Keep your Pearls to Yourself

This post is mainly for the Ladies!

"Don't Cast Your Pearls to Swine"

Matthew 7:6

Here I am again, writing when I am supposed to be studying.

This is how it usually happens.  I have a deadline, and I write of those other things and stay in denial of what is due.  I am supposed to be writing about another sexual disfunction from my sex therapy class.  Due Monday!  Yet, as I have researched and reflected on todays sexual culture, I cannot NOT write you you today.   Let me begin with a brief, and I do mean BRIEF history of the pearl!

Pearls are the world's oldest and most treasured gem.  Unlike gemstones that are mined from the earth, the beauty and brilliance from pearls  are produced by living organisms;  irritants, or parasites become lodged in the oysters' soft inner flesh and a substance called crystalline is produced that builds up around the irritant in layers until a pearl is formed.

In ancient Rome, pearls were considered the greatest status symbol and so precious were they considered, that Ceasar decreed that only the ruling classes should be allowed to wear them.  In Ancient China, pearls were considered to represent purity by the pearl wearer....

PURE AND PRECIOUS

Stay with me here ladies....  Did you know that you are a pearl?  A treasured daughter of the Most High God and your pearls are brilliant from all of the pieces of your story, your irritants, parasites, and years of protection in that shell?  Something beautiful in you has been made from perhaps so not-so beautiful surroundings too!  You are beautiful, unique, and priceless.  Your story is to be treasured.  Your body is priceless.   Your soul is magnificent!  These are your pearls!

Why do you NOT protect what is so magnificent?  A family heirloom is treated with more respect and cherished with more care oftentimes than your own body and soul.  I speak now in reference to the culture we live in where casual sex, pornography, swinging, group sex (to name a few) is fairly common.  As single adult, I see it everywhere from school, churches, online dating sites, to the work force.  If you are looking for that, it is certainly  not difficult to find.  In fact, if you are not looking for it.... it tries to find you!   I have recently had to (once again)  deactivate my online dating site of choice as it is inundated with the perversions that I have no patience to weed through.

Teens, you are experiencing it at school.  You think it's ok to participate in various other activities excluding intercourse because then you are "still a virgin."    Young ladies are trying so hard to fit in and keep the boy that they will participate.  There is so much pressure!  This is not to shame you ladies.  This is to show you that your value is far greater!  For you are more precious than even the most precious gems!  

This is not to scare you into purity either.  I don't believe in fear tactics.  (spoken from a recovered codependent who lived in fear) I want you to see your value and love yourself!

When you move too fast physically with a guy, you are giving your pearls to someone who has definitely not earned them.  He doesn't value you enough to take care of them.  How can he, since you just met him?   Those pearls will get thrown in the mud for sure.

When you are vulnerable with too much of your story too soon... (I've been there too) he/she has not earned that.  Brene Brown talks about this when she says that not everyone deserves to hear those parts of your story.  Not everyone deserves to share that vulnerable side with you.  Trust must be built first.

Trust takes time.  In our society we all are used to immediate gratification and we "want it all now"

Be patient.

But instead, as a society, we cast our pearls out to anyone who will take them, (the swine) and they end up in the mud!  Your soul is hurt, you feel betrayed, you have given a piece of yourself (sexually or non sexually) to someone who has not proven trustworthy or earned it.

I AM NOT ONLY REFERRING TO YOUR BODIES AND SEX.

When you make a new friend, and confide in them before they have build trust?  You have casted your pearls to swine.    I have done this in relationships that are plutonic and romantic in my past.  Have you ever done this with a new relationship?  Have you ever shared so much of yourself and your story quickly in attempt to build that close bond?  Oh man, That used to be my angle... for years and years...  And boy did I learn some painful lessons.   Keep those treasured pearls to you and your bestie!

I know, I know, I've been there...... Its the whole "if they know me they will love me" mentality.   Well, don't need to perform to get love!  You are already loved with an everlasting love dear girl!

AGAIN, it takes the value and treasures of you and cheapens as you share.  No one has earned the right to hold your pearls, until you have patiently built that trust.

KEEP YOUR PEARLS TO YOURSELF.  

.  

A little quote I hear occasionally when I meet a new friend or date a new guy is this, and its short but sweet...  "say little"    Say little.  Listen more.  Build the trust.  If its genuine, then you will know in time, and then, when you pull out a pearl to share, it WILL be valued and cherished.   

SEXY PICS

I did some research and do you know that there are instructions using barbies out there to teach you how to take a sexy photo to post? 

When you post a sensual "gasp face" (This is in by the way, and duck face is out apparently),
show cleavage, or then to that add  a scandally clothed picture of yourself (bikini...low cut top...short shorts, mid drift) on any social media, you have casted your pearls to swine.  Just saying.  I know it is hard to hear, but its true!

 Those are your breasts!  

That is your cleavage!

YES, it is all beautiful!

But now the whole world sees it and you have just cheapened yourself ladies....

I won't post anything like it...  I'm a bore I guess.. but the a few of the good guys (and a lot of swine) actually still come knocking at my boring pictures on that online dating website that I just shut down again.....

That is MY body and I respect ME  enough and I respect my  future husband (someday) enough to show even him that NO ONE has seen what is now his.  Not his buddies on Facebook or Instagram from a picture I posted.  Only him.  How beautiful is that women, if we save those most precious gems for HIM!  How loved and cherished will he feel by us knowing we did that?  How rich of a relationship do we set ourselves up for when we stay patient?

Do you want to be a sex object for men to visualize and then fantasize about?  That is what you do when you post sexy pics of yourself.  You have officially objectified yourself.  Yes, you will definitely get the attention you want.  But is that the attention you really want?

KEEP YOUR PEARLS TO YOURSELF.

When you send a sexy picture to someone via text.... more swine.  Not gonna lie, when I say I have had men ask, and even when I have wanted to (which is just about never) I remember how much I respect my body and my treasured pearls.  I remember my future and how loved my future will feel because of my choice now.  Once a picture is out, its out and you can't get it back!

Girls, you have WORKED hard for your pearls.  You have endured, and run that race.....  don't throw them now.  Hold on to your precious gems, keep your soul safe, and your body as the temple of the Lord.

The greatest things in our lives are worth waiting patiently for.  

Keep your pearls to yourself... They are way more beautiful on you than any swine...

Picture This.....

Want to get a picture of your own heart and soul?  Hold up a mirror?  Think about your thoughts and judgements towards others.    How do you feel about the person you like the least?  That right there my friend is an accurate snapshot of your heart.

Often, the flaws or things we judge in others are the things we judge  deep down into ourselves.  A particular person I love very much once said something hurtful to me and judgmental about how I handled some things in my life.  Did I sit in that hurt and stew awhile?  Well, heck yeah I did!  But not too long... Because certain tools I have acquired in my toolbox were pulled out and I directed myself back to center.  The thing I knew was that for that person to speak this, meant they didn't have a very high opinion of themselves at the time.  I actually felt compassion for that person once I did the work.  

That statement really was not about me at all.  I can allow that statement to enter into my "hula-hoop" or I can toss it in the bucket with the rest of the junk that gets thrown my way.  

Often, I want to judge others in my life that I feel hurt or wronged by.  I honor the feelings I feel, not shaming myself.  I do not react.  I grab another tool from my toolbox.  Getting to work, I realize the work in my own heart, self image, or judgements about myself are really the problem and not that person at all.  

What's going on in that heart of yours?  Take at look at your perception of others.  

Here's to doing the hard work for freedom.

CHEERS!  

sticks and stones

     Sticks and Stones                               

~The material I write is birthed in gritty, sweaty, gut wrenching experience.  This piece is no different than any other.  My words, ink dipped in the quell of human experiences, metaphorical and rich from suffering, joy, and beautiful lessons my amazing children teach me daily about my Creator's love for me.  Sticks and Stones comes after a hiatus of over 5 months.  After a season of still and quiet, holding on for dear life, and believing for greatness through the storms in life.  My testimony is that yes reader... you are greater than any suffering you may face.  You are greater because of the stick and stone.  Hold on dearest... you are right where you are supposed to be......

So much in the last 4 months has taught me the art of intentionality.  Every choice, every word, action, one after the other bears tremendous weight and influence.  We are all influencers; carrying with us a little bag of stones........

 

Sharp, smooth, shiny, jagged..... each a story from our own experience.  They can carry us, or we can carry them.  What we do with each stone; how we carry this weight mirrors our heart.  As a man thinketh, so he is.  The message our stones carry in tandem with the force we take it from our little bag and toss (or THROW) produce ripples that have the power to change the trajectory of a generation... maybe even two generations.  How deep of an impact will that disturbance make?  Our stones can be used to build up, encourage, and bear witness of beauty.  Or our stones can be thrown in accusations, oftentimes unintentionally and sometimes to purposefully damage. 

We bear a responsibility for our stones' throws.  Carelessly toss one at another in a put down, sarcasm, humor at another's expense and you've created a ripple.  Breathe a gentle word of kindness in a stone offering and a different ripple takes form. 

Intentionality..........

Before he was King......

David, the perceived illegitimate,  misfit, and forgotten carried his sling and  stones.   The misunderstood and tossed aside young shepherd boy with nothing to offer an oppressed people  held a bag of stones.  

David knew of bullies.  

He was surrounded by them.  But there was one we know of well, a giant bully.  This terrorizing, manipulating, and  havoc wreaking bully met his match with a young shepherd misfit boy.  With only a song in his heart, a prayer on his tongue, and a shout of praise and victory in the name of the Lord as his battle cry, a small misunderstood misfit reached into his bag, took a small stone. His stone that mirrored his heart of steadfastness  was hurled in his worship battle cry.  With only a stick and a tiny stone, the GIANT bully fell to the ground dead.......

Jesus had a stick and stones...

When the bullies swarmed around the woman in the street, caught in her harlotry, they threw stones at her.  Fierce accusations, hate, seething with self-righteous piety, with intention to destroy her for her "unforgivable acts." Each stone mirroring their own hearts.   

Jesus took a stick and wrote in the sand..... 

What he wrote is a mystery.  Perhaps he wrote all of the offenses of 

the bullies right there in the sand for all to see....  

But as he stood with a stone in hand, he offered just one bully the opportunity to hurl that jagged fierce accusing stone at the helpless.  The bullies' own stones meant to shatter that mirror.  Instead, as Jesus extended the stone,  they walked away in defeat.  Jesus, the Stone that was rejected by their jagged hearts....He not with accusation, extended that sharp stone with the force of  GRACE.  Jesus, with his stick and stone, offered kindness, love forgiveness.  

And I return now to David who defeated a Bully with a stone, calling on the name of the Lord.  The mirror of his heart.  I choose kindness, love forgiveness with my stones. With my stick, I write to inspire my audience to walk in their own authenticity and intentionality. Your stones.... Do they purely mirror your heart?  You carry the Power to change generations either way.  

Forrest was wrong: Life is like a muffin......

People brag and say they want community, but I am calling it out.... 

Many times, they don't... Not real community.

Community is the new cool hipster buzzword.  And anybody who is anybody is in one.  Except, many times, it really isn't community at all.  It's just another fist bumpin' good time to pretend.  Trust me... I know A LOT about the word "pretend" and "perform"
I was a professional pretender/ manipulator.

Remember that old line, "You can't kid a kidder?"

Well, you can't "pretend" with a recovered "pretender" 

Forrest Gump said,  "Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are gonna get...."


Well, I know this can be true, but I want to suggest that life is like a muffin....

Kinda like THIS muffin below!

 You know how it is.  you order the beautiful muffin at the counter with your coffee.  It looks so good and you can't resist, right?  Anyone else like me and go for the top first?  I never dive right in and take a bite...sinking my teeth into it.  No, I pick off the top first.  I love muffin tops  Then, I will pick and eat around the edges.  By the time the center is exposed and vulnerable, I am done.  I feel full and don't want to finish off the extra calories.  I got "just enough" to satisfy that yearning, and the rest goes in the trash.  (poor little cinnamon toffee muffin)

POOR.  LITTLE.  MUFFIN. 

How often do we do that to each other?  I observe this a lot in Nashville.  It's like a mini Los Angeles here.  (my judgment of course)  It's everywhere... Churches, groups, campuses, gyms, DATING, basically any community of your choosing.....

People brag and say they want community, but I am calling it out.... They don't... they just want the muffin tops.

I am guilty of participating in this behavior.  You know the kind.... You see a lovely  hipster "muffin" and you are intrigued.  It looks so good.  Your hipster community has so many to choose from too!

People are so pretty and cool and hip and talented her in Nash, bruh.  I mean, let's "totes" hang out soon.... says no unhip muffin ever.

Sometimes, I feel like this muffin.  I'm willing to bet you do too.  You feel like "Yay!  Someone is coming to get me!"  But they only get to the surface ( a nibble... maybe even a bite or two) before they leave you exposed  ( the good stuff is still there waitin').  They have enjoyed the surface... just a little.  But they are not committing to the entire muffin.

I am committed to the entire muffin today...   How about you?  

side note:  I would like to add how very grateful I am for this muffin... it was DE-LISH!  

Getting our Heads Out of Our Tails: Its Not About Me

Get Your Head out of Your Tail

It's Not About Me

This is my first post in a series that has been brewing within me for quite some time.  The series is inspired from my reading of Deuteronomy 28:13 and it states that the Lord will make you the head and not the tail.  Problem is that I didn't really know what that meant.  Until I delved deeper.....

One thing is for sure about life.  No one is immune to transitions, and or suffering.  Those factors are beyond our control.  In terms of my own suffering or yucky transitions, I used to associate them with my sin and being "bad" a lot.  I mean A LOT.  If ever there was an unfavorable transition, or suffering in anyway, I immediately felt that it was all because of me and my "bad girl" (shame) syndrome kicked in. If Lily got in trouble at church for talking too much in choir, I immediately thought I was a horrible mom... it was my fault.  I was bad.  If Lily was having a victory in any area of her life, I immediately went to a different pride..."I am one amazing mom!  I did that!" (And her daddy.  I always include him because he is a great dad.)

• Talking to the parents here for a minute: It is easy to attach identity to our kids, especially if you are a single parent.  The thing about our identity is this....  If we put too much stock in that thing, and then that thing crashes, then your identity will crash....  Never get too close to what you do.  Just get really really close to the Author of your story.... He will do the work.  I used to put all of my hope into my awesomess (when I was not shaming myself for my not-awesomeness). I was awesome at alot of things: mothering, cooking, communicating, friendships, and girlfriend being... yep... even that..... to name a few..... When I let go of my self-concepts and identities and focus on HIM, making it only about Him... life became peaceful and more simplistic.

As I look back on all of that time now, I think, "Wow, how arrogant was I?  Giving myself credit for all that junk.  That probably means that I gave myself credit for all the good stuff too."

I needed to pull my head out of my tail!

If there is one reader out there today that can get this, then this post is worth it...  "It's not about you." Let me say that again with emphasis... ITS. NOT. ABOUT. YOU.  Its not.... 

We need to pull our head out of our tails and realize that it's not about us at all.  When we start living in a way that loves others well, without expectations, without keeping score, without getting offended, we are living as the Head.

But you may say, "Shelli, you don't understand how I am being mistreated!" or "Shelli, you don't get it, they are so mean!"

Hey, I did not write the scriptures.... I just read them and do my best to infuse into my life... and Corinthians says that love is.....

Patient- all the time
Kind- all the time
honoring- even when we are misunderstood or dishonored
truth loving
even tempered- even when everything in me wants to get even at injustice of it all
forgets the wrongdoings- not remembers them and grows bitter
Protects- protects others reputations???
Trusts- I know that's a toughie, but its write there in Corinthians
Hopes
Perseveres

NONE OF THOSE THINGS SOUNDED LIKE GETTING OFFENDED to me, did they to you?  Its God's word, not mine...

I think the biggest lie we believe is that we get to take offense.  Step back when you feel offended by something, and ask yourself this question?  "Am I making this about me?"  Perhaps the offender is operating in a system of fear and not love.  Perhaps you are operating in a system of fear and not love.  As a mom of two teenagers, I have plenty of opportunities to get my feeling hurt, especially by my oldest as she is a girl and like me in alot of ways, and we can butt heads.  Sound familiar?  If I live at the "tail" I am going to get offended ALOT, and I am going to act out and say things I may regret...ALOT.

But when I remember that it is not about me...  My heart and actions change.  What do I want her (and my son) to know from me above all else?  I want them to know the love of God.  When I encounter a person that is not easy to talk to or be nice to, what do I want them to experience?  If I make it all about ME... then stuff goes wrong, every time.   If I can switch my thoughts, retrain my brain and make it always about LOVE....  then I are living as the Head that God intends.

You have to do that work.  How can you make it about love?  How can you make it about others?  What do others need today?  Go Be that.  It's not about you, friend.  When you start living this way, just watch and see what changes start to transpire in your own heart and life.

I dare you to apply this principle to every area of your life where you want to take offense.  

Oxen, Barns, and Hip Waders

A friend recently told me that she appreciates that I have an ox in my barn.  As she shared her admiration for my “barn” she said that sometimes she trades her oxen for manure-free.  Only one cup of coffee in from my morning, I had that dazed and confused look.  Initially, I thought that was the craziest statement ever and I tried to pull out the mysterious metaphor.  Then it made perfect sense!  You see,  folks have no messes to clean up when they have a manure free barn.  When your barn has no manure, its because you have no oxen.  Are you tracking?  When you have no oxen you don't have free fertilizer or an animal to plow.....

Proverbs 14:4 states that where there is no ox, there are no crop; and a good harvest requires a strong ox for the plow. 

Interpretation:  If we want a bountiful life and harvest, its pretty clear that there is gonna be some stinky messes  to clean up.  Sometimes a big harvest around the corner means, we are in those hip waders plowing through to clean up the manure. 

Here's to the stinky messes in life we sometimes have no choice but to wade through.  The harvest is worth it.  

xoxo

Playin' for keeps

What condemns you?  

What drives you to cower and hide into the cobb-webby corners of your world?

 What deep insecurities war within the truest desires of your soul?  The pressure from the insecurities, the hiding, and lies against the warring truth and authenticity of who God made you to be is relieved in a beautiful love story of redemption.  The longings and gifts yet exposed in the deepest places in your heart are buried into the depths of your core.  That, my friend is where your diamond lives.  Now, in this moment maybe still a lump of coal, it is just waiting to be uncovered, and brought forth to dazzle in all of God's glory.   

 The time it takes for you to unleash your diamonds will depend on you.  God is a gentleman and he won't force anything on you.  He will wait and let you take the difficult long path.  He will let you become broken.  He will wait until you ask him for His help.  When will you ask?  May I recommend you taking a good hard look at yourself in the mirror and ask now, before you are in that pit so deep that the only thing you see when you look up is dirt?  That was me.  Just a few short years ago I dug my pit, then I fell so deep that all I saw was dirt all around me.  It took decades to uncover the layers of lies and deceitful tactics of the enemy, but once I was down deep and had nowhere to go but up, I began asking, REALLY asking for help.   I didn't have a strategy.  I just said, "HELP ME!"  

What I have learned is that the very characteristics that  we have been gifted and purposed for are the very things the enemy is shouting lies into our hearts.  The enemy plants the seeds so slyly, and then he fertilizes and waters with more and more deceptions and lies.  Uneducated to his schemes, we accept his counterfeits as truth.  It is easy to believe the  lies, for they are so much louder than the gentle peaceful voice of God.  Lies start very early.  the enemy of our soul looks for cracks in our foundations right away.  

I KNOW A GIRL....

I know of a  little girl weighing 2 lbs 12 oz when born many years ago with a destiny to inspire others to become better versions of themselves to the glory of God.  Given 50 % survival, she fought a mighty battle to live. The first 2 months of her life, she was an orphan, and the enemy began crafting his own story.  She was created articulate, captivating, and creative.  The enemy, time and time again threw roadblocks to silence her with shame and condemnation.     As a toddler the enemy saw a chance to shame and snuff her cries through daycare workers stuffing her mouth with tissue as she cried for her mother.   As a child, he used embarrassment and shut down her carefree and spirited soul.  As a teenager, she was told she was not allowed to write her stories, for they were the "wrong" kinds of stories, and again she was silenced, voiceless, purposeless.   In over a decade of her young adult years, she was silenced and condemned by people she trusted in the church and home to keep secrets in order to protect her abuser.  Her first love, a youth pastor shamed her into keeping the relationship a secret, for fear of the congregation rebuking him for dating yet another "youth worker"..... until he broke her heart and she grieved that too in silence.  One may think she was a quitter and resolved to shame.  NOPE, but she was knocked around quite a bit.  Years and years of silence and secrets kept the unleashing at bay.  Her spirit resiled!

Once she got wind of the unoriginal tactics that were taking her to the dirt, she was able to do battle. Then, he Barn Doors  burst open, and the unleashing power of God fell.   

 Her battle, not one rooted in bitterness, but in knowing the truth in the word of the living God.  

Past pain makes her love deeper and harder.  God's truth gives her insight, and His value of her gives her courage and hope past her circumstances.  His immeasurable love for her is her driving force to love others.  

There are others......

Victims of multiple divorces, panic attacks, children running away, illness, negative patterns galore.........

Speaking from experience, and from the stories I hear of others in battle, what I know to be true is that the enemy always works to use  shame and condemning tactics to extinguish the light and purposes God plants within us.  "Whats wrong  with me Shellz?"  That is the voice of a hurting friend in my early morning hours today.  "What makes me stay in this cycle?"  

Friend, NOTHING is wrong.... WITH YOU.  What my friend recently told me I pass along to you.... "You are the well provided for and protected daughter to the KING!"  Its just that you THINK you are messed up.  

"As a man thinks in his heart, so he is" Provers something....

THE VERY THING WE THINK WE ARE CURSED WITH, IS THE VERY THING GOD HAS MADE US AMAZING AT.  WE ARE JUST LED TO BELIEVE THE LIES.

The enemy wants us to think we are cursed.  But when we go back to Genesis, we will read that the only thing cursed  was the enemy himself along with the ground he had to crawl on. 

 LADIES, take another glance, and you will see that not only did God NOT curse woman, but God then named woman "Eve" which means life bringer.  Women, we are created to breathe life into each other!  Stop gossiping and start encouraging.  

Don't give the enemy one more day of power over your life.  If you have Jesus, you are already victorious.  You just have to claim it.  If you don't know Jesus as your Savior, please email me and I will be glad to share with you this hope.  Its easy to know Jesus.  Nothing complicated at all.  In fact, If you want to right now, all you have to say is,  "Jesus, I need you.  Come in my life."  That is it.  He hears and comes.  

If you do have Jesus, then you have the power of his perfect BLOOD  to fight the struggles.  Whatever you struggle with today; where spiritual warfare is concerned,  there is a high probability that the precise purpose of your life being challenged.  The enemy wants to snuff you so God's glory won't be shared.   

Battle is simple, but not easy.  And we are unable to do it alone.  We need God and each other!  Battle plans are laid out in Ephesians 6:10-18 

That's what I am talkin' about!

The armor of God:

 "And that about wraps it up. God is strong, and he wants you strong. So take everything the Master has set out for you, well-made weapons of the best materials. And put them to use so you will be able to stand up to everything the Devil throws your way. This is no afternoon athletic contest that we’ll walk away from and forget about in a couple of hours. This is for keeps, a life-or-death fight to the finish against the Devil and all his angels."

Be Prepared!

 "Be prepared. You’re up against far more than you can handle on your own. Take all the help you can get, every weapon God has issued, so that when it’s all over but the shouting you’ll still be on your feet. Truth, righteousness, peace, faith, and salvation are more than words. Learn how to apply them. You’ll need them throughout your life. God’s Word is an indispensable weapon. In the same way, prayer is essential in this ongoing warfare. Pray hard and long. Pray for your brothers and sisters. Keep your eyes open. Keep each other’s spirits up so that no one falls behind or drops out."

If you need prayer or help knowing Jesus, please email me at shellinorvell@me.com 

If you need prayer for your daily battles, put on the armor of God, and email me too.  I am so honored to pray for you.  

Be strong and courageous! 

You are LOVED!!!!!