Tag: family

 “I am free to run, I am free to dance, I am free to live for you, I am free.”

I’ve never seen my dad dance.  Never. He doesn’t dance with my mom.  We didn’t dance at my wedding. He doesn’t dance.  I don’t know if it’s a lack of rhythm, deep seeded beliefs against the art form, or just plain stubbornness.  However, dancing is often an expression of freedom yet I’ve never met anyone more free than my dad.

A few weeks ago, on a rare kid-free Saturday, Jeff and I had lunch with my parents.  A situation came up and my mom got irritated about some circumstances we were facing.  My dad says, “Why do you care? I don’t have any concern about that. I’m free from those feelings.”  

Free from those feelings?  Free. As in they no longer affect his life, because he is free. That rocked my emotions.  The decisions and actions of these people don’t affect his minute, his hour,  his day, his life because he is free.

I desire his level of freedom.  However, I often find myself in more of a “fake it until you make it” kind of freedom.  I have the behaviors of a free person, because I know what that looks like, but lurking in the shadows are the things that continually try to bind me.

I don’t have any deep dark hidden addictions to confess.  There’s no major issues. But as it says in Song of Solomon, it’s the little foxes that spoil the vine.  No, in the shadows of my so called freedom lurks fear, anxiety, worry, bitterness, and sometimes malice. They sit waiting for me to fully walk away from the cave where they sit, just to pull back on the chain they have around my ankle.    The enemy that holds the chain is quick to remind me of the events or people or circumstances that those issues are rooted in.

“You can’t fully let go of that hurt, don’t you remember what they did?”

“You can’t really forgive them AGAIN, don’t you see the hurt they continue to cause?”

“You’ll never outrun the shadows of this cave.  You’ll never escape the feelings of inadequacy. Nothing will fix it.”

So, I may live life outside of the proverbial cave of slavery, but often I find myself still chained.  How do I fix it? How do I find the freedom that I long for? How do you find the freedom you long for?  I have acknowledged I’m a slave, so now what?

“Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”- John 8:32

Jesus speaks these words to his disciples, after instructing them to follow his teachings.  They are quick to respond that they have never been slaves to anyone. Jesus says, everyone who has sinned is a slave.  We have all sinned. Malice, bitterness, unbelief- all sins. Then, in such a Jesus’ way, he reminds them of who they are.  Slaves have no place in the family. However, a son belongs forever. You’re not slaves to sin anymore. You’re not slaves to bitterness.  You’re not slaves to fear. You’re not slaves. You’re sons and daughters of God.

I like to take things to their logical conclusions, so follow my line of thinking…

If the truth sets me free, the truth is I’m a daughter of God

If the truth sets me free, the truth is I’m chosen and dearly loved

If the truth sets me free, the truth is no weapon formed against me shall prosper

If the truth sets me free, the truth is the actions of others don’t have say in my life

If the truth sets me free, the truth is I was made for a life of freedom not slavery.  

It’s time to take off the shackles and not put them back on, ever.  Step fully out of the cave where the enemy and his lies live and in to the sun where truth and righteousness shine.  

Once we do this, we may feel like dancing.  We may be ready to rejoice in our freedom. We may be able to live a life where we can look at any obstacle and say, I know the truth and I am free.  

 

I have a very strong sense of smell memory.  I can smell things and instantly be reminded of an emotion, an event, or a season.  If you wear Sweet Pea fragrance from Bath and Body works and I smell it, I may first cringe and then smile.  It was the scent my best friend gave me as a gift when I was expecting Kate.  I took it to the hospital and it was what I used to take my first shower after an extremely traumatic delivery.  I cringe because I remember the trauma, the pain, the uncertainty.  I smile because I left the hospital 3 days later with a perfect, beautiful baby girl.  The lady next to my room wasn’t so fortunate.

There are other scents that cause emotions and memories.  Certain food smells or building smells conjure up fond memories or not so fond memories.  I love the smell of BBQ.  Most people probably do, but not like I do.  The smell of BBQ sometimes takes me back to my senior of high school when my family started a BBQ restaurant and we frequented there.  However, more often it takes me all the way back to when my grandmother was alive and summer days were spent at my aunts house.  I would have spent the day swimming with my cousins and my Aunt Paulette would come out and tell us the glorious news that my dad and Uncle Wayne were “cooking chicken and ribs” which meant that I got to stay at Aunt Paulette’s for the remainder of the day.  My family would gather and we would eat what would eventually become known as Choctaw Willy’s barbecue.  It was heaven, not just because the food was good, but it brought security and my heart was full.

Once I got to college, I became familiar with another smell, one that was lovingly termed Backyard.  I participated in a tutoring ministry while at Lee that tutored underprivileged kids across the tracks.  It was a wonderful experience that I wouldn’t trade for anything.  One day, after unloading the kids I tutored, my roommates and friends loaded up in my car to go eat.  One of them got in and said, “Oh my gosh, it smells like Backyard.” And the phrase was coined.  (I made a stop at Walmart that night to buy Febreeze to keep in my car.  I kept a bottle of Febreeze in my car for 4 years.)

You may wonder what Backyard smells like.  Let me see if I can help you understand… take a wet dog, add dirty cat litter, fry some sort of food and let the oil sit.  Then, add a healthy dose of boy that hasn’t showered in 3 days, cigarette smoke, cheap beer, and then add a bag of Funyuns.  That’s the smell of Backyard.  Now, I’m sure anyone who ever worked at Backyard has their own specific formula to help describe the scent.  It is unmistakable.

Recently, Jeff encountered the scent in an unexpected place.  He calls me and says, “Gosh, I opened the door and it smelled like Backyard.”  Instantly, I knew to what he was referring.  It wasn’t the smell itself, it was the implication.  The implication of poverty.  Deep, dirty, poverty.  Poverty that literally will take your breath.

The definition of poverty that strikes me most is the state of being inferior in quality.  Inferior.  Less than.  Less than others.  Not having enough.  Lower in rank.  Lower in position.  Lower in quality.  When I think about these, I could sit and cry.  How does one live constantly feeling inferior to others?  Yet, those who live in poverty feel that way.

Then I think to myself, I know so many who live lives of inferiority without living in poverty.  Their houses and cars don’t smell like Backyard.  They’re not living off of the kindness of local churches or government programs, yet they act like they are.  They are living inferior lives as if God didn’t make them equal to others.  Paul tells us, there is neither Jew nor Greek, nor male nor female, slave nor free in the Kingdom of God (my translation).  If you are forgiven, walk in that freedom with confidence that God has redeemed you and called you by name.  If you feel inferior, stop believing the lie of spiritual poverty.   God hasn’t saved you for you to live a life of “less than”.  Your life doesn’t have to reek with the scents of Backyard, the sign of poverty.  It can smell as clean as fresh laundry.  God has called you to walk in his freedom and believe what he says about you.  You are chosen.  You are called.  You are loved.  You are worthy of his love.  You are enough.

As my Granny used to say, “You’re as good as the best, and better than the rest.” So act like it.

God has not given us a spirit of timidity. 2 Timothy 1:7

As a teacher, I have heard these phrases a lot.

“Oh, they come from a broken home.”

“Children from broken homes don’t perform as well on standardized tests than those from intact families.”

“Broken homes are a predictor of academic success.”

So, when I became a single parent of 2 little ones, these phrases continually bounced around in my head.   And soon the “broken home” phrase morphed into “broken kids” in my mind which in turn morphed in to the thought “I am not enough.”

My dad was raised in a single parent home.  Every socioeconomic and traditional home structure was stacked against him. I wonder if my Granny ever felt like she wasn’t enough?  No one would have ever told her that, because in her almost saint like status, she filled her role as mother completely.

However, I’m not Reba. My persistent thought was I am not enough for my kids.  As a single parent, I could physically, emotionally, spiritually, never be enough for them.  Yeah, I felt broken.

Then, I started to think… even if I were married, I’d never be enough for them.  They need other people in their life.  They need their grandparents.  They need my close friends.  They need my college mentors.  They need their children’s pastor.  They need coaches.  They need their friends’ moms and dads.  I couldn’t do this journey alone.  The reality was, it had nothing to do with my “broken home” but everything to do with I will never be enough, God didn’t expect “enough” from me, he expects what I have to give.

I determined to be the best mom to them I could be.  I went back to school and got my master’s degree.  My motivation wasn’t as much the pay raise as it was the desire to show my kids that my life goals are still in place.  I’m not broken.  I led a book club and Bible studies, again to show them that ministry didn’t stop because I’m not broken.  We took vacations and I bought a house and we lived life because we aren’t broken.

Fast forward to today… I’m remarried to the best man I could imagine.  He loves my kids like they’re his own and I love his like they’re mine.  However, people still put us in the category of a “broken home”.

Yet we are not broken, we are blended. While the world labels us broken, we see ourselves as blended. A mix of unique personalities and perspectives that creates a design that only God could orchestrate.

We co-parent at a distance.  We struggle daily with the “are we doing enough for them?” The “them” who live with us daily and the “them” who do not. We wrestle the question of how do we continue going forward in the ministry God has called us to because our family lives in 2 states and some days it feels so very broken.

We wrestle the darkness that wants to envelop them.  We wrestle the culture that wants to enslave them.  We wrestle a world that wants them broken.

We wrestle the “enough”. We wrestle the reflections in the mirror and the voices in our heads that call every decision into question. The tension of truth is always tugging at us.

Truth is we made the best decisions for our kids.  Truth is God has still called us and has a place for us to serve.  Truth is God loves our kids more than we do and is pursuing them daily.  Truth is… most parents wrestles these same thoughts.  

We are not broken because God has healed us.

Maybe you didn’t face divorce or the death of a spouse, maybe there are other life circumstances that made you feel like if people could really see in your home, they’d see it was broken.  Take heart friend, what the enemy meant to break, God will use for your good if you allow him to take what you have and make it “enough”.

“You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.” Genesis 50:20