You can’t serve two masters. That is what pounced around my mind as I was trying to decide how to gloss over an important scheduling decision. I was trying to please two significant relationships by compromising my time with one and my truthfulness with the other. I really am not feeling transparent enough to tell you the scenario. You know by now that this is rare for me. In any case, remember Bon Jovi‘s Shot Through the Heart? That’s how the words, “You can’t serve two masters” pierced me. Not such a big deal in the end. I made the right decision.
A few days before, a new jogging acquaintance shared with me that she really couldn’t control herself when it came to food even in the face of diabetes. I literally ran into her a few days after my “You can’t serve two masters” experience. I had the idea to tell her that you can’t serve two masters – both God and food. Not sure in which direction she ran after that comment.
I work out with a group called CrossTrainers. We’re doing a study by Lysa Terkeurst called Made to Crave, Satisfying Your Deepest Desires with God, Not Food. Whether it’s food or something else that you’re craving – – really anything that you have an uncontrollable desire for, Lisa makes a lot of sense. She told this extraordinary story where, on the one hand, she was instructing her teenage son as to boundaries in a relationship he had gone too far with, and on the other hand, she was ready to congratulate herself on her hard day with her son by shoveling chocolate into her mouth. She says it was right then that Bon Jovi shot through her heart (my words not hers). How can we lead others, in their deepest need, to choose God, while we are feeding our own selves with food, instead of God?
Check out the study. If you don’t have the time, see how my Bon Jovi moment resonates with you. Have you made any recent decisions where you had to choose your Master? Did you choose right?
So, it’s almost Valentine’s Day. I walked the Wal-Mart aisles passing Valentine themed pillow pets that my daughter would love. Cardboard hearts full of chocolate that my son would love. Stuffed Valentine bears with the year “2011” embroidered on the paw . . . I would have bought that for a high school boyfriend. I glanced at the fancy Hallmark section – – Mahogany façade showcasing all sorts of embossed deep red Valentine cards. I had a miniature rush like the tide coming in – – Pick something up for the husband? I say miniature because this genre of thought usually lasts only long enough for me to decide that it’s not that good of an idea. Note that my sick son is in the cart patiently waiting for me to grab a hamper and take him home for lunch.
What in the heck ever happened to Valentine’s Day in my life, in my marriage? Do I even have the nerve to find a babysitter and go out on this famously romantic night? What in the heck will we do without the kids to laugh with and talk to all night? Seems kind of spooky to think about gazing into each other’s eyes. That gaze holds 18 years of life clips. My old roommate Ann calls it the “good, bad and the ugly.” It is hard to know what clip will surface in that gaze. Hence, maybe it’s better to stay home.
Early on in my marriage, we thought the whole event was a waste of time – – guys with a single rose, couples everywhere, restaurants jam packed, women with red shirts, red skirts, red shoes, red undies. We would have way more goin’ on at home with take out and candles than dining out with a preset price and menu. And then somehow life sets in and time gets you from behind.
Do your marriage a favor this year. However good, bad or ugly it’s been. Do whatever you haven’t done in years past. Join the Valentine conga line. Sort of like you did in your twenties when you went to all of those weddings. Get yourself a red something and a reservation. I am going to take a chance. What about you?
“Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end.”
I don’t feel beautiful when I have my period.
In fact, I find myself feeling downright unlovable during this time. Plus, I’m not exuding that much love towards others during my “ladies’ days”, as all this self-loathing makes me grouchy and surly towards anyone who crosses my path that week (yeah, I admit—not my greatest WWJD moments). Every cycle just seems doomed to present itself to me in exactly the same way:
1) “Huh??? My period is here?” (This is despite the fact that I am as regular and consistent as the rising and setting of the sun each day.)
2) “What is on my face, and why is it growing a pair of eyes?”
3) “To heck with my diet. Find Ben and Jerry and get them here—STAT!”
It is at this point that I feverishly calculate on my abacus-like fingers if my weekend plans to drink Bloody Marys will be ruined by the arrival of, well, Bloody Mary, herself.
While New Agers would love to see menses as a time of cleansing, rejuvenation and meditation, it’s very hard for me to focus on all of that hooey when my jeans won’t zip up that week. Frankly, loving myself is just not on the menu during my period, especially when my face is covered in acne-fighting gunk and chocolate syrup goop (cut to pity-party scene from Bridget Jones’s Diary, where Renée Zelwegger is singing “All By Myself”… “Don’t Want to be…All by Myyyy…Self…Anyyyy…morrrre!!!”)
Yet, without fail, the day after my period is done, there is an extra spring in my step (translation: doing the Running Man in front of my bathroom mirror) and a special song in my heart (“Oh yeah, Destiny’s Child!! Gimme some of that Independent Women!!”). The cramps and road rage from three days before are just a distant memory. I find that I’m in love again…with myself. (“Hey, baby, you come here often? Why yes, I live here–remember??”)
Bring on the weekend!! I feel beautiful once more! The birds are chirping, the sun is shining and I’m ready to embrace the world with open arms!
“Now, why can’t I just feel this way all the time?”
I guess I’m just one of those ingrates who will never fully appreciate menstruation as an expression of God’s brilliance in masterfully crafting a woman’s body for the role of procreation. In fact, I will always have some choice words for Eve around the same time every month (suffice it to say, *love* is not one of those four-letter words I scream at her).
However, when life starts beating me down, when my love for all of my quirkiness turns into disappointment over all of my failures, and when everyday starts feeling like another day “on the rag”, it is then that I must remember that God loves me madly and passionately, and that I am fearfully and wonderfully made in His image. According to Psalms 139:14, everything that God makes is breathtaking. So, guess what? That makes me beautiful, even when I don’t feel beautiful and no one else thinks I’m beautiful. That makes me lovely, even when I don’t feel loved and no one else thinks I’m loveable.
This year, I have to learn to love myself—without criticism, without judgment. This is the year that I choose to see myself the way God sees me, and to love myself the way God loves me. I just have to trust that God’s redeeming love makes all things beautiful in their time. Even me.
Prayer: Lord, I have no idea what you’re about to do in my life this year, but I trust You and I love You beyond measure. Help me not to second-guess Your ways when my world starts falling apart all around me. I know that You are transforming me into something beautiful, even when I don’t feel loveable. Make me beautiful and help me to accept Your all-encompassing love for me. Make my words beautiful so that I can love others around me; make my paths beautiful and let my steps be adorned with Your love; make my life beautiful so that Your love shines through me and brightens the darkness that surrounds me. Make me beautiful like You, Lord. Make me lovely like You.
“We’ve created what I call the chastity cult. Married and single Christians alike put sex on a pedestal…The Chastity Cult’s obsession with boundaries clouds the meaning and mirth of Christian sexuality. The sooner Christians leave it – whether we’re dating or married, the sooner we will discover the kind of sex life God intends for us.” –Tyler Blanski, author of Mud & Poetry: Love, Sex, and the Sacred.
As we can see all around us, couples divorce and families split up all the time. However, this story appeared to strike a sensitive chord, as this couple chose to publicize their newly-found romance in the New York Times’ Vows section. The Vows section traditionally highlights personal stories of love, romance and wedded bliss, and their story ostensibly fits the bill. Except that, this story manages to ignore the pain and consequences their families suffered, after this couple decided to go head-first into pursuing their “happily ever after.”
Have you ever experienced temptation of this sort in your marriage? Would you be willing to share with us how you overcame or gave into those feelings?
If you were a sheep and lived in a barn where someone had to feed you, protect you from wolves and love you, who would you choose? (Posed by Patsy Clairmont in her devotional Kaleidoscope and answered by my dear friends.)
Friend One: My mother (That comes from the one who lost her mom too early.)
Friend Two: Jesus (That comes from the one who has been disappointed by her husband.)
Friend Three: My husband (That comes from the one who is completely cared for by her husband.)
Friend Four: Caring farmer as well as a competent veterinarian (That comes from the one who has been through enough hell to think practical first.)
What about you? Post your Response. We’d love to hear it!
My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. John 10:27
FemmeFuel 