Another evidence...

That my husband is the best in the world!

We were in church a few Sunday's ago and in the context of the message the pastor said "just quickly - survey your life for evidences of God's grace."

Stephan's head turned as if on a swivel to look at me. I looked over at him, startled by his abrupt motion, and met his eyes.

"Found one," he whispered.

Tommorow...

my marriage turns 3!

As I was reflecting on this, two major thoughts came to mind.

First, of course, was that I married the most wonderful man in the world, second to none. I don't deserve him (though the debate continues as to whether or not he deserves me...).

Second, was how the past 3 years have been nothing but pure, undeserved grace. I shutter to think where my marriage would be today if God hadn't mercifully intervened, lead Stephan and I to our church, opened our eyes first to His saving gospel and then to His perfect plan for marriage, and through the teaching we received brought us to a place where we are experiencing all the blessings God promises to those who obey his word. We've grown into a depth of communication that few couples ever experience - this has lead to the sight and mortification of so much sin that would have otherwise festered and ravaged not only our relationship with each other, but with God. We've grown into the prescribed roles scripture lays out for husband and wife, and have experienced the blessings inherent in a husband leading his family, and a wife facilitating that leadership. The blessings of joy and quality in my marriage would be enough to put me on my face with gratitude each morning, but all this is sweetened by the knowledge that I'm walking out my marriage in a way that isn't only reaping benefits for this life, but I'm also storing up reward for myself in heaven as well - and helping Stephan do the same by helping him walk out his role as husband. God promises blessing to those who fear him and keep his commandments - and I've seen this over the past 3 years of my marriage. Scripture also says that God is merciful, and he sends the rains to fall on both the wicked and the good - I've seen that too, for I'm by no means perfect at this whole 'wife' gig. God is good - that's the bottom line, and that's what I've seen during my married life.

But back to thought #1 - my husband. He's the chief blessing given to me by God, and the highest form of his goodness to me...well, 2nd highest - absolute highest is, of course, him saving my soul through Christ's atoning death.

A friend at work asked me how I was doing a couple weeks ago.

"Saved!" I replied. "And it's beautiful outside! How could I be better?"

She snickered as she pulled her hair into a ponytail. "All this and Christ too!" she said.

That's been my pervading thought this morning: I have Stephan - a passionate, loving, encouraging husband who works hard every day to provide for his family; who looks at his whole future in the framework of providing for and protecting his family; who desires to bring his wife home to raise his children, and make sure she has not only all her needs, but her wants; who cares more about his wife's soul than her comfort and isn't afraid to call her to task on her sin and point her back to the gospel - All this and Christ too.

I'm incomparably blessed - and I've only been married 3 years! Thank you Stephan - and thank you God.

Earth Day Every Day!

I'd been at my new job at my church for only a couple weeks when one day I walked into the reception area where two of my coworkers were chatting. One of them looked up at me.

"Everything you wear is green or brown," she stated, matter-of-factly.

I looked down at myself. "Yes," I replied, just as matter-of-factly.

***

One of the pastors stopped me a couple days ago.

"Kari," he said, "What's the leaf?"

I looked down at the charm around my neck, a real leaf dipped in gold and hung on a leather strap.

"A gift from my husband," I answered.

"But what does it mean?" He asked.

"I've always been inspired to worship God by his creation. I kinda like leaves...I don't know if you've noticed all my clothes are green and brown..."

He smiled and nodded, then walked away.

***

WikiHow's step #10 to celebrating Earth Day: "Wear green and brown."

I guess every day's earth day in the Faherty house!

***

ps - yesterday was John Muir's birthday.

Another recent evidence that I have the best husband in the world...

I was sitting on the couch one day reading when Stephan came deliberately out of the bedroom.

"I hope we live to be a hundred and one," he declared.

I furrowed my brow. "Why? What happens at a hundred and one?"

He smiled. "Then I'll have been married to you for 80 years."

Recent reason #1 that my husband is the best in the world

Me: "I love fairy tales...have I ever told you that?"

Him: "No, but it doesn't surprise me."

Me: "I didn't think it would."

Him: "What exactly is a fairy tale?"

Me: "I'd say it's a story with fantastic elements that has a happy ending."

Him: "Doesn't it have to have a moral?"

Me: "No, that's a fable."

...

Him: "Then we're living a fairy tale."

Me: "What?"

Him: "Yeah - because of Jesus we know we have a happy ending - and you're fantastic!"

The truth of the matter

I was at work the other day and we had to assemble some binders for a training seminar. We'd be training people to lead small groups of married couples, and small groups of single people. Each group got a different color binder.

When I started assembling the content of the binders, I put all the married materials in the green binders and all the single materials in the orange ones. Later in the process, my husband (who was helping me) noticed that I was stuffing the married binders with single content and vice versa. I stepped up to the counter and took a second look at the binders. Sure enough, the green binders were labeled "singles" in bold letters, and the orange "married". My stomach turned and I began to feel feverish and jittery.

"Who let this happen?" I said in disgust. EVERYONE knows married is green and single is orange! This was nothing less than a great a display of arrogance and disregard for the natural order. Intolerable. Absolutely intolerable. I wanted to march right into my bosses office and inform him of this terrible travesty. But I knew he would not be sympathetic. This made me feel even sicker.

"You change 'em," I said, pallid and agitated. "I can't be near them anymore."

My husband, servant that he is, changed all the binders so I wouldn't have to.

I just sat in the corner and brooded, upset that I was the only person in the world who knew the truth and had to watch it be defiled - right in front of me.

***

Synaesthesia - "From the Ancient Greek (syn), meaning "with," and (aisthēsis), meaning "sensation"'—is a neurological condition in which two or more bodily senses are coupled. In one common form of synesthesia, known as grapheme → color synesthesia, letters or numbers are perceived as inherently colored."

The condition above describes how I perceive my world. To use Wikipedia's well chosen words, my 'coupled senses' are hearing and sight. When I hear music, voices, loud bangs or quiet breezes, I see color in my mind's eye. I also have strong grapheme-color synesthesia, it's so strong that 'incorrect colors' actually make me ill - like the situation described above. I still bristle and feel feverish when I have to handle those binders. When I park on level 3 of a parking garage and they've painted the walls yellow to try and "serve" me in finding my car again, I growl and grumble - because everyone knows that 3 is green. Put me in a room with another Synesthete and ask me to defend that 3 is green and I'll do it to the death. Why? Because it's the inarguable, unchangeable truth. I cannot and I will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. God help me. Amen.

I hope you caught the reference to Martin Luther: I cannot and will not recant anything, he said. I say I'd defend the truth of 3 being green to the death - Luther was defending a much weightier truth.

"Jesus Christ, our God and Lord, died for our sins and was raised again for our justification… therefore, it is clear and certain that this faith alone justifies us…"

We are rebels deserving punishment from a completely holy God, so lost in our sin we have no hope of recovering our standing through our actions. Given our inability to work our way into God's favor, he sent his son to be punished in our place, and now commands us to put our faith in that substitution, admitting we needed someone to meet God's standard of perfection for us. Luther was defending the Gospel itself.

He came to this most important of realizations by studying God's word. In a world of growing relativism, God's word is what separates white from black. In it we find clear definitions of right and wrong, and in the unspecified areas we find clear guiding principles to help us be discerning. My church says this about the bible in it's statement of faith: "...the Bible is free of error in all it teaches." I agree whole-heartedly with this - but it's not always easy.

When I first came to my church, I had a terribly proud attitude (I can still have a terribly proud attitude) and thought I was wise. There were some doctrinal stances that the church took that I disagreed with, and I proudly said to the pastors "show me in God's word where it says that and I'll change my opinion, but not before."

And whadduya know, they did just that.

Now I had a question to ask myself: was I really and truly basing my definition of truth on scripture or was I basing it on my own opinions? I was being confronted with scripture that ran consistently contrary to my stances - what was I going to do? After living for 22 years believing that 3 was green, believing it deep down in my bones, being so convinced of it that it made me ill to think otherwise - scripture was telling me 3 was red. What now?

By God's grace, I was able to submit those things to his word, and over time, my opinions really did come to aline with his. It wasn't easy, but over time, 3 became red - and I'm so glad it did.

The battle isn't over though. I fight it every day. Every day I wake up with my green 3s - with lies that I cling to and cultivate in my sinful heart, lies that I neglect to submit to God's word. Whenever I'm bitter I'm believing the lie that I have the right to judge others. Every time I'm angry I believe the lie that I deserve to be treated better than I have been. Whenever I feel lonely I'm believing the lie that God has left me alone. When I fall into the sin of pride again and despair of ever changing, I'm believing the lie that God is unfaithful to me and won't help me grow. In these moments, I'm totally convinced that 3 is green, because it's my nature to do so. It's my sinful nature to believe lies. It's my sinful nature to believe that God doesn't rightfully have a claim to every aspect of my life. It's my sinful nature to believe that I'm an accurate judge of my own and others' character. It's my sinful nature to believe I'm good enough, and therefore don't need a savior.

And when God's world flies in the face of these lies - when it clearly states that 3 is red - it's not easy to submit to that. When bitter, it's not easy to forgive as God in Christ forgave me. When lonely it's not easy to believe that Christ befriended the sinner. When caught in recurring sin, it's not easy to believe that he who began a good work in me will carry it through to completion. It's not easy to believe 3 is red. It grates against everything in me. My very flesh wars against it - but truth is not subject to my feelings and opinions - my feelings and opinions should be subject to it - subject to God's word, the perfect standard of measure he has mercifully given us.

What are the green 3s in your life? The lies you believe that your flesh rails against submitting to God's word? I'd encourage you to root them out and submit them to the truth of scripture. It hurts, but this kind of struggle is purifying, and I can tell you life is so much freer when we aren't clinging to 3 being green, and so much more beautiful when we allow God to pick the colors.

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Mail Merge

I'd never done a microsoft office mail merge before yesterday.

I'd tried twice before and was never successful.

But I had a deadline. This mailer had to go out the next day. It had to get done now. This mail merge had to work.

I thought about how I had struggled through one of these earlier in the year, how I'd pulled from every trick I'd ever learned about Microsoft Word, only to get to the end and be told my source document was bad, or something equally as cryptic. My knowledge of this program did not carry me then...

But this had to work today. It had to.

"God," I silently prayed. "This has to work. I trust you with it."

The mailer was successfully completed in 20 minutes.

Moral?

"Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him, and he will act." - Psalm 37:5

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths." - Proverbs 3:5-6

Humility...

I've been working at my church for 2 months now. Rightnow, we're having a Staff Retreat. It's been fun. We've talked about funny stuff. We've played get-to-know-you games. We've eaten Chinese out of big aluminum containers.

And now the whole staff - and keep in mind we're a bunch of secretaries and facilities guys - has been asked to critique how our pastors do what they do on Sunday Mornings.

I'm 24. I've attended the church for a 2 years. I've worked at the church for 2 months.

Beyond that, I'm proud.

And my pastors want my input on what they've been doing for decades.

My pastors are humble.

Psalm 139

"O LORD, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O LORD, you know it altogether. You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it." --Psalm 139:1-6