I was reading today in Psalm 51, and I noticed that David says this: "Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your unfailing love, according to Your great compassion blot out my transgressions." (verse 1)
When we pray, what is our basis for prayer? Is it the fact that we are good people and deserve to have our prayers answered? Is it the fact that we really just need this one answered? Or is it the one thing that is the ONLY basis we have for prayer? God's love and mercy is it, folks. I hate to burst bubbles, but we have gone too long thinking that we deserve to have prayers answered because we are good. When Moses was interceding for the Israelites, he appealed to God by way of the promise that had already been made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Israel). David asked for forgiveness because he knew that the Lord's love was unfailing and that His compassion was great. Jeremiah remembered all of the bitterness that he had upon seeing Israel go into captivity, yet he remembered that because of the Lord's love we are not consumed. The promises that the Lord makes are based on who He is, not on who we are. We would do well to remember that.

Celebration

So I'm a little late with this post, since I've been thinking about it since American Independence Day (I have to specify, since Brazil's was a little over a week ago).
I was thinking, though, about celebration in general, for I thought very little about "the 4th of July" since it wasn't being celebrated here. It really made me realize that celebrating anniversaries aren't worth squat if we don't celebrate them in our day-to-day lives.
I can't tell you the date that I got saved (I do know I was 12 -- that gives us 365 days to work with). What I can tell you is that 14 years later, my life is a celebration of my salvation. Before you think that sounds cocky, read on. I celebrate the fact that God finds me, a sinner, worthy to preach His name before men. I celebrate the relationship that I have with Him. I celebrate the fact that He is faithful -- not in doing whatever I want Him to (that would certainly be awful!), but in seeing His own will carried out. How can I celebrate without telling others?
I have friends that I have definitely learned to appreciate. My best friend from childhood is definitely very different (read: complete opposite) from me. To try to explain that fully would take too long. I smile a lot, shake my head, and think "that's just like her." I have many other friends that I do that with as well. I am loving the fact that I can appreciate our differences, or those things that I think are totally illogical, or those things that make that person a unique individual. I also love the fact that a lot of them seem to appreciate those things about me. So, let's celebrate! Every day, every hour.

How's your family?

I was thinking the other day about what causes our families to go through major changes. I have come up with the following:
-kids going off to college
-kids getting married
-kids having kids
-divorce
-moving
-having kids
-getting married
-death
I am wondering more and more about what my own reaction should be to my family's major changes. The very nature of a change suggests instability. I happen to like stability. Not necessarily order and regimen, but definitely stability.
During a major family change, I do not want to be defined as the family stabilizer (which I sometimes feel is my default role, as the oldest of 4 children). I have been told that it's a role that will stick with me for the rest of my life. I am a mediator. I dislike confrontation. I sincerely want everybody to stop their bickering and get along. Right now, that's the one thing I can't have. And so, I have to deal with it. How? I haven't decided quite yet.

The burning question

I have figured out what my central question in all of these wonderings is: Who am I going to allow to define who I am? Am I going to allow old friends or new friends to define who I am, according to the lives they live? Am I going to allow co-workers or bosses to define me? Am I even going to allow me to define me? I hope not -- my deep desire is that I will let Christ define who I am and who I am going to be.

Who am I?

I am being faced with myself, which is one of the hardest things to face for me, and I'm sure for a lot of us. I am a sinner, I am a plethora of paradoxes, I know who I am, but don't know who I want to be. I can't figure out sometimes if I'm showing the real me to others, or if I am just putting up a face for them to see. On the surface, the paradoxes are even many. For example:
Some days I want to live in the big, big city and some days I want to live in (Texas, Montana, Wyoming) and own a ranch and horses and be able to ride every day into the wild blue. I love to be outdoors and hike but I'd like just as well to go and get a massage or a manicure and dress up for a fancy dinner. I love to go see the theater (as in Broadway shows) but I'd just as soon stay home and have a nice home-cooked meal. There are many, many more, but you get the point.
I'm not sure why these things bother me, except that I know very few people who are the same way. Maybe I'm not opening my eyes wide enough.
Being faced with my own outside is not nearly as scary as being faced with my own inside, which I suppose is why I focus on the outside for now. The thoughts that cross my mind, the words that come out of my mouth, I have to wonder where they come from. So many of them don't come from someone who is radically loved by God. But that is what I am. So why is my human nature still winning so many days? Sometimes I conclude that it must be something that I am doing wrong, and that I am not trying hard enough to be "good" or that I am not pursuing God closely enough. Those are tricks of the devil, for God has shown me none of those. There is a simple truth: there is no one righteous, and I am included. The greater simple truth is this: Jesus Christ came into this world to save sinners, of which I am one. Praise the Lord!

A Path of Suffering

I am beginning to learn that suffering doesn't necessarily mean being persecuted for our faith, or being diagnosed with a terminal disease, or whatever we think of as being on the "grand" level of suffering. I, for one, am beginning to understand that suffering is present in our everyday lives, in a broken family, in a broken heart, in a thing as simple as the short word of a friend. These things seem senseless, and they do not follow what we think should be the normal path of life.
Finished reading These Strange Ashes, by Elisabeth Elliot, today, and am certainly encouraged by her words. In it she speaks of her own first year as a missionary, single and dead set on doing the Lord's will. Her words and her attitude of surety that she was doing the right thing remind me of the things that I have felt and said (if even only to myself) over the past year or so. Her heart was set to do the will of the Father, but she had doubts, and she had disappointments, and she had hurts. It is through these doubts, disappointments, and hurts -- in short, suffering -- that we learn who our Lord truly is, and that His ways are best, even when we don't understand them.
I know full well that the thing that God requires of me today is ruthless trust. Trust without hesitation, without reservation, without hindrance, pure and simple trust, like that of a child. Trust that Daddy knows what's best for us. Maybe that's what Christ meant when He said that we must receive the kingdom of heaven like little children.

A new home

So we've been looking for a new home for both of our cats for quite some time now, since we are leaving in November and none of us are ever home. I'd much rather have a dog anyway. The search became more urgent when I was innocently playing with Samantha and she scratched me on my finger -- it's not a pretty sight. I am pleased to report this wonderful news: WE HAVE FOUND A HOME FOR OUR CATS! And so, we bid them adieu tomorrow morning.
Have I mentioned how excited I am?

What a life

So tell me if this is bad:
The highlight of our (mine & my roommate's) day was seeing some of the stars from our telenovela (much better than an American soap opera and great for helping me learn Portuguese) up close. We were with a team, and the Americans just didn't seem to understand what we were so excited about.

Risky business

I've figured out (with a little help from my roommate) that sometimes being the one to give my opinion is a huge risk. I risk being rejected, I risk my advice or opinion not being heeded (which sometimes is neither here nor there), I risk being separated from others, and I risk being alone with nothing but the truth (and sometimes my own misery) to keep me company.
I desire more than anything else to speak the truth to others in love, and I am finding that it hurts when they don't want to hear it. Why do I want this so badly? Chalk it up to college experience, and the fact that hearing the truth hurts much less at the beginning than it does farther on down the road. To me, anyway.
A bit melodramatic, these two paragraphs, but they will stand thus, because they are truth for my own life.

Working out

Yesterday, I was reading Philippians 2:12. Here is what the tail end of it says: "work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." What does that sound like to most people? The way it is translated goes against everything I know about salvation. It looks like we are required to effect our own salvation. Not true. Again, the Portuguese is better. It can be literally translated, "put into action your own salvation." As in, salvation is something that you already have, you just need to "use" it. Let people know you have it. Do you have to earn it? No. You have it when you receive it. What is the evidence of your salvation? Putting it into action. Ephesians 2:10 says, "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." We are created to be doers of good, but that doesn't get us into heaven.

I WILL not grow weary

"But those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not grow faint."
I was reading Isaiah 40:31 the other day (suggestion from a friend) and noticed something really cool in the Portuguese. In English, all these verbs are in the future tense; i.e., they have not happened or are not happening yet. They are something we have to wait on. In Portuguese, the present tense of the verbs is used, so the verse would be translated something like this: "But those who hope in the LORD do renew their strength. They soar on wings like eagles; they run and do not grow weary, they walk and do not grow faint." It's a great thing to find out while I am running around like a crazy chicken with my head cut off. That is, that because I hope in the LORD, I am running with endurance. Not because I have it in myself, but because He is giving it to me, day by day, minute by minute. Bring on the race!

All it takes is a little imagination

I have certainly been expanding my imagination while I have been here, especially over the past week. Last Sunday, I decided that I'm going to pick a new place that I'd like to live (it was New York City) and try a new place in my mind every week. During the week, while working in the pharmacy (with a window in front, where others could watch me work), I felt like I was in a fishbowl. And so my roommate and I decided that I should be a different kind of fish every day. Unfortunately, we didn't decide this until Thursday, so I only got to be 2 kinds of fish. Thursday I was a rainbow fish (apparently they are colorful and smile all the time, no matter what the other fish are doing), and Friday I was a herring (having watched part of Monty Python and the Holy Grail the night before). Oh, what fun! Maybe I'm making up for being such a practical child....

Extra grace

I find myself needing a little extra grace lately, and it made me start thinking (along with reading in Exodus 16) about the Israelites and the manna. How do these two subjects relate? Perfectly, I say. The Israelites had to gather the manna every morning if they wanted food for the day. If they didn't gather, they had nothing to eat. If they gathered too much, it didn't last until the next day -- they had to go out and gather again. One of my favorite verses in there says "He who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little." The Israelites were responsible for gathering their own manna.
So it is with my own spiritual food. I am responsible for gathering it. Jim Elliot said that though we can be encouraged and uplifted by others, we cannot hold others responsible for our own feeding. We must dig into the Word and harvest its riches as the Spirit sees fit to reveal them to us. I pray that I will be disciplined and responsible enough for my own spiritual state that I may gather as much as I need every morning.

Have you ever noticed?

That the things that we see as faults in others are the very things that we ourselves may need to change? It causes me to question whether or not I need to change things about my own life, which is good, but other times it causes me to second-guess myself and wonder if I need to change things that are just me and don't need to be changed. That's the not-good kind of self-evaluation.
God knows that there are still tons of things that could be changed about me, but He is working on them, and I pray that He continues. It is a slow process, becoming the woman He wants me to be, but it's good to know that I'm not working on it alone.

Oh, how rude

I'm not sure why people have to be rude. I don't know if I will ever figure that out, though I probably shouldn't waste time trying. Are people rude out of their own insecurity? Out of the fact that they know they're not in control? Out of the fact that they need to be in control?
I've been having to decipher lately what constitutes rudeness as well, both coming from me and coming from others. Berating or calling out in front of others? If done in seriousness, not in jest, then it's rude. Have you ever heard the phrase, "Praise in public, criticize in private?" Or "Praise, then criticize?" Well, there are people in this world who have heard neither. I am not entirely sure that it hurts my feelings when it happens to me, but so be it either way. I try not to let it get to me, but somedays.... It just bothers me because there's no cause for it. No one should have to put up with rudeness. Ever. People need to learn that.

I think I've lost it

Sometimes I think that I’d lose my head if it weren’t connected to the rest of my body. Do you ever have those days that you just feel like a ditz? I do. And I’m not, which is the problem. (Those of you who know me, keep your mouths shut). The word in Portuguese is desligado – disconnected, of sorts. I’m not sure what the problem is here. I am in the first half of six straight weeks of medical clinics and I am already forgetting things. I think that I need an alternate memory source, like gingko or something.
One summer, one of my employers wore a small notebook around her neck that said “MEMORY.” I’ve decided that I need one of those. Maybe it would be a big help.

Simply life

Today I am struck by the fact that I can find such joy in being able to something as simple as getting a fresh-roasted chicken and french bread from the corner store. I am learning (re-learning, I should say) to find joy in the simple things.
I want to be happy in who I am, and happy in God, and happy in all the things that He has given me. I want to passionately pursue Him, and I want to find Him. I want to be passionate about life, and to live it to the fullest, because God gives me such wonderful opportunities to live!
Today I am still amazed that I am here, especially when I look back upon the course that has led me thus far. Three years ago, I would never have dreamed that I'd be doing this, but here I am, and I love what I do. There is no wrestling of spirit about being here, because I am learning to rest in the place that God has called me to.

You want me to do WHAT?

Some days, there are definitely not words to express how inadequate I feel to be a beacon of light in the darkness. Sometimes it passes, sometimes it doesn't. I definitely have had days of feeling inadequate, days of feeling like I can conquer the world, and days of amazement at the fact that I am even here in Brazil. I have been chosen for a noble calling, the same that all Christians are called to do.
Spread the gospel. Proclaim that Christ died and rose again. Until I came down here, I'm not sure that I really understood that. My first week here, I was put up in front of a classroom full of school children to tell them about why the Belmont University basketball team was in Brazil playing with them. Surprisingly, it was much easier than I ever thought it could be.
I have been forced to depend solely on Christ and the riches that He has for me. I must remember every day that He is bigger than all of my feelings and my attitudes and my thoughts and my actions and my words. His purposes always stand, and I think that means drawing men to Himself. He is good. Taste and see! Don't forget that.

Naturally, this comes next

What comes out of your mouth on a daily basis? I like to think that I've gotten pretty good at editing the thoughts that come across my mind enough to come out of my mouth in a presentable way, or to not come out of my mouth at all. Sometimes, though, that part of my brain that does the editing doesn't work as fast as my mouth and I end up saying things that I really shouldn't say. You know, I spent a whole summer trying to learn that, and all I learned was how to talk in code (and a LOT of verses out of Proverbs)! Marshmallows upon marshmallows of red kool-aid (or red Power-Ade before 10 am, I can't remember which) code. All on the way to Baton Rouge in the stolen Beefmobile, for some odd reason. There are only 2 people in the world who would understand anything about those last 2 sentences. And so, code either isn't that great or is too useful.
I am learning that it is much safer and not necessarily much easier to give our thoughts and words over to the Lord. He has saved me many times from saying things I shouldn't -- He offers my mouth restraint that I can't give it. He guards the door to my lips better than I ever could.
When do my words get me in trouble? When the editing part of my brain doesn't work fast enough. Maybe I need to practice more.

Guard your heart

"Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life." Proverbs 4:23
Guard your heart from what? People? Things? Hurtful words? I think that sometimes in reading this verse we are tempted to shut people out of our hearts and our lives. I don't think that the Lord ever meant for us to shut people out. Christ didn't. He let people in, and He allowed them to grieve Him, and He allowed them to make Him angry, and to make Him happy. Yet He was without sin -- there was no evil in Him.
If you will, allow me to call it "trash control." There is such trash coming into lives through TV, movies, radio, and other people that it's a wonder that any of us are nice anymore, and it's no wonder that we are losing morality by the day. I don't mean this as a rant of legalism, for that gets us nowhere. The Bible says "You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him" (Matthew 12:34-35). Now while I recognize that any good in us is given from God alone (did not Jesus Himself say "Why do you call me good? No one is good except God Himself."), the evil in us comes from the moment that Eve made mankind sinners. Where does the evil come from? Look around you. There is evil waiting everywhere to snare us, bit by bit.
Guard your heart, then, from the evil around you. Guard it from the evil that is in you. God tells us that the heart is deceitful above all things (Jer. 17:9). Guard it from wrong thinking about God and who He is. God tells us through the apostle Paul to test all things, and to hold fast to what is good, and to avoid all kinds of evil (1 Thess. 5:21-22).
As for people, there is certainly no sure way to tell if they will hurt us or not. There is always risk. But Christ took the ultimate risk in coming down to the earth, even as a baby in a manger (that's a cow's feeding trough, folks!). Through His risk, we now have the beauty of salvation. With Him, we have a sure thing. He does not change -- Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Heb. 13:8). He is always good. Flood your hearts with His life.