Call It Grace: Week 3

There is so much I learned this week in chapter 2 and 3! First, Lysa is REAL!  She is our people. I appreciate how she shares her real life unglued moments with us. There is just something freeing when others share their imperfect messy moments that makes us feel okay to be real about our imperfect messy moments. I hear all the time from other women, “Thank You for being REAL, it makes me feel like my life is more ‘normal’ than I thought.” It’s interesting how when we pretend to have it all together, the assumption is that others will be impressed. Instead, it sends others into a place of deeper hiding, makes them feel unsafe and repels them from us because they are now afraid to be honest about their life.

My husband is amazing at seeing the circumstances and situations of our everyday life and weaving them into biblical applications. I am not so much. To be quite honest with you, the days are a blur for me. My head hits that pillow every night utterly exhausted and relieved that we survived the day without losing any kids, missing any meals and no major catastrophes. So I can’t tell you a story to illustrate how I come unglued like Lysa, but I know I do because I have three mirrors in my home reflecting back to me when it happens, my 3 children. I see exactly what I look like when I see them coming unglued. I hear myself come out of their mouths as they yell at the glass that spilled water all over the carpet, or the backpack that dumped out as they’re rushing to the car to not be late. Oh yes, I’ve taught my children to come unglued quite well.  I can see how they don’t have grace for themselves or others because they see me not have grace. This is NOT how I want my children to act and react. I know first hand how it’s detrimental. And so, my motivation for imperfect progress starts with them!

Next, I was captivated by the section in the chapter about our thoughts. How our thoughts basically make a scratch into our brain. Thoughts that we think over and over again deepen that scratch turning it basically into a carving, and that when an emotion is tied to the thoughts, a memory is made! This actually really scared me and here’s why: What if the thoughts I’m thinking are lies? Lies like “I don’t matter,” “I’m not good enough,” or “I’m not loved.” What if I think these thoughts over and over, carving them deeper into my brain? and then, because these thoughts are discouraging ones, I attach emotions like shame, sadness, defeat and sorrow to them. I’ve carved these thoughts that are lies into my brain as a memory, and the memory I carry is now what I believe. Now, my beliefs are actually lies disguised as truths. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 10:5  “… take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ.” This truth from scripture came alive to me in a whole new way after studying this brain research. What we think becomes what we believe, and what we believe determines how we act and react. To become women who don’t let our raw emotions guide us to act out of control when circumstances are out of control, we need to guard our thoughts and make it a serious practice to take them captive, testing them against God’s word. Otherwise, we’re embedding lies into our brains disguised as truth!

Finally, what I was most impacted by from these chapters was the section on ‘labels.’ I immediately identified how much of my unglued behavior is tied to the ‘labels’ I’ve given myself.  I come unglued and then later regret it. I, then, begin to beat myself up mentally in my thought life spewing labels: “I always blow it, Why am I so overly emotional, I’m ridiculous, I was so stupid, I’m a bad ____ (wife, mom, friend, leader, etc.),” and the mental beating inside my brain goes on. These thoughts begin to increase the labels which increase what I believe about myself.  I loved looking at Simon and Saul in regards to ‘labels’. Simon, which means shifty, and he was. ‘Shifty’ was the label he probably carried after denying Jesus THREE times. Can you even imagine? We all would like to think that we’d never do that, especially being with Jesus in person and seeing everything He did with our own eyes, but I sorta think we would. Simon came unglued by being shifty with Jesus in the present, and yet, in Matthew we read this…

“You are blessed, Simon son of John, because my Father in heaven has revealed this to you. You did not learn this from any human being. 18 Now I say to you that you are Peter (which means ‘rock’), and upon this rock I will build my church, and all the powers of hell will not conquer it. 19 And I will give you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven. Whatever you forbid on earth will be forbidden in heaven, and whatever you permit on earth will be permitted in heaven.”  Matthew 16:17-19

Jesus changed shifty Simon to Peter the rock!  

And then there was Paul. Paul had an unglued past too. He carried the label ‘persecutor of Christians’ and ‘murderer’. You can read about Paul in Acts 9 and how he shed his unglued past, literally, as scales fell from his eyes and became the most influential person in the New Testament second only to Jesus himself.

You see, Jesus didn’t see Peter or Paul as they were, rather as they would be. Lysa used the best analogy for this when she shared about her experience seeing the David by Michelangelo. She shared how when Michelangelo was asked what kept him going so long to create this masterpiece he simply said, “I saw the Angel in the marble and carved until I set him free, the process was easy, I just chipped away the stone that didn’t look like David”.  Ephesians 2:10 says…. “ For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.”  The Statue of David was Michelangelo’s masterpiece, but we are God’s. So if we are God’s masterpiece isn’t it safe to assume that He might have similar thinking when it comes to us? Like Michelangelo, when looking at the raw stone when sculpting it into the David, God when looking as Simon Peter and Paul didn’t see them as they were, but as they would be. And He does the same for us.  He doesn’t want our unglued moments or our past to keep us in a place of beating ourselves up. He wants them to be reminders and revelations to us. We still have places that need to be chiseled by Him.  This week carve out space to write down the labels you carry and take them through Lysa’s Call It Grace exercise.

Identify the Label~

What is the lie in it?

What is the truth? I am a child of God that…

What is the Action?

How can you let the truth of this label help unstick other labels?

 

Let’s let Him chisel away all of the places of us that don’t look like us!

Kindly,

Tammy

 

Discussion or Journal Questions:

1. Without sharing the details or people involved… Think of a time you came Unglued. What did that look like for you? What feelings did it leave you with after the dust settled?
2. Romans 12:2 says, “Do not conform to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds…” AND 2 Corinthians 10:5 “…we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”
3. In chapter 2 Lysa describes the science behind how our thoughts develop into what becomes our “memory traces” and that when emotions are tied to those thoughts the trace grows exponentially stronger as our pattern of thought. And SO… as we enter into this journey of not being UNGLUED women… What are some memory traces your personal Unglued moments have left embedded in your mind?  (i.e. I always lose my mind. I’m crazy. I’m unglued. I can’t get it together. etc.)
4. What is your motivation for changing your thought patterns?
5. Share a thought you know you need to start taking captive?
6. What are some labels you identify you carry? *Call It Grace Activity