Lori Stanley Roeleveld's Blog, page 45

All the Broken Fathers

All the broken fathers who fell short of what we needed and all the faltering mothers who chose their own needs over ours,

they follow us, long after we’ve moved past them, into adulthood, into our own parenting, into our relationship with God. It is the first failing we own, our inability to heal our parents’ brokenness. Before we even form a sense of ourselves we know, somehow, we’ve failed because our existence isn’t enough to make them whole.

Our portal into this world, the first voices we hear, first eyes that drink us in, first hands that receive us, are also our introduction to its fragile nature, its bondage to sin, its fallen state. We gaze into the eyes of these sinners falling deeply in love.

As we grow in the shadow of their brokenness, we beam our love in their direction like healing rays, like spiritual laser treatments, as if sin was a form of TB and our love was the sun; willing them to be what somehow we know they can, projecting behind them a brilliant shadow, their perfect selves, even as we avoid the blows raining down on us from the darker reality of those on whom we rely for nurturance, provision, and instruction in this life.

We’re stubborn in our love, even if they break us, walk away, tear our hearts from our chests, or neglect us, leave us lying hungry and bleeding, still we love them and will them to love us with the perfect love we know by faith exists and is our birthright. Much of our adult lives is about seeking redemption for failing to love them into perfection, into wholeness, into their greater selves.

We brace against the howling in the wind, screaming about apples that don’t fall far from trees, about the sins of the fathers visited on the sons, about generational curses and spoiled inheritance. But there is a greater voice that whispers pure truth into the gale and we strain to receive it where we stand, “The word of the Lord came to me: “What do you mean by repeating this proverb concerning the land of Israel, ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge’? As I live, declares the Lord God, this proverb shall no more be used by you in Israel. Behold, all souls are mine; the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is mine: the soul who sins shall die.” Ezekiel 18:1-4 (ESV)

For even the children of broken fathers and babies abandoned by wandering mothers find wholeness, hope, a home in Jesus Christ. “For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in.” Psalm 27:10 (ESV)

And it is within His love we find our perfect Father, and beneath His wings we know a mother’s unbroken soul and from within His great heart, we discover the power to heal ourselves and those we love, through forgiveness, mercy, and grace. And so, we receive the remedy for our own brokenness so that we can be the answer to the prayers of our own children, so our offspring will be freed from our failings and healed of the brokenness that would be our legacy if it weren’t for Jesus.

It’s in this way we stand, no fall to our knees beside our broken fathers and our fallen mothers and cry, “Mercy, Lord, have mercy on us all.” “Abba, Father,” we cry, “save us, from our wounds and from our power to wound our children.”

The burden of this fallen planet is evidenced in the scars children bear from broken fathers and mothers with twisted souls. In this we bleed and weep.

But the One who lived, a perfect Son, and fulfilled a perfect Father’s will, this Jesus, has secured for us a place where all wounded children find the answer to the perfect love they knew, by faith, existed all along.

It’s not a false hope, loved one. Your name is not Forever Wounded, Not Enough, Unloved, Rejected, Damaged, or Abandoned. No. Those are lies the darkness whispered as you wept alone at night. Your true name is Cherished Child of the Most High God, Redeemed from the Land of Lost Children, Made Whole in the Grace of the Living God, Restored in the Name of Jesus, Adopted into the Eternal Family, One Who is Enough for the Perfect God.

Your true name is written on the palms of His hands and it’s those hands that reach for you now to hold you, to heal you, to guide you into the freedom that awaits you in His great heart. Take His hand, loved one, and know your Father receives you just as you are.

All the Broken Fathers (and mothers) https://t.co/t4szK6B3i6 key to surviving our childhood and living free #amwriting #childabuse #healing

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) May 30, 2016

It’s Not the Fall That’ll Kill You . . .

It’s not the fall that’ll kill you . . .

It’s not really the landing either.

What will kill you, or drive you batty, or rob you of joy, or complicate your recovery is constantly replaying that last step, the single decision, the wrong choice, or the split-second the bad thing happened and sent you off the edge in the first place. That’s the death sentence.

I should know.

When my son was fourteen, he woke me early in the morning after he’d been battling flu all night. As I dressed, he availed himself of the upstairs bathroom. Suddenly, I heard a thud. By the time I reached the hallway, he met with an odd look on his face. “I think I hurt myself,” he said. Then he turned and I realized he’d fallen against our old iron radiator and suffered 2nd and 3rd degree burns on his back. He recovered but for weeks, I replayed that thud, as if I could get back to that moment in time and change the events.

I’m experiencing it again now. This past Saturday, I attempted to reach an outlet I could just see over the top of several large slabs of sheet rock my husband had leaning in the hallway. I thought I could nudge it just enough to reach the plug but instead, over 1000 pounds of drywall fell in my direction, landing on me, trapping me in the hall, and smashing my foot. I’ll live (just one broken metatarsal and lots of soft tissue trauma) despite the drama of the ensuing rescue. Still, ever since the accident, I keep reliving that moment, as if I could bridge the time/space continuum and rewrite the choice to nudge, sparing myself the entire affair.

I’ve done that before. Obsessed over other choices – sinful decisions, poor judgment, missed opportunities – and driven myself over the cliff of useless mental games more times than I want to admit. But this week, I discovered a cure.

You see, I believe if it was useful for us to go backwards in time, God would work that out for us. He is outside of time. He can travel at will. If redoing our choices was the answer, He’d arrange that. Instead, He promises that all things will work together for good for those who love the Lord. Instead of redoing our choices, He redeems them. “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28

So this week, I’ve made a conscious decision to believe God, to take Him at His Word. The next time following that decision that my mind wandered back to the hallway and my hand reaching for the outlet, I imagined the cross of Christ between me and the pile of sheet rock. I reminded myself that Christ died for me, that I laid everything at the cross, and that my life belongs to Him. He has the last Word over all my choices.

The cross loomed larger in my mind than my foolish choice and reminded me and Satan that God will work, even this, together for good. When I did that, I imagined the living vine that is Jesus covering the sheet rock, the broken glass, my broken foot, my skinned elbow, my lumpy noggin, and instead of feeling foolish and stressed, I felt excited to see what God will do.

My mind still keeps dragging me back to the moment but the cross and the vine are there, too, and I now experience freedom from condemnation. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:1

God’s gift of imagination is too often used for evil rather than good. An imagination informed by God’s Word can be a healing thing. I’m excited now to apply this method of self-control over my thoughts by choosing to believe God’s Word to other times when Satan tries to drag me into the past and beat me up over things I can’t change.

Jesus owns my life now. Jesus has the last word on every choice. The living vine will have the last word on my swollen foot, the cast/boot, the crutches, and the days I lost in a haze of ice packs and pain killers. It won’t be the last bad decision I make or the last unfortunate thing that happens to me, but as I grow stronger in Christ, I pray it’s the last time I become a slave to the notion that the only way to overcome is to relive the past.

In Christ, I can move forward in time and still be an overcomer. Forward, that’s where the adventure lies.

Remember, it’s not the fall that will kill you . . . it’s missing the freedom found in Jesus Christ.

It's Not the Fall That Will Kill You https://t.co/DwaBhdJhZq Find out what will . . . #BadDecisions #amwriting #Redemption

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) May 20, 2016

Lord, Please Change My Crazy Husband!

Have you ever thought that if only your spouse were more righteous, more Biblical, more favored by God, well, then life would be so much better? Have you thought; if only he followed Jesus closer, read His Bible more, prayed more often, matured in Christ, well, then wouldn’t life be rosy?

None of these aspirations are bad. Would that all of us were more righteous, more Biblical, more favored by God. Would that all of us follow Jesus closer, read our Bibles more, prayed more often, and matured in Christ.

The assumed outcome of these  actions is the problem. Ask some Biblical wives what it was like to be married to righteous men. The word “rosy” won’t come up.

Mrs. Noah was married to the most righteous man of his time. It saved her life and the lives of her children but for one hundred years of ark building in a desert that had never seen rain, I’m betting Mrs. Noah suffered through more than her share of snide remarks and mocking snickers. Then there’s the long trip locked inside a floating brick full of filthy animals and the work of starting again, alone in a world now completely strange, unfamiliar and devoid of history or the comfort of friends her own age – and, just think, no one had yet invented post-traumatic stress syndrome.

Or Mrs. Moses. Now, there’s a marriage on a long, strange trip full of fat exploding frogs, endless manna recipes, people grumbling and rebelling against your man who spends countless hours meeting in a tent with God appearing, periodically, only to erupt in outbursts of anger that eventually cost him the Promised Land. Now, there’s a Hallmark anniversary card that writes itself.

Or, you could be married to King David. I’m sure he was great in the poetic romance department but you’d have had to wait your turn with all the other wives and concubines. That is, when you weren’t being carried off by his enemies. And then there’s figuring out how to respond when he’s worshiping God with such abandon that his tunic flops around letting everyone in on the family secrets. Oh, yeah, good times married to a godly man.

“But,” you protest, “these are all Old Testament heroes and I’m thinking about life with a New Testament man.” Keep reading, sister, that included long imprisonments, years of travel, public beatings, rejection by everyone with power or place in society, drastic career changes with low pay and few benefits, shipwrecks, stoning and eventual martyrdom. Sounds dreamy.

Are you wasting precious moments of life willing your spouse to be more righteous, thinking “if only” kind of thoughts and wondering why God isn’t giving you the marriage and the life you deserve? Are you waiting for that grand day in the future when “he comes around” and everything finally straightens out?

Here’s a bit of advice: throw out the photo of that smiling, righteous looking family on the cover of Sunday’s bulletin and open up your Bible. There’s nothing in there about sitting around wishing your spouse were better or resenting God because He won’t answer your prayers to “set him straight.” (Trust me, on this, I have searched – you know –  for a friend.)

There’s plenty in there about how Christ came, not to be served but, to serve and that we should do likewise. There’s plenty about being content. There’s plenty about how all of our righteousness is a gift through Jesus Christ. There’s a lot about how love is patient, kind, long-suffering, forgiving, and keeps no record of wrongs. There’s a pretty nifty passage about taking the plank out of one’s own eye before trying to remove the speck of sawdust in another’s.

None of us is married to the ideal spouse. I know my husband isn’t. We all have very real faults that make living with us a challenge and there’s nothing romantic or easy about that. Sure, we should pray for our spouses. Sure, we should work, each of us, to be more like Jesus. Certainly, when the bonds of human love have been stretched beyond endurance, we should cry out for a source of love that transcends. What’s amazing is that it exists. Christ supplies new love in abundance for those open to the transformation.

In this way, we will discover the power of Christ to supply ALL our needs, even the ability to love a crazy husband or be patient with an imperfect wife.

Seriously, why did you think you had to take formal vows that covered worse, poorer and sickness along with better, richer and in health? Ask Mrs. Noah. Even marriage to a righteous man isn’t a rowboat ride down a lazy river. Sometimes it’s a struggle to survive under the rush of a tsunami.

It’s not a greeting card or a plastic cake-topper, it’s something more – it’s life in abundance. We can’t change the ones we love but we can allow ourselves to be changed by the One who loves us perfectly. Which, in the end, is a much better plan than trying to pray the crazy out of the ones we love. Trust me on this one, loved ones. Ask my husband.

**My historical novella, Red Pen Redemption, explores the ups and downs of a lifelong marriage through the eyes of Helen Bancroft. She’s not a sweet woman and it’s not a sweet story but it is a finalist for a Selah Award. If you haven’t checked it out, I invite you to do so! It’s a story that just may change your life.

Lord, Please Change My Crazy Husband https://t.co/6Z9Gq0c3wk frustrated with your spouse, #amwriting #marriage #Christian

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) May 16, 2016

We’ll Start Seeing More Miracles When . . .

It had been a long time since he’d seen a miracle.

You could just tell. It was the way he held back. Placed his cards on the table slowly – studying you through narrowed eyes between each reveal. Gauging your reaction to his story.

Like a game of chicken, you kept the cards coming by not flinching. Not at the alcohol. Not at the drugs. Not at the abuse. Not at the jail time. Same as stalking a deer it is, this ministry of fishing for men, where the skill of holding very still for long stretches buys you more time in the open, greater opportunity to draw trust out from the deep soul-pockets into which it’s been shoved.

“I’ve made a career out of disappointing people,” he says. “I’ve been in lots of programs. They don’t usually work, you know?” You nod. You do know. “I get frustrated. I blow off at people or tell them they’re wasting their time. They don’t stick around long. Always send me on to the next program. Then, I’m still here, dealing with my kid with no help, you know? I’m all he’s got. The state lady tells me I’m doing it wrong but no one else knows how to do it either. At least, I’m trying to figure it out. That should count for something.”

“It does,” you reply.

“My kid, though, he doesn’t need someone who gives up fast. He – well, we – need the kind of help that will stick around until we figure this out. We don’t have easy problems. I don’t expect miracles but . . .”

He doesn’t expect miracles, no, but he does need one. You have to decide about investing in a situation with little hope of success.

You glance at the notes from the last program that closed because the family wasn’t responding to interventions fast enough. You read between the lines – they got out before the family failed big enough to mess with their statistics. High risk. Not unsafe, just always walking the high wire. Rats always abandon a sinking ship and there are programs that model themselves after these rats. You can’t judge them, too hard. Resources are dispensed based on success so everyone invests based on the numbers

But that’s why no one sees miracles anymore.

We stake everything on the numbers. We only play games where the odds are stacked in our favor. No one wants to call it wrong. No one wants to stick their necks out for the long shot. Failure hurts – personally and statistically. You know. You’ve faced it many times

But you’ve also seen miracles. Lives changed. Families healed. Marriages repaired. Prodigals turned around and strays taken home.

You used to wonder why God let you see miracles when others don’t. You’re starting to understand it’s because others worry too much about getting it wrong, about messing with their stats, about trying to pick winners. Others call the “game” before the final play. They’re smugly warm in their cars beating the traffic so they miss the miracle throw that turns it all around. If they worried less about being right, less about being smarter than the rest, and more about being like Jesus – they’d see miracles, too.

Don’t you think people talked about Jesus behind His back because He let Judas get so close? Judas was pilfering money. Others had to know. And here was this guy, claiming to be God, claiming to know people, but right in his inner circle was a guy with serious issues. And you know what? They turned out to be right and Jesus paid the price for counting Judas among the twelve.

But Jesus never worried about being right. He focused on being like His Father.

Jesus invested time and energy in people who were long shots – sinners, failures, screw-ups, disappointments, repeat offenders, habitual bad choice makers, deniers, and betrayers because His Father had sent Him to give everything to save them.

He wasn’t worried about being right. He wasn’t worried about padding the stats on numbers of people He was able to turn around. Jesus didn’t care if people thought He was blind to Judas’ shortcomings. He didn’t care what it said about Him as a leader that He allowed Judas into His inner circle. Jesus didn’t care what others thought of His choice of disciples – He cared about His disciples.

When we take our eyes off the numbers. When we resolve to be like Jesus. When we’re willing to love someone who might never turn around, who may disappoint us forever, who may break our hearts and betray us in front of others – when we forget about being right and focus on being like Jesus – we’ll all start seeing more miracles, too, baby.

Kingdom building – fishing for men – these are activities for men and women who gave up the numbers game the day they buried their own lives in Jesus Christ. We don’t love winning. We don’t love being right. We don’t love the pride that comes with always choosing winners. We love Jesus and we love those Jesus loves.

Jesus loved long shots. Jesus invested in people others condemned. Jesus loved Judas so well the disciples didn’t know which one of them was the betrayer until it happened. That’s the stuff of miracles, baby, that’s the stuff.

We’ll start seeing more miracles when . . . https://t.co/D6xAh9pknn why don’t we see more miracles? Maybe there’s a simple reason #amwriting

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) May 14, 2016

When We Gaze into the Wrong Mirrors

I’ve been looking in all the wrong mirrors, but I’m done now.

Mirrors can deceive. Stores install trick mirrors designed to make clothing appear more flattering. Carnivals line the walls of their fun-houses with warped mirrors that distort our perception. Magicians use mirrors carefully angled to create illusions that mystify and delude the audience. Cracked mirrors mislead us into seeing a disfigured view.

It was no stretch for the weavers of fairy tales to arm wicked queens with mirrors that told them precisely what they wanted to hear. Or to have evil sorceresses trap unwitting slaves inside looking glasses. We know that Alice found a fantastical world when she stepped through her frame.

Even armed with all this backstory, we still fall for the mirror trick.

The mirror the world sets up when it reflects its perception of the church draws us in, doesn’t it? We want so desperately to reach them, to teach them, to breach the gap between us, but we’re just as likely to become trapped like the wicked queen’s mirror-slave. The world says the love we offer in Jesus’ name looks off to them, imperfect, flawed, less than what they’d hoped to receive, so we try to clean up Jesus’ love, spin it in their favor, dress it in the fashion of the day and how wrong is that?

God is love. He defines it by existing. The world does not instruct Him in His own being and we shouldn’t listen when they try.

Sometimes people feel guilty because they are. Sometimes folk feel unwelcome because they hear the truth spoken and know their life is a lie. Sometimes individuals feel uncomfortable because the comfort they love is killing them, an elevator shaft to death.

Being in the presence of true love can be a lot to handle. It can be downright unsettling. Some people choose to walk away, to hide, to scoff, or to deride. The way being at a funeral inspires some to awkward giggles, so being in the presence of true love can evoke unpleasant reactions. It has inspired some to turn on love, nail it to a cross, and cheer on its demise.

So, why do we make adjustments (you know, us, the church) in the mirror the world holds in its hands?

What fools are we when the world tells us what love looks like and demands we upgrade the God we present to them for their comfort and we fix ourselves to match the reflection they desire? Sometimes I fall prey to that. I squirm in their twisted mirror and wonder why I’ve been saying one thing when clearly they want to hear another.

Thank God for His Word – the perfect mirror on which to reflect.

“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.” James 1:22-25

The truth causes discomfort. To the guilty it causes guilt. To those who want to compromise truth or dress it up or mix it with lies, it puts out the unwelcome mat. Love and truth are one in Jesus Christ. The love He offers is comprehensive, original, all-sacrificing, full of grace, light, and power but to love Him is to obey and to obey is to change. That’s why we look into a mirror, isn’t it? To find what needs change and change it. He provides the power but we submit to change.

The world is truly full of smoke and mirrors. They don’t reflect truth so we need to reject them. We need to refuse to believe their distorted view. We need to gaze often and long into the true mirror of God’s Word and then do what it says.

Imagine trying to make adjustments in a world filled with fun-house mirrors. The exhaustion. The futility. The absurdity. Imagine the relief of encountering a true reflection.

That’s God’s Word. It’s not a book of rules – it’s the looking glass that leads to the path of freedom. **Objects in the mirror may require adjustment, change, transformation. 

When We Gaze into the Wrong Mirrors https://t.co/ErPfqgWmdQ #amwriting #MirrorMirror #Godislove

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) May 13, 2016

I Use to Be Snow White

“I used to be Snow White, but I drifted.” -Mae West

She could be the patron saint of many modern Christians. I’m familiar with the danger of drift.

When I was a little girl, we would pack a cooler with tuna sandwiches on white bread, sliced cucumbers, and Kool-Aid in a thermos to spend long, lazy days at the beach. While my mother read “Jaws” on her blanket, my brother and I would take to the sea, walking out into the surf as far as we dared and riding in wave after wave.

Mom understood the dangers of drift. She’d set her blanket next to lifeguard chair number two and warn us to align ourselves with that chair whenever we rode a wave to shore, but we were kids and didn’t appreciate drift.

After a few hours, we’d emerge from the sea and head to our blanket, only to find it nowhere in sight! Panicked, we’d wonder momentarily, if our mother had forgotten and left without us! But then, we’d hear a familiar voice calling us and we’d look back down the beach. There she’d stand waving right where we left her. The subtle force of the tide had carried us far from where we had started. We were oblivious to the tow until we emerged but by then, we were already far from where we wanted to be.

There should be signs at church “Beware of Drifting.” I drift.

Like sleeping with my eyes open, I usually drift right out in the open in full view of others. But, because I have been a Christian for so many years, I have perfected the art of looking like I am still properly moored.

The early signs of drift are subtle. My prayer life becomes inconsistent or routine. I read the Bible but don’t engage with its contents – walk away unaffected and unchanged. I show up at church but I’m thinking that I don’t like the words to that song or didn’t we sing that one last month. During the sermon I start my afternoon’s “to do” list in my head. I listen to a brother or sister and look like I care what they’re saying and I respond as though I care what they’re saying but really, I don’t care, not really.

I can sense that it’s not enough for God. (He’s so particular that way!). I try to defend myself. “That was a prayer – why can’t that be enough?” “At least I read my Bible – c’mon, I can’t get something out of it EVERY time.” “Hey, I’m here at church, that’s something, isn’t it?” “I’m acting like I care and usually I do care so don’t I have some compassion credit I can borrow against now?”

And God says, “No. You’re in danger. Beware of drifting, daughter.” Suddenly I can see that I am way down the beach from God. He seems small and His voice very quiet. I can’t believe I didn’t see how far I had moved just by riding the tide.

And since everyone else is taking a dip in the same surf, they don’t notice either. See, I’m really good at looking like I’m awake now, even when I’m sleeping. Years of hanging with the church crowd and I know how to fake it with the best of them. I can drift and teach. I can drift and blog. I can drift and serve. I can drift and witness. And before you know it, someone asks “Whatever happened to her?” and someone answers “I don’t know, she just drifted off.”

God’s Word is like that lifeguard chair. The current of this world is so strong that daily I need to realign myself with that Word through prayerful reading, study, and obedience. In this way, it keeps me from being a victim of drift and like the lifeguard chair, prevents me from wandering off from the one I love.

Are you drifting? Beware. It’s more treacherous than the riptide because it takes you away before anyone notices – even you.

**For the amazing women of LHCC. Thank you for an incredible weekend of worship.

I Used to Be Snow White https://t.co/GaiUrFsveY the dangers of spiritual drift #amwriting #MaeWest #spirituality #christianliving

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) May 10, 2016

Just Because I’m a Woman

Dear Female Pollster Aghast at My Answers “because you’re a woman,”

In this day, in this age, in this time of awareness and selective cultural sensitivity (because isn’t my faith a legitimate cultural factor?), it amazes me how clueless you are about who I am, just because I’m a woman.

Why do you think you know me – how I’ll vote, what issues top my list, what causes move me, what choices I’ll defend – just because I’m a woman?

My chromosomal makeup only tells a part of my story but me, the person inhabiting this feminine form, I will tell you the rest. You can’t tell me my story, though you try, because it is my story. With your polls and your studies, your trending Twitter feed, and your superstar spokeswomen, you can’t begin to know my thoughts, my leanings, my preferences, or my needs. My story doesn’t fit inside the questions you ask over the phone. No great surprise. I’m a complex human being. Whatever made you think you could capture my essence on your piecharts?

I’ll cut my own slice, thank you, and it won’t be that sliver you’ve assigned me – that percentage labeled evangelical women, whatever that means to you. My sisters and I, we who love Jesus, we will bust through those dividing lines that try to tell our story through denominations and ethnic boundaries, with age and economic distinctions, with educational rankings and marital statuses, by regions or countries of origin. We don’t agree on everything, though that disagreement doesn’t break the tie that binds. We are a mystery to you, I grant, and so you try to analyze. Let me spare you. You do not define us with your politics or your polemics. Our identities do not rise or fall by your polls. What moves us is not determined by your rhetoric, your conventional wisdom, or your soundbite de jour.

We’ve gone off grid. We reject your entire matrix. We defy your cultural authority and refuse to bow before the idols you erect. We were once subjects of the kingdom that has you bound to the fashion of the day but then we met a man, that’s right, a man who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, who laid down His life so we might live.

We didn’t see His gender – okay, we did, we’re not stupid – but we saw more,  we saw His humanity, His deity, His power, and the love that rose above all others. He didn’t accept us despite being women, He accepted us as equal to our brothers, equally sinful, equally destined for destruction, equally in need of salvation, equally worth dying for, equally eligible for redemption because of His death and resurrection, equally, lavishly loved.

Before Him alone we bow, not the norms of our society or the cultural evolution you tout. He defines us. In Him we find our identity, our name, our worth, our story. And we have learned, from Him, that our pronouns are only a portion of who we are. The she we are is our design and it fits with the greater story He tells through all He has created but we are more than she as He is more than he. We are eternal beings, so we have a vision for the long game – a city in mind you haven’t seen.

Don’t begin to think you know me, just because I’m a woman. You think you know who I want to lead this country. As if I mark my ballot XX instead of signing my name. You think you know what choices I should value. I do care that women have control over their bodies – but I want to extend that right of choice to women (and men) who have yet to emerge from the womb.

Perhaps you think because we disagree that I haven’t used the mind God gave me to consider the issues myself. Or that I’m subject to the rule of an overbearing patriarch who discourages free thought. How insulting. Because I am a woman, I research, I study, I consider with my fine mind the subjects of my concern and I’ve reached different conclusions than you have. I respect our right to disagree, at least one of us does.

The discussion of submission in marriage made headlines this week and I’m sure you were outraged along with others who have subjected themselves to the rule of an overbearing matriarchy. Yet, I didn’t hear you express your outrage when submission was the discussion around Fifty Shades of Grey. Tell me why sexual submission is a freedom you applaud but mutual submission in the context of a loving marriage you find somehow threatening and detrimental to women as a whole. How does that add up?

You think I’m waiting for some powerful woman to free me, just because I’m a woman. You think I’m waiting for her to be my voice, to lift me up, to elevate my status, and to bestow on me opportunities and dreams, just because I’m a woman. But you don’t really see me, do you? You’ve been making speeches for so long into a mirror you’ve lost sight of me but that’s fine because I’ve found my freedom. Jesus elevates me. Jesus helped me find my voice. He lifts me up and bestows on me greater opportunities and dreams than you or I even knew existed. I’m not waiting for you or her or anyone.

So, what makes you think I’ll cave to the pressure, the rhetoric, and the policies that violate my conscience, just because I’m a woman and other women tell me it’s the right thing to do?  What makes you think I’m so easily swayed by permission to access the New Girl’s Club of America where everyone knows that power is the new black? What makes you think I haven’t already connected with a source of power that makes what you offer pale in comparison? You’ve bothered to ask but not to truly listen for the answer.

My sisters and me, we’ll politely decline your invitation to the party, thank you, as we engage in our own revolution. We’ll continue to explore our freedom, to meet regularly with other women – women from every tribe and every nation of every age and economic status in every condition and opinion – together with men, brothers in Christ, recipients of this same freedom. We live off grid. We celebrate another matrix, a kingdom come, a kingdom that stretches beyond this earthly power.

You’re welcome to join us. You ought to trust that I know what I’m talking about – just because I’m a woman. Women have been clued into the truth of Jesus and have been helping others find their freedom in Him since He arrived on scene. He is the true champion of women. He doesn’t take polls because His power doesn’t rest on how well He can spin today’s news cycle.

I’ll bet you’re sorry you drew my number. I’m sorry this all came out on you. Today I decided to exercise my freedom of speech, just because I’m a woman.

Just Because I’m a Woman https://t.co/7O5BQRQU90 you think you know how I’ll vote? #amwriting #womenvote #evangelical

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) May 3, 2016

Are You Sleeping with a Beautiful Liar?

The best liars are the heartbreaking ones. The liars we desperately want to believe. The ones we allow close enough to drive the dagger deep into our exposed hearts.

I’ve changed.

I’m done with alcohol, pot, coke, that way of life, that guy, that gang, those women, that vice.

Yes, I’m taking my medication, of course, why? You can test me. I’ll do a test right now.

I’ll work with the therapist, the courts, my children, my family, this budget, your rules, of course, I’ll work, I want this to work. I’m ready for a new way this time. Last time, I just wasn’t ready but now I am.

No, of course, I’m not using again, cheating again, hearing voices again, drinking again, gambling anymore, going to that place, seeing that guy, visiting that site, missing appointments.

I know I said I’d go last week but you wouldn’t believe what happened. This week I’ll get to church, find a job, show up for therapy, be home for dinner, call that counselor, go to a meeting.

With every fiber, you want to believe their words over your gut, their story over those busybodies, their explanation over the photo, the text, the evidence in your hand. You want to believe them over your own eyes, your own bruises, your empty bank account, your Internet history, the acid in your stomach, the alarm bell in your soul that has never been wrong before. You know the plummet, like an elevator sliced from its cable that drops within you until you’re almost longing for the moment you hit bottom – but you never do.

If you believe them, if you just believe them, then the evening won’t be interrupted, the meeting can be positive, dinner will go as planned, no one has to change or turn down the path of change – that narrow, rocky, blistering, steep, lonely path of change.

They excel at stories and, you know, who doesn’t love a good story? There’s a hook, right in the opening. A line that grabs your attention. There’s intrigue, mistaken identity, conflict, tension, cliffhangers, pathos, comedy, tragedy, twists and turns. They paint with colors you’ve never seen, not even in the large box of Crayolas. Can you hear the music? They ask. And you hear it. Can you smell the fire? They say. And you do, your face almost flush from the heat.

And the story never ends. There will be a new chapter tomorrow if you’re ready to hear it, and even if you’re not.

You know what it takes to combat the liar who holds your heart? A better story. A stronger story. A true story. The liar sounds like the truth until the truth arrives and tell his side. There is an old proverb “The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him.” Proverbs 18:17 And you know this Proverb is true because you’ve lived it, or at least, you’ve watched it on Judge Judy.

That proverb is exactly why we must continue to tell our story, those of us who know the truth. You see, the world has moved in with a beautiful liar who weaves a convincing tale at the breakfast table in the morning and over coffee at night. The world takes this same stomach-churning journey every day. Hearing promises over-easy with bagels followed by a plummet down the elevator shaft of deceit, listening to the beautiful promise of a different tomorrow whispered in the dark as ice is applied to fresh wounds. Tomorrow will be different and the world cleaves to the beautiful lie.

If there is no other testimony, the liar is the only voice and the world has no option but to believe the betrayer over its own eyes.

If there is another story. If someone tells the gritty truth. If someone bravely steps forward to bear evidence to a tale that isn’t so lovely, that isn’t easy to hear, that doesn’t warm the heart but instead, sets fire to the lies. If someone like that loves the world enough to face rejection, ridicule, wrath, scoffing, and hatred. If someone like that tells another story, then the world still has a chance, a choice, a flicker of hope.

The enemy of the beautiful lie is a steadfast assault of the truth.

Some people will choose the lie. Some will wrap themselves in the beautiful deceit, hold their hands over their ears and pull the covers up over themselves and the liar they love more than life. But let there be a choice to make. As long as we have breath, let us love well enough to tell a greater story.

Be the voice of truth. Tell a greater story. The true story. His story.

Are you sleeping with a beautiful liar? https://t.co/bueJsnYOEx how to defy the beautiful lie #amwriting #john316 #lovingtheworld #truth

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) April 30, 2016

What Kind of a God Does That?

In college, I was forced to take a science course. Not a fan of this requirement. Dr. Andrus, a petite, exacting, fireball seemed really excited about science, so I knew I’d better get over my distaste and jump into my assignments with appropriate gusto.

Our first assignment was to stare at a candle flame and write one hundred observations about it.

One hundred unique observations.

About a single candle flame.

Watching paint dry suddenly seemed appealing.

Once that assignment was completed, she told us to find an insect, in the dirt behind our classroom, and write one hundred observations about said insect. Seriously?

There weren’t many choices in the dirt. I couldn’t imagine touching a wood louse and ants seemed mighty self-explanatory, so I picked up a hard-shelled centipede, the kind that curl up into a ball when confronted (like me), thinking that perhaps, in desperation, I might be able to count each of its legs as a separate observation. I stared at it for hours.

And I actually learned something amazing from that assignment. If you had asked me about centipedes before, I’d have told you they’re brown and boring. Upon close inspection of this tiny creation, however, I discovered an intricate design in its tiny exoskeleton. Swirls, colors, patterns, absolute beauty on the back of a centipede. What could possibly be the point of that?

What kind of God places exquisite artwork on the spine of a bug that lives under logs and that most of us pass over without a thought?

This thought came to mind again when, years later, I was teaching science to my own children, and we watched a video of penguins in Antarctica. The three of us howled with laughter at the comical birds and their uninhibited antics when suddenly it occurred to me: What kind of God puts such delightfully funny creatures on a continent that, for years, was unseen by humans? Who was the show for? Who delighted in these creatures before we had the technology to discover them, film them, and notice them for the great act they are?

Lately, photos of beautiful sea slugs have been circulating around the Internet, and again, I shake my head in wonder at a God who does such lavishly creative work and places it at the bottom of the sea. What kind of a God does that?

I’ll tell you – a God who delights in creation. A God bursting with such unfathomable creative energy that He splashes His handiwork wherever He touches. No palette goes to waste for a God who is a Creator at heart. A God who has instilled the joy of discovery in His highest creation – humankind. Like a mother or father who hides love notes for their children or leaves trinkets around at Christmas, so our God hides treasures for us for the simple joy of watching us find them.

What kind of God does this? A God with a heart full of love for those who create with His same energy, alone, unnoticed, and hidden in the most unexpected places, fearing that no one will ever see or hear or read or experience the marvel of their work. He has coded the universe to let our creative hearts know – none of it goes to waste, nothing is unseen, no one goes unnoticed. He is aware of it all and each creative soul adds to the amazing masterpiece that one day all will see.

What kind of a God does this? Leaps, bounds, dances through time and space creating magic and wonder with a touch, a breath, a bubbling cosmic laugh? He goes by one name – Jesus. “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” Colossians 1:15-17

In Him all things hold together. He sees you, loved one, even if you’re currently living in the dirt under a log. One day, He’ll draw your beauty out into the light and we will all gasp in wonder at what He’s created in you.

What Kind of a God Does That? https://t.co/QHrxLAeVko the answer is in the blog #amwriting #creative #creativeChristians #Jesus

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) April 27, 2016

Pray Now for the Poets – They May Be Our Last Hope

We say prayers for the preachers and prayers for the hands of missionaries and teachers in foreign lands. We say prayers for the soldiers who are off at war and prayers for the workers serving food to the poor.

But a time is coming, twisting round like a cloud, when the preaching of truth will be disallowed. When the prince of the air and his kingdom of lies will be embraced by the masses who truth now despise. So I tell you this:

pray now for the artists, the poets, the kings of composition, of stories, and fantastical things. Pray for the hearts of the writers who weave truth into stories a few will believe. Pray for the filmmakers, novelists, and more to be courageous and bold when the world is at war with the beauty of truth, with the scandal of love, with the Lordship of a God who rules from above.

When the preachers are silenced and true teachers banned, the mission will fall to the poets on hand.

Like graffiti on street walls we’ll work in the night to spray paint the gospel with aerosol light. We’ll write Him in novels, in screenplays, in poems. We’ll paint Him in murals in the square, in our homes. Like an underground railroad we’ll pass Him along in stories, in dances, in sculpture, in song.

There won’t be room then for the spirit of fear so writers and artists should train now to draw near to the heart of the Almighty, to drink from His wine, to feast at His table and ingest the divine so it flows from our fingertips into our art and pours from our spirits fed straight from His heart.

Pray now for the artists, the writers, the scribes, for courage, for commitment to truth above lies.

Creativity is the last bastion of truth when convention is silenced and fear takes root. So pray for the souls striving alone with their art to labor with courage and to live from His heart.

Pray for boldness, for bravery, for insight, and power – to this work we’ve been called and now is the hour for each artist, and writer, composer, and bard to graffiti the world with the scandal of God.

“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths.” 2 Timothy 4:3-4 NASB

*offered humbly with apologies to true poets everywhere and dedicated to Cathy Baker

I invite you to take a sneak peak at the cover of my next book, Jesus and the Beanstalk (Overcoming Your Giants and Living a Fruitful Life), scheduled to release in September from Abingdon Press. What do you think? Just click on the link.

Pray Now for the Poets – They May Be Our Last Hope https://t.co/qtIZrRPtn7 #endtimes #amwriting #Christfic #ChristianWriting #Prayer

— Lori Roeleveld (@lorisroeleveld) April 23, 2016