It is funny as I type the title–Journey Continues and then start the entry with a reflection.  I may want to change this name to The Journey’s Reflections.  Yesterday started with the tasks I was going to do showing love.  I kept getting the sense I needed to call one of our pastors and talk with him.  This sense had been nudging me for the past couple days regarding this love topic.  After getting my grandson pulled out I called him.  He told me to come by right then so I did.  We talked much about this item of receiving love, believing God’s love and how to know it.

After leaving I went home and spent some time in the new book I bought myself in December.  It is entitled:  The Nature of Freedom by Graham Cooke.  It’s a compilation of love letters from God and reflection questions to respond to regarding what the letters say.  I have had this book for 3 weeks now waiting to get started.  It nailed my struggle.  On one page the question was:  What are the upgrades in your language that will reflect what God believes about you?  Ex. “Instead of saying______, I can say _______.”  I wrote:  Instead of saying I’m abused, I can now say I’m redeemed.  Instead of saying torn apart, I can say I’m lifted up.  Instead of saying I wasn’t wanted I can now say I was planned even before the earth was formed. Instead of saying I don’t know love, I can now say God is teaching me love.  Instead of saying I’m a broken vessel I can say I am born again and made new.  Lastly, instead of saying I can’t believe, I can say I believe!

This morning is when I did this page.  After writing the above items I went back to I Corinthians 13 and read it again.  It is called “the love chapter”.  I was able to read it without the fear I felt only a few days ago.  God really is teaching me about Himself and me.  This morning I realized that love is far more about Him than it is about me.  It becomes about me when I say:  “I believe”.  All things become possible when I (we) believe.

I guess you know that this is also true for you.  God doesn’t pick who He loves.  He waits for us to reach out to the love He already has extended to us.  To God be the glory!

So a truth about me comes out today.  We have had a record breaking amount of snow in the last couple weeks with an accumulation on the ground of 18+ inches.  All activities at our church have been stopped momentarily and my work with the school district has halted also due to all district’s cancelling school until the roads can be cleared.  So, what’s the truth about me in all of this?  I need to be doing something.  God has brought me to this point of addressing love and being loved.  He has made it very clear that His new creation can not only give love but can receive this.  In my mind I need to put this to work–right?

Well, my grandson just called and needs to have his car pulled out.  So, I’ll go over to where he lives and do this.  There are some phone calls God is asking me to make which is reaching out to some folks I know need to simply be affirmed.  I think this is giving love and it isn’t being done to hide anything–just give love.  That’s the odd awakening to loving in the new creation.  I don’t do anything to hide something.  How different this is.  I’ve just never had a loving thought that didn’t accompany a hiding one.  This is going to take some time but I’ll do this one day at a time, one moment at a time and see where it goes.  Just getting this started is already very freeing.  To God be the Glory!

I’m thinking the headline for this new year is LOVE–what in the world is it?  Yesterday I wrote about this and its personal impact on me.  Last night our Conquer class for men struggling with sexual addiction started again after taking 2 weeks away for the holidays.  The lesson had nothing to do with love, but it was all about love for me.  The lesson was teaching about fighting with God’s weapons when we are attacked by the enemy.

The armor of God:  Ephesians 6: 14-17 was a key part of the lesson.  It starts with the Belt of Truth.  I’ve just never addressed how my past annihilated my capacity to know love.  The beatings of childhood, the verbal abuse of it, the sexual abuse of it totally wiped away the innocence of childhood and replaced it with reservation, caution, walls, etc.  The lesson last night said we are to tell the truth about what we are experiencing and feeling.  I tried that one time and witnessed the worst beating I’d ever seen dad give.  I wasn’t going there again.  The truth that needed to come out was then protected with the same walls I was building within me.

All these years later God is telling me that His new creation–me, can let this go.  I can surrender it once and for all.  The lesson last night had questions to respond to about shame, guilt and sin.  The last question was:  Is sin your identity?  Yes, indeed it was my identity up until a very few years ago.  Even when I began to address this, it took up until now to remove the depth of its bondage.

As I began to think about love I thought it would be in the absence of all the ugliness of my past.  Instead, God is showing me that in spite of my past, I can love and be loved.  He started that by His love for me through Jesus Christ.  He is now showing me that I can trust love.  Actually, at this point all I can do is write this.  I don’t know the substance of it yet, but I’m assured I will in time.  God actually told me this morning to look around me and I would see evidence of love everywhere.  I can definitely see this.  Now I need to let it touch me.  I’ve told God this morning I want to be a good learner here and trust Him.  I’m glad I know “one day at a time, one moment at a time”.  I need that reminder with this topic.

I hope this blog is helping someone.  We can trust God together if so.

Well, God doesn’t waste any time moving me from the assurance of yesterday into today’s message from this morning’s devotion.  God has been helping me believe that this empty vessel He has cleansed through the blood of His Son Jesus Christ and filled with His Holy Spirit can now love.  I Corinthians 13 is all about this.  I’ve read this chapter literally hundreds of times in my life.  I’ve even used it when I’ve done the wedding ceremony for my nephew’s wedding and for the wedding vows renewal for dear friends.  I did all of this for–them.  This morning God is driving home that He means all of this too for me.  I’ve already told Him that we ought to leave good enough alone.  He’s assured me this won’t happen.  He leaves nothing incomplete.

I was stupidly reading the chapters leading up to chapter 13 in I Corinthians knowing this chapter was coming.  I wasn’t expecting God to slam me with the reality that there is more for me to address.  It is like He has pealed away all other layers and now in front of Him and me is my heart.  I feel like this is where I’ve always needed to protect that little boy who was called a weakling, a sissy, a baby, a bawl baby, a good wife, Hazel….  The anxiety began to swell in me as I was being confronted with this from God, He was at the same time assuring me that His work in me as I stated in the second sentence of this blog entry is complete for these anxieties too.  I asked Him how I could trust this time?  He simply said what I hear stated in every lesson of Celebrate Recovery–one day at a time, one moment at a time.

Maybe no one would know this, but I’ve always been very guarded with being loved.  Let me love you by doing things for you, but lets end it with that.  Just don’t be like dad about love for me and don’t touch me when I am not expecting it like my brother always did.  I’d rather you just be present.  I write this and see how selfish and controlling this is on my part.  There has been reason for it, but God is saying I can let this go now once and for all.  The new creation has no place for this type of receptivity for love.

I’m sure there will be more to this lesson for me.  This is ample for today.  I am going to step into it knowing the God I serve wants me to be here.  I guess He thinks I’m ready for this.  I know I’m ready to be all He wants me to be.  If this is my next lesson then ok.  Here we go.

I don’t think I’ve ever entered into a new year without a mental list of things I must be and do.  The be’s and do’s were always important so I could find relevance in living each day.  God has finally brought me face to face with this faulty thinking.  My scripture reading this morning is now in I Corinthians.  Back when I was in high school the Lord impressed upon me I Cor. 10:13.  I talk about this in my book, but this verse at the time gave me hope that the temptations of life wouldn’t have to overrule my behaviors or overrule the behaviors of how others treated me–my brother and my dad.  Scores of times I would plead with God to make this verse real and not just be a hope.  However, knowing the Bible is true, I would hang onto what the verse said hoping it could be true someday.

The second relevant verse of today’s reading is I Cor. 10:31.  The second part of this verse says:  “do all for the honor and glory of God.”  There is nothing added to the end of this verse saying something like:  do all for the honor and glory of God so you can now be important to Him and others.

Fast forward 50+ years.  God has replaced that added phrase of mine with the assurance that His work in me through Jesus Christ, His Gift to me of His Holy Spirit is as sufficient and complete as He Is Almighty.  He no longer wants me doing or trying to be in order to prove some type of hopeful worthiness which would be gone just as soon as the task was done.  The anxiousness that had been within me is now replaced with an assurance that my vessel–me–is able to be used by God as He so chooses.  There is such a calm in being in this state of mind.  I’ve never known it before.

There is a verse in Mark 9:24 that states:  “…I believe, help Thou my unbelief….”  So many times I’d seek God’s favor in trying to get Him to strengthen my unbelief so I could be disciplined enough to be and do all He wanted of me.  Finally, I’ve learned that discipline is replaced by surrender.  None of this has happened quickly for me.  God has needed to chip away at many defects of character I’d developed early in my life.  Today I am ready to be an empty vessel that God has filled with His Holy Spirit and, that vessel–He cleansed it completely by the blood of His Own Son–Jesus Christ making it ready for the Spirit’s indwelling.  I surrender to this truth and can now finally do what the scripture says in I Cor. 10:31–“do all for the honor and glory of God.”  I can now end the scripture where God has always wanted it to end–with Him (not me).

The journey continues with a new year beginning.  I look outside and see almost a foot of snow and the temperature in the single digits.  I think the journey will continue with me staying far more inside than out for a few days!

I’ve always liked New Year’s resolutions.  However, it wasn’t until Celebrate Recovery came into my life that I had a concrete way of using them.  Resolutions were more like hopes without any substance.  Celebrate Recovery (CR) has given me the means to sort through “the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference”. (Serenity Prayer except).  It has also given me the means to change what I can by learning to surrender rather than “get tough”.  My way of tackling things needing changed was to discipline myself.  The things I’d be attempting to address were impossible to do on my own, like stopping the voices of who I am, self gratifying when I felt defeated or felt I needed to escape, etc.  I never rose above any of these items until I had a team supporting me after I surrendered to what I learned from CR.

I know I’ve outlined this many times but it is very important for today.  What I am writing about are the steps to accountability.  Resolutions need accountability for they are the concrete substance making resolutions possible.  The first step in setting resolutions is the understanding I cannot do this on my own.  This is where we surrender the need to God (step 1).  Secondly, we choose who God is placing on our heart to hold us accountable with the resolution.  Thirdly, we commit to a means of communicating with God and our accountability person/s about how we are doing.  We give permission for our accountability partner/s to question us and pry into what they can see that we may be blinded to.

It was my first accountability person who told me after my first year of CR that I would likely never be able to quit the use of porn if I didn’t go back to counseling and address the intense hurt I was still denying as part of me.  They were SO RIGHT.  I was not able to see this need because I had so many walls built within me barricading this hurt.  This is the permission we want to give our accountability partner/s so they can be a voice of God when we aren’t hearing well.

I sent my accountability partner my resolution for this year yesterday morning so I could start the accountability right off the bat today.  We text twice a day about how we are doing with our goal/s (noon and 9 pm).  Join me if God is prompting you to do the same.  Let these steps guide you into a freedom we would never know possible without taking them.

This morning I continued my reflection walk.  I got out the journals which compile my morning journaling for the past 2 years.  I was looking to see where I was 2 years ago today in my spiritual development and again a year ago.  I was rather amazed with what I found.  Once again it is a reminder to the truth of the fact that our current walk is not the walk of our life.  When God is working and we are listening, changes are continuously taking place.  We often miss the lessons learned if we don’t take the reflection moment.

Two years ago I was just ready to start my book (and God reminds me–our book).  I was journaling about the anxiety and fear I was feeling about this.  I also wrote that thinking of the book was starting the voices of my past to scream at me again.  These truths of only 2 years ago have been hugely addressed in my walk with God over the 2 years.  It was literally this fall when God brought me face to face with my fears and my need to address them so they no longer own me.  In doing this, the voices stopped.  I wouldn’t have known these two were so closely connected until now.

A year ago I was journaling about my need to address what I do–my actions.  In doing this God began to show me He was more interested in working with me on who I am rather than what I do.  He said I would adjust what I do and why I do it when I recognize who I am.  This topic has been the very current work God is doing with me.

I can’t begin to tell you how wonderful it is to recognize that the time we spend with God is not futile.  In fact, it is my most important time of every day.  This morning’s reflection walk has solidified this for me all over again.  The evidence of God’s faithfulness to us, His love for us and His patience with us as we work through our struggles is nothing less than amazing!

It was about a year ago when I started listening to the CD’s about living in the New Creation God has made in each of us.  My 2017 goal is to live each day in this new creation.  My one personal step is to reach out to my accountability partner when I am tempted to live a moment in the old self.  In fact, each of us could have quite a conversation about what this looks like for ourselves.  I do challenge us to reach out to the one God will place on your heart to find support with this important step.  If you are interested in doing this, ask God to show you who your right person is.  He is faithful and will do this.  The new creation He wants us to know is already here waiting to be recognized.  To God be the Glory!

This morning I am having a moment of reflection.  As I do I question the title of this blog–The Journey Continues.  It seems that continue means moving forward.  However, as soon as I write the phrase:  moving forward, I realize that the definition I have in my head is very restricted.  To continue anything simply means to be in it.  So, with that said, I can continue.  I write this because when I reflect I stop all forward motion in order to see where the past motion has brought me.  I set goals from this practice.  Even though I’m very much like most others who set goals and then wonder why I do it, in the long run when I do set goals I still work on them even though they lag at times.

This morning I finished Romans.  This book, for the first time, motivated me to take further steps in my spiritual walk than I ever have before.  Always, prior to this reading of Romans, I’ve found condemnation from it.  Somehow the Light of Jesus broke through this time.  As I write this I realize that I’ve stopped condemning myself so much.  The belief that Earnie has been a failure all along and I’ve needed to shroud it with “good works” is going away.  My whole being wants to sob in gratitude for this release!  The weight of self-condemnation is huge.  I’ve carried it so long I didn’t realize how much it weighed me down until now.

Romans 15 talks about pleasing God rather than man.  Even though I’ve always wanted to please man, I’ve been driven to please God by doing, doing, DOING.  I know I’m a doer by nature, but the stress of doing to overcome “failure” is daunting.  For the first time in my life I can truly see this.  The truth is:  I have never been a failure to God.  What I had learned to believe from my dad had automatically transferred into what I believed about God.  Now I know that neither is true.  My dad never saw me as a failure I finally learned and God hasn’t either.  I was the one who saw myself that way.

Today I am ready to continue this journey as a new creation.  Join me if you’ve struggled with this too.  In so doing, tell someone you are doing this and set some God supported goals that you and your friend (accountability) can use to anchor yourself in this.  I am going to be doing this with my accountability.  Yippee–we are free!  (It sounds goofy to be 66 years old and feeling this way!)

God is not letting up on the application of Romans for me.  Today has already been a most informative time.  It all began as I read Romans 12:3.  Within the verse Paul is writing “to rate your ability with sober judgment….”.  The Holy Spirit was really nudging me to take this portion of scripture and let God speak to me about it this morning.  As I did I began to awaken to much truth.  I go back to the circumcision God did several days ago cutting away the blinders I have had about me.  Now He is telling me to rate my ability with sober judgment.

As I pondered all of this I knew immediately I had never been able to rate myself soberly.  If I did I would come up with the short stick every time.  Somehow, the verbal beatings from my father took deep root in me.  If I were to be a success in life I would need to cover up well what I wasn’t so I could be good at what I also wasn’t.  This was going to be a lose-lose no matter how it turned out.  This has been me “in my mind”.  This morning however, as I read Romans 12:3 I was ready to do as the scripture commanded:  rate my ability with sober judgment.  If I were to rate myself as a loser then I was also rating God’s creation as a loss.  God never wastes any of His creations.  I am no exception to this.  Satan certainly wanted me to believe otherwise, but I already know He is the author of lies and deception.  I now could aptly apply God’s truth to me personally.

It was in junior high that a teacher first told me I was smart and good at things.  As I got to high school more teachers reinforced this for me.  At church I had people reinforcing this message.  However, dad was my main messenger of who I was really.  All these people complimenting me now had to be fooled into thinking they were right even though I knew they were wrong.  I’ve lived with this internal battle for 50+ years.  Today, I am free of it.  I’m sure I’ll have to go back to this platform now and again, but the lies have been removed.

This is the first time I’ve ever written something like this where I feel ok about it.  Others have told me they identify with this struggle.  If you are one of them, don’t stay in that lie.  Let God show you as He did me that He never creates a mistake–NEVER.

I keep saying that the book of Romans in the Bible has so much for me to learn, understand and live.  Today I’m reading the 11th chapter.  The 6th vs says:  “But if it is by grace, it is no longer conditioned on works or anything men have done.  Otherwise grace would no longer be grace.”  I have always found much satisfaction from works.  Notice I say “I”.  I’ve also transferred this into my walk with God.  Not so long ago I had to do good works so I’d be considered good.  I now know this is not the truth but my inner being is driven to work–do something.  God is wanting me now to know that works and grace are diametrically opposed to one another.  If I am working to find Grace, I am doing the work for my own ego.  God has never told me to do anything but accept His Grace.  Somehow I needed the work to gratify the unworthiness factor so I could be worthy of Grace.  Jesus Christ did this for me (us).

Now that I’m this far along in my journey and with my recent circumcision of heart, I can see motives for my work I’ve not yet seen.  These motives are selfish and pride fulfilling.  I enjoy doing work that is good.  The problem arises if I am doing the work still to find value rather than to fulfill a day of being God’s committed servant.  If I am committed fully to being who God wants–filled with His Grace, I will not only do what is to be done but the one doing the work is reflecting a Spirit of Grace within and for others.  These truths of late are awakening me to a reality I’ve needed to find.

As I was journaling this morning and ending with the question I always ask–Father, what do you want me to know from you today?  He told me what Christ says in Matthew 11:28-30.  “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”  He reminded me that the light describing the burden is two kinds of light.  The one is the traditional light meaning without much weight.  But He also told me that the other light is the brilliance for which I can see Him in the burden as well as others can see Him as I live the burden.

I am going to need to spend some time reflecting on this new understanding.  I want to embrace life through God’s Grace and not through my old thinking about work.  God is not done with my journey yet and I’m sure He isn’t finished with yours either.  To God be the Glory.