Standing In The Gap

I'm listening to Klove while I clean and get ready to host our LIFEgroup tonight. They are doing their pledge drive which honestly drives me crazy... but today I tolerated it. They were asking people to give for families that couldn't see a way clear to do so. They called it standing in the gap.
I started to think about standing in the gap. Isn't this what life is all about? Isn't this what Jesus did for us? Isn't this the message we should be sharing with everyone around us? Maybe this is topic is elementary for some of you who have clearly gotten the concept better than I have.
Standing in the gap could mean any of the following and I'm sure more, but intercessory prayer(biggie), giving of time, $, self, just plain helping someone out,serving quietly and faithfully to see God's work carried out.
I can remember one time vividly where someone stood in the gap for me and it touched my heart so much that I will never forget it or the person who carried it out. I'm sure there have been others, but this one instance stands out to me. This someone reached out and offered to stand for me so that I could have a couple hours to myself. We would have had an infant, a 1 yr old and a 3 yr old and there were days I thought it would never get easier and nothing would ever change. It was a very simple thing really, yet in the trenches of dirty diapers, bottles, dishes, housework, 3 babies in 3 yrs still getting up at night and a husband who worked daylight to past dark, a simple gift of staying with my children so I could go to the grocery by myself for 2 hrs brought me to tears. And I'll never forget it. I said then that I would remember this kindness and pass it on to other mothers serving in the hard spots when my kids were grown. I had often wondered where the "older mothers" were, who didn't have kids at home to take all their time? And where are the grandmothers who sit and knit silly scarves? Why aren't they serving the young mothers who are wondering how they can even make it to bed time? There are lots of us who don't ( or didn't) have family close to help. Who is standing in the gap? Who is filling in for moms and grandmothers who can't be near to help their grown children?
Are you standing in the gap for someone? Are you a young mom serving your children and too tired to physically stand in the gap for someone else? Intercessory prayer may be the only thing you have to give right now. I get that... Is there a teen that has touched your heart? Are you standing in the gap for them, physically or emotionally? Is there someone from your church or community that needs a gap filler? Some of us can be that for them.
Please don't misunderstand this post. This is not to say you aren't standing in the gap for someone, but as a reminder to me... Some times I want to give up everything I'm doing and just have some ME time. But standing in the gap is so much more important .
Some of you have stood in the gap for me and I didn't even know.Some of you have stood in the gap for me as a mother figure. Some of you have stood in the gap for me thru all three hard pregnancies and deliveries. Some of you have stood in the gap for me thru some hard spots in our marriage. Some of the people who have stood in the gap for me have moved on and I never see them, yet they have left an impression on me. Those people are not forgotten and I'll always be thankful.
God has brought a lot of different people into my life to influence me. I hope it serves as a reminder of what Christ did for us. Standing in the gap, taking our sin on Himself, dying so that we can live.

11 years and counting...

Tomorrow marks 11 years of marriage for Noah and I. 11 years is a long time. But not long enough. Its so long that I can't even remember the first 3 or 4. Seriously. Or maybe it has been made foggy because ( as a friend said) "the good, the bad and the ugly" were mostly "the bad and the ugly".
I recommend getting married at a young age when neither of you know what you want and neither has had the chance to develop their own set of rules for living. Life would be so much easier if we just went from "yes, Daddy" to "yes, my Love". I'm hoping my daughter doesn't have the relationship with us that I had with my parents and want to leave at an early age. Setting up a home as a single young woman with a strong will to survive does not bode well for a strong willed male coming along and trying to fill the Godly roll he was given. I must say I have longed for the easy love and affection that seems to come so easy for so many other couples. And I realize that so many of them are only making it look good so that nobody can see the brokenness inside. I can't hide the brokenness and so I'm sure I was an open book to all of you looking on in those years. And if you bothered to ask, I told. I don't like cover ups and I don't like fake people. I can spot a fake person a mile away and they have a stench about them that it just triggers my fake people gauge. Anyway, we have never had a fairy tale romance. Or any romance, for that matter. According to my romance tank, its been on empty for decades. Or a decade.
But there are promises to God's children and I claim them for us. There is sun after the rain and there is hope after the flood of horridness that oozes from us. God is using us to mold each other into what His definition of a child of the King is. He never promises that marriage will be easy or that the other person will get whats coming to them if we have a bad relationship.
He doesn't tell us that even if we are faithful, He will keep our spouse faithful.
He doesn't say that if we submit to our husbands they will eventually come around and do what we want.
 He doesn't tell us that if we aren't happy it's ok to look around and find someone who will make us happy. Or make us feel good about ourselves. Or make us remember the good ole days of singleness when we could see whoever we wanted.
He never says it's ok to hit the bars or spend time out without our spouse, just because our spouse doesn't stop us.
Here is what He does say,

Galation: 2:17But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! 18For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. 19For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. 20I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness^b were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.

Galations 5:13For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. 14For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 15But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.

16But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. 18But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21envy,^d drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

25If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. 26Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.

Your spouse is your neighbor, a soul created by God, to bring glory to Him. Its not our job to tear them down so they can rebuild, or even better, so we can rebuild them. This has been a hard lesson for me. By the Grace of God, Noah is still being rebuilt by God and even more importantly, so am I. Though some days it feels like I'm only being torn down but each time I'm torn down, God rebuilds with something better, something so much sweeter and it works for awhile until I decide I can do a better job. That always ends in disaster and He starts the rebuilding process again.  

Noah is an amazing person. He has tolerated me for so many years through the good, the bad and the ugly. I'm sorry to say the ugly seems to be the prevailing theme around here. He is a patient husband in all my disasters, fixing anything and everything that I happen to ruin. He is patient with me when I've just had it and he comes home to a cold heart, a cold dinner and sometimes no dinner at all. He patiently folds the mountain of laundry that seem to accumulate from nowhere.  He has never threatened to leave me even tho I'm sure he has thought about it. Maybe because the cooking talent he had as a bachelor has mysteriously disappeared. :)

And 11 years later, we are still hanging out at home on our anniversary, with the kids, doing the same thing we always do. Bringing in the new year with silent hopes for a better year, better relationships, better communication and a deeper love that erases all the good, the bad and the ugly and just leaves us with the knowledge that we are loved, we are redeemed and we are precious to our Saviour. We don't need our romance tank filled, we don't need to be mushy in love, we don't need an exotic anniversary trip ( i do dream of this). All we need to know is that each has been brought to the knowledge of Christ and  each believes the covenant we have given ourselves to in Christ is bound with His Love and breaking it is not an option nor will it ever be.  We are one.