Ask

So I've been working with this whole concept of dependence for a while now, coming to grips with the understanding that dependence is not failure  but is, in fact, God's goal for me.  Realizing all the obvious and not-so-obvious ways I try to avoid dependence (or, at the very least, the appearance of it) at all costs.  Seeking to understand what a life lived in dependence really looks like.

And lately this is the word that keeps popping up: Ask.

When my youngest son gets himself in a pickle that he isn't sure he can get out of on his own, his first instinct is to throw a frustrated fit.

"This isn't working!!  Stupid snowpants are all in a knot!!  I can't do this!"

If an all-out fit seems a little over the top, or just requires more energy that he has at the moment, he'll resort to whining.

"Whyyy do you maaake me wear snowpants?  I can't even get them ooooon.  Now I'm going to be late to schooooool."

And when he's feeling particularly snarky and smart, he'll pull out some sarcasm.

"Well, I guess you don't care if I'm late to school. [Dramatic pause.] Because I can't get these snowpants on when they're all in a knot."

(Yes, for those of you who were wondering, this is the moment when the smack is officially laid down.  Sarcasm in a 7-year-old is so unbecoming.)

This is something we've been working on with Liam--not just because sarcasm isn't to be tolerated and whining is so unpleasant and frustrated fits are, well, frustrating.  But because it's all so unnecessary--not to mention, ineffective.

And so, in the moments when I remember to be good, intentional mommy and not reactionary mommy, I try to stop him and say calmly,  "Hey Liam, how about instead of the fit, let's just try this: 'Hey mom, my snow pants are really tangled up this morning.  Could you help me untangle them so I can get them on and get to school on time?"  (Of course, for this to work I would need to be able to respond with a nice "Why, of course, dear -- I'll be right there" rather than the more typical "Hold on a minute, I'm cleaning up the breakfast dishes and scrounging for something to take to work for lunch and doing my hair and writing your brother's teacher a note.  And, by the way, if you would have hung them up like you were supposed to they wouldn't be in a knot in the first place!" But, alas, that's a blog post for another time.)

God often uses my relationship with my kids to teach me something about my relationship with Him, and it's usually in the middle of a lecture in which I'm teaching my kids some great truth that God gently taps me on the shoulder and quietly suggests I practice what I'm preaching.  (He really is so kind about it, usually.)  But that's not how it went this time.

For months I have been struggling to discern God's will for me in a couple of areas of my life: fretting and stewing and ignoring and burying and then fretting and stewing again.  I've thrown a frustrated fit or two.  I've been sarcastic and snarky.  But mostly I've just whined. "Whaaaat am I supposed to be doing about this?  How will I knoooow what God wants me doooo?"

Looking back now, I'm pretty sure God tried the quietly tapping me on the shoulder thing a few times, but I was busy not listening and missed it.  And then I think He tried that still, small voice thing He does so well, only it was really hard to hear him over all that whining.

So this week, he just pulled me aside and gave me a dose of my own medicine.  "Julie, honey, how about instead of the whining, let's just try this:

If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. (James 1:5)

Well, ok then.  Just ask, you say.  Seems simple enough.

Except it isn't, is it?  Because asking for something shatters my facade of independence.  My good friend Erin Flater just wrote about this, that asking God for something puts us in a position of vulnerability.  When we ask Him for something, we are now dependent on Him to provide it.

Or not. 

And there it is.  God "gives generously...without finding fault."  I can trust Him to give me what I need.

BUT.

I need to ask.  I need to position myself in such a way that I am aware of my dependence on Him.  I need to trust that whatever He gives me is a generous gift.  It is enough.  It is more than enough.  

You do not have because you do not ask God.  James 4:2

When Liam is wrestling with his knotted-up snow pants (does this happen to anyone else -- or is it just us?), his frustration comes from wanting to be able to take care of it himself and finding himself unable to do that.  And so, what he really wants is for me to swoop in and rescue him without either of us having to acknowledge that he needed my help.    

Now that I get.

I want God to help me--to give me wisdom, to equip me for ministry, to make His path for me clear --but I'd really prefer if He could do that without blowing my little DIY self-illusion.

Apparently this is where God lays the smack down.  Because stiff-necked independence in His children is so unbecoming. 

Over and over in Scripture God says, "I will give you what you need.  Just ask.  Just acknowledge your need for me.  Just posture yourself to receive what I have for you."

In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths.  Proverbs 3:6

So, I'm going to give it a try.  For the next month, I'm going to be intentional about asking God a couple of specific questions.  I'm going to say out loud to you and Him and my own delusional little self that I am waiting on Him for the answers.  I am dependent on Him to do what He has promised. 

I'll let you know how it goes.

Don't mess with me, I'm recycling

So at our staff meeting, my pastor asked us to consider the question "When someone bumps into you, what spills out?"  My thoughts immediately went to the recycling machines at Wal-mart.

We drink a lot of pop at our house.  The adults, that is.  (I feel the need to tell you it's always diet.  I doubt you really care.) Anyway, in our beloved state we pay a can or bottle deposit which we can redeem by bringing our pop containers back to the local Wal-mart and painstakingly pushing them into a little machine.  It's a yucky job, but someone (that would be me) has got to do it.

Something about that scenario at the recycling machines always brings out the worst in me.  At least one of them is always broken or full.  There's always someone that comes with a huge cart full of cans and takes forever.  (Sometimes that person is me.)  More than once I've loaded all my cans into a cart, schlepped them through snow and ice, and whatever else is in the Walmart parking lot, into the store only to turn right around and schlep them back to my car because the machine was broken, the line too long, etc. 

All this to say, when I finally get in front of my little machine and I'm popping those cans in one after another, I tend to get a little territorial.  I usually try to have a can and bottle machine both going at once.  I straddle the two with my cart.  I give dirty looks to anyone else who dare approaches the area with a teetering pile of cans that could threaten the good thing I have going.

What can I say, it is every man for himself there at the recycling center at Wal-mart.

Until a couple weeks ago when I was there with my kids (no, the presence of my children usually does not change my selfish and generally inconsiderate behavior, I'm somewhat shamed to say).  As we approached, there was a very nice-looking college student cheerfully taking care of his cans and bottles.  He was doing the same straddle-two-machines maneuver, however as soon as he saw us he promptly cashed out of one and offered it to us with a smile.  As we worked side-by-side he would chat with the boys, casually pick up the multitude of cans the boys dropped as they worked and even toss a random bottle of his into our cart.  In the 8 or 10 minutes our worlds collided this random 20 year old guy brought joy and warmth to a generally distasteful task.  He blessed us.  At the recycling machine.

Who knew you could do that?

So I'd like to tell you that I made a vow right then and there to be a nicer can recycler.  To pay it forward, as they say, and be a blessing to someone else the next time.  But, to be honest the next time I was there I totally forgot about Mr. Friendly Recycler.  Until a guy walked up with his cart full and I instinctively started guarding my territory.  I felt the hardness, the selfishness rise up in me and only then did I remember our cheerful friend.

When someone bumps into me, what spills out?  All too often it's defensiveness, selfishness, a guarding of my own territory.  So I'm on a mission.  To be patient with the little old lady who is taking. so. long. to get her cart at Fareway.  To chat with the cashier at Walmart as she rings up my stuff.  To yield my turn instead of plowing forward.  To be a blessing in those small every day moments when I have a choice to guard or give.

Maybe I'll even show some love at the recycling machines.

Right now it takes effort, a conscious choice.  Someday I'm hoping it's just what spills out.

The Maker and the Made

For the customs of the people are worthless; 

they cut a tree out of the forest, 

and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel.

They adorn it with silver and gold; 

they fasten it with hammer and nails so it will not totter.

Like a scarecrow in a melon patch,

their idols cannot speak;

they must be carried

because they cannot walk.

Jeremiah 10: 3-5

I've been thinking a lot lately about what is man-made versus what is God-made.  It's not profound.  It may even be a little bit trite or cliche.  It is spring time after all -- time to get nature-y, right?  I have stopped running from house to car and car to grocery store or church or office, head bent low against the cold wind and started spending real time in the actual out-of-doors.  And so I suppose it's natural to suddenly notice the beautiful trees I drive past every day without much of a glance.  To stop for a moment and watch the churning water of the rising river and think how grateful I am to live in a place that has water running through it.  To revel in the feeling of the warm sun on my back.

But I think two things in particular have me thinking about this more this spring.  First, I got a bike.  Second, I got an iPhone.  

Let's start with the iPhone (even though it's second.)  I got it for Christmas from my hubs -- a complete and total surprise.  I love it.  It makes juggling two kids and two part-time jobs and managing the home front more do-able.  I never miss a kodak moment b/c I forgot my camera.  I don't double-book myself (quite as often) b/c my calendar is always with me.  I do a weeks worth of meal-planning AND grocery-shopping in 30 minutes flat with my favorite meal-planning app.  I could go on.  

But I gotta tell you, when I read the verses above in Jeremiah, well, first off I laughed.  It's kind of funny to picture Jeremiah totally making fun of the other guys' gods.  "Your god can't even talk.  It's like a freakin' scarecrow in a melon patch!  You have to carry it around like a little stump without legs!" But then I got a yucky feeling in the pit of my stomach and immediately I thought of my iPhone.  I know.  Silly.  But still.  

Because you see, I also got a bike.  Last fall.  A really nice, comfortable (old-lady-looking) bike that I love.  And since it is (finally) spring, I have been riding Liam to school and riding myself to work at church and just generally trying to spend more time on my bike and less time in my van.  And what I have noticed is that normal every day things like going to work become an opportunity for reveling in who God is and how amazingly good He has been to me when I am on my bike.  On my bike I am out in God's world, feeling the cool spring breezes, smelling the rich earth and growing things all around me, bombarded with colors and sounds and smells...all of them God-made.  

 And it makes me realize how much of my life is focused on what is man-made.  How much of my day is spent bent over that little iPhone, marveling at man's creation.  How much of my money goes to buying (or coveting) trinkets and treasures made by people.  How often my mind is completely consumed with managing, organizing, cleaning our man-made stuff.

This isn't a post about consumerism or materialism. It really isn't. I know I've got some stuff to deal with there too.  But this is about realizing that nothing man can make -- not even in this era of mystical technological leaps -- can compete with what God has already created.  The magnificent oak tree that burst out of a little acorn.  The gangly nine-year-old boy that once kicked and turned inside my womb.  The quiet rain that falls unbidden from the sky.  These are the things that bring glory to my Creator.  That turn my attention away from myself and onto God.  That cause praise and thanksgiving to rise up and take the place of weariness and complaining on my lips.

No one is like you, O LORD;

You are great,

and your name is mighty in power...

He who is the Portion of Jacob is not like these, 

for he is the Maker of all things...

the LORD Almighty is his name.

Jeremiah 10:6, 16    

What if God was real?

I was reading the Sermon on the Mount in preparation for worship tomorrow and as I re-read the things Jesus says about how we are to live I found myself getting worked up in the usual way -- it just seemed so completely overwhelming.  And then I heard Storm Bailey's voice in my head saying, "What if God was real?"

Right.  God.  Of course Jesus is going to ask us to live in a way that depends on God being real.

So what if we lived as though God is real?  What if, instead of backing away from the impossible things Jesus asks us to do we instead believed that God is who He says is and will do what He says He will do?  What would that look like?

I think that might look like the Kingdom of God.

Dependent

Dependent.  This is the word that has been haunting me for almost a year now.

I don't like it.  At all.

It sounds weak.

It is weak.

Because you can't be dependent without being needy.  That's the very definition, right?  If you're dependent on someone or something, you need them.  You can't make it on your own. You are not enough.

It feels very much like failure, this dependence, this not being enough.  It feels like something you need to fix--or recover from.

Independence.  That's what I'm after.  Being able to do it on my own.

Strength.  Competence.  Got-it-togetherness.  Those are the goals.

I can do it myself.

Except that I can't.  Or at least that's what God and my mother seem to have been gently suggesting to me over the last 30+ years. 

Oh, but here's where it gets worse.  SO. MUCH. WORSE.

This last year the thing that God's been hinting at ever so quietly is this:

Dependence is the goal.

(Sorry, I still can't quite bring myself to say it out loud.) 

Dependence (weakness, failure, not-enoughness) is not something He is going to save me from.  It's not something He will cure in me.  It's not something He will heal, sanctify, redeem, or resurrect.

It's the goal.  It's where we're headed.

This does not feel like good news.