August 29, 2010 by Teri Frana.

A couple weekends ago, my friend was in a half-triathlon, I think. I didn’t get all the details. (Why anyone would call a 67 bike ride, a 3 mile run, and some kind of a long swim, “half” - I’ll never know.) Anyway, it was during the bike ride when my friend’s strength faded and he fell to the back of the pack.

Soon, a friend of his dropped back with him and without saying anything, put his hand on my friend’s back and gently pushed him up with the rest of the riders. In fact, they made it to the front of the pack for awhile.  His “pusher” let go and my friend  eventually slipped to the back of the pack again. Several times, the “pusher” came and pushed him up with the rest of the pack.

This generous act deeply affected my friend. It also tugged at something deep within me. And it still is. You see, this next phase of my life, I’m going to need a lot of “pushing” from others. It is driving me a bit crazy thinking of all the needs I’m going to have and how much others are going to need to “push” me forward.
This morning I looked up the word “push” in my Bible. However, each time it is used, it has a negative connotation. It reads like someone is being manhandled. As I prayed and meditated on it, I felt God saying, “I will not be pushing you, I will help you.”

I realized the way I am thinking about it was wrong. Honestly, I’ve been seeing it from a very prideful mindset; I actually feel really guilty that others are going to need to push me along. I should be able to do it myself, shouldn’t I?? I see a whole lot of “me” and “I” reflected there.

I looked up the word, “help” in my Bible and it gave a whole new perspective on things:

• “The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.” Genesis 2:18
• “Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.” Exodus 4:12
• “And Saul’s son Jonathan went to David at Horesh and helped him find strength in God.” 1 Samuel 23:16
• “O LORD my God, I called to you for help and you healed me.” Psalm 30:2
• “Surely God is my help; the Lord is the one who sustains me.” Psalm 54:4
• “Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” Mark 9:24
• “Taking him by the right hand, he helped him up, and instantly the man’s feet and ankles became strong.” Acts 3:7
• “In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.” Romans 8:26
• “Guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you—guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.” 2 Timothy 1:14
• “So we say with confidence, “The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?” Hebrews 13:6

I could keep going with these, but I think we get the idea..

In God’s eyes, help is something we do out of love and mercy toward each other. God to us, us to others with God’s help. It is part of who God is and wants to be in our lives. I think of how I feel when I help others, I certainly don’t see it as “pushing”. I see it as an honor to walk along beside someone, helping them reach the goal before them.

Why do most of us struggle when the shoe is on the other foot? For me, it’s pride and fear - pride that I am capable or should be capable of doing it on my own - fear of needing to rely on others and God to help me. As I confess both of these things, it looks pretty pathetic in black and white, doesn’t it?

May God give us all eyes to see those who need our help, and all hearts who graciously and humbly accept help when we need it.

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July 21, 2010 by Teri Frana.

There’s a subject that’s been on my mind a lot lately and that is physical fitness.  After seven years in the dark nights, I find that I let myself go quite a bit.

Seven years ago I was very fit, ate healthy, and exercised five to six days a week.  I loved the feeling of being fit.  I wasn’t skinny by any stretch - it was just no part of my body jiggled.  When I waved goodbye, only my hand moved.

When I entered into the dark nights, (you can read the series starting with this post), exercise was the first thing to fall off my plate.   It wasn’t because I wanted it to fall off, though.  Now I see that it was God who not so gently took if off my plate.  Injury after injury, illness after illness plagued my workout schedule.  Within a year, I could barely run any distance before I gave out.

Now I see that God took exercise away from me to show that my fitness had become a god (with the little ‘g’).  It was a source of comfort and pride to me that I was fit and trim.  It made me feel powerful.  God wanted to show me how something healthy and good could become something I desired more than Him.

Here it is seven years later, yeah - I’m not much of a quick learner, and God has finally led me out of the dark nights.  I’m thirty pounds heavier, addicted to sugar, and very out of shape.  Although I’m convicted to get healthy again, I don’t feel the contempt for my very untrim body that I did before.

Yes, I need to exercise and eat healthy again, but I no longer feel the desperate desire to fit back into my old clothes.  It no longer drives me like a crazy fiend anymore.  Being freed from the “gotta get skinny because I hate my body” thoughts is very powerful.

On the other side of it, I do feel convicted by God to get healthy again, but in the sense of being whole.  God wants us whole and healed.  I want to exercise and eat right because it gives me more energy and it is really good for the body God gave me.

However, I know my tendency is to make fitness a little god.   I’ve been praying for God to show me how to keep Him at the center of my fitness.  The answer is SO simple.  Make fitness an act of worship NOT the recipient of worship.  Yeah!

Here’s how that looks for me.  I get up about an hour or so before my five year old would wake up.  I do my daily devotional, the quick one.  So I can put something in my mind to ponder.  I start out walking and focus my mind on Jesus.  This is not easy for me, I have a very tangential mind, so I have to train my mind to focus.

For me, I start out to the rythym of my walk or run and think to myself, “Jesus is ….” and complete the sentence.  Jesus is my Lord.  Jesus is my friend.  Jesus is my God.  Jesus is my redeemer.  Jesus is my Savior.  Jesus is my protector.  Jesus is my provider.  Jesus is the intercessor.  And so on, until my mind is focused on Jesus.

Pretty soon, my mind relaxes into a good dialog with Jesus.  Some days my heart is aching and that’s all we talk about.  Some days I pray for the saints.  Some days I plead for my family.  Some days I simply listen for the still small voice.

Then I come back and stretch.  I used to dance and so stretching is very important for me.  As I stretch, I thank God for something.  I go through a “thankfulness inventory”.  Then I can sit down and be calm and focused enough to read my Bible and do a more in-depth Bible time.

This typically takes about an hour and some days I have an hour and a half.  But, you need to make the time work that you have.  For me, my fitness, worship, and devotional time is invaluable to my walk.  I make it a very high priority.  It costs me the TV time that most others take.  But, I haven’t missed it much.

I try to do something every morning but on Sabbath.  My Sabbath has become Fridays.  But yours has to work with your schedule.

For food, I take God along with me to grocery shop.  “What do you want me to have, Lord?”  Asking God what He wants you to eat is a good way to keep Him at the center of your fitness.  I also try to make eating an act of worship.  This one is harder for me because frankly I really like Taco Johns.  God wants me to eat Taco Johns, but not five days a week like I’ve been doing.

The weight is coming off and my fitness level is increasing.  Praise God.  But, more than that, my devotion to Christ is increasing along with my freedom from slavery to “I gotta be skinny” monster.

Here is another blog that speaks to the importance of fitness and discipleship.  May you spend some time and focus today making fitness an act of worship…

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June 20, 2010 by Teri Frana.

Traditionally, the “dark nights” are a season of life when God grabs our full attention by intensely testing us.  Typically the dark nights start with very difficult circumstances affecting several aspects of life; career, marriage, health, relationships, finances, etc.  Often times, more than one of these areas are disrupted or even completely dismantled. (See previous post)

In my dark night season, I found God to be more interest in my response to difficult life circumstances rather than the circumstances themselves.  Through my reaction, God revealed things about our hearts that I didn’t know were there.  He peeled back the layers of what I call, “comfort junk” - that’s the stuff we put around our hearts for protection and comfort - like a well loved, well worn blankie.  The Bible would call those things IDOLS - what we clutch to tighter than we cling to God. 

For me, the revelation of what was under the comfort junk was more difficult to take than even the desperate life circumstances.  It’s worse than going to the dermatologist and looking at your skin under the coke bottle bottom lighted magnifying mirror.  As Bill the Cat would say, “Ack!”

The comfort junk will look differently for each person. For many people it’s status, success, achievement, or material wealth.  For me it was/is my Christian performance.  (”Is” because I still struggle with it.)  I prided/pride myself on NOT clinging to success or material wealth.  I was/am the best non-material girl anyone could want.  I also pridedpride myself on not being judgmental or self-righteous like so many other Christians. I was/am down-right self righteous about not being self righteous.

In the dark night, God revealed my self righteousness in the brutal starkness of His righteousness.  It was then I saw that I was clutching to the comfort blanket called, “performance driven religion”.  Deep down I believed that if I did everything right, didn’t behave like “those people”, and made my way through the check-list of faith ( Prayer? Check. Read the Bible? Check.  Go to church? Check.  Tithe? Check.  Serve? Check. etc.) that I would earn blessings from God.  I honestly felt that if I did those things and didn’t do those things that God would somehow OWE me the life I wanted.

When I did those things and didn’t do those things and still didn’t get what I wanted, I was catapulted headlong into the dark nights.   It’s that kind of hypocrisy that God starkly reveals in the darkness.  He wants to remove any of the comfort junk that stands in the way between His great love and mercy and our humanness.

I believe God is always asking us to drop what we clutch on to so that we cling to Him.  I’d love to see a large pile of well loved, well worn blankies lying on the ground and a whole lotta people clinging even tighter to Jesus.

“My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.”  Psalm 63:8

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