heavenly homes: The Empty Nest

heavenly homes: The Empty Nest: September 15, 2013 was the official date that we became empty nesters.  I expected to be in the bed with severe depression for at least a co...

The Empty Nest

September 15, 2013 was the official date that we became empty nesters.  I expected to be in the bed with severe depression for at least a couple of weeks and to need some pretty in-depth therapy for at least six months.  After all, being a stay-at-home mom to my five children was my life's calling for the last 26 years.  One day, out of the blue, you have no more children at home.  Just like that, my career of being a stay-at-home mom ended.  Kitty left for her YWAM program in New York and something strange happened....

 

 I started sleeping late.  I started giving all of my attention to my husband. I bought some dance lessons on Groupon.  I began to do some things that I wanted to do.  I reconnected with several old friends. I started noticing hundreds of things to be thankful for and counting my blessings.  As the days passed, I realized that I was more content and peaceful than I had expected to be.  Want to know why? Because the expression "empty nest" is not a term that is applicable to people whose hearts are full and my heart is full!  I have five children who love the Lord and who love me. There is no greater joy on the face of the earth than to know that your children are walking with the Lord.  I am not empty.  I am full of joy and peace and my heart is at rest. I would go so far as to say that I am rich. Rich in the things with eternal consequences.  The condition of my heart is not dependent on how many children I have under my roof.  How silly was I to buy into that?! I was sad most of last year because I was dreading the dreaded "empty nest."  I know God and I should have known better.

In Ecclesiastes, King Solomon writes about the futility of life.  He asks a lot of questions and repeats himself  a lot but in the end he makes it clear that the "things" of life are meaningless.  He encourages us to look for joy in the companionship of our mates, a cheerful disposition and a reverence for God.  Amen King Solomon, good preaching.

Eccl. 3:1 says: "There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven."This verse has given me so much comfort and hope in the different seasons in my life. The footnote in my Disciples Study Bible says:

        God has constructed His world so that different events come and go on schedule. The world God created has a well-balanced structure.  He holds everything together in His wise and omnipotent hand.

It is such a relief to know that my times are in God's hands.  God is good. He is faithful and I can trust Him. The book of Ecclesiastes does not offer the final light to a worthwhile life, but it does lead us to praise Jesus Christ all the more for bringing the final Light that gives supreme worth to life.  Both here on earth and in eternity.

So I'm good. Really good.  But if you are in a season of life that is very difficult for you and you are not good, I have some suggestions that I pray will help you:

1) Be gentle with yourself.  Sleep late.  Take a nap.  Put away your to-do list. Delegate responsibilities. Learn to say "no."

2) Breathe deeply.  Go ahead take about seven really deep, slow breaths.  It is good for you.

3) Take care of yourself.  Eat well and exercise. Drink lots of pure water.  Really simple to do.

4) Find a happy place to visit...your little heaven on earth.  Mine is Collier's Nursery here in Birmingham.  Go to your place and drink it all in.

5) Try something new.  I bought some French CD's so that I can be fluent when Rusty takes me to Paris someday!  What have you always wanted to do? Run a marathon? Paint like the masters? Learn to sew or knit? Go back to school? Grow a rose garden?The sky is the limit.

6) Dream and plan for the future.  Don't lose hope.

7) Surround yourself with positive life-giving friends who love you and who will pray for you and speak truth to you.

8) Give thanks.  This simple practice can change your life. Have you read Ann Voskamp's book One Thousand Gifts? Visit her blog at www.aholyexperience.com

9) Help someone else. Find a way each day to do something for someone else.  Something as simple as smiling holding the door for a stranger can make their day.

10) Count your blessings.

Calm My Anxious Heart: A Woman's Guide to Contentment by Linda Dillow has had a very positive impact on me and all of my family and friends who have read it.  It is a great companion book for a difficult season.

Be at rest dear friends.  God has you in the palm of His hand.

I hope to share more frequently as the Lord leads me.  I welcome your comments and suggestions for future topics.

Blessings to you and yours,
JoAnne

"This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it." Psalm 118:24

The True Love Waits Fallout

I DON’T WAIT ANYMORE.

Posted by gracefortheroad in The Mercy and tagged with follow Jesus, i don't wait anymore, love Jesus, purity ring, singleness, true love waits, waitingFebruary 3, 2012

When I was 16, I got a purity ring.

And when I was 25, I took it off.

I didn’t tell anyone I was doing it — it wasn’t a statement or an emotional thing. I just slipped it off my finger that day and, before tucking it away in a box, ran my finger around the words on the familiar gold band.

“True Love Waits.” Waits.

What’s it “waiting” for, anyway?

*****

I had my reasons for deciding not to wear it anymore. Other people might have other reasons. It’s a graveyard of hearts, this place where single church girls crash into their late 20s and early 30s. Churches see the symptoms. They scramble to reach out to the ever-growing young adult singles crowd who feels alienated by family-oriented services.

But there’s something bigger behind it than that.

Much bigger.

There are a lot of girls out there who don’t know who God is anymore – the God of their youth group years just isn’t working out. Back then, that God said to wait for sex until they are married, until He brings the right man along for a husband. They signed a card and put it on the altar and pledged to wait.

And wait they did.

*****

And waited and waited and waited.

Some of them have prayed their whole lives for a husband, and he hasn’t shown up. They’ve heard the advice to “be the woman God made you to be, focus on that, and then the husband will come.” They’ve read “Lady in Waiting,” gotten super involved in church and honed their domestic skills.

And still they wait.

More than a decade ago, a youth leader handed them a photocopied poem in Sunday School written to them from “God” that said, “The reason you don’t have anyone yet is because you’re not fully satisfied in Me. You have to be satisfied with Me and then when you least expect it, I’ll bring you the person I meant for you.”

And the girls see it posted on their bulletin boards from time to time.

“You’re right, God,” they say. “We’re not satisfied in you yet. We will put you first and then you can bring us a husband in your timing.”

But many of them – if they’re honest – will tell you that time has passed, and it’s wrecking their view of God.

If this is who God’s supposed to be, then He’s tragically late.

So some decide to chuck “Lady in Waiting” out the window … and possibly their virginity with it. Church goes next. God might go next, too. If He doesn’t answer these prayers after they’ve held up their end of the bargain, why would He answer any others?

Whether it was the fault of the leaders, the fault of us girls, or both, a tragedy happened back then.

A lot of girls were sold on a deal and not on a Savior.

*****

I had that poem on my bulletin board all through high school – the one where “God” was telling me to fall in love with Him first and then I would be able to fall in love with a husband later.

Who wrote that poem anyway?

Pretty sure it wasn’t God.

When Jesus was here on the earth, the crowds would follow Him because they saw He gave good things. But that’s not what He wanted. He wanted their hearts for Himself. So He would turn to them and say things like, “If you don’t love Me so much that every other relationship in your life looks like hate by comparison, you can’t follow Me.” (Matthew 10:34-39, paraphrase)

That sounds a lot different from the poem.

Christ is the source of everything we need and the giver of all good gifts … but in telling people about Him, it’s possible we’ve sold them on a solution for life’s problems and not life itself.

What if we as girls had learned early on that having Him was everything, not a means to the life we think He would want us to have.

If we had learned we don’t abstain from sex because we’re “waiting.” We abstain because we love Him.

If I’d had on my bulletin board, “Fall in love with Jesus.” That’s it. Bottom line. That’s everything you need to know, to work toward, to put your hope in.

If I’d learned who He is, what He wants, how to give Him everything, not “wait” so that one day I could give my everything to someone else.

If I’d learned that it’s not bad to pray for a husband, but that my greater prayer should be for Him to spend my life as He chooses for His glory.

If we as believers make that our message, things could be drastically different for a lot of girls wondering why the God they think they learned to follow doesn’t compute. It doesn’t necessarily stop the desire for a husband or end all feelings of loneliness, but it does show a God who provides, loves and gives infinite purpose even to our singleness rather than a God who categorically denies some who pray for husbands while seemingly giving freely to others.

It shows that while marriage is good, He is the greater goal.

*****

Don’t think I’ve done this perfectly.

I’d be deceiving you if you thought that. I’ve had relationships where I made major mistakes. I’ve gone through angst-ridden phases where I met with friends to plead together with God to bring us husbands. I’ve planned major life decisions around possibilities.

I lived like I was waiting for something.

And that’s why I slipped off my ring that day. It wasn’t that I wanted to sleep with people – I haven’t. It wasn’t a slap to True Love Waits, or to anyone who wears a purity ring – saving sex for marriage is good and is His design.

I just didn’t want to wait anymore – didn’t want to live like I was waiting on anyone to get here.

I already have Him … and He is everything.

“Follow Christ for His own sake, if you follow Him at all.” – J.C. Ryle