Epic

I hear this word in relation to everything lately. It will be an epic day. That was epic. This is epic.

As an avid reader and former English teacher epic has a very specific connotation to me. Epic is Homer. It isn't a song, a youtube video, or a party. Epic is heroic and poetic and majestic. It has great lines, story lines. Epic is history changing, adventure bringing, life giving, blood pumping drama. There are good and evil, dark and light, hero and villain...when it is epic, good triumphs and evil is banished.

I hate when we dilute great words. It means little to say I want to live an epic life when even a meal can be called that.  We have done it with other words as well. We have destroyed words like righteous and awesome; making them trivial. We have removed importance of these words just like we have words like sacrifice. We sacrifice a diet coke every day to feed a third world child. Or sacrifice our seat on the subway for the women in her eighties. We sacrifice an hour on Sundays (except when the Texans play) to visit the Lord's house. But sacrifice and epic are bigger than we can comprehend.
Epic is the battle raging daily between Heaven and Hell for the souls of those who have not yet meet God. Sacrifice is giving your last breath to speak the truth written in your heart so others can find the way. Epic and sacrificial lives are rare. They take everything you have and they are priceless. An epic life is lived when you have a cause and you're willing to lay it all down to advance that cause. Neither are done for glory or fame. Nor are they done without deliberation and intention. Epic takes planning and precision and discipline. Every battle worth fighting costs you something. And so we better count the cost. Sacrifice will leave you with nothing and in the end an epic soul will bare the battle scars.
Do you have the conviction to live life epicly whatever the cost? Do you believe in anything enough to truly sacrifice? I hope I do! And then when my life is complete I hope our Father greets me by saying "Now that was an epic ride, Angela!"

Can you take it?

Can you take it - when someone provides you the honest truth? When they point out that your version of yourself, or at least the version of you that you want to be, isn't really all there is. How do you respond? Do you get defensive, do you shut down, do you rationalize, do you change? I have been told that I am very coachable. But man what do you do when the coaching nails you to the wall and you come face to face with the version of yourself that you don't really admit even exists? That was my day today. I was told there seem to be two of me working at this company. The one people love to work with and the one people dread working with. What makes the difference? Why are there two versions of me running rampant at HP? Bottom line because there are two of me - not literally but spiritually. There is me who is full of me -full of sin nature and full of spit and fire. Then there is me that is redeemed - full of grace and full of acceptance and peace. Recently I heard an illustration I think fits here well about broken glass. The speaker was telling about the employee who always gets results and drives to completion but leaves glass in their wake. They have managers who come along and sweep up behind them. They make their managers look good but they leave chaos in the midst of the result. They make more work than they produce for those coming behind them. I have never considered myself a glass breaker but with two of me running around there is clearly some glass sitting at my feet. But it is okay - I can take it - I can get back to one person- I can stop the glass from crashing behind - because I have a power not my own. In the words of Rolf U Lovland - When I am down and, oh my soul, so weary; When troubles come and my heart burdened be; Then, I am still and wait here in the silence, Until you come and sit awhile with me. You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains; You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas; I am strong, when I am on your shoulders; You raise me up: To more than I can be. There is no life - no life without its hunger; Each restless heart beats so imperfectly; But when you come and I am filled with wonder, Sometimes, I think I glimpse eternity. I can take it - I am more than I can be!

Scary things

If you know me you know one of my favorite sayings is "free to go, free to stay". But how scary is that. It means you have to be totally out of control and who really wants to be totally out of control. I am the one with a million things to do and an order to do them in. I have a checklist - go to school, get degree, get job, work hard, advance, retire. I make goals, achieve goals, and don't let anyone get in my way. But there is a secret voice in my head that says you aren't doing what He called you to do. Of course, I don't seem to have a checklist for how to accomplish that one. How does one go about becoming a full time vocational minister while working full time? Believe it or not this week someone told me I needed a goal. I know it is hard to believe, me with no goals...I was pretending that I didn't know exactly what goal I need to set. They recommended I ask my family if they could think of something I talked about doing all the time but hadn't done. My husband said "you need to be involved in the church more." The original person had said you need to be involved in church more. I said "Man I hate it when God sends all these people to remind me to do what He has already told me to do and I haven't done." But that is because for a long time I haven't been equally free. Remember free to stay and free to go. Trust me, I have been plenty free to stay. After all HP is a great place to work. I tell people all the time how wonderful it is and how blessed I am that God has given me this season. And it is so easy to see how it will provide for the boys to go to college and how it will provide for me to retire someday and how I can control it all the way down the line. But the reality is I want to be free to no longer be in control, I want to be free to be amazed by God and His miraculous power to amaze. So today I did a scary thing. I woke up and said wherever and whenever to God. I know of one lady who did this and God said quit your job - and a few months later her husband was laid off - but God never let them lose their house,or go hungry, He carried them through and He moved on their behalf. You might have heard of that lady as well - Joyce Meyer. I know another young couple who moved to California without a single idea how they would support themselves and now she is teaching at a bible college -even though she is young and without credentials other than the might God living in her. Scary things - but today I am free to go - not where I want or where I see me - but where God gets to be awesome through me. I am taking the challenge to do something brave and just let Him drive. Let Him move me - after all lots of you have told me that I have a message in my heart that He wants to get out. So watch out Houston or Texas or the World - I letting go and letting God - and I am thanking Him already for providing something magnificent for me to do for His kingdom. Don't get me wrong that doesn't mean I am quitting my job or that I am sitting still and doing nothing. I am doing what He told me - I am getting involved locally - I am open to wherever He asks me to share. I am seeking His word so that everyday I am free to speak without hesitation to those around me. I am touching one life everyday - His! And I am free to go to work each day knowing that I don't need a checklist to make ministry my vocation. I am free to stay put where He has placed me and work on ministering in this season with HP being the one who signs the paycheck until He says they don't. The bottom line is it is just as scary to stay as it is to move. But either way I don't want to make it happen in my own will and power anymore. I am going to operate on God's energy and timeline and that is how miracles happen.