There is a reason I’ve been radio silent.

Up until March, I’d never fasted. Not that I was against it, I guess I didn’t fully understand it. That’s not accurate. I understood the idea of fasting and praying, but I didn’t comprehend the power.

I felt a nudge to fast back in October 2011. I even picked prayed and set a date. The date came and went and I ignored it . Then around February of this year, this happened and afterwards I was a bit bombarded with messages on fasting and prayed asking if I should do a fast.  A quick, clear, “Yes” answer was given and I prayed about when and how.  The answers came.

“A 24-hour Daniel fast.”

Ok. I can do that.

“Wednesday 10am-Thursday 10am”

Ok. Sounds easy enough.

“Once a week for 6 weeks, ending with Wednesday-Friday.”

That was quite the shock. I’d never fasted in my life and I was being led to this? 6 weeks? Granted, it was only once a week, but still. It was daunting.  I also felt led to go unplugged during this time of prayer and fasting. No computer, internet, phone, radio, or TV.

I had read A Woman’s Guide to Fasting back in October when I first felt led to fast, so I pulled it out and refreshed my memory, did a little research on a Daniel fast and hesitantly told Phil about it.  I felt a little freaked out because the information was so very specific and half of me wanted to believe I was making it up, but the other half knew without a doubt that God was being that specific for a reason.  To my surprise, Phil said he’d fast and pray with me.

I took the advice of the book and started with a documented plan. When, how long, what kind of fast, reason for fasting, Scripture to focus on, etc…

That post I linked to above, Spirit Led Prayer,  the part I didn’t tell was that was over a ministry position Phil applied for. I emailed his resume while he was at work, he called me to ask if I’d sent the letter of recommendation (I hadn’t) so I sent it, hung up the phone and was then on my knees in prayer. It was so weird.  I was still praying and crying when Phil called me back to tell me the founder of the ministry called him and  he’d been on the phone the WHOLE time I was praying (and he didn’t know I was praying.)  We both felt certain that the job would be his.

Then nothing. Not an email or a call back. Nothing. We were pretty devastated.

Then we started to get the feeling we were being called to Montana.  And this is when I was supposed to start my fast. March 28-May 4.
These were my reasons for the fast:

• Obedience. Because I clearly was not obedient the first time.
• Trust. Did I trust that what God was telling me was from Him? Or was I making it up in my head?
• Direction for our lives
• Direction for Phil’s “ministry” (whatever that may be) How would Phil serve God?

Most of those weeks were quite painful for me. Phil wanted to GO. I wanted to go with him. We were searching opportunities and job and sending resumes and trying to work out what God was asking of us.

The fasting once a week felt weird at first. Then I found myself looking forward to being completely unplugged, a day to spend with God–on HIS terms, not mine.  By the end, I didn’t want the fast to end.

During the fast, Phil got a promotion and we realized that maybe it was our own desire to GO and maybe God wanted us here. And here we are. Still feeling like something is going to change, but not jumping at everything, not going down rabbit trails. We’re trying to Be Still. Trying to listen. And it’s very, very difficult.

During these 6 weeks, I learned some pretty huge lessons.

• Fasting and praying is *not* about me. Oh you’d think I’d be less narcissistic by now, but no. Not so much. I wanted to be obedient, I wanted to trust more, I wanted direction for my  husband and our lives. Geez. How does God even handle the BS I dole out?
• I was too busy. Too many commitments, too many days away from home, I wasn’t doing anything effectively. I was just living to get by and that is not the life God has for me.  By unplugging and ignoring the world and focusing on Him, I learned the best lesson…He doesn’t want the things from me. He doesn’t want my  activities, my art, my workshops, my service…He wants me. Just me.  And by the end of the fast I was so looking forward to our time together.
• He doesn’t always provide the answers we’re looking for or expecting. I really expected to be packing and moving this month. We were ready to go. But the answer we got (by way of Phil’s promotion) seems to say that we need to Be Still. We need to be content.  We need to listen and pray more instead of guess what He’s trying to say.
• I still don’t know what’s next for us. I think that’s maybe the trust part. I have to just Be Still and trust that He is in control. (and man. that is the hardest part.)

So. That’s it in a nutshell.  I feel like I’ve still got more to learn from this experience and it feels very unfinished.  I don’t even know what that part means yet.

Admittedly, I don’t know a whole lot about Mark Driscoll. I’m a little familiar with Mars Hill church. I know people that I’ve met face-to-face who have attended Mars Hill and confirm that there is, indeed, reason to heed the warnings in the stories of people who have been scorned by this church.

The issue at hand is the disciplinary contract handed down for a church member to sign. A man who sinned (and which one of us hasn’t?) and who repented.  But in this church culture pastored and led by Driscoll, the man was issued a contract and when he prayed and thought it over and decided it might not be a good thing to sign, the church furthered their “discipline” by posting a letter instructing other members to stay far, far away from this man.

Part 1
Part 2

I was once a woman under “church discipline” and it’s hard for me, at this point, to say I’ve fully recovered.  Enough time has went by, I’ve analyzed it ad nauseam, I’ve gleaned lessons, and moved forward. Or so I thought.

Until I read something like this and all the pain bubbles back up.

Don’t misunderstand. I’m not sitting here in a ball rocking back and forth and drooling.  It’s just that when I hear about things like this I hurt for the other soul that is being split apart over this ridiculous behavior being touted as “Biblical.”

Yes, I understand that sin has to be addressed, I understand that fully.  Who, though, is addressing Mark Driscoll’s sin?  How about the sin of his leaders?

And did they not read the passages that came before their outline for Biblical discipline?

Where is the grace? The forgiveness?

The love?

I’ve been in the place of this man, though I felt a little more like Job. I hadn’t sinned and ashes and coals were being heaped on my head.  Maybe I felt more like Joseph, accused of wrongdoing and imprisoned and forgotten.  What I know is the Senior Pastor of the church I called home set out to take me down in a very witch-hunt-like way.  The meetings. Oh the meetings.  Everyone got to speak and throw accusations and look down upon me and judge me. I was an unbiblical wife. I was a heretic.  I needed to keep my mouth shut and learn in silence. I should quit writing because God doesn’t call women to write.  And two notebook pages full of garbage like this. They told me I couldn’t serve in their church any longer in any capacity. They banged their hands on tables and shouted when my husband told them we weren’t going to respond to their accusations, that we were going to go home and filter everything through the Word of God and through prayer and we’d respond at a later date, after much prayer.

And I knew we didn’t belong there.  In my heart, in my spirit, I knew these people were wrong.  My husband knew, too.  We left. They called us back to schedule more meetings, we declined. They told us we had to respond to their accusations and called almost weekly. And the emails. And more phone calls. And Lord only knows what was said through the gossip train known as the prayer chain.

Months went by and calls were still coming in.  Would we come in front of the congregation to tell them how the pastor had lied? (no. I don’t want any part of taking a pastor down. He’s your pastor, you deal with him. He, along with you, are why we left.)

Then a few months later another call. Would I come back to teach the leadership team how to lead.

Really. This happened.

I learned big time lessons from what I had to endure.

Repeatedly, I heard from my (former) pastor that Satan’s plot in the conflict was confusion. He said it was ironic that just about the time God was going to do an “explosive work” at that church, conflict occurs. He said the devil wanted to make a turn in the road. The (former) pastor told me all about Satan and what Satan wanted and how Satan worked. I never once heard from him about how God was working. I find that disturbing and sad. 

He also said, “This [situation,] given proper patience, prayer, and submission, will become a blemish in history not a turn in the road the devil wants to make it.”

Satan deserves no glory. There is One and only One who deserves recognition. The Lord my God.

I trusted someone else’s direction for my life (the pastor’s) instead of trusting Christ. God was trying to show me that I didn’t belong in the position the pastor appointed me. I thought Satan was trying to discourage me from being involved in women’s ministry at that church because Satan doesn’t like ministry. Sounds logical enough. It did at the time, anyway. I’ve learned that God was trying to get my attention by not furthering the ministry. I couldn’t hear Him, though, because I was too busy focusing on what the pastor was saying and by giving Satan glory.

I allowed myself to be deceived into believing that people who go to church know what God wants. I thought God must want me in women’s ministry if His shepherd put me there. This one hurts the most. I blame no one except for myself. The pastor appointed me Director of Women’s Ministry and I grabbed the job and ran with all my might. That is not what God had for me. And instead of asking Him, I just assumed that His shepherd knew what He was doing. Oh how foolish of me!!

I thought that God’s people should approve of God’s call on my life. Now this was just stupid of me to believe. I look back and think that if I’d only have paid attention to (for example) the story of Moses, I’d see that God’s people don’t always know or approve of what God wants.

I thought others should understand what God was asking of me and I thought it was my job to make them understand. Again, stupid. See Moses again.

I’m still learning from this conflict. I questioned God when it first started, but now I’m finding joy in the trial. I’d rather focus on the fact that God is testing my faith to discover what is in my heart and to increase the measure of faith He gave me, to give me endurance so that His work might be complete in me.

I pray that anyone and everyone who has been hurt by a pastor or a church will take the focus off the people and put it all on God. He will redeem you.

Giving away a copy of the Common English Bible. Don’t forget to comment to be entered!!

Yep. I missed posting last week.  But I didn’t skip reading.  Today was day 23 for me…and y’know, the experts say it takes 21 days to form a habit, so hopefully I can carry on with this new-again habit.

So far, I’ve only run across one thing in my reading of the Common English Bible that has given me pause.  It was today, actually, in Genesis and the telling of Jacob wrestling with God.

^{Chapter 32: 22} Jacob got up during the night, took his two wives, his two women servants, and his eleven sons, and crossed the Jabbok River’s shallow water. ²³ He took them and everything that belonged to him, and he helped them cross the river. ²⁴ But Jacob stayed apart by himself, and a man wrestled with him until dawn broke. ²⁵ When the man saw that he couldn’t defeat Jacob, he grabbed Jacob’s thigh and tore a muscle in Jacob’s thigh as he wrestled with him. ²⁶ The man said, “Let me go because the dawn is breaking.”

But Jacob said, “I won’t let you go until you bless me.”

²⁷ He said to Jacob, “What’s your name?” and he said, “Jacob.” ²⁸ Then he said, “Your name won’t be Jacob any longer, but Israel, because you struggled with God and with men and won.”

²⁹ Jacob also asked and said, “Tell me your name.”

But he said, “Why do you ask for my name?” and he blessed Jacob there. ³⁰ Jacob named the place Peniel, “because I’ve seen God face-to-face, and my life has been saved.” ³¹ The sun rose as Jacob passed Penuel, limping because of his thigh. ³²Therefore, Israelites don’t eat the tendon attached to the thigh muscle to this day, because he grabbed Jacob’s thigh muscle at the tendon. (emphasis mine)

 

I stopped reading and had to re-read (and this is the first time I’ve had to do that in this version) because it said Jacob wrestled with a man. And it kept saying man and almost across the board this passage usually says something about an Angel of God.  But in verse 30 Jacob says he has seen God face-to-face, so all’s well.  It just gave me a little jolt to see the passage written this way.

* * *

Comment and tell me your preferred version of the Bible. I’ll pick a random reader (one per week) and the people behind the CEB will send you one.  If you’ve never had a Bible and would  like to start with this one, let me know in the comments and you’ll automatically be the chosen one

Failure piled on failure…

most years, when I set out to do a year-long Bible reading plan I fail.  That’s not to say I’ve never read through the whole Bible. I have, but it’s been a few years.  So this year with my One Word and with my renewed energy, I’m going to attempt to read through chronologically.

What’s different this time?  A Smartphone, a Common English Bible (CEB)  and the YouVersion.com app.  The app reminds me daily to read.  I’m review the Common English Bible and can go to my hard copy or read it on the YouVersion app.  And of course, my Smartphone is attached to me.  Which means I have no excuses.

So far, so good. I’m right on track. And so far, I like the Common English Bible. Wanna peak at some verse comparisons?

Would you like a softcover edition for yourself?

Comment and tell me your preferred version of the Bible. I’ll pick a random reader (one per week) and the people behind the CEB will send you one.  If you’ve never had a Bible and would  like to start with this one, let me know in the comments and you’ll automatically be the chosen one

You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy, at Your right hand there are pleasures forevermore. Psalm 16: 11