Building Altars

Last week was a vacation week for me. Ryan and I took the week off work and spent each day...doing whatever we wanted. Stayed in our jammies for far too long...watched a lot of movies. Drank even more than a lot of coffee. Took in a few sights across north-central Indiana. Cleaned the attic. {We had to do ONE responsible thing.}

It was a glorious week. But the day before that week began was a day of much prayer and counting on God.

That was the day that began with me speaking in the chapel of a Christian school. To a group of 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th graders.

I have a lump in my throat even TELLING you about it. I was so afraid!! Teens and tweens! Do you remember those years? I do. Very vividly.

Ahhh sixth grade. The year of the poofy bangs. Don't believe me?

{The poofy bangs may have been the least of my problems.}

But despite the issues in and out of the body-image arena, this year was pivotal. Because THIS was the year that the Lord and I started a real relationship. Not a riding-on-my-parents'-coattails religion, but a legitimate, thriving relationship between Jesus Christ and me. Sixth grade. At the top of the elementary school ladder...a brand new aunt...about to discover junior high...that was when He got to me. And claimed me. Claimed that girl with big bangs and perpetual zits.

And that Friday, I got to stand in front of a group of smoother-haired sixth graders and let them know that I laid a foundation stone in the altar of my life...when I was a sixth grader.

And then I spoke to the seventh graders. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh seventh grade. The year it all went out of control.

I shall pause at this very point and bless the inventor of the hair straightener.

Seventh grade. The year that a girl in school made a hateful comment about my appearance. The kind of comment that fostered the self-fear that is obvious in the photo above. The year that made me so afraid to go to school because I was petrified of what the girl {who, by the way, had the looks of Halle Berry and no concept of an inside voice} might say about me next. I believed what she said about me and I was scared she'd say more. And that was the year God led me to Exodus 23:20 - which let me know He sent angels ahead of me to prepare the way. It didn't make the loud-mouth any quieter, nor did it make me less afraid of her. But it did let me know God was prepping my way. the way of a seventh-grader. And I got to tell a whole bunch of seventh-graders with their own versions of loud-mouth Halle Berry lookalikes...that  I laid a stone in my life altar with that moment and that verse.

And then I moved on to the eighth graders. Remember eighth grade? For me it was the year the bangs got EVEN bigger.

{Random fact: This photo was taken at my grandparents' home...which is now my home. I was standing in my own future living room!}

I stood in front of those eighth graders and told them about my encounter with peer pressure and how even in my own youth group, I was urged to do things against the rules of my house and even though it was hard, I said no. And even though I stood alone, God blessed me for my obedience and helped me learn how to say no...alone. And even though I KNOW the peer pressure facing the kids in the audience that day is MAGNIFICENT in comparison to what I faced, the point remained the same...it's a stone I laid in the altar of my life...that day. As an eighth grader.

And I finished up with the freshmen. The good old freshman year:

The year God got right through to me and taught me that He cares about every crisis. It was my first time to face a huge life issue...a crisis of faith, if you will. And I made the choice to follow Psalm 121 and lift my eyes to the hills and seek the help that comes from the Lord. That's what He was doing in the life of a high school freshman {who clung ever so desperately to those bangs} and in that experience, I laid another stone in the altar of life.

I finished my speech by dropping rocks in a fishbowl and explaining to those students that they're never too young, and nothing is ever too unimportant...to begin building an altar of remembrance to the Lord. And when they're grown and look back over their lives, they'll see how God worked. They'll remember the stones they laid in that altar, and they'll be able to say to others...See this?? This is when God worked in my life.

I'm so thankful...not only to have survived speaking to teens and tweens...but to have an altar to point to God...all the way back to these awkward formative years.

THIS girl....

is who she is because of stones laid in an altar that began way back here:

What's in your altar? Build it...tall and strong...to the glory of God!