Limits

Limits. Oh how I hate them, and how how a part of life they are! I had a conversation with a friend just the other day about limits and how neither of us can do what other people can do. We can resent that, or we can work on accepting it so that we can fully live the lives we have.

The Bible actually talks about limits in some positive ways. In the Psalms, David writes, "The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; surely I have a delightful inheritance" [Ps 16:6, New International Version (NIV)]. Pauls talks about how the Spirit intercedes for us when we lack the ability to find the words to pray (Rom 8:28). Paul talks about God's power being sufficient in weakness (2 Cor 12:9) about having "treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us" (2 Cor 4:7). In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul talks about differing gifts in the body (how we don't have them all, but that the body as a whole, functions together). All of these seem to point to limits being good, maybe not feeling good, but being for good.

How are limits good? Well, limits remind me that God knows better than I do. Limits teach me to be grateful to God for what He has done. As Kate Bowler says, "There's a lot to do if you have to save yourself" (Bowler, 2022). Praise Jesus, there is a Savior, and I am not Him! Limits teach me to rely on God's power instead of my own. Limits require others to exercise their unique gifts and talents because I certainly lack the many things that the church corporate needs. Limits require me to rest, something God in his perfection did, but that I in all my human weakness struggle to do. I guess what I am saying is that limits are good for for the building of my spiritual character, for my sanctification.

I still don't like limits, but what if I thanked God for my limits instead of resenting them? What if I learned to appreciate them for what they are, a tool to bring me closer to Jesus. I want that result, even if it's uncomfortable. So here's to limits. To acknowledging, and even embracing them. To maybe fighting against them a little less, because if I could fight them less, I might grow more within them, and thereby pursue the full life that God has for me. Amen and amen.

References:

Bowler, K. (Host). (2022, October 24). More life, fewer explanations. (S9, E8) [Audio podcast episode]. In Everything Happens. https://katebowler.com/podcasts/more-life-fewer-explanations-2/

New International Version. (2011). Bible Gateway. https://www.biblegateway.com/versions/New-International-Version-NIV-Bible/

The Check Engine Light

The check engine light came on in our car again. It was poor timing, right before my husband had a big test for his classes, along with an important meeting regarding his future career. I had work, too, and I didn't want to leave it. The thing was, I could. Several of my afternoon appointments cancelled, so I technically had the opening. I had vacation time I could take so I would not lose wages. The cost to me was my desire to do what I wanted to do, my pride.

I really wrestled with whether or not to leave work. I rued the fact that I had to be the one to take care of the car issue. I grouched that life was unfair. Why did the car have to be my issue, too? In the past, my husband had taken care of the car, but at this time and in this season, everything that is not his school or work is pretty much my responsibility. Taking care of these responsibilities is a way I can serve and support my husband, things I want to do, but selfishly, not in this way.

After much internal debate and some Holy Spirit conviction, I left work early, figuring I would make up time if I could, or take vacation. When I got in the car, the check engine light had mysteriously gone off. I hoped I might just go home to work, but my husband asked me to still take the car into Auto Zone. I did. There, they asked me to plug in the code reader myself, something I didn't know how to do. (Fortunately, YouTube did!). When I took the code reader back in for a download, the only code that read was about the gas pedal, we thought, due to my having bumped in while vacuuming out the car a few days earlier. I heaved a great sigh of relief.

As I drove the remaining distance home, I felt the conviction that this check engine light issue was not a coincidence. It was a check engine light for my marriage. Was I willing to sacrifice for my husband, for us? Was I willing to prioritize my home life over my work. I needed a priority check, and this was it. I think I passed, barely, but would I next time?

As it turned out, a few weeks later, the car's check engine light not only came on, but accompanied an issue that made the car virtually inoperable. I couldn't take care of the car, and my husband did so to take care of me. Maybe things all come out in the wash? Whatever the case, I know that only regular maintenance of my heart before the Lord and deliberate work on partnership in my marriage will ensure that our priorities are in place, and that we continue to work together, rather than at adds to one another. Only then will the light of Christ shine through us as we desire.

Sharing My Husband With Others

My husband is a very capable person, very talented, and very personable. Yes, I am proud of him, but that is not the primary point of this post. This post is about how everyone seems to want a piece of him, and how I have trouble sharing.

I learned years ago that blessings are meant to be shared. I guess I am still learning that. I struggled first with jealousy when my parents poured into others. I wanted them to pour into me. But then I realized that God gave me the gift of them as parents, and them helping others would never change that. I cared less about them helping others after I got married. Yes, I wanted to spend time with them, but I felt less possessive. Then came marriage. I loved the man my husband was, and when he proposed, I felt privileged to marry him and promise to love him forever. I soon realized that other people loved him, too.

Other people love my husband because of the kind and compassionate person that he is. They benefit from being in relationships with him. Sure, they don't love him like a wife, but they love him nonetheless, and they want time from him. I don't want all of his time. I don't take all of his time when we are home together, but when he goes out, or helps others, sometimes I get jealous. It is like I suddenly get a scarcity mindset and think I need all of him.

My dear college friend C. Salena (2023) posted about this on Facebook a while back. She said, "Don't be jealous, possessive, or carnally overly protective of your loved ones. The world needs them. If their life is a gift, let God give it....Don't be jealous....The world needs them...If their life is a gift." All things I needed to hear. All things I needed to consider. Yes, God gifted me with my husband. Yes, I love him and want to spend time with him. God made him, and God gave him, though. He is not mine to possess, but mine to graciously share. God is in charge, not me! To go further, I should see sharing my husband as a privilege, as an honor. How might God use him, and me?

Sharing is not just for kids. It is for kids, and adults. For the unmarried, and the married. All is a gift from God. Can I steward it well? Can I steward my husband well? Can I share? In God's strength, I hope I keep learning, so that not only I, but others, might benefit, and that God might increasingly get the glory. Amen!

Reference:

Wells, C. S. (2023, January 20). I really struggled with friendships growing up military and being from a city where trust and love couldn't be freely. [Status update]. Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/cecilia.s.wells

I Lost Some Fitness and Gained Some Health.

If you have been reading this blog for awhile, you know I took several breaks from running last year, choosing to focus on other activities like strength and hiking. My body was stressed. I felt super tired. I kept reading about people saying that running could overtax an already stressed body, so I quit. I restarted with commitment to base building last November. I remembered how much I enjoy running and renewed my commitment to try to stay healthy enough to do it. I had some race goals, but knew I had to hold those lightly given the continued prevalence of COVID-19.

Enter January when I found a 5K race I thought my husband might like to do. I proposed the idea, and was delighted when he accepted the challenge to train for it. I put on my coach's hat, referenced a few different Couch to 5K plans and drafted a calendar for him. I thought that he would train himself, but as it were, we started training together. Initially, I would go for a run and then come back and run his shorter training distance with him as a cool down. As his distances increased, though I started running with him first, and then running a bit longer by myself at the end. That greatly decreased my pace per mile, but allowed me to support him as he built up his fitness. 

To my surprise, the more my husband and I ran together, the more I enjoyed it and the less I cared about my pace. The more I enjoyed the process of running with my husband, the more I prioritized it. If I was tired on the off days of running with him, I walked rather than ran. If I thought that a different fitness activity might affect running, I didn't do it. I hiked less, watched my weight lifting, and overall let go quite a bit of fitness.

Overall, from January to now, my 5K pace has decreased over a minute a minute. When I look at just the facts, I get a little bit frustrated. But then I think about what I have gained. I have enjoyed extra time with my husband. I have felt less obsessed with running and more appreciative of it. I have tuned into my body and its needs a bit more. I have started to value running more for its secondary social, emotional, and mental benefits than its primary physical benefits. On the whole, I feel in a more balanced place.

Registered Dietitian, recipe developer, and blogger Gena Hamshaw wrote earlier this year about the importance of perspective when it comes to our physical bodies. She shared,

It’s humbling to find ourselves in a different state of ability than the one we used to have. It’s natural to look backwards. But we’re human beings, not machines. We’re changing all the time, often mysteriously and in a way that defies expectations. The best we can do is to meet ourselves where we are and thank our bodies for continuing to give us a home.

A lot has happened since my "peak" level of fitness: a move, a new job, COVID, race cancellations, restrictions that led to a more sedentary life, personal and social tragedies, etc. I can mourn the level of fitness I once had or give thanks for the ability to engage. I can look with envy at my past stats, or think gratefully about the blessing it is to still be living at all after so many have lost their lives. I can resent running with my husband because it slows me down, or enjoy every extra minute of the time that he dedicates to running with me. I have choices about my perspective, and it is pretty apparent which choices benefit me most.

There is fitness, and then there is health. Fitness is primarily physical. Health is so much more. It is a unique interplay of relational, mental, emotional, social, spiritual and so many other factors. While I may have lost some physical fitness over the past year, I have gained so much more. I am grateful, and thankful to God, my body, and my husband for getting me here.

It's Okay to Need!

I've been struggling lately with needing. I hate feeling like I can't do this life alone. I hate needing help. I hate asking for help. I struggle to accept help when it's given. I've been angry at myself for how much I need my husband. Overall, I've judged myself as weak and selfish and have honestly felt ashamed. But then I read something in None Like Him, the book by Jen Wilkin that I've been reading.

What? Come again? We're created to need. Yes. A need is a limit, and since only God is self-sufficient and limitless, need is part of our created nature. As I reflected on that statement and thought about the Garden of Eden, I realized that God created Eve because Adam needed companionship before the fall. God saw that it was not good for man to be alone, so he gave Adam another human being (Gen 2:18). This means need is not a sin. In fact, it might be quite the opposite. Not admitting I need might be the real sin, because I'm trying to act like I'm on par with God, an entirely self-sufficient being. Yikes!

It's incredibly freeing to see my neediness as at least neutral, or even as good. Neediness forces me to run to God as my ever-present refuge and fortress in trouble (Ps 91:2). Neediness allows me to acknowledge my brokenness and sit with others in theirs. Neediness allows me to draw close to others as they minister to me and I minister to them in the ways that God has called us and gifted us. Neediness strengthens and deepens my will to persevere and helps me see that God can work good out of any situation. Neediness allows me to feel close to others and to relish the closeness that our human frailty brings.

My name is Sarah. I'm needy. I guess that's okay.

Complement, Not Competition

I had a pretty big meltdown a few weeks before Chris asked me to marry him. I felt utterly inadequate and incapable of being a good girlfriend, let alone anything else. I had a serious talk with Chris about my feelings and tried to give him the chance exit our relationship graciously. Clearly that didn't work. (And praise God, it didn't.)

But here I sit again, a little over a month into marriage, feeling super inadequate. I felt that way when I wrote my reflections about a month of marriage, and I felt even more that way when I arrived home from work to find flowers and a really sweet card that evening. I had seriously typed up some thoughts, wrote an, "I love you," note on the outside and set it an Chris's spot at the table that morning. That was all.

Chris was teaching at youth group when I got home and found the flowers. I wanted to text him and tell him, "Thank you," and that if we're supposed to "outdo one another in showing honor," he'd won (Rom 12:10, English Standard Version). But then I stopped myself. Here I was again, thinking that we were in a competition. We're not. That's not what marriage is about. So I texted a simple, "Thank you" instead. It wasn't enough to say, but that was all I could say.

So often in marriage, I think we find ourselves competing. On good days, we compete to see who can be more loving, or more helpful, or more "spousely." On bad days, we compete to see who will can nurse anger the longest, who can hold a grudge without caving, who can make the other one move first. Competition isn't good, folks, in any of those cases. Because if we're trying to win, we're working independently. We're operating out of pride. And our marriages will ultimately lose.

If we go back to an Ephesians 5:21 definition of marriage as mutual submission, we shouldn't ever be trying to win in our marriages. Rather, we should be trying to serve out of and in love. Because when we serve out of love, we look for ways to complement and help, rather than compete. We build up, rather than tear down. And that drives our marriages to Jesus and helps us be more complete in Him.

So friends, if you, like me, find yourself competing with your spouse (in good ways, bad ways, or maybe both), stop. Take a breath. Ask yourself if you're really doing yourself any favors, if your marriage is going to win because of your behaviors. Then turn around, serve your spouse, and show love selflessly. Find ways that you can help. Look for needs in your spouse that you might be able to meet. Competition won't win you any growth in your relationship. Complementation will.

Real Life Marriage: One Month In

We've been married for one month, and marriage has been good, and awesome, and amazing. But it's also been hard. I expected it to be hard, but not in the ways it has been. One of my goals with my blog has always been to be honest and real. And since I've gotten married, I might as well be honest and real about marriage, too. 

(Photo courtesy of George Fletcher Photography)

So here's the first of (what might be) many posts on what I'm learning in marriage.

Communication: We haven't really had any fights (though we may at some point or another), but I've been fighting with myself. As in, it's been hard for me to communicate my needs, mostly probably because I don't want to need. But I do, and it's not fair to expect my husband to know what I need unless I tell him. So whether it's asking for a hug, or help around the house, or for the trash to be taken out, I have to say it. And that's new, and hard in ways I didn't expect.

Gender roles: I was blessed to grow up in a home where my mom stayed at home, and as a result, she did most of the chores around the house. I always assumed that's the way it should be. But the reality is that I work, a lot. And as I think about gender roles biblically, there's really nothing wrong that I can see with my husband cooking dinner, or doing dishes, or helping around the house sometimes. Yes, I want to do all those things all the time, but the reality is that I can't, or if I can and I do it, I'm a grouchy mess. So while I have the helper role in this relationship, I'm learning to accept (and appreciate) help, and that's been hard.

Independence: I've always prided myself on being strong and independent and able to" do it myself." When I got married, I knew that I was giving up my independence and some of my freedoms in exchange for interdependence. I was fine with that. What I didn't realize was the guilt that I'd feel over being dependent. I recognize that biblically my husband is my covering and my head, and so therefore I am his responsibility, but that's been hard for me. He tells me that he knew what he was signing up for when he said his vows, and I thought I did, too. But submission to God's design for interdependence has thus far been harder than actually submitting to my husband.

The "hard" of marriage might not be what I expected, but God knew. God knows. If marriage is about growth and sanctification (and I believe it is), this is just part of the process. And I'm all in. I've always been and forever will be.

And Just When You Think You Have It...You Don't

"If anyone thinks they are something when they are not, they deceive themselves."

~Galatians 6:3, New International Version [NIV]

I found myself doing and saying things I normally wouldn't. I found myself trying to prove something. I found myself wanting to be better than others. I found myself prideful.

I don't normally think of myself as a prideful person, but there I was prideful, puffing myself up, and in so doing being derogatory towards others and pushing them down. I wasn't being my true self, either. The Spirit convicted me, and I confessed. I thought I was good, and then a big crash happened. And I was further humbled. Pride goes before a fall, and man, did I have one (Prov 16:18). And I was prideful even in that crash. I had to repent of that, confess my sins to others, and ask for forgiveness.

The trick in my field of work is to remain curious, to never think you know it all. I didn't think I knew it all, and the fall still happened. And it was epic. I got to a point of pretty utter desperation and despair, and it wasn't pretty.

Humility is a fruit of the Spirit. It's a Spirit work, not a me work. And man do I know that now. I just hope I learn the lesson a little easier next time....

Pride

I recently posted this photo of a 5K medal I received on Instagram. I almost didn't. I didn't want to boast. I didn't want to seem arrogant or proud or stuck-up. I was just thankful, and happy, and I guess proud of myself for what my body accomplished, but not in an, "I'm better than you" way.

(This is the medal I received in the mail from September's Patriot Run.)

I consulted with my mom before posting, and she said she thought it was okay. I put a lot of stock in what Mom says, so I posted. But I mulled over the issue of pride all night.

When is it appropriate to be proud? When is pride a sin? The Bible doesn't seem clear, calling pride a sin in some situations, but then using it to describe belief and self-confidence in other situations. Take a look at the verses below:

Proverbs 16:18
Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.

Proverbs 11:2 
When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.

Proverbs 16:18
Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.

Romans 12:16
Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.

2 Corinthians 7:4 
I have spoken to you with great frankness; I take great pride in you. I am greatly encouraged; in all our troubles my joy knows no bounds.

Galatians 6:4 
Each one should test their own actions. Then they can take pride in themselves alone, without comparing themselves to someone else.

Is pride just bad when it preoccupies a person? When it begins to put self above others and God? When is it okay to be proud? Billy Graham's website says, "the kind of pride the Bible condemns is a pride that puts ourselves first, and leaves God out of the picture." Maybe that's why I tagged my Instagram post #thankful.

I struggle with extremes, as noted in my many posts about perfectionism. I think this is another area of it. I want to be a perfect Christian, to not come near sin. But in the process, I often demean myself. I don't give God gratitude for things He allows me to accomplish, like winning a medal in this 5K. And when I obsess about trying to be a perfect Christian by avoiding any possibility of sin, I feed into the lie that I can be good enough to earn my salvation. That says Christ's sinless sacrifice wasn't good enough to cover my sin. I don't even want to go there.

Where am I settling on pride? I am settling on the idea that it is okay to be proud of accomplishments, to give God glory for the ability to get things done on this earth. It's wrong to be proud and stuff things in the faces of others, to demean God's created beings by pretending I'm better than them. But it's also wrong, and prideful, to not share God's goodness, to hide His gifts and pretend like that makes me holy. It doesn't. It makes me stingy and ungrateful and lacking in confidence to do what God wants me to do.

So friends, where are you? What has God allowed you to accomplish? Celebrate it. Talk about it. But just don't forget to remember the God that got you there.