Audience of One

(First posted in March 2014 before our move to Waco, Texas.)

The number one idol is self. Why do we “lay up treasures where moth and rust destroy and thieves break in and steal” (Matthew 6:19)?  Do we really love our stuff that much? I don’t think so. We love the perception that it makes us okay, because if it all disappeared, we would be left with just ourselves, and that is a scary thought. Unconsciously, perhaps, we often see ourselves as valuable because of the lives we have built for ourselves.

I see a stage being set for a play. People are working to put all the props in place as they set the scene and adjust the lighting, sound, etcetera. When everything is ready and it’s time to begin the play, the actors then enter the stage. They deliver their scripted lines before the audience who, if they perform well, give their applause in approval. To a lesser or greater extent, that’s what we do. Much of our lives are spent performing. Without realizing it, we work on our “props” continually: our homes, our jobs, our appearance, even our children. And we feel okay about ourselves when the “audience” approves. These props serve as our self-protection, and when we protect ourselves, we become our own gods.

Jesus told the rich young ruler, “Go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me,” (Mark 10:21). He wasn’t making a general statement that everyone should sell everything they own. He was looking into the young man’s heart, and he saw the idolatry. The young man believed he had kept all the commandments from youth (performance), but he still needed his “props” (self-protection), and he wasn’t willing to give them up.

I experienced a lot of change during my years as a widow. I sold the home where I had raised my children and bought a smaller house. Then I moved out of it and into an apartment in the city where I commuted to work. A few months later, I was homesick and moved back home. I sold that house when Mark and I got married and moved in with him. It took some time to make Mark’s home my own. Now after almost four years, every room is decorated and furnished to suit us as a couple. It meets our needs for ministry, for family gatherings, and for grandchildren to come and play. Now the Lord may be asking us to leave it all.

Mark and I are walking a narrow path in the ministry calling God has given us. We are waiting on him for direction as we have to make some huge decisions in the near future, mainly how we are to live as we wait for his promise for provision. We are praying about a less expensive living arrangement and maybe even a geographical move if that’s his will. My questions are “Can I do it joyfully? Will I be okay without all my props?”

Now I see an empty stage. You walk out to give your performance, but there is nothing on the stage–no props, no other actors, no scene. You feel exposed and vulnerable. What are you supposed to do without them? You look at the audience, and you see only one person, Jesus. Instead of giving a performance for him, with one look into his eyes, he fills you completely. It’s you and God alone. As he satisfies your soul and refreshes your spirit, then he sets the stage, all that you need to live out His will for you.

I’ve seen death up close and personal, and I know there are no more opportunities to trust him once we are in the grave. There will be no reason for exercising one’s faith in heaven.  Jesus, I can’t make myself ready for such a big change. But I have experienced your faithfulness in the biggest storms of my life. I’ve seen how you’ve gone before me and prepared me. I know you are preparing me now. By your grace and mercy, help me to lay down my idol of self, of making myself okay. I trust you to meet me here. I want only your will. Amen.

“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose,” Jim Elliott.

Living Outside of the Box

The Box
I cannot find me.
And I don’t want to look inside the box anymore,
For I know now that I don’t belong there.
But I’ve tried so long to fit in it.
Sometimes stuffed in it.
Sometimes very small in it.
What if I walked away from it for good?

I’m thinking about how our miniature schnauzer Calvin steps out of his crate every morning so slowly, yawning, stretching his cramped hind legs that have been tucked under him all night. And I realize this is how I am coming out of the box. It’s like I’ve been asleep, on autopilot for a very long time. So when I come out, I have to stretch myself as I try something new, like saying no or responding differently or giving myself permission to do the things I really long to do—giving myself permission to be me, but not sure exactly how to go about it.

Calvin hesitates. Does he go to the door, ready to go outside and do his business, or does he jump on the chair and go back to sleep? On a rainy morning like today, the effort was too much, so he went back to sleep on the chair. That’s me. Many days the newness in living outside the box seems like too much, so I find a place mentally to curl up and numb out. But other times I rush out to meet the day, welcoming life and eager to discover more about who I am and what God has for me. I know this is a process. In getting off the merry-go-round, I’m doing a lot of floundering. But I know in time my weak legs will get stronger.

When I wrote the poem “The Box,” I didn’t have a label for it, but Mark clarified it for me. The box is false identity, not living as God created me to be, using the unique gifts he put in my hands to fulfill my purpose and bring his light to the world. Inside the box, I was governed by expectations others had put on me, or more often that I had put on myself—needing to please people in order to feel loved, self-protecting mindsets to avoid pain, believing lies about myself that are rooted in wounds. 

The enemy wants to keep us in a place of captivity, where we’re afraid to move from status quo. Life with the Lord is lived in a spacious place where we are free to breathe and move around, freedom to live as God designed us. Why has it taken me so long to get to this place, Lord? But God sanctifies time, and he is faithful. I’m making the choice to not look back and to stay out of the box. I know it’s okay if I stumble and fall and even occasionally go back to sleep. But by his grace, I will get back up! 

He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me.
 Psalm 18:19.