I think I do a lot of arguing in my head. I go back and forth, flit here and there... so writing things out tends to help me gain clarity. It also helps me decide which thought gets to reign supreme... at least for that day.
I went to two church services yesterday and I'm kind of getting all jumbled as to what was said. Instead of reporting my thoughts... I think I'll try to write down how the sermons made me feel.
During the first service, I cried. I cried pretty hard. Before you get all sad and stuff... I think you should be reminded that I rather enjoy crying. I don't really enjoy how I look when I cry but I enjoy how it makes me feel afterwards. It's cathartic. And I hadn't cried in a while so I was long due for a purging.
I went to visit my friend at her church. I'd been feeling that I miss the Word. I really love the Word and I love it when other people share what they've learned directly from it. I also really love learning about the people in the stories... about what they did, how they reacted, and what it meant... how God took it and what God did afterwards.
This sermon was on Genesis... the Abraham parts more specifically. I really like Abe. He had amazing faith. He did make mistakes... as did almost everyone else in the Bible... but he did believe and God counted it as righteousness.
I remember reading about what happened back then when they made covenants. Covenants were something taken very seriously. They chopped animals in half and then walked between the halves of the animal and it was a symbol of the covenant... that they be torn in half like these animals if they broke covenant. I'm pretty sure that's the gist of it. It's a gruesome image and I'm kinda glad that we don't do that today but at the same time... I also wish that people wouldn't make promises so easily and break their word more often than not. Something I learned on Sunday was that of the two parties making the covenant... the weaker one would walk through. But what had happened was that God caused a flaming torch to pass through the carcasses... and in that way God lowered Himself to make a covenant with Abraham. I didn't remember that little tidbit... or I didn't pay attention to it but the pastor made a point to mention it and it really stuck with me. How great is our God that He would lower Himself to covenant with us? What an amazing echo of the kind of love God shows His people throughout history.
Another piece I remember from the sermon was about the promise God made to bless Abe with offspring too numerous to count. It was about 19ish years after God made that promise to Abe before Isaac was born. Before that, Ishmael was born... because Abe and Sarah thought they'd help God out in their own way since they were both getting old and they'd been waiting for years already. So... the thing I learned from that part was... not to rush God's promises. If I rush and do things my way... I make trouble. He fulfills His promises in His good timing and a lot of times, He waits until it's humanly impossible before He acts so that we will know with absolute certainty that it was Him and only Him. He doesn't need me to "help" him... He just wants my obedience and continual submission to Him.
And about continual submission... God called Abe to forsake everything that he knew... to leave and go to a land which God would tell him (but didn't tell him at the time he had to leave). I don't know about you but ever since I had a little mishap with the GPS and it led me straight into a prison, I have decided that it would be a good idea to have some kind of a general gist of where I'm going before even leaving the driveway. Just an overview. And also... that it's a good idea to trust what I'm seeing with my own eyes and not follow the directions blindly. This is a good thing to do when driving because GPS's can be wrong... and especially with maps in iOS 6... you best double check just in case. But this is not the case with God. God knows all and He knows exactly where you need to go and the perfect route to get there. It's probably better that you don't trust what your eyes can see because our eyes are so fleshly and dim and sometimes God wants to do so much MORE than our eyes can see that we'd be limited in what we'd receive because our flesh limits us. God has proven Himself worthy to be trusted 100% at all times... Garmin and TomTom haven't. So with God... I know the ultimate destination... which is heaven... but everything in between in this life... how long it'll take me to get there... which route I'll be taking... I have no idea. And God calls me... just like Abe... to just go to a land which He will tell me... step by step... and have confidence knowing that I am exactly where I need to be right now because He wouldn't have detoured me or brought me here if there wasn't an express purpose for it to be so. I am super bad with directions. My gut almost always tells me to go the wrong way. It's usually no biggie... I just have to make a lot of U-turns... but how much more efficient would it be if I just listened to the God who knows... versus listening to myself and then having to make U-turns or having to make a few lefts or rights to get back to where I was and then go the other way?
Another memorable line was... that God doesn't call us to be martyrs right away... usually not. In my case... not. He actually calls us to die slowly over time... on a daily basis. Dying to myself and choosing God's way instead is my act of obedience and if there is no greater love expressed than to die for others... my obedience is showing God I love Him. That is definitely something I want to do.
So... action points. It's always good to have action points. To be a doer of the Word and not merely a hearer. I thought about what I needed to die to... and the first thought that came to mind... the first thought that always comes to mind lately... is my singleness and the desire to be married again. It's not a bad thing. Actually... later on that day, I was reading about how Paul was saying to the Corinthians, I think... that singles and widows should remain single and it's a good thing... which was pretty encouraging as a reminder to be thankful that I don't have to worry about pleasing God AND a husband... I just need to concern myself with pleasing God. So yeah. I definitely put singleness at the top of the list of things I need to submit to God.
But I also sensed... that I wasn't done yet... that God wasn't done yet. He wanted to push me to dig deeper than the obvious. So I searched further. What else to submit... and then one word came to mind: inadequacy.
When that word came to mind... a mighty rush of thoughts smacked me in the face. I dunno if thoughts can smack you in the face if they're in your head but they might have smacked me in my figurative brain face. I had the realization that I have an intense fear of failure because I fear not being good enough; I fear being proven inadequate.
I remember the day I got my first C in AP Euro. I cried at school for the first time and I was pretty much inconsolable during lunchtime. I think about it now and it was such a small thing but I was getting flashbacks or glimpses of how deep-seated my fear of inadequacy really is. I had another flashback to the day I decided to put away the MCAT books and not take the test. It was a conscious choice to avoid going down that road. I had a lot of other reasons as well but... I think that fearing that I wouldn't be good enough was one big one I never wanted to admit to anyone else. I had another flashback to the night right before I was about to meet with a cardiologist. I was SO nervous. I was pacing the unit...all jittery... waiting for him to arrive... and my friend told me that she'd never seen me so unglued. Again something so small but my body defied my logic. And another flashback to a week ago when I knew I wasn't prepared to take my neuro/endocrine/hematology exam. I was extremely nervous. Irrationally nervous. I knew in my head that it was no big deal if I didn't do well on this test... that I could make it up on the next tests... but my body was betraying my mind. And then a few days ago when my manager told me that she was possibly going to assign me to be team leader in the unit. I freaked out. I couldn't sleep. I was SO scared that I was going to be pushed into this role and that I would be found lacking... that I would let down the patients in the unit... that I would be found out for the fraud that I am...or think I am.
Now... is it a facade... is it truth... or is it completely false? Am I truly a fraud? Have I built up facades of strength, of competence, of capability... and am I just worthless underneath? Or is it true that I am a fraud... that I am not a good nurse... a good woman... a good friend... it's just all a beautiful illusion? Or is it just another lie that Satan would like me to believe... is it true that I am strong, competent, and capable and that I am being fed the lie to tear me down and weigh my heart with sadness... to keep me from soaring in freedom like I should be?
I think that there isn't a simple straight answer. I am not 100% of anything at all times. Sometimes I am putting up a facade. Sometimes I am a fraud. Sometimes I have skated by on pure luck or have been saved by the competence and excellence of those around me and not by my own acumen. I don't even know if I'm using that word right. It just seemed right in that place. I might just be a good test taker and not necessarily a master of the material. I might pass the multiple choice but fail the practicum... which is where it really counts. Maybe I'm just good in theory.
And I think that my inadequacy also pervades my struggle in my own singleness as well. What if I'm just good in theory but in practice... no one wants me. And that's when the waterfall of tears came. I had let one or two tears squeak by but I couldn't hold them in any longer the moment that thought came into my head... "who would want you? no one thinks you're good enough to want to share their life with... to cherish and have at their side... no one wants to be your partner because you are NOT good enough and you never will be".
These thoughts came to mind right as the worship team started to lead us through Forever Reign... in perfect timing to minister to me in my thoughts.
You are good You are goodIn the very moment when I felt destroyed and beaten to an inch of my life by an onslaught of toxic thoughts of inadequacy... it was time for me sing this chorus and to run into His arms. Or maybe crawl... crawl quickly. And when I got there... it was also time for God to cradle me against His chest... for me to rest my head on His shoulders and for me to feel the strength of His hands over my head, on my back and under my legs... fully supporting the whole weight of me so I could just let go. I didn't need to hang on for dear life... I could just rest. Rest and cry until I had no more tears to cry. And be washed with the peace that always comes after coming honestly before God.
When there’s nothing good in me
You are love You are love
On display for all to see
You are light You are light
When the darkness closes in
You are hope You are hope
You have covered all my sin
You are peace You are peace
When my fear is crippling
You are true You are true
Even in my wandering
You are joy You are joy
You’re the reason that I sing
You are life You are life
In You death has lost it’s sting
[Chorus]
Oh I’m running to Your arms
I’m running to Your arms
The riches of Your love
Will always be enough
Nothing compares to Your embrace
Light of the world forever reign
You are more You are more
Than my words will ever say
You are Lord You are Lord
All creation will proclaim
You are here You are here
In Your presence I’m made whole
You are God You are God
Of all else I’m letting go
[Repeat Chorus]
My heart will sing
No other Name
Jesus
Jesus
Whelp... and then the lights came on and it was the end of one service. Half an hour later I found myself a couple miles away at another church... going into another service... still pondering my thoughts from the first service.
There were a few things I remember about the second service... but the thing that stood out most was that "heaven is experiencing the evidence that God is there... being loved by Him". And I smiled knowing that I had experienced a glimpse of heaven that morning.
I hadn't recognized the extent of how deep and how broad my fear of inadequacy actually extended. You really don't figure out what you don't know until you've been tested. After the testing... and after being able to review the test... you can then start to plan out how you're going to start building up your weaknesses and patching up the holes... hopefully before it starts raining.
So all in all... a good Sunday.
Jehovah Rapha... heal my heart. Jehovah Shalom... grant me peace. Jehovah Jireh... provide for my needs. You know what's pretty crazy... He's already done it. Past tense. All I have to do is believe it. It is my unbelief that keeps me from experiencing and recognizing it to the full extent of His grace and provision. You know what's also pretty crazy that I was pondering... I remember pondering it on the 57 North on-ramp at Lambert... that God has so many names because He is Everything. The only reason we need to have echoes and repetition and different names are because we can only comprehend bits and pieces at a time... but He is everything all at once... to everybody at all times... and He has been and will continue to be... since time began and until forever and ever. How can we even begin to grasp His vastness and greatness? I only know a single drop compared to the oceans of His greatness. So crazy. And a God like this would humble Himself... carrying with Him the greatest love ever... to meet me... a nobody... in that velveteen chair on a random Sunday... and every time and anywhere I ask Him to... for always and forever. My heart will sing no other name... Jesus. The riches of Your love will always be enough.
<3 p="p">Tiff
But practically... I definitely need to (not necessarily in any particular order...):
- Love God, love others.
- Study more and study harder. Not just to pass multiple choice tests but to pass practicums. Must achieve clinical awesomeness.
- Strive for excellence in all areas of my life. Prove myself a worker approved by God and men.
- Discipline myself and make good choices... in what I take in, in what I do, in what I take care of... to run the race to win the prize. I'm going for "Olympic gold" in my life and nothing less.
- Cut out the excess, tidy and organize what I have been placed in charge of. I want to be ready for a test at all times and I want to be found as a servant who has multiplied my talents by 100% or more.
- Remember... who I am, in Whom I place my worth, and Whose opinion matters most.
- Get a smog check (by January 28).
- Rest.
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