Marriage Renovations: Blueprints HER Way

Photo credit: mikeg1968 Etsy Shop

In this series, Josiah and I are talking about the "renovations" God has recently made in our marriage, and how to negotiate your own marital renovation project.

When you're building from scratch, you start with the foundation and build up. In a Christian marriage, the foundation is Jesus Christ. He is the cornerstone. He is the rock you build on.

Josiah and I had this part already, praise God. (If you don't, but you'd like to know how, get with us!)

Nevertheless, even when you've built on a strong foundation, and you sincerely love your home, there are times when you need to do renovations.

Today, I'm talking about what the Blueprints Phase of the project was like for me. You can catch up on what's already been written here:

Marriage Renovations: Intro
Marriage Renovations: Demo Day HER Way
Marriage Renovations: Demo Day HIS Way

This is a hardhat area, folks. Strongholds are falling.

PHASE 2: Blueprints - Alissa Style

 My dad is a construction project manager. Since I was a little girl, I have loved helping him at his office. I would go in and help him “organize” his desk (which probably looked far more like me putting things where he couldn't find them). I played secretary and toyed with the typewriter (yes, I'm old).

When I went to his office, I was always marveled by the drafting table. On it, laid stacks and stacks of drawings that looked like a combination of hieroglyphics and an etch-a-sketch gone wild: blueprints.

The men who sat at those tables poured over layers and layers of the technical drawings. None of them knew the plans as well as the architect, but they could read them. I, on the other hand, could not make heads or tails of them.

Marriage/life renovations are like that.

When you're working on a home renovation project, before you demo stuff, you draw up plans for what needs to be done. You take measurements and consult experts. It takes time and precision.

In life, the blueprints have been drawn for us. God knew each of your days before he put the earth on its axis. He's not surprised by anything that's going on, and as we've already discussed, there is purpose in your suffering.

The Architect of our days knows the plan without even looking at a drawing. We start out, as baby Christians, and like me as a little girl staring at the drafting table, we can be completely oblivious. However, when we learn to trust the Architect, to read His instructions, and to consult Him in all things, we get better at discerning the plan.

With practice and training, you get better at reading the blueprints.

In our most recent marriage renovation project, at first, it was difficult to see through the pain. I was so hurt and demoralized that, for a bit, I lost sight of the Architect. I prayed continuously, though, and He is faithful.

After reading the first chapter of For Women Only, the book for women about men (which he had picked up mistakenly in the dark), Josiah was able to voice the fact that my complaints – about his lack of leadership and his failure to protect me emotionally – made him feel inadequate.

My first reaction? On the outside, I shut down. And I'm overwhelmingly grateful for that because the inside looked something like this:

What?! God, How could he say that?! How could he say that me voicing VERY valid complaints made him feel inadequate? I mean, I guess can understand how he would, but is it MY fault that he feels inadequate, or is it HIS because he hasn't been doing what he's supposed to do? Am I NEVER supposed to voice any complaint?!

Not pretty. And as I voiced those feelings in my head, I could feel the Holy Spirit tugging on me.

It felt sort of like my mind was being ripped in two because those feelings are very acceptable by the world's standards, they are NOT Biblical, and the Holy Spirit will always pray for you in alignment with God because He IS part of God (Romans 8 :27).

I was talking to God and saying one thing, but the Spirit was saying another, and I could feel the dissonance.

So, I decided to consult the Architect about His plans.

I prayed continuously. I started keeping a prayer journal. I dug into God's Word.

The more I dug, the more I realized that my viewpoint was not, in any way, substantiated by Scripture. Yes, we're supposed to correct one another with love, but generally, we're supposed to SEE the good the BE the good.

That's my new motto: see it and be it.

SEE the good:

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation,

by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,

present your requests to God.

And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding,

will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Finally, brothers and sisters,

whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right,

whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—

if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—

think about such things.

Philippians 4:6-8

I don't know if you noticed, but that doesn't say anything about me looking for what needs to be fixed about Josiah. It tells me that INSTEAD of worrying about those things, I'm supposed to go to God WITH GRATITUDE and talk to Him. I'm also supposed to try to concentrate on what is GOOD about Josiah, not those few things at which he may not excel.

Jesus told us to love one another as ourselves, and to treat one another as we would like to be treated.

Do I want Josiah to pick out the things I do wrong in an effort to help me “improve.” OR, do I want him to see the best in me, and appreciate the best in me, despite the areas I may need improvement in?

That's a rhetorical question: I want to be loved for who I am. Duh. So does he.

Now, BE the good:

“...wives,submit yourselves to your own husbands so that,

even if some disobey the Christian message,

they may be won over without a message by the way their wives live

when they observe your pure, reverent lives....

For in the past, the holy women who put their hope in God

also beautified themselves in this way,

submitting to their own husbands,

just as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord.

You have become her children when you do what is good

and are not frightened by anything alarming.”

1 Peter 3:1-2, 5-6

Whaaaaat? I'm not supposed to lovingly point out to Josiah where he's going wrong? I'm supposed to win him over without a word when he sees the purity and reverence in my OWN life and in my OWN Christian walk? I'm supposed to beautify myself in the eyes of God by submitting to my husband?

What the what?

I'm actually feigning shock here because I already knew all that. I knew It in my head, but God took this verse and made it a piece of my heart.

I LOVE THAT.

Here's the deal, ladies. Our husbands don't need our loving complaints, a.k.a. nagging. (Yup. I went there).

They need our support because our support makes them feel respected, and when our men know we respect them they can move mountains or build skyscrapers.

At this point, you may be thinking the same thing I was: That's all well and good, but there's NO WAY I can walk that out! How do I even BEGIN to do that?!

With Jesus, sweet sister...only with Jesus, but we'll talk about that more on REBUILDING DAY....

Running Chubby

Today, I'm going to tell you a story about discouragement.

My friend, Chad, and I started our health journeys at about the same time. We also both have a good amount of weight to lose. It's a tandem journey.

As these last couple months have gone by, I've seen him get progressively smaller. He's losing weight every day, and I'm SO happy for him. He's also trying REALLY hard. We use a fantastic product that can help you with your weight management goals, but it's not magic beans. 

It just makes it possible for you to put forth the appropriate effort.

Then there's me. 

I haven't been working out every day like Chad, but I have been consistently working out about 3 times per week...which is more than before.

I haven't been AS careful about what I eat, but I am being careful with my portions and eating pretty well...which is more than before.

I'm definitely drinking more water than before! Heck, I had to pee 4 times yesterday just at church!!

I've lost a few inches overall, but other than an initial 6 lb water weight loss, the scale hasn't moved. As a matter of fact...it's moved a couple pounds back in the opposite direction.

Now, I know all the answers. I know I've gotten more lean muscle again; I can feel the muscles in my legs re-forming. I know I've lost a few inches; I can feel the very slight difference in my clothes.

Nevertheless, I have been discouraged...very discouraged.

IT'S NOT FAIR!! I've screamed to God in my head. Yes. I scream at God in my head sometimes.

But yesterday, as I was brooding in front of my closet before church (because that's when I have a tendency to do that), the answer hit me like a lightening bolt...

God doesn't promise results.

That's depressing, right? Yes...but true.

You see, in everything, God just wants me to trust Him and be obedient....no matter WHAT that means.

God says I'm to honor Him in how I treat my body because my body is the temple of the Holy Spirit 

Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit,

who is in you, whom you have received from God?

You are not your own;

you were bought at a price.

Therefore, honor God with your body.

1 Corinthians 6:19-20

My body is not my own. I need to treat it well. However, nowhere in there does it say that if I treat my body well, I'll look great. I've scoured the Scriptures; it never says God will appease my vanity by helping me lose weight. God doesn't promise that what we want will be exactly what we get.

Bummer.

Guess what that means? It means if the scale never moves, then I still need to honor God with my body. 

God led me to the products we're using, and I feel better than I have in YEARS. He led me to promote for a company I love, and that has helped us catch up on bills more than I ever thought possible. Isn't that God being faithful?

No matter what the directive, we are ordered to be faithful and obedient DESPITE the results we see.

Even if your husband never changes, you were told to treat him with respect.

Even if your wife never changes, you were told to treat her with love.

Even if you never see a changed heart, you were told to continue sharing the love of Christ.

Even if....

Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us...looking to Jesus, God's son, God Himself (the mystery of all mysteries), who was obedient to the point of death. Jesus understood that the results of faithfulness go so far beyond what we want here on Earth, but have eternal consequences.

So today, I will run the race set before me. I'll have to run that race a little tubbier than I'd like; nevertheless, I'm running it.

What race is set before you today? Will you respond in obedience no matter what the results?

The Next Day

*sigh*

The next day. The day after the whiny rant.

Here's the way this works. I feel a certain way for a looooong time, and I have a really hard time shaking it. So, I finally write about it to get it off my chest, and then God shows me why I'm wrong.

Actually, strike that. It's at that point, when I've opened myself up for the world to see, that my heart is finally softened so he can make his point...I think.

I'm a work in progress folks.

Anyway, regarding yesterday's little "rant," I've been convicted in the following ways:

1. Wow. I am prideful. So prideful. This isn't really a shock to me because, as it turns out, almost every time I feel deep conviction, it's because of my pride. I want God to do this, and I want God to do that. Like the creator of the universe needs to bend to my will and do what I want when I want it. Prideful.
2. The whole "I'm lost" thing is complete crap. Completely. Crap. I'm not lost. That's the point of the Good News. I'm found ya'll. I've been adopted by the aforementioned Creator of the universe. I CAN'T be lost. He knows the number of hairs on my head, and I'm not lost at all. He's just making me wait...spoiled brat that I am.
3. A lot of my whining about my efforts has been that I don't feel they're fruitful, so I don't know if I'm doing the right thing. How do I know? In Galatians Paul says, "So we must not get tired of doing good, for we will reap at the proper time if we do not give up" (6:9, emphasis added). Yup. Like Josiah noted last night, we prayed a lot before we started this marriage ministry and all along the way. It's not what I'M doing anyway (prideful again), it's what GOD chooses to do. I do the work, and he grows the fruit. 

God is making me wait for a reason, but He hasn't left me. He hasn't forsaken me. Why, then, have I been feeling so stinkin' ALONE?! 

Because of THIS. I haven't been doing THIS.

I've told myself that I don't have anything to write about, and besides, I don't have the time to write. Who has time to write?!

I do. 

If I've got time to mindlessly scroll through facebook, then I've got time to jot down thoughts about how God's working in my life.

See, I'm a verbal processor. In order to really solidify my thoughts, I need to share them.

I've told myself since not many people read this blog, it's a waste of time. However, I now know that's not true.

God has told me to write, and if no one else reads it, then no one else reads it. This is about me being obedient. As it turns out, God doesn't necessarily want me to write for other people; He wants me to write for me. So I can grow closer to Him.

I bawled talking to Josiah about all this last night. I asked where God was. I've been seeking Him every day. I used to feel Him moving in my life and speaking to me. Is He mad at me? Why has He left me?

He hasn't gone anywhere. He's just been waiting for me to obey Him so He could speak to me. For me, reading His word isn't enough. I've got to write about it in order to actually process and apply it. 

That's me. He knows it. He created me; every bit of me. 

You know me, God. 

In true God-like form, He also sent me a little word today, and of course, He chose to do it through a child.

Little Ryan sauntered into the dining room this morning before breakfast and said, "I did my devotion, Mom. It was on waiting. God makes us wait for birthdays and all kinds of stuff. I'm waiting for Phinehas's birthday!"

Then, he got his breakfast.

I pulled out his devotion, and read it. God is so awesome. The words and Scriptures that go with it are below:

While You Wait (from Jesus Calling for Kids, March 26th - he wasn't even reading the right date)

It is good to wait quietly for the Lord to save.
-Lamentations 3:26

Waiting is not an easy thing to do, but there is a lot of it in this world. You wait for birthdays to come; you wait for your ride to arrive; you wait in all kinds of lines. You even sometimes wait with worry for bad things that never happen.

Waiting on Me is different. You are waiting for the perfect timing of My plans in your life. Waiting on Me means trusting me with every fiber of your being instead of trying to figure it all out yourself. When you trust me - when you wait for my timing - I will fill your life with blessings. I will give you strength and joy and hope. And I will give you My Presence - while you wait.

I say: the Lord is my portion,

therefore, I will put my hope in Him.

The Lord is good to those who wait for Him,

to the person who seeks Him.

Lamentations 3:24-25

You reveal the path of life to me;

in Your presence is abundant joy;

in Your right hand are eternal pleasures.

Psalm 16:11

Dirty Little Secret

I've been avoiding writing this post for a while. I have a whole backlog of other things I want to write on, but for some reason, I felt like God was keeping me from writing them...until I wrote this one.

*sigh* This will not be my favorite.

I have a confession to make - a nasty awful, sincerely gross confession:

I hate to clean bathrooms.

Blech. I don't like to clean my own dirt. Add someone else's dirt (or multiple people's) on top of that, and let me tell you...it makes me cringe.

I don't mean this is something I just don't like doing. It's almost a phobia. I dread it deep within my soul. Do you hear me? Dread.

Or at least I used to.

It was my dirty little secret. Well, probably not so secret if you ever dropped by my house unexpectedly and saw my heart drop through the floor and my eyes widen to anime proportions.

I was ashamed...but apparently not enough to fix the problem. I just swept it under the proverbial rug.

I would clean or straighten ever other area of the house, but that one area...I just couldn't seem to get around to it. Or I would make excuses about it. 

I told myself over and over and over that it would be done the next day...but guess what...didn't happen.

And you know what? It got GROSS. The kids' bathroom is the one most people use when they come over, and I would try to make sure they kept that somewhat straight and clean, but I had a hard time with that, too. It felt so hypocritical to enforce strict bathroom cleaning rules on them when my own was a wreck. 

The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing,

while the soul of the diligent is richly supplied.

Proverbs 13:4

I was totally being a sluggard.

And then...God started to work on my heart. I wish I could tell you exactly when the revelation hit me or when I had my breakthrough moment, but I just can't. Slowly, bit by bit, God convicted my heart until I understood very clearly what He was trying to say to me.

"Alissa, sweet girl, you keep telling me to let you go and do big things for Me. You keep begging to let you loose to speak truth for my kingdom, and I want to let you do it! But how can I set you free to do the big things when you're not being obedient in the little things? It's time, Alissa. Obey me in this, and then we'll work from there."

Here that? That's God speaking conviction to my soul...not shame, but conviction that leads to repentance. However, I wish I could say that it led to repentance sooner.

I still lollygagged a bit.

I printed out a cleaning schedule from Clean Mama, and she has bathroom cleaning first thing on Mondays. I put the cleaning schedule on the fridge, and it sat there for about a week. 

Then my dad popped by for a surprise visit on Memorial Day weekend. 

It was a fantastic surprise, and I was so happy to see him. As always, he was super helpful in and around the house. He chose not to go with us to dinner on Sunday evening over at Josiah's parents and surprised us by mowing and weed eating the yard instead, which was a HUGE blessing because Josiah's been working so hard elsewhere that he hasn't had time to get to it (and even pregnant I wouldn't mind mowing, but I have a hard time getting the darn thing started). 

On Monday, he decided to replace the kitchen faucet for us (that we'd already bought, but didn't really know how to put in), and to replace the shower head in the kids' bathroom because they had NO water pressure in there. But because of that, before we went to Lowe's, he wanted to shower in my bathroom.

NOOOOOOOO!!!

I, of course, said that was fine, but I needed to clean it first. He just laughed a little and shook his head and said, "Nevermind. I'll take one in the other bathroom."

"No, no, no!" I said. "Today is Monday, and we're supposed to clean bathrooms on Mondays!"

He laughed at me and called me a liar, at which point I pulled the calendar off the fridge and said, "Nuh-uh! See? I've been meaning to start instituting this cleaning schedule and it says I clean bathrooms on Mondays! I'll be done in just a bit."

So that's what I did. It was Monday, and I cleaned the bathroom...and I felt fantastic. It was like cleansing out my soul...but let me tell ya, that was a nasty soul cleansing.

Since then, I've cleaned my bathroom without fail, almost obsessively. I'm so proud of it. The rest of the house might get messy with the kids all over the place, but my bathroom is clean, and it feels so good.

I almost look forward to it.

Obviously, that's not because I look forward to the task itself...because it's still nasty. But I look very forward to the peace and calm that comes with knowing you're I'm being obedient to God...even in the little things.

"And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here I have made five talents more.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.'" Matthew 25:20-21 (emphasis added)

This has served as a great lesson, for both me AND the kids. Self-discipline isn't about doing things that are easy or that come naturally to us. Self-discipline means teaching yourself to do things we don't want to do or feel we're not naturally inclined toward.

For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant,

but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness

to those who have been trained by it. 

Hebrews 12:11

It's not easy folks. If it was easy, we wouldn't need Jesus...but we do. Oh we do. We can do all things through him.

So there's my dirty confession...and I didn't want to write it. I feed off of approval from other people (not a good thing), and I just knew this would shame me. I could hear my friends whispering to one another (or even just to themselves, "EW...Alissa's dirty" or "Good moms just don't do that."

I felt ashamed my by confession, even though my heart AND my bathroom are now clean. 

But guess what?

There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus,

who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

Romans 8:8

That's right, Paul!! Preach it brother!

See, there's a larger lesson to be learned here. We all have our secret, dirty places. Maybe yours is a room in your house or maybe it's a corner of your heart. Let's face it, we all probably have more than one. 

Today, I would ask you to consider where your dirty little secrets lie. Where is God trying to clean up your act, but you're resisting, making excuses, and being hard-hearted? 

Give that over to God. Let Him help you clean out the grime, so you can be renewed by His presence and "yield the peaceful fruit of righteousness."

I promise, you won't regret it.