Who, Me?
Who, me?
I would just like to throw it out there that if God can use me, God can use ANYONE. My friend once said something to me to the effect of “I wish I could be like you. You’re so amazing and spiritual and wise.” HA! We were texting, so to that I replied “L.O. - freaking - L.” And I told her exactly what I’m about to tell you…in less than 140 characters. You get the extended version.
My friend looks up to me, but she doesn’t see the insecurity, the fear, the lack of discipline, the pride, and all the GUNK that messes up the inside of my heart. She reminded me of an instance where I was giving her advice and she said that I said the exact right thing. I remember that particular moment very well. It was the moment where I was sitting there praying silently, “God, I have no idea what I’m doing, I’m way out of my league here, I really need your help! Give me the right words to say!” And He DID!
Not because I was worthy, but because I was willing.
See, we don’t have to have it all together before God can use us. We don’t have to be mature and confident and eloquent and spiritual and have great faith and know everything to be used by God. In fact, if we were able to minister to people on our own, what would the point even be? If we could witness to people all on our own power, what would we be witnessing about? There’s a verse in the bible that says “I will boast in my weakness because in my weakness, God’s strength is revealed.” Paul wrote it. And that’s the whole point. We can’t do this on our own and that’s the beautiful part where God’s holiness fills in all the gaps in us. In Him, we are whole.
So it’s not up to us to “convince” anybody of anything. Truth is truth, and we are called just to give it all to God and let Him flow through us. We need merely be the mouthpiece, and He will do all the work on their hearts, through His Holy Spirit. Doesn’t that take the pressure off? One pastor once said “I couldn’t save a blade of grass.” And it’s true, we can’t save anybody, God does that.
So my whole point is that no matter who you are and how bad you think you are, God CAN and WILL use you, if you’re willing.
A great resource I drew upon as part of my inspiration for this post was the message of pastor Brad Noel at a youth conference in 2010. He called his message “Lessons in FAITH from Doubters, Wimps, Jellyfish, Murderers and Whiners.” Here are some examples of Bible “Heroes” he gave who did great things for God, and definitely didn’t have it all together! Gideon was afraid and insecure. Elijah didn’t think he was spiritual enough. Peter denied Jesus in a moment of panic. King David was an adulterer and a murderer. John the Baptist felt that he couldn’t hear God’s call anymore.
As most of us probably know, these guys are prominent heroes and role models of the Bible. Gideon was always portrayed to me as a great warrior and leader. Elijah performed more miracles than any other prophet in the Old Testament. Peter founded the first early church with his oration skills. David was called “a man after God’s own heart”. John the Baptist seems like the ultimate example of selflessness and humility in his fervent witnessing. And yet, these guys weren’t superheroes! They were normal people, like you and me.
Finally, I can testify that if you ask God to give you the right words, whether you realise it or not, He will. You would be surprised how He uses the randomest stuff you say. Or do. I weep at the realisation that my words have actually made an impact on people. Because I know that it’s all God using me. And it’s so humbling. I can’t believe that God would use me, as messed up and undeserving as I am. I mean, I can’t even handle my own mortal life, let alone my own eternal life, and DEFINITELY not someone else’s eternal life! I need Jesus, and astoundingly, He doesn’t need me, but He wants me! And He actually sees me as something lovely, and something useful! I am so honoured that I am usable to God.
And like I said, if God will use me, He will definitely use you. The world sees your physical qualifications, but His eyes roam the earth, searching for a devoted heart. Faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains. Have enough faith to stop trying on your own and give it all the God, and watch the mountains move as the Holy Spirit flows through you.
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Why worry about pleasing "God" and living your life to his standards instead of living for yourself and fulfilling your dreams and desires? I can't imagine living by someone else's rules and standards for a spot in an afterlife that i'm not even sure exists. I understand how strong faith can be, but why live by God's standards for a potential afterlife instead of living by your own standards now in the definite life you've been given.
As a Christian english geek, I am severely suspicious of your use of quotation marks. Because your entire question, in fact your entire world view, can be summed up by your usage of quotation marks in that question.
First up, do you know this “God” that you condemn to dubious ideology with your intellectually patronizing punctuation? Is “God” a lie or a fairytale to you? Is He a made-up story you tell kids, like Santa Claus or the Easter bunny?
Is He a vague, nebulous idea, filed away in your repertoire of knowledge, to pull off the shelf in time of crisis for some warm fuzzy feelings, like Love, Peace and Destiny? Because if you call Him “God”, it’s no wonder that you “can’t imagine living by someone else’s rules and standards for a spot in an afterlife that [you’re] not even sure exists.” Let me tell you about God. GOD cannot be contained to a cute little pair of quotation marks. GOD cannot be banished to history books and fairy-tales by academic snobs. He’s not just an idea made-up by people to control other people’s behavior. He’s not a historical figure in a book written thousands of years ago. He’s not a story or a religious figure or a symbol of the power in all of us, or a name for the forces of good and evil conflicting in the universe. And He’s not even just “someone else”. See, I don’t worry about pleasing “God”. I have the immense, undeserved blessing of knowing GOD:The architect of space and time. The composer of the stars’ song and the choreographer of the planets’ dance.The sovereign ruler of all that was and is and is to come. The infinite, almighty, omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent, transcendent orchestrator of the universe. He who wove strands of DNA into a person. He who breathes life into our bodies.He who supplies our very power of thought. He who commands the winds and waves to fall silent and they obey. He who can stop the earth spinning on its axis and start it again. He who said “Let there be light” and there was.Because He is light. He is life.He is love. Before you were, or I was, before Jacob was, before Isaac was, before Abraham was, God IS. He always was. Always is. Always will be.All of what we know exists in the mortal world sprang from His imagination. So I know who He is. And I know that He loves me. Wait…what? He loves me? He loves me! He loves me!!!! I know that He loves me in a crazy, scandalous, outrageous, incomprehensible, all-consuming, unconditional, inclusive, tidal-wave kinda way. Not only that, but as one person out of 7 billion on a planet that is only one millionth the size of the sun. The sun is only a small star among billions of stars in the Milky Way. And the Milky Way is one of hundreds of billions of galaxies in the universe. Okay, so just take a second to grasp the scope of how massive that universe must be. And then stop and try to grasp that the God who created that universe out of His head knows me and you personally. He knows the number of hairs that are on our heads. He pays very particular and very close attention to our lives and knows the intimate details of our hearts. He saw our unformed bodies before we were even a thought in our parents’ minds. He knit together our unformed bodies in our mothers’ wombs. He knew every single second of every single day of our whole entire lives before we were conceived. That’s how important and precious we are to Him. Okay, so not only do I know WHO He is, and HOW MUCH He loves me, I know what He DID. He died. He stepped out of heaven, out of paradise, out of light and love and perfection…into the dirt and dust and disgustingness of our world. Into the rape and the murder and the genocide and the abuse and the poverty and the injustice and the pain and the shame and the guilt and the ugliness and the wretchedness. Why? For all those reasons. For all the crap and the gunk. For all my mistakes. For every time I hurt someone I cared about. For every time I hurt myself. For every time someone else hurt me. For every single careless word we wish we could take back. For every sleepless night ending in shame and guilt and fear. For every panicked feeling of helplessness. For all the bitterness. For all the anger. For all the feelings of worthlessness. For “every daughter whose innocence was stolen by every son who couldn’t help himself” (Jason Gray). For all the fathers, brothers, uncles, cousins and friends who betrayed the trust of a young girl and left her despoiled, abandoned, feeling like garbage. For every affair that shattered a marriage into painful, jagged shards. For every child who was left on the streets because their parents died of AIDS, sniffing an oil-soaked rag to numb the hunger pangs in their stomach. For every child who was abducted in the middle of the night, had addictive opiates ground into cuts on their arms, handed a gun and told to shoot their mothers and brothers and sisters. For every child who was packed into a shipping crate and sent across the ocean like worthless cargo to a brothel where they were assigned a number and put on a menu for people to choose from for their perverse desires. For the thousands tortured and killed in the most inhumane ways by people who thought they superior beings. For every scar on my friend’s arm. For my friends porn addiction. For my friend’s eating disorder. For my pride and arrogance. For your broken heart. GOD, the architect of space and time, transcendent, perfect being, who need not even concern Himself with us, stepped right smack dab into the middle of our colossal mess. And He allowed us to mock Him, whip Him, put a crown of thorns on His head, nail Him to a tree, and let Him suffocate under His own body weight, when He grew too exhausted to lift Himself up to inhale. He could have commanded angels to rescue Him, but He didn’t. He suffered a humiliating, barbaric death and the complete human experience when God the Father turned His back on His son and dumped ALL our sin on His shoulders. So you know that huge list of terrible things I listed back there? That was ALL dumped on Jesus. He felt it ALL. Generations upon generations of pain and hatred and hurt and shame of all humans since the beginning of time and until the end of time stacked on top of each other. More psychological and emotional agony than you or I will experience in an entire lifetime, or even billions of lifetimes. All of it, on Him. Can you imagine the immensity of that soul-wracking Hell on earth? Nope. None of us can. By that point, Jesus was probably BEGGING for that physically-excruciating death. Whose fault is it? Who put Him there? We did. We didn’t mean to. We’re just trying our best. But we don’t really know what we’re doing and we screw up a lot. And we’ve messed up our world, so we can’t go to heaven when we die cause heaven’s perfect and we’re imperfect. But God is like “I know a way. It hurts and it’s terrible and awful and painful but it’s the only way to save these pitiful human creatures that we love so much for no reason other than that we created them.” And Jesus is like “whatever you say, I’ll do it. I love them. I love Katherine and Rebecca and Joshua and Anna and Daniel and Rachel and Kate and Laura and Jessica and Emily and Jonathan and Adam and….” …and all of them. Every person who every existed. Even for a second. Even if they didn’t make it past their mother’s womb. Even if they had no human name, all of our names are written on the palm of His hand. The same hands that took the nails. And so, instead of being bitter or blaming us on that cross, He remembered the names on His hands and He remembered what the nails were for. And He said “Father, forgive them, for they know now what they do.” THEN, not only that! But He went to Hell. Heck yeah, He went to Hell. This is like the Disney Hercules movie for goodness sake! He went to the Devil’s turf, his territory, his playground. And HE TOOK THE FREAKING KEY! He took the key to death. He went and trashed the place! He stole victory from the devil. He conquered life AND death. He broke every chain the devil ever had on us. Then He came back, and now we can live forever with Him in Heaven. My point is that if you’re still putting God in quotation marks, you DON’T understand “how strong faith can be” because you don’t even know what my faith is in.
If you’re still putting God in quotation marks, you don’t know God. And now that I’ve tried to explain who He is and what He did, it has NOTHING TO DO with “[living] by God’s standards for a potential afterlife instead of living by [my] own standards now in the definite life [I’ve] been given.” I live a life of complete surrender and worship to the God who made me and saved my soul because it’s the ONLY LOGICAL COURSE OF ACTION. If you knew what I know, you would live your life the way I do too. Once I understand what He did for me, I can’t help but pour my whole entire life out as a living sacrifice of praise. Every breath I take, every move I make, every thought I think, every word I say, is only by the grace of God and I am aware of that. I’m just trying to give back all that I can for a debt that I can NEVER EVER repay. So yeah, that’s why I “worry” about pleasing “God”. Ha. Because He’s the only thing in the whole world that matters. Also, the bible says that what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal (2 Corinthians 4:18) so I would say that the afterlife is more definite than this one. If I accept that God is real, I accept that heaven is real, and I accept that He loves me and died for me. Therefore, worship is the natural, instinctive response of this wretched human heart responding to His love and grace. On a side note, from a purely human point of view, living by God’s standards sure as heck hurts myself and other people a lot less. It gives me a moral code that saves me from addiction and heartache. It makes me a kinder, more generous, more compassionate, more loving person. It gives me empathy and a passion for helping the less fortunate. It gives me hope and peace. And it has been scientifically proven to improve my health and extend my life. Why the heck wouldn’t you live life by these standards? They’re awesome! If everybody actually lived by these standards (instead of twisting them through their own corrupt worldview, ahem WBC…), this world would be a beautiful place, and not the terrible place it is today. Jus’ sayin’. ;) To wrap this up, if He was just “God”, I wouldn’t bother trying to please Him either. So I can’t really blame you for your question. But your misunderstanding comes from a place of ignorance. I hope you understand a little better what I believe now. He’s NOT just “God”. I know I may have sounded vicious in this post, but I’m not mad, just passionate. Always, Peace and love!-Katherine
I yelled at God today.
This morning, I woke up PISSED. Before going to bed, I had gone on a massive twitter rant about this whole “Make Rape Legal” rally nonsense going on. And I couldn’t let it go. Like, this was really eating at me. This morning, I yelled at God. I wasn’t mad at Him. I was so frustrated and bitter and angry with this world, and the people in it. I was so done with humanity and everything we’ve created.
This happens every morning. If it’s not a pro-rape rally, it’s a black kid shot by police. It’s protesters at Planned Parenthood. It’s a mass shooting in a school or a theatre. It’s Trump. It’s murdered and missing Aboriginal women in Canada. It’s human trafficking. It’s refugees dying at sea. It’s terrorist attacks. It’s casual racism and sexism on facebook. It’s thousands of children dying of hunger. It’s capitalism. It’s imperialism and colonialism. It’s everything. Every day. I wake up PISSED every morning because of this wretched, broken, messed up world we live in. This wretched, broken, messed up world we MADE.
I asked God, “how am I supposed to have joy and peace in the midst of these atrocities and injustices?” I knew that I wasn’t supposed to have this rancor and vitriol rooted in my soul. I know that this bitter, hateful, black feeling inside me is not of God. But I knew that I was outraged for the right reasons. I know that I am angry because of all the evil in the world. So why does my reaction feel so antithetical to my calling? Why can’t I help but have the feeling that I am destroying myself from the inside out? My heart is in the right place, right? I love people, so I’m outraged at their mistreatment. So why is this love stealing my peace and my joy? Why does my love feel like hate?
I asked God this. I said to Him, “are you angry like me? Is your heart breaking like mine?” And He said, “Katherine, my heart breaks for the victims AND the perpetrators. I weep for lives taken and souls lost, no matter who they are.”
See, my problem is that I say I love people, but I don’t actually love all people. My love only extends about as far as my personal code of ethics deems people worthy of love. I love the victims, and I forget to love the perpetrators. I love the oppressed and I forget to love the oppressor. I love the innocent and I forget to love the guilty.
Funny, right? Cause I am the guilty. We’re all the guilty. Jesus died for rape victims AND the rapists. And I think I love people but it’s only when God shows me the hatred I harbour in my heart that I realize that I don’t know how to love people at all.
Somehow, I bought the lie that hate is the right response to hate. Somewhere along the way, my love was hijacked and twisted and corrupted into hate, and I couldn’t see it. I couldn’t understand why I was so tortured all the time. I thought that hate was strong and love was weak. So I hated the people inflicting injustice and I thought I was doing something about it.
I forgot that love already did it. I forgot that it’s already done. I forgot that Jesus said “It is finished.” I let the enemy steal my peace and my joy because I forgot what real love looks like.
So when I yelled at God today, and I said “what am I supposed to do?!” He told me to love.
Which was much more revolutionary to me than one might expect. :P
I can’t understand how anyone can be against people asking to be treated with justice. I can’t understand how anyone can be against people being treated like human beings. I don’t understand why we are still having to protest for these basic rights.
Bottom line is that a horrible crime was committed in broad daylight and we cannot be OK with it being dismissed. Michael Brown is not by any means the only one, it is the one that tested us beyond what we are capable of ignoring.
Do you think God or Jesus would get mad if someone had sex before they got married?
No, I absolutely do not think that God would get mad. Because, you see, God is very consistent, and all sin is equal to God. Sex before marriage is just as bad as murder, but also just as bad as saying hurtful words. And you don’t see God smiting me with lightning every time I lose my temper. Thank goodness for that!God loves us. He knows that we’re going to screw up. And yes, our screw-ups separate us from His perfection and His glory, but He didn’t want that, so He made a way for us to be close to Him even though we’re imperfect and corrupt. That was the cross. God’s grace is infinite! It’s like a tidal wave that crashes over you and snatches you up in the inexorable current and tumbles you head over heels in it’s wake. It submerges you completely, until you don’t even know which way is up anymore. But that’s okay, because unlike real life water, God’s living water makes you feel like you can finally breathe again, and that there’s no weight pushing down on you at all. It makes you feel like you can fly, like you’re soaring high up in the atmosphere, weaving in and out of clouds, and you haven’t a care in the world! God’s grace is vast enough to handle our mistakes. He will not get mad at us for having sex before marriage. He wouldn’t necessarily be delighted with us, but I picture Him as the father who’s all like “I’m not mad…I’m disappointed." I know, that kind of makes me want to crawl into a dark hole and never come out again. BUT! Here’s the really big, gigantic, ginormous, massive, humongous BUT! When we go to God and we’re like "I know I screwed up, and I’m sorry. Please forgive me and make me all perfect and beautiful and spotless again." He does! The bible says that He will throw our sins into the "sea of forgetfulness" - that expression comes from Micah 7:19:
19
You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea.
The bible also says that He has removed our sin from us as far as the east is from the west in Psalm 103:12:
12 He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.
So basically, never be afraid of God if you feel like you’ve done something He wouldn’t like. Because the minute you approach Him in contrition, He is so ready to hug you and say “It’s okay, I forgive you and I love you.” That applies to any and every sin out there! Peace and love! -Katherine
Can God call me to be an exotic dancer?
Dancing is an absolutely beautiful art form which can totally be used for ministry. HOWEVER imma go ahead and assume that when you say "exotic dancer" you mean it as a euphemism for "stripper". I wanna be all saucy and brush you off but...Here's the thing.God is so not into disrespecting yourself and your body. You do realize that He made you right? That He "knit you together in your mother's womb" (Psalm 139:13). He twisted together chains of deoxyribose nucleic acid with his bare fingers. He personally designed every physical trait you have. Your body is His masterpiece. And He is so not down with you using your body to incite lust. He is so not down with random men undressing you with their eyes because you're so much more than that! You're beautiful and perfect and made in the image of God! So....haha no. I don't think God's gonna call you to be an exotic dancer. I know you were just being a sauce-pan but it's not a topic I take lightly. So I am taking this opportunity to remind you, and everyone, to love and respect yourself and your body. And on a sidenote, I do not appreciate your attempts to twist my words and trap me into saying something I'll regret. That is very pharisee-esque of you. As in when the pharisees were trying to get dirt on Jesus so they could arrest him. And boy did they get BURNED! Food for thought. (Don't make me turn off the anon option!) Peace and love!-Katherine
I'm pretty unexceptional looking...
And I'm about to tell you why that statement means absolutely nothing.
Most people would not describe their appearance as special or extraordinary. If someone were to ask you if you're attractive, you'd either say no, or you'd proceed to give a vague, equivocating description of your mediocre beauty. Even supermodels and movie stars have acute and sever insecurities. There's not a single person in this world who legitimately views themselves as head-turning attractive. In fact, I think we're all too comfortable with the idea of looking "average". We style our hair the way everyone else is doing it. We wear the same clothes every one else does. We all just want to blend in and not draw undue attention to our person. Our fondest wish is to look like everyone else. Do you deny it?
HOWEVER, not one of us believes that we really are actually like everyone else. Whether you think that's a good thing or a bad thing is not for me to decide, but you know that you're unique. You know you're different from every single other person around you. If you do think that's a bad thing, I'm here to tell you that it's not. You have interests, skills, talents and passions that are unique and entirely your own. And that's awesome and super cool and you are special and amazing specifically because you are not like any single other human on the planet.
But here's my point. Judging by appearances is literally the dumbest thing ever because the outward appearance gives absolutely no indication of who someone is. Too often we get too caught up in the outward appearance and it consumes us. We narrow our minds to the here and now, the tangible and touchable. Even though the physical body is present and right in front of us right now, it is a meagre representation of the person inside. Every single person is exceptional and extraordinary. People who look perfectly average and even might look "boring" have entire galaxies inside their heads. They have unwritten novels and unheard music and unknown inventions inside of them. They have love stories and ancient histories and imagined eternities in their hearts. So even though we spend most of our time trying to blend into our surroundings, our characters make us stand out from the crowd because of our various vibrant and dynamic personalities.
That was definitely not as deep as I thought it was. I wish I could impress upon you how incredibly important this is to me. I don't even know if that made sense, I just really really wanted to tell you all my thoughts on this topic.
Peace and love! -Katherine
Many christian families seem to almost block or discourage their children from reading certain books, watching certain movies, or just taking out tv and computers all together. Do you think this is because these parents believe that if their children are exposed to these influences, the children will form their own opinions and leave the family?
I sincerely hope not! Haha your question makes me wonder about your opinion of Christian families. :P
I personally think that the primary objective of any parent, whether Christian or not, is to protect their children. And any parent anywhere, at any time, of any religious affiliation, who forbids their child to read or watch something, is doing so because they think that the entertainment in question is somehow inappropriate for their child. This might include gratuitous sexual references, excessive violence, coarse language, or questionable thematic messages. There was lots of stuff I wasn’t allowed to read or watch a a child, because it contained one or several of the content “red flags” I just listed. The real reason parents put boundaries on their children’s intellectual diet is because children’s brains are very malleable, and they form world views based on what they see. And they will quickly become desensitized to anything they see or hear frequently in various media, and they will then assimilate it into their way of thinking and it’ll come out in their actions and speech. If you let a kid play super violet video games when they’re like, 6, they will be more likely to respond aggressively and violently to day-to-day situations. If a kid is watching shows everyday with the f-word in them, they will start saying it too.
What you will find is that parents who have more conservative beliefs (such as Christians) will put more restrictions on their children’s reading and viewing material because there are more things they want to keep their children from getting desensitized to.
However, I would never agree with the statement that this is to keep the children from forming their own opinions, or being able to think for themselves. In fact, children can’t really think for themselves. You don’t even develop post-conventional morality or abstract logic and decision making skills until after the age of 12, and even then your frontal lobes are still developing all throughout your teens. So especially for young kids, what we see as their “thinking” is really just a product of the input.
So you’ll find that a lot of the age restrictions parents impose are ages like 12 and 16. [sidenote: for me, cell phone was 12, Facebook was 16, and dating was 16.] that’s because these ages are in the period of life when people actually do start thinking for themselves.
Christians aren’t brainwashed; we know that following Christ is a personal decision, and your parents can’t make it for you. I imagine that every Christian parent’s fondest wish is that their son or daughter would think for themselves, make their own decisions, and choose to have a personal relationship with their Lord and Saviour. Lots of us do. :) and those who do..did it because we wanted to. Not because we didn’t know any better :P
Thanks for the question! Peace and love! -Katherine
Societal Conditioning? New Rant yayyyy!!! Today I filmed like four rants and this is the first :)
Okay so. I'm what one might call an evangelical christian. God is my reality - the foundation upon which my life and my identity is built. And it's pure love and joy.
But sometimes, being a christian really sucks. I feel guilty, like all the time. I feel guilty for stuff i do. For stuff i don't do. For stuff i've done. For stuff i haven't done. For who i am. For who i'm not. Sometimes i just feel guilty, just like, in general? No reason. I'm just chillin and feeling guilty without any idea why. I think that is due, in no small part, to my christian upbringing.
And it really fuckin sucks. the story of God's love for humanity is all about redemption and freedom and perfect unity with God themself. but humans' interpretation of that story is like, "wow, we are shitty. we are all so shitty. we're, like, the worst. we have to feel very bad about this and hate ourselves and punish ourselves for this until we die." Like, way to miss the point!?
And then, kids like me grow up in that environment and end up feeling guilty all the time for no reason! It fuckin sucks!!
please see pinned post. queer christian currently deconstructing my faith and trying to unlearn religious legalism and prejudice. pro choice. sex is a spectrum. gender is a construct. protect trans kids. stop nonconsensual surgeries on intersex babies. black lives matter. indigenous lives matter. land back. free palestine. (canada) every child matters. (canada) no pride in genocide. i'm a white settler living on stolen land trying to be anti-racist and anti-colonialist.
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