Blooming at Bliss

I had the honor of speaking last week for PWOC (Protestant Women of the Chapel) during their installation of next year’s board members. I love the women of PWOC, the community, diversity, and fellowship they offer. If you are at Ft. Bliss and have not connected with this group of ladies I highly encourage you to do so. A few of them asked for the script to my talk so I thought I’d share it here.

My family has been at Bliss for nearly 7 years. This is our first duty station and sometimes I’m left wondering if it will be our only. Growing up I moved around some. As a preacher’s kids 5 years was the norm. The longest I lived in any one place was in Sebring, Florida from the middle of third grade to the middle of ninth. When my husband enlisted the one thing I was most excited about was the uprooting and replanting every few years. I love to travel and I wanted to go everywhere. We should have bought a house but every year we have heard next year you’re going. It has finally come true.
We are moving next week a full mile down the road.

When John called from AIT and said we are going to Ft. Bliss I jumped online and immediately started viewing the tourist sites. I was excited to be moving to a border town. I had been to Venezuela and Mexico a number of times as a teen and in college and loved my time there. I couldn’t wait to spend my weekends with the kids in Mexico.

It was somewhere along 1-10 between Midland and Van Horn that I began to question our sanity. Fear almost got the best of me as a dirt devil the size of a small building made a beeline for our car. I will never forget yelling at my husband asking him if I should pull off in the ditch. He of course didn’t wake up. Growing up in Florida and Arkansas if you see a funnel you run and hide.

A few miles later we pulled over in what may have been a ghost town to change some diapers and were sand blasted for the first time in our lives. By the time we arrived to El Paso – picking sand from our ears, teeth and hair- the adventure of military life had already worn off. It had died on 1-10.

Three weeks of living at the YMCA during monsoon season with 2 toddlers and 7 months pregnant looking desperately for a home without bars and cooled with real AC I had decided this place was not for me. Thank goodness it was temporary, right?

I was miserable at the beginning of our time here. El Paso was not what I had hoped for and military life was far off my career goals. To be honest I was blindsided when my husband said he was joining at the age of 35, in the midst of our cancer fight for our baby, and during a successful career in Restaurant management. I had just finished seminary and had big dreams for missions and ministry. Our daughters cancer put a hold to both our goals and he saw the army as a way to get back on track for his.

So I plastered a smile on my face, looked for the best in where we were and pressed on like any good southern girl from the Bible Belt should. But inside I was dying. I felt lost and forgotten. My life was not turning out how I had planned.

I plastered a smile on my face, looked for the best in where we were and pressed on like any good southern girl from the Bible Belt should Click To Tweet

Not long after we arrived I met Carol and she invited me to PWOC (Protestant Women of the Chapel). At first I was hesitant, I mean God wasn’t on my side and I was in the midst of my temper tantrum with him. But I was desperate for community and I came.

It was here, or in Bdg 449 to be specific, that I found Christ again. I took the class The Jesus I Never Knew with Sue Huggler and discovered I’d been living with God in a box expecting him to work on my terms and unflexible when he chose something different. PWOC became the highlight of my week as I rediscovered Christ.

I began noticing all of the desert scenes in the Old Testament. I paid attention to the grumbling of the Israelites as they wandered for 40 years. I could visualize them for the first time covered in dust, thirsty and tired complaining to God. I saw them in the mirror. Soon I found Hagar at the well.

Whenever there is a well in a desert take notice. God is about to speak.

Whenever there is a well in a desert take notice. God is about to speak. Click To Tweet

God spoke to Hagar in her grief and she named him the God who sees. It was as if in that moment as I read her story God was telling me I see you too and I have a plan. I wasn’t forgotten. Military life wasn’t just for my husband with me tagging along. There was a purpose for me as well.

I have loved this year’s theme Bloom at Bliss. Things really do bloom in the desert. We do. I have. God takes the places where others see dry, broken, dusty nothingness and he brings great beauty.

As believers in Christ we have been set apart. In the midst of a desert each one of us is blooming for Him. In his grace he has turned us from death, from the ugliness of sin, and he has given us salvation if we will just receive it. He has taken our ugliness and made it beautiful.

2 Corinthians 2:15 “For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.”

When God looks on us he no longer sees a broken dry heart, he no longer sees our sin, he sees Christ’s perfection. Throughout the Old Testament incense and spice are sacrificed to God. Incense often represented the prayers of the people being lifted up to God. We see this in Psalm 141:2 and later in Luke 1:9-10.

When God looks on us he no longer sees a broken dry heart... Click To Tweet

Genesis 8:20-21 says that the aroma is soothing to God and appeases his wrath. But in Jeremiah 6:20 we discover the fragrance itself in not enough. “There’s no use offering me sweet frankincense from Sheba. Keep your fragrant calamus imported from distant lands! I will not accept your burnt offerings. Your sacrifices have no pleasing aroma for me.” God was looking for obedience not just sacrifice. He did not want a foreign incense offered up to him.

So what does it mean that we are the fragrance of Christ? I don’t know about you but I still struggle with sin. I offer up prayers in the midst of my brokenness and doubt. There have been moments where I’ve wished God wasn’t the God who sees because I don’t want him to see my faults, my constant failings, struggles and my doubt.

But unlike in Jeremiah 6 where the aroma was foreign and unpleasing, we bare the fragrance of Christ. The greatest sacrifice of all. Even on my worst days I am covered by Christ’s sacrifice on the cross.

So the big question right now. The one we are probably all thinking or at least have at one time is does this mean we should go on living however we please?

The apostle Paul addressed this question already in Romans 6:1-2 “Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace? Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it.”

Once we realize just how amazing God’s grace is that’s when we truly begin to bloom. God sees us as the beautiful blooms we will become long before we become them.

God sees us as the beautiful blooms we will become long before we become them. Click To Tweet

Ephesians 5:1-2 “Imitate God, therefore in everything you do, because you are his dear children. Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered himself a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God.”

And you know what? That’s what God sees, the fragrance isn’t foreign it is familiar, it is His son and He is pleased.

On the way here today the song Next Year People by Colin Hay game on the radio. If you’ve never heard it it goes like this:

You can’t live without hope that things will change for the better.

You can’t live without the dream of someone reading your letter

We’ve had dust storms before and sit out the dirt

We’ve had droughts before but none quite like this

We’ve had winds that cut up your face all to pieces…

Next year everything will come good.

The rains they will fall and we will dance on the hood

We’ll fill up our bellies with plentiful food

We’ll eat, drink and be merry.

Yeah next year people wait and see.

We’re next year people wait and see.

Don’t be next year people Bloom today. Be the fragrance of Christ to God, an encouragement to fellow believers and a testimony of God’s goodness to unbelievers.Be the fragrance of Christ to God, an encouragement to fellow believers and a testimony of God's goodness to unbelievers. Click To Tweet

* indicates required

First Name

Email Address *

Privacy guarantee: I hate spam too and will NEVER share your email address with anyone. You are free to cancel at anytime.

Leave this field empty if you're human: