Your memoir: Finding beauty in your broken pieces

“Lord, make me a godly man. Lord, mold me into a woman after your own heart. . . . But don’t let it hurt too much.”

Have you ever prayed such prayers?

I do. All the time. Every day I pray for God to give me and my husband and kids and grandkids a soft, easy life. A life protected from difficulties.

 But Chuck’s words zing me: They tell me I’m shortsighted in my thinking and my yearning and my praying.

Chuck continues: “‘Lord, make me stable, long-suffering, and gracious,’ but don’t remove too many of my creature comforts.”

“‘Lord, teach me faith, make me strong,’ but don’t let me suffer.”

Chuck points out, “We want instant maturity, not the kind that requires sacrifice or emotional pain of hardship. ‘Lord, give me patience . . . and I want it right now!’” (Charles R. Swindoll, Great Days with the Great Lives)

You, like me, probably ask God to remove roadblocks and pot-holes.

We ask him to give us stress-free lives. We want carefree, peaceful days.

We want happiness and joy, not sadness.

We beg God to prevent heartbreaks and detours and setbacks.

But loved ones die. Health fades. Pandemics wreak havoc in countless ongoing ways. Finances dry up. Marriages fail. Children rebel. We do stupid things that hurt others and ruin our relationships. Careers crumble.

We cry out in pain when our plans collapse and our dreams die.

We feel broken and worry we’ll never be whole again—that in a sense we are dying. We’ll never return to “normal.”

But our perspective can change if we realize that every life has its sorrows and losses and disasters and failures and that if we cooperate with Him, God can use them for our good.

That’s what Romans 8:28 means: “We know that in everything God works for the good of those who love him” (NCV).

But does God really do that? And if He does bring good from bad, how?

Chuck Swindoll continues, likening our experiences to a training course: “God’s spiritual boot camp . . . is designed for our development toward maturity. . . .”

Development, he said. Maturity. Like boot camps, our challenges—our road to maturity—can require self-discipline and hard work. A tenacious faith.

All the hard stuff God allows is designed to make us better, stronger. It’s a fine-tuning process, a way of encouraging us to change. With His help, we can leave behind what’s not so good and replace it with what’s better.

Because, let’s admit it. Each of us has rough edges, hard chips and slivers in our hearts, blind spots. Each of us is selectively hard of hearing. Each of us hangs on to some childishness. Selfishness.

But Bill Gaither’sold song offers us hope for the future: “All I had to offer Him was brokenness and strife, but He made something beautiful out of my life.”

Read that again: “He made something beautiful out of my life.”

While writing your memoir,

look for the ways God has taken your heartbreaks,

your ragged edges, your tragedies, your regrets,

and made something beautiful of your life.

Look at this photo. 

Those delightful tiles were bludgeoned, seemingly destroyed. But within the ruins, someone saw worth and usefulness. Someone made something beautiful out of it—and gave it a lovely reason to exist, a way to serve a good purpose as a serving tray.

Examine your life. The Bible says God bestows on broken ones “a crown of beauty instead of ashes. . . .” (Isaiah 61:3) Even within the poundings and the breakings that you’ve experienced, God sees you as a child of great worth to Him, beloved and useful for His good purposes.

He has made and continues to make you increasingly beautiful in His sight.

He has given you a lovely reason to exist, ways to serve His good purposes while on this earth.

Take all the time you need to discover

the specific ways God has put together all your broken pieces

and made you beautiful and useful—useful to Him and to others.

In the process, ask yourself:

What, specifically, is the grout between my pieces?

What kinds of grace and mercy and love are represented by the grout?

Write your stories!

God can use your memoir to help others discover

how beloved and beautiful they are in God’s sight.

Your story can help others live loved.

“It won’t be painless. It won’t be quick.

But God will use your mess for good.”

(Max Lucado, You’ll Get Through This)

What can you write in your memoir about prayer?

Does your memoir include a story about prayer? If it has a spiritual dimension, and if our theme verse resonates with you:  

“Always remember what you’ve seen God do for you,

and be sure to tell your children and grandchildren,”

then you probably will include something about prayer.

To help you, here are some questions to ponder:

• Who taught you to pray? Or who modeled for you the importance of prayer?
• Was there a time you were flat-out helpless to do anything but pray?
• Think about key times in your life in which you prayed and you saw God answer.
• What happened when God responded to your prayer with silence? Or when He answered your prayer differently than you hoped for?
• When did a “No” to your prayer result in something even better?
• What’s the most important aspect of prayer that you can impress upon your kids, grandkids, and great-grands?
• What stories can you write about prayer (yours or someone else’s) to teach readers about forgiveness, grace, wisdom, and hope? And about loving God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength? (Mark 12:30)

Here are inspirational tidbits to get your ideas percolating:

“Dear God, so often in my prayers I present You with my own agenda. I ask for guidance, and strength, and courage to do what I’ve already decided…. Help me to think of prayer throughout this day as simply reporting in for duty and asking for fresh marching orders. I want to be all that You want me to be, and I want to do what You have planned for me. May this morning prayer be the beginning of a conversation with You that lasts all through the day…. Amen.” (Lloyd John Ogilvie, Quiet Moments with God, February 22 selection based on Ephesians 6:18 “praying always…”)

“Give ear to my words, O Lord, consider my sighing. Listen to my cry for help, my King and my God, for to you I pray. In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation” (Psalm 5:1-3).

“He will respond to the prayer of the destitute; He will not despise their plea. Let this be written for a future generation, that a people not yet created will praise the Lord” (Psalm 102:17-18).

“Our prayers may be awkward. Our attempts may be feeble. But since the power of prayer is in the One who hears it and not in the one who says it, our prayers do make a difference.” (Max Lucado, Discovering the Power of Prayer)   

“Have you ever found that your Father has answered a forgotten prayer? I have, and I always feel ashamed; it is so rude to forget.” (Amy Carmichael, Edges of His Ways, June 24 selection)    

“One of the experiences of prayer is that it seems that nothing happens. But when you stay with it and look back over a long period of prayer, you suddenly realize that something has happened.” (Henri Nouwen, The Genessee Diary)

“... Pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44).

“If you are having difficulty loving or relating to an individual, take him to God. Bother the Lord with this person. Don't you be bothered with him—leave him at the throne.” (Charles R. Swindoll)

“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your  Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, don't keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (Matthew 6:5-8).

“Isn’t it amazing how often people try everything but prayer? It’s like the old saying: ‘When everything else fails read the instructions.’ The same with prayer. When everything else fails, try prayer…. But Elijah [in 1 Kings 18:22-40] didn’t use prayer as a last resort. Prayer was his first and only resort. A simple prayer of faith was his major contact with the living Lord. It set everything into motion.

            “Let me ask you a straight-out question: Do you, personally, pray? Now notice that I didn’t say, ‘Do you listen when the preacher prays or when your parents pray?’ I didn’t say ‘Do you know a good Bible study on prayer?’ I didn’t even say, ‘Have you taught on prayer?’ I asked, ‘Do you, personally, pray?’ Can you look back over the last seven days and pinpoint times you deliberately set aside for prayer? Even just a solid ten or fifteen minutes of uninterrupted time with God?” (Charles R. Swindoll, Great Days with the Great Lives, p. 176) 

“ . . . Pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances...” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).  

What stories about prayer came to mind? 

Quick! Jot down a few notes now 

and work on that story in earnest in the next few days. 

I never dreamed I'd be capable of doing that

We’ve all been there. We’ve chosen to do something selfish, mean, immoral—or maybe even illegal.

We’ve made willful decisions that hurt people and bring shame upon us. Deliberate actions that cause life-long consequences—for ourselves and others.

Sometimes it takes a long, long time to admit our transgression.

And when we do, the enormity of our offence hits right between the eyes.

The depth of our wrongdoing feels like a kick in the stomach and we take a new look at ourselves and say, “I never dreamed I could be capable of doing that.”

“Who am I? And what that kind of person am I, really?”

Yes, we’ve all been there.

Eventually we realize we couldn’t hide any of it from God. He knows every detail.

 

Like David, we cry out, 

Oh, God, don’t cast me away! 

Don’t reject me! 

(Psalm 51:11)

And we know deep down inside that we can do nothing—nothing—to undo what we’ve done. We can’t make our actions disappear. We are powerless to do anything to clean ourselves up.

All we can do is fall on our faces, confess our hard-hearted, selfish disobedience, and ask God’s forgiveness.

If our repentance is sincere, God is ready to forgive.

If we’re ready for “…a radical reconstruction of the heart,” (Max Lucado), God is ready to forgive.

Repentance:

“… a radical

and deliberate

turning or returning to God

that results in

moral

and ethical

change

and action.”

(from NIV Study Bible footnote for Matthew 4:17; 

emphasis mine)

Yes, God is eager to forgive.

Remember that symphony from last Thursday? Here it is again:

“God not only puts our sins out of sight

(Isaiah 38:17);

he also puts them out of reach

(Micah 7:19, Psalm 103:12),

out of mind

(Jeremiah 31:34)

and out of existence

(Isaiah 43:25; Isaiah 44:22; Psalm 51:1, 9; Acts 3:19).”

(NIV Study Bible’s comment for Isaiah 38:17; emphasis mine)

God’s forgiveness is complete.

His forgiveness is perfect.

We are undeserving, but “… Through forgiveness, [God] releases us from a debt we could never pay and assures us of His continuing love for us.” (Martin De Haan)

Our only response must be to accept His mindboggling forgiveness, grace, and mercy.

Fully accepting and grasping God’s forgiveness can take a long time, but after we do, can we forgive ourselves?

And after God forgives us, after God takes our sins from us—as far as the east is from the west!—should we forget our wrongdoings? Or should we remember our willful disobedience? Or should we do a little bit of both?

We’ll come back to this next week but, for now, think about these questions. Pray about these questions.

Listen to something important:

Your readers—

your kids, grandkids, great-grandkids,

generations yet unborn—

will struggle with their own failures

and weaknesses

and temptations

and sins.

God can use your life’s stories

to help them turn to Him

for forgiveness and restoration.

Your stories are important.

Spelling out every last detail

might not be appropriate

(more on that next week)

but with God’s help,

you can write stories to bless

entire families and generations.

What stories do you need to write?

(Revised from an earlier post)

Forgiveness: forgetting and remembering?

“‘I was wrong. I’m sorry. Now let’s get on with business. It’s your job to forgive me. It’s time for us both to put this behind us.’ With a few well-chosen words, the tables are turned. Like a wrestler doing an escape and reverse, an offender gains the upper hand. His victims are now expected to forgive and forget.

“He might even remind them that according to Jesus, if we don’t forgive others, our Father in heaven won’t forgive us (Matthew 6:14-15).

“Now that I’ve admitted my wrong, now that God has forgiven me, and now that the Bible requires you to forgive me, why can’t we act like this never happened?”

Thus writes Martin De Haan in his article, Forgiveness (from Times of Discovery, Volume 60, Number 1; emphasis mine).

He continues, “We’ve been told that when God forgives, He forgets, and that if we really forgive, we’ll forget too.”

If you’ve ever been on the receiving end of such words, you know the ripping, searing feeling in your heart because something about this doesn’t seem quite right!

So, let’s look at what the Bible says about God’s forgiveness:

“God not only puts our sins out of sight,

(Isaiah 38:17);

he also puts them out of reach,

(Micah 7:19, Psalm 103:12),

out of mind,

(Jeremiah 31:34)

and out of existence.

(Isaiah 43:25; Isaiah 44:22; Psalm 51:1, 9; Acts 3:19).”

(NIV Study Bible’s comment for Isaiah 38:17; emphasis mine)

So, God forgets.

God forgets?

“God doesn’t forget anything,” states De Haan. “From cover to cover, the Bible shows that God remembers the sins of His people.

“Both Old and New Testaments are full of stories which preserve forever the memory of His people’s forgiven wrongs.”

Whoa. I don’t know about you, but sometimes the Bible and God jerk my emotions around.

So God forgets but He also remembers?

De Haan proposes that forgiving doesn’t mean forgetting. He observes that while we can easily forget some wrongs against us, others are “always near the edge of our awareness.”

“When God says He will not remember our sins,” De Haan says, “He means He won’t remember them against us.”

Read that again: “When God says He will not remember our sins, He means He won’t remember them against us.”

Pastor Sid said it this way one Sunday morning: To forgive is to let go of holding someone guilty.

In the Hebrew, Jeremiah 31:34 means God will not mention, recount, bring to remembrance, or think about those of our sins He has forgiven.

Max Lucado has an earthier way of explaining it: When God says He will remember our sins no more, it means He will not rub our noses in them.

So what should we do when someone says to us, “The Bible requires you to forgive me, why can’t we act like this never happened?”

“Forgiveness may not involve complete restoration,” suggests De Haan.

“… Forgiveness doesn’t require a return to business as usual. There may be results that are irreversible.…”

De Haan is talking about natural, reasonable, and logical consequences.

“Forgiveness may allow for consequences. A forgiver may still wisely and lovingly ask for reasonable restitution, legal due process, a plan to avoid recurrences, and time to heal. Wise follow-through is often necessary if we are going to forgive and love well.”

Forgiveness takes lots of time and it requires the offender’s genuine repentance.

“Repentance is more than

a change of mind

or feeling sorry for one’s sins.

It is a radical

and deliberate

turning or returning to God

that results in

moral

and ethical

change

and action.”

(from NIV Study Bible footnote for Matthew 4:17; emphasis mine)

It is wise to develop a plan for healing.

(It is also wise to develop a plan for rebuilding trust. Forgiving is not the same as trusting again, but that’s a topic for another day.)

So what do you think? 

Does forgiveness leave room for forgetting AND remembering?

Revised from a post in November 2012

My mother and “Things unseen and eternal”

My sweet little mother died a few days ago and my family and I are grieving her loss. (See pictures of her at A pause.)

Professionally, Mom was extraordinarily accomplished, but everyone knew the most important things were her family, God, and her church.

I am deeply thankful to her for teaching us how to know, serve, and love God and others.

Mom showed us how to live well, how to grow old with dignity and grace and, in the end, how to die well—to die in peace.

King David, too, lived well and died well, in peace. In the Bible he is commended for carrying out his duties with integrity of heart and with skillful hands, and then, when David had accomplished God’s purpose in his own generation, he died (Psalm 78:70-72, Acts 13:36). 

When David breathed his last breath, what a sense of peace he must have held, knowing he had accomplished God’s unique purposes for him. What a sense of satisfaction (the right kind)!

I am confident my little mother, too, lived with integrity of heart and with skillful hands—that she accomplished God’s purposes for her generation, and died in peace. Hers was a life well-lived.

Dying. Death. What are they?

Here’s what Henry Van Dyke wrote:

A Parable of Immortality

I am standing upon the seashore. A ship at my side

spreads her white sails to the morning breeze

and starts for the blue ocean.

She is an object of beauty and strength, and I stand and watch

until at last she hangs like a speck of white cloud

just where the sun and sky come down to mingle with each other.

Then someone at my side says,

‘There she goes!’

Gone where? Gone from my sight—that is all.

She is just as large in mast and hull and spar

as she was when she left my side

and just as able to bear her load of living freight

to the places of destination.

Her diminished size is in me, not her.

And just at the moment when someone at my side says,

‘There she goes!’

there are other eyes watching her coming

and other voices ready to take up the glad shout,

‘Here she comes!’ 

(Henry Van Dyke)

I know Mom heard, loud and clear, “Welcome! Well done, good and faithful servant!” (Matthew 25:21).

I can only begin to imagine what she’s experiencing now.

She is seeing God face to face.

Eternal life is no longer something she only partially grasps.

Mysteries suddenly make sense.

Heavenly, unseen things are perfectly clear.

All the pieces have fallen into place.

Everything that puzzled her now makes sense.

She’s now involved in a “…contemplation of things unseen and eternal” (A Diary of Private Prayer, John Baillie).

How about you?

What are your thoughts about dying?

What do you think heaven will be like?

At the end of your time on earth,

what will it be like to stand before God

face to face, one on one?

What stories can you write for your kids, grandkids, and great-grands?

Dying and death and God and heaven seem elusive and mystifying and scary, especially for young people, so writing about them can benefit both you and your readers. Your stories can quiet fears. They can help others live with courage as they face the unknown.

Your stories can make readers think. Examine. Refine their stances. Take a fresh look. Maybe change the way they live, especially when their time on earth draws to an end.

“There is a time for everything,

and a season for every activity under heaven:

a time to be born and a time to die…”

(Ecclesiastes 3:1-2).

In writing your memoir, teach your readers how to live,

but do more than that: Teach them about that “time to die.”

God can use your stories to bless your readers. Really!

Stories are among God’s most powerful tools.

They can fortify timid hearts,

help people make important decisions

and find their way,

and inspire readers to find God’s purposes for their lives.

Your stories can change lives forever.

Related posts:

A time to be born and a tie to die

A pause

Your memoir: sharing about sin and God’s forgiveness

We’ve all been there. We’ve chosen to do something selfish, something mean, immoral, or maybe even illegal.

We’ve made willful decisions that hurt people and bring shame upon us. Deliberate actions that cause life-long consequences for ourselves and others.

Sometimes it takes a long, long time to admit our wrongdoing.

And when we do, the enormity of our offence hits right between the eyes.

The depth of our corruption feels like a kick in the stomach and we take a new look at ourselves and say, “I never dreamed I could one day be capable of doing that.”

“Who am I? And what that kind of person am I, really?”

Yes, we’ve all been there.

Eventually we realize we couldn’t hide any of it from God. He knows every detail.

 

Like David, we cry out, Oh, God, don’t cast me away—don’t shove me out of Your presence! Don’t chase me away! (Psalm 51:11)

And we know deep down inside that we can do nothing—nothing—to undo what we’ve done. We can’t make our actions disappear. We are powerless to do anything to clean ourselves up.

All we can do is fall on our faces, confess our hard-hearted, selfish disobedience, and ask God’s forgiveness.

If our repentance is sincere, God is ready to forgive.

If we’re ready for “…a radical reconstruction of the heart,” (Max Lucado), God is ready to forgive.

Repentance:

“… a radical

and deliberate

turning or returning to God

that results in

moral

and ethical

change

and action.”

(from NIV Study Bible footnote for Matthew 4:17; emphasis mine)

Yes, God is eager to forgive.

Remember that symphony from last week? Here it is again:

“God not only puts our sins out of sight

[Isaiah 38:17];

he also puts them out of reach

(Micah7:19, Psalm 103:12),

out of mind

(Jeremiah 31:34)

and out of existence

(Isaiah 43:25; Isaiah 44:22; Psalm 51:1, 9; Acts 3:19).”

(NIV Study Bible’s comment for Isaiah 38:17; emphasis mine)

God’s forgiveness is complete.

His forgiveness is perfect.

We are undeserving, but “… Through forgiveness, [God] releases us from a debt we could never pay and assures us of His continuing love for us.” (Martin De Haan)

Our only response must be to accept His mindboggling forgiveness, grace, and mercy.

Fully accepting and grasping God’s forgiveness can take a long time, but after we do, can we forgive ourselves?

And after God forgives us, after God takes our sins from us—as far as the east is from the west!—should we forget our wrongdoings? Or should we remember our willful disobedience? Or should we do a little bit of both?

We’ll come back to this next week but, for now, think about these questions. Pray about these questions.

Listen to something important:

Your readers—

your kids, grandkids, great-grandkids,

generations yet unborn—

will struggle with their own failures

and weaknesses

and temptations

and sins.

God can use your life’s stories

to help them turn to Him

for forgiveness and restoration.

Your stories are important.

Spelling out every last detail

might not be appropriate

(more on that next week)

but with God’s help,

you can write stories to bless

entire families and generations.

What stories do you need to write?

Does forgiveness leave room for forgetting AND remembering?

“‘I was wrong. I’m sorry. Now let’s get on with business. It’s your job to forgive me. It’s time for us both to put this behind us.’ With a few well-chosen words, the tables are turned. Like a wrestler doing an escape and reverse, an offender gains the upper hand. His victims are now expected to forgive and forget.

“He might even remind them that according to Jesus, if we don’t forgive others, our Father in heaven won’t forgive us (Matthew 6:14-15).”

“Now that I’ve admitted my wrong, now that God has forgiven me, and now that the Bible requires you to forgive me, why can’t we act like this never happened?”

Thus writes Martin De Haan in his article, Forgiveness.* 

He continues, “We’ve been told that when God forgives, He forgets, and that if we really forgive, we’ll forget too.”

If you’ve ever been on the receiving end of such words, you know the ripping, searing feeling in your heart because something about this doesn’t seem quite right!

So, let’s look at what the Bible says about God’s forgiveness:

“God not only puts our sins out of sight

[Isaiah 38:17];

he also puts them out of reach

(Micah7:19, Psalm 103:12),

out of mind

(Jeremiah 31:34)

and out of existence

(Isaiah 43:25; Isaiah 44:22; Psalm 51:1, 9; Acts 3:19).”

(NIV Study Bible’s comment for Isaiah 38:17; emphasis mine)

So, God forgets.

God forgets?

“God doesn’t forget anything,” states De Haan. “From cover to cover, the Bible shows that God remembers the sins of His people.

“Both Old and New Testaments are full of stories which preserve forever the memory of His people’s forgiven wrongs.”

Whoa. I don’t know about you, but sometimes the Bible and God jerk my emotions around.

So God forgets but He also remembers.

De Haan proposes that forgiving doesn’t mean forgetting. He observes that while we can easily forget some wrongs against us, others are “always near the edge of our awareness.”

“When God says He will not remember our sins,” De Haan says, “He means He won’t remember them against us.”

Read that again: “When God says He will not remember our sins, He means He won’t remember them against us.”

Pastor Sid said it this way Sunday: to forgive is to let go of holding someone guilty.

In the Hebrew, Jeremiah 31:34 means God will not mention, recount, bring to remembrance, or think about those of our sins He has forgiven.

Max Lucado has an earthier way of explaining it: When God says He will remember our sins no more, it means He will not rub our noses in them.

So what should we do when someone says to us, “The Bible requires you to forgive me, so why can’t we act like this never happened?”

“Forgiveness may not involve complete restoration,” suggests De Haan.

“… Forgiveness doesn’t require a return to business as usual. There may be results that are irreversible.…”

De Haan is talking about natural, reasonable, and logical consequences.

“Forgiveness may allow for consequences. A forgiver may still wisely and lovingly ask for reasonable restitution, legal due process, a plan to avoid recurrences, and time to heal. Wise follow-through is often necessary if we are going to forgive and love well.”

Forgiveness takes lots of time and it requires the offender’s genuine repentance.

“Repentance is more than

a change of mind

or feeling sorry for one’s sins.

It is a radical

and deliberate

turning or returning to God

that results in

moral

and ethical

change

and action.”

(from NIV Study Bible footnote for Matthew 4:17; 

emphasis mine)

It is wise to develop a plan for healing.

(It is also wise to develop a plan for rebuilding trust. Forgiving is not the same as trusting again, but that’s a topic for another day.)

So what do you think? Does forgiveness leave room for forgetting AND remembering?

* “Forgiveness,” from Times of Discovery, Volume 60, Number 1