MY BLOG POSTS
Ditch the Drama
One theme that I read over and over again, every year, is “Don’t get caught up in the drama.” These 17 and 18 year olds realize that they had wasted some valuable time getting worked up over issues that really don’t matter at all.
I think that’s something we are all guilty of – from those in middle school to those in middle age. Think back 5 years — do you even remember the stuff that made you mad? I remember getting upset. Really upset. But what was it that got me upset? Who was involved? No idea. Even though it was, I’m sure, VERY important then, it is not important now. Unless, in my anger, I lost a friend or hurt someone I loved. But I don’t recall anything good coming from getting unrighteously angry.
What do I remember when I think back 5 years? I remember fun times with my husband and kids. I remember what God was teaching me then. I remember friendships that impacted me. I remember places I visited, books I read. You know, the important stuff. The rest – whatever it was – just doesn’t matter now.
So how should that affect today? I need to ditch the drama. I need to let go of petty things that make me mad, petty people who want to steal my joy, petty issues that cause me to lose my focus. I need to spend my energy on what matters – on WHO matters: my Savior, my family, my friends and my students.
“Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.” ~Phil. 4:8
Poe Kids
I’m not sure how the relationship works. Poe never had kids. But my mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and niece all have Poe as their middle names. And that middle name has been passed down for generations before them.
So we’re related.
Once, when my three kids were little – 8 and under – I wanted them to connect with their literary ancestor. So I read them “Tell Tale Heart” (A short story where a guy kills an old man – possibly his father – whose eye annoys him; then he dismembers the body and buries it underneath the floorboards. Brilliant work of fiction. Brilliant.) By the time I finished reading it, my two daughters were in tears, clinging to my husband. My oldest looked at me and said, “Why would you read that to us, Mommy? Why?”
This is what happens when your mother is an English major and your father is distantly related to Edgar Allan Poe.
Moral of the story: Reading stories about deranged psychopaths to small children is not as good an idea as you’d think.
Matters of Life and Death
I squealed with her and told her I know she will be a terrific big sister. Then she handed the phone to her mom – my baby sister – and I squealed with her. A new life is growing inside her. It is wonderful.
The same day, we got an update on my mother-in-law. Unless God chooses to work a miracle (which He could!), she is is facing her final days. Cancer is growing inside her, torturing her, ripping the life from her. It is awful.
Life and death.
Joy and pain.
Happiness and grief.
I wonder, as I give praise for one and prayers for the other, how anyone can survive the radical ups and downs of this life without knowing Christ. He is the source of all good gifts, the giver of life. And he is the Rock we cling to when the storms of life threaten to drown us.
Knowing Christ doesn’t insulate us from life. Jesus himself said that we should expect difficulties. He modeled that for us – enduring temptation, persecution, and even death – an excruciating death that he did not deserve. This life isn’t easy, it isn’t perfect. We will experience pain. But this life is good, too. There are incredible joys, beauty all around us that we sometimes forget to see when circumstances weigh us down.
But the greatest joy I have – in both the happiness and the heartache – is knowing that this life is not our only life. In fact, compared to what is in store for us, this life is nothing – a vapor, a mist, dew on the grass. The greatest joys we can experience here pale in comparison to the joy that awaits us. And the greatest pain will be forgotten when we step out of these sin-trapped bodies into our eternal home.
So I will rejoice with those who rejoice, and I will weep with those who weep. I will live this life with the next life in mind. Because, as the beautiful old hymn teaches, “My hope is built on nothing less/than Jesus’ blood/ and righteousness.”
The Greatest Superpower Ever
My son, Thomas, asks me that question every few weeks. His dream superpower changes every time he asks – from flight to invisibility, to super-human strength.
At this point in my life, my dream superpower would be Super-Metabolism: Being able to eat as much chocolate as I want without gaining an ounce. My costume would be dripping in chocolate syrup and lined with chocolate-covered strawberries. Every nibble would count as a mile run.
It’s a fun question to think about, a fun dream to dream. Super human abilities are so appealing. Being better than we are – Krista 2.0 – is exciting.
A while back, my pastor spent a couple weeks talking about forgiveness. Forgiveness is tough. Really tough. We’d rather eat glass than forgive someone who’s really hurt us. And asking for forgiveness?? We’d rather eat glass while rolling in it. At least I would. I hate saying “I’m sorry.” And, sometimes, I hate offering forgiveness. It seems too simple. When someone hurts me, I want to hurt them back. Forgiving them is so nice. It feels like I’m just letting them off the hook. Where’s the payback?
And then it dawned on me: Forgiveness is the greatest superpower ever. True forgiveness is something we can only truly offer if we have accepted it in our own lives. God offers us forgiveness through Christ. Complete forgiveness. No asterisks, small print, no “but I’ll never forget what you did…” And our response — complete devotion to this wonderful Savior who lavished his grace on us, that “while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”
Christ’s forgiveness frees us from slavery to sin, it allows us to know we will spend eternity in heaven, it gives us joy and freedom here on earth to do what God has called us to do. And yet, while we are quick to accept God’s forgiveness, we Christians are sometimes very slow to offer it. Which is sad because it should be the opposite. We, who have been forgiven so much, should joyfully, lovingly offer it to others. We should humbly request it from those we have hurt.
This “superpower” has the ability to do greater good than almost anything else on earth, yet we often neglect it or reason it away. On our own, we can’t “tap into” its power, but we “can do all things through Christ” who strengthens us. We can offer forgiveness. We can accept forgiveness. We can seek forgiveness.
What a super world we would live in if we just used this power that God makes available to us, this Super Power called Forgiveness.