Posted on by Renee Meyer

What Do We Do With Our Negative Emotions? {Desperate: A Devotional on Psalm 42}

What do we do with our negative emotions? Psalm 42 teaches us to run, desperately to God with our anger, fear, confusion, disappointment. And to say to our souls: Hope in God.

As the deer pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for You, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God; When shall I come and appear before God? (Psalm 42:1-2)

I’ve sung these words as a lullaby over each of my babies, and you can find sweet, peaceful prints of these words in any Christian store. A sweet fawn tenderly approaching a quiet stream: Lovely.

But that’s not the picture the psalmist is painting. Psalm 42:1 is a picture of desperation.

Joel 1:20 uses the word “pant” to describe animals when the brooks are dried up and the pastures are devoured by fire. Maybe a better translation is:

“As a hunted deer, dying of thirst, pants for water, so my soul longs for You, O God.”

It doesn’t work quite as well for a lullaby or home decor, but I personally need to know that there’s a place for desperation in the life of the faithful.

Whether we like to talk about it or not, we all have negative emotions. Sorrow, grief, disappointment, confusion, anger: At ourselves, at each other, at our circumstances, at God.

And we have a choice: We can ignore these negative emotions. We can bully and bury them with truth. We can eat them to death, drug them, numb them, run far far away from them. We can be so busy we never have to face them. We can settle for living with them, that these negative emotions are all we have, always. We can complain about the reasons for them.

Or we can let them drive us, desperate, to God.

The root sin of humanity is the desire to be God, to live independently from God.

What if the hardships that come from living in this fallen world can help save us from that independence? What if we let those things drive us, desperate, to God?

This is the great lesson of the lament Psalms. Honest, specific, even poetic descriptions of the hardships of life on this earth. The psalmists take their complaints, their disappointments, their grief, confusion, and anger straight to God. And they included these conversations with God in their public worship, coming together to affirm their desperate need for God. Saying together,

Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, The help of my countenance and my God. (Psalm 42:11)

What would it look like for you to allow room for negative emotions, in yourself and others?

What would it look like to bring your hard things to God, and wait in the tension between what God says is true of and for us and our circumstances, our felt experiences?

This world is a hurting, broken place. Things are not as they should be, in the world or in the church among God’s people. Things are not as they should be in our own homes and families.

Whether we realize it or not, we are desperately in need of God, the living God.

And now, Lord, for what do we wait? Our hope is in you.

What do we do with our negative emotions? Psalm 42 teaches us to run, desperately to God with our anger, fear, confusion, disappointment. And to say to our souls: Hope in God.

 

Image used in Photo by Robert Zunikoff on Unsplash

 

Posted on by Renee Meyer · 1 Comment

Checking in on my 18 for 2018 (yikes.)

Instead of traditional New Year’s Resolutions, this year I made a list of 18 things that will make my 2018 happy/happier. I promised myself that I’d check in on this list, publicly, throughout the year. I wrote “CHECK IN ON 18 FOR 2018” on Thursday 2/22 on my calendar. And when I sat down to write this, I decided that could wait and wrote half of another post before I realized that I was running away from honesty and accountability because I’m pretty sure I haven’t started in on any/many of my 18. Yikes.

This is why people hate New Year’s Resolutions, isn’t it?? I’m reminding myself that I don’t have to do these things, I want to do them, and I chose things I think will legitimately make me happier. Also, I have all year, so it’s no biggie if I haven’t even thought of a few of them, right??

So here we are: It’s 2/22, and here’s how I’m doing on my 18 for 2018.

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Posted on by Renee Meyer

Eating Obstacles for Breakfast (No Fear)

Are you facing challenges that make you feel like a grasshopper? Look to Joshua and Caleb and learn to eat those obstacles for breakfast. (No Fear Devotional from reemeyer.com)

Our No Fear study this week continues the story of Moses and the Isrealites, who saw the Lord fight for them, while they had only to be still. After crossing the Red Sea and experiencing the deliverance of the Lord, the Hebrews were ready to enter the land God promised Abraham generations before.

Standing at the brink of God’s promises, at the border of Canaan, the people decide to send 12 spies into the land, to prepare the nation for the battle ahead.

Ten spies return with terrible news:

They gave out to the sons of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone, in spying it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants; and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great size… and we became like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.  (Numbers 13: 32-33)

This report causes the people to despair. But there is a voice of hope. Two of the spies have an entirely different view of the land of promise.

Caleb and Joshua attempt to calm the people, assuring Moses that the people can indeed take the land as God has promised. As the people weep and wail, wishing they had died in Egypt, Joshua and Caleb beg the people to believe God’s promise.

This fascinates me: How can 12 people have the exact same experience and come to two entirely different conclusions?

The answer is perspective.

Ten spies see obstacles, barriers, giants. Their view of the obstacles is bigger than their view of God: And so they preach fear and fleeing.

Joshua and Caleb see the obstacles, but their view of God is bigger than anything they saw in the land. And so they preach faith. Hope. Trust.

Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, of those who had spied out the land, tore their clothes;  and they spoke to all the congregation of the sons of Israel, saying, “The land which we passed through to spy out is an exceedingly good land.  If the Lord is pleased with us, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us—a land which flows with milk and honey. Only do not rebel against the Lord; and do not fear the people of the land, for they will be our prey. Their protection has been removed from them, and the Lord is with us; do not fear them.” (Numbers 14:6-9)

Ten spies see giants. Joshua and Caleb see food, knowing that the obstacles we face by faith strengthen us.

Perspective is a choice.

What choice will we make? As we look to the unknown, to challenges, as we listen to the voices in our heads that cry “I CAN’T”, which is bigger? The challenge? The obstacle? The giants?

Or God?

Perspective is largely a function of focus. In photography, whatever is closest to the camera appears largest. I have a choice where I focus, and what I let be closest to me, as I picture challenges and things that make me afraid.

Is the challenge, the source of fear, standing between me and God?

Or am I looking at every challenge – like Joshua and Caleb – through the lens of a good God, who keeps His promises?

This is an important choice: It will lead us to be grasshoppers in our own eyes, or it will allow us to see obstacles as food for us. And if we’re leaders? It’s the difference between leading people to despair or encouraging them to faith. God WILL keep His promises. No fear.

 

Journaling Prompts:

What obstacles are you facing right now? What makes you feel like a grasshopper, and maybe like you’d be better off anywhere but here?

As a leader (in life, in your job, in your family), in what ways might you tend to focus on challenges and obstacles, letting them be bigger than God in your eyes and the eyes of those you lead? And how are you encouraged in your leadership by Caleb and Joshua’s example?

As you look to the future, things that make you feel fearful, what would it look like for you to see God as bigger than any obstacle or challenge?

Are you facing challenges that make you feel like a grasshopper? Look to Joshua and Caleb and learn to eat those obstacles for breakfast. (No Fear Devotional from reemeyer.com)

 

 

 

 

This post is the latest in the NO FEAR Devotional Series. If this resonated with you, check back every Tuesday, and read the previous posts in the series here.

Photo in cover images by Gouthaman Raveendran and Boris Smokrovic on Unsplash
Posted on by Renee Meyer · 1 Comment

Raising Boys in the Age of #MeToo

7 Things to teach your kids if you don't want them to be creepers or abusers

I am so thankful that people are beginning to talk more openly about abuse and harassment occuring in places where there are power differences between men and women. After years of work with college women in the church, I am familiar with stories of abuse, molestation and harassment. Very little that is happening in the #MeToo movement is surprising to me. It is GOOD that these things are coming to light.

But it’s also depressing. And a little terrifying, as I’m busy raising 3 future men.

I’d really like to guarantee that these boys would never show their penis to someone at work. I’d like to know that they’d never use any position of influence or power to abuse or belittle women (or other men.) I’d like them to see women (and other men) as human beings, made in God’s image, not something to be used and abused.

Even writing this, I’m scared because I have no guarantees. Did Matt Lauer’s mom know she was raising a creeper (I think I am supposed to say alleged creeper – though I believe his victims)? Did Bill Cosby’s mom know she was raising a rapist (again, alleged, but…)? Did the mothers of any of the men headlining the news right now know what their sons would become? Maybe they knew, maybe they didn’t. I don’t personally know anyone who wants to raise a child who will show their unsolicited private parts to co-workers (or worse.)

I’d like to be intentional in all areas, but especially in this area. So I’m starting a list of things I think will help my efforts to teach my boys not to be creepers or abusers.

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Posted on by Renee Meyer · 1 Comment

When you’re feeling trapped and there’s no way out…look for the way through (No Fear)

Do you feel trapped, like there's no way out? Read this {No Fear} devotional about trusting God to lead you on the way THROUGH.

But Moses said to the people, “Do not fear! Stand by and see the salvation of the Lord which He will accomplish for you today… The Lord will fight for you while you keep silent.” (Exodus 14:13-14)

Our story today finds the Hebrew descendants of Abraham enslaved in Egypt, crying out under oppression. God heard their cry and raised up a deliverer in Moses. Moses famously demanded of Pharoah, “Let my people go”, and after the trauma and death of the plagues, Pharoah let the people go. And they went. They went all the way to the Red Sea, where they realized Pharoah had changed his mind about releasing the slave population that made life in Egypt possible.

So the Hebrews found themselves trapped, between Pharoah’s armies and the deeps of the sea.

As Pharaoh drew near, the sons of Israel looked, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they became very frightened; so the sons of Israel cried out to the Lord. (Exodus 14:10)

Do you relate to that feeling?

Have you found yourself between a rock and a hard place? At the end of your rope? Between the devil and the deep blue sea?

Do you know what it feels like to be trapped?

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Posted on by Renee Meyer · 3 Comments

What I’m Reading: January Book Reviews

January Book Reviews: Braving the Wilderness; Daring to Hope; Maisie Dobbs; The Lilac Girls

Every month I do quick reviews of the books I’ve read. I LOVE to read, but have very specific tastes and am a highly sensitive reader, so for years I just read non-fiction and middle-grade novels (with Hunger Games and the like, large portions of YA entered territory too stressful or graphic for me.)

I like and can highly recommend nearly every thing I read, because I (finally) learned how to pick good books for myself.

It took me years to learn what I like and don’t like in books, and to make peace with why I read and what I like to read (as an English major, I wish I liked more “important” and less “fluffy” fiction, but I’ve decided to let myself off the hook for that. Who decides what is fluffy and what is important anyway? And why is so much that is labeled “women’s fiction” also considered fluffy, even when it is about important subjects?)

I am still trying to stretch and grow as a reader, and we all need to push against the attention span our brains are being trained into by the internet and social media. But I had nearly quit reading because I didn’t feel OK about reading what I wanted to read, and when I did, I didn’t know how to find it.

So: If you’re looking for negative reviews, you usually won’t find them from me. I only read things I’m relatively sure I’m going to enjoy. I have a limited amount of time to read, and I don’t want to waste it with something that isn’t for me.

I’m also nearly always reading at least 3 (often more) books: An audio book, a non-fiction, and a fiction. This month I returned to a beloved audiobook series, read a FANTASTIC Christian memoir, finally finished the non-fiction book I’ve been reading over many months, and fought my way through a great fiction book that wasn’t as much a-book-for-me as I would hope (but it was good and I think many of you will enjoy it more than I did!)

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Posted on by Renee Meyer

Bankrupt Without Love {14 Days of Love}

How would you define love?

Is love a feeling? A choice? Is love weak or strong? Can we live without love?

Bankrupt Without Love: Day 1 from "14 Days of Love: A Devotional Journey in 1 Corinthians 13" (click through for your free PDF!)

 

Our culture (even within the church) idealizes and idolizes romantic love. The love Paul is talking about in 1 Corinthians is agape, the love of God (“for God so loved the world…”) and our response of love to God and one another (“By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another…”).

My expository dictionary’s entry on Agape says: “Love seeks the welfare of all, Romans 15:2 , and works no ill to any, 13:8-10; love seeks opportunity to do good to ‘all men, and especially toward them that are of the household of the faith,’ Galatians 6:10.” (Hogg & Vine)

In your life and history, which have you valued more, romantic love or this agape love? Why?

 

 

Think about the different activities that take up your time throughout any given week. Your job, your classes if you’re a student, errands you run, tasks you accomplish, relationships in which you invest.

What does it look like when you’re doing those things

With love?

 

Without love?

 

 

And maybe the most important question I could ask:

Do you believe you are worthy of being loved? Really loved, unconditionally, success or failure, for who you really are? Why or why not?

 

Taking a break today from the NO FEAR series to post day 1 from “14 Days of Love: A Devotional Journey through 1 Corinthians 13.” Get your free copy when you sign up for the Reemail, my weekly update newsletter.

Spend a couple of weeks thinking about God's love, and asking how you can RECEIVE God's love and OFFER love to others.

Posted on by Renee Meyer

Looking for Love in all the {RIGHT} Places

Happy first day of February!

LOVE is in the AIR!

I want to spend some time in this, the month of love, looking away from the Hollywood version of love, love that can be summed up in chocolate candy hearts and over-priced red roses.

When I was in college and a brand new believer I had a poster of 1 Corinthians 13 (now that I think about it, it might have been my first Christian-ese, Family Christian Stores type purchase?) I loved that thing, but after a while I came to see 1 Corinthians 13 as kind of trite, commonly chosen as a reading for weddings by people who may or my not have known anything about Jesus. In other words, I got snotty and decided I was too advanced for Paul’s words about love in 1 Corinthians 13.

OH THE HUBRIS.

1 Corinthians 13 Printable from reemeyer.com

I have repented and returned to this beautiful description of love in the years since those young & prideful days. But I’ve never studied them in depth, I’ve never worked my way slowly through it. So this February, that’s what I’m doing.

Want to join me?

Each day of the devotional focuses on one aspect of love from 1 Corinthians 13. Most days include other verses on that topic, and some have a few thoughts from me. Every day there are a series of questions to think about and some practices to try, in order to RECEIVE love from God and OFFER love to others.

The content is appropriate for men or women, married or single, happy or sad in your love life. I am a sucker for romance, and I love love – but the point of this devotional is to think about real love, not romantic love, or the Hollywood version of love. I think you’ll enjoy it, wherever your love life finds you in this present moment.

The cover art is pretty & feminine, because I love these particular graphics & have been wanting to use them, and because LOVE. I know this  devotional will be read by men as well as women, and I don’t want to scare the fellas away with all the flowers. I thought about using something less feminine…but really there are not a lot of love-related graphics that aren’t floral or overtly valentinesy. And then I remembered that women read and study books with masculine covers all the time, and we can handle it. I’m sure our gentlemen friends can handle the reverse.

It’s a PDF, so you’ll get the devotional all in one download (I don’t have time to set up daily emails like I did for the Advent devotional right now, but if that is something you would prefer, let me know for the future!)

14 Days of Love is a FREE GIFT when you sign up for my weekly Ree-mail (I still can’t type that without laughing – too cheesy??)

When you subscribe to my REEMAIL list (hee hee), you’ll immediately get an email with a link to download YOUR FREE COPY! Click the pretty graphic below and you’ll find yourself in the right place!

YES! I want a copy of 14 Days of LOVE!

Posted on by Renee Meyer · 4 Comments

Heard & Seen: A Message for the Ones Who Feel Invisible and Disposable (No Fear Devotional)

No Fear Devotional: Heard & Seen: A Message for the Ones Who Feel Invisible and Disposable (No Fear Devotional)

Throughout my childhood and early adulthood I battled feeling invisible in my family, in school, and in my first jobs.  My preferred method for dealing with hard things tends to be to handle them myself rather than speaking up, and I think it’s important to own my own participation in areas where I don’t have a voice. I have learned to speak up (to the point where now I’m told – by some people- that I can sometimes take up too much space. I’ve now grown a lot of shame around the idea of being too loud, too opinionated, too much.), but I still relate to the feeling of having no voice and being invisible.

And I hear the stories of women who feel invisible, weekly. In their families, in their marriages, in their jobs, in their friendships, women are under attack, and the lie being thrown at us is INVISIBLE. You’re not heard, you’re not seen, you don’t matter.

Make no mistake: Invisible is a LIE.

We have a God who sees, a God who hears.

I was so happy to be reminded of this truth in my search through the places in God’s Word where He says, “DO NO FEAR.” When I am afraid, the reminder that God sees me and hears my cries is balm to my soul. Read more

Posted on by Renee Meyer · 2 Comments

DIY Dear Future Self Letter (free printable)

A Letter to My Future Self is by far my most popular post so far this year, and I so appreciate the sweet responses I’ve gotten, as well as the wonderful conversations this sparked in real life.

A few folks asked me for a printable version. Maybe they were joking, or just being sweet, but it was easy enough, so I made one :).  Read more