Still

Noise. Commotion. Disquiet.
Always noise.
Filling my senses. Overwhelming them.

Perhaps from the television screen.
Maybe from phone screens and tablet screens.

But always noise.

As I look at the precious 8-week-old face of my son, I see such innocence, simplicity, malleability. Somehow, I find a greater need for stillness, for quiet.  His fragile life is in my hands and I must not fill his space with the same noise that has saturated my own.

God gently knocks, knocks again, until I see. He knows my heart is stubborn and needs prodding. These messages about slowing down, making space, and eliminating noise has presented itself several ways over the last few weeks.

I have slowly been paging through Present Over Perfect by Shauna Niequist.  She writes:

It's only when we're truly alone that we can listen to our lives and God's voice speaking out from the silence...In seasons of deep transformation, silence will be your greatest guide. Even if it's scary, especially if it's scary, let silence be your anchor, your sacred space, your dwelling place. It's where you will become used to your own voice, your agency, your authority. It's where you will nurture that fledgling sense of authority... Silence will become the incubator for your newfound spirit, keeping it safe, growing it steadily. (pp 105-6, emphasis mine)

My tendency is to fill the space of my life. Episodes of Criminal Minds and Big Bang Theory on the DVR. Rounds of Candy Crush on the phone. Always occupied, always activating the senses. Muting my personhood, filling the space of my life and pausing my sense of agency.

Yet silence is where we experience ourselves. Only in the quiet can we hear our own thoughts and become aware of the recesses of our minds. The places where we connect most deeply, where we hear most clearly the voice of the Lord. The parts of ourselves that fully enjoy, that express our desires, and pursue our interests. We get consumed by the noise and lose our truest selves in the process, living in a routine that has been created for us by the hubbub, the voices of those around us. When we do this, we relinquish our sense of choice.

In the silence I rediscover what I love, what I enjoy, what I long for. And I begin again to actively choose the way I live my days.

In the psalms, David reminds himself, and us, to "Be still, and know that I am God" (Psalm 46:10).

Be Still.

Easier said than done in the hustle of everyday tasks and errands.

But in the stillness we sit in a place to receive the spring-like newness and restoration of the Lord. When we stop striving, He Easters us in our rest, giving us life and showing us our purpose and direction.

The stillness is where we experience the Father, we feel his quiet prodding, we remember his deep shalom.
We learn to abide deeply in the redemption He has already gifted us.
He Easters us with his presence when we stop long enough to listen and experience him.

So now I have a choice. God has shown me, on repeat, the importance of stopping. Breathing deeply. Experiencing the beauty around me. And the beauty He has made inside of me.

So I stop.

In the stillness I remember I can choose.
In the stillness the Lord deepens my rest.
In the stillness He prods my heart to desire, and reminds me of the agency He has given me to live out His call.

How My (Former) Dermatologist caused me to develop Lupus.

I was having a hard time getting out of bed in the morning because my joints hurt so badly. I was constantly tired and couldn't roll over in bed without sharp pain in my hips.  It became hard to move, though I continued to live my life normally.

Here's the story:

I thought I had somehow dodged the single-most terrible self-esteem killer of the adolescent world.

When I graduated high school and college without any major problems with acne, I thought I was in the clear.  Little did I know that the struggle would start ten years late!

Working in the Kansas City area, my position was incredibly high-stress (this feels like an understatement). The degree of stress brought on all kinds of new problems with acne, anxiety, and depression too. I moved to Saint Louis thinking that the change of scenery and drastic decrease of stress levels would be a cure-all.

It wasn't.

I started seeing a dermatologist in the area who prescribed me a low-dose antibiotic.  It didn't work.  Two months later, he increased the dosage.  It didn't work.  Two months later, I ask if a different medication might work differently/better for me, so he prescribed a different antibiotic, at a higher dosage.  It worked a little bit, but not much.  Two months later, he increased the dosage.  And increased again.  And again. And again.  The same increase, every two months, for two years.

Never having been educated on the effects of antibiotics, I didn't know any better.

After getting married last summer, I changed health insurance companies, which meant that I had to switch dermatologists.  My new dermatologist is younger, and educated in a different school of thought than my previous near-retirement dermatologist. When she saw the dosages of antibiotics that I had been on and for how long, she immediately told me we start weaning off, because of how bad it can be for your system.

As we weaned, she continued to ask me if I had been having any joint pain.  At first, I said yes, but explained that I had been in a car accident in 2006 that caused ongoing knee issues. Several months later, I was having a hard time getting out of bed in the morning because my joints hurt so badly. I was constantly tired and couldn't roll over in bed without sharp pain in my hips.  It became hard to move, though I continued to live my life normally.

When I told my new dermatologist, she immediately ordered bloodwork and explained that the prolonged use of antibiotics can cause drug-induced lupus. (Here is some info on Lupus from Mayo Clinic)

WHAT?!

I was shocked.  And sad.
My bloodwork came back positive for ANA (antinuclear antibodies), which indicated that my immune system had launched a misdirected attack on my own tissue.

In July, three months later, I had bloodwork done a second time to see if the levels of ANA were back to normal.  With drug-induced lupus, the lupus should go away after being off of antibiotics for a period of time.  The symptoms should lessen.

Mine didn't.  And still haven't.

They anticipated the levels of antinuclear antibodies in my bloodstream would dramatically lessen over the three months after the original blood test.  Two weeks ago, I learned that my levels of ANA had only dropped a tiny bit.  I also learned that drug-induced lupus can persist and become regular run-of-the-mill lupus.

I have lupus because my former dermatologist didn't know or didn't care that high doses of antibiotics over time can cause problems. And that's a problem.  Doctors need to be informed, need to be updated on new findings in their field.

Because my dermatologist was uninformed, he put me in a position to develop lupus that has the potential to last my entire life.

I don't usually blame other people for problems in my own life.  I'm a strong proponent of taking responsibility for yourself and making active changes to improve your quality of life.

This time is different.

I am only almost 29 years old, and there is nothing I can do to change the diagnosis, except to keep moving and make the best of it.

And I will warn others of the dangers of prolonged antibiotic use.

Please pass this along, for the health and longevity of the people you love!

----------
Current:  I have been off of antibiotics completely for four months, and my skin is better than ever! We have a RainSoft water purification system that has helped more than I ever thought possible, and I'm on a low-dose hormone blocker which has made my acne almost completely disappear!!

Navigating.

Every few days, there are moments in which I think to myself: "Man, I'd love to write about that!"  And just as quickly as I think it, it gets pushed aside because something else is more pressing.

Here I am, a year since my last post, finally writing.

So much has changed.
I have been challenged.
I have changed.

Marriage does that to you.  It should do that to you.

I suppose it began before we even were officially married.  We were two very independent adults, living very independent lives.  Suddenly we were forever committed to a life that looked very, and naively unexpectedly, different.

I say "naively unexpectedly" because I thought I knew.  I thought I knew Jeremy well enough to know his flaws, to know how to respond well, and how to protect myself from getting hurt, because everyone who loves gets hurt.  I thought I had experienced enough, helped enough people, and maybe even learned enough to have a marriage without problems with conflict or strife, because I knew how to communicate well and to mediate conflict resolution.  Or so I thought.

I find myself, over and over again, marveling at and mourning over my own pride.

Marriage is not easy.  Not even a little bit.  Sure, the companionship and love are nice.  I like having someone to do life with, to find new hobbies with, to have fun with.  I like knowing that I get to arrive home to the arms of my husband to rest at the end of my far-too-often 16-hour weekdays of work and classes.

I also know that there are days I would rather spend alone, but I don't have that option anymore.  I know there are times when I'd like to go on a little shopping spree, but I don't have a full-time income and sole control of my finances anymore.  There are even times when I'd really like red sauce on my pasta, but open a jar of alfredo sauce instead, because I know Jeremy doesn't like red sauce.  I know it's a small thing.

Marriage changes things.  It means I actually have to give up what I want.  Not just be willing to compromise (because compromise is easy - I still get part of what I want) but willing to completely set aside what I desire for what is best for us.  Us is very different than me, because us isn't just about me.  It's about us together.

And for us it means a lot of changing.  It means that we work our conflict all the way through even when it's the hardest thing to do.  It means loving the other person enough to stop being defensive.  It means not always being right, even when you know you're right. :)

So we continue to navigate this marriage thing.  We continue changing and growing.  Walking over the rocks and around the boulders, sometimes being the helping hand, and other times needing the hand.  Sometimes burying the rocks, and other times building an altar of remembrance and praise.

This isn't easy, but it was never meant to be.
By the grace of God we will continue navigating. :)

the soundtrack of our lives.

More often than not, the radio is turned off in my car.
A year ago, this certainly would not have been the case.  Ten years ago, I would have been upset if I even had to turn it down from the ear-drum shaking level at which I preferred it.

Sometimes now I just feel too full, too loud, too anxious to even have it on quietly.
My thoughts certainly need more space than music allows sometimes.

I've heard it said that the music we listen to is the soundtrack of our lives.

What we choose to listen to shows the pace and activity of our lives.

And I desire for my life to be paced well.  To be slow and steady and peaceful.  So my choice of music, when I do choose to listen to it, generally consists of acoustic folk music and quiet indie folk.  The music allows my mind the space to think, provides the backdrop for real processing, and slows me down enough to really see what I see and to more fully experience what I experience.

Sometimes isn't that what we need, deep down?  Just enough slowing down that we really enjoy the things we experience.

So I choose a soundtrack for my life that exemplifies the kind of life I desire to live: intentional, peaceful, simple, quiet, communal.

What is the soundtrack of your life?

It's all interwoven.

When I'm at work, my mind is completely focused on my job.
When I am at school, my mind is entirely committed to the things I am learning.
When I am with Jeremy, my mind and heart remain focused on only him and our relationship.

Sounds nice, right?

Each part of my life only affects that one part of my life.
Ideally, anyways.

About a month ago, I was forcefully confronted by the fact that life cannot possibly remain compartmentalized.  That what happens at work, affects school, affects Jeremy, affects... everything.

Because our lives are messy.
And it is not our job to clean them up.

As much as my perfectionistic, logical, type-A tendencies would like to convince me otherwise, it's okay for my life to be messy.  It's okay, and even, dare I say... good for it to stay that way.  I would love for the stories I hear at work to have no effect on my relationships.  But they do.  I have new awareness, even fears, that have developed because of the incredible brokenness of women who have experienced certain things.  I would love for what I learn in my classes to stay in the realm of counseling and theology and stay there as a skill set, rather than as a pervasive mindset shift that is inextricably linked to every area of my life.

But maybe God wants our lives to be messy.  Perhaps there's beauty in the scattered, in the integrated, in the diverse.

The relationships I had in college still affect me today.  The things I learned in high school still apply to me today.  The way I learned to "parent" at Shelterwood still influences the way I set boundaries and interact with people today.  And that's okay.

God certainly designed us to pursue him in all that we do.  Everything.  Not just in the time allotted for church and small group.  Not only in seminary classes.  But in our time at the gym, our sit-down at the dinner table, our friendships, and our shopping.  And in our every day trips to the grocery store.

I am reminded of the Old Testament Jewish law, where God commanded the people of Israel not to harvest all of their crops, but to leave the edges for the orphans and the widows.  God's heart is to provide for his creation, and mind should reflect that.  So at the grocery store.  Purposefully choose the food items that have a portion of the proceeds donated to an organization.  Put some quality food in the donation bin, not just the cheapest box of generic mac and cheese you can find.

I am reminded that our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and we should take care of them.  So instead of buying chips and ice cream, I buy fresh produce and whole grain bread - something my body actually knows how to use and to process.

Every part of our lives is integrated, even as we walk day to day with a Christian worldview.
As we pursue what is important to the Lord.
Even as we walk through the aisles of the grocery store.

changes, churning, blessing.

A woman prophesied over me a few months ago.  It was my first experience with this and I most certainly had my doubts.  I anticipated that she would speak in broad generalities and have a demeanor something like that of a "psychic".  She blew all of my expectations out of the water.  She began speaking into the lives of some people I know, making specific references to details of their past that represent their most protected memories, encouraging them that God is using those things for good.  She could not possibly have known those intimate details on her own. I saw that the Lord was - maybe, just maybe - working and speaking through her.  But my guard was still up.

It was my turn.  She took my hands in hers and began praying over me.  She prayed over and spoke into areas of my life that only the Lord and my counselor know about.  My guard dropped.  The tears flowed.  And the Lord spoke through her.

Among other things, she spoke of a harvest that was coming after a long and hard dry season of doubt and sorrow (with more detail than I care to share with the public, but that confirmed she was not just making a general statement that could refer to anyone).  It seemed as if this "harvest" was coming too quickly, like I needed to stay in that place of hardship longer to keep learning, to do justice to the hard place before stepping into harvest time.  The Lord knew my thoughts, and this woman spoke them aloud as they were spinning through my head.  I was amazed at the knowledge of God.  Never before had I felt so understood, so known.

Harvest.

I feel it.

The ground is churning.  Things are changing, shifting, falling into place.

The dry season is over and growth visible, vivid, rapid.


God is working in more ways than I can even comprehend, but I am so blessed.

- I am officially accepted into the Master of Arts in Counseling program at Covenant Theological Seminary, starting full-time in August.

- I am finally shifting into a position at work that will bring a taste of normalcy to my schedule, giving me my weekends off again!  It may take a month or two for it to become a reality, but I wait in anticipation.

- God has so blessed me to have a wonderful man in my life.  One who I feel honored to be with, who desires the Lord over everything else, and who exceeds any expectations I have had.

- Just this week, he was offered an incredible job working for an esteemed company, that just happens to be located only a few miles from my apartment!

In very tangible ways, things are finally changing.  They seem to reflect the ways in which I have grown internally over the last few months.  It was so agonizing to feel as if things were changing inside, and yet my circumstances were not at all getting better, as I had no new direction or hope for change.  And then the Lord brings the harvest - a great manifestation of the waiting season I have been in.

Finally.
I am certainly blessed.

hiatus over.

You may have noticed that I haven't posted in a while.  If not, don't feel bad, I'm not offended.  But you may have wondered why.

Well, here it is.

Sometimes things are hard.  I'm not fine all the time.  Sometimes things can't be fixed with an easy quip at the end of a blog post (ex. "So we press on").  And sometimes we just need time.

Any and every irrational thought, mis-timed feeling, and anxious leaning, I have learned how to replace with the rational and reasonable.  I look at a hard situation and tell myself that "I should be able to make it to the other side of it because obviously it's going to end.  Obviously it won't last forever.  Let's be realistic here."

In doing so, I denied myself of emotion.  I denied myself of being honest about what I thought.  I deceived myself and everyone around me into thinking I was a certain kind of person.

It was all a lie.
Unintentional, of course.  But a lie nonetheless.

As I'm honest about what I think instead of replacing my thoughts with ones I see as "better", well, it has brought up a lot of doubts.  My faith has been shattered and is slowly piecing back together.  My thoughts are raw and I see myself as the dirty, wicked sinner I am.  Real.  I feel like I'm finally being real.  With myself and with others too.

I didn't even know that I wasn't being real before.  It certainly was not intentional, but the realization wrecked me.  And now I'm healing from it.

In that time of doubt, well, I had to deal ruthlessly with my own soul.  To lay the axe to the root of so many wrong foundations.

I made some choices that I regret and wasted time doing what I wanted.
But I finally gave up the last piece.  The piece of my own desires that I finally surrendered.
And dang, it wasn't easy.
It never is, is it?

But I am so confident that it was right.  Giving in to the God who has had control all along and always will.
Lord, help me, because as much as this is right, it's hard.

It's hard to blog about what God is doing in your life and what He is teaching you when you don't let yourself see it.  That's why I stopped for so long, and that's why I'm starting again.

self-preservation

Self-preservation.  We all do it; in fact, it's universal among almost all living organisms.

Pain is the major motivator for an individual to withdraw from a damaging situation, to protect a damaged body part while it heals, and to avoid similar experiences in the future.
Fear causes one to to seek safety and causes a release of adrenaline, which increases one's strength and heightens senses such as hearing, smell, and sight.
Figuratively, self-preservation regards the coping mechanisms one needs to prevent emotional trauma from distorting the mind.

We have all experienced these things in one way or another.  The pain of being made fun of in school, of being spanked as a child, so one withdraws; or fear of rollercoasters or of moving away from home so adrenaline gets one going.  The most prevalent in my life, however, has been the figurative kind of self-preservation; the kind that isn't necessarily physical, but more emotional.

I've been repeatedly placed in emotionally-charged situations, ones that initially brought me to tears nearly every waking hour (my first few weeks working at Shelterwood...).  I heard heartbreaking stories of lives shattered and innocence lost.  I got yelled at, disrespected, cussed out, and ignored repeatedly and frequently.  While the experience was incredible and I wouldn't trade it for the world (in fact, I've written several posts about my time there that talk about the positive aspects of the experience) it certainly changed me in good ways and bad.

The constant apparent rejection from the little sisters (though inside they just longed for love and acceptance..), well, I stopped caring a whole lot. I guess it was my way of protecting myself.  I couldn't take the hurt that came from it, so now I just don't care if someone likes me or not and I became apathetic to most emotional attachments.  I expect to be disappointed, so I set my expectations low.  I don't express how I really feel to anyone for fear that the next moment they will turn around and walk away.

The reason why I did not continue to cry the way I did initially during my time there was self-preservation.  I could not possibly process and respond in ways to the situations in which I was placed, so I shut off.  Nothing would affect me at all and I was "fine" until I would break down and cry for a day seemingly about something minor, and then I would be "fine" again.  The crying was my body's way of telling me -"Something is wrong.  STOP!  Process.  You need it."  But I just kept going because I felt like I had to.  I had to be fine because everything else felt like chaos and nobody around me was doing well, so I needed to pretend for the sake of everyone else.  So I was happy, I was fine, and according to anyone's perception around me, I was healthy.

These perspectives are skewed, I know, and, without a doubt, unhealthy.

All of that "shoving down" I did over the last two years?  Well, it's catching up with me.

And now begins the learning.  Learning to process things as they come.  Learning to actually have emotions and express them as they come.  Learning that it's okay to dislike things, to tell people that you care without the fear of being shut down, to expect to be cared for in return.  Learning that it's okay to feel hurt - that it's a real feeling that doesn't need to be shoved down and ignored.

Learning.  A constant state or so it seems, because we are never finished.  And somehow the learning that comes after is harder than the situations themselves.  Processing is painful, but so necessary.  Evaluating these things about myself was and is really hard.  I don't like learning that what I always thought was a strength at Shelterwood has now become my greatest weakness and that it has marred or even ended relationships that were good, simply because I didn't allow myself to connect to or express things the way I really was experiencing them.

Strengths become weaknesses so quickly, and this process of growth never ends.  So I keep going..

advent.

I asked someone what she thought Advent was about.
Her response?
"Eating a piece of chocolate every day for the month of December because stores sell calendars for it."

Okay.  I get it.  Christmas is entirely commercialized and sometimes it becomes more about maintaining traditions than about the real "reason for the season."  We put up our Christmas trees, complete with handmade ornaments from our childhood, or perhaps perfectly color-coordinated and themed ornaments to maintain the "pinterest" look of our homes.  We frame our windows with white lights.  We bake peppermint treats.  We wrap gifts with paper and bows.  We sing carols and drink hot chocolate.  We may even make a birthday cake for Jesus.

 And it is all in the name of tradition.

I don't mean to say that tradition is bad.  In fact, my family covers the entire month from Thanksgiving to Christmas with "every year we ___!"  There is a lot of value to creating special moments and special memories by doing things regularly that you enjoy together and that celebrate well.  Not only do we celebrate, but we celebrate for an entire month!  How much better could it get?

But in the bustle of garland and frosted window-panes, it becomes far too easy to forget.  The why of the season gets lost in the tradition, in the busy, and even in the beautiful.

Last Sunday began the season of Advent.  It's a season of the church calendar that comes around every year.  And every year I need a kick in the pants to remember it.  How easily do we forget what Christmas actually celebrates?

Advent celebrates the waiting.  The anticipation.  The expectancy.  And here we sit in our earthly, sinful mess, anticipating the restoration, the redemption that Christ brings.  Advent celebrates it - the already (Christ came!  He conquered sin and death!) and the not yet (He's coming again!  And ALL the earth will be redeemed!).

So we live in the already but not yet and anticipate the coming of Christ in this season.

advice.

We are so good at giving advice, aren't we?  There's always something that someone else could so easily do differently that would make their situation, or themselves, better.  And we are all too ready to make an opportunity to inform them of this imperative information you have and they don't.

There are dozens of newspaper columns and magazine articles that are full of advice on how to do something better, how to fix a relationship, how to... anything.  Dear Abby thinks she can fix anything, and Judge Judy thinks she can determine a verdict.  Dr. Phil thinks he can explain things away and get people to think rationally.  We all see ourselves as magi when it comes to giving advice.

And somehow I have it all figured out, while everyone else around me is falling apart.  It then becomes my duty to share the never-ending wisdom to help fix it all.  We say to just do this one thing and you'll be fine.  Or to just change the way you see it.  Or just tell that person how you feel.  It's always prefaced with a "just" as if it is the simplest thing in the world, why didn't you think of it yourself?

Sound familiar?

A twisted way of thinking, no doubt.  But it's real.  Until real introspection begins.  The kind that recognizes even the most deeply rooted issues that make me no different than any of the teens I worked with at Shelterwood or the women I work with now, or anyone else, really.  And in this reality, I remember the depth of grace.

I recognize profound beliefs that are untrue.  Thoughts that reflect inaccurate perceptions of reality.  And feelings that culminate based on those lies.  I am no different.

And here I begin to see my words of advice, at work and otherwise, as empty shells of false hope that, given to the right person who hears it the right way, may somehow make a difference if the Holy Spirit gives them understanding.

So I think about my words to others and begin to see their relevance in my own life.  I've recognized unhealthy thought patterns in my own life that so distinctly reflect those unhealthy ones in others that I work so precisely to eliminate.  I encourage them to use tools to change their thinking, to remind themselves over and over again of truth, to go to the Lord instead of allowing thoughts to rule them.  I rarely, if ever, take the advice for myself that I give to the women I work with.

Who am I to think that I am above those techniques and above those practices?  If it works for them, it will certainly work for me.  If it's beneficial for them, it is certainly beneficial for me.

It's about time I take my own advice.

pomegranate.

This recently popularized fruit has long been a favorite of mine.  Its presence in stores coincides with autumn in full swing towards winter.

I know I'm rich with cheesy analogies, and the pomegranate is a favorite for that reason... it comes with an analogy of which I am reminded whenever I eat one.  Today was no exception.

The bright, sharp knife pierces the peel and I break open the fruit. As expected, the fruit is full of seed casings, arils they are called.

As I see it, there are two ways to eat a pomegranate.  One is to take large pieces of the fruit and bend it a certain way so that all of the arils fall out into a bowl.  This technique allow you to eat more than one at a time.  The second, and my usual method of choice, is to take out and eat the arils one by one.

It's a little bit like life.  You experience it one taste at a time, one moment at a time, one aril at a time.  They take work to get to, but then you are able to savor each one.

I could continue the analogy, but I'll refrain. :)
Your mission this week is to get your own pomegranate, especially if you have never had one before, and try it.  Savor each piece!

processing.

Tonight I sat with a girl outside of the sanctuary at church as she sobbed.  It had been nearly a half an hour since she ran out during worship, and there were still no words, but it was imperative that we stay.  It was the first time in six months that she had cried, and finally it all came out.  She had worked through so many things, changed in so many ways during those months, and finally she could verbalize to me that she was broken over the piece that had remained untouched.

I was reminded of the importance of tears.  Sure, I may have spent the better part of my last year and a half at Shelterwood crying over the brokenness of those girls and the difficulty of the position I was in there, but it has been a while.  Once removed from there, the tears shut off - for the most part, anyway.  And so did the processing.  Somehow the two are linked for me, and when I'm thinking through something that deeply affects me, well, crying is inevitable.

We all have something like that, don't we?  I know someone who, when he needs to think through things, takes a bike ride to another state.  Another spends time writing poetry to reflect his thoughts.  Yet another paints until her canvas is full and her head clear.  Still another talks incessantly until every piece of every thought and every possible scenario and solution is spoken aloud.  Each is different, but all are means to an end: clarity.

And we all want it, right?  Nobody wants to sit in confusion.  Nobody wants to remain in insecurity and doubt and pain and fear.  We want freedom and we want understanding.  God gives us means by which we reflect who He is and thus bring Him glory as He works in our thoughts to bring perspective to every situation we may find ourselves in.  Therapists may call them coping mechanisms, but in the wise words of Shakespeare,

"What is in a name?  That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

So we learn to cope and process and heal in a way that brings us closer to the only one who can bring real healing, and we learn to enjoy Him in our everyday lives that used to bring us farther from the Lord.

It's about time I take this all for myself and begin to really process this new stage of life I find myself in.  A new place, new job, new life, and for no short amount of time.  Oi.

homily recap.

When I lived in Chicago, I did have a home church that I was a part of, but I would regularly visit a few others.  One of those was called Grace Chicago.  A small community of believers, they made intentional efforts to worship well.  Their music was arranged by a member of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and included several stringed instruments, classical guitar, flutes, hand drums, and other small percussion instruments.  It was always well-done and always beautiful.

The service centers around the church calendar, celebrating the rich history of the Christian faith, and recognizing the redemptive rhythm of God's presence in our lives.  It includes several liturgical readings and responses, worded just right so to convey exactly the message intended.  The homily, what most evangelicals call a sermon, is always profound, intellectual, well-planned, and inspires thoughtful reflection and response.

The pastor also keeps a blog that contains homily recaps.  While there has been a significant time gap since his last post and the most recent one, I found the one posted a few weeks ago to be incredibly insightful into the apparent conflict between suffering and redemption.  Please check out the recap here.  You won't be disappointed, I promise, and you may even find it to be your new favorite homily recap blog!

me without you.

Last weekend I watched the marathon.  I know I already posted about it, but what I didn't talk about was the amount of planning that went into it.  When you have to be responsible for several groups of people getting to three different mile markers by an ungodly early hour, and then navigating ways back downtown avoiding the blocked roads and also avoiding the football traffic only a few blocks away, to be at the finish line by a given time, especially when it was made very clear by my boss that we needed to be there at a certain time, well, planning is necessary.  To get 30 women fed, clothed, and medicated, with snacks and drinks and coats and gloves and out the door by 5:30am, there is preparation and planning.

While it was necessary before the morning of the marathon, I'm realizing its effect on many other things I do.  I like to plan ahead.

One thing I noticed yesterday is that I listen to my iPod in the car instead of the radio.  I say it's because I don't like most of the music on the radio (which is true).  I say it's because the music all sounds the same, or the messages they send are awful, or because even the Christian station plays the same songs over and over again, and I could continue with my list of reasons why I don't listen to the radio.  But on a deeper level, I realize that I want to be able to choose what music I listen to and when I want to listen to it.  I think they call that control.

So I turned on the radio instead, and the Lord spoke.
Even in the small act of relinquishing my control of my music, God works.
This song came on:  Toby Mac's Me Without You.

I began to think about where I would be right now if it wasn't for the Lord's leading in my life.  In an immediate context, well, I would no longer be in Saint Louis if it were up to me.  I ask God to remind me every day why I'm here.  I have to, or my bags would be packed.  Because everything in me wants to leave and be somewhere where I'm known, to be with people I love.  Where I am not alone.

Then I remember:  Even here, I am not alone.  When my apartment floods, God is here.  When health issues arise, God is here.  When I'm stressed about circumstances outside of my control, God is here.  When I seem to be lacking, God is here.  If He wasn't here, well.. I would be a mess.  But He is there even when I am a mess.

He is here.  And He is in control.  Of everything.  Even when I grasp for the edge of things already in His grip.

So I stop grasping.  It begins with the small things - today I thought to myself that I really wanted to see a particular movie, so I just... went.  I didn't plan ahead for it, and I even (God forbid..) left an unfinished to-do list at home.  And I listened to the radio on the way there. :)

One day at a time, one open palm at a time, I let go in the small things so I will learn to let go of the big ones.

accomplishment.

Through the cracks between the shoulders of the crowd in front of me, I could see them running, raising their arms in victory.  Red faces and throbbing legs accompanied the wide grins on their faces after running a god-awful number of miles.  They slow down, put medals around their sweaty necks, and they breathe.

Runners.

There was something beautiful about it.  A sense of accomplishment radiated from their faces.  Whether or not each one reached their time goal didn't matter because they finished.  They finished.  A feat for which one trains a long time.  During training, it seems like all you do is work and run and sleep and work and run, repeat.  But as their bodies cross that line, it is all worth it.

I have a brother named Daniel who is now 20 years old.  Always an active guy, he played soccer, baseball, and golf.  He ran a couple of 5k's in elementary school.  He danced in show choir and even rode the unicycle.  It was at 16 years old, as he earned his black belt in tae kwon do, that he learned he had rheumatoid arthritis.  He was constantly in pain and it hurt to even walk.

And now, four years later, he ran a marathon.  By the grace of God, his medication is just right to keep him pain-free.  He accomplished what seemed to be the impossible.

There's something beautiful about that, isn't there?  When something seems unreachable, but you desire it so deeply.  Determination, focus, and most importantly faith get you there.  God brings us there.  And in that accomplishment, we become more and more the people who God created us to be, and do more and more for His glory.

 Think about your own accomplishments and praise God for them.  Think about your own goals, and pray that God will get you there.

So we strive.  We press on toward the goal.  We remain in Him.  We accomplish that which He set for us to do.

relationship.

"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket — safe, dark, motionless, airless — it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable."  - C.S. Lewis

My dear friend Lisa always says, "Relationships are weird."  I am reminded these last few weeks of how true that is.  Not only are they weird, but they are hard.

People are so vastly different.  We all act differently, we think differently, and being around different people brings out varying facets of who we are.  We give our stories, our past, our dreams, our time and energy, and, most importantly, our emotions.  And in that revealing of who we are, we give ourselves, in small pieces, to those with whom we are in relationship.

Acquaintances, friendships, dating relationships, and family all require a person to give and to receive.  But then if and when those relationships end, well, those pieces of you go with the person who leaves.  It's strange.  And it hurts.  It happens when you move from one place to another, leaving behind relationships that will inevitably change with distance.  It happens when a dating relationship ends and that person will no longer ever be a part of your life.

We are made to be in relationship, and those things that make us known to the other are the very things that make us the most vulnerable.  Those are also the things easiest to withhold for fear of getting hurt.  So I withhold and my fears are validated when relationship ends.

Yet for the sake of my well-being long-term, it is time to relinquish that fear, give up the hurt and disappointment, and make myself vulnerable, but this time using better discernment to choose the receiving end.

As C.S. Lewis said, "your heart will certainly be wrung and broken", yet I know of a great healer who puts those pieces back together if the hurt is great, and even if it is small.  He is Healer, He is good, He is faithful, and my heart is whole and full.

disobedience.

God always gets His way.
But you know what is forever true?  His way is always the best way.  Even if it takes time to for us to realize it.

God often calls us to do specific things.  Some are easy and enjoyable, others are difficult and take a lot of courage.  Like Jonah, we have the choice to obey and go to Ninevah, or to say no and run in the opposite direction.

When we disobey that voice of God and run the other way, there is most certainly disappointment at the other end.  Disappointment and pain that could have so easily been avoided had you just done what you knew you should have done to begin with.  Disobedience will always always lead to disappointment.

His plan for our lives is bigger and better than what we see in our day to day.  His desire is to use us, to love us, to bring us closer and closer to himself in order to bring restoration to this world.  He knows us inside and out, knows our desires before we do, knows our thoughts before we think them, and absolutely desires the best for our lives.  So when He tells me to do something, why do I still choose to think that my way is better?

It stems from a pattern I was recently reminded of.  A pattern of rebellion and disobedience that once had very tangible consequences in the form of spankings as a small child, then grounding and restricted computer use in my teens.  It progressed to internal consequences of feelings of guilt and condemnation over disobedience after I left Green Bay.  And now?  Well, now it seems God is showing me again and again that He gets His way whether I choose to listen to Him or not.  The consequence?  Pushing myself away from the one, the only one who has my best interests in mind and can tell me what I need to do.  I create my own consequences when I separate myself from the creator, the lover, the one who wants desperately for me to return to Him.

So I repent and I obey and I run to Him, confident that He knows best.  That the development of my respect for my authorities here on earth is to now be translated to a God who is my ultimate authority.  If I were to go to the Lord first and listen to the Spirit first and trust in Jesus first, well.. I would be in unbroken communion with God.  And this is what I desire.

name change.

As I've been thinking about the name of this blog, I just didn't like it.  "Life is an adventure" seemed cliche and, honestly, was the first name I thought of when I first started this blog four years ago.  Therefore, its thoughtlessness has finally gotten the better of me, and a new name has been tugging on my heart.

I strive to pursue life.  Life is joy and relationship.  Life is excitement and rest.  Life is in abundance with our faithful Creator.  Life is worth pursuing, so I do.

And here on this newly-named blog I will continue to write about it.

he will not prevail.

As I knelt on a trash bag, precisely laid against the floorboard, I scrubbed.  The once-white hard-bristled brush was now covered in chemicals and the spores of a black mold that had grown overnight on a small portion of the wall.  I WILL eliminate this if it's the last thing I do is all that was running through my mind.  The flowery scarf tied around my head blocked the spores from entering my mouth and nose, and the gloves on my hands protected my skin.

The "get rid of black mold" supply list.

Earlier, I carefully poured several solutions of various combinations of vinegar, hydrogen peroxide and baking soda on my brand new mattress.  I was exhausted after a busy weekend at work and all I wanted to do when I arrived home was to lay down and sleep.  The smell of cat urine was pungent as I nearly laid my head on the now-contaminated pillow.  The questions raced:  Why this?  Why now?

Today I carefully took a bucket of bleach water and, square by square, scrubbed the linoleum floor.  All I wanted was to be free from the filthy residue from the dirty water that regularly poured itself from the rusted pipes.  Thanks to the handiwork of a plumber, the pipes are fresh and new and the water stays inside of them as it was always meant to.

And I remembered.  I remember the words of a post I wrote just last week that fully centered on hope and staying positive.  I wrote, "Why not look at the positive, see the possibility for redemption in the brokenness of our shattered lives?"  Oh goodness, how easily I forget in the day to day.

The enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy.  I know this to be true.  But what the devil means for harm, the Lord makes good.

This weekend at work, we took the residents to another conference, this one in Springfield, Missouri.  The way that the speakers proclaimed truth and the power with which they encouraged that particular body of women, well, I left with a renewed passion for a long-forgotten dream that God placed in my heart years ago.  I will write more about that some other time, but my point here is that God did something in me this weekend, and the only way the devil could retaliate was by making me frustrated, yet again, by my living situation.

He will not prevail.  My God is bigger.

Timely, how this negative attitude came over me right after writing about optimism.  It is as if that very piece of me was tested this week by various things.  I was asked, "What about if this happens, will your hope be crushed?  What about now when life get messy?  Will you still find the positive?  Then let's hit you with more and see if that is enough to crush you."

He will not prevail.  My God is bigger.

hope.

There is a certain energy that comes from an excited crowd of people.  When a group of individuals comes together for a common purpose, whether it be a hobby or a cause, a common interest or to support an organization, passion stirs.

I recently went to a very large women's conference.  Women from across the country gathered and broke racial barriers, broke socio-economic barriers, and worshiped God together.  Somehow when that many women were gathered, all hungry for the Lord, it created an excitement that was contagious.  I couldn't help but jump and shout in worship, because the goodness of God became so radically apparent in the beauty of His creation by which I was surrounded.

On a seemingly (but not really... you'll see) unrelated note, I am a hopeless optimist.  I like to think the best of people, and find the spot of sunshine in even the most frustrating of situations.  I used to sing quietly into my little sister's ear when she was grumpy, "Gray skies are gonna clear up, put on a happy face.  Take off that gloomy mask of tragedy, it's not your style.  You'll look so good that you'll be glad you decided to smile.."  It was so ridiculously happy that she couldn't help but grin and subsequently develop a more positive outlook on whatever the situation was.

One of the residents I work with mocks me for my "Well, at least it's warm, even though it's raining!" glass-half-full comments.  A girl I work with tells me that I need to stop and be more realistic, because everyone doesn't deserve the benefit of the doubt.  She pretty consistently counters my positive with a cynical negative.  So I began to reevaluate this outlook that I've come to hold, and even try to find negative in situations.  It was unnatural and seemed to only bring the other person down.  So I stopped.  I remember a time when my unwavering belief in the goodness of people led me to be used and manipulated by someone who I cared for deeply.  While the way that I care has most certainly changed as a result, my belief in a person's best intentions remains.

A message at this conference specifically validated my instincts.  Hope must be the anchor of the soul.  No matter how much we waver, we should be inseparably linked to the Lord of hope - a God of second chances.  A God whose precise purpose in sending His Son was for our redemption, our made right-ness.  Why not look at the positive, see the possibility for redemption in the brokenness of our shattered lives?  Our God sees the perfection of His son in the place of our wicked and sinful hearts that long for everything but the one thing that redeems us.

I choose to see the should be and the could be, and figure out how to make it possible.  It makes for a much more hopeful existence than the melancholy sights of an Eeyore.  And in the spirit of children's literature, I'll leave you with a suitable quote from a childhood classic:

"Good morning, Pooh Bear," said Eeyore gloomily. "If it is a good morning," he said. "Which I doubt," said he.
"Why, what's the matter?"
"Nothing, Pooh Bear, nothing. We can't all, and some of us don't. That's all there is to it."
"Can't all what?" said Pooh, rubbing his nose.
"Gaiety. Song-and-dance. Here we go round the mulberry bush."