The Official Website

Latest

Some Trust in Chariots

At the end of January, my husband was laid off and was without a job for about two months. It wasn’t the first time we had experienced a setback like that, and as I heard the words over the phone the day he was laid off, I knew that my immediate reaction would be the foundation for how I would respond repeatedly, as long as we were without a paycheck.

I sank to the the stair I was standing on and my stomach tightened. I breathed in and out a few times and then said, “O-kay . . .” Breathe in.

In the past, the words, “I lost my job,” would have been a trigger for me to go to my dark place, my depth of despair, but surprisingly, that didn’t happen once during the time that my husband was home and looking for work. My immediate response after reminding my body to breathe was, “God is here, this is Him. He is in control. I trust Him.”

I was really proud of myself for having so much trust. It was a victory for me because I have such a hard time remembering, in the moment, how faithful God has been to us. There were plenty of times during those two months that I had to remind myself to breathe, grab a hold of something and take a minute to fix my thoughts on my unfailing Father, but I never went into that familiar dark place, and we saw so much blessing during those months. The Father provided for us in the most amazing ways, to the point where we were laughing over the checks that were showing up in our mailbox, providing for our needs, and even some extras.

My husband has been in a new job for a month and a half today, and I have been thinking lately about how much easier it was to have faith in the Lord when there was nothing tangible and regular coming in. Now that we have a regular paycheck again, I find myself doubting again that there will be enough, that there will be extra. This job was God’s provision for us, and it’s ongoing yet here I am doubting it. What????

When I realized what I was doing, I was reminded of something the Father spoke to us just about a year ago. “Do you trust the paycheck? Do you trust the man signing the paycheck, or do you trust in Me?”

I am disciplining myself to put my trust in the Lord who is the giver of life, but this discipline is challenged every day, in all kinds of scenarios, including the publishing of my next book.

I’ve done a lot of reading on the craft of writing, the publishing world, the self-publishing world etc., and I’ve had significant moments of doubt in my gift, my process and that people will continue to stand behind me in support. To be honest, I don’t know how I measure up in the world’s standards, and in self-publishing I circumvented a lot of rejection, and plenty of authors look down on self-publishing because of that. I’ve really began to question whether what I’m doing is the right thing, if I’m walking down the right path in gearing up to self-publish Nor Forsake.

The Father had to remind me this week about why I self-published Stones of Remembrance: Because that is what He directed me to do. Not because I didn’t want to experience rejection and criticism that might have hurt or even bettered my skills, but because it was His leading to self-publish.

While it’s definitely a good thing to read articles and try to better myself, it is wrong to put those things in a place of authority in my work. I don’t trust market-standards, or bloggers who have opinions, I don’t even trust the rules for writing fiction. I trust in the Lord, who has given me the call to write, and I submit my work to Him and Him alone. That might sound hokey, or like a cop-out, but He is my source. He is the one who gives me the words to write.

I trust His leading implicitly. He will not lead me astray. He will not let my family go without.

*I wrote this post yesterday morning, and held off on posting it. The dark clouds came almost immediately after saving it. My entire day was attacked and I struggled for every waking moment to see the Father’s hand, to rise above and rule my thoughts and actions and I felt like a complete failure all day. Then I got a text from an old friend with this verse:

He gives strength to the weary
    and increases the power of the weak.
 Even youths grow tired and weary,
    and young men stumble and fall;
 but those who hope in the Lord
    will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
    they will run and not grow weary,
    they will walk and not be faint.

Isaiah 40:29-31 (NIV)

Even in our weakness He is made strong. I cried my eyes out as I read it and just received His grace. We all have those days.

What is the Father asking you to trust Him with today?Where do you need to receive more of His grace?

(google images)

Posted by  |  May 16, 2013 | Categories: Life, Spirituality, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

He Dreams a Dream

I am still walking in the midst of some intense healing, and I know that this is probably just the tip of the iceberg. The ugly cry hit me with a vengence this morning as I heard the Father say, “Don’t you dare doubt the plans that I have for you.” I got this really intense feeling in my chest and I knew that He was letting me know that I have allowed the manifestations of the brokenness in my life to distract and hinder the plans that He has for me. I have doubted that He can still use me while I am weighed down, weary and broken. But this morning he was so near and spoke so clearly that all He needs from me in order to accomplish His plan is a willing heart. He can use my brokenness, He can use anything that I offer to him, and nothing that is going on in my life can eclipse what He has for me if I am willing to surrender to Him and if I am willing to let Him have his way.

Now I’m going to say that a little differently, and I pray that you hear His heart for you.

All he needs to accomplish his plan in your life is a willing heart. He can use your brokenness, He can use anything that you offer to Him, and nothing that is going on in your life  can eclipse what He has for you if you are willing to surrender to Him and if you are willing to let Him have his way. Don’t you dare doubt the plans that He has for you. Don’t you dare let the enemy lie to you and tell you that the Father’s plans for you are diminished because of your past or present. Agree with who the Father says that you are and receive His healing and His dreams for you. Nothing will compare, I promise.

Be blessed today, He dreams about you.

Posted by  |  May 2, 2013 | Categories: Family, Life, Recovery, Spirituality, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

Under the Shadow of His Wing

Once upon a time I thought to myself, “I’m doing really good. God has done so much in my life, I don’t really have that many issues left to work through.”

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH.

I can hardly describe the work the Lord has been doing in my heart. Every morning when I sit down to have “Mommy Time,” I wonder if He’s really going to show up as powerful as He did the day before. I wonder, will I cry today?

ENTER THE TEARS.

The last 2 weeks have been some of the most intense of my life, and it’s all simply because I sit down and open my heart up to the Lord, rather than doing anything on my own. I haven’t opened my Bible in days, but God is speaking and moving and healing and I am OVER. WHELMED.

This morning as I was reflecting on all that He has been doing, I recognized that most of what we’re dealing with together revolves around my tumultuous teenage years. As I dredged up all that I have had to walk through about my past, I cried out to Him this morning and said, “How did that girl survive all of this?”

I was protecting her.

More tears.

You guys, this is what a Father does. He protects His kids. That doesn’t mean that we don’t feel things, that we don’t suffer. I believe that if I had had the tools back then that I have now, I would have lived a more fulfilled life. But the fact that I didn’t doesn’t mean that those things got to destroy me. Yes they hurt, yes I have limped most of my adult life because of them, but not to the point of destruction. Only to the point where the only place I can go is the feet of my Father, where I receive His healing.

I felt pressed to share with you this morning, and ask you to seek out where His protection has been your lifeline, in the past, present and to look for it from here on out. He is GOOD and His love ENDURES.

 

Posted by  |  April 25, 2013 | Categories: Family, Life, Quiet, Recovery, Spirituality | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave A Comment »

Be My Best Friend? — Patterns of Rejection Part 3

I have a friend who is fierce. She is beautiful and strong, though she’d argue that point. She has walked some similar paths as I have, and for a long time, our paths were so intertwined it was hard to see where the distinction was between them.

When we met, we were so young and bruised, totally naive, but something in our hearts clicked together and we became best friends almost instantly. I gladly absorbed myself in her life in order to escape my own, and she depended on me, which gave me value and a purpose. I’d already rejected who I was at home and school, so at least in this relationship I had a reason for being and I wasn’t failing.

Because we were both just walking out our brokenness, it was inevitable that we would hurt each other, that our wounds would get in the way and tear us apart. There was a lot of betrayal and a lot of lies between us and eventually we had to part ways.

I blamed her for a long time, and even though the Father has done an incredible healing work in our relationship, there are moments when I look back and my scar tissue starts to sting. I think that’s normal to a point, but this week He is showing me what was really going on back then. Like I said, I had given out assignments to people in my life that didn’t fit their purpose, and I wasn’t the only one making that mistake. I have forgiven where necessary, but there was, once again, more to the story.

When I look back now, with the new knowledge and hindsight I’ve been given in the past few weeks, I see every relationship and hurtful memory as part of this cycle, rolling waves of rejection and unforgiveness, that keep lapping at the shores of my heart. Over and over I tried to fill those holes I talked about yesterday and over and over my efforts fell short. I put people in places they never belonged. I assigned them shoes they could never fill. I rejected my identity in order to become someone people might like better, might find more acceptable than who I really was and again, in rejecting myself to be accepted, all I reaped was more rejection. I remember in my senior year of high school I experienced a betrayal so deep that when I sat in my room weeping, the Lord showed me that I’d completely lost myself in the relationship that had devastated me so much. I had no identity anymore. That was the very beginning of this healing process. That was fourteen years ago.

I started talking about this yesterday, the idea that we are all broken to one degree or another, and in the past year whenever I’ve received offense about something, stewed about it for a good long while before dealing with it, I always, always, find that when I face it head on the offending party was responding exactly how I was: out of their wounds and out of lies the enemy had spoken. Sometimes what’s going on has absolutely nothing to do with me too. Sometimes what the other person is struggling with is manifesting itself in my life in one way when they’re thoughts aren’t even on me.

I had a conversation with a friend recently and I confessed an offense I’d taken up that involved a situation she was an inadvertent part of and she confessed her own issue as it related to the scenario and I couldn’t help but shake my head. I had thought it was all about me. This was where the “picked last for dodgeball” mentality kicked in before my birthday. Like people are out to get me, all the time, when what’s true is that they’re just trying to navigate the muddy waters of living life in a broken world the same way that I am.

This is where I wish again that we could get a free pass as teenagers. At such young ages, though we thought we were adults and mature and oh, so wise, we had absolutely no clue what was going on. We were totally blind to our own issues and were walking around trying to fix everyone else’s. At least that’s what I was doing, repeatedly.

I shake my head at myself now and wish I could go back and sit down with those two teenagers and tell them that what they have to together is so precious, but that they’ve got to get some perspective in order not to ruin it. I can only speak to my own set of brokenness but maybe that would have be enough.

I am so thankful that the Father has redeemed our friendship, and that it is in a healthy place today, and that we are both on our own journeys with the Father, and I don’t regret the years past, because we both learned and grew in ways we needed to, but if only there had been a voice that we would have listened to, that could have spoken to the gaping holes in our hearts . . . If only we had understood the Holy Spirit’s real purpose in our life.

Comforter, Redeemer, Advocate, Helper. Holy Spirit, come and comfort. Come and redeem, advocate and help. Remind us of everything Jesus has told us.

That’s His job according to John 14:26, and all of the healing that I’ve been experiencing this week and over the past few years is only happening because I’ve finally opened myself up to Him and allowed Him to do His job in my life. It’s not always this easy, but it’s always better than anything I ever try to do on my own.

What is the Holy Spirit stirring up in your heart today? I encourage you to find a quiet corner and ask Him what He’s doing and then trust Him to complete the work in your heart!

Patterns of Rejection Part 1
Patterns of Rejection Part 2

Posted by  |  April 20, 2013 | Categories: Grief, Life, Quiet, Recovery, Spirituality, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments »

Hold My Hand . . . No. Don’t. — Patterns of Rejection Part 2

Patterns of Rejection Part 1
Patterns of Rejection Part 3

When my parents decided to renovate our kitchen, my mom took it upon herself to fill some of the holes that were going to be painted or tiled over. There was one hole in particular that was quite large, it had to be from an outlet or something . . . I don’t remember, I just remember that she took a huge glob of wall putty and started trying to fill it, and then left it to dry.  It turned into this disgusting hard blob that looked like it dried in the middle of a drip. Both my dad and the lady who was painting the kitchen were very frustrated, it was really hard to fix the job my mom had done. Eventually we all laughed about it, and the fact that I took my cue from her and pretty much puttied my entire bedroom when we re-painted it (I used a LOT of tacks to put up my DC Talk posters.).

The revelation that I shared in yesterday’s post,  about going back into my family tree and seeing the patterns of unforgiveness and rejection has opened my eyes to see that some of my wounds are a lot bigger than I ever realized. On Wednesday when I sat down and asked the Lord where we were going, he took me back to a relationship that I’ve shared before, right here. It’s the only relationship that I have vehemently regretted and beat myself up over for many years. Awhile back I did walk through forgiving myself for being a stupid teenager, and received some revelation about what was really going on back then, but this week I got an even clearer picture of what happened.

It all started with some innocent flirting. I’d never had a real boyfriend before, and in my head, it was ‘safe’ to flirt w/ this particular guy because I knew his reputation and I knew I was never going to be interested in him (insert eye rolling emoticon.). I was visiting friends for the weekend and he happened to be there. We’d never met before, but as I said, his reputation preceded him and I wasn’t the least bit attracted to him . . . at first. I don’t even think I realized that I was attracted to him until one afternoon we were all at someone’s house watching a movie and he sat beside me. About half way through the movie, he grabbed my hand and started rubbing it with his thumb. My insides went crazy. I had no idea what was happening to me, but my cheeks were flaming, my legs shaking and my heart was racing. I felt like someone had zapped me with some kind of electric current.

I think you know how the story goes from there; we dated for awhile, it was bad news, he as a jerk etc. I have always chalked that relationship up to the fact that I was ill-prepared for what happened when I experienced physical attraction for the first time. I have preached it to whoever will listen, and even whoever will read it, here on this blog. I still believe that it’s monumental that we teach our kids about how our bodies respond, that there should be no shame involved . . . everything I’ve ever said here about this subject is still true and good, BUT: There is more to my story than that.

There is one wound in my life that has bled into Every. Single. Relationship. I’ve. Ever. Had. There is one offense that has colored my entire life with rejection, one gaping hole in the wall of my heart that I have been trying to fill since I was a child. When I experienced that feeling for the first time, that electricity buzzing through my body at the affectionate touch from a male, it was something completely foreign to me. My heart, my head, my body, they had no idea how to process what was going on because of lies and agreements that had been allowed to plague my family for years. I was lacking in something so paramount for a teenage girl, aside from rejecting who I really was, as I talked about yesterday, the part of my heart that needed healthy physical affection had never been filled. To this day, if someone, even a friend, touches my arm in a caring way, I get goosebumps and and my heart squeezes momentarily. The flip side of that is that I am not an incredibly affectionate person with my friends. I’m not a natural hugger the way my husband is.  He hugs everyone. I wave, smile or eventually do the awkward side-hug.  This stuff is mind-blowing for me, you guys!!!

It now makes sense to me that the first time I felt that squeezing in my stomach, those butterflies dancing inside, that I latched on to that guy and mistook it for love rather than a natural physical reaction. Do you know how many years I have hated on myself for making that mistake? SEVENTEEN YEARS. It wasn’t my teenage stupidity and lack of knowledge. It was a festering emotional wound that led me into the arms of the biggest regret of my life. I can see it so clearly now that I feel sorry for that fifteen year old girl. She was just trying to find a way to meet her needs without even realizing what they were. She was gooping wall putty onto a hole that was far to big to be filled with such an inadequate substance.

The Father showed me a picture of a big heart, full of those gaping holes, and then showed me that instead of putty, he was pouring cement into those holes. Putty can be drilled through again, but with cement, it’s a lot harder. It takes a bigger tool and a lot more effort. The Father is filling the holes that were drilled into my heart at a very young age, and all I have to do is break the agreements I made with rejection and continually walk in forgiveness. It’s not as easy as it sounds, but every day it’s a little easier, especially because I can see that the ‘offender’ in this situation was just walking in his or her own wounds, which is often the case when offense is stirred up. We’re all in the middle of our own stuff, and when my stuff collides with your stuff, sometimes it explodes. There is misunderstanding, regret and hurt, but when we come together and look at things with clear eyes, we see that we’re all just dealing with our stuff and reacting out of what’s going on rather than who we really are. Did that make any sense at all? I’m still trying to wrap my mind around it and I’ll touch more on it in the next post because it’s an ongoing theme.

I kind of wish there was a grace period for the teenage years . . . I mean, there is grace, period, but what I mean is that all of the things the Lord is bringing up in me have to do with those tumultuous years where I just had no idea what was really going on. I’m thankful I’m seeing this stuff now though, before my kids reach their teens, because maybe, just maybe, I’ll be able to remember to ask deeper questions and use my new Holy Spirit Eyes to see what’s really going on when I see my kids hurting. I pray that’s the case!

What would you say to yourself as a teenager? What do you wish you could go back and fix? Where was the Father in the midst of those struggles? Can you see His hand in those memories?

Posted by  |  April 19, 2013 | Categories: Family, Grief, Life, Quiet, Recovery, Sexuality, Spirituality | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Praise Team Girl — Patterns of Rejection Part 1

I stood outside the multi-purpose room at my school in a long line of girls, waiting for my name to be called, praying quietly for calm nerves and that my vocal chords wouldn’t fail me.

The door opened and it was my turn. I walked slowly towards the piano, wiping sweaty hands on my baggy jeans and eying the two girls who had the coveted positions of our school’s Chapel worship leaders. They were two years older, and just the fact that I was in the same room with tenth graders who were focused solely on me was a huge deal, not to mention the fact that I had to sing for them.

I reached the piano and they smiled and explained how it would work. I would sing lead for one song and then harmony for one. I took a deep breath. I can do this. I can do this in my sleep. My sweaty palm left condensation on the top of the piano and I pulled it away, wiping it quickly, embarrassed, nervous. As soon as the first notes started to fill the room, the nerves dissipated and I sang with all that I had within me, just like I always had, like I always do. Nailed it. I thought as I walked out of the room, the butterflies dancing in my stomach again.

Waiting was the worst. It took three lunch hours for them to get through all the try-outs and then make their picks. We all (girls) gathered in a classroom on Thursday to hear whether or not we’d made the cut. I couldn’t help but feel overwhelming joy when they called my name, even though that meant some of my friends didn’t get called. This is it. This is what I was made for. Chapel worship team. This is all I’ve ever wanted.

By this point in my life, I was pretty hard core about Jesus, and everyone knew it. As the years went on and I was given more responsibility and eventually all the responsibility in the worship team, my mission became larger and more worthy of the work in my eyes. I wanted my fellow classmates to know Jesus the way I did. I begged in my spirit from on stage for them to just get a taste like I had. But most of them stared at me with blank eyes and mouths that mumbled the words so it looked like they were participating.

Around the tenth grade, the guys in my class decided it was time to dole out nicknames. There was “New Kid,” whose name I struggle to remember to this day, labeled as such because he was the only new student in our class that year. “Head,” which was actually the guy’s last name, but it was said with this gangsta-style inflection that always got a reaction from anyone around. (If you watch “Community,” it’s kind of like the reaction Magnitude gets when he does his ‘Pop pop’ thing . . . except maybe not quite so much.) As you can probably guess from the title, mine was “Praise Team Girl.” At first I didn’t mind it, it was kind of a prideful thing for me. That’s right. I’m the Praise Team Girl. Then when one of the other girls on the team got pregnant, and another one dropped out and became a little unstable, Praise Team Girl suddenly had a new connotation.

“Oooh, there goes Praise Team Girl. I wonder when she’s gonna get preggers?”

“Hey Praise Team Girl, when are you going to cut all your hair off and turn gothic like so and so . . .”

There was suddenly an immense pressure to not fail, which meant that my convictions needed to become that much stronger, my feet planted deeper in what I believed. I put on a strong face and walked through my school with self-righteousness all over me, which only, of course, made things worse. I was taunted a lot, not bullied, just taunted, irritated, and lacking the right tools, I always gave them what they wanted: a reaction.

During our last year of high school, the powers that be decided to change things up and put a teacher in charge of the team, demoting me to just a regular back-up singer. That was one in a series of painful events that revolved around my worship team experience that year. Suddenly the thing that identified me wasn’t mine anymore, and I hadn’t accomplished my goal. My peers weren’t in tears on the floor during worship times, experience the Father’s goodness, healing and gripping salvation. I felt like I’d failed.

At least I could still be an example. At least I could still sit at home on Friday nights instead of getting drunk at bush parties and show up to school without red-rimmed eyes from smoking pot. At least I was still righteous. What I really was was rejected.

The guy who instigated the nicknames came to our school in the eighth grade and on the first day of school, there was some kind of interaction between us that I don’t remember, but it made an impression on him because the next day in PE, he picked me first for his team in whatever it was we were playing. He said it was because I had been nice to him. Naturally I fell in love with him on the spot and it took almost the entire school year for me to get over it. He rejected me pretty big time, repeatedly over the course of the year, and he was in our class until graduation, so I really struggled with being around him. When he started the nicknames, and mine took the course that it did, the rejection was pretty overwhelming, except I didn’t know what it was. I just knew I was lonely and felt separate from my classmates. I looked at it then as a type of martyrdom. I was the good Christian girl and they were all (mostly) the lukewarm and/or indifferent.

It took me until this week, when the Father began a healing work so deep in my heart to see what had actually happened. Recently as I was being prayed for for some back issues that I need to be healed from, the Father revealed some root issues of unforgiveness and rejection not only in my life, but in the genealogy of my family, on both sides… like buckets of the stuff. Buckets and buckets, which of course led to buckets and buckets of tears on my part as I saw the pattern the enemy had been spinning in my family.

I have always felt on the outside of things. I have always felt like an after thought. I have always felt rejected. The Father showed me that with this significant memory from high school, the reason that it was so easy to be rejected by my peers was because I was rejecting who I really was. I was never created to be the savior of my class. I was never created to be the poster child for Kelowna Christian School, and I wasn’t ever meant to stand alone, apart from my classmates. In trying to be who I thought God wanted me to be, I became who they perceived me to be: Self-righteous, judgmental, probably extremely annoying, and unacceptable. I wasn’t Julie. I was Praise Team Girl, and that was contrary to who Julie was created to be.

But God, I was such a good example, I made all the right choices. How is that a bad thing?

It wasn’t. Your choices were pleasing to me, but you made those choices for the wrong reasons.

In trying so hard to be who I thought I was supposed to be and be accepted at the same time, all I reaped was rejection, which led to a slew of other things worse than that: self-loathing, condemnation, unworthiness . . . the list goes on, and I have made agreements with all of these lies over the past however many years, and it explains so much of why I struggle with what I struggle with, and this is only the tip of the iceberg. On Monday morning I began to break the agreements that I’ve made, I began to forgive the faces that have haunted me for years, and I forgave myself for not knowing any better. I began to cut off the root systems that go deeply into my family’s past that have been allowed to grow and twist, branch off and grow new root systems that have threatened to strangle me. This is the part that is the hardest. This is the part that is continuing. Every morning I sit down and say, “Lord, where are going today?” and within seconds I’m taken back to a memory and I have to cut off the roots that sprouted that wound. I could probably sit here for a year and do this.

Like I said, it’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Patterns of Rejection Part 2
Patterns of Rejection Part 3

Posted by  |  April 18, 2013 | Categories: Family, Grief, Life, Quiet, Recovery, Spirituality | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments »

Working on It

I have a couple of monumental (for me) posts heading your way. The emotional attack I have been under over the past few weeks and months has all come into focus and I am just in awe of the stuff that the Holy Spirit is uncovering in my life and how He’s walking me through it and keeping my heart so tender and receptive in the process.

I haven’t felt the urge to write something new, so strongly in awhile and as I think about manuscripts already written that need to be revised, and even completed, all I want to do is dive into something brand new and give it everything I’ve got. I feel like I’m cheating on my other works, putting them off like that, but it’s not as if they’re supposed to be published tomorrow . . . I know my characters will forgive me.

So tomorrow, before I start a new manuscript, I will have the first of probably 3-5 posts about what’s going on in my life. Someone asked me recently why I choose to share so freely about what I’m going through, and my initial response was, “That’s just who I am.” I wear my heart on my sleeve, but then I wondered for what purpose? The purpose is because every single time I share with my readers what I’m going through, I get a response. Someone messages me and says, “How are you in my brain/heart right now?”

1 Peter 5:9 tells us (paraphrased) that our struggles are not unique; that people all over the world struggle with similar root issues, so I believe that what the Father is working out in me, He can also work out in you, and maybe, just maybe He’ll use my words to start or continue the process.

So stay tuned. My next heart-surgery post is coming!

Posted by  |  April 17, 2013 | Categories: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , | 4 Comments »

Hover Cloud

bright water, dark clouds || canon 350d/ef17040L@17 | 1/60s | f5.6 | iso400 | handheld

 

It wasn’t even my birthday yet, and the gloom was already settling in. I thought I’d gotten to the root of it, beat it and gotten free from it, this dark birthday cloud that has followed me for the last sixteen years, but there it was, hovering above me. I woke up on Sunday morning, the day before the imminent age change took place, feeling rejected and overcome with self-doubt and loathing.

I struggle with expectations . . . at least I’ve been told that I do, and I know that there is some truth to it, evidenced by the fact that I don’t really like surprises. When someone tells me they have a surprise for me, and they build it up really big, I start to close up a little, for fear that it won’t mean as much to me as it does to them. I also don’t enjoy being the center of attention, which might sound odd considering how many years I’ve spent on stages and the fact that I’m trying to promote myself and my book(s). That attention is for a purpose though . . . I suppose it would be more fitting to say that I don’t like being celebrated, but how dumb does that sound? It makes sense in my head though. Before my book release party back in August, I stood in the shower and cried my eyes out over the stress of it all, over being the center of attention for an entire evening.

I trudged into the bathroom to get ready for birthday brunch with some close friends from Dallas, feeling crummy and sad, not wanting to to celebrate anything. I just wanted to crawl back in bed and go to sleep for the next year. I stared at myself in the mirror and and saw all the things that were wrong with me, and I remembered all the stupid food choices I’d made during the week, I replayed them for myself as punishment and dug myself deeper into my hole.

Rejection started knocking pretty hard then and I opened the door and made room for it on the couch next to self-pity, self-deprecation and insecurity. I heard a very familiar voice telling me that there was pity involved in my brunch date, which made zero sense at all, but this what that voice says to me around my birthday. I listened to it explain why some other scenarios in my life were shaping up in certain ways, and that dark cloud pressed in closer, making it difficult to breath deeply.

On my sixteenth birthday . . . you know, sweet sixteen, my expectations were far from met. There are many reasons why that I don’t need to go in to, but I know that that birthday was the catalyst for the rest to come. Things said that were meant to be funny were received as truth and I really believe this is where the pity thing comes from. “Oh it’s your sixteenth birthday so I guess I’ll give you the attention you deserve.” From that point on it was difficult for me to receive gifts, so much so that if you look at the pictures of my 18th birthday, the day my parents gave me my first car, I don’t look the least bit excited, even though I loved that car and today I look back and have such fond memories with friends and “Cassie the Pontiac.” I wounded my parents that day w/ my lack of excitement. I just couldn’t muster it up, birthdays were just another opportunity for me to  see how unimportant I was and who of my friends wouldn’t really care that I’d been born.

I left the house too early, actually attempting to be late. My time frame was off though, so I had thirty minutes to kill. I drove to Walmart because I needed a few things and I sat in the parking lot for a long time, fighting tears. I didn’t want to show up to my birthday brunch with my makeup smeared and my eyes red-rimmed. How could I explain the tears to my friends? So I prayed in the car for a long time and I blinked back stinging moisture over and over again, taking deep breaths and asking the Lord to speak.

My present this year was miraculously provided for, and I’ve been incredibly excited about it. I’m going to a retreat this weekend, a retreat that has been a highlight for me since it started. God was really sneaky and fun in the way he provided for it, even when I had serious doubts that I would get to go. I’ve been so thrilled to go until the whole rejection thing popped up again and I began to let the lies about who I am play on repeat in my head. Picked last for dodge ball again.

Julie. Why would I give you rejection for your birthday?

My eyes opened wide and I stared out the car window. “Oh,” I said quietly, shaking my head. It wasn’t an incredibly victorious moment where God tore the cloud from over my head, but it was like I could breathe again. Even though, the entire time, in my head I knew what was going on, I knew that lies were trying to take root, I knew that the enemy was trying to ruin things, I just let it go on. I just kept sinking deeper and deeper into the darkness.

“I’m sorry, Lord. You’re right. You would never give me rejection, or anything else like it for my birthday. My friends are not gathering to pity me. They’re gathering because it’s my birthday tomorrow and they want to celebrate me.”

I felt the pressure in my heart begin to ease, and I went into the store and even purchased a small gift for myself to prove that I wasn’t bowing to the darkness anymore. I was celebrating.

Sometimes I think that kid’s birthday parties really set us up for the kinds of things I deal with on my birthday. They’re all about how many presents you get, and how cool they are. That changes so much as you grow. The number of gifts decrease, it’s harder to buy for grown ups that have most of what they need and you don’t know what they want. We are trained to expect excess on our birthdays, so then what if you only get two presents, and one of them sucks?

 

I got to the restaurant and met up with my friends and we had a great time together. I didn’t feel like it was all about me, and I didn’t have to be anything other than who I am. Then the gift came. The gift that my friend was so excited about giving me. The one I was afraid to open because even though my husband said I would love it, the pressure of it all was just too much. The pressure to react in a fitting way no matter how I might be feeling inside.

Last Christmas there was a pretty big misunderstanding surrounding my present from my husband and we both spent the day in a horrible funk, frustrated with each other, and I was embarrassed because his whole family witnessed it. When it was cleared up, I felt like such an idiot, and I was actually really excited about the gift, which . . . coincidentally was a plane ticket to attend last year’s retreat, the same one I’m going to this weekend. Hmmm.

I took the gift bag and pulled away the tissue and found . . . such an incredibly intuitive gift. Something I’ve wanted for awhile that you can’t get in stores anymore, and is hard to win on Ebay b/c of it’s popularity. My friends, it’s this blend of Starbucks coffee that I’ve fallen in love with that only comes out once a year (is it important to note that I was introduced to it at the SAME retreat? hmmm.) :

I had no problem reacting properly to this gift. None whatsoever. It was perfect, and so incredibly thoughtful.

On Monday, I didn’t expect anything else, maybe a card in the mail or something, but nothing else. I was stunned to find that every single time I opened my door on my birthday, one of my friends in the neighborhood had left me a gift. From vegetable plants and wine to chocolates and treats and gift cards. Materially speaking, it was the best birthday I’d had in years! Emotionally speaking, it was one of the best birthdays I’ve had in years.

Julie. Why would I give you rejection for your birthday?

He was so gentle and good to me this birthday, in spite of my desperate humanity trying to eek its way out from underneath who I am in Christ. He showed me that who I am in Him, in this neighborhood, with my friends and family, is someone who people love and think about, event though that is really hard to believe sometimes.

I’m re-learning to receive only good gifts from the Father. Nothing else will do.

Luke 11:11-13

New International Version (NIV)

11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for[a] a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

Posted by  |  April 10, 2013 | Categories: Family, Life, Quiet, Recovery, Spirituality | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments »

Amazing How it All Works Out

After realizing that I was running around my circle of neighbors and friends, proverbially knocking on their doors looking for “my mother“, I really wondered how the Father was going to bring about the relationships that we are seeking in our area. If I’m not acting like a chicken with its head cut off then how is anything going to get done?

Ha. Sometimes I think Jesus hears the unspoken doubt in our heart and responds a little bit like this guy:

Kudos if you get the reference.

This week, by chance, I was able to get in to see my hair dresser who is one of my very dear friends. It’s really hard to get an appointment with her without a few months notice, and I had previously rescheduled an appointment and then remembered a wedding we were participating in and thought maybe the bride would like it if my roots weren’t longer than my highlights. So I sent my friend a text and miraculously, she had a cancellation the next day! Score! Not only did I get my hair done, but I got to spend time with my sweet friend, on a day when she just happened to need a friendly face. I love that.

On my way home, I needed to grab some lunch and I was thinking about a certain sub-sandwich store when I saw a place that another dear neighbor friend of mine took me to once and I thought, I might as well stop by there and support some local business! I paid for my bagel sandwich and looked up to see . . . my dear neighbor friend! So I sat down and talked with her until we both had to leave.

Next up that day my youngest son had a play date with one of his best buddies, and I got to hang out with another mom-friend from the neighborhood.

I came home that day and thought to myself, “Well all I did today was exactly what I needed to do, and somehow friends and family just inched their way into my day without any extra effort on my part.

The next day, yet another (yes, my dear friends circle is growing!) friend came over to borrow my dryer and we got to hang out casually and chat it up.

Now I can’t help but wonder what I was thinking, striving so hard to find friends and family. They’re just right there. It’s really not as difficult as we make it out to be.

A simple, yet monumental lesson for me. All I have to do is be.

What are you striving for this week? What do you think would happen if you let it go and just existed for a time?

Posted by  |  April 4, 2013 | Categories: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Winners Announced!

 

Thanks to all the lovely ladies who participated in the giveaway! The winners have been contacted and are as follows:

Pendant– Nicole

CD– Katherine

Ebook– Kimber

Thanks for playing, and please continue to help spread the word about Howdy Panda, A Boy and His Kite and my book Stones of Remembrance!

Posted by  |  April 2, 2013 | Categories: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , | 1 Comment »

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 251 other followers

%d bloggers like this: