Newly Found Freedom

This Saturday, Randy and I will spend the day in NYC with friends. We’ll hop on a bus early in the morning for our second visit to the Big Apple. Our first visit was in May. Yeah, we drove. It was that weekend that caused us to finally break down and buy a GPS. The drive from Hoboken back to our hotel in New Jersey proved to be more of an adventure than we were up for. The next morning, we walked out of our hotel, up the street to the bus stop, and rode into the city as planned. But before we left that night, we found a Radio Shack and bought that simple little device that would not only help us navigate home but would give this directional impaired wife and mother a sense of freedom she never thought possible. A GPS.

Since our trip to NYC in May, I have frequently plugged that little device into my car and found my way to places that I would have never been able to find my way to before… well, at least not without having a complete emotional melt-down and calling my husband hysterical because I was lost.

Over the last 7 months, as I’ve been driving around with my GPS and my newly found freedom, I have noticed a lot of similarities between the relationship you and I have with God and the one I have with that that little 3x2 device fastened to my windshield.

Along with the GPS, named Lola, that guides me from my windshield, I have a two self appointed GPS's. Tomorrow, I'll tell you a little about them. Any guesses as to their names?

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"I Don't Get to Make That Choice"

I must say dozen times a day, “You get to make that choice.” Most often that is said to my kids. “You get to choose if you have a cell phone or not, because you get to choose to follow the cell phone rules or not.” I’m all about choices with my kids. Partly because then I don’t have to be the bad guy.

Funny thing is, as much as I tell others “you get to make that choice,” those closest to me often hear me say, “I don’t get to make that choice.” Hahaha! I guess I better explain since that kind of sounds like I have a double standard.

See, in March of 2004, the Holy Spirit softly asked me to make a choice. A choice to allow God to transform my character into something that looked a little more Jesus. He asked if I willing to allow Him to mold me into something that would be useful in His hands. What I probably didn’t fully understand in those moments, was that making that one choice made the choice for so many other choices. That night, like a good Christian girl, I said "Yes; transform away." Little did I know how hard that would be.

Last week, a friend said to me the words I hear so often, “I don’t know how you do it. I could never do that.” My response? “I don’t get to make that choice.”

When someone talks bad about me or tears me down to make them feel better about who they are, do I want to respond in love? Absolutely not! What I want to do is tell them and everyone else what butt they really are. But I don’t get to make those choices. I have to respond the way Christ would respond. With love, with grace, with understanding… without throwing up.

Why? Because in March of 2004, I made one of the top three most important choices I’ve ever made in my life. A choice that overrides every desired, selfish reaction … the choice to allow God to spend the rest of my life transforming my character to look a little more like the character of His son...