Hello, my friends. As I figure out this blog thingy, I’m learning a lot.

My priorities—home, family, and newspaper deadlines—are teaching me I can’t blog weekly. Meanwhile, my job at the candy shop keeps me from other story submissions and my book project. While I’ve shared snippets of Naked Truth, I want to give it my full attention.

But, I’m also learning there are times I need to vent, clear my mind, and write an off-subject story. So goes my brain these days.

Like Dug, the dog in the movie Up, I have my squirrel moments.

Sometimes it’s hormones, sometimes it’s caffeine, sometimes it’s the passions God put in me. Lord, help us, when it’s all of the above. But He uses it all.

As my writing career enters its toddler stage, I’m cutting new teeth and  learning to walk. Yes, my wonderful readers, you’re kinda like my parents. You’ll see me wobble and whine.

Such is life for us who seek to grow. We will doubt and we will fail, but God doesn’t. He coaxes us to baby steps and sometimes to giant ones.

A couple years ago, I prayed, “God, I want to do something so big that only You can do it through me.” It’s a scary, exhilarating, giant step. But, a toddler doesn’t worry about what to do once she learns to walk, she just goes for it.

It’s all about letting go and learning as we go.

Is there a niggling desire you keep pushing away because you’re afraid to fail? As God’s children, we can surrender the outcome and step from fear to faith because we know He’s got us. Abba waits with arms wide ready to catch us, steady us, and guide us.

Do you feel a tug on your heart to punch fear in the face and step further into your God-given identity? Not simply to do more but to be more?

Perhaps you’d play piano, talk to a neighbor, or jump out of a plane. Maybe you’d forgive or apologize or stop worrying about things you can’t change.

Friends, if you’re over-thinking, you’re bowing to fear. I know. I do it all the time.

As we seek to grow into our divine design, we’ll toddle and fall. There are days we’ll want to give up. Especially when we hear, “Who are you kidding? You can’t do this. It’s too big.”

Lately, I hear that when I sit down to write. When do you hear it? That’s where God wants you to step from fear to faith.

Those nasty confidence killers love to taunt us straight from the pit of hell. But remember, whether it’s baby steps or giant ones, God will teach us along the way. It’s okay to wobble. Just keep moving forward, my friends.

 

© Robin Melvin 2015

Hello, my friends. I’m taking a detour from what I planned to write. My mind won’t focus until I get this out. Most days, I’m positive. Today, not so much. The horrible headlines don’t end.  I stay somewhat detached to protect my mind and spirit. But this one demands my attention, as toddlers often do, and shakes me awake.

Forgive me,  there’s no delicate way to mention baby body parts found in the Garfield Park lagoon. Those words don’t even belong in the same sentence. It’s repulsive and evil but I can’t shrug it off because this child, whose gender is unknown, needs to be noticed.

What brings me to the keyboard today is this baby’s utter invisibility. How can a child be on this earth for two to four years and no one reports him missing?

Can a person be so insignificant that not even neighbors notice he’s gone? Have they decided it’s none of their business? Are lives that disposable?

God help us.

I’m guilty. I turn away from far less messiness and tuck myself into my comfortable, suburban bubble. After all, seeing requires tears, heartache, and possible despair.

As Christ followers, we’re comforted in our own pain and often prefer to stay that way. But God calls us to a paradox, to an absurd opening up to another’s struggle. Not fun. But, we’re called to it by the One who did it. We set self and our warm fuzzies aside and invite pain in.

So I cry, yell, and pray. Now that I’m done believing my feelings and their lies—People are hopeless. Nothing will change. Retreat is your best option.—I’m just mad.

Satan is a liar and a thief. What did he whisper to this baby’s killer? What does his foul breath hiss into the ears of those who know something?

What fears keep us from doing the right thing?

Truth is, despite the headlines and our fears, our soul’s enemy is already defeated. 

By surrendering to the cross, Jesus chose the Father’s will. He conquered sin, our soul’s enemy. By sacrificing feel-good comfort, He invited pain in. All the world’s sin and its crushing heartache.

Aren’t you glad we don’t have to carry it all?

Christ’s Holy Spirit empowers us to overcome fear and model His compassion. While many choose to serve evil, most are simply lost—harassed and helpless. We are called to invite their pain in.

Father, show us the invisible, the forgotten, the marginalized. Don’t’ let us walk past them in our homes and our churches. Stir our hearts when we drive past them in our neighborhoods, our hospitals, and our nursing homes. Patient Father, give us eyes to see the helpless, compassion for the harassed, and courage to feel their pain. May we be faithful to carry our small part as we move forward on this lifelong journey to become more like Jesus.

“When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.  Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.  Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.’ ” Matthew 9:36-38

Hello, my friends. I hope you started your week rested and ready to meet the world. I woke up with the perfect family hangover. You know, one that makes you smile at a weekend full of fresh, homemade memories.

I’m glad you’re here. Thanks for checking out #4 of my Naked Truth series. Today we continue our journey to uncover those lies that make God small.

Remember The Lord of the Rings and Frodo’s epic trek? He frees his mind and spirit from evil by destroying the Ring in the hell fires of Mordor. Are you ready to trash some mindsets that hinder your journey?

Okay, maybe you’re not a Tolkien groupie. But I bet you’re a Pinocchio fan.

Remember his friend, Jiminy Cricket? His advice to “let your conscience be your guide” was solid. But, we’re going to look at the danger in allowing our conscience to be our God. Author J.B. Phillips calls this false god, a Resident Policeman.

Our conscience is our sense of right and wrong. It prompts that feeling when we know the right thing to do or the wrong thing to avoid. It tells us “Oops. You shouldn’t have done that, said that, or thought that.” Valuable, indeed.

But it’s dangerous to believe that our conscience is God’s voice because consciences are corruptible.

Think of the Nazi and how his moral sense was perverted by propaganda. Kindness toward Jewish people made him feel guilty, as though empathy toward the despised race was sin. Hate became duty. Anything less unsettled his conscience.

For less extreme examples, let’s look at some subtle taboos we learn from family or culture.

Do you ever feel guilty for even thinking about an afternoon siesta? Perhaps you were taught that naps are for wimps. Do you feel guilty for staying home with your kids? Somewhere you learned it’s not a real job and it makes you feel less-than. Maybe your career is outside your home and you fight false guilt from stay-at-home moms.

I have a friend who wasn’t allowed to go to movie theaters. Even now, with her children in tow, she feels a twinge of guilt when buying tickets to The Minions. Really? Fifty Shades of Grey, perhaps, but not those adorable, yellow guys.

Do you see how a corrupted or misinformed conscience gives us a wrong idea of sin and a false sense of guilt?  It’s impacted—good and bad—by things like culture, family, and religion.

Many of our old taboos have nothing to do with our relationship with God. They are simply standards set in our minds giving us false guilt when we don’t obey their rules. They make our conscience, our God.

False guilt and a god contained in our conscience, a Resident Policeman, is too small to teach us our God-given identity and too tiny to lead us into abundant life.

Of course, we need honest guilt to tweak us when we’ve truly sinned—that deliberate doing or not doing what we know is right. Honest guilt coaxes us to freedom.

To really know God and what’s truly taboo, look at Jesus. What does He do? What does He say about rules taking God’s place? In John chapter 4, he crushes an ancient taboo by speaking to a Samaritan woman. He chooses relationship with the Father and people over manmade rules every time.

So, what makes you feel guilty? Is it rooted in a wrong mindset or in what’s true and right? These are the questions we ask to keep growing into our divine design.

As I close, here’s more advice from Jiminy Cricket:

“When you get in trouble and you don’t know right from wrong, give a little whistle.” 

May your conscience guide you to God, your Resident  Redeemer. Grace and peace, my friends.

 

 

© Robin Melvin 2015

Hello, friends. I’m glad my shower epiphany didn’t scare you off.

As a woman well past mid-life, unless I live to 103, it’s a tad embarrassing to admit I still uncover childish thoughts. But, it’s not the most scandalous thing you’ll hear from me, I guarantee.

Last time we looked at childhood mindsets that dictated the cooking and shampooing habits of two grown women. Yes, old thought patterns die hard. We all hold onto habits and opinions because people we trusted told us or showed us, so we believed them. No questions asked.

We listen to those we trust. And for good reason. It’s important to stay out of the road and let streetlights remind us to head home before dark. But there’s a time to question beyond childhood lessons. Especially when culture, family, and life events hand us unhealthy beliefs about God.

We’re grown-ups. It’s time to ask some big kid questions.

Do we really know Him?

Has our faith grown beyond head knowledge and found a home in our hearts? Perhaps we see God as a Santa Claus, a spoilsport, or a lightning-toting tyrant who keeps mortals running between fear and guilt.

Has our faith molded around past teaching or past experiences? Is it modeled after how it was lived out or not lived out in our family?  Maybe it’s what we weren’t taught that leaves us empty and our minds full of wrong thinking.

If so, your God is too small.

As we strip unhealthy mindsets, we’ll know the One who gave us our individuality, our uniqueness and personality. On our journey to grow into our divine design, we need to know the truth about our Designer.

After all, we are made in His image, to reflect His nature .¹

As a child, I thought God was distant and unreachable, waiting to zap me if I did something bad. Sin’s definition was a bit fuzzy to me so I remembered the Big Ten checklist and recited the Act of Contrition before bed just in case one snuck past me.

My small, immature faith was enough for me then and for decades later when I decided to seek God – not as lightning insurance – but as a savior to change me and guide my life. On the outside life was good, but on the inside,

 I was dying for peace and purpose.

I opened my mind and heart to my pastor’s messages and started living out Jesus’ teaching in the Bible. Forgiveness gave me peace, trust taught me hope, and healing revealed my purpose. Soon, I understood the sin, the love, and the grace that my childhood bedtime prayer talked about.

Maybe, like me, you’re thankful for the faith you knew as a child. But if we want to reach our full, liberated potential, we can’t stay there. Our spiritual growth is consistent with the size of our God. Small God, small us.

And we weren’t born to be small, my friends.

Many of us, even Christ followers, live with inner dissatisfaction and incompleteness, sensing that we’re living below our potential. We feel inadequate because our God is either non-existent or way too small.

 “If it is true that there is Someone in charge of the whole mystery of life and death, we can hardly expect to escape a sense of futility and frustration until we begin to see what He is like and what His purposes are.” ²

Unhealthy mindsets block us from seeing God’s true character.

Next time, we’ll look at a little Jiminy Cricket theology and uncover some lies. In the meantime, read one of the Gospels, like John. Get to know God’s nature by getting to know Jesus.

I need a bigger God today than when my biggest worry was waking up first for Saturday morning cartoons. I’m done fearing lightning bolts and ready to live the abundant life Jesus promises in John 10:10. How about you?

Peace, my friends.

 

1. Genesis 1:26-27
2. J.B. Philips, Your God is too small, p. 9

 

© Robin Melvin 2015