Button-pushing, Strongholds and Love



Ever had a time when some of your biggest fears seem to be prodded almost daily? Ever been confronted with an aspect of your character that you didn't like, swear to change it then find that daily, you fall down in that particular area?

If you're human then, at some point in your life, you will have experienced one or both of these cirumstances.
Why do these things happen, especially if you're trying so hard to overcome that fear, making every effort to knock that bad attitude on the head? It can wear a body down and, if you're not careful, you can find yourself just saying "oh well, it's me. I can't change. It's just too hard. You can even feel like stamping your feet and saying "it's not fair!". Go on, be honest now.

 One of my great fears is rejection. I feel sick when I think people don't like me and, as I've touched on in previous posts, I'm a bit of a people-pleaser. Common sense tells me this is from my own insecurities but knowing that doesn't actually change anything. In the last seven days, I've come up against real and perceived rejection. It's hurt and angered me.

These experiences have caused me to now confront something unpleasant in my character.It's the old "tit for tat" attitude. If you hurt me by rejecting me then I'm going to behave this way (withdraw from you emotionally and sometimes physically or go on the attack and either be upfront rude or mutter under my breath or to others). I agree, it's pretty infantile behaviour really and not how a supposedly mature Christian should act. I should add here that "mature" is said tongue-in-cheek. I may have been a Christian for 30+ years but I act as though I have all the understanding of a newborn (I actually think most newborns are ahead of me really).

I've been pondering this, inbetween my mood swings of sadness at the rejection then anger at the "perpetrators", and have had some thoughts in the following order :

1. Early in the week and even up to this morning - It's the devil's fault. He knows I want to press on in God this year. He knows I want to see radical change in my life so he's chosen one of my key areas and decided to start punching that button, all the while laughing at my lack of faith whilst I boo-hoo to myself about being rejected. He must be chuckling away as I do some of his job for him in ignoring some people, whispering about people (me, who hates gossip, supposedly!). So I've thought about spiritual warfare, how might I fight him, how I need to plead for God to get him off my case so I can continue my walk in peace and harmony.
2. In the last hour or so (I like to keep things current) - If I've been praying for God to change my heart and draw me closer to Him, won't God want me to face these things - fear of rejection, the angry attitude and selfish behaviour? God spoke to me earlier this year (see my previous post) and told me that this year would be about strongholds and their removal. Well, fear plays a big part in my life and drives quite a bit of what comes out of my mouth, how  I act and also what I don't say and don't do.Fear of rejection is one of the strongest fears I have. Wouldn't God, in His love, want to tear that stronghold down in my life? So who is responsible for these circumstances? I'm not going to say God because I don't think He makes people reject us or make us think we are being rejected even when we aren't. I do, however, believe He will make use of such events in our lives for His own purpose.

So my conclusion is, if you have recently been praying for God to move in your life, to change you and make you more like Jesus, to being you closer to your Father where you can experience more of His love and fall in love with Him yourself, don't be surprised if things get tough suddenly. I think God is answering your prayer because He takes what you say seriously (sadly sometimes what we pray about, we're not actually that serious about).

So, thanks to a good friend, I've been reminded of Romans 8: 38-39. "38 And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[a] neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. 39 No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord."

If I feel I'm being rejected I need to use what God has so generously given to me, His Word, and pray it over myself, declare it aloud and, most importantly, BELIEVE IT! It's pointless spouting this stuff unless there is belief that it's true and, if that's the case, then pray God will help you to believe it. I will be doing that for myself because it's easy to believe it for others but not for one's self - such an error.

God's love is such that He isn't out to trip us up but that, in the confronting of the attitude, the fear, there would come understanding, repentance if required, forgiveness, healing and release. It can happen.

I write this post as much for myself as for anyone who might read it. I can be very slow-witted when it comes to God, His love for me, the promise of His Word.  So, in putting this in print, I want to reinforce the message that God does answer our prayers for change but, in doing so, He may have to take us out of a comfort zone and make us uncomfortable so He can bring about that change we long for.

Hold on, keep going, persevere.I'm running with you. Let's press on.

Philippians 1:6

"being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus."

"It's good to talk!"



If you are from the UK, you will recognize this as being the strap line for BT (British Telecoms) and Bob Hoskins, an famous actor, used to speak this line at the end of the televised advert.

So why am I blogging about this?

It started a few weeks back. A loved one and I just seemed to be guessing what was going on in the other's life. Because we didn't want to upset the other, we stopped talking. No, I don't mean cease all communication. I mean we stopped talking about the things that matter to us. We would talk about the news, the weather, the shopping but not about what was going on inside of us. In particular, I was worrying about a number of issues including Christmas, whether I could invite my family for Christmas Day lunch, financial worries and bills to be paid, a sweet young family member's recent trauma and, finally, relationship issues, all of which were tormenting me. I grew very distant and this made my loved one very concerned. When asked what was wrong, I would just deny anything was wrong then carry on moping around the house or the office.

So not only was I increasing the worry of this family member but I was also isolating myself and increasing my stress levels too. I was feeling increasingly swamped by these worries. Did I pray about them?
Nope, God got shut out too. When I close down, I shut everyone out, close friends, God, family, work colleagues.

Who exactly was being helped by this, by my shutting down? No-one!
No-one was benefitting from my largesse to "not burden people with my problems". Instead it seemed far better to burden them with my silence, my hangdog expression and the cloud that grew bigger over my head (yes, this is sarcasm).

Finally, after much prodding and poking and, nearly 3 weeks later, I opened up. It wasn't done in a relieved way but rather resentfully, as though people had intruded on my personal pity party which, if I'm totally honest, this had now become. I had gone from having genuine worries to allowing this to escalate into a "Oh poor me, the world hates me and it's all so unfair" fest of self-pity.

But, fortunately for me, the one listening to me understood what was going on and let me rumble on then, when I had finished, proceeded to go through my worries, one by one, addressing them with either a solution or atleast putting them into some perspective.

The following day, I felt lighter in my being, I was relieved and could actually smile again. I realised that, had I just talked to my beloved, to a friend, to God, to someone, it would have helped, not necessarily with the actual issues but to atleast talk about it and get it off my chest, so to speak. This is how women tend to process things in their lives, through conversation.

Now with men, it seems slightly different. They don't necessarily want to talk through problems, they prefer to ponder it themselves, coming up with a solution in time (I realise this could be a crass generalization but I'm going by all the chaps I've either spent time with (father, husband, stepson, work colleagues) or heard about from friends (their husbands, fathers etc etc).

But even when this is the case, when my husband worries about things, he generally stops communicating with me. This puts a strain on the relationship and I can start imagining things that aren't there because we aren't talking. When we have finally touched on what is going on with him, the air is cleared and, whilst the problem may still exist, the relationship itself is restored because there is finally understanding as to what is going on and what support can be given.

In a worst case scenario, problems can spiral out of hand when communication ceases between people, be they husbands and wives, employee and employer, friends, relatives.
Communication is essential.

It's the same with God. I think we get hung up on prayer sometimes because we think of it as "PRAYER", this lofty subject in capital letters which is breathed in hushed reverant tones and that only special people can really master. To employ a quaint English exclamation, poppycock!

Prayer is talking to God. In the same was that our conversations vary with different people and in different circumstances, there are times when we will be reverant in our conversations with God as we address His Majesty, as King and Master of the universe. But then other times we can talk stutteringly, in between sobs, as we pour out our sorrows to Daddy in Heaven. Yet other times we will speak to Him with great excitement, loudly even boisterously as we either praise Him or thank Him for Himself, for answered prayer or in praying for people or events. But, like I did recently, we can forget that God wants relationship with us and that includes all the crappy parts of our lives so stopping talking to Him because we don't want to bother Him is a bit pathetic, to be honest. He is the one Person who will never judge us, will never hold any of what we say against us and will give us His appropriate response - correction, comfort, knowledge, wisdom, boldness, encouragement, sometimes even silence when it's what we need.

This is what a relationship is. It's the hard times as well as the good times. A truly great relationship is found when you can talk about all the aspects of your life and know that the person you are sharing this with will keep it private when the topic requires it, will honour the trust you are placing in them and will try to help when they can.

I have realised that I need to talk to God more. I get very caught up in other things, some of which are equally important but can stop me from doing that one thing that I need to do above all others, communicate daily with my Father, share with Him all the aspects of my life, my sins, my worries, my happiness, everything. I want to grow in my relationship with God, I want to talk to Him more and open up to Him so He can do more in my life, share His thoughts with me and change me from the inside out. This will happen, can't help but happen, if I communicate with, talk to Him daily.

My name is not Marah.

I keep tabs on a church website where I find out what they've been preaching on. I noticed they seemed to be going through the book of Ruth. In fact, in the last month, I have noticed that the book of Ruth has come up again and again from other sources. I was reading an article which talked about the story of Ruth, then today, as I was looking at God TV's website, I noticed a "watch now" conference by Nancy Goudie, a great woman and one who's conferences for women I've attended in the past.
Guess what she was speaking on? Yup, Ruth.

After a while, you have to say "Lord, is this coincidence or are You trying to get my attention?"

Well, no question about it, today God most certainly wanted to speak to me through the book of Ruth and the topic? Well, He wanted to speak about bitterness and how it can maim us if we let it.

I decided to listen to the first part of the series on Ruth from the church website. The passage was Ruth chapter 1 v1-18.
Having read it, along with the preacher, he then spoke about how some women have been at the mercy of poor decisions made by men. As with Naomi, who's husband decided to take them into Moab.

Basics of this tale is that Elimelech ( means "God is my king") decided to move the family to Moab because of a lack of food. However, God had previously said that the Jews were to have nothing to do with the Moabites so why on earth would He tell Elimelech to move there? That's the point, God didn't. What did God have against the Moabites? Well, that nation of people were a result of an incestuous relationship between Lot and his oldest daughter and the sin was never expunged. The Moabites remained at war with the Jewish nation for most of the Old Testament.

So, back to the book, the husband takes a decision without seeking God and the result is that Naomi is finally left in a strange land, no husband, no sons and no means of support. I thought about how I would feel if I was Naomi and let me tell you, I would have been be deeply, deeply unhappy! I think I would have been pretty bitter, bitter with my now dead husband, bitter with my now dead sons who failed to move back to Judah but, instead married Moabite women and continued to dwell in Moab. I would have felt pretty aggrieved at God too, if I'm honest. After all, wasn't my husband, Elimelech, meant to be God's man, a faithful follower and the protector of my family? Think about it now.

Naomi decides, having heard that God is blessing Judah with food and crops again, its time to go back to her land. It's a risk because she still has no husband and no sons to take care of her so she is alone, an unenviable position for a woman. She fully expects her daughters-in-law to stay with their people, the Moabites, and remarry.
Initially that's not the case but Naomi tells them not to be daft and, amidst tears, Orpah leaves. Ruth, however, pleads with Naomi not to send her away but pledges to go anywhere with Ruth and adopt her Jewish roots and her God as her own. Orpah, rightly or wrongly, has turned back to the old ways of her people. Ruth elects to unite herself to an unknown future with Naomi, her mother-in-law.

It'd be very easy at this point to make an example of Orpah and say how awful she was for doing that but, faced with the same situation, would you go back to what you know, to what is safe, or would you decide to gamble it all on a future in an unknown land with an unknown God worshipped by a people  your own relatives have been at war with for ages? Think carefully now before you answer.

So what am I learning from this? It's pretty desperate for Naomi, she lost everything important to her in Moab. Things could have stayed right there, a bad place for Naomi. She could have remained bitter, she could have remained in Moab.
However, she takes a step out of it. She hears how things are in Judah, there are crops again, the favour of the Lord is there. She makes the decision not to stay where she is but to go back to Judah, to go back to where God is blessing His people. But God isn't waiting in Judah for Naomi, I believe He was right there, waiting for her to make the decision to come home and, when she does, God moves Ruth's heart in such a way that Naomi will not have to travel alone but is given a companion for the trip and for life (Ruth means friend"). God, the ever eager Father, leaps in straight away with a gift of companionship for Naomi.He is also laying the path on which His Son will arrive on earth later to free us all.

The preacher spoke eloquently on this passage and ended it with prayer for women who had been either hurt or affected by a man's poor decision or choice. He urged the ladies to forgive. It's at this point I began to cry because I realised that I have been "marah", Hebrew for bitter. I have experienced great hurt at the decisions of more than one man and have held bitterness in my heart for a long time. It's possible to love these people but to still harbour anger against them. I also realised that I still hold God responsible for those bad decisions that those men have made which affected me.

But I had a choice, like Naomi. I decided to think about where God is now. God is where He has always been, right beside me and ready to show me love, healing, forgiveness. What's more, He won't just remove the bad stuff like the bitterness but He also fills me with His grace and His joy. Who would think of feeling joy when all you've felt is pain and desolation when considering those decisions and the results? To suggest it sounds like a dismissal of the pain felt but that's not the case. Like Naomi, we all have to make a choice - will we stay where we are, where there is bitterness, lack of forgiveness, hurt and anger or will we turn back to God, extend forgiveness to those who hurt us, give up our rags of bitterness and anger and instead look to God for that friendship, that relationship that will bring us joy, even in the midst of troubles, where God will meet our needs as He sees them?

So I prayed where I was, hands raised and tears streaming down my face, sobs wracking my body as I thought of the things that I am bitter about, the decisions that have caused me pain and left me with scars and I turned it all over to God. I know there will be times I will be tempted to take them back, a fit of pique or anger, a fresh wound maybe. The reason I am writing this post is so that I can be accountable to my readers (if there are any actually) and also to my own written testimony. I have forgiven people, realising there may be more brought to mind before the day is ended, and released them to a place where God can speak to them, to pour out His mercy where I feel it's necessary, so that I also can be in a place where God can speak to me, where my bitterness will  no longer make me deaf to God's voice.

I won't say I'm bouncing up and down with joy, inane grin on my face and singing "Jesus wants me for a sunbeam". It would be great if I was but I choose to believe that God is giving me that joy and freedom and that my emotions will, at some point, come into line with the truth of what God has done and is continuing to do in my heart since I prayed those prayers.

God loves me. I am His child. He is healing me, making me whole. He has amazing plans for my life and will share those plans with me as I spend time with Him, deepening that relationship with Him and His Son, Jesus Christ. God's plan doesn't include being dominated by fear, guilt, anger, unforgiveness because of the actions of another. I am free. This is about freedom to go back to God and enjoy communion with him again.


My name is no longer Marah.

When the chips are down, pray!

Where did anyone get the daft impression that, the minute you decide to believe that Jesus is the Son of God and you hand over the reins of control to Him, your life is going to be peachy keen without a worry in the world?

Jesus never promised that life would be easy being a believer in Him and the Father Almighty. In fact, he said the world would hate us for our beliefs. How's that for a marketing angle! Somehow Saatchi and Saatchi would never have used that tagline had they been brought in to promote Christianity as a new religion.

So having set that line of thinking out first, I feel I can now continue with my post.

It's fair to say that the month of November has brought several challenges for me. Firstly a devastating piece of family news which I referred to in my previous blog. On top of that, my husband has been stressed beyond measure with his job which has had a knock-on effect on our marriage. I also managed to damage myself during my keep-fit class which resulted in me being on crutches for a week and no exercise for the last 6 weeks. Yup, it's been pretty shocking.

It's very easy to get caught up in one's own issues but then I had email and twitter exchanges with a dear friend of mine and it turned out she too was suffering from various physical, emotional and relational issues. We compared war stories. Actually that is exactly it  - they are war stories.

Let's not forget, the devil is no admirer of people who have given God free rein in their lives so he is out to get us - big time! There's a couple of well known (and well worn) verses in 1 Peter 5 " 8 Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. 9 Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings. " Now I'm not saying that every single bad thing is directly from the devil. That is crazy. Life is messy - fact! We have consequences of sin, be it selfish choices on a personal, corporate or national level.We live in a broken world so some of the difficulties we experience are just the result of living but other times, you get to realise that some things just aren't a coincidence.

As my friend and I talked, we put two and two together and the figure kept coming up as four. We pieced sequences of events together, looked at breakthroughs we'd been experiencing, noted prayers we'd made and it just fit.

So we agreed to cover each other with prayer, to pray for each other, for our husbands & marriages, for our families.

It was amazing how quickly the atmosphere changed for both of us personally. We both felt a surge of faith. No, our circumstances did not improve immediately and some of those things we discussed are still very tough. But what changed first was our faith in God, we began to encourage one another to believe that our God is for us, not against us. Our prayers became focused and no longer by rote (which, if we are honest, can happen from time to time). We began to get words and pictures for each other, words of encouragement, pictures which either encouraged or gave direction on how to pray more effectively for these events which were troubling us.

We are walking in this season at the moment. I feel so grateful that God loves me so much that, in the midst of many troubles, He would have provided me with such a friendship that I could share my heart, my sorrows and troubles, that my friend could do the same and that we would be able to stand together before Christ and petition Him for help and grace to deal with these issues.

So the point of this post is to say do not lose sight of the value of prayer with others. There is something amazing that happens when two or more people start to agree in prayer and invite God's Spirit to get involved. God loves to hear such prayers. He is a loving Father, He wants so much to be a part of our lives and for us to turn to Him when times are tough.

If you have a friend or relative who believes in God and whom you trust, if life is getting on top of you, don't be shy, let them in then agree to pray about it together. The power of praying together is amazing. Jesus even encouraged it.

Matthew 18:19

"Again, I tell you that if two on earth

agree about anything you ask for,

It will be done for you by My Father

in Heaven".

Driving

I've just got back from an weekly exercise class. I drive there and back every Tuesday.

To be honest, I don't really think about it. I just jump in the car and go.

When class is over, I take the long route home to give me time to wind down, feel the wind in my hair because I'm usually so hot from the exertions.

On the way home tonight, as I listened to music, I heard clearly "honour God in your driving".

"What?!" I thought. No, seriously I can't have heard right, I must be imagining things. But I heard it again, quietly in my spirit, "Honour God in your driving".

Now I should explain that I love driving but I'm not the world's most patient driver. I have a tendancy to speed and lose my temper frequently with other road users. Infact, I am the epitomy of a "road rage" driver.
If I let someone out at a junction and they don't thank me, they have a tirade of abuse and sometimes, depending on the mood I'm in, some hand gestures that aren't included in the Highway Code. I'm not sure where this rage comes from but as far as I'm concerned, I get behind the wheel of a car and yes, I do own the road!!!

Now that may sounds funny but, thinking about it, how Christ-like is it?  Trust me when I say, I'm not being all super-spiritual here, this is actually hitting me in an area where it hurts. I love my assertive driving (my husband calls it aggressive!). I think I get a bit of a buzz from being out there, driving with purpose and holding my own in the traffic. No-one gets the better of me when I'm in a car.
But I re-iterate, is it Christ-like behaviour?

Obviously the answer is no. But I'm thinking how on earth am I going to change my attitude on this one?
Well, first stop is pray about it. If it is the Spirit I heard, and I believe it was, then I need to ask for God's help with this. I also need to remember I am probably not going to change overnight (it would be terrific if I could but largely God allows us to fail sometimes, I believe, so that we are put into a position of relying on His strength to see us through, thereby giving Him the glory for any changes made.
So I need to ask forgiveness regularly and not beat myself up about failings.

Why has God chosen to pick on my driving? Not entirely sure when there is a whole catalogue of things He could choose from but the fact is, this obviously is an area He wants to work on in me. I think its more my attitude rather than driving style (although I'm sure He is also keen for me to stop breaking the speed limits).

It puzzles me but maybe, in challenging me in this area, God is beginning a work that could lead to progression in other areas. I'm not really thrilled about it, if I'm honest, but I have been praying that God would change my heart so, guess what, prayer being answered me thinks!!
I'll keep you posted.