musings from my heart

Learning to Live

"For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, power and a sound mind."

What do you choose?

posted by bec @ 5:56 pm 0 comments

Courage Under Fire

The other day someone responded to the knowledge that I worked for The Salvation Army Family Services with, “I’m sorry.” At the time, I assured them that there was no need to apologise and that I was very happy in my job and that God was still alive and present in the social services of The Salvation Army. Today, a young girl walked into my office, and once again reminded me just exactly why:

She is 20, just over 2 weeks out from her 21st birthday. Two nights ago, as she was up studying for mid-terms, she was alerted by a cracking and the sound of collapsing furniture.

Her investigations found her parents racing around the house - it was on fire.
She helped remove her brothers and sisters.
The fire department has told her family that they are lucky to be alive.
Tomorrow she will go back to her house, to find out if anything that she owned survived.

She came into my office as, “the fire victim,” but she is more than that. Not even the oldest sibling, she has taken the responsibility of caring for her family at this time, because her parents don’t speak much English, and no one else is taking responsibility. She is the one thinking about how she has to appropriately accommodate her family, how she doesn’t want to stress her parents by separating them, and how she would love to be able to bring a smile to the faces of her brothers and sisters.

She could have justifiably in a bed, hiding under the blankets, but instead she was in my office, making wise decisions, and even making steps to care for herself and find the time out she needed. And as if the fire wasn’t enough, she is still pulling up from a car accident, which though in no way her fault, left her limited in her capacity to work, and emotionally wounded because of how the events played out.

It’s at times like these that passages like Matthew 9:36 begin to ring in your head, “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” It is a real privilege to be the living example of this to someone. It is one of the reasons I love working where I do. In actuality, it’s probably why I’m there.

But after she left my office today, I had to wonder who had helped whom more. As she sat there, with the few tears slipping down her face, talking about all that was on her mind, I had to think how little anything I was facing compared to her situation. How can I say things are too hard, when she is sitting there across from me? And so we may help her, and it will be my joy to be The Salvation Army and to do the things we should do, but I know she will help me; I will remember her courage, and be inspired.



(And in case I didn't spell it out, God is very much alive in our social service!)

posted by bec @ 4:48 pm 0 comments

The Scariest Thing

One of the scariest moments I've had in a while:

Looking at the face of someone while you were speaking and knowing that they were hanging on to every word that you said; knowing that they wanted you to be right and that they wanted you to be the person that you presenting to them; because somehow, if you were, it gave them hope.

That, for me, is a very scary thing to live up to.

posted by bec @ 9:21 am 0 comments

Miracles

Just in case you weren't sure if they still happened...

The nephew of a friend of mine was born with a condition that damaged his nerves such that when he tried to walk, both of his legs would try to jump and he would fall down. He was 5 years and in a walker and in the last year decided to start praying that God would let him walk. Recently his mom was referred to a specialist who is one of the very few people that does surgery on this kind of condition. The surgery was had and not only were the doctors amazed at this boy's beyond speedy recovery - he was beginning to walk by himself 5 days after surgery - 10 days later he is home and is actually walking.

I know it pricked my eyes when I heard it. Praise God, for the unswerving faith that he gives small children that know that their God is the one who heals, and who made the lame walk. Praise God that he IS that God, almighty, powerful, creator, healer, saviour.

Let's pray that this boy's testimony acts powerfully in his life for God's glory and his kingdom.

posted by bec @ 9:12 am 0 comments

if the effort to be yourself is so much that you want just leave it,
does that mean it was really you or that you were trying to be
something, that was never you in the first place?

or is it simply that discussions of what should take place
take the place of what does take place
and the place that you are left is where you should be
but only because what should be done never was

posted by bec @ 10:30 am 2 comments

distance, not always a temporarl consideration.
can you ever be too far away to come back?

posted by bec @ 10:07 am 0 comments

Do I believe what I say enough to actually follow it.

It's a good question for me to ask myself sometimes.

posted by bec @ 10:56 am 0 comments

My Rights

So i've been having random thoughts a lot recently. So i've been updating my blog. Probably won't happen again for ages. So sue me :P

I have a very big habit of not liking to be hurt in relationships. Of course everyone is like this to some extent, but for me this is a considerable factor for me when pursuing any kind of relationship. I have operated under the belief that there is no need for me to pursue a relationship if I believe that the outcome of it is likely to cause me more pain than I feel like dealing with. As a result, I have often limited my contanct and deep friendship with people around me.

But I'm gonna try and change all this. Because I realised that I have been operating out of a false assumption about what my rights are. I believed that it was my reasonable right to be in a relationship that didn't hurt me too much and to not have to be in relationships that did. But I've realised that I don't have that right. It was never given to me. If I look at the example of Christ I see that he loved, and continued to love even with betrayal, his friends. He was probably hurt more by those closest to him, than I ever will be. If I'm following him, I have to follow this example.

This means that I'm giving up my 'right' to be in a relationship and not expect to get hurt. I'm giving up my 'right' to pull back out of a relationship if I do get hurt. Instead I'm going to give as I can to people, of me, and do so even expecting that I will probably get hurt, but do so anyway, most particularly because Christ did and I know that I find my strength in him.

posted by bec @ 9:43 am 2 comments

Random Insight

Maybe this was completely obvious to everyone else, but not to me, however I just kind of stumbled onto this thinking the other day.

If you want to know how your relationship with God is, chances are you can look at how you are treating other people:

If you are shutting people out and caring about your own needs, chances are you are shutting God out and caring more about yourself than following him.

If you are heartless and mindless to those around you, chances are treatment of God is around the same.

If are openly loving, giving and sacrificing to those around you, chances are you'll see it in the way that you approach God as well.


Like I said, maybe it made sense to everyone else, but it just hit me. We are told that we will be known by how we show love to one another, and there is the remind, "Whatever you do to the least of these..." but somehow this really puts it into perspective for me.

posted by bec @ 1:41 pm 0 comments