You've read it all ... all the controversy, all the hype, all the reviews, all the complaints, all the platitudes, all of it.  Pepsi should know better.  The NFL should step up their game.  Performers should be more mindful of their pelvic thrusts and pole dancing.  Yes.  We've all heard it.

But, am I  - a Christian - responsible to do something about the Super Bowl half time show?  

Stand up for what you believe.  Switch the channel.  Write a letter.  Boycott a product.  Ban this.  Bash that.  Again, you've read it all.  I get it.  But the question still begs to be asked: "Am I responsible for the Super Bowl half time show?"

I'm often caught off guard at moments like these when conservative values are being lifted as the cultural norm setting a Christian narrative off like wildfire.  The bottom line is that the cultural norm will never be a Christian norm.  

Let me be clear.  I am a Christian.  I realize that my value system usually swims upstream to the world around me.  I don't live an insular life.  I love my community and participate in making mine a better place to live.  However, I do not expect my value system to be the norm outside of my faith community.  To think it should is to be naive.  However, to hope I can make a difference is the very essence of my faith.  To believe the One I put my faith in can transform my community is to excersise radical faith - the kind of faith that says a mustard seed can do some pretty big things.

Jesus hung out with sinners.  Jesus went to places the religious thought impious and unworthy for the godliness of men to stumble into.  Jesus didn't ban their meeting places - He transformed them!  

So what the heck does that mean for me, living in 2020, when the Super Bowl half time show reflects a very different moral compass than my own?  To sit back and do nothing is not an attitude I'm touting as a means to combat the moral standard.  But it has to start in other places long before the Super Bowl.  Christianity isn't about behavior modification.  Christianity is about loving God and sharing His love with a world in desperate need to find Him through our actions, words, and open mouths ready for honest conversations.  Yes, there are absolutes.  Yes, there are moral conducts prescribed in the Bible.  But should we require "the world" to abide by those?  Are we to judge the world?

Romans 13: 11-14 says:

11 And do this, understanding the present time: The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber,because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. 12 The night is nearly over; the day is almost here.So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. 14 Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh.[c]

This was written to Christians.  Are we to ask "the world" to abide by the same standards?  We are if we are asking for behavior modification.  But what if we were praying for soul transformation?  What if we cared for the very soul of our neighbor, our city leaders, and our Super Bowl performers to experience the greatest love of all time and be transformed by the love of God?   

I'm not saying critics of the Super Bowl half time show are not praying and caring for participants.  What I am saying is that we who love Jesus have a calling:  to love others and engage in our community with the practical and tangible love of Christ.  He is the great transformer.  

What if scandalous Super Bowl half time shows caused a great waking from the slumber of Christian communities to see the importance of really knowing their salvation?  What if we, first, put aside our own deeds of darkness and put on an armour of light?  What would it look like to start clothing ourselves in Jesus Christ and not think about how to gratify our own desires of the flesh?  Would we be more involved in civic affairs?  Would we be more active in our schools?  Would we love our neighbor?  Would we foster children, feed the homeless, and get involved in local politics to be agents of change for the greater good of humanity?  Would we be more patient with other Christians?  Would we get honest about our own addictions, emotional issues, and hang ups that keep us from living our full potential in Jesus?  I'm not talking compromising who we are nor the Biblical standards by which we live.  I'm talking being more like Jesus.  

Being more like Jesus, for those who say they belong to Him, is the answer to not just the Super Bowl half time shows, becoming more like Jesus is the answer to transforming the cultural norm!

So, no ... no I am not responsible - as a Christian - for the Super Bowl half time show.  I am, however, responsible for being used by God to be an agent of His love which transforms the world around me,
Christina

Knowing God, His character, His ways, His thoughts, and certainly His heart changes us.  That seems almost silly to say to an audience of people who would say they know God.  However, knowing demands depth.  The deeper we go the more we find out.

I'm digging deeper into knowing God.  Part of my "knowing" Him involves dealing with some past hurts that have blinded me from really seeing who He is in my life.  If any of you are familiar with a class called Living Waters, I am a current student.  This 20-week course dives into past hurt and allows God, Healer, to enter into those places.

It's been scary.  It's been like standing on the edge of a cliff and being asked to jump.  Jump hard.  The first jump I took was into a memory that surfaced when I was 7 years old.  It was a memory that I had forced down, kept quiet, formed opinions about God and myself, and protected from ever surfacing - ever.  Yet, the kindness of God allowed me to go knee-deep into the memory.  Actually, go heart-deep.

Like a diver preparing for an underwater excursion, I prepared.  I entered into the pain of the moment.  What surfaced was the most significant and tangible experience with this Creator, God, that I have ever experienced.  Where I had seen Him absent, He was front and center.  Where I had seen Him permissive, He was a warrior - fighting for me.  There are no words.  I am forever changed by allowing the hurt to propel me into a place of intense healing that has changed me.  I am changed because I saw the face of God in the middle of pain.

I have known God for a long time.  When I was 19 years old, I entered into relationship with Him.  This journey has never been dull.  Despite knowing Him and walking in constant ear shot of Him, like any human is conditioned to do, I have tried to avoid pain.  Makes sense.  This idea is often a reliable and encouraged survival technique.  However, when avoiding soul pain its just a denial activity that won't end well.  The Bible says there is a root of bitterness (Hebrews 12:15) that when not dealt with grows.  Bitter roots grow bitter plants.  Bitter plants grow bitter fruit.  Yet, some of us learn to tolerate the taste of the bitter.  Bitter can be pain we avoid but dull with addictions.  Bitter can be memories we repress.  Bitter can be activities that keep our minds too busy on healing our inner world.

In Isaiah 42:25, the Bible says that Jacob (one with a relationship with God) was surrounded by God's anger but didn't know it.  He was even burned by the fire of His anger but paid no attention.  Let that fall on us.  How many of us walk around with our bitter, our pain, our offense and have no idea the long-term affect it is wreaking on us?  We've carried it (bitter, pain and offense) so long we've gotten used to it and don't even think twice about the extra weight we carry.  It's like the proverbial frog in a pot of boiling water.  If you stick this green jumper into a pot of lukewarm water he feels comfortable.  If you gradually turn up the heat to the point of boiling, Mr. Green Jumper remains and is boiled alive.  He just got used to the water.

Pain - our pain - I believe is meant to drive us to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.  Our pain is for our good.  Our good Father is not the giver of pain.  That role belongs to the ruler of this world who battles for our demise every day we breath on the planet. But in His great love for us, He desires for us to use our pain as a catalyst for change.  Our pain is a trigger.  We've learned to see the trigger as negative.  What if we dared to change the semantics and gave it another value?  What if the trigger had value?  What if that pain had value to thrust us first not into fear, addiction or bitterness but into the Presence?

I said that I am learning more about God, His character, His ways, His thoughts, and His heart.  In doing so, I'm proving my own point that knowing these things about my Creator demands depth.  The deeper I go the more I find out.  I'm finding out that I don't need absence from pain, I need a fresh outlook on where pain can take me!  One memory dealt with and healing achieved.  Believe me, there is more to deal with but I'm committed to stay in the fight.  How about you?  Put on gloves that are given to you by a gracious, kind, and victorious Father.  It will cost you pain.  But ... it is worth it.  It's always worth it!

P.S.  Frogs weren't meant to boil!

Saturday morning in good ol' Norman, Oklahoma began with how my "favorite" Saturday's evolve:  lovely french press coffee in hand and an episode of Barefoot Contessa on laptop (Ina Garten, if you are reading, you are my favorite!).  Happy as a little clam in our new apartment, I sat and sipped and watched and felt at peace.  Now, feeling at peace in an apartment with a list of essentials I need to get from Walmart open on my "Notes" phone App with no idea how long this temporary residence will bear my mark sounds weird.  But weird is something I am comfortable with and so sit in peace I did!

After Ina and I had spent quality time together (insert big cheesy smile here), I turned my attention to my Bible and journal.  Joshua 22: 1-8 left me speechless and feeling empowered.  Israel, wanderers in dessert places, were on the brink of entering land longed promised.  Before unpedicured toes and feet stepped into promised places, Joshua had a list of do's and don'ts:

• Love the Lord your God
• Walk in All His Ways
• Keep His Commands
• Remain Faithful to Him
• Serve Him with All Your Heart

Why these basics?  Why the need to be reminded by Papa Joshua that the Lord needed to be loved?  Seems weird.  To love God was given as a command.  Leaves me thinking love is so much more than a gushy feeling.  It's about decisions.  And given the circumstances the Israelite desert dwellers had come through, a decision to love God during the "tough" in life was essential.

Feet back in an Oklahoman, borrowed bed, boxes stacked and ready to be moved to another temporary location, a suitcase filled with Austrian gifts for American friends, and jet lag saying it's final goodbye, I ponder.

Oklahoma is OK!  Yesterday, the neighbor noticed we were home and asked us if we're sad to be back.  The reply was automatic.  No!  No, we are not sad to be back.  This is where God has put us and we are content and will thrive and continue to make this "home" our "home".  So no, we are not sad to be home.

Yet, having been back for almost a year, my thoughts turn toward what the year brought out in me.  I was convinced that God would provide a house for my birthday ... in August.  I was hopeful that God would surprise me with a house ... for Christmas.  I was sure that a house would be ours before Austrian friends came to visit ... in May.  I was pretty convinced we'd surely have a house by the time we visited Vienna ... in June.  No house.  So what do I do with my timetable?

Joshua led many teams on excursions that looked pretty horrible.  They faced enemies that were really too big for them to fight on their own.  The people of Isreal were small in number compared to the enemies that lived in spaces in the promised land that God said was theirs.  Yet, battle after battle took them closer to obtaining a promise.  For me, little wanderer that I am, it gives me hope and rock-solid confidence that each battle of doubt, each battle of "maybe this time", each battle of "is this the house", each battle of wanting so desperately to put up curtains on windows in a home that bears a title with my name on it ... is coming.

What trips me up is Time.  Time leaves me doubting that God's word is only true measured by an estimated time table.  Time leaves me wondering if God is really with me.  Time makes me doubt His goodness.  Time leaves me questioning that He will do what I heard Him say.  I don't want Time to have this effect on me, but there is a tiny thread of wrong believing that creeps into my mind the longer Time does not produce what I know God has promised.

You see, long before we moved across the ocean, we were sure.  We were sure God had called us to move to Oklahoma.  We were sure that God would provide for our needs.  We were sure God would also provide a house.  How do we know?  Our Spirits knew.  We were at peace.  Others confirmed.  He gave us scripture to affirm what we sensed in our hearts.  Just like Isreal walking in borrowed territory to claim their own possession we knew God was giving us a "home".

This morning, a year after moving, I am at peace.  What God has taught my heart is that He keeps His Word.  He gives me new mercies every morning.  For me, the mercy of reminding me I've heard Him and He will deliver ... on His timetable ... keeps me going another day.  Hope is cumulative.  One day builds on another.  Each day I see God's faithfulness, His kindness to remind me He is near, gives me spiritual fuel to keep going ... to keep believing.

Today I'm all fueled up.  My house awaits in His time.  So ... O-K-L-A-H-O-M-A, Oklahoma, OK!

In America, in a hospital bed at OU Medical Center, my 40-year-old friend is dying.  I got a text from her sweet Momma in the wee hours of the night.  My friend has fought a battle with cancer and now kidneys and lungs are shutting down.  God can totally reverse this situation.  We all have the faith to believe He is able.  In a few short hours, they will disable all life support devices.

In a small Austrian village, our friend who feels more like a son is getting ready to get married.  In a few hours, we will watch him sign the certificate and say his vows to a young woman he's waited and prayed for.  God has been right in the middle of their relationship from the start.  We couldn't be more proud, more excited, more in love with both of them.

"You have stayed at this mountain long enough.  Resume your journey.  See, the Lord your God has set the land before you.  Go up and take possession of it.  Do not be afraid or discouraged."  (Deuteronomy 1:6, 7, 21)

Both of my friends have stayed on mountains.  One, a mountain of great pain.  She's endured unthinkable hardship that doesn't include her cancer.  She's walked through devastating things that would make most people crumble.  Yet, this little woman has walked through and emerged a powerhouse of big faith.  Her eyes have never landed and settled for the facts of her circumstances.  Instead, her eyes have landed on the truth of what God can do and what His Word says about her and her future.

The other has stayed on a mountain of waiting.  He's waited a very long time to establish a life with someone who would share his ideas and life vision.  He's waited for someone to build a new life and a new family that would bear the characteristics of a childhood he never experienced.  He's wondered if this would ever happen for him.  He endured some relationships that didn't last and suffered the heartbreak of lost love.  Yet, he's remained faithful to the promise he's believed God has given him for a family.

Now, my dear friends, are resuming their journies.  One, unless God whispers life back into her body, in heaven.  One as a husband.

Now, my dear friends are getting the privilege of taking possession of a new place that God has prepared for them.  One, a place we know about, read about, and dream about but is surrounded by mystery.  The other, a place of becoming one with another human and sharing and building a life together.

Both have the same marching orders:  do not be afraid or discouraged.  Neither one of them has walked the new journey ahead of them.  They do not have any idea what's next.  All they know is that God is waiting.  God is with them now.  He is waiting for them in the next journey.  He will be with them always.

Today I live with the awareness of funerals and weddings.  God is in control of both.

Make the most of your time.  Release people to their next step

Learn to adapt.  Live within the lessons learned.

Experience new things.  Normal is flexible.

When I see God working outside my own culture, I see the greatness of a great Father.

The 12

Alfred

Alfred is a man who has an intimate relationship with Jesus.  He makes the mysteries of God seem like simple truths to be lived by the ordinary.  Like E.F. Hutton, when Alfred speaks, I listen. His wife, Helga, is a quiet woman.  Elegant and gentile, she personifies class. She is warm and friendly and looks at you as if she's seen you for the first time every time she sees you.  

Being away from your normal surroundings is a good thing.  It gives you space to think.  As we are working and living and doing life in our beloved Vienna for the next month, already there is new space to think new thoughts and hear from God in a fresh way.  For this, in spite of 97 degrees with no AC, I am grateful

Traveling always expands your mind.  You see new things and people that you hold up next to your old things and people.  Comparison and evaluation occur.  And in the space where differences divide you from the others, there's room to expand your thinking.

When we first moved overseas in 2009, we adopted a phrase as a family.  To girls who were 5, 9 and 13 years old, we repeated a mantra:  "This is not weird.  This is different."  Truth is, often things were weird!  They were so outside our experience it made us uncomfortable.  However, it didn't make our things right and other things wrong.  It just made things different.

There are lots of people on this planet.  If I just focus on one segment of society, the Christian community, there are lots of differences.  Some raise hands.  Some wear hair in buns.  Some sport tattoos.  Some drink.  Some dance.  Some observe different days as a Sabbath.  Differences are up and down the spectrum.  However, when we spotlight what is "right" and "wrong" from a place of human logic and stand on soap boxes made from personal opinions we divide and drive wedges that I'm pretty sure God never intended on being there.

In Numbers 12, Miriam and Aaron start bashing their brother, Moses, for having a bride from a different culture.  This brother has ushered 10 plages upon the mighty Pharoh, opened up a sea, made water gush from a rock and asked God to bring meat to a grumbling audience of 2 million of his kinsman.  And yet, Miriam and Aaron got stuck on this one difference.  They got stuck on Moses performance and not his position.

Performance issues (what we see on the outside) highlight something in us that needs to be resolved spiritually.  God is always interested in our position (our heart in relationship with Jesus).  Moses, despite marrying a woman from a different culture, was humble and obedient and as a result, had a direct line of communication with a Holy God that Miriam and Aaron did not have.

Moses' humility and apparently his obedience put him in a position to hear from God directly.  God honored the position of Moses' heart.  Because Miriam and Aaron were critical of his performance, Gods anger burned against them.  He was defending His kid, Moses.  He was letting Miriam and Aaron know there was something more He wanted for them to see.  He wanted them to look beyond finding their worth and value in laws and rules and finding their worth and value in a relationship.  He knew that their future depended on not seeing with 20/20 vision but rather seeing from His perspective.

That's a tough one, isn't it!  I'm not advocating we accept wrong and sinful thinking and/or behavior in the Christian community.  Turth is truth.  But, because just like every culture in the world looks different, so can Christianity.  The way I am "Christian" in Norman, Oklahoma will look vastly different from Peruvian tribesmen.  However, the position of my heart in relationship to Jesus Christ and the position of the Peruvian tribesmen's heart in relationship to Jesus Christ makes us equal.  I may raise my hands in an air-conditioned auditorium and he may dance around in a loin cloth in a mud hut but in Christ, we are the same.

In Western culture, we say position matters but we get caught up in performance.  Performance is what people see, right.  I can be super active in my faith community and do all the right Christian things like sweet Miriam and Aaron.  However, my heart can stink.  I can still be in Christ but out of alignment in my heart and head thinking because so much of my attention is focused on my performance.

Case in point, me.  Normally, I've got a plan for my study times with God.  I love my routine:  coffee, Bible, TJ Max journal, favorite pen, reading plan, prayer, hear from God.  It works.  My discipline of devotion to this life-giving book called the Bible has matured and shaped me into the person I am.  But since I am out of my normal routine, I know God has asked me to go out on a limb and shake up my time and experience with Him.  I'm throwing out some routine and spending a whole lot of time letting Him guide the morning.  In Norman and now here in Vienna, my study times are valuable.  However, I'm creating some space to allow God to speak in a different way.  There may be some "Miriam and Aaron" kinds of things lurking in those places of my soul that a little shake-up of my routine will flesh out.

Stay tuned.  You just never know what will happen when we let our performance slip and our position take center stage!

Today's Lesson:  Morning Walks Clear Heads

In my young adult years, I suffered from Anxiety.  I make it a noun, in capital letters, out of respect.  Anxiety was an enemy that has now been defeated.  However, because God is good and never wastes anything meant for our demise, I honor it as that thing that put fierce tenacity in my soul towards God's Word.

You see, Anxiety tried to tell me that real is not real and God is weak.  Anxiety always raised its head above my circumstances, bullying its way to the top of the list of things to do or things to fear and made itself an honorary dictator.  The problem is that self-promotion is false and God is a Rock.

During those years when I battled with Anxiety, and trust me - it was a battle, I learned that taking walks cleared my head.  My eyes were forced to see tangible evidence of God's handiwork instead of the piles of laundry and unticked boxes on lists that kept my total attention.  My ears were forced to listen to noises other than the voices yammering in my ears like annoying small dogs with high-pitched voices.  Outside made everything better inside of me.


This morning, I needed to walk.  Anxiety wasn't rearing its ugly and impotent head, but things were getting loud in my brain.  So, after letting God's Word sit lightly on the surface of my heart, I took to the streets.

Letting God's Word sit lightly is a good thing.  Leaving it there to sit by itself usually ends with dismissal.  But when those words sit lightly, they have the power to penetrate in tough places.  That's what happened during my walk.

As I unloaded, I kept hearing the Spirit whipser those words back to me that I read this morning:  "May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to You, Lord, my Rock, and my Redeemer."  Psalm 19:14  

As I began the dialogue that has become so familiar and priceless to me, it makes sense.  Words and mediations can be acceptable to God.  Words guided and mediations directed by God's Word are acceptable.  But, what happens when they are not?  What happens when I have a morning like this morning when it's hard to put fierce trust in God's words because circumstances are distracting me from what I know to be true?  I have to filter my own words and thoughts through God's Words and thoughts.  I use that Rock, who God says He is, to sustain me and my words and thoughts.   I use His redeeming character to know that my words can trust His words because I have been redeemed.  My mediations can be redeemed.  And when they are junk ... when I forget He is Rock and I am Redeemed, He redeems the words and the thoughts for His good!  Oh, my friend, it's a win/win situation!

Unpacking my own thoughts, filtered by what God says, changes my words.  I may feel this or that.  But, I will speak God's Word as a battle cry because His Words have power, life, and are able to sustain and uplift me like the Rock.

So, let the words of my mouth and the mediation of my heart be acceptable to You, Lord, my Rock, and my Redeemer!!

Walking and letting words and thoughts be acceptable,
Christina

This time of year, listening becomes a challenge.  I've heard numerous people speak of busier schedules, busier work days, busier social engagements.  It's hard to be still and listen when you are busy.

So during the month of December, I pay attention to listening:  to music, to people, to my heart.  One of the things I do to help my Spirit listen is find something new to do when I spend time with God.  I try a reading plan.  I try focusing on some attribute of God.  This year, I'm studying the names of God.

When I sit down, in the middle of my own busy life, I sit with the goal in mind to listen, to get the full value of who he is and not who I've experienced him to be or who I think Him to be ... to get the full truth.  This sounds really spiritual and scholarly but this is really how this thing plays out:

This morning I read about God, El Olom.  I at first chuckled to myself because the letters - in my head - got transposed to El Olaf which then took me to the Disney animated film, Frozen ... which then reminded me of the beloved snowman character, Olaf ... which made me want to sing "In Summer" with a raspy voice ... and then remembered what I was doing ... hearing from God.  You see ... this listening is a hard job!  Once I got myself together and quieted the Disney playlist that had already begun in my head ... I read further.

El Olom, God Everlasting.  Isaiah 26:1 - 8 gives a description of what God Everlasting looks like.  He keeps those who keep their eyes on Him in perfect peace.  He is an eternal Rock.  He makes a smooth path for those who follow.  Hmm.  I think I could use this God, El Olom right now.

Last night, I fell victim to catching up on world news and emails.  First, the news was ... disturbing. Second, my emails contained messages from the U.S. embassy for Americans living aboard to exercise extreme caution in light of the recent announcement of the U.S. embassy being moved to Jerusalem.  I stopped reading.  I let my mind wander.  I've currently got parents traveling abroad.  I've got a daughter who will board a plane in a week.  I've got daughters who travel public transportation.  I've got a hectic week.  I've got to wash sheets.  I've got to get work done.  I've got to find addresses for Christmas cards.  I've got to exercise.  I've got to find a tailor to fix my broken zipper on my coat.  I've got to remember to buy milk.

How fragile my mind can be ... when I'm trying to listen to the One who knows every detail of my life ... as well as everyone else on the planet.  When I can't seem to muster a few moments of quiet reflection and exercise the ability to listen to the One who is Everlasting ... it dawns on me.  He's listening.  Always ... to my thoughts that wander, to my worries that bog me down, to the weight of my heart and to the mundane of my life, He's listening.  Not to judge me, condemn me, lecture me, or scold.  He loves me. He listens.  And then I turn my mind toward Him, this gentle pursuer of my thoughts, and tell him about it all:  the news, the embassy, the traveling, the week, the sheets, the work, the addresses, the cards, the exercise, the zipper, the milk.  I just tell Him everything.

It's this God, El Olom, who is everlasting. And yet, in the stillness that measures this moment in time ... He, Everlasting God, is listening to me.

Makes me feel small and big at the same time.

Listening,
Christina

I love coffee.
I really love coffee.

Sometimes, when I go to bed at night, and I'm really, really tired ... I think about waking up the next morning.  And when I think about waking up ... I know what's coming.  Coffee.  Good coffee.  Good coffee that I make in my espresso maker.  I fall asleep with a smile on my face.


I love my Chris.
I really love my Chris.

Sometimes, when I'm riding on the subway and I get a text from him ... I think about what a lucky girl I am.  I think about that skinny, mullet-haired, single guy that asked me out for the first time and I smile.  I smile really big because now he is ... my Chris.

"See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are!"*

• You won't see the "bad things" that happen as punishment for some behavior
• You won't see lack of anything in your life as God's wrath
• You won't withdrawal from asking for good things for yourself because who are you to ask such things from God.

*1 John 3:1

When someone tells me to "be quiet", "be myself", "be assertive" or "be respectful" ... I kinda raise my back feathers and want to rebel.  Just being honest.  What I first conclude is that they think I am not exuding the qualities they are asking me to display.  If they (and who in the sam hill is "they"?) tell me to be quiet, apparently I am not being ... or acting ... quiet.  Again, laying all Sunday school answers at the door and being brutally honest, I want to clear my throat loudly, stomp my foot, and whisper loud at their request to be quiet.  Quiet, in fact, becomes the last thing on my mind.  Loud.  Loud is what I want to be ... and act out ... and develop.

So when I read in 1 Thessalonians 4 what Paul writes to his friends, I cringe.  Yikes.  Paul is someone I admire, respect and consider worthy of taking advice from.  He says to them ... "be holy".  I gotta ponder that a moment, for I, the keeper of a rebellious heart, have some questions.

I am a Mom.  I love my three, precious, beautiful, smart, witty, brilliant, strong, soft, assertive, justice-seeking, single-minded, merciful daughters.  When I look at them, I don't see what's wrong with them ... for could there be any fault in such beauties?  Yes.  Yes there are faults, but not ones I want to rub in their faces and mock.  Their faults are things (characteristics/tendencies) that I see I have struggled with and want to bring into the light and encourage them to develop to make strong.  I don't want them to keep these faults hidden and neglect them and wish them to disappear.  Hiding only highlights the defect.  Exposing brings into a place of sweet revelation and healing.

So when Paul tells his friends to "be holy", I have to suppose he desires for them to take into account their current behavior in light of an alternate behavior that will bring them good, make them healthy, lead to a better way of living.

But is it behavior he is after?  As a Mom, I want a certain behavior, but not at the expense of my girls leaving their heart at the door and only feigning actions without strong conviction behind those actions.

When they say they love their friends, I don't want them to merely act like they love their friends.  I want them to love them from a heart level.  I want them to care for, pray for, devote themselves to, invest in, cry with, laugh with, stay awake for and be deeply committed to their friend.

I want their heart first.  Actions leap from the deep places in the heart.

And therefore I've answered my own questions about what Paul was saying to his friends:  be holy.  Don't act holy.  Don't put on a show.  Don't give lip service to.  Don't attend certain gatherings because.  Don't abstain from things or engage in things because.  Just be holy.  At a heart level, making a commitment to be holy, will ooze out into all areas of my life.  I will act holy if in my core and in the beating of my heart is the decision to be holy.

And then, kind of as a "kicker" to the whole equation, Paul says this after his request.  First, he tells them to be holy.  Then, he says that because God is so faithful, He will make it happen.  It isn't enough that we make a commitment to be holy.  No, God comes in and then says "I will do this for you, you sweet girl, because I see your heart and I am the One who will transform you."

Wow.

In a recent conversation with a dear friend who is a young Mother, I made this statement:  "Are you after behavior modification of a heart change?"  The same principle applies here ... be holy.  It's a statement about the condition of our core being.  The behavior springs from this place.  And if there's a good core, there will be good actions.

Being holy,
Christina

P.S.  Holy doesn't mean perfect ... and that's another story ...