Even though...

Even though times are hard there is so much joy in Christ's life. Discovering each day what it means to turn to Christ is irritatingly hard. Everything I thought I knew about my faith was thrown out the window the day I decided to follow Him outside of the institutional church.
It hits me at some point several times throughout the day that I am in Him, I am following Him, and I have finally, finally found Him. When I became a Christian there was so much joy. There was a lot of pain and suffering(I was in year long a rehabilitation program), but there was most of all joy. Now, 13 years later, I have been returned to Him. I have finally been given back the joy that comes only through knowing Christ.
I used to read that scripture that talks about seeking Him with all my heart and when I seek Him with all my heart then I will find Him. I sought Him with all my heart for what felt like an eternity without knowing if I was 'finding' Him. I didn't know what it would be like to find Him. Would I get really spiritual? Would life hurt less?
What I learned most in finding Him is that He is not hiding and it's not hard to find Him. If I am desperate enough. I didn't find Him so much as I found that He is always within.
Chris and I are struggling right now in so many unspeakable ways. But we have Christ at the heart of our marriage and our lives. He heals us and guides us. Above all else, we have joy. We have such deep joy in Christ. When I realized that recently, it hit me that I have finally found Him! All of that seeking Him and all I had to do was open my eyes to see that He never went anywhere.
I was seeking Him and found freedom. He is freedom. I was seeking Him and found joy. He is joy. I was seeking Him and found fullness in every little detail of my life... He is that fullness.
In seeking Him I have become less. It is no longer I who do the things that I once claimed glory for. It truly is Christ who lives and is the goodness that fills my soul.
So... even though life is difficult to the ninth power right now, His joy is un-freakin'-shakable.
Thanks for reading!
Love,
Jackie

His Way

Ahhh, the joy of dying to self... and the pain that comes along with it.
Letting go of all the expectations that have been in my heart is frustrating. Realizing that Christ is my everything when I want nothing more than to focus on my emotions, is hard.
It is Christ that surrounds me and that is the reason for my every breath. I say His name in each breath. Yahweh. As I contemplate knowing His desires and His heart I wonder why I still worry about earthly life. There is nothing big facing me right now. I love my home and the people that I see each day. I love the women that the Lord has made into my band of Sisters. I love that the Lord has answered my prayer and given my a closer relationship and more patience with my kids.
As you can see I have the best of life!
What I have not learned yet is to ignore the discontentment in others. I am not talking about the needs or feelings of people, but the rude actions of others. Being rude is a way of life in our culture today. It is encouraged everywhere. And for some reason, I still get hurt feelings by it.
Even as I type this I am seeing that I expect too much. I am learning to live by Christ's life. The same love that rescued the earth is dwelling inside of me and ministering to me, teaching me how to live. That is amazing! That is how the Lord designed it to work. So where does hurt feelings fit into all of this?
I suppose this is where I lay down my hurt feelings and acknowledge they are there, but that I am choosing Christ instead. Lord Jesus Christ is living on the earth today in His people and I am choosing Him. I cannot force another to choose Him, I can only look to Him myself.
These are painful lessons and all new to this Saint. As I end this, let me just say how much I love life right now, even as I lay it all down. I love being in Gainesville so much. The Body life with Brothers and Sisters in the Lord is an answer to prayer. It is what I've been seeking for all my years as a Christian. I love to watch the Lord get what He wants and be our Life.
Everything is a testament to Him and the glory is all His, that's what this daily death is all about.
Thanks for reading,
Jackie

one new man

My, Christ is big. Big enough that He gets into places in my heart I never wanted Him to go into, until now. He is all truth and meaning in my life, but to get here I didn't have to seek Him out the way I thought I needed to. I tried for so many years to let the Christian part of me overpower the 'flesh' part of me. I had my 'church' friends, my friends not from church, and my family. All these different groups of people that I could be a different version of myself with each group. I had my Christian 'heart' or personality, and then I had my flesh one. I was one or the other at any point in time.
Something amazing is happening in my soul. The two parts are becoming one person and it's because Christ has my full persmission to enter into me completely.
I am complete in Him. Totally complete. That means that no matter how long I live, how much ministry I engage in, how much Scripture I learn, how much theology I study, and how may hours I spend praying I will never get beyond Christ. It doesn't get any better than Christ.
Before letting go of religion, I had been learning all these methods and tricks. How to pray, how to seek Him, how to this and that. All I need is Him. Now I have heard some argue that 'we need certain ministries or certain ministry positions'. I don't. All I need is Christ. I actually do have authority over me, as we all do. But my authority shares Christ and only Christ and does not fill a paid position. He does not 'peddle the Word for profit' as Paul would say. I like that the leaders in my life arise naturally. They are never appointed a position. I like that the leaders in my life share Christ with me and never try to 'teach' me things. I see that this is also what the New Testament believers had as well.
When I look to Christ instead of my Brothers and my Sisters, I actually end up finding Him in them. It is hard to be anything other than humble when I am seeing Christ in another human. Instead of Christ simply 'bringing out the Christ in me' he is forming Christ in me. As He is being formed in me, it's easy to allow Him access to my whole heart.
Another thing I want to mention is that I am pretty perceptive as most women are. I can almost always tell when a little manipulating/deceiving is going on even though I just smile and politely act as if I don't know. This has made me kind of a paraniod person. What I am noticing lately is that Christ is allowing me to see the good, see Him, in His children. When there is no other agenda than Christ, I know that I am not going to be manipulated, stepped on, taken advantage of, or lied to. Not to say that my feelings won't ever get hurt by another, but I don't have to worry about agendas. By agendas, I mean money(like, a paid postition), power(leadership positions to be filled), personal pride(wanting to be the big fish), and standard jealousy(she's going to be liked more than me, then I will be forgotten). I have come across all these agendas in institutional church and my reaction has been to back down and hide away. I was never after a postition or a coveted spot in a clique. To be honest those things destracted me and made me wonder why I even stepped into a church in the first place. I want Christ, not programs and people with positions. So now I am out of the institutional church. I don't have a pastor or a spot I need to work to fill in the church. I have Christ. I have others who are so infatuated and engulfed in Christ that I couldn't imagine ever having time for positions and organized religion.
So this is what it is like to be in a relationship with Him for me. I no longer am seperate people with each group I am with. I am a girl who is learning that Christ dwells within and that I have freedom to embrace Him in others and to share Him with others as well.
Thanks for reading.
He Lives In Me,
Jackie

livin' it

Life has so much to offer. The older I get, the more I discover that there is no 'one' way to be. For example, for the last 10 years or so I tried to be a type of person that I wasn't in order to fit onto the 'christian' mold. I remember getting rid of movies that I loved in order to 'guard my heart', when in fact, there was nothing wrong or bad about those movies. They just weren't christian.
Another example is in my homeschooling. I joined some online support groups. What I noticed about a lot of the Moms I met was that their whole lives centered around homeschooling. The lifestyle had taken over and become number one in their families. So I became obsessed with this style of taking care of my kids and family. But then I began going through hard times(getting off my meds) and schooling wasn't the biggest part of my life anymore. And I have come to see that I like it this way.
Most of my life has been spent searching for Christ and finding out who I am in Him. I have learned a lot over the years, but it's only been recently that I am finding the real treasure. There is nothing that makes me who I am other than Christ. I defined who I was by what I was into at the moment. When I was younger, I was an opiate addict. It consumed me fully and I thought that for the rest of my life I would be in a love affair with the almighty opiate. She turned out to be a wicked bitch to serve. I was spared from her grip.
My early twenties were spent meeting and falling in love with Christ. I shunned traditional 'drug recovery' because why follow a man made plan for being free when I could have the living Christ. In the beginning it was pure and right. I joined a church at one point and wasn't feelin' it so I left. Since then I have searched for who I am in whatever my latest thing was... health nut, raw food diet, stay at home mommy, working mommy, volunteer, life of the party, homeschooler, and finally Christian. But not a woman who has Christ as her Lord. I was the Christian that the world taught me to be. The type who worries about my own sin and strives to overcome it. The type that served on every committee I could sign up for at church. I spent countless hours in prayer and meditation every week. I studied my bible and memorized scripture on a daily basis. I prayed without ceasing and worshipped through song each morning. And I didn't even know my Lord. But, I was the perfect little Christian. Until I began to ask questions and stand firm in some of my convictions(most notably, Christ is the Head of His Body, not a pastor. It all started with a little red book that takes dead aim at the holy grail of religion today:the modern day pastoral office. The book is called Pagan Christianity and it's by Frank Viola who is an amazing man of God and a person I call Brother). Then I was the rebel, troublemaker, and whatever else would make the religious feel better to call me. I stayed the outcast for a little while.
Then I met Christ again. Just like I had in my late teen years. And I began to fall in love with Him in a new way. For the first time I am seeing that all these parts of me and of my past make up who I am. I don't have to choose to be one way. I can be free to spend time on the things that have become enjoyable parts of life. I can be a homeschooler, without it being my religion. I can accept that I am a person who enjoys pod tea(legal tea blend made from the poppy plant) for the mild relaxation it brings when life gets physically painful. I can also be a health nut at the same time. I can be all the things and Christ will still be my Lord. I find that I actually have way more fellowship with Him now than I did spending all those years working and volunteering in 'ministry'. A perfect example of this new outlook: a mom asked me if I use christian curriculum in my homeschooling. I thought this was a really interesting question. I went to my favorite verse in the bible that I use in almost all my blogs(not real sure where, other than in Colossians)... Christ is all and is in all. I use curriculum and because I am in Christ, it is Christian. No matter what I use it will be Christian curriculum. That is how I feel about life. I can be all these things and still be totally and completely in the Lord, belonging to Him and serving Him. Even though it may not look like what the world or the conventional, institutional church thinks it should look like.
Thanks for reading.
Loving Him,
Jackie

what it is...

It's been a bit since I've written so I'll start by catching you up on life's latest doings...
Last week was my Sister's retreat. I was able to go to a beautiful state park in Georgia with a group of women I am coming to call my family. Christ was there in each of my Sisters. One day I will be there too, but not yet. I am too messed up right now. I love Christ and I know that He lives in me, but my flesh is always in the way of expressing His life.
I don't feel up for the tiresome task of completing my detox/withdrawal/cleansing. My body is confused. My mind is disoriented. I must "gear myself up" for each round of leveling down. I am at a place right now where I should probably wean down another half milligram, but I am still feeling pain and residual withdrawal from the last taper a week ago. Chris and I did the math last night and calculated that I have enough medication to last me another 6 months+ if I chose to stay on it. Those numbers really don't make me want to do this as quickly as I have been. If I wean down using the recommended schedule, I will feel very little illness. Unfortunately, I don't believe that's what the Lord wants from me.
His wisdom is something that I used to acquire like little tidbits here and there when I had enough quiet meditation and prayer time with the Father. Something has changed in my life and wisdom is being imparted daily, hourly sometimes. It is the greater revelation of knowing who He is sans religion. It is also the prayers of my righteous fellow man that is allowing me to hear Him clearly. I know that I need to be off this medicine quickly. I know the Lord wants this for me.
I am praying that His strength will indwell and inhabit my body as well. As I sit here typing this, pain is swelling in my back and wrapping around to my sides, then my abdomin. I have to wonder, if I can completely let go of myself and have total communion with my Lord, will the pain be miniscule? A minor annoyance rather than a crippling thorn in my side?
Not too much new here... just getting tired, while at the same time hopeful for little things. I want to be excited about homeschooling like I was just a couple of months ago. Getting off these meds requires my total attention and devotion. It's hard to even have a two way conversation when I am concentrating every moment on not doing exsacly what my body needs for relief. I am also excited to experience Christ as the Body. I have always loved and understood Him as the Godhead, but I have never known and loved Him as the Body. That is the fullness of the Lord. I see it. I am an outsider looking in right now. I am excited that one day I will be a part of that Body, one that it present and clear minded, without narcotics running through my blood. I am also excited about health. I have been detoxing my body of all toxins, not just my medicine. Chris and I are both doing a 2 month long colon cleanse as well as a full body detox program. We are using DrNatura's formula, a little pricey, but supposidly the best. I am excited to live with a clean body, mind, and soul.
Thanks for reading.
Jesus is Awesome,
Jackie

above the rain clouds

This blog has been on my heart to write for a while now. The kids are sleeping, laundry's done, grocery shopping's done, and I feel the Lord leading me to write. So here it goes...
Sometimes people come along into my life that tend to tear down. By tear down, I mean pointless critizism as opposed to healthy critizism, or backhanded compliments, or simply trying to play games. Now, I am not as tough as I used to be, but I still know how to deal with these types of people. Usually it is someone who is not stable in anyway or has a dark cloud always overhead. I figure out if a character is shady/not shady this way... I have 3 amazing brothers. These guys really are the greatest people I know and I would do anything for them. They are surfers, hilarious, and would give their lives for the people they care about. If someone in my life wouldn't be able to hang out with them and just chill, I don't get too close to that person.
Ten years ago I was known for popping females in the face just for caddy remarks(only twice, but they were good ones). Today I am actually not ruled by flesh. My flesh will begin to manifest when I dwell too long on a comment or a conversation that I may feel needs a little 'correction', but overall, I am ruled by my Lord. I let both males and females say pretty much whatever they want to me. If I care about the person I will talk, have a conversation, and basically respect myself enough to not get railroaded.
I have found that lately I seem to be caring less and less about anyone who feels so jealous, out of control, or angry that they need to put me down. I am strong these days and can handle it. I have the strength to turn the other cheek all day long if needed. The world sees this as weakness, fear even. Actually, it is my flesh giving way to the Spirit within me. If a person is extra delusional I even go along with it just because there's no point in rocking the boat if I truly don't care.
I feel strong. This is not the world's type of strong, but something bigger and more calming. There has never been more peace than there is now. There has never been more clarity than now. I see that the world is full of issues. And I am okay with that for the first time. Nothing seems that scary because I truly feel that the Lord is with me and I am above the pain.
If anything I am beginning to see the fear, pain, and unsettlement with the discontented. And I thank the Lord because this is His gift to me.
I am not saying that I am totally immune to any slip of the double edged sword, only that it is simply annoying now. If I do settle on negative words spoken over me too long I bring it before my Lord and confess it to my husband and he usually makes me laugh at it one way or another.
There are safe places in the world, but sometimes I need to venture away from them and come into contact with gloom. It used to cut me deep. It is now barely a scrape and I really wanted to blog about it. Maybe for my benefit or maybe for someone else's.
God Bless,
Jackie

drug addict vs. physically dependant

After reading a great article on breaking addictions I was left feeling more discouraged and confused than ever. I think that most folks don't understand opiate addiction. It is hands down the most excruciating, painful, agonizing event one can go through in one's life. It is not the same as breaking a nicotine or fast food addiction, or even a cocaine or crack addiction. Let me explain a little further.
Opiates have the ability to hook folks on two seperate levels... physcologically as well as physically. When taking a medication for pain, (especially pain from complications after getting 2 organs removed, as I had) the level of euphoria that is reached by these medications are zero. Therefore no real phsycological or emotional addiction occurs. It's different than if an addict were taking drugs to get high or escape pain.
Unfortunately, once my dopamine receptors in my body got used to being filled unnaturally by the prescription narcotics, I became physically addicted. I had no emotional or mental dependance on these drugs. My physical being became so used to having artificial endorphins that it formed a strictly physical dependance.
That is why although I am physically addicted to the medicine my body has gotten used to, I am certainly not a drug addict that craves anything from this drug. If anything, it made me feel like crap while on it, it put me in bads moods often.
One of the better solutions I have heard on how to fix an addiction is to fast. I highly recommend doing this in order to break any stronghold in one's life. I have done it before in dealing with anxiety issues and it does hold power.
However, to fast during an excruciating opiate withdrawal would be pure hell. In addition to dealing with pain from no longer taking my meds, I would have to deal with withdrawal symptoms as well as try to stop the muscle spasms and leg kicks long enough to pray.
One of the best pieces of advice I can give to someone going through this physical ordeal is to eat a healthy and low processed diet. Eat lots or fruits and veggies. Detox from opiates has killed many people. I think that if I needed to do a fast for a physcological withdrawal I would certainly wait until it was physically safe as well as possible. Fortunately the Lord shielded me from ever becoming 'dependant' on this medicine the way a person becomes dependant on other soothing or relaxing addictions.
I appreciate reading about how others got through thier addictions. I think it's important to share what worked and what didn't. It makes the road smoother for those yet to go through it. That is why I am writing this blog.
What is important to remember is that there are different types of withdrawals, drugs to withdrawal from, as well as addictions. A plan for someone who got high is going to be different than a plan for someone who took small doses of appropriate medicine for pain associated with endometriosis, adenomyosis, organ removal, as well as bladder sling surgery.
I also feel it's important that a person who's body has become used to and dependant on meds, not be lumped in with a person who takes drugs to feed a craving or to attain a feeling.
Hope this didn't bore you to death. Just had to clear this up.
God Bless,
Jackie