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By Joan Kelley
Related to the Following Forward and Reviewing My Days Maps from Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story by Sibyl Towner and Sharon Swing.
Do you know what’s drawing you toward God and pulling you away from God these days?
I’ve been writing an almost daily blog for the last seven months. One huge blessing out of that is the time spent reviewing my day. In the midst of thinking about the highs and lows of the day were, I’ve been more able to recognize what God has been up to in my life. It gives me time to consider what I want to change for tomorrow, how I can parent differently, notice where I’ve seen a smidge of growth, where I need to laugh at myself more, qualities I need to celebrate in myself, character traits that can get me in trouble, and things to be thankful for. Do I see all these things every day? No, but I start to see patterns and themes and threads that I can follow or connect. And the year begins, it’s easier to think about what I want this new year to hold.
I’m asking: ‘What do I need to let go of as I enter 2010?’ and ‘What do I want to carry forward into 2010?’ I want to let go of things like my need for control and having my way, busyness and people pleasing. I want to hold onto seeking simplicity, joy, delight and gratitude, trusting God more, focusing on relationships first, listening with my whole self, finding my true self, being vs. doing. By looking at these two lists I now know what to say yes to and what to say no to. I am reminded when I say yes to one thing, I’m saying no to something else. My lists of letting go and holding on help me set expectations and boundaries in healthy ways. These lists are no longer just two sheets of paper, but a set of evolving ground rules that help me make choices throughout the day. They remind me what draws me toward God and others and what pulls me away. I wonder what your lists might look like. Share them with a friend this week or even in response to this blog.
SCRIPTURE REFLECTION:
“Draw near to God and He will draw near to Him.” James 4:8
QUESTION:
As you leave 2009, what do you need to let go of?
As you enter 2010, what do you want to carry forward?
Joan Kelley is a facilitator and teacher using the Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story, a visual workbook for small groups, mentoring relationships, workshops, retreats, classes, between spiritual friends, or individually to re-discover the storyline of the life they are authoring with God. More information is available at www.onelifemaps.com. Joan writes a daily blog at www.caringbridge.org/visit/willkelley.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
From Discontentment to Gratitude
By Cheri Hudspith
Related to the Reviewing My Day Map, Desires & Longings Map, and Valley Experiences Map from Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story by Sibyl Towner and Sharon Swing.
Last fall, I was troubled by the fact that I could not arrive at a contented place in a very big part of my life. I wanted desperately to live without the tension and burden of discontentment. I noticed that when I talked about the future, my voice was filled with angst and struggle. It was not the voice of a trusting daughter. I desire to be a trusting daughter of the Most High God. I started asking the Lord to show me the cause of my discontentment.
Apparently, this was something the Lord was pretty happy to supply an answer to. Through a series of events… a retreat in Colorado, questions asked by others in a bible study on Colossians, a serious physical trial being faced by a friend and a book called Choosing Gratitude by Nancy Leigh DeMoss, I discovered a hard truth. The Lord both gently and firmly with His still small voice said, “Cheri, you are demanding. In the places where you choose not to be grateful in all circumstances, you only know discontentment.”
Through the use of the Reviewing My Days Map, I have discovered that God is moving in this area of my life where I have been discontent. He’s just not doing it the way I want Him to do it or at the speed I want. My arrogance in this way of thinking is so profoundly heart breaking. Who am I to tell God how or when to do anything?! Now, it is more clear to me why I have resisted the Desires & Longings Map. I was afraid of being disappointed and being tempted to get bossy with God. I instinctively knew that I would be in potential conflict with God when I dared to give voice to what I desire and long for.
I am now making use of the Valley Experiences Map. What events in my life or ways of seeing the world need to be reframed by truth… truths about God and truths about me? While praying through this map, I’m having a series of new realizations that are helping me understand how my past hurts contribute to my tendencies toward ungrateful discontentment.
God has done a work in me. I can honestly say that I have moved from discontentment to contentment, angst to peace, bossiness to submissiveness and ungratefulness to gratitude. I have known the deep love of the Lord for me in the midst of the revelation of truth. I’m so grateful He heard my cries and has answered them. Praise be to God!
SCRIPTURE REFLECTION: “Never stop praying. Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus. Do not stifle the Holy Spirit.” 1 Thes. 5:17-19 NLT
QUESTION: Will you trust the Lord to show you where you struggle to be content or grateful? Are you being invited to discover how to be grateful in all circumstances?
Cheri Hudspith is a facilitator and teacher using the Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story, a visual workbook for small groups, mentoring relationships, workshops, retreats, classes, between spiritual friends, or individually to re-discover the storyline of the life they are authoring with God. More information is available at www.onelifemaps.com.
Related to the Reviewing My Day Map, Desires & Longings Map, and Valley Experiences Map from Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story by Sibyl Towner and Sharon Swing.
Last fall, I was troubled by the fact that I could not arrive at a contented place in a very big part of my life. I wanted desperately to live without the tension and burden of discontentment. I noticed that when I talked about the future, my voice was filled with angst and struggle. It was not the voice of a trusting daughter. I desire to be a trusting daughter of the Most High God. I started asking the Lord to show me the cause of my discontentment.
Apparently, this was something the Lord was pretty happy to supply an answer to. Through a series of events… a retreat in Colorado, questions asked by others in a bible study on Colossians, a serious physical trial being faced by a friend and a book called Choosing Gratitude by Nancy Leigh DeMoss, I discovered a hard truth. The Lord both gently and firmly with His still small voice said, “Cheri, you are demanding. In the places where you choose not to be grateful in all circumstances, you only know discontentment.”
Through the use of the Reviewing My Days Map, I have discovered that God is moving in this area of my life where I have been discontent. He’s just not doing it the way I want Him to do it or at the speed I want. My arrogance in this way of thinking is so profoundly heart breaking. Who am I to tell God how or when to do anything?! Now, it is more clear to me why I have resisted the Desires & Longings Map. I was afraid of being disappointed and being tempted to get bossy with God. I instinctively knew that I would be in potential conflict with God when I dared to give voice to what I desire and long for.
I am now making use of the Valley Experiences Map. What events in my life or ways of seeing the world need to be reframed by truth… truths about God and truths about me? While praying through this map, I’m having a series of new realizations that are helping me understand how my past hurts contribute to my tendencies toward ungrateful discontentment.
God has done a work in me. I can honestly say that I have moved from discontentment to contentment, angst to peace, bossiness to submissiveness and ungratefulness to gratitude. I have known the deep love of the Lord for me in the midst of the revelation of truth. I’m so grateful He heard my cries and has answered them. Praise be to God!
SCRIPTURE REFLECTION: “Never stop praying. Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus. Do not stifle the Holy Spirit.” 1 Thes. 5:17-19 NLT
QUESTION: Will you trust the Lord to show you where you struggle to be content or grateful? Are you being invited to discover how to be grateful in all circumstances?
Cheri Hudspith is a facilitator and teacher using the Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story, a visual workbook for small groups, mentoring relationships, workshops, retreats, classes, between spiritual friends, or individually to re-discover the storyline of the life they are authoring with God. More information is available at www.onelifemaps.com.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Living Forward
By Joan Kelley
Related to the Following Forward & My Life Story maps from Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story by Sibyl Towner and Sharon Swing.
Where do you tend to get stuck – the past, present or future?
It’s hard for me to believe that in a couple months my son, Will, is going to turn 17. Seven months ago he was diagnosed with leukemia. So I have to admit we were ready for 2009 to end. I think because of all that has happened, I have spent some extra time reflecting on his life and mine as we enter 2010.
It’s funny to me how these almost 17 years have flown by. If you had told me when Will was just a baby what was ahead, I think I wouldn’t have believed it. I wonder what I would have changed had I known. Perhaps I would have been more present when he talked or shown more love and less nagging, read more stories, made him finish his vegetables.
I know I can’t go back and relive it but I can live forward. Living forward requires living in the present first with an eye on the future, while learning from the past. Living forward means waking up and being grateful for the day and living it, really living it to its fullest, living it with the capacity that God gave me, living it simply, living it with less focus on me. Living forward means taking the moments during the day to have a snowball fight, play CandyLand when you don’t want to, letting the dishes sit there sometimes, reading the bedtime story vs. your newspaper, putting the Blackberry down so you can hear what they are saying, telling them specific things about their character that you see them developing.
Living forward is selfless and hard and doesn’t make sense sometimes to the human mind. But living forward takes the tension we live in between our past and present and the anxiety we may have about the future and forms a more healthy relationship among all three – past, present, future. The past doesn’t hold us captive, the future is not something we are dependent on for our happiness and in the end the present feels like a place where you can be content. I think I’ll make 2010 a year focused more on living forward.
SCRIPTURE REFLECTION:
“I'm not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don't get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I've got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I'm off and running, and I'm not turning back.” --Philippians 3:12-14
“Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don't get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.” –Matthew 6:34
QUESTION:
What can you do today and in the coming months to “live forward?” Share it with a friend this week.
Joan Kelley is a facilitator and teacher using the Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story, a visual workbook for small groups, mentoring relationships, workshops, retreats, classes, between spiritual friends, or individually to re-discover the storyline of the life they are authoring with God. More information is available at www.onelifemaps.com. Joan writes a daily blog at www.caringbridge.org/visit/willkelley.
Related to the Following Forward & My Life Story maps from Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story by Sibyl Towner and Sharon Swing.
Where do you tend to get stuck – the past, present or future?
It’s hard for me to believe that in a couple months my son, Will, is going to turn 17. Seven months ago he was diagnosed with leukemia. So I have to admit we were ready for 2009 to end. I think because of all that has happened, I have spent some extra time reflecting on his life and mine as we enter 2010.
It’s funny to me how these almost 17 years have flown by. If you had told me when Will was just a baby what was ahead, I think I wouldn’t have believed it. I wonder what I would have changed had I known. Perhaps I would have been more present when he talked or shown more love and less nagging, read more stories, made him finish his vegetables.
I know I can’t go back and relive it but I can live forward. Living forward requires living in the present first with an eye on the future, while learning from the past. Living forward means waking up and being grateful for the day and living it, really living it to its fullest, living it with the capacity that God gave me, living it simply, living it with less focus on me. Living forward means taking the moments during the day to have a snowball fight, play CandyLand when you don’t want to, letting the dishes sit there sometimes, reading the bedtime story vs. your newspaper, putting the Blackberry down so you can hear what they are saying, telling them specific things about their character that you see them developing.
Living forward is selfless and hard and doesn’t make sense sometimes to the human mind. But living forward takes the tension we live in between our past and present and the anxiety we may have about the future and forms a more healthy relationship among all three – past, present, future. The past doesn’t hold us captive, the future is not something we are dependent on for our happiness and in the end the present feels like a place where you can be content. I think I’ll make 2010 a year focused more on living forward.
SCRIPTURE REFLECTION:
“I'm not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don't get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I've got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I'm off and running, and I'm not turning back.” --Philippians 3:12-14
“Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don't get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.” –Matthew 6:34
QUESTION:
What can you do today and in the coming months to “live forward?” Share it with a friend this week.
Joan Kelley is a facilitator and teacher using the Listen to My Life: Maps for Recognizing and Responding to God in My Story, a visual workbook for small groups, mentoring relationships, workshops, retreats, classes, between spiritual friends, or individually to re-discover the storyline of the life they are authoring with God. More information is available at www.onelifemaps.com. Joan writes a daily blog at www.caringbridge.org/visit/willkelley.
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