YOU'RE BREAKING MY HEART: PART 2

Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility.

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer 

This post is a continuation of the previous post, so if you're wondering why I am just cutting to the chase, that's why.

So where were we? Oh yes...

3. We think it is SO about us. I am all for the Church helping folks grow strong in the Lord and in the truth of who they are in Him. However, human nature is a strong force. It seems that we can get stuck within our four walls, focused only on our problems, our wants, our programs, and our routines. With this short-sighted view of the Church's role in the Kingdom of God, we miss the bigger vision. While we are supposedly growing in Christ, the rest of the world on the "outside" is waiting to see the sons and daughters of God revealed in their new found strength. We all have hang-ups. We will ALWAYS be working them out along the way. BUT He is faithful to complete what He started in us. I promise one thing. He never designed us to live self-centered, reclusive, or apathetic lives... no matter what our hang-ups are.

Check Isaiah 58:4-14 out:

Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
    only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed
    and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
    a day acceptable to the Lord?

“Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
    and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
    and break every yoke? 

Is it not to share your food with the hungry
    and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter —
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
    and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? 

Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
    and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
    and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. 

Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
    you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.

“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
    with the pointing finger and malicious talk, 

 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
    and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
    and your night will become like the noonday. 

The Lord will guide you always;
    he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
    and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
    like a spring whose waters never fail.

Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins
    and will raise up the age-old foundations;
you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls,
    Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.

“If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
    and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
    and the Lord’s holy day honorable,
and if you honor it by not going your own way
    and not doing as you please or speaking idle words, 

then you will find your joy in the Lord,
    and I will cause you to ride in triumph on the heights of the land
    and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob.”
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

A lot of benefits are promised here for God's people when they reach out beyond themselves. God's people get blessed and so do those who need His touch… a tangible one. Now that's a system that finally makes sense to me.   

I have seen every one of these benefits manifest in my own life. I can't be clear enough when I say that when the bible says it is truly more blessed to give than to receive... that's a fact. Especially when the giving is done with the right heart, not done with self-seeking motives. Only one simple motive will do... to love.

I was praying one day about what the Lord would have me focus on. Since Phoenix was now in school full-time and I felt to step out of all leadership within the church for a time, I now had... well, time. I was a bit anxious praying because I am not one to feel comfortable being still (which by the way is a requirement for hearing the Lord... clearly). I was struggling to just sit there and listen. I thought the Lord might hurry it up if I cried out. So I did. What drama. Anyway, I remember telling the Lord that I will go anywhere and do anything for Him if He would just make it clear. After telling God I would go care for millions of orphans with Heidi Bakker in Africa, all I heard in return was the garbage truck emptying all the trash cans on the street. Is that one of the most aggravating sounds on earth, or is it just me? 

Finally, that still small voice did answer. 

It came when I ditched the quiet time with God, since He wasn't responding fast enough to my inquiry, and went to work on my computer! GO FIGURE! I'm not joking. I was looking through my emails and I saw this random one about a girl needing a heater for her new apartment. She just aged-out of the foster care system. She obtained a new apartment but didn't have a heater, or much of anything really. At this time it was around Christmas, so it was cold. I remember thinking, why was I sent this email. Then I remember thinking, WHY was she given an apartment with no heat! THEN I remember thinking, WHY ON GOD'S GREEN EARTH DID AN EMAIL EVEN HAVE TO BE SENT OUT ABOUT THIS. HOW HARD IS IT TO GET A HEATER FOR 30 BUCKS AT WAL-MART! I was livid. I went into a train wreck of thoughts about how if the Church was doing it's job, this girl would not only have a heater, but a home filled with all she needed to live comfortably. Heck, if the Church was doing it's job, SHE WOULD HAVE PARENTS! 

As I grew mad, all of a sudden, my heart started breaking. What is this? My heart hurt. I started feeling for this girl. She had spent all her life in different homes, has a new start as an independent, and all she is left with at the end of all that loneliness, abuse, and rejection was an empty cold apartment. My heart cracked and it hurt. Now I know why it's easier to stay ignorant or distant from the needs of others. When you allow yourself to really "see" the reality of someone's desperate situation, it touches you. Deeply. All of a sudden that still small voice of God's came... "Can you do something practical Kim? Can you go get the heater for her?" I was seeking the Lord earlier that day about moving to Africa and mothering orphans and the Lord answered me with a practical request from my own backyard. I started to understand what He was trying to say, and there would be more heaters to buy. 

To be continued...

Kim Winston Bigler

FREEtheINSIDE

(This entry is dedicated to the young lady to whom I brought the heater to. I was hoping to change your life, but in turn, you changed mine. BTW, I am still hoping to change yours.)

YOU'RE BREAKING MY HEART: PART 1

Christianity is a faith that was meant to spread-but not through coercion. God's love was intended to be demonstrated, not dictated. Our charge is to both proclaim and embody the gospel so that others can see, hear, and feel God's love in tangible ways.
- Richard Stearns, "The Hole In The Gospel"


There have been 2 questions that have haunted me for the past 6 years:

1. What is church really suppose to be... and do?
2. What is a Christian really suppose to be... and do?

As I became jaded about the Church ( I am using the uppercase "C" to represent the church in general regardless of denomination) years ago, I started to ask these questions. Boy did it put me on a path of discovery that I never saw coming! The one thing I know for sure is this... If you ask the Lord hard pressed questions, He WILL give you the answers, in His way and His time. Some church folks get weird when you start questioning things, but actually this became the most beneficial thing I could have done as it related to my relationship with God and the church. He saw it fitting that these answers came by way of process for me. A process means waiting, and if you read this blog, you know how much I loath waiting:)

I am not going to go into the MANY ways the Lord has given me inches of these answers over the last 6 years of searching and researching. Some of these ways are described in earlier posts. I am however going to speak very frankly about certain answers that have changed how I view church and my relationship as a child of God...

America is the most evangelized nation in the world. We have churches on every corner it seems. Years ago I started to wonder why with SO MANY churches was there NOT MUCH transformation in the communities they reside in. With people who supposedly "knew" the most powerful and loving Being in the universe, why was there such a lack of evidence in their communities of this love and power. I heard about great faith, great love, and a great God... so where was the great changes that should accompany such greatness? It didn't measure up.

Without a shadow of a doubt I knew Jesus was real and powerful. I had experienced Him personally in a very dramatic way. NOBODY can tell me anything to derail me from the truth of who He is . Many have tried, and many fail. That's how important a personal encounter with Christ is (I can see how one would have to rely strictly on head knowledge and could doubt without a personal experience of His presence). I have also seen His real and powerful love change many lives over the years, so I knew He was powerful to change us in ways that we could NEVER on our own. So if He was all that He claimed to be, then it was the Church who was suspect.

Some folks may think that I am hard on the Church or I am just negative. This is far from the truth. It's because I love the Church and believe in it's existence that I am passionate about seeing it do what it is really suppose to do and be what it is really suppose to be. I am literally grieved when I see us play Church and not be the Church. The message of the gospel, the message about Jesus, is so life transforming that even if one church was "being" what Jesus meant for it to be, the evidence of that LIFE in it's surrounding community/ies would be completely undeniable. So what's the problem?

1. We don't really know how much we are loved by the Lord. We haven't really grasped the reality of it. It is too great for us to comprehend. We are so use to earning and obtaining in this life that we struggle to receive anything we haven't deserved or earned. This great LOVE WAS FREE... IS FREE. I have found when we truly receive that love, our faith will naturally and joyfully produce good works, the kind He made for us to do before the foundations of the world.

2. We have made it routine. Our hearts need to be connected to the message we claim to believe and to the person we claim to worship. It's only when the heart is connected that faith turns into action. Even our giving must be with a merry heart, a heart that is connected, for it really to mean anything... for it to be real worship... for faith to produce something that has substance. I have to pray everyday that the Lord continue to pull my heart close to His. It's not easy for a heart to stay present in worship or in relationship to Jesus in this life. We have SO many things competing for our hearts, it's tough. That's why I don't pretend to have the love, the passion, the fire for Him or His will at all times... when I don't. I pray EVERYDAY the Lord keep that love burning in me, so my "doings" are flowing from a sincere love for Him and others, and not from cold commitment or false obligation.

3. We have made it SO about us!

To be continued... I'll post more tomorrow. This particular post will probably be 2 or 3 parts.

Kim Winston Bigler
FREEtheINSIDE

(This post is dedicated to the foster children who have benefitted thus far from my "heart change" that occurred as a result of this 6 year process. Praise the Lord He didn't leave me feeling "ok" with the status quo. I was blind, but now I see.)