neglected unto the Lord

A few weeks ago, a counselor-friend that we have worked with ourselves and connected many others with called me out of the blue. I was having a rough "How is Stacey going to get through this?" day...mourning all the losses again, frustrated with all my mourning again, wondering what in the world God was doing again, wondering why trusting Him was truly feeling so bitter and dry.

As soon as I saw her name on my phone, I knew it was about to be all about me. She was calling to check on me! She was worried about me, and rightfully so! She would have good counsel for me. I could dump it all on her and she would listen and understand and probably say something very helpful and feel very terribly for me.

I answered in relief...which quickly turned to irritation.

She sweetly and discretely spoke to me about a painful, broken situation of another, and asked if I had any contacts that could help. And I truly did...I had the perfect contact for this complicated situation!  I texted my contact friend, they were in touch with one another within moments, I was off the phone and out and done and...miffed.

Well, that was not about me the way it should have been! I caught my attitude confessing, feeling even more hurt, frustrated and wronged than I had been before.

As the morning went on, instead of growing more and more sour at my seemingly unconcerned friend and all the care I wasn't getting, I felt the Lord prodding my heart with a new level of awareness of what was in it.  

Somewhere along the way, my genuine heart-break and struggle had stopped being about healing and redemption and rejoicing in the Lord in all things, and had started to become all about me.

The Lord used my sidelined phone call to expose the selfishness in my heart and I remembered all over again that the ME parts of my heart are always human. Are always wrong-perspective. Are always ugly. When I'm on the throne, I'm in such trouble.

It's been a purifying few weeks that finally brimmed over the surface these past two days of powerful testimonies, humbling brothers and sisters showing up for us, and the Lord's unmistakeable hand. 

There was selfishness I wasn't attacking or surrendering with abandon. 

There were hurts and frustrations and injustices I was begrudging, not forgiving.

There were offenses I was not overlooking.

There were pains I was not reaching out for healing.

There were burdens I was sure were beyond Him.

There was grace I have not been extending nor accepting. 

There was a focus on Him I've been passing up for a focus on me.

When it's all about us, that's all we have: US.

...our grudges and our frustrations and our hurts and our rights and our destructive self-pity.

It's only in the Lord--where healing, grace, redemption, forgiveness, freedom and joy are found--that our ash-heap lives are made beautiful.

I've been doing the work since that phone call realization...and He's been meeting me at every turn. 

 

What a joy to watch these cousins...apart for over a year...be cousins.

What a deep joy to celebrate today with Rev. Doug Smith, all the way from Jersey--the man who sent Matt to Asbury, the man who married us and baptized our babies. What a deep joy to have him with us...to testify to how faithful God has been through this friend.

What an overwhelming honor to have our brother Dr. Charles Lake...author and church planter and preacher and discipler, our steady friend sweating it out in Haiti alongside us for so many years...come all the way from Indiana to stand beside us. I'm crying here again tonight, just that they SHOWED UP.  

MAN, the ministry of JUST SHOWING UP for people...it was the greatest ministry God ever came down for.

The joy of Dr. Ron Smith, all the way from Kentucky, the man who sent us to One Mission Society, the preacher-friend God has used many times to warm our hearts to His Truth!

The testimonies...the powerful testimonies of graduates from Africa, from Jackson, from everywhere in between, of how God CALLED, of how God SHOWED UP, of how God's been faithful. How God has used Wesley. How God has been in the deserts with them.

The stories of Dr. John Neihof, a faithful man, taken in an instant, setting up a legacy of poured out. His dear wife who has worked sacrificially and intentionally to love us WELL and to HELP me, though I have done nothing to merit or earn it.

An afternoon with Karen Oswald...a weekend with Dr. John Oswald, witnessing their wisdom and kindness and abandon to all that "makes sense" for all that is HIS.

My dad and Cindy have kept our kids for banquets, have done piles of laundry, have washed dishes, have been taxi drivers, have scrubbed bathtubs and washed windows and shown up and poured out and been so, so gracious. 

Matt's parents and brother and sister-in-law giving up baseball games and days of work and days at home to be with us. Our dear neighbors dropping off handbags on their way to school...making fancy sandwiches for me to serve to the board wives...coming to Matt's inauguration today...

Listen.

That phone call wasn't about me...and that was exactly what I needed. 

This weekend had nothing to do with me, it was nothing I've worked for or earned or merited... and how beautiful it has been to be humbled and misty-eyed and small, for there is LIFE in Him and Him alone, and in my small He's been SO FULL.

This weekend has had everything to do with finding Him, acknowledging Him, celebrating Him and professing that all the efforts, all the sacrifices, all the hurts, all the victories, all the painful days, all the mountaintops, all the injustices, they were all given unto Him...and THAT has changed everything.

That person who wronged you, friend, it is time. 

Give it up. 

In light of YOU, it will devour you and destroy.

In light of Him, there is true forgiveness and freedom.

That situation that has threatened to break you, friend, here He comes. 

Loosen that grip and reach instead for the fringe of His robes. 

There is festering and destruction in our inward bent...or there is healing to be had in His shadow.

That focus we have, beloved, on "the way it should have been" being OUR way...ask the Lord to show you where we are about US...and to spare no expense in redirecting us to HIM.

 Holding onto our rights and ways and wisdom bring NO joy, NO freedom, NO peace, NO change.

Come, those who are weary and heavy-laden--for in tasting and seeing the Lord alone to be good and re-establishing Him on the thrones of our lives--He will give us rest. 

As we are weak in these seasons, may He be glorified.