The Lord places the lonely in families- now what?

I love this verse in Psalms: :"A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows,

is God in his holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families." Psalms 68:5-6. It's such a beautiful concept. The images it brings to mind are of families happily spending time together, enjoying each others company, and participating in fun recreational activities. The idyllic family reunion at the park on a beautiful summer evening is what I see. It's kind of like imagining a wedding. The beauty, the elegance, the magic of a wedding day is impossible to match. Especially in the every day interactions, boring and monotonous I might add, interactions

of marriage. Family is a beautiful thing, just like a wedding is a magical experience! Family interactions, family health and a encouraging a family to grow together takes work, lots of work. Just like a marriage takes work.

If this is not an easy experience, why does God then find it so important to place orphans, widows and the lonely in families?  My only explanation is to help us learn how to get along with people we wouldn't otherwise choose to have a close relationship with. It is also the only social situation where you do not have a choice in who joins the group. Other people, siblings, children, etc choose their mates and bring them to the family for inclusion and acceptance. Refusing to accept the person's spouse only sours the relationship between the related family members. It's a fascinating dilemma. I may be just fine confronting a spouse of the related family member on issues that are concerning. However, I may not be willing to pay the relational price with the related family member. Its a difficult dilemma. The dance of intimacy then begins - too close with someone and you might lose your sense of identity, this is managed with distance. Too distant and a family starts to lose its cohesiveness, this is managed with increased intimacy.

There are also these weird unspoken things, like women are the gatekeepers of relationships. I didn't know that prior to getting married. If you have a step-parents, the wife may be the gatekeeper to your dad. In the in-law relationship, your mother-in-law will be the gatekeeper to the relationship with your father-in-law. With your brother, your sister-in-law will be the gatekeeper of the relationship. With your son, your daughter-in-law will be the gatekeeper of the relationship. Aunts will be the gatekeeper to relationships with Uncles. This took all of my last 5 years of married life to figure out. Very helpful to know and understand.

This doesn't even begin to cover the areas of boundaries, levels of relationship, and even maintaining civil conversations. The complexity of the family relationship is limitless. I don't pretend to have an answer to creating a close, loving family. I don't have an answer for what to do when a member engages in destructive relational interactions. I do know that it is ALWAYS the children that pay the price for positive skills and for negative skills. Maybe the Lord will continue to provide me opportunities so that when I am 80 - this wisdom will be mine. I do know that within the family is where a legacy is created and passed on to the next generations. In a family is where grace, love and faith are learned at the knees of our parents and grandparents. In a family is where relational skills, for better or for ill are learned and integrated into our lives. I also know that belonging is such a tenuous feeling in extended families, that making sure that everyone is aware they belong to the family is helpful. 

And if you ever have wisdom on growing family relationships, be sure to include me.

Challenges of Parenting

I had a conversation with someone this weekend about how to connect with and maintain a relationship with adult children. As I am no expert on this myself, I went looking for resources.


From the wisdom shared with me by parents of adult children, this list seemed most like what was shared with me.

For the complete article by Dr Joshua Coleman, click this link. Here is part of the list

• Don't criticize their choice in romantic partners. You have raised your adult child to be independent, so don't assume that you know better about who they should be with.
•  Don't criticize their parenting. Yes, you may have years of experience, but most people like to learn on their own and resent intrusions from the outside, especially from parents.
•  Don't guilt trip about their lack of involvement with you. Guilt increases distance and resentment.
•  If you're going to say no to a request for money or some other form of support, do it with affection and not as a complaint or criticism.
•  Take responsibility for mistakes you've made in the past.
•  If your adult child has cut off contact, don't respond with retaliation. 

Wisdom perhaps for more than just parent/child relationships as well. 

My #1 Principle for Reconciliation

Just a short and sweet note tonight. I had multiple thoughts battling it out in my mind this evening. This is the one I wanted to jot down. My #1 principle for reconciliation:

1. Reconciliation cannot be at the expense of other relationships in your life. If being reconciled to someone will take time, energy and affection away from other people in your support system and cause additional cut-offs in other relationships, it's just not time for reconciliation yet.

One person is unable to complete the process of reconciliation. Being able to restore a relationship really reflects on the relational health of the support system of both parties involved. I don't believe in forcing reconciliation. I also don't believe in excusing relational cut-offs, especially in family. However, when an individual is blessed with a reconciliation of a relationship, the entire family is blessed, enlarged, and grows. A forced reconciliation will just re-establish the wounds that are present and the reasons for the cut-off.

That said - as a third party to a relational cut-off you will know you are ready for reconciliation when you are able to hear both sides of a story and believe both sides to be true. Its a challenge, no doubt about it. The blessings of a restored relationship, make it worth going through all the work.

Tested

When I think of faith being tested, I rarely think of my own faith being tested. I mean, I am a Christian, I believe, that alone should be enough. As I have journeyed through my twenties I learned that claiming Christianity isn't enough. It's like a baby saying, "I'm born. Isn't that enough?" As I look back on it, I see its a great start. It's the best start. It's not like claiming Christianity isn't enough. It's the fact there is so much more that could be experienced.

Let me explain it this way:
when my husband and I married, I would have preferred that we started out debt free. We didn't.  The experience of working together to get out of debt, is what helped us learn to work as a team. This experience was not an easy, smooth or simple process. It brought us to the edge of what our marriage could take. However, we wouldn't have experienced the troubles or the triumph together, without first pledging our love to each other in marriage. Our wedding began our life together. Our wedding was a great start. Our wedding isn't what taught us how to work together. Our marriage was tested, from the beginning. Would we be able to overcome? Or would we be broken by life's experiences as a married couple?

Being a Christian is a similar experience. How will I know the depth of God's love for me, if I don't have experiences that break my heart? How will I learn to trust Him completely, if I always have other people who will bail me out of problems? I'm not saying I like heartbreak and loneliness, its just been my burden to bear. Other people have other burdens that either bring them to their knees, or break their faith completely. I have heard this verse throughout my life, but it just sank in this morning: "For the time has come for judgment, and it must begin with God's household"(1 Peter 4:17). I get it now. When God has a plan for the world, He starts with His people, and He tests them.  Having experienced life as an adult, I don't think God expects His people to necessarily "get it" the first time. Like Jonah, He will come after us until we find the right path and follow His plan to completion. God's will is perfect, but He has imperfect followers, who have a tendency to bungle things up badly. This is why I am so thankful for forgiveness. I need it so often. And a fresh start. I am willing to do His will, just often confused as to what His will means.


When HomePage started over a decade ago, the mission involved relationships. In fact our mission statement starts with "restoring relationships between God and man." An ambitious undertaking for sure. However, after several years, it didn't seem like "restoring relationships" between anybody was actually occurring. To understand what is happening often takes time. Sometimes I will think to myself "in ten years this experience might make sense." Like a great philosopher once said "You live life looking forward, you understand it looking backward." Moments like today are when I understand what happened. If as a church body you are going to try something that no one else has tried, you will be tested first. Let me repeat myself: YOU WILL BE TESTED FIRST!! If your mission is to restore relationships, guess what? Your relationships will be tested first. It's easy to think that the testing, and the failures along the way are the end of the story.
Failure is only the end of the story, if you let it be the end of the story. Failure is only a chapter in the story. Multiple failures are only different portions of the story. God, however, doesn't seem to have a problem with having a lot of Jonahs for help.  If I let God tell the story of my testing, He has His own plan. From the story of Job, a man whose testing of faith brought him  face-to-face with the decision of whether to choose life or death, understood being tested. Job faithfully stated "But he knows where I am going. And when he tests me, I will come out as pure as gold"(Job 23:10). That is our promise too. In fact over the last several years, I have watched as relationships are restored between people and with God. A church experience that might have been labeled a failure, has found its way and is blessing others. It's an amazing experience to participate in! My life is enriched and blessed by this group of people!!

God knows our desire to serve and worship Him. Since testing begins at the House of God, we know it can't be avoided. Failure oftentimes cannot be avoided either. How else would we learn? What we can understand is by maintaining our devotion to Him during the time of testing, our faith will be purified, and we will come forth like gold, pure gold.

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Comforted like Job

"In the world you will have trouble, but I'm leaving you my peace
That where I am, there you may also be" Rich Mullins.


I find the story of Job a great comfort. There was a time in my life when it seemed like all would be lost. Relationships..... gone. Financial support....... gone. Emotions reeling from all of the losses. Spiritually drained - exceeding hopelessness, and an uncertain future. My emotions in a place of constant change as well, dealing with uncertainty and fear of the future. Honestly though, I am glad that I didn't know that there would be even more painful losses in the future...however, that is for a different time, if I ever figure out how to tell that story.   

Why did I experience such loss in my younger days?

I believe that when we experience such devastating losses, there are two choices that we have to make:

1. Attempt to take control
2. Learn to become flexible

An attempt to take control over life is to give into the fear of loss and instead of embracing the new opportunities, to seek out a way to never feel such grief again. There are so many ways that losses are experienced, divorce (parents and/or personal), emotional cut-off, job loss, loss of a family member or friend, moving and so many more things,  The problem with taking control, is that in order to maintain control over relationships,  life and God, your emotional and relational world must become smaller and smaller. Why? Because relationships, life and God are unpredictable. So an attempt to control life, usually results in few people able to meet the "tests" and exceeding demands a person attempting to control can manage. Relational burnout occurs, and other people move into to replace those who can no longer emotionally support an individual in such desperate need of control. However, that control is comforting, it feels like protection and action against future losses. So I can understand why someone would choose this journey.

I like this verse in Job. I think it answers well the attempts to control God's actions in my life. "Shall the one who contends with the Almighty correct Him? He who rebukes God, let him answer it" (Job 40:2 NKJV). I am not saying that we must not question God. I am saying that when we do question God, the conversation gets real pretty fast.

The second option - learning to become flexible - is what I have sought most of my life in response to loss and grief. One of  my spiritual mentors is Paula Rinehart. Her book Strong Women, Soft Hearts, is a book that is well loved, bent, taped together, and always an inspiration no matter how many times I have read it.

Paula Rinehartsays "we meander through life, and somewhere along the way, pain enters our lives and leaves an indelible mark, as though it has actually been stamped on our passports. My point is that eventually pain does get stamped on your passport. No matter how hard you work to avoid it, pain makes its appearance; and the hardest part to accept, sometimes, is its inevitability" (Strong Women, Soft Hearts, 42-43).

Why do I choose to be flexible? Once again I am inspired by Paula Rinehart:

Exquisite pain that love is, it is forever interwoven with the risk of offering your heart to another person, who sometimes tramps all over it. Love anything....and your heart will be wrung. The more you succeed at love, the more you will have to lose. But honestly, would playing it safe and hedging your bets take you any place you really wanted to be? (Strong Women, Soft Hearts 158).

With flexibility my life, my heart, my home is enlarged. I have more blessings in my life and I have more opportunities for my future. Having made the choices I have, I cannot imagine living my life in a small spiritual box, or in a small relational box because I must have control over my life. My constant prayer is that I can accept the losses in my life, grieve the losses in my life, without taking them out on my husband, friends and family, and allow God to create beauty out of those losses.

I don't know why I must experience loss. I don't know why my family and friends must experience loss other than the fact that there is sin in the world. I do know that as I work through different losses, and give my future to God, that I am more content then I have ever been. Looking back at the story of Job, the ending is quite unexpected. Job responded to the rebuke from God by saying "I have uttered what i did not understand. Things too wonderful for which I did not understand" (Job 42:3). Out of Job's losses, losses so devastating I cannot understand, Job was  blessed, "now the Lord blessed the latter days of Job, more than his beginning"(Job 42:12).

I think that if you choose to be flexible and deal with life as it comes, with prayer and thanksgiving, you will find the blessings, because you will be looking for them.

 

A Couples' Spiritual Focus

When an organization of believers has as its key verse:

"He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children,

and the hearts of the children to their fathers."

Malachi 4:6, " you know there will be challenges. Our specific challenges involve the focus of the members - where do we as a church body encourage each member to focus their resources. Is it more important that outreach have the church body's focus? Or spiritual growth? Or evangelistic meetings?

It's something that at the HomePage the message that everyone wanted to highlight was that of grace. So began the journey into the "conspiracy of kindness" (by Steve Sjogren) and Kindness Ministries developed. Little did we know that as the journey of sharing grace with our community began, so would another journey. 

What do you do when their isn't enough support? What do you do when families within the church are stretched to their limit, by the simplest of things? Life. Life happens to all of us...illness, work (especially overtime is exhausting), family......children. What do you do when your families are unable to support ministries within the church because they are married and developing a marriage of faith? or when those same couples become parents, and all of their waking moments are spent pouring their love, life and hope into little ones? 

When my hubby and I were dating, all twelve short weeks of it, we went to a large Adventist conference together. There was a speaker there that exhorted the young adults gathered, to remain single and childless. He then made a derogatory comment about his wife of many years. My hubby (future) and I were stunned. My hubby was also infuriated - that someone would exhort him to remain single (yes, I was putting the pieces together :-) ). I was stunned that a spiritual leader would say something mean spirited about his wife in front of several hundred young adults. The thing about single adults though, is that they have more time, energy and finances to put into a church ministry. For a spiritual leader to exhort young adults to remain single, is the very thing that allows a church ministry to grow and flourish. If you want to complicate the growth of a ministry, then have the young adults pair up, marry and start a family. The progress then is very slow....unless you have a workaholic partner who is devoted to ministry. In that case, the spouse and the children suffer. 

At the HomePage, we are a very small group of believers, primarily made up of  families of young children and/or their support systems. When ministry ideas progress slowly due to marriages, babies and growing families, the response at our church....is to let them be. If someone doesn't come to church for a week or two - then we make sure to stay in contact with each other. Besides that we recognize that when families/members aren't able to attend, they are putting what ever energy they have left over from the week, back into their marriages, back into their children. Shame and guilt over missing out on attending church or not participating in ministries within the church. drives a wedge between a couple and drains emotional resources that spouses and children need. 

Meeting the needs of families with young children involves giving them the space, support and appreciation they need. Appreciation that these families are raising the next generation of believers, and that their task is very precious indeed.

A Time for Healing

I've had a premonition for a few years now that something wasn't quite right. I fatigued easily, sleep didn't make me feel better, I cried easily and tension and conflict in my life would often continue to impact me long after the moment passed, showing itself in a physical reaction - sometimes insomnia, sometimes panic attacks, sometimes other ways. This was compounded last year during a particularly stressful time (physically and emotionally) that I couldn't seem to overcome on my own. My biggest problem - I didn't know who to turn to or whom to ask for help. It's  not easy to go to a primary care provider and let them know that things are just off. No specifics, no glaring issues in blood work or typical exams and tests. As far as I knew - this was normal and I would just have to deal with it.

Back to the main item I brought up...building a support system. I didn't know who I could turn to in a situation like this where I know something is off, but don't know what to do. The fact of the matter is that it's easy in general for me to determine that I will figure out what is wrong and fix it..no matter what. No matter that I exhaust myself in the process. No matter that I actually refuse willing supports in my life the opportunity to help me. Even refusing to allow my support system to simply pray for me, for healing.

I know I am not alone in this. For me the fierce determination comes from thinking that there is no one who will support me - so if I don't do it for myself, no one else will. For others it may be a myriad of reasons. Allowing other people to help - means someone else to share in the journey, the joys, the sorrows and ultimately sharing in the experience in finding the deep underlying meaning in your life's story.

Sometimes too extra support comes from being  able to pay for services.Having someone help clean the house, mow the lawn, or do some babysitting can provide some much needed relief to the stressors of life. For me it meant finding someone who would listen to my concerns for my physical health and be willing to support me through the healing process. I think this is another way that God works - through family and friends, and friends of friends, and family of friends, and friends of family. I heard of a medical provider in my local area, who might be able to provide the kind of support I wanted. No, the support I really needed.

I have been receiving medical support for a month now and the changes are phenomenal. I am sleeping at night and feeling rested (when I feel fatigued now its a reminder to rest, not a pervasive feeling), I no longer feel so overwhelmed and I feel much more confident, and the physical responses to tension and conflict have subsided. What a relief!!

In addition I reached out to my church family and solicited their prayers. My hope is for complete healing. However, I am content with whatever I am given - recognizing that my health at this point depends a lot on my choices regarding diet, exercise and rest.

Divine support sometimes start in recognizing that sometimes when it comes to healing I need to provide some of the legwork - look for support, ask for support, make necessary changes, and then allow God to decide the outcome.

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