Tag Archives: emotional health

A God-Inspired Sabbath

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A God-Inspired Sabbath title image

A God-Inspired Sabbath

There will be times in our lives where God leads us into a period of rest or a “Sabbath”. It may be taking a break from work or something that you do, a hobby, serving, or even a temporary break from a friendship or relationship. These times of rest are there to refresh and replenish you. They might also be there to create margin because God may foresee things coming up that you are getting ready to encounter. You might need extra time and energy in order to face them.

My recent God-inspired Sabbath

Over the last several months I’ve missed my writing, and I miss (and have sometimes felt a little guilt-ridden) about the consistency of new content on my site. Consistency, loyalty, and faithfulness are character traits that I have always valued and strived to achieve and demonstrate. Therefore, it’s been extremely difficult for me to feel like I’m not successfully living up to those traits in my writing over the past year.

Although, I do feel like God, in his kindness and divine foreknowledge kind of gave me a “heads up” that I was going to need to take a bit of a break, a “sabbatical” of sorts, from writing new content and spend some time recycling, updating, and reposting some of the older content on my site. I expected the break to only last for a few months, however, it ended up taking place over the entire year.

Seventh Year Sabbath from my writing

I decided to take a break from writing for my blog (or at least from writing a new post every week). It was a bit of a hard decision. I felt some guilt about it, like I was letting people down or letting God down. When I decided it just felt like I needed some rest, some time off because I couldn’t keep up the way and the pace that I wanted and had been doing. The word “sabbatical” came to mind which then caused me to think of “Sabbath” (aka…rest).

Something made me take a look at how long I had been writing on my blog, and coincidentally, I was just entering my seventh year. God reminded me of the times in scripture where he asked his people to let certain things have their “Sabbath” on the seventh year. He instructed them to let the land rest and not to plant new crops on the seventh year.

Seventh Year Sabbath in scripture

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Burn the Ships

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Burn the Ships title image

Burn the Ships

A couple months ago I heard a song for the first time called “Burn the Ships”, by for KING & COUNTRY (video below). I got really excited to show my son the song because he had just told me the story about the Spanish explorer and conquistador, Hernán Cortés, who burned his ships to give his men motivation to fight. I never remembered learning about this story before.

He had actually learned it from his baseball coach this year. In fact, it’s one of the team’s mantras this year. You see, last year the team made the state playoffs but just missed making it to the championship game. This year their coach didn’t want that to hold them back. He said they need motivation just like Cortés’ men did in order to conquer the new land. They have to fight in order to survive.

For the baseball team, the metaphorical ships are their past (the past losses, being an ordinary team, almost winning, etc.). They needed to burn them down, get out of their shell, and fight as a team this year. To symbolize this, the team huddles up and shouts “1-2-3-BTS!” (BTS=Burn the ships) The back of their hoodies this year also say “Burn the Ships”.

Hernán Cortés-Burn the Ships

Cortés was said to have burned his own ships upon arrival in Veracruz, Mexico in 1519 to prevent the retreat of his men. This would send a clear message—that there was no turning back! After doing a little bit of research I discovered that Cortés, in fact, may not have actually burned the ships. There is some dispute about whether or not he burned the ships or instead sank, scuttled, or ran them aground. Additionally it is debated whether or not he actually spared one ship to send to King Charles V in Spain with a portion of the treasure from his conquest.

Regardless of the “how”, it is evident from history that the ships were indeed destroyed. Thus, the result and reasoning remain the same…to prevent retreat and ensure his men were committed to their mission. Cortés knew one thing: retreat is easy when you have the option. Therefore, to burn the ships is to cut all sources of retreat. Consequently he removed any obstacles that could potentially hold his men back from giving their full effort. The message? “Succeed or die. We are not leaving this place alive unless we win.”

A reminder to me

This reminded me of a particular time that I too had to burn the ships at one time. 10 years ago our marriage was in a deep and dark place, to the point of separation and divorce papers. It was very broken—beyond any repair that we could humanly do. Only by God’s grace, forgiveness, and power was our marriage restored.

Tattoo rings...symbols of what God has done

My tattoo ring is a reminder to me of what God has done in my marriage

We symbolically burned the ships when we literally burned our divorce papers. (I had a picture I was going to post of us burning them with fireworks on the 4th of July, but I can’t seem to find it.) My “ship” was divorce, and by burning that it took that option off of the table forever. Then on our 15 year anniversary, five years later, we re-committed with another symbolic (yet quite permanent!) declaration by getting tattoos on our wedding ring fingers as a reaffirmation of our vows.

Last month (December 2019) we celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary. The traditional “gift” for 20 years is china, so I made Eric a mosaic out of a broken piece of china of my grandmother’s. This mosaic represented how God made something new and beautiful out of something very broken. This was only possible because we committed to burn the ships and decided to look ahead to the possibility and promise of something new.

Mosaic china heart

Mosaic china label

Still need reminders on occasion

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Wounds Heal But Sometimes There Are Scars

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Wounds Heal But Sometimes There Are Scars

Have you ever experienced some kind of pain or trauma in the past but have since recovered and healed from that? Do you have reminders, triggers, or stimuli that bring that past pain up again? Does that mean that you aren’t completely healed? Not necessarily. Personally, I don’t think that this automatically means that you aren’t fully healed. Now, as a disclaimer, let me say that this most certainly could be the case, and that some healing might still be in process (as healing IS often a long process, especially when wounds are deep or trauma is severe). However, I also believe that there are times when wounds heal, but sometimes there are scars left behind.

Even after healing, there may be times when we still experience some subsequent pain. There might even be some external or internal triggers to prompt further pain or remind us of an old injury. There may be some additional healing and recovery to be done. Then again, it may just be a scar serving as a reminder of a wound that once was there.

Let me give you an analogy…an old basketball injury

Several years ago my husband, Eric, completely damaged his ACL and meniscus in his knee. “Obliterated” was the precise word the doctor used. Eric experienced excruciating pain at the time of the injury, and the pain lasted for quite some time. He eventually had surgery replacing and repairing parts of his knee, yet afterward he still experienced some pain for a while during the recovery process. He also had ongoing physical therapy for a while. Again this was all still painful, but the pain gradually diminished as his wound healed.

Though he now has permanent scars, over time the knee was completely healed and the pain was completely alleviated. However, it’s odd because there are times when the weather might trigger a flare up of pain in his knee at the scars. Even though the injury is healed, there is a trigger for pain from time to time. The pain doesn’t last indefinitely, and experiencing pain again doesn’t negate the fact that his injury is completely healed. Nevertheless, because of the old injury he just still suffers from subsequent pain on occasion even after healing, and sometimes there are external triggers that might cause a renewed temporary discomfort, ache, or soreness.

Additionally, because of the old injury and the initial pain affiliated with it, he tends to favor, protect, or guard that knee a little more. He wants to prevent that pain or that same or similar injury from happening again. That still doesn’t mean he’s currently experiencing pain or that it’s not healed. He just tends to be a little more cautious and careful—he’s more aware. He may even avoid some of the activities that were involved in the injury to begin with.

Wounds we experience, the scars left behind, and subsequent pain even after healing

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