Beauty For Ashes

13 Aug 2010 2 Comments

by aimieboo in Uncategorized

Isaiah 61:3

³ and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness
instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
a planting of the LORD
for the display of his splendor.

Where to begin??????

Over the past several months, God has been doing a tremendous work in my heart. It began last summer and really kicked into high gear in April, at the So Long Insecurity simulcast in Atlanta, that I blogged about previously. I told you that I had felt that God was “commissioning” me into ministry at that point, but I really had no clue as to where that was headed or even what direction to take with it!

Then, in May, things started going a bit haywire in my family life…NOT in my home family life, but with my parents health (who live in Charleston, SC). My dad had back surgery on May 14th and just never quite recovered the way he should have. He came home for several weeks, but things just weren’t “right”. Then my mom had a scary episode with her heart that resulted in her own hospital stay in the midst of dad trying to recover. Thankfully, hers was quickly discovered  to be something non-life threatening and that she had apparently had her entire life.

THEN Dad went back into the hospital on June 10th. It was scary. No, it was terrifying. The first few days were bad, but the months that have followed proved to be just as confusing and scary, but to the glory of God alone he is finally on the upswing and could even possibly come home next week! If you have been around for all the messy details, you would know just how little control any of us have had on this situation. And by control, I even mean in the way of being informed as to what was truly going on with him. The doctors were stumped. My family was stumped. My dad was NOT himself and at times it truly seemed like he might never be again. Life was hard. The family dynamic was tough. Relationships strained. Life was hard. It was impossible to concentrate on much else, which is a MAJOR occupational hazard for me since I had 4 little people at home demanding and desperately needing my full attention, or at least a functional part of it.

Through all of this, God was working on my heart. I kept reading devotionals about forgiveness and wondering what on earth He wanted me to do. I needed healing, for sure, but from what? And FOR what?

You see, I have always believed that saying that “If God brings you to it, He’ll get you through it.” And even more so, that He’ll have purpose for you in it after you are healed from it. In short, He’ll work through you to use it for HIS good, for the BETTER good, and for HIS Kingdom work. You see it all the time in big Christian speakers. Beth Moore had a past of insecurity and lack of confidence as a women, now she teaches women to overcome that through Christ. Our female ministers were told as children that women were not meant to be in ministry, even though God had told them very clearly that they were. David Ring was told he would never have a family or a career, much less, a ministry, because of his disability…and now he is THRIVING in all 3…and USING his disability as his platform! Amazing. Beautiful. Fulfilling. Contentment. Purpose.

Back to me….well, at the end of July I was preparing to go on a weekend retreat to my FAVORITE retreat spot with a new group of women that i will be serving with this year through Community Bible Study. Throughout the week before the retreat, I felt like God kept saying to me, “This weekend will be about us, you and Me. We’re gonna spend a lot of together, just the 2 of us. And we’re gonna get some healing.” I kept saying to myself that I had made that up and that the purpose of this weekend was NOT for me to concentrate on ME but to build relationships with my new sisters in Christ and to work on training to serve and lead alongside of them. I know that I have the tendency to pull away from social situations and be by myself and I was determined that I would be brave this time and make new friends and find my strength in this new group.

Well, God had His own plans, obviously and HE was even more determined to accomplish the work He had in mind. Over the weekend, we had the glorious mandate to spend 2 hours each morning in complete silence, alone with God. This was AWESOME! And I thought, “hey, this is God’s chance to speak to me one-on-one and then I can go on with being social and making new friends.” Well, that definitely happened, some. I was put into an amazing small group that I will spend the next year with, in prayer, in fellowship, in leadership responsibilities,and in growing in friendships, but other than our when we were together with that group, I really had a hard time connecting. This was really foreign for me because in the recent past, I have the sweet blessing of easily finding similar hearts to share with in conversation and am normally VERY comfortable in groups of Christian women.

But i wasn’t. Not this time. And even found myself questioning God’s call on my life to this position. But I KNEW that He had, in my heart and even in my mind, I knew that He had ordained this for me, but yet again I chose to allow the seed of doubt into my mind because of what my heart was FEELING.

This retreat was based on the most amazing book called Hinds Feet On High Places (which you HAVE to read!) and one of the things we had to do in preparation for the retreat was to come up with a name for ourselves that represented our biggest internal struggle. For example, the main character in the book was named “Much-Afraid” and her cousins were named “Craven Fear” and “Bitterness” , etc…

Throughout this summer, God had put the verse from Proverbs 4:23 in front of me over and over again. It reads:

“Above all else, guard your heart,

for it is a wellspring of life.”

So I decided my name would be “Guarded Heart” because of my tendency to not really allow anyone into my innermost being and to guard myself from building deep, meaningful relationships, or at least to not allow FULL access to my heart to anyone, even my closest friends and loved ones. I honestly did not know how that even works, but I felt like it was one of the things that I deeply lack. Throughout the weekend, God spoke to me about this and more specifically, about my relationships within my family, and even MORE specifically, my relationships with my children.

Confession time: I have always had a VERY short temper with them. God help me. I have screamed, I have been sarcastic, I have berated, I have lacked compassion and empathy, you name it, I couldn’t understand it. I HATED it. I HATED myself when I lost it. I HATED yelling, I HATED the looks on their faces when I said ugly things and was short and impatient with them. I HATED the feelings I had afterward and the thought of them growing up unable to have the mother that God intends for children to have. To not have the safe place to fall, the unconditional love that we are to display as God’s children…You name it, it gave me guilt. And rightfully so. I tried over and over again to figure out solutions, to will myself to be patient. I read parenting books, I prayed continuously and at times it seemed “to work”. I hate using that term b/c it sounds like we are reducing God to a method and that is just not in any way, what He is or provides. God is love. God is healing. God is provision for the lack, whatever it may be. But God is NOT simply a “method” for us to master. He is the Master and we are His “method” for ministry in this world. We are His children and all of the qualities that He has in Himself are available to us through His Holy Spirit living in each of us, even if we have never been “taught” these characteristics here on earth.

So, in a nutshell, that’s what He taught me. Through the most amazing exercise of the weekend, our groups went on “journeys” around the retreat grounds and at the end, we burned those old nametags and those old names. Our group leaders had been faithfully and whole-heartedly praying for God to provide new names for us and scripture to back them up and speak truth into our lives through them. I burned that name tag and stepped up to get my “new name”. I was anointed “Set Free” by my amazing leader and the verse that GOd supplied me with through her is Psalm 119:30-32:

³⁰ I have chosen the way of truth;
I have set my heart on your laws.

³¹ I hold fast to your statutes, O LORD;
do not let me be put to shame.

³² I run in the path of your commands,
for you have set my heart free.

Set my heart FREE! My “guarded heart” has been set FREE! PRAISE BE TO GOD ALONE! And you know what, it WAS! I left that mountain with a new heart, a “new creation” in Christ. a new mother to my children, a new wife, a new daughter, a new friend….SET FREE.

I could go on for hours on that, but time and my day won’t allow it, so here’s the latest news!

This past Monday, during the kids naptime and my study time, God all of a sudden, in a rush, filled my mind with thoughts and ideas for a retreat for our church. I won’t go into detail just yet, because it is VERY much still in the works, but He literally just began overflowing my heart and mind with these ideas. I just happen to have a friend in ministry that is on the committee that facilitates this retreat and started texting away with her about what she thought! I think we must have sent over a hundred texts in the course of an hour and we were both excited. The next morning I e-mailed our minister in charge of another retreat and set up a meeting to talk about my ideas.

The NEXT day, during my study time, I read in our book about how God gives us our life and ministry passions out of our deepest pains…and the ultimate healing through those sweet victories in our lives! All of a sudden, it hit me like a ton of heavenly bricks (which, of course, are gold, so that’s some pretty HEAVY stuff that my ministry was going to come out of my pain. My ministry, that God had commissioned me for way back in April and had ordained for me since the beginning of time, is about being the mothers to our daughters that He means for us to be. It’s about parenting our daughters in a way that directs them towards Christ and shows them that First they are priority to Him and second, that our daughters are high on the list of our own priorities. Their bodies, minds,and spirits are a precious gift and that we are to take responsibility for them as their mothers, something that I could have never done without having surrendered my will to Him and accepted His spirit and provision as my own to parent my girls and boys from His loving, kind, compassionate Spirit.

Amazing. Just yesterday, I was searching for a certain scripture. The one about “beauty from ashes..” and for the life of me, I could not find it in my Bible. I knew that it was highlighted and thought for sure that it was in the book of Isaiah, but couldn’t find it. Then last night, things got hairy. I was exhausted last night and just really wanted to get everyone to bed and get myself to bed as well, knowing that Josh would be gone all day and all weekend for his birthday camping trip. Anyway, I laid down at 8:15 after a quick, painless bedtime routine. Then, I heard the girls talking and Josh tell them to be quiet and go to sleep. Then I heard him walk out the door to start preparing his boat and stuff for his trip. Not 2 minutes later, I heard the bathroom door open upstairs and Maggie scream out “Boo!”

I was FURIOUS. Yet again, (as has been our struggle over the past few weeks with her) she had deliberately disobeyed us and was doing something that she knew was wrong and not acceptable behavior. Josh was outside and I knew that that was the reason she thought she would get away with it. I threw the blankets off of myself and stormed upstairs only to talk very sternly and then take away way too many privileges for that simple offense. I was so angry. Angry at her. angry at me. Angry at God for what I considered as Him failing me in my spirit. I went to bed angry, defeated, and in a spirit of despair about this new work that God had called me to.

Well, God wasn’t having it. At 4am I woke up. And. could.not.go.back.to.sleep.

I kept telling Him NO. I was tired. I needed sleep for the long weekend ahead. NO.

NO.

Nope.

NO!!!!!

At 5am I got up.

I took my time, getting my morning devotional stuff together, washing my hands, getting my favorite quilt, whatever I could do to stall.

Then I finally surrendered. Face down on the floor I said I was sorry.

I picked up my favorite devotional and read todays entry. Nothing too significant except a verse about God giving “the lonely a family” and I was thankful to Him for that.

Then I decided to pick up my other devotional, Beth Moore’s Praying God’s Word. Here is the entry for August 13:

“Your Word declares that we will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor. We will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated; we will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations. (Isaiah 61:3b-4)”

Can u guess what verse Isaiah 61:3a is?

“and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness
instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
instead of a spirit of despair. “

THERE is was!!!! I had been searching for it and there it was! He gave it right to me! So easy, so simple. I obeyed Him and surrendered my will yet again to Him and He immediately provided EXACTLY what I needed! EXACTLY when I needed it!

Beauty from Ashes.

My old name tag lays in a pile of ashes and all that is left is what God has made beautiful and will continue to make beautiful…as long as I continue to surrender my will to His “good and perfect will”.  He anointed me with His “oil of gladness instead of mourning” and just today, He gave me a “garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair”.

God is SO GOOD.

Now, how will I respond?

How will you respond to your ashes? Do you have ashes yet or are you still holding on to that old name tag?

Burn it sister! Let God set you free to find your passion and purpose!

To quote my favorite teacher, “There ain’t no high like the Most High!”

Join me, won’t you?

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