MY BLOG POSTS

I am dealing with a HUGE pain in the neck right now. And I’m not talking about that kid in first period who never listens to a word I say. I mean a literal pain in the neck….I have a pinched nerve. It hurts.

But I have noticed something: the pain is worse when I’m thinking about it. When I’m sitting at home, icing it, medicating it, massaging it, it hurts MORE. When I’m at school, teaching, talking, grading, not being listened to, it hurts LESS.

The pain is still there, at home and at school. The difference?

Me!

Specifically – my mind. When my mind is occupied on something other than the pain, it seems less awful.

This, I have found, is true of the metaphorical pains in the neck, too. When troubles come – and they come to us all! – we have to make a choice. Will we focus all our energy on that “pain”? Or will focus on something else?

Pain-in-the-neck situations and people can sometimes mess me up far more than any physical pain can. I can stew in anger, dwell on hurts or offenses, plan ways to “pay them back”. This, of course, serves no purpose other than to make the pain even more aggravating.

What I need to do is to occupy my mind on “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable…” (Phil. 4:8). Focusing on those things will bring more than distraction – they bring freedom!

So the cure to a pain in the neck? A change in the mind.

There’s a popular worship song that many of you probably know by heart: “Always”.

I like it. I close my eyes and pray the words: “I will not fear/His promise is true/my God will come through/Always”.

But…

There are four words in that song that open my eyes and close my mouth. Four words that don’t fit with who God has revealed Himself to be. Those four words?

“He will not delay.”

Um, hang on a second. What about Joseph being wrongly imprisoned by Potiphar, praying and waiting for YEARS to be freed? How about David being anointed as king but waiting years – while being chased by a homicidal Saul – to actually ascend the throne? How about the Jewish people being told a Messiah would deliver them, but waiting CENTURIES for His arrival? What about Paul – longing to see fellow brothers in Christ, but prevented because he was imprisoned OVER and OVER again??

I could go on!

God DOES delay. He delays to strengthen our character, to teach us endurance. He delays to draw us closer to Him, seeking His strength in our weakness. He delays because HE IS GOD, and He knows best.

I have experienced delays throughout my Christian life. I am in a period of delay right now. While I don’t love it, I am grateful for it. God is working in me in ways I would never have experienced if I had just gotten what I wanted right away. God’s word is sweeter, more necessary as I wait. I feel His grace and strength and peace as I wait. My husband and I are growing closer as we wait together, our kids are seeing the “walk by faith” command fleshed out as we wait.

My God DOES delay. He WILL delay. But, as the song rightly teaches, “My God will come through/ALWAYS.”

We don’t need to fear delay. But we do need to expect it. If you haven’t experienced a delay from God, yet, you will! He is not punishing you or ignoring you. He is loving you and shaping you into who He wants you to be. Cling to Him. Trust Him. He is good, and He is GOD. So praise Him in the delay and know that God is FOR you!

There are some things I just don’t like to do: I don’t like doing laundry. Or the dishes. Or cooking. Or anything domestic, really. I don’t like math. I don’t like exercise. I don’t like admitting I’m wrong. I don’t like confrontation. I don’t like turning down a warm brownie.

And because I don’t like those things, I justify not doing them. I wait until the “feeling” hits before I do them…meanwhile, everything around me gets messy.

God has been working on me in this area. In His gracious, yet firm, way, He has been pushing me out of this mess and showing me that, very often, we have to suck it up and do stuff we don’t like. Even when we don’t feel like it.

I started a weight loss Bible study (check it out – it is amazing!) about a month ago. The studies focus on God’s word – feasting on that, not looking to food to meet our needs. As I have spent even more time in God’s word than I used to, I have found that more than just weight is coming off. Some of my excuses are falling away too.

I started exercising. I hate exercising. But I realized I can hate it and still do it. I have been foolishly waiting to “want” to exercise before I did it. That will happen about the same time I “want” to sit down with Emma and do Algebra II. Never. But I do it anyway – I swim laps or walk on the elliptical machine. And I hate it. But I do it, anyway.

The “do it anyway” lesson is carrying over to housework. I’m doing a better job keeping up with the laundry and the dishes, not because I suddenly turned into a Suzy Homemaker, but because I can recognize that, while I may hate it, it still needs to be done. 

Even better, this lesson is affecting my spiritual life, too – I may not feel like forgiving, but I’m going to do it anyway. I may not feel like being loving, but I’m going to do it anyway. I do not need to wait for my feelings in order to do what I know I need to do. The feelings may follow, and they may not (I seriously doubt I will EVER enjoy doing the laundry. No way). But I can do it anyway.

 This is, I realize, both a life-long lesson and a minute-by-minute lesson. I have to wake up everyday choosing to “do it anyway”, whatever that “it” may be. I absolutely cannot do that on my own. But I CAN do it by abiding in the vine (Jn. 15:4), walking in the Spirit (Gal. 5:16), and feasting on God’s word.

“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Phil. 4:13

Judy Garland in “For Me and My Gal” (1942)

I love everything 1940s – the movies, the music, the clothes…If I could travel back in time, that is the decade I’d want to return to. I would gladly exchange my straightening iron for pin curls and my skinny jeans for A-line dresses.

But it wasn’t perfect. World War II battered that decade, and the generation who lived through it lost more than just husbands, sons, daughters, and sisters – they lost the hope that one “Great War” is all we’d ever have. They learned that evil can’t be stamped out for good – one evil is wiped out, but another comes on the horizon.

Most of the people in my grandparents’ generation believed in right and wrong, good and evil. They didn’t see Hitler and argue that what he believed was all right for him. They recognized Hitler’s ideologies were sick and destructive. Men like my grandfather went over to Europe to fight against Hilter’s Nazi regime so our country could remain safe and so other countries could be rescued.

My generation, though, and the ones coming after me, hate the idea of right and wrong, good and evil. We want to believe truth is what we make it. We even see that in some Christian circles! As long as we’re not hurting anyone, we can do what we want, how we want. Truth is relative and anyone who says otherwise is close-minded (never mind that those who say that are, themselves, close-minded!).

Here’s the Truth: We don’t get to determine the Truth!

Whether we like it or not, agree with it or not, there is One Truth. That Truth is found in scripture and was given to us by a gracious God. He did not leave us without divine revelation, nor did He give each one us our own personal revelation. He created us to be in community, so he gave us His word as a community – to read, study, and learn together. He gave us teachers to understand it, preachers to challenge us in it, those with gifts of mercy and helps to show us how to live it out. We have Truth, and it is neither unclear nor unfair. It is, at times, uncomfortable.

We believers, then, have to make a choice. Are we going to believe in the One Truth and take a stand against the lies that oppose that Truth? Or are we going to allow the world to dictate what we believe?

Let us learn from the Greatest Generation – there IS right and wrong. There absolutely is Truth. We have it, we can know it, and we should share it.