Month: February 2018

Uncategorized

on singleness and relationships

alyssapebbles

Lately I’ve been inundated with wisdom about Christian singleness, dating and marriage. It’s the “ring before spring” season, and people are seeming to pair up faster than I can keep up. My heartstrings are being pulled as I am more aware of my singleness than ever- it’s hard not to equate it with aloneness. 

As someone who has never been in a committed, long-term relationship, it’s something my heart desperately longs for. To have someone to share experiences with- someone to share my life with. Someone to have long conversations into the night with, someone who will always be there for me and encourage me in my faith. It’s hard not to idealize and romanticize, to really believe that my life would not be any better without that “special someone.”

I want romance- I want to be pursued. I want someone to want to know me deeply down to my core, and to love me despite all my little quirks and bad habits. Despite the fact that I am deeply flawed and not actually worthy of love.

I want to be known.

It really is the greatest desire of the human heart- to be known truly and loved deeply just as we are. Being loved like this will inspire us to become better, but true love never comes with that expectation. It meets us where we’re at. It reminds us that we are beautiful creations and calls out the very best in us. True love doesn’t expect us to change but it will inevitably change us as we become more of who it tells us we are.

Because God is love. In Him is perfect love, and this love sets us free- free to be who we are, who God made us to be. And guess what? We can’t find this in a person.

There is no person on earth who can love you the way you were made to be loved. 

There is no person who can fill the aching hole in you that cries out to be known. No person can do that for you, except the Person of Christ.

He made you, and He knows the exact dimensions and shape of that hole. He knows just the way to satisfy you and fulfill you, if you will seek relationship with Him instead of trying to fill it with the imperfect love of other humans.

Now, all that being said, He also created us to be in relationship with others:

It is not good for man to be alone.

~Genesis 2:18

And specifically, He created Adam and Eve, male and female, to be together in a very particular and intimate way that is different from the way that they are in relationship with others.

It’s part of the design. A man leaves his family and is united with a woman, and they become one. This design reflects our relationship with God- we leave our flesh behind and become united with Him in Spirit. It’s the most intimate and beautiful relationship we could ever have: where two become one.

Of course we long for that and crave it. It seems like the answer and end to all loneliness, and it is- in God. We can find perfect intimacy and oneness with Him, and we can come very close to that with other humans, but we will never experience complete unity with other people on this side of Heaven. No one can know us and love us completely and wholly except our Creator.

As I continue to wait for my person, I do so not impatiently but relishing in the gift of singleness. I am reminded that during this season my heart can be completely His, not distracted by another person. As He pursues me and continues to draw me to Himself, He will help me to continue to become the kind of person who is able to be in a healthy relationship- one that is giving and encouraging instead of self-centered. One that is focused on Him and united in purpose. I understand that now, with more clarity than I ever have before. I can finally trust him with my relationships and longings, instead of taking matters into my own hands and winding up even more hurt and lonely.

Maybe you have been hurt in the past, and don’t believe that anyone will actually love you completely for who you are. Maybe you’ve lost hope that there is someone out there for you, that there is someone who really does want to know you and love you. It’s easy to become discouraged and to lose hope. I find myself doing that sometimes when I look around me and it seems as though everyone is in a happily committed relationship- as though all of their relational needs are being met while I am still here alone and unknown. But that isn’t the truth.

The truth is that even people who are in relationships can be lonely. I know this because I know lonely people who are in relationships. The only way to be free of the loneliness that we all feel- regardless of whether we have a significant other- is to bring our needs before the Lord. He is our comforter, lover, and best friend. He is the one who will provide us with companionship and intimacy when we feel alone, the one with whom we can share our joys and our fears, our hopes and our disappointments. He wants to be intimately involved in our lives, so much so that He gave us His Spirit. We never have to be alone.

Although there are times when I long deeply to be in a romantic relationship, I know those longings are only pointing me back to my Creator, and when the time is right, He will fulfill that desire. But for now, I continue to trust Him and lay out my life before Him. My identity is not in whether or not I am in a relationship with another person- it is in my relationship with Him.

 

 

Uncategorized

the war

alyssapebbles

There is a war going on. It’s all around us, and if we can train our eyes to see it, we can begin to learn how to fight.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

~Ephesians 6:12-17

I have never felt more spiritually attacked than when I was working for the church. The enemy did not want me in the church. He did not want me discovering God’s power in me, the impact I could have on the body of Christ. He hates the church with a passion- it is one of his greatest desires to destroy the church. And he does it by slowly picking away at each member- at the most basic levels of their worth and identity.

I let his sneaky and conniving voice take up space in my mind with lies. I gave him room in my heart to get comfy with bitterness and envy. I allowed him to intimidate me with fear and shame, to shake my confidence in the One who loves me and instead be suspicious of His motives. Instead of fighting with the armor of my Beloved- the belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness- I succumbed to the darkness and gave it power over me.

Because that’s the thing about this war: we get to decide who we let have the power in our lives. God has the ultimate power, and He doesn’t need to convince us of that. It’s in His nature. It’s who He is: the omniscient, all-powerful God. His still, small voice can move mountains.

The devil, on the other hand, has to do a lot of convincing. He has to inundate us with poisonous lies and try enormously hard to make us think he has even an ounce of authority. He tries to capture our attention with cheap distractions and plays on our fleshly desires. He, like God, knows our sinful condition and how prone we are to give into our temptations if we’re not careful. And when we do, he’s quick to catch us in the trap and remind us of how very sinful and hopeless we are.

But if God has the victory, then why do we still fall into his snare? Why does the darkness sometimes feel like the realest thing, and His truth far from true?

Because there was a fall.

And the prince of darkness rules the earth…for now. God is making everything right, and restoring everything and everyone to Himself, but in the meantime Satan is still rampant and looking for victims:

Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.

~1 Peter 5:8

This battle is not only going on in the spiritual realm- it is going on inside of us. We are not passive in this fight. We must actively engage with God and remain strengthened in Him and His truth or we will be subject to the tactics of the enemy.

Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

~James 4:7

Fortunately for us, we are not alone in the fight. We have God’s Spirit in us, and with Him we are more than equipped to stand against the wiles of the devil and his angels. The more we begin to recognize His voice and know His character, the more we will be able to recognize what is not from Him. We will be able to discern the truth from the lies. We will see the enemy clearly for who he is: a thief who comes only to kill and destroy. And when that happens, his power over us is gone.

This battle is not like any other. It is not fought with violence, but with peace. It is fought with hope and joy, with trust and faith. It is by abiding in our Father and remaining in Him- not by our own strength- that we will be able to stand.

Uncategorized

unashamed

alyssapebbles

Those who look to him are radiant;

There faces are never covered with shame.

~Psalm 34:5

Since I have decided to follow Christ with my life, I have been inexplicably drawn to people who seem to know Him, and I mean really know Him. The people that have that glint in their eye as they speak about Him, as though He is their most intimate and truest friend.

I have known very few people who have this kind of relationship with Him, but when I meet them and get to know them, I know that I want what they have. I want to know Him like that- like a best friend and ever-present companion, like someone who is always so close and so near that I can feel Him breathing through my lungs. The people who know Him like that are not ashamed of Him- they can do nothing but exude His presence in the lives of those around them; it emits from their very being. They are always thinking about Him and talking about Him- and talking to Him. They are so deeply in love with Him.

It should not be unusual to meet people like this, especially in the church. But it is.

How many people do you really know who completely lay down their lives for Him, who live and breathe His breath? Who constantly meditate on His word, and continually abide in His presence? I know very few.

My question is: why are we ashamed of Christ?

Why are we afraid to seem “overly spiritual” or even perhaps crazy to people who don’t know Him? What are we to gain by stifling His spirit in us?

In modern, Western culture Christianity, it is okay to go to church and be involved serving in the body of Christ, so long as you don’t offend others with your faith. It is okay as long as you don’t weird people out with your relationship to the Lord by talking to Him or being led by the Spirit in certain ways that people don’t understand. As a result, we’ve discouraged personal relationship. We’ve encouraged public testimony and appearing a certain way. But we’ve forgotten the whole point: Christ.

We’ve forgotten the whole reason we signed up for this thing in the first place; all this pain and sacrifice and dying to self. It’s all because of Him, and if we weren’t in love with Him, we would never go through all this. If our faith is not motivated by love for Christ, but instead becomes a way to make ourselves look good, we are lost. When we judge our brothers and sisters for the way God manifests Himself in their lives, as though He can only work in one way, we lose our own connection to Him.

We have to stop trying to please people. We have to stop expecting our relationship to look the same as anybody else’s. The Creator of the Universe loves each of us in unique and wildly different ways. He gave us passions and interests and joys and fears, and He knows what makes each one of us tick. He loves it when we delight in Him, when we enjoy Him- because He enjoys us. When we begin to truly get to know Him, we unlock His heart. We can begin to understand the magnitude of His love for us, and it will absolutely overwhelm us.

Let’s not forget who our First and Last is, and let’s never let fear of what other people think cause us to be ashamed of Him.

He is not ashamed of us.

Uncategorized

perseverance

alyssapebbles

A close friend texted a word of encouragement to me the other day: it was an exhortation to keep persevering and enduring in this seemingly endless season of uncertainty in my life.

Though I’ve witnessed God’s powerful and life-changing work, there is still always the temptation to give up- to stop being hopeful and give into cynicism and discouragement over the reality of my circumstances.

But through it all, He has been guarding my heart and mind. He has given me the ability to persevere. I am able to get up early each morning instead of sleeping in, not knowing what my plans will be for the day but trusting that He will be in whatever I do- whether it’s applying for the twenty-fifth job or going on a spontaneous adventure with a friend. He’s in it. I don’t worry anymore because worry does absolutely nothing but hold us back.

If worry and fear are no longer options, there is only one choice: to press on. To continue in Him with strength and discipline, to move forward. Dwelling on the past and fretting about the future are both wastes of time, and He calls me to be with Him here and now.

Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

~Matthew 6:34

We spend so much energy worrying about things that are out of our control. We let our troubles consume us, as though obsessing about them will somehow make them go away. We magnify our problems and minimize Christ.

But God asks of us a simple obedience out of trust- to actually trust Him in all the trials we face, not just some. Once we begin to consistently obey Him in everything, we begin to experience the hard work of perseverance:

Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

~James 1:4

Of course God doesn’t allow hardship into our life to defeat us. Testing and trials are all for our benefit, and all can draw us closer to Him. The road ahead may look long and arduous, and the outcome may be unclear. You may only have a glimpse of the plan, or perhaps it is completely hazy. There will be dry spells and wilderness seasons. We will have times where we feel like we are wandering, unsure exactly where we are headed- or if we are headed anywhere at all. But we must not be discouraged in these times:

Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.”

~Joshua 1:9

That’s when we turn to what we can’t see- when our human lenses fail us, we must rely on faith. We must keep showing up and meeting with God. If we continue to hope and endure, He will reward us. We will begin to see the fruit in our lives that can only develop through trials: the fruits of patience, peace, gentleness, self-control- the fruit of joy. We will become mature and more and more like Christ, as he prunes away the dead parts of us that were getting in the way. We must look ahead to the other side of the mountain, where God is waiting with open arms.

But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

~Isaiah 40:31