The “Big 4-0″ is Closing on Me

This Thursday is not only Thanksgiving in my house, it is my birthday. Also, it is not just any birthday, it is my 40th birthday. It’s not the age that is bothering me. I have many friends who have gone ahead of me and they assure me that there is air up there. I don’t want to seem like a childish youth-seeker holding my breath as I am pushed out of the elevator doors onto the 40th floor. But I cannot ignore the emotional effects that this transition is having on me. I am also wrestling with the fact that I am not responding as a child of God, full of faith and hope. So, in an effort to sort through the clutter of my mind I will unpack some of it here.

Adding: I got married when I was 20 years old. My adult life began with a big add. I had added a husband and another family. I added my own home with the furniture that I had found and chosen. About 5 months after we were married we found out that we were adding a person to our home. Over the next 5 years we added two more people to total three boys that we were thoroughly enjoying  and doing our best to raise.

All through the last 20 years I have been adding. I have had losses. I have had some truly difficult losses that will always leave a hole in my heart.  But by and large it has been a time where each new phase approaching my life brought something that would add to my life in a beautiful way.

The fear of Subtracting: As I face my 40th birthday, I see a time of massive subtraction ahead. I have a sense that the scales are tipping. This is why I am afraid of this transition. My boys, whose company I love and cherish, are reaching the times when they will be rightly moving on and starting their periods of adding to their lives. But that will be a subtraction from mine, times three. I know that the people that are in my family are approaching their times of moving onto the BIG ADD, Heaven. But that will definitely be a deeply felt subtraction for me.

My daily life will be subtracted as I need to cook for less people and maybe even less often. Not a big loss as far as the chore of it all but rather the joy in knowing that I am making the men in my life happy. I love hearing the yummy noises of delight and hearing them say, “That was really good, Mama. Thank you for making dinner.” Such a sweetly generous reward for a menial task. I will feel this subtraction.

I know it seems a dismal view to take about an upcoming milestone. But I find that I cannot avoid it. I can repress it but ultimately to no real avail. I am feeling stung by the transition. I see a fog of undefined reality ahead of me. I can’t see what the adds will be whilst the outlines of the upcoming subtractions are all too clear. Truthfully, I am frightened. The tiny, inner me that whines at adversity and cowers at change is screaming, “But I don’t wanna!” I am trying to rationalize with her, but I fear she is deaf to reason. I am coming to my dear friends who are across the threshold for assurance and reason.  I am looking to my parents and in laws to see the joys of the next phase of add that waits; daughters in law, grandchildren and such, if God wills.

So, I will do my best answer the knock on Thursday  with a gracious and hopeful smile, welcoming the possibilities of the future. I will quiet the inner me with a soothing lullaby chorus of, “Breathe. You were never in control to begin with. God is bigger than the moments you fear. Go back to sleep until you arise again at 50.”

8 Ways to Overcome Fear and Find Courage

Reblogged from Leadership Freak:

Gutless leaders aren’t leaders. Separated from courage the other components of leadership like decision making, problem solving, and vision casting are meaningless drivel.

Cowardly Leaders:

1. Closes their ears to criticism.
2. Attack critics.
3. Use anger to fuel action.
4. Make excuses.
5. Refuse to change their minds.
6. Change their mind too quickly.
7. Defend poor choices.
8. Play office politics.
9. Pass the buck.
10. Lie.
11. Don’t trust others.

Read more… 313 more words

This is excellent and I had to pass it along.

Forgiving Jacob

Genesis 32:25-26 ESV

When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he touched his hip socket, and Jacob’s hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. Then he said, “Let me go, for the day has broken.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

I must admit that all of my Christian life I have judged Jacob in my heart as selfish and arrogant. That he was demanding that the emissary of God bless him before he would let go seemed unconscionable to me. I am now keenly aware that I have spent all of these years misunderstanding this story. God’s kind revelation to me is as follows.

Jacob was in a time of great uncertainty and fear. He felt that everything he held dear could be violently stripped from him within the next day’s time. Then, as if to add insult to injury, he is up all night in a wrestling match with an invincible challenger. Then in the midst of the struggle he refuse to let it be for nothing but believes that a blessing can come out of the difficulty and pain – his hip was touched & he limped as he left.

The last year of my life has been that type of emotional wrestling match for me. No matter where I turned or what I did I could not escape being in God’s grip. Nor could I force Him to change or submit. I realize now the beauty in laying hold of God in anyway at all. Also, that in the dark night of my soul, His voice is the one that called out to me that day had come. Rather than letting me languish in pain & fear alone in the night, He engaged me, changed me, made me walk differently. In all of that struggle I remember thinking that I had to hold on tight until I saw, for sure, God’s goodness toward me. I needed His blessing.

So now, dear brother Jacob, I repent for judging you. Rather I thank you for showing perseverance and desperation to lay hold of God in the truth of His nature and in that moment to receive the blessing of having seen Him. Better to limp at the hand of God than walk easily in ignorance of being in His grip.

Genesis 32:30-31 ESV

So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, saying, “For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been delivered.” The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip.

The Art of Living Like a Child

When is it that we decide that needing to learn something is a sign of weakness? As a child we unabashedly ask for explanation when we don’t understand a concept or don’t know a word. Yet somewhere around age 13 we begin to feel that knowing everything is what is expected. We stop asking questions in class for fear of being mocked. We pull back on our relationships with adults so that we don’t look like goodie goodies. Therefore, forgoing anything that they could impart to or teach us. Unfortunately, it’s hard to reinstitute the previous attitude toward life. It takes a serious and concerted effort. It takes a humility and a willingness to “look stupid” among all of our peers who still seem to know everything.

However, the benefits of humbly asking for what we don’t know are so great. We are able to gain new insights, accept before unseen truth, and turn to others with an attitude of sincere help rather than arrogant condescension. Only if I see my own deficiency more clearly will I increase in patience and love for the deficiency I see in others. How could I judge and badger others if I know their plight? That is what support groups are built around. People sharing the same struggle and gaining strength from one another as they share their failings and successes in an environment of encouragement and understanding. Maybe the key to loving each other in a way that lets the world know we belong to Jesus and follow His way is the art of living like a child.

Matthew 18:2-4 ESV

And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.