Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Lessons for the Gretch


I've been shown two things this past week, and I want to share them both with you.

#1
I was reading in Romans the other day and I was struck pretty hard with this passage: "More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us" (Ro. 5:3-5 ESV). I was struggling with a couple things during the week and I was feeling so guilty because I couldn't get over it. I kept telling myself, "Gretchen, you're stronger than this! Gretchen, you are more mature than this! Gretchen, just let it go! Gretchen...WHY do you do this to yourself!?" And when I read this I was just reminded that I am going to have struggles just like everyone else. I think there's this misconception, or expectation (whether we place it on ourselves or it's placed on us from the outside) that because we're "missionaries" everything is going to be all glorious all the time and we're never going to have spiritual or emotional struggle because we're in constant ministry and always talking about God and such. Well, that's just not the case. No matter where we are in our Faith, we're still fallen people...we're still going to make mistakes. And then it happened! I related what was happening to one of our rep songs! Yes, yes, a testimony was born in this moment. It was quite humorous for me because I sing the song Sometimes and Carrie or I talk about this song at every single concert. But it's always been something that we're TEACHING, how "we're all going to fall; we're all going to make mistakes. But when we do, we fall into grace...delight in THAT, don't get caught up in the mistake; get caught up in the grace that follows". This day however, it was a lesson I was LEARNING.

#2
Let me tell you about Carrie really quick...
she's so awesome! Man, I'm so glad I've gotten to know her. I love her! You know how sometimes people ask you how you're doing and you can tell they really don't care what your answer is, they're just asking you out of obligation? Well, it's not like that with Carrie...not at all! Every time she asks me how I am or if she can do anything to help me...even if she asks me several times a day, I know she's being sincere; I know she cares about the answer I give her.

So yeah. Just thought I'd share those lessons with you all...because they've been a blessing to me. Hope they are to you as well.

So long for now.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Love you much Gretchen.
You are always in our prayers and thoughts. In addition to that you are tied to us like a daughter.
We look forward to seein you next month.

don and elf