Random thoughts

Romans 14:12 So then each one of us will give an account of himself to God.¹³Therefore let us not judge one another anymore, but rather determine this--not to put an obstacle or a stumbling block in a brother's way.


So, I went to a gambling party last night, something I've never done.  I had a blast.  As usual, though, I found myself in a position of judging people for judging people.

See, I have this personal weakness. (No, it's not gambling!)  I am an extremely tolerant person.  When someone approaches me and she or he has a personal struggle, there is very little that will shock or disgust me. Sure, I may hear something that surprises me or challenges my paradigms, but I have a very large capacity for absorbing what might on a visceral level disgust me and turning it into just another learning experience.

I like people.  I also recognize that the human heart is depraved, even mine, and we have a vast ability to create or incorporate novel methods of experiencing evil.  I also recognize that most people either don't recognize their actions as evil and therefore need my love and compassion or wish to escape an evil that has enslaved them and therefore need my love and compassion.

I get it.  People struggle, and we all need a lot of grace.

Being human and sinful, however, I have an end to my compassion, unlike God.

It ends when other people are judgmental.  So, does it make me the biggest hypocrite in the world that I feel an intense vitriol toward judgmentalism as a philosophy?  And that I feel a sort of disgust toward those who are judgmental?

If I were to explain my reasonings for this prejudice, they might make sense.  I, as a Christian, see regularly a world that flees from judgmental Christians.  When Christians look down their noses at people who sin, Christians give Christ a bad name.  Especially because Christians are sinners, too, and as my husband so aptly put it to me, everyone is a hypocrite.  So, when someone stands in judgment, that person is the ultimate hypocrite.

Case in point, when I judge other's judgmentalism, I'm being a hypocrite!  I think my head is spinning.

So my advice for both you and me is: lay off of other people.  We have plenty of sin in ourselves to focus on without wasting time feeling superior to others.  In fact, according to what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 4, we're not even supposed to waste too much time judging ourselves.

1 Corinthians 4:3 But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. In fact, I do not even judge myself. 4 For I am not aware of anything against myself, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. 5 Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God.

If we have the gall to judge someone else, then chances are, we've forgotten how incredibly grateful we should be to the God who has forgiven us so many sins that their number and type would shock the world if posted on the net for all to see.

So, remember gratitude to God.  And please don't judge me for judging you.  I'm working on it; I promise.

confession is good for the soul

Okay, so I have been working unsuccessfully for the past 3 hours on trying to associate my blog with the website I bought six months ago, and now I finally have mooremom.com redirected to my blog. See, the original name of my blog was "mooremom," but I changed it to "smalltalkisoptional."  Why, you ask?

Well, I've been having a dilemma the last few weeks that has been driving me crazy.

I found out that yet ANOTHER of my friends is in the process of filing for a divorce. Now, believe me, I can understand why a woman would get fed up with her husband. Every human who must interact with another human will run into some serious disagreements; they will even run into willful sinfulness. So, I get it. We each have our personal struggle. BUT THIS SHOULD NOT BE ENDEMIC IN THE CHURCH!

That being said, the surest way to make people clam up is to point the finger of shame. Let me assure you, I am not in any way judging those who make this decision. Rather, I would like to point out that there is a better solution if you are willing to listen to it. Speaking of willful sin, sometimes I know we don't want to listen to it.

What does this have to do with my name change?

I am sick of surface conversations. In my own class, people show up week after week to Bible study, and years down the road they stop coming, only to announce their impending divorce. I want to do what the Bible says in James 5:10 "Confess your sins one to another and pray for each other so that you may be healed."

Are you going to go into the Bible study class dressed up in your fancy clothes, with your righteousness worn on your sleeve, and start pouring out your sins? No, nor should you. But shouldn't there be some place where it's safe to admit that you're struggling? Some place where, instead of listening to each other criticize and complain about our husbands, we can learn to forgive our husbands for not being God?

I am done with the status quo, so I have two choices. One is the choice my best friend and her husband made: leave the unhealthy place and go find some place new. This is a viable option. However, I am not yet ready to do that. In leaving, I would also be abandoning very real people that I love to very painful problems that have a simple, though not easy, solution. God commands me to feed His sheep, and for the time being, I will feed the flock in the field where I live.

For twenty years, I have lamented the absence of discipleship and personal accountability. I think people will be surprised, considering my rant, to find out that I am notorious for letting people off the hook. If you come to me and confess your sins, I will have compassion because God has had and still has much compassion for me. We will pray together and consider together how to escape from the sins that enslave you. I hope you'll do the same for me.

God loves to forgive people. That's why He died on a cross for that very purpose. We need to give grace, and we need to receive it.

Come one, come all, women of God, and you will find the love of Christ. Ephesians 5

way of life

Who needs a journal?

For the past 15 years, I have foregone any sort of personal writing because, to be honest, it's been too painful. I have innumerable responsibilities, and for me, writing is an indulgence, not therapy. However, in order to write, I must dig deeply into the wells of my emotional center.

Why is this a problem?

I don't have time for that kind of emotion. I have nine amazing kids who need me, and if I am going to be functional enough to serve them, I can't spend my time wallowing in melancholy reflections. I feed my emotional center in other ways: I play piano, I read, I (gasp) play computer games, I study random information that I find on the internet. In other words, I do things that I can leave at the drop of the hat and attend to a child's demands.

Writing involves a level of mental commitment that I have had to sacrifice to be a decent mom. For a long time, I think I resented that. I won't deny that in weak moments I still sometimes harbor some ill feeling when I have to sacrifice what I want for a child's selfish and unimportant demand.

An amazing thing has taken place, however. Like a butterfly that emerges from the ugly cocoon, the depth of thought that has emerged from all these years of self-denial and sparsity have bloomed greater and more beautiful than I could ever have imagined.

Man, it was extremely, stinking hard to get here, and I haven't even arrived yet.

The inspiration for this post came from my morning's events.

I am writing a book and had been extremely excited about it until yesterday. Yesterday, my plot fizzled like a cheap firecracker. As a result, I have spent the last 18 hours or so in a personal funk. It would be nice if that did not spill over into my family life, but alas, that is the very reason I didn't embark on this writing journey sooner. I'm a grouchy writer.

All morning, my head has hurt, I felt sick and depressed, all because I can't get Liset Cortes to France in a satisfactory manner.

Now, it's Labor Day, and my husband is home. All day I've felt slightly irritated at his presence, knowing that I can't hide in my closet and try to fix Liset's problems when he is witnessing my problems outside with the crying children. Ugh. Plus, our house is a wreck and I know that bothers him which bothers me both because he's bothered and because it actually does bother me. Everybody clear now?

Well, he calls the kids all downstairs, lines them up like the Von Trapp family, and proceeds to inform them that they have 5 minutes to clean the downstairs. I secretly cringe, anticipating the scoldings that are sure to follow when the children fail. I hide in my room.

Five minutes later, I hear the timer beep, and my husband calls me to survey the work.

I am aghast.

In five minutes, my children have taken a 2500 square foot pile of junk and turned it into near museum quality. Without my permission, tears well up in the corners of my eyes, but I control them.

Then my husband who doesn't always catch my subtle emotional signals turns and notices the tears. He proceeds to accurately explain to the kids the inner workings of my mind, telling them that I am so sad because of the hours of stress and frustration it costs me to accomplish what they did in five minutes. True. He even hugs me.

What's the point?

I have waited patiently - well, not really very patiently - for the time when I can once again brave the depths of my mind and heart and express them in written form. I think maybe, just maybe, I have reached that point. The point where my world is safe enough to expose the raw edges of my soul to more than just the unsearchable knowledge of God.

I hope so.

And even better if it can help you, too.

Reluctant

So, I have reluctantly entered the world of blogging at last.

I say "reluctantly" for several reasons.

Number 1, I feel rather egotistical thinking that anyone would really want to read what I have written. While part of me enjoys the thought, the larger part of me feels a visceral aversion to the voyeuristic tendencies of our culture. Not to get on a soapbox.

Number 2, I gave up journaling about the time I got married. When an idealistic youth, the beauty of my own thoughts often inspired me to write lengthy journal entries. (BTW, I often use sarcasm in my writing in case you don't catch it.) But as the darkness of real life overtook the shining brilliance of my childhood dreams, I often did not like my thoughts. My thoughts about God, my husband, my children, myself. Somehow writing down those thoughts meant I had actually had them, and for an idealistic person such as myself, having such uninspirational thoughts was unacceptable.

Number 3, I despise rough drafts. Almost every paper I ever wrote in school was a first edition. This oftentimes resulted in my getting abysmal grades on the editing portion of my paper while receiving glowing exhortations from my teachers about a "well-written, compelling paper." I just had trouble caring about "passive voice" and such. So I know I am doomed to have a slew of grammarians reading my thoughts thinking, "Oh, look how inaccurately she used the subjunctive mood in that sentence!" I extend my apologies now so I can get it over with.

And number 4, who in his right mind would welcome the scrutiny of telling all of his or her thoughts to a monstrous beast who would then shout them to the world? I personally don't want people to look that closely at me. I promise you, between sins, vices, and imperfections, there will be so much to complain about with me that there will probably be little room left to praise me.

But I guess that's okay. Because to tell you the truth, the reason I overcame my reluctance is that my only purpose for even existing is to show you and everyone else how great God is. And if you're too busy praising me, then there will be no time left for you to praise God.

Beyond my ego, my aversion, my laziness, and my fear, there is a perfect God who makes it all work anyway. So, here I am, blogging. Bring it on. Someday I have a feeling I'll look back and say I regret saying that. But someday after that, I'll look back again and say, "God got His, and He's got me. And that's all that matters."