Pride and Submission

I’ve started a bible study written by a friend. One of the questions in day one is “what has God asked you to do that you’ve held back on”? I’m afraid there might be more things, more times than I can remember to list.   
I was raised by a man who had worked hard to escape the shadow of his hard drinking sometimes unfaithful father.  Because of a great deal of hard work my dad was very skilled at his job and with that came pride.  Pride can be tool of motivation but can also be a very big stumbling block. Later in life the man who had worked so hard to not be his father became him. He was able to quit drinking after it almost killed him but his pride had not saved him from falling into alcohol’s grasp and it had kept him from accepting help from the people who loved him most.
I use this to explain the very large dose of pride I started out with. The attitude that I can handle anything and everything myself if I work at it hard enough.  I was too proud to submit, too proud to bow down and too proud to admit that there was a need that I could not fill. I found the whole idea of obedience an affront. I did not promise to “obey” my husband in our wedding vows. It was after all the seventies and women did not pledge obedience to their husbands, the wording was changed politically to “honor”. 

It would take a very long time for the concept of obedience and submission to become anything positive to me. I write that and it seems so very odd that someone who spent their whole life going out of their way to please, to be liked, to “not rock the boat” would not be willing to submit to God, to be obedient. Isn’t pride a wonderful thing?

When I found myself on my own in my fifties I decided it didn’t matter how much money I had or didn’t have I would start tithing. I can’t say I didn’t steal from God a couple of times or borrow from Him a few more but I made the serious attempt to give 10 percent.  Through those years there were times of part time work, well paid full time work and unemployment. Whatever the ups and downs I gave 10 percent.  And the strangest thing happened. I had enough to eat, I had enough to pay my bills. Somehow there was always enough. I wish I could say it was easy and that I never looked at the check and thought of things I could do with that money.
I wish I could say Satan never whispered in my ear “they’re going to use this money for things you don’t even agree with….the pastor lives in a better house than you’ll ever have…how many people is the church paying more than you make”?  When you start doing something right, prepare for the attack. If you aren’t being attacked then you aren’t moving in the direction God wants you to go. I would not have been able to take that giant step of obedience had I still been relying on only myself but I could no longer accept that as truth.
Because of several life events I realized that my life was not in my hands but in God’s. I guess when you’ve been stripped of the façade you’ve been hiding behind there’s not too much to be proud of. Humility can be a painful lesson but a very freeing one. Every day I have left is not something I earned but a gift from God and to Him I will submit.

Looking Back

I’ve come across people who are forever looking back, back at a past relationship, back at their high school or college years, back at when their children were babies. There’s nothing wrong with having fond memories or a few moments nostalgia but spending too much time looking back steals our sight from right now and what comes after. Maybe some of my past isn’t worth reliving or maybe I’ve actually figured out you can’t go back only forward. Whatever the reason is I don’t have a problem living today and looking forward to tomorrow. If you were to ask me what the very best part of my life has been I’d probably say “I don’t know, I haven’t gotten to the end yet”…well not that I know of anyway. I don’t necessarily like the way I look since age has begun to leave its mark but to be honest I don’t know that I’ve ever been too thrilled about my physical appearance. It’s probably  just a woman thing but looks aside I think I enjoy every day for whatever it has to offer.  Even when it doesn’t seem that there is a whole lot to be “enjoyed” there are always the small things, unexpected things and some downright joyous things. Are you so busy looking back, you’ve forgotten to look around? Time is short don’t waste it looking back. Look around, enjoy the scenery and look up and say “thank you God for another day”.

Princess

This is the counter in my bathroom. Full of stuff to make me look beautiful....well at least presentable.

When I was a kid my mom told me quite matter-of-factly that I wasn’t pretty but that I did have  a homey look, not homely but homey. I think she meant that I had a nice face, not ugly just not “cute” and for me not to set my sights too high and be hurt because I was never going to be a “princesses”.  I know more than once I’ve said things to my daughter regarding her looks that I should have just kept to myself. She, like me has trouble keeping her weight static and I’m sure is aware when the scale creeps upward. I do hope I gave her confidence in her beauty because she is beautiful.

Had my mom regularly said “you look beautiful” it wouldn’t have really mattered whether I was or not, whether the world considered me beautiful or not. I would have known that even if it wasn’t something obvious to be seen that I was at least inside, beautiful.

I called my daughter one day very upset because my mom had told me I shouldn’t ever wear jeans as “they aren’t very flattering on you”. I didn’t think I looked that bad in jeans and given the choice I live in them.  I asked my daughter “do I look terrible in jeans?” She just laughed and said “I don’t think so”. She also said “one of the reasons Mike married me was because he figured if I looked like my mom when I was your age it wouldn’t be bad”.  If I was as cool as my daughter, right now, that wouldn’t be too bad either.

So the thing is, you tell someone enough times that they are stupid or ugly or worthless and they will believe it and become just that. If you tell someone they are kind, beautiful, smart, they will at least try to be exactly that. My mom loves me. She wants me to have a good life filled with good things. Sometimes the things she says come not from her but from her past and I have come to understand that. I try not to take things the wrong way. I have the benefit of a group of the world’s best Godly women surrounding me and reminding me that I am and always have been a princess, a daughter of the King of Kings.

The Dance

 "I could have missed the pain but I would have had to miss the dance”

One of my favorite songs of all time is “The Dance” by Garth Brooks. How many things would we avoid if given the gift of knowing the future. How many times would we take a different path to avoid the pain of a love lost, betrayal by a friend or a stupid financial decision.

Some of my decisions have sent me tumbling down some pretty rocky inclines but was it the wrong path? I’m not sure I can say yes. Maybe a few bruises were what I needed to wake me up. Although the path I’ve taken from there to here was not the most direct, the easiest or the most pleasant at times, there were times when it was absolutely fantastic. Given the choice I might have avoided some of the mud, some of the wind and rain but had I done that I might have missed some of the most awe inspiring sunrises after the rain. It’s slow going through the mud but the memory of a mud fight with a good friend can never be erased or the memory of mud sliding on “borrowed” cafeteria trays can’t be topped.

The saying “it is better to have loved and lost then to have never loved at all” seems a little too pat but it is true. My heart has grown through love only to be broken but because brokenness more room was made for even more growth.  

Being single does not make me less than what I’ve always been, just different than I have sometimes been. I’ve had love that was like the 4^th of July and love that was more like being wrapped up in a warm blanket on a wintery day. Now I have the memory of both and the contentment of knowing I will be fine by myself or with someone else. Who I am is not determined by my situation. That was one of those falling down the rocky incline realizations.

Some things are best undone, some things are best unsaid but in the end whether we take the easy way or the hard way it’s the destination that’s important and the journey is just a giant added bonus. Don’t worry about the detours, those off in the ditch moments or an occasional dead end.  If you had known better you might have missed that obstacle but you might have also missed the dance.