Tag: mistakes

Ever Wonder If You’ve Heard God Wrong?

June 19, 2019 /

A week ago my small group was sitting around our harvest table finishing off yummy enchiladas when one of my young mom friends with toddlers shared about a difficult decision she and her husband made which she was still anguishing over.

This couple prayed and prayed, seeking wisdom from the Lord about whether to spend their limited budget on some extra child care that would free up a little time for them to nurture their marriage in a very stressful season of travel for her husband, or use the funds to send one of their kids to a private school that they think might provide a particularly nurturing environment.

They were faithful in prayer and sought information and guidance that might inform their decision. They are committed to God’s Word and want to honor Him. They made a decision, but keep wondering what the consequences might be.

Have you ever wondered if you might have heard God wrong?

Over thirty years ago, John and I were serving at a church in the suburbs of Chicago. We were open to moving and received a call from a church in Washington D.C. As we prayed about whether to accept this position, John reminded me this wasn’t a shell game with God. It wasn’t like there was necessarily just one right answer. Our job was to trust God and try to discern what we thought would be most pleasing to Him.

After much prayer we decided this move would be honoring to God and we ended up moving to D.C. Here’s what happened:

via GIPHY

  • I went 8 months pregnant with our second child, her sister just 19 months old
  • D.C. had the highest cost of living in the nation at the time and we had no money.
  • We moved away from all our family for the first time and knew no one.
  • Our church was a cathedral type church, drawing from a large area so we didn’t see the people we worshipped with during the week – hard to build community.
  • The area we lived in had no moms who had made the choice to stay at home with their kids so I went to the park every day and would basically say to any stranger, “Will you be my friend?”

John went to a transition seminar that was required when he started the job. He came home and said, “I have good news and bad news. The good news is, we won! We had more stress points than anyone else! The bad news is, they said we should be in counseling.”

The bottom line was that our years in D.C. were maybe the hardest of our marriage. We kept saying, “Lord, did we get this wrong? How could this be Your will and feel like such a bad fit? Why is this so hard?”

We’ll never know this side of heaven whether pride or impatience or something else clouded our discernment of God’s will, or if we were exactly where He wanted us. But as we have reflected on this season, here are some things we’ve observed:

  1. Just because circumstances are hard doesn’t mean you’re outside God’s will. Although we prayed fervently, things never got easier during the time we lived in D.C., but God was still faithful. We learned to be grateful that He was our shelter, our rock, unchanging. “Great is Thy Faithfulness” became our anthem. “Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow, Blessings all mine and ten thousand beside!”

None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.

Romans 8:37-39 msg

2. Sometimes God wants to do a work in you instead of for you. As we look back, we see many ways God was preparing us for things to come. We experienced deeper intimacy with Him and greater dependence on Him. God knit our family together in love with Him and each other because that’s all we had.

So we’re not giving up. How could we! Even though on the outside it often looks like things are falling apart on us, on the inside, where God is making new life, not a day goes by without his unfolding grace. These hard times are small potatoes compared to the coming good times, the lavish celebration prepared for us. There’s far more here than meets the eye. The things we see now are here today, gone tomorrow. But the things we can’t see now will last forever.

2 corinthians 4:16-18 Msg

3. We may mess up. We may get it wrong, but God promises to redeem as we turn to Him. We came away from our time in D.C. with more humility and awareness of our fallibility than if we had gone from “strength to strength.”

…we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

romans 8:28 msg

What’s been your experience with discerning God’s will? As always, I’d love to hear from you! If you get this in email, just click on the title and it will take you to the site where you can post a comment. If it’s your first time, don’t worry if it doesn’t show up right away! And if you’re interested in some smaller doses of inspiration, join me over on Instagram. (You can turn on “notifications” in the upper right-hand corner if you want to know when there is a post.)

3 Prayer Mistakes I’m Trying to Learn From

June 24, 2015 /

Prayer is a mystery to me in so many ways. Like math or the rules of Cricket, or why people like cats is a mystery.

But I keep doing it.

I keep talking to God because He says it’s a good idea and it reminds me of who and whose I am.

As I pray, I think I get it “wrong” a lot, but I picture God smiling patiently, still glad I’m showing up. Like my dad used to do when I tried to build something out of wood alongside him at the basement workbench. He was glad I was down there with him, but I had a lot to learn.

When it comes to prayer, I have a lot to learn.

Here are three mistakes I’ve become aware that I make when I pray: Continue reading

Changing the Hashtag

April 10, 2014 /

Is it just me or does it seem like Christians have been acting a little meaner lately?

Maybe this shouldn’t surprise me, but it does.

My mom was one of those who said “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.”  And mostly, my tribe has lived by that.  Certainly you who read this blog are in that camp.

But, it turns out that church world can be a pretty darn ugly place.  Especially in social mediaville.  Go figure.

World Vision is a vibrant, effective, non-profit organization that exists to serve the poorest of the poor in Jesus‘ name. We believe the work they do, with extraordinary commitment and love, is amazing.

Two weeks ago the leadership and board of World Vision made a series of mistakes. Mistakes they are heart-sick about.

Mistakes that have undercut the trust of supporters, and deeply wounded gay people who are beloved children of God.

But I’m thinking, maybe the biggest mistake the leadership of World Vision made was to drastically over-estimate the ability of Christian brothers and sisters to live in unity and love while not agreeing on everything.

Sadly, it seemed to me that many in the evangelical world responded with swords of self-righteousness drawn, marking battle lines.  It felt like everything was end-of-the-world-dramatic and horrible.

As I read the comments and tweets and posts I thought about our two daughters who are very different from each other.

One is an introvert – strong, with brown hair…wicked smart and a runner. The other is petite, blonde-haired, creative and committed to social justice. She does yoga.

Both are followers of Jesus.

They are beloved children of ours.                                                                                                                                     They are beloved children of God.

They are different from each other, and different from us and (surprise surprise), we don’t agree on everything. But…

We wouldn’t say to either of them, “You can’t possibly love Jesus or spend eternity with Him or do good in the world because you disagree with us on gay marriage.”

But that, essentially, is what many in the church did in response to an HR decision that was trying to love employees well and fairly, and recognize that although World Vision as an organization doesn’t endorse gay marriage, not all Christians agree with them.

It’s like the church people with the loudest voices were shouting with hashtags like #WHOSINANDWHOSOUT.

I confess that there have been times when that has been me.

The thing is, I don’t see anyplace in my Bible where, because someone didn’t agree with Jesus, He said, “Nope, that’s it!  Not gonna love you anymore.”#REJECT.

I don’t know that He’d be a hashtag kind of guy, but if He was I’m guessing it might be different than some of the ones I’m tempted to use.

In spite of the loud, pharisaical voices the world hears and has come to equate with “evangelicalism” – I am encouraged by some gentle-strong voices of friends who are saying with humility and grace, “We may disagree, on some things, but we both love Jesus and are trying to be kind and brave and love like He would.”

I believe there are many who would like to model a different kind of love to the world.  I believe there are many who, even if they disagree about some of the things, would unite around the Main Thing.  

I believe many who love Jesus would like to encourage one another under a new hashtag.

What if Christian organizations and churches and leaders united around the love that Jesus modeled?  What if we flooded social media with words of compassion and life and encouragement?  

Maybe we could talk to each other about the places we disagree face to face, where there’s room for nuance and expression and deeper understanding.

Will you join me in changing the hashtag?

#LOVEGODLOVEPEOPLE

When Mistakes Have Been Made and You Want to Hide

April 7, 2014 /

I’ve titled this series “When Mistakes Have Been Made”, but I’m thinking that may minimize what we’re talking about and what many of us experience.  Maybe the title should be something more like “When you’ve messed up messier than Lindsay Lohan.” or “When your sin seems like a toxic waste dump”.

The problem is most people are doing the best they can.  They’re trying really hard to do the right thing.

Sometimes as a leader you make an error in judgement that hurts many like friendly fire.  Other times you feel like you’re walking through a land mine of personal sin. But you long to do better.

Whether it’s your personal choices, or identifying with a community that has behaved badly, sometimes you just want to hide. I’ve written about silence and lament, but clearly there’s more.

When I make mistakes I think I want to hide, but I realize I really want something else.

This is a note I framed that Katy wrote when she was about 4 or 5 years old.

IMG_3323 In case you can’t decipher it it says,

“Do not come in! P.S. I will be under the covers.”

In other words, I’m hiding, but I really want to be found. I want you to find me and love me no matter what I’ve done or how bad I’ve messed up. 

Isn’t there a part of all of us that feels that way? A desire to be known. Found. Accepted no matter how big the mistake. No matter how “not good enough” we feel.

I’ve been thinking lately that I should hang another picture underneath this note.

A picture of the Samaritan woman at the well. The woman trying to hide in plain sight, going to the well in the middle of the day – like an obese person shopping at Walmart at midnight – so she wouldn’t be shamed by critics.

It struck me recently when I was teaching on this passage… What is it that she runs back and tells everyone after her encounter with Jesus? What impacted her the most? “Come see a man who knew all about the things I did, who knows me inside and out.” (John 4:29 MSG). He saw her and He still accepted her. She mattered to Jesus.

Just a reminder. In case you’re feeling like you’re under the covers and no one knows, you’re wrong. God knows. He sees. He loves you. No matter how “not good enough” you are.

 

When Mistakes Have Been Made and You Don’t Know What to Do

April 3, 2014 /

I vividly remember the second time I ever saw my husband, John.

He was up in front of the congregation at the church I was attending. He was the youth pastor, fresh out of seminary and it was his first time preaching. He was leading the congregation in reading the morning Scripture passage responsively – him one verse, us the next. The problem was he was reading from one Psalm and the congregation was reading from another – the correct one – the one printed in the bulletin.

After a few awkward, “off” responses that left people confused, he stopped and said, “Have you ever made a really big mistake in front of a lot of people?”

I may have fallen in love with him at that moment. A leader who can own his mistakes and move on is rare.

But some mistakes are much bigger than others.  Sometimes owning our mistakes is complicated and the consequential damage can seem irreparable. Continue reading

When Mistakes Have Been Made and You Don’t Know What to Say

March 31, 2014 /

Hmmm… Well…Ahem…(Can you picture me looking down and scuffling the dirt with the toe of my shoe?)  A lot going on this past week on so many fronts…

Mistakes have been made.

I’ve made them, you’ve made them, we all have.

Some have bigger consequences than others.

Ironically, part of the text for John’s sermon yesterday included these words about Peter on the Mt. of Transfiguration “He did not know what to say…”  This comes right after “Peter said…” (Mark 9) Continue reading

The Most Important Thing to do When You Make a Mistake

June 12, 2012 /

When was the last time you made an embarrassing mistake?

My answer would be, “Yesterday, thanks so much for bringing it up!”

I’ve been convinced for quite awhile that evil elves live inside my computer and conspire against me with every technological weapon at their disposal, putting their tiny pointed heads together and hatching plans for my destruction.

Continue reading

The Biggest Parenting Mistake You Can Make

April 30, 2012 /

This is my friend, Sherrie.  Not the bald one.  The beautiful one in the bed who still looks like she’s in her 20’s.  She and Rick have three delightful grown and almost-grown daughters. We raised our kids together with other Jesus-following parents who were all anxious about getting it “right”.

Last year around the time Sherrie’s eldest daughter was getting married she began to think she might be going through menopause.

Nope.

 Meet Jolie Layne Byron.  Born April 23, 2012.

I went to a shower for this new little one and we got to talking about our experiences with our “first round” of kids.  I started thinking…If I had it to do over again, what would I do differently?  What mistakes did I make?  What mistakes didn’t I make?!

There are the “little” things people might point to like the time I let Maggie wear her sandals to church.  It was 30 degrees, but I figure you gotta pick your battles.

Or, Katy might point out how in grade school she was scarred for life when she was home sick and I let her watch “Wait Until Dark” while I ran to the grocery store.

I could also throw John under the bus and mention the time he gave Maggie Ipecac in the middle of the night thinking it was cough syrup.

Times when I was too controlling and times when I was too permissive.  So many possibilities, so little time!!

I sent our daughters, 24 and 26, an email and asked them to weigh in.  I know they could give a list of things they wish we had done differently, but they were both feeling gracious I guess, because they only sent what they appreciated about our parenting.

It made me think of something that happened when the girls were in grade school and we were coming home from a vacation in Florida at a time we had had to pull them out of school.

They’re both really good students but keeping up with homework when there’s a beach beckoning is tough.  In spite of our reminders, Katy had not done the work she was supposed to do.  John, frustrated, said, “Katy!  Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t punish you!”

She didn’t miss a beat.  “Because you’re always telling us it’s all about Grace, Grace and more GRACE!!”

Maybe the biggest mistake we can make is to forget about grace.

I think of all the ways I’ve messed up and, I think of my heavenly parent.  I’m His reckless, well-meaning toddler, crashing into things and tripping over my toes.  I’m overwhelmed by a God who picks me up and dusts me off, and sets me back on my feet with the power to redeem my mistakes, turn me around and point me in the right direction.

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in your weakness.” 2 Cor. 12:9

Might you leave a comment today about what did your parents did right?  

Or a mistake you’ve made that you saw redeemed by God?

Bubble Wrap and Three Responses to Criticism

February 8, 2012 /

This was a text I received from daughter Maggie awhile ago:

“This afternoon a man from the DC Legislature and Regulatory Services in the office next door reprimanded me for playing with bubble wrap too loudly.

BTW, You raised me.” 

Hmmm…Really.

This text raises so many questions.

The Jesus-y way people used to say this back in the day was “I rebuke thee!”  And it came with flames of fire, and lightning bolts.  Like Jason Bourne, Bruce Lee, and 007 doing their super hero moves in a whirlwind smack down of high kicks, karate chops, back flips and flying tackles.

Rebuking seems like the biblical free clobber card although these days it often comes under the guise of “doing a Matthew 18:15”.  If we’re honest, sometimes I think we can enjoy being the clobberer (or imagining it), but as the clobberee we usually we feel like we’re picking ourselves up off the matt, bruised and bloody after being called out.

A few weeks ago I was corrected loudly and publicly for a mistake I made.  Then later in the day I was scolded for something I wrote.  It felt like Simon Cowell had told me he had never heard anyone with less talent.  On national t.v.  Want-to-crawl-in-a-hole-pain-full.

We Christians don’t like making mistakes.  It’s so, you know…ungodly.

Once in awhile critique comes wrapped in love from those close to us, like Mr. Rogers putting his arm around us and gently saying “You messed up, but it’s ok.  We all do.  You’re still a part of the neighborhood.”

But more often it comes from a stranger and it feels like Mark Driscoll has put us on his “Jesus hates you” hit list.

All this bubble wrap stuff has made me think about the ways we usually respond to criticism or correction.

1.  We hold hoard it like an 80 year old grandma saving plastic baggies to reuse.  We let it define us.  Maggie could see herself forever as the “Bubble Wrap Bimbo.”  Let it drown out any affirmation.  Research shows that it typically takes 4 positive interactions with someone to offset one negative one.  We’re giving reprimands a lot of power!  Maggie might so focus on the rebuke that she’d miss the three other compliments on her creative bubble dance moves, her cat-like reflexes, and her innovative use of trash.

2.  We rebuke the rebuker.  Replay the conversation in our heads complete with witty original comebacks.  In these scenarios we always emerge righteous and are able to do an end-zone victory dance with moves like Victor Cruz in the Super Bowl while the other person begs forgiveness for being  SO wrong about us.  Victim turned Victor.

3.  We look for the truth, learn from it, and move on.  Borrrrring, you say?  Yeah, and it’s about as easy for me as competitors on the Amazing Race, sifting through the mud to come up with the prized Japanese frog.  But I’ve seen it done so I know it’s possible.

What might a frog from the mud text from Maggie to Regulatory Guy look like?

RG, Sorry the noise bothered u.  It was thoughtless of me not 2 tone it down, but bubble wrap is joy in plastic!  Next time I’ll invite u 2 join us in the dance.  Have a great day! 😉

Just recently Mark Batterson tweeted, “Criticism, even unfair criticism, can be a blessing in disguise. It keeps you humble.”                                                                              Great.  Thanks.  Yea for humility.

I’m trying.  End zone victory dance fantasies aside, my prayer this morning was, “Lord have mercy on me, a sinner.  Help me to hear the words of truth in each criticism aimed at me.  Let my words of correction always be few and seasoned with grace.”

What’s your most common reaction to criticism?  How do you handle it?

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