Tag: Change

Hope…Always

February 16, 2022 / Shari Baar / 4 Comments

Dear Daughters,

I received a potted amaryllis bulb at the end of November from Aunt Rhonda. Over the years I have grown several with great success and I was eagerly expecting the same. I followed all the directions, put it near a window and watered it faithfully for weeks expecting to see some lush green growth topped with a beautiful flower by Christmas. Day after day, week after week it looked the same, like a dead bulb in dirt. After 4 weeks I was just about ready to toss the whole pot in the trash and be done with it. Then one day I saw a slight white shoot peeking out the top and celebrated that perhaps all my watering and care was not in vain.

Now, finally in mid-February there are some gorgeous magenta blooms – just as I had hoped.

Because I was impatient, I just about tossed out what was to become a lovely flower, but because of that slightly ambiguous word – hope – I faithfully continued to water and keep it in the light so maybe, just maybe it would grow like I had expected.

And then I got thinking about situations for which I have been praying for years. The healing of a relationship, the growth of a marriage, the softening of hearts, and the healing of a broken body. I know Jesus hears my prayers and is working things out for my good but sometimes I get frustrated and think,

Why should I care anymore?

What good is it doing?

Will anything ever change?

Have you ever had those thoughts, when the prayers you pray seem to be hitting the ceiling and dropping down again? It’s hard to keep on loving, keep on showing up, keep on doing good. In fact, there’s a proverb written over 3,000 years ago stating,

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.

Proverbs 13:12

Obviously waiting over three weeks for an amaryllis to bloom is much different than waiting years for something you’re hoping for. I think of those women who have waited for years to have a baby, suffering through months of infertility and disappointment. Or those who have suffered sexual abuse and have waited for months, perhaps years, to see a judge convict an abuser. Sometimes it seems as if God is on mute as we pray for the people we love year after year, hoping that justice will be served.

I ponder the story of Abraham and Sarah who were promised a child from God and waited for 25 years before it came to be. King David, who after he was anointed King, had to wait another 10 years running and hiding in caves in order to keep from King Saul’s vengeance. Good things do happen, promises are kept but sometimes it’s hard to keep on going, every day putting one foot in front of another when we repeatedly hear the voices whispering in our heads,

Nothing is ever going to change, it will be this way forever...

Certainly it feels like it at times, but the truth is – life is changing every day. Just as imperceptibly as a plant grows – we cannot see it day by day – but during months and years they do grow. God is listening, working and at just the right time the beautiful bloom will appear.

Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap…Let us not lose heart in doing good,

for in due time, we will reap if we do not grow weary.

Galatians 6:7,9

Did you know that bamboo plants grow as many as 35 inches a day! And on the opposite extreme there is the Tamarisk tree, native to the drier climates of Eurasia and Africa, which only grows about 1 inch per day. Why? Because that’s the way God, in His wisdom, created them. Different species require different growing times and different maturation dates.

…And there is an appointed time for every event under Heaven.

A time to give birth and a time to die,

a time to plant and a time to uproot what is planted…

Ecclesiastes 3:1-2

Have good courage and confidence because God is doing a good work, and He will bring it to completion.

I love the following prayer from Tim Keller:

Lord, I confess I do not understand your timing. If I were in charge of history and my life I would have arranged things differently.

But I cannot see the whole picture, I cannot see from beginning to end, and so I wait for you in obedience and prayer. Amen.

Love, Mom

How Old Are You?

September 13, 2017 / Shari Baar / 0 Comments

Dear Daughters,

How old are you?

A seemingly simple question, but lots of options for answers. I could state the obvious – the number of years I have lived on this earth – or use it as springboard for something more. The other day I heard it asked as an open-ended question, so I decided to answer it for myself.

I’m old enough to know I cannot change anyone but me.

I wish I would have learned this one decades ago. For far too long I have tried to change people, which is, in effect, criticizing God’s creation – thinking that I know better than Him. Sounds like some dangerous ground to tread upon.

In Galatians 5:23, the last fruit of the spirit listed is self-control. It is not husband-control or child-control, but self-control. The only person I can change is myself and that is more than enough to keep me busy for a life time. I still struggle with changing only myself, and I can tell it will be a life long journey.

I’m old enough to know that the most valuable things in life cannot be seen with the eyes.

There were times when I have been envious of what others have – homes, cars, jobs – but I’ve learned that the most valuable things in life are not my income, my college degree, where I live, what I wear, but relationships, peace of mind, love of family, a good marriage, having a handful of close friends, knowing that God loves me.

I’m old enough to know that bitterness keeps me in a deep prison, but forgiveness sets me free.

I’ve tried the bitterness road, and it is a deadly dead end. If I want to be miserable, I will continue to replay the hurts, scenes of rage, words of anger, and any other injuries committed toward me. But if I desire freedom, I need to forgive – today, tomorrow, next week, the following year, and most likely for the rest of my life.

For me, forgiveness has not been a one-time deal, but a lifestyle. After forgiving a person, and giving him to God, I become free and find that a huge burden has been lifted.

I’m old enough to know that self-centeredness ruins relationships.

Being a people watcher, observing relationships and what makes or breaks them, it doesn’t take long to see that selfishness is the prime destroyer of marriages, business relationships and friendships. If I think the world is all about what makes me happy, I will become miserable and be the loser. But….. if I care about others’ needs and seek to bring hope and encouragement to them, I will be surprised by joy.

I am old enough to know that God answers prayer.

He doesn’t always answer it the way I think is best. Sometimes His answer is yes, sometimes it is no, and sometimes it is wait, but He always hears and answers.

I am old enough to know that 1 Corinthians 13 has the best definition of love in the world.

Love is patient

Love is kind

It does not boast, it is not proud

Love is not rude, self-seeking or easily angered

It keeps no record of wrongs

Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices in the truth

Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails.

…and Jesus Christ is the personification of Love.

Now I’m not saying I am able to love like this, but it has become my life’s goal.

I’m old enough to know that suffering is not something to be avoided.

I read the most interesting analogy of the good found in suffering the other day by Eleonore Stump in her book Wandering in Darkness:

Imagine aliens who somehow managed to tap into a video feed from earth, but all they could see was the hospital delivery room when I was being born. And they watched as the doctors forcefully told my mom to do things that made her scream in pain. And then when she could take no more, the doctors got out a knife and cut right into her stomach. They took me out – blood everywhere – and even though my mom was reaching out for me and screaming for me, they immediately rushed me away from her.

What would the aliens think? If all the aliens saw were the first few moments of life, they might think the doctors were utterly evil. They might also conclude that bringing a child into this world is a terrible crime. Only from a fuller perspective would they be able to see that the doctors actually cared for my mother extremely well, and in fact saved my life. Only from a fuller perspective would they be able to understand why many of us are in fact grateful to our parents for having given us life.

Taking time to study the big picture of life – the celebrative, the suffering and everything in between – teaches me that I need all kinds of experiences on the spectrum of life to live my life to the fullest.

I’m old enough to know that God still works wonders and miracles today.

There are miracles of physical safety, like homes and people kept safe from wildfires, hurricanes and tornadoes. There are also the everyday miracles like a baby being born, the sun rising and setting, an eclipse, the wonder of beautiful, vibrant colors of autumn.

And then there are the miracles of people being transformed from selfish, mean, complaining, self-destructing and bitter, to caring, encouraging, loving and compassionate. In the past few months I have heard stories from three close friends about how Jesus has transformed hearts – changing a sister, a mother and a husband. As my friend Gail summed it up:

It is the biggest miracle on the face of this earth.

I’m old enough to know that the unseen world is much more real than that which we see with our eyes.

We struggle not against people, but against the spiritual world – the enemy of our soul. This is no athletic contest that we’ll walk away from in a day or two. It is a life-or-death fight to the finish against the Devil and all his angels.

I’m old enough to know that the sun still shines above the clouds.

Far too often on an emotionally cloudy day I forget many of the blessings that have happened in my little circle of life. I am learning to remember that even though all I see may be dark, Jesus is still doing his work, slowly and faithfully.

I’m old enough to know that giving thanks is medicine for the soul.

Following the example of Ann Voskamp, I continue to write in my gratitude journal. Every day I find it is as important as eating a diet of healthy food – writing line upon line those things in life for which I am grateful. Even though it is something as simple as seeing a hummingbird or a rainbow, tickling a tiny tummy and hearing those baby giggles, or something as big as a wonderful night of sleep, I give thanks. I am slowly learning to give thanks for the difficult struggles in life as well.

I’m old enough to know that God is good and his love endures forever.

And because of that I can face tomorrow without fear.

I hope you are a faster learner than I, and that it doesn’t take you over six decades to learn all these facts of life. But remember that if it does, Jesus will still be patient with you as He has been with me.

Love, Mom

Deserving Success

September 30, 2014 / Shari Baar / 2 Comments

Dear Daughters,

John Adams wrote a letter to his wife, Abigail, during the Revolutionary War. Part of that letter reads: “We can’t guarantee success in this war, but we can do something better. We can deserve it.” He basically said “How the war turns out is in the hands of God. We can’t control that, but we can control how we behave. We can deserve success.”

The same principle is true in marriage – How things turn out is not in our power, and we definitely cannot control another person, but we can act in such a way that is honorable, and then trust God to do the changing. It’s an interesting concept to think about, but perhaps your husband’s faults are the very tools that God is using to change you. All those things about your husband that annoy you may be God’s way of teaching you to become more patient, longsuffering and kind. In other words, your marriage makeover might begin with you!

In our early years of marriage I was disappointed. I couldn’t understand why Dad didn’t do more to make me happy. In my “happily ever after” mind I thought it was all about me and my happiness. With a mindset like that it didn’t take long to become discontented, and I thought more than once that I must have made a mistake in my choice for a husband.

It seems counter-intuitive that we should start the improvement by changing ourselves because, of course, it’s always the other person who needs to change. But think about it, if your husband changed solely because of your efforts and manipulation it would be easy to become proud and arrogant. When you demand that someone change for your pleasure, you’re trying to bend a person to meet your needs, make you comfortable and bring you happiness.

If you remember the Fruits of the Spirit (love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness…) you will recall that the last one listed is self-control. It’s not child-control or husband-control, but self-control. The only person you can do anything about is you.

God doesn’t require perfection in our behavior, but he does hope to see progress. In five years we should be wiser, stronger, and more mature in character than we are now. Jesus wants us to be a reflection of himself. He’s into character building – that’s His specialty. But guess how He builds character? By allowing difficult times to come into our lives so that we can learn to persevere. Gary Thomas, author of Sacred Influence asks the question “How is God using your marriage to teach you how to love?” God has us face many issues that may terrify us and make us feel completely inadequate so that we depend on His strength, His wisdom, and His love to be able to persevere through the trials and become a stronger, more loving person because of it.

I used to be annoyed by Romans 5:3-5,

We also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us.

Rejoice in my sufferings? Yeah, that’s not my gut reaction when hardship comes my way, but I’m slowly learning to recognize the tough times for what they are – God’s tools to make me stronger and more loving. Mother Teresa has another way of saying this: “I never call difficulties ‘problems.’ I always say ‘gift of God’ because it is always much easier to take a gift than to take a problem.”

As I’ve said before, our marriage is better now than it has ever been. But it is only that way because we have both persevered through the hard times, and now we can rejoice in the good times. The good news is that God is involved in our lives. He knew, even before we were born, who our husband would be, and He is not at all surprised by the challenges that we face. He will never leave you, nor forsake you, no matter hard life gets.

I just read the other day that life is 10% circumstances, and 90% our attitude toward those circumstances. That puts a lot of responsibility on us! But with God’s help, we can become the women he wants us to be. And that in turn will influence our husbands to be the best they can be.

Love, Mom

Be Bold

September 9, 2014 / Shari Baar / 0 Comments

Dear Daughters,

I’m sure there are things about your husbands that are annoying to you, simply because they and we are human. The subject of Chapter 2 in Sacred Influence is “Becoming strong enough to address your husband’s “Functional Fixedness.” Functional fixedness is a term meant to describe a man’s reluctance to change. Men don’t normally see a need for change in themselves if what they have been doing seems to be working for them. If a wife allows her husband to treat her poorly – with disrespect – he has no motivation to change. He needs a compelling reason to change, but it has to be more than your unhappiness with the situation.

One would think that a husband would want to please his wife, but let’s face it, men (as well as women) are often more concerned with their own needs than the needs of their spouse. Many women fall in to the typical trap of expressing their needs to their husbands. Things change for a few days, but eventually he goes back to his old habits. So how do we influence our men to make good, permanent changes?

In my younger years my M.O. (method of operation) was to put up with Dad’s insensitivities for a few weeks, then the week of my period I could contain my annoyance no longer and I would do the pms thing and blow up. Not a healthy way of dealing with the problem.J It wasn’t until years later that I was able to simply bring up a problem I had with him in a good conversational voice and be able to talk through what was bothering me.

The author, Gary Thomas, warns that we dare not overestimate our ability to live with a deep hurt or a gaping need for years. Satan knows how to exploit such things and may suggest another man that seems to be so much more caring and understanding than your own husband. If your ideal plan for marriage leaves no room for divorce, you must honestly accept your weaknesses and be willing to create a climate of change in your home in which your husband will be motivated to change. Unfortunately Thomas gives no easy “five steps to influence” but the rest of the book (and over the next several weeks) I will detail Thomas’ strategies for creating situations in which our men will become the best that God can help them be. If you have tried in the past to communicate your hurt and it isn’t solving the problem, then you are most likely dealing with a case of “functional fixedness” – which will take a great deal of strength and courage on your part to address.

The first strategy is that we need to become a change agent in our marriage, and as I’ve written before it starts with us knowing that we are dearly loved by Christ. Also, to truly believe that if we ask Him He will help us in our journey to love our husbands.

Be Bold. The first thing many women in the Bible had to be told was to “Be bold.” When Hagar was abandoned by her husband and she and her son seemed to be slowly starving to death, God’s angel encouraged her, “Do not be afraid.” When Mary was told that she as a virgin would carry Jesus Christ, the angel told her “Fear not.” When the women were outside of the empty tomb wondering what had happened to their Lord, an angel again said “Do not be afraid.”

Fear gives way to paralysis, and many times passivity is our greatest enemy. Marriages can slowly die from apathy; relationships wilt when neither partner will address the unhealthy patterns that are sucking the life out of their marriage. But to be able to become that bold woman we must know who we are in Christ – beloved daughters of God. Armed with that knowledge, security, and acceptance we can be bold and become a force for good in our marriages. The power of Moses’ words are a wonderful promise to keep in mind “The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” (Deuteronomy 31:8)

Simply hoping for change is not a strategy. A good marriage doesn’t happen by accident. You can’t build a business by accident, and I can’t write a song by accident. All good things take work and activity, but too often we find ourselves thinking “It’s no use.” It’s so much easier to give up on marriage, give up on kids, give up on prayer, give up on ourselves. But God always encourages us to keep walking. When you fall down, get up and try again. God is the God of second chances, third chances – however many times it takes. His love never fails and He is always there, cheering us on.

Love, Mom

Change Who??

August 18, 2014 / Shari Baar / 4 Comments

Dear Daughters,

About fifteen years ago our family was on vacation in Idaho at Grandpa and Grandma’s home – the year we were celebrating their 50^th anniversary. I don’t remember all the details, but Grandpa and Grandma were snipping at each other in the kitchen for some trivial reason. I was sitting in the den so I heard part of what was said. Then Grandma left to go outside and pick some veggies out of the garden. I remember clear as day Grandpa’s next remark to me,

Your mom and I have been married for 50 years and she’s still trying to change me.

It was like a flash of lightning for me, because for 25 years I had been trying to change your dad. Apparently, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Right then and there I vowed to find a way to learn to really love him for exactly who he is now and not for who I hope he will be in the future.

Since then I have been learning and reading, making mistakes, praying for wisdom, learning more and reading more and failing again .…..you get the idea. But I have just started reading an incredible book written by Gary Thomas entitled Sacred Influence. And because I have been learning so much I thought I would share it with all of you, my precious daughters. You can take what you like, throw out the rest, but I feel the need to verbalize what I’ve been learning and trying to put into practice. I just want to try to share succinctly one chapter at a time.

As you all know, our marriage has always been committed, but not always loving, encouraging, and peaceful. In the first chapter of Sacred Influence, Thomas writes that although there are many good books on marriage written by women for women to encourage them in their marriages, he thought it might be helpful to write some male insights into men’s thoughts and feelings.

He starts by stating that God loves women. He feels passion for you when you cry, in fact he cries with you. He wants your marriage to be fulfilling and satisfying. Gary writes,

God knows that men can provide great strength, nurture, comfort, and security, but also that they can be frustrating, terrifying, demanding, and selfish.

Then he goes on to remark that there is no way we can change a man, but that we can learn to influence him or move him – a far subtler art. Remarkably, he goes on to say that your husband isn’t the only imperfect person in the relationship. Now that was one of my problems earlier on, I thought I was OK just like I was and that the whole problem in our marriage was Dad. But one day God showed me that I was also a big part of the problem – what a shocking revelation.

So, as I was trying to digest this scandalous new mindset I realized that there is only one person in the world I am able to change, and that is me. After the initial shock of this enlightening insight, so much pressure has been taken from me to know that I can’t, and finally don’t want to change Dad, but I can become more patient, kind, and loving, then leave the rest up to God. That too, was a new concept to me – letting God do the work that only He can do.

But before I can love, I must believe that I am loved by God because I simply cannot conjure up love on my own.

I love the words from Lauren Daigle when she pours out her heart to God:

You say I am loved, when I don’t feel a thing

You say I am strong, when I feel I am weak

You say I am held, when I am falling short

And when I don’t belong, Oh You say I am yours.

And I believe….

Yes, I believe. I must believe, I have to believe that God loves me before I can love anyone well. Believing has been some of the hardest work I have ever done, but also some of the most life-saving work God has done through me.

Yes, it has taken much effort, time, and rejecting those lies from my past – those lies that I had been forgotten and dismissed, somehow falling off God’s radar.

Some days I find myself reverting back into my old ingrained ways of thinking, but little by little I am learning, growing, trusting and changing.

Love, Mom

Tag: Change

Hope…Always

How Old Are You?

Deserving Success

Be Bold

Change Who??

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