When Life Is Rough - Part 1
It’s a ruff life in Chula Vista, CA.
What do you do when life is rough? If you’re a follower of Christ, what do you do when your pursuit of Christian maturity keeps calling you onward and upward, to terrain that is steeper and more challenging? If you're a leader, what do you do when criticisms just keep on coming despite your best efforts to be sensitive, to listen well? What do you do when your friends depart or forsake you? What do you do when your job is dissatisfying, or you’re let-go from it?
I don’t know about you, but I find myself turning to cliches, pithy sayings, idioms, axioms, prayer, and lots and lots of Scripture when life is rough. (And lots of talking. Thanks for always listening to me dear husband!)
I’m going to split this into a multi-parter. Here’s part one/cliche one.
Not my first rodeo.
Last summer, we were hosting a coffee-tasting shindig at our house and our housemate (before she was our housemate) asked me if the Christian walk ever gets any easier. I laughed. I didn’t mean to, since it’s not a silly question, but sometimes my reactions are faster than my brain can think about showing some self-control. I told her, “no, but your confidence in the Lord’s faithfulness gets stronger, and your recovery time gets shorter.”
2 Corinthians 10:5 says,
“We are destroying arguments and all arrogance raised against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.”
Sometimes, Satan uses rough circumstances to make us doubt our knowledge of God. Questions are okay, doubts are okay, but don’t stop there, look for the answers. We celebrated Easter last week, and we say “He is risen” over and over again not for vain repetition’s sake, but to get it into our muscle memory to respond, “Jesus is alive.” When life is rough, I have to remind myself that my circumstances do not change the fact that Christ is risen.
Because He is risen, we (who follow Him) get to live in resurrection power, resurrection hope. Because He lives, we have been made alive.
When I asked our missionary friends last summer if they had any concerns returning to Ukraine knowing conflict was on the horizon, they responded, “well, we’ve done it before.” They were in Ukraine in 2014 when Crimea was annexed and have spent the last 8 years ministering to Internally Displaced People/Refugees (IDPs.) The Lord was faithful and moved in power then, and He has not changed.
Hebrews 13 lists several encouragements for believers to keep going. Depending on the English translation, verse 1 says to “keep on loving.” Verses 2 and 16 say, “do not forget.” Verse 3 says, “continue.” Verse 7 says, “remember.”
You know what all those reminders imply? They imply that the original recipients of this letter (believers in the first century) were tempted to give up.[1]
Thankfully, this wasn’t the author’s first rodeo. And so he encouraged the Hebrews, and then he encouraged them some more, to keep the faith, to not forget their knowledge of the living God.
“For He Himself has said,
‘I will never desert you, nor will I ever abandon you,’
so that we confidently say,
‘The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What will man do to me?’”
Hebrews 13:5b-6
Indeed. The Lord is my helper.
***
And some first century believers did leave the faith. See 1 Timothy 1:19, “keeping faith and a good conscience, which some have rejected and suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith.”
We sat on cold metal chairs in a white room, leaning against a cold metal examining table...waiting. Our beautiful dog Sabrina had been hurried to the back of the emergency clinic without us. She was in danger and distress.
It’s been a minute.
I love that phrase. I probably overuse it. And my repetitious use of it probably annoys those in my listening (or instant messaging) range.
Why did the tomato blush? He saw the salad dressing! Thank you for laughing. I appreciate it.
When you gotta go, you gotta go.
Our friends returned to the mission field last week. They had to go.
Lakes are pretty cool places. One might say that they're refreshing.
Months ago, we taught Silas how to count to twenty. Recently, he has been skipping six. Poor six.
I’m a huge fan of Os Guinness (and his ministry The Trinity Forum.) If you haven’t heard of him, go look him up on your favorite podcast app or on YouTube because he is a gazillion times more articulate than I am.
In the past ten months, I have had to hold fast to Hebrews 13:1-2a, “Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers.”
Hospitality to strangers is easy to neglect.
What do you think of when you hear, “when strivings cease?”
“When the burden is too much for you to bear, you do not need stronger shoulders, you need weaker knees.”
Dr. Mitch Kim
What do you do when life is rough? If you’re a follower of Christ, what do you do when your pursuit of Christian maturity keeps calling you onward and upward, to terrain that is steeper and more challenging?
What do you do when life is rough? If you’re a follower of Christ, what do you do when your pursuit of Christian maturity keeps calling you onward and upward, to terrain that is steeper and more challenging?
Our cool-factor here at SBCA has been notched up tenfold the past month. Why you may ask? Great question!
Yesterday was Palm Sunday. We had a lovely time at church.
And while no Dickensian Ghost-of-Palm-Sunday-Past visited me, I found myself reminiscing. Holidays and rituals are meant for such a thing, I suppose.
We attended a Christmas party last December and within two minutes of our arrival, Silas (age 2) showed me a toy he had just found. We were outside, in the dark, and on time (meaning not many people were there yet.) Looking around, I asked him, “where did you find this tractor?”
I nerded out this weekend at a ‘Faith and Science’ conference held here in San Diego. Praise the Lord for paid time off and for a grandma who is willing to watch the kid.
In the summer of 2007, in the sticks of San Diego county, Jeff and I met at Indian Hills Camp.
Oh Indian Hills Camp. So dusty. So Wild West-y. So can’t-ever-forget-that-camp-song-y.
No, this isn’t about Eutychus (Acts 20:9.) This is about the first Sunday of March in 2019 when someone suddenly died at the church we were serving at.
It’s early March and the evenings are still too chilly for me, even in San Diego. Since I’ve committed to staying inside in the evening until the weather warms up, it seems like a good time to start spring cleaning.
I am a terrible movie watcher. I don’t cope well with plot holes. Everyone else will talk about the scenes they loved, the parts that captured their imaginations. I, however, will talk about plot holes and major oversights.
During a short vacation to the mountains last summer, I had the time to read a few books
A few Sundays ago, we were singing ‘Be Still My Soul’ at church and my not-so-still two-year-old ran up on stage. Uggh.
Which of the four did I pay attention to (or do I plan to pay attention to) this weekend: the Super Bowl, Valentine’s Day, my mom’s birthday, or an anniversary?
This Wednesday is the first anniversary of Cat Lawyer! I love Cat Lawyer so much that I felt it appropriate to give him an homage via blog.
I’m an institutionalist. I believe we’re stronger as a team - that’s dedicated to the mission - than we are siloed off.
Two years ago while preparing material for our homegroup leaders, I came across a word study that shifted my thinking, or at least readjusted my focus: “Created for good works…so that we would walk in them”, (Eph.2:10). The word “walk” in the Greek does not imply the simple straight line from point A to point B, but has a more spherical quality.
I live in suburban America. Here in suburbia, we have companies that come to our houses on a weekly basis and take our trash away. It’s wonderful. Until the week before Christmas, when the magic stopped. The garbage workers went on strike. Womp womp.
Last night, we ditched our Sunday night prayer meeting, packed up Silas, and drove 98 miles to see a commissioning service at Celebration Church. One of their pastors and his wife will be returning to Cambodia to share the good news of Jesus with the people of Cambodia who have not yet heard His name.
Why start a blog? Here is a list of questions that I asked myself before starting this.
Kylene Lopo
Kylene Lopo is a pastor’s wife, a BI Reports Developer, and is the mother of Silas (age 4) and Hosanna (age 0.) She has a masters in Biblical Literature from Alliance Theological Seminary and is an official worker with the C&MA in the South Pacific District.