Jody McComas – Page 3 – Motherhood and Ministry

Tattooed by life and Ink

Twenty years ago for my birthday, I got a tattoo. My boyfriend at the time took me, I picked out a small design that I liked, it didn’t have any specific special meaning I just liked. I chose the spot and I was forever inked. Tattoos weren’t even overly popular then, I think I just wanted to do something rebellious (I can’t even really remember, it was 20 years ago after all). It was such a new thing in my small town that when I went home to show my family my grandma announced it at a luncheon with all her friends and made me show them, while in the golf course restaurant. That was memorable. I don’t regret getting that tattoo like many told me I would, and it didn’t stretch out or look crazy when I was pregnant. Thank goodness.

A LOT of time has passed since that last tattoo. My life is radically different than it was when I was 18 and I’m so grateful for that. God has changed me, intervened in my life, and redeemed me in ways that I never knew were possible. God took a broken, young woman and pieced my heart and life back together after I tried to fill it with relationships and the world. I was really broken back then (not that I’m not a mess at times now but it was a different, hard, broken). But even after redemption in that area and choosing to make God a part of my life since then, hard things still happened. Over the years I’ve had to walk the journey of infertility, losing a baby, health issues and surgeries to name a few. My heart and my actual body have scars from the pain and reality of life. My body, near the first tattoo continued to be marked in the passing years with physical scars. In the midst of those trials though I have seen God show up, he has healed wounds, and smoothed those scars. God has shown his power and strength when I had none and he has redeemed my infertility and the longing for children in ways that I never would have planned or expected. He really can make beauty from ashes. He really can redeem our brokenness and for that reason, above my old tattoo and below the physical scars of surgeries that mark losing a baby I tattooed the word Redeemed.

It’s a funny thing though, even though I am redeemed and I know this to be true I can struggle to choose joy. I can get caught up in the things daily that are hard and forget to see where God is at work. I can miss out on the small mercies when I choose not to look for them. I get happiness and joy mixed up.

A few years ago when I read Kay Warren’s book Choose Joy Because Happiness isn’t Enough, and I was struck by her definition of joy,

Joy is the settled assurance that God is in control of all the details of my life, the quiet confidence that ultimately everything is going to be all right, and the determined choice to praise God in all things.

Over the years I have learned that the reality of joy is knowing and choosing Christ even when it doesn’t feel good. Joy is knowing and choosing to believe that I am never alone or forsaken. Joy is knowing and choosing to continue to walk the journey of faith and Jesus’ ways when I don’t understand them. Choose Joy was a message God has spoken to me, and over me, daily for years now. I still don’t succeed most the time if I’m honest and I knew that I wanted it to be tattooed on my arm as a daily, visual reminder. Choose Joy. Choose Jesus.

I could think of no better way to spend my 38th birthday, 20 years after my first tattoo, than to tattoo significant words on my body that remind me of God’s faithfulness and love to me. He did after all tattoo his love on his hands and feet, not with ink but with nails and his own blood, because he chose to sacrifice for me, for us. He brought redemption to a broken world and for the joy that was set before him endured the cross.

May God be glorified and a greater story be told through my life and even through my tattoos.

Do You Believe These Truths?

Last Mother’s Day my sweet daughter made me a gift and she was so giddy for me to open it. It was beautifully painted with words that she picked out to describe me. My heart filled with joy that she saw those things in me, but another thing that filled my heart was doubt. Did she really see those things in me?

I can often face doubt that I am enough, that my identity doesn’t rest in the things that I do or the outcomes of the day. As a Jesus follower I am adamant that others not believe the lies that the world can throw at you, but I can easily fall into the trap of doubt myself. Our identity comes from our relationship with God himself, what He says is true of us. No matter how the day goes, circumstances, or how well I’m performing, these things are what’s true, I am beautiful, I am worthy, I am loved, I am enough. You don’t need to be a mom to need to hear that truth. Do you believe those things?

Some of the sweetest reminders from the Lord come through our children. To read the rest of the blog post head on over to the Portland Moms Blog.

What Will You Choose, Faith or Fear?

I read the headline while scrolling through Facebook, State Finds Alarmingly High Arsenic, Cadmium Levels Near Two SE Portland Schools. I clicked on the link and panic set in, my heart was racing. The school listed was our school, the business emitting toxic levels of cadmium and arsenic is in our neighborhood. I finish the article feeling rage, fear, and uncertainty. Our world is already a giant mess and now in my own back yard I’m worrying about my kids health as well as ours. We live in a country that I expect to protect us from harms such as this but even that is too high of an expectation these days.

All I could picture was my kids playing in the dirt in our yard, eating out of our “organic” garden that now is probably laced with these chemicals, all of us being outdoors breathing in this terrible air. So being the rational, calm human that I am I exclaimed to my husband, “We’re moving! We can’t live in this mess of a city anymore!” Being the level headed one he assured me that we didn’t need to move, quite yet.

As I drove to pick up Isaac from school my heart and mind were racing with the “what if’s.” In the midst of all of the swirling mass of crazy happening in my brain it came to me very clearly, “What will you choose? Faith or fear?” My mind stopped and I had to ask myself that question over and over. What will I choose? I actually have a choice here. Even though there are things happening around us and possibly to us thanks to the negligence of our legislature and harmful business, I have a choice to choose faith and not fear. God is still there in the midst of the mess. He didn’t cause it. He doesn’t approve of it. But He is there and He is trustworthy. I can choose to put my faith in Him.

I was reminded of a talk by Tim Keller (I think) where he said that worrying is a choice. It’s a way that we think we can control situations even if it’s just in our minds. We can conjure up situations, possible solutions and outcomes with our worry. When I choose to set that down, let God take it and do with it what He will then I release the power that it has over me.

We took our kids to be tested to see if they have elevated levels of cadmium and arsenic in their systems. I had to have the piece of mind and want it on record that we tested them in case somewhere in the future something does come up with health issues. At one point my kids left the room and the doctor stayed to give me information. Before she could even talk her eyes welled with tears and she apologized that she was having a hard time not crying about the situation that we were in. She continued to tell me the increased risk of cancer that these toxins cause. The mention of cancer causes my heart to sink. I’ve often told my husband, watching my children go through cancer is one of my biggest fears.

We left the clinic with me in tears because of the fear I felt. It came to me again, “What will you choose? Faith or fear?”

Just because I choose to have faith doesn’t mean that we can’t take action as parents, as neighbors, and as advocates for change. You better believe that we’ll attend meetings about our air quality, we’ll sign petitions and write letters to our legislators to change the laws that don’t protect us. We’ll speak out for our children who don’t have a voice yet. We’ll seek change. I don’t have to sit back and be idle while still choosing faith.

No matter what the situation, a new job opportunity, a health scare, a hard relationship, the unknown in life, we all have the choice, faith or fear. What will it be?

I’m choosing to remind myself daily that I don’t have to fear bad news but can confidently trust the Lords care for me (and my children) (Psalm 112:7) and that He goes before and behind me (Psalm 139:5). It’s a daily battle to choose faith over fear but with God’s help I can do it, one fear at a time.