Heart’s Desire

Sacrificial Love

/ LeahDanee29 / Leave a comment

“Abraham answered, ‘God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.’ And the two of them went on together.”

Genesis 22:8 NIV

Richard Bach is noted for saying “If you love someone set them free. If they come back they’re yours. If they don’t they never were.” Although internet investigators cannot substantiate this, they did find a similar quote by Jess Lair (1969): “If you want something very, very badly, let it go free.  If it comes back to you, it’s yours forever.  If it doesn’t, it was never yours to begin with.” (from the book, I Ain’t Much Baby—But I’m All I’ve Got) This concept of loving something or someone and setting it free forms a belief system based on fate. It’s about as effective as making a wish before blowing out your birthday candles or throwing a coin into a “wishing well.” It’s indecisive and inconclusive. It’s wishy-washy and neither practical nor stable. Love is not something to chalk up to fate, it is a gift and a promise from God. It’s a gift He freely gives but sometimes asks us to temporarily give up. Especially if our love for something or someone exceeds our love for Him or if He is testing our loyalty to Him.

The Greeks describe love seven different ways; eros which is romantic love, philia which defines friendship love, storge is unconditional familial love, agape which is an unconditional selfless love, ludus which describes playful or flirtatious love, pragma which is a long lasting, committed love, and philautia which is self love (from: https://www.elizabethrider.com/7-types-of-love-and-what-they-mean/). The Bible also tells us what love is and what it is not. 1 Corinthians 13 is a famous reading at most weddings describing love as patient and kind, not envious, boastful, arrogant or rude. As the reading progresses we are reminded that love bears all things, hopes all things and endures all things. But right in the middle, just after love is kind and just before love bears all things, is this sentence: love is not self-seeking. Both the Bible and the Greeks can agree on the concept of love-it is unconditional and it is sacrificial. 1 Corinthians 13 gives us a glimpse at what sacrificial love looks like but let’s take a deeper look at what it is and is not.

Sacrificial love, is not sacrificing love. It is not falling in love with a person or a dream and then throwing them away to test if the dream or person were actually meant for you. It is not pushing people away because of fear or uncertainty either. In fact, 1 John 4:18 tell us: “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.” Do not run away from or close your heart off to love out of fear or confusion. Seek God’s help in overcoming your fears and allow His love to teach you how to truly love and freely accept others’ love. When we are walking in God’s calling of love, we should experience no fear or spirit of timidity. We should only know His peace that surpasses all understanding. But we know the devil uses fear to jerk us off the path of God’s calling. It’s why we read how “do not fear” or “do not be afraid” is written in the Bible approximately 365 times. That’s a reminder a day for an entire year. (from: https://www.quora.com/How-many-times-is-fear-mentioned-in-the-Bible) When fear rears its ugly head, we need to squash it like a serpent under our feet reminding ourselves that there is no fear in love.

Sacrificial love is not sacrificing all of yourself for your family or dream either. In fact, sacrificial love is the opposite of completely losing yourself. It’s about stepping outside of yourself and sacrificing your own will because your love for God is greater than your love for yourself. Abraham is a prime example of this type of sacrificial love.

Abraham had a dream. All he ever hoped for was to be a father. God promised Abraham he would be a dad but he made Abraham wait 25 years before keeping that promise. Abraham trusted God but had a few moments of doubt during his time of waiting. Can you blame him? How many of us could believe we heard God correctly if we were still waiting on Him to keep His word for that long? At one point, Abraham tried to manufacture his own miracle having a son with Hagar, his wife’s maidservant. But God told Abraham, Ishmael, his son with Hagar was not the son God had promised him. Instead, Abraham’s wife Sarah, at the age of 90, would bare a son whom Abraham was to name Isaac. Did you know the name Isaac means “laughter”? Interestingly, both Abraham and Sarah laughed when God reminded them that Sarah would have a baby because they thought they were too old to be parents. How many of us, who have been waiting on God to fulfill His promise are at a point of that kind of laughter? More interesting than that is the fact that God’s covenant with Abraham, was the very definition of laughter. This tells me that God’s dream for you and me involves laughter too.

Isaac, not Ishmael would be God’s covenant with Abraham. God kept his word, and Isaac was born. Special note, God didn’t forget or throw Ishmael away. In spite of Abraham playing God by having a son with Hagar first, God still blessed Ishmael, making him fruitful and increasing his numbers. (Genesis 17:20) I believe God’s care for Ishmael shows that He will redeem any circumstance or at least uses every circumstance for His purpose, even when we get in His way and try to play God in our own lives.

The birth of Isaac isn’t Abraham’s story of sacrificial love. If you are familiar with any Sunday School Bible story, then you know what happens next. As if Abraham waiting on God for 25 years didn’t already show his trust in God’s word, God tests Abraham’s faithfulness too. He calls Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. (Disclaimer-this took place a bazillion years ago BC. Sacrificing children now is not only illegal but NOT at all what I believe God would ever call any of us to do. In other words, do not try this home.) Now I don’t know about you, but if I waited 25 years for God to fulfill His promise to me, to fulfill the one thing my heart truly desires, then turn around and say, “sacrifice if for me” I’d respond like cousin Eddie from National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (Hughes Entertainment, 1989). Only instead of saying, “Are you serious, Clark?” I would ask, “Are you serious God?!” To add to this, keep in mind Abraham had no warning, just a sudden calling from God to go and sacrifice the very promise He had waited on God to fulfill. Raise your hand if you don’t respond well to anything that happens suddenly, especially if you’re left feeling turned upside down and blind sided. Picture me typing with one hand right now because I’m flailing the other one up in the air.

Abraham however, doesn’t question God. The next day, he takes his son, a donkey, a few of his servants and all he needs to build an altar and heads up the mountain with an obedient heart. Can I stop here for just one moment? The Bible I read leaves no mention of what Abraham was feeling or thinking during this time but I can imagine Abraham was full of anguish, perhaps even a hint of confusion or despair. If nothing else, this had to be breaking Abraham’s heart. I point this out because I believe questioning God’s calling, especially when it feels contradictory to what we know He promised us is a natural human response, just as anguish, confusion, heartbreak and/or despair would be natural human feelings to process. I don’t think it’s a sin to feel any of these emotions. Sin occurs when we lose faith and allow these emotions to redirect us instead of walking in obedience with God. This could look like telling ourselves we heard God wrong or choosing a substitution to sacrifice instead. Abraham could have woke up the next morning and told himself he dreamt the whole thing or he could have convinced himself getting rid of Ishmael and Hagar, something he had already done, was what God really meant. He could have even tried to have another baby with Sarah and use that child as the sacrifice. Instead, he chose to obey and God honored his obedience by sending a substitution and sparing Isaac’s life.

Abraham’s story has an example of another sacrifice, which is Sarah’s sacrifice for Abraham. Women of the Bible were known to see their identity and worth through their ability to bear children. If they were barren they viewed themselves (and society also viewed them) to have little to no value. A moment of transparency, God has gifted me two children. Both of which I call my miracle babies because my chances of having them were lower than the average healthy woman. After having them, continued complications led to surgery that removed any chance of me ever bearing more children again. Like Sarah, I too, struggled with my identity as a woman, questioning my worth and my value after I could no longer bare children. I had to allow God to redefine me and show me who I am in through His eyes to be free from those thoughts and feelings. In the Bible, the barren ones would share their husbands with their maidservants and fulfill their identity through their maidservants’ children. Another disclaimer: this is not a socially accepted practice today nor am I recommending it. Why? Because, as in Sarah’s situation, this brought about jealousy and only increased the barren woman’s insecurity. Anything that brings about jealousy or insecurity is not a form of sacrificial love. God will never call us to make a sacrifice that creates either. God’s calling may hurt, and we may not want to let go of what He’s calling us to sacrifice, but just as He provided a ram for Abraham, if His calling is only a test, I believe He will provide a substitute sacrifice for you and me too. It will never leave you feeling jealous or insecure.

God put sacrificial love on my heart this morning as I was praying over circumstances beyond my control. As I poured out my heart out to Him today, I found myself asking Him to help me let go of my own pain and heart’s desire in order to focus on what really needed to be pray for. God called Abraham to sacrifice what he loved to prove to that he loved God more. He may call us to do the same. Sometimes, God isn’t calling us to let go, but His test may be to loosen the grip on what we love in order to trust Him more. Loosening our grip can be just as painful as letting go but as God showed me today, obeying Him and praying for His greatest good, in spite of our own pain, is a true act of sacrificial love. As you prepare to celebrate Christmas this weekend, reflect on the greatest sacrificial love of all-Mary gave birth to a son. A son who, 33 years later, demonstrated His great love for all of mankind by dying on a cross. While reflecting on this, don’t forget, even Jesus questioned God’s calling for this great sacrifice. Just before He was arrested, alone with His thoughts and two of His disciples, He prayed-““Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” (Luke 22:42 NIV) If God is calling you to walk in sacrificial love, I think it’s ok pray this very same prayer-Lord, take this cup from me. Yet not my will but yours be done. Remember this-a sacrifice is not a closed door. Abraham did not loose his son. The world did not loose Jesus. No sacrifice that God asks you to make will leave you empty. When the time is right, God will provide the ram to replace what He called you to sacrifice and let you keep all that He has promised you. Perhaps sacrificial love isn’t about sacrificing at all. Perhaps it’s merely walking in love, trusting and obeying God, no matter what He calls us to do.

Debunking Boaz

/ LeahDanee29 / 5 Comments

“The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves.  He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you but will rejoice over you with singing.”  Zephaniah 3:17

If you’re familiar with the Bible then I’m guessing you’ve heard of the story of Ruth.  If not, let me give you a quick summary.  Ruth was a woman who married a man from a foreign land and tied herself to his family.  Her father-in-law, her husband and her brother-in-law all die (not simultaneously) and her mother-in-law (Naomi) decides to return to her homeland.  Naomi tells her daughters-in-law to stay with their own families.  Ruth’s sister-in-law Orpah stays.  But Ruth clings to Naomi and ends up returning to Naomi’s homeland with her.  Ruth then goes to work in a barley field as a means to provide for herself and Naomi.  There she meets Boaz who just so happens to to own the barley field Ruth is working in.  Long story short, Naomi finds out who Ruth is working for, realizes it’s a relative who can “redeem” Ruth as wife and mother and plays matchmaker between the two.  Her instructions and Ruth’s obedience pay off as Boaz marries Ruth and Ruth gives birth to Obed who was King David’s grandfather.

The book of Ruth is one of redeeming love and used as an example of how God can take tragedy and turn it into glory.  However, if misinterpreted, it can easily be romanticized and fill people, especially single women longing for marriage, with false hope.   For a woman longing for marriage, especially one has endured much rejection and/or abuse, the story of Boaz redeeming Ruth can fill her with the idea that God will use a man to redeem her circumstances also.  I want to be clear-Boaz was a kinsman redeemer but he did not redeem Ruth.

In Ruth’s cultural times, a kinsman-redeemer was a relative who carried out an act for a near relative who could not carry it out for themselves. In Ruth’s case, she was left a childless widow.  Boaz acted as a kinsman-redeemer by marrying and impregnating her in order to carry on her husband’s name (Ruth 4:10.) Boaz was a man of noble character but he was not a knight in shining armor who rescued Ruth.  He was a man who was impressed with Ruth’s beauty and work ethic.  He saws Ruth’s approach toward him as an act of kindness.  He also admitted there was another relative closer in relation to be Ruth’s redeemer. He protected Ruth’s reputation but was willing to step aside if the other relative chose to redeem Ruth himself (all found in Ruth chapters 3 and 4.)

Ruth was not a damsel in distress either.  She suffered great loss.  She made hard choices.  She worked on her own accord.  Ruth doesn’t bring up the idea of remarriage or children.  Her mother-in-law does.  Ruth only obeys the directives Naomi gives her.  Ruth was not wallowing in sorrow or waiting for a man to come along and rescue her.  She was in survival mode focused on taking care of herself and Naomi.  God stepped in and redeemed Ruth’s circumstances by connecting her to Boaz but God is Ruth’s ultimate rescuer.

No where in the book of Ruth does it mention that the desires of her heart was remarriage or to have a child.  In fact, when Naomi tells her to stay in her homeland, it’s because Naomi had no other sons for her to marry in order to bare a child.  Naomi tells her to stay with her own family and find another husband there.  But Ruth tells her this; “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” (Ruth 1:16-17)  Ruth does not choose to go with Naomi hoping to meet Boaz or any kinsman-redeemer.  She goes with Naomi because that’s who she identifies as her family and she has a loyalty to staying with that family.  The Bible doesn’t say it, but I believe Ruth either had no intentions to ever remarry or simply trusted God to take care of the matter.  Either way, remarriage was not Ruth’s priority.

Please don’t misinterpret today’s post.  I am not against marriage or remarriage.  The point of this post is to empower the woman who believe a man, a relationship and/or marriage is her saving grace to let go of that ideology.  To the woman who thinks her life will begin when God finally sends her the man of her dreams, you’re missing out on life that’s happening right now! God is our true redeemer.  He was Israel’s redeemer in the old testament and He sent Jesus to be our redeemer from sin in the New Testament.  He saves our circumstances and He redeems us from sinful mistakes.  No human being has the power to do that.  Expecting someone to redeem us puts unnecessary pressure on the person we identify as our savior.  It also is a form of worship and violates the Ten Commandments (Thou shall have no other gods before Me…)

If you are a single woman and your heart’s desire is marriage, please don’t pray for a Boaz.  Boaz was Ruth’s husband.  He can’t be yours.  Pray for the man God has designed for you.  While you’re waiting, be diligent in your work, recognize where you can rescue yourself and trust God to rescue you when you cannot.  Be the provider for the family God has gifted you, even if that family is just you and a pet or two. Trust Him to be your leader and partner.  See God as the husband you wish you had because we are all His bride. He is ultimately the One for each and everyone of us.

God will always be our Mr. Right.  If we misinterpret Boaz and especially if we get caught up in romance or Hallmark movies, we can easily become impatient and fall for a Mr. Right Now.  Wait on God.  Trust His ways.  Celebrate your singleness (it’s just as precious gift as marriage) and work hard at being the woman God made you to be.  If being a wife is part of His design, it will come to pass, just like it did for Ruth, in God’s time and His way!  We don’t need to manufacture our own love stories.  Ruth didn’t and God gave her Boaz.  Trust Him to write your love story too!

 

What’s Your ETA?

/ LeahDanee29 / 1 Comment

“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

I’m a planner. I love having a schedule planned out for the day and/or week and sticking to that plan. I don’t tend to respond well when my plan goes awry or doesn’t play out at all. That holds true even when I’m traveling or running errands. I plan out my stops to ensure the shortest route and alleviate driving out of my way or back tracking. What I typically don’t plan for are detours.

When I take a road trip, I plan out the start time, my expected time of arrival (ETA) and my return home time. When I lived in another state, I used to travel several hours to get home for visits and even had designated stopping points along the way-for every single trip. As a traveler, I’m more of a “let’s look at the map and find the shortest route from point A to point B.” I tend to always be running behind so short cuts are the best at helping make great time.

When I was younger, I traveled with someone who was the complete opposite of me. Sure they’d plan out a trip but their idea of travel was not “let’s get there.” Their idea of travel was more like, let’s find the longest route possible, make an innumerable amount of stops and enjoy all the sites we experience along the way. When traveling with them, I learned not to have a planned ETA. I also saw many spectacular views of waterfalls, caves and other beautifully hidden treasures that go unseen when you’re merely focused on getting to where you’re going and avoiding delays.

Where I live, there’s a joke that says, “We have four seasons-winter, spring, road construction and fall.” This is said because every summer our highways are covered with orange barrels and reduced down to one lane in an effort to repair the cracks and damage our harsh winters do to the pavement. Although the never ending process brings about safer roads, when you’re stuck in a traffic jam, or trying to navigate your vehicle through orange barrels or even better, detoured through areas you’re completely unfamiliar with-your appreciation for road construction is more like the feeling you get when you have to go to the dentist and have a tooth pulled. You simply want to avoid it altogether.

My daughter is learning to drive now. Recently I let her drive home from a family reunion that was two hours away. We were talking and I got distracted. I forgot she didn’t exactly know the way home and we missed the exit that led to home. We were probably 10 or 20 minutes passed that exit when I realized what had happened. I was tired and didn’t want to drive an hour out of our way to get home. I quickly got onto my iMaps to find the shortest route from where we were at. It consisted of backroads but it got us home. My daughter’s response, “It’s ok mom. It’s an adventure!” She even turned it into a site seeing tour pointing out strange lawn ornaments in peoplE’s yards from time to time.

Not to sound like Forrest Gump, but life is merely a journey full of point A’s and point B’s. We each have starting and ending points with many scenic tours, detours, back tracks, side steps, and even stand stills. Some parts of the journey are painstaking and we wish for a shortcut to get us to where we want to be a whole lot quicker. Somedays life is like trying to go around the block in a city filled with 1 way streets. What seems like the simplest of task ends up taking you way out of your way, just to get back to where you started from. It’s even more frustrating when we have a goal in mind, we’ve been working hard to reach that goal, we can see it in reach but life takes a right turn and feels like we’re driving the opposite way of what we are striving for. It can be additionally frustrating, even faith shaking, when we believe that goal was God spoken yet seems as though it will never come to fruition.

My own life has felt like a constant detour. Some road blocks I created myself based on wrong turns. Others are like traffic jams where I feel parked and no matter how hard I try, God is not moving me at all. Yet other days it feels as though I’m actually driving in reverse. Those are the days I realize I keep going back to the same sin or the same destructive pattern. On the days when life actually feels like a good traffic day, I’m learning those days still don’t reveal to me where I’m going or what God’s ETA for my goals really is. Those days were merely smooth driving days with minimal speed bumps.

Everyone has a starting time (your date of birth) and an ending (your date of death.) The dash in between is our individual road map of our own individual journey. Life is a road trip. You can get impatient and try to shortcut to your goals. Or you can enjoy the scenic route God takes you on, even if He makes you go the opposite way. Let your ETA be His ETA for you. During your roadblocks, speed bumps, traffic jams and detours, look around and admire the view. God has beauty in every moment of our lives and He shows it best when we’re less focused on the goal and more focused on the journey. If you make a wrong turn-that’s ok. We all get lost in our travels. God’s GPS will always bring us back to the road He has set before us when we repent and surrender to His ways.

If today you’re feeling like Abraham, Moses, David, Sarah, Hannah or Elizabeth, with a God given goal but no direction on how tor each it, or you’re experiencing road blocks that feel like closed doors, read about the delays the experienced before God gave them their ETA’s. Abraham specifically experienced this: God promised him offspring. Then told him to move away from all he was familiar with. Twenty-five years later, God’s word finally came to pass for Abraham. May his and the others’ stories give you the strength to trust God most during the road construction detours in your own life.