Anxiety

Enough

/ Stefani Carmichael / Leave a comment

I won’t ever forget standing in the darkness of the catacombs in Kiev, Ukraine, my thin wax candle flickering. I felt something in my coat pocket. Looking down, a child of 3 or 4 stood with a jacket several sizes too big. I barely caught sight of the dirty face under the toboggan and am still uncertain whether the child was a boy or girl.

Asking questions, I learned this child lived in the streets and was probably looking for food or something of value. A junior in high school at the time, I had relegated situations like this to Charles Dickens’ novels of long past.

In the United States, my family was not well off. At the time, I was living in a second-hand single wide trailer in Mississippi. Neighborhood families had often brought us their cast-off clothing, and to me this was just normal life. I had my first steak at age 18 when I visited my aunt, and she was appalled when I tried to slather ketchup on it because that is just what we did to make meat palatable.

But I had never faced starvation. I certainly knew that if you did not eat the food you had you would not get more, and I had forced down my share of canned vegetables to get better things. Leftovers were to be eaten until they were gone, and nothing was to be wasted.

But this small child had no one to provide meals. Scrounging on your own as a toddler? How could that be?

At that moment, my heart for orphans took root. Whether girl or boy, that face will forever be etched in my memory.

In college, I studied International Business and Economics. At the time I was learning the GDPs of countries worldwide I ended up in an expensive formal shop on the coast. I couldn’t help but notice that the dresses cost more than an average person made a year in many of these places.

When I think about things like this, it’s tempting for me to numb myself to it. It’s tempting to turn back to the world around me and deal with the things I can handle, knowing that I can’t fix this.

But I hope I never do.

Yes, it’s painful to look at the brokenness in this world head-on. This weekend, I feel assaulted by it. Reminded of the plight of orphans, the poverty in the world, the wars our veterans have fought, the incivility of politics, not to mention the hurts of those near me it can be tempting to harden yourself from it all.

But I refuse to do it.

I keep reading the messages online from various places that, “I am enough.” I look at all that I just mentioned, and I admit quite honestly, “I am not enough. I will never be enough.”

So, how do I keep standing, keep walking, keep eating, keep breathing each day? How do I keep going seeing the deep need of our world?

I take it all—all the pains near and far to the God who is enough. I don’t pretend it doesn’t exist. I don’t look away. I don’t pretend I can handle it. I look at it and I let it drive me to Him.

I cry on my bed and I intercede for the orphans, those treated unjustly, those who are persecuted, and the persecutors.

I put my trust in God, and believe he is at work.

I don’t always understand his timing. Why does he sometimes answer quickly, and at other times help seems so slow? His ways are beyond me, but he is at work.

I saw babies packed in cribs, but I have also seen some brought into a loving home.

I have seen girls left unattended in an orphanage, but I have also heard reports of 70 being adopted by their heavenly father.

Joseph never knew why he was hurt and abandoned by his family, enslaved, betrayed and imprisoned—until years later when he could say:

You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.
Genesis 50:20

I am so thankful I am not in charge, and that I can confess my own inadequacy. It leaves me free to be used in the hands of my maker in the capacity he has for me. The burden of the world is not on my shoulders—in fact my own burden has been lifted by the one who can bear it all.

I can’t do everything, but I can do something. I can give, write, encourage, teach, love. Not everyone. Not as well as I would like to. But when the needs of the world and the people of my own home face me, I am so glad that I haven’t left them thinking I am the one who can satisfy all their needs. I can give a drink of water, but you will be thirsty again. Thankfully, I know where you can find the never-ending spring.

A Matter of Perspective

/ Stefani Carmichael / Leave a comment

I don’t know about you, but some days (every day) I need to grab a breath of fresh air and gain some perspective. Some days facing the world, political drama, rubbing against the lives of those nearby and hearing the unkind words of those far away jumbles together into a giant mess that can be a bit disheartening.

Fortunately, it is only disheartening from my limited perspective, which is why it is so important to stop and look at life from a different frame of reference regularly. From my perspective, I see a lot of corrupt people. I often wonder who is telling the truth. I see a lot of hurt, and a lot of hurt people hurting other people whether they want to or not.

This often mixes together with good things. Blessings abound in my life, to be sure. The more I enter relationships with others, the more I see both beauty and pain, joy and chaos.

Alongside others, this can be far too much. It can make you want to retreat even though you know you should not. At these times, I realize I do need to retreat, but just long enough to be replenished and to love again. My source of love is the God who is love, and if I am not filled with his Spirit, I have little joy and nothing to offer.

In the middle of life’s challenges, navigating in love is so essential if we don’t want those things to get worse. But in the middle of these days, we are also in need of wisdom. Wisdom seems a bit sparse at times, but we have been told where to find it.

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.” Proverbs 9:10

Often when people discuss the fear of the Lord they explain that the fear of the Lord is not terror but reverence and awe. Or conversely, they might do the opposite as a reaction, reminding people that we do really have reason to fear God in the way we generally think.

The truth is, when we look up the original word in the Hebrew lexicon , it includes all these forms of fear, and adds respect, reverence and piety.

Proverbs come in distinct forms, and this one has two parallel parts. We understand the first better as we look to the second. If we do that, we see that “fear of the LORD” is parallel with “knowledge of the Holy One.” Basically, we learn from this that this fear of the Lord has to do with knowing who God is.

Do you want to be wise? Know God.

In his word, we learn of a God who is holy. This passage itself parallels the name of the LORD with the “Holy One.” The only reason we will ever be able to stand before God at all is because of Christ. If we stand in rebellion against him, we should fear in the most common modern usage of the term.

Yet, we also learn of a God that is deserving of awe. He created all things. Do the mountains fill you with wonder? Does the immensity of the universe humble you? Then marvel at the God who created them. If we can delight in a wonderful book, painting or movie, how much more can we delight in the creator of creative people? How much more can we delight in the One who made everything out of nothing. Our creativity is but a reflection of His.

We can marvel at His creation because it is beautiful, diverse, and detailed beyond our comprehension. Yet, we can also stand amazed at his power to create. A God who can create all of this deserves this kind of fear.

We learn of a God who is both just and merciful. In a world where justice sometimes seems completely illusive, we see stories of those who cried out over injustice and were heard by the God of the universe. As our nation questions who is telling the truth in the highest matters of justice in the land, I am thankful for the God who knows and sees all things, even the hearts of men. His justice is impartial in a world where partiality and partisan politics seems to rule.

And yet, justice itself can be a frightening thing when we sit in the seat of the accused and guilty. When we ourselves deserve wrath due to justice, he found a way to save us. When we, his creation, rebelled, he pursued us in love. He found a way to satisfy his justice and free us.

We learn of a patient God who perseveres throughout centuries, and yet a God who knows every hair on our head and every tear we have cried.

We learn of a God who can laugh at rulers who plot against him. The mightiest rulers in the world are as nothing to him. Fear God, and you don’t have to fear principalities or powers.

What kind of knowledge do we need to have of God to gain this wisdom? Learning about Him through reading His word is great, but if we know about Him in the same way we know about Gandalf it does not lead to the wisdom mentioned. We may think Gandalf is a great character, but we also know he is not real. The wisdom of knowing God comes from a belief in him. This knowledge is a relational knowledge, that differs from knowing about something.

When you trust in God and know him relationally as your Father, that knowledge grows and deepens with time through his word and prayer. When you first experience the fear of a real and holy God, followed by the awe and reverence of his grandeur and love… that’s just the beginning of wisdom.

Today, if you are struggling and in need of perspective, take a step back and spend time with God in prayer. From His perspective, our concerns are small, and He can handle them. From His perspective, the time is short, and our difficulties are light and momentary compared to eternity.

On Sovereignty and Stewardship

/ Stefani Carmichael / 2 Comments
IMG_3681

Overview of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

September 11, 2001 as planes crashed into the twin towers and the pentagon, I discovered just how much I had placed faith in the United States of America. After a year of searching I found my heart resting with more security than ever in the sovereignty of God, as it should.

At the same time, this newfound knowledge allowed my heart to rest enough to marry and pursue a family, without guilt at not being able to solve the economic struggles of the former Soviet Union (as I had once hoped to do).

The sovereignty of God is a true, sweet, and necessary doctrine if one is to live a life without anxiety, for which I will forever be grateful. It has brought me through many difficulties and upholds me in the darkest days.

Fast-forward fifteen years, and the Lord began placing on me a desire to pray that I would love him with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength and my neighbor as myself. I couldn’t get past this being the summary of what God desires for our lives, and so I began praying this daily.

Let me warn you, that praying this prayer may not look like what you expect. As I prayed this, I found God confronting me with my deepest fears and leading me to face them, because as it says in 1 John 4:18, “perfect love casts out fear.” Repeatedly I found myself crying out that God would help me love and forgive when I wanted desperately to run and not look back.

During this time, a friend invited me on a mission trip to Ethiopia. God immediately began making this seemingly impossible trip happen. He provided over half the funds and childcare before I even agreed to go. Inside I wrestled with what we could do in a short-term mission trip, and God reminded us regularly that it was not about what we could do, but what He wanted to accomplish.

I confess to having been “on-the-fence” about short-term mission trips sometimes. I know there is a desperate need for missions, and yet I struggle with small questions like, “Is this the best way to do it?” I confess at times those questions have kept me from doing all that I should. This is but one area where my fear of not doing something well enough could keep me from doing anything. I must come to grips with the truth that I will never do anything well enough, but God does call me to do what I can.

As I prepared for this trip, I read about Ethiopia, and my heart opened as I read about the plight of orphans in that country. My former concerns about poverty in other countries resurfaced. I am ashamed to say, I had stuffed a lot of those concerns and numbed them with the “Sovereignty of God.” I had used a true doctrine in a wrong way to numb my heart rather than fuel God’s work.

As I wrote earlier, I fully believe in the sovereignty of God. He certainly doesn’t need me to help orphans in Ethiopia or to bring the gospel to all nations. And yet, God’s call on our lives is to love him first and others next. As I have sought to do that, I have noticed him reawakening long dormant desires in me.

I admit, that as an immature believer, I probably could not have handled seeing the things I did in Ethiopia. The overwhelming need would have been crushing, and I would not have been strong enough to share hope without being crippled by despair.
Instead, I have been blessed to see God shine a light in many ways while we were there, and since. I have been blessed to see what the Lord can do, and through the process my belief in God’s sovereignty has deepened.

At a church in Ethiopia, the pastor providentially shared a sermon on the parable of the talents. Amid great poverty, I was given a powerful reminder that I was a steward of all that I have. My time, my money, my intellect, my entire life is not my own to do with what I please.

Why did the man bury his talent in the sand?

FEAR

The God who reigns and pursued me with his love also asks me to love Him and others, not to live in fear doing nothing. God pressed me with another area of fear in my life and planted a seed in my heart that would birth this blog. Why should I not use the gift of writing the Lord has given me to encourage others?

I may not have time to blog as much as I would like, but one thing I know, is that I cannot let fear be the cause of dissuading me. If I don’t blog, let it be because I am too busy loving my husband, my children, my dorm girls, my church family, orphans…. Don’t let it be because I am burying any talent the Lord has given me in the sand.

Please understand that I am not advocating neglecting the responsibilities God has already given you. When you pursue loving God with everything, you will find priorities matter. In this journey, I have failed time and again at getting this balance right. In those moments, I thank God anew for his sovereignty. His plans will not be thwarted by my imperfections. I don’t want to encourage you to neglect your family or other God-given priorities to pursue something else. Sometimes in our efforts our call is to step back.

I think of David’s desire to build the temple.

“My father David had it in his heart to build a temple for the Name of the LORD, the God of Israel. But the LORD said to my father David, ‘You did well to have it in your heart to build a temple for my Name. Nevertheless, you are not the one to build the temple, but your son, your own flesh and blood—he is the one who will build the temple for my Name.’”

1 Kings 8:17-19

If you have a desire to do something that is outside of your realm to pursue at this time, be comforted by this passage. God saw David’s heart to build him a temple and commended him for it even though his sovereign plan entailed Solomon building it instead.

God’s sovereignty is a comfort to us at times when we cannot do what God has placed in our hearts. At those times, we can pray and entrust those desires to the God who sees our hearts.

At the same time, sometimes we have more than enough and fail to see it. Sometimes we have more that we can give. Sometimes we hold back rather than offer all. Our children, our churches, our ministries are blessed to a degree by pouring out our lives further as we do see just how greatly God has already provided for us. This is an intricate balance, and one that we must constantly bring before God.

Where are you in the balance today? Are you failing to trust God’s sovereignty by holding back out of fear? Are you failing to trust God’s sovereignty by not resting in an area that is outside your control? This is a tension to be wrestled with as we seek God’s heart. Sometimes we need to lay a situation at his feet, but sometimes He shows us ways He can use us. There will always be people using their talents for his glory, and his glory will always be displayed. But, which servant will you be?