nope, I have just ignored it. I have wallowed in my selfishness, my worry, my fear, my apathy. My own thoughts have become too much for me to handle, and instead of giving them to God I have held onto them. It’s like I have seen the dirt on my body, and instead of having a shower and scrubbing myself with soap until I am clean, I have stayed in my filthy clothes for days and weeks on end, becoming ever more black and smelly. Only God can clean up my heart, but I haven’t allowed Him to do that. How I must grieve Him. And I am so sorry. I am so, so sorry.

I’m not sure where I go from here. There needs to be change in my life. But I have a remarkable ability to forget a lesson within hours of learning it. I turn everything into a theory. I will think about it, ruminate upon it, but I will ignore its reality, and it therefore loses its impact on my life. There have already been some changes in my life, small ones though they may be. I have ditched the anti-depressants, I have made an appointment to see a psychiatrist and I am working with Mr. Razzler on some deep breathing techniques. Maybe the next thing that I need to do is to get down on my knees and talk to God again. It’s been a while.

Overwhelming Love

I have been so overwhelmed by the love and kindness that Mr. Razzler and I have been shown by the people in our church. It’s been absolutely phenomenal. Hugs, cards, prayers. Offers of help. More hugs. Mr. Razzler has said this his strength has been increased many times because of his new and ever-growing church family.

The funeral is on Thursday and although I can’t go I know that Mr. Razzler will be looked after. And a couple from church is looking after me on that day so that I won’t be sitting at home on my own. They came bounding over to me today and hugged me tight before telling me that I’m going round to their house for the duration of the funeral. Tears sprang to my eyes.

And I have had emails from church family all around the country this past week, filling me with strength and courage. How blessed we are to be so loved. It has brought home to me the realisation once more that we are a global family, not constrained by time and place, language or culture. And one day we will be together for eternity, praising the Lamb who was slain and who is alive today and forever.

The nature of things

OK, I have a few minutes to myself so I thought I’d get a blog post written.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the nature of sin. And the nature of love. And how the two go together. They always seem to be together. I’m talking here about my love for God. And my knowledge of His love for me. My love for God seemed to diminish for a while these last few months. I wasn’t on fire for Him. I didn’t think about Him all the time, I didn’t have the impulse to read my Bible. I couldn’t seem to find Him. I felt lost. I even wondered if He was even really there, or if I just wanted Him to be. Doubts, doubts.

Although I know from what I have learned that my identity is in Christ (I am who He made me to be, and Christ’s sacrifice has made me clean in God’s sight) I still compared myself to other people all the time. I have always done this to a certain degree but I reached new levels of neuroticism recently. I was constantly wondering what other people were thinking of me. I needed their approval. I was gutted when I didn’t think I received it. Other people’s opinions of me became far more important than God’s opinion of me.

A few weeks ago I started taking medication to try and control my anxiety. They took a while to kick in, and in fact I became more nervous for a while. However, during our week on holiday I was able to get some perspective. I felt my body physically relax. Towards the end of the week I was thinking more clearly. When I came back to work I was much less worried. And I started to think about how my sin pulls me away from loving God. Or how my lack of loving God leads me into sin. Which way round is it?

Red Wine Gums said recently that:

The problem when you don’t feel God in your life, when you don’t love him with all of your heart is that it’s impossible to truly hate sin.

So true. When I am feeling far away from God, that is when certain sins become acceptable to me. Like maybe having a bit too much to drink, or getting cross with somebody and moaning to Mr. Razzler about them behind their back. It just seems like it’s too much hard work to be fully committed to God. He doesn’t help me, I’m left to do this on my own, and it’s too hard. What does it matter if I don’t love this person the way I should, what does it matter if I was impatient at work today?

I got a lovely little mp3 player for my birthday. It’s great. So I spent some time walking by the river while we were away, listening to some great music. I felt calm flooding through me. I felt like I kept catching little glimpses of God. Little glimpses of who He wants me to become. But the doubts were (and are) still there. Did I really feel God or did I just think I felt him because of all the pretty trees and ducks and good music? Or because of the anti-depressants that I’m currently shoving down my throat every evening? After all, I am a very emotional person. How can a feelings-oriented person work out the difference between feelings and reality? How can I tell what is God and what is me?

I Forget

I need to write. After a gentle reminder I have edited this:

___________________________

I experience God’s love for me in a tender, deeply personal way.

I forget. He forgives.

I struggle to relate to those close to me. I learn compassion.

I forget. He forgives.

I learn that my identity is in Christ. I learn that I am free.

I forget. He forgives.

I spend time with those who consider me an outsider. I learn to love.

I forget. He forgives.

I read my Bible and acknowledge its truth. I pray to God. I cry out for forgiveness.

I forget. He forgives.

I break down in tears. I am on my knees before God. I don’t understand.

I forget. He forgives.

I delight in the simple pleasures. A glass of wine. A compliment. A cuddle.

I forget. He forgives.

I reach out. I cry out. Please show me. You have removed my sin from me. I am free. You are mercy.

I forget. He forgives.

Each day a new war. God’s truth is drowned out. I’m so close to understanding. I’m so close to slipping.

I forget. He forgives.

I know I am clean in Your sight. Give me Your peace. Let me remember.

Identity

I have some serious thinking to do. I’m going to try to express some of what I need to think about here.

I have been allowing myself to dwell on negative thoughts. People I can’t deal with, situations I can’t handle. I have been allowing myself to see my world as something I’m stuck in. Certain situations I have found myself in over the last few years have strengthened my conviction that we are all responsible for our own actions. We can’t blame other people, or happenings in our life for how be think and behave. We can seemingly make a go of our lives but if our thoughts are still rotten then it means nothing. This is a concept which is so important to me that I can’t even express it clearly. I see people who wallow in self-pity, who allow bitterness to eat them up inside. I so desperately want to help but I have to recognise that it is beyond me. This frustrates me so much.

And yet… here I am, wallowing. Just because I haven’t really felt like myself for a while. Just because I have had to recognise that I’m not a super-hero. I can’t solve everybody’s problems. I can’t repair this broken world. I just have to watch. Just accept people the way they are and love them anyway. I can’t do any more than that. And because I have despaired of ever making a difference I can now see that despair has seeped into my life. I can’t help so what’s the point? Stop talking to me about your problems. You just want me to be a shoulder, someone you can rant at, but you don’t want to know what I actually think about the situation. You don’t really want to change. So if you don’t want to change then I don’t want to listen. It’s too much for me. Just leave me alone.

In my last post someone left a comment asking how being compassionate is going to help me to feel better. Good question I thought. I should be taking time to out focus on myself. Have a little me time. Me me me me me. But am I not then just doing exactly that which so frustrates me about other people? Running away from the world because it’s too hard to deal with.

It strikes me that it’s odd how low self-esteem and arrogance can sometimes go hand in hand. I am so hard on myself. I demand so much from myself. I beat myself up over the smallest things, tell myself that I’m rubbish and nobody should ever like me; I seem to be constantly expecting someone to find out that I’m a fraud, that I’ve been playing the role well but it’s all just an act. And yet at the same time I am angry when other people don’t behave in the ways I deem best. When they don’t take control of their lives, when they just allow the waves of life to roll over them and then become bitter when it didn’t turn out the way they wanted. Does my head in. Arrogance and self-doubt entwined.

And here is what I need to realise. My identity is in Christ. I have been learning this for years, and just when I think I’ve got it I screw up once again. At Easter this year someone close to me really lashed out at me. I was very hurt and confused and had no idea how to handle the situation. Again there was the temptation to just run away and hide. But the fact that it happened on Good Friday may have been my saving grace. I was immersed in what Jesus had done for me. He died for me, took my sin, paid my punishment and set me free. All those black thoughts in my head, Jesus paid the price for them! The one man who never did anything wrong bore my punishment. The God who created me became a human and died for me, so that I would know… what? Well, at the time it made me realise that I have no right to punish anyone for what they do to me – God forgave me so I must forgive others. When I came to that realisation I was free again and I could begin to restore the broken relationship.

The other thing I came to realise was that it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks of me. God loves me. What a trite phrase that has become in our society nowadays. Smile – Jesus loves you! Urgh. The reason it doesn’t matter what anyone thinks of me is because my God created me, He knows every part of me, he knows all my black thoughts and he accepts me anyway. I have been made clean in His sight. Now, I know that I am not clean. I am sinful, full of rebellious, selfish thoughts – but God has made me His own and He will not let me go. He has forgiven me.

And now, here we are, four months later and I have almost forgotten everything. I have started to judge myself harshly again. I have started to think that I am not up to the task that God has called me to – namely, to love God with my whole being, and to love others. It’s too hard! I can’t do this. How do I break this cycle? I’m a very up and down sort of person. One minute I’m high in the air, full of the realisation of everything, passionate about God – then next I’m down and anxious. I want to be able to praise God even when I’m down. I want to rest in the full assurance of who I am in Christ. I want to be able to accept this gift God has given me, the gift of salvation. I accepted this gift for the first time twelve years ago. But have I ever really known it deep down inside me? I have known it, many times, but I want more than that. Not just occasional incidents where God points out to me who I am and who He has made me to be, but a constant knowledge that is with me all the time. I don’t want to keep forgetting. Is this an attainable desire? And how do I go about getting there?

Thank you to Christy, who brought these thoughts to the fore this morning.

Joy

As you know, I’ve not been feeling too great this week. I’ve not been feeling that good for a few weeks actually, and it’s starting to get me down. I started worrying this week that maybe depression is coming back. I feel so tired and lethargic, not interested in anything. I just want to curl up at home with Mr. Razzler and stay there for a while. I doubt I am even mildly depressed, I think I’m just a bit run down and my imagination is running away with itself. I didn’t want to post anything about how I’m feeling unless I could bring something positive from it.

So… tonight I went to a home group meeting. We were studying Philippians 3:1-11. The passage starts with the words:

Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord!

I don’t feel like rejoicing. I don’t feel like I have joy in me. Someone said that joy is what gets us through the hardest times. I thought that joy disappeared during the hardest times. We feel joy when things are going well. But that is not joy. What is this joy? It is surely more than just an emotion or feeling. Rejoice! Be glad that you have been saved by Christ. Righteousness through faith. Hope of eternal life.

Our righteousness does not come from the things we do well. It comes from God. It is a free gift from God. There is nothing we can do to make ourselves more pure in God’s sight. So when I berate myself for being rubbish, I am forgetting everything I believe in. I am adding to the Gospel and turning it into something it is not.

May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it. 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24

To him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy. Jude 1:24

Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good. Titus 2:13-14

I could go on! God is faithful, He makes me pure and blameless. Christ redeemed me from wickedness and He will keep me from falling so that I can be presented before Him in glory. So I can rejoice. No matter how I feel, I can rejoice. I can fix my eyes on Him, the Author and Perfecter of my faith.

Humility #2

Some of the posts I have written recently, about anger and worship, have lots of issues running through them: idolatry, truth, unity, forgiveness. But one thing that hit me in the eye last night is humility. That seems, to me, to be the essential component in dealing with any of these matters. Consider the passage Philippians 2:1-18, which I helpfully posted for you.

‘Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.’

Another translation says, ‘count others more significant than yourselves’. That is so hard. How often are we looking to our own interests, even when we don’t think we are, even with those people we love dearly? Even with those people in our own church.

Selfish ambition. Vain conceit. Thinking our own opinions are worth more than others’ opinions. So that we can’t even talk to each other.

We take Christ as our example. Christ’s perfect humility. He gave up his divine inheritance and became a man. His family was poor, he worked with his hands. He suffered. He was beaten, mocked. How could the God who created everything, the Lord of Life, allow himself to be mocked? Only because he ‘did not consider equality with God something to be grasped’. We live in a society obsessed with its rights. I have a right to be heard, respected. I have a right to live in a way I deem appropriate, to have a successful career, a family. Did Jesus have a right to these things too? Yes. He had a right to more. He had a right to be worshiped, that we should fall down on our knees and worship him, purely because of who he is. But he did not insist upon his rights; he gave them up. To die. He was obedient, even unto death.

Therefore. What a wonderful word! Therefore, because of this wonderful example, we should work out our salvation, with fear and trembling. This is serious business, people! I have been saved by Jesus, I am clean in God’s sight, and one day I will be welcomed into his presence. But… I must constantly work to learn the things of God. I am not passive… I am active in my faith, as I continue to work it out. Not to work for my salvation, but to work out my salvation, on my knees before God, in fear and trembling, in awe of his mighty power, love and beautiful humility. This is my worship. To give back to God what he deserves. And I remember that I do not do this alone. God did not save me and then abandon me. He is working in me ‘to will and to act according to his good purpose’.

‘Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life.’

Why should we do this? If you go back to the beginning of the passage it tells you. ‘If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion.’ If. What a big word. All of this comes from a right relationship with God. If we do not have any of these things then we cannot follow Christ’s example. This is a huge lesson! If we look at this passage and realise that we do not have any encouragement from being united with Christ, no comfort from his love, no fellowship with the Spirit, if there is no tenderness and compassion – then we need to go right back to the basics and sort out our relationship with our Creator.

If we look at our community of believers, and see a lack of humility, then this needs to be addressed. Are we so concerned with unity, with trying to keep everybody happy, that we cannot speak the truth? We need to bring our community back to the beginning, to look at Christ’s example. And we need to address this in our own hearts too. Our selfish desires must be put to death.

And look what God did!

‘Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
      and gave him the name that is above every name, 
 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
      in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 
 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
      to the glory of God the Father.’

How wonderful. Here is the reason why this passage is one of my favourites in the Bible. Jesus humbled himself, to death, even death on a cross. He became nothing. He put himself right to the bottom. Because of that God raised him to the highest place. And one day every tongue will give him praise.

Humility #1

Philippians 2:1-18

Imitating Christ’s Humility

If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: 
 Who, being in very nature God,
      did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, 
 but made himself nothing,
      taking the very nature of a servant,
      being made in human likeness. 
 And being found in appearance as a man,
      he humbled himself
      and became obedient to death—
         even death on a cross! 
 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
      and gave him the name that is above every name, 
 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
      in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 
 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
      to the glory of God the Father.

Shining as Stars

Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life—in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor for nothing. But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you. So you too should be glad and rejoice with me.