Month: September 2016

That was then, this is now.

/ fionacharisbrown / Leave a comment

Joshua erected a monument at The Gilgal, using the twelve stones that they had taken from the Jordan. And then he told the People of Israel, “In the days to come, when your children ask their fathers, ‘What are these stones doing here?’ tell your children this: ‘Israel crossed over this Jordan on dry ground.’

23-24 “Yes, God, your God, dried up the Jordan’s waters for you until you had crossed, just as God, your God, did at the Red Sea, which had dried up before us until we had crossed. This was so that everybody on earth would recognize how strong God’s rescuing hand is and so that you would hold God in solemn reverence always. – The Message Translation, Joshua 4: 20 – 24.

The church we were a part of when we lived in America has a feature of a  bunch of rocks by its front entrance, with the above accompanying description (they use a different translation though).  The rocks are a visual reminder of God’s rescuing hand.  The rocks are a reminder of God’s stories in our lives.  The rocks are there to urge others; to urge us all, to tell our God stories, to share our God stories.

I don’t have a big ole pile of rocks by my front entrance at my home now.  Nope.  Don’t think the landlords would entirely approve of that.  But I do see this here blogeroo of mine as a ‘rock formation’ of sorts;  these are things my God has done for me, this is how I know I am loved beyond measure, and I have hope for every situation.

When I was in my teens and twenties I was able to attend a lot of leadership training and conferences and the like, and a common theme or idea that often came through in these sessions, was the fact that your stories needed to be ‘new’ and ‘relevant’.  Up to date and from your current life.  So yeah.  Current and up to date was what I looked for,  and somehow along the way it became a little too easy to begrudge or to belittle the stories of my yesterdays.

But lately I’ve been realizing that our stories of our last weeks and our last months, and of our last years and our last decades, are just as valuable as those stories of our today’s. Don’t you think that the temptation is there to often think that those stories from our yesterdays are done and dusted with? Finito.  The end. Book closed.  But actually……no……I think that God has a sneaky way of bringing our stories from then into our lives of today. And along with that is the fact and the blessing, that thankfully He can bring healing to very hurt places, over a time-frame known only to Him.  He’s that omnipotent.  And He’s that omnipresent.

In a blog post a while ago I mentioned the fact that there’s a building here in Auckland that I didn’t like to drive past. Or even think about.  It brought back sad memories of a time in our lives where we faced great loss and experienced a lot of heartache.  But. And this is a big God but.  Just yesterday I was with some people and they were describing a part of Auckland and I realised it was exactly the area in which my aforementioned dreaded building is.  And you know what?  My heartbeat didn’t change tempo at all.  My mind didn’t race to flashbacks.  And I can honestly say that it was well with my soul.  Only now, twelve years on from my experience in that building, with much more of life experienced, I now can know that God’s gentle gluing of my heart back together is complete – with regards to that experience of grief.  That particular story of mine didn’t end when we threw out the dead flowers all those years ago, and it didn’t end when I put words to feelings and began to write of that journey, and it won’t end now that I know I don’t have to deal with fearful memories any more.  But it is a continually evolving and living story of God’s presence throughout pain and of His faithfulness.

You see that particular story of mine matters.

And the many other stories of mine, matter.  Just like your story matters.

Who you are matters.  Where you’ve come from.  What has shaped you.  The choices you’ve made.  The things that make you smile from ear to ear and belly laugh deep down.  The things that make you tear up and whether you put on a brave face, or allow those tears to escape, those things matter. Because the God I know and serve is a God who is faithful.  He’s powerful. He’s not finished with you yet, and He is certainly not finished with me yet. Your stories matter.  Our stories matter.

I’ve suspect I’ve got more stories to tell from my yesterdays and my today’s.  And I’ll continue to do my best to shine a spotlight on Jesus.

Joshua built a monument of rocks from the Jordan River to remind the Israelites of God’s faithfulness, of  God’s rescuing hand being strong.  You see there’s nothing about me that makes me any more special than you – you’ve got stories to share too. What story can you share and to whom, as a living monument of God’s faithfulness? We get to do that. We really do.

A photo by Austin Neill. unsplash.com/photos/ZahNAl_Ic3o

 

 

 

 

 

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Stubborn is as stubborn does.

/ fionacharisbrown / Leave a comment

I’m pretty sure that this isn’t such a great thing to be particularly proud of, but as far as being stubborn goes, I’m up there in the leading rankings of high levels of stubbornness present. Anyone else with me on the leader board?

I am a Queen of Stubborn.

Strongly, fiercely independent, combined with a splash of stroppy, mixed together to make a good, strong batch of stubborn.That’s me.

I’m the type of stubborn that refused to get my drivers licence until I was thirty, when I had moved to a different country, with two little children (and preggers with number three) I discovered that walking everywhere was no longer an option.  Then I had to learn to drive on the other side of the road.  Some may have said ‘that’ll learn me’. And maybe it did.  But maybe it didn’t.

How and why I came to be so stubborn is really a story for another day. I don’t have enough chocolate in my house right now, to deal with that. But I am who I am.

Stubbornness ain’t all that bad though. My stubbornness worked in my favour when I was sent from medical specialist to specialist, and came away from all CT scans and MRI scans with nothing abnormal jumping out at us, but finally, after a three year journey I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disorder.  There’s a lot to be said for persistence and not settling for less than what you think is right. That’s stubbornness put to good use.

I have to be careful though, not to let this stubborn streak of mine make me miss opportunities that I shouldn’t miss, or not to let this stubborn streak of mine make my heart less malleable than it should be.  A soft and tender heart is what I always hope to hold onto.

I’m learning that there are a few things that I can do to help reign in this ‘stubborn’. Because if I’m not careful, sometimes this ‘stubborn’ can stop me from embracing a whole bunch of opportunities and experiences.

I’m learning that just because I may see myself as being x, y or z, I have to also remember that I don’t know what I don’t know.  While my filter on who I think I am may be reasonably accurate, its probably not quite as accurate as how close friends would see me, and of how God sees me.

As much as I talked in my last blog post about ‘who do we say God is’, and how that shapes how we outwork our faith, I think we also need to ask the question ‘who do you (God) say I am?’.  When we pause to ask that question, and really take on board the answers that come our way, I think we can all be pleasantly surprised.  We don’t know what we don’t know, so sometimes we need to ask a lot of questions.

In addition to asking God to reveal more of who He says we are, I’m learning to ask the right questions to the right people around me. Is what I think about x,y,z ok?  Does it line up with other things in my life? Allowing others to speak into my life means I have to take the time to take things on board, and to process things if they aren’t what I’d naturally think myself.  And for a stubborn chick, this is hard work, but oh so worthwhile.  You see, like I said before, we don’t know what we don’t know.

So how do you know you’re listening to the right people?  When you’re a person who is pretty strong minded to start with, how do you open your heart and mind to receive good and worthwhile advice and help?  I say look at the fruit in other people’s lives.  That’s my benchmark. Is the way this person lives, something I’d like to be emulating?  Do others respect them and speak highly of them?  Do I long to be closer to God because of their influence in my life?  If yes – then I know I need to put aside my own stubborn thoughts and opinions, breath deeply and listen intently to whatever it is they have to say on a situation that I may need swaying on.

Proverbs 1:5  talks about the importance of getting advice from others: let the wise listen and add to their learning, and let the discerning get guidance.  Guidance is a good and necessary thing.  We are so much better together.  

So this is my prayer as one who knows she’s as stubborn as they come: may my heart and mind be steadfast and sure because I know without a doubt who I am in Christ and whose I am, but may that ever be growing. And may I always be looking for Godly wisdom from God himself and from others who love Him.  May my heart always be pliable, able to be stretched and ever increasing in capacity.  And may I always stop to consider that there’s much I don’t know, and we just don’t know what we don’t know.

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Dot to dot.

/ fionacharisbrown / Leave a comment

I used to like those dot to dot pictures. You know the ones – when little ones are practicing those early numeracy skills and they draw those wobbly pencil lines from number to number and those lines eventually reveal a picture. Dot to dots are cool.

I like dot to dots in real life too. Those times when you can take a step back from a situation for a minute, and see that you think a certain way, because of what you thought about another thing. One thing led to another.

This week the ministry my husband works for is holding their annual appeal. A massive chunk (between 80 and 90%) of their income is based purely on people’s donations, and once a year they have to make that ask, that appeal, for continued and new financial support. Here’s a random fact for you: typically less than 5% of all viewers (of a Christian tv station) or listeners (of a Christian radio station) will give financially to that ministry. This week is not my favourite week in the world. It’s humbling and hard in lots of ways, but unavoidable. But here we are, in that week. Last night the on air presenters were talking about how research shows that a major barrier to people giving to any charity or ministry is fear. Fear that if they were to give, then they wouldn’t have money for x,y, or z. And that can be a very real fear in a lot of ways. But if you have that fear, then you can’t truly believe that God can and will provide for your every need. You can’t believe that God says we’re not to worry about what to wear, or what we have to put in our stomachs.

Dot to dot. Your responses to situations and your actions are a direct result of what you believe.

I popped by a friend’s class today just when she happened to be student free. Written in big, bold words at the front of her classroom are the words ‘Who do you say I am?’.

Dot to dot.

The gospels (the first four books of the New Testament part of the bible) records Jesus as saying these words to Peter; ‘Who do you say I am?’.

You see I reckon that how we see Jesus, who we say He is, pretty much decides what our faith looks like when it is lived out.
And this ‘who we say God is’ also determines what our fears look like.

It’s hard to be fearful of sickness when we say that God is our healer.
It’s hard to be ashamed of past mistakes when we say that God has forgiven us and remembers not.
It’s hard to be downcast when we say that God can give us fullness of joy.
It’s hard to feel unlovely, when we say that God loves us with an everlasting love.

Dot to dot. One thing leads to another.

I don’t know about you, but my negative internal voices sometimes run off and have themselves a wee tea-party in the corner of my heart. But I’m discovering that when I come back to this one point,’Who do you say I am?’, when I re-frame how I see God, when I re position my true north on who God is and all He sees in me, then I find that fear and worry dissipate. Certainty replaces uncertainty. Peace replaces distress.

The next time you’re facing something that’s making you question your abilities or where you fit in this big wide world, or you’re fretting about something that the future holds, then do this simple thing. Move from that ‘dot’, back another ‘dot’, and answer that question once again for yourself. ‘Who do you say I am’ – Jesus.

And I think you’ll just find those dots to dots can indeed form a beautiful picture – your life, crafted by the Master Potter, Jesus.

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