I've spent a lot of time recently talking to people about loneliness and abandonment; about suffering and loss. Of course, this is a regular part of my profession. It is my comfort (or at least my occasional comfort) with such topics that has lead me to this role. I think most people really struggle to look at this stuff dead in the face. They don't want to see it.
Today alone, I have heard about or experienced examples of the ways we deal (or really don't deal) with these pains. We loose touch with reality (through lies and pretense and dissociation), we harden our hearts (through bitterness and unforgiveness), we delude ourselves (through the illusion of control), we run away. It's all such utter nonsense.
And when we are there, forced by circumstance or choice to look these things in the face, we often find ourselves very much alone because the rest of the world is totally not on board. I cannot tell you how many times in this very week I have heard the following phrase: "I just wanted someone to be with me." From the mouth of a divorcee, a longtime single, the victim of rape, someone coping with death, someone facing death - "I just want someone to be with me." Not someone to fix it, to minimize it, to run from it, to delude me about it, to encourage me to be bitter or entitled, not someone to know exactly how I feel or say exactly the right words but "someone to be with me."
And it strikes me that God chose two names for his son:
Matthew 1:21
And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins.
and Matthew 1:23 (as well as Isaiah 7:14)
Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel, God with us.
So the God's son shall be named "God saves" and "God with us". God saves.... God with us.
I don't know about you, but when I generally think of saving or rescuing I think of escaping. You know, a train barreling toward you and you are saved by the person who leaps into you, pushing you out of the way of the train. You've escaped.
When we think about Jesus, I think we can get stuck in this same kind of reasoning. Jesus saves by leaping onto the cross, just in the nick of time before our sins run us over. We've escaped. We've been rescued. Whew - now that's over.
But this is not my experience of Christianity. That's not to say it might not be an accurate reflection of some spiritual event I couldn't fully experience, I don't know. But what is certain, is that I have never felt the pressure of sin bearing down upon me and Christ narrowly carrying me out of danger. Nor was I immediately twinkled out of every desperate sin and ditch I had dug for myself when he came into my life. Something is very different about the way Jesus goes about saving.
In fact, it seems very clear to me that God does not save by sending a rope down from heaven with an evacuation plan. Cause look around dudes, we are all still here. And so was Peter and Paul and Mary and Martha and John.
So what's the deal God! Do you save? Yes - but the clue is in his other name. Because it is not just "God saves" but "God with us."
So Jesus doesn't push us out of the way of the train, He stands with us staring at the train and somehow this saves us.
Suffering.
God saves.
Someone to be with me.
God with us.
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Itchy Ears
I just finished a book a few weeks back by Rob Bell called Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived. Boy, oh, boy is this a controversial book.
As you may or may not be aware, folks in the evangelical community are all up in arms because the perception was that Bell was taking a universalist position on the afterlife. For those unaware, the church has been fighting back and forth for centuries about the nature of the after life (i.e., who goes to heaven, who goes to hell; what exactly is heaven, what exactly is hell). For at least the recent past, three positions have been articulated: exclusivism (i.e. only Christians get in), inclusivism (i.e., Christians and some other people get in) and universalism (i.e., everybody gets in). Now, I am totally uneducated about who has held the majority position over the course of church history, but I do know a two things: (1) the loudest group of Christians presently endorse an exclusivistic perspective (I was gonna say majority of Christians, but I am not sure if that is true) and (2) there have been people in all three camps throughout the course of church history.
Now before some of you get all angry about exclusivists being the loudest, and possibly majority, group, I want to say something. I am pretty sure that a good number (if not the majority) of exclusivist Christians are exclusivist not because they really like the idea that most of the people who have been born and will be born are going to burn in hell. I am pretty sure they are exclusivist because their read (or the read of people they deeply respect and trust) is that, that is what the Bible teaches. In their view inclusivism and universalism are attempts to compromise the gospel to make it more palatable to the world. They take very seriously the warnings across the new testament about false prophets and manipulation of gospel. Warnings like 2 Timothy 4:3
For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.
And I will tell you something true, Mr. Bell's book did scratch my itchy ear. You see for a very, very long time I could not stomach Christianity. I could not stomach it because it seemed very much like a country club with ridiculous entrance standards; specifically, like what we like, dress how we dress, think how we think or burn in hell for all eternity. Of course they wrapped their invitation in words about love and acceptance but I saw through that bull to the purple kool-aid. And let me tell you what, I was not about to drink it.
So Mr. Bell's writing, his invitation to draw near to the gospel without having to draw the same conclusions as the people I knew was unquestionably part of my path to God. Certainly the existence of universalism at all, provided me a path toward God. But the question then is: Am I actually drawing closer to the real God? The Creator of the Universe? Or am I drawing closer to a god that I am fashioning from concepts I already like? Can I "put up with sound doctrine" or am I "gathering teachers" to scratch my itchy ears?
And here is my take. At the center of the Bible is a tension - a tension between who God is and what He wants and the apparent outcome. On the one hand, you have an omnipotent, omnipresent, omnipowerful God, Creator of the Universe, who is love and wants every person who ever lived to return to Him. On the other hand, you have mention of hell, judgement, wheat and chaff, weeping and gnashing of teeth, and of a rebel army that fights with Satan in last war in Revelation. These two things are very, very difficult to reconcile. If you reconcile them by saying - "Oh well, God is all powerful, his love is unending, he will pursue people until he gets them even into the after life" you are over looking some very explicit warnings about how you live this life, the image of judgment and the clear picture that not all will come to the party. If you reconcile them by saying - "Clearly, I can tell you that "those people" who didn't do or say this or that thing, in this or that way are lost and going to burn" you are over looking who God is, and minimizing Him into a genie or mechanism that acts right in given circumstances. I think we ought to realize that if God says He wants something, there is a good chance He is going to get it.
So what I think is that the itch we all have is for reconciliation of that tension. We don't want to sit with dissonance - we want some preacher to resolve it for us. We want a prayer or book or philosophy or an approach to resolve it.
So be careful brothers and sisters. Be wary of people who tell you what you want to hear! Who have bumper sticker phrases which claim to resolve tensions that the Scriptures leave open. God is complicated! Or more accurately God is deep and rich and broad and wide and incomprehensible in His fullness. Yes, take seriously His warnings about this life and life to come. Take seriously His commands to obey and to reach out and tell others about Him. But also hold on to the knowledge and the hope and the truth that He is mysterious and all-powerful. That compassion and mercy are His to determine. As it says in Exodus 33:19
I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
Doesn't leave much room for us to decide who is in and who is out, does it?
As you may or may not be aware, folks in the evangelical community are all up in arms because the perception was that Bell was taking a universalist position on the afterlife. For those unaware, the church has been fighting back and forth for centuries about the nature of the after life (i.e., who goes to heaven, who goes to hell; what exactly is heaven, what exactly is hell). For at least the recent past, three positions have been articulated: exclusivism (i.e. only Christians get in), inclusivism (i.e., Christians and some other people get in) and universalism (i.e., everybody gets in). Now, I am totally uneducated about who has held the majority position over the course of church history, but I do know a two things: (1) the loudest group of Christians presently endorse an exclusivistic perspective (I was gonna say majority of Christians, but I am not sure if that is true) and (2) there have been people in all three camps throughout the course of church history.
Now before some of you get all angry about exclusivists being the loudest, and possibly majority, group, I want to say something. I am pretty sure that a good number (if not the majority) of exclusivist Christians are exclusivist not because they really like the idea that most of the people who have been born and will be born are going to burn in hell. I am pretty sure they are exclusivist because their read (or the read of people they deeply respect and trust) is that, that is what the Bible teaches. In their view inclusivism and universalism are attempts to compromise the gospel to make it more palatable to the world. They take very seriously the warnings across the new testament about false prophets and manipulation of gospel. Warnings like 2 Timothy 4:3
For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.
And I will tell you something true, Mr. Bell's book did scratch my itchy ear. You see for a very, very long time I could not stomach Christianity. I could not stomach it because it seemed very much like a country club with ridiculous entrance standards; specifically, like what we like, dress how we dress, think how we think or burn in hell for all eternity. Of course they wrapped their invitation in words about love and acceptance but I saw through that bull to the purple kool-aid. And let me tell you what, I was not about to drink it.
So Mr. Bell's writing, his invitation to draw near to the gospel without having to draw the same conclusions as the people I knew was unquestionably part of my path to God. Certainly the existence of universalism at all, provided me a path toward God. But the question then is: Am I actually drawing closer to the real God? The Creator of the Universe? Or am I drawing closer to a god that I am fashioning from concepts I already like? Can I "put up with sound doctrine" or am I "gathering teachers" to scratch my itchy ears?
And here is my take. At the center of the Bible is a tension - a tension between who God is and what He wants and the apparent outcome. On the one hand, you have an omnipotent, omnipresent, omnipowerful God, Creator of the Universe, who is love and wants every person who ever lived to return to Him. On the other hand, you have mention of hell, judgement, wheat and chaff, weeping and gnashing of teeth, and of a rebel army that fights with Satan in last war in Revelation. These two things are very, very difficult to reconcile. If you reconcile them by saying - "Oh well, God is all powerful, his love is unending, he will pursue people until he gets them even into the after life" you are over looking some very explicit warnings about how you live this life, the image of judgment and the clear picture that not all will come to the party. If you reconcile them by saying - "Clearly, I can tell you that "those people" who didn't do or say this or that thing, in this or that way are lost and going to burn" you are over looking who God is, and minimizing Him into a genie or mechanism that acts right in given circumstances. I think we ought to realize that if God says He wants something, there is a good chance He is going to get it.
So what I think is that the itch we all have is for reconciliation of that tension. We don't want to sit with dissonance - we want some preacher to resolve it for us. We want a prayer or book or philosophy or an approach to resolve it.
So be careful brothers and sisters. Be wary of people who tell you what you want to hear! Who have bumper sticker phrases which claim to resolve tensions that the Scriptures leave open. God is complicated! Or more accurately God is deep and rich and broad and wide and incomprehensible in His fullness. Yes, take seriously His warnings about this life and life to come. Take seriously His commands to obey and to reach out and tell others about Him. But also hold on to the knowledge and the hope and the truth that He is mysterious and all-powerful. That compassion and mercy are His to determine. As it says in Exodus 33:19
I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
Doesn't leave much room for us to decide who is in and who is out, does it?
Monday, October 31, 2011
I'm Back and Where I went
Hello All,
Yes! I am back, after a nearly two month, unplanned and unannounced sabbatical from the blog. I write you today, knowing deeply that my desire to return is a clear indication to my spirit that I am finally hearing God and being healed.
So where did I go? Well, I think I veered off the road about the time I arrived Indiana - maybe a bit before. You see, I was trying to do a lot. I was saying good-bye to my friends, my church, my home, and my parents. I was saying hello to a new home, a new living situation, a new job, and new people. I also had somethings hanging on to me - two summer internet teaching assignments and a brand new course to develop for the fall, lingering entanglements with my previous job and a sack load of unresolved healing to do around seeking the approval of others. Oh - I was also totally caught up in the fact that a dream of mine was finally coming true and now what was I going to do with it.
None of this was particularly "bad" or "unusual" or even "too much" with the provision of grace. The problem really started when two things snuck in. We will call these two things: "guilt" and "trying to fix it."
SO - Guilt. Believe it or not, when you are trying to do way too much you tend to drop the ball. I've dropped the ball more times than I care to count over the last four months (which, by the way, is never - that is, I care to never drop the ball). For example, I have a two $15.00 checks I've needed to mail; one for approximately four months, the other for two months. I have so many unreturned emails to people I love I cringe when I think about opening my gmail account. I am developing my course at a pace that places me one day behind each week and have grading stacked to the point that it would take at least two full days to get completely caught up. There are unpacked boxes and little fixes that need to be made all over the house. Oh!!! Oh!! And the worst of all, I agreed to take on a client at work, realized I was overbooked and had to refer him out. He was irritated and told my bosses - CRINGE!!!! And that's just what I can think up off the top of my head.
Now, did I meet myself with grace? Or go to God and ask Him to set my task list? No way Jose. Instead, I've been living in a perpetual state of guilt, shame and fear. I am not kidding when I say that my heart would literally start to beat through my chest when I thought about getting on-line. It represented for me a million failures, unmet deadlines and disappointed people. The other day, when my boss asked me about the complaint that client called about I was fine in the moment (Lord knows, if I had acted how I felt she might have disapproved...wink), I literally FREAKED OUT. Near tears, ruminating for hours about it, stuck, stuck, stuck. Guilt - "Your failing everyone, Paula." "You are not enough, Paula."
Surprisingly, I felt even less like getting caught up with all of that nonsense going on. It was getting to the point, that I would have to build myself up for twenty-minutes just work up the energy to open my email. Holy, Moly!
Now - Trying to Fix It. Trying to Fix it, moved in shortly after guilt. As I am intimately familiar with at this point, guilt, shame, condemnation, fear - whatever you want to call it - feels really bad. It makes me feel physically ill, like I wanna vomit. It makes me break out into a sweat. It makes me irritable and sad. Needless to say, I did not want to continue feeling this emotion. It sucks.
So, I went about trying to fix it. Rather than being entirely absent from this process, God does make an appearance in this part... at least in name. I tried to use God, like a tool, to fix the pain. I prayed. Of course, my prayers were mostly like "Oh God, this sucks. I hate this feeling. Let me tell you the five things I have planned to do to make it better." And then I would go about doing the 5 things I had planned to make it better. Meanwhile, for the first time in 3 years I was not doing my Bible Study homework with regularity, attending church with consistency or reading anything theological. I did not have one thing to write about on the blog. Don't get me wrong, I recognized these things were happening (see guilt above) and I was always trying very hard to fix it - adjusting the time of the day when I would complete Bible Study, planning a trip to a new church for the next weekend, promising myself for the 500th time I would get on the blog - but do you know what I actually did: I failed. Failed, failed, failed. The only thing that my grand plans succeeded at was adding more items to my overfull task list and more guilt for me to cope with.
I was in a state.
So what now? Well, God had been sending me little messages on the DL all the while. A card from my Bible Study girls back at Canyon. My Jackie beating her head into a wall trying to tell me to sit down and relax. David bending over backwards to try to take something off my plate, so I would just be happy for a minute. There were moments in the car, where a song would catch me and I would cry. But it didn't all come to a head until this week. Apparently, God has given me enough leash and is going to speak with a bull horn.
I have heard, in no less than four different places, that I need to SLOW DOWN and breath. An entire video devoted directly to the issue of working for victory instead of resting. You see, so long as I am working I am not trusting. God wants me to rest. Salvation = trust + rest. No work in there at all. I also learned about "the breath of God" or nooma (in Greek) from three different sources all in the same week - all saying, "Slow down, breath, let the breath of God fill you, let God fight your battles for you."
So I think I took my first big bite of rest. My first real acceptance that I don't have to dance around constantly trying to fix me in order for me and God to ok. Me and God ARE ok.
In fact, He says we are more than ok - I am his beloved child. Nothing I can do, no mistake I can ever make, will alter that. Sigh - Oh yeah... that's right isn't it?
Yes! I am back, after a nearly two month, unplanned and unannounced sabbatical from the blog. I write you today, knowing deeply that my desire to return is a clear indication to my spirit that I am finally hearing God and being healed.
So where did I go? Well, I think I veered off the road about the time I arrived Indiana - maybe a bit before. You see, I was trying to do a lot. I was saying good-bye to my friends, my church, my home, and my parents. I was saying hello to a new home, a new living situation, a new job, and new people. I also had somethings hanging on to me - two summer internet teaching assignments and a brand new course to develop for the fall, lingering entanglements with my previous job and a sack load of unresolved healing to do around seeking the approval of others. Oh - I was also totally caught up in the fact that a dream of mine was finally coming true and now what was I going to do with it.
None of this was particularly "bad" or "unusual" or even "too much" with the provision of grace. The problem really started when two things snuck in. We will call these two things: "guilt" and "trying to fix it."
SO - Guilt. Believe it or not, when you are trying to do way too much you tend to drop the ball. I've dropped the ball more times than I care to count over the last four months (which, by the way, is never - that is, I care to never drop the ball). For example, I have a two $15.00 checks I've needed to mail; one for approximately four months, the other for two months. I have so many unreturned emails to people I love I cringe when I think about opening my gmail account. I am developing my course at a pace that places me one day behind each week and have grading stacked to the point that it would take at least two full days to get completely caught up. There are unpacked boxes and little fixes that need to be made all over the house. Oh!!! Oh!! And the worst of all, I agreed to take on a client at work, realized I was overbooked and had to refer him out. He was irritated and told my bosses - CRINGE!!!! And that's just what I can think up off the top of my head.
Now, did I meet myself with grace? Or go to God and ask Him to set my task list? No way Jose. Instead, I've been living in a perpetual state of guilt, shame and fear. I am not kidding when I say that my heart would literally start to beat through my chest when I thought about getting on-line. It represented for me a million failures, unmet deadlines and disappointed people. The other day, when my boss asked me about the complaint that client called about I was fine in the moment (Lord knows, if I had acted how I felt she might have disapproved...wink), I literally FREAKED OUT. Near tears, ruminating for hours about it, stuck, stuck, stuck. Guilt - "Your failing everyone, Paula." "You are not enough, Paula."
Surprisingly, I felt even less like getting caught up with all of that nonsense going on. It was getting to the point, that I would have to build myself up for twenty-minutes just work up the energy to open my email. Holy, Moly!
Now - Trying to Fix It. Trying to Fix it, moved in shortly after guilt. As I am intimately familiar with at this point, guilt, shame, condemnation, fear - whatever you want to call it - feels really bad. It makes me feel physically ill, like I wanna vomit. It makes me break out into a sweat. It makes me irritable and sad. Needless to say, I did not want to continue feeling this emotion. It sucks.
So, I went about trying to fix it. Rather than being entirely absent from this process, God does make an appearance in this part... at least in name. I tried to use God, like a tool, to fix the pain. I prayed. Of course, my prayers were mostly like "Oh God, this sucks. I hate this feeling. Let me tell you the five things I have planned to do to make it better." And then I would go about doing the 5 things I had planned to make it better. Meanwhile, for the first time in 3 years I was not doing my Bible Study homework with regularity, attending church with consistency or reading anything theological. I did not have one thing to write about on the blog. Don't get me wrong, I recognized these things were happening (see guilt above) and I was always trying very hard to fix it - adjusting the time of the day when I would complete Bible Study, planning a trip to a new church for the next weekend, promising myself for the 500th time I would get on the blog - but do you know what I actually did: I failed. Failed, failed, failed. The only thing that my grand plans succeeded at was adding more items to my overfull task list and more guilt for me to cope with.
I was in a state.
So what now? Well, God had been sending me little messages on the DL all the while. A card from my Bible Study girls back at Canyon. My Jackie beating her head into a wall trying to tell me to sit down and relax. David bending over backwards to try to take something off my plate, so I would just be happy for a minute. There were moments in the car, where a song would catch me and I would cry. But it didn't all come to a head until this week. Apparently, God has given me enough leash and is going to speak with a bull horn.
I have heard, in no less than four different places, that I need to SLOW DOWN and breath. An entire video devoted directly to the issue of working for victory instead of resting. You see, so long as I am working I am not trusting. God wants me to rest. Salvation = trust + rest. No work in there at all. I also learned about "the breath of God" or nooma (in Greek) from three different sources all in the same week - all saying, "Slow down, breath, let the breath of God fill you, let God fight your battles for you."
So I think I took my first big bite of rest. My first real acceptance that I don't have to dance around constantly trying to fix me in order for me and God to ok. Me and God ARE ok.
In fact, He says we are more than ok - I am his beloved child. Nothing I can do, no mistake I can ever make, will alter that. Sigh - Oh yeah... that's right isn't it?
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Songs to Share
God has been ministering to me through music again. I use the word ministering (rather than talking or communicating) not to be ultra-spiritual, but to reflect what I feel like he is actually doing. He is healing and comforting me, soothing and reminding me - ministering to me.
It's funny, because I can't even tell you why some of these songs are so moving to me. They must speak to something I need to hear. So here they are -
The first is a Nichole Nordeman, Amy Grant collaboration based on the book of Ruth called "I'm with you." Ironically (given my recent depth study of Ruth), I didn't recognize it as a Ruth inspired song. What I recognized was a song about friendship and intimacy and commitment. The minute I heard the first chord and certainly by the end of the song I was tearful, grateful for my Jackie. In my mind, it's our song.
Next is a couple of Matt Maher songs. The first is "Christ is Risen", which has spoken really deeply to me since around Easter time. For some reason, the reality of what Christ's resurrection really means (i.e., Victory over sin and death!) and the beauty by which is was accomplished (i.e., through selflessness and sacrifice and compassion) was so salient and powerful to me. This song just claims this Truth so clearly. My absolute favorite part is the bridge: Oh death, where is your sting? Oh hell, where is your victory? Oh Church, come stand in the light! Our God is not dead, He's alive! He's alive!
The second I didn't even know was a Matt Maher song - it sounds super country - and part of me doesn't want to like it, but I love it! It's called "Turn Around" and it is about how God is in hot pursuit of us, always standing just behind us, longing and waiting for us.
Then there is Natalie Grant's "Your Great Name". My eyes just well up in tears: every fear has no place at the sound of Your great name... the enemy, He has to leave at the sound of Your great name.
Finally, there is Shawn McDonald's "Rise." For He, who is in me, is greater than I will ever be and I will rise. Yes, He, who is in me, is greater than I will ever be and I will rise.
It's funny, because I can't even tell you why some of these songs are so moving to me. They must speak to something I need to hear. So here they are -
The first is a Nichole Nordeman, Amy Grant collaboration based on the book of Ruth called "I'm with you." Ironically (given my recent depth study of Ruth), I didn't recognize it as a Ruth inspired song. What I recognized was a song about friendship and intimacy and commitment. The minute I heard the first chord and certainly by the end of the song I was tearful, grateful for my Jackie. In my mind, it's our song.
Next is a couple of Matt Maher songs. The first is "Christ is Risen", which has spoken really deeply to me since around Easter time. For some reason, the reality of what Christ's resurrection really means (i.e., Victory over sin and death!) and the beauty by which is was accomplished (i.e., through selflessness and sacrifice and compassion) was so salient and powerful to me. This song just claims this Truth so clearly. My absolute favorite part is the bridge: Oh death, where is your sting? Oh hell, where is your victory? Oh Church, come stand in the light! Our God is not dead, He's alive! He's alive!
The second I didn't even know was a Matt Maher song - it sounds super country - and part of me doesn't want to like it, but I love it! It's called "Turn Around" and it is about how God is in hot pursuit of us, always standing just behind us, longing and waiting for us.
Then there is Natalie Grant's "Your Great Name". My eyes just well up in tears: every fear has no place at the sound of Your great name... the enemy, He has to leave at the sound of Your great name.
Finally, there is Shawn McDonald's "Rise." For He, who is in me, is greater than I will ever be and I will rise. Yes, He, who is in me, is greater than I will ever be and I will rise.
Monday, August 22, 2011
Modesty
As you all know, I have been completing a Bible Study on sex and sexuality. For the past two weeks, I've been studying passages in Scripture (predominantly Proverbs) about "the strange woman." These passages are written as warnings to men, to stay away from women who use their sexuality, particularly risque dress, to entice them. And because the Bible study I am doing is geared to women, what we've really been talking about it modesty (i.e., Are you the strange woman?).
First, you should know that I immediately get salty when I even smell a hint in the air that women are going to get blamed for male sin. If a man is lusting in his heart, it is his issue. I want to say something like, I don't care if she is parading around in the nude, his thoughts and decisions are his responsibility. So you can imagine, two weeks devoted to telling me (or women generally) that they should dress modestly because otherwise we are going to tempt men into sin is going to have me prickly. And I am prickly about it. Women are not responsible for male sin. If a man lusts, it's his deal.
But I also want to say something else that is true. I recently had a very vulnerable conversation with two very close friends about some of my "stuff." And part of my "stuff" is the deep, entrenched longing to be the object of desire. I have a few recurrent dreams, one of which is directly related to this topic. Specifically, I have this dream where I am being chased by a man, sometimes many men. This is not a threatening dream, I am running and hiding but all the while enjoying because I want to be chased. It's one of those dreams when you wake up and you wish you could fall back asleep, because I feel so desirable. And in the conversation I had, I admitted that what I really want (deep down) is to be so beautiful, so captivating that every man in the room wants me - married, single, my husband or somebody-else's it doesn't matter. And I think that desire is really sick, it is the desire to be the strange woman.
And you may be thinking to yourself, what is so wrong with that desire?? What harm does it cause if you don't actually act on it??
Well, I want you to ask yourself something - have you ever known a woman like that? A woman that you know is conjuring up desire in every man around? Have you ever watched that desire manifest in an actuality? I have. I have intimately known at least three women - two of whom I called very close (even best) friends at points in my life - whom had a large degree of success at attaining what I desire. And this is my lived experience of that truth:
(1) They were not trustworthy women - their longing to be desired over-road everything else. You could not trust them with any man you loved (brother, boyfriend, father, husband, potential love interest), given the right set of circumstances no one was off limits. And I don't mean that they necessarily slept with all of them - they just used their sexuality to get something from them, most often a sense of self-esteem from being desired by them. As you can imagine this dramatically decreased their ability to have close friendships - it eventually ended most of ours.
(2) They were predatory - seducing men was not an accident. They dressed, talked, and walked in a way specifically aimed at seduction. They were not innocent. This is not the story of some innocently beautiful woman, who accidentally makes those around her swoon just by her mere presence (p.s. I have yet to meet one of these women outside of fiction). They were using their eyes, lips, and words as deliberately as a frat boy might use alcohol to get what they wanted.
(3) Getting involved with them was never a good idea. I mean honestly, no man I ever knew that got involved with one of these women ever left better off then when he started. They often broke off relationships with or cheated on other women in their lives. Many became quite attached and experienced great pain when she would move on or cheat on him. Honestly, the best case scenario was for the worst type of man - the one that was capitalizing on her vulnerability and knew she was "easy." But even they left with a awful stereotype of women confirmed.
(4) Finally, they were not happy - even though this huge desire was being fulfilled mostly they felt empty, incomplete and unlovable. Most often the fuel driving the longing train was a deep seated felling of unworthiness, that they needed to mediate as quickly and often as possible with a warm body's "proof" that they were worthy of something.
So when Proverbs says something like "Hey men - stay the heck away from women like that, they are only gonna kill you." I see that as just good advice. Sorta like saying to women, "Hey ladies, don't go to frat party alone those boys are often up to no good" is just good advice.
I also think it tells me, "Hey Paula, is this who you really want to be? Do you really think that being desirable is what you really want? Take a careful look at the price tag for both you and those around you - because it is not cheap."
First, you should know that I immediately get salty when I even smell a hint in the air that women are going to get blamed for male sin. If a man is lusting in his heart, it is his issue. I want to say something like, I don't care if she is parading around in the nude, his thoughts and decisions are his responsibility. So you can imagine, two weeks devoted to telling me (or women generally) that they should dress modestly because otherwise we are going to tempt men into sin is going to have me prickly. And I am prickly about it. Women are not responsible for male sin. If a man lusts, it's his deal.
But I also want to say something else that is true. I recently had a very vulnerable conversation with two very close friends about some of my "stuff." And part of my "stuff" is the deep, entrenched longing to be the object of desire. I have a few recurrent dreams, one of which is directly related to this topic. Specifically, I have this dream where I am being chased by a man, sometimes many men. This is not a threatening dream, I am running and hiding but all the while enjoying because I want to be chased. It's one of those dreams when you wake up and you wish you could fall back asleep, because I feel so desirable. And in the conversation I had, I admitted that what I really want (deep down) is to be so beautiful, so captivating that every man in the room wants me - married, single, my husband or somebody-else's it doesn't matter. And I think that desire is really sick, it is the desire to be the strange woman.
And you may be thinking to yourself, what is so wrong with that desire?? What harm does it cause if you don't actually act on it??
Well, I want you to ask yourself something - have you ever known a woman like that? A woman that you know is conjuring up desire in every man around? Have you ever watched that desire manifest in an actuality? I have. I have intimately known at least three women - two of whom I called very close (even best) friends at points in my life - whom had a large degree of success at attaining what I desire. And this is my lived experience of that truth:
(1) They were not trustworthy women - their longing to be desired over-road everything else. You could not trust them with any man you loved (brother, boyfriend, father, husband, potential love interest), given the right set of circumstances no one was off limits. And I don't mean that they necessarily slept with all of them - they just used their sexuality to get something from them, most often a sense of self-esteem from being desired by them. As you can imagine this dramatically decreased their ability to have close friendships - it eventually ended most of ours.
(2) They were predatory - seducing men was not an accident. They dressed, talked, and walked in a way specifically aimed at seduction. They were not innocent. This is not the story of some innocently beautiful woman, who accidentally makes those around her swoon just by her mere presence (p.s. I have yet to meet one of these women outside of fiction). They were using their eyes, lips, and words as deliberately as a frat boy might use alcohol to get what they wanted.
(3) Getting involved with them was never a good idea. I mean honestly, no man I ever knew that got involved with one of these women ever left better off then when he started. They often broke off relationships with or cheated on other women in their lives. Many became quite attached and experienced great pain when she would move on or cheat on him. Honestly, the best case scenario was for the worst type of man - the one that was capitalizing on her vulnerability and knew she was "easy." But even they left with a awful stereotype of women confirmed.
(4) Finally, they were not happy - even though this huge desire was being fulfilled mostly they felt empty, incomplete and unlovable. Most often the fuel driving the longing train was a deep seated felling of unworthiness, that they needed to mediate as quickly and often as possible with a warm body's "proof" that they were worthy of something.
So when Proverbs says something like "Hey men - stay the heck away from women like that, they are only gonna kill you." I see that as just good advice. Sorta like saying to women, "Hey ladies, don't go to frat party alone those boys are often up to no good" is just good advice.
I also think it tells me, "Hey Paula, is this who you really want to be? Do you really think that being desirable is what you really want? Take a careful look at the price tag for both you and those around you - because it is not cheap."
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
First Church Experience in Indiana
I went to church for the first time since the move this last Sunday. It isn't that I haven't wanted to go - it's something about moving and boxes and being entirely out of a routine that's kept me away. Every week I would think "I really need to go to church" and every week it would be Sunday at 11:00 and I would realize that the window had closed.
But what got me off my tuckus and to the church service, was the fact that one of my colleagues was speaking.
Ok - a quick side note - Can I just say how awesome it is to work at this practice?? We prayed together to open and close the staff meeting. Did you hear that??? At my JOB we prayed at a staff meeting! If that weren't enough, I met up with another of my colleagues to discuss transfer of cases and we spent probably half the meeting talking about how God is working in us and in the community. And at no time did either one of us feel the need to justify ourselves as still competent professionals or just generally non-judgmental people. Well, maybe I felt the need to (old habits die hard) but I didn't actually do any justifying and he didn't seem to care. Hallelujiah!
So back to the story...
One of my colleagues, David Smith, was speaking at the service. Now I knew through snippets that David had a interesting tale to tell; that he had walked with God through a time of being pastor for a church and had lost a child. I also knew that he was going to speak on suffering, despite (as his wife put it ) telling God he would not speak on suffering. You know its going to be good when God does something like that - He ain't foolin around. So I was NOT going to miss it.
So I was there - two Bibles in hand (my big study Bible and my little purse Bible; overkill I know - but I really didn't know what to expect). The venue was so strange - everything was different and yet familiar. I mean Canyon is huge; stadium seating, separate children's facility, 5 big screens, a full rock band, etc. This service was maybe 75 people with a projector in this room they typically used for faculty meetings. Yet we sang some familiar songs and prayed together. The church was in crisis a bit because a new baby among the church family, little Lily Frost, was sick (meningitis) and we prayed for her, her parents, the doctors, you name it. It was so warm and comfortable. I remember half-way through the service realizing that this was a little glimpse of a heaven - a room full of the faces I would see and the brothers and sisters with whom I would share eternity. You know this life is hard and being a Christian is not always easy, but moments like that - standing in a room full of basically strangers, in a new state, by myself still feeling a deep sense of connection and belonging - *sigh* there are some benefits, aren't there?
And then David begins speaking and he poses two questions: (1) Why does God allow suffering? and (2) Where is God in my suffering?.
Immediately two of my nearest and dearest come to mind. The first question brought my Leslie up. There was a pivotal moment in my relationship with Leslie where we were talking about my faith. Les often asked about my faith and listened intently. One day, she asked how I reconciled a loving God, who was active in the affairs of the world, with the suffering I see all around me - I gave some answer, I don't remember what, but I do remember her response. It was something like - "I've heard that before. And it works if we are talking about the small sufferings of my life, but it does nothing to explain the fact that God didn't stop those men in Africa from raiding homes, raping and killing families with small children over and over again." And though she didn't say it - hanging there was a question "Where was your God then?" And in a way I never saw before, I saw Leslie's heart, bleeding compassion and rage for those children and families. No shallow, American version of understanding suffering was going to work. She needed something she could bite into - something that didn't diminish the suffering of those people or paint something so atrocious using rosy, bright sided optimism.
So the Leslie from that moment lives with me. She will not let my soul settle for anything less. So listening to David speak - there she was, right next to me, listening. And though I cannot tell you whether or not the real Leslie would be satisfied with what David offered, I can tell you that I was satisfied. First, he said something like "all pain is the result of sin, sin that we all contribute to". For example, those men in Africa who did all that murdering and hating - they weren't born that angry, something made them angry. Maybe watching their parents struggle to feed their family or watching 3 of their siblings die of malaria or their fathers and uncles die in war.So it is really sin (personal sins against them, and more global sins like greed and selfishness) that causes those atrocities. Second, he said something like "and this fact means that we are living in a dead and dying world." Death and dying means = loss and tragedy = suffering. Thus, we end up with the truth that it is our poor choices that has created suffering. So why doesn't God remove our choice? The answer is that choice is what defines humanity. According to Biblical narrative, to remove our ability to choose - removes our ability to be human, to love, to anything. And God will not sacrifice our humanity no matter the cost, it was the purpose of our creation. Now perhaps you disagree with the price tag, but God does not.
What he did not say, but I will add - is what I call the good news of suffering. Specifically, that God DOES have a plan for this dead and dying world. He has not stood by inactive, allowing sin to swallow the world and pain to win. This plan honors our humanity and still allows for healing. His plan is REDEMPTION! To pay the price to be united to us; to heal the sin. The Biblical narrative does not diminish suffering, it states that God was was willing to pay any price to end it.
The second question brought my Jackie to mind. Walking along side her through the journey of grief has been challenging. It brings the reality of suffering from concept to lived experience. I have literally stood by as someone has felt abandoned by God to suffering - stood by as someone has cried out "WHERE ARE YOU?!?!" And I gotta tell you, my response has not always been good. I do not want to feel that way and as a result I do not want Jackie to feel that way. I want to make that moment about something she is doing wrong or something we can easily fix. But turns out, that is an incredibly shallow and selfish response.
And David - in the gentlest, realest way - helped me to see that. He pointed out that Christ himself felt abandoned by God and cried out to Him "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" He pointed out that God does not always show up with audible encouragement or a felt presence at the crisis moments for those who love him in the Bible. Many feel incredibly alone. So where is God in their suffering?
What you have to ask yourself is this, did God truly abandon these folks? Is the story that Joseph was abandoned in prison? Or that Job died in his misery? Was God not in Jesus sacrifice on the cross? Did he truly abandon him to suffering?
And what I figured out from those questions, is that the zenith of our suffering - though it may feel final - is only the middle of the story. Hope is coming. One more time - Hope IS coming.
Oh there was so much more my friends. Pages and pages more - where he spoke to the ways in which we as a church family can diminish each other in our pain - calling suffering "a lesson" or "a punishment" or a result of our "lack of faith". Or when he spoke to the ways that Jesus intimately knows and experienced suffering on this earth or bore the sin of the world in His body. But alas, I have gone on long enough for today and need to get back to work.
BTW - I am going to church this Sunday. No more tuckus sitting for me.
I love you all.
But what got me off my tuckus and to the church service, was the fact that one of my colleagues was speaking.
Ok - a quick side note - Can I just say how awesome it is to work at this practice?? We prayed together to open and close the staff meeting. Did you hear that??? At my JOB we prayed at a staff meeting! If that weren't enough, I met up with another of my colleagues to discuss transfer of cases and we spent probably half the meeting talking about how God is working in us and in the community. And at no time did either one of us feel the need to justify ourselves as still competent professionals or just generally non-judgmental people. Well, maybe I felt the need to (old habits die hard) but I didn't actually do any justifying and he didn't seem to care. Hallelujiah!
So back to the story...
One of my colleagues, David Smith, was speaking at the service. Now I knew through snippets that David had a interesting tale to tell; that he had walked with God through a time of being pastor for a church and had lost a child. I also knew that he was going to speak on suffering, despite (as his wife put it ) telling God he would not speak on suffering. You know its going to be good when God does something like that - He ain't foolin around. So I was NOT going to miss it.
So I was there - two Bibles in hand (my big study Bible and my little purse Bible; overkill I know - but I really didn't know what to expect). The venue was so strange - everything was different and yet familiar. I mean Canyon is huge; stadium seating, separate children's facility, 5 big screens, a full rock band, etc. This service was maybe 75 people with a projector in this room they typically used for faculty meetings. Yet we sang some familiar songs and prayed together. The church was in crisis a bit because a new baby among the church family, little Lily Frost, was sick (meningitis) and we prayed for her, her parents, the doctors, you name it. It was so warm and comfortable. I remember half-way through the service realizing that this was a little glimpse of a heaven - a room full of the faces I would see and the brothers and sisters with whom I would share eternity. You know this life is hard and being a Christian is not always easy, but moments like that - standing in a room full of basically strangers, in a new state, by myself still feeling a deep sense of connection and belonging - *sigh* there are some benefits, aren't there?
And then David begins speaking and he poses two questions: (1) Why does God allow suffering? and (2) Where is God in my suffering?.
Immediately two of my nearest and dearest come to mind. The first question brought my Leslie up. There was a pivotal moment in my relationship with Leslie where we were talking about my faith. Les often asked about my faith and listened intently. One day, she asked how I reconciled a loving God, who was active in the affairs of the world, with the suffering I see all around me - I gave some answer, I don't remember what, but I do remember her response. It was something like - "I've heard that before. And it works if we are talking about the small sufferings of my life, but it does nothing to explain the fact that God didn't stop those men in Africa from raiding homes, raping and killing families with small children over and over again." And though she didn't say it - hanging there was a question "Where was your God then?" And in a way I never saw before, I saw Leslie's heart, bleeding compassion and rage for those children and families. No shallow, American version of understanding suffering was going to work. She needed something she could bite into - something that didn't diminish the suffering of those people or paint something so atrocious using rosy, bright sided optimism.
So the Leslie from that moment lives with me. She will not let my soul settle for anything less. So listening to David speak - there she was, right next to me, listening. And though I cannot tell you whether or not the real Leslie would be satisfied with what David offered, I can tell you that I was satisfied. First, he said something like "all pain is the result of sin, sin that we all contribute to". For example, those men in Africa who did all that murdering and hating - they weren't born that angry, something made them angry. Maybe watching their parents struggle to feed their family or watching 3 of their siblings die of malaria or their fathers and uncles die in war.So it is really sin (personal sins against them, and more global sins like greed and selfishness) that causes those atrocities. Second, he said something like "and this fact means that we are living in a dead and dying world." Death and dying means = loss and tragedy = suffering. Thus, we end up with the truth that it is our poor choices that has created suffering. So why doesn't God remove our choice? The answer is that choice is what defines humanity. According to Biblical narrative, to remove our ability to choose - removes our ability to be human, to love, to anything. And God will not sacrifice our humanity no matter the cost, it was the purpose of our creation. Now perhaps you disagree with the price tag, but God does not.
What he did not say, but I will add - is what I call the good news of suffering. Specifically, that God DOES have a plan for this dead and dying world. He has not stood by inactive, allowing sin to swallow the world and pain to win. This plan honors our humanity and still allows for healing. His plan is REDEMPTION! To pay the price to be united to us; to heal the sin. The Biblical narrative does not diminish suffering, it states that God was was willing to pay any price to end it.
The second question brought my Jackie to mind. Walking along side her through the journey of grief has been challenging. It brings the reality of suffering from concept to lived experience. I have literally stood by as someone has felt abandoned by God to suffering - stood by as someone has cried out "WHERE ARE YOU?!?!" And I gotta tell you, my response has not always been good. I do not want to feel that way and as a result I do not want Jackie to feel that way. I want to make that moment about something she is doing wrong or something we can easily fix. But turns out, that is an incredibly shallow and selfish response.
And David - in the gentlest, realest way - helped me to see that. He pointed out that Christ himself felt abandoned by God and cried out to Him "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" He pointed out that God does not always show up with audible encouragement or a felt presence at the crisis moments for those who love him in the Bible. Many feel incredibly alone. So where is God in their suffering?
What you have to ask yourself is this, did God truly abandon these folks? Is the story that Joseph was abandoned in prison? Or that Job died in his misery? Was God not in Jesus sacrifice on the cross? Did he truly abandon him to suffering?
And what I figured out from those questions, is that the zenith of our suffering - though it may feel final - is only the middle of the story. Hope is coming. One more time - Hope IS coming.
Oh there was so much more my friends. Pages and pages more - where he spoke to the ways in which we as a church family can diminish each other in our pain - calling suffering "a lesson" or "a punishment" or a result of our "lack of faith". Or when he spoke to the ways that Jesus intimately knows and experienced suffering on this earth or bore the sin of the world in His body. But alas, I have gone on long enough for today and need to get back to work.
BTW - I am going to church this Sunday. No more tuckus sitting for me.
I love you all.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Reflecting on Sex
So I’ve been doing a Bible study focused on God’s design for sexuality. I think I’ve been sucked into the topic since I read Rob Bell’s Sex God where he explored the infinite connections between our spirituality and sexuality. It really opened my eyes to something I already knew deep down, that there is a whole lot more to sex than physical pleasure or release.
I’ve known that to be true since forever. I mean sex is great – but what draws me to it has very little to do with the physicality of it. It’s the feelings of acceptance (desirability, even!) and closeness that I long for.
I remember the first time I decided I would sleep with someone if he asked. I was 15 and away at summer camp, missing my very close friend and first love. I missed his gaze and the feeling of his shoulder pressed up against mine in his little truck. I decided if he wanted me, I would be his. Not because I wanted to have an orgasm, but because I wanted to be missed in the way that I was missing him. I wanted to feel like I belonged to him, was a part of him. I wanted us to be connected in some indefinable and immutable way.
Well if you know me well at all, you know that this story did not end in consummation but rejection. Perhaps for the best, right? No teenage sex. No unplanned pregnancy or man from my past. But what stands out for me is the profound way this experience shaped me. And yet we are told, over and over that we all just want sex to procreate or to feel that sexy feeling. But I didn’t feel the pinch of missing out on a “release” or a “pleasure” at 15. It certainly didn’t feel shallow or meaningless then. It felt like the ultimate exposure and rejection.
All this to say – that when God makes a big deal about sex I believe it.
And boy oh boy, does He make a big deal about sex.
My Bible teacher for this study is Kay Arthur. And if you know anything about Kay, she goes right to the meat. No dancing around in the safe verses, instead by day two we are reading Leviticus and how you should stone adulterers to purge evil from Israel.
“Yowza! What is this doing in here?” I think to myself. I mean, I’m not a moron, I knew stuff like that was in the Old Testament, but staring it straight in the face day after day makes you think about what in the heck God is trying to say. Just to keep rooted in the faith I found myself mumbling “To see me, is to see the father” trying to remember the revelation of God’s character is found in the person of Jesus Christ – the same dude who said, “He who is without sin, cast the first stone.”
I also took a week off. This also seemed to help to give me the distance I needed to start seeing something of what God is saying. And not that I’ve sussed the whole thing out – but it seems super clear that God is saying something like:
Sex is a very big deal. Sex is more than sex, sex is a representation of something incredibly profound spiritually. Perverting (or corrupting, or co-opting) sex is a very big no, no. Sex is the physical manifestation of covenant – two becoming one – you don’t mess with that without some very serious and long lasting consequences.
This stands in stark contrast to our culture’s messages about sex. Like: “sex is fun and inconsequential” or “sex is something we can use to market something else”.
And I wonder which holds up for you. I wonder if, like me, you weren’t looking for something deeper the first time you decided you would have sex. Or if you didn’t feel robbed of something more profound when you weren’t given the choice.
I don’t know. I am very white and suburban and female and Midwestern and heterosexual– so I get that I don’t get what sex is like for everyone else. It just seems so unlikely to me that the way it differs in its degree of significance.
Anyway, I know there’s some stuff to argue about in there. Stuff about what constitutes perversion and corruption – stuff that is valuable to work out. But what weighs heavy on my heart today is the larger image (sex as a profound spiritual practice) and the larger loss (sex is cheap and meaningless).
Friday, July 22, 2011
Sparkle
I’ve been having a lot of deep conversations lately. You know, those stay up until 3:00 in the morning over a bottle of wine (or in this case a six pack of beer) exploring the mysteries of the universe and your soul. I’m around the people who bring that out the most in me – though, to be fair it is not at all difficult to suck me into psychological, philosophical, or moral discussions that creep into the wee hours, I just love them.
As always, I’ve left most of these conversations reflecting on what others and I’ve said. Recently, I've also walked away with a salty dissatisfaction with myself. Most often I’m dissatisfied because I feel like I’ve come across as hard-hearted and cynical and certainly not the hopeful, humanitarian who sees the good in all things (as I hope to be perceived). If I were to comprise a theme to my input, it’s generally that people and the world are broken and selfish and there is little hope that whatever they do or say is going to fix it.
And the truth is I believe that.
I have been reading the Mitch Albom book For One More Day. The first day I was reading I came across a quote I just had to write down:
Maybe you figure men like me, men who play in the World Series, can never sink as low as suicide because they always have, at the very least, the “dream come true” thing. But you’d be wrong. All that happens when your dream comes true is a slow, melting realization that it wasn’t what you thought and it won’t save you.
I believe that. I cannot underline, highlight or exclamation mark that truth enough. No wordly dream is what you thought. No person is what can fix you. Not even your inherent beauty or humanity. No, no, no. And I feel like I’ve been thrusting forth that message with such clarity and force that the only conclusion I can draw from listening to myself is that I am a hopeless cynic who doesn’t see the beauty in people, only their short-comings and failures.
But that is not true. I love people. I think people sparkle. Even the most broken soul still sparkles in the light. They can’t help it. They are created by God to sparkle.
But here’s the deal – sparkling involves two entities: the prism and the light.
See what the world tells us is that we don’t need the light to be beautiful. Which in some sense is true, I mean prisms are neat looking with or without sun shining through them. But prisms are meaningless without light (what is a prism for except to refract light?) and they certainly don’t sparkle. I see it everywhere – do this, buy into this or that ideal and you’ll be fixed. But the only way – the only real and lasting way to find meaning is to hang in the light and let it shine through you. Sparkle.
So I think I feel cynical, because I keep incessantly shooting down every other option.
It’s a weird juxtaposition to me. Here I am, at once and earnestly cynical about this world, yet also entirely hopeful for the hand of God to redeem, to dust off and to make us all sparkle.
Monday, July 11, 2011
Welcome home, Paula
So this is it… my first official post from the farmhouse.
My brother sent me a post a few days ago that said “Welcome home.” It’s weird to think of this place as home and not some vacation spot. I found out a few days ago that it actually has been a retreat destination. It has certainly been that for me this far.
I love old houses. The way they sound (creak, crack) and smell (dust and age). Houses this old seem wise. Let me share some of my favorite bits of this old house:
Stained glass windows… Aren’t they perfect? Stained glass reminds me of my paternal grandmother’s house. My Grandma Emke was (and is) this generally stoic German woman whose house was always immaculately kept. She also baked up a storm. Stained glass windows remind me of the Easters I spent at her house eating delicately frosted sugar cookie bunnies (her famous recipe) with little red hots for eyes. Delicious. It also reminds me about the way she used to stand at the door and watch us drive away. She would wave her hand and one tear would slip down her cheek. There is something so powerful about when those who hold their cards so close to the chest show emotion visibly. It’s so tangible and real. Something that makes you feel really deeply but simultaneously respect them. 
Patterned Wall paper…. Along the halls and some of the ceilings is this white wallpaper that looks like punched tin (one of my favorites). It’s peeling back in places. My anal retentive side wants to get out the wallpaper paste and fix it, but my heart likes the age and imperfection. It’s beautiful and it’s old. I think there is something really comforting about that for me. 
This old vanity/hutch in the upstairs bath…. I just love all the drawers. Makes me feel like I am five years old wondering what could be nestled inside. (BTW – Right now there is nothing nestled inside, but one day…)I also love the deck and the river and the porch and the garden and the sticky weather and the huge windows that let in light everywhere. I love the trees and the hammocks, the flowers and the bug bites and the smell of rain in the air. The hardwood floors, the ever playing sound track of music, the stream of welcoming visitors. The doggie boys dancing their dance whenever I come or go.
But the bits I love the absolute most are the hardest to share. A spontaneous bear hug from behind – “I’ve been wanting to do that all day.” People who are interested in listening to you tell the same old stories over again; smiling, laughing or crying at all the appropriate spots. Hearing new and old stories. Sharing a bottle of wine. Trying a new type of beer (Lingen-something er other). Watching as ones I love so much, giggle and experiment with our forehead thermometer for Sydney – “I wonder how different my temperature is from my head to my arm” or lift her up so she can “climb her first tree.”
I’ve had all of my fear of rejection brokenness surfacing here. It’s seems so out of place in this context, but I see what this is. These circles of friends have always meant rejection for me. Look at how close “we are.” But here, in some way that is undeniable to me, it isn’t “we” but “us.” It isn’t theirs but ours.
I guess that is what my brother probably meant when he said welcome home.
Welcome home, Paula.
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Here I am Lord
I am preparing for leading Bible study tonight. The first part of this week is focused on being called to redeem, or our role in carrying out God's redemptive plan. It got me thinking about my favorite old hymn, Here I am, Lord. I can remember being so young, like six or seven at the oldest, and singing this song to myself or being so delighted when it would be included in mass. It's hung with me through everything - my many years outside of the church, my doubts, everything. Whenever I would feel really lost or alone, I would sing this song.
So here it is (lyrics below):
So here it is (lyrics below):
I, the Lord of sea and sky,
I have heard my people cry.
All who dwell in dark and sin,
My hand will save.
I have heard my people cry.
All who dwell in dark and sin,
My hand will save.
I who make the stars of night,
I will make their darkness bright.
Who will bear my light to them?
Whom shall I send?
I will make their darkness bright.
Who will bear my light to them?
Whom shall I send?
Chorus:
Here I am, Lord. It is I Lord?
I have heard you calling in the night.
I will go, Lord, where you lead me.
I will hold your people in my heart.
I have heard you calling in the night.
I will go, Lord, where you lead me.
I will hold your people in my heart.
I, the Lord of snow and rain,
I have borne my people’s pain.
I have wept for love of them.
They turn away.
I have borne my people’s pain.
I have wept for love of them.
They turn away.
I will break their hearts of stone,
Give them hearts for love alone.
I will speak my words to them.
Whom shall I send?
(chorus)
Give them hearts for love alone.
I will speak my words to them.
Whom shall I send?
(chorus)
I, the Lord of wind and flame,
I will tend the poor and lame.
I will set a feast for them.
My hand will save.
I will tend the poor and lame.
I will set a feast for them.
My hand will save.
Finest bread I will provide,
Till their hearts be satisfied.
I will give my life to them.
Whom shall I send?
Till their hearts be satisfied.
I will give my life to them.
Whom shall I send?
(chorus)
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Had to Share
Every once in awhile during Bible study I will come across a paragraph or verse that makes me want to jump out of my seat and shout 'Amen!' This morning, I had one of those moments and I just had to share it. So here it is (marked like my book):
"I wrote my first Bible study about modern-day idols and called it, No Other Gods. One of the main characteristics of serving false gods is that we must constantly downgrade our expectations of them. We start with high hopes and dreams that a certain idol will deliver happiness, excitement, and well-being to our lives; but because a false god is false by its very nature, our expectation must continually be lowered until we're in total bondage to something that doesn't even resemble anything close to what we had originally hoped. But not so with one true God. With Him we find the opposite. The more we get to know Him, the more we trust and serve Him, the more our expectations ascend and our realities bloom."
And then I wrote three "Amen!"s in the margin.
One of the things that strikes me the most about my relationship with God is that I find the above paragraph to be true and my logical/atheistic flesh absolutely cannot explain it. How so?
I have unquestionably worshiped approval, achievement, beauty and success. All of which, at least to some degree, I have been successful in attaining. And the process of that attainment, has always left me feeling in bondage. Bondage to long hours of work, diets, tied to a mirror or the shopping mall, weighed down by the scale. Even during times of success, the debt looms large. Nothing is satisfying.
Yet, when I started worshiping God and following Jesus, I have found myself freer and freer. This worship has not asked unreasonable things from me. Nor has my belief disappointed me. In fact, the very opposite has proved true - I have gained more happiness, peace and contentment from the decision to worship Christ that I have from any other of my pursuits.
Now if there is no God, there is no explanation for this. This worship should look like all other earthy pursuit and ultimately fail to satisfy. In fact, because my worship would be entirely empty, it should prove fruitless even more quickly than most false idols. How can you explain how belief in a non-existent god can transform more radically than belief in yourself? belief in tangible rewards? belief in accolades? belief in relationships?
The short answer for me, is that I can't. I can't explain me, who I am now, without God.
Love you all.
"I wrote my first Bible study about modern-day idols and called it, No Other Gods. One of the main characteristics of serving false gods is that we must constantly downgrade our expectations of them. We start with high hopes and dreams that a certain idol will deliver happiness, excitement, and well-being to our lives; but because a false god is false by its very nature, our expectation must continually be lowered until we're in total bondage to something that doesn't even resemble anything close to what we had originally hoped. But not so with one true God. With Him we find the opposite. The more we get to know Him, the more we trust and serve Him, the more our expectations ascend and our realities bloom."
And then I wrote three "Amen!"s in the margin.
One of the things that strikes me the most about my relationship with God is that I find the above paragraph to be true and my logical/atheistic flesh absolutely cannot explain it. How so?
I have unquestionably worshiped approval, achievement, beauty and success. All of which, at least to some degree, I have been successful in attaining. And the process of that attainment, has always left me feeling in bondage. Bondage to long hours of work, diets, tied to a mirror or the shopping mall, weighed down by the scale. Even during times of success, the debt looms large. Nothing is satisfying.
Yet, when I started worshiping God and following Jesus, I have found myself freer and freer. This worship has not asked unreasonable things from me. Nor has my belief disappointed me. In fact, the very opposite has proved true - I have gained more happiness, peace and contentment from the decision to worship Christ that I have from any other of my pursuits.
Now if there is no God, there is no explanation for this. This worship should look like all other earthy pursuit and ultimately fail to satisfy. In fact, because my worship would be entirely empty, it should prove fruitless even more quickly than most false idols. How can you explain how belief in a non-existent god can transform more radically than belief in yourself? belief in tangible rewards? belief in accolades? belief in relationships?
The short answer for me, is that I can't. I can't explain me, who I am now, without God.
Love you all.
Monday, June 20, 2011
The Down-side of Redemption
I have been in a really rocky place for the last few weeks. I think David has been too. This move is bringing up all of our insecurities and neither of us is feeling particularly equipped to help the other. We also look at each other with a little resentment in our eyes - thinking "This is MY time of need here. Aren't YOU supposed to be helping ME? Isn't that why I got married in the first place, so that I would have help when I needed it?"
In case you were wondering, what I have just written out there is sin. Not sin the behavior (i.e., murdering, lying, stealing, sleeping around, etc.), though that is the type of sin that gets the most press; but real sin, or the true nature of sin, the sin in our hearts. Pride. Selfishness. Entitlement.
When that part of our nature shows, we are pretty ugly and unloveable. I want to remind myself, that no where in my vows did it say anything about loving David so long as he helped me out, or did what I needed when I needed it. Nor does that even seem reasonable when you consider the fact that marriage is about two people becoming one. Hello! If your both the same person, your pains are going to be his pains; your time of need is going to be his time of need too. How is it possible for this tit-for-tat (or complimentary - as it is more euphemistically put) mentality supposed to work when you share joys, failures, brokenness, stress, and pain?? You both have the most to offer at the same time, and the least to offer at the same time - it's not going to work.
And it is at this moment, when I am working the irrationality and unfairness of my desires through, that I come face to face with my limitations. When I come face to face with my own sin. My own bankrupt state. My selfishness prohibits me from being there for David. My entitlement stops me from thinking I should. My pride emphasizes his short-comings and minimizes my own.
I need a goel, a redeemer, one whose love is far deeper than my own, to supply me with what I need right now. Because, quite frankly, I don't have much love to offer, much forgiveness to give out, much humility to spare. I think what I am, very much of the time right now, is one big gaping need. I need love, I need forgiveness, I need security, patience, mercy, softening. I need, need, need, need, need. NEED.
And I, frankly, I am pissed about this! And isn't it David's job to fix this?? And why, when I am them most desperate, is he the least available? And, and, and, and, and.
'Oh, honey,' I hear somewhere down in my spirit, 'he is never going to satisfy you, and you, you're never going to satisfy him. Those shoes are far too big for either of you to fill. Stop trying to get what you need from him and come to Me.'
And I wrestle with this, because it means growing my faith. Relying on Deity that I cannot see or prove or verify or sue if He lets me down. I also cannot offer anything in exchange, I can only humbly receive, a powerless, vulnerable position if ever there was one. But this is the option. The only option that will work.
This is the down-side to a goel, to redemption. We must admit that we can't do it and we don't have anything to offer. We must have faith and humility. Our pride and self-righteousness and entitlement can't come.
In case you were wondering, what I have just written out there is sin. Not sin the behavior (i.e., murdering, lying, stealing, sleeping around, etc.), though that is the type of sin that gets the most press; but real sin, or the true nature of sin, the sin in our hearts. Pride. Selfishness. Entitlement.
When that part of our nature shows, we are pretty ugly and unloveable. I want to remind myself, that no where in my vows did it say anything about loving David so long as he helped me out, or did what I needed when I needed it. Nor does that even seem reasonable when you consider the fact that marriage is about two people becoming one. Hello! If your both the same person, your pains are going to be his pains; your time of need is going to be his time of need too. How is it possible for this tit-for-tat (or complimentary - as it is more euphemistically put) mentality supposed to work when you share joys, failures, brokenness, stress, and pain?? You both have the most to offer at the same time, and the least to offer at the same time - it's not going to work.
And it is at this moment, when I am working the irrationality and unfairness of my desires through, that I come face to face with my limitations. When I come face to face with my own sin. My own bankrupt state. My selfishness prohibits me from being there for David. My entitlement stops me from thinking I should. My pride emphasizes his short-comings and minimizes my own.
I need a goel, a redeemer, one whose love is far deeper than my own, to supply me with what I need right now. Because, quite frankly, I don't have much love to offer, much forgiveness to give out, much humility to spare. I think what I am, very much of the time right now, is one big gaping need. I need love, I need forgiveness, I need security, patience, mercy, softening. I need, need, need, need, need. NEED.
And I, frankly, I am pissed about this! And isn't it David's job to fix this?? And why, when I am them most desperate, is he the least available? And, and, and, and, and.
'Oh, honey,' I hear somewhere down in my spirit, 'he is never going to satisfy you, and you, you're never going to satisfy him. Those shoes are far too big for either of you to fill. Stop trying to get what you need from him and come to Me.'
And I wrestle with this, because it means growing my faith. Relying on Deity that I cannot see or prove or verify or sue if He lets me down. I also cannot offer anything in exchange, I can only humbly receive, a powerless, vulnerable position if ever there was one. But this is the option. The only option that will work.
This is the down-side to a goel, to redemption. We must admit that we can't do it and we don't have anything to offer. We must have faith and humility. Our pride and self-righteousness and entitlement can't come.
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Goel Follow-Up
I was perusing the short videos created to go with the Ruth study this morning. The videos are called "The Living Room Series" because its basically footage of a the author and her group of girlfriends sitting around talking about the study.
Normally, I like them - but this one I LOVED! I don't want to say too much before you watch - so take a look and then I'll tell you what I loved about it.
Ruth: Loss, Love & Legacy Week 3 from April Dace on Vimeo.
Ok - so what do I love.
(1) The exchange about the homemade whipped cream, sliced strawberries and purchased cake. There is something about friendship there - especially when the girl said "What she meant to say was that she grew these strawberries herself" that just makes me smile. It reminds me of the ease, comfort and intimacy of closest my female friendships.
(2) When Kelly mentions that we need to remember that God is the author of social justice. As a psychologist, I hear this term thrown about quite a lot. Used by people who know it is the right thing to say, but have absolutely no heart for the matter at all. They are interested in creating another in and out group actually: the competent - of which they are clearly a part - and the incompetent. I love being reminded that Our God is all about social justice in earnest. Inviting the slave to the table since the beginning. It makes me breath a little easier.
(BTW: I know she says Christ, which might get some of your panties in a knot about timelines - but I think she means Christ, as in the Word that has existed since before the foundation of the Earth; and if she doesn't she should - because the book of Ruth takes place before Jesus walked the Earth).
(3) Finally, I absolutely LOVE the part where one of the women asks if they will explore why Boaz did those things for Ruth. It is so revealing about us ladies - She says "Why? Was she really attractive? ... Was Boaz really desperate to get married? Was she really beautiful?"
OH HEAVENS! Can you see our sickness all over that??? The options are "she's either gorgeous or he's desperate!"And before you think I am condemning this woman, you must know that I have thought THE SAME THING! Despite the fact that not one shred of Scripture supports the interpretation that any of this story has to do with Ruth's physical appearance, I just assume she must have been beautiful to have "caught Boaz's eye." Thus, I see myself and our broken culture and how I still, clearly, have some healing left to do.
I also think it reflects how broken we can be in our understanding of redemption. I mean, we just don't get grace at all. Our first question, when talking about a redeemer, is essentially "What did she do to deserve it?" And the answer is plainly: nothing. She did nothing to deserve it. She could not earn it. If she could, that would not be redemption. We just don't speak redemption.
Anyway, somethings to chew on. I love you.
Normally, I like them - but this one I LOVED! I don't want to say too much before you watch - so take a look and then I'll tell you what I loved about it.
Ruth: Loss, Love & Legacy Week 3 from April Dace on Vimeo.
Ok - so what do I love.
(1) The exchange about the homemade whipped cream, sliced strawberries and purchased cake. There is something about friendship there - especially when the girl said "What she meant to say was that she grew these strawberries herself" that just makes me smile. It reminds me of the ease, comfort and intimacy of closest my female friendships.
(2) When Kelly mentions that we need to remember that God is the author of social justice. As a psychologist, I hear this term thrown about quite a lot. Used by people who know it is the right thing to say, but have absolutely no heart for the matter at all. They are interested in creating another in and out group actually: the competent - of which they are clearly a part - and the incompetent. I love being reminded that Our God is all about social justice in earnest. Inviting the slave to the table since the beginning. It makes me breath a little easier.
(BTW: I know she says Christ, which might get some of your panties in a knot about timelines - but I think she means Christ, as in the Word that has existed since before the foundation of the Earth; and if she doesn't she should - because the book of Ruth takes place before Jesus walked the Earth).
(3) Finally, I absolutely LOVE the part where one of the women asks if they will explore why Boaz did those things for Ruth. It is so revealing about us ladies - She says "Why? Was she really attractive? ... Was Boaz really desperate to get married? Was she really beautiful?"
OH HEAVENS! Can you see our sickness all over that??? The options are "she's either gorgeous or he's desperate!"And before you think I am condemning this woman, you must know that I have thought THE SAME THING! Despite the fact that not one shred of Scripture supports the interpretation that any of this story has to do with Ruth's physical appearance, I just assume she must have been beautiful to have "caught Boaz's eye." Thus, I see myself and our broken culture and how I still, clearly, have some healing left to do.
I also think it reflects how broken we can be in our understanding of redemption. I mean, we just don't get grace at all. Our first question, when talking about a redeemer, is essentially "What did she do to deserve it?" And the answer is plainly: nothing. She did nothing to deserve it. She could not earn it. If she could, that would not be redemption. We just don't speak redemption.
Anyway, somethings to chew on. I love you.
Monday, June 13, 2011
Goel - The Kinsman Redeemer
Do you know what I love - literature with multiple layers.
I first realized this sophomore year of high school, when we read Wuthering Heights for the first time. As we discussed the text in class, I realized that there were several stories within the story- the story of Heathcliff and Catherine, the story of wealth and poverty, the story of fickleness and circumstance. All of these stories wrapped up into one book. I felt so engaged, I could read the same book 5 times and explore different things each time.
One of my favorite things about the Bible, is that it is just the same. And whats more, though each book has a story about specific people, at a specific time, doing specific things - each book also has layers of meaning and depth. And what is even more incomprehensible, is that in someways each book tells one story - Christ's story, the story of redemption.
Now all 66 books have this story, but I am presently reading/studying the book of Ruth. Ruth tells the redemption story through a Cinderella tale that begins with tragedy and ends with the birth of a son. In the middle, we get up close look at a man named Boaz. The look at Boaz tells us things about Boaz, but it also tells us something about the Jewish culture, something about Christ and something about God.
What Boaz teaches us about Jewish culture, is about the role of "goel". Specifically, in Leviticus God sets up a redemption plan for wayward Jews who through unfortunate circumstances or bad decisions end up in debt. God ordains that a blood relative may act as "goel" (literally meaning "the one who redeems") or "kinsman redeemer" by purchasing lost land or paying off debt. From what I can tell, this was a revered position, intended to provide second chances for broken people. There were four qualifications for a goel: (1) They must be a blood relative, (2) They must have the ability (in this case the money) to redeem, (3) They must be willing to redeem (its a choice) and (4) They must be willing to marry the widow of their kinsman and bear a child in their name. Boaz is the image of the Jewish culture's goel - he can, he does, he marries, he redeems. Very knight in shining armor like.
By acting as a goel to Ruth and Naomi, Boaz also teaches us about the ultimate Goel, our Goel, Jesus. Look at those qualifications - He must be one of us (Philippians 2:6-8), He must be able to redeem (have the ability to pay the price for sin; 2 Corinthians 5:21), He must be willing to redeem (choose to pay the price for sin; Luke 23:34) and He must be willing to marry the widow of sin (the Bride of Christ, Revelation 19: 7-10).
Finally, Boaz teaches us something about God (this is my favorite part!). Specifically, God has been writing the redemption story from the very beginning. Leviticus, the portion of the Bible laying down the rules and identity of the goel, is a part of the Torah - the sacred Jewish texts thought to be written by Moses himself. Ruth was also written chronologically, early on - most likely book #8. God has been telling us, how this was going to happen since He's been speaking. It's never changed - not once.
There is something so beautiful and secure about that. That God has been saying the same thing to people for thousands of years. That we can mess it up, miss interpret it, get confused, get angry, get lost, whatever - He's still saying the same thing. I will redeem you. There are second chances. You don't have to be capable, or earn it, or deserve it - I will provide it and we will be married (joined, merged, united in an unbreakable bond). Let me show you in this role. Let me show you again in this story. Let me show you with My Son. Let me show you with your life.
Oh Lord. Thank you. What I beautiful story You are telling.
I first realized this sophomore year of high school, when we read Wuthering Heights for the first time. As we discussed the text in class, I realized that there were several stories within the story- the story of Heathcliff and Catherine, the story of wealth and poverty, the story of fickleness and circumstance. All of these stories wrapped up into one book. I felt so engaged, I could read the same book 5 times and explore different things each time.
One of my favorite things about the Bible, is that it is just the same. And whats more, though each book has a story about specific people, at a specific time, doing specific things - each book also has layers of meaning and depth. And what is even more incomprehensible, is that in someways each book tells one story - Christ's story, the story of redemption.
Now all 66 books have this story, but I am presently reading/studying the book of Ruth. Ruth tells the redemption story through a Cinderella tale that begins with tragedy and ends with the birth of a son. In the middle, we get up close look at a man named Boaz. The look at Boaz tells us things about Boaz, but it also tells us something about the Jewish culture, something about Christ and something about God.
What Boaz teaches us about Jewish culture, is about the role of "goel". Specifically, in Leviticus God sets up a redemption plan for wayward Jews who through unfortunate circumstances or bad decisions end up in debt. God ordains that a blood relative may act as "goel" (literally meaning "the one who redeems") or "kinsman redeemer" by purchasing lost land or paying off debt. From what I can tell, this was a revered position, intended to provide second chances for broken people. There were four qualifications for a goel: (1) They must be a blood relative, (2) They must have the ability (in this case the money) to redeem, (3) They must be willing to redeem (its a choice) and (4) They must be willing to marry the widow of their kinsman and bear a child in their name. Boaz is the image of the Jewish culture's goel - he can, he does, he marries, he redeems. Very knight in shining armor like.
By acting as a goel to Ruth and Naomi, Boaz also teaches us about the ultimate Goel, our Goel, Jesus. Look at those qualifications - He must be one of us (Philippians 2:6-8), He must be able to redeem (have the ability to pay the price for sin; 2 Corinthians 5:21), He must be willing to redeem (choose to pay the price for sin; Luke 23:34) and He must be willing to marry the widow of sin (the Bride of Christ, Revelation 19: 7-10).
Finally, Boaz teaches us something about God (this is my favorite part!). Specifically, God has been writing the redemption story from the very beginning. Leviticus, the portion of the Bible laying down the rules and identity of the goel, is a part of the Torah - the sacred Jewish texts thought to be written by Moses himself. Ruth was also written chronologically, early on - most likely book #8. God has been telling us, how this was going to happen since He's been speaking. It's never changed - not once.
There is something so beautiful and secure about that. That God has been saying the same thing to people for thousands of years. That we can mess it up, miss interpret it, get confused, get angry, get lost, whatever - He's still saying the same thing. I will redeem you. There are second chances. You don't have to be capable, or earn it, or deserve it - I will provide it and we will be married (joined, merged, united in an unbreakable bond). Let me show you in this role. Let me show you again in this story. Let me show you with My Son. Let me show you with your life.
Oh Lord. Thank you. What I beautiful story You are telling.
Monday, June 6, 2011
To Write Love on Her Arms
I was watching Life Today this morning and they were featuring a new author named Gabe Lyons and his book "The Next Christians." There are a lot of truly compelling stories in this book, but one jumped out about some Christians that formed an organization call "To Write Love on Her Arms." They sell t-shirts to support treatment for those with depression and addiction. Here's a link to their website.
During the show, they told just enough about the story that began the organization to get me looking. A few minutes of googling and here's what I found (just have to share it because it's so beautiful):
Pedro the Lion is loud in the speakers, and the city waits just outside our open windows. She sits and sings, legs crossed in the passenger seat, her pretty voice hiding in the volume. Music is a safe place and Pedro is her favorite. It hits me that she won't see this skyline for several weeks, and we will be without her. I lean forward, knowing this will be written, and I ask what she'd say if her story had an audience. She smiles. "Tell them to look up. Tell them to remember the stars."
I would rather write her a song, because songs don't wait to resolve, and because songs mean so much to her. Stories wait for endings, but songs are brave things bold enough to sing when all they know is darkness. These words, like most words, will be written next to midnight, between hurricane and harbor, as both claim to save her.
Renee is 19. When I meet her, cocaine is fresh in her system. She hasn't slept in 36 hours and she won't for another 24. It is a familiar blur of coke, pot, pills and alcohol. She has agreed to meet us, to listen and to let us pray. We ask Renee to come with us, to leave this broken night. She says she'll go to rehab tomorrow, but she isn't ready now. It is too great a change. We pray and say goodbye and it is hard to leave without her.
She has known such great pain; haunted dreams as a child, the near-constant presence of evil ever since. She has felt the touch of awful naked men, battled depression and addiction, and attempted suicide. Her arms remember razor blades, fifty scars that speak of self-inflicted wounds. Six hours after I meet her, she is feeling trapped, two groups of "friends" offering opposite ideas. Everyone is asleep. The sun is rising. She drinks long from a bottle of liquor, takes a razor blade from the table and locks herself in the bathroom. She cuts herself, using the blade to write "FUCK UP" large across her left forearm.
The nurse at the treatment center finds the wound several hours later. The center has no detox, names her too great a risk, and does not accept her. For the next five days, she is ours to love. We become her hospital and the possibility of healing fills our living room with life. It is unspoken and there are only a few of us, but we will be her church, the body of Christ coming alive to meet her needs, to write love on her arms.
She is full of contrast, more alive and closer to death than anyone I've known, like a Johnny Cash song or some theatre star. She owns attitude and humor beyond her 19 years, and when she tells me her story, she is humble and quiet and kind, shaped by the pain of a hundred lifetimes. I sit privileged but breaking as she shares. Her life has been so dark yet there is some soft hope in her words, and on consecutive evenings, I watch the prettiest girls in the room tell her that she's beautiful. I think it's God reminding her.
I've never walked this road, but I decide that if we're going to run a five-day rehab, it is going to be the coolest in the country. It is going to be rock and roll. We start with the basics; lots of fun, too much Starbucks and way too many cigarettes.
Thursday night she is in the balcony for Band Marino, Orlando's finest. They are indie-folk-fabulous, a movement disguised as a circus. She loves them and she smiles when I point out the A&R man from Atlantic Europe, in town from London just to catch this show.
She is in good seats when the Magic beat the Sonics the next night, screaming like a lifelong fan with every Dwight Howard dunk. On the way home, we stop for more coffee and books, Blue Like Jazz and (Anne Lamott's) Travelling Mercies.
On Saturday, the Taste of Chaos tour is in town and I'm not even sure we can get in, but doors do open and minutes after parking, we are on stage for Thrice, one of her favorite bands. She stands ten feet from the drummer, smiling constantly. It is a bright moment there in the music, as light and rain collide above the stage. It feels like healing. It is certainly hope.
Sunday night is church and many gather after the service to pray for Renee, this her last night before entering rehab. Some are strangers but all are friends tonight. The prayers move from broken to bold, all encouraging. We're talking to God but I think as much, we're talking to her, telling her she's loved, saying she does not go alone. One among us knows her best. Ryan sits in the corner strumming an acoustic guitar, singing songs she's inspired.
After church our house fills with friends, there for a few more moments before goodbye. Everyone has some gift for her, some note or hug or piece of encouragement. She pulls me aside and tells me she would like to give me something. I smile surprised, wondering what it could be. We walk through the crowded living room, to the garage and her stuff.
She hands me her last razor blade, tells me it is the one she used to cut her arm and her last lines of cocaine five nights before. She's had it with her ever since, shares that tonight will be the hardest night and she shouldn't have it. I hold it carefully, thank her and know instantly that this moment, this gift, will stay with me. It hits me to wonder if this great feeling is what Christ knows when we surrender our broken hearts, when we trade death for life.
As we arrive at the treatment center, she finishes: "The stars are always there but we miss them in the dirt and clouds. We miss them in the storms. Tell them to remember hope. We have hope."
I have watched life come back to her, and it has been a privilege. When our time with her began, someone suggested shifts but that is the language of business. Love is something better. I have been challenged and changed, reminded that love is that simple answer to so many of our hardest questions. Don Miller says we're called to hold our hands against the wounds of a broken world, to stop the bleeding. I agree so greatly.
We often ask God to show up. We pray prayers of rescue. Perhaps God would ask us to be that rescue, to be His body, to move for things that matter. He is not invisible when we come alive. I might be simple but more and more, I believe God works in love, speaks in love, is revealed in our love. I have seen that this week and honestly, it has been simple: Take a broken girl, treat her like a famous princess, give her the best seats in the house. Buy her coffee and cigarettes for the coming down, books and bathroom things for the days ahead. Tell her something true when all she's known are lies. Tell her God loves her. Tell her about forgiveness, the possibility of freedom, tell her she was made to dance in white dresses. All these things are true.
We are only asked to love, to offer hope to the many hopeless. We don't get to choose all the endings, but we are asked to play the rescuers. We won't solve all mysteries and our hearts will certainly break in such a vulnerable life, but it is the best way. We were made to be lovers bold in broken places, pouring ourselves out again and again until we're called home.
I have learned so much in one week with one brave girl. She is alive now, in the patience and safety of rehab, covered in marks of madness but choosing to believe that God makes things new, that He meant hope and healing in the stars. She would ask you to remember.
During the show, they told just enough about the story that began the organization to get me looking. A few minutes of googling and here's what I found (just have to share it because it's so beautiful):
Pedro the Lion is loud in the speakers, and the city waits just outside our open windows. She sits and sings, legs crossed in the passenger seat, her pretty voice hiding in the volume. Music is a safe place and Pedro is her favorite. It hits me that she won't see this skyline for several weeks, and we will be without her. I lean forward, knowing this will be written, and I ask what she'd say if her story had an audience. She smiles. "Tell them to look up. Tell them to remember the stars."
I would rather write her a song, because songs don't wait to resolve, and because songs mean so much to her. Stories wait for endings, but songs are brave things bold enough to sing when all they know is darkness. These words, like most words, will be written next to midnight, between hurricane and harbor, as both claim to save her.
Renee is 19. When I meet her, cocaine is fresh in her system. She hasn't slept in 36 hours and she won't for another 24. It is a familiar blur of coke, pot, pills and alcohol. She has agreed to meet us, to listen and to let us pray. We ask Renee to come with us, to leave this broken night. She says she'll go to rehab tomorrow, but she isn't ready now. It is too great a change. We pray and say goodbye and it is hard to leave without her.
She has known such great pain; haunted dreams as a child, the near-constant presence of evil ever since. She has felt the touch of awful naked men, battled depression and addiction, and attempted suicide. Her arms remember razor blades, fifty scars that speak of self-inflicted wounds. Six hours after I meet her, she is feeling trapped, two groups of "friends" offering opposite ideas. Everyone is asleep. The sun is rising. She drinks long from a bottle of liquor, takes a razor blade from the table and locks herself in the bathroom. She cuts herself, using the blade to write "FUCK UP" large across her left forearm.
The nurse at the treatment center finds the wound several hours later. The center has no detox, names her too great a risk, and does not accept her. For the next five days, she is ours to love. We become her hospital and the possibility of healing fills our living room with life. It is unspoken and there are only a few of us, but we will be her church, the body of Christ coming alive to meet her needs, to write love on her arms.
She is full of contrast, more alive and closer to death than anyone I've known, like a Johnny Cash song or some theatre star. She owns attitude and humor beyond her 19 years, and when she tells me her story, she is humble and quiet and kind, shaped by the pain of a hundred lifetimes. I sit privileged but breaking as she shares. Her life has been so dark yet there is some soft hope in her words, and on consecutive evenings, I watch the prettiest girls in the room tell her that she's beautiful. I think it's God reminding her.
I've never walked this road, but I decide that if we're going to run a five-day rehab, it is going to be the coolest in the country. It is going to be rock and roll. We start with the basics; lots of fun, too much Starbucks and way too many cigarettes.
Thursday night she is in the balcony for Band Marino, Orlando's finest. They are indie-folk-fabulous, a movement disguised as a circus. She loves them and she smiles when I point out the A&R man from Atlantic Europe, in town from London just to catch this show.
She is in good seats when the Magic beat the Sonics the next night, screaming like a lifelong fan with every Dwight Howard dunk. On the way home, we stop for more coffee and books, Blue Like Jazz and (Anne Lamott's) Travelling Mercies.
On Saturday, the Taste of Chaos tour is in town and I'm not even sure we can get in, but doors do open and minutes after parking, we are on stage for Thrice, one of her favorite bands. She stands ten feet from the drummer, smiling constantly. It is a bright moment there in the music, as light and rain collide above the stage. It feels like healing. It is certainly hope.
Sunday night is church and many gather after the service to pray for Renee, this her last night before entering rehab. Some are strangers but all are friends tonight. The prayers move from broken to bold, all encouraging. We're talking to God but I think as much, we're talking to her, telling her she's loved, saying she does not go alone. One among us knows her best. Ryan sits in the corner strumming an acoustic guitar, singing songs she's inspired.
After church our house fills with friends, there for a few more moments before goodbye. Everyone has some gift for her, some note or hug or piece of encouragement. She pulls me aside and tells me she would like to give me something. I smile surprised, wondering what it could be. We walk through the crowded living room, to the garage and her stuff.
She hands me her last razor blade, tells me it is the one she used to cut her arm and her last lines of cocaine five nights before. She's had it with her ever since, shares that tonight will be the hardest night and she shouldn't have it. I hold it carefully, thank her and know instantly that this moment, this gift, will stay with me. It hits me to wonder if this great feeling is what Christ knows when we surrender our broken hearts, when we trade death for life.
As we arrive at the treatment center, she finishes: "The stars are always there but we miss them in the dirt and clouds. We miss them in the storms. Tell them to remember hope. We have hope."
I have watched life come back to her, and it has been a privilege. When our time with her began, someone suggested shifts but that is the language of business. Love is something better. I have been challenged and changed, reminded that love is that simple answer to so many of our hardest questions. Don Miller says we're called to hold our hands against the wounds of a broken world, to stop the bleeding. I agree so greatly.
We often ask God to show up. We pray prayers of rescue. Perhaps God would ask us to be that rescue, to be His body, to move for things that matter. He is not invisible when we come alive. I might be simple but more and more, I believe God works in love, speaks in love, is revealed in our love. I have seen that this week and honestly, it has been simple: Take a broken girl, treat her like a famous princess, give her the best seats in the house. Buy her coffee and cigarettes for the coming down, books and bathroom things for the days ahead. Tell her something true when all she's known are lies. Tell her God loves her. Tell her about forgiveness, the possibility of freedom, tell her she was made to dance in white dresses. All these things are true.
We are only asked to love, to offer hope to the many hopeless. We don't get to choose all the endings, but we are asked to play the rescuers. We won't solve all mysteries and our hearts will certainly break in such a vulnerable life, but it is the best way. We were made to be lovers bold in broken places, pouring ourselves out again and again until we're called home.
I have learned so much in one week with one brave girl. She is alive now, in the patience and safety of rehab, covered in marks of madness but choosing to believe that God makes things new, that He meant hope and healing in the stars. She would ask you to remember.
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Learning to Trust
I have a confession to make - I am terrible at trusting. Terrible. I mean it - TER - I - BULL.
I do love... truly and deeply. But without trust, what starts out as love gradually develops into resentment. Why? Because I feel alone. I feel like I give and give and give and get little in return. And though I think in some sense that is true (I really don't receive too much), it's not because people aren't trying to give me anything.
Think about it like this: Love is like a wrapped gift, you have to unwrap it to fully receive it; but without trust, I am too scared that whatever is in there is not going to be something I like or worse yet is going to be something that hurts me. So I end up with piles of unwrapped gifts, many of which I am too suspicious of to even keep in the house (maybe there's a time bomb wrapped up to look like love) and others I admire from the outside, grateful to have received the gift but unwilling to really open it.
Can I be honest? This is a sucky way to live.
Now my Jackie would say something right about now, like "Paula, you are feeling this way right now, but you're actually doing much better at this." And she would be right. God has done some work, sent some people who I generally trust enough to open their packages. Not all of them of course - if they look too big or extravagant they sit around collecting dust or get the "too suspicious" label and get shipped out. But I have been doing much, much better.
This, of course, is a huge stumbling block in my relationship with God. Because, guess what, God sends bigger packages then anyone I've ever known. Let me give you some examples:
(1) Radical sacrificial love
Romans 5:6-8 You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
(2) Infinite love
Ephesians 3:14-19 For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord's people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge - that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
(3) Empowering love
Galatians 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
Huge packages - HUGE. My nature is to slap the "too suspicious" label on those before they even get to my house. The minute they are suggested! Years ago, I had such a venomous response to those claims - "yeah, open that box and you'll find hand cuffs and all your dreams washed away" or "I know what comes in that wrapping paper, cruelty, judgement and condemnation." Basically alarms going off everywhere! My heart spinning in my chest - screaming "GET THAT OUT OF HERE! IT'S GOING TO BREAK ME!"
And it does break me when I let it in.
I can still see my generally controlled self standing in church next to my father and one of our worship leaders singing "Oh, How He Loves Us." My heart thumping so hard it felt like it my pop out, a lump so huge in my throat I could not sing and tears dripping off my chin. My flesh screaming - NO, NO, NO!
So this year, I've been focusing on learning to trust. I have a strong suspicion this going to take more than one year - but I am leaning in. Memorizing scripture related to trust.... and I just want to say (maybe to those of you who face similar struggles) it's hard. Definitely the hardest thing I have ever had to do. But I believe... I trust ... that it will be worth it.
I love you.
I do love... truly and deeply. But without trust, what starts out as love gradually develops into resentment. Why? Because I feel alone. I feel like I give and give and give and get little in return. And though I think in some sense that is true (I really don't receive too much), it's not because people aren't trying to give me anything.
Think about it like this: Love is like a wrapped gift, you have to unwrap it to fully receive it; but without trust, I am too scared that whatever is in there is not going to be something I like or worse yet is going to be something that hurts me. So I end up with piles of unwrapped gifts, many of which I am too suspicious of to even keep in the house (maybe there's a time bomb wrapped up to look like love) and others I admire from the outside, grateful to have received the gift but unwilling to really open it.
Can I be honest? This is a sucky way to live.
Now my Jackie would say something right about now, like "Paula, you are feeling this way right now, but you're actually doing much better at this." And she would be right. God has done some work, sent some people who I generally trust enough to open their packages. Not all of them of course - if they look too big or extravagant they sit around collecting dust or get the "too suspicious" label and get shipped out. But I have been doing much, much better.
This, of course, is a huge stumbling block in my relationship with God. Because, guess what, God sends bigger packages then anyone I've ever known. Let me give you some examples:
(1) Radical sacrificial love
Romans 5:6-8 You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
(2) Infinite love
Ephesians 3:14-19 For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord's people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge - that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
(3) Empowering love
Galatians 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
Huge packages - HUGE. My nature is to slap the "too suspicious" label on those before they even get to my house. The minute they are suggested! Years ago, I had such a venomous response to those claims - "yeah, open that box and you'll find hand cuffs and all your dreams washed away" or "I know what comes in that wrapping paper, cruelty, judgement and condemnation." Basically alarms going off everywhere! My heart spinning in my chest - screaming "GET THAT OUT OF HERE! IT'S GOING TO BREAK ME!"
And it does break me when I let it in.
I can still see my generally controlled self standing in church next to my father and one of our worship leaders singing "Oh, How He Loves Us." My heart thumping so hard it felt like it my pop out, a lump so huge in my throat I could not sing and tears dripping off my chin. My flesh screaming - NO, NO, NO!
So this year, I've been focusing on learning to trust. I have a strong suspicion this going to take more than one year - but I am leaning in. Memorizing scripture related to trust.... and I just want to say (maybe to those of you who face similar struggles) it's hard. Definitely the hardest thing I have ever had to do. But I believe... I trust ... that it will be worth it.
I love you.
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Last Days
Hello Family,
It's been a little while since I checked in - it's been a wild ride since then with a lot of stuff happening. For example, I was sick the last time I posted. I had been sick for about a week without really taking any medication (this is pretty typical for me) and it took another whole week before I went to the doctor (again, just like me) who told me it looked like I had the beginning stages of walking pneumonia. Believe it or not, being sick for about a month makes you incredibly tired and cranky - also, going to the doctor helps! Who knew?!? For those of you who saw my sad self, prayed for and urged me to go to the doctor know that I eventually followed through and am feeling a world better!!
Also in this period, I went to the memorial service for a dear friends mother. It was really beautiful. I am a pretty "morbid" person - in the sense that reality of death and the fragility and temporariness of life are a pretty active part of my awareness. So for example, it's really rare for me not to think at some point during the day about the fact that this may be the last time I see so-and-so, even if I have a lunch date with them tomorrow. I just think that way.
I tell you this, so that you understand I am constantly aware of the fact that people don't really live their lives. As one of my former clients put it. "they just go back and forth to the mail box collecting bills and then working to pay them." But Kay (that's the name of woman whose memorial service I attended) really lived - and when you really live, it shows all over. It showed on the hospice record of visitors, it showed in the stories told about her, it showed in the sea of pictures where she was present and smiling (and not hiding from the camera like I might be). And I felt so happy to see a life well lived, and so encouraged that when we turn our lives over to Him we SHALL DOUBTLESS really live our lives.
I don't know about you all - but I can honestly say I am living my life for a memorial service like Kay's. I am living my life with the hope that a sea of faces will fill that room, full of stories and love, full of the presence of God. It just brings me back to that Nichole Nordeman song Legacy.
I wanna leave a legacy, how will they remember me?
Did I choose to love? Did I point to You enough to make a mark on things?
I want to leave an offering. A child of mercy and grace, who blessed Your name unapologetically.
To leave that kind of legacy.
Not well traveled, not well read. Not well to-do or well bread.
Just wanna hear instead, "Well done, good and faithful one."
I mean that's it. That is what it is all about - and I feel so incredibly privileged to have real women examples before me.
Speaking of last days, I've also been having a lot of last Las Vegas days. Last day of WOW, last day of work, Syd's last day of school. I've got a little more than a month here and I imagine the last days will continue to come. (Hey maybe that guy who said the last days were starting last weekend was right, he just didn't realize he was speaking to me exclusively!)
Last days are so bitter sweet for me. I am resting in the assurance of God, that where He leads He will provide. If you know me at all this is less like rest and more like a daily inner battle.... but our God is amazing and meets me patiently where I am, with assurances and blessings literally sitting just the other side of a plane ride. But I love so many here - and good-byes are so hard for me (see the section on my morbidity above). I have found Him here - in the safety and familiarity. But I think the thing with God is that safety and familiarity are not often His plan; instead it is Risk and Reward. Battle and Victory. Faith and Glory.
Today I was asked to read Psalm 126 as part of Bible Study - it seems an appropriate way to close.
When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion,
we were like those who dreamed.
Our mouths were filled with laughter,
our tongues with songs of joy.
Then it was said among the nations
"The LORD has done great things for them."
The LORD has done great things for us
and we are filled with joy.
Restore our fortunes, LORD,
like streams in the Negev.
Those who sow with tears
will reap with songs of joy.
Those who go out weeping,
carrying seed to sow,
will return with songs of joy,
carrying sheaves with them.
I love you all.
It's been a little while since I checked in - it's been a wild ride since then with a lot of stuff happening. For example, I was sick the last time I posted. I had been sick for about a week without really taking any medication (this is pretty typical for me) and it took another whole week before I went to the doctor (again, just like me) who told me it looked like I had the beginning stages of walking pneumonia. Believe it or not, being sick for about a month makes you incredibly tired and cranky - also, going to the doctor helps! Who knew?!? For those of you who saw my sad self, prayed for and urged me to go to the doctor know that I eventually followed through and am feeling a world better!!
Also in this period, I went to the memorial service for a dear friends mother. It was really beautiful. I am a pretty "morbid" person - in the sense that reality of death and the fragility and temporariness of life are a pretty active part of my awareness. So for example, it's really rare for me not to think at some point during the day about the fact that this may be the last time I see so-and-so, even if I have a lunch date with them tomorrow. I just think that way.
I tell you this, so that you understand I am constantly aware of the fact that people don't really live their lives. As one of my former clients put it. "they just go back and forth to the mail box collecting bills and then working to pay them." But Kay (that's the name of woman whose memorial service I attended) really lived - and when you really live, it shows all over. It showed on the hospice record of visitors, it showed in the stories told about her, it showed in the sea of pictures where she was present and smiling (and not hiding from the camera like I might be). And I felt so happy to see a life well lived, and so encouraged that when we turn our lives over to Him we SHALL DOUBTLESS really live our lives.
I don't know about you all - but I can honestly say I am living my life for a memorial service like Kay's. I am living my life with the hope that a sea of faces will fill that room, full of stories and love, full of the presence of God. It just brings me back to that Nichole Nordeman song Legacy.
I wanna leave a legacy, how will they remember me?
Did I choose to love? Did I point to You enough to make a mark on things?
I want to leave an offering. A child of mercy and grace, who blessed Your name unapologetically.
To leave that kind of legacy.
Not well traveled, not well read. Not well to-do or well bread.
Just wanna hear instead, "Well done, good and faithful one."
I mean that's it. That is what it is all about - and I feel so incredibly privileged to have real women examples before me.
Speaking of last days, I've also been having a lot of last Las Vegas days. Last day of WOW, last day of work, Syd's last day of school. I've got a little more than a month here and I imagine the last days will continue to come. (Hey maybe that guy who said the last days were starting last weekend was right, he just didn't realize he was speaking to me exclusively!)
Last days are so bitter sweet for me. I am resting in the assurance of God, that where He leads He will provide. If you know me at all this is less like rest and more like a daily inner battle.... but our God is amazing and meets me patiently where I am, with assurances and blessings literally sitting just the other side of a plane ride. But I love so many here - and good-byes are so hard for me (see the section on my morbidity above). I have found Him here - in the safety and familiarity. But I think the thing with God is that safety and familiarity are not often His plan; instead it is Risk and Reward. Battle and Victory. Faith and Glory.
Today I was asked to read Psalm 126 as part of Bible Study - it seems an appropriate way to close.
When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion,
we were like those who dreamed.
Our mouths were filled with laughter,
our tongues with songs of joy.
Then it was said among the nations
"The LORD has done great things for them."
The LORD has done great things for us
and we are filled with joy.
Restore our fortunes, LORD,
like streams in the Negev.
Those who sow with tears
will reap with songs of joy.
Those who go out weeping,
carrying seed to sow,
will return with songs of joy,
carrying sheaves with them.
I love you all.
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