My Biggest Mistake

The other day I put a post on FB that asked others, "What is my biggest mistake."  I had some responses that said things like pride, jealousy, laziness, naive, self pity, addiction, with a few colorful remarks that made me smile as well.  While I may have all of these things as part of my character these are not my biggest mistakes.  My biggest mistake has really never been some thing that I have done.  It is not a lie, cheating, divorce, sex or drugs.  No my biggest mistake still haunts me.  I still fear my biggest mistake.  I am not afraid of going out and doing drugs again.  I am not afraid of being tempted in a bar to get wasted and go home with some random guy.  I am not afraid of.... you fill in that one.  I am not afraid of many things.  I'm getting too old. I'm a wife and a mother and I hope that my walk with God has brought me past that.  I have grown with Him and I am no longer haunted by the same things that used to haunt me.  And besides all of those things really only involve me.  I am not afraid of most all things that only involve me and my personal struggles.  No the thing that I consider as my biggest mistake, that thing that still drives me because I never want to become that again... Enabler. 

If you look enable up in the dictionary or the thesaurus you will find words like empower, approve, and  facilitate.  All of these words seem very good, but sometimes your greatest strength may cause the most destruction.  I hope now that I can use my greatest strength to bring others up, but there was a time when my greatest strength was a tool to bring others down.  Let me give you the best and easiest example I have... my ex-husband...

In my previous marriage I was my husbands biggest enemy.  It all started with simple little things.  He didn't want to go to church.  Well I really didn't want to either, so we didn't.  He wanted to play music full time, so I came up with the idea of living in a camper at the KOA.  He quit his day job and we lived very cheaply.  I'm not going to bore you with more details that you already know.  I'm the one to blame for I did not hold to a higher standard in my life.  I brought that standard down and became his enabler, his dealer, his.... fill in that blank... I became his "sin".  

In Deuteronomy 4 Moses is giving his farewell speech to Israel.  He is calling them to remember.  He is  reminding them that they are to follow God so that others will want to follow them.  So they can help become part of the redeeming factor of the world.  They were designed to be a vehicle to reach other nations.  With our limited view, it may not look like this is what their ultimate job was, but remember "God so loved the world that He gave His one and only son" ... 
“But watch out! Be careful never to forget what you yourself have seen. Do not let these memories escape from your mind as long as you live! And be sure to pass them on to your children and grandchildren.  Never forget the day when you stood before the Lord your God..."(4:9,10).

My biggest strength is also my biggest mistake.  I never again want to enable destruction in someone else's life.  I am not responsible for what they do Oswald explains this nicely, but I do not want it to be known that because of how I acted in their life they are now destroyed.  "If a child gives in to selfishness, he will find it to be the most enslaving tyranny on earth. There is no power within the human soul itself that is capable of breaking the bondage of the nature created by Yielding."  

The challenge for me now is to know how to love others as they are, but not to enable them to continue on as they want to be.  It is about coming up higher to how He originally created us to be.  For we are the apple, the little maiden, the little man of His eye.   I am not responsible for others behavior like an amateur providence... and amateur is all that I would be.  It was my own selfish desires that allowed me to enable that same fault in others.  In holding myself to a higher standard, I hope I can enable others in a good way this time.  This is my time. My time to allow my greatest mistake to become my greatest strength, just like He originally intended!

Hearts True Agenda

The other day I read a post that a friend of mine posted on FB. "Do we need to be part of the 4-walled church? Explain." With that my week of thinking, searching, listening started. My travels did not take me where I was expecting to go. My first turn was what directed my search. My first turn ended up bringing me full circle in the end.

Ravi Zacharias, "Lotus and the Cross" a conversation between Jesus and Buddha. In this book there are several characters and as you read, the conversation takes you on a trip through life questions. A very good read I must say... Anyway, toward the end of this book Jesus is answering a heart question and this is where I paused. Their was a Samaritan woman who came to draw water in a well where Jesus was resting. He started to dialog with her, which was her first red flag, Jews never talked to Samaritans. “Go and get your husband,” Jesus told her. “I don’t have a husband,” the woman replied. Jesus said, “You’re right! You don’t have a husband— for you have had five husbands, and you aren’t even married to the man you’re living with now. You certainly spoke the truth!”

Another turn. I opened my bible to John 4 and camped there for a while. What was the heart question? What was the answer?

“Sir,” the woman said, “you must be a prophet. So tell me, why is it that you Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place of worship, while we Samaritans claim it is here at Mount Gerizim, where our ancestors worshiped?”

The question was positioned in a specific place, but was this her real question or was it something different that I had never noticed before? So many questions, yet what was the real question that only Jesus could see? What was it that made her run and tell everyone that she had found the King? What was it that she was trying to divert His attention away from, yet couldn't?

"But the time is coming—indeed it’s here now—when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. The Father is looking for those who will worship him that way. For God is Spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.”

I have always missed this answer, for I was looking at it for an answer. This is where I landed and this is what opened my own heart to my own questions and when I ask them. In the mix of His answer, He called her heart out..."true worshipers", "spirit and in truth".... her question wasn't sincere, but a diversion. He had shown a spotlight on who she had become and it hurt. With that pain, she tried to take the focus off of herself and redirect Jesus' mind to concentrate on what others concentrated on, how to worship. But this wasn't sincere at all! Her heart, her pain had been exposed and anything that she could grab to take focus off of her was her goal. She was talking to no fool. There was a deeper issue. What was this issue, we will never know for the conversation was interrupted, but she had had enough to know that this One was different.

With courage from her heart being exposed, she went and shared His story, through her story, with the rest of the village and all of her surroundings were transformed. "Many Samaritans from the village believed in Jesus because the woman had said, 'He told me everything I ever did!' When they came out to see Him, they begged Him to stay in their village. So He stayed for two days, long enough for many more to hear His message and believe. Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not just because of what you told us, but because we have heard Him ourselves. Now we know that He is indeed the Savior of the world.”

So many times throughout this life we come upon questions that are not really questions at all, but diversions to get the focus off of us and on a topic instead. I am the master of this. If I start to get pressured into telling others how my health is holding up (or failing) I divert the conversation away from me and change topics! I don't want to talk about this, it is work, I struggle with doing what I need to do in order to live and I divert the topic away from health... Every time! I am not saying this is what my friend did on FB, but it did bring me to a very important conclusion. What is it that we often are trying to hide from others? What is it that we do not want to see ourselves? What is it that God is trying to get us to look at within our own hearts that we keep trying to look away from? Are we asking questions in truth, or is there an underlying agenda we are seeking? Are we brave enough to allow Him to expose our hearts, so that we can heal?