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Freedom and the Red Sea

09.20.2016 by Kim Findlay //

This month at Facets of Faith, we’re answering the question what would you give up to maintain your freedom? Tracy and Jen have already shared. Be sure to check out their posts by clicking on their names.

3As for me (Kim), when I think about this question, an epic story comes to mind. A story of slavery and the quest for freedom. A display of power and great love.

The Israelites crossing the Red Sea.

I often wonder what life was like for them.

From the good life under Joseph’s provision to the growing tension between two nations to being enslaved by the Egyptians, the Israelites were beaten, controlled, put down, and placed in bondage. They grew weary and longed for freedom, yet freedom seemed so far away.

Have you ever felt that way? Caught by something where the weight wears you down, trips you up, and enslaves you?

Maybe it’s an addiction, or a broken relationship. Maybe it’s a pattern of unhealthy choices, or a marriage that’s tearing you apart. Whatever the pain may be, it has the power to control and keep us locked up in turmoil.

There’s been a lot of brokenness and sorrow in my own life. From the death of my daughter to years in a difficult marriage that ultimately ended in divorce, I often cried out to God in despair, wondered if my life would ever change.

I wanted relief. I wanted my circumstances to change. I longed for the freedom found on the pages of Scripture and felt it was beyond my grasp.

For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” 2 Corinthians 3:17, NLT

“I have come that they may have life and have it to the full.” John 10:10b

I wanted that. Freedom for a full and abundant life. But truthfully, I didn’t really know what that looked like. I lived in bondage to brokenness for so long, freedom – true freedom – seemed elusive, almost like a cruel joke.

Kind of like the Israelites.

They prayed and cried out to God, wondering if their situations would ever change. But God did hear their cries, their sorrow and lament, and He planned to do something amazing about it.

I wonder if any the Israelites knew what was coming? Did they suspect they were about to be rescued and see the glory of God? Do you think anyone laid in the bed at night as a sense of expectation filled the air? Or were their chains all they saw?

Enter Moses. Moses, saved first by his mom in a little boat, and then by Pharaoh’s daughter from the river. Moses, the one who heard God in a burning bush, called to lead His people to freedom. Moses, the one who questioned, and the one whom God answered. From let my people go to the 12 plagues until Pharaoh finally said go. And go they did, all the way to the Red Sea.

The Red Sea.

That’s the moment I wonder about. That moment when the freedom seemed but a hair-breath’s away. That moment when the hope that soared high was threatened by the stretch of water before them.

I wonder what the Israelites were willing to give up in that moment in order to maintain their freedom?

They gave up their homes, and all that was familiar. As they stood on the banks of the sea, what else were they willing to release? Fear? Disbelief? Uncertainty? Doubt?

Perhaps those are some of the same we need to give up in order to maintain our own?

God, the One who led them in a cloud during the day and fire by night, commanded Moses to spread out his arms. Did the Israelites stare in disbelief as Moses raised them up? Did doubt crowd their minds and tumble from their lips?

Is he really doing that? Will it even make a difference? 

As the sea began to move, did their hearts skip a beat? Were their doubts and questions replaced with expectancy as the waters shifted?

Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think.” Ephesians 3:20, NLT

What about that moment when the sea parted and the ground was dry? What happened then? Did the nation move quickly, a spring in their step as faith propelled them forward? Or did they move with hesitancy, trapped by the doubt regardless of what happened before their very eyes?

For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.” Isaiah 55:9, NLT

Scripture doesn’t tell us those specific but it does make know that never once during those moments at the sea, nor throughout their wanderings were the people of Israel alone. God was with them every step of the way, working out His perfect plan to draw the nation closer to Himself.

But they had a choice. They had to choose let go of what they knew in order to experience what they didn’t.

As God mends my heart, He is showing me that I have a choice as well. Yes, Jesus came to offer us freedom from sin, freedom from death and destruction, freedom to live an abundant life in Him, but unless I move, I’ll remain in chains.

Like the Israelites, I can choose to stay on one side of the sea, sure of what I think I see, or I can step out in faith, release my thoughts and expectations, and follow the One who sees it all.

I’m learning to let go of the very things that have hurt me most – the sorrow of death and the pain of failure. I’m learning that my freedom – peace and joy and abundant life – are worth the risk of choosing to heal, choosing to trust.

I’m letting go of my fear and my doubt, believing God is as faithful and true now as He was when He parted the Red Sea.

I’m learning there is freedom when I release the pain of my past to the One who holds my future as I fix my eyes on the living Author and Perfector of my faith.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith.” Hebrews 12:1-2a, NLT

What hurt are you willing to give up in order to maintain your freedom?

Join the conversation here or on our Facebook page.

Kim Signature

Categories // Freedom Tags // child loss, divorce, Freedom, healing, hope, truth

How Has God Changed Your Perspective About An Issue?

07.05.2016 by Tracy Stella //

As glorious as the sun is, its rays burn if we don’t find shade’s safe solace. We need protection from what could cause harm. As long as we take precaution, the sun is beautiful, inviting even. When we choose to go unprotected into summer’s sun without calculating the cost, the rays scorch as they move from warm to sizzle.

Something beautiful in design turns out to be quite painful to the touch. Our skin in need of healing, because we exposed ourselves to too much of summer’s tantalizing allure. We didn’t count the cost, and the decision to play in the sun made us uncomfortable in our own skin.

I (Tracy) have gotten too much exposure to sun. I’ve also gotten too much exposure to sin. Sinful decisions have scorched my skin making it painful to touch. Only when God’s soothing balm of love and forgiveness covered my former shame-scorched surfaces, did I see my need for God or His healing hand. Once I felt His soothing touch, my pain began to subside. As pain receded like an ocean tide, I began to walk in my purpose.

I didn’t always seek the safety of God’s shade. Now, I know the shadow of His wing is the safest place to hide as He covers me in His love, forgiveness, protection, and healing while leading and guiding my life.

In some ways I think, “Oh what I wouldn’t give to go back and do things differently.” How would my life have looked if I had known Jesus and my need for Him all along? What if I always had known how much He loved me?

But then I wouldn’t be me. I wouldn’t have learned the hard lessons I must have needed to know. Maybe my sin was the only way I could see how good and merciful God is to us—to me. I don’t know. I do know He’s helped me climb many mountains.

Perspective_Issue TracyHealing can feel arduous, but the outcome is worth all the effort we must put in to fight for it. I’m sitting on the other side of some mountain climbs thanking God and thinking, “I am so grateful You had me start in the valley as You helped me to rise higher. Higher into my healing. Ultimately, higher into my calling.”

Your righteousness is like the highest mountains, your justice like the great deep. You, LORD, preserve both people and animals. How priceless is your unfailing love, O God! People take refuge in the shadow of your wings. They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights.—Psalm 36:6-8 NIV

As I have grown to understand my need for God’s love and forgiveness, He has helped shift my perspective on many things. He has helped me (and He keeps helping me) not to become scorched by my own sin.

One place He has shown me a different perspective is in the area of intimacy.

Before I knew the truth of God’s abundant love for me, I was needy in the area of love. I’d search for it however I could get it. Sex too soon and outside of God’s design was only one way I tried to fill the void. There was also striving, performance at all costs, people pleasing, and a whole host of other ways I tried to get people to love me.

Looking for love, operating out of need, is a very dangerous endeavor. We fall victim to Satan’s lies that the allure of sin will somehow help us feel better. We are also easy targets for people who are broken and in their own sin.

God first showed me what an intimate relationship with Him looks like. He met me where I was and held me close. He rooted me in His love, taught me through His Word, and helped me see who I am and how He created me to be.

Prayer became a sweet time to pour my heart out to God as I grew to know He leans in to hear what I have to say. He also taught me how to hear His voice, my listening crucial to fulfill His divine purpose for my life.

Awareness of how deeply known and loved I am by God changed me forever.

Using God’s model of intimacy, He has shown me how to bring genuine intimacy into my marriage. The more I learn and understand of God’s design for intimacy in general, including sexual intimacy, the more I see how duped I was over my lifetime—especially in this area.

God has shown me, and continues to show me, what it looks like to let someone in—really in—to a place and space where I am truly known. It’s vulnerable and real, and that’s what makes intimacy so valuable. I’m loved for who I am, not for what my sexuality has to offer. That’s powerful!

Sex is beautiful. It’s absolutely breathtaking when it’s in the context of a safe marital relationship.

Outside of that context I had no business engaging in those activities. It’s not because God is some sort of prude He asks us to wait. It’s because God desires to protect us. He wants husband and wife to become one. God doesn’t want us letting just anyone into that sacred space. He knows the scars that will be prevented if we take precaution and calculate the cost of giving the most precious parts of ourselves to the wrong person, or even too early to the right person.

I think about all the risk I exposed myself to. I think about the fear and anxiety I had to endure, because I ventured into “off limits” territory. I think about the cost of my sin. It had great expense for me, and for others.

One very costly area I encountered as a result of my sin also became one of the biggest perspective shifts God brought.

I paid the high price of getting pregnant outside of marriage—twice. I remember being very embarrassed that I got pregnant a second time. My pride could not handle having another child without being married.

While I didn’t necessarily believe in abortion, I believed in a woman’s choice. My pride screamed it was my decision. While I chose to keep my first child, I did not choose to keep my second. My sin was multiplied, because I fell to my own fleshly desires and I believed the lies of the enemy. It wasn’t just pride. I was also afraid. I already felt “not good enough” as a mom. There was a laundry list of reasons why I thought this decision was good.

That was only on the surface. I believe deep down I knew it wasn’t right. I even tried to “punish” myself afterward by not taking any of the medications to stop the bleeding or alleviate the pain.

Decades later God showed me a different perspective about abortion. It’s not a choice. It is sin.

I was reading the Ten Commandments. As I read the “thou shalt not’s”, I remember saying in jest, “Well, at least I didn’t commit murder.”

God asked a question in one of His most effective ways, since of course He already knew the answer. “Really?”

He asked the question, and then He waited.

I was very confused at first. God brought clarity. As I dialogued with Him quietly in my head, it was then He told me my choice to have an abortion was murder.

God was gentle and merciful with me, but I will never forget that day. He comforted me, sitting down in the dust of my sin as He soothed my pain from that choice.

When the reality of my decision sunk in, I sobbed. In God’s perfect timing He revealed the truth to me in love, and it was like a flood of remorse broke free. I went from joking around with God to a place of absolute repentance. God communicated in a way that convicted me without making me feel condemned; the beautiful balance only He can pull off. He needed me to walk in truth, because that’s where freedom waits.

God couldn’t heal what was left in hiding. Oh, and did I need healing! I just had never realized it.

It’s another of those big perspective shifts God brought. I needed healing from my decision to have an abortion. In God’s mercy, He brought it. I had been hiding for years from my decision, but that didn’t mean its effects hadn’t hindered me most of my adult life. It had.

Healing was hard, but the soothing aloe of Abba Father helped me through it. He allowed me to see how that decision shaped so many others. How I had bought into lie upon lie about myself. I had been buried in shame. That’s why I kept the decision so well hidden. I remember feeling unworthy of God’s goodness or His forgiveness, but I also grew to know how imperative they both were (and are) to walk in freedom from the sin that once hindered.

God in His infinite mercy gave me my child’s name, Asher. God told me Asher is happy with Him, seated at Christ’s banquet table. What more can a mama want than to know her child is safely seated with God, happy? I don’t know how all that happens, but my faith says it can. It’s one of the hopes I cling to: I will one day meet Asher and get to spend all of eternity with him. I have no right to that privilege, but that is what makes God’s mercy so powerful. We don’t deserve it, but He blesses us with mercy in spite of who we once were.

There’s a lot God can do with a repentant heart.

My decision is now part of my calling. God has placed women in my path faced with making a similar choice. I can’t make her decision for her, but I can share how that decision shaped my life. I can share how much it hurt me, and others. I can share what God shared with me in a way others wouldn’t be able to. God doesn’t let me stray too far from the emotion when I share my story. I don’t walk around “feeling it” all the time, but when I’m engaged in an important, life-saving conversation, God keeps me connected to it all. It’s important for authenticity. I have to go back and visit those feelings. It’s important, because a child’s life might be saved. That possibility is worth remaining connected to things that are hard.

The outcome is solely up to God; He only asks me to be obedient when opportunities to talk present themselves.

Besides my gratitude to God, there’s a powerful reason I want to keep myself emotionally open to engage with others about my biggest mistake. It motivates me to know my son Asher’s life mattered and still does. God brings me conversations with expectant mothers. Any child’s life saved because of a sharing of my story is part of Asher’s legacy. It’s his story too. It’s Asher’s legacy of love as I silently say, “This is for you sweet son.”

It’s also God’s way of bringing beauty from ashes. God redeems what we feel is far beyond His reach and He shows us how He works all things together for our good, even the choices we wish we would have never made. Nothing is beyond His reach. Nothing.

For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lords holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.—Ephesians 3:14-21 NIV

Has God ever radically transformed your opinion about an issue? What or who did He use to shape your perspective? Join the conversation here or on our Facebook page.

Signature Block - TracyNeed help with post-abortion healing?

If you think you need help healing from a decision to abort your child, consider participation in Surrendering the Secret Bible study.  God used the teaching to heal my heart, and I highly recommend it.

Also know that you are forgiven. Scripture even goes as far as to say that if we claim to be without sin, the truth isn’t in us. He forgives us when we turn from sin to follow Him. (See 1 John 1:8-9) The truth is what sets us free. (See John 8:32)

If I could reach through this screen, I’d surely be giving you a hug right now. I’d tell you it will be okay. Trust God. Lean into Him and let Him heal your heart. Let Him love every part of you back to life. Healing, wholeness, and freedom from shame are all possible. I pray you feel God’s hand leading and guiding you every step of the way. In Jesus’ name, amen!

Categories // Life, Perspective, Tracy Stella's Perspective Tags // abortion, Asher, Calling, Ephesians 3:14-21, forgiveness, Freedom, healing, Intimacy, Legacy, Love, Mercy, murder, Perspective, Purity, Repentance, sin, Surrendering the Secret, truth

A Perspective Shift on Death, Life, and a Little Girl

06.21.2016 by Kim Findlay //

Here we are at week three and it’s my turn (Kim) to answer the question: how has God changed your perspective about someone else? If you missed Tracy and Jen’s answers, be sure to click on their name and check them out.

Perspective_Someone Kim

I dreamed about her last night. I don’t often dream of her. I can count on one hand the number of times she’s entered my dreams since she’s been gone.

Yet there she was . . .

Living.

Dancing.

Breathing.

My heart grasped to understand. I felt the warmth of her little body next to me yet somewhere in the deep recesses of my brain, reality slowly dissolved my dream. I had buried that precious body more than eleven years ago.

When Emma died.

Some people say time heals all wounds but honestly? If I left the healing of my tender heart to the impersonal care of time, my wounds would still be gaping wide in the open air, festering and gross. Others say the time we have here on earth is all we’ve got. When we breath our last, we simply disappear and cease to exist.

So does Emma no longer exist? Has any other child, or parent, or spouse, or loved one who died simply . . . disappeared?

Or is there something more? Something that comes after death? If you had asked me that question twelve years ago, I would’ve shared how death scared me. How the darkness of the unknown reality after a final breath terrified me to the core of my soul. And if someone had even hinted that one of my children might die, I might’ve laughed, and then cried, and then lived in fear every minute of the day.

Emma was our gift, as every child is to a family. But her? She was the one who belonged to each of us, a completion to our blended family. She drew us in, bound us together, and spread love everywhere she went.
Especially to me.

I’m her mom, after all. Her momma bear. The one who watches over her, protects her, and cares for her. I carried her in my womb for nine months as those innate, primal instincts grew alongside her, just as they had with her older sister.

Isn’t it natural, then, to think our children belong to us; that she belonged to me?

So when death ripped my sweet Emma way at the tender age of five, it felt anything but natural. Fire destroyed our home and I stared death down . . . and lost. I lost her. I lost my identity as her mom. And I almost lost my way.

The weeks that followed the fire were a blur of hospitals & doctors, police & fire investigators, sorrow & failure. My heart vacillated between the destruction my family endured, the longing to hold my precious girl once more, and listening to a quiet, gentle voice that began whispering to my tattered heart.

I failed her.
There is no condemnation with me (Romans 8:1)

I don’t know what to do now.
I know the plans I have for you (Jeremiah 29:11)

I’ll never see her again.
In my house are many rooms (John 14:1-4)

Her life was cut way too short.
 I set her number of days, and yours (Psalm 139:16)

I can’t live without her.
You can do everything with me (Philippians 4:13)

But I was supposed to die first.
My ways are higher (Isaiah 55:9)

That’s the thing about sorrow, it distorts everything around us. Our circumstances. Our perspectives. Our truth.

Even about my sweet girl.

A battle raged deep in my soul between the seen devastation and His unseen kingdom. Stories about the great cloud of witnesses, Scripture verses, and those whispers drew together to become a tender battle cry, spurring me on as the drama of death and loss unfolded.

When all I could see was the empty chair at the table, He reminded me of His presence (Psalm 91:14-16) . When my eyes stayed stuck on what I lacked, He reminded me of His provision (Matthew 6:33). When shame and sorrow wrapped around my soul threatening to squeeze out the last ounce of breath, He reminded me that He is my sustainer and giver of life (Ezekiel 37:5-6).

I begged God to show me what was true in spite of what I saw. To help me to fix my eyes on Him as the Author and Perfect of my faith. He heard my cry and slowly, ever so slowly, He shifted my perspective and answered my prayer.

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.” Hebrews 12:2a

I knew this to be true: Emma died. Her body no longer moves and breathes and grows. This side of heaven, I will never again hold her in a sweet embrace. I won’t get to watch her learn how to drive, graduate from high school, fall in love, or embrace her life’s passions.

As I pressed into my sorrow and pain, as God blessed me with the strength to keep my eyes fixed on Him, a larger truth took shape.

Heaven is real (1 Peter 3:22).

Jesus is preparing a place for each one of those who love and follow Him there (Ephesians 1:19-20).

Heaven is our home. (Revelation 21:1-4)

She is still my sweet girl and I am still her mom.

No, I will never again see Emma this side of heaven. But that’s the key, isn’t it? This side of heaven. That means there’s another side, a side where Emma lives and breaths and moves, more alive than any moment she had here on earth. A place where a precious piece of my heart now resides. And one day, one glorious day I will join her. One day my Savior will call me home and I’ll walk through heaven with my sweet girl’s hand placed firmly in mine. And this time, mother and daughter will never again be apart.

He reached down from heaven and rescued me; he drew me out of deep waters.” Psalm 18:16, NLT

How is God shifting your perceptive about someone in your life?

Kim Signature

Categories // Life, Perspective Tags // child loss, Death, hope, loss, Scripture, truth

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