Helen Martin’s Blog

Lysa TerKeurst is offering three Cecil Murphy scholarships for She Speaks, an amazing women’s conference for writers, speakers, women’s ministry leaders, and girls who are drawn to these ministries as they head toward womanhood. Look here for the scholarship contest information, and click here (or on the logo on the left) to reach the She Speaks Conference website.

My entry…..

The first time I tried break up with my credit cards for good was in 2006. When the “Hearts at Home” women’s conference came to Minnesota that year, I couldn’t afford to go with the cash we had, so I volunteered at the event in order to reduce my cost.

Some lady named Lysa TerKeurst of Proverbs 31 Ministries was going to be the keynote speaker. I had heard enough about P31 to know they were legit, so I was interested to hear what she had to say.

Soon after she began speaking she had wrapped me up into the story of her life. And through her inspiring testimony, I found out we had a lot in common. For one thing, we both went through a period of our lives feeling like throw-away people, and we shared some similar reasons for having come to that conclusion about ourselves. Yet I was looking at a woman who was doing—with such confidence and excellence—things I would love to be doing. And while she seemed to know her value, more often then not, I still felt very disposible. I knew I had questions for Lysa, and as God would have it, I was the “floater” who was sent to help at her book table. During the down times, I got my chance to ask questions. And I asked a lot of them.

I don’t know how it happened, but I let my guard down, and at some point I found myself saying in half sobs…., “Lysa, what do you do when you think you can write, and you think you can speak, and —-” (choked out with tears were the words “you know you can sing?”) Our beloved Lysa (you’d never know she’s not huggy-by-nature) gave me a warm embrace and prayed for me. Then as time stopped around us she said,

“Helen, you need to tell God that you will walk through whatever doors He opens, and that you will never say it was a waste of time.”

With my whole heart I told God just that, and I emerged from that weekend like a little firefly of hope, full of eager anticipation to see what God would do, and carrying a small flyer that told about a conference called She Speaks. I was a budding blogger with a lot to say, and brand new to the women’s ministry leadership team at our church, so She Speaks 2007 seemed like the perfect door to walk through. And it proved the perfect test of the second part of my promise to God.

I attended the Speakers Track and somewhat on a lark, I scheduled two meetings with publishing professionals. Armed with little more than an elevator pitch (it’s a long story told elsewhere on this blog) I embarked on perhaps the worst literary meeting in the history of the conference. Had the man fallen asleep in the middle of my description and started snoring loudly, I would not have been surprised. He was that impressed with me and my book idea.

Yes, it was a disaster. But a waste? No.

After that meeting, I decided to cancel the second one that had been scheduled for me. No need to repeat that horrible experience, right? So I found Katie, the wonder-girl with the clipboard, and tried to cancel…. but the woman sitting next to her didn’t let me. It was Luann Prater. In fact, after talking with Luann, and praying with her, somehow I ended up being scheduled for a third meeting with a publisher! (Luann is like that. It’s unexplainable.)

I went to those meetings and came out with a very different experience. Neither of the publishers liked my idea any more than the first person had, but they were both abundantly gracious and I was given the great gift of seeing (in one weekend) both the worst and the best that rejection had to offer. Who would have thought it could be be done with so much love and encouragement? (To be fair, the first person wasn’t unkind, just very quietly unimpressed. Nice enough. But I couldn’t make him laugh, and that is like torture to me.)

There have been so many failures and rejections since then that I have lost count. Some bitterly painful, some… OK, they’re all pretty painful. Yes, I told God I’d walk through whatever doors He would open for me, but a lot of the the time I have peeked around half closed doors to see if they would swing a little. I have made so many messes, made so many mistakes, tried so hard… Tried. So. Hard. And with so little progress each time I find myself wondering, why do I keep trying?

Why?

Because I said I would. And because the One who is opening the doors (or not opening them) is the One who turns disappointment into humility, frustration into perseverance, “waste” into gain, and failure into freedom from self-sufficiency.

See, this whole time, I have known that what I am also doing is trying to find my significance and secure my identity; to somehow stop feeling like a throw-away person through temporal measures of success and the approval of others. I have known exactly how foolish that is, yet, I’m not able to proceed like a completely whole person. The fact is that I am too in-progress to even pretend to be whole. You’d think that this in and of itself would disqualify me from His service. But he won’t let me out of my contract.

He knows how insecurity riddles my being. He’s always known. And it doesn’t scare Him. He also knows what He has put into me that is good and passionate. He knows that there is something He has purposed in me—works He has prepared ahead of time for me to do. No matter how unqualified I am, that doesn’t disqualify me; and it doesn’t get me off the hook. In fact, it’s the very act of fulfilling His calling on my life that He is using to bring that wholeness, because it’s forcing me to depend on Him, to pray, to seek, to trust Him in ways that are unfamiliar and often very frightening to me.

I didn’t think I was asking Him for a ministry. But He has given me one. And I keep agreeing to do the next thing that brings me in so far over my head that you can’t even tell how badly I need to have my roots done. (And since I don’t want more debt, I do need to have my roots done. Very. Badly.)

I have always wanted to sing, like a bird who throws back her head and does what she was born to do. And He is calling me to do that. I think of myself as a talker and a blogger, but He has me doing the work of a speaker and a writer. I need to get better at both. I must catch my skill up to the level of my responsibility. And all along the way I need to surround myself with women who will point me to the only One who can make me whole, and make me feel wholly loved, completely apart from anything I could ever do.

She Speaks is a place where both expectant worship and exceptional work are emphasized. It’s a door I would eagerly walk through again and again. As much as I desire to attend this year, we simply don’t have the extra money. I’m not poor. I’m not wealthy. I am just an ordinary woman with excellent credit, who has grown very weary of paying for everything indefinitely. I really do believe that I’ve broken it off with my credit cards for the last time.

By God’s grace I may be able to attend She Speaks somehow, but He will have to provide the way. If receiving a scholarship is the way, I will very gratefully accept. And Lysa, I promise I will definitely never say it was a waste of time!