Category Archives: Invitations

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.

From Jesus Freak to Evangelism Phobia, Part One

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In this 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.

I was the teenage girl who painted “Jesus Freak” in giant letters on a bright yellow t-shirt, wrote songs about Jesus, spent two summers selling religious books door-to-door, and took a turn in every spiritual leadership position at my private school. I grew up in a small, rural church, and my eager interest was met with plenty of opportunities for involvement. I made floral arrangements and bulletins for church, served as Sabbath School superintendent and deaconess, led song services and provided special musics. Before I moved away for college, I preached a sermonette centered around a song titled “The Station,” in which Jesus’ followers are entreated not to take their heaven-ticket to the train station, but to go out into the streets where “there is work to be done.”1

I bought evangelism—hook, line and sinker—but I didn’t grow into it. It was baggy and ill-fitting. I don’t recall ever having a conversation in which I tried to convince someone of God’s existence, God’s love, or their need for a relationship with God. Rather, Christian community was like being on an athletic team. It was a great way to keep me active, connected, passionate, and out of trouble. I believed everyone needed to “know Jesus,” and I faithfully kept a prayer journal and participated in all faith-feeding activities, but mostly I was just happy to be a good person (ignorance is bliss).

Fast forward 20 years, from the late 90’s to the late 2010’s. I no longer felt like a good person, and I was nursing a decidedly bitter attitude toward witnessing. At one point I participated in a Bible study focused on “winning” souls for Christ, and “warning” friends and relatives of Jesus’ soon return to Earth. I found these ideas as unpleasant as a wedgie, and I wanted relief from the discomfort. When I thought about “winning and warning,” what came to mind were a number of messages from my church (and purportedly from the Bible), including: 1) you are bad (sinful) and I know what can fix you (Jesus); 2) there is a god who has great things for you IF you submit to him, but if you don’t he’ll punish you; 3) your heart matters and your behavior matters, so it is imperative to work toward a pure heart and loving actions at all times; 4) once you’re in, it’s your job to bring more people in.

None of these messages set me free, so why would I spread them around? All of this assumes that people whose spiritual journey is different than mine are wrong, and it’s my job to convince them I have the truth (and they don’t). The primary reason for treating people well is so they’ll want to become Christian. Every person I add to the church books is a “jewel for my crown in heaven.” Yuck.

I thought about people in my circle of influence. If I’m not being nice to them with an agenda—to “win them for Christ”—is there still a reason to be nice? Do I haphazardly shoot love-darts, hoping to penetrate a hard heart? Am I being nice to assuage my guilt for the rampant selfishness in my life? I think about neighbors, friends, strangers. What reason do I have to treat them as valuable, dignified human beings? If I’m not intent on witnessing and converting, why would I take interest or go out of my way to care for someone?

For a time, I found comfort in something Jesus said. “I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!” (Matthew 25:40b, NLT). I know Jesus. I would go out of my way for Jesus. So if He is in every person around me, I am invested—in neighbors, friends, and strangers alike—because in loving on them I am loving on my bro, Jesus.

Jesus tells us to love our enemies, so presumably He does the same. He loves the people disinterested in His kingdom, and the people opposed to His kingdom. If this is true, then ought not my message to be that Jesus loves you? I don’t need you to come over here to where I am. I want you to know that Jesus loves you over there where you are.

But this comfort was short-lived. Even the phrase, “Jesus loves you,” started to feel risky. I know people who are gagging on religion, vomiting over and over, waiting for it to leave their system so they can breathe. Once they heal, they will be hungry. But not for what religion is putting on the table.

I’m deconstructing, along with thousands of evangelicals and exvangelicals in my generation. Yet while I reject churchy messages, my lifestyle for the last several years has included co-leading a house church, speaking for chapel at my kids’ school, blogging about my relationship with Jesus, and lending my favorite spiritual books to friends. If that’s not evangelism, Christianity, or church, what is it? If I’m not telling people they’re sinful and Jesus loves them anyway, who or what am I?

Next week, in Part Two, I’ll talk about finding new words and ways. There’s nothing final about it, and that’s okay. I’m getting more comfortable with uncertainty. Still, there is comfort in finding a toehold.

Endnotes:
1 Lisa Marie Buster is a favorite musical artist, and I still enjoy her song, “The Station,” on the album by the same name.

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.

What Is God up To?

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What Is God up To?

Reflections – week 8

It’s the final week of reflections inspired by my current small groups. We’ve been exploring these books: Father’s House: The Path That Leads Home, and The Whole Language: The Power of Extravagant Tenderness. I have a feeling I’ll be going through these books again in years to come. They invite me to occupy my own wholeness, to live in my Spirit center. I’m honored to read the words of folks who are truly alive, and to offer my own words into the great expanse.

Many thanks to the authors of these books—to Karen McAdams, Rachel Faulkner Brown, and Gregory Boyle. You are Spirit wind blowing in my life.

I have long been certain that God is crazy. Here’s proof, from the mouth of Jesus: “Whoever believes in Me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these because I am going to the Father” (John 14:12). I could write pages on what I think this means, but I honestly have no idea. Regardless, it blows the doors off my measured world and invites me to a wild curiosity.

Gregory Boyle writes, “I hired a homie named Julio once who was in possession of the worst attitude to ever walk through our doors. Julio was not the first homie who told me where to go and requested I do things with myself that I don’t believe can be physically done. I do remember, as I hired him, that I deliberately chose to be intrigued by him rather than get defensive. Instead of dreading his arrival and the implications of his belligerence, I opted for curiosity. Way better. It worked out.”1

I find myself in a place where I’m liable to get defensive with God, so I’m opting for curiosity. Curiosity keeps me from “furiosity” and fear. Father’s House Session Seven is about how we were “made for more,”2 and that “more” may look like healing people and exercising power over spirits of darkness and oppression. Exercising spiritual power feels like one more chance for me to mess things up, in a very public way. If I pray over someone for healing of a physical malady or for the removal of a spirit of fear or depression, it’s no longer private. And I probably need an answer for when it doesn’t “work.” I don’t have one, and I hate all the usual ones about whatever God’s will is and maybe I misunderstood what to pray for, or maybe I needed to pray longer or with more people or with more faith, blah, blah, blah. I’ll pass on looking like an idiot and I’ll pass on making excuses for God not showing up.

So obviously I have some things to work through. In the meantime, curiosity keeps me present. Curiosity holds open the possibility for things to happen that I don’t expect or understand. Curiosity invites an awareness that God may be up to something of which I am totally unaware. Curiosity lets God out of the box, to see what He’s going to do. I’m not sure why God lets me keep a lid on Him. But I’m kinda ready to take the lid off. Or at least open it a crack and see what comes out. Curiosity allows me to wonder instead of worry. What is God up to?

In the early chapters of the book of Acts, Peter is beginning to inhabit his spiritual boldness. One day when he walks with John to the temple for prayer, they encounter a man begging for money. The man was lame at birth, and presumably made money to help his family care for him by begging at the temple. He asks Peter and John for money, and instead they heal him in the name of Jesus. He gets up on those legs that didn’t even work in utero, and runs around praising God.

So God’s house can be a place for beggars to come, and to receive something different than what they’re asking for. Through His Spirit, God gives us good things we don’t ask for. This is why I want to be curious. What is God up to?

I suppose I was made for this. It’s not like flying to the moon so much as it’s like walking or eating. I am naturally supernatural. The adventurously expectant life is not my posture toward God, nor His posture toward me, but something we experience together. I am a trusted daughter in this partnership.

* * *

As I look back on Father’s House, having now journaled through it twice in small groups, I recall the story I shared at our final meeting last fall. I journaled it that morning, just a couple hours before we gathered for our Father’s House finale.

November 1, 2022

Saturday our family spent the day around the fire pit in our back yard. The freestanding metal fire pit and all the chairs are still out in the lawn now, on a Tuesday morning. Yesterday it sprinkled a bit and I thought about moving the fire pit, but I didn’t make it a priority. As I fell asleep in the evening I could hear it raining more, and each time I awoke in the night it was raining. I wanted to enjoy the sound of rainfall, but I couldn’t help thinking about the fire pit out there and how easily it rusts. When I got up this morning and it was still raining, I remembered that our two favorite lounge chairs rust also, and I started feeling anxious and frustrated with myself.

Then Papa reminded me, “no condemnation.” And I thought, “but doesn’t letting that stuff rust mean I’m a bad daughter? Doesn’t it make me careless, wasteful … and just really really wrong?” And the answer was, “no. Leaving stuff out to rust has nothing to do with who I am.” I faltered as I tried to say that in my spirit. It was uncomfortable, to say the least, but with some effort I said it. I wonderingly turned it over in my mind and as I accepted it to be true I wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. I felt light. Amazed. Loved. Free. Then, as is my custom on Tuesday mornings, I weighed myself. 114.6 pounds. As I entered it on my smart phone I felt good about keeping my weight in the 113-117 range for several years now. And then I knew in my spirit that weight management says nothing about who I am. If I weighed 200 pounds I would be just as beloved. And I knew it in my heart. And then I just felt spoiled.

I am spoiled by knowing I don’t have to get life right, and I don’t even have to get spirituality right. There is no “right” incantation or posture or actions. There is no deserving. He is the one doing—the Giver, the Filler, the Inviter. My role is to receive (and there is no “right” way to receive) whatever extravagance He extends to me. He elevates me to where He is, and invites me to a life of amazement. In living that life, I extend the same invitation to the people around me who are still trying to get it “right,” or who have settled miserably into the mire of getting it “wrong.”

“God stands with the powerless not to console them in their powerlessness, but to always remind them of their power. … Jesus invites us to this anarchy.”3

Endnotes:
1The Whole Language, page 130
2Father’s House, page 136
3The Whole Language, page 135

A Need to Need

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A Need to Need

Reflections – week 7b

Welcome to week seven (part two) 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. Next Wednesday’s post for week 8 will conclude this series.

I’m finding joy here, and I’m pleased you’re with me on this journey.

Father’s House. Lesson seven. Myth #41: God turns His back on me when I have needs—especially needs that are annoying or ongoing.

Having needs is a no-go for me, for many reasons. Needing is vulnerable. If I need, I’m giving another person the opportunity to help or ignore me, and that’s way too far out of my control. Needing is weak; it happens because I didn’t plan right, or I made a mistake. In short, needing is never safe. Never. If I’m not strong, I’m worthless. Needs are more likely to create distance than bring connection. I don’t feel safe within my own self to have a need; heaven forbid I need something from my husband or friends, or from God Himself.

Father’s House points out that, “Everywhere Jesus went we encounter His immeasurable goodness—healing ALL who came to Him, delivering people from demonic torment, raising the dead, forgiving sinners, loving the unlovely and dining with the disreputable.”2 Yes, but this is all about doing, and I get hung up there. It sounds like Jesus went around fixing things, but my spiritual experience tells me that’s a mis-read. God hasn’t been much into fixing me. I think the Bible, the way people talk about the Bible, and the way I understand Jesus have given me the wrong idea of Father.

There is a God I know and trust, a Father I have encountered in my anger and fear and self-loathing; in music and friends and words and quietness. I have found His abiding presence in my knotted heartstrings, and in the cadence of my day. But there is also a Father who isn’t going to help me live my life, who is okay with me running on empty and doing only what I can do in my humanness. I am terrified to approach Him with deeply felt needs. Does God actually respond to a person’s real, tangible needs? What about the intangible needs I don’t even have words for? How often will God “meet” my needs, whatever that means? If it’s one time out of ten, I’d rather not ask.

I want a loving Father’s help, but the stakes feel high. I always end up angry at Him, at me, or at both of us—probably because I have expectations. I want a contract. In fact, a prenuptial agreement would be nice. I’d like to know what I get out of this when God stops showing up.

But I also want to know what it’s like to be cared for. I want to trust, to settle into what is better than a contract.

Father’s House. Day Two. Page 125: “Now climb up in [Papa’s] lap in His big chair and tell Him what you need from Him. Lay it all out.”3 I’m terrified to admit that I need to be lavishly loved, that I want to be celebrated. But I know I will settle for less if I keep clutching my needs, unwilling to hold them out, to allow someone else to see them. So I follow directions. I make a list of what I need from Papa.

I need You to bless me.
I need You to see me.
I need Your seeing to precipitate action on my behalf.
I need You to remind me it’s okay not to be useful.
I need You to move toward me with interest and intention.
I need You to want to hear from me as much when I’m doing poorly as when I’m doing well.
I need You to like being with me.
I need You to behave extravagantly toward me.
I need to be wedded to You—a forever kind of togetherness.
I need “enough” to be out of the equation—no evaluating.
I need to order takeout and waste time with You, in my pajamas.
I need to hold hands with You.
I need You to ask how I’m doing and listen without an agenda.

My list surprises me. It seems I’m more interested in being seen and loved than being served or dealt a fair hand. I’m not sure how I feel about this. I know relationship is better than rules, but sometimes I want God to follow the rules. Sometimes predictable feels safe.

Maybe predicting is rather like weather forecasting. You end up with a mix of everything, undefined no matter how hard you try to define it. But, every day we know there will be weather. I don’t know how God is going to show up today, but I know He’s going to show up. It might not be the sunshine I prayed for, but I need never fear I’ll wake up to a day with no weather at all. God is alive and I am alive, and there are days when all that aliveness is unpredictable, stormy, maybe even disastrous. But no one will wonder if anything happened that day. We’ll know. So I don’t need God to run my life, or predict my life, or change the forecast to be in my favor. I just need Him to like me and see me and bless me, and keep showing up.

It is safe to have needs in Papa’s house.

Gregory Boyle writes that when we are “held by a no-matter-what-ness” we can “reidentify and accept [ourselves] with a mystical wholeness. You can then discard all those things that previously you held back. The places where you used to get stuck. … After that, it’s not so much smooth sailing as it is resilient and integrated enough to deepen the sense of your own truth.”4 My truth is that God’s Spirit joins with my mine to affirm that I am His child (Romans 8:16). I hear His affirmation, and I make another list.

God says,
I’m so glad you’re here.
I love holding you.
I love being with you.
I am and I have all that you need.
Together, let’s rest in what is finished. Let’s rest for a long time.
Let’s be together with no distractions. Let’s have fun together.
Let’s go for a walk, get ice cream, love every person we see.
Let’s enjoy and create.
Let’s take everything that burdens and stresses you and put it on my docket. You’re free.
Let’s do relationships together. Let’s parent together.
Let me spoil you. Let me do more than you “deserve.”
Let me warm you and feed you and provide a feast of beauty for your eyes.
Let’s be alive together. I release you from the identity of responsible servant-child and name you sparkling heiress. I’m your Daddy. I made this world and the people in it. You can’t break anything or anyone in a way that I can’t re-make.
I always have your back (and your front and sides).
I know you. You don’t ever need to hide, or explain yourself to me. You make perfect sense.
You’re exactly where you need to be. Every moment.
You are not bound or caged. You are wild and free and alive.
You cannot lose my favor. I would never think to say that, because it seems silly to me, so thank you for letting me know what you need to hear.
“I’ll love you forever. I’ll like you for always. As long as I’m living [which will be a long time], my [daughter] you’ll be.”5

I have believed I am worthy of having what God perceives as my needs met, but not worthy of having what I perceive as my needs met. Now I’m less sure that’s an important distinction. God is listening and loving. He is not measuring and monitoring. That’s about as safe as it gets. So I will practice bringing my needs to the table, and I will take comfort in being “held by a no-matter-what-ness.” In Papa’s house, needs are a point of connection. They are a meeting place for intimate friends. They are safe.

Endnotes:
1See Father’s House, page 120
2Father’s House,page 127
3Father’s House,page 125
4The Whole Language, page 110
5Love You Forever, by Robert Munsch

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