Faith

Categories Faith, Health

Coming off the happy pills

1 Comment by

It was sometime last November that I realized I needed help. The day was Thursday–it was a day that seemed straight from hell. I woke up and went about my morning activities feeling more than a little off kilter. I ran into a wall, and tripped over my own feet on the way down the stairs. At 6:30, I left for work. My whole body felt tense and my reactions times were slow. I felt sure I was going to hit someone. I parked my car and began my walk into work. I clung tightly to my bag and stepped carefully, sure all the while that I would fall off the bridge and break my head open.

I made it to work, but I was strung so tightly I could have snapped any moment. My boss noticed my tenseness–but I couldn’t tell her what was going on–only that I seemed really paranoid that morning.

It took twice as long as it should have to prepare my assigned recipes because I kept having to search for my ingredients. I was into the walk-in three times before I found my spaghetti sauce ingredients–on the stack in the corner where they always are.

I rushed from work to class–ate my lunch in lecture. Forgot an apron for the cooking lab so I got points docked. Class got out early–I had two extra hours before I had to be at my next job. Usually I only had a half an hour.

I went home and took a nap–and even though I had set my alarm, I overslept. I was awakened by a call from a coworker. I was 45 minutes late to relieve him from his shift. I felt awful. The day kept running through my head until I finally got off at 9.

I got in my car and turned it towards home on autopilot. But I couldn’t go back to my house. I knew that if I did, I would crawl into it as if into a hole–and never come out again. Instead, I went to my parents house and spent the next two hours bawling.

That’s when I realized I needed help. The next day I cut my hours at the one job and gave up as many weekend shifts as I could at the other. And I set up an appointment with my physician assistant.

I came away from my appointment with a diagnosis of depression–most likely seasonal affective disorder–and a prescription for Zoloft. Within a week on the meds, I was coping much better.

This morning I took my last half pill of Zoloft. I’m going off the happy pill for the summer–maybe longer. I don’t know. The questions and judgments surrounding drug treatment of depression–and even the diagnosis of depression itself–rise in my mind once again. I had pushed them down, ignored them during the winter because I couldn’t afford to be philosophical–I needed the pill.

Now, when the sun start shining again and I can wake up without three alarms, when I have energy to carry out my daily activities, and even to dream and plan for the future–Now the demon reemerges to condemn me for my reliance on a drug to see me through. “Don’t you trust God? Can’t He heal you? Depression is all in your mind. It’s all your fault. You weren’t even really depressed–you just didn’t want to face the music. You’re a hypochondriac. You did it to yourself. And now you’re relying on a quick fix drug to ease your pain. How different are you really from someone who drowns his struggles in the bottle?”

Depression is a diagnosis that I’ve feared, hated, and gladly welcomed. Antidepressants are a cure I’ve despised, despaired over, and depended upon.

I fear that I’ll never have a winter of relief–that I’ll have to rely on my happy pills every year. I fear that it’ll extend–and I’ll always be depressed, not just in the winter. I fear that maybe the cause isn’t physiology–that maybe the problem is me. Maybe I just can’t cope, can’t manage. I fear that I’m deficient. I fear that depression is a sin–that all it means is that I’m not trusting God.

But the Bible says that perfect love casts out fear. Lord, may I bask in Your love. May I trust that Your arms will hold me fast even as the enemy attacks my mind with condemnation. “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.” I believe. Help me in my unbelief.

Categories Following Christ

Living Life Together

Leave a comment by

Almost everyone in my Life Group was out of town this weekend, so we canceled our meeting tonight. Instead, I joined another Life Group for the evening. After a bit of trouble finding the house (my fault for assuming that the street one block from 33rd would be 32nd!), I arrived just in time to begin.

I was welcomed warmly into the group–that was small that night because several of their members were also gone. It was myself, one of my good friends, our youth pastor and his wife, and another couple that I don’t know very well.

It was wonderful–I love that I belong to a church that opens their lives to one another. Our little “catchphrase” is “Living Life Together”–and that’s truly what occurs. Even though I didn’t “belong” to that group, I still belonged. I was welcomed. I was given the freedom to share, to cry, to pray. We chatted for quite a while afterward, informally. We talked about marathon running and the origins of the band “Black Sabbath” and teased about women always spending forever talking (while the men kept asking each other question after question after question.) After our youth pastor and his wife left, my friend and I could just chat on the couch for a while longer–our hosts didn’t mind.

We got to catch up on life–talk one on one. It seems we don’t get that too often anymore now that I’m not sponsoring at Z-360 with her any more. Now almost all our visiting time is with little siblings or quasi-siblings hanging around. Nothing like how we used to be able to chat while setting up the room for Wednesday night services. So it was nice to just enjoy conversation.

This is just one of the many things I love about my church–I love my own Life Group, but I love that I can drop by any other one and be with people who care for me and will pray for me. I love that I have a family and quasi-family within my church that “hangs out” all the time. I love that I have sisters like my friend who I can be real with. I love that I can share my heart with the body and know that they value and guard my heart.

That’s what the church is–it’s people, living together, together being conformed to the image of Christ. None of us individually can truly reflect the glory of God–but as we all live together in Christ, God begins to reveal Himself to, in, and through us.

Categories Faith

Wobbling off Center

2 Comments by

Have you ever had a slow leak in a tire of your car–one that you didn’t notice until it was a full-blown disaster? Have you ever worked really hard to finish a project–only to realize that you’d missed a vital piece of information about the assignment?

That’s sort of how I’ve been feeling lately. Like I’ve been going about my daily life, adjusted to the routine, not realizing how out of whack my life is becoming.

I’ve grown comfortable in my life as a “working woman, a lady of leisure”. I’ve enjoyed quilting and keeping my house clean and piddling with this hobby and that.

But a few weeks ago, something started niggling in my mind, “Something’s wrong. You’re wobbling. I think you might be a bit off-center.” And I was, but I couldn’t figure out how to get back on to center.

I was doing my devotions like normal. I was going to church. I was praying when I thought to. But I wasn’t practicing the presence of God. I wasn’t living with an awareness of His kingdom. I was just blah.

And I couldn’t seem to break it. I tried to conjure emotion and bring things onto center–and only got more depressed about being off center.

I started to ask people to pray for me–that I would desire God above all else, that I would be aware of His presence, just… I didn’t know what I wanted, but I wanted something to change. I didn’t want to just be doing–I wanted to be truly living.

At our disciplemaking class at church on Monday, we heard a speaker talk about Paul’s exclamation: “Yet indeed I count all things as loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ….that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death…”

We were speaking about the vision of a disciple-maker–and I had to say that I don’t feel that I have it. I don’t have that vision to know Christ and to make Him known. I want to have it. But I don’t have it. Vision is more than just words–it’s seeing. And when I walk throughout my day, I don’t have that vision “to know Christ and to make Him known” in front of my eyes. I just don’t. We prayed about it that evening.

I picked up a book at the library earlier that day on a whim–Tony Evans’s “Our God is Awesome.” I started reading Tuesday morning. The first chapter resonated with everything I’d been experiencing. Evans writes: “Knowing who HE is defines who WE are….To know God is to have Him rub off on you, to enter into relationship with God so that who He is influences who you are….The knowledge of God affects your self-interpretation….Unless the knowledge of God has changed you, you don’t know Him….Life can never be what it was intended to be for you or me unless that life consists of God’s life being lived out in us.

That was it. The dull ache, the sense that something was off balance, that somehow this wasn’t enough–this is what it was saying. Life isn’t LIFE until I’m walking in intimacy with Christ. And somehow, over the course of my leisurely semester off, I lost that intimacy with Christ. I was thirsty for relationship with Him–but I didn’t recognize the thirst for what it was–and I kept drinking other things.

Physically, I’ve been dehydrated for a long time–so much so that I experience blackouts because I don’t have enough blood volume to get oxygen to my brain. Since learning this in January, I’ve had to retrain myself in regard to my thirst cues. I had to learn to listen to them–and get something to drink when my body was thirsty. An orange isn’t sufficient. Gum might “wet my whistle” but it won’t make me more alive. The only thing that will solve my blackouts is water.

I’m coming to see that I’ve also become spiritually dehydrated–blacking out because I’m not receiving proper nourishment. But instead of recognizing the thirst and drinking from the fount of living water, I popped some gum and continued my day to day activities. And just like I’ve had to retrain myself to listen to and obey my thirst signals, I’m going to have to retrain myself to listen to and heed my spirit–that cries out for intimacy with Christ.

“I am thirsty.” I tell myself whenever I experience thirst. “I will get a drink by [insert reasonable amount of time to break away from my current activity].”

Yesterday and today, I’ve started to remind myself. “You are thirsty. You need to be in relationship with God.” I’ve been spending more time in the Word, singing worship songs during work, praying over things instead of worrying over them. But mostly, I’ve just started realizing that I’m thirsty–“I want to know [Christ] and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death…” I want to have God rub off on me, so that who He is influences who I am.

I may not be going much of anywhere quite yet–but I feel as though I’m coming back to center–back to Christ, who is the center of it all.

Categories Everyday Life, Faith

Miracle at the Department of Motor Vehicles

Leave a comment by

Today, I went to get Jack his new tags. The postcard from the DMV has been sitting on my desk, and then on my floor for over a month–and I realized yesterday that I had only two days to finish it out.

So I put “car registration” on my to-do list for today–and deliberately made the rest of the list short.

After all, a trip to the DMV generally takes about an hour–and the majority of that is spent between the ropes of the queue. I left by 10:15–cutting it a bit close, I thought, since I had a lunch date with my dad at 11:30.

But when I got to the DMV, I discovered that the line was…nonexistent. It took me about 15 seconds to pass through the empty ropes, and less than two minutes to get my registration updated–and that was with changing my address and not having my check already written!

It seems small to call it a miracle–but it wasn’t. It was a God-thing through and through. The lack of a line meant that I was able to drop by Wagey Drug and visit with a couple of friends who work there. It meant I was able to “run into” the mother and grandmother of a girl I went to Bible school with. I “chanced” upon a former coworker and was able to have a nice little conversation with her. And I got to my lunch date early–allowing me and my dad to enjoy a leisurely meal without having to cut off our conversation in the middle because I had to get to work!

Does God care about the little details of our lives? I’m convinced He does. Searching for a reason to worship God? Worship Him because He sees the big picture, but still takes the time to do detail work.

Categories Everyday Life, Faith

Taken as Tacit Approval?

Leave a comment by

Today at work, we had a luau–or more specifically, we assisted the HSS RA’s in hosting a luau. Staff were invited to wear a Hawaiian print or otherwise brightly colored outfit to work.

What I didn’t mention was why we (or more specifically, the HSS RA’s) were giving this luau. The luau was named the “Latex Luau”–it was a celebration of safe sex.

Those of you who know me, know that I am not at all a proponent of safe sex. In fact, I remember declaring in a conversation with a coworker during one of my first weeks on the job that “I’ll keep my vagina to myself, thank you very much.” The best way, and only way to practice “safe sex” is by abstaining from sex until a mutually monogamous relationship made permanent by a marriage license. Period.

So when two values clash–when I am offered a choice of wearing a brightly colored dress at work or wearing my uniform as a conscientious objector–which do I choose? I chose to wear my bright orange 70’s tropical print dress.

Me in Tropical Dress

And what I’m wondering is–have I compromised my values or weakened my testimony by wearing a dress that could be taken as tacit approval of the “safe sex” message?

Categories Faith

He believed God

Leave a comment by

Abram was something around 80 years old and childless when God told him he that his descendants would be as the stars of the sky. Abram’s wife, Sarai, was about 70. But Abram “believed in the Lord, and He (God) accounted it to him (Abram) for righteousness.” (Genesis 15:6) About 20 years passed before God made good on His promise. But He did.

There rests one of the hardest parts of the Christian walk–believing in the Lord. Can I take God at His word, even when life doesn’t seem to confirm that it’s true? Can I trust God when He takes twenty years to make good on His promise? Too often, I lose heart–focusing on the unfulfilled promise and asking God why.

A few months ago, I wrote this song about that struggle–and as a submission of faith. I believe You Lord, even when I don’t see. I am clay–have Your way. Speak Your word, I will obey.

I am clay: Please forgive the rudeness of this recording–there’s only so much I can do with my rudimentary recording tools here at home.

Categories Following Christ

MY Dance

Leave a comment by

Our pastor’s son, Brandon, mentioned to me a while back that his sister Ashley had been imitating me during worship. When I sat a bit further back than normal on Easter Sunday, I noticed this same phenomenon.

Ashley

I recognized the rhythms of her dance, the movement of her arms and hands. She was dancing my dance before the Lord.

It’s a great and awesome responsibility to be a role model for a young child. Jesus said “whoever causes one of these little ones to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea.” Little children are born imitators–when they imitate me, do they see a walk of uprightness or do they stumble because of me?

It’s a sobering thought. Ashley watches and imitates every sway of my arms, every swish of my hips. She imitates me as I bow or kneel. When I twirl, so does she. So what does she learn as she imitates me?

Does she learn the greatness and worthiness of God as she imitates my worship? Does she see His love as we dance together? Does she follow a life of devotion to the King? Or does she see exhibition, inhibition, or insincerity? Do I put a stumbling block in the way of my little imitator, or am I letting this little one come unto Christ?

Lord, grant that I, like Paul, could say “Imitate me, as I imitate Christ.”

Categories Faith

Desires of my heart

Leave a comment by

I have often wished that I did not have so many great desires. For had I fewer and lesser desires, I should be less pained when I am called to lay them aside for Christ.

If food did not so interest me, if I did not so much enjoy comfort, if I did not so much long for recognition. If this world did not so much enchant me, the breaking of the spell should leave more of myself intact.

And such is the problem–not my desires but the thing that both produces them and is sustained by them. I am the problem and all my desires are small compared to the desire for self-preservation. Self-love induces me to beg for things for myself–and that, at least, if they must be taken, I might remain.

But that is exactly opposite what Christ has come to do. He has not come to make me an ascetic–free from all but myself–but to make me nonexistent. His dream is not that I HAVE less but that I BE less–in the sense that every jot of identity that I hold of my own and apart from Him is completely and utterly destroyed.

Thus is my struggle. Even in denying itself, my flesh seeks to save itself. If the bewitched self should be destroyed, surely a more noble self remains.

O what folly I am consumed by–to think that something worthwhile dwells in me. For in me dwells no good thing. My righteousness is as filthy rags. Every thought and intention of my heart is evil.

Lord, I do not want You to destroy myself, but please do. I do not want my desires to be denied, but let them be. I do not want to be cut away, but I desire that You would be shown a great. So I bow this clay to the Potter’s hand and only beg that in my place You leave Your image.

Categories Faith, Reflections

Rethinking Gothard

Leave a comment by

Occasionally, I have epiphanies–not regularly, but not infrequently either. Sometimes they excite, sometimes they challenge, and sometimes I don’t know what to think. Today’s epiphany fall squarely in that last category.

I read something that describe Bill Gothard as a cultist and, on a whim, Googled “Bill Gothard” and “Cult”. I didn’t really agree with all the stuff I skimmed, but I did start to remember some of the stuff I heard at the Basic and Advanced Life Seminar. About how milk and meat shouldn’t be eaten together, and how a man shouldn’t sleep with his wife for seven days after her period ends. I thought of how Proverbs seemed to be the basis for about everything–and I realized that something was missing.

And the epiphany–“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.” Matthew 23:15

For years I knew I disagreed with some of what Bill Gothard said, but since I also agreed with some of it, I considered him to be okay. Now I wonder. How different is Bill Gothard than the scribes and Pharisees who were so interested in all their little rules that they missed the Savior standing right in front of their noses? Bill stands and gives tons of “princibles” from the “Sc’iptures” as to why we should not listen to rock music, not eat meat with milk, have sex in certain ways. He teaches all about authority and foolishness and discipline. He speaks of family planning and courtship models. But one thing I don’t remember him teaching on is the gospel, or the character of God.

The Scriptures are not a set of “rules” or even “principles” by which to live. They are a testimony of Christ. In John 5:39, Jesus says, “You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me.” But what is the one thing that for all of his Scripture quotations Bill Gothard fails to talk about? He fails to speak about Jesus Christ.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay the tithe of mint and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law.” Matthew 23:23

Categories Faith, Rants, Relationships

On Singleness as a Calling

1 Comment by

The month has arrived and, as usual, I am well on my way to becoming in a high dudgeon over something or the other.

The month, of course, is February–or in Z-360 speak–the “love month.” And as usually happens, coverage of the “love issue” isn’t as comprehensive or balanced as I think it ought to be.

For instance, what compels happily married people to declare to a group of single teenagers that God has the perfect mate out there for them? Says who? Where do you find a promise of a mate in Scripture? I’ve never found one. And sorry, but I don’t think the “desires of your heart” can be taken as a definitive promise of a spouse. It’s just not there. Statements like that do little except create disillusioned single adults who think that somehow God is holding out on them.

But bringing that up only creates another morass of indignation within me. For the response to my assertion will be–“I’m sorry, that statement is not correct. God does call some people to never marry.” Talk about opening another can of worms!

I do believe that God does call some people to never marry–to remain celibate. But more than that, I believe that God calls many people–all people, in fact–to be single for at least a portion of their life. And I believe that this call of singleness should be regarded highly, as a call in and of itself.

Singleness is not a waiting room for marriage–a place where every event brings you closer to the blessed appointment. Instead, singleness is a calling in its own right–even if it is followed by marriage! Take the example of my former pastor as an illustration. Pastor Rodney Hinrichs received a call from God to become a pastor many years ago. He went to seminary and pastored in a number of locations before coming to Lincoln, NE, where he pastored Rejoice in the Lord Church–the church I grew up in. When I was still in my pre-teens, Pastor Rodney and his wife Malinda felt a call of God into the mission field. They took on that call and Rodney stepped down as Pastor of Rejoice. Currently, they minister in Africa, India, and around the world.

Now tell me, was Rodney not called to be a pastor, since he was called into missions later? Did he not hear God clearly when he heard the call to pastoring? After all, that wasn’t the calling he ended up with. To say that Rodney was not called to be a pastor just because God later called him out of the pastorate and into missions is preposterous. Likewise, to say that singleness is not a calling unless it is lifelong is preposterous. Just because God may call a person out of singleness into marriage does not mean that they were not called to singleness in the first place.

Some of you may now be thinking that I’m going off the deep end–making a mountain out of a molehill. Surely it’s not that big of an issue whether singleness (even for only a period of time) is seen as a calling or not.

I contend that it is a big issue. It is a big issue because it effects our view of and value for the vast and growing single population within the church. If, in general, people are called either to be single for the rest of their lives or to be married, the singles can be one of two things–either they are “lifers” or they are “waiting”. The “lifers” we view with awe–How on earth could they do such a thing?–while the “waiting” we regard with pity–How sad that they haven’t found anyone yet. In both scenarios, these men and women are defined by their lack of a mate.

The “lifers”, having ruled out marriage as their calling in life, are now free to pursue what their real calling and place might be–without regard to marital status. They may explore what profession, what ministry they fit into–the purpose for which God has called them to singleness.

The “waiting”, on the other hand, have only one charge–anticipation and preparation for the day when their status will change. These single persons are given one singular mission–finding a mate. Little thought is given to ascertaining the purpose for which they are single. Instead, their current single state is seen only as a speed-bump or a detour on the path to marriage. So rather than seeking God for His will today in their singleness, the “waiting” population seeks to prepare themselves for the possibility of a mate, and to pursue the procurement of a mate. And when the mate does not materialize, the “waiting” are forgotten, discarded, an unhappy reminder that sometimes God’s plan doesn’t always fit the fairy tales we’ve created.

Why is it so important that we begin to see singleness as a calling–even if it is not a permanent one? Because until we see singleness as a precious, although perhaps seasonal calling, we will continue to marginalize the precious single people in our midst. Until we see singleness as a gift from God–even for those who eventually end up married, we will continue to waste precious years of our lives–years that could have been productive, but were lost, pining for a different calling.