10 Leadership Lessons...so far - #3: Giving Thanks in the Breaking

While I was in leadership, there was a Friday that I had carved out for prayer. There were so many things that were heavy on my mind and heart, and I needed to be intentional about taking everything to Christ.

This is a discipline that has been instilled in me as a leader and became a critical life line for me for sanity, solace, and even creativity. Choosing to take time as a leader that is a follower of Christ, and make that time for sitting with God in prayer, offers profound dividends. I have found for some of my other friends in leadership that it can be hard to do this. I believe many of us already talk to God all day long whispering heart praises, prayers erupting over circumstances and sights, and prayers intentionally spoken over needs and His response to those needs. Pausing to refocus on Him through a time that is specific for prayer takes on a whole new color of talking to Him as you walk along. It holds an even heavier weight when people follow you as you do that walking.
 

Prayer time became essential for me as a servant-leader to be able to come back to the heart of the work I was tasked by God to do in that season. It was easy to get distracted and lose my center or true-north. That time also became a place for Christ to call me back to the central truth that He is able to do immeasurably more than all I could ask or imagine if I would simply come to Him. I had a lot I was asking and imagining, so specific prayer time became my place with Jesus to pour out and be poured into. That time deeply affected my leadership and my connection to Him in those places of leading and serving. That is still true for me today.

Back to this one particular Friday...I sat down to offer Him everything. I had so much I wanted to say and that I needed. My people needed a lot too. We had growth needs, financial needs, staffing needs, and so on. Big stuff for any team and organization. But my spirit felt like if I rushed head long into the "ask," there was something I was going to miss about being with God. I felt compelled to truly thank Him first. God calls us in Philippians 4:6 to come to Him in prayer with all of our requests and personal needs, but to do it with thanksgiving. I believe that giving thanks resets our minds to what He has already accomplished and drives our hearts to a different kind of prayer and asking when we see how much He has already done. That truth was calling out to me, so I began to pray and thank Him. He had given us such a feast of abundance (Ps. 36:8). It was like a table full of plates. My reality looked like a Thanksgiving feast!

When I have prayer time I sometimes draw out my prayers. I am not artist, so it's really more words and simple shapes. I drew a table with plates and filled them in with words that expressed all that He had given me and our staff. There were things about people, provisions, relationships, new paths and new unity and so on. All things that had profoundly affected me, the team, and how we served together. All of it came from His hand. It was so rich to stop and thank Him! I could see God and praise Him! He had called me to gratitude first and I found Him to be so near and generous. He is good!

Honestly, I almost felt guilty that I had anything to bring Him and ask Him for. He had been so amazing and had done what only He could do. Yet I knew that not only had I been invited come to Him in prayer, but I had been invited to ask. Philippians 4:6 is housed in a section of scripture that are on the rigors of ministry. People, needs, conflict, hearts that are torn, minds that need reframing, a hunger for the nearness of God: those are all ministry or leadership needs. Many of those things were making my own list. I came to God, trusting that He was near and that He was eager and willing to answers my prayer just like I had seen Him do in the past. I looked out over the landscape of my needs and it felt like the story with Christ and the 5000 (Jn. 6:1-15). He was there teaching and the multitude became very needy; needy in a practical way. They were hungry. How often I felt like the disciples wondering how in the world I was going to meet the vast and varied needs of so many people. Sometimes the needs of leadership or ministry can feel like 5000 people getting hungry all at once. I ran to Jesus with all of my practical solutions, most of which, like the disciples, met no real needs at all and only disconnected people from Jesus. (Remember the disciples suggested sending them away?) In the same stroke of my prayerful pen, I told Jesus that I also felt like the boy that Andrew brought to Jesus. (Andrew was always so faithful to bring people to Jesus and then see what Jesus could do.) The boy stood and offered to Jesus what he had with everyone wondering how far it would go in the neediness of the people being served by Christ's ministry.

I had so little to offer for such needs and demands. None of it could compare to that feast of abundance that came from Christ's hands that we had celebrated earlier. Knowing that all that I have comes from His hands, I simply asked if I could tell Jesus about my five loaves and two fish. I expressed to Him all that I was bringing that might help the needs I was prayerfully identifying with Him. I had spiritual loaves, practical loaves, emotional loaves, experience loaves, and gifted fish. It wasn't in pride that I offered these things. I was terrified of that as I laid them in front of Jesus. I simply was there and knew I was partcipating in the neediness of my people and had something to offer, however little it was.

What God opened my eyes to was His hands. His hands had prepared and provided the feast of abundance. His hands had given me my daily bread as an individual and as a leader. His hands had given me my loaves and fish to offer back to Him. In the miracle of feeding the 5000 the multiplying of the loaves and fish happened in His hands. It was in the giving of thanks and then the breaking of what was offered that all the needs were met. Loaves and fish have to be broken to be shared and multiplied. The multiplication and the meeting of the needs happened in His hands.

Jesus offers the feast. He can easily feed the 5000. I must, like Christ, give thanks in the breaking. He would break every single thing I would offer in order to multiply it. I looked at my loaves and fish, the ones He had given me from His hand, and I could see the breaking. As I led and served there were places of spiritual breaking, situations where my practical suggestions were being broken. Emotionally I had seen fractures, and my experience was cracking in the midst of exponential development work. Breaking is not always bad or negative, but breaking is not necessarily easy. I was having to be broken, humbled, sacrificial, open-minded beyond my preferences and views, generous, silent, vocal, part of a team, accepting, patient in waiting, and a servant in change and newness. That's just a taste of the breaking. But God could use it to bring about something filling and glorious if I would put it all in His hands.

I sat prayerfully before the Lord and saw Him point out all the areas of breaking. He showed me that it was His hands that were doing the breaking. Not mine or anyone else's. There was no "fault" to identify in the breaking, only humble glorying that a God so good could cause such a breaking that it would multiply instead of disintegrate. How gentle and miraculous! I was drawn to thank Him for breaking what He had given me, trusting that He would meet whatever needs as He saw best to His glory through what little I offered.

Being broken by His hands. Thanks in the breaking.

Fortunately, thanks in the breaking doesn't come without a promise. He promises that He will give us everything that we need at all times (2 Cor 9:8) and that He has given us everything we need to live godly, fruitful lives (2 Pet. 1:3-9). Both of those promises are sealed in the grace that comes through Christ, the One Who was broken for me. All, everything, abundant, Jesus. So, instead of relying on my fish and loaves, even though they are part of my daily provision from Him, I must rely on the God of the feast, the God of abundance, the God of the humble and needy, the God of those being served and those serving in ministry, the God Who allowed His own Son to be broken to multiply grace, life, and sonship. I must trust Him to multiply in His hands what He has given me, miraculously, to His glory. They become in His hands a part of His miracle of provision, focusing everyone in need on Christ and His ability to meet our needs. My fish and loaves disappear in the miraculous abundance of His hands. God will gloriously match His promises of all, everything, and abundant. With some leftover!

Being broken in His hands was not an easy lesson in leadership. It is easy to recognize in the midst of need how little we can offer. It's harder to realize He wants to break us to bring His glory. His lesson for me that day in prayer was how much His hands have already done and can do when I place myself and what He has given me in them, then give thanks, and prepare to be broken.

As a leader, what are you trying to offer that you recognize is simply not enough to meet the need? Do you see areas where you are "breaking"? Would you be willing to explore with Him the needs and your loaves and fish? Would you be willing to give thanks in the breaking knowing that God has promised to give all, everything, abundance? Would you look for how He plans to use you to bring Him glory? Will you trust Him to provide not just enough to fill, but enough with leftovers?

Thanks in the breaking.

Just another seed of my faith,

Ginny

10 Leadership Lessons...so far - #2 People ARE the priority

As a person, I am a "people person." I love to be able to have long conversations, deep discussions, time together. I love relationships. I truly love people! I am energized by people! I am a "shepherd" that deeply enjoys moving with, guiding, and caring for people.

As a leader, I must also admit I really love a good box checked. I'm an achiever. I have a list, things that are priority and important. That list drives work and results and people to great things. When I get to check something off my list, I feel a true sense of accomplishment. A full list checked off? Well that's exhilarating! And then I start a new list.

The reality of great leadership is that it's all about people. I can have top priorities, grand vision, SMART goals, and a personal hard work ethic that produces results, but none of that will work without people. And more over, if the tasks and results are all I truly focus on, I will identify great people to get the job done, use those people, alienate those people, hurt those people, and lose those people. And my results? They will fall short because it takes people to make those results happen.

What I learned in leadership is that while I am a people person, my pride loves tasks. I feel a sense of accomplishment, I get things done, I see goals met and exceeded. It's about me. What Christ has called me to as a leader is to be about others. That smashes my pride. In each phase of new leadership, I have felt this tug of war inside me. I have felt a desire to really accomplish something significant, but have had a conviction deep within me that if I didn't take time to know and serve and love the people on my team, then I would miss my calling completely, and any real purpose I was supposed to have or feel would be lost on tasks. Don't get me wrong, the tasks and results were critical, and I am convinced they have eternal weight. But if I only focused on tasks or results, then I missed the true significance in leadership: the people. For great leaders, people are the priority.

Whenever I find a principle in leadership, I can always root it back to the ministry of Christ. He is the epitome of "leader." Christ was about His Father's work. Christ was singularly focused on God's purpose for His life. Christ was the God-Man on a mission. His teaching, ministry, and even His footsteps were all towards the end game: the cross. And His priority in all that on earth was people. God's heart is for people.

Consider with me two stories in the ministry of Christ that show that people were His priority. Pause for a second and remember that Christ is the Messiah, the great Rabbi, the Son of God. He has healed whole cities, taught ground breaking truths to crowds numbering in the thousands, and done miracles. Miracles! He has a following like no other leader and He has an eternal mission to accomplish perfectly in only three years. He also has a group of 12 men that He must individually and corporately disciple so that they can carry on His work. Jesus could be viewed as a high powered, busy leader.

Jesus could be viewed as a high-powered, busy leader. But His priorities looked very different than many leaders. One of my favorite stories is the Samaritan woman and Jesus in John 4. Jesus took the long way around to get where He was going. He chose to meet with a woman that was relationally off-limits to a Jewish man for several reasons. He purposefully was there when she would be there to engage her in a difficult conversation that would change her life. Jesus was about her. She was His priority. Knowing Him, truth, wholeness, and no more shame: that was His plan for her. And He enjoyed it! He was so satisfied by His encounter with her and the result of this encounter, so full from having changed a life, so satiated by doing exactly what God would have Him do in this situation, that it was like food to a starving man. His disciples came back with lunch, and His heart was so full He wasn't even hungry and wanted them to feel the same way! A single woman was His priority.

In worldly terms, this situation was time consuming, inefficient, potentially reputation damaging, outside the boundaries of normal business, small "potatoes" compared to His usual audience, uncomfortable in confrontation with a difficult personal subject matter, and there was a lunch to get to. But Jesus' priority was people, and she was His focus. The result of this "people priority" was a whole city encountering the life changing power of the Messiah. He made her a priority and when her life was changed, she shouted it from the rooftops! With no shame! They came running to meet Him, "...and because of His words, many more became believers. They said to the woman, 'We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.'" (Jn. 4:41-42)

One more: In Luke 7, Jesus was on the move with His disciples. He had just taught the Sermon on the Mount and had been traveling, healing along the way. He comes to the town of Nain and at the gate, He sees a funeral procession. He is moved with compassion for a mother who has lost her son, and immediately people are His priority. He casts off any agenda He may have had, and throws off all social and personal restraint and reaches out and touches the dead son on the stretcher. Jesus, by Jewish standards, has defiled Himself. ("The Son of God could not be defiled no matter what He touched. One day soon He would literally take on the sins of the entire world while still remaining the perfect Lamb without spot or blemish." Beth Moore, Jesus the One and Only) He couldn't help but be about her and the life of her son. He didn't care about anything but being with those people in that moment and impacting their lives. His touch and word raised the son from the dead! Those two became His priority. They were immediately on the agenda. They became the agenda! Whatever He was headed towards, this interrupted. And Jesus was all in for an interruption by people and bringing life to someone God placed in His path. The result was life for the son, a miracle for the mother, and news of God among the people spread throughout Judea and the surrounding country. Talk about results!

We as leaders, are invited to be about people. We are called to be about people. When I am submitted to His way of being about others, I see results that multiply and last. When my priority becomes the people God has placed in the care of my leadership, then I have the ability and opportunity to infuse life, shape, impact, influence, and even be an instrument for God's change in their lives. And that type of priority is so extraordinary that it always points back to Christ and His power! Those people in turn go, like the woman at the well and the people in Nain, and impact others in significant ways because I was faithful to Christ to make His priority my priority.That's eternal! That's great leadership.

So, in a 21st century setting, what does this look like? There's still the list, there's still the agenda, there's still the results to be seen. That's a reality. That may be your reality. Chances are, your results and agenda are tied to a team of people you are leading. It's most likely not you alone in this endeavour. If that's the case, then God has given you multiple "things" to steward. You feel that tug of war between people and processes, goals, results. If you will invest in your people; that means be intentional about taking time to know them, encourage them, equip them, inspire them, celebrate with them, teach them, be willing to be interrupted by them, have compassion on them, free them to try and fail and lead again and win, and serve them, then they will follow you, their leader, towards whatever processes, goals, and results are in front of you. They will trust you and work hard with you because you have made them a priority and you have made their work matter because you have shown them they matter to you and your mission.  Results will happen and goals will be met. They will grow as team members and develop as leaders, and ultimately, when they leave their season under your leadership, the investment you poured into them will multiply as they make other people their priority in new places of leadership. This is the purpose of leadership: people.What's more, you will bring life to those God has placed in your path, and like Christ, you will feel a deep sense of satisfaction and overwhelming joy, that's like food to a starving man.

I am a people person, but this prioritizing of people is not exclusively "housed in" or available only to leaders "like me." Our calling as leaders is to be about others. That's something we all can do, but only if we look to Christ to do it through us, just like He did in His ministry here on earth. When you make people your priority, that's Christ in you, and He gets the glory for the results. That delights me to no end as a leader, because that's as it should be!

We have an opportunity to lead in a way that points to Christ and have eternal results.We must simply look to Him and follow His example.

People are the priority.

Just a seed of my faith,
Ginny

10 Leadership Lessons...so far - #1: Change IS God's way

Seasons come and seasons change. And right now I am in the midst of a season change. I can say that with simplicity and confidence, but it hasn't always been that way for me. As a woman and a leader, I have learned a lot about change, and the biggest lesson is that change is God's way.

I love stability. I really enjoy when things stay the same. I am a creature of habit. I find something I like, and I keep it. I always order a #1 with cheese, no pickle, no onion and a root beer at Wendy's. I have for years. I love comfort and honestly, I hate change.

When I stepped in to leadership, things seemed to be what I would call stable. There seemed to be little change, a process and supporting document for everything we did, and a group of tenured staff members that had a rich history of serving together. We had a ton of fun and I found a comfortable place where I could find my feet in new leadership and serving, and any question I had, there was a path or a story they could bring alongside to help me in my experience. Truly, we weren't without challenges, but it seemed that we had a way of doing things and it worked well. I loved that season.

I say season, because I have learned it was just that. A season. Prior to me being there, there was change that precipitated all that stability, and those friends and leaders had had to weather that change together. That's the stuff great teams are made of, and they were a great team. The time came for a change in seasons, and I struggled. Internally, externally, emotionally, spiritually, personally, interpersonally - I struggled with change. I think in some ways we all do, so insert the details and thoughts of your own struggle with change here, even if your struggle is that you are a change junkie and people like me slow you down in enjoying change!

What God taught me along the way as I lived and led others through a series of organizational changes is this: Change is God's way. Think about it. From the moment of salvation, His promise is change. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" (2 Cor 5:17) I love it that He puts an exclamation to that. How exciting is that change! From there, all of God's work in our earthly lives - personal, loving, skillful, effective work - is to change us to look more like His Son Jesus. We are in a state of constant change with God. It's His way with us and for us. It's to our benefit that we go through change.

As I started to walk a journey of understanding change, God reminded me of something He taught me in a different season. We had been through change as a couple, having a baby and moving from Lubbock, which we had known as home, and had had a significant door shut for Chip on a career. We were left with little money, a little baby, and all of our things in storage, living with his parents. I brought my heart to my mother-in-law, who is a tender, grace-filled, godly woman, and shared my burden with her. I had the simple yet huge question of, "What do we do?" She responded to me with words of truth. "Honey, what I have learned over the years about God is this:
God is good.
God is loving.
God is faithful.
God provides.
When you don't know how to view your circumstances, those are the truths you recount and recount until you see Him move."
I hung on to that wisdom and made it my own. God carried me through that change and grew my faith with those truths.

Later, we had gotten comfortable and had deeply embraced a different season of life. We were convinced that it was so fruitful and so good, it was certainly God's will that the season continue or last. Within that season there were challenges for sure. And each time a challenge came, I ran back to those words:
God is good.
God is loving.
God is faithful.
God provides.
During that time, Chip was training with an airline and one morning was a big morning for us. The airline would reveal what city we would be based in; where we would live and from where his trips would all start and end. We were certain he would be based in Dallas. God was active and things were going so well. I was thrilled when the phone rang; I knew it was him.
I answered the phone with, "Well?"
"Ok. I have some news for you, are you ready for this?"
"Ok! What did we get?"
"San Juan, Puerto Rico," in a dead pan voice. Then there was silence.
Chip is known for his humor and I am known for my gullibility with him. I warmly scolded him.
"Chipper!"
He replied, "No, there's no punchline. I am being serious."
He began to unravel this story of anticipation he had experienced as bases were awarded to the oldest man in his training class first, all the way down to him, and a guy named Jeff, the youngest in the class.
"And the only two cities left on the board were San Juan and San Juan."
Now there was silence on my end. At that moment, faith and Jesus Himself, I am convinced, grabbed a hold of my heart and my response surprised even me.
"Well,
God is good.
God is loving.
God is faithful.
God provides.
We're in this together, I go where you go, so San Juan it is."
Chip had to get back to class, our call ended, and in that moment, I was left sitting by myself, with nothing clearly in front of me but Who God is.

Fast forward into leadership. I had to sit with a group of people I was serving and leading and shepherd them through a season of change. I was feeling it too. Change is not easy. Now I was not having to follow someone in change, but lead others in change. God added a fresh lesson to this truth I owned as we walked a journey in change. We gathered together and I shared the above story with them. Then, God laid on my heart to share this: Often times we struggle to move ahead in change because it's good here, it feels safe here, and at times, what we have experienced here has been profound. The Israelites experienced that at the foot of the mountain with God in the wilderness. And yet God had for them to move, or change, because He had something better waiting for them. For the Israelites, it was the Promised Land. They couldn't know it, know Him more, or receive it without moving, or changing. Change. then. is letting go. It's letting go of this place and this time to move or grow. God does not allow us to have anchors. We don't get to stay the same or stay here. Change is His way. So we can't hang on or lay anchor. What we must do instead is recount in the midst of change Who God is:
God is good.
God is loving.
God is faithful.
God provides.
If I hang on to this season, I have a clenched fist. If I will recount these truths, these experiences I have had with God, then one by one, it opens my hand. The last thing we have to say is, "I choose to believe this." That's the last part of letting go. That statement, that act of declaring faith, opens my hand. Once my hand is open in faith, I am free to receive what it is that the Lord has for me. If I go to Him about change and stand there with a closed fist, or even shake that closed fist at Him, I miss out on what He wants to offer me. With a hand opened in faith about Who He is, I receive what He wants to put in it instead. I'll only know the goodness of that gift, the goodness of change, if I open my hand in faith. We'll do this together, I'll go first, even though this is hard, because this is the stuff great teams are made of.

And, by God's grace, He used His ways and His words that He had taught me to shepherd us all through change after change in a season marked by change.

God is good.
God is loving.
God is faithful.
God provides.
I choose to believe this.

I am certain I said that this morning as God leads me into a new season.

No anchors, only open hands of faith, because God's way is change.

Just a seed of my faith,

Ginny

Does it really matter what Jesus thinks of me? A question I couldn't stand.

I have just finished reading John Eldredge's Beautiful Outlaw. I struggle to make it through books at times because while reading can be so encouraging, sometimes at this place in my life I would rather take a nap. But this book was intriguing to me. I like Eldredge because he is a fun mix of passionate, clear, slightly abrasive, real, and rooted in Scripture. I will say I am not quite sure I believe everything he deduces about Jesus' personality, but I find none of it concerning. God tells us we will know as we are known, so at some point that will all get cleared up in the face of Christ in front of us. It's a really great book.

One question that he poses at the end is: "At the outset of the book I asked, 'What do you think of Jesus?' Here is a very revealing way to get at the issue from another angle: What do you think Jesus thinks of you? You discover what you actually believe about Jesus when you admit what it is you believe He thinks of you." (pg. 158)

When I read that sitting on a plane, that question drove to the center of my heart. Engage that question with me for a second. You don't have the back story of the book I read, unless you've read it too, but don't let that stop you from seriously considering that.

At first, after I was able to actually regain my breath and close my opened mouth, my heart felt crushed. I moved to reinflate it with a few arguments. First of my thoughts was, "That's an awfully self-centered question." I have an issue with self-centered faith; that it's all about me and my perspective and my comfort and my position and my view of things as good and right and loving. I personally fight that all the time. That's deceit that's as old as the Garden and it will draw us away from Who God is and what He actually does and truly what He has for us in a relationship with Him. God calls us to a God-centered faith. The Bible is a story of God, my story is God's story with and in me, and Christ is the focal point of all of history, humanity, and eternity. So I agued that to know God and this Jesus that Eldredge (and I) have worked so hard to really discover means that I will not put myself at the center of that type of question. "To be honest," my heart argued, "his original question is off base as well. Does it really matter what I think of Jesus? He is Who He says He is. My thoughts may have very little to do with the reality of Christ. What if my thoughts are wrong?!" There. Take that Eldredge. I could breathe again.

Except for this nagging yet tender place inside of me that really wanted to engage that question."I am a strong woman, I love Jesus, I can be challenged and still stand firm on my feet, ok...I will go there." What do I think Jesus thinks of me? He (Eldredge) says I discover what I actually believe about Jesus when I admit what it is I believe He thinks of me.

Before I tell you what I worked through on that airplane, I invite you to consider with me why I believe this may be a very real and good question. My heart was crushed because I knew I most likely had an issue behind that question. Not with the question, but an issue that would be answered with that question. I really didn't want to go there. I didn't want to disappoint Jesus again with more unbelief. More on that in a second. It's a phenomenal question to ask because His word to us, God's story through the Bible, is full of Him calling us into relationship with Him where He tells us who we are in Him. He died on the cross so that we could be called something different. We went from enemies to sons! We went from dead to alive. We went from old and broken to new. We went from unrighteous to righteous. We went from destined for wrath to priests that are perpetually in His presence. On and on and on in His Word He tells us that because of Christ's life, death, and resurrection, we are. If you will allow me, Ephesians 1 alone tells us a TON about who I am. I am blessed, chosen, loved, adopted, redeemed, and forgiven, I am also sealed, guaranteed, and the praise of His glory. Breathe that truth and reality in!

One of the Bible studies that God used to do a hugely  transforming work in me was Believing God by Beth Moore. She puts forth, rooted in God's Word that there are 5 parts of living, active, believing faith. God is Who He says He is, God can do what He says He can do, I am Who God says I am, I can do all things through Christ, and God's Word is alive and active in me ("because I'm believing God!"). As I had argued internally, I was willing to engage those first two parts of believing faith. Did you notice it? "Does it really matter what I think of Jesus? He is Who He says He is." But unless I negate most of the New Testament that calls me to understand how to love and live in relationship to the fullness of Who He is and What He can do and has done, I have to also believe that I am Who God says I am. I think that's what Eldredge was getting at. Who does God say you are, and do you really believe it? It's a faith question that often ends up touching our feelings, and that's what it stirred my heart. It starts by asking the question: What do you think Jesus thinks of you?

So, here is how I answered this personally: My heart offered this to Jesus with total trepidation mixed with reality and shame.(The shame right away should have been a flag. It's a fingerprint of the evil one's work.) I think that Jesus expects more of me and often I have not delivered. He has set so much in front of me and has equipped me with so much: salvation, His Spirit, His word, gifts, passion, opportunities, American life, time, people around me. And so inlight of all those things, He has simply expected more out of my life and I have not delivered it. I think He has saved me and has to love me because that's Who He is, but really I just cease to fully deliver or meet the expectation out of what He has so grandly given me. My heart bled on that airplane. I project that feeling into so much of my life. At work I feel as though I never deliver what I truly could, and others work harder and deliver so much  more and I feel that lack of full potential and team playing. At home I feel as though I can never fully be the mom that I should be and that my kids don't know that fully now but they will struggle later because of it. I feel as though I can't be the wife Chip needs because I am going in a thousand different directions and that whole wife thing could always be better. And so it goes with every area of my life. The expectations of me were great, and I have simply not measured up. Not to Jesus and not to others. Oh, there's forgiveness, but there's still a lacking in me. He knows it and has a holy God type of disappointment in it. That's what I thought Jesus thought of me.

On to the statement he makes after that: "You discover what you actually believe about Jesus when you admit what it is you believe He thinks of you." I took that next step. I believed that Jesus was supposed to love me but the expectations of me were great and I have not measured up. In essence I believed that as a follower of His, He has set a bar I am supposed to meet. I believed that He is Savior and will forgive me, and even love me, but He thinks of me in terms of His opportunities He's given to me and my abilities. And most of that is a lie. I have carried around a significant, crippling, long time weight because I believed that He had to be true to His Word, but His feelings about me are subject to my performance. That, as I believe Christ spoke tenderly and strongly to me on the plane, is a lie from the pit of hell. It is fundamental unbelief in the gospel. That's why it pierced my heart. That question exposed the root of the hurt, stomach issues, stress, and feelings of comparison and failure I perpectually feel. He corrected me with the gospel that says essentially this: "You are right. I am Savior, I am love, I am Forgiver, I am Giver of your gifts and passions, I am the Author of your time and Planner of your place in this world. But God set a bar a long time ago that you could never meet. You can never serve me hard enough, juggle well enough, or love greatly enough. You as a person will never meet the bar. But God's approval of you is not tied to your performance. It's tied to Mine. I did what you can't do. I did it all, perfectly, fully, met the bar, and fully pleased God. The final expression of that was My death on the cross. My resurrection says that the bar, which really leads to death, doesn't exist anymore. You are fully approved because your life is hidden in Mine. That will not change and that approval is fully at its fullest all the time, because I am. So, you are free. That's what I say over you. I "think" of you as approved and free from meeting the bar. You receive that grace and honestly, let yourself off the hook. You could never do enough. That's Who I am and what I did, and what I continue to do. So then, you can live and rest in the fact that that's who I say you are." Now I can actually believe something REAL about Jesus. I am finding that the realness of Jesus in my life as it is today will always go back to the gospel.

Talk about reinflating a heart! Nothing does more for a woman that longs for a real relationship with Christ and to do good for Him (Martha, anyone?) than to hear His gospel again, spoken right over her life, setting her free, giving her rest. Oh Jesus I needed that! Thank you!

I wonder how you answered that question. Did you wrestle with it? Did you try to opt out of it like I did? Or did you fall head long into it and receive His grace in your time of need? Do you know what He says about you? It's no different than what He thinks of you. You are Who He says You are because of Who He is and What He did, so that He can do what He says He can do and be the God He says He is in a real way in your life today.

So, I cling to the gospel in a fresh way because of a question Jesus brought to me in Beautiful Outlaw. Did I mention it's a really great book?

Just another seed of my faith,
Ginny