Signs & Ghosts

Hello, God, it’s me again.  You know – the one who said she needed a sign before she could buy into the “God’s got a plan for your life” bit.  Remember me?  Well, here I am again, looking for a sign, wishing you’d make it real clear.  Could I get some fireworks, lightning, maybe a clanging bell or a really BIG road sign – flashing in neon purple at midnight?

That was me, wanting a bonfire when a match would do.  In order for me to “fit” into God’s Kingdom work, I thought I had to do something really, really BIG for it to count.  I had to be part of the church leadership, join the choir or praise team, or teach a Sunday School class.  I thought I had to be in the limelight, be seen by everyone as actively working in the church so people would know I was a Christian and think about what a wonderful person I was. 

Of course, at one point I also thought being a good person and doing good works was what made me a Christian.  Certainly it didn’t require devotion or adherence to rules.  I didn’t have to be obedient to God’s Word or set time aside to study it. I didn’t have to attend church or fellowship with other Christians.  I didn’t have to do much more than a 2-minute prayer to get by. As long as people thought I was a Christian I’d be okay.  Right?  Sure, Merry, Cinderella isn’t a fairy tale and the moon is made of green cheese too.

So what’s a girl to do. I’ve had a lot of challenges in working in the church. As I’ve said before, I’m not the work-in-the-kitchen-or-nursery kind.  I have a rule – if you can’t nuke it then you don’t need to eat it.  Cooking is not something people ask me to do (unless they’re new and don’t know about my burnt offerings).  I’ve found that many people believe because I don’t have any children I shouldn’t be allowed to care for them in the church nursery. 

I could sing in the choir but during tax season getting to practice is an anomaly; when you work 54-60 hours a week and you never know what shift you’ll be working it’s hard to get to practice.  I’ve worked on websites but decided that wasn’t in my best interests when folks got in my face and threatened me if I put their names on the Internet. In many churches I couldn’t teach a male above the age of sixteen, or couldn’t teach males at all, even if they were two years old.  There were certain tasks that were bastions of male expertise.  Committees were often off limits unless it had to do with women’s missionary groups, the kitchen, or the nursery.

I’ve often wondered what was left for me to do and whether there was something wrong with me since I didn’t exactly fit the typical social female stereotype of being married with 2 ½ kids.  Could I possibly have a calling considering my background?  I was almost afraid to ask. I seemed to bring up all kinds of ill thoughts because I wasn’t what most folks thought I ought to be. 

Most of the time I felt like a ghost.  I’d come into service and sit on the end in a middle pew. I’d listen to the songs and the sermons and leave out the side door.  Just like a ghost.  I felt bereft of fellowship.  Even when I went to gatherings I ended up sitting by myself, in my own little corner, in my own little chair.  Poor Cinderella!  I think what hurt most was that it didn’t seem to bother anyone that people like me were ghosts; we didn’t fit in, weren’t part of the community clan, didn’t have a place, and were, for all intents and purposes, virtually invisible.

Recently I’ve begun to notice that there are more ghosts than we think – hurting people who wander into a church looking for hope and understanding, only to discover no one even knew they were there.  I wondered if I’d been one of the ghost-makers.  Had I ignored them the way I’d been ignored?  Probably. More than likely. Yes, I have.  Color me oh so guilty. 

What I came to understand was that I had to make some changes in the way I approached church and the people who are the church.  I had to change my perspective.  It’s not about how the church meets my needs but how I meet the needs of the church – and by church I mean the people God intentionally put in my path.  It is God’s church, his people, so if I want to be about the business of working in God’s Kingdom,  then I better remember that what I do for any one of them (the people who make up the church) is the same as doing it for God.

Balancing Act

Today at church I learned about balance.  I learned that God can’t use me if I’m not vested in his work.  He can’t use me if I don’t think there’s a great work to be done.  He can’t use me if all my focus is directed inward instead of outward. He can’t use me if I cannot find time to do the work needed, or if I believe I’m above doing the work needed.  I needed to rethink my vision of working for the church and for God.  Was it all about being able to say I’m the clerk of the church or about being able to say the work is being done even when I’m not noticed or credited with any of it?

Here’s the picture I finally came up with to describe what I was thinking about my place in God’s great work:

   

I have to maintain my upward relationship with God, or everything falls apart and I end up on the ground in agony because once again I have failed him.  When I’m not looking up and connecting with God I’m not in a position to be of service.  I am out of balance with God’s vision for my life and the great work he has commissioned for the church.

        If I don’t look up I forget to maintain my relationship with the author and finisher of my faith.  I start think I’m more than I am, forgetting I am nothing without him.  My center moves off Christ and my connection falters.

If I am only looking at me I can’t see my family, my church, or God for that matter.  I have abdicated my service in God’s great work by focusing on me, myself, and I – the human trilogy of nonsense.  Because I’m looking anywhere but up I am giving Satan the perfect opportunity to sneak in with lies containing only a milligram of truth, enough to convince me he could be right.  My armor, no longer freshened by the Word of God and prayer, weakens and fails.  Because I have let my armor fail, I have nothing left with which to fight; I am overcome.

If I look only at my family I lose my balance because I allow that part of my life to overshadow everything else; I forget it’s God first.  I’m so busy taking care of my family I fail to see that if I don’t put God first, I’m not really taking care of my family at all.  I tell myself there isn’t enough time in the day to study the Word and pray; not enough time to complete my appointed Kingdom work; not even enough time to go to church – they won’t miss me anyway.  I may eventually convince myself I have too much to do to bother with church services and fellowship with other believers.  My perception becomes distorted, shifting the focus back to me; I am overcome.

If I only look at my church I lose my balance because that part of my life overshadows all else.  I’m focused entirely on bake sales, praise team practice, teaching Sunday School, taking food to the needy, serving on the visitation team, etc.  I’m so busy doing things I fail to notice that’s all I’m doing.  I’m not serving others, I’m serving myself.  When others try to tell me I need to drop a few activities and get back to studying the Word and being with God, I tell them I have too much to do; after all, what would the church do without me? 

I become self-absorbed; surely everyone can see how important my church work is.  I begin counting my works as study and prayer time.  I convince myself I’m doing everything I can.  I’m working hard, won’t God notice that?  My perception becomes distorted, shifting the focus back to me and what I can do in my own strength; I am overcome.

When I forget the most important part of balance is attending to my relationship with God and obeying his commands, I fall – badly.  When I neglect time with God, I neglect not only my family but also my church.  My armor must be kept polished and clean; I must dedicate my time first to God and then to whatever he leads me to.  If all that amounts to is sending cards to encourage others, then I have done what he asked.  It is enough.

And so I work to build the wall, straight and true, on God’s Word, his law and precepts. As he commands I build other walls for family and church that strengthen the wall God is building in me and through me.  I must connect to others, even though I’m not exactly the touchy-feely kind of person.  I must shine the light of the one true God on the path of others, even when they have no desire to see it, in spite of the ridicule and scorn which pummel me daily for calling myself a Christian.  I am called crazy, stupid, insane to believe in such a wild God, one who would allow pain to purify my walk. I continue to strive to walk and not grow weary.  Until life is over, I will faithfully follow his path for me.

From the rubble of my past, the splinters of what might have been, God creates substance to fill my walls, making them stronger, more durable, lasting.  What I have been adds texture to my story, to the story God is telling through me.  There is solidity and comfort in working to build the wall; God has a plan for me, a plan for good and not for evil.

Building the wall is a continuous effort; God is forever.  My life is a vapor yet while I live I will serve him and keep building the wall.  The battle rages on around me; I work through the pain and terror, knowing God is always there to guide and protect me.  He remains when all else passes away. The work continues despite my circumstances; they are secondary to doing the work God has set before me.  The scope of God’s great work reaches beyond me to unseen others.  God would reach them all.  If only they would listen.

I cannot come down from building the wall to deal with the foolishness of Satan.  He wastes the time God has given me to finish his work.  Only God knows how much time I have to complete his work, so I don’t have time for foolishness and lies.  There is no time for the things the world would tell me are more important than God’s work.  These things are a vapor – here and gone in an instant. God is forever.

Brick Walls

Have you ever felt like you were running into a wall and were stuck there, unable to move, unable to think, unable to do?  I have – at work, at home, and in my spiritual journey.  I’ve looked at the gray sky and wondered where God was, why he didn’t show up when I expected him to.  I’ve sat in break rooms wondering why some people seem specially favored.  I’ve wondered why I wasn’t a knockout beauty or why I didn’t have that wonderful marriage with two kids.  I’ve sat in waiting rooms for one doctor or another and wondered why this had to happen to me, as if some other poor soul deserved cancer more than I did.

I was stuck in a rut called Me, Me, and Me. I was focused on the wrong person.  It was all about me when it should have been about God.  How selfish can a person get; pretty selfish I’ve discovered.  I’ve learned, at long last, that it was never about me.  It’s always been about the blood, about Christ, about God.  The reason I never received the blessings I thought I ever so richly deserved was because I was looking for all the wrong things in all the wrong places. 

It used to bother me that some people seemed to be untouchable and unstoppable.  All they had to do was smile to be awarded the position I thought I’d worked harder for.  No matter how many ugly things they did to others, they always prospered.  She is a born beauty; I’m as plain a Jane as they come.  He can’t even concoct a simple declarative sentence, yet he’s the one chosen to write reports and articles.

Truth is their success only lasts for a time.  Crooked ways eventually become evident.  Beauty with no depth soon disappears.  Greed manifests itself in horrible ways.  What we have done in the name of bettering ourselves becomes a pathway for destruction.  As what we could have been dies within us, we search for a way out, something to revive what we once were – before we became ruthless and uncaring.

We’ve been listening and acting on Satan’s lies.  We’ve bought into the “it’s all about me” fever.  If the world doesn’t give you what you deserve, take it I’ve heard.  The world owes you a living and a good one at that!  Satan’s delusions look bright, pretty, engaging.  We can just see ourselves in that life.  All we have to do is walk all over everyone else to get it. All we have to do is give up who we are.  Here’s the Lake of Fire, isn’t it beautiful?  Jump right in!

It seemed to take me forever to finally see through the lies I was being told.  The Apostle Paul was said to be a homely little man, yet God used him in mighty ways.  Moses could barely speak in front of crowds, yet he brought God’s people to the Promised Land.  Me, well, I may be common, I may be naïve, I may be downright dumb, and I may even be ugly – but I am made in God’s image.  Last I heard, God don’t make no junk. God uses those the rest of the world thinks are worthless.  I say, sign me up.

I’ve discovered I don’t need to be the CEO of the company; I can serve right where I am.  I don’t have to live in a mansion; my little bungalow is just fine.  I don’t have to dress in Nordstrom or Sax Fifth Avenue; Wal-Mart clothes work just as well.  I don’t have to be a member of the church praise team; I can bellow from the middle pew quite nicely.  Bye, bye brick wall.  You’ve been demolished!

Curiously enough once I stopped caring about all the bright, beautiful “me” things Satan was offering, and started paying attention to the things of God instead, all things I thought I had to have or be didn’t matter anymore.  I don’t have to be married and have 2 ½ kids to be used of God.  I don’t have to be the CEO of the company to work in God’s Kingdom.  I don’t have to be rich to be able to serve in the church. And I don’t have to be a church leader to be a member of the church body.

If cancer has taught me anything, it’s about what is or is not important.  Climbing over someone else’s back to get a promotion is definitely not important; praying for that person is.  Being the best at some obscure task is not important; taking part in God’s great work is. Being ridiculed for being overtly Christ-centered is not important; being Christ-centered is.  Doing more than anyone else to compete in some game to bring me glory and honor and praise is not important to me any longer; doing the best I can at the work I do and honoring God as I do it is far more important.

I know there are some folks watching who are shaking their heads and saying, “What a nutcase she’s become!”  OK, works for me.  If faith in an everlasting God is crazy, so be it. One day you too will discover the importance of faith; it will happen when faith is all you have to hang on to. If finding joy in cancer is evidence of insanity, go ahead and sign the papers to admit me to the asylum.  I know from painful experience that joy will take you farther than despair, that being positive is far more productive than negative ramblings, and that no matter what you do to me, joy comes in the morning.  You can’t scare me – I’m a born-again child of the one and only living King.  My Dad can beat your Dad any time, anywhere, at any game.

It’s funny how content you can be when you stop struggling with the expectations of the world and start living, truly living, for God.  Paul was stoned, beaten, ship wrecked, driven out of cities, sick, scorned, mocked – and yet he was content.  When Paul said he must go to Rome, he knew what lay ahead, yet he was content to go.  He knew what I now know – it doesn’t matter where you go as long as God goes with you.

So if I’m at the back of the pack, at the bottom of the barrel, at the end of the line, it’s okay.  As long as I’m where God needs me to be, I will be content.  He may have to poke me sometimes to get me moving (I can be incredibly obtuse) but I’d rather be doing God’s work than have all the riches in the world.  I kind of think all those riches don’t make you happy anyway.  They’re just sad replacements for what your soul really needs – Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Joy isn’t the result of things you can buy or money you can make.  It doesn’t appear just because you’re married and have 2 ½ kids.  Joy can’t be boxed up and peddled to the highest bidder. A bigger house won’t make it appear, nor will the newest car or the highest-paying job.  Joy is not the result of anything man can do. It is the result of being in tune with the Master and going about the work he gives you. Joy, God-given joy, is irrepressible and priceless.  It’s what makes people wonder how you can laugh at cancer and dance through the storms in your life.  When the source of your song is the Savior, joy is easy to find.

Whispers

When I first discovered I had a tumor, I was a little leery of telling anyone.  I didn’t want cancer to be the only topic of conversation.  I didn’t want to make it the talk of the floor where I work.  I didn’t want people to feel sorry for me.  I didn’t want to see that look in their eyes that said, “She’ll be dead soon.  She has cancer.” I could hear the whispers as I passed by.  I could see people hurriedly washing their hands after touching me for fear they’d catch it too.

I feared the silence.  People seem to think that saying nothing and avoiding you is the best thing to do.  People are funny about things like cancer and death; they assume that since they don’t know what to say, it’s better to say nothing at all.  Of course, that’s easier if they can avoid seeing you too.  It is a hard thing to watch people you thought were your friends turn and walk the other way when they see you coming.  Worse still is to have them say things like: “Well, dear, you should get your affairs in order. Just in case, you know, anything happens.”

Worst of all is to have people assume that because you have a disease you have somehow committed a sin beyond repair.  You are condemned by God for your sin and his punishment is cancer!  If only you had done this instead of that God wouldn’t have punished you! Isn’t that basically what Job’s friends thought?  They never saw a loving God who knew Job’s faith. They said, “Curse God and die.” On the other hand, God was all Job saw. He praised God and his righteousness.  The result – blessings beyond Job’s wildest expectations.  Job never lost track of who he was and who God was.  No matter what happened he knew God’s righteousness would turned to good what another intended for evil.

How sad and tragic it is that people think in terms of punishment.  Sin is sin – it’s neither great nor small, it’s just sin.  God hates it all, grieves over it all, forgives it all.  Cancer is not a sign that I have sinned and require punishment but rather that I have been blessed by a turn in the path of my life that will take me closer to the Master, straight into the loving arms of the Father. The objective is to get me to turn to God and see him for who he really is – the author and finisher of my life.  Sometimes I require a little shoving to walk the right path; God knows what it will take to turn me around.

I used to have to listen hard to hear God’s still small voice, yet I had no trouble hearing people whispering in the hallways about me.  “Does she know that color looks awful on her? She didn’t earn that promotion. Look how fat she is.  What a dummy, can’t even run a network.”  And who did I listen to?  All the voices in the hallways.  All the people who called me a failure behind closed doors.  All the people who said I couldn’t do that because I am a woman.  All the people whose cruel taunts said I was worthless and unnecessary.  Amid the rumbling of all those voices I couldn’t hear the whisper that said, “You are my child.  I made you exactly the way you needed to be made.  I have plans for you. My blessings are right around the corner.”

These days I talk about being blessed by cancer.  I’m sure some people think I’m mad.  Even some of my family members think I’ve lost my mind. Cancer kills people, so how can it possibly be a blessing? No one in their right mind would call cancer a blessing!  God used it to teach me more about him and his plan for my life, though I’m still not exactly sure where that plan is leading me.  It was necessary to taste the bitter before I could taste the sweet.  There is much truth to the idea that you cannot minister to others without having been through the fire and come out on the other side stronger in your faith.

I’ve had people ask me how I can be happy about cancer.  It’s certainly not because I have any power over cancer, nor am I in denial.  I am happy because the source of my strength and joy is Christ.  He is the anchor that holds even through the worst storm I could imagine.  He is the unmovable, unstoppable force that stands me up and propels me forward. I may be battered and broken but that happens to be exactly what God is looking for.  God uses common, broken but willing vessels to do great things for his Kingdom.  I hope to be one of those willing vessels God uses to touch someone else’s life for the Kingdom.                                                                       

God’s blessings aren’t always what we think they should be.  I wouldn’t have thought cancer to be one but it has been.  It has given me the opportunity to walk down a path I would never have gone down without it.  For along with the blessing of cancer has come the blessing of being able to share someone else’s pain, of being able to see joy instead of sorrow, and being able to rest in the arms of a loving Savior.  There are many things I don’t know about tomorrow but I know the God who makes every tomorrow and I know he holds my hand.

Circumstances often dictate our behavior.  Tragedies will turn us into defeated, hurting people.  If we let them, these events will keep us right where the enemy wants us – sucked into a hole so deep we cannot escape.  He knows exactly when and where to strike.  He uses everything at his disposal – places, people, events, disease, emotional distress, whatever he can get his hands on, wherever he can find a crack. My task, as I see it, is to fill those cracks with God so that the enemy cannot find purchase in my life to take me down into the depths of despair and defeat.  When God is there, Satan is forced to flee.  

We walk by faith through fire knowing that God is right there with us.  His Son walked through fire for us all the way to Calvary.  Cancer is nothing compared to what my Lord suffered.  Yes, he agonized in the garden all alone, forsaken by his friends.  Still he said, “Your will be done not mine.”  He said it on the cross, struggling to remain upright, fighting against the pain in his body, knowing he had done nothing to deserve what he willingly took.  If he can deal with that kind of agonizing bonfire, surely I should be able to walk through the flutter of a match called cancer and beyond.