be or do?

Tomorrow is a great day. I know that already. Tomorrow we leave for Camp Barnabas and I really could not be more excited. I'm excited for many reasons. One, I get to hang out with our students. I love them. Two, we get to serve other students. That's pretty sweet. Three, we get to serve the Lord in a capacity outside of our everyday routine. I have no idea what to expect. Four, we get to see the Lord do some crazy cool things. I'm already claiming many victories. Five, I get to grow. I know I'm going to be stretched, and I know I'm going to be stretched far. This is thrilling to me. At the same time, if I'm being completely honest, I must admit that I'm scared too.

Over the last few days, as my anticipation, excitement, and nerves have been building, I've been doing a lot of reflecting, a lot of analyzing. It was pretty easy for me to get to the meat behind my eagerness and excitement, but it took a little more probing for me to get to the root of my fear. I think I've nailed it though. After quite a bit of toiling and wrestling, I think I've identified the culprit, the primary cause of my fear: I still struggle with measuring my worth based on my actions. Basically, I focus too much on doing and not enough on being. And as long as I base my worth on actions, on doing, I can never do enough. I can never prepare enough. I can never learn enough or lead enough or pray enough. And then worry and doubt slyly creep in and take root. And suddenly I'm a whirlwind of frustration and fear. Then the frustration and fear multiply and I have to do more in futile efforts to appease them. Seems a little counterproductive to me.

It's always in times like these, in the whirlwinds of life, that God really reminds me of His goodness, of His faithfulness. In Galatians 5, Paul writes regarding freedom in Christ. He addresses the on-going debate about circumcision. In the end, Paul writes, "For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love." (Galatians 5:6) Paul takes the emphasis off of an action and places it on a way of living; he shifts importance from doing to being. "Faith expressing itself through love." I don't see any specific, tangible action that defines either faith or love. Yes, we ought to show faith and love through tangible actions, but our actions do not define or confine our faith and love.

I'm not saying don't "do," but I am issuing a challenge, to myself and to anyone else interested. What is my focus? Am I so caught up in doing things, in checking off the list and meeting the requirements that I miss fellowship with the Lord--that I miss building community with others? Is my primary focus doing things for God or being with Him and then in turn being the body of Christ?


Psalm 46:10
"Be still..."

a new day.

today is a monumental day. what a journey this last year has been. how thankful i am for the freedom that is found only through Christ.


Liberation

With traces of yesterdays not soon forgotten
outlined along her arm,
she raises her eyes to the sky.
The clouds floating above reveal truth
as they spread and comforting light breaks through.
In the light, her scars barely exist;
yet their subtlety screams loudly for all to hear.

“I am healed.
I am free,”
echoes her cry, as she dances in golden fields.

Alone somewhere in her nearby past sits a tattered backpack,
spilling out its now useless contents of Band-Aids and blindfolds.


“And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 8:32

ramblings.

i hate having something to say and lacking the appropriate words to express myself. it's such a tease--that compelling anvil of emotion that begs to be released then can't fit through the allotted space i've provided. it's like waking up and resisting with every ounce of your being the inevitability of unraveling yourself from the perfectly warm cocoon that a glorious night's sleep creates, and finding solace only in the enchanting and inviting beams of sunlight piercing through the blinds, assuring you that the day waits to sweep you away into a world of golden encounters. all of that surrender, all of that motivation, and all of that anticipation only to open the front door and be greeted by a burst of biting below-zero february currents. such a let-down, a complete breach of trust. the words--er, the lack thereof--are no different. cooperation would be nice. yes, i have quickly realized this to be a lofty, intangible idea.

chaos hasn't ever really been my idea of beauty. a book i'm reading describes the human soul as a fractal, a structure that contains an irregular, a fragmented pattern within it. not until i read that did i begin to see the chaos i've detected in my life as positive. i've always prided myself on being organized; i've always tried so hard to have it all "together." the truth is i've never had it together. in my stubborn and human nature, i just never saw it until recently. and at first, i was incredibly embarrassed at my realization. i'm a christian. i'm a role model for students. i'm almost a college graduate. i should have it all together. that's how i felt.

i was buying lies.

if i have it all together, if my life is all figured out, if i know every step along the way, then what need is there for me to trust? if i could do it all on my own, then what would be the need for me to have a relationship with my Creator? the truth is that i don't have it all together. i have nothing of my life figured out. i know very few steps at all. and i definitely can do very little on my own. even then, usually what i do on my own ends up turning out pretty crummy. so i need trust. and even more than trust, i need my Creator. put those two together and you get quite possibly the greatest lesson of my life: i need to trust my Creator. i want to trust my Creator. finally, finally i'm doing it. i'm learning how to trust and i'm learning to be okay with the fractal that is me.

now, i'm buying Truth.

readjusting.

i feel like i've lost sight lately. i know i've lost sight lately. i've become consumed and concerned with everything worldly going on around me and in me. i've been distracted, so distracted, in fact, that i've stopped seeking. if i'm being totally honest, i think i have to admit that only part of lack of seeking is due to being distracted. the rest of it is due to me being, well, angry, hurt, and just plain exhausted. i've been battling so many giants, and sometimes i do really well at not fighting on my own. lately though, lately, i've been trying to do it on my own. and the problem with doing it alone is that my pouch gets so full of stones that it weighs me down. it sags and drags behind behind, stretching and ripping the fabric along the way. there's beauty in this bruising process though. i think the lord knows what it takes for me to come to him. for some reason, i'm so stubborn and strong-willed, so hard-headed, so determined, and so gullible, that i think that i can do it on my own. and i try, and try, and try, and try...bound and determined to prove myself. see, the lord knows that i am so slow to learn these things, and so slow to take my eyes off of my own target, that unless he allows a distraction to occur, i may never look back. without the surmounting weight building up in my pack, it wouldn't cause me discomfort and it wouldn't drag. if it didn't cause me pain, if it didn't wear me down, then i wouldn't notice it. and if i didn't notice my heavy load, then i couldn't possibly notice the hole being ripped in the bottom of my tightly woven pack. and if i didn't notice the holes wearing through, if i didn't notice that they even existed, then i wouldn't pause to consider the origin of the tears. i wouldn't realize that they were being ripped by grace. see, my god, my savior, he knows these things about me. and he loves me just the same.

he loves me like that and i still fail to follow. heck, i fail to even seek. no longer will this be the case. i'm making the conscious effort to bow. i'm taking off my pack. again. i'm admitting that i don't know where i'm going. i don't even know where i am right now. i think i'll choose to be okay with that. every time i've ever known where i was going, i was in control. i was reading the map. that's not what i want; that's not what i need. i surrender to the unknown. i surrender to you, lord. be my vision and be my guide. help me seek you with everything i have. i want to search for you with all my heart.

"you will seek me and find me when you search for me with all your heart." jeremiah 29:13

relentless.

well, i did it. i cleared another hurdle. obviously it wasn't me alone; it was clearly Christ in me. really, all i did was yield to him and allow him to be my strength. that's no small task. at least not according to my track record. i have a history of NOT trusting. and wimping out. and worrying. and succumbing to anxiety. but none of that happened. not this time. i held my ground and didn't cower to the enemy. it wasn't easy. oh boy, was it difficult. but no one ever said this world was made for sissies. it's clearly not. the best way to survive--the ONLY way to survive and be effective--is to surrender to my weakness and allow Christ and Christ alone to be my strength. all other efforts are futile. i seem to learn this lesson slowly. but i'm so glad that i serve a God of unlimited patience and grace. there's no cut-off for how many tries i have to get it right. if there were, i'm pretty sure i would have surpassed that number long, long ago.

the Lord has brought me through so many challenges in the last nine months. i hate how that sounds because i always thought it was such a cliche kind of thing to say. and it always sounded so fake to me. but now i have discovered that there is no other way to say it: God IS my refuge and strength. period. no question about it. even when i don't feel Him, even when i don't acknowlege Him, even when i don't please Him, respect Him, fear Him, or love Him, He is still my refuge and strength. and He takes great delight in being such. why has it taken me so long to let Him? and why do i continue to struggle with this? these things i do not know. but one thing i am sure of: He is unrelenting. this i am constantly learning.

burying the dead.

a camera flashes to reveal birthday cake and shattered glass in the same still frame. smiles lie. so do tears. the truth is unbearable. things are not right. no matter what anyone says, no matter what anyone does, no matter how strongly anyone feels or hurts or cries or bleeds, things are not right. they can't be fixed. lives are disintegrated into pieces more numerous than the stars, and once again blown about by the cruel north wind. this time the pieces are too far apart to be retrieved. it's too late. the end has come. and so she sits silently at the bottom of the stairs, listening to the dead bury their own dead, and waiting for time to begin again.

i'm so mad. SO mad. i know i've been that way for a while now, i just didn't realize it until recently. i know i need to give my anger time and respect to say its piece. and i know my anger is justified. i can definitely rationalize it from every angle. but i don't like it. i don't like being angry. i don't even like the word angry. it's not pretty at all. it makes me grimace. i'm not exactly sure why. actually, i have a couple of guesses, but i don't really feel the need to expound on those here. i just need to say that i'm angry. that's a big enough step for now. figuring out what to do next will come soon enough. but for now, i'm angry. and i'm angry that i'm angry. maybe dr. lentz is right after all when he says that anger begets anger. that makes me mad if that's the case. way mad.