Worn Out part 2

The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.

Zephaniah 3:17

Once the children were in the house the air became more vivid and more hearted; every object in the house grew more alive.

Mary Gordon

Childhood reveals tendencies. Youth develops personality. Maturity establishes character.

Hubert van Zeller

Heart of HOME Online

Click here for Part I of this article

Spiritual Friendships, Mentors and Christian Counselors
We are relational beings, and, ultimately, all of our problems are relational. All of the practical areas discussed so far in this article have to do with changing how we relate to created things (like time and our living environment) and changing what we allow to affect our relationship with ourselves (our thought patterns, our energy level, etc.). But there are other relationships that contribute to stress and conflict in our lives. Yes, we may have too much to do and not enough time to do it, but this time/space problem only reaches "burn-out" when there are underlying relational problems such as tension between husband and wife, conflict between parents and children, or estrangement between fellow Christians. Usually the largest source of relational stress is in our marriages, because most of us got married without ever being taught how to make a marriage work.

Those of us with relational problems don't need time-management courses or housekeeping seminars, we need spiritual friendships, mentors, and counselors who help us develop right relationships with others and with God.

What about spiritual friendships? Unfortunately, many of us hesitate to share our deepest struggles, because we suspect other Christians will treat us like a problem that needs to be fixed. Larry Crabb says in The Safest Place on Earth that all Christians yearn for...

...a community of friends who are hungry for God, who knows what it means to sense the Spirit moving within them as they speak with you. You long for brothers and sisters who are intent not on figuring out how to improve your life, but on being with you wherever your journey leads.

We would give nearly anything to be part of a community that was profoundly safe, where people never gave up on one another, where wisdom about how to live emerged from conversation, where what is most alive in each of us is touched....where we would feel safe enough to meaningfully explore who we are with confidence so that the end point would be a joyful meeting with God.

Scripture tells us that God intends for the Body of Christ to be just that: a safe place that nourishes the godly in us and brings us to a "joyful meeting with God." It is worth searching for spiritual companionship, even if we find only one or two others who befriend us spiritually.

What about mentors? Within the Body of Christ, godly older women are specifically intended to help other women be all that they can be as wives, mothers, and home-makers. But, as I once remarked to a Christian psychologist, "All of the older Christian women I know are faking it just as badly as I am!"

Most of us have struggled to become Titus 2 women-keepers at home, lovers of our children and husband, etc.- but very few of us have had godly older women to show us the way. Instead, we have been nurtured and discipled by women who are as unskilled as we are at fulfilling the Titus 2 mandate. I have always thought of my generation as a "sandwich generation." We are "sandwiched" between a generation that never mentored us, and a generation that desperately needs for us to mentor them.

How do we cope with this dilemma? First, we need to take a good, hard look at who our primary influencers are. Are these women worthy role models? Can they provide us with a pattern of beliefs and godly living as well as with practical skills that we can duplicate in our own lives? Is their influence causing us to be happier and more productive, or do we relate to them because "misery loves company?"

Second, we can search for women worthy of modeling. Sometimes this will mean we have to settle for second-hand modeling, by reading books or listening to tapes by women who are well-respected and generally acknowledged as worthy to instruct other women. For example, most of my role models are women I never knew personally: women like Corrie Ten Boom, Edith Schaeffer, and others whose lives will withstand scrutiny.

In addition to the lack of godly, older women, there is a dearth of mature Christian counselors. It is hard to find someone to talk to whose advice isn't mixed with pop-psychology, or who doesn't try to superimpose their agenda over your problems. What do I mean by "agenda?" It's like the old saying: "When you have a new hammer, everything looks like a nail." We've all had the experience of someone trying to make our problems fit their doctrine. If they happen to be into inner healing, then our problem becomes the "nail" to their inner healing "hammer." If they happen to believe in demons, then our problem becomes the "nail" to their deliverance "hammer." Don't be ashamed to seek professional help, but when you do, check the person out as carefully as you would any other mentor. And don't let anyone ever treat you like a "nail."

Sin and Unbelief in Our Lives
No discussion of frustration and stress would be complete without examining whether there is any sin or unbelief in our lives that may be contributing to our feelings of being overwhelmed and under-supported. The primary relationship that undergirds all of our other relationships is the relationship we have with God. If our relationship with God is out of balance because of sin or unbelief, all other relationships suffer and no amount of time management, household organization, self-help, spiritual friendships, mentors, or counselors will help. These measures may seem to provide temporary relief, but will never address the root problem, which is our disobedience to or lack of faith in God.

Let's look at the three most common areas of sin that cause women to be stressed-out. First, there is the area of proper discipline and training of children. When we do not "nurture and admonish" our children in the ways God requires, we are not only creating children who make our lives miserable, but more importantly, we are sinning against God. Next is the area of the husband-wife relationship. If your attitude toward your husband stinks, it will be impossible to achieve a sense of peace and order in your home no matter how hard you try. Finally, there is the area of personal sin. Maybe your house is a wreck because you feel it's unfair for you to have to do so much work, or you feel cheated of your potential by being a mother and home-maker. Or maybe you're caught up in some secret sin like over-eating or sexual fantasies, or whatever. No matter what your personal sin, it clouds your relationship with God, with others, and with earthly things like time and money.

The bad news about sin is that it is like a disease that weakens every part of our lives. The good news is that God freely forgives and heals us if we confess our sins and turn from our wicked ways.

Unbelief is a form of sin. God has provided everything we need through many precious promises, and through the shed blood of Jesus Christ. This "everything" includes strength and vision to enjoy the privilege and endure the demands of home schooling our children and running a household. The Bible says, "The wise woman builds her house, but the foolish woman tears it down with her own hands." We are foolish women when we let our sin and unbelief tear down our houses.

Reaching Ground Zero with God
When you're in the midst of a crisis, when you've reached the end of your rope, when you can't seem to find the inner resources to keep going for another day, you often will reach a place of "ground zero" with God. Ground zero is a term used to designate the immediate blast area of a nuclear bomb, and sometimes life sends "bombs" that leave you feeling like you are in nuclear winter. The nuclear winters of life are times when you must come to terms with Who God really is. So in one way these times are extreme challenges, but in another way they are "gifts" from God because they give you a true perspective of what is valuable and what is not, they show you who your real friends are, and they force you to accept God on His terms.

Here is the story of one of my "ground zero" experiences. In January, 1994, due to a freak accident, a piece of metal fractured my skull and destroyed my right eye. Just before the accident occurred, Chris had resigned from the pastorate and the lease was up on the house we were renting. This meant we had sixty days to find another place to live and another source of income. The Elijah Company at that time certainly was not capable of sustaining us financially.

While I was recovering from surgery for removal of my eye, well-meaning Christians came and counseled me. Most of their counsel was variations on five themes: either (1) there must be some sin in my life for me to have been injured, or (2) I had somehow "come out from under my covering of authority" for this to have happened, or (3) I would never have been injured if Chris hadn't decided to leave the pastorate, or (4) God was teaching me a powerful lesson through this, or (5) I must be a very special person for God to have let this happen to me. All of this conflicting counsel further unraveled me emotionally and I began to feel like I would throw up if I ever heard Romans 8:28 again.

After my release from the hospital, I had to be very careful in standing, and was not supposed to lift anything or do any physical work for six weeks. The only comforting aspect of that six weeks was a tape my sister sent me with the chorus, "I'm going to walk right out of this valley, lift my hands and praise the Lord!" I don't know the name of the song, but I played it over and over.

But a remarkable thing happened. Some people I had thought were good friends vanished, but people I hardly knew started packing up the house for me. They brought meals and offered to watch the children. A church group from another part of town came over the day we had to move, rented the moving van, loaded it, drove it to our new place, unloaded it, and cleaned up the old house. Then they presented us with a "love offering" of enough money to help us get started in the new direction we felt God was leading us.

The challenges continued. Losing an eye meant losing depth perception and balance, so I had to re-learn how to do many, many things I had never before realized relied on hand-eye coordination, balance, and depth perception. This was a very long, fearful process, but I had to keep going because life didn't slow down just because I had been injured. Children needed caring for, a household needed managing, and a business needed me to write catalogs, speak at conventions, and exhibit at book fairs. There were times during those first years after the accident when I was hanging on emotionally and spiritually by the thinnest of threads.

But you know what? As trying as these times were, something "ground zero" about God was being formed in me. Francis Shaeffer always described our relationship with God as a series of "bows." Well, I had to bow to God's god-ness. This meant I had to acknowledge that He is God and I'm not. It's hard to explain, but I realized that God is God, so He's always right, no matter what happens and no matter what I might think about what He does. It may not make sense, but it was very freeing to know my life was out of my control and in the hands of a God whose "work is perfect and all His ways are just."

Several months after the surgery, I went for one of my monthly doctor's appointments and happened to sit in the waiting room next to a man who had also lost his eye. I asked him what had helped him get through it and he told me his story. He had been a telephone workman repairing the line when the pole he was attached to snapped at the base and fell over on him. The whole right side of his body had been crushed and he had undergone multiple surgeries to regain limited use of his limbs and to reconstruct his face. This is what he said, "For the first few months to a year, all you will be able to think about is what happened to you and how bad off you are. Then, after about a year, you'll only think about it a few times a day. After about another year, you'll only think about it a couple of times a week, then a couple of times a month, and then you'll get on with your life and hardly ever think about it anymore." It's been over six years now, and the man was right.

There is one final "gift" I want to mention. One of my greatest private griefs in losing an eye was that I found I couldn't ride a horse anymore because I would get dizzy and lose my balance. I struggled with feeling like one of the things I loved to do most had been stripped from me. Then, in the fall of 1999 I went to a Cowboys for Christ service at the All-American Quarter Horse Congress. One of the men who spoke at the service (Steve Heckaman) had been a famous horse trainer who was involved in a horrendous traffic accident that crushed the right side of his body, killed his wife, and injured his young son. He had to undergo multiple surgeries and extensive rehabilitation. On that day in Cowboy Church he shared how the accident had totally transformed his life and brought him to Christ. He had learned to walk again, but one of his biggest challenges had been riding again because he had lost his right eye and no longer had the balance and depth perception he needed to stay in the saddle. With the help of friends, he learned to ride again and came back to the show ring and won at the largest Quarter Horse show in the world.

So guess what? I'm starting to ride again. I'm still scared, and it's still a struggle, but I'm going to do it.

So what's the point of all this. Well, one point is that your "ground zero" experience may be the turning point in someone else's life. Another point is that "ground zero" experiences will eventually enter the "This too shall pass" phase and life will move on. The third point is that there will always be someone else whose "ground zero" experiences make yours look like a piece of cake. The fourth point is that, after a "ground zero" experience, life's everyday hassles don't seem so hard to bear. And the final point is that these experiences can be "gifts" in disguise, gifts that bring you face to face with Who God really is.

In Closing
I know this article is way too long, and I've turned it into a testimonial, but before closing I want to share a recent experience. My father died unexpectedly in November. Our grief was intense, but the funeral was a family celebration of his life and faith in God. Our son James sang one of Papa's favorite hymns, Chris and I both spoke and shared memories of his life, and his grand-daughter read a poem she had written.

During the preparations for my father's funeral, I began thinking about my grandmother, Caroline Blackshear Bridges. When she died nearly 25 years ago, I drove to Blakely, Georgia for her funeral. As I looked around me at her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren, as well as all the friends who had assembled in the First Baptist Church to pay their respects to the woman we had all called "Miss Carrie," I thought about Exodus 20: 5 that says God visits "the sins of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation." I was suddenly struck with the reality that the reverse of that scripture is also true. God blesses the children of the righteous to the third and fourth generation. I knew that Miss Carrie had been a Christian. Her father died when she was a child, but her maternal grandfather was a Christian who said he received a call from God to become a missionary to the then wild and sparsely settled portions of backwoods Georgia. His name was James C. Bass, and he would travel to remote lumber camps and stand on a stump to preach the gospel to the rough lumberjacks. This grandfather had a powerful impact on Miss Carrie's life.

So there I was at my grandmother's funeral, over half a century after James C. Bass died, realizing that nearly every one of Miss Carrie's children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren were Christians. As I sat through that funeral, I was overcome with gratitude for my godly heritage.

Then, this November I was at my father's funeral (Miss Carrie's son). I again saw children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren: three generations who had all been affected by my father's belief in God. My father was not only a Christian, he was a Southern gentleman, who imparted a legacy of loyalty, integrity, principle, productivity, and confidence to his children, grandchildren, an great-grandchildren, as well as to all those around him. He gave us all a firm belief that each person's life could count for something.

I spoke at my father's funeral, and what I shared was that God is faithful to bless righteousness. One righteous person can impact four generations, and those four generations can each impact four generations after them, so that the ongoing impact of righteousness can be never-ending as it passes down into the future. In fact, the Bible tells us God shows His mercy and steadfast love to a thousand generations of those who love Him and keep His commandments (Exodus 20:6).

How about that? We can bring mercy and steadfast love to a thousand generations simply by loving God and keeping His commandments.

So, I guess what I want to tell each of you who reads this article is: YOUR LIFE CAN AFFECT FOREVER. Maybe you don't have generations of godliness standing behind you, but you can start where you are and affect your children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren-at least three generations beyond you. And each of them can affect at least three generations beyond them. And who knows? If God were once willing to spare Sodom for only ten righteous men, maybe your presence in your own city has more of an impact than you could ever imagine.

Disclaimer
I know this article tends to sound like I've got it all together. Nothing could be farther from the truth. It's only by God's grace that I am a fairly sane woman today, so I feel somewhat hypocritical in writing this article.

What makes me bold enough to write it is that I used to love listening to John Wimber, founder of the Vineyard Fellowships. Wimber's life impacted thousands, but every time he spoke he freely acknowledged there was nothing in him of any worth. He would often say, "I'm just a fat man trying to get to heaven." Well, I'm a lot like that. There's nothing in me of any worth. I'm just a frazzled, adventurous Mom trying to get to heaven.