Time Doesn’t Heal All Wounds
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Originally posted at Desperately Seeking Sanity March 11, 2009
…it’s what you do with the time that heals… 
Profound isn’t it?
Time DOESN’T heal all wounds.
I have wounds from as early as yesterday tht have healed better than those from over 25 years ago.
I can remember specifically something that was said to me when I was in the 4th grade, my daughter’s age, and it has stuck with me ever since. It hurt then, and if I bring that memory up, it hurts with the same verocity that it did then.
Needless to say, I try not to drudge it up often.
But despite the fact that apologies were made, and the other person, I’m certain, feels just as bad about the words that escaped the lips, I can’t let that go; I can’t move past it; it hurts every time I think about it. The memory does nothing but allow satan to plant the thought of what if it’s the truth? in my head each and every single time.
That wound has not healed. It won’t heal until I choose to do something about it. I’ve let 23 years pass without dealing with it. I’ve not talked about it; not spoken about it with the other person, instead telling others about it, and how it made me feel.
It’s my fault that wound is still there.
Have I forgiven the person? Yes. I did that recently. I understand why it was said; I can realize the situation that we were in and what prompted it to be said; I understand why it happened.
And I have forgiven.
25And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.” (Mark 11:25, NIV)
31Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. (Ephesians 4:31-32, NIV)
However, there are some other wounds in my life, that time, and action have healed.
Let’s take my divorce.
(And, while I’ve not cleared this post with my ex or his wife, I hope that I’m not overstepping my bounds by speaking about it, however, I don’t think, given what I’m going to say, and by staying within my boundaries, that it’s going to be an issue…)
When my ex-husband and I separated, it was not pretty; it wasn’t amicable; it wasn’t good. Words were said, actions taken, and all around just not a pleasant situation for either of us. That being said, I know that any of you who have gone through a separation or divorce know that what happened between us is normal, to an extent. When you come to the conclusion that your marriage is over, it’s hard to deal with on many levels. One of the first things we do is put up the defenses. We get to the point that we feel the need to protect ourselves, our feelings, and our possessions. If a marriage is ending, feelings have already been hurt after all, we had to get to this point somehow. However, knowing that you are now making plans to go in different directions from your spouse, you do everything humanly possible to avoid enduring additional pain.
Often times, we use words or actions to deflect our own pain and hurt back to the other person. We say things that we don’t mean out of spite, out of not thinking clearly, or simply because they hurt us, so now we’re going to hurt them.
I know this all too well.
36But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken. (Matthew 12:36, NIV)
20 Do you see a man who speaks in haste?
There is more hope for a fool than for him. (Proverbs 29:20, NIV)19 When words are many, sin is not absent,
but he who holds his tongue is wise. (Proverbs 10:19, NIV)
Oh, how I wish I knew the expectations of my toungue nine years ago. But, sadly, I’m not sure that it would’ve mattered. Because despite the words that came out of my mouth, in my mind, at the moment, I justified them. In my mind, I was right in saying them.
But almost 9 years have passed since my ex-husband and I decided to separate. In December of this past year, our divorce had been final for seven years. Time had passed.
From the day that we separated and for the four years that followed, it was not pretty. I was jaded. I was hurt. I was angry.
Notice all the “I” statements?
It was all about me. I was wronged. I was hurt. I was treated unfairly. I was so far up on my high horse had I fallen, I would’ve broken my neck. I took a holier than thou attitude, because, just as in my words, I felt that I was right; that I had done nothing wrong; that I had not caused any of the events that were going on around me.
Because of HIM I had to live with my parents. I had to take care of two children while going to school full time and working full time. I had to tell people that I was divorced. I had to deal with the court system. Not once, in all those years, did I ever stop to search within myself to assess the real reason the marriage ended, or to see if I played any part in it.
Not once.
I hated him and would stop at nothing to see him suffer and I felt he hated me and did what he could to spite me.
This is how we lived.
But sometime around June of 2004, things changed. I attribute alot of it to his then girlfriend, now wife.
Well, let me back up. I attribute all of it to God. I firmly believe God used this woman, a woman who I WANTED to hate, who I TRIED to hate, for no other reason than because she was with him, to heal the wounds that were left gaping open when our marriage dissolved. Make no mistake about it, I didn’t want to rekindle anything, but I didn’t want him to hurt anyone else the way that he hurt me. I didn’t believe that he was capable of change.
Again, are we seeing the ME attitude here?
When we were deciding how to manage two children in two different households, I again, demanded the power. I stated that the rules would be the same in each household. I never wanted to hear “well, Dad lets me do it” from my children. He agreed. I told him that as long as there was a Santa, the children would wake up HERE on Christmas morning. He agreed. I made sure the school had the court documentation so that he was not allowed to get the children from school. When asked for an emergency contact for the children, while I should’ve put his name first, I never did. Regardless of the fact that he was there to help, I refused the help.
I chose to play the martyr. I chose to play the role of the victim. I chose to live in misery.
Know what happened? The wound didn’t even begin to heal. I was still bitter. I was still angry. I was misreable.
There were days that I didn’t even want to be around myself.
But over time, and again, I attribute it to his wife, we began to talk again and laugh. I became less and less uncomfortable around him. I began to feel less threatened by him. I began to see him as someone who had a vested interest in the well being of our children. I began to refer to them as “our” kids and not “my” kids.
Here we are almost five years later. We have had dinners together, all of us, his wife included. I’m helping him with a project that he’s working on, not for money, but because he needed help and I have the skill set to help him. He and his wife have attended our church on occassion. Often times when he picks up the kids or drops them off, we’ll sit on the porch and talk about them or laugh or cut up. We sit at sporting events together. He takes the kids for me, whether it’s his time or not, if I have to travel out of town for work or with the youth group.
In a nutshell, we work together for the betterment of our children.
The turning point for me was an email that I wrote him threeish years ago. The interesting part about it was that I sent it prior to becomming a Christian, but I sat down at the computer and told him that I saw the change in him and that I appreciated the role he had in the kids’ lives. I thanked him for stepping up, for being a father and forgave him for the past; for everything that has transpired between us, whether it be something said in a courtroom or in a heated discussion in the driveway. I apologized for my actions, my words, and my part. (At least I think I did. If I didn’t, please see this as a public apology for my part in the everything, my words, my hatefulness, etc.)
As soon as I hit send, I felt better, a little vulnerable, but better.
I took action.
And today? There is no wound. It’s healed. I don’t see him the way I once did. I don’t see him as my ex-husband; I see him as a friend. I can trust him. I can confide in him. I can tell him what’s going on and trust that he won’t judge me. I know that if I need help with the kids, he’s going to be there.
Moreover, recently, my character was questioned. Guess who went to bat for me?
My ex-husband.
I can sing the praises of his wife. She does not have to do the things that she does for my children. They are not hers; not her responsibility, but she, too, will step up to the plate for the kids. I know that she’s as invested in them as we are.
My children are very fortunate. The beauty of it all is that they KNOW they are fortunate. I overheard Matthew talking to a freind recently whose parents had recently divorced and Matthew said to his friend, “Your parents should be like my parents. They get along great. They’re friends.”
Fortunately, Matthew and Samara were too young to recognize the hell that he and I went through all those years ago. Their memory only houses images of us as freinds and two parents who truly work together for them and their well-being.
And for that, I am eternally grateful. I am grateful that I was able to come off my high-horse. I am grateful that he changed. I am grateful for the role that his wife has played in all of this. I am grateful that God moved through all of this. I am grateful that I was able to take action.
I am grateful that the wound has healed.
There are still other wounds that need healing; they are in need of action.
I am grateful that I have people in my life that are willing to encourage me to work on those wounds.
But I more grateful that I serve a mighty God who is going to be with me, and encouraging me to “keep on keeping on” that I need to take action with these wounds.
2 When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze. (Isaiah 43:2, NIV)
Love
By · CommentsOriginally posted at Desperately Seeking Sanity on February 11, 2009
On Saturday, I was asked to share a devotion/testimony at the Upward games at church. I did so last year as well, but last year, it was a little easier for me to come up with something to talk about… afterall, it was a year after I had found my church, through the Upward Ministry.
This year, I didn’t want to talk about how Jesus plays basketball (my topic last year). I wanted to talk about something different, but what?
So, I started thinking.
Saturday was the 14th… Valentine’s Day… a Hallmark Holiday if there ever was one, commercialized, and probably my least favorite holiday of them all. Sunday was my 2nd birthday in Christ. I started thinking about the things that I’ve learned over the past two years and if there was anything that stuck out as one of the biggest things that I had learned.
Who knew the answer would be in the holiday that I hate the most?
As I sat and pondered, I kept thinking of all the things I’ve learned, discovered, or changed and there were so many. My decision to remian pure, my cessation of using foul language, my new found love for teenagers and ministering to them. There were so many things that God had done through me that it was almost overwhelming to think about all of them. I’d like to say that I had it hammered out before I got there Saturday morning. I had every intention of getting it done, preparing, going over it and being confident in the talk that I was going to give that could potentially reach someone the same way a halftime devotion reached me two years prior.
But I didn’t.
I walked into the Fellowship Hall Saturday morning completely unprepared and unknowing of what I would talk about.
Way to go, Heather. Way to be on top of things.
Of course, anyone who knew how my week went last week would’ve been completing understanding if I said, “forget it, I can’t do it. I’m not prepared.” But I didn’t want to say that. I didn’t want to shirk what I signed up for. It was important to me to talk. It was important to me to share my faith. I just didn’t know what I wanted to talk about.
That is… until I walked into the Fellowship Hall and saw all of the beautiful decorations that my partner in crime had adorned the day prior. The Fellowship Hall reeked of love. We were setting up for our “Celebration of the Greatest Love” dinner, a youth fund raiser that we had planned and was finally here.
It hit me like a ton of bricks. It was Valentine’s Day and I had the opportunity to talk to these people about Love, but not the love that they think about when they think about Valentine’s Day, but rather the greatest love there is… His love. The love that I never knew before, that I had come to experience over the last two year and the love that completely blew my mind.
I sat down at one of the tables, my bible open to the concordance going through all of the verses that contained the word love, most of them recognizable to me and just started jotting down notes and verses on index cards. I had them all arranged in 30 minutes and then it was time for me to talk. I didn’t know if it was going to come out right, or make the point that was so vivid in my head, but when all was said and done, I had people come up to me and hug me, thank me, ask for the verses that I used. I had spoken to people.
Shoot one lady was there for the first and third games and approached me after the last game and told me that it was better the second time around that she heard it. I had a mad who told me that he had been married for 40 years to a blessing and didn’t know what he was going to do when she passed. He got teary talking about it, but told me that he knew that when that happened, she would be in a better place, waiting on Him, and it was through His love that he knew this.
It was a great experience.
I guess the ironic part about this is that while the boy knew that I was speaking on Saturday, I never told him what I spoke about. He asked me how it went and I told him, but I never went into any detail. Today, after church, he gave me a picture that had a verse on it that is one of my favorites…
I stared at him.
“What?” he asked.
“Just funny. That’s all.” I said.
“What’s funny?” he hates when I do this… leak just enough information from my brain to make keep him guessing…
“Well, it’s just that I’ve had a pretty crappy last couple of weeks with everything going on in my world and have been feeling a little blah about all of it. And it’s not that I’ve been questioning God, you know that, but kinda… well, I don’t know. Just feeling a little out there, floating around, not being able to make heads or tails of alot of things and pondering this whole love thing and trying to wrap my arms around His love for me, despite everything going on,” I replied.
Ok, so I didn’t really say that. It’s what I would’ve said had I been given an opportunity to say that but with teenagers and children milling about vying for his attention and mine it doesn’t leave much room for talking. What I did say was, “this is verse that I talked about on Saturday.”
“Heh.”
God just works like that, ya know? It’s pretty amazing.
Anyway, in case you’re wondering exactly what I said about love, here we go…
I’m celebrating my 2nd Birthday tomorrow. Not the day that I entered the world but the day that I entered the Kingdom. Two years ago, tomorrow, I gave my life to Christ. And in thinking about what I wanted to talk about today, with it being Valentine’s Day, a holiday I abhor normally, and on the eve of a pretty special day for me, I started thinking about some of the things that I’ve learned over the past two years and what the Lord’s done in my life.
In the past two years, both of my children have given their lives to Christ. I’ve had friends that I’ve helped just by living out my faith and I’ve become a different person. Some of the changes, I willingly made and others? Well, they just kinda changed. But that doesn’t surprise me because the Bible states in 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come.”
And new has definately come. I’m not the same person that I was and you can ask anyone in my life from my boss, to my parents, to my friends to my children and they’ll tell you about the transformation that they’ve seen.
However, I attribute most of these changes to the Love that the Lord pours out on me and today, for me, has become the celebration of the Greatest Love. Despite how much I try, it’s hard for me to grasp the concept that someone loves me enough to give up his own son, to allow his only son to die for me, to forgive me of the sins that I’ve committed and am going to commit at some point in time. It’s unfathomable. But love is talked about alot in the Bible. In reading the Bible, I’ve been able to discover alot about love; what it is, what it can do, what it isn’t, and more and everytime I stop and think about it.. and I mean really stop and think about it.. it’s almost beyond comprehension.
I work with the teens here at church and the word love is thrown around alot…almost as much as the word hate. Love normally goes with the cute boy with the locker next to one of them and hate is normally associated with the girl that he likes and their parents. I can’t blame them. When I was their age, I thought I knew what true love was. When I got married, I thought I knew what true love was. When I got divorced I thought I knew what true love was. When I had my first child I thought I knew what true love was. All those times, and many other times in the last 32 years, I’ve thought that I knew what it was, what it meant, and how to live it out as well, but I didn’t.
But I’m slowly getting it. Slowly, but surely.
The Greatest Love has a feeling. “His unfailing love toward those who fear Him, is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth.” (Psalm 103:11, NIV) Isn’t that the truth? I can’t tell you how many times that I experience a “high” because I know that I am loved for who I am, faults and all. And when I’m feeling down, or alone, or unloved, I can “know and rely on the love God has for [me]. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.” (1 John 4:16).
I know can know that love and rely on that love.
How amazing is that? I can know it and rely on it. Rely on it. How many things can you rely on in your life?
Love isn’t just a feeling, it’s a command. We’re commanded to do a lot of things if we chose to live by the Word, but we are commanded to love in 1 Corinthians 16:14 when we’re told to “do everything in love,” and again in John 15:17 where it states, “This is my command: Love each other.”
Woah. Hold up. So we have to love each other AND do everything in love. How hard is that for you? For me? It’s hard. It’s a choice that I have to consciously make. But that love, the love that He has for us has great benefits. Did you know that love erases things? “Hatred stirs up dissension, but love covers all wrongs,” says Proverbs 10:12 and it’s reiterated in 1 Peter 4:8 when it says, “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.”
If you have children, you know this first hand. Just one look with their eyes and it doesn’t matter what they’ve done, the love that you have for them, and maybe the tax deduction, is what keeps you from sending them packing.
Or at least, that’s how it is if you’re anything like me.
But yes, we are commanded to do everything, not some things, but everything in love and we’re commanded to love one another. But that’s so hard. There are people in this world that I don’t want to love, and we discuss this alot with the teens. Often times, I’ll hear them say that they hate their parents, and I have to stop them. I have to remind them that they may not like their parents but they have to love them, and respect them and then I throw this verse on them and it will stop them in their tracks and make them think….
“We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, “I love God”, yet hates his brother, his is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And he had given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.” (1 John 4:19, NIV)
Hold up. Wait a minute. Yup. That’s the response that I get from the teens. And it’s not just teenagers that have a hard time with this… it’s adults, too. It’s me. I have a hard time loving people who are difficult people to love until I stop and think about the love that HE has for me. If HE can love ME despite what I’ve done, or what I’m going to do, why can’t I LOVE others? Doesn’t mean I have to LIKE them, but I do have to LOVE them. When I stop and think about it in that manner, it’s a little bit easier of a pill to swallow.
But it’s still hard.
And so we stop and think about all this stuff about love and we hear that we have to love others because He loves us, and how we have to do everything in love and how love can erase a bunch of wrongs… but what is love?
Can we define it?
Of course we can. We can because He defined Love for us by His actions and it’s reiterated in the Word in 1 Corinthians 13. But my favorite part? Verses 4-8a.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delights in evil but rejoices in the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always preserves. Love never fails.”
LOVE NEVER FAILS.
His love for me is unfailing. How freakin’ amazing is that? Unfailing.
So, if you don’t know that love, if you’ve never experienced that love, I am more than willing to chat with you about it and share some more of my experiences. It doesn’t fail.
Ever.
Praise God for that.
Empty Me
By · CommentsOriginally posted at Desperately Seeking Sanity January 12, 2009
For months, I’ve been burning the candle at both ends. I had it all, or so I thought. I had a full time job, a booming little side hobby that provided some extra cash, was fixing websites for people who in return would either pay me, albeit not the running rate for web help but something, or sometimes I would simply help someone out and answer a quick question, and I would be called wonderful names such as genius or something else along those lines. Any one who knows me, knows that my love language is words of affirmation, so a simple thank you, or accolade goes a long way.
Things exploded. There were more requests than I could keep up with. People wanted blogs done and they wanted me to help them with it. I felt smart. I felt worth something. I felt needed.
Anyone who knows me also knows that I have a desire to feel needed.
I began to fill all of my free time with my “hobby”. It’s actually how I justified it. It was a “hobby,” something that I loved to do, that I was receiving money for. What could be better, right? I mean, there are mothers out there all over the world who would love to be able to find a way to make money on something that not only were they good at but that they also loved to do. I felt blessed. I even went so far at one point in time to call my “hobby” a ministry, and I guess, in a way, it was.
But what I failed to do was to listen to Him. He told me before I even started that I shouldn’t do this and I listened for many months until one day, I stopped listening.
As things were growing, I continued to hear Him. He would speak when I would respond to an inquiry. He would speak when I would offer to help someone. He would speak and I wouldn’t listen. The accolades and the ever growing balance of my PayPal account would drown Him out.
And one day, I finally HEARD Him. It was loud and it was painful and I’m still licking my wounds over it. But I HEARD Him and He used so many different people in my life to speak to me. He spoke to me in ways that I never thought that He would.
But despite the fact that I heard Him, I didn’t obey. The message was loud and clear. “This is not what I’ve called you to do. You need to give this up. I need you for other things.” The other things were mentioned specifically and it was scary. Some of the things that He wanted me to focus on were things that I knew, but because I was discouraged, I didn’t want to fight the good fight. Other things that He mentioned were things that were foreign to me, things that I didn’t think I could ever do.
I just kept thinking to myself, “How can I give this up? Where will I compensate that income?” Keep in mind that I don’t NEED this income. I have a full time job and make good money. This was money that I didn’t have prior to May. This was money that allowed me to not have to always watch what I was spending, so my discussions with Him were purely selfish — “What about me, Lord?”
And His response was always, “What about you?”
I’ve struggled with this for quite some time and as I’ve been struggling, He’s opened every door for me to escape, to walk away, and shown me how He will provide for me. He’s given me ways to fix all of it and I was still hesitant to listen.
One night, I discussed all of this with the boy. Worried that I might be giving it all up for him, so that I had more free time, I told him all of this. I dug way down and share all that I just shared with you with him to let him know that I shouldn’t be involved in this at all. That I knew I shouldn’t be, I never should’ve started, and that I KNEW it, I was TOLD, but that I didn’t LISTEN.
I wrote a letter to the people that I worked with and let them know what was going on, but without this spiritual detail. I simply let them know the truth: That while I love doing this, I can’t manage it all and I’ve started doing sub par work. Something that I had always promised myself was that when the hobby was no longer fun or when I could no longer complete work to my standards, that I would hang it up.
It was time to hang it up.
But I held on to that letter. The two people that I shared it with told me to hit send.
But I couldn’t.
One night while watching my children play checkers, with the radio on in the background, and my thoughts consumed with the battle of what to do, a song came on the radio. It’s a song that I’ve heard a million times, one that I love, one that makes me sing at the top of my lungs and one that has always moved me.
But this time, it was almost as if I had never heard the song before. I stopped. I listened to every single word. And then I walked over to the computer and hit send.
The song?
Empty Me.
And He was speaking again. Not just in regards to my “hobby” but to other things in my life. This was the Lord SCREAMING in my ear.
I’ve had just enough of the spotlight when it burns bright
To see how it gets in the blood.
And I’ve tasted my share of the sweet life and the wild ride
And found a little is not quite enough.
I know how I can stray
And how fast my heart could change.Empty me of the selfishness inside
Every vain ambition and the poison of my pride
And any foolish thing my heart holds to
Lord empty me of me so I can be filled with you.I’ve had just enough of the quick buys of the best lies
To know how prodigals can be drawn away.
I know how I can stray
And how fast my heart could change.Empty me of the selfishness inside
Every vain ambition and the poison of my pride
And any foolish thing my heart holds to
Lord empty me of me so I can be filled with you.Cause everything is a lesser thing
Compared to you, compared to you.
Cause everything is a lesser thing
Compared to you. So, I surrender all!Empty me of the selfishness inside
Every vain ambition and the poison of my pride
Empty me of the selfishness inside
Every vain ambition and the poison of my pride
And any foolish thing my heart holds to
Lord empty me of me so I can be
Lord empty me of me so I can be filled with you.
Oh, filled with you.
Empty me.
And so I’ve made it my prayer. Empty Me. Fill me with you. Help me to be the person that you’ve called me to be, to do the things that you’ve called me to do.
The lesson wasn’t an easy one, my friends. I’m still not done as I have some things that I’m embarrassing late on in getting done. I’ve actually lost money in the process. But I will make it right, I will correct the wrongs, and then I will listen and obey.
No matter how hard that is, I know that He will provide for me. He already has. All I had to do was listen.
Death Is Real and We Have An Appointment With It
By · CommentsOriginally posted at Desperately Seeking Sanity on October 13, 2008
Today, I attended the funeral of a man that was on fire for God. It was obvious and he was the nicest man that I’ve ever met. He always smiled and up until his last breath, he was telling others about Jesus Christ.
I didn’t know this man for very long, although at age 90, he’d touched many lives, mine included.
He greeted us at the door on Sunday mornings, wearing vibrant colored ties and jackets. He always had a smile. He had a way of making you feel welcome.
The message that was delivered had the title of this blog post, “Death is real and we have an appointment with it.”
We do. We’re all going to die. We may not know when, but we’re all going to die.
I’m not afraid of death, the death that this man had encountered last Thursday. That death, I’m okay with. It means that I have fulfilled the purpose that the Lord intended for me and I’m going home. I’m cool with that.
What I am afraid of is a spiritual death, one that removes me far from my walk with the Lord and unfortuantly, it’s all to easy to flirt with that death.
As I listened to those that knew him far longer than I did, telling those in the sanctuary what he did in his life, what he accomplished and the lives he touched, I was planning my own funeral.
Morbid, I know. Incredibly morbid, but something that I think I needed to ponder today. In a society where we get so wrapped up in the World and not the Word, I need to determine what people will say about me when I’m laying in a casket, on display, and people are paying their last respects.
I want people to talk about the mother I am. I want people to admire the way that I lived my life. I want people to talk about my heart for God, my walk with the Lord, my passion for Christ.
I want people to say that I’ve made a difference in their lives. I want to know that when I get to Heaven, there are going to be people there that I influenced even though I never met them face to face.
It’s a tall order. I need to work on something and get some things straight. I need to start LISTENING to God, because He’s talking to me, but I’m too busy to listen. I’m in my own little world, doing what I want to do and will do so until I get “caught” and go running back like a dog with my tail between my legs.
I know that He’ll scoop me up, just like the father that He is, and forgive me and let me start over, but why do I have to let it get to that point?
Yesterday, when I said things were on the up and up? They are! Things are good. Things are where I want them to be. But are they where He wants them to be?
With on thing that’s going on, I believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that it is. I know that I am exactly where I’m supposed to be. However, there are other things going on in my life that I know are not where He wants me to be, but it’s where I want to be.
And I know that. I knew it going it, yet I still did what I wanted to do. But I don’t want to walk away. I don’t want to. I’m kicking and screaming.
And much like we learned yesterday in church, when Pharaoh asked Moses to pray for the frogs who had invaded everything to go away and Moses asked when, Pharaoh responded with “Tomorrow”.
Tomorrow? I would want the frogs gone TODAY. But the frogs in my life? I’m right up there with the Pharoh. Tomorrow.
Now I understand where Pharaoh was coming from.
The problem is, we’re not guaranteed tomorrow. We’re only guaranteed today.
And if my funeral was tomorrow, while there would be niceties as I’m not a horrible person, there would be frogs all over the place.
And at my funeral, I don’t want frogs.
So I’m off to contemplate a little more and spend some time with the Lord.
He deserves to hear from me more than He has been.
My Hardened Heart
By · CommentsOriginally posted at Desperately Seeking Sanity on September 13, 2009
Y’all, I have to tell you. I am walking around with a HUGE hardened heart right now.
I’ve admitted it which alleviates part of the problem, but fixing it is another story. Honestly, I don’t think I’m ready to fix it but I’m sure the people around me, those who know me the best, wish I would hurry up and get over it.
I am a people pleaser by nature which often results in becoming a human doormat and at some point in time the last few weeks I decided that I no longer wished to be a doormat.
I’ll admit full responsibility when it comes to being a doormat. Someone asks, I do.
But now, I don’t want to be a doormat anymore and those who are used to wiping their feet on me and trampling all over me, don’t like it. Nor do those who have never treated me as a doormat because now, the “me” attitude that has overtaken my mentality is affecting all that are involved.
Friends, it’s not pretty.
At all.
I don’t like me right now. I don’t even want to be around myself, but my heart is so hard that I don’t even know what to do about it. Short of pray, and my prayers have been short, and less than enthusiastic.
And today, despite all the things that God was telling me during the service, I didn’t want to listen. It was if I was sticking my fingers in my spiritual ears and saying “la la la la la” as loud as I could.
In fact, I even refused communion, the first time since the 8th grade when I took my first communion that I have ever done that. But I believe in confessing before communion and I couldn’t bring myself to confess.
For the past six weeks, I’ve seen this coming on and for the past six weeks I have carried my sorry little butt up to the alter and confessed over and over again and have asked over and over again that He soften my heart, that He take these resentments that I seem to be harboring away and no sooner does service end, something else happens and I slip right back to the place that I have been trying so desperately to escape.
I’ve spent far too much time crying, an act that I believe is needed at times, but leaves me worthless when I’m done, and I’m just over it. Yet, I spent even more time crying today at church.
I’ve gotten to the point where I’ve lost faith. Not total faith. I still know that my God is a mighty God and that He can do the impossible, but I’ve lost faith that I will stop feeling this way anytime soon.
That frightens me. My “me” attitude frightens me. The passion that I once had that seems to bring more resentment now frightens me.
Yet, I don’t know what to do about it.
Rarely do I ever pull the “single mom” card but here of late, I’ve wanted to. I haven’t yet, but the desire to shout out to someone, “I’m a single mother and it’s only me and I can’t do that for you because I’m barely keeping my head above water right now as it is.” But when I respectfully decline offering my help to someone, because I physically CAN’T take on any more, I feel as if I’m letting someone down or as if I need to readjust my priorities.
And secretly, I wish, just once that someone would come to me and say, “Heather, I know that you’re really busy right now, is there anything that I can do to help?”
Knowing myself as well as I do, I would probably say no, my stubbornness getting in the way of ever allowing someone to help me, as if that would be admitting failure. But the joy of knowing that someone actually wanted to help me, just to be nice, would send me over the top, restoring the hope in humanity that at one point in time, I had.
And asking for help? I hate it, but I’ve done it. I’ve come to the conclusion, many times over, that I can’t do it all and that I HAVE to ask for help. And I do.
I know that people aren’t supposed to cater to my every whim or do things the way that I want them done. But communicating with me would be appreciated. When it involves me, it would be nice if someone would just keep me in the loop. And I’m so over people volunteering me for things. To agree to do it is an invitation to let someone down or fail and to decline makes me appear as if I don’t want to help.
So, this vicious cycle keeps going on in my head, and in my heart. And all the turmoil of emotions are like rocks tumbling around hardening the outside of my heart.
And I hate it.
Just verbalizing all of this in this post has helped some what, in being able to see just how angry I am, at no one thing or person in particular, but me.
And maybe all I need to do is forgive myself. Maybe all I need to tell myself that it’s okay to NOT want to be a doormat, but to learn to better appropriate my time and my efforts.
Maybe all I need to do is accept the fact that I don’t have to be everything to everyone and that it’s okay.
Maybe I need to sit down with God and talk about the current state of my head and heart.
I know that there’s a wonderful, beautiful heart buried down in there. I know there is. I’ve seen it. I’ve felt it. I’ve loved it.
And I want that heart back.
