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The Maturation of Sacrifice

For the past few months, I’ve been thinking about the different sacrifices I have made throughout my life (so far) and the sacrifices I know I will have to make in the future. When I was a child, I did not like the idea of sacrifice because of the lens that I saw it through. I often saw certain themes related to sacrifice; I saw the women in my family sacrifice more than the men in my family. To be honest, I even believed that women should sacrifice more since we are the ones who are nurturers and mothers and wives. I couldn’t figure out why we seemed to have a heavier burden than men did, and I didn’t look forward to that being my future just because I was a woman.

As I got older, I intentionally put myself in positions where I would not have to sacrifice that much, and once I became independent I reveled in my power of not having to sacrifice as much as others did. In fact, the last substantial sacrifice I remember making before becoming independent was when I moved in with my maternal grandparents when my grandmother was in her middle stages of dementia, and my grandfather wanted to keep her at home. I moved in with them for about six months or so to help out with my grandmother‘s care, in addition to home health aids coming a few times a week. At that time my mama warned me not to move in with them, and it wasn’t because she didn’t believe that I was capable of helping, but because she knew how much I loved my grandmother and she knew I wasn’t ready for the emotional sacrifice of having to see her in a state of diminished capacity 24/7. She ended up being proven right; it was incredibly painful to see my granny lose her speech and her mobility and see my papa grieve the woman that he knew and the life that he was used to. We eventually moved my granny into a facility where she stayed for many years before she passed away.

While she was at her facility, I moved out and I’ve been out on my own ever since. Outside of church, spending time with my family, and my work obligations, I found myself not having to sacrifice much. I won’t say that I was selfish, because I’ve always had a generous heart and I love and support the people around me. But I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that independence allowed me to make decisions about who/what I sacrifice for vs it being required and/or forced on me. I enjoyed my own company and the autonomy of my own time. I did not have the responsibilities of being a wife or mother, and I promised myself that any sacrifices I made in the future would be my own choice. I wondered what would happen as my parents got older and if they became ill, but I talked with my brother about it and we both agreed that we would both step up when that time came.

But then I was confronted with the idea of sacrifice being non-optional, and that is when my paternal granny passed away. At her homegoing service, different family members shared about how much she sacrificed for her many brothers and sisters, uncles, and cousins. She was a woman who thought of her family first and who did everything she could to support her loved ones. While I was grateful to hear her spoken of so highly and celebrated, I couldn’t help but wonder what happened to her own dreams and desires. I wondered if she had any unspoken regrets, or if she ever felt feelings of resentment that she never spoke out loud.

I have a tradition in my family that is not spoken out loud, but one that has been a repeated pattern, and that tradition is the single woman in the family becoming the primary caretaker for their elderly family member. I’ve seen this play out throughout my life, and I have a fear that I will follow in the footsteps of this tradition. I use the word fear cautiously because caring for my elders is not something I am afraid of; it’s the way the care is done that I don’t want to mimic. Don’t get me wrong, I love my family and I have every intention to honor my parents and to care for them the way they have cared for me. But I want to care for my family and not sacrifice my own well-being in the process, and not sacrifice my own dreams and desires. I’ll be honest and say that I don’t know if this is what will happen. I don’t know if I will repeat the cycle, and that uncertainty brings a lot of emotions, and I will honor them.

When I think about decisions that I am currently making about my future, my career, and even my retirement and things of that nature, I admit that I am not just thinking about myself anymore. My parents are in their 60s, and I think about them. My grandpa is 85, and I think about him. While I am not an only child, my brother is married with his own family, and I have to acknowledge that. I am single with no family of my own, and I don’t know when and how that might change. If I were 26 again, I would probably pick up and move and do all kinds of adventurous things. And while I’m still young at 36, life is different. There are now realities that I see in my parents and my family that I feel like I need to be here for. That’s why I called this blog the maturation of sacrifice, because maybe the way that I have seen and perceived sacrifice needs to mature.

Under no circumstances have I arrived at total peace with sacrifice. God is still going to have to work on my heart concerning the fears I have about the future. But one thing I do know is that I’m not going to give up on my own dreams and desires. Life is moving incredibly fast and time is the only thing that we can never get back. I don’t want to have any more regrets with the time I have left.

For all the people who have to sacrifice and who don’t have a choice in the why, the how, or the how long, I see you. Most importantly, God sees you. I believe that no desire or dream is ignored by God. He sees all of it, and He sees all of you.

See y’all next week~

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The F Word

I may be alone in saying this, but I hate it when I hear people use christian clichés as a way of dismissing someone’s pain. For example, someone shares how they are disappointed with you about something that they really wanted that didn’t happen, and the response they get is “It’s okay, this just means that God has something better for you.” Now, while I understand the heart behind this type of response and I acknowledge that we do not always know God’s plan, these types of sayings do not erase the pain that person is in. Newsflash- we can know and believe that God’s plans for us are good and perfect, and we can still be disappointed and confused at Him for not giving us what we wanted. In our lives, our efforts may not always match the outcomes we get.

Another cliché that I remember hearing especially as a student was “Do your best and trust God with the rest.”Again, while this sounds good, and while the intention behind this statement is kind, I believe that it creates a false narrative for people. Just because you try your best and you trust God with the rest does not mean you will receive the best outcome; in fact, let’s be real- there are some things we put effort into that we didn’t even talk to God about.

The point of today’s blog is to be honest about the outcomes we have had in life and to examine our relationship with failure. Now I want to be clear that there is no failure in God, but let’s not be confused-there is certainly failure in humanity. As long as we are living on this earth we will fail as human beings; we have failed before and we will fail again. But this is why it’s important to know what failure actually means versus how we use it in our everyday language.

Failure has multiple definitions in the dictionary, but today I want to focus on the first three definitions found in the Merriam-Webster dictionary. The first definition of failure is an omission of occurrence or performance, and an example of this would be failing to get to work on time. The second definition of failure is a lack of success, like failing in business. The third and final definition of the word failure is falling short; having a deficiency, like saving up your money for a down payment, but not having enough.

The reason why I wanted to focus on all three of these definitions is because I believe that they all speak to the different emotions we have when we experience failure. Depending on the person, you may not feel any type of way if you fail to be at work on time, especially if you have a job with autonomy/flexibility. But if you work in a time-sensitive role, where you have to clock in and out every day, you might have stronger emotions about being late. Or let’s think about all of the times we failed to succeed at something. When you’re in college and you study for weeks for that test and you still only get a C grade. When you invest hours into a work project and the company decides to change courses and pursue another idea. When you launch your business after years of planning and don’t make any profit. In these examples, the outcome that you get can feel like a waste of the effort you put in.

It takes a lot of mental and emotional energy to put effort into something, not knowing what the outcome will be. This year I told myself that I would be braver and try and go for new things and put myself out there more, both in my career and in my personal life. There are two major things that I applied a lot of effort to, things that I stepped outside of my comfort zone for, and things that I genuinely asked and believed God for. Guess what? Both things failed. After the news of each outcome, I initially told myself those same tired christian clichés. “God has a plan that I don’t see yet”, “Every rejection is God’s protection“, and my personal favorite, “God I thank you for every closed door.” Don’t I sound super saved? YES!

I let myself have a few days of believing that I was fine, that I was healed from the disappointment I felt. But I’m so grateful that I am mature enough in my walk with Christ to know that God can handle the real emotions I have and that my churchy words and phrases do not distract Him from what’s in my heart. I had to be honest with Him and tell the truth. “God this hurts me, I really wanted this thing”. “I thought this was your will for me and now I am not sure I hear you clearly”. “I’m mad because I feel like you don’t care about the things that I care about”. I had that conversation with God.

But God is so thoughtful and patient with me, and more importantly, He knows me better than anyone. He allowed me to have my tantrum, and then He asked me a couple of questions in return. “So, you only want to give effort when you are guaranteed to get what you want in return?…..” “Why don’t you believe that I know better than you about what’s best for you?” Yep, He slapped me upside my head with His sandal. Again.

So, even though having that talk with God gave me perspective, accepting that I failed still hurts me, and I know that your failures may still sting for you. And while the outcomes in our lives may not be what we wanted, our effort is the win. If you gave your best, hold your head up! The failures we have in this life are not a label or a determinant of our worth, they are just steps on the journey. Know that there are future outcomes in your life that will be good; that the plans of God are for your good. Get up and try again, and don’t be afraid to fail again.

See y’all next week~

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Doubting the Promise

Photo by Jennifer Enujiugha on Pexels.com

Over the last few days, I’ve been thinking a lot about the promises of God. As a church girl, I grew up reading stories about different people in the bible who were given specific promises from God. A promise from God is when He says that something will (or will not) be done, given, and/or come to pass. My favorite bible story is the one about Abraham and Sarah, and the promise they were given regarding having a child. Their story is found in Genesis, where God makes a promise to Abraham that He would make a great nation out of him. At the time, both Abraham and Sarah were in their nineties, way past Sarah’s childbearing years. It seemed like an impossible situation, but God ultimately did fulfill His promise and bless them with a baby, named Isaac.

The story of Abraham and Sarah is one of many in the Bible where God gives and fulfills a specific promise to people. One of God’s characteristics is that He is faithful to keep His promises. The bible also tells us that God does not change, meaning that He is the same God today that He was then, and that He is still giving and fulfilling promises to His children. *Cue If He did it before by Tye Tribbett*.

But even though I know these characteristics of God, it doesn’t mean that I don’t have questions about how His promises work. I’ll be honest and admit that I am sometimes doubtful about whether God has specific promises for me. I’ve has moments throughout my life where I was sure that God promised me something and ended up disappointed. In hindsight, I can admit that some of the things I called promises were really just my desires that I added God to (maybe one week we’ll talk about God’s permissive will). But sometimes, I really believed I heard God promise me specific things, and when the promise(s) was not fulfilled, I was heartbroken.

Now, I want to be very clear in explaining that there is a difference between the general promises of God given to all of us as believers, and specific, tangible promises given to people. In His Word God says that if we seek Him, we will find Him. That’s an example of a promise that we all have, and I don’t have doubts about these kinds of promises. What I doubt is whether God has promised specific, tangible things to me.

I know that promises from God can be a hot topic in the Christian community, and I’ve heard polarizing opinions on it. If you’re a single woman, I know you’ve seen those YouTube videos of women explaining how God promised them a specific man as their husband, and how it came true. But for every one of those videos, there is another video from a woman explaining how God does not promise you a specific person for a spouse, and/or that God does not promise you a spouse period. When we hear and see these conflicting realities, it can cause not only confusion, but comparison, jealousy, and envy. When you watch someone else get the very thing(s) you have been praying for, it can be hard to accept and disappointment and bitterness can creep in. This is especially true when you have been believing that God has promised those same things to you, and they don’t come to pass.

So my prayer for today and for next week is to remember the promises from God that you already have. He will never change His mind about you. He will never leave you nor forsake you. He has plans for you. And He has plans for me too.

See you next week~

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Living an “At Least” Life

It is my belief that the most unhappy people are the those who settle in life, whether that be in their job, their relationship, even where they live. This is not to say that settling is something we should never do, because sometimes we have to pivot in life to reroute ourselves in the right direction. But I’m not talking about that kind of settling-that kind is only temporary. I’m talking about the kind of setting that is not necessary, and that is chosen out of fear and a lack of faith.

Sometimes we settle into making “safe” decisions. Now this is not always true (I’ve definitely made some reckless decisions in the past), but as I get older I have found myself settling more and more. I can provide several intelligent reasons why settling was a good decision in the moment, but the truth is, I can lack faith. Pure and simple.

In my adulthood I’ve learned that there is a key difference between a reason and an excuse. A reason is an explanation for something. An excuse is a justification for something. So, using myself as an example, I have many reasons why I have settled in different areas of my life. What I do not have, however, is an excuse. Deep down, I know that I should overcome my reasons and choose to go for what I really want and believe God for my dreams. And a few weeks ago, God showed me just how costly my settling has been over the course of my life.

I was reading a story I’ve read many times, the story of Moses helping to free the Israellites in Exodus. In Chapter 15, after they crossed the Jordan, they started complaining to Moses, about them having bitter water. So God performed a miracle, and gave them clean drinking water. But by the next chapter, they were complaining again, this time about being hungry, and they compared their current state to when they were under Pharoh’s rule and had ample food. They were so extra, they even accused Moses of trying to starve them to death!

Now, as you read on you will see that God performs another miracle and gives them food, but I stopped at their complaining. I was irritated with them, and I said out loud to God, “How could they entertain returning to forced labor and abuse under Pharoh over some food?“, and God responded “it’s because they had an ‘at least’ mindset”. And then He proceeded to tell me about myself.

To give you a heads up about my relationship with God, it’s very unique. I can hear God as clearly as I can hear anyone, and I jokingly say that He slaps me upside the head with His sandal. And that’s what He did that night. I’m going to summarize our conversation below.

Me: “I just don’t get how they would trade their freedom for some food. They watched you part a sea in half and put it back together.”

Jesus: “It’s funny that you are so irritated with what they did when you have done the same thing multiple times. It’s not about the food, it’s about them not believing that I had better for them, so they were willing to settle for what was safe. “

Me: Silence.

I couldn’t look away, I couldn’t say a word. I had no excuses. Have you ever heard something so piercing that you had to write it down? That was me in that moment, and not only did I write it down, I immediately wrote down examples of how God was right.

Here I was thinking I was better than the Israelites when I was just like them! Okay, no, I’m not in physical bondage or forced to do hard labor. BUT, there have been times when I know that God was asking me to trust Him for better, but I allowed my “at least” thinking cause me to settle, and I didn’t consider what it would cost me.

At least I have a man, even when I knew he was not the right one.

At least it’s a job, even when I was deeply unhappy.

These are excuses I told myself to justify making certain decisions, and can I tell y’all a secret? Neither of these decisions had a happy ending. In fact, they led to the same end result. Regret.

While I wish I would have realized and corrected this mindset years ago, I probably wouldn’t have listened to God or been still enough to hear His voice. But now that I do know, I have some work to do. It’s not easy unlearning a pattern of thinking, but I’m committed to doing it. I don’t want to forfeit anymore of the promises and plans that God for me because of the limitations of my own thinking, and it’s my hope that you don’t want to either. When God speaks, we must listen.

And then we need to DO something. I’m speaking to myself first and always.

See y’all next week!