God has been updating my vocabulary lately, changing the primary meaning of words that have long defined me. Case in point: abandon. Previously a fear that kept me from building my life on the solid rock, preferring instead to keep all my ambitions, hopes, and plans safely on my own back. If He abandons me, what happens? Better to carry the weight myself than to invest it all in one place and risk losing it when He loses interest. Lately the change has been from fear of abandonment to reckless abandon. Jesus' blood never failed me yet, so the new default is to trust Him, assume that He'll act according to His goodness and love in all situations, and operate out of that place.
Dwelling is another. I've always been one to dwell, especially on mistakes and accusations-- one harsh word the only thing necessary to send me careening into guilt and self-doubt for the foreseeable future. I've spent years striving to live above the need for correction, and often opting out of risk-taking in order to preserve myself from the inevitable mistakes. Confrontation, advice, negative claims (whether false or accurate) about me, all adding up to failure in my mind. I have failed to please, failed to love well enough, failed to work hard enough, failed to be enough. Now I dwell in Him. I am enough because He is enough and I am His. There's nothing else worth dwelling on.
Friday, December 2, 2011
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
The heart of striving
Striving is a trend in my life. I've actually always seen this as a good thing. I try to be always moving forward, always learning something new, always developing some new ability or eliminating some old habit, always growing. At surface level, not a problem. Learning, development, abilities, death of bad habits, growth... all good things!
But a couple of weeks ago, I looked in a different mirror than the one I had previously been using, and this mirror allowed me to see what was at the heart of my striving, and it was a startling discovery.
I was striving to earn the love of God. Striving to prove myself worthy, striving to show myself to Him as a good investment... striving to earn His love. But I couldn't ever quite get there. But I kept trying. But I just couldn't.
And this striving was at the root of everything else. I was striving in ministry, striving in friendships, striving in fitness, striving at work, striving at home, striving and wondering why my striving hadn't brought me a husband yet-- must just need to strive harder, right?
It is so exhausting to walk through life with the burden of trying to prove yourself at every juncture. It feels a little bit like being in a boat on a river just above a disastrous waterfall and rowing upstream for your life. All day. Every day. And every once in a while, you look to the right or the left and realize that the boat is slowly slipping farther downstream and that you are not, in fact, gaining ground. And you're certainly not enjoying the river or the scenery, because all you can think about is the inevitable moment when you will fly over the edge and someone will yell out as you go screaming by, "Hey, you didn't quite row hard enough!"
It's the heart of the older brother in the parable of the prodigal son. He's out in the field, striving, and his famously un-striving younger brother comes home and gets a party for doing nothing but screwing up and then crawling back. And when the father comes out to track down the older brother, he turns and says, probably with tension in his shoulders and tears in his eyes and a bitter taste in his mouth, "Don't you see me striving? Haven't I done enough yet to earn your love?" And the father says, with regret and compassion and willingness, "I have always loved you, and I have always been ready to celebrate you, but you would never stop striving long enough to come to the party."
You are enough. Right now, you are enough. And He'll love you if you do more, but He'll also love you if you never change, and He'll even love you if you turn and run the other way. Not any more or any less, but with everything He has and everything He is, because that's what He does.
But a couple of weeks ago, I looked in a different mirror than the one I had previously been using, and this mirror allowed me to see what was at the heart of my striving, and it was a startling discovery.
I was striving to earn the love of God. Striving to prove myself worthy, striving to show myself to Him as a good investment... striving to earn His love. But I couldn't ever quite get there. But I kept trying. But I just couldn't.
And this striving was at the root of everything else. I was striving in ministry, striving in friendships, striving in fitness, striving at work, striving at home, striving and wondering why my striving hadn't brought me a husband yet-- must just need to strive harder, right?
It is so exhausting to walk through life with the burden of trying to prove yourself at every juncture. It feels a little bit like being in a boat on a river just above a disastrous waterfall and rowing upstream for your life. All day. Every day. And every once in a while, you look to the right or the left and realize that the boat is slowly slipping farther downstream and that you are not, in fact, gaining ground. And you're certainly not enjoying the river or the scenery, because all you can think about is the inevitable moment when you will fly over the edge and someone will yell out as you go screaming by, "Hey, you didn't quite row hard enough!"
It's the heart of the older brother in the parable of the prodigal son. He's out in the field, striving, and his famously un-striving younger brother comes home and gets a party for doing nothing but screwing up and then crawling back. And when the father comes out to track down the older brother, he turns and says, probably with tension in his shoulders and tears in his eyes and a bitter taste in his mouth, "Don't you see me striving? Haven't I done enough yet to earn your love?" And the father says, with regret and compassion and willingness, "I have always loved you, and I have always been ready to celebrate you, but you would never stop striving long enough to come to the party."
You are enough. Right now, you are enough. And He'll love you if you do more, but He'll also love you if you never change, and He'll even love you if you turn and run the other way. Not any more or any less, but with everything He has and everything He is, because that's what He does.
The key to transformation
Who He is transforms who we are.
How many years have I spent trying to systematically eliminate sin from my life? I see something in myself that I know isn't in line with the Kingdom, and so I make it a goal and I put it on my to-do list and I set myself against it until it is vanquished. And that can be effective, to a point. I've eliminated some habits in this way, and I've learned and I've grown because God is gracious and He uses whatever we're ready to do.
But here's the thing. I may recently have discovered the fast track to transformation. And it, like everything else in this Kingdom, is upside-down and backwards. Ready?
Sit still. Fix your eyes on Jesus. That's it.
It seems simplistic. It is simple. But it's what He tells us to do (Hebrews 12:2- fix our eyes on Him, Matthew 6:33- seek first His Kingdom, Psalm 46:10- be still and know that He is God).
Be still, and know that I am God. In the King James, it says "cease striving" and know...
When we turn from Martha into Mary, leaving all the doing and the trying to be worthy, and we just sit at His feet, everything else falls away. Worry will fall away. Insecurity will fall away. Sin, itself, will actually fall away as we are transformed just by knowing Him. As we behold Him, we become like Him.
So I set aside my to-dos and my goals and my areas for self-improvement for a while, and I replace them all with one thing: behold Him. Sit at His feet. Rest in His presence.
He doesn't wait until we're perfect to love us. He loves us in order to make us perfect. He washes us with water by the Word (Ephesians 5:26). Time with Him is the key to transformation.
How many years have I spent trying to systematically eliminate sin from my life? I see something in myself that I know isn't in line with the Kingdom, and so I make it a goal and I put it on my to-do list and I set myself against it until it is vanquished. And that can be effective, to a point. I've eliminated some habits in this way, and I've learned and I've grown because God is gracious and He uses whatever we're ready to do.
But here's the thing. I may recently have discovered the fast track to transformation. And it, like everything else in this Kingdom, is upside-down and backwards. Ready?
Sit still. Fix your eyes on Jesus. That's it.
It seems simplistic. It is simple. But it's what He tells us to do (Hebrews 12:2- fix our eyes on Him, Matthew 6:33- seek first His Kingdom, Psalm 46:10- be still and know that He is God).
Be still, and know that I am God. In the King James, it says "cease striving" and know...
When we turn from Martha into Mary, leaving all the doing and the trying to be worthy, and we just sit at His feet, everything else falls away. Worry will fall away. Insecurity will fall away. Sin, itself, will actually fall away as we are transformed just by knowing Him. As we behold Him, we become like Him.
So I set aside my to-dos and my goals and my areas for self-improvement for a while, and I replace them all with one thing: behold Him. Sit at His feet. Rest in His presence.
He doesn't wait until we're perfect to love us. He loves us in order to make us perfect. He washes us with water by the Word (Ephesians 5:26). Time with Him is the key to transformation.
Heavenly discontent and divine addiction
I see a majestic house, hundreds of years old, still standing and holding life today even while it speaks of a time when elegance, grace, and honor were a part of daily life.
I see a maple perfectly suspended in that moment of fall fullness when its colors are so brilliantly alive but only a handful of leaves have drifted to cover the frozen grass beneath.
I hear a strain of music that, at the same time, takes away and gives back my breath.
I smell winter in the air for the first time, whispers of frost and cinnamon and pine and crisp, frozen brilliance even before it arrives in full.
I read a wholesome, brown-bread love story about old-fashioned honor and pursuit and values and patience and virtue and reward.
I sit inside, warm, safe, and surrounded by comfort while looking at rugged, age-old hills dusted with snow and wrapped around with clouds.
And my heart swells and I feel an urgency to breathe it all in, to gather it and save it and savor it before the moment is gone, and yet I am never quite quenched before the fleeting sensation flickers and slips out of my fingers, and I am left hungry. Deliciously hungry. Rightly hungry. Heavenly discontent.
"If I discover within myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world." -C.S. Lewis
Some days, I try desperately and repeatedly and in vain to be quenched now, within the confines of what this world can offer. Other days, I place all my hopes in things just beyond my reach: when I go to Africa, when I am married, when I have children... But these days, I embrace it. I breathe it in and let it fill me for a moment and remind me of my emptiness, meant to be filled by something so much greater. I take the wistful bursting of my heart and I turn to the One who both satisfies and stirs the hunger. The One who meets every need and every desire, but gives it back again, stronger, with a promise to meet it again. The One who overflows my heart and grows it and overflows it again.
I enter willingly into the cycle. An addiction? Sure, but if I'm going to be a slave to something, let it be the Creator of every beautiful sensation and the giver of every good gift. If I'm going to worship and depend on something, let it be the One who promises and performs, never giving a desire that He will not, one day, satisfy completely. May I never run from the Lover to the gift He has given, but instead appreciate the gift for what it is and enjoy it from the comfort of the arms of Love Himself. May I make my home in His arms and live from that place long before I go there at the end of this little life.
I see a maple perfectly suspended in that moment of fall fullness when its colors are so brilliantly alive but only a handful of leaves have drifted to cover the frozen grass beneath.
I hear a strain of music that, at the same time, takes away and gives back my breath.
I smell winter in the air for the first time, whispers of frost and cinnamon and pine and crisp, frozen brilliance even before it arrives in full.
I read a wholesome, brown-bread love story about old-fashioned honor and pursuit and values and patience and virtue and reward.
I sit inside, warm, safe, and surrounded by comfort while looking at rugged, age-old hills dusted with snow and wrapped around with clouds.
And my heart swells and I feel an urgency to breathe it all in, to gather it and save it and savor it before the moment is gone, and yet I am never quite quenched before the fleeting sensation flickers and slips out of my fingers, and I am left hungry. Deliciously hungry. Rightly hungry. Heavenly discontent.
"If I discover within myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world." -C.S. Lewis
Some days, I try desperately and repeatedly and in vain to be quenched now, within the confines of what this world can offer. Other days, I place all my hopes in things just beyond my reach: when I go to Africa, when I am married, when I have children... But these days, I embrace it. I breathe it in and let it fill me for a moment and remind me of my emptiness, meant to be filled by something so much greater. I take the wistful bursting of my heart and I turn to the One who both satisfies and stirs the hunger. The One who meets every need and every desire, but gives it back again, stronger, with a promise to meet it again. The One who overflows my heart and grows it and overflows it again.
I enter willingly into the cycle. An addiction? Sure, but if I'm going to be a slave to something, let it be the Creator of every beautiful sensation and the giver of every good gift. If I'm going to worship and depend on something, let it be the One who promises and performs, never giving a desire that He will not, one day, satisfy completely. May I never run from the Lover to the gift He has given, but instead appreciate the gift for what it is and enjoy it from the comfort of the arms of Love Himself. May I make my home in His arms and live from that place long before I go there at the end of this little life.
Monday, April 25, 2011
Newness
We are not what has gone before;
we are not what they have spoken
or believed
or failed to believe for us.
We are what is yet to come,
unfolding legacy,
revealing and realizing potential.
We are not bound
by the chains of generations,
but rather propelled onward
by the snapping of age-old bonds,
a slingshot into newness.
we are not what they have spoken
or believed
or failed to believe for us.
We are what is yet to come,
unfolding legacy,
revealing and realizing potential.
We are not bound
by the chains of generations,
but rather propelled onward
by the snapping of age-old bonds,
a slingshot into newness.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Psychology and/or faith?
As a dedicated Christian and a student of psychology and counseling, I am daily faced with a conflict. Much of Christian tradition shies away from the social sciences, claiming the sufficiency of Christ, while psychology tends to view faith as a sometimes-useful placebo, valuable for the mindsets it can create but containing no inherent truth. How am I to walk that line? As a person who believes in both the power of Christ and the usefulness of tested psychological theory and practice, and who believes that God is able and willing to both work through and transcend traditional counseling practices, is it possible to live in the balance of these two worldviews? As a person who will likely spend a lifetime practicing psychological counseling within the context of Christian ministry, I see it as necessary. Rather than choosing one and rejecting the other, I see the value in both. I see them as complementary, able to be combined for a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. And so I step with excitement into a combined field that has largely (and lamentably) been ignored thus far.
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