Remembering the War Stories

~ Bekah Legg ~ Leave a comment

I get a lot of stick from friends and family any time I mention the K word. That would be K for Kenya. So many of my stories begin, “When I was in Kenya . . ” and I know I drive everyone mad. In fact I don’t anymore, I’ve learned to keep those stories for myself. Or at the very least to swap in the word Africa occasionally, or just tell the story without the need for geographical context.

But I won’t forget my time in Kenya.

Some of it, yes, is getting lost in the fogs of time, but there are other stories that I need to treasure and keep hold of. Some that shape my today and my tomorrow, stories that remind me who I am, where I have come from and the astonishing journey God has taken me on.

The Israelite equivalent of my K-word was the E-word. E for Egypt. They refer to it all the time. And not just the Israelites who’d actually set foot in the place, their sons and daughters, their grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Even today Jews still remember. Generations of God’s people keeping the memories alive of the escape from Egypt. The stories that remind them who they are, where they have come from and the astonishing journey God took them on.

There are over dozens of mentions in the Bible of the “God who brought us out of Egypt”. It’s how God introduced his code of living; the ten commandments. They didn’t start with the do’s and don’ts, they started with “Remember.”

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt.” God reminded His people who He was so that they would trust Him to know what was best for them.

We need to treasure our stories; write them down, tell them to our children, pass the message on. We need to store up the times when we felt God’s presence like we could touch it, the times when we heard his voice more clearly than our own, the days and weeks when he rescued us from situations that seemed impossible.

Those memories will sustain us on the days when it feels like we can’t find Him, can’t hear Him, start to wonder if He’s really there. And we ALL have those days. The days that we doubt are the days that we need those memories most; when we need to reminisce and tell ourselves again what God has done for us.

When we allow ourselves to forget, we stray, just like Israelites of old. In Psalm 78, Asaph writes:

They did not remember his power—
the day he redeemed them from the oppressor,
the day he displayed his signs in Egypt,”

When we write God out of our history we start to believe we did it all ourselves; that is a dangerous place to live. Independence is given great value in our culture, but it’s not what we were created for. We were created for interdependence. We were created to walk with each other, and we were created to walk with God, hand in hand.

God gave us brains capable of storing vast amounts of information, but we need to give priority to the stuff that gives us life. We need to look back at our history and ask God to open our eyes to where He has been at each stage of our life; where He was in the pain and the suffering, how He worked a situation out. Ask Him to show you where He was in the joy and celebration and remember.

Remember the stories, look back at them often so that you can find strength for today and look with hope and confidence to tomorrow.

The Tension of Humility

~ Bekah Legg ~ Leave a comment

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Because Herod did not give the glory to God, an angel of the Lord immediately caused him to be sick, and he was eaten by worms and died.” Acts 12:23

That’s an awkward verse. Uncomfortable, and one you don’t often see replicated today. People complain about the lack of miracles, say we don’t see people risen from the dead like we used to. There don’t seem to be as many jailbreaks as in Peter’s time, but we also don’t see quite so much of the striking down.

I have never heard anyone tell a story like this one about Herod. I’ve not heard about people being eaten by maggots because they got arrogant and puffed up. And I’m quite sure it’s not because there aren’t arrogant and puffed up people in the church. I’ve not heard of God striking people dead because they kept their money from Him and lied about it, and again, I’m quite sure it goes on.

But there’s something about this story which grips me, challenges me. Something that makes me remember something I read just the other day, the words of a different King, one who was after God’s heart:

But who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give as generously as this?Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand.” 1 Chronicles 29:14

Here’s a king who at the end of what could, without exaggeration, be described as a magnificent reign, knew where his magnificence came from. Here was a King who had slain giants, killed ten’s of thousands of men and brought Israel peace for the first time in years. Here was a man who was given glory by man long before he became king; who enjoyed the adulation of a modern day footballer. Here was a shepherd who had risen through the ranks with astonishing speed to become ruler of a nation. Yet here was a King who knew exactly who had enabled him to do that.

David knew that everything is a gift from God and walked in the humility of that. Not just finances, but health, success, talents, gifts, family, friends. He knew not to hold those things tightly. He knew he was a steward of them, not an owner.

There’s such a challenge there. We talk, sometimes, about how we hold our finances, about the importance of giving or tithing, but our family, friends, success? That’s hard. How do we feel about holding our health loosely, our talents loosely, even our gifts? How does that change how we feel about illness, failure and struggle?

And how do we find the balance when we do well? How do we celebrate success? Where is the line between pride and humility?

There are times when I know without a shadow of a doubt that the only reason I have succeeded is because God was with me, working in me and through me. Days when I felt I wasn’t well enough prepared and yet somehow gave a message that spoke to people’s hearts. I know that wasn’t me, I know I can’t do that, I know that somewhere God has taken what I have done as a sacrifice of some sort and turned it into something pleasing. I know it was Him.

But yet I am pleased. Pleased to be have been the bearer of the message, pleased that people liked it, liked me. Pleased that I’ll get asked again, encouraged that I can do it, that people believe in me.

I guess the line lies in knowing that it’s an honour. An honour to be in that position. An honour to have the words and the wisdom. It’s an honour to be asked and an honour to be used. A God-given privilege to be grateful for.

And I guess that goes for everything that we’re good at; cooking, parenting, hosting, organising, leading or serving. It’s wonderful to be appreciated, but let’s never forget who put us in that place in the first place. Let’s never forget who gave us the kitchen, the kids, the guests, the home or the talent.

God is so good to us. It says in the Bible that He will always give us what we ask for, but the truth is, He has given us so much already that we take for granted. Things we never even had to ask for, things we don’t even realise are gifts. It’s why our heart’s song needs to echo those words of King David and join with another great song writer, “Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.”

Confessions of a Fool

~ Bekah Legg ~ Leave a comment

Confessions of a fool.

Foolish people are always fighting, but avoiding quarrels will bring you honour.”  Proverbs 20:3

I’m considering putting this verse on a plaque on the wall in my house. I have five teenage girls; quarrels seem inevitable whether they’re about who’s turn it is to empty the dishwasher, who has hidden the hair dryer or who wants to spend time with who.

Forget about honour, avoiding quarrels would bring me peace.

But this verse isn’t about me not having to put up with teenage spats and avoiding the headache of mediating between hormonal girls, this verse is about my quarrels, the fights I pick.

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I don’t like to think of myself as a fight picker. I have a whole different image in my head of who does that. In my head, my only issues are with people who pick fights with me, and leave me with no option but to deal with the situation they put me in.

But here’s the thing, and I can hear my mother’s voice ringing in my ears like an echo from the past, it takes two to quarrel.

The truth is, I’m not a fight picker, but I do choose to engage when someone brings the fight to me. I’m not and never will be a street brawler, but I can not stand injustice and when I perceive that someone is not being fair in a situation, I want to set them straight. Particularly if it’s about my children, my friends or me.

I want to rationalise with them, reason, make them see sense and even on the times when I realise that reasoning isn’t going to work, that this is a fight I can’t win, a person that doesn’t want to see the other side of the argument, I continue the thoughts in my head.

I think of all the things I want to say, I imagine how the conversation would go in my perfect world, construct brilliant arguments that no one could possibly fail to be won over by. If I’m not careful, I start obsessing about the things I think they might be saying to other people, the things they’re thinking about me, the things I do and the right I have to do them.

And as I allow these thoughts to ramble through my brain, they take over. They pop into my psyche with increasing frequency. I stop thinking about the things I should, I stop concentrating on what really matters. I become stalled in time and space quarrelling by myself with someone who doesn’t even know that I’m doing it.

I can’t imagine a better definition of foolishness.

When I think of it like this, it’s plain embarrassing. No matter how unfair the person is being, how unjust, I can’t control their thoughts. I think that is one of the things I find hardest in the world. I’m quite sure it qualifies me as a bona fide control freak, but it’s true. My inability to make other people see things the way I do, frustrates me more than almost anything else in the world, but here’s the thing I’m trying to learn:

I can only control me.

The only person I can change is me and my response to a situation. I may not pick fights but I do choose how to respond when someone brings them to me. I can choose to accept that someone doesn’t like me, I can even choose to accept that they are not being fair. I can choose to forgive them. I can choose to pray for them – not that God will appear in a cloud of glory and tell them I was right, but just pray for them, for their good, for their relationship with Him, for their peace, that I can love them better.

And I can leave the rest to God. I can choose not to rehearse the conversations that I would like to have. I can choose not to wonder what they are saying and thinking about me, I can choose not to fear how others are influenced by that.

I can choose to find my identity in who God says I am. Turn to Him for validation, read His Word to know what He says about me. As I choose to do that, I can grow in confidence and security to a place where it really doesn’t matter what someone else says, because I know who I am, because the bible tells me so.

I can choose, instead, to focus on the calling on my life, to grow in wisdom, to become more like the one I follow. I can concentrate on doing the things I should be doing – writing, talking, teaching people about Jesus, being a mum, a wife and a friend.

When I make those choices I don’t just find honour and peace, I find freedom.

Home Help

~ Bekah Legg ~ 4 Comments

Apparently 8 out of 10 husbands don’t pull their weight at home.

I read this in the Guardian yesterday, the figure shocked me if I’m

honest. Maybe it shouldn’t have but I’ve grown up in a family where my Dad and Mum shared out the domestic chores, have a brother who did his turn as a househusband so that his wife could pursue her career and am married to man who takes it in turns with me to get everything done. I’ve been a little sheltered it would seem.

It’s astounding that so many men think it’s OK to let their wives share the income generation of the family

and still shoulder the burden of the housework, but according to analysis by the Institute for Public Policy Research thinktank, eight out of 10 married women do more household chores. Just 1 in 10 married men does an equal amount of cleaning and washing as his wife. The other one in ten does more.

It has led people to ask the question why is the gender imbalance still alive and kicking in British households and more importantly, what can we do to change it? I’ll be honest, I stayed awake last night thinking about it. People talk about needing a change of mindset, the need for there to be a cultural shift. But these can be just the things we say when we want to groan about the current culture, they don’t carry much weight without action.

Things needs to change and there is definitely a place for those two in ten husbands to get vocal about their views and what they do. For them to be raised as role models for men who think it’s OK to let their wives run themselves into the ground trying to keep everything going alone. The media needs to be challenged about the gender stereotypes it portrays and some key characters could do with a not so gentle word about the sexism they perpetuate with their ‘humour’ and their lifestyles.

But women need to get a grip too. We have been complicit in allowing these figures to be true. We can only do more than our fair share if we actually do it. If we didn’t it wouldn’t be true. I’m not saying that we have to sit back and watch the pile of dishes grow mould in the sink whilst we wait for erstwhile husbands to get the hint, but we need to set some boundaries. We need to have those conversations and let our other halves know that currently they are other third due to the fact that we seem to be doing twice as much as them. We need to raise our expectations. Too many women have watched their Mums do everything, have seen their Dads waited on hand and foot and haven’t thought about doing it differently.

Of course the danger is that we will be called nags. I suggest we need to get a backbone and realise that sticks and stones might break our bones but names like nag can’t hurt us. Working ourselves into a nervous breakdown however, trying to manage challenging jobs, maintain picture perfect homes and raise exemplary kids all by ourselves will hurt. It will hurt a lot.

Husbands can only take us advantage of if we let them do it. I’m not talking about women who are victims of domestic abuse or suggesting for a minute that I expect them to say ‘no’ and leave. That is exploitation on a whole different level. Those women have had their ability to choose taken away by men who have made a conscious decision to manipulate the women they chose to marry. No, I’m talking about women who are married to lazy men.

We can argue that they should just know better – and they should. But they currently, apparently, don’t. So we need to show them. Just like we would an employee who hadn’t learned the ropes, or a new member of the team who isn’t used to the way we do things. We need to set boundaries and not avoid doing that because we don’t want confrontation. It’ll be messy for a while, we may have to do some staff training – but we’ll get there.

The only way to change these statistics is to refuse to comply; to refuse to participate in a system of inequality. These fights can be fought from a platform or through the pages of a blog or a magazine, but it will be won by a ground movement of women who refuse to participate. It’s a gender equivalent of not getting on the segregated bus. We don’t need to hurl insults or employ terrorist tactics we just need to opt out of the system.

This doesn’t mean that we need a mass file for divorce of lazy men, it means we need to gently tell them that it’s time to change, that we’re not doing it this way anymore. We need to take a deep breath and ask them to cook dinner tonight, to put the kids to bed and to sort out the laundry basket. It may even need a full on ‘darling we need to talk’ moment and a sitting down with a piece of paper to detail a timesheet of each of your days and a rota to show how everything is going to get done.

But it’s a conversation that needs to be had, it might be difficult, there might be some tears, but it will be liberating.

For both of you.