The Point of Reference

After Isaac was born, and somewhere around a year old, I suddenly decided that I really wanted to begin running. I had never really pushed myself physically in my entire life, and I set my mind to building up to running a few miles every day. I had already lost down to my pre Isaac weight, and so this goal had less to do with weight loss and more to do with the desire to push myself in a way I never had before. After a while, I started lifting light weights and doing other strength training exercises. I had never felt better or been in better shape before. Unfortunately, it was very demanding to keep this up with two kids. I felt like I was on a major race against time each day to continue this routine before Danny left for work. But I continued, because now I had set a standard and I felt like I failure if I let myself slide.

One day I found a pair of gray jeans on sale. They were super. Super long, for one...which is really tough for me to find. But besides that, they just became my favorite jeans. They were a smaller size than I had ever worn before, and I had to cuff them up to keep from walking on them. That's a problem I've rarely faced in my adult life.

Truth be told, as time went by, I felt like I was spending too much time devoted to exercise in the mornings. It was a lot of pressure, and it was as if I believed I was losing some imaginary ground if I didn't run on vacation or if I ever took a break. The problem sort of solved itself though, when I became pregnant with Amaus and due to some obvious signals from my body, I couldn't even continue light jogging like most people can throughout pregnancy.

After Amaus was born, those gray jeans automatically became my mental goal.

"You will wear the gray jeans again." I told myself over and over.

I started running again for a while and did my best to eat right and make wise choices. It just wasn't easy. The pressure was back on again. I started feeling like a failure for not being able to get the results I wanted fast enough...or even with a lot of work. I could zip the gray jeans, but they shouldn't be worn in public. Ever. Plain and simple.

As time continued on, I finally had an epiphany. While being in shape was a great thing it was not worth me feeling this way all of the time. Because, I already actually felt physically, good. I already was in good enough shape from walking and taking care of a household and chasing three kids to be healthy enough. It just wasn't the culturally, close to impossible, state of fit that woman have to slave away several hours out of their day to achieve, kind of fit. But I really didn't want to devote so much time to something of so little value. (Mind you, I enjoyed the feeling running gave me. And perhaps one day I'll pick it up...but I can say with assurance I probably won't be stressing over it like I did at one time in my life.)

I had made the gray jeans my point of reference, and I stayed mad as long as I tried them on to find they weren't fitting quite the same. So one liberating day, I rolled up the gray jeans and hurled them for the trash can. I didn't need them to remind me that I wasn't where I supposedly remembered I once was. Who even knows if that were exactly true? Those gray jeans had been washed and dried to the point of not needing rolling up at all anymore. Had I actually been beating myself up about something that wasn't quite the way it had been in reality?

I have had similar so called points of reference in my walk with the Lord. Points that I remember feeling "high on the mountain" where it seems my heart was focused and I was growing and learning in what felt to be leaps and bounds. I think great things went on during those seasons, no doubt. But I have often used them as a measuring rod for my relationship with Jesus. I have told myself that, if I could possibly ever get back to where I once was...so focused, so on fire, I would be so much better off.
I have often used those points of reference as landmarks to compare my progress with. As if I'm climbing on some ladder of closeness with God and I'm constantly going up and down based on my feelings, prayer life and devotion.

Not long ago, it's as if I knew it was time to throw out the "gray jeans" of my walk with Christ. I knew it was time to throw out these illusive points of reference I'm constantly trying to measure up to. After all, I'd probably made myself out to be some kind of flawless angel in my memories by now, when I know for certain I was also dealing with real sin and life struggles then, too.

See, life is constantly moving forward, and with it, circumstances, trials, burdens and victories. I am not the same girl I was when I came running home to Jesus as a fifteen year old pot head who knew that when Jesus found me, I had seriously came upon the greatest discovery of my life. At that time, I diligently set my alarm, regardless of what went on the night before, for five every morning to read my Bible and pray. I was addicted to singing praises to God...I sat on my floor in my bedroom and would worship the Lord all alone. God had totally changed my life.

Now I have a husband and four children who greet me with the sunshine (or before) every day. Life is not even close to comparable to what it was when I only had me to be responsible for. I have to be more diligent to find those alone times...but they are still just as precious to me as they were at fifteen. They however, come in a variety of ways now. Sometimes they are in the middle of the day through a conversation with one of my kids. Sometimes they're found in a three minute window I've found to stop and pray about something that I see come up. Sometimes they are still at five in the morning when I'm able to rise and dig into God's Word.

Has my passion dwindled? I hope not. I know this: I've never known life to be sweeter, more joyous and more fruitful than I see it now looking back over the last fourteen years of walking with Jesus. I've had some hard times. I've had some internal battles. I've went to war for my kids, who are still very young, and I've learned way more than I thought I knew about love ten years ago. I've learned that I still have a lot more to learn.

That's the beautiful thing about being a follower of Christ. I don't need a point of reference to have hanging over my head as some tutor to remind me of how I used to spend my time and thoughts twelve years ago when my life couldn't be more opposite than it is now. That's merely a tool of Satan to keep me looking backwards and to keep me feeling defeated.

On the road of truth, walking with Jesus, it only goes upward. Each season is new, just like each day holds new hurdles and blessings. If I focus on where God is bringing me, rather than where He's taken me...I keep pushing forward knowing that truly the story of my life is far from finished...and the greatest chapters are yet to be written.

Paul said it like this in Philippians 3:12-14.

"Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus."

I don't have to live in comparison to my past, because Jesus is just as much with me now as He's been since I cried out to Him for the first time. He's still leading me forward. Sure, my faithfulness has wavered throughout time- but His never has. He has constantly drawn me forward, reminding me of where real joy is found. But even in those moments of acknowledged sin and repentance- He is the One directing. He is still with me. When I trust the One directing this life, I don't have to search for Him in photo albums of my memories; Dreams of where I once thought I was with Him. I can look right at the present time and at the present stage of life and know Jesus is RIGHT HERE. He's ever present now- pushing me forward to the prize-leading me on to knew victories; And that's just too miraculous a site to miss because of being so burdened looking backwards.