Heart Rest

What would a day of heart rest look like?

Perhaps you would be free of that envy of your sibling, or friend, or co-worker whose life just seems to always have everything working out for the better.

While you struggle...

Or it could be a day minus the waves of self-loathing that keep crashing against your heart, reminding you of how you have fallen short, especially when you compare yourself to others.

How you struggle...

A day of heart rest for you could be a day when you let your anger at God--for everything that is present or absent from your life--take a holiday. To carry so much anger at God has been exhausting.

Always you struggle...

The envy, the self-loathing, the anger--all very real struggles in a very real life.

A day of heart rest might look like this:

God, you tell me I am fearfully and wonderfully made by You. I don't feel it. I don't see it. And I think you could make it so much easier. But I want a day of heart rest. I choose rest but I need You to help me stay in that rest position. And while I'm resting, could You show me a new view of my circumstances, that tomorrow might hold more hope?

Any prison of struggle is a place that needs an exit designed by God. He might be waiting for you to ask.

There is No Public

Daily Guideposts devotional writer Elizabeth Sherrill remarks in a written prayer:

...to You [God] there is no "public," only individuals whose every need you know.

The context is being self-conscious about praying in public. In her case, when she and her husband said grace before a meal in a roadside diner, it opened the door for a waitress to be comforted and strengthened.

There is no public.

Only individual people, each clamoring for space and time and voice.

Doesn't that change everything?

That public we worry about--at least in terms of our image--doesn't exist.

We are free to pursue our path of goodness and service, realizing that courage, when we can find it, lends itself to the next person.

When we bow our heads before a restaurant meal, someone watching is gathering courage to do the same.

When we have a conversation about our personal faith journey, someone listening is gathering courage to do the same.

When we allow ourselves to become known for pursuing the adventurous, unplugged lifestyle that comes with chasing God, someone growing in Christ is gathering courage to do the same.

There is no public.

Help others find their space and time and voice through God's exceeding grace, hidden in your courage.

I Wish This Election...Day 2

I wish this presidential election was not telling the story that our country is in the throes of divorce.

Divorce threatens when trust fails and a separateness of each side grows a larger and larger divide.

The movement of compromise is halted by one party or the other--or both.

Money becomes a fight. No progress is made in budgeting and prudence of spending.

Ideology marches in opposite directions with no respect for the other's heartfelt platform.

Meanness takes root.

If you are blissfully unaware of the rancor that is at the heart of our governance, I guess you should just stay where you are.

But if you feel called to look in on it, I hope you'll ask God if there is hope for us. Can divorce be prevented?

Can this marriage (of two parties governing and leading) be saved?

I don't know.

Throwing God out of schools and government so many years ago might not have been such a good idea.

If this is the result of "We don't need you, God, we can do it ourselves," I'm for calling Him back into the game.

I Wish This Election...Day 1

I wish this presidential election was between a true Democrat and Republican. Then it would be United States business as usual, with the checks and balances of history continuing to keep us somewhere in the middle of the road of strength and prosperity of personal responsibility, embedded in a culture of freedom of faith.

But there is a most chilling undercurrent.

A bank of Middle Eastern countries is poised to become a united conglomerate of Islam, perhaps even the United States of Islam. That unity will produce a superpower of anger and demand that is the polar opposite of our superpower status.

Please press the pause button on your eagerness to jump into this scenario.

Our superpower status is based on a peculiar freedom: our leaders don't randomly kill our citizens, there is no affront for worshiping the God that came to earth as Jesus, and we are free to come and go, marry and start a family, work where we please, and teach our children as we see fit. Our government of the last 200+ years does not rage at the denigration of symbols and persons tied to a particular faith.

When there is an uncanny amount of respect in a leader's language for the Islam that is connected to these countries for whom rage is a viable option, beware.

Shield your vote with prayer. Let God, the one that came to earth as Jesus, have a say-so in the critical presidential choice before us.

This battle is centuries old. If you are a Christ follower, you know how your faith goes against the cultural grain of the world. Don't give away the unique privilege of following Jesus that we know in this country.

This is not politics as usual. This is a crossroads we have never known before.

If you don't believe me, at least ask God. If I'm wrong, He can let you know it.

When Families Fail

What is God to make of families who fail?

Sadly, families fail in many ways:

We judge each other's missteps and misfortunes. We decide our way(s) will prove superior.

In the name of family, countless cruel words have been issued. Perhaps worse, even more omissions of kindness have been put into play, in the name of "It's what he/she deserves!"

God seems undeterred though it must break His heart.

Without missing a beat, He surrounds the broken filly, or family member, with a new team of horses, not related by blood but by shared strength and forgiveness and common embrace.

The abandoned or rejected family member will find him or herself buoyed by a family of friends through church or other circumstances that only God could assemble.

Therein lies the power of love made great through brokenness and new embrace, and the pivotal power of not judging each other.

Friended Family, made by God.

Back Pain: When Our Subconscious Backfires

I am reading a book with the most interesting premise.

Dr. John Sarno (M.D.), in Healing Back Pain, was confounded by the prevalence of back pain in American society, and set out to think outside the box.

By considering back pain a result of the work of our subconscious mind, he created a relationship and thus successful treatment between mind and body previously undetected.

He writes:

The patient was a middle-aged man who had been having recurrent attacks of pain in the neck and shoulders and pain, numbness and tingling in his hands for about three years prior to the time I saw him. The episode that brought him to me had begun about eight months previously with pain in the left arm. He saw two neurologists, had a variety of sophisticated tests and was told that the pain was the result of a "disc problem" in the neck. There was debate whether he should have immediate surgery; he was warned that he might become paralyzed if he didn't. Not surprisingly, the pain spread from his arm to his neck and back; he was unable to ski or play tennis, two of his favorite sports. He was very frightened.

My diagnosis disclosed that he had TMS (Tension Myositis Syndrome) and that there were no neurological abnormalities. Fortunately, a third neurologist concluded that there was no structural basis for his pain so he was able to accept the diagnosis of TMS with an easy mind. He went through the program and in a few weeks was free of pain and able to resume his usual athletic activities. He has not had a recurrence.

Stunning, right?

Oh, if that could only be our story.

It can. The treatment Dr. Sarno uncovers begins with his discovery that our subconscious mind plays a dubious role. If we have anger and anxiety embedded deeply, our subconscious wraps it up to "protect" it and thus the angst of it gets played out in back, neck and shoulder pain, among other symptoms.

When the subconscious mind is examined for the the stress, anger, anxiety and other holdouts, it can release them and the need for the structural dysfunction and pain disappears entirely.

I am discovering that the world is full of great ways to think outside the box to feed our strength. This is a biggie.

Share with yourself or another as needed.

I like to imagine this is one of God's favorite prescriptions.