Tea Anyone?

BROKEN   DREAMS-author unknown As children bring
their broken toys
With tears for us to mend,
I brought my broken dreams
to God
Because He was my Friend.
But then instead
of leaving Him
in peace to work alone,
I hung around
and tried to help
With ways that
that were my own.
At last I snatched them back
and cried,
"How can You be so slow?"
"My child," He said,
"What could I do?
You never did let go."

There are some dreams that may remain broken throughout our lifetime, or until we move away from them.  Sometimes it takes our removing ourselves or God removing us from the situation completely.  Why?  Because we continually try to fix it otherwise.  We cannot help ourselves.  Especially moms and dads. We are in the repair business.  From the time our children start rolling over we are kissing boos boos and mending broken hearts with words and actions of love.  Our hearts cry out to mend the wounds of those we love.  Sometimes we cannot.  Sometimes we must let go and let God and when we refuse, He must take another course of action to open the eyes of our spirit so we can see clearly the damage we are doing by holding on.  I am guilty once again.

This may sound like a broken record - "I am guilty" - but God tells us to confess our sins one to another in order to help set us free and to build each other up by letting others know they are not alone in their life experiences.  When others share with me it helps me examine myself to see if perhaps I am in the same boat and haven't realized it yet as well.

So I pray this will help in the same manner those who read this . 

“I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness;
    I will take hold of your hand.
I will keep you and will make you
    to be a covenant for the people
    and a light for the Gentiles,
 to open eyes that are blind,
    to free captives from prison
    and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness.  Isaiah 42:6-7

We are the body of Christ and are to act in His place in this world through the power of the Holy Spirit. 

I have written many blogs regarding marriage being a beautiful picture of our relationship with Christ.  God has blessed me with a wonderful marriage, a beautiful extended family through said marriage and given me many examples of His love for us through it as well.  One part I have not written regarding this is our position in marriage in order to keep the picture vivid and active for the world to see clearly and be drawn to it.

But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God. I Corinthians 11:3

Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.
I Peter 3:7

My husband has been that loving man mentioned in I Peter, but I have failed in allowing him to be the spiritual head of the household.  For going on two years now I have felt a burden in my spirit that something was wrong.  My husband was not worshiping like he used to.  He was coming to church, but only for the sermons.  It was easy to make this "his problem" rather than ours.  I began to pray for him, but closed my spirit to the answer, which was simply to listen to him.  He had been gently trying to tell me the problem and what he believed to be the solution without forcing me to do anything.  He was genuinely treating me as the weaker vessel and I was taking advantage.

Several years back God gave me a picture of a china tea set.  There was a beautiful cup and saucer set before me.  The cup was delicate, beautifully shaped and able to hold quite a bit of very hot tea without being damaged in any way.  The saucer, though not so beautiful and shapely as the cup, was strong, broad and able to hold the cup up and receive overflows when the tea became too much for the cup. 

This, God explained, is how He designed the marriage relationship to be.  The wife is the cup.  She is, in the saucers mind, beautiful, delicate and able to do more than even she recognizes.  She carries the burdens of the family while the husband carries her (along with the problems) in order to help her bear them.  If he does his job properly, she will barely feel the weight of the "tea" she carries.  However, sometimes the problems overflow and the husband must catch them in order to keep them from causing harm to anyone or anything else.  God holds the saucer in his hand, the saucer holds the cup and only One feels the true weight.

This has been true in virtually every situation where I have allowed my husband to fulfill his roll in our lives.  However, I have failed many times in my position.  Rather than carry the tea unless it overflows, I have dumped it in my saucer and walked away.  Not only that, but I have blamed the saucer for allowing it to spill over onto others.  I didn't want to share the burden.  I wanted him to carry it all.  His attitude toward worship was his problem, not mine - and yet, I knew in my heart of hearts that it was indeed mine and I needed to quit dumping it on him and others.  So I recently began to earnestly pray.  I received the answer Thursday evening.

As we were driving to community choir practice I made a statement regarding this being my last rehearsal and concert, at least for the time being.  He sweetly replied with, "I told you what you need to do."  I was startled.

I asked him to refresh my memory.  He said, "You need to forget about this choir for now and go back to First Baptist and join their choir.  That way you can sing the songs you really want to be singing every week."  I was dumbfounded for a moment.  Then I asked, "What about you?  Would you go back to orchestra?"  Yes.  He has been looking for a place of service since we left and has found none except to pick up trash found on the parking lot, etc. That night I told him I needed to pray.  He smiled and said, "Okay,"  I think he knew what was going on inside me.  I confessed to God my sin of not allowing my husband to lead and asked what I should do.  I knew right away that I must give everything away.  The next morning I gave up my teaching position and turned down a leadership position at the Fall Festival.  I explained what was happening and cried at the lovely responses of encouragement I received.

The amazing thing about all of this is, as badly as I didn't want to let go of my current church family, I now feel at peace and am beginning to even get excited, knowing that I will once again be able to worship as one with my husband!!  I have come to realize that it doesn't matter where we worship together but that we worship together.   First though, I had to "let go and let God do the work." 

As a side note, last evening Michael asked if I really wanted to sing or be part of the orchestra again.  I told him that I wanted to sing, but during the big productions to be in orchestra.  I want my cake and to eat it too.  Then I told him the truth - "I am actually a spoiled brat wanting it all.  But God loves me and you love me, and that is really all I need." 

Father, help us realize when we are holding on to things so tightly that You cannot accomplish what needs doing, because we won't allow it.  Show us too when we are dumping on our spouses the load we were designed to carry, causing mishaps and spills that otherwise would be contained and would have ended up quenching the thirst and warming the spirits of others.  Thank You for loving us even when we do make these kinds of errors and Lord, thank You for loving husbands who cherish their wives and are willing to carry them throughout life as You carry them in the palm of Your hand.