new to you friday–how to stop worrying

Be someone other than Jennifer Taylor.

Kidding, of course, although this is a good first step since I have completely mastered worrying and could compete at a Worry Olympics with other champions.


It began early.

Jen, age 5: (holding paper and crayons, sobbing): Mom, I can’t make my fours right. I make them backwards. (More sobbing.) Mrs. Pence makes her fours the right way and I can’t do it!

(Mrs. Pence was my kindergarten teacher, a lovely lady who introduced me to turnips and wrote a poem about me that had nothing to do with turnips before retiring the next year. But I digress.)

Mom: (patient smile): How old is Mrs. Pence?

Jen (trying to breathe): Old.

Mom: How long has she been making her fours?

Jen: A long time. Because she’s old.

Mom: How long have you been trying to do your fours?

Jen (a dim light dawning in her tear-soaked little brain): One day.

Mom: Right. I promise before you are old you will make your fours just fine. You just need to practice some more.

Sniffling and hugs…………….end scene.


So the ability to turn small issues into huge crises is one of my biggest gifts.

But I’m now closer to 35 than 5 (gulp) and it’s time to get a handle on this. Although the situations are far less common now, I still tend to turn into that teary five-year-old (inside, anyway) when things I care about don’t go as planned.

Worry is one of those acceptable sins, like gluttony and gossip, that we minimize or say we can’t help. Sometimes we also cause ourselves more worry by believing if we could just “trust God more” we would stop fretting, and therefore we are bad Christians with little faith.

I disagree with both perspectives.


I think it’s a control issue.


Author and Christian psychologist Henry Cloud writes, “Worry is often the non-acceptance of situations that you cannot do anything about.”

This is an amazing insight, because it positions worry as the symptom, not the core problem. The real issue is an inability to accept our lack of control over other people and circumstances. We are unable to accept that we may not get the house we put an offer on, or the job we interview for, or the relationship we want. We can’t control the other couple making an offer or the opinions of the interviewer or the feelings of the potential friend or date.

We can do some things, of course: work with a good realtor and make a competitive offer, research the company and practice our interview skills, share our wishes for the friendship. But ultimately we cannot make anyone else do anything, and we certainly can’t control the timeline of their response. We must simply do what we can and let it go. (This is where the trust-in-God discussion becomes more helpful.)

You lucky non-worrier types are thinking, “What’s the big deal? Of course you can’t control everything. Why waste all that emotional energy?” To which I say to you, on behalf of all worriers everywhere, yes, we know, and thank you for pointing out that we are wasting time and energy on this because now that gives us something else to feel bad about. Also, please ask your spouse what aspects of your “laid-back” personality drive them nuts.


As for me, one thing I have accepted is it’s time to deal with this issue, this year. After all, I did finally learn to make my fours. I can do this, too.

new to you friday–men, man up

A few weeks ago, a guy I’m friends with said two things that made me smile.

The first—“I thought about dating you, but decided it wouldn’t work because I’ve been reading your blog and you’re too Christian”—because that deserves a trophy for Back-handed Compliment Of The Year.

And the second—“You need a strong guy, and there aren’t many strong Christian guys”—because it made me think of this post.




Let’s make up a statistic and see if we can get it to go viral. How about, “If you are a single Christian woman over 30, you are 64% more likely to get hit by a bus than to get married.”

Look both ways, ladies.

—————————————————————————————-

At dinner with some friends this weekend, one of them described the guy she’d just started dating. He was raised in a Christian home but no longer attends church or “practices” any faith. My friend likes him and plans to see him again but she’s also approaching it casually; she realizes his lack of faith is a major issue.

Whether or not she should date a non-Christian at all is a whole other discussion. In his book How to Get a Date Worth Keeping, Henry Cloud asserts that dating unbelievers is fine if you approach it as a way to make new friends, have fun, and grow as a person. As someone who dated and subsequently did the love and loss routine with an atheist, I would argue the opposite point of view.

But wherever you land on that, the point is she’s dating this guy (let’s call him Jack) because even though she knows dozens of Christian men her age at our church, not one has ever asked her out. And before you ask—yes, she is smart, attractive, outgoing, and generally “together.” So are my other single friends, many of whom struggle with the same situation. Why the dating drought when it comes to Christian men?


I obviously can’t speak for the men, but based on the statistics I’ve read it doesn’t seem they lack interest in marriage and family. The majority of single men—believers and otherwise—say they hope to marry and raise children.

Yet many Christian guys don’t date—they lead Bible studies and singles events, they pray for a wife, they attend group activities for years on end, but they rarely exert a little energy or spend a little money to know any woman individually.

Nothing’s wrong with groups, but Jack didn’t wait for verification from five buddies as to whether my friend might be interested in him. He initiated conversation with her, expressed his interest, and took a risk.


God created men to be initiators, so this kind of assertiveness gets our attention. My friends and I are strong women, but we refuse to usurp that role and act as the pursuer. If our Christian brothers won’t, either, what’s the new strategy? My friend summed it up well as we finished our coffee. “I don’t know what will happen with Jack, but it’s frustrating to have few alternatives. I guess we’re just supposed to be ‘waiting on the Lord.’ Okay. We’re waiting……”

I’m really not trying to be down on men here. I know it’s hard to take those kinds of risks, and I know women can be confusing and contradictory. But I do believe that, despite the difficulties, God created men to step up and take action in every area of their lives—which includes “finding a wife” (Proverbs 18:22).


Guys, we don’t expect you to quote poetry or be able to benchpress your car. We just wish you’d spend a little less time reading Wild at Heart and a little more time living it.

what’s saving you?

In her memoir Leaving Church, Barbara Brown Taylor writes,

Many years ago now, when I was invited to speak at a church gathering, my host said, “Tell us what is saving your life now.” It was such a good question that I have made a practice of asking others to answer it even as I continue to answer it myself. Salvation is so much more than many of its proponents would have us believe. In the Bible, human beings experience God’s salvation when peace ends war, when food follows famine, when health supplants sickness and freedom trumps oppression. Salvation is a word for the divine spaciousness that comes to human beings in all the tight places where their lives are at risk, regardless of how they got there or whether they know God’s name. Sometimes it comes as an extended human hand and sometimes as a bolt from the blue, but either way it opens a door in what looked for all the world like a wall. This is the way of life, and God alone knows how it works.

She goes on to describe her answer to this question: teaching, living in relationship with creation on her farm, observing the Sabbath, encountering God in other people, and “committing myself to the task of becoming fully human” are saving her life as she writes the book.


Now before you compose testy comments, I understand that only Jesus truly saves us. But as Taylor notes, he often uses other people, circumstances, and tangible blessings to bring “divine spaciousness.” If we accept salvation as a journey instead of simply a once-and-done destination, it follows that God can use anything he wants to open doors along the way.

Even a casual reader of my blog over the last year would recognize some of my own “tight places.” I continue to struggle with calling and purpose, with prayer, with church as usual, and with God.

I welcome these struggles because, as author and psychologist Henry Cloud says, “Non-growing people are very comfortable.” I’d rather be growing than avoiding uncomfortable tight spots—but, like Taylor, I appreciate lower-case-s salvation along the way.


So right now……

–Good books are saving me. In addition to Leaving Church, I’ve been reading or re-reading Prayer by Philip Yancey, The Writing Life by Annie Dillard, The Divine Commodity by Skye Jethani, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller and Angry Conversations with God by Susan Isaacs. Good fiction is helpful, as well, for its lessons and its escapes. Recently I’ve liked The Help by Kathryn Stockett, The Postmistress by Sarah Blake and Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry. Two months ago that list would have looked entirely different and two months from now it will again—and so will the way I think about life.

–Therapy is saving me. Hopefully we are long past the days when seeing a counselor carries a stigma. I’ve worked with mine on and off over the last several years and she’s immensely helpful in pointing out unhealthy patterns and suggesting new approaches. I don’t know anyone so well-adjusted and neurosis-free that they couldn’t benefit from therapy at some point. If you think you’re that person, you really need it.

–Music is saving me, as it always does. Right now it’s Andrew Peterson (as it always is) and, ahem, the songs from Glee. What? They’re fun and joyful and generally not too silly.

–Driving is saving me, preferably driving with music. I get my best ideas and insights in the car. But I will say there are a great number of very slow drivers in Nashville, many of them proudly displaying Dave Ramsey bumper stickers. Someone should conduct a sociological research project on this phenomenon. Are financially conservative people also cautious drivers? Are they just trying to save gas? Is there a Financial Peace project meant solely to drive me crazy? Someone needs to investigate.

–Gardening is saving me. Nothing else I’m doing right now gives me as much satisfaction as digging, weeding, and planting, or seeing the tidy flowerbeds and growing vegetables that result. During one bad week recently I shoveled up a second part of my yard and created a shade garden, because I’d run out of plantable space before I ran out of the need to plant.


Christ saves us, but uses the world he created to help us grow. What is saving your life now?

how to stop worrying

Be someone other than Jennifer Taylor.

Kidding, of course, although this is a good first step since I have completely mastered worrying and could compete at a Worry Olympics with other champions.


It began early.

Jen, age 5: (holding paper and crayons, sobbing): Mom, I can’t make my fours right. I make them backwards. (More sobbing.) Mrs. Pence makes her fours the right way and I can’t do it!

(Mrs. Pence was my kindergarten teacher, a lovely lady who introduced me to turnips and wrote a poem about me that had nothing to do with turnips before retiring the next year. But I digress.)

Mom: (patient smile): How old is Mrs. Pence?

Jen (trying to breathe): Old.

Mom: How long has she been making her fours?

Jen: A long time. Because she’s old.

Mom: How long have you been trying to do your fours?

Jen (a dim light dawning in her tear-soaked little brain): One day.

Mom: Right. I promise before you are old you will make your fours just fine. You just need to practice some more.

Sniffling and hugs…………….end scene.


So the ability to turn small issues into huge crises is one of my biggest gifts.

But I’m now closer to 35 than 5 (gulp) and it’s time to get a handle on this. Although the situations are far less common now, I still tend to turn into that teary five-year-old (inside, anyway) when things I care about don’t go as planned.

Worry is one of those acceptable sins, like gluttony and gossip, that we minimize or say we can’t help. Sometimes we also cause ourselves more worry by believing if we could just “trust God more” we would stop fretting, and therefore we are bad Christians with little faith.

I disagree with both perspectives.


I think it’s a control issue.


Author and Christian psychologist Henry Cloud writes, “Worry is often the non-acceptance of situations that you cannot do anything about.”

This is an amazing insight, because it positions worry as the symptom, not the core problem. The real issue is an inability to accept our lack of control over other people and circumstances. We are unable to accept that we may not get the house we put an offer on, or the job we interview for, or the relationship we want. We can’t control the other couple making an offer or the opinions of the interviewer or the feelings of the potential friend or date.

We can do some things, of course: work with a good realtor and make a competitive offer, research the company and practice our interview skills, share our wishes for the friendship. But ultimately we cannot make anyone else do anything, and we certainly can’t control the timeline of their response. We must simply do what we can and let it go. (This is where the trust-in-God discussion becomes more helpful.)

You lucky non-worrier types are thinking, “What’s the big deal? Of course you can’t control everything. Why waste all that emotional energy?” To which I say to you, on behalf of all worriers everywhere, yes, we know, and thank you for pointing out that we are wasting time and energy on this because now that gives us something else to feel bad about. Also, please ask your spouse what aspects of your “laid-back” personality drive them nuts.


As for me, one thing I have accepted is it’s time to deal with this issue, this year. After all, I did finally learn to make my fours. I can do this, too.

happy blogiversery

Today marks three years for this blog! (And tomorrow involves a birthday with more threes…….heaven help us.) Here’s a look back…..

Ten of the posts I like best, for one reason or another:

Do we really want a country of McChurches?

The story is bigger than our short-term happiness.

Can Christians drink?

A Holiday Tip.

“Leadership” means dealing with reality—including conflict.

eHarmony: I’m not a fan.

If you must read “The Shack“……

On preaching politics from the pulpit….

Why I’d rather work for men.

An open letter to Tim Keller.

Ten of the posts that received the most feedback, on or off-line:

Apparently you can’t love trees and love God—or so say some readers.

How would Jesus vote?

Parents, please keep your crying kids out of worship services.

“Shout to the Lord” on American Idol…….oh, the drama.

The church’s response to homosexuality.

How I messed up the 2008 NACC.

So we saved ‘em. How do we disciple ‘em?

One attempt to start a small group.

All a-Twitter.

Is this it? I’m ready for more.

Ten people, places or things I still think you should check out:

Tokens Show

Andrew Peterson

Books by Henry Cloud

Christian Church Today

Design Intervention (both versions!)

What kind of church is this?

Ring the Bells: A Christmas Offering

Deadly Viper Character Assassins

Nichole Nordeman

Second Guessing God by Brian Jones

buy the book

Today I received this email:

Jennifer,

I was brokenhearted last night at our small group Bible study when my friend poured out her heart and tears concerning the drain she feels because she has trouble drawing lines between her job as the church secretary, her personal (“off the clock”) ministry to the church, and her responsibilities of home and husband. Her struggle is amplified because, even as a relatively new Christian, she can identify the gap between the Biblical counsel of the church leaders and the reality of their own lives. I feel my advice to her was helpful but painfully inadequate. I am having a terrible time finding any articles about the ministry to the ministers, or helping the helpers. With all you do, you must have personally come to some conclusion on this matter, and I respect your opinion and advice. Have you written any articles or are you aware of any resources that may help my friend and her husband separate employment from ministry from family, but yet stay connected to them all?  How do you define the line between devotion to a ministry and workaholism (by your choice) or abuse (by the choice of others)? I would appreciate any references to which you can direct me.

Your brother in Christ,
—–
There are very few people or organizations I recommend without qualification, but Cloud Townsend Resources is one. Cloud and Townsend wrote the masterpiece Boundaries and have separately authored other great books including Changes that Heal, Handling Difficult People, and 9 Things You Simply Must Do.

Henry Cloud, whose dry sense of humor in live presentations makes him my favorite half of the duo, just released his new book, The One-Life Solution: Reclaim your personal life while achieving greater professional success. I haven’t read it yet, but I trust Cloud so much I recommended it to my friend immediately.

“The author hones in on common weaknesses—overdeveloped needs for security, approval and perfectionism—and leads readers through a plan for regaining control of themselves, their work and their lives with easy-to-follow activities to implement changes as personal policies,” writes Publishers Weekly. “Unfailingly encouraging, Cloud is a fine advocate for the benefit of gaining control and protecting boundaries and his book is a must-have life management bible.” A PW review is one of the reviews that matters, especially in “secular” publishing, so this is quite an endorsement.

So much of life has to do with boundaries: setting them, respecting them, communicating them. Improvement in these areas almost guarantees better quality of personal and professional life. I’m glad to know those of us still working on our needs for security, approval and perfectionism– that would be all of us–have another resource to help.

This morning I spent some time talking to a staff member from Higher Ministries, a non-profit organization that reaches out to pastors and churches in crisis. During our conversation, Tony made an interesting observation: “Guys leave Bible college or seminary full of knowledge in theology but without adequate training in leadership and conflict management skills.”

I am continually astounded at the number of leaders I know who are unable to have the difficult conversation or who, like Michael Scott in The Office, equate leadership with being everyone’s friend. It causes so many problems and solves so few.

Henry Cloud talks about this in his book Integrity: The Courage to Meet the Demands of Reality. (The title alone is telling.) He points out that truly successful leaders are oriented towards reality—they seek the truth about situations even if that truth is negative. “Reality,” he says, “is always your friend.”

Unfortunately, we can all point to people who operate as if reality is a problem to be avoided at all costs. As a result, the 40-year veteran of ministry is cruelly let go without dignity or even explanation by a senior leader unable to speak the truth in love. An entire organization fights paralysis while its leader stubbornly pursues business strategies that stopped working years earlier. A board keeps a faltering leader in place because it’s too much work to find a replacement—and then wonders why the staff has such low morale. A group of elders talks to everyone on the church staff about a problem—except the staff member who created it.

I could go on, but I’m getting depressed. What baffles me is that despite my youth and inexperience, the solutions to these problems seem clear to me. If I, who have never led anything more rigorous than a small group, understand these issues, why on earth don’t others? If I’m able to confront a toxic person or difficult situation, it seems my elders (church or chronological) should be able to as well.

Leaders clutch dog-eared copies of Good to Great but are unable to practice one of its major points: all the great companies (and their level 5 leaders) could “confront the most brutal facts of current reality.” They wait for situations or people to suddenly improve on their own, although every law in the universe says that won’t happen. They shy away from conflict but follow Jesus who confronted Pharisees, disciples, entire towns, and the reality of our sin. They avoid unpleasant news but follow God, who moved quickly to deal with Adam and Eve’s sin and proactively create a redemptive solution.

It’s all rather ironic, and very frustrating, because it’s ultimately the staff and the ministry that suffer from a leader’s lack of courage (or, I’ll be charitable, lack of insight). When he refuses to make a choice, he’s making a choice—to postpone the inevitable, to cause even more conflict, and to make the process twice as painful for everyone involved. And it’s young ‘uns like me and my friends (who have personally experienced every one of the situations I list above) who have to deal with it.

I may never be a good leader, either, but I do know one thing: ignorance does not equal bliss—for anyone.

More input needed

Yesterday I was asked to coordinate/produce four services for a new leadership training event at The Local Megachurch (as my friend and fellow blogger Jan calls it). “The LAB” includes three days of special speakers (including Boundaries author Henry Cloud) and over 40 workshops on everything from small groups to social justice. It should be a good time.

However, my focus will be on the four services that bring the whole group of (hopefully) 800-1,000 people together in worship and learning. These times need to include Moments (you know what I mean), funny and/or meaningful videos, unusual and creative plays on the “lab” theme (perhaps a local chemistry teacher blowing things up on the side?), interactive and fun things to get people talking to each other around round tables, and some common elements to run through the entire experience.

The gig is just a few weeks away, and I need your help. You know where the best videos-for-purchase are, right? You probably just thought of 10 cool takeoffs on the lab theme, and at least once this year you did something out of the usual routine that really connected with people.

I need to know what those are! Will you drop me a line and let me know? If it helps, the themes for the four services are leadership (duh), integrity, leadership in crisis (with a pastor from New Orleans) and blessing/commissioning.

At dinner with some friends this weekend, one of them described the guy she’d just started dating. He was raised in a Christian home but no longer attends church or “practices” any faith. My friend likes him and plans to see him again but she’s also approaching it casually; she realizes his lack of faith is a major issue.

Whether or not she should date a non-Christian at all is a whole other discussion. In his book How to Find a Date Worth Keeping, Henry Cloud asserts that dating unbelievers is fine if you approach it as a way to make new friends, have fun, and grow as a person. As someone who dated and subsequently did the love and loss routine with an atheist, I would argue the opposite point of view.

But wherever you land on that, the point is she’s dating this guy (let’s call him Jack) because even though she knows dozens of Christian men her age at our church, not one has ever asked her out. And before you ask—yes, she is smart, attractive, outgoing, and generally “together.” So are my other single friends, many of whom struggle with the same situation. Why the dating drought when it comes to Christian men?

I obviously can’t speak for the men, but based on the statistics I’ve read it doesn’t seem they lack interest in marriage and family. The majority of single men—believers and otherwise—say they hope to marry and raise children.

Yet many Christian guys don’t date—they lead Bible studies and singles events, they pray for a wife, they attend group activities for years on end, but they rarely exert a little energy or spend a little money to know any woman individually.

Nothing’s wrong with groups, but Jack didn’t wait for verification from five buddies as to whether my friend might be interested in him. He initiated conversation with her, expressed his interest, and took a risk.

God created men to be initiators, so this kind of assertiveness gets our attention. My friends and I are strong women, but we refuse to usurp that role and act as the pursuer. If our Christian brothers won’t, either, what’s the new strategy? My friend summed it up well as we finished our coffee. “I don’t know what will happen with Jack, but it’s frustrating to have few alternatives. I guess we’re just supposed to be ‘waiting on the Lord.’ Okay. We’re waiting……”

I’m really not trying to be down on men here. I know it’s hard to take those kinds of risks, and I know women can be confusing and contradictory. But I do believe that, despite the difficulties, God created men to step up and take action in every area of their lives—which includes “finding a wife” (Proverbs 18:22).

Guys, we don’t expect you to quote poetry or be able to benchpress your car. We just wish you’d spend a little less time reading Wild at Heart and a little more time living it.