Category Archives: The Christian Walk

March 26, 2012 · 6:00 am

What’s Distracting You From Your REAL Calling?

What’s distracting you from what God’s called you to do?

This was the question asked by my pastor from the pulpit.

Easy, I thought. Everything.

Immediately my brain went into overdrive, listing all the things that distracted me from writing.

Laundry. Cleaning. The Internet. Time. Obligations. My children. TV. My husband. Life. Time. Lack of time. Church responsibilities. Friends. Life. Laundry. Cooking. Grocery shopping. Time. Twitter. My emotions. Life.

I started making mental lists of all the things that distracted me and how I could better organize my life to contain or limit these distractions.

God called me to be a writer. And life distracts me from it.

My pastor continued to talk, but it wasn’t his voice I heard in my ear. My pastor’s voice was but a murmur, while a stronger, clearer voice rang through me, piercing my heart with conviction. God spoke to me as my mind whirled, stilling my thoughts with one clear statement.

Before I called you to write, I called you to be a wife and a mother.

Did I mention conviction?

Here I was, trying to figure out what I could do to limit the things that were distracting me from writing, including better management of my family, when it’s writing that’s distracting me from them.

Writing is distracting me from my first, true calling.

God has called me to write. But before that, he called me to be wife and mom.

Priorities. Calling. Being the woman God has called me to be.

I’m passionate about my family. I’m passionate about writing. God has called me to do both, but I know what the real distractions are.

Share with me: What’s distracting you from your real calling?

12 Comments

Filed under Family, The Christian Walk, Writing

Tagged as distractions, family, marriage, writing

March 19, 2012 · 6:00 am

The Promise When Words Aren’t Enough

We hope for what we don’t have yet. So we are patient as we wait for it. In the same way, the Holy Spirit helps us when we are weak. We don’t know what we should pray for. But the Spirit himself prays for us. He prays with groans too deep for words. Romans 8:25-26 (NIrV)

As writers, we love words.

We love what they mean, how they sound, what they convey, how they flow in combination, the feelings they provoke, the stories they tell.

But there are times when words just aren’t enough.

There are times when words, no matter the combination or the intention or the meaning, cannot do justice to the depth of the emotion within.

There are times when even we, the ones who manipulate words for a living, can’t find the right ones to express the innermost thoughts and desires of our soul.

So we bask in the promise that the Holy Spirit, the one who dwells within us and sanctifies us, knows how to convey even our sighs and groans (AMP Bible) as prayers to the Holy one.

Praying over this verse brings peace in times of heartache, but also in times of joy, when our hearts are too full to describe what we’re feeling.

What a comfort it is to know that one so much more powerful than I, one who IS God, knows me well enough to convey the prayers I can’t even think of.

It’s beautiful. It’s overwhelming. It’s calming. It’s a promise.

And it makes it a whole lot easier to wait patiently in hope for what we do not have yet.

Share with me: What verses or promises has God been giving you lately?

7 Comments

Filed under The Christian Walk

Tagged as bible, Jesus, prayer, promise

March 12, 2012 · 6:00 am

Living With Tunnel Vision

I’ve been living with a pretty severe case of tunnel vision lately.

Before you start to feel sorry for me, understand that I’m talking about self-imposed tunnel vision, not medical tunnel vision.

My eyesight is just fine. But my heart-sight has been way out of whack.

For the past few years, ever since I stopped teaching to be a stay-at-home mom, I’ve had this feeling that my life, daily life as I know it, is temporary. I feel like I’m in an interim period. I know it isn’t going to last. One day I won’t have the pleasure of being a SAHM. One day I’m going to have to go back to work. One day things will change. This is temporary.

So I’ve focused my life around the next “big” event. And as each event comes and goes, as each thing is accomplished, my focus shifts to the next thing on the list.

Someday we’ll have another kid.

Someday I’ll write a novel.

Someday I’ll get an agent.

Someday I’ll be a multi-published author.

Someday I’ll get my Specialists degree.

Someday we’ll buy a new house.

Someday we’ll have another kid.

Someday I’ll go back to work.

To me, each goal is the bright spot at the end of the tunnel. Each bright spot will bring me to a place of “permanency” where my life won’t feel so temporary, so much like I’m in holding, just waiting for the next big thing. That glowing beacon at the end of the tunnel pulls me forward, calling me toward the light, demanding my focus and attention. And when I accomplish one goal, another quickly takes its place.

My pastor preached a very profound sermon on tunnel vision a few weeks ago. It was one of those sermons that went beyond gently nodding my head in agreement or even saying a slight “Amen” here and there. No, no.

This was a kick-me-in-the-gut-God’s-getting-my-attention-right-now kind of sermon.

I’d been struggling with this feeling of “permanency v. temporary living” for a while. It’s not that I don’t appreciate the little moments– I absolutely do, but I don’t want to always be looking forward saying, “what’s next?”

I don’t want my need and desire to control everything to dominate the simple pleasures of living.

Tunnel vision is blinding.

This may seem an obvious statement, but when you think about it, focusing all attention on a goal blinds you to everything else in your life. You’re missing opportunity. You’re missing memories. You’re missing the little things that make life life. You’re missing joy.

The harvest is now.

Not then, when things will be better. Not at some ambiguous moment in the future when intense focus has paid off. Not when everything on the list has been accomplished.

God says, “Look where I have put you and what I have done for you in this moment. The harvest is now.”

And when I really consider each piece of my life; each person in it, each day I’m given, each opportunity that arises, I recall what I’ve always known–that life is never permanent. It’s constantly shifting and changing and molding itself to be whatever God has planned for it to be.

Not my plan–His.

Life is beautiful. And when I can’t see what’s ahead, I look toward that eternal goal in front of me, illuminated by the brilliance of Christ.

His glory lights up everything and it appears around me, freeing me from that tunnel vision to focus on the here and now.

It’s wonderful to have life goals, but I don’t want to miss the life-moments that get me there.