In the Word: Introductions Part 2

We read Matthew 1 and 2, and Luke 2. The nativity accounts! The first descriptions of who Jesus is.

Matthew 1 and 2

We came to Matthew with the understanding that it is written for the Jews of the time, to show fulfillment of the Torah. He wrote at a time when Jews and Jewish and Gentile Christians were figuring out how they related to one another, and how they fit together in the overall story.

Matthew begins his account with the lineage of Jesus, showing his readers that Jesus is a Jew, and from the line of David. He was born in Bethlehem according the the Micah 5:2 prophecy. He was born of a virgin, fulfilling the Isaiah 7:14 prophecy, and beginning his life as a miracle.

Jesus’ birth was revealed to the wise men from the east. These were not the righteous Jews who would’ve expected to be told of the Messiah’s coming. In fact, when they told the Jewish King, Herod the Great what they had learned, he and “everyone in Jerusalem” were disturbed at the news. Herod didn’t want a new king; he was a ruthless protector of his own authority. Yet it was the unexpected people who were told of the Saviour’s coming. After this, we see an interesting parallel between Jesus’ life, and that of the Israelites. His family had to leave their land and go to Egypt to find safety (Jacob’s family ran to Egypt to be saved from the famine). Herod the Great slaughtered hundreds of baby boys in an effort to maintain his power, just as Pharaoh did. When the time came, the Spirit of the Lord let them into the Promised Land, Nazareth for Jesus (fulfilling Isaiah 40:3).

Luke 2

Luke wrote to relate Jesus to every ethnicity and gender. He compiled as much information as he could, in order to present information as completely as he could. The nativity account here is believed to be directly from Mary, indicated by the details regarding her thoughts and the greater detail of events surrounding Jesus’ birth.

Many Jews were expecting a conquering King to save them from the Roman rule. Others were awaiting one who would heal their afflictions. No one was expecting a baby in a stinky cave, and no one was expecting the shepherds to be the ones to announce the coming of the Messiah.

However, as much as Jesus began to break expectations from the beginning, his family did follow temple tradition following his birth. He was offered to God, as all first born Jewish sons were, but would have also been bought back with the traditional redemption price. His mother was ritualistically purified after giving birth.

We meet Simeon and Anna in Luke 2. These are two individuals who were faithful Jews, but were also waiting for God to reveal the messiah to them. Simeon recognized the baby Jesus as the one who fulfilled Isaiah 42:6-7 and 49:6. Jesus was the one who would restore Israel to what she had been created to be-the light to reveal God to the nations. Anna recognized baby Jesus as well, and told everyone around her that God had come to rescue Jerusalem. I don’t know what their reaction to this was, but goodness gracious, I hope I can live an expectant, full faith, content in God’s presence and Word, as she did regardless of what others thought.

This is also the chapter where we see Jesus stay behind in Jerusalem to speak to the teachers at age 12. We see that he recognized God as his Father, but was also obedient to his parents. He went back to Nazareth to grow in maturity and wisdom, as we all must.

In Conclusion

The big theme we found in the Nativity accounts, was that God sent Jesus for everyone, but not for their expectations. He came to the shepherds, the nobles from far off lands, the humble girl from Galilee, and the old man and woman waiting in the Temple. You are not too obscure, marginalized, dirty, or insignificant for God to use you as an important part of his plan. He sees you, and will reveal himself to you. I love that in a culture dominated by men and religious leaders, it was the women and shepherds who God chose to carry his initial message of the Messiah’s birth.

At this point, we’ve seen at least 4 prophecies fulfilled.

The next study will move forward in the story to Matthew 3: 1-17, Mark 1-11, Luke 3:1-22, and John 1:19-28.

In the Word: Introductions Part 1

For those of you who check in here from places other than Prince George, my beautiful friend Emily and I started a Bible study last week. Because I process through writing, and knowing that I need a prod to keep writing and a place to process what we study, I’m going to write along the progression of our study.

I first approached Emily about hosting this with me in response to learning a lot of hard lessons this spring. I found myself living in a safe, defeated place that I’ve spent the last couple of years building up. It was a really lonely place, and that loneliness and fear is really what finally helped me see. I started processing that earlier this spring (here), but there was much more to work through that I didn’t understand until I was invited to an individual session with our pre-marriage counsellors. The past two months have been a huge journey for Stephen and I, but I think maybe especially for me.

In high school, and even right after high school when I started this blog, and was working as the youth and worship intern, I was an active extrovert, organizing events, and trying to encourage and lead those around me, trying to be deliberate about using my gifts. When I got to university, I was hurting a little from different thought patterns and influences, and it became much easier to focus on school, and grades and Stephen than to put myself out there in this new place and find spaces where I could be the organizer and leader I was made to be. I didn’t create or build into many relationships, and didn’t realize that it would build to the state I found myself in this spring. I was blogging periodically, my relationship with Stephen was good, my relationship with God was pretty good (I thought). I didn’t realize that I was tucking a piece of myself away on the back shelf. After a lot of processing and hard conversations, I decided that it was time to work on living fully as the woman who God made me to be, the woman Stephen decided to marry three years ago, again. I had been buying into the lie that my way of processing and doing things had less eternal value than the way others did things. But, that was a lie, and I’ve been able to own that and move forward.

So I needed a place to build relationships with other young women, and I wanted a space where I could lead and encourage others tangibly, using my organizational skills and energy to create a community for those around me. I went for coffee with Emily, and she was totally on board. My love of teaching and her ability to host work together wonderfully!

So here we are. In our introductions last week, I was totally blown away that in nearly every introduction, the women around me were saying that God had told them it was time to find a community like this to build into, and to receive encouragement from. When everyone left, I cried with Emily, knowing that I am not the only one who needs this space, and that we can truly encourage one another.

We’re doing a study of the character of Jesus, as told through the four Gospels. We are trying to leave behind preconceived notions from what others have said, or what our experiences have taught us, and looking into the Word to discover his mission, his nature, and his character. As women who are coming to this text from a variety of spiritual backgrounds, and maturity of faith, we are trying to put ourselves on the same level, and discover Jesus together. We are heading Into the Word.

Just to keep length of post in mind, the next post will contain the summary of our discussion! If you are in the Prince George area and looking for a community to plug into beyond Sunday morning, send me a message! If you’re unable to come, we welcome your thoughts as you plunge into God’s Word from wherever you are, and discover Jesus with us!

Healing My Lonely Heart

Over the course of last weekend I went from having awesome time with friends and Stephen, to realizing that I’ve been lonely lately, and I was lonely once again as everyone returned to their normal lives (some in different cities).

I didn’t know how to process that, and normally I would’ve tried to fix it by spending time with Stephen, but I was housesitting/taking care of 4 kids and we had hardly had time to finish getting back on the same page after a misunderstanding, let alone for my extroverted emotional tank to be filled.

In my frustration, I vented to God a few pages in my journal, then decided to try to get over it until my crazy week was over.

On Wednesday, things started to change.

I got out of class early that afternoon, and found myself with a whole hour between classes, and a lot of sun shine outside! I found some steps to hang out on outside, and realized that I had my journal and one of my Bibles in my backpack (it’s always there actually, I just don’t use it nearly as much as I intended to!). As I reread my prayers from earlier in the week, I was drawn back into my loneliness, and just feeling a little bit lost.

I opened my Bible, and after some flipping around, found myself at Psalm 139, specifically verses 1-12. I memorized this passage ages ago, but it’s amazing how easy it is to forget the meaning behind the words. Read the whole thing, really, but I just want to highlight what caught my attention.

“You have searched me Lord, and you know me.”

A salve for a lonely heart.

I think especially as we’ve been preparing for marriage, I’ve gradually placed more and more mental responsibility on Stephen to be the one who knows me, who sees me, and who understands my heart. When I misunderstood something he was dealing with this week, I felt really hurt, upset that he didn’t understand what I needed. But, the extent to which I expected him to understand me (without direct communication) was selfish and unrealistic.

Something God really said to me on Wednesday, is that this crazy desire to be seen and known I’ve been discovering this week, is good. He made me that way. But, if I look to Stephen to fill that need for me, I will be disappointed. There is no possible way that he, as an entirely human man, will ever completely know my heart, and my thoughts. I’m really excited (and kind of terrified) to spend the rest of our lives building that knowing, but I’m finally figuring out that my need for intimacy is designed to draw me to God.

He knows me. 

He built my heart with all of it’s fears, joys, desires and dark places. He sees it all, and loves it deeply. He sees my heart. The darkness that makes me broken and human are the corners from which He teaches me love, and shows me His healing power. He is the only one who will every truly know me, and I’ve been trying to fill that need from broken people.

I am still lonely, but He is teaching me, loving me, drawing me in. I am so thankful that I’ve got four more months to continue this journey before I marry Stephen. By building intimacy with my God, and learning to trust Him with all of me, I hope I will come to a place where I am a little more ready to be a wife, a place where I can fill my need with God’s presence, so that I can try to love Stephen selflessly and build a healthy, human intimacy with him.

I know I am definitely not alone in my loneliness. I hope that if you’ve been struggling with this, that you’ll allow God to begin speaking to your heart. Find those Psalms that proclaim His love for you, the way that He knows you. Meditate on them, speak them, cry them, whatever it takes for them to penetrate, and begin healing your hurt.

Tomorrow

My university profs are on strike right now. In a month were I was supposed to have 4 paper due dates, 4 midterms, two presentations and many quizzes, I now have no idea what’s going on! I’ve probably said it before, but just in case you’re new to the blog, I really don’t appreciate unknowns like this. I have no idea when I’ll have class next, or when my assignments will actually be due, and even though my profs were really reassuring beforehand, I find it stressful.

Wednesday evening, before the faculty had posted whether or not the picket lines would be up the next morning, Stephen and I were praying. Have you ever had a moment where you weren’t sure where your prayer was coming from, but all of a sudden you realized you’d just been taught something?

“Thank you, Jesus, for tomorrow. Whatever it looks like.”

I know faculty strikes will not be the scariest uncertainty in my life. As soon as I graduate Stephen and I will face a lot of uncertainty as we try to discern where God is going to take us. So, I think this is a prayer I need to start practicing.

Because, really, are there any tomorrows that aren’t somewhat uncertain? I love Christ, because He is constant. He is giving me tomorrow, whatever it looks like, and He promises to do it with me.

Here is Psalm 34. I love it because it is real. It says that the righteous will actually have troubles, but the whole passage speaks about praising and praying to the Lord in the midst of desperation. I know I can feel pretty desperate in the unknown, but God will redeem those who take refuge in Him.

So I’ll keep praying:

“Thank you, Jesus, for tomorrow. Whatever it looks like.”

Refuse to Fear Judgement

I have been overwhelmed this week by comment threads. Between more yoga pants/modesty pieces, countless Fifty Shades of Gray articles, and the hordes of women on social media, I should have known better than to go perusing through those deep dark places. But, because I’ve been able to find pieces of wisdom hidden among the muck on occasion, or evidence of more general cultural attitudes, I still did a little bit of looking. This week I’ve recognized a strong trend of defensiveness, especially within the comments on articles about “Christian issues.”

“Don’t judge me.” “You have no right to judge me.” “You don’t know my relationship with God.” “That’s your opinion, I don’t have to share it.”

Sound familiar?

When I read these, I hear the World.

If you read through any secular blog or media piece, it is likely you will encounter something designed to normalize what people may be offended by, or think is wrong. There is this huge movement against judgement in areas of employment, appearance, pregnancy, sexuality, and gender expression. Basically within any area where you could have a different opinion than someone (especially one based on religious values), they are trying to build an “anti-judgement” space.

This really scares me, especially when I see it happening within Christian media.

I understand. Being judged is the thing we seem to fear most. We do our best to avoid it by trying to follow all the rules and avoid judgement (my preferred method), or by proclaiming that none of our choices deserve to be judged. Judgement attacks the places we are vulnerable. It targets our insecurities.

What causes our defensive reactions?

It is the truth. Whether or not the person addressing us is speaking truth, the truth in our hearts recognizes the voice of judgement and recoils. We, as humans, are meant to be judged.

Since the beginning, it has been clear that sin is a part of who we are as people. Wrong priorities, skewed morals, and dark ambitions are just a few of the things that we can’t shake off on our own. Whether we acknowledge it or not, there is some corner in our hearts that knows the Voice of Truth, and is terrified of it. When we feel judged, we are being punched there.

I know, I spent most of my life fearing judgement. Even though I was generally confident, I feared judgement by friends, and began hiding parts of who I was. I feared judgement from a God who could see the sins that no one else could, and I became more and more attached to behaviours and habits that would make me seem better from the outside. I tried to fix myself, to put myself in a place where I could no longer be judged, but the harder I tried the worse it got. Ask my mother, I am someone who easily becomes defensive, always have been. But, I’m learning what that really means for the condition of my heart. When I become defensive, it is a symptom of the pride I’ve built up in my image and abilities. It shows that I may not actually have confidence that I am pursuing truth in a decision or a position that I’ve taken. It shows a struggle that I may be ignoring.

In the past couple of years, I’ve learned something. It wasn’t a sudden realization but a very drawn out process. Looking back, I can see that when I gradually began to understand grace, and to personally, relationally pursue Christ, it went hand in hand with being able to start letting go of my fear of judgement.

Have you heard this story?

There is a King. He rules over all the land, but there was a time in the past when He had no one with whom to share the beauty of life. But, The King had a plan. He gathered up the dust of the Earth, and breathed His life into it. “The Man came alive-a living soul!” The King also gave the Man a partner to work with and love, the Woman.

Now, the Man and the Woman cared for the Earth, and they lived with The King in true community. But the Man and the Woman were faced with a problem. The King had given them a great gift, called Choice. It was a beautiful gift, but they weren’t sure what it meant. They thanked The King, and He showed them how they were meant  to live and use their Choice. When the Man and Woman found Temptation however, they used Choice in a way The King had asked them not to. They opened the gate of the Earth and allowed Shame to enter, and they hid from The King, for they knew He  was also The Judge, and they feared Judgement.

Because The King ruled over all the land, He knew immediately that Shame had entered His Kingdom. It broke His heart, and He reached out to the Man and Woman. They could no longer live with Him in true community, but He clothed them and sent them on their way unharmed, the beginning of His People. The King knew that it was time to put the next part of His plan into action.

Throughout the following ages, The King tried to love His People. The monster Shame had brought with it Pride, and Greed, Power, and Immorality. When these beasts combined forces, they lured His People away from Him, and built walls of Defensiveness around their hearts. His People did not allow The King to love them, but His plan was still in motion.

Some of His People began to have dreams, and to prophesy that they were going to be rescued from the monsters attacking them. Those who listened lived with hope that The King would rescue them, but they went a long time without hearing from Him, or knowing what He was going to do.

Then one day, The King gave them a piece of Himself. He put His heart into a Woman, in the form of a Child. This Child grew up to become a Warrior. He began teaching His people how to fight Shame and his fellow monsters. He showed them that Truth was the way to free themselves. Those who had built up Defensiveness around their hearts however were unable to see the Warrior as anything but a threat. 

Some of those who had Defensiveness had tried to live as they thought The King wanted them to. They followed all the laws of the land, even creating their own in order to protect themselves from Shame. These were those taken by Pride. There were others who tried to cheat The King, these were taken by Greed. There were still others who ignored The King, these fell to Immorality and Power. Those taken by Shame continued to hide from the Warrior, while the rest spat in His face. 

Those who served Pride were offended by the Warrior, and began plotting to kill Him. They tricked those serving Power into executing Him. What they didn’t know, was that this action was the climax of The King’s plan. Though His People thought they had killed His heart, The King knew that He had defeated Shame.

You see, The King’s heart cannot be killed. In The King’s heart was hidden a second gift for His People, Freedom. When Pride had the Warrior killed, it broke The King’s heart, but it also released Freedom, which healed the heart, and began seeping into the Earth. It welled up as springs of Living Water for His People to find throughout the rest of time.

Those who find the Living Water have the walls around their hearts, their Defensiveness, dissolved. Their service to Shame ends, and they are no longer subject to judgement. They find Freedom, and are restored, welcomed back into true community with The King. 

I have bathed in that Living Water. I should no longer fear judgement, if I have truly accepted the grace offered by Christ. 1 John reminds us what it means to Live in the Light:

⁵ This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all. ⁶ So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God but go on living in spiritual darkness; we are not practicing the truth. ⁷ But if we are living in the light, as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin.

⁸ If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth. ⁹ But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness. ¹⁰ If we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that his word has no place in our hearts.

If we are living in the light, we will seek the life that Christ offers us in him. We will understand that while we are sinners, that it is not our sin that he sees, but he sees who we can be in him. When we are living in this truth, it will destroy the defensiveness, our fear of judgement.

If others do not agree with my choices, I should not get defensive (difficult as it may be), but remember that what truly matters is that my choices line up with God’s standards. I should remember that judgment is not something I should fear any longer, as long as I keep righteousness and holiness as my goal.

While not all comments are made from a spiritually healthy place, especially on the Internet, we should seek to be a part of communities where we can receive accountability and perspective within healthy, personal relationships. It is in those spaces we are called to speak life and truth in the choices we make as the Body of Christ. We cannot reject the comments of others, for when we accept Christ’s grace, live with humility, and refuse to fear judgement, the comments of others can reveal attitudes and standards that don’t line up with the way we are called to live. They can also encourage us as we pursue attitudes that do reflect Christ. People cannot judge our eternal fate, don’t give them power that they aren’t given in the first place. BUT, we are called to live within vulnerable, accountability with our brothers and sisters.

Fear of judgement is an attitude of the world, refuse to let yourself be chained by it.

 

The story is mine, written in a style similar to Stephen’s stories. I hope to post mores stories (mine or his) in the future. Feedback would be greatly appreciated!