I not only wonder about Abraham’s marriage, I also wonder about his friends.

He didn’t live in a land of smartphones.  I’m guessing when he up and left his home, his friends were the ones traveling in his caravan–most likely servants or family members.  Sure, he had Lot but I imagine Abraham did most of the heavy lifting in that relationship, bailing him out time and again.

When you move, whether to a new city or country, it is always a test of friendships.

It’s hard to believe that I’ve now been away from Los Angeles for almost six years.  What amazes me is the friendships that have stood this test of time.  Friends who have stayed with me through distance and time zones, who have reached out and stayed connected.  I recently read, “Friends are the family you choose.”  So true.  Through life’s transitions, some friendships are best for a season, others for a lifetime.  Either way, they are both significant parts of the journey.

Today my mom celebrate’s her 77th birthday.  I am blessed to say she is family who I chose to be my friend.  She has been a support along my life’s journey.  I treasure the memories she has created with me over the years.  She remembers the little details for everyone, I mean, everyone in her life.  She remembers the life-altering dates that have blurred for me.  For over thirty years, she sends a card to me for the day I decided to follow Jesus.  Even now, she sends our baby weekly “birthday” emails.  I hope I can be the friend and mom that she has been to me.

“Wisdom is with the aged, and understanding in length of days.” (Job 12:12)

Thanks, Mom!

• Who can you depend on?  Who do you lean on for support?

“True freedom comes when we learn to choose what we did not choose.” (Jacque Phillipe)

Of course, we all want to experience true freedom and rarely would we admit that we have chosen otherwise.  It’s amazing how our lives become so routine that we often go through the motions, not putting much thought into time or choices.  We may be too busy, thus no time to think beyond what’s next.  We may have too much time but numb our minds with texting, posting, updating, gaming or watching tv.

As I’ve reflected on Abraham’s story this month, I’m reminded of the culture he lived in where there weren’t options or choices for life paths like we’ve become accustomed to today.  Life was pretty much set as one path.  I doubt there was too much overthinking, “Am I missing something better? Am I choosing the right thing?”

Yet today it’s just the opposite.  So many options, so little time.  It’s easy to think there’s something better and surely others are doing it.  The grass is greener.  We keep looking, keep reaching.  Rarely at peace with where we are today, in this moment.

This week I’ve been particularly provoked by the above quote.  Freedom is a choice.  When we keep looking “over the fence,” we think we’re stuck.  We see our life as the “lesser” and we tell ourselves others’ have “better.”  Instead of looking at our current path as if “it’s something we didn’t choose,” freedom comes in choosing it now.

When will we choose freedom?

“I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”  (Jesus)

Truth : “the real facts about something : the things that are true.”  (Webster)

We are so busy focusing on what others define as true that we don’t take time to look at the truth about ourselves.

For this, I am the worst of sinners.  If anyone (well, my husband mostly) dares to identify the truth in me (mainly my flaws), well, then the claws may come out.

If we have no problem identifying what we see as true in others, why is it so difficult to accept it ourselves?

Bonhoeffer says “It can never be good, however, to deceive yourself about the truth, for if we deceive ourselves about the truth of our own life, we will certainly also deceive ourselves about the truth of God.  And it’s certainly never godly to close our eyes—which God gave us that we can see our neighbors and their needs—when they have to see sadness and horror.  It is certainly never right, therefore to avoid the things that frighten and depress us.”

Sometimes what is within us might be the most frightening of all.

So we mask, we dull, we suppress.  More texting, more social media, more work, more drinking, more spending, more eating, more ignoring, more socializing, more sexing, more isolation…more.  Ignore the news, ignore the homeless, ignore the beggar.  If we don’t look, we don’t see.  If we don’t see, we aren’t responsible.

If I stay busy, or just close my eyes, I chose to avoid what is true about me.  Worse yet, I ignore what God has spoken.  I miss my responsibility to reflect Him in the sadness and horror.

As the prophet Isaiah says in chapter 61:

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
    because the Lord has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor;^[a]
    he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives,
    and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;^[b]
2 to proclaim the year of the Lord‘s favor,
    and the day of vengeance of our God;
    to comfort all who mourn…

May I see truth.  May I not chose to close my eyes.

As I’ve written this month, I’m reminded of the temptation I have to read the Bible through my own eyes and life experience.

When I read the story of Abraham, I often wonder what his marriage was like but then I quickly remember that he lived in a different culture.

But I keep coming back to this.  We enter his story when he was seventy-five.  Already, there is so much to ask.  I assume his marriage was arranged.  Was Sarah as young as many in that culture, maybe even fourteen?  We know they were ten years apart (Genesis 17:17).  Did they love each other?  Were they friends?

Nevertheless, we see things were complicated.  She followed him to an unknown land.  When a famine hit, he and Sarah went to Egypt, where he told her to tell others they were brother and sister.  He was willing to pass off his wife to spare his own life. God spared both their lives and they traveled on.

God promises Abraham that he will have an heir.  After years passed waiting for this covenant to be fulfilled, Sarah urged Abraham to sleep with their maidservant so that she would have a child.  I can’t imagine this decision made their relationship any less complicated.  Sure enough, she was filled with contempt, blamed Abraham and banished her maidservant.

Eleven years had passed since we started Abraham’s story until this hate-filled moment.

There was no marriage counseling.  No marriage wisdom from the New Testament.  They had one thing…the promise directly from God.  They still doubted.  They still acted on their own understanding.  Sure, I can read these stories, knowing how the story ends and think, “How could they do that?”  But have I not done the same thing?  Have I not acted in anger or impatience, uncertain of what I’m doing along the way?

Thirteen years later, Sarah became pregnant.

I imagine years of agony, heartache, loneliness, doubts and confusion.

Yet the most powerful part of this story is that God remains constant and faithful.  “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” (Genesis 12:1)

The Lord God walks with his people, where they are along their journey, and He still fulfills His promises!

So I married an entrepreneur…what does that mean?

1. I move to where the business is located.
2. Learn a new language.
3. When I meet people, they identify me as “Chris’ wife.”
4. Conversations full of vision and inspiration.
5. Long days and short nights…or they blur as one altogether.
6. Days/weeks traveling apart.
7. Meeting a variety of people I never would have otherwise.
8. Risk.
9. Adventure.
10. Loneliness.
11. Flexing flexibility.
12. Expanding new skills.  Never thought I’d be in sales.
13. Letting go of dreams.
14. Learning to drive in a lawless land (i.e to be comfortable with honking).
15. World travel.
16. Laughter.
17. Sadness.
18. Friendship.
19. Pride.
20. Frustration.
21. Humility.
22. Growth.
23. Sacrifice.
24. Patience.
25. Forgiveness.
26. Strength.
27. Courage.
28. Brokenness.
29. Bitterness.
30. Trust.
31. Prayer.
32. Overcoming challenges.
33. Loss.
34. Learning to find my voice.
35. Exploration.
36. Insecurity.
37. Success.
38. Comparison.
39. Freedom.
40. Peace.

Infertility.

It’s one thing to read the story of Abraham who waited twenty-five years for the arrival of his son, Isaac, as we know the ending.  It’s another to live it without knowing the end.  I know I would not have responded in the same faith that Abraham did.

When I was single, infertility wasn’t exactly on my mind.  I was young, therefore, I assumed, it wouldn’t been an issue.

I got married just before turning 32.  Still young.  Not an issue.  Besides, I was adjusting to plenty of other life changes at once, I wasn’t exactly hoping to add another.  We had a new business to focus on as well.  With Chris’ schedule (i.e. arriving home anywhere from 11:00pm to 1:00am), I knew it would be a challenge to do family life.

So time passed.  Our childless couple friends soon became parents.  The business grew.  Some months, we were on the road more than we were home so I didn’t really have time to think about our start to a family.

I recall one mother asking why I didn’t already have four or five children.  Some women would be grandmothers by now.  I didn’t have an answer.  How do you explain to someone who has no issue having children that you don’t know why?

Another year passed by…and another and another and another.  Baby showers for loved ones came and went.  It’s a dichotomy only other childless women understand to share joy for a friend and grieve your own loss.  It becomes more and more difficult when there is no explanation for the infertility.  All tests show normal results.  “Unknown” is the response you get from doctors.  God seems to remain silent year after year.

And so we wait.

This past summer, during a grieving time, a friend’s husband asked to pray with me.  As he finished speaking hope, he added, “I see a baby girl.”  After years without answers, this word fell on a stoic heart.  I wanted to believe, as Abraham, did. But I was more like his wife, Sarah.  I had years to learn how to self-protect from what added up to constant disappointment.

Yet, this time, something was different.  I was reminded that God saw me, that He had not forgotten or overlooked me, when it seemed everyone around me received the blessing I had now longed for for several years.

As the weeks passed, I forgot those words of hope.  Then the miracle happened…that God had already showed me would.

Now, just months after I turn 38, I will meet the miracle.

I’m far from living the faith that Abraham demonstrated.  He was a willing and obedient servant of God.

By no means was he perfect but he believed.  He was seventy-five when he first heeded God’s call to uproot his family and leave his homeland.  At this moment, God promised the land to Abraham’s offspring.

He heard this promise and believed….and waited.  And waited.

So he figured he should take matters into his own hands.  At eighty-six, Abraham had a child with his maidservant.

At ninety-nine, Abraham hears God speak, ““I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless, that I may make my covenant between me and you, and may multiply you greatly.”

By 100, Abraham’s promised son, Isaac, was born.

I have a hard time waiting.  I was that kid who eagerly gave my dad a Father’s Day gift and before he could unwrap the first edge, I would yell, “It’s a tie!”  Patience isn’t my strong suit.  Let alone faith.  I’m quick to forget what God has said.  I easily get sucked into the whirlwind of doubts.

In my thirty plus years as a Christ follower, I’ve believed that I have lived by faith.

Do you have truth sayers in your life?  The irony is that I want them in my life but I’m not always accepting of when the truth comes.

Today I’m told by one of them, “Anxiety is ruling your life.”  Of course, my immediate response was to dismiss these words. Yet, after letting them sink in, I wanted to dig deeper.

What is anxiety?  Fear.  But fear of what?  As Webster defines anxiety as “(1) fear or nervousness about what might happen; (2) an abnormal and overwhelming sense of…fear often marked by physiological signs (as sweating, tension, and increased pulse), by doubt concerning the reality and nature of the threat, and by self-doubt about one’s capacity to cope with it.”  So in other words, fear of…anything.

What does anxiety look like in my life?  As I further self-examine this trait in my life, I notice it has emerged more clearly since moving here.  What I was once used to–convenience, stability, comfort, predictability–has all gone.  So here, whether I’ve recognized it before today or not, anxiety has reared its ugly head anytime I sense a lack of control.  Pretty much daily.  It may not show with signs of sweat or an increased pulse but it can often come as Webster stated, through doubt of a situation or self-doubt.

What is the opposite of anxiety?  Peace.  Something I want more of but know I weakly demonstrate it.  Yet another reason to doubt.  Yet, there is hope.  The Bible addresses anxiety throughout the Old and New Testament.

Psalm 34:4  “I sought the Lord, and he answered me and delivered me from all of my fears.”

Psalm 56:3  “When I am afraid, I put my trust in you.”

Isaiah 41:10  “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”

Luke 12:25  “And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?”

John 14:27  “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.  Not as the world gives do I give to you.  Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.”

Where does anxiety come from?  Fear that I cannot control a situation.  In anxiety, my hope and trust is in me alone.

Where does peace come from?  When my hope is in Christ alone.  No one else.

Proverbs 12:25 “Anxiety in a man’s heart weighs him down, but a good word makes him glad.”  May the good Word encourage you today to choose to walk in peace!

We recently had our property fumigated in hopes to save the trees infested by pine beetles.  For years they have gone undetected.  They remain below the bark, secretly eating away at the healthy part of the timber.  Once they devour a tree that they have inhabited, they fly to the next tree to continue the cycle.  Unfortunately, weeks later, we needed to cut down eight of our trees.

It’s not always easy to catch what is below the surface in our lives.  Often times, we don’t see the problem or we choose to ignore it.

I tend to be an all-or-nothing person.  Also, an optimist and an idealist.  These don’t bode well for the slow-gnawing issues of life.  I don’t like to address them.  Or when I have to, I go “all-bad” as my husband reminds me.  With this approach, I am tempted to skip the “fumigation” process and jump right to the extreme, tree-cutting stage.

The good news is, and I’m still learning this, that life isn’t black and white.  Unlike the tree, for us, life is fluid.  This is freeing, if I apply it!