Cultivating Thankfulness

In preparation for Thanksgiving I've really been trying to cultivate a spirit of thankfulness. This practice takes deliberate effort because as Americans we live in a world that cultivates the exact opposite... discontentment. Why would I say such a thing? Just look at this stack of catalogs I have received thus far for Christmas shopping. I'm ashamed to say they actually started arriving back in October but hit full force after November 1st. Catalogs are no more than glossy books with pages and pages of stuff all to make you discontent with what you  already have. Fundamentally this is what advertisers are banking on. They know as Americans,   we have a growing sense of purposeless, and the majority of us try to fill this void with stuff. All the while telling ourselves, "If I just had __________, then I would be satisfied." Somewhere in  our hearts we know this is not where contentment lies. This week when we sit down at our Thanksgiving table, listing what we are thankful for, it will the relationships, family and basic provisions that are at the top of the list...not  our stuff. God recently gave me one of those 'a-ha' moments for cultivating thankfulness all year round and he used the mail to do it.

When most Christians talk about our relationship to material things they will quote scripture from Matthew 6 with most of the emphasis on where we should store up treasure and that we cannot serve two masters.

"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.  But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
 The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light.  But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money."

God revealed to me the key to all of this may actually lie in the middle verse which is often skipped when quoting this passage. The key is keeping our eyes healthy; the key to cultivating thankfulness is where you look! 
If Satan cannot affect your salvation, then his next goal is to affect your impact for the kingdom of Christ. His primary focus for the saved Christian becomes making us ineffective and stealing our joy/ability to live an abundant life in Christ.  In other words, the enemy wants to help you cultivate discontentment. If he can keep you focused on your self and your own problems, you are less likely to see the need around you. Subsequently, you are less available to be used by God. Like I wrote in my previous post, often to be more thankful simply requires looking at the problems and needs of those around you. "Generosity is a way of telling the subconscious: I already have ENOUGH. If you reach out your hand to help others, you know you're coming from a place of sufficiency."
My enemy is constantly sending me catalogs of what I don't have. If I could give them  a few titles they could be periodicals like:
1. The People Who Don't Respect Me
2. The Patients who Chose Someone Else
3. The Employee Who Takes Advantage of You
4. The Family Members Who Push Your Buttons

Who would want to look a those catalogs? But that was exactly what my eyes focused on, due to past insecurities that would filter the events of life and attach a context; knowing my vulnerabilities, the enemy would shove one of those titles right under my nose. God spoke to me in a quiet voice one morning as I listened to a sermon on Matthew 6. He suggested, "It's a simple as that, just don't look. Don't look at what the enemy says you don't have, focus on what you do have in Christ." The interesting thing is I've discovered the two are connected. The more I keep my eyes focused on Christ, the less I look to fill the 'voids' in my life with stuff. Now don't get me wrong, this is not an instantaneous thing. That's why I said we have to cultivate thanksgiving; it takes work and constant attention. By training our eyes where to look (and for me this might need to be like a horse with a set of blinders!), the goals of this scripture will fall in to place. Less insecurity means less need to acquire treasure here. Less focus on ourselves, means more ability to store up treasure in Heaven. Less behavior of filling emotional voids with stuff, means we are not a slave to a particular lifestyle but a slave to Jesus Christ. It is all connected. "For the one who was a slave when called to faith in the Lord is the Lord's freed person; similarly the one who was free when called, is Christ's slave." (1st Corinth 7:22)
This week I am determined to cultivate Thankfulness. At the top of the list is my relationship with the one who died to make me free; "So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed." (John 8:36). Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

More than You Can Handle

I have some people close to me who currently are in the midst of turmoil. One could say they are in the middle of one of "life's storms"...however the magnitude of what some of them are dealing with is like being in a dingy in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico during Hurricane Opal...without a paddle. Big storm, big problems. In my last post I spoke about my fatigue in dealing with my own problems; essentially, I was sick of being consumed with my self. So many times we call things tribulations that are really annoyances. Want some perspective? Take a look around you and see what other people are dealing with; suddenly, your perspective will change and you'll be thankful for what you have instead of focusing on what you don't.
One of my friends was really struggling and someone tried to comfort her by telling her, "Remember, God will never give you more than you can handle!" I was standing near and immediately I felt my hair stand on end. I know the person meant well, but I despise when Christians use this expression. Why? Because, frankly this is just not true and  further is not based on scripture at all. Telling someone this only adds to their defeat. It either makes them feel like they are inept and that's why they can't handle what they obviously should or it leads them to the conclusion that God does not care about them and that is why they are feeling overwhelmed by their circumstances.

Paul tells us that "the temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so you can endure." (1st Corin 10:13) This scripture lets us know that when we are faced with difficult situations in life, or we feel like we are in way over our heads, our enemy will always be there to offer us a short cut or a way out that leads to sin. God will never allow us to endure any temptation  that we cannot overcome, if we turn to him for the solution. Paul is telling us that we have a choice in any situation...to believe God or not. What is factual is that we will be given situations in life that are more than we can handle. If you could handle everything in life on your own, you would have no need for a Savior. You would have no need for Jesus.

This leads me to my final thought. Trials are where the rubber meets the road. When life is going well, what we believe to be true is not tested. But when life overwhelms us, like a rogue wave on the ocean, this is when your theology becomes your reality. Trials are necessary to test our faith...do you really believe that God uses all things toward your good? (Romans 8:28) Do you really believe that nothing can separate you from the love of Christ?(Romans 8:39) In other words, do you really believe what you say you do? Or is that just what you want others to believe about you? The reality of life is that you are not fooling anyone by telling them what you think they want to hear.  Fiery trials bake the fake right out of us. That is what God is after. He is seeking authentic believers who 'know what they know' because they have experienced God coming through for them time and time again.
"Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.  Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 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.  But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do." (James 1)  The spiritual paradox about the rogue waves of life is this: the more you keep your eyes focused on Jesus the smaller the waves become and the less effect they have on your person. What once would have knocked you off your feet in the past, can eventually feel like a breaking tide around your ankles. Tribulations become annoyances.

She Has My Back

I need a vacation.  I'm just going to go ahead and admit it; for the truth is, I already did, out loud, and I spiritually suffered the consequences. (I should have read my previous post about coyotes!)  I've been telling those close to me for quite some time.  I worked really hard this past summer, taking call every other night for 4 months, and bearing the extra work load. I continued my running/exercise regime despite this to maintain my physical fitness and still managed to complete a triathlon Labor Day weekend.  The fatigue I was feeling was more than physical though. I've done a lot of work with God this year; we've wrestled out some big issues in my life. I've fought a lot of spiritual battles and in some cases gained some real ground in my promised land. God is bringing me out of my Egypt..my captivity of insecurities, hurts and hang-ups.  But something in my spirit was growing weary. I began to ask myself, "When are these issues going to be under my feet? Why am I fighting the same battles over and over?" It seemed like every time I gained ground, my enemy was right there to throw something new at me or the Lord pointed out something new I needed to work on. Ephesians 6 talks about the spiritual armor we clothe ourselves with when we fight battles. They include the belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, shoes of peace, shield of faith, and helmet of salvation. Pretty well covered from the front, when you can see an attack coming.

"Remember what the Amalekites did to you along the way when you came up out of Egypt. When you were weary and worn out, they met you on your journey and attacked all of you who were lagging behind; they had no fear of God." Deut 25:17-19


The physical burden has lifted now with two new physicians rotating into the call schedule, but the whole process left me physically tired and mentally weary. I recently discovered that this is when you are most vulnerable to an attack you didn't see coming. Out of no where a spirit of discouragement and frankly evil engulfed me from behind; thoughts came into my mind completely not characteristic of me with a strong inclination to sin. It is hard to describe, but in the moment, it felt like my fear of the Lord left me. Now please don't misunderstand me. When you are saved, you are sealed under the day of Redemption. No spirit can get in you; but they sure can get on you. They can evoke feelings and emotions. It scared me to see them rise up quickly and so out of character for me. Of course my enemy was eager to add shame to my insult. This is when you must fall back into what you know God's word says, instead of what you feel.  Knowing the danger of where this would lead if not stopped abruptly I immediately went to the one person I know has my back spiritually speaking. She hemmed me in.

This is why it is imperative that every Christian has an accountability partner. Although difficult to admit what was happening in my spirit, I knew it had to be done. Accountability requires face to face one on one interaction. It is the only way you can really get to the heart of an issue. When Jacob wrestled his issues with God, ultimately changing his name to Israel (Genesis 32) it says he was alone, and "got face to face with God and lived." I really believe this is why the world is moving so much to texting and social networks for interaction...No accountability. People will write/text things that they would never say in person. Further, if I surround myself with such communication as my primary method of dealing with my issues, then I never really have to get "face to face" with them or God for that matter. In the presence of God we become immediately aware of how holy He is and sinful we really are. Isaiah immediately upon being ushered in his vision into God's presence, cried "Holy, holy,holy" followed by "Woe to me. I am ruined! I am a man of unclean lips."
Accountability partners have to be someone you trust implicitly, who loves the Lord and knows his word, but is not your spouse. They really should be of the same gender and unafraid to speak truth into your life. Mine just so happens to be my best friend and I am unspeakably grateful for her. I immediately felt better after talking to her. That is exactly what is supposed to happen. Our enemy wants you to believe that if you really admit what is in your heart to God or another person, you won't be accepted or forgiven. Worse yet, like Jacob, we think it could be the death of us, if we really had to face it. Maybe not physical death, but the death of our dignity, what we want people to think of us, relationships or hope. The truth is exactly the opposite; your soul won't find rest until you get face to face with God. Sometimes he uses other people to do this. "As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." Prov 27:17.
The second half of the scripture is really where the key lies. "When the Lord your God gives you rest from all the enemies around you in the land he is giving you to possess as an inheritance you shall blot out the name of the Amalekite."
There is no shame in being weary; God knows this happens to us. That is why his word says, "So let's not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time we will harvest a crop if we don't give up or quit." (Gal 6:9 MSG) As long as we don't quit and allow the enemy to overtake us you will get your inheritance. God showed me this is why the attack really comes. It's not because you were weak in your faith or tired. It is because the enemy knows you are about to get your inheritance due and when you do, the shame won't be anywhere but squarely on his head. So for the meantime, I am counting down the days until my vacation which is soon coming and eternally thankful for my best friend who has hemmed me in until I rest in what God is about to deliver.