Transformed- Relational Health

Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.
1 Peter 4:8

This past Sunday, we learned that fear cripples relationships.

Many times, we stop short of the relationships we were destined to have because we are afraid that people will find out what we’re “really like” and reject us.

And when that fear actually comes to pass, our mindset is reinforced and the behavior continues.

I spent my entire childhood, teen years and a portion of adulthood living with the fear of exposure. I was always afraid that if my friends and loved ones knew what I was really thinking, how I really felt about situations and ideas, and what I was really like, the relationships would end.

Several decades ago, my love for the Lord had grown cold and I made choices apart from the faith in which I had been raised. I lived in rebellion and disobedience.  During that five year stretch, I had a group of friends whom I loved dearly. They loved me as well.

However, I always kept certain aspects of my heart secret from them. In spite of my rebellion, there were concepts and ideals held over from my Christian upbringing that were greatly divergent from those of my friends. I didn’t want them to know what I really felt about certain topics because I was afraid I’d lose their friendship.

Then, through a series of supernatural events, God rescued me from myself. I gave my life over completely to Him. And I told my friends all about this.

The conversation did not go well, to say the least.

It exploded into every tangent you could imagine. Eventually, all those ideals and concepts I’d been keeping secret in an effort to preserve my friendships were laid bare.

My worst fear was actualized. The relationships ended in a very ugly and painful way, and the concern, “If I’m real with the people I love, I’ll eventually be exposed for who I really am. They won’t like that person. And they’ll leave,” became legitimized.

It took years of God’s perfect love, and the love of some really beautiful people who selflessly pursued relationships with me to finally eradicate my fears.  

Eventually, those people got to know the real me, including the ugliest parts of the real me. And they still loved me. Surprisingly enough, they seemed to love me even more because I showed them the ugly parts! The depth of these relationships has shown me a tangible dynamic of God’s love for me that I am reminded of time and time again through the last lines of the old Chris Tomlin song Indescribable:

You see the depths of my heart and you love me the same
You are amazing God..

Of course, I’m a work in progress, as are we all. I am learning that there may still be those that reject us because they don’t like who we are. However, there are many, many more, including our Savior, who will love us more deeply simply because of who we are. For that I am so thankful!

Let’s continue to be transformed in our relationships this week as we walk this out together.

Written by: Jaime Hlavin

Edited by: Tamara Sturdivant

Transformed- Emotional Health

Emotions are messy and complicated.

Unfortunately, for a greater portion of my life than I care to admit, my modus operandi had been to compartmentalize and stuff the messiest and most complicated emotions and move forward in a logical manner.

Mr. Spock would’ve been so proud.

Your emotions are a gift from God. As I wrote that phrase in my notes from Sunday’s message, I couldn’t help but chuckle. I haven’t always believed that.

I felt like emotions made me do things I didn’t want to. Like cry in front of people when I talked about my mom. Or yell at my kids when they disrespected me. Or give my husband the silent treatment when he made me angry. Or stay cold and distant from people because I was ashamed. My emotions were like little tyrants living in my head that forced me to do things against my will. And I had no control.

Therefore, emotions needed to be filed into the appropriate folders and stuffed away.

The results of compartmentalization and repression, in my case, were always unpleasant. Physical manifestations included migraines, neck and back spasms, TMJ and upset stomach. But the relational havoc wreaked was much worse.

In her book Unglued, Lysa TerKeurst states that emotions “are indicators, not dictators.” I pictured those little tyrants, the dictators living in my head, making me do things I didn’t want to do (and yes, I imagined my emotions as having mustaches…because dictators always seem to have mustaches, no?)

Emotions are indicators of what is deep in our hearts-indicators of something needing to be addressed. They are gifts from God. He gave us emotions to navigate us toward Him during the times we need Him most.

When I am sad, Lord, comfort me in my grief.

When I am angry, Lord, show me the source of this anger and help me address it righteously.

When I am offended, Lord, teach me to forgive.

When I am anxious, Lord, grant me your peace.

Our emotions – these gifts from God – when managed correctly, offer a bonus component. When we are transformed in our emotions, we are able to connect in healthy and meaningful ways with those around us. 

So as we go forward this week, open your heart and emotions up to complete transformation and be sure to thank God for these special gifts.

Written by: Jaime Hlavin

Edited by: Brigit Edwards

Untitled

As a young, college age woman with zero mother experience, I initially thought writing for this Mother’s Day might be challenging, strange, and even awkward. I sat Sunday morning, wondering how I was going to take a service that is almost always (and rightfully so) about life as a mother and throw my two cents in. I can almost hear generations of women before me whispering shouting, “YEAH WELL YOU’VE NEVER HAD A PERSON CLIMB OUT OF YOU”.  Yes, it is true, I know absolutely nothing about being a mom, besides the fact that my mom is pretty awesome.

All my tensions faded once the gracefully real Kim Waldie began her message.

No, I do not know about being a mother. But I DO know about being a woman. I know about being a person. I know about having my identity compromised and about realizing where it belongs. And thanks to Kim, I recently had the revelation that I DID learn much of this from my mom.

It always threw me a bit as a kid whenever someone would commend my mother’s character based on my brother and I’s actions. (It also made me weirdly self-aware for about 30 seconds, but I usually got over that and resumed my perpetual wild child status). I remember thinking how weird it was that people saw her as somebody’s mom, because I saw her do much more than mother. I have seen my mom be a hospital worker, a homemaker, a wife, a friend, a student, a GRAD student, a volunteer, and soon I will see her be a social worker. I have a hard time believing that this is not the case for many of us. We never see our parents as just parents, because we are constantly seeing everything else they do.

The fact remains that whether my mom was being a mom, or anything else, she has always been her. She’s got the same sense of humor, the same values, and the same attitude. Through so many different experiences and areas of her life, she has brought these things with her (though there are plenty of other lessons she has learned and shared, but I’m writing a blog post, not a novel). She is herself to the very core, because at the very core, she seeks God first.

Revelations 1:8 is an extremely clear statement as to how important and necessary it is to find our core identity in Christ. "I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty." When we find our identity and our heart in line with the God who was, and is, and is to come, we begin to live our lives with a consistent, God-centered view on all that was, and is, and is to come to us. We nurture the desire that has been placed in everyone to seek eternity.

So this week, whether you are a mother or not, I challenge you with this:

Celebrate your mothers, one another, and yourself. Celebrate not only for what you are--such as a mother, doctor, businessperson, father-- but for who you are; a child of God.

Written by: Brianna Vanderveen

Edited by: Tamara Sturdivant 

Transformed- Mental Health

Back in our college days, my future wife (then just a friend) once shared a prayer need for handling another friend who was making romantic overtures lately. We all have our own ways of reasserting our sinful nature, if and when we backslide. This man’s particular drug of choice was women. As a musician he was fairly adept with them, and my wife did, after all, care about him and his spiritual state. So at first, she feared resisting him would be a challenge. But soon it wasn’t, and he got the message -- because her mindset had changed.

 More on that in a moment. Pastor Aaron shared during the “Transformed” message on mental health this week that temptation or struggling with sin starts as a desire, then if not resisted leads to a doubt, followed by deception, followed by disobedience and defeat. Points for the alliteration, but to put it another way, it’s dangerous for us when a desire becomes a meditation. We can be so convinced that a situation is perilous for us, and we are weak when confronting it, that we are preoccupied with succumbing. Or at least with letting someone else down gently or in finding an escape from the struggle.

The escape, besides (of course) trusting in a God who enables us against any temptation, is often to end the meditation. Give yourself no place to think about how tempted you are. Your un-renewed mind, after all, is another part of your flesh and can war against your spirit as much as any other part of you. We all, as pastor’s message stated, have an inner being that delights in serving God and another nature that still makes war against Him (Romans 7:22-23). And it’s easy to forget sometimes which side our mind is taking in the fight.

In clinical psychology the term is anosognosia – or, having a condition where one of the symptoms is being unable to recognize that you have a condition. Have you ever heard the adage that, if you’re asking yourself “Am I crazy?” the answer must be no, because a crazy person never asks that question? Similar concept here. You can be very self-aware about your sin and temptation, but at the same time during the meditation you become unaware of your deliverer. I particularly liked hearing the phrase on Sunday that your feelings don’t shape your life -- your beliefs do.  Manage your mind. Believe in your source of help. You serve a master who has defeated every enemy, including your own unquiet mind. Proverbs 23:7 says, “As a man thinketh, so is he,” and this is encouraging when you consider how much control you have been given over your thoughts. Make yourself stop thinking you are being tempted and, pretty soon, you might not actually be tempted anymore. It’s been known to happen.

I remember praying with that godly young woman, long ago, to be sober and equipped for victory in that difficulty with her friend.  But even then I could tell she didn’t really need it.  Once her mind was right for the situation, the rest was execution. Part of me suspects the Lord brought that situation to me not to become a prayer warrior, but to teach me something that she knew and I needed to know. My wife is mentally one of the healthiest people I know, but we are each as healthy as the thoughts we choose. It is not the season of temptation, or the flesh, or the devil, but I, who decides which thoughts linger in my head. And you can have that control too.

Written by: Chad Halcom

Edited by: Tamara Sturdivant