Define crazy.

Several years ago I was in a Bible study and Priscilla Shirer was talking about convictions; your conviction may not be my conviction, and vice versa. 2 Corinthians 5:13 says, “If we are ‘out of our mind,’ as some say, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you.” I’ve heard plenty of people say, if it sounds crazy it’s probably from God. I got it, but I never really GOT it until recently.

I’ve been studying spiritual warfare lately – another topic (or 20) for another day. Part of that study was a book on deliverance ministry (Pigs in the Parlor, Hammond) that was fascinating. I’ve been diving into how pervasive the occult is in our current culture, and how we may be opening up doors we don’t realize. It’s always interesting to me what stands out to some people – in this case, I was the some people. In the book, he was recounting this story of deliverance and mentioned that the girl had a mobile with owls hanging in her room; he asked the family to remove it. Owls. I slowly looked up and around my house. From my vantage point on the couch I could count at least 10 decorating my home. The conviction hit deep. My flesh kicked in overdrive.

I called a friend who had recommended the book – "you won’t believe this, he’s talking about this and that and he talked about owls, and holy cow do you know how many I have all over my house? deep breath I think I need to remove them." Her response, “you were convicted for a reason.” (I found out later that she asked her mom if she remembered anything in that book about owls and neither one of them recall it…but the consensus was, it was highlighted to me for a reason.) So, I walk into my room where my husband is lounging on the bed and read him the passage. I’m 100% sure he’s going to tell me I’m crazy. I feel crazy. He looks up and says, “well, we better get rid of them then.” I began the process of gathering the owls in our home, and quickly filled the fireplace hearth. I sat on the couch staring at them and my heart broke. I have long since been fascinated by this particular one of God’s creatures. Many of them were thoughtful gifts from people who love me. Some of it was very expensive art (including one piece that hadn’t even had time to make it on the wall yet.) They were beautiful and fun and many of them were sentimental. Surely this isn’t what God was saying…so I left them alone.

The next morning, there they are…staring at me. I begin to rationalize. Clearly this is not an all out removal – perhaps God is dealing with me on excess. I began to research scripture, the Word is our foundation, right? Nothing inherently forbidden except for eating them, which…ew, agree. I call my friend again. "I can’t find anything in scripture. Surely this is not the expectation…there has to be another lesson here." I love my friend, truly. She never judges, she never tells you you’re wrong, she just gives you the facts as she knows them. The facts about owls are not encouraging. I go back to my husband. “If God told you to get rid of them, get rid of them.” Ok, fine. But what do I DO with them! I cannot in good conscience hand them off to someone else or sell them – so you want me to trash hundreds of dollars in owl décor? He did. But instead of making me do something I wasn’t ready to do, he packed them up nicely and put them in the garage – “we’ll deal with it when you’re ready.”

The next night was a meeting with our marriage small group at our house. My stepmom came in with a beautifully wrapped gift for me – “just because, no special occasion necessary. I love you.” In the hustle and bustle and late night, I didn’t get a chance to open it immediately. When I did, I about died. Wrapped in tissue paper were two of the most beautiful owl bookends I think I’ve ever seen. Let me just bullet point the thoughts of the next few days:

• God showed her those, laid me on her heart, and she showed up with them the day after I cleaned out my whole house – so maybe God is saying I’m crazy and HE never said that.

• God created owls, why would anything in his creation be bad?

• God showed her those, laid me on her heart, so maybe I can just keep THOSE.

• It’s a test. This is definitely a test. Of what exactly, I don’t know…but it’s a test.

I prayed for days. (I'm stubborn.)

What is interesting is, God had been telling me for several weeks that there was something from my childhood I needed to deal with in preparation for the next season. Up to this point, I had been unable to uncover exactly what it was (there is just so much to choose from.) So, I went to bed one night with two questions for God: What exactly do you want me to deal with? What do I do with those OWLS? I believe God answered both questions with one dream.

Here is what you need to know about me: I’m a fiery, ambitious, sometimes bulldozer and I have spent a lot of time working on delivery; unfortunately, offending people with my directness is not abstract in my life. I also had quite a rebellious streak that would throw the average person off my true scent. But deep down, I have this desperate need for approval. It’s deep rooted all the way back to my childhood – and any action I’ve taken that may have seem hurtful to someone was probably unintentional because I was blinded vying for the approval of someone else. In my mind, the worst thing I could do in life was disappoint someone, especially someone who loved me.

So God had done two things with that gift: 1) He commanded my obedience; 2) Obedience required me potentially disappointing someone I love…and facing square up to my need for approval.

I’ll spare you the details and skip to how good God is. I scheduled time to sit down with my stepmom and explain why I had to return the gift. Can you believe that she had a story from her own life that was almost the exact same situation? She was so gracious. She affirmed that I was doing the right thing. She made me feel a lot less crazy. I thanked her profusely for the gift – not just because of what it meant to me personally, but because of what it did with my relationship with God…because God hadn’t just done two things, he had done THREE. He had also shown me that he really was talking to me, and I really could hear him. I asked her if she had a receipt so she could return them, and she told me no - she wanted me to break them and throw them away.

I’m not saying you need to remove owls from your life, my conviction is not necessarily yours…but I am saying that God may convict you of something that seems a lot crazy. It doesn’t mean you have to disown anyone who doesn’t follow your conviction – after all, that was specifically for you – but it does mean that God has required something of you, for whatever reason, whether you understand it or not. And in the words of my dear friend, “God’s final test will always be to see if you really got it or not.” 

Good luck on your future exams...in the meantime, we'll be praying for you and taking out frustrations by breaking things. :) 

And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. - Hebrews 11:6