My Theory

I recently saw a book entitled “How to Attract Birds to Your Back Yard.”  Being an old birder, I immediately knew: Give them what they need.  Food, water, and shelter. 

And if you’re serious about having birds in your backyard, you”ll go to the trouble of buying bird feeders, bird seed, a bird bath or two, and a couple of bird houses.  If you already have bushes and trees in the yard, you’re sure to have birds in no time at all.

Notice I said “…you will go to the trouble...”  Except you won’t consider it trouble because it’s something you want to do, a project the whole family can get involved in.  You spend time, money and effort to get the effect you want.

It should be the same for our time with the Lord.  It should be much more for our time with the Lord. 

We ought to be willing to do anything, to give up anything, that keeps us from

Being alone with the Lord,

Studying His word,

Learning every bit of information we can absorb,

Praying to Him,

Listening to Him.

I love the birds in my backyard, but while I’m enjoying them, can’t I also praise the One who put them there?  When a friend’s name comes to mind, can’t I pray for that person?  When I’m with someone and suddenly feel the Holy Spirit, can’t I ask to pray with that someone? 

God is attached to everything. Even the bad stuff.  Especially the bad stuff. 

Because He takes the bad stuff and uses it for good.

There’s no way around God.

if you come across something that you can’t connect to God, would you let me know?

Because it’s my theory that you can’t.

Photo by Cindy West McGregor

 

A Love Letter

This is a love letter that I wrote a couple of months ago.  I hope it inspires you to do the same.

To be read on the down days…

Dear Carol,

I’m sorry you’re feeling down today.  Your energy is down, you ache, everything seems too much.  Easily overwhelmed, feeling worthless, feeling that you’ll never write again, never speak again, never do all the things you’ve been told you have to do to have a ministry.

I’m here to tell you that you are mistaken.  You will be able to write, study, speak to groups, have a wonderful ministry.  I know this because I am you on a good day.

Good days are when you have at least a little energy, enough to write a little, to read and stay focused.  You have good ideas for talks.  You wonder about things, you ponder.  You feel you can handle a talk now and then.

Great days are coming again to you, too.  Those days you have energy to work on your ministry all day, you have great passion for your work.  You see God everywhere!  It’s exciting!

It’s okay to have down days.  The up days are coming, maybe as soon as tomorrow.  But while you’re feeling down, don’t berate yourself.  Try to just rest and know that God is still working, you haven’t disappointed him.  You will be okay.

Don’t beat yourself up.  Please.  When you have the energy, you will do it.  If you have no energy, it’s time to rest.  Don’t worry that you can’t focus to read or write.  Don’t worry that you’re just staring at the TV.  Don’t let the father of lies fill you with remorse and bitterness. 

When you hold off the lies, the light shines through.  Let it through.  You will feel better shortly.  Just rest in God.  You can do it.  I know you can.

Love,

Carol

Experiences

Have you ever experienced something that you never want to experience again? 

Have you ever been to a place that you would never visit a second time?

That’s the way it’s been with my depression and anxiety. 

It was so bad in 2001 that I was close to suicidal.

I’m sure it was coming on for a while before it got to the crisis part, but I didn’t know what was happening.

At its worst, this is what would happen every morning before work.  I was alone in the house.  The rest of the family had gone their own ways.

I would stay in bed for as long as possible. 

I was scared to go to work.  I was scared to go anywhere, even out of bed.

I had started a new job that I liked a lot with more money.  I wasn’t afraid of the job.  I liked my co-workers and they liked me.  But I was scared.

After I finally got out of bed and got dressed, sort of on automatic, I would have to go sit down on the couch in the den. 

My chest would hurt.  Not like a throbbing pain, but more like lightening as it streaks across the sky. 

The pain would start on my left side and then, in a very jagged, abrupt way, go to my right.  It was hard to breathe. 

I had to talk myself into going to work. 

I thought I was losing my mind.  I didn’t know what was happening, and I was scared. 

I had a running monologue inside my head, constantly telling me to act natural.  Don’t let anyone know anything is wrong.  They can’t know, it will be embarrassing, and then what would I do?  What would I do?  What would I do?

I would obsess about what to do next.  I would have wild thoughts banging around in my head.  I was so scared.

I would finally talk myself into going to work, driving about 10 miles to the office.  I was desperate to act normally.  They couldn’t know.  It was unthinkable, unbearable.  They must not know.

At lunch, I would drive a few miles to Taco Bell, use the drive through, get a Mexican pizza and a drink, drive straight into a parking space, and sit there trying to eat a little, and obsess about having to go back to work after lunch.

So anxious.  Chest hurting.  Thinking I was losing my mind. 

What would I do?  What would I say?  What would I do?  What would I say?  Vicious, vicious, unrelenting words.

Only because I was frantic to appear normal, I would talk myself into going back to work on time. 

It was so hard to leave that parking lot.  How I wanted to stay there forever…

I must act normally.  No one can know this awful secret.

Except my close friend Margaret.  She encouraged me greatly to see my doctor. 

She said he would ask me questions like “Have you lost interest in things you normally enjoy?” or “Are you sleeping a lot more or a lot less?”

I went to the doctor and told him that a friend of mine thought I might be depressed.  I had seen this doctor for years.  He knew me well. 

He looked at me and said, “Well, I guess you could be depressed.  Do you think you are?” 

Unfair question.  I wasn’t coping.  I couldn’t tell him what I thought.  I didn’t know what I thought. 

I was afraid the vicious words swirling around in my head would come out of my mouth, so I just shrugged.

He gave me a prescription for an antidepressant.  I had it filled.  Although I started to feel a little better after a few weeks, the side effects were not good.  I changed antidepressants a couple of times before I had one I could live with.

I started to come out of that dark, desperate pit.  I didn’t make it all the way out, but it was better. 

My anxiety ramped way down, for which I was incredibly grateful.  I started to interact with the folks around me in a more natural way. 

In my attempt of appearing normal, I had shrunk away from contact with others.  It was exhausting trying to stay put together so my secret wouldn’t get out. 

It would have been so good to go to bed and stay there.  I was so close to doing that before I started the meds. 

After five years of taking several different antidepressants, I got stuck kind of in between being depressed and feeling normal.  I was at least to the point where I knew I needed some professional help.

I started seeing a psychiatrist I had worked for years ago.  She changed my medication and saw me every 2 or 3 months for the next 10 years.

The medication change was just right, and I began to feel so much better.  Talking with her helped just as much.  She saw me through more than one crisis, and helped me with issues from my past.

I told her that I wouldn’t take my own life because of my faith.  Even in my worst moments, I knew there was hope in Christ.  If not for that, I might have tried it. 

But I just knew – in a purely intellectual way because my emotions were smothered by the depression – that God was there and He would get me through. 

I didn’t know how or when or why He had even allowed this to happen to me.  But I knew He would save me.  Again.

 

 

Yogurt and Gasoline

What does a full tank of gas and yogurt that tastes like Boston Crèam Pie have in common?

They both put a spark in my honey’s eye! 

My Honey

David never, ever liked yogurt until Yoplait came out with wonderful flavors that don’t taste like yogurt at all.  We’re now both hooked on flavors like Apple Turnover, Red Velvet Cake, Cinnamon Roll and Triple Berry Torte.

But when I come in from the grocery store with Boston Cream Pie Yogurt, his smile is extra big.  He knows that I don’t eat that particular flavor, so I bought it just for him.

However, his smile is practically non-existent when he uses my car and finds the gas tank in desperate want.  My idea of needing to fill up is when the little reminder light has been on for a few days.  Definition of the word “few”:  Being more than one but indefinitely small in number.  (It’s the indefinitely part that we argue about).

In my defense, I point out that I don’t drive very far anymore, to which he replies, “You won’t be going anywhere with an empty tank of gas.”  I hate it when he’s right.  So I try to always have at least half a tank to cut down on the disapproving frowns.

These are little things, but I do them because I love David and he loves me.  And he does little things for me, too.  It’s all part of having a relationship with him.

‘Course, relationships are very complex.  Taken by itself, being thoughtful is sort of a small thing.

But that’s what makes it so simple, and that’s what makes it so profound. 

To meet a simple need in the midst of a multifaceted relationship is to touch the other in a very deep place.  It is enormously gratifying to be dear enough to someone who will show the depth of their love by doing this just for you.

And if this is true of connections between human beings, how much greater is it when God Himself meets a simple need of ours?

I just love it when He does that…

What I Know About Marriage

I’ve been married a l-o-o-o-n-g time.  I’ve been married my entire life minus 18 years.

I look back on who I was when David and I got married, and sometimes I laugh out loud remembering the things I thought  and what I said.  I must have been a royal pain in the keester.  I’m surprised anyone from that era will even speak to me today.

Fortunately, I’ve changed quite a bit.  It’s hard to relate Carol at 18 to Carol at 61.  I’m all grown up now; past growing up, really.  I’m entering the elderly department.  New expectations.

The new expectations are from others.  I know I look my age, so there’s no doubt of the phase of life I’m in.  I’m recovering from knee replacement, so I know that I look kinda pathetic taking one stair at a time and being very careful about it. 

One of my biggest fears is falling.  Carol at 18 or even Carol at 55 didn’t have that fear.  It goes with the elderly department, which, in my mind, is always accessed by elevator.

You don’t realize how long hallways can be and how daunting stairs appear until you somehow can’t manage to traverse them.

Growing old means lots of changes.  I wonder how many couples stay together because it’s just not worth the trouble of parting?  I always told David that if we ever got a divorce, he was getting the kids!  We joke that that was the only thing keeping us together, and now we’re staying because of the cats.

When I was 18 and David was 20, we repeated the marriage vows with no comprehension whatsoever of what they meant or how we were going to live them out.

When we reached our 25^th anniversary, we renewed our vows, this time knowing what they meant.

Or at least I thought so.

Seven years ago, my world collapsed.  David was diagnosed with severe congestive heart failure, with the real possibility that his heart would suddenly stop.  He was a workaholic who had retired the year before so he could run a business of lawn care, stump grinding, odd jobs, part-time at a hardware store.  He loved it, being his own boss, doing what he enjoyed. 

But on that day in February 2006, his world collapsed, too.  He had no idea that he had heart problems.  He is blessed in that he has few symptoms.  On paper, he was a wreck, but in person, he looked fine.

So now we find ourselves living with this illness and around this illness and through this illness.  It defines us in many ways.  We have to work around it a lot.  Our dreams have changed and will continue to change as we face each crisis as it comes.

If we renewed our vows now after 42 years of marriage, would I know what they meant?  Would I realize what I was getting myself into?  Would I even bother to voice them if I thought I wasn’t going to follow through and do them?

My answer:  I would know better what they meant, but I wouldn’t believe that I knew them completely.  I was full of pride early on because I thought I was in control.  Even at the 25-year mark, I thought I could manipulate any situation to fit our needs.

That’s almost laugh-out-loud funny.  What a fool I was!  Pride goeth before a fall, and I learned that the hard way.

David and I have stayed together all these years because we love and respect each other, and we have fought hard at times to keep our marriage afloat.  People can’t go through these life altering events without being changed. 

That’s what the vows possess.  Even as we change, it’s their power that stays with us.  God uses that power to sustain us, “us” meaning both, not one at a time, but us together.

So be it for a l-o-o-o-n-g time…

 

Wow! What a Friend!

We are taught that we should talk to God as if he were a friend.  Some prefer to talk to Jesus, some to the Holy Spirit.  Doesn't matter.

I thought about that friend aspect of it and how I talk with my friends.  It's just not the same.  We are told in the Bible to ask, to be persistent in our prayers, to pray continuously, etc.  So how do I do all those things?

I started talking to God just like I was talking to a friend.  One on one.  Just He and me.  It was awkward.  I was used to just stating my wants, trying to listen for a response, lifting up names and situations throughout the day.  But talking to him like I talk to another person?  Wasn't happening.

So I prayed.  I really wanted to have God as my friend in addition to my Savior.  I started paying attention to how I talk to my friends, what things I said and how I said them.  Then I talked to God like that but with the same requests.

At first, I felt ridiculous.  Why was I reciting the same things over and over?  I wouldn't do that with a human friend who may or may not remember what I've told them; why should I do that with the God of the universe?  Surely he could remember the details of why I want blessings on friends and family.

I wanted to stop this experiment in prayer because I felt silly doing it.  Yet I was compelled to stick with it a little longer.  I felt the Holy Spirit had something for me just around the next corner, if I would only give it another chance.

What I found was the best understanding of prayer I have ever had.  When I just couldn't force myself to repeatedly repeat my cares, I found myself going past the just-asking point.  I started talking to God about the whole situation, not just what I thought should happen or just saying "Your will be done."  I talked with him about the history of these things, what had worked and what hadn't.  This part was not a repeat of earlier prayers.  I felt like it was more like how I would talk in a two-way conversation.

But God doesn't care if I repeat.  Like a good friend who has heard this story many times, He patiently listens and sends love to me through my soul.  As I talk to him, I receive His thoughts on the matter, things I would never have thought of on my own.  I go deeper into the request, finding new layers I didn't know existed, even with old, old stories that have twisted and turned through the years.

I believe that every time I post on my blogs, every time I present a program at church or at the local city jail, there is someone who needs to hear it.  Sometimes I suspect that person is me.  So I offer this to you just in case God has picked you this time.

Whoa vs Woe

Do you tell everyone you meet what Jesus has done for you?  No, me neither. 

Do you wait for that just-right-moment before bringing it up?  Well, of course. 

And how often does that just-right-moment come up?  Well, I mean, if you’re going to get technical…

For if I [merely] preach the Gospel, that gives me no reason to boast, for I feel compelled of necessity to do it. Woe is me if I do not preach the glad tidings (the Gospel).                                                                                                                                               1 Corinthians 9:16 (AMP)

What I get from this verse is that we should be compelled to weave the Gospel throughout our normal, everyday conversations, and that we should be doing it in a normal, everyday way.

I struggle with this one a lot.  I want to be able to throw in a praise or two for Jesus, but it just sounds so pious and snooty.  Like “you don’t got what I got.”  Even to other professing Christians, it’s the same thing.  Like “I know you got it, but I got it better.”

That’s what it sounds like in my ears.  It’s not what I’m thinking.  I want to come across as genuine.  I want to be genuine.

Do you know what regret is?  Yeah, me too.  The I shoulda, coulda, woulda thoughts that go round and round in my head. 

In the above passage, Paul says “Woe is me.”  Woe, although it’s pronounced like the overused “whoa,” does not have a positive meaning to it.  It’s a negative, such as sadness and misery.  And regret.

I wonder if Paul ever had regrets as he waited out his sentence in the Roman prisons.  I wonder if he ever laid awake at night and thought, “Gee, I wish I had today to do over again.  I wasted so many opportunities to talk about the Good News.”

It’s certainly a subject that I should be losing sleep over.  Anybody with me on this?

But the Good News that Paul speaks of is truly good, because we get another chance to get it right.  Every day is a new day, time to try it again, to practice what God wants us to do.

If anyone has reason to regret, it’s God Himself, for creating these wimpy, self-centered creatures.  But He doesn’t regret because He cannot.  It’s not His nature.  He sees us every single second of our lives and He rejoices in us. 

Good News?  Wow!  We may want to amend that to read GREAT News!

Photo Courtesy of Cindy West McGregor