Author: Colleen Craig

Posted on

Ticks, Needles and Left Behind

My Dear Sister,

I was still awake…way past my bedtime. My parents were still not home, even though they said they would be. My mind raced: Were they raptured and I was left behind? Were they in a car accident? Will they ever come home? Will I be alone? The fear of losing those I loved most kept me awake till I heard the garage door being opened.

I had the nightmare again…ticks and leaches falling through the ceiling. I have a fear of all things that suck my blood: ticks, leaches, vampires, and needles to name a few. I won’t walk in tall grass or soak in stagnant water. I close my eyes before a needle is even presented and I will not see movies with vampires…even those in love.

Fear is an interesting thing. It can be good motivator when it motivates us to help those in need or protect ourselves and others when faced with danger. And it is right and Godly when we…well…when we fear God. But when fear presents itself due to not trusting the Lord, it becomes an ungodly and sinful fear for which we must repent.

This paralyzing ungodly fear focuses on circumstances, not on the Lord. We fear something more than we fear God. I feared being left behind more than I trusted that the Lord would take care of me. I feared pain and torture more than trusting that the Lord would not give me more than I could bear with His strength. I’ve noticed lately that I would rather live in my fear so things can only get better rather than seek to trust and that trust be broken. But then I realized I am trusting in the wrong things and people. The Lord will never leave me nor forsake me. If my husband, child, friend, parent, bank account, or comfort leave, do I trust the Lord that He won’t? Am I satisfied in Him?

Sweet sister, am I alone in this? Oh how we need to renew our minds. We need to repent of the sin of unbelief that the Lord has us in His hand. We need to remind ourselves that God is sovereign (Is 46:9-11; Gen 50:20; Jer 32:27), He helps us in times of need (Is 41:10; 2 Cor 12:9; Heb 4:16), and we can seek His help when fear is at our doorstep (Ps 34:4; Ps 46:1-3). We have heard that perfect love casts out all fear, and this is true, but trusting the Lord and His promises are the key to overcoming sinful fear. Do you trust Him…do I?

Your Sister,
Colleen

Posted on

Fired Up

Dear sister,

AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! I was SOOO angry!!! I am a red-headed Irish blooded creature that is prone to anger…plus I was provoked…and hungry and tired. I got over it quickly, it’s in my nature to simply explode and go, so it’s no big deal. It’s not like I let the sun go down on my anger. I have every excuse in my own written book to explain away anger. Don’t you? After all, the Lord made us emotional beings to feel things…so anger is ok, right?

Well, kind of. The Lord did give us anger as an emotion and sign of something going on in our hearts. Righteous (or right) anger is a passionate response to evil and things that oppose God’s glory and the real good of mankind. It is right to be passionate about the death of children, war, murder, disobedience, and people being taken advantage of. Jesus was angry at His Father’s house being made into a Wal-Mart. He was angry when death took his friend Lazarus too early. He was angry at the sin of the religious people of the day who thought looking righteous made them righteous. I have to admit, my anger is usually not this kind of anger. It has a totally different focus.

My anger comes when I’m not getting what I want or think I deserve. I get angry when my husband is not doing the housework my way, when my little girl is not obeying in the right way, right away, with the right attitude. Or she freaks out at the playground and grocery store. I get angry when I’m late and when I am inconvenienced. Pretty much, when people are not fulfilling my desires, I flare up. Yes, I have a passionate emotional response for sure, but as you can see, my passion is directed at ME and MY desires and not for the Lord’s glory and others good. Man, is that ugly!

Richard Baxter writes that anger is without reason and against reason. It’s a temporary madness and drunk like state. I’ve been there, have you? As believers, our passionate hearts should be reigned in by the Holy Spirit, not let loose like the Tasmanian Devil! The Lord promised that He will never give us more than we can bear and He also says there is a way out of every temptation (1 Cor. 10:13). One of the best ways to avoid sinful anger, is to avoid sinful anger. Walk away, take a deep breath, eat something, take a nap, or go to another room. Pray for the Lord to give you self-control and patience. If you are prone to sinful anger, have a friend keep you accountable.

We don’t just want our behavior to change, we first desire our hearts to change. Seek repentance of your sinful anger, ask for forgiveness from the Lord and the one you’ve sinned against. Oh sweet sister, Christ died for our sinful anger. He rose again to give us freedom from the curse of sinful anger! There is hope for life away from sinful anger! It’s in Christ! We need to seek His glory, not our own! We need to want His desires, not our own! As our hearts turn to Christ, our anger will morph into Godly anger, to uphold His glory and be passionate about others good, not our own. Dear sister, what is your passion toward? Yourself or the things of the Lord?

Your sister in Christ,
Colleen

Posted on

The Object of Courage

“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” Scripture often uses “courageous” and “strong” as close brothers. These brothers are given by the Lord in times of battle where, I would assume, men would easily become frightened and dismayed. The best part of the verse is that these people can be courageous BECAUSE the Lord their God was with them wherever they went! How amazing is that? Amazing, but how can I apply that to my life? I don’t go to war to fight the county next to mine for their large grapes and fields.

Our lives, sisters, should be grounded in our theology. So when we think about courage, it should be defined by our faith. With that in mind, think of being courageous as a demonstration of your faith, in the face of opposition, that God is true to his word. We can face the fears and battles of today by trusting that what God said in His Word is true. Think about it, we won’t act courageous if we don’t confidently trust God’s word as true. If I don’t believe that God will look after my husband while he is deployed then I would not have the courage to be in another country with my baby alone. If I don’t believe that Christ came to pay my sin debt in full and gave me his righteousness so that I will be with God for eternity, I would live in fear of death. If I didn’t believe that my eternity is secure in heaven, I would live my life in fear of death and trying constantly to earn heaven. Instead, I can be courageous to tell others about Christ because I believe His Word and life is true. I can be courageous as a stay at home mom in the face of a feminine society that pressures me to find my worth outside of the home. I can be courageous being a single woman who loves God does not have to be complete with a man because I am complete in Christ. I can be courageous as a believer in Christ to stand up for Christ in a world that belittles our faith and Savior. We can be courageous in the face of disease and death because we know that this world is not our home. We have the hope of heaven because our sins have been forgiven!

The object of our faith (Christ) is what should make us courageous. The warriors thousands of years ago believed God’s Word was true and that gave them courage to fight their battles. God’s word is still true and the One who is called Truth is the reason that we can be courageous in our lives and not be frightened or dismayed.

Your Sister in Christ,
Colleen

Posted on

Radical Freedom

Sister,

“Choose Freedom!”  I said to my fifteen-month-old daughter Annabelle as she once again reached out to play with the computer cords.  I had already begun training her not to grab the cords in the house, as they can be dangerous if pulled and yanked.  She looked back at me slyly as her chubby fingers barely grazed the cords.  “No Annabelle,” I said to her quietly.  She continued to stare me down while carefully caressing the cords.  I could see her little mind wrestling between her perceived freedom of touching and grabbing everything she desired, and the real freedom of obeying her mom.

Aren’t we all like this?  We truly think that freedom is doing whatever we want when we want.  But in fact, that is anarchy and chaos.  If everyone does what is right in their own eyes, societal orders collapse and individual freedoms soon follow.

So, how can we choose freedom?  Freedom implies that we are a slave to something.  One thing all of humanity has in common is that we are a slave to sin.  No matter what country you are from, no matter who your parents are, no matter what age or maturity level you have obtained, you are a slave to sin.  The Bible teaches that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Rom 6:23a).  Annabelle knew she was not allowed to touch the cords, yet she was compelled to touch them because she is a sinner.  Me too!  I know I should be patient with her and my husband but how quickly I choose impatience and anger.  The Bible also says that the wages, or cost of this sin (disobedience to God), is death.  DEATH.  Death is no joking matter.  Scripture describes death as a real place, hell.  Hell is where God pours his wrath down on sinners.  There is fire, gnashing of teeth, and separation from all that is good and right, God.  We are a slave to THIS!  THIS sin that God will punish in eternal hell.  Stop and sit on this fact for a bit.  The longer you think about how completely hopeless, painful, and abhorrent God’s wrath in hell is, the sweeter the freedom of Christ will be to you.

The rest of Romans 6:23 says, “But the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.”  He died for us when we were still sinners (Rom 5:8).  When believer’s eyes are opened to the utter slavery of their sin and the freedom that came through faith in Christ, our joy abounds!  We have been set free from the ultimate penalty of sin and have the ultimate freedom of heaven!  I can hear you now, “but I still sin!”  “I still want to touch the cords!”  “I am still impatient!”  Yes, we still have our moments of desiring perceived freedom, but real freedom is walking in the righteousness that Christ has already given us.

So sweet sister, no matter where you are in life, there is freedom for you.  If you have not yet put your trust in Jesus, you can have the freedom from the ultimate penalty of sin.  Trust that He paid the price for your sin by dying on the cross and rising again!  He took on your filthy sin and put His righteousness on you instead!  What an amazing gift of freedom!  And fellow sister in Christ, you are free to walk in His righteousness!  Your righteousness is not based on what you do or don’t do.  Your freedom does not rely on your good or bad works, it relies on Christ alone!  So be radically free!  This gospel is for you!  There is freedom in obeying Christ!

~Colleen

Posted on

Grace or Merit?

My Dear Sister,

It’s been a long day.  Annabelle, my 14-month-old daughter woke up cranky and continued to be so throughout the day.  She would not eat the food I prepared for her and she even gave me angry eyes as she forcefully pushed it away.   She wouldn’t play in the grass and she complained when I took her for a walk.  No treats for her tonight!  I don’t want her to think she can get away with how she behaved today.  As a parent I should correct consistently so she won’t build bad habits, right?  Finally, bedtime came complete with cries and leg kicking.  I shut the door to let her cry it out.

Giving her grace was nowhere in play this day.  And what is grace? Grace is getting what you don’t deserve.  Grace involves two parties where one party has wronged the other in some way, yet the one who was wronged gifts the wrong-doer not according to what he or she deserves, but rather out of a heart of unconditional generosity.  Wow, that’s a lot of words.  There is a difference between merited favor and grace.  Often we treat people with merit thinking its grace…if Annabelle is normally a well behaved child, then I will gladly give her a treat or overlook an act of disobedience because she is normally well-behaved. That is merit, not grace.  What if a badly behaved child does the same disobedience?  Would I give them the same treat or overlook the same offense?  If I was honest, I probably would not because I give treats based on past or overall behavior.  That is not grace.  Grace is given freely without regards to good or bad behavior.

The gospel is our example of grace.  Jesus lived a perfect life with no sin and was crucified a horrible death to take the entire penalty of sin.  He then arose three days later thus conquering the penalty of death.  This is called the “great exchange”…where Jesus took on ALL the sin of His children and then put His perfect righteousness on them so that God now looks them as righteous, as His adopted and chosen sons complete with the full inheritance of heaven!  Nowhere in the gospel are believers chosen for what they have done or not done…for how they behaved or did not behave.  They are gifted salvation by God’s unconditional generosity.

This day with Annabelle could have been so different.  If I had only remembered what God has gifted me in Christ (forgiveness of my sins, eternal life, righteousness, adoption, and the riches of heaven) and that He gave me this not because I deserved it, earned it, or merited it, then maybe I could have looked at Annabelle in the same manner.  I should have loved her in grace, had patience with her in grace, and not gotten flustered or frustrated with her lack of obedience or her foolishness.  Christ loved me before I believed; he gave me grace in my bad behavior…how much more should I give grace to my daughter (or husband, family, and friends)?  How would Annabelle act if I treated her with grace instead of merit?  Sure, there is a place for discipline, structure, and obedience, but it should be under the umbrella of the gospel of grace.  To give her a treat when she doesn’t deserve it and tell her that is what Jesus did for me!  He gave me life when I deserved death!  To play with her, when she “deserves” a time-out, to show her that the Father never turns His back on His children.  These actions and training can only come when her mom remembers the unmerited grace that was given her.  Annabelle might not have acted any different in this day, but her mom would have.

~Colleen