Processings

The good thing, the terrifying thing, about grief... It reduces me to "I don't know". 

How are you? What is going to happen? Are you okay? What do you need? 

I don't know. 

I guess I was a bit addicted to answers. To figuring things out. To working out the redemption and seeing the good and the end. It's an empty feeling, being devoid of any knowing of the way to walk through uncertainty and pain of this magnitude. 

I think maybe my answer-seeking cripples me sometimes. 

Yesterday, I sat cross-legged in the center of my favorite giant tree stump and tried to feel where God is in this whole thing. I followed the light filtering through the trees and all the shifting hues of color and all the other ways God usually finds me and my crashing dissonance starts to harmonize and I start to work out a sense of good in the world and balance it with the reasons my head aches from crying. I couldn't get anywhere.

I know the theology. I firmly believe that God is complete Love and Beauty and Life Abundant. I can see that all this suffering and chaos is not of His causing. It's clear to me that the enemy is stealing, killing, and destroying, using people and events to mar whatever good he can reach. I know and have seen that God has always been working overtime to restore and redeem, but none of this patched anything for me this time. I couldn't arrive at any conclusion I could rest in, knowing that THIS time, again, God can make something good. How can He do that when the last bits of good in an already-broken story are the bits being ground to dust? 

I don't know. 

And it scares me. 

I was looking at the light again, absently wondering why I felt so estranged from it and unable to reach it with my being, when I remembered telling Ryan all the things that had me tense and worried. How he repeated over and over until I relaxed and let it be my greater reality: I love you. 

And the color-tinted trees, the lines of the branches reaching their fingers to the bottomless blue, the evening light-beams reaching down to the green underneath, alive with whole communities of chipmunks, birds, and bugs... In ALL of it, I felt God say the same thing in a voice too deep for the ears.

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.

And that is my greatest reality. 

Dirty Hands

The news this morning was a fist in the gut. I stared aghast at the screen, my mind doing those little spasms of unreality. The amount of suffering contained in just one of many news reports just blew right past my level of comprehension.

The families of the victims, and all who knew them. The survivors. The family of the shooter. So much trauma that will take a lifetime of years to heal. The shooter himself. What broke him to this point of insane hopelessness? No healthy person wakes up one morning and decides to plot a massacre.

I wonder if God ever regrets His vulnerable, loving choice to entrust us with free will? Most of the time, I understand His wanting friends and co-collaborators instead of puppets. But when human will goes rabid and we hate and destroy each other, I can't help but wonder if I'd rather live under a dictator than a Father.

I confess, sometimes I am angry at Him. As if this messy, hurting world is His doing instead of ours. But it is our doing, Lord have mercy.

And even the space of one day is crammed with breath-taking proof of this consoling truth:

God has not abandoned us in the mess we've made. His presence is still here. With us. On this planet. Walking the streets and fields of our neighborhoods. His hands are still at work.

While I was still wondering why God lets us choose to hurt each other, I was telling one of my teens how proud I was of her. Her determination to inflict as much pain as she has received is gone. She stands proudly, bright face and clear eyes. Her pride in her new determination to make choices that respect both herself and the people around her is vibrant and evident. 

During a training session on mental health diagnoses, one of my favorite co-workers told his story of grief, loss, and teen years in lock-up. He's overcome behavior disorders, dyslexia, and lack of parental support to become one of the kindest, safest people I know. 

A phone call from a friend left me in awe and worship. Prayers for change and wholeness in the lives of people I love are years in the answering, but here they are. 

Maybe I can't understand why God doesn't intercept human will when it wreaks swathes of horror, but I know this: He is still at work, calling us into relationship with Himself and with each other. Relationships that shape our wills into our greatest empowerment for wholeness. 

There aren't quick fixes and easy answers for suffering. There simply are not. But there is a God of patience, dirty hands, re-shaped lives, and a sort of wholeness that is a beautiful offering to others. 

God is still at work. And we get to choose to help Him. 

a gift for Good Friday

Her normally quiet self was doubled in half, wrenched with grief. Her lungs wrung out ragged wails, and her tears bounced off the carpet. "My brother is dead! Why did they take him?" Her anguish was raw and tearing. It consumed her until I thought she would fall.

I pulled her into a chair and held her close. Helpless. What do you tell a sixteen-year-old girl whose brother was shot in the street, six times to the head? What sense do you make of violence what takes a seventeen-year-old boy because his friend is in a rival gang? What is left to offer? Only tears, an arm around her shoulders, and hands stroking her hair. And prayer.

But what prayer? What can you ask when a heart is broken beyond recognition? Mine was only a giant heart-sob. And in return, I heard Him:

"I am here. And I know."

When she was limp and emptied, I asked if I could pray for her and her family. And, even in my vicarious pain, all that came out was "thank you".

Thank you, Jesus, that You KNOW. You know what it is to cry over a dead friend. You know what it feels like to die. You know what it feels like to be killed. Her brother was not alone in that moment because You have been there already.

Thank you that You are HERE. You cry with us. You died for both the sins committed by us and the sins committed against us. For both, You writhed in pain, and Your blood soaked wood and earth.

Thank You.

It has been several years since I finished this drawing, but creating it remains one of the most deeply moving experiences of my life. It was a kind of sacrament, really. A profound realizing that I had a part in this. And this fierce, conciliatory, crucified Love is mine. And I am His. 

In honor of this Gift, I'd like to make a small one of my own. If you want to be included in a drawing for a print of the "Greater Love" drawing, leave a comment. If you want to let other people know about it, each time you share a link to this post on facebook, twitter, or what-have-ya, you can leave another comment to increase your chances. 

The print is 18"x11", unframed, and black-and-white, as the original was done in graphite and charcoal. The print is an archival-quality, professional copy by my friend Tim Kirk. I'd be glad to mail it worldwide to the winner, so if you connect with the drawing and want a chance to have have it, comment away! I'll randomly draw a winner a week from today.

And make space in your time and heart today to ponder the awful lengths to which God went to prove His love for you. For us all. 

first thoughts for Advent

Sometimes God shows up in the expected places. 


In the written Word or through His servants. 


Still, He seeps in through the corners of the world.


In a tree by the river into whose bark one whispers secrets. 


Into the hungry eyes of a homeless woman holding her contented child. 


Into the unmarried womb of a virgin, to take form as the illegitimate Son of Man. 


With His presence He sparks mystery in the ordinary, dignity in suffering sacrifice, 


and endows dignity and glory to shame.

[this tiny stone starts mental avalanches from my kitchen windowsill when i wash dishes]

simply complex

Sometimes it is good to have hashing sessions with friends.

About what Jesus meant when He told His followers to "make disciples".
And how we are doing that.
And how we are not doing that.
And how are we supposed to know what parts of our culture are worth holding onto in that endeavor.
And how are we supposed to be willing to give up some traditions or patterns of thinking that inhibit us in making disciples?

About what Jesus meant when He said that He, in fact, IS God.
And then proceeded to act very differently than the God everyone expected.
And what that means about the nature of God.
And what that means about the way we view history.
And what that means about the way we see and treat broken people.

Sometimes it is also good to stop all that discussion and complexity and just burst out:

"You know? I'm pretty madly in love with Jesus."

[I am. I really am.]

Good Friday reflections

Isaiah 53:4&5

Surely our griefs He Himself bore,
         And our sorrows He carried;
         Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken,
         Smitten of God, and afflicted.
    But He was pierced through for our transgressions,
         He was crushed for our iniquities;
         The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him,
         And by His scourging we are healed. 

His wounds.

His Love.

We are healed.

We are known.

I'm a bit wordless. A bit overwhelmed. I really can't wrap my head or heart around the depth, patience, and ferocity of God's love for us all. 

Sometimes loving people takes a mad lot of emotional strength. Watching as they make choices that hurt themselves... being pushed away when they seem to want rejection instead of love... Loving even then hurts like lead clogging the bottom of your heart and drains you of emotional vibrance.

If my love is weak and imperfect in comparison to God's, how does He survive, loving every single person in the whole world so passionately?

He watches us sabotage ourselves, hurt ourselves and others, and settle for the cheap version of His good intentions. And still He stays engaged, returning even when we shun Him. 

I might have grasped a tiny corner of his strength. My heart is moved to trust and adoration.

Deconstruction [still] Underway

"The scary thing about God is not that He gets His own way, but that He lets us have ours." -Vincent Beiler

Vincent stood and said this after a sermon on Jonah. I've been thinking about it ever since.

Choice, sin, and all such things we so easily misunderstand. So easily we cast God as an egotistic tyrant who makes rules He knows we'll break so He can punish us for them!

I think Tolkien was saying the same thing as Vincent in a scene with Gandalf and Bilbo. Gandalf sees Bilbo's almost innocent infatuation with the Ring of Power, and advises Bilbo to leave the Ring behind when he sets out on his last adventure.

Bilbo, just like Gollum when the Ring began to consume him, body and mind, hisses, "Why shouldn't I keep it? It's mine! It came to me!"

Gandalf stands to an intimidating height and bellows, "I am not trying to rob you!" Then, more gently, "I am trying to help you."

It's because God knows how quickly we serve and ruin ourselves, how willingly we choose our own destruction, that He tells us how to live. Yet He loves us enough to still let us choose.

Amazing. I am in awe... especially when I know a little bit of the heartbreak He must feel when we sin and face our consequences. It's shattering. And still He waits and loves.

All this to say that my view of God is still being deconstructed.

Tidings of Comfort and Joy

A month ago, I saw a Gospel sign that made me stop longer than necessary at the intersection and stare at it. I almost took back everything I've ever said about Gospel signs. I almost cried at the warm wind of change from the usual portrayal of God as a god who threatens and frightens people into a relationship with Him. This is what it said:

The almighty God was born a baby, grew up in a poor town, and became a homeless healer. God stood at the foot of a sycamore, looked up at cheating, lying, thieving Zacchaeus and didn't proclaim his faults to the crowd or command Zacchaeus to fall at His feet and confess. Instead, He said, "I'm going to have lunch with you." He dignified Zacchaeus in front of the very people who had reason to hate him. He loved him. And that's what made Zacchaeus right his wrongs and give half of his assets to the poor. 

I suspect it is because we are created in the image of the One who is Love that we respond best to love. He knows us well enough to know that love is the only thing that can really heal and change us. That's why He came to be like us, to speak with lips like ours, so that we can't escape the Good News.

We are seen. We are loved. We are not alone.

Merry Christmas, everyone! I wish you all a day of celebration, peace, deep joy, and awe at the gift of Jesus.

Oh, the things I learn

Kids' club is in full swing. I love the sisters who bounce into my car every week, all talking at once and each making sure her sisters all have buckled themselves properly. As much as I love my girls at work, being with eager, happy kids is invigorating.

I love the honest questions and answers. During prayer time, Megan requested prayer for her cat. He has finally succumbed to cancer. Not sure how to pray for a dead cat, I asked God to help Megan not to feel too sad when she misses her cat. "But you didn't pray for my cat!" Megan persisted. I really didn't know how to pray for dead cats, but instead of admitting it, I asked her if she wanted to talk to God about her cat. Promptly, she did. "God, I hope Fluffy is doing OK. Are you taking care of him? Tell him I miss him. But tell him I do NOT miss him peeing on the couch." Megan knows how to pray for dead cats. Now I do, too.

Last week, a table-full of girls sat relatively quietly during the story about Jesus calling the twelve disciples. I have been aware of my coming at lessons like a steam-roller, driving the moral (weee-weee-weee-weeee) all the way home. Reading the story and asking Jesus to teach me how to teach, I realized He wasn't marching up to people and saying "Follow me (because-you're-doing-it-wrong-and-you-really-need-to-pay-close-attention-so-you-know-how-to-walk-correctly)". When Philip brought Nathanael to Jesus, He said, "I saw you before you came, while you were still under the fig tree." He didn't take him to task for dissing Jesus' hometown and doubting Jesus' validity because He came from Nazareth. He let Nathanael know he was seen, wanted, before he saw Jesus. He proclaimed Nathanael a true and honest man and told him he'd see better things than foresight if he followed. Things seem more in focus for me. Instead of stressing over making sure they understand good bevaviors, my job is to present Jesus and tell them how He's teaching me to follow Him.

For an activity, we traced our feet (because we're trying to be followers, duh) onto pieces of paper and colored them. I thought perhaps these 9+ girls would declare this silly and juvenile, but they kicked off their shoes with abandon and traced each others' feet. The part that made me get emotional was this: a girl who was in my class three years ago when I helped with club while at FB has made tremendous, tremendous progress. It used to be impossible to get her to enter into activities. She'd sit, seething, when she wasn't running out of the building or inflicting injury to the person naive enough to get too close. When given craft materials, she'd grab the darkest colors possible and vehemently scribble her paper beyond recognition. Now? She's asking me to have her help me during class. She was the first one to grab her foot-tracing buddy and tear off both her shoes and socks. Her finished picture looks like a piece of modern art... intricate design and... bright, happy colors.

Dear girls. How fortunate am I to spend a few hours with them every week? Very fortunate, that's what. Even when they tell impossible stories such as mistakenly carving their pet instead of a pumpkin.

Part of a Reflection

I find it intriguing how, as I fall more in love with God, I fall more in love with people. I love their faces, their hands, the way they are made, and how they move.

One of my favorite exercises is to take mental photographs of people I meet. Frozen for a moment, in black and white, I notice them more. I feel them, as I feel pieces of art as I walk through a gallery. The little lady, her vintage shawl pulled close to her wrinkled face, patiently turned in the direction her bus will approach. The powerful man, sun rippling off the waves of his dark muscles as he walks down the sidewalk, the fist of his tiny son clenched on one of his long fingers. The intent, dirty face of the culvert-layer, shadowed by his hard hat. The group of laughing college kids, nearly perfect in their youthfulness, but  furtively deciphering where they fit in the dynamic. The woman, alone at her table in the coffee shop, loudly informing the hapless recipient of her phone call the unfairness of the traffic citation she received. The man with a grungy plastic bag sitting on the bench at the corner of the park... his blank yet searching eyes.

In each person, I see their Maker's regal reflection.

In each person, I see myself.

I might be developing a frail grasp of what it means to be a part of this reflection. In a large sense, individually, we are broader, deeper, larger, and more textured because of our being in relationship with God and people. To some extent, we comprise each other, help each other find ourselves, and find ourselves in each other. Just as our the relationship of our Maker's personality is nearly impossible to dissect, without people we almost cease to be ourselves.

In losing relationship with someone, we face the fear that, irretrievably, a part of us ceases to exist.

Playing a Game

"At times he heard within him a soft, gentle voice,

which reminded him quietly, complained quietly,

so that he could hardly hear it.

Then he suddenly saw clearly

that he was leading a strange life,

that he was doing many things that were only a game,

that he was quite cheerful

and sometimes experienced pleasure,

but that real life was flowing past him

and did not touch him.

Like a player who plays with his ball,

he played with his business,

with the people around him,

watched them, derived amusement from them;

but with his heart, with his real nature,

he was not there.

His real self wandered elsewhere, far away, 

wandered on and on invisibly

and had nothing to do with his life."

-Herman Hesse

Do the quote and picture seem contradictory? Good. They are. If you knew Dave, the contrast would be even more stark.

Dave isn't just playing a game. Instead of toying with his work and people for his own amusement, he engages. Mine was the privilege of working with Dave when I lived in Lancaster, and I hope I assimilated something of his characteristic love for people.

One Sunday afternoon, while taking a walk, I witnessed a motorcycle accident. One man, my neighbor, landed in the ditch with obvious head injuries. The other man dragged himself and his nearly severed leg off the road. I sat on the bank, lacking the training to do anything about the groans and screams, waiting for the ambulances and police to arrive. One of the ambulances was driven by Dave and his wife, Mary, who have been EMT volunteers for many years. Just seeing them at the scene, I felt comforted. The gentle, professional manner in which Dave served the patient was familiar to me; that was how Dave treated his employees at work. I knew the man was in good hands. The following morning, Dave met me in the entry at work, asking if I wanted to talk. "The responders have a chance to debrief and talk about the trauma they witnessed, and you didn't have that," he said. Not only was talking therapeutic, but also the fact that he thought about me and made sure I was alright.

When Haiti was struck by an earthquake, Dave and Mary immediately joined a team of medical volunteers sent by Christian Aid Ministries... during a busy time at work. Everyone said it was "such a Dave and Mary thing" to do, and the picture of Dave changing the bandages on the little boy's head is "so Dave". He gives with heart, and he lives a vibrant, full life.

Visualize, for a moment, life as a crystal of myriad facets. Imagine the earth, people, self, and the Maker of All being the primary facets, the ones with the most surface area, the predominate interactions one makes on a daily basis. Just as blocking the light from any facet of a crystal banishes the rainbows that dance on the walls, refusing to give one's self... to genuinely know and be known... on any facet of life dulls life of the splendor it was meant to be. Conversely, in really loving people, I love in them myself. In loving people, myself, and the earth, I love in them their Maker. In loving Him, I love them.

Knowing and being known... loving... is much harder than wandering aimlessly apart from my own existence. However, I'd rather be purified by the humility, vulnerability, and work requisite to unity with the existence gifted to me. I'd rather dive deeply into the vibrant depths of this communal gift, the gift of life.

I don't want to be only playing a game. I want to receive what a great Man named Jesus (whom I suspect taught Dave how to live) offers: not only life, but Life Abundant.

Tolkien and the Gospel, or "Adventure"

I think we all reach points in our stories when it seems like we've reached the end. Nothing seems to be turning out the way it should, and we don't see much reason to go on. The problem is, the book isn't over. Somehow, we have to keep living, going from page to page.

It's hard. So hard that you being to understand that you can't do it much longer. Only you don't seem to have much choice.

If only you knew how it all would end, you could live this page. But that's the problem: you don't know. And every page of every day, the words your feet scratch seem to be the same as the page before. You guess the next page will be the same.

I've been there, and I began to understand something: my story isn't my own. I'm a character in a meta narrative, an epic that was begun before the ages. Rather than focusing on whether or not my end will be the one of my choice, I only have to see what my part is on this page. In that realization, I found something: adventure.

J.R.R. Tolkien, master of human story-telling, says it well. It's the scene where Frodo and Sam are nearing Mount Doom in the evil wasteland of Mordor, near the end of their weary quest to destroy the One Ring. But you know this, right? If you don't, I beg you to end your deprivation and read the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

I don’t like anything here at all,’ said Frodo, ‘step or stone, breath or bone. Earth, air and water all seem accursed. But so our path is laid.’


‘Yes, that’s so,’ said Sam. ‘And we shouldn’t be here at all, if we’d known more about it before we started. But I suppose it’s often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of sport, as you might say. But that’s not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have just landed in them usually – their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn’t. And if they had, we shouldn’t know, because they’d been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on – and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same – like old Mr. Bilbo. But those aren’t always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we’ve fallen into?’

‘I wonder,’ said Frodo. ‘But I don’t know. And that’s the way of a real tale. Take any one that you’re fond of. You may know, or guess, what kind of a tale it is, happy-ending or sad-ending, but the people in it don’t know. And you don’t want them to.’

It's true. Life isn't for wimps. That doesn't mean we have to just buck up and deal with things, pretending we don't care or it doesn't hurt. Neither should we have to pretend that because God knows what's going on, this must be His Divine Doing and we shouldn't question. Being characters who only see today, it's not only fine, but necessary, to be honest. To cry as well as laugh, to question as well as believe. Meanwhile, we keep writing. With hope and an abiding sense of excitement. Because we know the Author. And we know that He is weaving together, with threads of Redemption and Mercy, the imperfect parts we all play... and that, somehow, when the Author ends the chapter titled "Time", it will all come out right.

The most admired of lives were lived by those who kept going, not avoiding hardship, because they knew. They were part of something bigger. A grand adventure.

sabotage

hold up your hand
to block out the sun
put your hand down
and look what you've done
i know this talking wasted someone
i know this time was wasted hating me
and killing me
you know it's sabotage

you know it's sabotage

why does that snake
keep hanging around?
here comes my girl
to show what she's found
we went down that road
looking for a new sound
looking for peace
but that's not what we found
we found sabotage

we found sabotage

-"sabotage", by james clay

Just like Adam and Eve, we think we have The Alternative. For countless generations, we've demonstrated an astounding propensity to sabotage ourselves. Trying to protect myself, I find my heart numb. I watch those I fiercely love make devastating choices, chasing happiness. People killing each other over land and prejudice. What does it leave us? Shrunken, tired, listless.

My heavy heart and I sat in church last Sunday, trying to stop processing the sad events of the previous two days and actually listen to the message on the feasts of Leviticus. Suddenly it dawned on me... the feasts were proof of the GOOD that God wanted for His people. The celebrations of harvest, the remembering of deliverance... times of celebrating God's abundant heart toward them, times to spend time with people... times to draw near to God. Funny, how my alternatives usually expunge one or all three of those necessities.

I, for one, am tired of sabotage. Instead, I want to "run the way of [God's] commandments, then [He] will enlarge my heart." (Ps. 119:32) That's what I want, a heart that keeps enlarging... a heart big enough to love all people, all creation... a heart that lives increasingly in the presence of God... a heart able to believe and rejoice in Redemption, no matter how broken I... and those I love... are.

summer, simplicity, & surrender

As I write, I have dirt under my fingernails and a bloodied toe. I feel like a kid again. It feels so good that I'm not even thinking about how ghastly my toe is going to look when the injured nail takes its leave. So much for my French pedicure. It's quite laughable, actually. Who sustains injuries while mulching their flower beds? Well, obviously...

Did I think the aforesaid information necessary or enlightening to your existence? Hardly. But if you want a synopsis of my life at the moment, there ya be... Discovering a deep, saturating joy in simplicity. Like being good and dirty for a change.

I learned it from the birds.

No beaks about it.

While watching the nuthatches, titmice, chickadees, purple finches, sparrows, and the resident pair of cardinals visit my backyard feeder, a peace stole into my complexities.

They don't have to be right all the time. They don't try to see tomorrow. They don't wonder how or what they SHOULD be feeling. And yet God sees them. And they praise Him just by LIVING.

Is this called surrender? This stillness in the wake of letting go?

It gives me ears to hear the heartbeat of a creation being redeemed... and the sacred opportunity to play along with its music... just by being who He made me to be. And knowing He sees me.

The rewards are abundant.

The simple joy of

local strawberries,

EATING the strawberries with homemade egg custard on the porch in the evening...

making bread... (sorry the picture is so grainy; my only camera is my phone right now. Ha! Get it? "Grainy?")

Turning this:

into that:

to sunny up my room.

I saw the idea on Folding Trees and knew that's the inspiration I was waiting on to add some texture to that wall. Not having any pipe cleaners on hand, I threaded a needle with heavy thread and knotted it on the back of the flowers. The thread tails made for easy hanging, too. Aren't they fun?

Coffee filters I had on hand + scraps of fabric from a dress I just finished + a wavey-glassed, peeling-painted beauty of a window I scored for FREE on Craigslist (happy day!) = a room that makes me smile.

"Love conquers all; we must, too, surrender to love." -Virgil

...and it is in that surrender that we find what it is to live the day one is given as the person one is made to be.

Trying to Follow

A misty rain veiled the city this evening. A spring rain. A running rain.

I couldn't resist.

All the tension of waiting all day for the call that hasn't come. All the questions I've been asking that haven't seemed answered. All the frustration of waiting and silence drained through the soles of my running shoes.

"Howdy, mum! Off for your run?"

"Yessir! It's beautiful!"

He laughed from his porch. Laugh as big as his white smile in stunning contrast to his skin.

"Sorry." He returned to his phone conversation. "Dat was my neighbor. I tol' you about my neighbors, Clair and Anna? She's their sister."

I smiled as I ran on. Because I am proud to be his neighbor. Because I've never been able to convince the whole block I'm not related to Clairs'... and because I love belonging to the "family" that does make me their "sister".

Reverently through the paths of bejeweled trees and flowers of the park, stopping to kiss a dogwood bloom. The cross-shaped white blooms with rusty edges and rough-crowned centers. The azalea bush an unspeakable hue, rain-dropped and lit by a watery sun. The persimmon tree's new baby leaves.

On down to the river, with its river-otter mudslides and my favorite tree, all newly green.

Back to the road, for the pure joy of running. Of feeling more alive than I had all day, hunched over a computer.

Running.

All the hopes, frustrations, dreams, and fears of late solidified into a question a friend asked me once. "What do you want to be the sum of your life?"

My answer came back to me: "I want a lot of people to know they are loved."

I want to run with that news, to follow the trail left by the greatest Lover... to glory in the immensity of His wake. I want to teach others to run... for the sheer joy of it.

It's too big for me. I can't master the pace. About the time I think I do, I take my eyes off my feet and see I'm far behind. I don't have this loving this down pat. I am less and less confident in my ability to do it myself, much less teach others.

At the end of my street, I waved to a lady I often see as I drive by but never have talked to. She yelled something about diabetes, and I crossed the street to talk to her. How lonely does one have to be to tell one's complete medical history to a complete stranger? When I made my leave, she said, "Thanks for talking to me!" I thanked her as well, and felt my face as lit as hers. In her lined and toothless face, her waist-length iron and white hair, her wide, faded blue eyes, I saw Jesus.

I've been asking Him to teach me to follow, to teach me to love. Begging Him to show His face. He did. In the beauty of people, in the beauty of nature. I saw Him.

And now I'm wondering if making disciples is as much about being taught as it is about teaching... receiving as much as giving.

A quote by Shane Hipps in "Flickering Pixels" has been niggling the interior of my cranium since I read it. "We are called to make disciples, not believers."

Good thing, too. Because the I've found the whole "making believers" thing to be a fine line between ethnocentric bigotry and total irrelevancy.

In the left-brained, logical, sequential thinking formed by the written culture following the printing press, Christianity became a set of doctrines to be embraced mentally. Hence, fundamental evangelical churches. Fulfilling the Great Commission involved dispersing written words.

Now? Who cares what you think in your head? With the advent of technology, our thinking patterns are reverting back to the visual, right-brained mode. Somewhat similar to the culture in which the stories of Scripture were told both verbally and through stained-glass windows and paintings, it's less important to us (culturally speaking) if someone believes in predestination or believes in hell. It's irrelevant to now, to today's triumph and tragedy. Trying to argue someone into the Kingdom is like "trying to nail jello to a wall" (S.H.). It seems as though the only way we, as followers of Jesus, are able to tell the Good News is by getting involved and getting dirty. Loving.

I'm glad. Because, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that's what Jesus was trying to show us how to live the whole time He was here.

So before this post evolves into a full-fledged book review (which would hardly be coherent due to the hour), I'd like to thank all of you for reading the mosaic that is my blog. I keep meeting people I barely know who tell me they read this site. Your telling me that my writing encourages you humbles and blesses me. I'd like to hear from some of you, either by commenting on this page, emailing, or, better yet, telling me in person (if possible)... where have you seen Jesus? How is He teaching you to love? I'd love to hear it because I have an astonishing amount to learn.

Peace always...

"My God, my God!"

"Why have You forsaken me?"

Jesus' anguished words from the cross...

In unimaginable pain, His heart longed for the comfort of His Father. Of all the times He needed strength, needed comfort, it was then. But He says He's been forsaken.

I always hated this part of the story of Jesus' passion worst of all. I mean, it's one thing for the egocentric, nasty, misguided people to kill Jesus. He's forgiving them as they do it. It fits His mission, fits His model for us. It's another thing for evil to kill Jesus. That's to be expected, that it would try to conquer Good while vulnerable, incarnate in limited flesh. But God? If He forsook Jesus while Jesus was dying, was God a co-conspirator to Jesus' torture and death? How could God forsake a part of Himself? To be honest, the theory that God had to temporarily hate Jesus because of Jesus' taking on the sins of the world confused me as a kid (and for many years afterward). If God focused all His "holy fury" on an innocent Man... even if that Man was, in essence, Himself... He was hardly just and merciful... or even very holy.

Where was God as Jesus approached death? Did He withdraw Himself completely from the cosmos, off somewhere beyond comprehension, unfeeling and unseeing?

My friends' newborn baby boy nearly stopped breathing and was life-flighted to the hospital. The father described recently the experience of watching his tiny son receive tracheal intubation. Having to stand by helplessly and watch his son's anguish as the tube was shoved down his throat was more than he could take. His own anguish at his boy's suffering so overcame him that he nearly lost consciousness. He had to leave. And he knew what the Father heart of God was as His Son suffered on the cross.

I can't stop thinking about that picture. It offers a more holistic view of God and enables me to enter more fully into the brokenness of the ultimate sacrifice... the ultimate love.

For you. For me.

"My God!"

ruminari

In an earlier post, I made comment on focus being important. Wanting to offer further explication, but lacking the words that made any sense outside my head, I've been ruminating.

Attending an evening of stellar music with Derek Webb and Jennifer Knapp yesterday, a comment made by Derek perfectly encapsulated the essence of my disturbance: "If we [the church] is known more by what we hate than what we love, something's wrong, folks."

Very wrong.

Sit in coffee shops. Read comments to articles on CNN. Listen. People are sick of Christianity. I don't blame them, really. I react to a religion that lulls people into a warm bubble-bath sort of comfort, conditioning them to disengage themselves from the hurting and "messy" people in order to "keep themselves unspotted from the world". (Might that verse be warning against those very behaviors?) If the only time we engage people outside our circles is when we are militantly defending our beliefs, we have just discredited ourselves with a glaring duplicity. Will waging verbal and written war on evolution and alternative lifestyles gain us any credit with God or other people? Evidence would dictate a negative, at least where people are concerned. Jesus' careful attention to how we treat others might offer some insight where God is concerned.

If faith equals a lack of doubt, then Christianity only amounts to a conditioning of the mind and emotions to seeing the world, life, and the search and relationship with God through rose-colored glasses.

Onlookers want something more real. Something that engages life in all its complexity. Something that offers a hope that is not mere denial of reality. Something that respects people instead of claiming to have all the answers.

Am I right in saying that we Christians are human enough to have a preoccupation with the means rather than the end? When the teachings receive more focus than the Teacher, we miss His intent with astonishing completeness.

So this is my confession. I have much from which to repent. Bigotry and pride are no more excusable sins than hate and harlotry. I want my Christianity to amount to loving others the way I am loved... to telling how I am continually redeemed by the Love that I don't deserve.

Oh, and I was utterly thrilled to hear Jennifer Knapp live! That woman can play a guitar, yo! Her raw vocals, combined with her honest lyrics, make her one of my favorite female artists. Three years and three records into a promising music career, she disappeared from the music scene entirely. She took an indefinite hiatus from the Grammy nominated, Dove-winning hype and moved to Australia. Seven years later, she's back. I discovered her music rather by chance at age 17. "A Little More", "Breathe On Me", "Martyrs & Thieves", "Romans", "Say Won't You Say", "Undo Me", "Whole Again"... these songs in particular have given words to and offered solidity to the most fragile, formative times of my life. Her courage in returning to making music offers me courage as well...

Derek Webb's insightful sarcasm makes for some pretty great songs. He played a few of my favorites, like "Heaven", "Ballad in Plain Red", "I Repent", "A King & a Kingdom", and "Wedding Dress". Here's some advice: if you're looking for the relaxing sort of beauty in a musical piece, listen to classical. I think I feel a classical streak pending. Too much hard thinking and wrestling for long months. It's been real. It's been good. But I miss the magic. Sometimes life was made to be figured out; other times it was just meant to feel, to live. That said, I think I shall seek out the company of my favorite tree... down by the riverside. ;)

What is Truth?

Pilate asked the question, and I wonder if his tone was exasperated. "What is truth??" I don't wonder he was befuddled. Outside his palace was a mob of people, waving their scrolls, demanding the death of the Man before him... The Man he had found guiltless. And yet, the scroll-wavers said their scrolls contained the truth. They said that, by the words therein (or their interpretation of them), this Jesus of Nazareth had committed crimes worthy of execution. 


Pilate wasn't exactly a compassionate man. I wonder if his reluctance to sentence Jesus is indicative he had a gut feeling that Truth stood before him, incarnated and epitomized in the Man named Jesus. 


Each of us, individually, is left with the same question: what is truth? We look at the Pharisees and religious leaders of Jesus' day, and marvel that their thinking contained such an elephantine disconnect. How could they have searched the Scriptures with such avidity and missed the Fulfillment of the purpose of the giving of those very writings? 


Jesus Himself answers that question quite nicely:

^37"And the Father who sent me has himself borne witness about me. His voice you have never heard, his form you have never seen,³⁸and you do not have his word abiding in you, for you do not believe the one whom he has sent. ³⁹ You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, ⁴⁰yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life." (John 5)

In their frenzy to be right, they produced their own righteousness. They assembled, in their studying, a god that looked like their expectations of Yahweh. Could it be because they deemed the study of His words an end in itself that they missed Who He really was, even when He conversed in a human tongue? 


Though we quietly scoff at their educated ignorance, it is in our critical interest that we take warning. Sure, let's read the Bible. But let's remember that, while it is true, it is only a telescope through which we can know... relationally... paramount Truth, Jesus Christ. Though it may seem an insignificant nuance, focus [worship] is important. Very, very important.

Happy Birthday, Jesus

This Christmas season, I've been asking Jesus what it really means that He came to earth. I know, I've been told since I can remember that He came because He loves us... to die for us... but several interactions with people lately make those reasons sound a bit flat to my own ears. I am on a journey of re-discovery, and perhaps I am about to enter the Kingdom of the One who simply tells us, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind... and your neighbor as yourself."

I wonder if anyone ever had to tell Mary to love her Lord with all her heart, soul, strength, and mind. She carried Him in her body for nine months. He was as near to her as her own heart. All her physical and emotional strengths were bent toward bringing Him to earth in human form, even as she wondered at the mystery of Immanuel, God... with her. Is this what it means for us to love Him as well?

In loving my neighbor as myself, do I actually engage in Jesus' ministry of reconciliation? The angels who announced the advent of the King of Kings didn't intend their message of peace on earth to dissipate in the Bethlehem night air.  Unless it compels us to befriend and engage living, breathing people who need forgiveness and love as much as we do (but are more honest about it), the God who is glorified by justice ["care"] served to the broken is only glorified by our annual singing. Weak incense. From where did the church learn that it is more Christian to hurt those who hurt others than it is to forgive them? The news coverage of the "balloon boy hoax" intrigued me, particularly a profound and shocking comment made by Mr. Heene's attorney:

"That's where this society has come; vengeance and justice are one and the same in the minds of many people." -David Lane

I would add that the vengeance=justice ideology is made more lethal when coupled with religion... one reason being that people can act almost without reason when they believe their actions are sanctioned... another being that the Jesus who raised eyebrows by talking to (and going home for lunch with!) outright sinners and forgiving people convicted of crimes deserving of death is portrayed as a carbon copy of the Pharisees He rebuked. Maybe it seems pointless to decide how the Heenes' case should have been handled, but the fact remains that the views we form shape us... and increase or decrease our love for the people around us who might be annoying, disruptive, and even destructive. Kinda like the rest of us, you know?

This evening, for Bible Study, my youth group carried candles to an inn where we were told there was no room for us... and on to a bitterly cold stable to worship the One who came to be with people just like us... in the company of goats that pee and horses that chew on clothing. I was overwhelmed by the how deeply the Father loves His delinquent kids, how lost this delinquent kid would be without Him, and how much this delinquent kid wants to love her Father with all her heart, soul, mind, and strength... and her neighbor as herself.







"Kyrie", a Christmas confession by Jonny Baker

Kyrie eleison
Christe eleison
Lord have mercy
Christ have mercy

Holy God, accept our confession. You asked for all of our being - our thoughts and actions, our creativity and expression. What do we give you? We think back two millennia to when the Christ child was born. What would we give the baby? What does the baby ask of us? What gifts did the baby receive?

Gold - a gift for a king. A metal so precious that we have died and killed for it. We treat your creation like it wasn't our home. We've robbed the earth of its riches and left its wounds open to infection. Forgive us for not unwrapping your gift to us in the right spirit. Forgive us for not giving you the best of us. What's the point of giving you our religious bits if the rest is kept closely guarded?

Kyrie eleison

Christe eleison

Lord have mercy

Christ have mercy

Frankincense - a gift for God. The fragrance of worship. God's eau de cologne. Worship - giving God the honor that is due to him. We saw your creation as a dirty thing, that we had to manufacture souls for heaven. Forgive our efforts to worship you only when it's convenient to do so and with the people that we choose - making outcasts of our brothers and sisters. Forgive us when our actions make our words of worship meaningless.

Kyrie eleison

Christe eleison

Lord have mercy

Christ have mercy

Myrrh - a gift for a mortal. The smell of a cover up to hide death and decay. But nothings is hid from you. Forgive us for denying the reality of pain, suffering, and struggle. Do we get angry and shout at God, or do we bury our pain? Forgive us for not giving our pain and suffering to you and for not interceding for others.

Kyrie eleison

Christe eleison

Lord have mercy

Christ have mercy

You ask for all that we are. What do we give? May we take seriously the meaning of your birth and your cross. Amen.

Happy Birthday, Jesus. I love you.

Lunch-break ponderings

While packing orders this morning, I had an epiphany.

A box, ready to be shipped, is just how I want it. I've selected the very best of the products the customer ordered. I pack it carefully, taking care that at least two inches of packing peanuts protect the product on all sides. Even the tape securing the box and the labels directing it to its destination are placed with care. The cardboard box is clean and smooth. Aesthetic and quality... that's what I want for my customers.

Some of my customers are as far away as California and New Mexico. As the box takes its FedEx journey, it is handled by many people. It's loaded onto trucks and unloaded in warehouses. Neither trucks nor warehouses are devoid of gray machinery dust. I've been impressed with the care with which FedEx handles packages, but, nevertheless, the packages are handled... and the box starts to bear witness to the fact. The corrugate shows, indented, through the once-smooth cardboard. The neat white label is scuffed with gray. Whether jostled en route or accidentally dropped, occasionally the contents of the box break. One customer opened her box to find the packing peanuts a solid, sticky blob, and the jars that had contained the honey she ordered were interspersed in shards throughout the mess. The box contained everything I sent her, but it was most definitely not what I wanted her to receive. What is her view of me and the company I represent? How will she view the FedEx workers?

The God who has been coming to man since He first created Adam must feel the same way. His message of love, His instructions for living, are delivered by... and understood by... people. Though we might try to observe the "handle with care" instructions, the contents and packaging undoubtedly endure jostling and scuffing. Sometimes, left with sticky pieces, we try to understand what in the world God sent us. It takes a certain amount of faith to trust God's good intentions toward us as we sort through the contents, trying to identify and comprehend.

Learning to allow for, and even embrace the impaired vision of humanity toward God can be exciting. It's mysterious. It adds to the beauty. It leaves more to be discovered of this God who still comes to us.