Metamorphosis Mondays

Join me here on Mondays, where I'll share some words that are changing me for the better...

I just started reading Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard.  I can't get over the way her style simultaneously fills my desire for poetry and for story, and hints at the deeper thrum of what is going on beneath our seeing.  Here's an excerpt...

Cruelty is a mystery, and the waste of pain.  But if we describe a world to compass these things, a world that is a long, brute game, then we bump against another mystery: the inrush of power and light, the canary that sings on the skull.  Unless all ages and races of men have been deluded by the same mass hypnotist (who?), there seems to be such a thing as beauty, a grace wholly gratuitous.  About five years ago I saw a mockingbird make a straight vertical descent from the roof gutter of a four story building.  It was an act as careless and spontaneous as the curl of a stem or the kindling of a star.  The mockingbird took a single step into the air and dropped.  His wings were still folded against his sides as though he were singing from a limb and not falling, accelerating thirty-two feet per second per second, through empty air.  Just a breath before he would have been dashed to the ground, he unfurled his wings with exact, deliberate care, revealing the broad bars of white, spread his elegant, white-banded tail, and so floated onto the grass.  I had just rounded a corner when his insouciant step caught my eye; there was no one else in sight.  The fact of his free fall was like the old philosophical conundrum about the tree that falls in the forest.  The answer must be, I think, that beauty and grace are performed whether or not we will or sense them.  The least we can do is try to be there.   

 

 

July 4th, No Accidents, and Real Equality

We celebrated July 4th yesterday in pretty typical fashion: people pennant-clad in red, white, and blue; a massive barbecue boasting hamburgers, potato chips, ice cream, and stuffed stomachs; and from the car windows on the late drive home, glimpses of the few fireworks sanctioned by the city (numerous fires still burn throughout our state, so individual fireworks were a big no-no this year).
Yet there were eccentricities to our celebration as well (because, you know, normal is something we just don't do around here).  Present at the barbecue were people from Iraq, Kenya, Vietnam, Libya, Korea, France, China, and Germany, to name a few.  Only a handful were even American citizens.  Most were college students who had traveled to America to earn a degree, and a number planned to return to their native countries after graduating so they could support their families.
It was the American fellow, the young man named Dave who was studying medicine so he could work in Afghanistan and heal the wounds of a war-torn nation, who said it best: "We have so much in this country that we aren't even grateful for.  People all over the world are dying because they don't have doctors, and here we whine about waiting a few hours for a routine check-up in a spotless hospital."
So I am thankful for America.  I am thankful that we suffer from overabundance rather than starvation.  I am thankful that all my sisters are safely here, not sold so my family could pay off a debt.  I am thankful that the police are capable and willing to capture criminals, rather than turning a blind eye or even participating in crimes.  I am thankful that I can have a box of Bibles in my closet, two on my shelf, and one in my bag, without being arrested or tortured or killed.  I am thankful that, even jobless, my family hasn't even begun to experience real poverty.

And all these, while beautiful and good and gracious, are gifts given to me only because, as Bono put it, I am an accident of latitude.  It seems only chance that I was born surrounded by doctors and nurses and family in a hospital that churned out babies daily like factory, instead of in the dirt floor of an isolated hut where no one heralded my arrival.
But, as we've clearly been told, there are no real accidents, and we are here for such a time as this.  These gifts we have been given are to be given again.  The desire is not that we are to be overfed while others suffer, but rather that there be equality for all.  We have been given freedom, yes, and with freedom comes a choice.  We can use our freedom in a way that benefits only ourselves, continuing to live in comfort and enjoying the pleasures that America has to offer.  Or we can use our freedom to help others, regardless of location, and to make equality a reality.

{Breaking Up: Fear}

Dear Fear,
We've been together a long time.  In fact, I think you were there at the hospital, right along with my grandparents in the pristine lobby, waiting for my wrinkled self to emerge so you could lay claim to me.  You kept an arm around me through all my growing-up years.  At first you kept me safe.  You wouldn't let me wander anywhere without my parents (which, in retrospect, may actually have been for the best).  You saved me years of scrapes and scars by making me hyperventilate at the thought of riding a bike until I was ten years old.  You are the reason I made up elaborate injuries to persuade my friends to play on the ground instead of racing to the treetops. I learned to recognize you as somewhere I could hide, a way I could stay safely inside my comfort zone and never, ever get hurt.  I trusted you.
As time went on, however, you became more and more controlling.  I feared punishment, so of course fourth-grade-me lied about cheating on that long-division test.  I feared rejection, so middle-school-me shifted her persona to be more acceptable to her peers, and when she was not, she retreated back into her lonely fortress.  I feared failure, so high-school-me molded herself into every image of success and found herself caught in a pursuit of meaningless glory that left her burnt-out and disgusted at the end.  Fear, it seems that wherever I turn, you are already there.
And I'm not going to do this anymore.  I found Someone else, Someone who says to be strong and very courageous.  I am not afraid to face myself anymore and admit my failures with honesty, because I now know that my shame has been borne by Another and my ugly everything is being made new.  I am not afraid of releasing my true identity to the scrutiny of the world, because I know that there is Someone who loves me and calls me a beloved creation formed after his own image.  I am not afraid to fall through the cracks of a rat-racing society and simply live by living simply, because now I know that I am judged successful based on how well I love, not on how well I stock my bank account.
We're done.  Thank you for keeping me safe, but I've found that safety does not reward.  Anything worth doing, worth being, requires a risk, and I can't afford to not take risks anymore.
I'm over you, Fear.  I'm in love - in Love - now, and so I'm casting you out because there is no fear in love.  You have no more place here.

Metamorphosis Mondays

Join me here on Mondays, where I'll share some words that are changing me for the better...

I'm a huge fan of Bob Goff, the US consul to Uganda, founder of Restore International, lawyer and law professor, and all-around whimsical world-changer.  I'm rereading his book, Love Does, and there are words that continue to electrify me in the best of ways.

I enjoy those parts of the Bible where Jesus talks about how much He loves His bride.  It makes me wonder if the trees and mountains and rivers are things He planned in advance, knowing they would wow us.  I wonder if God returned over and over to this world He placed us in thinking what He had created was good, but it could be even better, even grander.  I wonder if He thought each foggy morning, each soft rain, each field of wildflowers would be a quiet and audacious way to demonstrate His tremendous love for us. 

And then...

I heard a self-help guy say once you could look in the mirror and give yourself something he called positive affirmations, like saying to yourself you are good or smart or talented.  I don't know if that works, to be honest.  Maybe it does.  But I do know one thing that works every time - it's having somebody else say something good about you.  I think that's how we were created, you know, to get named by people this way.  I think God speaks something meaningful into our lives and it fills us up and helps us change the world regardless of ourselves and our shortcomings.  His name for us is His beloved.  He hopes that we'll believe Him like I came to believe what the coach said about me.  He hopes we'll start to see ourselves as His beloved rather than think of all the reasons that we aren't.  Sometimes we don't think that the name someone picked for us is accurate either.  How could the coach think of me as a real ball player?  And how could God think of me as His beloved? But then I remember how Jesus said to one of the guys with Him that he was a rock even though He knew this same guy would deny ever knowing Him.  I don't think Jesus was blowing sunshine at Peter when He did that.  Instead, I think He was calling something out from inside Peter.  It was kind of like the coach telling me I was a real ball player - he saw it in me and was just calling it out.  We get to do that for each other still today.

I also just got involved in a class at my church that's viewing and discussing episodes from the recent Verge Conference.  Wow, have I been missing out!  One of the speakers, Caesar Kalinowski, challenged us to ask God to show us three people we can bless this week.  I love that.  It's intentional, yet not at all in-the-box, and so simple (really? Ask God to show me specific ways I can bless THREE people?  Yeah, I can probably manage that).  He also pointed out that discipleship isn't something "additional," to be squished in the in-between spaces of our lives; rather, discipleship involves transforming everything you're already doing by intentionally living your life as a mission.  Definitely something good to think about there.

Here, Too, There Is Joy

Most days, I feel buried alive.
Technically, I have three jobs now: one, full-time, is watching two girls on their farm about ten miles from my house; the second is marketing CUTCO knives through scheduling appointments (there will probably be a post about this job in the near future); and the third, which I have not yet started and am wondering how I can possibly find time to squeeze in yet another position, is assisting in the assembly of various musical instruments for a man whose demands exceed what he can supply on his own.
Often, it feels as though the world is pressing in on me from every side, and I fight claustrophobia as daily activities surround me and close in.  I've downsized as much as I can in terms of how I use my time, and still I feel consumed by the chaos.
But one phrase has been whispered in my ear in the sacred early mornings before the girls wake up, when it's just me and God and the goofy, floppy-footed Labrador puppy: Here, too, there is joy.  Because here, too, I am found.
I am seeking God.  Not in the mountaintops where it is easy to find Him, where the air is clear and seeing God is as simple as turning around.  I am seeking Him in the everyday, in the moments where girls throw dirt and harsh words at each other, in the moments where I am late to a meeting or forget to call my manager, in the moments where I am falling, exhausted, into bed at the end of the day.
When the Word became flesh, He made His dwelling among us.  He entered into our insanity and self-destruction and offered abundant life and living water through Himself.  And where He is, here, too, is joy.

Beginnings

It's always fitting when mountaintop experiences happen on top of mountains.

I stood this morning in slippered feet and sipped peppermint tea while my mom and Aunt Darlene chatted in the next room.  Buttercup, a lion of a golden retriever, kissed my hand while I toyed with her silky ears, and the twilight-blue Steller's jay flew furiously at the enormous squirrel at the bird feeder (I've seen cats smaller than that animal).  The Poirson's house - mansion, really - towers over the rest of the world from its mountaintop perch, and from any window I could look out and see the city spread like a twinkling map below me, lights winking through the early-morning fog.

I needed some perspective, and here, standing over my life, I began to see a little more clearly.

I feel as though I am leaving behind many things that have clung to me throughout 2012, casting them off because they have become too heavy for me to carry (and, of course, were never mine to bear in the first place). Now I can look ahead with farsighted hope and anticipation of a new beginning instead of a continuation of the tiresome old.

This will be a year of remaking, rebuilding, restoring.  Given my tendency towards failure, I will fall many times and need to be picked up and brushed off and set back on the right track, but ultimately, I believe that the God who began a good work in me will carry it on to completion.  That's the thought that gives me joy and hope as I enter this new year.

Metamorphosis Mondays

Join me here on Mondays, where I'll share some words that are changing me for the better...

Isn't it nice when beautiful things happen in unexpected places?  We read this poem in English class today and I'm still dizzy from the heavy beauty of it.

Evening Hawk by Robert Penn Warren

From plane of light to plane, wings dipping through
Geometries and orchids that the sunset builds,
Out of the peak's black angularity of shadows, riding
The last tumultuous avalanche of
Light above pines and the guttural gorge,
The hawk comes.

His wing
Scythes down another day, his motion
Is that of the honed steel-edge, we hear
The crashless fall of stalks of Time.

The head of each stalk is heavy with the gold of our error.

Look!  Look!  he is climbing the last light
Who knows neither Time nor error, and under
Whose eye, unforgiving, the world, unforgiven, swings
Into shadow.

Long now,
The last thrush is still, the last bat
Now cruises in his sharp hieroglyphics.  His wisdom
Is ancient, too, and immense.  The star
Is steady, like Plato, over the mountain.

If there were no wind we might, we think, hear
The earth grind on its axis, or history
Drip in darkness like a leaking pipe in the cellar.

And from one of my favorites, Jon Foreman of Switchfoot, comes this excellent ending (read the rest here?):

Yes, dancing is absurd. There is no logical reason to dance. It's awkward, especially for folks like myself. Dancing won't end global poverty. It doesn't stabilize the price of oil or fight to dethrone evil dictators. But does dancing bring you joy? Does dancing remind you of your humanity? Does dancing makes you laugh? Heck, my dancing in particular can certainly lighten the mood. I'm tired of fighting my way through life; I want to dance. To head back out on the dance floor of life armed with my four ridiculous dance faces and the intention of finding joy in the journey, finding happiness in the song along the way. Certainly, there are times to fight. There are times to challenge injustice, hatred, racism, and corruption. But most of life is not meant to be a fight. It's meant to be a dance. Victories and defeats will come and go but the joy of the dance is always available.

Also, I can't stand Bradley Hathaway's voice.  It drives me crazy.  But I've fallen deeply in love with this song, so I've learned to tolerate his thirteen-year-old-swallowing-spoonfuls-of-coarsely-ground-gravel voice.  You should also check out some of his poetry along the side of that YouTube page, because it's absolutely fantastic. 

And finally, from Brennan Manning's amazing book The Importance of Being Foolish (I can't even begin to say how much this gentle book challenged and moved me.  Go read it.  Now.):

Scripture is not about the transmission of inert ideas.  It is a call to love, and love that does not lead to action is not love.

The Year of Vision

Students run on different calendars than the rest of the world.  Everyone else marks years in spans of 12 months, 365.25 days, repeating in a cycle that flows from January to January.  Students, though, have a year that runs from August to May, with a netheryear in June and July.  When we say "last year," we probably don't mean 2011.  We mean the last time school was in session. 

And so when I say this is the Year of Vision, I'm not listing New Year's Resolutions early.  School started for me about a month and a half ago, and God and I had a date in the parking lot of Garden of the Gods (as a side note, one of my favorite things about living in Colorado is that a half hour drive takes me to places like this).  I prayed for a while, asking him what he wanted for this year.

God, I said, it's my senior year.  I'm going to turn eighteen.  I have to apply to colleges and figure out what I'm going to do with the rest of my life.  I would really like a vision or something.

And God, in the rising bubble of God-voice that nudges somewhere deeper than my heart and finally bursts into coherent phrases, God said You don't need a vision, you need vision.

Yeah, I need vision.  Sometimes I've wanted soul-glasses so I can see clearly now.  I have problems with seeing accurately, or sometimes even at all.  I need something more powerful than Lasik to undo the blindness that keeps me from noticing the blaring neon signs that say ATTENTION!!!!  GOD IS HERE!!!! 

So this year, the Year of Vision, my divine optometrist named God has been working on correcting my sight.  I've found him in some pretty unexpected places lately.  Did I expect that being nominated for homecoming queen would lead to some excellent conversations with friends about God, security, and identity?  Or that my friend would email me a Bible verse on a day I needed it very badly?  Or how 'bout those lovely aspens beginning to glow golden on the mountains? 

Yes, God is everywhere.  I just need the vision to see him. 

Metamorphosis Mondays

Join me here on Mondays, where I'll share some words that are changing me for the better...

It's going to be a little brief today, friends, but we'll go for quality over quantity.

First, from L.L. Barkat's famous Rumors of Water:

"Want to hear my story?"  says Sonia cheerfully.  She is already moving on to her own agenda.
"Sure," I say.

The story is about a girl who is drawing a purple moth as large as a dragon.  The moth has teeth and is holding something like spears.  The girl is not paying attention in class, so she misses the lesson about the Space Race.  But she has a purple moth to show for it. 

And then a poem from Louise Gluck:

I have a friend who still believes in heaven.
Not a stupid person, yet with all she knows, she literally talks to God.
She thinks someone listens in heaven.
On earth she's unusually competent.
Brave too, able to face unpleasantness.

We found a caterpillar dying in the dirt, greedy ants crawling over it.
I'm always moved by disaster, always eager to oppose vitality
But timid also, quick to shut my eyes.
Whereas my friend was able to watch, to let events play out
According to nature. For my sake she intervened
Brushing a few ants off the torn thing, and set it down
Across the road.

My friend says I shut my eyes to God, that nothing else explains
My aversion to reality. She says I'm like the child who
Buries her head in the pillow
So as not to see, the child who tells herself
That light causes sadness-
My friend is like the mother. Patient, urging me
To wake up an adult like herself, a courageous person-

In my dreams, my friend reproaches me. We're walking
On the same road, except it's winter now;
She's telling me that when you love the world you hear celestial music:
Look up, she says. When I look up, nothing.
Only clouds, snow, a white business in the trees
Like brides leaping to a great height-
Then I'm afraid for her; I see her
Caught in a net deliberately cast over the earth-

In reality, we sit by the side of the road, watching the sun set;
From time to time, the silence pierced by a birdcall.
It's this moment we're trying to explain, the fact
That we're at ease with death, with solitude.
My friend draws a circle in the dirt; inside, the caterpillar doesn't move.
She's always trying to make something whole, something beautiful, an image
Capable of life apart from her.
We're very quiet. It's peaceful sitting here, not speaking, The composition
Fixed, the road turning suddenly dark, the air
Going cool, here and there the rocks shining and glittering-
It's this stillness we both love.
The love of form is a love of endings.

(Think on that for a while..."when you love the world, you hear celestial music...")

Metamorphosis Mondays

Join me here every Monday, where I'll share some words that are changing me for the better...

I stumbled across this by accident while online the other day...

When I no more can stir my soul to move,
And life is but the ashes of a fire;
When I can but remember that my heart
Once used to live and love, long and aspire --
Oh, be thou then the first, the one thou art;
Be thou the calling, before all answering love,
And in me wake hope, fear, boundless desire.
          -George Macdonald, "The Diary of an Old Soul"

From the highlight of every Monday...

Your real life IS your spiritual life, and both are going to be awful until you realize they're not two separate things!

And last but certainly not least, will you head over here and read this post by a wonderful woman named Micha?  Or listen to this incredible song by the talented Catherine Prewitt?


That's all for now, friends.  Hope to see you again next week!

Bare

I admit that I'm timid about posting this one.  And that timidity is the reason I've procrastinated about posting for so long.  See, I wrote this last month in my journal and I didn't put it through the refining process of what is acceptable to say or write publically, so what you have here is some very raw heart-material.  And I feel very vulnerable saying all this...
I guess what I'm asking for is grace, dear friend. 

Is this how I'm meant to survive, Lord?  Not standing tall, filled with divine confidence, invincible against all pain?  I thought You were going to make me strong, but instead You have peeled away layers of my heart until, naked, shamed, my pathetic weakness is laid bare.  Is this how it should be?  Am I, fully aware of my own inability, to come all the more trembling to You, pleading with You for completion?  Can You still speak light out of darkness?  Can You build a universe out of empty space?  Can You still breathe humanity into a cold heap of dust?

God, I love so imperfectly I cringe to even use the word.  There is unspeakable evil inside of me, and though I have concealed it with every facade I can fathom, it still lives within me, threatening to overcome everything I love with everything I hate.

And now...now You're speaking.  You tell me these words don't reflect the heart of the redeemed.  You remind me that you paid the ransom to set me free, and you say that now I am using the speech of slaves.  You say that, yes, it is impossible for me to overcome the monster that is myself, but in the same breath You whisper that You are in the business of slaying serpents.  And in a way that I cannot fathom, You hold my naked, weak, terrified self and whisper fierce love.

I have never before now known what You meant when You said Your power is made perfect in weakness and Your grace is enough.

I think I'm starting to understand now.

A Table in the Wilderness

"Cast your cares on him, for he cares for you."
We stood before a roomful of kids, kindergarten to sixth grade depending on the day, chanting the verse over and over and over again.  Each word was coupled with a motion to cement it in the child's mind: swing both hands away from you like you're casting a fishing rod, circle one scissor-fingered hand on the other like you're stirring in a bowl (sign language for "cares"), point upward for "him" and "he," four fingers for a "for," crossed arms covering your heart for "cares," and a final emphatic, Uncle Sam finger jabbed out for "you."  We varied the volume occasionally - "Which side of the room can be louder?" leading to an up-and-down rhythm in the words (CAST your CARES on HIM, for HE CARES for YOU!!!!!!!!), and "Which side of the room can be quieter" sounding like silver mountain breezes whispering through aspen leaves. 

There are no aspens here, though.  The scrub oak, cottonwoods, ponderosas, and other mountain trees are still about a thousand miles to the west.  Instead of spiky yucca and coarse grass with hardy roots for survival in the dry soil, cornfields compete with natural undergrowth for a place in the rich loam.  And the air!  Far from the Colorado "Got Oxygen?" quips, the air in Sterling, Illinois feels a little bit like the rush of wet air on your face when you lift the lid from a pan of boiling water. 

We've been here five days now, and we only expected to stay for one night in the sweet little farmhouse just outside the sweet little town.  But last Saturday morning, barely a mile onto the interstate, our fifteen-passenger van went kaput and we headed back to town while the vehicle was towed to the shop.  The next day, the embarassed mechanic admitted that after an entire day of tests and examinations, he couldn't find anything wrong and suggested we have it towed on Monday to a dealership. 

"Perfect!"  Valorey, the temporary caretaker of the farmhouse said with her lively grandma grin.  "You guys wanna come to church with me tomorrow?"

(Valorey bought us dinner twice, introduced us to her chubby-cheeked and brilliant-blue-eyed grandsons, and lent us her 8-seater suburban for the duration of our stay.)

At church, Carolyn, Katie, Elizabeth, Tiffani, Alax, Joel, Micah, PJ, Jason called George, and others surrounded us with instant friendship and gave us a home among strangers. 

"Come to youth group tonight, guys!"  As if we needed any persuasion!  At youth group, they begged us to join them for Go Loco, a week of VBS volunteering and community service around town. 

"If we're still here, we definitely will!"  We said. That became our answer to any invitation for the next three days. 

At Go Loco, three friends and I volunteered to help an elderly lady who had recently lost her husband of over sixty years.  Ms. Wanda spoke tearfully of the her loneliness and helplessness and gently kissed the picture of the uniformed man on the dresser.  We hugged her and gave the word-comfort we could.  At the end of each day, she came smiling with a box of ice cream bars and said that she'd eventually get all our names down in her mind (she was disappointed because she couldn't remember speeches she'd memorized in elementary school anymore). 

Today, they found and fixed the problem with our van (something about a timing belt?  I don't speak car.).  We're headed back to the Springs, and Sterling is fading behind us.  But in the time we've been here, God has shown us more of his infinite love by providing for our every single need - from basic shelter and food in the farmhouse and delightful homemade meals given to us by gracious friends from the church, to giving us kind friends and allowing us to serve others in our time here. 

Why?
For he cares for you.

Bread, and Always Christmas if Not Now Winter

We have a bread machine that works like Rumplestiltskin, turning basic ingredients into warm, golden bread with no more human involvement than is required to put things in and take things out.  We have a KitchenAid mixer that works nearly the same way, with a hook that kneads dough twice as effectively in half the time it takes me.  But today when I make bread, I want to make bread.

I take down the thick cookbook we never use.  I gather the huge white bowl, the wooden spoon, and the measuring cups.  I mix two tablespoons of yeast and half a cup of lukewarm water and while they are growing foamy, I heat three tablespoons of butter and a cup and a half of buttermilk in a pan until the butter dissolves.  The double-butter milk cools to lukewarm, and the house is quiet.  My family is gone, running errands, and I am the only one home, baking bread after a scholarship essay is polished and submitted.  Silence warmly invites me to sing, and to my surprise, the song that bubbles from my lips is not one that reflects the nearly-100-degree weather outside the window.  Instead...

Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel

And ransom captive Israel

That mourns in lonely exile here

Until the Son of God appear

Rejoice!  Rejoice! 

Emmanuel shall come to thee, oh Israel.

I mix flour and liquid with my hands, dough coating my arms almost to my elbows, and think on the words that came from me and came from nowhere.  One of my two favorite Christmas songs, yes...but in June?  The rhythmic kneading of the dough beneath my hands beats the tempo of the song, and I sing the lyrics again. 

Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel...

"Emmanuel," meaning "God who is with us." 

I grease the bowl - cheating this time, with a can of Pam oil spray - and the kneaded dough lands splot in the bottom, where it grows for an hour and ten minutes.  And I sing carols that are relevant year-round. 

Christmas marked the beginning of God's dwelling with us, and that time has not ended. 

And the Presence that arrived announced by angels and stars and shepherds and a scandalized couple gloriously invades my kitchen and my heart and my neighbors probably think I'm crazy for Rejoice!  Rejoice!  nearly shouted in the middle of June.

Sometimes I wish my name was Barnabas

Barnabas was one cool guy.  He hung out mostly in Antioch, was mistaken for Zeus, and had sweet hobbies like getting beat up and thrown in prison.  He vouched for Saul/Paul when the other apostles were too afraid to accept him, sang songs that literally rocked, and argued with Paul over whether or not to give John Mark a second chance.  But what I like most about Barnabas is that his name isn't really Barnabas.  Acts 4:36 calls him, "Joseph, a Levite from Cyprus, whom the apostles called Barnabas (which means 'son of encouragement')." 

The encouragement of Barnabas was so much his defining characteristic that the apostles gave it to him as a name.  Barnabas's identity was wrapped around his gift to build up those around him, filling them with courage and strength.  He had an ability to call out the gold from within people, even when nobody else (or even the individuals themselves) couldn't see anything shining. 

I want to be like that. 

I want to build up the people around me rather than tear them down, to see the best in them and call it out, to comfort and counsel and summon courage inside them - not so much to create something, but rather to point out what was always there. 

I want to be a daughter of encouragement.

Awe like Lightning

I like feeling small.

And last night I stood wind-whipped, with the porch planks as amphitheater seats, and heard a colossal concert that dwarfed the assumed largeness of myself.  Crickets hummed like violins, strong wind blew flute song through my ponytailed hair, and the percussive thunder punctuating the symphony matched the pounding of my awestruck heart.

I thought I may as well be struck by lightning because the excitement pulsed through every synapse and left me glowing and electrified.


What if we stood up and took notice when we say “wow”? Awe is an integral Christian “disposition of the soul,” [Herbert] Anderson* contends. It leads us into and disposes us toward faith. Luther himself said, “Wonder brings faith.” Such a disposition is what actually connects belief and practice. Without an outlook titled toward awe, belief becomes a hallow platitude and practice turns into empty habit. Builidng on Luther, Anderson emphasizes, “We will be more disposed toward moments of extraordinary awe if we have been attending all along to wonder and awe in the ordinary.”
-In the Midst of Chaos, Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore

Desperation and Cold Water

As of today, I've read Ecclesiastes 3 times.  The first time was when I read the Bible straight through because reading the Bible straight through is like a rite of passage for all good Christians, just having dc Talk's "Jesus Freak" on your iPod or being a rabid Tim Tebow fan.  It's just what we do.  I didn't get much out of Ecclesiastes that time, most likely because I was 11 years old and the Bible is a very long book and, to an 11-year-old, Ecclesiastes is pretty forgettable.

The second time was last fall on a whim.  I realized that I didn't remember a thing Ecclesiastes said and figured I should probably read it again because, being the Word of God and all, it might have some important things to say.  I read the 12 chapters in a day (which is the only way that book can be read...suicide is likely if you stop before the end) and decided it was one of the best things I've ever read.  We blitzed through the book again this morning in Awesome (if you're not a FEFC-goer, Awesome is what we call Sunday School, because seriously, who wants to go to school on Sunday?!  And Awesome is a pretty good description of everyone and everything there, so it didn't take long for us to pick that name instead.), and I was reminded why I like this book so much.
See, I spend a lot of time around desperate people.  The majority of my friends aren't content with the mediocre existence offered by society, many come from difficult family situations, and quite a few struggle with depression of one form or another.  So they, we, look for something to quench our soul-thirst, to satisfy the yearning we have, to give us a sense of purpose.

That's pretty much what Solomon covers in the first 11 chapters of Ecclesiastes.  I envision him as a knight on a quest, hunting for anything that will give meaning to his life.  Through eleven chapters he searches, looking first to wisdom, then to pleasures, to work, to advancements, to wealth, to everything he can think of that might possibly offer him a reason to live.  Each experiment ends the same way, though: "This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind."  Solomon echoes the bumper sticker maxim, "He who dies with the most toys still dies."  He goes so far as to say that it's better to never even be born than to see the oppression and wickedness in the world.  For eleven chapters, it seems that the end of his quest is the conclusion that the best anyone can hope to do is to work hard and enjoy the life they have while it lasts.  YOLO?
But
(There's always a but when things look hopeless)
But then chapter 12 happens and Solomon remembers God. 
"Remember your Creator in the days of your youth...Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man."
"The whole duty of man."
Our entire purpose.
Seems almost like a letdown.  That's it?

But to desperately thirsty souls on a quest for Abundant Life, it's like a long drink of cold water. 

And the commandment to keep commandments?  It's not a heavy, burdensome demand.  Really, there are only two commandments: to love God and love people.  These aren't rules; they're relationships. 

In the end, Solomon discovered what Jesus would sum up thousands of years later...

"Anyone who drinks from this well will be thirsty again, (we run to wells we know won't satisfy), but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst.  Indeed, the water I give them will become a spring of water welling up to eternal life."

One List I Don't Need

I make a lot of lists because I have a tendency to forget.  I list homework assignments, people I need to call, ideas I have, quotes I like, places I have to go, things I need to pack, and even music I like to listen to.  The previous sentence was a list of lists.  Lists keep me organized and focused, two things I have trouble being. 

A while ago, I thought about making a list of God's characteristics because I'm especially bad at remembering those.  I thought a long, long list of things I know are true of God would help break my cycle of recreating God and stuffing him in a box.  I got a few statements into it: "God is greater than anything around me."  "God's mercies are new every morning."  "God hates injustice."

Those things are true, but eventually I realized that this list thing was kind of weird.  I mean, I don't make lists about any of my other friends.  That would just be crazy.  I don't have to say, "Lexy makes fantastic Cowboy Cookies" or "Mary is a great artist" or "Gabrielle looks like Mandy Moore" or "Autumn has a really sweet car."  I don't make lists about my friends because I know them.  They have a name for people who make lists about other people.  They're called stalkers.

So I've focused on knowing God rather than knowing things about God.  I don't need to make a God list any more than I need to make a Lexy list.  I'm not the best at remembering, but God is very good at reminding.

Enough

Lately, I've been learning that everything in my life that hides under the ugly umbrella of "sin" is really an expression of disbelief - disbelief that God is who He says He is.  If I really believed that God is my source of strength, would I search for security anywhere else?  If I really believed that God will supply all my needs, would I bother to seek fulfillment in something that promises to satisfy, but in reality drains the life out of me?  If I really believed that God's grace is enough, would I cower through the awkward, guilt-ridden stage after He has gently pointed out a(nother) flaw in the dark corners of my heart? 

Time and again, I've asked myself if I really even know God at all.  The walls of my mental God-box begin to rebuild, but before they ever form completely, He does something that smashes the safe, comfortable image I've erected of Him and replaces it with Himself.  It's like He's saying, "This is who I am.  Do you trust now that everything I am is more than enough for you, that the real Me can satisfy every need and desire you have?" 

Always, the answer is yes - I mean, being confronted with a little bit more of who God really is is very overwhelming - but I have a terrible habit of turning back to the things that destroy me, of almost subconsciously replacing the Real God with a monotonous, tame being that looks a lot more like Sophia than it does anything else. 

So how to fix this?  Well, the recent awareness I've gained is definitely a good starting place.  Beyond that, maybe I need to remember the "basics" of prayer and reading the Bible...because how else am I going to get to know the Real God who promises to be my Delight and to satisfy every desire of my heart?  And I will pray with the father who found his last and only hope in Jesus: “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” 

The Relentless Answer to "Why?"

It's been a few weeks since the first question, and the answer stays the same.
"God, I don't understand.  Why have you put so many incredible people in my life?"
Anything to draw you to Myself. 
(Jawdrop)

"Why" is the beginning to many - maybe most - of my questions.  Why is she sick?  Why is that really so wrong?  Why can't I serve two masters?  Why are You allowing this hurricane?  Why should any one person go through that much?  WHY CAN'T I UNDERSTAND THIS MATH HOMEWORK?!?!?!?

And the answer to all of these (except maybe the last one...although on some occasions...) has stayed the same, breathed through the tatters of my tantrum-tired spirit: Anything to draw you to Myself.

In his book Blue Like Jazz, Don Miller writes, "We dream of Christ's love for His bride reading like Romeo and Juliet; two equals inflamed in liberal love.  I think it is more like Lucentio's pursuit of Bianca in The Taming of the Shrew.  That is, the groom endearing the belligerent bride with kindness, patience, and love."

It's life-changing, really, when you look at your life as one big love letter.  When I'm punished for sin (and sin = anything that stacks a brick on the wall between God and me) or just going through a hard time, it isn't because God is a divine bully and wants to ruin my life.  It's because God is crazier in love than Beyonce or anyone else can ever understand.  He loves relentlessly, wooing His creation back into communion with Him.  Why?  Because love desires what is best for the other person, and is anything better than embracing the story for which we were created, a love story that makes Shakespeare and Taylor Swift and Stephanie Meyers (but especially Stephanie Meyers) seem about as knowledgeable on love as a preschooler is on astrophysiology? 

And not all of the story is wrought in hardship, either.  There are moments of awestruck, grateful giddiness at the unexpected delights hidden like pirate treasure around my life - days of laughter, dandelions peeking through the deep green of the lawn, songs that remind me who I am, quiet mornings alone with ancient King David poetry, and especially the friends who fall like lemonade on my hot-and-tired-and-thirsty spirit.  These, too, pull me in closer.

So the point of everything - everything, from the pink-blossomed trees I walk past every morning, to the heartache of losing a friend, to the daily routine that so quickly becomes monotonous - everything is another word in the love letter God is writing to me, laboring repeatedly, relentlessly, redemptively, to draw me to Himself. 

This song sums it up pretty well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0urB9mnCx-A

How to Surf in a Hurricane

Hurricane (Hur-ih-keyn) n:  a violent, tropical, cyclonic storm of the Western North Atlantic, having wind speeds of or in excess of 72 miles per hour; a storm of the most intense severity. 

"A storm of the most intense severity."
I'm in a hurricane right now. 

I am rain-drenched and wind-blasted and battle-weary, and my world has been flattened and feels a little bit like this:


Things happen that force you out of your comfort zone.  I had typed the words in a message to a friend.  But when life gives you a hurricane, you go surfing.

Things are happening that I can't control, and there are choices to be made that will hurt no matter what I choose, and there are wounds too big for me to heal, and I am tempted to despair. The control-freak in me is panicking and worry has been my companion far too often these past few weeks. I've spent nights with little sleep and skipped meals because who can eat when they feel like this, who can stay afloat when the ocean is eating them alive? 

Jesus slept soundly through the storm. Jesus ate the meal knowing it would be only a few hours before his friend betrayed him and he would be questioned and tortured and killed. Jesus walked on water too stormy for a boat to cross with ease.  Jesus didn't worry. Jesus trusted.

As Ann Voskamp of 1000 Gifts fame says, I have soul amnesia.  I get slammed by a wave and forget that my God is the One who soothed the sea to sleep with a sentence, fed thousands with a prayer, and lived among us as the Word.  I become disoriented and lose my bearings and everything spins out of control.  I forget that I can trust and instead I panic.  When the "Peace, be still" finally comes through the whirling rain, it is said to me instead of the storm.

In the movie Soul Surfer, there is a scene where shark-attack-survivor Bethany is talking with her father because she wants to surf competitively, even though she lost her arm.  Her father tells her that it won't be easy, and, with an attitude I love, she replies, "I don't need easy.  I just need possible." 

With God, all things are possible.  God knows the plans he has for me and everyone else - plans to prosper and not to harm, plans to give a hope and a future.  God is faithful and forgiving and unchanging and compassionate and loving and just and comforting and relentless and powerful and good.  All he asks is that I trust.  Trust, instead of worry and forget and panic and fear.

Just trust.

That's how to surf in a hurricane.