Satan left her...

            A few months ago, while reading through the book of Job, an aspect of Satan’s attack on Job jumped out at me that I had not considered before: In Satan’s efforts to entice Job to forsake his righteousness and to curse God, Satan removed Job’s immense wealth, abundant possessions, precious children, and even his health…but, Satan left his wife.

Satan stripped Job of all those other portions of his life because they were great blessings to him, the deprivation of which Satan was sure would cause Job to drop his (supposed) mask of righteousness and rail against the Lord. Why, then, did Satan not also remove Job’s wife? The possible answer to this question, as a wife myself, made me tremble. I don’t think it was merely because she herself was not a blessing to Job. I believe Satan did not remove Job’s wife because he knew that her presence in Job’s life, rather than her absence, was more likely to entice Job to curse God in his suffering than to encourage him to remain steadfast in the Lord. Ouch.       

I went on to ask myself, why was this so? In my study of the brief portion of Job chapter 2 where the wife appears, I came to the conclusion that it was the condition of the wife’s heart that made her a ready tool for Satan to use against Job. Satan’s devastating treatment of Job was all in an effort to prove that Job’s righteous living was merely a shallow, natural response to the abundant wealth and prosperity God had blessed him with, rather than an outward reflection of a heart truly devoted to the Lord. Satan’s ultimate goal was to hear Job curse God to His face, and thus, to prove Job’s righteousness a sham (Job 1:11; 2:5). After Satan afflicts Job with horrific sores over his entire body, Job’s wife says to him, “Do you still hold fast your blameless uprightness? Renounce God and die!” (Job 2:9, AMP). In the NASB, her words are translated, “Curse God and die!” That sounds a lot like what Satan wanted Job to do, doesn’t it?

The Bible does not give any indication of what the wife was like before Satan afflicts them—she may have appeared to walk uprightly as Job was doing, or, at least, she may have supported Job’s righteous living. However, her words in that one verse expose the true nature of her heart. Though we do not know what her heart was most attached too--whether it was to their material security, their children, or whatever it might have been--her heart was clearly more attached to that "something else" than to God.
Job’s response to her also exposes her nature to us, as he likens her to “one of the impious and foolish women” (Job 2:10, AMP). According to the dictionary, “impious” means “lacking reverence for God” and “disrespectful.” Job is too tactful to call her impious and foolish directly, but she is clearly displaying a lack of reverence for God and a lack of respect for her husband, as she reprimands, rather than encourages, his continued devotion to the Lord in the midst of his suffering. Thus, the condition of her heart was one of greed, irreverence, and disrespect.

            Having said that, I would like to pause briefly and extend grace to Job’s wife and her response to all that had happened to them. This is not to excuse her response, but rather to acknowledge that they experienced devastating loss, not only of their great wealth, but of all their children as well. Even Job, though he never curses God for what happens to him, later cries out that he wished he had never been born (Job 3:3). I can’t even imagine the level of anguish both Job and his wife must have experienced, and then, for her to see her husband afflicted with sores from his head to his feet…Who is to say we would not also be tempted to respond in anger and despair as she did? It is only by the grace of God that we would have the strength and faith to respond differently to such horrific suffering. It is only by God’s grace that our hearts and lives become devoted to the Lord to begin with, and, as a result, that we develop the same mindset as Job: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I shall return there. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away. Blessed be the name of the LORD” (Job 1:21, NASB).

            Climbing aboard my original train of thought, it appears that the wife’s heart was not devoted to God in this way, but, rather, that it was more attached to her worldly possessions and wealth (which included her children) than to the Lord. Satan may have been aware of this already, and that may have been why, instead of taking her from Job as he took Job’s children, he let her remain with Job. Satan may have had a strong inclination that the condition of her heart, after the tragedy he was about to inflict on them, would likely cause her to encourage her husband away from the Lord in the midst of his suffering, rather than closer to Him. Satan may have even influenced her more directly, since the condition of her heart would have left her open to Satan’s manipulation.

Considering this possibility, I was reminded of another instance in Scripture where the condition of a person’s heart allowed him to be overcome by Satan, to the point of betraying our Savior to His death. Judas Iscariot’s betrayal of Jesus was fully under God’s control and was part of the prophetic journey that led our Savior to the cross, but it is also worth noting that Judas was not a man fully committed to the Lord who suddenly turned against Him. We are told in John chapter 12 that Judas was “a thief, and as he had the money box, he used to pilfer what was put into it” (v. 6). We learn this after Mary anoints Jesus’ feet with expensive perfume, perfume that, as Judas points out, could have been sold “for the poor,” though he really meant “for himself” (Matt. 26:9). After Judas is denied this potential money, his greed leads him to the chief priests, to whom he ultimately agrees to betray Jesus for the sum of thirty pieces of silver (Matt. 26:14-16). There are many thoughts surrounding why Judas betrayed Jesus to the chief priests, but two aspects of his betrayal are evident from Scripture: Judas was more devoted to money than to the Lord, and Satan was able to enter into him (John 13:27). I would not be surprised if it was, at least partly, the condition of Judas’ heart that allowed Satan to enter him.

            Returning to Job’s wife, it seems her heart was in a similar position as Judas’, and, as a result, Satan may have been using her, whether directly (by entering into her as he entered into Judas) or indirectly (by merely letting her live so she could just “be herself”), to further his attempts to shatter Job’s faith. Again, there is nothing from Scripture to indicate that either situation was the case, but we do know that out of everything Job was stripped of, Satan left his wife.

            This fact causes me to tremble because, as a wife myself, the thought that the condition of my heart could lead me to assist Satan in his attacks on my husband, humbles and frightens me. I find peace, however, in remembering the security I have in the Lord because of my faith in His redemptive work at the cross, which shields me from any such direct manipulation as Satan had over Judas Iscariot. However, I am also aware that I still struggle with my sinful nature, and that Satan can, and will, take advantage of that if I am not careful to respond to the Holy Spirit’s conviction of sin in my life.
           I do not want to allow my heart to become hardened to any part of my fleshly struggles to the point that I open a door for Satan to use my selfishness, my pride, my insecurities, my fears, my anger, my whatever to entice my husband away from the Lord rather than closer to Him. I am not saying that my husband’s spiritual walk is my responsibility, because, ultimately, my husband’s relationship with the Lord is not, and should not be, dependent on me. However, being that the Lord has made us one, I do know that what I say and do can have a very real effect on my husband’s physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual state.

Praise be to God! though, that no matter what my flesh or Satan may entice me to do, and no matter how this may affect my husband, that there is nothing God cannot redeem! Satan may have intended Job’s wife to be a curse to him, but, ultimately, God used Job’s wife to bless Job even more abundantly than he had been blessed before, by granting him seven sons and three daughters, daughters whose beauty was unmatched throughout the land (Job 42:13-15). And Satan’s manipulation of Judas to betray Jesus to His death was perfectly orchestrated by God to redeem mankind and to defeat Satan and death forever! God truly does turn our ashes into beauty!

I want to walk in that beauty from the beginning, though. I want to be a wife that encourages my husband to remain faithful to the Lord in the midst of life’s trials and suffering, as my Savior enables me to do the same. I don’t want to be a wife who allows a love of money, of possessions, of temporary health and security…of anything other than my Savior, to draw me away from the Lord, and, in so doing, to threaten to take my husband with me. If Satan is going to attack the blessings the Lord has bestowed upon my husband, in an effort to destroy his faith, I would much rather be a blessing that helps to strengthen my husband’s faith than to be a curse in my husband’s life that poses no threat to Satan.

I Don't Want to Jinx It!

Yesterday, I had a very random thought pop into my head.

I began wondering, "Where in the world did the phrase, 'I don't want to jinx it, but...,' come from?" I had used this exact expression only the day before when talking to my husband, and, during my reverie yesterday, I was shocked to discover that a legitimate fear accompanied this phrase! A part of me was seriously afraid that if I told my husband the good thing that had been happening in my life, that I would jinx it and it would end. I almost laughed out loud at the ridiculousness of this realization (later, while relating this to my husband, I did laugh out loud), but it was also a very sobering thought.

How did a made-up word come to hold real fear for me and, I suspected, for other people as well?

I contemplated the question further, and I came to realize this phrase has become a "comical," indirect way of expressing my fear that God is going to take away the good thing, event, person, whatever, in my life. I have actually been afraid that if I share with others about the good gifts God has given me (because all good gifts are from God [James 1:17]), that I will set off a chain reaction that will result in His taking them away from me. Ridiculous, I know, but it's true.

I suspect that I am not the only person who has worried God will remove His blessings from his/her life. The very sad part is that this fear of losing what God has given to us prevents two very important things from happening:

First, it prevents us from fully enjoying the good gifts the Father has lavished on us. If there is always a small voice in the back of our minds whispering, "Be careful! Don't enjoy this too much or talk about it with others because, if you do, it won't last long!," then we will be living in a state of fearful trepidation rather than joyful acceptance of what He has blessed us with. We will be robbing God's free, gracious blessings of their blessedness.

Second, and most importantly, this fear prevents us from proclaiming the goodness of the Lord in our lives! If we hesitate to share God's blessings with others because we're afraid we might "jinx" them, we will miss valuable, precious opportunities to bring glory to our Father's Name. Instead of showing the world a heart that is enraptured by the Father's love and goodness, we will be showing them a timid heart that is fearful of the Father's hand in our lives. But "God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline" (2 Tim. 1:7, NASB). 

In order to overcome this fear, we must first discover where it comes from. I considered this for a while as well, and I believe this fear is first rooted in memories of good gifts that were taken away. God gives and He takes away, and this is something that is hard for me, and many people, to accept sometimes. Understandably, we don't want what we have desired, what we have dreamed of, what we have prayed for, to be taken away from us. When, in God's perfect wisdom, it is taken away, this cultivates in us a fear of fully embracing the new gifts He brings into our lives.

Whether this fear is a result of past loses or merely an unfounded but, nevertheless, real anxiety about losing a blessing, I believe this fear is secondly, and ultimately, rooted in a mind that is fixed too greatly on the temporal. If I am fearful of losing a gift God has given me on this earth, then I am holding on too tightly to that which was never meant to be eternal. 

The fact of the matter is, all good gifts Jesus gives me while I draw breath on this earth--apart from Himself and my salvation--will come to an end! 

Whether in the moment when I draw my last breath, or sometime before then, every blessed gift and circumstance will cease. If they end before the day my Savior takes me home, new blessings will replace them, because God delights in giving His children good gifts (Matt. 7:11). But those too will someday end. This is because, while God loves to bless His kids on this earth, He never intended for us to be too comfortable here. 

This place, after all, is not our home. It is temporary, and it is hard. It is hard because of sin, and the difficulties we face are meant (among other reasons) to fix our hearts and minds on the eternal, on the Hope we have that awaits us in heaven. 

Our losses are a part of that hardship that is meant to point us to Him.

If I let myself meditate on the fact that the earthly gifts God gives me are temporary, that they were never meant to last forever, and that I possess a far greater, eternal Gift, then I will be free to embrace to the fullest the temporary blessings God has bestowed on me, however long they may last!

I will be free to rejoice in the joy they have brought to me, an undeserving sinner, in the midst of a fallen world! 

I will be free to proclaim without constraint the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living!  

And, whenever those gifts may pass away, my joy will not cease, because it will be rooted first and foremost in the most precious, eternal Gift I have, or will ever, receive!

~~~~~~~~

Lord Jesus, thank You that the greatest gifts You have ever given me--Yourself and my salvation--are ones that will never be taken away! Thank You that no matter what life may bring, these are gifts I can always cling to and rest in. Thank You also for Your abundant grace and love that You pour out on us by giving us even more blessings and gifts throughout this life! I acknowledge, Father, that they are temporary gifts, never meant to make me completely content or happy on this earth, because there is a far better, eternal Gift awaiting me with You.

However, I also acknowledge that these gifts are meant to bring me joy for the season that they are a part of my life--that they are good. Therefore, I surrender my fear of losing them to You, and I choose to freely enjoy them while they are mine and to proclaim them to the world that it may know Your love and goodness! By Your grace and strength alone, Father, I do this, and I ask that You would help me to surrender all my "jinxes" to You. Thank You, Abba. I love You!

In Your holy and precious Name I pray, Amen.     

Forgiveness Comes With A Price

Today during my quiet time with the Lord, I read Psalm 65. It is a wonderful Psalm that praises God for His abundant blessings and provision! It is full of His tender mercies not only to mankind, but to the earth itself: "The grasslands of the desert overflow; the hills are clothed with gladness" (v. 12).

Verse 3 in particular, however, stood out to me. King David wrote, "When we were overwhelmed by sins, you forgave our transgressions." A footnote next to the word "forgave" directed me to the bottom of the page where I was shown that the verse may also have read, "When we were overwhelmed by sins, you made atonement for our transgressions." It struck me that the word "forgave" could also have been the phrase "made atonement for." To make atonement for something means to make reparation, or payment, for something, and usually that something is a wrong that has been committed.

Jesus made atonement for our sins when He paid the penalty our sins demanded: death. He died in our place on the cross that, through faith in His sacrifice and resurrection, our sins might be forgiven and we might have eternal life with Him!

I have known since I was a little girl that Jesus died for my sins on the cross, and that when I repent of my sins and believe in His Name, He will forgive me of my sins and cleanse me from all unrighteousness. Today, however, I was struck with a deeper understanding of forgiveness than I had ever considered before. Hebrews 9:22 says, "[The] law requires that nearly everything be cleansed with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness."

Being God, Jesus had, and has, the authority to forgive sins, but by the law He Himself set forth centuries ago, it was necessary that blood be shed in order for our sins to be forgiven. Forgiveness came with a price: our lives. But, in His unfathomable love and mercy, God chose to pay the price forgiveness demanded Himself, and He offered His life instead. Oh, Abba...how amazing is Your love for us who are so unworthy!

Dwelling on the awesome, necessary price Jesus paid in order that our sins might be forgiven, I began to consider how this new revelation about forgiveness should be applied to my life. If the greatest act of forgiveness demanded the greatest sacrifice this world will ever know, then I must expect to pay a price as well when I choose to forgive another.

Forgiveness is far more than my saying, "I forgive you," whether directly to someone's face or indirectly in my heart. Forgiveness will also demand that I pay a price as Christ did, and that price is a denial of myself. I must deny myself any desire, when I am in the midst of my pain and hurt, to punish that person for hurting me, to hurt them back, to act as judge over them, to deny them forgiveness when it is sought, or to bring up their sin again in the future.

If Jesus chose not to condemn, not to retaliate, to offer forgiveness without hesitation to us who could never deserve it, to remove our sins as far as the east is from the west and to remember them no more...then when I choose to forgive, I too must pay the price of denying myself and must offer forgiveness as freely as He did, no matter how I might feel. I may have to forgive many times, because the hurt will not automatically disappear when I forgive and I must lay the pain at His feet, but by the strength and grace He provides, I know it is possible to pay the price forgiveness requires.

Only then will I truly be forgiving others as Christ has forgiven me.

The One Who Sustains

     Today, March 10th, 2013, I have completed my undergraduate degree! I wanted to commemorate this day by writing a post to share what God has taught me throughout the more-than-four-years it took me to finish my degree (a B.A. in English Literature).
     My journey actually began in my Junior year of high school, when I started taking classes at the local community college through my high school's Running Start program. I did Running Start exclusively during my Senior year, and, by God's grace, I graduated high school with 82 college credits. As a result, I was able to begin my university experience as a transfer student, which I was very grateful for.
     For as long as I can remember, I never had any strong aspirations about continuing on after high school to pursue a bachelor's degree. Not because I didn't know it could be very useful or because I disliked school (I didn't), but because my heart's greatest desire had always been to be a stay-at-home wife and mother. I had played around with the idea of pursuing different careers, even joining the military, as all my siblings had done, but nothing ever gave me lasting peace. As a result, you can imagine that my drive and passion for going to college was lacking. I went anyway, however, because I knew the Lord would not want me to be idle and going to college seemed to be the next logical step in my life (which is why I was grateful I could start as a transfer student).
     After high school, my mom and I moved to CO, where I eventually began attending the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. I decided not to pursue a degree in English because (this may sound strange) I knew it was my strongest area, and I wanted to give myself more of a challenge. Thus, I originally began pursuing a degree in Psychology, because the idea of being a counselor had always interested me. However, I discovered early on that a Psychology degree was not right for me, so I decided to change my major to English Literature after all.
     This is the first lesson God taught me: Whatever skill I have with reading, writing, and working with the English language in general comes from the Lord and, as a result, there must be a reason why He has given me these specific abilities. I was unsure what that reason might be, but I decided back then to embrace the skills He has given me and to trust that He will direct me to use them for His glory. I still do not know exactly what I will/may use my degree for, but God gave me peace shortly after my husband, Brian, and I began dating in 2010, that He wanted me to finish my degree once Brian and I were married (I had taken a break from college at that point because of a personal situation). Brian and I got married May 7th, 2011, I transferred to Grand Canyon University to finish my degree online, and today that goal has been realized!
     This is the second lesson God taught me: Nothing is impossible with the Lord. Despite whatever obstacles, whether real or imagined, I or others saw placed on the path to my degree, the Lord was faithful to see me through and to sustain me to the end (and to this new beginning). He taught me that no matter how uncertain the future may seem, He is in complete control and He will be my Sustainer and Provider through it all--and He was. He sustained me through trials both in and outside of school, and He taught me that as long as I am faithful to seek His will above all else, He will be faithful to reveal it in His time.
     The third lesson God taught me is not to view undesirable situations as undesirable, but rather as opportunities to share His love and grace with others. Several times throughout my classes at GCU, we would have group papers or projects. I am not a fan of group papers/projects to begin with, because it is naturally easier (and usually safer) to only have to worry about your own work. However, group work can be even more frustrating in an online setting, largely because of the lack of face-to-face communication. Looking back, I know I had no reason to worry and be frustrated like I was, because every group I was in worked hard and God brought everything together in the end. Most humbling of all, however, was how God used the groups to bring certain women into my life, whom God used me to encourage, assist, and comfort during trials they were going through at the time.
     In one such case, I had no idea that my short message of sympathy and encouragement to a woman who was facing the one year anniversary of her father's death would end up blessing her as much as it did. That one message turned into many more, and she told me that she truly believed God had placed us in the same group at that time so I could offer her the comfort she needed. I was blessed to know that the Lord had used me to encourage her so greatly, especially because I didn't do anything more than email her and respond to her emails--but it was what she needed, and God knew. Most of all, I was humbled. I knew that, if it had been up to me, I never would have chosen to do a group paper...but God had other plans, and He turned a situation that I would have avoided into an opportunity to love a hurting heart. This was one of the greatest lessons I learned during my college career, and I pray it is one I will not soon forget.
     Fourthly, God taught me to never stop praying to Him for wisdom and direction. Because God gave me victory paper after paper, it could have been easy for me to stop asking Him for help, to assume that the wisdom would come. Or, even worse, it could have been easy for me to start relying on my own skill instead of relying on God, from whom any ability I have has come.
     God revealed to me during my college career a seed of pride in my heart regarding my writing that could have grown into a tree of arrogance, were it not for His abundant grace that brought me to tears of repentance, and a renewed understanding that all I am is from and in and by and for Christ. He taught me that no matter how much knowledge I have attained, there is always more for me to learn, but I must be willing and humble enough to receive it.
     So, paper after paper, I renewed my prayers and petitions for wisdom and guidance, because every new challenge was, and is, a new opportunity for me either to choose to rely upon myself or to rely upon the Lord, and to choose to believe that He will grant me wisdom if I have faith and not doubt (James 1:5-6). By His grace, He taught me only to rely upon Him, and I pray I always will.   
     I have no doubt there are many more lessons I could share of what I learned over the past almost-eight years of my college career, but I think these are enough to demonstrate the power, faithfulness, love, and mercy of the One who sustained me through it all. He sustained me through far more than just my undergraduate degree--He sustained me through many other trials and challenges life threw my way, and I would not be where I am today, or who I am today, without Him. Jesus used my amazing husband and other dear friends and family to be His hands and words and heart to me during that time as well, and I am forever grateful for the gift of their love, faith, and guidance.
    
     Lord, whatever the future may hold, may I remember not to be afraid to use the abilities You have given me, and to always remember from Whom they come. Please help me to remember not to shirk undesirable circumstances but to seize them as opportunities to reach out and touch others' lives and hearts for Your glory. Keep me humble. May I never stop asking You for wisdom and guidance in my life. May I believe and not doubt that You will grant me the wisdom I seek. May I always remember what You have sustained me through, so when new challenges and trials arise, I will not fear but trust in You. Most of all, dear Savior, may I remember that nothing is impossible for You, no matter the mountains that surround me, that are only hills in the mist. Thank You, thank You, thank You for sustaining me through this chapter in my life! Thank You for what You have in store for me today and in the future. Thank You for enabling me to complete my degree. Above all else, thank You, Jesus, for making me complete in You. To You alone be the glory and honor and power and praise!
     In Your holy and precious Name I pray,
          Amen