church

On Needing God

/ Elizabeth Trotter / Leave a comment

In the years since moving back to America, I’ve sometimes found myself getting caught up in the way “the world” works. After a lifetime of proudly being different from my peers and going against the flow because “any dead fish can swim downstream”—and making a string of countercultural decisions like getting married early, giving up an engineering career for motherhood and ministry, even saying farewell to friends and family to live and serve overseas—I suddenly found myself surrounded by American culture.

And I started absorbing it like the water one swims in.

There’s the pressure to work hard to make enough money because you can never have enough money and you always need more. There’s the pressure to look beautiful all the time—and in fact I’ve never felt uglier than after moving back to America. There’s the pull of easy entertainment and the never-ending scrolling and streaming, which is where most of our excess time goes.

Somehow I started believing that life is all about accomplishment and achievement and working hard and looking good because the economy is so bad and what makes you successful and important is working hard and earning it all by yourself. You gotta pull yourself up by your own bootstraps, right?

But then I would feel like such a failure because I’m not accomplished, at least not in the world’s eyes—even though I’ve always worked very hard at the vocations God has given me. I started wondering what was wrong with me. Why can’t I do all these things on my own the way people (er, Americans) are supposed to and even appear to be able to do? Because when I looked around, I saw people who were genuinely successful and who didn’t appear to need God or faith in any way.

But the truth is that I do need God. I always have. I need His strength to do the things He’s asked of me. I need His power to fulfill the callings He’s placed upon my life. As Americans we may have grown up with this ideal of rugged individualism, but I can’t in any way see that it’s biblical. God’s original design was always to have us depend on Him and on others. It’s the way He made the world, but then the world made up its own rules and told us we have to live by them.

We don’t. Anyone I’ve ever talked to who’s been walking by faith a long time will say you need God, that there’s no way to do life over the long haul without God. This is simply not something you will hear in the world. The world says you can do it on your own and you do not need God. Nor do you need the church or other people—especially those pesky, hypocritical Christian people.

Except that’s not actually the way God architected the universe. He designed it for us to need Him and depend on Him, and He didn’t design it for us to just accomplish things by our own selves, through our own worthiness. He intended for us to look to the interest of others because of His example, because of His Holy Spirit empowerment. And to need others to look to our interests too.

Sometimes I am so desperately needy for God that I forget others are too. The truth is, we all are. It’s totally acceptable to live like the needy creatures we are, to live countercultural to the world, because the way the world is designed is not the way God designed it to be. Needing God isn’t a failure in abiding by the world’s rules; it’s actually exactly what is supposed to happen.

We need people too. God never intended for us to be alone. We see that from the very beginning in Genesis 2, and we see it all throughout the New Covenant as well. We need the community of Christ to be carried through this life. Sometimes I am carried, sometimes you are carried, but we all do the carrying, and we all take our turns being carried — sometimes even at the same time.

This is the beauty of the body of Christ.

For more reflections on life as a woman of faith, read The Hats We Wear.

A Liturgy for the One Who Knows Where They’re Going But Doesn’t Know the Way There

/ Elizabeth Trotter / Leave a comment


God,
I long to follow close behind You,
but I often see dully as through a glass.
I cannot envision what I am meant to be in You,
though I catch glimpses from time to time.

Paul told us to imitate him as he imitated Christ,
and You have set examples among Your people
of what it means to be a living sacrifice,
of what it means to be beloved in Christ.

So make me like Mrs. C.,
who believes in the power of prayer
because it set her free and made her new,
who, like You, does not show favoritism
and believes healing from the Holy Spirit is for everyone,
who has a testimony to tell of Your great power
and won’t stop praying till it comes on earth.

And make me like Father T.,
whose deep knowledge of Your love for him over a lifetime
has settled in his breath and in his bones so deeply that
when he walks into a room, everything changes.
Shoulders relax, souls breathe easier, and
people start to grasp that maybe, just maybe, they really are
as loved as You say we are.

But most of all, God, make me like me,
the me I am meant to be,
the one you dreamed of when you knit me together in the dark.
May I become my true self in You
as You become ever more enfleshed in me.

If it takes a lifetime to become a living sacrifice, 
take my life and daily pour it out.
And if it takes a lifetime to become the beloved one,
take my heart and teach me your incomparable, transcendent love.

I am willing to wait.

(Scriptural inspiration: Psalm 63, Romans 12:1; 1 Corinthians 11:1; 1 Corinthians 13:12; Ephesians 3:14-20; Philippians 2:17)

How Preparing a Gift for My Parents’ 50th Wedding Anniversary Reminded Me of My Calling

/ Elizabeth Trotter / Leave a comment

For my parents’ 50th wedding anniversary (which is today, by the way!), my sisters and I decided not to throw a party. I’m not sure my parents would have wanted a party anyway. But we wanted to celebrate them in some way, and we chose two avenues. First, we signed them up to write their memoirs bit by bit through a company called Storyworth. It’s been fun for all of us to read the stories of their life as they arrive in our inboxes week after week.

And second, we decided to put together a book of memories for them from their closest friends and family. These people are scattered across the country, as our family’s story includes fifteen years in the U.S. Army, including four years stationed in West Germany in the early 80s. I knew this had the potential to be a once-in-a-lifetime gift, but I had no idea what its true impact would be on me or my parents.

As the letters started to trickle in, I noticed a pattern. Over and over again, the main thing people remember about Jeff and Mary Hunzinger was the way they served others. Consistent across all their locations—El Paso, Germany, South Dakota, Fort Riley, Red Bridge Church of Christ, Legacy Christian Church—they were just always there for people.

I remember hearing the same themes when my mom’s dad died. People kept talking about how he helped other people, how he was there for them. At the wake someone told a story I’d never heard before of Grandpa helping a man in the community who’d been at risk of suicide and how he’d even gone to his house in the middle of the night. My grandparents were farmers. They didn’t have a lot of money. They didn’t even have high school diplomas (though Grandpa was really proud of Grandma for earning her GED later in life), but people didn’t care about that. All they remembered was how much Grandpa had contributed to the community.

It reminds me of the way people talk about my husband’s parents. Mark and Kerry have been gone for decades now, but the main thing people remember about them was the way they were there for other people. They had this special ability to see where people were spiritually and to speak into their lives. With a dentist’s salary, they also had the means to bless people financially—and often did. But it’s not just Jonathan’s parents who gave us this example; his dad’s parents lived in much the same way. 

So I read all these letters about my parents and thought about the legacy I’ve been given on both sides of the family, and I was moved to tears. It made me grateful. More than that, though, it made me want to live into this precious legacy I’ve been given. 

My parents didn’t know any of those things when I visited them earlier this summer. I was still acutely ill, but after dinner we sat around the table talking like usual, and Mom was commenting on life. I can’t remember the context, but she said something about how life isn’t all about you, it’s about other people and serving them. Her priorities were clear. She knew the important things in life. But she hadn’t seen any of the letters yet. She didn’t know what people were saying about her and Dad. She just knew how she wanted to live her one beautiful life, following in the footsteps of her parents and in the footsteps of Jesus.

I started to think back over the last several years and see how my health struggles and mental health challenges have just been so all-consuming. I wasn’t always able to see outside myself. I remember pregnancy being the same way. A momma just turns so inward, needing to take care of the little life inside. After a few pregnancies, I remember consciously thinking that it would be good for me to take a break from being pregnant because it’s so inward-focused, trying to take care of the baby and all. 

And then I thought back over this past year and how (with the exception of this summer) I’ve had the best mental, physical, and relational health in a long time, probably due to finally being on HRT. Suddenly I could see outside myself again—because service has long been a theme in my life as well. 

Why do my hormones need to be in balance in order to serve the God I’ve loved since I was a little girl? Why do my neurotransmitters need to be in balance to be the person God made me to be? Because I know who God made me to be—I’ve known that for so long—and loving Him and loving ministry and caring for my family and for people in the community has defined so much of my life.

And then perimenopause and re-entry (not so affectionately called re-entrypauseTM in our household) just sideswiped me. I look at who I am when my hormones are out of balance, and I have a hard time believing that’s God’s intention for me. Self-centered and irritable is not who He made me to be. He made me to be joyful, patient, curious, nurturing. This years-long process has shown me that sometimes these mortal vessels need medication for us to be the person God created us to be. 

Re-entrypause shifted my ability to listen to God, to see other people outside myself, to see things in reasonable and rational ways. My thinking got all twisted up on so many levels. I’m thankful for modern medicine that can restore the circuits in my brain to be able to look outside myself and to serve other people again—and to want to do that for the rest of my life. I just had a birthday this past week, 45 trips around the sun. I’m already halfway to the end, if not more than that. For the second half, I want to return to the way I tried to live most of the first half, in service to God and others.

So these days you’ll find me singing the words of that old camp song, “Make Me a Servant.” I pray the song, and I think about my parents’ legacy, so that when I get to the end of my life, what people remember is how much I poured out, not how much I took. I want to live a life that flows outward, not inward. A life that points to God’s love, not one that points to myself. And the only way to do that is through the blood of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit.

Mama Said

/ Elizabeth Trotter / 1 Comment

My mom was an Army wife. She told me that things always go wrong when a dad is out of town — whether deployed or out for field exercises or summer training. All the Army wives knew it was true. 

A kid would get seriously sick, or the car would break down, or something would go wrong with the house when a dad was gone. It was a fact of life they had no choice but to accept. One time a toddler ended up in the hospital while my dad was gone. Another time Mom had a baby. (Thank God for supportive church people, right?!)

But this truism ended up applying to more than military life. Ministry life felt much the same.

I remember being six months pregnant with my fourth child when Kansas City received torrential downpours. Jonathan was at Bible camp with the youth group, and the parsonage basement flooded over fifteen inches. It short-circuited both the air conditioning system and the (newly replaced) hot water heater, which now both needed replacing, and ruined most of what we’d stored down there — books and family photo albums in cardboard boxes which we had carefully placed on top of stone blocks. 

But the water level rose above those stones, and capillary action on the cardboard ensured total damage. I needed an entire team of people to help empty the basement of its boxes and furniture, now ruined, try to salvage anything we could, and toss the rest. Later that week a nearby water main broke, and we didn’t have water at all for a while, which was even worse than trying to shower in cold water a few days before. 

After that, we stored our belongings in plastic boxes on even higher blocks.

I remember another time when we lived in Cambodia and Jonathan was on an international trip and I got sick. He wasn’t planning to come straight home though. He was going to meet me and the kids in Thailand, where we were scheduled to be the keynote speakers at a home education conference.

I had to figure out how to get better and still make it to the conference with four kids in tow. Asian airlines and airports have been checking for fevers long before COVID-19 hit the world, so I didn’t actually know if I would make it to the conference. That week involved a lot of praying, phone calling, and Tylenol swallowing.

Something similar happened again recently. Jonathan was just about to leave for an international ministry trip when I became seriously ill. I couldn’t concentrate, I was in constant pain, and I could barely get out of bed, but I somehow dragged myself to the doctor for testing. What I was diagnosed with (thyroiditis) was going to require a long recovery, but there were some medications that could help manage symptoms in the meantime. 

Then it was time to decide whether he should leave on the ministry trip or not. I was in bad shape, and he offered to stay home and care for me. But I really felt he still needed to go. People were depending on him — some people were attending the event specifically to meet with him. Plus, I had all these older teen and adult children who could help, in addition to an amazing local church family. One thing I know for sure: the prayers of the saints have held me these past couple weeks.

This illness isn’t fun. I actually got worse for a little while after he left. But the experience reminded me of my mama’s wisdom. Things always seem to go wrong just when the person who is supposed to help you navigate the trials of life is also gone. Is it chance, happenstance, spiritual warfare? I don’t know. I do know that my husband and I have often fought just before a big ministry event — so much so that he began to expect it. 

This time around we didn’t fight. I got sick instead. 

I’ve never been one to accuse the devil of much. I’ve seen the practice misused. But sometimes it’s hard not to draw spiritual conclusions. This illness was so unexpected. I’ve never had thyroid problems, and they don’t run in my family. I’m generally healthy. Yet right before Jonathan was supposed to leave for an eleven-day trip to do some really important ministry, I was diagnosed with a temporarily debilitating illness.

The truth is, maybe we’ll never know the reasons these things happen. But as every military, ministry, and missionary wife knows, they do tend to happen. The question then becomes: What are we going to do when they happen?

More Than a Baby Dedication

/ Elizabeth Trotter / Leave a comment

Long before a certain first lady popularized the phrase, the Church has known “it takes a village” to raise a child, to make a disciple. Whether we are parents hoping to shape the soul of a child or adults seemingly in charge of our own spiritual formation, discipleship is not an individual sport. We simply cannot do it on our own. We need help.

Yesterday morning our church held a baby dedication. What a gift to be part of a body whose love for children overflows into the need for once-yearly baby dedications. I’ve seen it before — anyone fellowshipping with Red Bridge Church of Christ in the 1990s witnessed it too — but it doesn’t happen just anywhere.

Watching those parents walk on stage with their little ones, I remembered my own baby dedications. The fresh hope of new parenthood. The weary fog of sleepless nights and never-ending laundry. The overwhelming determination to be a better follower for your son or daughter. And of course those sweet baby kisses.

At the time I didn’t realize that baby dedications are about so much more than committing to raise your kids in church. They’re also about leaning on the wisdom and guidance of others as you muddle through family life. About knowing you have people in your corner, people who believe in what you’re doing and are willing to help you when times get hard.

Now that our kids are older, I find myself able to be that village for younger moms, even as older moms offer the same for me. Just yesterday, in fact, someone ahead of me on the journey checked in on me and encouraged me. I, in turn, did the same for a younger mom — as though our auditorium interactions were illustrating the point of that onstage baby dedication.

During the service, the pastor first asked the parents for their commitment to raising their children in the faith. Then he asked the church to commit to supporting these parents in both spiritual and practical ways. One of the commitments particularly moved me:

“Do you commit, as brothers and sisters in Christ, to continually and lovingly welcome these children into the family of God and affirm their participation in the Kingdom of God, so that they never doubt their belonging amongst His people?”

My eyes welled with tears. Only in the church is this kind of intrinsic, never-fading belonging possible. To be sure, the church gets it wrong sometimes. We have hurt people terribly. I have been hurt. You have been hurt. But when it’s working as God intended, the church is a place for deep, unquestioned belonging. No manmade organization can rival it.

Anna Danforth, Lauren Wells, and the rest of the team over at TCK Training call this “multi-generational belonging.” Kids who receive it feel more grounded and secure, and it helps to offset the difficult things that inevitably happen in life. And it’s something the church has been doing for thousands of years, long before the modern research on Positive Childhood Experiences.

But it’s also something we must commit to in every season, in every generation. For every new baby that’s born, for every new beginning. This kind of belonging doesn’t happen automatically. It happens when we take Christ at His word and welcome a child into our life. It happens when we commit to supporting young moms and dads and when we ask older believers to help illuminate the path for us.

Intergenerational faithfulness is about more than just a baby dedication. It’s about the church being the church for every member, from newborn babe to great-grandmother and everyone in between. Because you belong here — but only if we live like we believe it.