Category Archives: Invitations to Rest and Stillness

An Invitation to Mystery

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An Invitation to Mystery

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe,
for caterpillars,
who quietly eat their way
from size zero to plus-size.

When they grow up
they find a place to hang
from their last proleg,
upside down.
Do they know they will never
eat another leaf?
that their next meal
and every meal thereafter
will be liquid?
Do they know they will
keep only their six front legs?

We humans were like caterpillars
in the garden of Eden,
squishy and naked,
immersed in plenty.
But we didn’t trust the plenty,
didn’t trust ourselves,
didn’t trust God.
We left the mystery of plenty
for the certainty of scarcity.
Perhaps it would have been better for us
to surrender to love,
and to allow love
an element of mystery.

Instead we work
to stay the same size,
the same shape,
eat the same leaves.
We use what we know
to fight against God
and each other,
forgetting that mystery
has its own peace,
and not-knowing sometimes
makes butterflies.

I’m Breaking Up With This Advice

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“We have all failed, not only because we have sinned,
but because we have thought it wise to keep tabs at all.”

-Danielle Shroyer, as quoted in “Attached to God” by Krispin Mayfield, p. 135

I’m breaking up with this advice: “Stop and think.”

I have stopped to think and here I remain, thinking. It’s time for me to go and not think. I have lived my whole life under a microscope, evaluating everything. This is exhausting, cold, dehumanizing. It’s like looking in one of those concave mirrors that magnifies skin pores, obsessing over the health of each one. No wonder I’m weary.

The alternative is to zoom out a bit and smile. Zoomed out I see a face, a person, a life. God is inviting me to stop. evaluating. everything.

And I feel the freedom. “It is for freedom that Christ has set [me] free” (Galatians 5:1a, NIV). Imagine an unevaluated life. Just a life. Safe and free and homey. And maybe a little daring and vulnerable. I want to model this to my kids: an unevaluated life; a different way than school and work and self-help books, where everything is examined, measured, and labeled. “Bad.” “Good.” “Better.” “Best.” What if nothing was labeled? Imagine the chaos, the freedom, the delight. Imagine the curiosity, the seeing, the open hands receiving.

My calm and whole center where I know I’m okay seems to be growing. One morning I moved to it from a very distracted and unruly mind, and the calm felt bigger than it used to. In this holy center I don’t need to prove my worth or earn my keep. I am truly, deeply okay. In a strange way I feel perfect. The tension between where I am and where I ought to be doesn’t exist here. Imagine—a place where evaluation and measuring are a foreign concept. Breathing, smiling—these things come more easily.

If I can be free from scrutiny, how about everyone else? I feel a growing desire to stop evaluating others. I want to invite them to live freely, to zoom out and smile. See something beautiful here. Stop thinking for a minute—it’s revolutionary.

When I Grow Up I Want to Be Roy Kent From Ted Lasso

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When I Grow Up I Want to Be Roy Kent From Ted Lasso

Journal entry, March 2023

I don’t feel on top of things, but I also don’t feel run over by things. I feel alive, real, and less scared.

Feeling on top of things is always about ego. Feeling run over by things is also about ego, but it feels like depression and stress.

I’d like to be like Roy Kent in the TV show Ted Lasso—fully present, wise, honest, and not connected to people because I’m nice, but because we’re connected. I think that’s called “secure attachment.”

Papa God, thank You for inviting me to this place and waiting—for years—while I hesitated outside the door. Thank You for sitting there outside with me, and for keeping the door open. Thank You, Spirit, for intimacy.

Journal entry, May 2023

I feel lost again. Depressed, I guess. I notice myself trying harder in some areas, and not trying at all in others. My mental space feels foggy and disconnected. I want to stay present, but being present feels like one more thing I “should” do that I’m terrible at. As I showered this morning, my mind was sluggish, but restless, like a tired housefly. I told God I feel out of practice at being present, and I don’t know what to do.

God told me the present is safe. It’s safe to be with myself in this moment. The moment I’m in is exempt from evaluation. I don’t have to carry a ruler—dual purposes of measuring and punishing. Instead, I receive the “we’ve got this” look from my Father.

Until my shower-talk with God, I didn’t realize I live mentally in the past or the future because it feels safer than the present. The past is over; I can fret about it all I want, and my judgement and worry give me a sense of control. The future is coming; maybe if I plan it just right my life will be better.

If I’m thinking about what’s next I reduce the pain of knowing I’m not showing up how I want to right now.

The present is wobbly. It slips away like kite string, pulling, whimsical. It doesn’t behave, doesn’t let me nail it down. Qué será será? Not on my watch.

This awareness I’m afraid of the present, and God’s assurance it is safe to be present—these are my invitation to relax. Like a massage, the words “present is safe” loosen the tightness underneath and free me to move and breath. And who knows, maybe if I receive this moment and accept safety in being present, I’ll have less to fret about in the past and the future. Maybe it’s all okay, even when it’s not okay.

Like Roy Kent, I can be angry and pessimistic if that’s what I experience in the present, and I can also be generous, compassionate, and honest. All of these are safe experiences for me, and receiving them open-handed is what steadies me for the next moment. I don’t need to worry. It is both safe and brave to be present, and I have a growing appetite for safety and bravery. Now is where I belong.

From Jesus Freak to Evangelism Phobia, Part Two

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In this post—as in last week’s post—I use words like “Evangelism,” “Witnessing,” “Christianity,” and “Religion.” Each reader will have a different understanding of these words, both in denotation and connotation. Personally, I’m in the murky depths, somewhere between a conservative upbringing and an emerging mystical faith, still feeling around for a vocabulary that doesn’t cause pain.

***

“Aren’t you the one with a blog talking about Jesus?” Khalid asked.

I was at the home of my friends, Khalid and Tiffaney. They’d been to a concert earlier that week, which I avoided because of the musician’s evangelistic bent. “I don’t like evangelism,” I said, which prompted Khalid’s question about my blog.

“I certainly hope people don’t think I’m evangelizing!” I deflected the question.

It had not occurred to me that my blog (and my social handle @jesusmyfavoritesubject) could be viewed as evangelism. I have written over 100 blog posts, with the premise that talking about Jesus is one of my favorite things to do. What is that, if it’s not evangelism? Suddenly, I needed to answer this question.

I asked my husband if what I’m doing is evangelism. In his typical style, he looked up the word on his phone and found half a dozen definitions, all of which involved the concept of convincing another person. A Google search tells me that to convince is: to bring (as by argument) to belief, consent, or a course of action; persuade; cause (someone) to believe firmly in the truth of something. Combine this with the gospel of Jesus Christ, and you have evangelism: teaching or preaching about Jesus with the aim to bring about belief or action. Is that what I’m doing? I don’t want to answer.

A gray Jeep with a “Jesus Loves You” bumper sticker kept showing up on B Street last week. I passed it on my way home from school pick-up, and it got me all up in arms. Rather than joy at the sweet reminder of how loved I am, my response was irritation. People have all different conceptions of Jesus; the person displaying the sticker has no idea how many painful ideas he or she is promoting along with the positive ones. “Jesus Loves You” doesn’t see people, it talks at them. It doesn’t have any idea what tragedies or triumphs are on the reader’s mind, and it cannot weep or rejoice with them. The sticker is evangelism. I don’t like that I don’t like it … but I don’t like it.

One Friday afternoon, while chatting with my friend Celina at her dining room table, I brought up the question of whether I’m evangelizing. She asked, “If you’re not trying to convince when you write, what are you trying to do? What do you hope will happen when people read your blog?”

“I want people to feel seen,” I said. “I want them to be able to take a deep breath. I want them to know they’re okay.”

If God is in the picture, I hope people will see God seeing them.

On the eve of my recent 38th birthday, I spent a couple hours making a mental list of 38 people who have influenced me. It included coworkers, authors, family, and friends. Every influence was gentle; not one produced an about-face change in my life. They were quiet but strong: my boss—Jerry Mason—who believed in me, gave me responsibilities I would never have pursued on my own, and whose confidence in me was a steady presence in my life for over eight years; the authors—Gregory Boyle, Barbara Brown Taylor, Anne Lamott—who gave me permission to breathe, to try life open-handed; our mom tribe—half a dozen ladies who see me and allow me to see them. This is the kind of influence I hope for in writing.

I suppose I’m inviting people to be at home in themselves, rather than reject themselves to be at home in Christ. Krispin Mayfield, in his book Attached to God, writes about the Christian experience of sinfulness, and compares it to the pain of disconnection described in attachment theory.

It struck me that the theology I’d been given and the attachment literature I was reading seemed to be describing the exact same thing but offering different explanations. The theology taught that this awful feeling of ‘inner deformity’ was because of things we’ve done—lying to our parents, disrespecting teachers, sneaking extra candy. The psychology suggested that the terrible feeling came from what has been done to us. … (pg. 169)

When we have an insecure attachment, we feel awful inside not because of our sin but because of our unmet needs. It is the feelings of distance and separation that create the intense pain of shame. … (pg. 170)

“We think that if we can get a little bit better, a little less sinful, we will feel better about ourselves. In reality, true connection heals shame. (pg. 173)

True connection. That I might be willing to shout from the rooftops. I want to offer the things I thought I had because I was a Christian, but slowly and devastatingly found out I didn’t have: hope, peace, love, joy. These are almost synonymous with Christianity, but they evaded me for decades. So as I’ve found them, I’ve also found different language. When I share hope, I talk about how it’s okay to not be okay. When I share peace, I talk about disentangling from perfectionism. When I share love, I talk about expansiveness. When I share joy, I talk about coffee and friends.

I guess I’ve always wanted people to know they’re loved, and for a long time I thought telling them about Jesus was the best way to do that. But I was “the blind, leading the blind.” Religion created a structure in which I could feel my way around while my eyes were closed. But at some point I started bumping into sharp corners, and I didn’t feel safe any more. God suggested I sit still and open my eyes. In that terrifying posture of stillness, I learned to hold hands with myself, let myself be loved, and let life be both brutal and beautiful—“brutiful,” as Glennon Doyle would say. The structure of religion was an external protection. The beauty of loving and being loved is an internal strength. I’m learning to be strong rather than safe, and that’s what I want share. Is that evangelism? I still wonder about that.

Ain’t No Love Got Time for That

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I’m on the couch, 6:30 a.m., hungry for the re-membering presence of the Spirit. I feel anxious and sad and heavy. I also feel grateful and loved and okay. The kids were in my office so I came downstairs to journal. Phrank, our cat, is on the couch with me, his foot on mine. He meowed a very loud request to come inside, and I actually stood up and went to let him in.

I am not a high-energy person. In scientific terms, I have inertia. Once I sit down it’s hard to get back up. Once I get going on a project, it’s hard to stop. Everything is a project.

Sedentary pastimes are my go-to: crochet, reading, scrapbooking. I know how to do gardening and canning, but I don’t want to. Long days in the yard and kitchen sound overwhelming. These days my commitments are at a bare minimum. Other than taking my kids to school and participating in several small groups, my time is flexible. I am utterly spoiled, living in the extravagance of an unburdened schedule.

This state of unhurried flow is almost comical, given my upbringing and my high-energy plunge into teen and adult life. I always worked during high school—babysitting, custodial, cashier, fruit picking, door-to-door sales, school office, yearbook editor. I was never idle. My boyfriend in college, whom I married after my sophomore year, pushed me to work a little less and play a little more. Conversely, I pushed him to play a little less and work a little more. Marital conflict ensued. But, eventually I could watch a movie without crocheting at the same time to feel productive, and he could mow the lawn before it got out of control.

At age 27, after five years working full time, I quit work to stay home with our newborn daughter. That was the beginning of the end of having energy. I didn’t know sleep was my drug of choice until I could no longer reach for it at will. I became afraid, always afraid, of not having enough energy. I was too much of a purist to drink coffee, too independent to ask for help, and too naive to realize I was depressed.

Fast forward three years. I had a three-year-old and a one-year-old, who still often woke me at night. Exhaustion was so normal I couldn’t remember any other state. I was resentful and angry. I was too stubborn to consider working instead of staying home full time, too lonely in marriage to lean into my husband, and too resentful to take refuge in gratitude. At this point I became tired enough of myself that I started seeing a therapist. Her name was Beth. Together we turned directly into a swamp of pain that would take seven years to wade through.

It’s May 3, 2023. My babies are ages ten and eight years old. Tomorrow I will be 38. I like myself, more than half the time. I enjoy a hundred things—including hot showers (which I previously hated), my children (whom I previously resented), coffee (which I am no longer too much of a purist to drink), and friends (they’re not as scary as they used to be). I’m taking antidepressants, enjoying life-changing intimacy in my marriage, and practicing asking for help. I write poems of gratitude. I blog for fun. I rarely write a to-do list, and I’ve given up controlling my schedule and my loved ones (at least some of the time).

I am free in a dozen ways—fruit of the last five years spent dredging my murky depths. An ability to hold the stresses of life lightly is one of these freedoms. I could stress out when a friend stands me up on a lunch date, or I could enjoy the rare time alone and the gossipy conversation of sweet-smelling, wrinkled ladies at the next table. I could shame myself for not getting groceries until two days after the milk runs out, or I could enjoy making peanut butter and banana sandwiches for breakfast. I could be angry when a kid wakes up in the middle of the night, or I could be grateful I’m able to be there with them.

Please, please understand this is not about choice. I have very ugly, unresolved feelings toward whoever says we can choose to be happy. Maybe I’m an exceptionally difficult case, but I did not have access to the “power of choice” for many long years. The ability to choose love, grace, and the quirky flow of life—wow, it’s relief, like a warm bowl of soup after gardening in the rain.

I think God is having the last laugh when it comes to my anxiety about never having enough energy. After ten years (ten years!) it is apparent to me that stressing about everyone’s behavior (including inanimate things—watch out if the utensil drawer sticks when I try to close it) takes an incredible amount of energy. Possibly more energy than loving. I know, it’s a long shot. Finding my wholeness has given me courage to take long shots.

Here I thought God was asking me to do more, but actually He was inviting me to do less. My new mantra is: Don’t try so hard, don’t analyzing everything, just live. Love doesn’t have time to mull over every unmet expectation or frustrating inconvenience. It turns out open-handed receiving takes less energy than tight-fisted control.

I breathe, and my oxygen-starved heart says, “It took you long enough.” I smile, because I don’t have the energy to feel bad about ten years of struggle. Ain’t no love got time for that.

Love Everyone, and Everywhere Love

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Love Everyone, and Everywhere Love

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe,
for Your rooted, yet whimsical, love.
It stands, unmoved by my inner turmoil;
it moves, to stand wherever I am.

Blessed are You
for taking up residence
everywhere, like air.
I breathe Your life
when I remember You
and when I forget You.
I dine at Your expanding table
where there is room for one more
and then one more.

Blessed are You,
Lord our God,
King of the Universe, for this:
because You are a safe place, so am I.
We are haven of emotional safety,
home for anger and doubt,
aware that despite their bulky size,
they are effortlessly held within love.
Love is a home big enough,
always big enough.

It Has Been a Year Since We Left Church, for the Second Time

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The first time, it was all rather unexpected. Friends invited us to start a house church with them. We could provide a place for people who didn’t feel safe in traditional church, people who had too many questions or doubts or painful memories.

So we left church to create church.

What followed were six years of beautiful upheaval. Often kids outnumbered adults, two to one. Treasures in the chaos were a sense of purpose, relational Bible studies, conversations over lunch.

But, five years in, I got tired. Bible studies irritated me. Sabbaths felt long. My husband and I watched ourselves interacting with people and noticed how empty we were—selfish and short-tempered and irritable.

Uncertainty hovered around our house church commitment for many months, until it became clear to me that fear was holding me there, not love. Quitting would leave us without a church family, it would disappoint our ministry partners, and, quite frankly, it would look pathetic. I really wanted God to call me to something new, so it could be about going there instead of leaving here. But He didn’t.

Last April, after six years in house church ministry, we made an abrupt exit. We left church, for the second time.

We became the unchurched.

At first this unchurched place of neutrality felt unspiritual. But somewhere along the way I accepted an invitation to my own wholeness.

Now I work with God in a never-ending vocation of inviting people into their wholeness. It’s small groups and coffee dates, reading and writing, praying and listening. It’s group texts and play dates and learning that my identity is not in how people respond or don’t respond to me. It’s not empty, it’s full. It’s not certain, it’s curious. It’s not settled, it’s in motion. It’s not so much about leaving church as it is about finding my holiness and realizing that, as Gregory Boyle would say, there is no “them,” just “us.” We’re all in.

Brain Be Quiet, Let The Heart Speak

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Brain Be Quiet, Let The Heart Speak

Reflections – week 7a

Welcome to week seven of reflections inspired by my current small groups. Together with some of my favorite women, I’m exploring these books: Father’s House: The Path That Leads Home, and The Whole Language: The Power of Extravagant Tenderness. I’ll be referencing material from Session Seven for two weeks (7a and 7b). And then Session Eight will conclude this series.
I’m finding joy here, and I’m pleased you’re with me on this journey.

Mostly I have believed that my head should rule my heart. Doesn’t information come to me via my head? Then what I know will inform my feelings and impulses, my way of being in the world. There’s just a tiny little problem. This trickle-down effect hasn’t happened. When I first noticed, I figured it must be a matter of management—I need to take a strong hand. My heart may or may not agree with what’s in my head, but my God-given will allows me to choose how I behave in the world, based on what I know to be true. Except this never worked either. So how the hell does my software work?

Karen McAdams, in this week’s Father’s House video, says, “If there’s a battle between your head and your heart, your heart is gonna win every time.”1 So I’ve had it backward the whole time?! This clears up a litany of questions I’ve had over the years: Why do I pray for patience and then try hard to be patient? What makes it so difficult to truly love another person, especially when I’m spread thin and they’re a hundred pounds of trouble? When will my beliefs about God start impacting the way I interact with Him and with people? Why am I always at war with myself, exhausted by listening to the arguing factions and trying to reach a conclusion?

Answer: “If there’s a battle between your head and your heart, your heart is gonna win every time.”

Karen McAdams suggests it’s critical that I give my heart permission to speak.2 So I opened my heart room and started picking things up and asking questions. I spent a long time learning how my heart pictures God. I refused the right answers, and listened for the felt answers. The honest truth is shocking, sometimes sacrilegious, always insightful.

God,
I don’t trust You. I want to be in charge of my own self, my day, my time, my family.
You don’t want me to be kind to myself because that would be selfish and sinful. I was made to think of others and do for others.
I’m angry at You for not changing me the way You said you would.
You’d rather be with me when I’m in a good mood.
You’d prefer I figure things out on my own; and also, get them right the first time.
You want me to be dependent so You can control me.
No matter what I do, You’re gonna be volatile, unpredictable. I never know if you’re gonna show up.
When I get lost in myself, You look the other way and wait for me to find myself again.
You like to watch me fail because it reminds me that I need You.
No matter how hard I try, I will fall short. The standards are always changing, just enough to keep me ashamed and aware of my sinfulness.
Your so-called perfection is made perfect in apathy. You are neither warm nor cold, loving nor angry, approachable nor distant, kind nor harsh. This middle ground protects You from criticism, and also from getting too close to me.
I’m furious at You for promising abundance and then giving me stale trail mix.
You’ve really fucked me up by promising You love me and then forgetting to hug me, ever.
The only reason I still believe in You is that my daft head tells me to, and keeps cramming stuff at me until I can’t breathe.
When things get hard, it’s my fault, so I ought not to expect a handout from You.
You’re actually an alcoholic because looking at me and the rest of this world is so damn overwhelming You need to numb it however You can.
You’re so sick and tired of my slow transformation that You can’t stand to look at me, and You’d rather not talk again until I get my act together.
I’m supposed to just let You do whatever the heck You feel like and be okay with it because You’re God.
I’m invisible to You unless I’m useful.

Lonely heart, I hear your pain.

My heart was at capacity, but I didn’t know it. It was full, full, full. Whatever my head sent to my heart, my heart sent right back, unopened. Return to sender. I foolishly thought my heart had unlimited capacity. It never occurred to me I might need to do a good old-fashioned purge and let a couple of boxes go to the second-hand store.

Oh my heart, I’m sorry I have rendered you voiceless, and therefore powerless. But now that you have some room again, and we’re talking, what do you think about some new things? Not too heavy, not too many things. Pick a few. Leave space to breathe.

God,
You don’t mind that I curse at You more than anyone else.
I have Your undivided attention and unmetered affection.
You want to give to me more than you want to take from me.
You see how often I run on empty, and You notice my weary body.
You don’t expect me to change because You love me.
You are more interested in being present with me than You are in molding my character.
You favor me and bless me when I reject You.
You don’t expect me to figure things out on my own, but neither do You expect me to rely on Your advice.
You like to laugh and joke with me, read books together, write together, sit together and look out the window.
You feel the pain I feel, and You bless it.
I am important to You. When You’re dancing with me, You don’t let anyone cut in.
You like to hug me, and You’re always up for a celebration.
You are such a God that I cannot permanently mess even one thing up.
You are not politely neutral toward me. This is a love story, not an agreement to shake hands and keep the peace.
You come find me when I’m curled up in fear and self-loathing, holding a sign that says, “Fuck Off.” You are not fooled, and You’re not offended. You come close enough to feel the tension and see my eyes flashing, and You stay, gently.
You always see the real me, the truest me, the me You made in Your image, unshakably good. You are disinterested in my performance or mistakes and fully aware of who I am as Your daughter.

“Homegirl Inez says, ‘At Homeboy, we don’t check boxes, we check pulses.’ And if one of our trainees misses, we don’t ask, ‘Where you been at?’ but ‘How ya doin’?’”3 Imagine a God who doesn’t ask, “Where have you been?” but “How are you doing?” That’s the God we actually have. The too-good-to-be-true Father, who can witness everything in our hearts and still want to hold hands.

Homeboy Ricky said, “I’ve come to realize that I never need to drown in the shallow end of my own beliefs ever again. Been standin’ up ever since.”4 After living in the fetal position so long, standing up is like becoming a whole new person, unfurled, alive, looking around in wonder at all the beauty.

I will keep giving my heart a voice. I will engage with hope by letting God encourage me. Boyle writes, “… we are meant to both feel encouraged by God and be a source of endless, hopeful encouragement for the downhearted.”5 Dialoging with my own heart will teach me how to dialogue with other beautiful hearts. And I will keep the conversation open. I will be tender with myself when I find more pain in my heart, and I will pray:

Okay Father, I’m gonna talk directly to You. I have a hard time picturing a Father who delights in me, whose countenance toward me does not change based on my performance. But I know that being kind to myself is a way to remember Your kindness, and that remembering Your kindness is a way to be kind to myself. We are in this together. Your authority is my authority—not standing over me, but always backing me up. You like to have fun with me. You always have time for me. You do not hand me a to-do list in the morning and check it over in the evening. You invite me to be with You, creating or enjoying. Just by being You and being my Dad, You remind me who I am when I forget. I belong in Your house. I receive You as my Father, Jesus as my brother, and Spirit as my truest self, my center. Thank You for hearing my heart, and for giving me courage to hear it too.

Endnotes:
1Father’s House, Session Seven video teaching
2Father’s House, Session Seven video teaching
3The Whole Language, page 103
4The Whole Language, page 118
5The Whole Language, page 116

Mess to Meadow

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Mess to Meadow

Reflections – week 6

Welcome to week six of reflections inspired by my current small groups. Together with some of my favorite women, I’m exploring these books: Father’s House: The Path That Leads Home, and The Whole Language: The Power of Extravagant Tenderness. This is week six of eight.
I’m finding joy here, and I’m pleased you’re with me on this journey.

“Messy.” This word resonated with me as a descriptor of my inner world for most of the past ten years. Also, “Complicated” and “Untrustworthy.” Being at home with a newborn baby introduced me to my inner world, and brought to light a toxic relationship with myself that had been flying under the radar most of my life. Twenty-one months after quitting work to stay at home, my second daughter was born, and in between cuddling warm, squishy babies and washing loads of laundry that left only pink lint in the dryer screen, I learned to hate myself.

Self-hate is like having the world’s worst roommate, and reading only bad news in the paper. On some level it feels normal, but there is always the hope that things will improve. I had no idea what would be involved in learning kindness to myself. Mercifully, it was not a journey I took alone, but in the company of my husband, favorite authors, music, and God.

I didn’t know it, but I needed to learn what parts of my inner world are truest. What parts can influence or control other parts? Why did I feel powerless so much of the time, and why did I increasingly try to control myself, my children, and my husband to combat those feelings of powerlessness?

One aspect of learning to be friends with myself was practicing acceptance of all the parts. This has been a vital key in finding peace. But I still want to know, when different parts are at war, what is the most real part? In a broader sense, who am I?

Gregory Boyle writes, “When the homies arrive, they have not been properly introduced to themselves.”1 I can relate. While caring for two little ones, I was introduced to myself, but it wasn’t a proper introduction. I got acquainted with what Father’s House calls my soul—made up of mind, will and emotions.2 These always seemed at war with one another. I thought my will was the control center, the part of me that could call the shots for everything else. But it didn’t work. My emotions jumped into control, my mind spent most of its time cowering in fear, and my will unceremoniously shoved me through the duties of each day. After a few years of getting to know myself, I was thoroughly done with being me, and I was madder than hell at whoever said my will was supposed to control my mind and emotions. I was also angry with myself. So angry, from trying to control my emotions with my will, and my will with my mind, and failing. Always failing. Defeated, lying on the ground, exhausted, dirty.

In the video teaching for Father’s House Session Six, Rachel Faulkner Brown introduces the idea of a spirit center.3 The soul (mind, will, emotions) is around the spirit center, and is informed by the spirit center. In other words, everything moves outward from my spirit center. This means I don’t rule myself with willpower. I cannot tell you what a relief this is. Willpower is an unfaithful partner, an accident waiting to happen. I either wield it to the detriment of the soft parts of myself and my children, or I don’t use it, also to the detriment of our most tender parts.

A spirit center changes everything. There is a whole and holy part of me, a quiet place, a finished place. After being properly introduced to myself, the haggling between my will, mind, and emotions took its proper place outside my spirit. The authors of Father’s House write, “In the Kingdom, who you are releases what you do. The enemy tries to convince you what you do determines who you are. That’s why Satan attacks what you believe about yourself the hardest.”4 I have been caught in a vortex of doing, not knowing that being comes first. Spirit is my center, and my center is Spirit. I don’t need to control my spirit.

So, the truest—by which I mean the most unwavering—part of me is my spirit center, around which all the other parts find their places, and the whole becomes a residence of freedom and meaning.

Rachel Faulkner Brown suggests that I ask God, “What do You call me?”5 This is Papa’s response: “Meadow. You are now a place of beauty, stillness, rest, wonder, creative activity. Seasons may change the blooms or the flow of water, but you will always be these things.”

Mess to Meadow.

Wrestling to resting.

Despicable to divine.

The coming hours of this day are not a treacherous trudge over land mines, but an adventurous afternoon in a meadow.

Endnotes:
1The Whole Language, page 94
2Father’s House, page 100
3Father’s House, Session Six video teaching
4Father’s House, page 99
5Father’s House, Session Six video teaching

Taste and Swallow

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Taste and Swallow

Reflections – week 5b

Welcome to the second half of week-five reflections inspired by my current small groups. Together with some of my favorite women, I’m exploring these books: Father’s House: The Path That Leads Home, and The Whole Language: The Power of Extravagant Tenderness. This is week five of eight.
I’m finding joy here, and I’m pleased you’re with me on this journey.

Communion as Helplessness

Babies get spoon-fed. Adults with declining health get spoon-fed. Those who can feed themselves, feed themselves. Except at wedding receptions. Bride and groom hold out thin slices of cake for each other, while family and friends hold their breath—will it be romantically delicate, or smash-in-your-face fun? If they’re really brave, a couple will do the same with drinks. God bless them if they stain the wedding dress.

Holding a drink to another person’s mouth, or putting a bite of food on their tongue, is an intimate interaction. You’re participating in the entrance of a substance into another person’s body. The muscles in your hand and arm are ultra-focused, working in awkward tandem with another’s lips and tongue and throat.

In the Father’s House week 5 visualization, I’m invited to see myself at the table in Papa’s house, receiving communion from His hands.1 Imagine God Himself putting food in my mouth, holding drink to my lips, intimate, connected. This involves so much receiving, which I have never been good at. It involves not doing it on my own. Does God have time for such shenanigans?

As I swallow bread and drink, it occurs to me that tasting and swallowing are nearly the only bodily sensations I will experience with this food. After esophageal muscles carry the food to my stomach, it travels through my body unnoticed by me, yet is giving of itself for hours, sustaining my well-being. But over all this I have no control and very little awareness.

I wonder if my goodness—God’s gift to me—is this way. I hunger for belonging, rest, wholeness, so I open myself to receive. After tasting and swallowing, my mouth may return to neutral—no sensations—but a hundred things are happening inside me, producing life. Resting my hands in my lap and allowing God to feed me, trusting that I was made to receive, and trusting receiving to be life-giving and ongoing—maybe this will calm the hustle and quiet the perfectionism. Maybe being dependent will feel like peace, not prison. Maybe receiving as if I am helpless to do it myself will usher me in to abundance.

When I receive, I’m not generating something new. I’m depending on what already is. Swallowing is a surrender. I have invited something into my body, to become part of me. In the same way, receiving God’s goodness—my goodness—is a surrender to life. It’s not a structure I build brick by brick, but rather a piece of toast with butter and honey, sweet to the tongue, trusted to enter my body and do me good.

As Gregory Boyle says, “Then we stop being ‘spiritual,’ moving from here to there. Instead, we want to move from there to here.”2 God is inviting me to take up residence in myself and to taste my real life and allow it to nourish me. I am not trying to get somewhere so much as I am opening my mouth to partake.

I Declare

Father’s House encourages declarations—statements we can write down and speak aloud in order to internalize new ways of thinking. I’m not much for formulas, and I haven’t been practicing my declarations with any regularity, but writing them even once can be impactful. I had fun this week re-writing in my own words some of the scripture-based declarations from the book.

I am innocent.

I am powerful in my own self.

I live within the walled city of God’s love, my refuge and place of peace.

The greatest power in the universe is for me. All powers against me are lesser.

I am an abider.

I am whole, because this is Jesus’ gift to me.

I am alive. Good things flow through me.

I am an enjoyer of abundance.

God is never on the other side.

Jesus’ faith is my doorway out of law prison.

Slavery to the law falls off me like water off a duck’s back.

I am spirit-inhabited, married into the trinity.

My Papa is compassionate with me. Always.

Let Him Sing

Every week of Father’s House closes with a letter from Papa God, fresh with edibles for my hungry spirit. Excerpts from this week’s letter:

I am singing My promises over your soul. Let them wash over you and fill your mind and body with confidence.
I am putting opportunities in your life to grow your trust and faith in Me. How do I do this? By giving you endless encounters with My goodness.
The prize of My promises is a relationship with me.
… practice the language of possibility! You’re learning to be content using a new muscle – the muscle of rest and trust.
As you wait on My response with a carefree heart… I am holding you in my perfect embrace.

All My Love, Abba Daddy.3

Here’s to endless encounters with God’s goodness—bread and drink—and bulging muscles of rest and trust.

Photo by Ketut Subiyanto: https://www.pexels.com/photo/girl-feeding-her-father-with-a-cake-4815325/

Endnotes:
1Father’s House, Session Five video visualization
2The Whole Language, page 84
3Father’s House, page 94