...Is Thankful that God is God (Red-neck snow skiing)

My kids love it when my husband and I tell them stories...stories about us during our growing up years (obviously those are hand-selected and words carefully chosen so as to not give any ideas), stories about each of them (especially their adoption stories), and stories we make-up. Tonight's story featured a little of my redneck past. It goes something a little like this...

During the winter of one of my junior high years, we actually got some snow and a lot of ice. At that time, my daddy drove a Ford Festiva...aka Sardine Can. Unbeknownst to us, he had thrown in two sets of rubber boots, two sets of work gloves and a rope. He told my mom he was going to take us for a ride to see all the snow and ice...he obviously hadn't told her his plans either.

Lori and I bundled up and jumped in the car. Daddy drove us further into our hilly and curvey subdivision and told us to get out of the car. We were giggling because we just never knew what creative and fun thing daddy would come up with...by the way, this was before the trip to North Carolina in the bed of a pickup truck (see prior blog).

Daddy had Lori and I put on the boots and the gloves. Then he wrapped the rope around the back bumper, and he said he was going to teach us how to snow ski (obviously redneck style). So, Lori held onto one end of the rope as I held on the other. For a while we were happy going up and down the hills. We laughed while our noses froze, eyes watered from the cold, and fingers and toes became numb. Then without any warning, daddy makes a sharp right turn. Did I mention that Lori and I were wearing men's, large, rubber boots, squatting behind a Ford Festiva, holding onto a rope, "skiing" red-neck style?

Daddy in the Ford Festiva made a quick whip to the right, and Lori and I went flying off toward the left and landed in the ditch. At this point, daddy is laughing hysterically. Lori and I are stunned and are trying to climb out of the ditch that is coated with snow and ice, but shortly realize the humor in it and the fun in it.

You've no doubt heard the phrase, "hit the ditch," but I bet you didn't know it originated during the red-neck, snow skiing competition in the Red-Neck Olympics. Daddy slungs us around every curve and every corner in the neighborhood. If there was a ditch we missed, I would be surprised.

We spent the rest of the time being flung from one ditch to the other. Then one of our neighbor friends saw and wanted to join in on the fun. It's really amazing we didn't kill each other or get seriously mamed.

I'm not really sure when we told momma about that adventure...if it was that evening when we were so sore we could barely walk or if it was when we were in our 20s.  You see, when we were with daddy if he told us our switch was off it meant we were not to breathe a word of what took place, so there were things momma didn't find out until we were in our 20s. I told daddy that he has to teach my kids about the switch. I survived daddy's crazy ideas and antics, and I figure they will too, but I'd like to live without knowing all the details.

I'm teaching a lady's Sunday school class, and we're going through the book Lies Women Believe and the Truth that Sets Them Free by Nancy Demoss. In it one of the lies we believe about God is that God is just like our earthly fathers.

In case you haven't noticed, I am a daddy's girl, but not everyone has a good daddy, so comparing God to the likes of our earthly father is devastating to them. We also have to realize that by putting God in the box with our earthly fathers, we are restricting and confining and limiting His ability to work in and through us.

There is a book called The Shack by William Young, and some people wouldn't read it because He put God outside of the box. He allowed God to become what the main character needed in order to meet the character where he was in his life. It really made me think. We apply our limited, finite knowledge based on our human exposure and experience to a God with whom we can barely wrap our mind around. A God who is omniscient, omnipresent,  who has no beginning or end, who is the Alpha and Omega, who is so many things and has so many unknown attributes that He can't possibly fit in a box. I think we need to destroy the box and allow God the freedom to communicate to us the way He chooses, to love on us the best way which His way alone, to fix and heal us as He wills.

My prayer is that God will remove the scales from our eyes, our hearts and our minds and that we will start looking to see how God is moving in our lives and in the lives of those around us. I pray that we choose to open our eyes, ears, heart, and mind expecting God to show up, expecting to hear a word from Him, expecting to see Him working in everything. Everything including when we screw things up because He's that good -- He can take whatever I mess up and work it out for my good. Is that not an awesome God we serve?

I love my daddy, but I'm glad my Heavenly Father is not like my daddy because I already have a daddy. What I need is my God.

His Daughter,

Kristy