What does your dysfunctional family of origin have in common with my dysfunctional family of origin? Well, the question says it all. The question is entirely answered in another’s dysfunctional mess of a family story; Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat is our modern version of this ancient story.
Joseph’s father’s obsession, just one of his dysfunctional characteristics, was how the family portrayed themselves to the world. His dad cared more about their family image than what atrocities the family’s boys had inflicted.
We see in this biblical family mess upon mess, insult upon injury, and imbalance upon outright off-centeredness. If you look up the word dysfunction in the dictionary you will probably find a picture of the “Jacobites,” all the boys, the sisters, the four moms, and of course Jacob himself. This is the home (tents) that Joseph grew up in.
Since foundations are critical; since beginnings often dictate the race; or as the idiom would say, “Once a cheater, always a cheater,” Joseph conservatively had the deck stacked against him.
All of that was in play before the story that we have come to know:
Joseph, the dreamer
Joseph, the big mouth kid
Joseph, the tattletale
Joseph, the favourite
Joseph, the hated
Joseph, the throwaway
Joseph, the left for dead
Joseph, the sold
Joseph, the …deck stacked against, come from a mess, sold into a mess; somehow became second in command in the Egyptian Dynasty/Empire, dream fulfiller, and vision caster.
What a story.
What a metaphor.
What a future; that we can mine hope out of these ancient pages.
In the case of an accident, by the time you would be able, the evidence would be gone. No pictures; there wasn’t time; at 100 kph it was done almost as quickly as it started. It was a full on blizzard for something that lasted little more than twenty seconds. It was a band of weather crossing the road. By the time anyone could investigate, it would look like you just lost focus in normal conditions.
I was driving and then all of a sudden there were white out conditions. The car that was plainly visible in front of me disappeared in a moment. For a moment the road and defining lines were gone. At that moment, with the wrong set of circumstances, there could have been a mishap.
At that moment, in that flurry, what do you do? There are no manuals, time, or instruction videos immediately available. What you know is what you’ve got. Who you are is who it is. I backed off the throttle, stayed steady and cautiously proceeded.
Sometimes that is the way that life hits. In a moment, everything you know is gone, compromised, and jeopardized.
Emotional white outs, do they happen? Sometimes we want to run; we just want to bug out. Those are moments when we need to stay steady, back off the throttle and cautiously proceed. In about the time that it takes to breathe it’s gone and done. The only one who knows how precarious it was is you.
And one more thing, actually he’s not a thing he is a he. The Holy Spirit, if you let him, has promised to be your guide. Think about that, an internal GPS that comes with the instructions. “But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth.” (John 16:13, NIV)
Three separate things came into my world and joined hands just the other day.
1) My good friend’s daughter gave a stellar performance last week on the parallel bars and balance beam in her gymnastics competition.
2) Facebook reminded me of a performance that I joined my daughter in six years ago as she took on Victoria in, “Vancouver Island’s Got Talent.”
3) Another buddy walked into my house and with an ashen face said, “The doctor told me to prepare my will…I’m going to die.” They had found an aneurysm the size of a Loonie.
These three things kaleidoscope‘d’ in my mind and nailed a thought.
My friend’s daughter’s performance was videoed and put on Facebook. His heart leaked out of his mouth as he watched and videoed his accomplished gymnast, “Woohoo!” Three combined letters said it all.
Then as I watched, now six years removed, my pride swelled again as my daughter killed her performance and walked away with the prize.
My buddy, who five days ago had his holidays canceled and his life held over a cliff, had to know if he/we were praying to get God’s approval or if he already had it. When you are told that your brain could have an explosion at any moment, you don’t know whether to “blow or sneeze. ” Both are precarious.
My thought was this, “None of these things had love hanging on performance.” My friend’s expression didn’t leak out because all of a sudden his daughter had finally won his approval. No, her performance came out of a long relationship of love and support. She didn’t need to try and acquire, purchase or earn it; love and approval were already hers. She was free to perform just because of hard work and talent.
I traveled and joined my daughter to try and help out because I loved her and wanted the best for her. I didn’t develop that love pending on the win. There was a lifetime of love invested, but this was just performance time where she brought all her gifts to the table/stage.
My buddy, dangling over death, had to choose. He needed to know that in his ‘world collapsing moment,’ he was loved, and didn’t have to do anything to deserve it. He needed to know that his prayers were heard, not because he had negotiated the right price or formula to purchase an answer, but because his Father in Heaven crazily loved him.
Performances were nailed, and prayers remarkably answered, because of love.
My buddy is in Mexico today because love made a way through miraculous intervention.
So now it’s your turn. Are you performing because you are loved, or are you trying to get love by performance?
So, I read a story today about a guy when he was young, who, almost cavalierly, asked God to fill his life with the power of the Holy Spirit. He accounts that God immediately answered and he felt God’s power. His life went on to be amazing. The events of his life took a positive graph position, up and to the right, and, looking at his life today, that appears to be exactly what happened.
That is not what happened to me. Oh, when I was young, I felt God amazingly fill me, but my life went anywhere but up and to the right. This reading today was an emotional GPS moment of truth versus feelings for me.
I would like to be able to tell the story of success and accomplishment, according to my version of those things, according to the way that story I read today worked, but that is not my story. Rather my story is one of a very Blue Collar, slug it out, and figure it out type of life. The two books I have written, Blue Collar Theology and Path Out – Eliminate the Swirl, tell some of these accounts.
My point?
Does God show favouritism? Do some get the “Blessed or Easy Way,” while others of us get to clean up the mess? Sometimes it seems so. But, it is not so!
God carefully, amazingly, intimately, and personally cares for you. He is working a plan that supports and includes you, even if it isn’t immediately obvious.
He wants to connect with you in such an incredible and purposeful way. All you need to do is what I did: Acknowledge him in all your ways, (this includes your emotions at the moment) Proverbs 3:5&6, and choose truth over feelings.
Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
Measuring against God is risky business. I would rather measure myself against someone else. (Previous two blogs.)
The problem? If I accept God, I have to take his standard and be subject to his rules and authority. This immediately puts me at a deficit of magnanimous proportions. If I am standing on my own accomplishments and pride, I need to find another way, any other way out of such a standard. In all reality, that is the issue. Unmasked, unpopular, and undone pretty much sum up the feelings connected with such vulnerability, so why would I engage in such a journey?
Why would I go through such a feeling of smallness and weakness?
Rather, I want something that affirms my prowess. I want someone who affirms me and lifts me up. I want my personal graph to move up and to the right. I don’t want to talk about an accurate reading, and accurate emotional GPS especially when it includes words like; deficit, deficient, shortfall, need, help, or weakness.
So, why? The upside is fantastic!
The provision that God makes for those who fall short (of his standard, not ours) is unbelievably generous. He has known all along that we do not measure up. We cannot. He has just been waiting for us to realize and recognize it. Nothing in our life changes, nothing can be appropriated, nothing will genuinely transform until we do.
It is that simple. Recognize our need and receive un-proportional grace (God’s own enablement) to help.
Hello God, my name is Phil, I am so bent on doing my own thing, my own way on my own terms. I need help.
I don’t measure the amount of water I drink in metres or feet, neither do I build my house by quarts or litres. The right quantifier, measuring stick, is imperative. It makes all the difference and gets the job done.
We need to discover our personal, emotional, GPS. Who we measure against is most revealing.
Already in the previous blog, I tried to discuss the futility of comparing ourselves with someone else. It just produces a false reading.
However, if we compare ourselves with the ultimate source, with God, we get an accurate, though maybe uncomfortable reading, every time.
There is a huge advantage here.
An accurate attitudinal positioning makes for a great foundation in life. It provides for admitting our lack humbly, but at the same time to fully embrace our strengths. The playing field is levelled, we are humanly equal, and both the rose-coloured glasses and the dark shades of shame are eliminated. We no longer need to prove ourselves to anyone. We can breathe deeply once more.
Why?
Because the one we measure against has demonstrated in abundance His acceptance and love for us regardless of where we fall on the scale. He gave us Christmas.
You needn’t have been alive very long to suffer the emotional effects of conflict, trouble or misunderstanding. These effects have probably already lasted way too long.
When you have pain from mishap or wrong done, and you have wrestled with the hurt from a life that has gone sideways or soured, you have got to do something. Somehow you have to process your shock, hurt, remorse and grief.
It is Personal
Pain and hurt were brought home to me in a poignant and remarkable way. I had taken my family through the shame, regret and humiliation of bankruptcy. I had failed in business. As a Christian, I was against this failure and everything that had transpired to cause my life to fall apart. Caught in the middle and found guilty, I was reaping the full harvest of a life gone wrong, mine. I was in complete consternation.
I had to move away from family and home to find work, just to make our ends meet, and, possibly find a way out for us. This separation only added to the guilt of my circumstance. I was alone with my thoughts, and I didn’t like them.
I had rehearsed the events that led up to bankruptcy ad-infinitum. I took that rehearsal to the Lord in prayer many times. I felt lousy, condemned and abundantly guilty.
I had owned my mess in its entirety, but the weight of it continued to oppress me. I knew it was my fault, and I knew I had to live with it.
After seven months apart I was able to relocate my family to our new home and try to start new.
One more time I cried out to God and was asking him to forgive me. Then something strange and remarkable happened. I heard his response to my thoughts, in my thoughts, and it shocked and halted me. He said, “I can’t.”
What do you mean you can’t?
I immediately thought I had heard wrong, and so I challenged the thought. “You are God, who always forgives. Something is obviously wrong with my hearing and, or, my understanding.” I reprocessed the part of the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive as we forgive those who have trespassed against us.” I had forgiven and repurposed to forgive again. I came again, “You are God, who always forgives.” He responded, again in my thoughts, “I can’t forgive something you are not guilty of.” I was perplexed, hopeful and still halted.
I began to understand, and from that moment, began to find a lasting peace.
I had taken care of and owned “my stuff” for which I was guilty. I had thoroughly dealt with it in openness and confession but “it” was only part of the problem. I was stuck because I had seen “it” as the whole problem. There were four more ‘causes’ that worked into the complexity of the problem. It was only when I completely dealt with all five of these sources that I was able to walk out in freedom. I was forgiven, clean and on the path to restoration.
Five Sources of Conflict
The sources of conflict were: Myself; Others; The World Around Us; The Devil; and God.These are the five areas that I needed to understand and now need to communicate with you so that you can make sense of your life and completely deal with your hurts and remorse of your past. They are the precise points where you can experience victory; a victory uniquely yours. “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I [Jesus] have come that they [you] may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:10, NIV) [Inserts, my own.]
