Struggles

Something that I dislike about having a blog that is so open and so readable is the fact that I can't just hide behind my keyboard and post things anonymously. I share my struggles and then go out into the world and people know about them. Hello.

Lord, help me to be transparent. I know that's why You called me to start this blog. You're working in my heart now and it's painful sometimes. Open heart surgery is painful right??

I also want to apologize for any disjointed thoughts. Sleep has been elusive and erratic right now, this makes thinking difficult. Again, Lord, help me.

I've been struggling a lot with pride and selfishness. Self-centeredness. Me-ness. Oh how I want the world to revolve around me. I don't even like to type that because it looks so ugly.

I have been wanting to blog just so I can get more hits or comments about how amazing I am at blogging. It's a doubled edged sword I think. I want to be vulnerable and yet I want to be awesome at the same time. Lord, help me to see that this is about You. I am small. Let me be content to just be small and inadequate. It's better when I'm weak and I get to be carried by You Jesus. That way Jody is not exalted so high. I don't belong up there. I just want to be found in You.

I found myself wanting others to know that I'm a musician. Honestly, I'm not that talented. I used to write a lot, mostly out of my struggle with depression and feelings of inadequacy, but I just haven't been able to write these past four years. I want to write a song so badly, but it just won't come. Lord, thank You for humbling me in this area. I would totally think I'm amazing had You not humbled me and broken me. Thank You.

I have been wanting to be skinnier. Mainly so that my clothes wouldn't be so snug and uncomfortable. I've found myself comparing myself to other women thinking, "why can't I look like her?" or looking at myself in the mirror and thinking, "I hate my arms … or my stomach or my legs … " or any other body part that Satan wants to pick in that moment to highlight and hate. Jesus, You created me. I am fearfully and wonderfully made. You created even my fat stores to be where they are and You called me beautiful. I am beautiful because You created me. Lord, help me remember that this body You have given me is good. Help me not to abuse it with a third helping of brownies. Help me to know how to nurture it and take care of it. I pray that I would not even allow thoughts of hatred toward it to be entertained for one millisecond. I am Yours.

All of this has been so me-focused. I feel like it's led down a path of depression lately. Even as I was taking care of the kids, talking to Ben, laying them down for naps I just had a spirit of anger. It wasn't just like a sad depressed, but it was more of an angry depressed. I couldn't put my finger on why I felt this way. But then the Lord showed me, that it's because I'm only looking at me.

Lord, You are so faithful to show me my sin. Yet, You are so faithful not to leave me there. This heart slips into these patterns so easily. Thank You for showing me where I need release. Thank You for humility. Thank You that I get to live a transparent life and I don't have to be concerned with what others think of me, because only Your opinion matters. You see all of my heart. Let me live in that place. Let me be only concerned with You. Give me strength to love my children and my husband and serve them sacrificially no matter how little time I get to myself. They are truly a joy and I really do have the best job in the world.

Thank You Lord.

A Confession

Taking a break from projecting right now. The truth is, I really just don't want to go out and paint in 97 degree weather. Maybe I'm just a wimp.

I'm about 22 and a half weeks. Pregnancy isn't something you can speed up or slow down, it just is what it is. I'm feeling pretty good these days, but wondering if I'm gaining a little more weight than I should...

I've been wanting to blog in the afternoons, honestly, just because that is when I'm always so tempted just to eat. It may be my worst time of day as far as temptation goes. I'm usually tired, I'm usually alone and usually I feel like it's "my time" to do whatever I want. Also, I am usually starving by about 3 o clock (or at least it feels like I am).

Honesty Room: I have not wanted to give this area over to the Lord lately. I've wanted to keep my eating to myself, I've enjoyed it and I have run to it as a source of comfort.

I've been reading in Ezekiel lately. I've never really read Ezekiel and didn't know much about him. I'm super duper proud of how I'm STILL on track for reading the whole Bible chronologically this year. This is the first time I've read the Bible in a year and I have to say, it is awesome. Do it. Stick with it. It's hard at times, but it's good.

So, Ezekiel is probably the most graphic prophet I've read yet. I always though Hosea was the most scandalous, but really, it's Ezekiel. He has the most visions from God, direct, crazy visions, and his prophecies are intense. Like when he was prophesying to a religious leader and the guy just dropped dead, or the analogy about Israel being found and nurtured by God, then they went and prostituted themselves out to other nations.

Anyways, this morning I was reading in chapters 31-34 and it just talked about obeying God and how these people talk like they are believers, but they do not act that way. They do not depend on God. They still sin in secret. I was so convicted in my heart that I had not been trusting in God. I had been trusting in me. I had been running to pleasures.

Lord, help me to run to You. It is so hard, and those voices of sin are so strong within me. I see how sin destroys and leaves us emptier than we were before. I pray that I would overcome. Thank You for the songs this morning that talk about how You are stronger, You break the chains of our sin, You have risen and sin is broken. Please continue to break the sins inside of me.

Choices

I have been realizing that life is just a series of small choices.

This is annoying to me. Why can't it be one big picture, I make one decision and it changes my life?

Example: This afternoon I wanted a huge spoonful of peanut butter. Nothing wrong with peanut butter for sure, that just happened to be my drug of choice this afternoon. I made myself a cup of coffee instead. I wanted to sit and look at facebook all afternoon, instead I did a few exercises from my yoga video. Right now I want to eat a bowl of ice cream. I had ice cream last night. The night before that I had a brownie. The night before that... well, let's just say I've probably had enough sweets this week.

I keep wondering why I still have a bit of a jiggle around my middle section (nothing wrong with it, I'm actually very satisfied with my body right now, strangely satisfied). This sounds so stupid to say I want to lose five pounds when I used to need to lose 50 or 60. Five pounds is DUMB. I'm just gonna say that for the record.

The truth is, it's not in some big, killer exercise program or weight loss program it is in the nitty gritty, every day, small, minuscule, tiny choices I make in my life.

I want it all to be solved in one night and then I want to be able to eat ice cream all the time, but the truth is, it's a much slower process than that.


A few afternoons ago I had to dump some ice cream in the trash. I was midway through a bowl of it and the Lord was giving me a way out. He was practically yelling at me that I was eating not because I was hungry (I was actually quite full) but because I was stressed about something completely different. I didn't feel like listening to songs I was supposed to listen to for worship team, the kitchen needed to be cleaned, the house was a disaster. I was overwhelmed. The Lord very clearly said, "you can either throw that away inside your body, or you can do it outside your body. You are not hungry at all Jody, lay it down. It's okay to waste food sometimes. It's okay."    

"Crap... okay, fine."


It's the small, everyday choices that I struggle with the most.

Oh Jesus, help me to listen.

Things God is teaching me

Lord, please help me as I write this. I have so much I want to share but I don't know what I need to hold back and what I need to bring forward. Please help me.

God has been teaching me many things lately.

But I am a slow, reluctant learner.

In the mornings when I read my Bible and pray and journal everything sounds really awesome and I think, "yes! I want to do that!" but then two O clock hits and I am not wanting to submit and obey anymore. That's around the time when I want to do things my own way.

I hate that.

I think it's laziness and lack of conviction.

The thing is, if I try to fight my own laziness I just end up making excuse after excuse. "I'm a mom" "I had a rough day" "I deserve this" ... and so on. I don't follow through because I depend on myself and honestly, I'm like a reed blowing in the wind.

Lord, I have been lazy with my house. I have been lazy in my prayers and scripture memory. Yes, I have two little kids and they are demanding and difficult and definitely not convenient, BUT I don't think that's an excuse not to call on You at all times. I don't think that's an excuse to waste their nap time on facebook and reading blogs or eating cookies or whatever I can find in the pantry. Father, I have been wasteful in my time and that is wrong.

God has also been teaching me about pride.

Some friends of mine were talking about their small group leader once who would say "Honesty Room" and then he would just blurt out whatever was on his mind. He would say maybe what everyone in the room was thinking but afraid to actually talk about. He would confess sins and for some reason it was okay because he said "Honesty Room" beforehand. ... I think I could live my life in Honesty Room. I'm going to steal his phrase though.

Honesty Room. I love compliments. I love the praise of man. I love to look in the mirror and think about how beautiful I am. (Oh my goodness, I sound so vain)... but vanity, that's what it is. Losing weight has not helped in this area. I pass by a mirror (still) and think, wow, I am so skinny! ... (Oh my gosh, I can't even believe I'm saying this right now, I'm saying it because it's true). It's not true all the time, mind you. I have days when I look in the mirror and I hate what I see, but that's not as often the case.

The truth is that my heart is wrecked with sin.

I want to be humble. I want to have a humble heart that doesn't even THINK about that stuff. I want to have an others-focused heart that loves and gives of itself. Lord, I can't do that without You.

Generosity.

Are we still in Honesty Room? Cause I am. I am not a generous person. I mean, I can be and I want to be but I am also paranoid about money sometimes. I realized the other day and told Ben that Christmas stressed me out because all these stupid gifts had to be given and we would have to spend all this money and buy people things and it was all mandatory because of this holiday. I have to make out a list of what I want for Christmas so my family can know what to give me but the truth is that I don't need anything. There are things that I want but they cost hundreds of dollars and it's really awkward asking for cash for Christmas. I just don't know that I'm much of a gift person. It's terrible.

But it's not just the gifts, it's that I'm not generous to the poor. I'm not generous with my time or my money. There's this thing that keeps itching in the back of my mind that I keep thinking about how stinking wealthy and comfortable we are. We have heat and air conditioning. We have comfortable couches, washing machines, dryers, we have hot water heaters, soft beds, the list could go on and on. There are people walking around on this earth who have nothing. I have brothers and sisters in Christ who don't even have a tenth of what I have. We spend at least a hundred dollars a week on just food, if not more. I know that this is the culture we live in and the cost of living and all that... but still. It doesn't sit right.

I want to go volunteer at a soup kitchen or go give Christmas presents to a family or something like that. But I have two little kids and I don't have time... It would be difficult.

Lord, help me with this. I want to be generous.

Simple Obedience

Have you ever felt like it takes like eight trillion times for you to learn one simple thing? I have been feeling that way lately.

The Lord is teaching me about absolute obedience.

Ben and I have decided to start studying our Bibles this way:
Read a passage of scripture
Write down the scripture in your own words
Write down a list of how you can obey the scripture. A list of "I Wills"

Then you have to do the "I Wills" and you have to talk to other people about it. Just say, 'This is what God has been teaching me lately..."

Very simple. Yet oh so difficult.

I've been reading in Luke and it's basically the Sermon on the Mount only in Luke's words. Yesterday I read two things that hit me.

One: What is done in secret will be disclosed. If you say anything in secret, if you do anything, it will someday be shouted from the rooftops. Now, it may happen on Judgement Day or it may happen before then, but really, none of our lives is hidden. Everything is seen and heard.

Now I'm going to get a little more down and dirty and how this applies to my life. Lately I have been eating in the afternoons. Eating a lot. Let's just say the other day I had eight cookies. I'm just saying that so that there will be no imagination used or anything and I just believe that absolute honesty is the best way to go. Something I have struggled with for years has been closet eating. The secrecy of it is terrible. Maybe that's why I have to say that out loud, so that it doesn't have power over me any more.

It's usually that my kids are down for naps and I think to myself, Ben won't notice these cookies being gone. Or: he doesn't care what I eat. Or: this is MY time, I've had a rough day and I've EARNED this by gosh.

Yesterday the Lord really convicted me in that I think that because I'm alone I can get away with this sin. Yes, it's a sin, I'm harming the body God has given me and I'm going to food for comfort. It's a sin. Really, He's right there with me. He sees everything. what I do in secret, when i'm along in my house is important. That time when no one sees me does matter. Not so I can be skinny or awesome or anything like that, but my heart needs to be towards Him and not towards food.

Now, just to clarify the freedom: I believe one or two cookies are not a sin. God did make food to be enjoyed but the excess of eight or ten or twelve... I know that I'm not simply looking to enjoy a part of God's creation, I am being selfish and I am over indulging and treating a good thing in the wrong way.

Okay, on to the other thing I am learning...

Two: Sell your possessions and give to the poor.

(looks away)

Really Jesus? What do you mean by that? How many possessions should I sell? What should I keep? How do I sell them?

I read that one this morning.

Honestly, it kind of scares me because I don't know how exactly to obey that one. I hated having a garage sale and really I did about 8 hours of work for about a hundred bucks. So dumb. I have often thought about selling stuff on Ebay or Craigs List with dollar signs in my eyes thinking, I could make money and be rid of stuff. (I hate how much stuff we have in our house). But then I think about setting up and Ebay account and taking pictures and setting prices and then mailing the stuff and it all becomes very overwhelming. Is that dumb? I feel so dumb to say all that. But it's really how I feel.

So, here's my prayer for this last scripture I read.

Lord, I know that you don't want us to be held down by our stuff. I know you want us to give to the poor. You say that we will have so much greater treasure in heaven when we do those things. But Lord, I'm really lost in how to obey you in this one. I don't want to obey you. I feel like I sound like my three year old when he was whining about not wanting to eat his green beans last night. "I don't like it!" Thank you for being patient with me. Holy Spirit, please empower me to obey You. I have no idea what I'm doing and I feel stupid sometimes but You can enable me to do the things I need to do. I want my heart to be right and ready and willing. Help me to be able.

Honesty

I have so much that I want to write about. So much is on my heart and mind.

There is something going on at my church right now. It is an open confession of sin in front of everyone. Our pastor is at the front and people are just lining up to confess sin, to read scripture that has been on their heart, to share deep places in their lives. I love it. I could sit in it and rest in it all day. I love openness. I love honesty. You can ask me anything about my life and I will answer it completely, even the uncomfortable stuff.

It makes me think of the time when I was fifteen and our youth pastor put a microphone at the front of the room and asked us to share. Everything in me wanted to stay sitting on the floor, to stay in my sin, to just sit there and be silent about my pain and my messed up life. But something was telling me that I wanted freedom more. There is something so freeing about honesty. To live and know that when people are looking at you they can see all of you. There are no secrets.

So I got up as a young fifteen year old. I felt like I had a lot to lose. I was playing on the worship team, I was a "leader" in our youth group, my parents were in full-time Christian ministry... for a kid, I had a lot to lose :). But I went up to the front and I confessed. I remember saying, "People tell me I have a pretty smile or that I smile a lot, but I want you to know that a smile can hide so much." I confessed my loneliness, depression, my struggle with food and eating, my struggle with thinking about sexual things (this was in front of about 60 of my peers).

And then I got down and wept. I just wept. I remember one of my youth leaders, a mom of one of my friends, holding me. I remember three girls coming up to me afterward, I had no idea that they were struggling with the same things.

Now, from there on I would be lying if I said I lived a perfect, sinless life. That would be ridiculous. In fact, I think I struggled even more intensely with sin later in my life. Even immediately after that time I think I struggled with a deep depression.

But I think it was my first taste of real freedom. I can look back on that moment and say, that is when I began to live in the light. The book of James says "Confess your sins to each other so that you may be healed." I think that is where my healing began.

Broken Churches Led By Broken People part 2

I always seem to procrastinate with the posting. I doddle around on Facebook and then check my email, check my messages, hoping to get caught up in something else.

For the most part, I loved my church growing up. I loved the music especially. :) Around about 7th grade our old worship pastor moved on to another job. He was the traditional hymns and piano kind of guy. I learned many of the hymns I know today from his time. The old people loved him too:) So when we got a new guy who had just come off the mission field from England and the Czech Republic who had a guitar and kid who played the djembe there was a bit of an exodus. He mentioned once to me and a few others that he would get angry letters in the offering tray about it. I imagine that would be a difficult thing. It's interesting how an offering plate can be passed around and the offering from the body are notes of... well, not encouragement.

I loved this new worship leader. He and his family were so full of life and fun. His wife played piano and they had such a heart for international missions. It was as though we had a worship pastor and missions pastor all in one. At the time our youth pastor was encouraging us to be a part of the church, serve in adult ministries, not just to be the future church but to BE the church. As a home schooler this didn't seem too bad to me. I was comfortable with adults and went to some of our Equipping Classes. I think these days they would be called Small Groups. I also got to sing on the worship team. I remember someone asking me what year I was in college and I told them I was in seventh grade. I was tall for my age, but still... really? Whatever. Seriously though, I don't think I've grown an inch since then. :)

Anyways, so after our new worship leader came our youth pastor was called to leave maybe a year later. He gave us four months to find a new youth pastor.

We went nine months without a youth pastor. The parents tried to do their best to step in, but we had been probably too enamored with our first youth pastor, plus, they were our PARENTS... :) really? Who wants them? I started a youth worship team and we were TERRIBLE. I played the piano and this other guy played electric guitar, we tried to incorporate a trumpet, it was terrible.

We got a new youth pastor the middle of my ninth grade year. I wasn't sure about him, he seemed too happy or goofy or something. Now as I look back I see that he had a genuine heart and a desire to be led by the Spirit. He helped me to break outside of my perfect shell. One weekend on a retreat he had an open time of sharing. I knew I needed to tell the truth about my struggle with an eating disorder, my lonliness, my struggles with sexual fantasies... I didn't want to. For some reason I got up there anyways and shared through tears in front of my youth group of about fifty or sixty kids. As a result I had three girls come up to me that night and tell me they were struggling with some of the same things. Since that night I have made a pledge with the Lord that I would be honest at all costs. I knew He would be faithful to bring others into my life I could share with and it didn't matter who knew.

Lord, what do You want me to share? What kind of details? I don't want to slander anyone, but I want to be holy in the way I say stuff... I want to be honest.

Okay, let's just count here. I've seen three youth pastors leave our little church, three worship pastors, four teaching pastors... there was a pastor "disagreement" that was never truly resolved I felt. I think that was the biggest blow. The pastor who left was gracious and moved to another state to continue pastoring, but still about half the church left. It was hard to watch people leave. Easier to see them go on good terms than bad ones. I had one youth pastor take four months to leave, another one left in two weeks. One worship pastor left to go work as a chef, another left to do full time missions around the world, another one left to make a more "seeker friendly" church... I think... I can think of two friends specifically who were hurt by one pastor's ministry and him confronting them on wrong grounds, I guess it was just messy and people lying and stuff like that. ...

Okay, all of that junk to say, the church is led by broken people. So many times I have asked God why? Why did you allow this? These people are wrong! But God quietly responds that He put men in charge who are broken. The more they realize that and live in a dependence on Him, the better. They will be held to a higher standard and God is a just God. Jesus was the hardest on the teachers of the law, I wonder if that's because there was a carnage of people in their path.

We are to submit ourselves to the authority God has placed in our lives. We are to live faithfully to where He has called us to be. We are to do all things without grumbling or complaining. We are to search the scriptures for ourselves and make sure that no one is committing heresy. We are to grow where we are planted and do what He has called us to do.

Comparison

I wanted to talk about comparison. I hate comparison. I measure myself up against others all the time. And I hate it.

This blog is me taking skeletons in my closet and literally throwing them out into the open. I am examining them, weeping over them, rejoicing over the victory of them, struggling with them. My flesh is weak and it wars against my spirit. You can read more about that in Romans chapters 6-8. I highly recommend it.

Here is a skeleton I still struggle with. I have victory over it and then I struggle some more.

Comparison.

I have even found a new dimension of comparison with my husband and son. I compare my husband to other husbands, how does he measure up? Is he as good as that guy over there, does he lead as well? Is he as attractive? In my son, can he do what other 15 month olds are doing? When he was in the process of crawling to walking I would see other kids his age walking and him not walking and I would worry. I would compare. I'm sure next it will be talking, then potty training, then other abilities like sports or music or whatever. The possibilities are endless. Sadly. We compare ourselves amongst ourselves.

I compare myself with other women. How do I look next to them? Am I heavier? Am I prettier? Do I have more talent than them? Do I have better knowledge of the scriptures? Blah blah blah... I think you could call the road of comparison the road of DEATH. Death of friendships, death of peace, death of worth of yourself (we are worthy because we are in Christ and He created us), death of just plain loving your husband even though he's imperfect, death of loving your child just because they are your child and you just love them for them. That's all kids want, just to be loved for who they are and not what they can do.

This is why Facebook is such a struggle for me. We can put up this appearance of perfection. We can post on our walls about our perfect lives, put up pictures that make us look amazing, and compare ourselves to the lives of others. I love Facebook for the communication and the networking it provides, but I still struggle with it.

I feel like this comparison struggle creates a wedge between people. Specifically women. I don't see men struggling with this as much, but with women it seems to just drive something between us.

Lord, help me. Please speak to this area of our lives.

I want to live in transparent truth. The truth shall set you free. I have discovered that in a deeper way these past few weeks. More than anything it has increased my gratitude for the Cross and what it did to my sin. Jesus died on the cross, washed us clean in his blood, rose again conquering death and now God sees me as perfect. I am perfect in a way... I'm made holy and clean. Day by day I am being refined by His Spirit who is walking with me. I trip up and He faithfully picks me up. He is gradually (very gradually) making me righteous.

So what does all this mean in the realm of comparison? Your opinion of me doesn't matter. :) I say that with a smile because my opinion of you doesn't matter either. If we will rest in that and just SIMPLY do what He has called us to do, no more and no less, then comparison won't be an issue. Easier said than done.

Lord, change my heart in this area. Help me to rejoice in You always. Let my gentleness be evident to all, because You are near. Let me not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving present my requests to You. And Your peace which passes all understanding, it goes beyond my situation, beyond my hurts, beyond my striving, will guard my heart and my mind in Christ Jesus.
This prayer is taken from Philippians 4:4-6

The Redemption of My Physical Body: part ten

When Ben and I were dating, well, it was kind of like word vomit all the time. I had decided a long time ago that whoever was brave enough to date me would know every nook and cranny of my life. I think that's why our dating and engagement was so short because we KNEW each other so well. I mean, it wasn't like the first date I lined out perfectly all my struggles past and present and every mistake I ever made, but literally two weeks into it we shared with each other late one night on my parents' front porch our deepest, darkest sins. We both had to sort out and forgive each other of these things, we got to process them up front, from the beginning and encourage one another in them. We were driving in the car one time and I was like, "Do you want to know how much I weigh?" I wanted to know if he would accept me at this weight I was at. He responded that it didn't make any difference to him what I weighed, that wasn't why he liked me. So I told him. I weighed 5 pounds MORE than he did. And he's 6 inches taller. I put it out there and it didn't change his love towards me ONE BIT. It was good to just have everything on the table. I hear about how couples learn so much about each other after they get married, or find out secret things or may not even know some basic things and they have known each other for YEARS, this is incomprehensible to me. I guess I could see how that would happen, but still there is a level at which I just simply don't understand.

I think this honesty with Ben has allowed me to be okay with sharing the ridiculous things I have done. If I can share them with my soul-mate, my life- partner, my husband and he will still love me, then I can share them with anyone.

I remember struggling with buying a wedding dress. I talked about struggles with clothes in this post. Since meeting Ben I had lost some weight, but was still fairly ... big. I mean, maybe had about 30-40 pounds in my opinion. I remember just dreading it. There was no way I was going to buy one of those big white dresses. I wanted to get married, yes, but I didn't want to have everyone looking at me. I didn't want people judging my choice of dresses, I didn't want that pressure. So, I told Ben. And he said, "Jody, don't wear a dress for anyone else, just wear it for me. Remember that you are my bride and I want you to wear white just as we wore white the day that Christ bought us as his bride, so you are symbolizing our relationship with him." There was no arguing with that.

I decided that it would be a no pressure thing. So I took my little sister and we waltzed into David's Bridal on a Tuesday morning. The store was empty and I told her what kind of dress I wanted. I didn't want a veil (probably mostly because I'm cheap) I just wanted a dress with straps (there was no way I was going in there with my football shoulders with a strapless dress) sleeves if possible because I hated my arms, no long train, or not too long, and this was my size, I don't care if it's bigger or whatever, I'm not defined by a number on a tag.

I loved the first dress I tried on. Kelsey and I had a blast just making fun of the bridesmaid dresses that were on display, the undergarments, dancing in front of the mirrors, etc. I'm so thankful for her as my sister, I don't know what I would have done without her. :)