Finding Faith in the Mess
“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” John 10:10 I follow a lifestyle blogger who touts living her best life. She just turned forty and decided that it is about time …
FLASHBACK FRIDAY The boys recently asked my about my teaching past. They wanted to know what grades I taught and what I thought of the kids. They asked if it was hard and if I liked to teach. Jack asked me if I wanted to …
The complexities of faith. We google and search trying to find answers to our faith. We look up the Hebrew and Greek translations studying the context of the time trying to make sense of it all. We listen to the voices from the pulpit and the ones who are deemed authorities on all things Scripture related and write their words in permanent ink on our hearts. Others walk away from faith completely. It’s too hard to understand, makes absolutely no sense, or, we’ve deemed it all crazy. Whatever the case may be for you, we sure have made this whole faith thing complex.
“What made sense to me when I first heard about Jesus is how He doesn’t give us a bunch of directions intended to manipulate our behavior or control our conduct. Instead, He has beautiful hopes for us and has told us what those are, but He isn’t scowling at us when we’re not yet ready to have those same hopes for ourselves. He won’t love us more or less based on how we act, and He’s not stuck telling us what to do, when to do it, or what we want either. Far better, He continues to tell us through our successes and our mistakes who we are, and here’s what He wants us to know-we are His.” Bob Goff
I got a text from a friend the other day. It was the anniversary of a loved one’s death. She was trying to reconcile this person’s faith. He said he believed in God but his faith really stopped there. She was asking us to help her make peace with whether or not he was in Heaven. Since I am not in Heaven myself and cannot give her absolute certainty, here is what I told her. It’s a matter of his heart. We are going to more surprised by who is not in Heaven than who makes it there. The outward actions of our faith carry far less weight than the truths of our hearts.
We get so concerned with and wrapped up in our actions; what people can see that we lose sight of Jesus. The rules matter more than the relationship. Being right according to our faith carries more authority than loving our neighborhood. We exhaust ourselves from trying to do it right all the time when Jesus is asking us to let Him carry the weight of our burdens. Our hearts are what matter; are what’s on the line. Yet, instead of exercising our hearts, we are facilitating our rightness.
Jesus isn’t complicated and that scares us. He doesn’t keep a record of wrongs. He doesn’t roll out His list of rules we must follow. He loves. That’s it. And it’s that love that propels others to change.
Reckless love like that of Jesus scares the heck out of us. When people choose to follow Jesus this way, their faith is questioned.
How can you just love? It’s our job to keep people on the right track.
No, no it isn’t.
How can you love that person? Your job is to hold them accountable.
No, no it isn’t.
How can you love that person? Their lifestyle completely opposes the church.
I can love because of Jesus. We forget that Jesus was there when we were created; when life first began. He knows our ins, outs, and in-betweens. He knows we need time to come to terms with what He sees in us. I know this because I can look at every single person in the Bible and see how each of them needed time to fully accept and step into the person God was calling them to be.
God called Moses to leadership but Moses told God he wasn’t a leader.
God called Sarah into motherhood and she told God she was too old.
God called David to be king but he was the scrawny kid.
God called Mary to be the mother of the Savior yet she was a unwed teen.
God called Peter to be the rock on which the church would be built but he would betray Jesus.
God called Saul to bring the saving message of the Gospels to the Gentiles, yet he killed Christians.
I can go on and on listing others who were not what God called them to be. They could not see this person in themselves. Yet, there was something in Jesus, that extravagant love, that led them to those callings. That same love resides in you and me and those people you shun.
We like rules. We like structure. It makes us feel safe. It gives us a script when everything is so unknown. It makes us feel like we are in control. What I am finding, however, is that the rules are like chains on my soul. They are too complex and I end up living in fear instead of freedom. Fear that I will fail at the next turn because there is absolutely no way I can live out all these regulations. I was never meant to live this way that’s why it feels like a prison.
Jesus’ love scared the Pharisees of His time and it scares us today. Because there are no limits to His love, we steer away from it and head towards our rules. They feel safer than His limitless love.
God’s love is reckless and risky and so very freeing. It allows space for mess-ups and mistakes. His love gives rise to what we are to become and in that becoming, He desires for us to know Him in the deepest parts of our souls. God’s love is simple in a world that is so complex. You no longer behave because you are terrified of breaking one of the rules. You start to live righteously because of Love. You make good and pure choices because of Love. You serve others out of Love not obligation. You are free because of Love.
Love isn’t a bunch of rules. Love is Jesus wholly and purely present in your life. Go break the rules today and love.
“Let me give you a new command: Love one another. In the same way I loved you, you love one another. This is how everyone will recognize that you are my disciples—when they see the love you have for each other.” John 13:35
Love & Blessings,
Meg
I had a dream. I was at a conference and a speaker did not show. I was asked last minute to fill in. I did not have any content; nothing written down. I had gone as an attendee desperately wanting to fly under the radar and not be seen. I got up on stage wearing a sweatshirt, jeans, and tennis shoes. I stood before a crowd not knowing what to do or say.
And then it hit me.
I abruptly woke up the moment I read what was on my sweatshirt.
The Messy Mingling.
This.
This is it.
This is what the Lord has been preparing me for all these years.
The Messy Mingling.
My whole life has been neat. Let me say, I have had my fair share of messy moments. Like all of us, I have faced struggles and hardships so deep, so painful, I never thought I was going to push through. But, now that I am on the other side, I can honestly say I could wrap my life up in a beautiful box and pretty bow.
Everything in its place.
All the throw pillows coiffed perfectly on the couch.
The to-do list on the fridge written using bullets.
Neat and tidy.
And then came the dream. The vision was also neat and tidy. Do step one followed by step two. Each foot landing perfectly in front of the other. Eventually, I will follow this perfect little path towards the splendor of a dream fulfilled. Or so I thought.
My whole life, that perfectly wrapped box with the beautiful bow, was not as neat and tidy as I thought. If you opened it up, out would pops Jack-in-the-box.
There’s a mess inside and it’s beautiful.
All the things I have experienced up until this point have hands-down prepared me for this moment right now.
Not growing up in a Christian home.
Finding my faith as a young teen through a friend not my family.
A family on the rocks; on the fringe of despair.
Walking a dual life for years trying to balance them both.
Meeting my unbelieving husband thinking I would be the one to change him.
College taking longer and being much harder (and more expensive) than I thought.
Student loans.
Debt.
Marriage.
Kids. Oh, the kids. (All boys. Who would’ve thought).
Miscarriage.
Moving across the country.
Finding myself.
Anxiety rearing its ugly head.
Losing myself.
Finding myself again.
All of it. All this mess has purpose. The mess is what drives my faith. The mess is what propels me to search for a Savior. The mess is what forces me to lean into Jesus because there is nothing else I can hang on to.
The mess.
It launched a dream.
As I think back on my dream, me standing in the spotlight in all my messy glory, I see you. We are all a little messy, aren’t we? We all get a little lost sometimes. We all search and fret and wonder and doubt. Every single one of us. We all have a similar goal: we all desire to make this mess into something beautiful.
The Messy Mingling? It’s not one girl’s made-up dream. It’s made up of each of our gloriously messy stories. Stories that shout redemption and grace. Stories that usher in victory and healing. Stories that make space for the mess. Because the mess matters.
You are The Messy Mingling.
Love & Blessings,
Meg
I have a circle.
You do, too. Inside of our circles are all the rules; a certain way to live. We like things a certain way. We also like to force others to live inside our circles. We desire them to abide to our rules, opinions, and ways. If they do not conform to our circle, we become frustrated and angry.
My husband and I got into a fight. Well, not really a fight but a disagreement. Over what, you ask? Oh, you know, a pan. Like a pan you cook with. I will spare you the (lame) details, but let’s just say this “disagreement” was my fault. I wanted something a certain way and he did not heed my desire. When we hashed it all out, I realized I wanted him to live inside my circle. And you know what? He doesn’t reside there. I do. And while he does have the right to tell me how I can and cannot treat him, he doesn’t have the authority to tell me how I should feel in a certain situation (and vice versa).
This is the same when it comes to our faith journeys. Each of our journey looks different yet we desperately want them all to look the same. We may say we don’t, but our actions speak differently. When someone doesn’t live in our faith circle, we will do anything and everything to make the jump.
We want all our circles to be perfectly round and the same size; cookie cutter. There is no room for ovals or circles that are off-center. No one’s circle needs to be bigger than the next guys and our circles aren’t supposed to be small. Just like the houses of the suburbs, every circle should look the same.
Let me challenge us (especially us, Christians) to stop forcing each other to fit in our circles. While we do have the authority to tell people about Jesus, we do not have the authority to tell people how to get there. That’s their circle. Not ours.
My husband and I like to take different routes home from church. I like to avoid this one highway (it’s a mess) and he likes the speed he can travel on said highway. We take our separate paths but both make it home. One may take longer than the other, but we both make it. Neither way is wrong. Just different. The destination, Jesus, is the same for each of us. The way we get to that end is our own circle.
I found freedom when I released others from living inside my circle. I understand that they, too, have a circle where they reside. My circle is for me and me alone. It only works for me and no one else. Jesus talks to me in a particular way in my circle that is unique to me. He speaks to you in your circle in only a way you can hear Him.
I like the space inside my circle. A lot. But, my circle isn’t for everyone else. Just me.
Don’t force others to live in your circle. It wasn’t meant for them. Respect the boundaries of their circles, too. You’ll find freedom there. And, who knows, maybe Jesus will be seen more vibrantly when we all stick to our own circles.
Love & Blessings,
Meg
“That’s the thing about insecurity. When it grips us, the very thing we need most-truth-is the very thing we have a hard time grasping” Lysa Terkeurst, The Best Yes “and let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we shall reap …
