Living Out Your Vows...

When you recited your marriage vows you may not have imagined you would need to follow through on some of them. Young and full of blind infatuation...But now that you must love as God called us to love, how many have you survived through? How many have you broken?

Ron and I have been through it all. It is not easy. But sometimes the love shines through the commitment, rather than the feeling. Praying for my friends who are struggling with theirs and continuing to pray for my own as we survive the trials of this fallen world.

Moments of Clarity

God's Not Dead. 

Boy that can sound intimidating, depending on the side of the fence you're sitting on. 

I am sure if you are a Christian you have seen the movie (right?!) because of the press and the many churches that have shown it and promoted it.  And, if you are not a Christian, well, I am sure you are so sick of hearing about it.  Hearing about the Robertsons (Duck Dynasty) and their beliefs.  About the movie that the Christians are all toting.  About the text messages that everyone is getting, 'God's Not Dead'.  Am I right?  Probably. Or maybe you haven't heard a thing. 

I admit I have wanted to see it.  But, until tonight, I just hadn't.  One thing or another came up.  And that is pretty typical of life.  Everyone I talk to has stuff coming up.  Some of it really ugly in their lives.  Some of it just busy.  Some of it overwhelming in obligations or demands made on them.  Right? You too?

My life has felt like that for so long.  So long.  I just jump from one set of gotta do's to another.  If you looked at my life in retrospect you would see a Multiple Personality Disordered life.  No disrespect of mental disorders intended.  All the times I have done 180s and, I bet you would have stories to come back at me with. It is just life.

There are moments though, when life gains a whole lot of clarity in a very short amount of time.  And sometimes we get so dang excited about it that we want to tell everyone.  

And some nice people shake their heads and smile and say, "Wow, that's great!"  

And some nice people wrinkle up their eyebrows and say, "Err...that is really interesting." 

And, some nice people cut you off before you get three words out of your mouth and say, "I am not interested."

I do that to salesmen at the door.  I do that to other faiths that I don't believe in or agree with.  So I am not that different than those who do that to me.  I probably don't deserve the time of day to recount my exciting revelation or moments of clarity.  But thankfully, it really isn't about me.

My walk the other day that started my blogging again, well, that wasn't about me.

And the revelations that I got from that walk (Come Awake, well, they aren't really about me either.

And what I write about, well, that is about me.  But it is not really for me.  And ultimately it isn't so much about me either.

I know in 1997 when I first became a Christian because of a crazy, and I use that word in a worldly sense, dream that I had.  Well, I know that people just thought Stephanie was having a crazy moment, a passing fad, another 180, another stage in her life.  And if I was on the outside looking in I think at first I would have thought the same thing too.  Some people I know stopped being my friends.  Got angry.  Refuted my new beliefs.  Called me bible thumper.  I didn't know people really did that.  Actually, at the time I didn't even understand what that was.  I was amazed, actually, at the fact that an admission of Christianity could bring out so many negative  feelings in others.

I was a baby, brand new Christian.  And that being said, I only knew that Jesus saved me.  

I didn't know how.  

I didn't know why.  

I didn't know who he was.  

He was a baby in a bed of hay under the Christmas tree.  

That was it.  But that dream, that vision...What ever you want to call it, it changed my life and made me want to know who he was.  I was desperate to know.  

Because at a point in my life when I was willing to give up everything because I selfishly didn't think I was worth anything this Jesus thought enough of me to invade my dream and save me in such a way that spoke to me.

I still think it sounds crazy.  

It has been almost 20 years since that night. Almost to the month. 

And no matter the 180s I have made since then, there is one 360 that I never stopped doing.  That is, turning to God and, believing in Jesus.  I am just as much a sinner as either group I started this with. By sinner, I mean someone who has not lived a perfect life free of guilt and doing what is wrong. And I will not claim to be perfect because I am a Christian.  I am simply saved.  I recognize my need for a Savior and I chose to believe in the one who died to save me.  There is a lot of other stuff that came after that.  Some good.  Some bad.  But the one truth remained the same.  I cannot imagine how I would have made it through the tough stuff of life without having God there.  And there is nothing I could possibly say in my own words that could even convey it to you.  The magnitude is unbelievable.  But I can tell you one thing.  God's Not Dead.  

If you haven't see the movie, see it.  It won't hurt you.  It might seem a little crazy at times.  But it might be just what you're looking for... to answer a few questions that keep bugging you. And if not. Then it was just a movie to you.  Thank God for free will, right? ;)

Either way, I hope you see it.  It was pretty darn good.

I included the trailer just in case you haven't seen it or the movie.

I am Meant to Be an Oregonian...

 When I started this blog I meant it to be honest to goodness, real life, encouragement with a focus on Christ.  I know this blog and writing is gonna go to dust someday.  And I am really bad at sticking with too many things for very long.  Not to mention the fact that there are a billion out there, but hopefully it serves a greater purpose for the one person who reads it and needs it. Often times I feel like when I write I am trying to encourage myself, but I get too excited about what God is revealing to me and it becomes preachy or too deep.  Don't get me wrong, I end up there because I love Deep.  But as much as I love it I am often shallow in my life.  So instead of being a conduit of the living water I am often a runoff from the rain.  

Today Ron and I went on a walk in the park.  We live in a small town that has started to adopt some big town things and ideas...well, at least some bigger town things and ideas.  the park is nice and one place where change is happening slowly.  The old park benches are decaying, new ones are in different places. Most of the old play equipment has been changed out with the new fangled, ergonomical, plastic stuff. I realize how much my husband and I sound like old farts with how we miss the old stuff that really has little impact on us.  

As we walked around the park I still really found some joy in the fact that for being almost July it was overcast and cool.  Everything is super green right now.  It made me start to think about growing up in Portland and working for a year down town and never going to any of the parks in that part of town, though I rode the bus there every day.  I cannot even remember what anything on my 6 block walk from the bus stop looked like.  
Now, to be fair, I was 18 at the time and pretty self absorbed.  I had appreciated sights, sounds, and nature as a kid, but as a teen it lost the magic for me in the wake of boys, malls, and self.  Also, I remember always being scared of people I didn't know and avoided eye contact and confrontation.  
I am plenty beyond that now.  Two grown kids and two half way there.  Married 22 years this week.  I realized that I still take very little time to actually suck in the beauty and appreciation for the stuff God created without my input.  I didn't know God back then, but what are my excuses now?  I am often still absorbed by what ever is currently in my life.  So boys, malls, and self have given away to children, second-hand stores, and the husband.  All the same in different clothing.  
Most of all I came to realize that I never appreciated those things when it was raining.  Nothing like being a native Oregonian and hating the rain.  

And yes, I know there are parts of Oregon that are not that stereotypical. But I have always lived in fitting places.  I have lovely seasonally affected emotions and when it is gray, wet, and cold I tend to be a real drip myself.  I know it is not going to kill me and I am not going to drown in it, but I just don't like it.  There, I said it.  I don't like the rain.  But, I want to like it...
I have heard all the Pollyanna positive points to the rain.  And I know them in my heart.  God's way of watering the earth.  So as I walked around the park I appreciated the greenness, but I had no desire to get wet and was glad that the rain held off for the walk.  I did enjoy really taking in the sound of the large creek, the wind in the trees, children laughing, the soft touch of Ron's hand in mine.  The smell of the flowers and green damp earth. It was nice.  But I am still not sure if when another 25 years pass if I will even remember anything about it.  I still come home and realize there is a water leak, kids fighting, housework to be done.  I wonder if the fleet moment of joy in the park will make a stand out memory, as nice as it was.  

I love my God, but I do not appreciate everything that he has surrounded me with in life.  I realize it all has purpose.  And it serves a greater purpose that I do not even have the brains to comprehend.  But I don't like some stuff.  I find myself having to pray so verses I learned from the bible to help me not just want to call myself a lost cause. (Yes, that is being dramatic.) And really in a world where people who don't have faith believe reality is what you make it I would be (and was) feeling hopeless and miserable.  But God gave me some insight into the fact that there are bigger things and bigger meaning to things in the last 15 years.  
I know I am not perfect and I don't ever intend on achieving anything close in this life.  I still stave off some of those same self focused fatalistic emotions.  I am still a sufferer of the weakness and frailties of humanity.  But I am gradually learning to spend more time, than not, now focusing on the meaningful things and appreciating God's handiwork more than mans.  Maybe I am getting old. Maybe a spark of wisdom is creeping in my life.  Or maybe God is just whispering louder so I can hear him touching my life.  I don't know exactly. This is what I can hear Him say...This is the way you felt, 

Ecclesiastes 3:1- 22 (NIV)
A Time for Everything

There is a time for everything,
    and a season for every activity under the heavens:
 a time to be born and a time to die,
    a time to plant and a time to uproot, 
 a time to kill and a time to heal,
    a time to tear down and a time to build,
 a time to weep and a time to laugh,
    a time to mourn and a time to dance,
 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
    a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
 a time to search and a time to give up,
    a time to keep and a time to throw away,
 a time to tear and a time to mend,
    a time to be silent and a time to speak,
 a time to love and a time to hate,
    a time for war and a time for peace.
What do workers gain from their toil?  I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race.  He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live.  That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.  I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.
 Whatever is has already been, 
    and what will be has been before; 
    and God will call the past to account.
And I saw something else under the sun:
In the place of judgment—wickedness was there,
    in the place of justice—wickedness was there.
I said to myself,
“God will bring into judgment 
    both the righteous and the wicked,
for there will be a time for every activity,
    a time to judge every deed.”
I also said to myself, “As for humans, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals.  Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless. All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return. Who knows if the human spirit rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?”
 So I saw that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy their work, because that is their lot. For who can bring them to see what will happen after them?

...But now you and others have a greater view of things because of the hope we have made possible through Jesus and the truth we live by.  The writer in Ecclesiastes got a lot of it right, but like so many of us he filled in the blanks with his own limited knowledge and the evil one found a way of making him feel hopeless.  Unlike him, we know that the human soul has a great hope!

Romans 5:1-2 (NIV)
Peace and Hope

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God

My hope for you is that you too find some encouragement in what God has to say and what I share.  
Blessings!