Oh, Hezekiah.

Here's the story: Hezekiah is king of Judah. He's one of the few "good kings." God tells him he's going to die, so he begs humbly for his life. God agrees to give him more time.

Then, the King of Babylon hears that he's recovered, so he comes to visit. He not-so-humbly lets this king see everything he owns, all his treasures and...Well, all the stuff you don't let another king know you have.

He's rebuked by the prophet Isaiah for doing that and God tells him that one day all his stuff will belong to the king of Babylon and his sons will be his eunuchs. Here's his thoughtful response: "The word of the LORD that you have spoken is good.” For he thought, There will be peace and security in my days. (see Isaiah 39)
______


That last little bit always fills my heart with anger. How on earth could you be so selfish and self-centered and...I mentally continue angrily interrogating King Hezekiah. {It's oh-so helpful and accomplishes a lot.}

Tonight, I stopped my little mental rant and realized: Usually, the reason I get angry at someone for something, especially a sin, is because it's something I do. {i.e. I get super angry at prideful people who want to be right, because it inhibits my moment of being right.}

I sat for a few minutes and journaled through my thoughts. I was thinking King Hezekiah was filled with pride, selfishness and a love of comfort...

Dang it.

That last one got me. Ooh, right on the kisser.

If I struggle with any sin, and I struggle with many sins, worshipping myself is number one. And what better way to bow at my altar than to be sure I'm always super comfortable. I've sacrificed much time, love and many people on the altar of comfort.

I got nothing. No more throwing stones at King Hezekiah. I must walk away with my tail tucked while Jesus writes my name in the sand.

After being humbled to the dust, I am grateful for a few things in this:

• God always tells the whole truth about great "Bible heroes." 
• He's preserved their stories, so I can see my life through theirs.
• I don't have to hang my head in shame when I see my sin.

God's already paid the great cost of my pride and selfishness and idolatry. I'm free! Free to obey Him and follow Him and love Him above all, badly and inconsistently, but love Him just the same. 

What if the Bible isn't True.

My pastor writes a short study each week to help prepare us for the next sermon.* It gets his people in the Word each day and has been very helpful in my life.

Yesterday, the question was asked in the study: What happens to the Gospel if the Bible isn't true? I sat and thought for a while, and my heart hurt.

The Gospel completely falls apart if the Bible isn't really God's Inerrant Word. Everything that Christians are banking this life and the next on is a lie or at the very least a mistake.

The Gospel is that God loves His children so much that He dies for them, so that they will be holy. They're freed from slavery to sin, freed from God's wrath and given victory over death and hell. They have His Spirit with them in this life and live with God forever in the next. All because of Jesus.

But if Jesus wasn't who He said He was, and the Bible isn't what It says It is. We truly are to be pitied above all men.

All that crumbles in my life if the Bible isn't true:

• my marriage
• hope in the face of death
• my parenting
• my personal worth
• my decision-making
• how to steward our money
• why I exist
• how and why I love others
• compassion for the marginalized

Nothing is eternal. Nothing is everlasting. It's all fleeting and has little purpose beyond today. 

My Hubby and I are banking our entire lives on the Gospel, and It is true. It is the real, life- and heart-changing Truth that gives meaning, purpose and freedom to our lives. 

It may sound sad to wrap our lives up in something so tightly. But we all do it. We all worship something. If one thinks about her life, she may realize what she worships may not last much longer. Only a relationship with God through Jesus brings eternal satisfaction.

"When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:

'Death is swallowed up in victory.'

'O death, where is your victory?

O death, where is your sting?'

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."

(1 Corinthians 15:54-57)

*I understand this fear: If your pastor is writing the sermons and dictating what you study in the Bible, then he may lead you astray. Yes, that is true. Cults are run this way. However, we're at liberty to read and study the Bible through any pastors or studies that we feel are helpful. This just keeps our church simple and has everyone on the same page. 

So far? Only two weeks.

Since our wedding, seven years ago, the longest time my hubby and I have been apart was two weeks. In a couple of months, that will change.

My hubby has accepted a job overseas that will take him away for a year. He'll have a couple of "leaves," but over all, he'll be working in the sand for a long while. The Toot and I will not be going with him. We will be home in the States, learning how to rely solely on the Lord.

I'm going to be stretched, there's no doubt. I can't begin to think of how much I depend on the Hubby. Changing the AC filters, fixing wifi, taking the car to be serviced, fixing anything that breaks, weed eating (I mow, but I'm terrible at weed eating.), and so many other "Honey Do" chores. I am now thoroughly convinced that God's word for this year is diligence.

These next two months, before he leaves, are going to be so difficult. I want to make the best of our time together, but I'm so nervous and afraid and trying not to burst into tears. None of that makes for a great time.

Here's to trusting the Lord and knowing (if only in my mind) that He's faithful and good and loving and trustworthy and omnipresent.


"He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say to the LORD, 'My refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust.'”
(Psalm 91:1,2 ESV)

P.S. For any creepers who may stumble across this post: We have two very well-functioning house alarms, and there will be few nights that I won't have someone sleeping over. Just sayin'.

From Which Shall I Drink?

I have a choice to make every day, even every moment: Will I drink from the Fountain of Living Waters or from broken vessels that can't hold any water?

What do I know about fountains?

• A fountain is fed by a continuous stream of water.
• Its water is doesn't stagnate, because it's always moving.
• The water is fresh and clean and tastes delicious. 
• The water quenches one's thirst.
• It doesn't accumulate nasty critters that the eye can't see. 
• It's beautiful to watch and relaxing to hear.
• It isn't man-made.
• It helps animals, people and plants to grow and thrive.

What do I know about broken cisterns?

• A cistern is sometimes a jar to carry water in. If it's broken, then all the water pours out. 
• Sometimes a cistern is a well dug into the ground to hold water. If it's not filled in well, it'll leak.
• It's like a reservoir with a broken dam.
• It's usually man-made and man-broken, but not always.
• If there is any water, it becomes stagnate and not worth much. It can only grow organisms no one wants in his body.

Today, I've had and will have decisions to make. Will I drink and be satisfied from the Fountain of Living Waters? Or will I lift a broken cup to my mouth to drink, finding nothing or only drops of unclean water? 

Be appalled, O heavens, at this;

be shocked, be utterly desolate,

declares the LORD,

for my people have committed two evils:

they have forsaken me,

the fountain of living waters,

and hewed out cisterns for themselves,

broken cisterns that can hold no water.

(Jeremiah 2:12-13 ESV) 

If God is the Fountain of Living Waters, then as His child, I can drink and drink and drink, being filled up, my soul's thirsts wholly satisfied. 

Not everyone has this opportunity. Some are still slaves to the thirst with only broken containers laying around them.

Mrs. Erven, drink up! Children of God, drink up!

"Thou changest not. Thy compassions they fail not."

Finished feeding Caleb and wanted a few minutes away with the Lord before heading back to sleep.

I wrote a love note to my hubby and placed it near the door. Then, I made some hot cocoa and curled up on the sofa with my journal and Bible. I had a portion of two songs stuck in my mind. One of which I could hardly remember the right lyrics. I wrote them in my journal as I prayed, and then listened to the songs.

Beth Moore calls these moments GODstops, because it's like God is saying, "Stop! Look what I'm doing in your life right now!"

The two songs' lyrics that I could remember went as follows:
"...chiseled...carving idols of stone
have crumbled like sand 'neath the waves...
All the [pennies] I've wasted in my wishing well..."

"He's always been faithful to me."

Couldn't remember the title of the first song. The second song's title is the same as the lyric above. Between the two songs I saw a theme: God dashes our idols to the group and washes them away, because He's always faithful to us. Those idols will never satisfy and give us what we need or what our soul's desire, only He will. Therefore, His loving faithfulness sweeps those empty pitchers out from under our parched lips and sweeps us under His waterfall of Living Water. (John 4)

Well, to gather all this together: I found the first song on my iTunes. The title, Faithful to Me. Some may call it coincidence, but I think it's God saying, "Stop! Remember this: I'm always faithful to you. I'll dash anything to the ground that draws you away from me. I love you! I satisfy your soul as nothing else can!"

Both songs are of God's faithfulness, smashed up in my mind, and I didn't even know it. Sweet, sweet intimate reminders of a faithful and personal God. It's wonderful that God is faithful, but it's extra-wonderful that He personally reminds His children with little times like these.

Faithful to Me by Jennifer Knapp (Kansas Album, 1998)

He's Always Been Faithful to Me by Sara Groves

My hubby is a broken cistern, and that's a good thing.

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments." (Exodus 20:4-6 ESV)

I serve a jealous God, and that sounds terrifying. It isn't the kind of jealousy that is megalomaniacal. It's a "jealous for" something rather than a "jealous of" something. God is jealous for my affections and love. He won't settle for anything less than all of me. He commands His children to bow to and serve only Him, nothing and no one else.

Again, it sounds self-serving. God only wants us for Himself. He wants us to bow to only Him. Well, if He weren't all-satisfying, then, yes, that would be devastating. We'd live our lives in submission to His will, only to be left longing for what's better and more filling.

God know only He fills the voids in our hearts. He knows only His love makes us whole and keeps our souls satisfied. Knowing all this, He draws us to Himself to find peace and fulfillment and satisfaction. Everything else we run to is what God names, "a broken cistern."

"Be appalled, O heavens, at this;

be shocked, be utterly desolate,

declares the LORD,

for my people have committed two evils:

they have forsaken me,

the fountain of living waters,

and hewed out cisterns for themselves,

broken cisterns that can hold no water."

(Jeremiah 2:12-13 ESV)

I have done this. I didn't know how many broken cisterns I'd built for myself until yesterday.

Labor. Delivery. Breastfeeding. My hubby. Sleep.

The list seems small, but they are idols nonetheless. Even one idol is destructive and sinful.

All these things and people I'd expected to satisfy me. Labor was to be at home with my hubby, not short but moving along well. I could be relaxed and wait before heading to the hospital. Delivery would be without medication, and it would be with no cutting. Breastfeeding may not come easily, but it would come. It'd be wonderful and intimate and connect me with Caleb. My hubby would be my coach. He'd keep me calm and relaxed and take wonderful care of me.

Some of those things happened. Mostly the last. However, now my hubby's back at work. Slowly, God has stripped away the others. (I'm even afraid of what may happen to my hubby. Will God strip him away, as well?) All of my idols, my cisterns that I dug, have proved

that they cannot hold water, and they cannot satisfy.

If God did not satisfy and strengthen my soul, I would not be writing this. I would not be whole. I would probably not love Caleb and be able to move forward in life. I have felt small temptings of PPD, and I can see how others can get pulled in and trapped for weeks and months.

I still have my hubby and my baby. My hubby still loves me and is taking wonderful, wonderful care of me, so I'm at an impasse. I know full well that God will have no other gods before Him. I have seen and felt His discipline for idolatry.

I can either fight the temptation to make my hubby and idol, or I can turn my back to the Fountain of Living Waters and continue searching for water in my hubby. One decision brings peace and joy. The other will dry me up and leave me with nothing, possibly literally. (Yes, I realize that God doesn't snatch things from us just for fun, but He will do whatever He needs in order to keep us for Himself.)

"Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver;

I have tried you in the furnace of affliction.

For my own sake, for my own sake, I do it,

for how should my name be profaned?

My glory I will not give to another."

(Isaiah 48:10-11 ESV)

Father in heaven, give me grace upon grace. Give me strength to obey You and love You and serve You above all other gods. Keep my heart and soul so satisfied that I won't look to my hubby or Caleb or sleep or any other god to fill me up. Please. Please. I confess that I'm afraid of Your discipline any further. I don't want to lose my hubby or my baby. Forgive me. They are Yours to do with as You see fit. Give me grace to love You no matter Your will for my life. Let me say with Job, "Though he slay me, I will hope in him." I love You, Lord. Keep my heart. Guard it from idols. In Jesus' Name. Amen.

Thus says the LORD,

your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:

“I am the LORD your God,

who teaches you to profit,

who leads you in the way you should go.

Oh that you had paid attention to my commandments!

Then your peace would have been like a river,

and your righteousness like the waves of the sea;

(Isaiah 48:17-18 ESV)