“NMWBYBD” – A Super Bowl Sunday Blog Post

N M W B Y B D. This is the tattoo I would get if I ever got one (or maybe I already have one 😉), just those initials listed and in that order. I’ll tell you why and what they stand for in a moment.

On a day when we tend to gather around TVs and food trays and all the like, I think of winning – who will win? Who will be victorious? Who will get that trophy, the ring, the interviews, the hype and the glory that comes with it?

For the last few days, weeks really…I’ll be honest, probably longer (all year!) I’ve been in a mental, spiritual and sometimes even physical wrestling match with none other that yours truly. There is a laundry list of things that are not going my way ,or the way I think they should go, in pretty much every area of my life right now. Before I go any further I will tell you that I am aware that I have so much to be thankful for & I am. This post is about the other things, the estranged relationships, the dreams that haven’t come to pass, the painful memories of the past hurts that don’t seem to go away, the health issues that keep creeping in and so on and so forth. It can get me down, and I mean down 😩!

So in my funk God kept bringing me to this verse: Luke 22:42

⁴² saying, “Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done.”

Did you catch it?

The “NMWBYBD”?

It’s the “not My will, but Yours, be done” part of that verse. That’s my tattoo because that is what true victory looks like. That’s winning!

Here are the facts: God loves us. God has a perfect plan for our lives. When we surrender to Him (accepting Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior) we get to experience the great exchange of our will (which is mostly, if not all, limited and selfish) for His will (which is perfect and glorious). We get to have those moments where life gets hard and we shift our focus to sit in the “hard” and let God lead us through to the other side.

On a day when we look at winning through the lens of a tv screen may we also remember a garden scene where the real victory took place when Jesus uttered those words ‘saying, “Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done.”‘

My prayer today is that we look at the hard stuff in our lives and turn to God uttering those very same words. The garden didn’t look like victory at the time, but you and I know the truth – that garden, those words, our Jesus, made the impossible possible. He won so we could live victoriously.

Have a blessed Super Bowl Sunday!! Thank you for reading!

With all my heart,

Sonia

Road Work Ahead…Expect Delays!u

I was driving home from the beach around 9:00pm last week and turned onto a road that leads me to the freeway when all of a sudden I see this black lit up road sign that has this flashing across it: “ROAD WORK AHEAD. EXPECT DELAYS”. I’ve seen road signs like this before but for some reason this one seemed large and magnified to me – almost like I had put on 3D glasses, and this sign was the focal point. And then the thought struck me….this is what God has been trying to say to me all along, but it took a dark night, road work and a big flashing sign to get my attention! Basically He spoke to me through that sign to say that He is going before me to make a way for wherever I need to go so: THERE ARE GOING TO BE DELAYS – EXPECT THEM! There’s road work to be done (and not just road work, but heart work too). This was so profound to me because there are so many loose ends, so many things up in the air, so many situations needing resolutions, so many answers that I’m still waiting on and this constant feeling that I’ve been on an airplane just circling over a landing strip but haven’t gotten the green light to land yet. Have you ever felt that way? I don’t know about you, but I am unfortunately quite famous for jumping the gun when I shouldn’t and not jumping when I should especially when I feel like this. I am a “fixer” among all the things I listed in the first blog post so when things feel out of control – like delays – I try to “fix  it” by changing something so I don’t have to wait.  We all have a bit of “fixer” mentality – some more than others – I tend to lean more towards the “major fixer mentality” hence the timing issue I seem to have. There are several reasons for that. Since I’m the oldest, it was up to me to blaze the trail for my two younger sisters, and, for whatever reason, I also felt it was up to me to beat up anyone in elementary school who would give them problems. I think I was 8 years old when I first beat up a boy. He had been teasing one of my sisters at school because she had burns all over her face from an accident while helping my mom in the kitchen. I think he said something like he couldn’t eat his lunch because my sister’s face made him lose his appetite, and he got everyone at the lunch table to laugh at her. My sister relayed this story to me through her tears so I waited after school for the boy, and then beat him to a pulp. Even now, as I write, in the back of my mind somewhere is the default thought, “Don’t mess with my sisters!” I now know that the protective nature I have isn’t a bad thing when I’m “fighting” the way God calls me to – through prayer and being connected with God. I felt like I was always fighting as I grew up which led to me to lead a double life. There was the sweet, loving Sonia that helped people and brightened up a room and then in my private life, there was a whole other thing going on. It was rage. Merriam-Webster defines rage as “a sudden expression of violent anger.” As I write that word and its definition, tears are filling up my eyes. It’s a sad truth that sometimes the very people that look so loving to the outside world can be extremely hurtful to those closest to them behind closed doors. That was me. I was this person who couldn’t handle my emotions and would fight in explosive and damaging ways. At the expense of those I love, I put on a facade for the world to see and would take out all my frustrations and broken heartedness on them. It didn’t matter what self-help book or doctor recommended treatment I would try, nothing seemed to help. This went on for years. I am ashamed to say that. Before I go on, I want to say that I don’t want to use this blog for any sort of pity party or justification for things I’ve done so I’ll spare you the history lessons as to why I think this rage manifested in my life, but I will say that every wrong behavior has a root. And yes, I had some roots. I know for this reason and many others God has to deal with my mind and heart. During one of my outbursts my husband said, “God can heal you!”  To which I responded, “No He can’t! If He could have He would have done it already”. I am learning that spiritual, emotional and physical maturity is essential, but the spiritual and emotional growth must go hand in hand. That’s why I need to “Expect Delays”. I’ve got some growing up to do, and God has to point out the narrow road for me as I go. This takes time. It takes His perfect time. So today the Lord gave me this verse in my morning Bible reading (for those of you reading through the One Year Bible format you’ll recognize this from today): Proverbs 21:19 Better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and angry woman. The Lord knows I can go from “zero to contentious and angry” in less than a second so He gave me that gentle yet profound reminder because a little later in the day my husband and I would hit a bump in the road. I would love to say I stayed quiet and remained still before the Lord, but I wasn’t. I got angry and upset. I always wish that I was that girl who could just cry it out and her husband would love her and comfort her, but not me. I just got puffed up with ugly rage boiling up and out of me, BUT the good thing – the new thing, – was that it was over as fast as it started. In the past, this would be an all nighter and maybe go on for a few days, thankfully this was not the case this time. I allowed myself some vulnerability and said I was sorry. But more than that I looked to God. I had a conversation with Him in my spirit letting Him know how I was feeling and asked Him to help me. He did! He does…for all of us as we call on Him. Not only are we to look at the signs that say “Expect Delays” but also “Under Construction”. We are a work in progress! Five years later, in my walk with the Lord, I am as often the raging woman anymore. He is working in me, and I need to be patient with myself and others, and WAIT ON THE LORD. I’ll end this post here, but I wanted to also thank all of you who wrote me words of encouragement and support. It means so much to know we are all in this together 🙂 Please listen to this song (and dance too – it feels really great!). Stay blessed and thank you so much for reading!

With all my heart,

Sonia