I have been married for twenty-nine years. That sounds like such a long time. Fortunately, it hasn’t felt like twenty-nine years.

Just recently, I had to prove my marriage. My husband’s insurance was doing an audit, so they were getting very picky about paperwork. We had to provide original birth certificates for each of our kids. Then, we needed to prove that we were married.

My husband starting bugging me about this long before the paperwork was due. Yeah, yeah, I’ll get to it, I told him. I was in the midst of helping my son with all the paperwork he needed to do for college. This wasn’t a big deal. I’ve been married for twenty-nine years. How can they even question that?

Time marched on ahead of me and I hadn’t gotten the paperwork to prove we were married. In my mind, we’ve been married for twenty-nine years. All of our taxes have been filed for the last twenty-nine years, as married, filing jointly. Every piece of important paper in our house, had my married name on it. I’ve been on my husband’s insurance for twenty years. How could these even be a question?

But it was a question. We needed to prove we were married. I finally, downloaded some paperwork off the internet and sent in fifteen dollars to pay for a copy of our marriage certificate. I was kind of cutting it close, filing three weeks before it was due. But I knew I was married, so what’s the big deal?

Two weeks after requesting a copy of our marriage certificate, I received an envelope from San Diego County. This was a week and half before the paperwork was due. The envelope was a little thicker than regular letters. I smiled. I knew it was because it contained my marriage certificate. I tore open the envelope to find a form letter in there. “We have searched for a marriage certificate under the names you provided for us. We cannot find a marriage certificate for those names on that day. We used the fifteen dollars to conduct the search. Thank you for your time.”

Wait, what?! But I’m married. How can they not find my marriage certificate? I got married in San Diego county. What’s going on here? I called them. The woman on the phone asked me where I was living at the time I got married. I told her Los Angeles County. She told me I needed to request the marriage certificate from that county, not the county I got married in. That’s where my marriage certificate would be filed.

Now it was crunch time. I had ten days until the deadline before the paperwork was due. I looked up the address for county records for L.A. county, wrote down the address, then ran out the door to get in there before the office closed. I got to the records building, ran up the long steps, and asked a security guard where to go. He pointed me in the direction of a row of computers. I touched the screen, and filled out the request for a marriage certificate. Once I filled out the form on the computer, I had to go to the window to pay. I got in a line of about five people ahead of me. I secretly hoped they were all part of the same group, so I wouldn’t have to stand in line all day. When I finally got to the window I asked the woman if there was a way to do this quickly. She asked me when I was married. She said no, they couldn’t do rush jobs on anything before 1995. I was married in 1989. She said it would take three weeks to get it.

I left, defeated. I was married. I have been married for twenty-nine years. Why is this even a question? But it was a question. Even though I was married and had been married for twenty-nine years, if I couldn’t prove it to them through a copy of a marriage certificate, I would be dropped from my husband’s insurance. Yikes.

I broke the news to my husband when he got home that day. He said he would call them to see if there was any other way we could prove we were married, besides a copy of a marriage certificate. He came home the next day and said, we could email copies of our taxes and anything else with my married name on it and then they would look it over. I did that immediately. A few days later, they said they never got the email. I emailed them again, with a copy of our taxes, an insurance card with my married name on it and a copy of my daughter’s birth certificate with my maiden name on it and my married name.

After that, a few days later, I got an email, telling me they accepted the paperwork we had sent them and I wouldn’t be dropped from our insurance. Whew!

I’m so glad God’s got my name written down in the Book of Life. I’ve been a Christian for a long time, but I don’t have to prove it to God. I am His. My name’s written down. I don’t need to prove anything. It’s been filed with God.

In 2004, a guy named Morgan Spurlock produced a movie called, “Supersize Me.” It was a documentary about the effects of eating a diet of McDonalds for thirty days, on the body. Spurlock only ate McDonalds for three meals a day for thirty days. At the end of that time, doctors did a health assessment. Besides a massive weight gain, doctors found Spurlock’s liver to be identical to an alcoholic. He also reported to have shakes, depression and a decreased libido.

“Supersize Me,” became a super-sized movie and made Spurlock a millionaire. The results of his thirty day McDonald’s diet was striking as he explained at the beginning of the movie he was in good health and denied abusing alcohol when a doctor asked him.

Now thirteen years later, Spurlock has admitted that he hasn’t been sober for more than a week in thirty years.

Wait, what?! Spurlock told the doctor in the documentary, that he didn’t abuse alcohol and now he’s saying he hasn’t been sober for more than a week in thirty years. It seems obvious now that Spurlock’s poor liver condition was due to the fact that he was an alcoholic. And the shakes and depression go right along with alcohol abuse.

When “Supersize Me” came out, I heard many people around me refer to that movie and its claims of what horrible things thirty days of fast food can do to the body. But it appears that wasn’t the case at all. Spurlock was an alcoholic. He wasn’t in great shape to begin with. McDonalds didn’t hurt Spurlock’s liver, thirty years of drinking did.

Am I trying to defend McDonalds? No. What I’m trying to say is that we, as Christians, need to be vigilant in where we get our information.

My mom used to quote this saying to me: “Don’t believe anything you hear and only half of what you see.” Would it be a good idea to eat McDonalds everyday, for thirty days, for every meal? Of course not. But common sense tells you that. We don’t need an alcoholic man to make a movie and lie to us. If we took the quote, “Don’t believe anything you hear and only half of what you see,” it might bode well with all of us. We live in a day and age, where information is coming at us from every direction at a rate, none of us can keep up. Is this true? Is that? How do we know?

I’ve figured, I’ll just keep the Bible as my plum line. The big questions about life can all be answered from the Bible. Like, “where do we come from? Why are we here? Where do we go when we die?” And the rest of it is just icing on the cake. At least I have all the big questions answered and that’s all I need. I know where I’m going after I die. I know why I’m here.  And common sense tells me things like, “don’t eat fast food every day for thirty days. It’s not good for me.”

Unlike McDonalds is for the body, the Bible is excellent nourishment for the soul. And none of it has lies.

Darlene Deibler Rose was a missionary in Indonesia, who was captured and imprisoned by the Japanese during World War II. During her imprisonment, she wasted away to almost nothing. While imprisoned, she began to crave a banana. She had this longing for a banana, while in prison. She prayed to God, for just one banana. After she prayed, she began to second guess herself and God, and couldn’t think of any way possible, she could ever get one banana. It would never happen. Then she took back the prayer, realizing, there was no possible way to get one banana. But God answers prayers. One day an officer, knocked on her prison door, when she opened it, the officer came into her cell and dumped ninety-two bananas at her feet. When the officer left, she fell to her knees and thanked God and apologized for doubting him.

My daughter returned from England a little over two weeks ago. She’s been trying to adjust to the time difference. She’s not sleeping well, but it’s getting better. She came back exhausted and sad to leave all of her friends she made in England. She had a glorious time. It was such a great time there, staff reminded the kids that this wasn’t reality. It’s like summer camp.

This wasn’t what I was expecting, when we dropped her off at the train station in London, to drive up to Capenwray. We had spent a week in London, exploring the tourist sites of London, and the closer we came to it, the more anxious she grew. She wondered if she would meet any new friends. She’d only spent time away from us, with her grandparents. She’d been homeschooled all of her life. She was becoming more and more anxious as we neared the time for her to go up there.

We arrived at the train station and found a group of kids that were sitting around waiting for the bus. I looked at my daughter and saw the fear in her eyes. I thought to myself, “She’s going to have to sink or swim. There’s no way we can fly back her to come get her.” I looked at my husband and said we should go sit over in some chairs away from the kids and leave our daughter there, to get to know the other kids.

I watched my daughter. She looked like a deer in the headlights. Her mouth was a straight line. She stood stiffly near the other kids, but didn’t say a word to anyone.

God answers prayers. He really does. I had been praying for my daughter for almost a year now, about going to England and attending Bible school there. I had prayed she would adjust and at least make one good friend there. Well God does exceedingly more than we ask for.

She came back with tons of friends. She has tons of pictures of herself with her friends, and she has this twinkle in her eyes, that warms my heart. She has stories to tell about her time there. She’s all a twitter about her trip. Was this the same girl we left at the train station, who looked like she was going to bolt for the door at any minute?

She had such a good time there, she didn’t want to leave. She cried when she had to say goodbye to her friends. She’s talked about going back, it was such a great time. She did well on her studies and papers she had to write. She thrived there.

There’s a reason God tells us to pray without ceasing. He tells us to pray about everything. I had prayed she would have at least one good friend. She came back with so many I can’t keep track of them all. I prayed that she would survive. She thrived. Darlene, the missionary prayed for one banana, she got ninety two. God always does exceedingly more than we can ask or imagine.

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One of my favorite stories is when Jesus walked on water, and Peter came out to walk with Him. I love that story.

“Peter said to Him, “Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water. And He said, “Come!’ And Peter got out of the boat, and walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But seeing the wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, “Lord, save me!” Immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and took hold of him and said to him, “you of little faith, why did you doubt?” Matthew 14:28-31

Now that I’m older, I have to wear glasses all the time. I didn’t realize how bad my eyesight has become until a few months back, I broke the glasses I was wearing. I didn’t have a recent pair of glasses, so I pulled out an old pair from one of my drawers.  This pair was at least 8-10 years old. I put them on, hoping they would be just as good as the other pair. Nope. Not even close. I had to squint to see anything, Everything had a genuine blur to them. I went around the house squinting all day. It was so frustrating. It would be three weeks before I could get another pair. When I finally did, the relief I felt! Everything was so clear and sharp. Even colors seem to be more vivid.

The story of Peter walking on water is me right now. I’m Peter. I’m looking ahead to the future, and wondering what is going to happen. When I do that, I start to panic. Fear and anxiety sets in and I start sinking, just like Peter did.

The story of Peter walking on water tells us, believers, how we are to live are lives. We are to look right at Jesus, just like Peter. We aren’t supposed to look around at the waves or the fact that we are walking on water, only look at Jesus. See Him clearly. Focus on Him. When we do, we are safe. When we don’t, we sink. I’m finding I need to do that consistently.

Physically, my eyesight, without glasses isn’t so great. Spiritually, I need to remind myself that my vision is only good, when my focus is on Jesus Christ. If I stare at the problems ahead of me, I start to sink. I start to get panicky feelings of what’s ahead. That’s not how God wants me to live. He wants me to focus on Him. Jesus gives me crispy, spiritual eyesight. I can see well, if I focus on Jesus. When I take my eyes off of Him, I can’t see well at all, and panic sets in.

So that’s what I’m doing now. Every time I start to worry about the future, I let it go, and instead, start thinking about God. I remember so many times, over and over when God answered my prayers. I call up details of the joy I felt.

That’s what God wants all of us, believers, to do. He wants us to lift our eyes off of the problem, and instead to focus on him. Pray to Him. Then we can see clearly. God is our spiritual eyeglasses that helps us to see things clearly. And what do we see clearly? God tells us He will never leave us or forsake us. He tells us He loves us. He tells us He provides for us. I’m focusing on these things, and it’s making the biggest difference in my life.

 

I just graduated my second and last child from homeschooling. You may ask yourself, “Homeschooling, eh? You must be one of those perfect mothers: organized and perfectly sane?” That would be a big fat no! I’m as far away from perfect as you can possibly be. And sanity? That’s a whole other story.

I never had an inborn desire to homeschool my kids. In fact, it was probably as far away from my mind as anything. I thought homeschoolers were weird and kind of like hippies. I thought all the women grew their hair really long and ground their own wheat. I thought, to homeschool, I would have to be a farmer and live off the land and live in long denim skirts. I found out homeschooling is nothing like this. I found out that there were lots of homeschoolers who lived in California and never ground an ounce of wheat, ever.

Why did I homeschool? Well, to be perfectly honest, because God told me to. Try arguing with that. But seriously, that’s the truth. I wasn’t going to homeschool. God told me to do it.

I look back over my years of homeschooling and I can see the benefits for my children. But what I really see, is the benefit it held for me. Sure, my kids got one on one attention from one of only two people in this world who loves them completely. And sure, they got a curriculum, adjusted to their individual pace. And sure, I got to teach them about Jesus Christ and who He was. But many of the lessons were for me.

I got to walk with God, intimately. I didn’t have all the answers. In fact, I had hardly any answers. I didn’t feel adequate to teach my children to read and write. Apparently, God thought I could. But that’s just the thing. God doesn’t ask for perfection from us. In fact, He always chose the deficient, the problem people to do His work. That’s what He found in me: imperfect, really deficient, wholly unorganized person to do the work.

He was showing me something. He was showing me Who He was. He was showing me what He does, how He works. He was telling me over and over, in different ways and situations. “You don’t do the work, I do. You just rely on Me. I do it for you.”

And that’s what I see, looking back over my years as a homeschooling mom: the worst candidate to homeschool, is asked to homeschool, because they are in fact the worst candidate to homeschool.

And I think that carries over to the Christian life. God calls us to Him. Not because we are perfect and nice people. Not because we are sinless, but because we are sinful. He calls us to Himself, because firstly, we are sinners, in desperate need of a Savior. And the whole issue of salvation has nothing to do with us. Jesus Christ paid the price (with His life). He paid the debt, He bore our sins on Himself.

And then, once we are saved, He calls us again, to let Him do the work again, through us. He asks us to do things, not because we are good at it, but because He wants to work through us. Like Moses who had a speech impediment, that’s the guy God would use to speak to Egypt, to let His people go. Rahab was a harlot (a nice term for prostitute), she would be in Jesus biological line, making her His great, great, great (I’m not sure how many greats there should be), grandmother. A harlot would bring forth the sinless Messiah.

Perfection doesn’t need God. Imperfection does. God wants us to need Him because He is perfect. He wants to work through us. He shows the world, through us, who He is and what He does. His perfection is revealed, through our imperfection. And that’s exactly what God did through me, as I homeschooled my kids. He worked through me and I was the perfect candidate because I had no idea what I was doing. His perfection was revealed through my imperfection. And that’s what He calls all of us to do: allow His perfection to be revealed in our imperfection.