moss on a rolling stone by noah gundersen.
"I believe nowhere is a better place to be
Than not knowing where you're going now
I said education is a better state of mind
But I'd trade all my books to find a home
If I made bets on a better time
I'd lose my money every single dime
I believe moss on a rolling stone
Is better than the rust that's growing on my home
'Cause it eats at me sometimes
The more you struggle
More you fight it
More it clings to you at night
The more you wonder
More you dream
The more you pray it starts to die
And it does
Though it kicks you in the side
Yes it does
Though it takes a little time
I believe heaven is a pretty place to stay
But not knowing scares me half to death
I believe God is a bigger man than me
But sometimes I think that I can fight him
We kicked the devil on a Friday night
Just about lost when he came in close and tight
Took him with a punch to his gritty chin
Asked him to please not come back here again
But he eats at me sometimes
The more you struggle
More you fight it
More he clings to you at night
The more you wonder
More you dream
The more you pray he starts to die
And it does
Though he kicks you in the side
Yes it does
Though it takes a little time
I believe home is a place that I will get someday
If someone just will hold me
I believe hope is a thing that I will find some time
If someone just will show me
I believe love is given, going, gone
Come back to kiss me on the forehead
And I believe moss on a rolling stone
Is better than the rust that's growing on my home
'Cause it eats at me sometimes
The more I struggle
More I fight it
More it clings to me at night
The more I wonder
More I dream
The more I pray it starts to die
And it does
Though it kicks me in the side
Yes it does
Though it takes a little time"
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Thursday, August 23, 2012
the company kept.
on the last leg of our 11 hour drive and i love it as much as when i started. i wonder if i love it because in some ways it is the opposite of my life. normally i run around like madness, too fast, hoping for rest, and moving as fast as my legs will take me. being responsible for all of the movement that takes place. in traveling though, i find rest and am not responsible for the movement. i also enjoy it because to a degree, i am confined. i cant spread myself too thin cause its just me. thankful.
ive been cleaning out some stuff in my life and found a few pages of notes that i consider wise. in many ways we become the company we keep. i can only pray that i am in the process of becoming like mine.
"courage is fear that has said its prayers". recently, i think i have shied from wanting to live courageously. i let fear stop me from a lot of things, especially in potential friendships and that is unfortunate. you should be brave in relationships. its not the same as being a blunt asshole, but its more than backing away to avoid toes.
"we just know whats in our in own (hearts) what wrongs were capable of and that knowledge is terrible enough."
i read divergent recently and its been really insightful. it is good to know what you are capable of, both good and bad. no one is one or the other, we are all both and we should strive for better, but ultimately we must learn to accept ourselves, because we cant escape ourselves.
"working on your relationship with the Lord definitely improves your other relationships, but it works the other way too. there is a sweetness to surrender and trust." they both flow into each other, so its worth looking at both sides.
"he did not create it to be empty but formed it to be inhabited isaiah 45:18."
"i will strengthen you though you have not acknowledged me so that from the rising of the sun to the place of its setting men may know there is none besides me. i am the Lord and there is no other isaiah 45 5&6"
"a searching and fearless moral inventory״. i think this was said in light of a 12 step program or something, but what a great thought of reflection. to be fearless in our personal lives.
"the first thing he does is teach you to hide the things youre ashamed of. not to expose them in full truth." this was said in reference of one of the first lessons we learn from satan. it is a subtle opposite to the way God asks us to deal with shame. how revealing it is to genuinely examine the things we hide? we skate around the places where we still feel chained by shame.
"since were priests is the ability to forgive each other". in a conversation about confession, we talked about how we forfeit potential healing when we refuse to bring things out to the light. my friend lauren made a great point about how we deprive each other of our call to the ministry of reconciliation. we lose our ability to love each other and we give up another possibility of finding relief from the things that way on us.
"off the cuff comments binding my wrists". a good reminder that the things that slip out of our mouths reveal more than we'd like.
"we reciprocate love given. humanity makes a living off of imitation." i have realized recently that this is really true. we imitate what we value, and we reveal what we value by what we imitate. we are individuals, yes, but we soak up soooooo much from our environment. i dont think you are necessarily defined by it, but you are undoubtedly impacted by it. we become the company we keep. we adopt each others idiosyncrasies and morals. your life is your opportunity to aspire for better. living in spite of your reputation, and in light of legacy. you cant change everything about your reputation but you do have in regards to your legacy.
"i have tested you in the furnace of affliction isaiah 48:10" wow, how often do we miss this verse (slash how often do we forsake the old testament) we are guaranteed sanctifying afflictions. read jesus' big talk, the beatitudes. you are promised struggle. and in some cases, relief but in all cases grace.
"becoming better is a way longer process than getting worse. it takes a second to die but a life time to live". its not hard to live stupid and be cruel. not hard to develop a poor reputation and be foolish. its way harder to be known for integrity and wisdom. but you tell me which one is worth it.
"this above all else, do not lie to yourself -brother lawrence." lying to others should be avoided, but nothing hurts you more than lying to yourself.
"demise is never dependant on only one factor". nothing ever falls apart because of just one thing. there are always cofactors.
"shallow relationships are too much work cause you always have to be happy". i finally realized why i didnt like them, thanks sarah rome. its good to have shallow ones, cause they cant all be deep.
"pain is a place to relate to God". nobody knows pain more than God. i dont think highly of pain, i guess. i know it changes things, for better, for worse, and for both at the same time most days. it does not allow for stagnancy. in your pain, you have the capacity to relate to God in the most intimate ways. im not saying you should seek out pain. dont, youll run into enough of it in life. but when it comes, consider the privilege you have in knowing Christ. Philippians 3:10 i want to know Christ and his sufferings. to know means to understand intimately. what a dangerous, fruitful prayer.
"i wonder if love starts with acceptance. we cannot begin to love our neighbor until we are first okay with them". this applies to our neighbors, and ourselves. in the past when people have told me to love myself, like every other well-intentioned thing, ive pushed it away and continued walking. how can you love something/someone i despised? how could you be head over heels for yourself? wrestling. i learned that although those things can be love, most love takes the form
of acceptance. when do you feel most loved? when you feel accepted. what makes a friend your friend? they accept you for you. be a friend to yourself. dont bother trying to be infatuated with yourself, thats prideful and annoying. but be okay with yourself. laugh at yourself in a goofy way not because youre mean. learn to be okay with yourself, cause its not like you can avoid yourself. look at yourself in the mirror and dont look away. learn to be okay. itll make loving everyone else a lot easier.
"so many of our greatest accomplishments and strengths are spurred on by motives of out deepest fears". most of the things i am adamant about are due to fears. im articulate because ive been called a liar. calling things by their right name. its interesting to look at your strengths and the things you do consistently and wonder where theyre from.
"in that season i had to grow up. i could not shrink. had i, i would have only destroyed, first in line being myself." someone asked me what changed in life. how did i start liking myself instead of criticizing everything i did. i changed out of necessity. it was no longer an option to keep going, so i stopped and said, "okay." when people spoke into my life, i said okay. when people loved me, i said okay. and when people said they needed space, i said okay to that too. i dont want to destroy myself. i want to laugh a lot and enjoy life for its grace.
"i am not convinced that you can have both complete safety and complete liberty, theoretically or practically. humanity works against both of those paradigms". think about. insert boundaries and margins speech.
"guilt as a tool rather than a weapon agaibst the self." still thinking through this, but i see it. transformative shame instead of restrictive.
"sometimes i forget that i can hurt you. that you are capable of being hurt". capacities.
"telling and trusting are not interchangeable". to tell someone about your life and to trust yourself are too very different things.
"long nights and cold sweats
beneath sheets of tangled regrets
secrets lie in want of things that once were never meant
but we are we are
we are fools falling over each other
inflicting wounds and walking bandaged
unaware and blind
broken bones and promises
i swore i never would
but later, swore i never meant it
we are fools we are fools
stumbling drunks hoping for more
settling for less
clamoring out of hellish pits
we are blind
we are we are
walking metaphors peeking out between sets of preconceived notions
who are we behind our words
foolish we are
but we are we are
love falls hard on our deaf ears"
i have been on the bus for 8 hours. it will probably take just as long for you to read this. absurd. i love travel time on a team.
ive been cleaning out some stuff in my life and found a few pages of notes that i consider wise. in many ways we become the company we keep. i can only pray that i am in the process of becoming like mine.
"courage is fear that has said its prayers". recently, i think i have shied from wanting to live courageously. i let fear stop me from a lot of things, especially in potential friendships and that is unfortunate. you should be brave in relationships. its not the same as being a blunt asshole, but its more than backing away to avoid toes.
"we just know whats in our in own (hearts) what wrongs were capable of and that knowledge is terrible enough."
i read divergent recently and its been really insightful. it is good to know what you are capable of, both good and bad. no one is one or the other, we are all both and we should strive for better, but ultimately we must learn to accept ourselves, because we cant escape ourselves.
"working on your relationship with the Lord definitely improves your other relationships, but it works the other way too. there is a sweetness to surrender and trust." they both flow into each other, so its worth looking at both sides.
"he did not create it to be empty but formed it to be inhabited isaiah 45:18."
"i will strengthen you though you have not acknowledged me so that from the rising of the sun to the place of its setting men may know there is none besides me. i am the Lord and there is no other isaiah 45 5&6"
"a searching and fearless moral inventory״. i think this was said in light of a 12 step program or something, but what a great thought of reflection. to be fearless in our personal lives.
"the first thing he does is teach you to hide the things youre ashamed of. not to expose them in full truth." this was said in reference of one of the first lessons we learn from satan. it is a subtle opposite to the way God asks us to deal with shame. how revealing it is to genuinely examine the things we hide? we skate around the places where we still feel chained by shame.
"since were priests is the ability to forgive each other". in a conversation about confession, we talked about how we forfeit potential healing when we refuse to bring things out to the light. my friend lauren made a great point about how we deprive each other of our call to the ministry of reconciliation. we lose our ability to love each other and we give up another possibility of finding relief from the things that way on us.
"off the cuff comments binding my wrists". a good reminder that the things that slip out of our mouths reveal more than we'd like.
"we reciprocate love given. humanity makes a living off of imitation." i have realized recently that this is really true. we imitate what we value, and we reveal what we value by what we imitate. we are individuals, yes, but we soak up soooooo much from our environment. i dont think you are necessarily defined by it, but you are undoubtedly impacted by it. we become the company we keep. we adopt each others idiosyncrasies and morals. your life is your opportunity to aspire for better. living in spite of your reputation, and in light of legacy. you cant change everything about your reputation but you do have in regards to your legacy.
"i have tested you in the furnace of affliction isaiah 48:10" wow, how often do we miss this verse (slash how often do we forsake the old testament) we are guaranteed sanctifying afflictions. read jesus' big talk, the beatitudes. you are promised struggle. and in some cases, relief but in all cases grace.
"becoming better is a way longer process than getting worse. it takes a second to die but a life time to live". its not hard to live stupid and be cruel. not hard to develop a poor reputation and be foolish. its way harder to be known for integrity and wisdom. but you tell me which one is worth it.
"this above all else, do not lie to yourself -brother lawrence." lying to others should be avoided, but nothing hurts you more than lying to yourself.
"demise is never dependant on only one factor". nothing ever falls apart because of just one thing. there are always cofactors.
"shallow relationships are too much work cause you always have to be happy". i finally realized why i didnt like them, thanks sarah rome. its good to have shallow ones, cause they cant all be deep.
"pain is a place to relate to God". nobody knows pain more than God. i dont think highly of pain, i guess. i know it changes things, for better, for worse, and for both at the same time most days. it does not allow for stagnancy. in your pain, you have the capacity to relate to God in the most intimate ways. im not saying you should seek out pain. dont, youll run into enough of it in life. but when it comes, consider the privilege you have in knowing Christ. Philippians 3:10 i want to know Christ and his sufferings. to know means to understand intimately. what a dangerous, fruitful prayer.
"i wonder if love starts with acceptance. we cannot begin to love our neighbor until we are first okay with them". this applies to our neighbors, and ourselves. in the past when people have told me to love myself, like every other well-intentioned thing, ive pushed it away and continued walking. how can you love something/someone i despised? how could you be head over heels for yourself? wrestling. i learned that although those things can be love, most love takes the form
of acceptance. when do you feel most loved? when you feel accepted. what makes a friend your friend? they accept you for you. be a friend to yourself. dont bother trying to be infatuated with yourself, thats prideful and annoying. but be okay with yourself. laugh at yourself in a goofy way not because youre mean. learn to be okay with yourself, cause its not like you can avoid yourself. look at yourself in the mirror and dont look away. learn to be okay. itll make loving everyone else a lot easier.
"so many of our greatest accomplishments and strengths are spurred on by motives of out deepest fears". most of the things i am adamant about are due to fears. im articulate because ive been called a liar. calling things by their right name. its interesting to look at your strengths and the things you do consistently and wonder where theyre from.
"in that season i had to grow up. i could not shrink. had i, i would have only destroyed, first in line being myself." someone asked me what changed in life. how did i start liking myself instead of criticizing everything i did. i changed out of necessity. it was no longer an option to keep going, so i stopped and said, "okay." when people spoke into my life, i said okay. when people loved me, i said okay. and when people said they needed space, i said okay to that too. i dont want to destroy myself. i want to laugh a lot and enjoy life for its grace.
"i am not convinced that you can have both complete safety and complete liberty, theoretically or practically. humanity works against both of those paradigms". think about. insert boundaries and margins speech.
"guilt as a tool rather than a weapon agaibst the self." still thinking through this, but i see it. transformative shame instead of restrictive.
"sometimes i forget that i can hurt you. that you are capable of being hurt". capacities.
"telling and trusting are not interchangeable". to tell someone about your life and to trust yourself are too very different things.
"long nights and cold sweats
beneath sheets of tangled regrets
secrets lie in want of things that once were never meant
but we are we are
we are fools falling over each other
inflicting wounds and walking bandaged
unaware and blind
broken bones and promises
i swore i never would
but later, swore i never meant it
we are fools we are fools
stumbling drunks hoping for more
settling for less
clamoring out of hellish pits
we are blind
we are we are
walking metaphors peeking out between sets of preconceived notions
who are we behind our words
foolish we are
but we are we are
love falls hard on our deaf ears"
i have been on the bus for 8 hours. it will probably take just as long for you to read this. absurd. i love travel time on a team.
Monday, August 20, 2012
stick around.
it is well it is well it is well.
re-engaging the conversation. i am so thankful. literally surrounded by wisdom.
there is a song by david ramirez called stick around and ive listened to it recently.
Gonna hop on that train today
I got nowhere to go
No reason to stay
I got nowhere to go
No reason to stay
In four years I’ve traveled 160,000 miles
The wind keeps pulling me out
Maybe I go cause I’m chasing something
Maybe I go, cause something is chasing me
Maybe I leave, cause I have yet to find someone who will look me in the face
The wind keeps pulling me out
Maybe I go cause I’m chasing something
Maybe I go, cause something is chasing me
Maybe I leave, cause I have yet to find someone who will look me in the face
Saying, ‘Stick around, I want you next to me, so stick around
There ain’t no reason for leaving, yeah the road’s been hard boy
But I’ll never bring you down, so come on, stick around…’ “
There ain’t no reason for leaving, yeah the road’s been hard boy
But I’ll never bring you down, so come on, stick around…’ “
those are most of the lyrics. its the chorus that i love the most. the idea of moving, waiting for someone to ask you to stick around. i move too fast for my own good and bounce from place to place. change doesnt scare me, i love it. moving isnt hard. but sticking around.. that is challenging for me. or has been. or will be. whatever. i love it right now. i am sticking around. i am receiving when my friends ask me to stick around. i am investing and being invested in. i am loved well. i am thankful. this is home. this weird town in north carolina. its a safe place to sort thoughts, and know that you wont be attacked for verbalizing the things you wonder about.
the songs ive listened to recently are great. acoustic, little bit a folk, and hella deep lyrics. just the way i like em. i am fascinated with the idea of remembering well, but still being present and engaged. God asks us to remember, to live in light of our own reality. light. its funny cause i appreciate the dark too. maybe even feel more comfortable there. i think if you have lived in the night, or still do, you learn to embrace a calm sense of self; maybe a deeper sense of thought. maybe i am liar. it happens. but i like that. i like weathering seasons. i like watching people grasp grace in those times. a good friend of mine is about to be 7 sorts of challenged at school. she is a wildly (ironically) different person than the last time she was at school. i am excited for her, because i know she is resilient and she will be okay. she is a survivor of many things, more than she knows. i have another friend who just ended a serious relationship. i talked to her tonight and literally heard nothing but grace through the receiver. she is wrestling and is the first to admit her wounds. but she chooses to live in light of the work that God is doing instead of giving credit to the devil. so many of the things we experience in life are a work of deep rooted grace, and we so quickly call them the work of the devil. i am hesitant to do that now.
God is good to me. i am sticking around. i am resting at home, and laughing. i am living free. thinking too much as always, talking too much as well, but laughing just enough and walking with the Lord. sometimes the things i write can be interpreted as dark, but i see so much light in them. maybe that is the maturing process. to see light in the dark. to see both, and watch them grow.
its too late for me to be awake, but i am thankful. i lie in my bed before i fall asleep and smile to the Lord and say thanks. i watch grace as a spectator and experience it as a human in a relationship with the creator and savior of the universe. i guess when i put it that way, there isnt much of a choice. i thank God when i pray because i dont know what else to do. thanks that little is in my control, thanks that i am healing/healed, thanks that i am learning and that i laugh, thanks that there are some things in my control, and for whatever reason jesus trusts me. thanks that i can see what is worth being thankful for.
Sunday, August 19, 2012
receiving.
the fullness of my recent conversations is good to my soul. trust. that word keeps coming and it wont stop. i think it is wise to stop where we are sometimes and evaluate the definitions we keep for words. it reveals where you are in life, and in many ways, what you've experienced (or haven't experienced). we will see how it changes, but for right now, trust is doing something, or engaging someone, knowing that they have the capacity to hurt you (and likelihood), yet knowing deep within you that you will be okay. maybe that has more hope than meriam-webster might use, but its where i am, and for now, its what i know.
i talked to a tired friend today and it was good to my soul. sometimes i like hanging out with people when theyre tired because it reveals their humanity. i think we're also a little more honest when we're tired. not enough energy to crank out a smile if we don't mean it. i like that a lot. we talked about trust, and how a lack of it usually indicates life experience. when i told her how i defined it, she said she could see my life in it, and where i was coming from. i am thankful to be known.
grace and pain often remain intertwined, braided together. who knows. i surely do not.
anyways, receiving. rarely do i ACTUALLY receive anything, whether it be a gift or a compliment. christa and sarah rome and i have a project where if one of us compliments the other one, we are not allowed to say anything but thank you. eye rolling is also prohibited. the conversation will not move forward until thank you is said. it reminds me of learning to love yourself. i dont think the goal is to be head over heels in love with yourself. i think the goal is to be okay with yourself. to know yourself and understand yourself well enough to grasp that you are capable of healing and harm. learn to live there and laugh out the difference. in the same way, im not sure the initial goal is to brand yourself with certain qualities. i think the goal is to first accept them and acknowledge them. to remember that you are capable of being known for those things. to accept them deeply, instead of tossing them out when no one is looking. in talking to sarah today, i realized/acknowledged that i typically dont do the things that i talk about. i make moves in life, yes. but i throw around these weighty things like forgiveness and love and trust, but dont DO them. or accept them for that matter. i am afraid to in many ways. my humanity is inescapable. i talked about slowing down to let things sink in, and in the same hand, slowing down to let things move out. not moving quickly and avoiding eye contact when someone praises a quality they see in me, or distracting the conversation with a story, and sometimes a laugh. i do laugh often, and i enjoy it, but sometimes my laughter is just a prettier version of a heart-fence. mmmm this is so revealing.
learn to trust that it is okay. silly, but i am afraid of being close to people. of intimacy. through conditioning, a broken pair of glasses, a little habitual thinking, and some compounded experiences, i have grown/deteriorated to believe that closeness always ends in abandonment. i have enough relationships in my life that would speak against that in loud booming voices. i have people who know my life and are committed to the long haul. but there have been damaging relationships and experiences that reinfected old wounds, and they whisper about my old fears. i hate it, but those are often the voices i listen to. i hate it so much. i am learning a lot, but the Lord is reminding me to trust. to confess and TRUST that on the other side of my voice, the ears that hear will be okay with me. that i will be okay.
i am okay. i know that and believe it. i see fear in my life, but i want to live with bravery and courage. i dont want to get stuck in the potholes of running my mouth and never putting a hand to the plow. i want to work in my life, and equally watch the Lord work because that is sweet too. knowing that both of my hands are equally skilled. i dont want to be weighed down by the things that scare me, i want to face them, to shake them, and to remember them as memories, not as realities.
the Lord is so good to me. here is to a season of learning to receive and to trust.
i talked to a tired friend today and it was good to my soul. sometimes i like hanging out with people when theyre tired because it reveals their humanity. i think we're also a little more honest when we're tired. not enough energy to crank out a smile if we don't mean it. i like that a lot. we talked about trust, and how a lack of it usually indicates life experience. when i told her how i defined it, she said she could see my life in it, and where i was coming from. i am thankful to be known.
grace and pain often remain intertwined, braided together. who knows. i surely do not.
anyways, receiving. rarely do i ACTUALLY receive anything, whether it be a gift or a compliment. christa and sarah rome and i have a project where if one of us compliments the other one, we are not allowed to say anything but thank you. eye rolling is also prohibited. the conversation will not move forward until thank you is said. it reminds me of learning to love yourself. i dont think the goal is to be head over heels in love with yourself. i think the goal is to be okay with yourself. to know yourself and understand yourself well enough to grasp that you are capable of healing and harm. learn to live there and laugh out the difference. in the same way, im not sure the initial goal is to brand yourself with certain qualities. i think the goal is to first accept them and acknowledge them. to remember that you are capable of being known for those things. to accept them deeply, instead of tossing them out when no one is looking. in talking to sarah today, i realized/acknowledged that i typically dont do the things that i talk about. i make moves in life, yes. but i throw around these weighty things like forgiveness and love and trust, but dont DO them. or accept them for that matter. i am afraid to in many ways. my humanity is inescapable. i talked about slowing down to let things sink in, and in the same hand, slowing down to let things move out. not moving quickly and avoiding eye contact when someone praises a quality they see in me, or distracting the conversation with a story, and sometimes a laugh. i do laugh often, and i enjoy it, but sometimes my laughter is just a prettier version of a heart-fence. mmmm this is so revealing.
learn to trust that it is okay. silly, but i am afraid of being close to people. of intimacy. through conditioning, a broken pair of glasses, a little habitual thinking, and some compounded experiences, i have grown/deteriorated to believe that closeness always ends in abandonment. i have enough relationships in my life that would speak against that in loud booming voices. i have people who know my life and are committed to the long haul. but there have been damaging relationships and experiences that reinfected old wounds, and they whisper about my old fears. i hate it, but those are often the voices i listen to. i hate it so much. i am learning a lot, but the Lord is reminding me to trust. to confess and TRUST that on the other side of my voice, the ears that hear will be okay with me. that i will be okay.
i am okay. i know that and believe it. i see fear in my life, but i want to live with bravery and courage. i dont want to get stuck in the potholes of running my mouth and never putting a hand to the plow. i want to work in my life, and equally watch the Lord work because that is sweet too. knowing that both of my hands are equally skilled. i dont want to be weighed down by the things that scare me, i want to face them, to shake them, and to remember them as memories, not as realities.
the Lord is so good to me. here is to a season of learning to receive and to trust.
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
missed naps.
currently lying in bed with my feet propped up against the wall, praying to drain out some lactic acid. sometimes i forget what it looks like to be an athlete, because i havent been one in so long, and even when i was, i was too physically limited to do most things. but by so much grace, i am essentially working at full capacity. its weird because it has been so long since i could claim that as true.
had my first break today, which should have been filled with a nap but instead had a little bit of restlessness and thoughts. i look forward to this weekend because there will be time to be still and gather some thoughts. i have recently wondered about the fine lines of respect and fear. when i make a decision, is it based on the freedom of respecting someone and trusting them and myself? or is it based on the fear of what will happen if i say no? the latter is typically true in my life, which is usually beneficial for whoever i am following, and typically unfortunate for myself. in this season of transitioning, i still catch myself trying to avoid peoples toes, and ignoring what i feel for the sake of functionality. rarely do i ever give an authentic first response, and when i do its either because im pissed or exhausted. it makes me flighty and fearful in my relationships. even in this post where im attempting to articulate emotions, ive retreated to the functional nature of term paper writing.
boo. ive got loose ends and unresolved things. i am finally far enough removed from a few environments to see how adapted to what i experienced, and sometimes (now) thats a little disheartening. ill work out the difference in due time, but for right now, that dirty trust word is forcing itself into my line of sight. i dont trust well. i am fearful, from old things backed up, and new things compounded. but the reality is, i cannot be fully me or fully present in relationships if i do not trust. here is to trying to trust the Lord to mend broken things.
had my first break today, which should have been filled with a nap but instead had a little bit of restlessness and thoughts. i look forward to this weekend because there will be time to be still and gather some thoughts. i have recently wondered about the fine lines of respect and fear. when i make a decision, is it based on the freedom of respecting someone and trusting them and myself? or is it based on the fear of what will happen if i say no? the latter is typically true in my life, which is usually beneficial for whoever i am following, and typically unfortunate for myself. in this season of transitioning, i still catch myself trying to avoid peoples toes, and ignoring what i feel for the sake of functionality. rarely do i ever give an authentic first response, and when i do its either because im pissed or exhausted. it makes me flighty and fearful in my relationships. even in this post where im attempting to articulate emotions, ive retreated to the functional nature of term paper writing.
boo. ive got loose ends and unresolved things. i am finally far enough removed from a few environments to see how adapted to what i experienced, and sometimes (now) thats a little disheartening. ill work out the difference in due time, but for right now, that dirty trust word is forcing itself into my line of sight. i dont trust well. i am fearful, from old things backed up, and new things compounded. but the reality is, i cannot be fully me or fully present in relationships if i do not trust. here is to trying to trust the Lord to mend broken things.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
ramble pants.
its funny to me that these posts look more like my journal. they start with things like, ill write more later. words often said but never meant.
volleyball has started and i love it. the team is good to me and the leadership is so different. i am tired but so excited to practice. i am happy and i laugh. so many contributing factors to that, but i know that one is leadership style. my humanity forces me to wonder what it would have been like if it was always like that. but it stops there because i am thankful for the result of this messy winding process.
currently at work, and its empty here and i love it. i have been so blessed by great conversations recently. sometimes, it is genuinely wiser to keep your own secrets, but sometimes, it is liberating to let them go. to confess and admit wounds and wars. and for that i am thankful. the idea of trust has come up a lot recently, both in conversation and conviction. i dont do it well. i am trying, and learning always. learning what trust means and looks like. a lot of acceptance. acceptance of the reality that the person on the other side will probably hurt you at some point, whether intentionally or not. acceptance that you probably wont have much control of the relationship, regardless of what you would like to think. trust. to know things will be okay in the aftermath, one way or another. trust. another one-syllable loaded word. but i guess at this point in the game, they all are.
i had a conversation with one of my best friends and got to release a secret. it sat caged in my head all summer, and i felt it move around. some things should be guarded in your life and that is okay too. it doesnt mean that you suck or that you're dishonest. sometimes it just means your respectful. at least i hope that was the case. but i am thankful for friends who let me let go. let go and let God. haha christa edwards and sarah rome, over and over again. the peace of confession is beautiful. in its right time. thankful in 16 flavors.
i talked with matthew lineberger in the coffee shop today. he is a great friend and a wise soul. he loves tradition more than oceans and has taught me so much about integrity, respect and honor. we talked about so many things today and it was beautiful. a lot of it was about cultural norms and how vast they are. about how most of our culture does whatever it wants to do because the idea of consequences is now so far removed that life's best teacher is no longer accessible. not always. but many times, we face no consequences for things, so we never learn from them. we never learn responsibility for our actions and choices. but sometimes we do, and those consequences lead to grace and wisdom. my sweetest year of life came after a season of accepting responsibility. after owning the work of my hands. i broke a lot of things. i became someone i swore i would never be. but i was. it was disgusting to me, but i learned. i am capable of great good and great harm. i will accomplish both many times over, for the rest of my life. but i pray that i steward those moments well and learn from them.
we also talked about the gospel and what it means in different regions. here in the western hemisphere, we talked about the gospel in a logical, legal paradigm. we say that Christ has paid our debts, and when we share, the only logical response is to accept it. in the eastern tradition, honor and shame are larger players in that game. and we agreed that neither was right or wrong, but that we would do well to examine them both and appreciate their value. i wonder what our decision making process would be like if we considered the honor and shame attached to the consequence. i am not sure that i am brave enough or wise enough to live in that perspective, but i will certainly see how it shapes me.
i dont always read people well, but a lot of times i can see them for who they are and who they are becoming. i can see the hope in them, the possibility. and i geek out about it. i can see people being on the cusp of things, knowing that they have the capacity to fall down or stand up, but the choice is theirs. the quality that i love to see the most is resilience. it is a beautiful cog in the machine of life. humanity sucks sometimes, but more often than not it is resilient. the mark of maturity (for me at least) is the look in someones eye, and the tone in their voice that says "i have been somewhere and i have survived it". i love it. we are capable of so much more than we realize. if you have gone through crap and life and you are alive to read this, you have not given up the fight yet. we forget that sometimes. that we are usually capable of survival. that something in us continues to fight even when we refuse to. one of life's mysterious gifts. i have a few friends right now who are beginning a journey of pruning and grafting. and thats really painful sometimes. usually. but the rose on the other side is sweet and a little tougher. it brings me joy knowing that there is hope. that no experience we encounter is ever wasted. or at least not so far. who knows. im only 22 which isnt much but ive seen the dredges of life used for good in my character. and thats nice. blah blah blah. word vomit. some of my friends are facing their choices. they are owning the work of their hands. there is so much to be gained from that, including perspective. we are wired for survival. we are built to fight against so many things. there is a song by satellite called ring the bells. the chorus says, at least we live tonight. how sweet those words are. nothing ever hurts us more than love. we will all get hurt if we love the way we should. so much wisdom in my friends and in my company. i am lucky to keep it and to hold it.
love includes trust and acceptance. being vulnerable and believing. we are miserable fools, preaching about these things, but not quite knowing them. knowing them is hard. in the hebrew the word for knowing is "yada". it has 2 meanings. one is to have sex with. i used to giggle at that in class because i was/am immature, but the more i thought about it, the more i understood. the closest you can physically be to any human being is having sex. there is absolutely nothing more intimate. it binds you because thats what physicality does. it is union that is difficult to separate. like wrestling, you know every curve, piece of perfection, and flaw. and you accept those things. the other definition carries the same intensity, but provides a different pictures. it carries the same intimacy and depth. to KNOW something means to be deeply invested, accepting of flaws, and understanding. to believe something to be true. if sarah currie ever read this, she would laugh because so many of my aphorisms are things that she repeated OVER AND OVER again, because i am/was just as stubborn as she probably was. what is life if not to laugh. i gained a lot from her mentorship and for that i am thankful. you should be thankful for it too, cause its good. to know love is hard, regardless of what definition you use. to say that you will be okay on the other side of a wound. thats hard. it is so hard to trust once you have been betrayed. but i guess Jesus did too. the betrayal he faced was brutal. and maybe that is another purpose for the pain. to bind us with the intimacy of Jesus, to walk as he walked, and to rise and he rose. resilience. survival. who knows. knowing. my brain is messy and all over the place but sometimes it leads to unwalked paths, or at least paths that are overgrown from under-use.
i am so thankful for the work that the Lord has done. i am nowhere near perfect and i am okay with that. but i am thankful to know and be known. to be a spectator and player in the processes of my friends. i feel so privileged to walk alongside people as the work out their lives, knowing that we all have something to glean from each other's harvests.
"Find the words that make it right again
Calling birds help you make it through the night
It's just enough to find a way to open up once again
And learn to take all the beauty that's inside
We'll ring the bells that lead you home
Cause the only truth I've ever known
Is that nothing ever hurts us more than love
So circle up your best friends
And we'll celebrate the way it ends
At least we live tonight
At least we live tonight
Scream out loud
Until you feel again
And hear the sound of how to heal an achin heart
And those that know you most
Can help you to live again
So keep the close
As you're making your new start
Well ring the bells that lead you home
Cause the only truth I've ever known
Is that nothing ever hurts us more than love
So circle up your best friends
And we'll celebrate the way it ends
At least we live tonight
At least we live tonight
The day you finally turn to dust
And finally hear your name
Brings colors that will never fade away
Sometimes the best in all of us
Can still break down and still give up on love
But it's never gone
Well ring the bells that lead you home
Cause the only truth I've ever known
Is that nothing ever hurts us more than love
So circle up your best friends
And we'll celebrate the way it ends
At least we live tonight
At least we live tonight"
volleyball has started and i love it. the team is good to me and the leadership is so different. i am tired but so excited to practice. i am happy and i laugh. so many contributing factors to that, but i know that one is leadership style. my humanity forces me to wonder what it would have been like if it was always like that. but it stops there because i am thankful for the result of this messy winding process.
currently at work, and its empty here and i love it. i have been so blessed by great conversations recently. sometimes, it is genuinely wiser to keep your own secrets, but sometimes, it is liberating to let them go. to confess and admit wounds and wars. and for that i am thankful. the idea of trust has come up a lot recently, both in conversation and conviction. i dont do it well. i am trying, and learning always. learning what trust means and looks like. a lot of acceptance. acceptance of the reality that the person on the other side will probably hurt you at some point, whether intentionally or not. acceptance that you probably wont have much control of the relationship, regardless of what you would like to think. trust. to know things will be okay in the aftermath, one way or another. trust. another one-syllable loaded word. but i guess at this point in the game, they all are.
i had a conversation with one of my best friends and got to release a secret. it sat caged in my head all summer, and i felt it move around. some things should be guarded in your life and that is okay too. it doesnt mean that you suck or that you're dishonest. sometimes it just means your respectful. at least i hope that was the case. but i am thankful for friends who let me let go. let go and let God. haha christa edwards and sarah rome, over and over again. the peace of confession is beautiful. in its right time. thankful in 16 flavors.
i talked with matthew lineberger in the coffee shop today. he is a great friend and a wise soul. he loves tradition more than oceans and has taught me so much about integrity, respect and honor. we talked about so many things today and it was beautiful. a lot of it was about cultural norms and how vast they are. about how most of our culture does whatever it wants to do because the idea of consequences is now so far removed that life's best teacher is no longer accessible. not always. but many times, we face no consequences for things, so we never learn from them. we never learn responsibility for our actions and choices. but sometimes we do, and those consequences lead to grace and wisdom. my sweetest year of life came after a season of accepting responsibility. after owning the work of my hands. i broke a lot of things. i became someone i swore i would never be. but i was. it was disgusting to me, but i learned. i am capable of great good and great harm. i will accomplish both many times over, for the rest of my life. but i pray that i steward those moments well and learn from them.
we also talked about the gospel and what it means in different regions. here in the western hemisphere, we talked about the gospel in a logical, legal paradigm. we say that Christ has paid our debts, and when we share, the only logical response is to accept it. in the eastern tradition, honor and shame are larger players in that game. and we agreed that neither was right or wrong, but that we would do well to examine them both and appreciate their value. i wonder what our decision making process would be like if we considered the honor and shame attached to the consequence. i am not sure that i am brave enough or wise enough to live in that perspective, but i will certainly see how it shapes me.
i dont always read people well, but a lot of times i can see them for who they are and who they are becoming. i can see the hope in them, the possibility. and i geek out about it. i can see people being on the cusp of things, knowing that they have the capacity to fall down or stand up, but the choice is theirs. the quality that i love to see the most is resilience. it is a beautiful cog in the machine of life. humanity sucks sometimes, but more often than not it is resilient. the mark of maturity (for me at least) is the look in someones eye, and the tone in their voice that says "i have been somewhere and i have survived it". i love it. we are capable of so much more than we realize. if you have gone through crap and life and you are alive to read this, you have not given up the fight yet. we forget that sometimes. that we are usually capable of survival. that something in us continues to fight even when we refuse to. one of life's mysterious gifts. i have a few friends right now who are beginning a journey of pruning and grafting. and thats really painful sometimes. usually. but the rose on the other side is sweet and a little tougher. it brings me joy knowing that there is hope. that no experience we encounter is ever wasted. or at least not so far. who knows. im only 22 which isnt much but ive seen the dredges of life used for good in my character. and thats nice. blah blah blah. word vomit. some of my friends are facing their choices. they are owning the work of their hands. there is so much to be gained from that, including perspective. we are wired for survival. we are built to fight against so many things. there is a song by satellite called ring the bells. the chorus says, at least we live tonight. how sweet those words are. nothing ever hurts us more than love. we will all get hurt if we love the way we should. so much wisdom in my friends and in my company. i am lucky to keep it and to hold it.
love includes trust and acceptance. being vulnerable and believing. we are miserable fools, preaching about these things, but not quite knowing them. knowing them is hard. in the hebrew the word for knowing is "yada". it has 2 meanings. one is to have sex with. i used to giggle at that in class because i was/am immature, but the more i thought about it, the more i understood. the closest you can physically be to any human being is having sex. there is absolutely nothing more intimate. it binds you because thats what physicality does. it is union that is difficult to separate. like wrestling, you know every curve, piece of perfection, and flaw. and you accept those things. the other definition carries the same intensity, but provides a different pictures. it carries the same intimacy and depth. to KNOW something means to be deeply invested, accepting of flaws, and understanding. to believe something to be true. if sarah currie ever read this, she would laugh because so many of my aphorisms are things that she repeated OVER AND OVER again, because i am/was just as stubborn as she probably was. what is life if not to laugh. i gained a lot from her mentorship and for that i am thankful. you should be thankful for it too, cause its good. to know love is hard, regardless of what definition you use. to say that you will be okay on the other side of a wound. thats hard. it is so hard to trust once you have been betrayed. but i guess Jesus did too. the betrayal he faced was brutal. and maybe that is another purpose for the pain. to bind us with the intimacy of Jesus, to walk as he walked, and to rise and he rose. resilience. survival. who knows. knowing. my brain is messy and all over the place but sometimes it leads to unwalked paths, or at least paths that are overgrown from under-use.
i am so thankful for the work that the Lord has done. i am nowhere near perfect and i am okay with that. but i am thankful to know and be known. to be a spectator and player in the processes of my friends. i feel so privileged to walk alongside people as the work out their lives, knowing that we all have something to glean from each other's harvests.
"Find the words that make it right again
Calling birds help you make it through the night
It's just enough to find a way to open up once again
And learn to take all the beauty that's inside
We'll ring the bells that lead you home
Cause the only truth I've ever known
Is that nothing ever hurts us more than love
So circle up your best friends
And we'll celebrate the way it ends
At least we live tonight
At least we live tonight
Scream out loud
Until you feel again
And hear the sound of how to heal an achin heart
And those that know you most
Can help you to live again
So keep the close
As you're making your new start
Well ring the bells that lead you home
Cause the only truth I've ever known
Is that nothing ever hurts us more than love
So circle up your best friends
And we'll celebrate the way it ends
At least we live tonight
At least we live tonight
The day you finally turn to dust
And finally hear your name
Brings colors that will never fade away
Sometimes the best in all of us
Can still break down and still give up on love
But it's never gone
Well ring the bells that lead you home
Cause the only truth I've ever known
Is that nothing ever hurts us more than love
So circle up your best friends
And we'll celebrate the way it ends
At least we live tonight
At least we live tonight"
Saturday, August 4, 2012
youre welcome.
that girl who moved out to california? yep, her music is incredible. and youre welcome.
i love coffee shops and the word.
and making jokes.
one day in north carolina, i will sit at BRCC and type all these bullet points in my mind but i just havent made it there yet.
currently in roswell georgia with my mentor in high school and i love it. my time at home was really sweet, but it reminded me that the more i go home, the less i consider it home. in the deepest of my trenches, my friend kay said that she was making a name for herself. for whatever reason, that phrase led to a turning point. i was going to make a name for myself. my own name, despite reputations i had between friends. i was going to follow the Lord when he allured me into the desert and spoke tenderly to me. i was going to let the Lord do a new thing, and stop trying to piece together the frayed edges of a puzzle that no longer fit together. so thats what i did. i made a name for myself. i lived from the whole of me, not just the expectations others had for me. i stopped trying to become better and instead gave myself the freedom to laugh at myself instead. and its been incredible. hard to get there, but so worth the fight.
being at home is always interesting, regardless of how home is. you spend such a significant portion of your life there and the familiarity is overwhelming. so its not hard to fall back into the same holes at home, even if you didnt have to deal with them at all while away at school. but back to the name thing. i came home and realized that tampa has nothing for me anymore. its not a bad place, its amazing. but i am removed from it and i dont want to go back. it has nothing to do with haunting memories or bitterness, but the honest reality that i am 22 and i have made a name for myself in north carolina. i have established community and i am becoming an adult there. north carolina is home right now, which is weird to say. technically, the beginning and end of every season is a transition period, but ive never felt it to the degree that i do now. i am almost an adult. i pay some of my bills and by this time next year, i will be paying all of them. i live in a house and tomorrow i am buying furniture. i will not have breaks to go home and thats okay too. i am my parents daughter, but i am also now their friend. no longer the DD but sometimes sitting in the stool with them. i know im not old, ive just barely made it past 20. but i also know that my life is different now and i am not drawn to the same things. the party doesnt interest me and the concerts are fun, but i no longer want to fight my way into the crowd, i just want to sit back and enjoy the music. i value porch time more than ever, i make boundaries, and i get up early. and i love it. this new stuff is fun, and i never thought it would be. im still passionate, but it looks so different than it did before. and for that i am thankful too.
the last few days have had some of the most incredible conversations, both with new friends and old mentors. in the last week, ive gotten coffee or lunch with 4 different teachers, all of whom were from middle school or earlier. driving back one day, i realized how blessed i was to have such incredible women in my life. i was a messy kid but i was taken care of by so many people. there have been a few male figures in my life as well, but these women have cared so deeply for me, and are still invested in my life. thursday was probably the coolest though, because my mom came to lunch with me. 2 of my old pe coaches, and my soccer coach, his wife and 2 kids came. it was a really powerful moment to be together with them, 8 years later. we all laughed and no one was older or younger, we were all the same age, making the same jokes. im also thankful that several of these women have pursued higher education. 3 of them are in doctorate programs and i love it. ive had such strong women in my life.
so obviously i think music is powerful and super beautiful. as i drove around tampa, saying goodbye to my town, i had my music cranked and my windows down. the song wounded by third eye blind came on and i smiled and fell back into my seat. the subject of the song is tough, but everything in it and behind makes it so beautiful. its one of my favorites, and when it comes on, i think my skin glows or something, idk. but there is a definitely change in me. i think i like it a lot cause its a crying out song, where you bare your soul in singing, but its not about your personal turmoil, its crying out for a wounded friend. i think about it a lot because i get that. i care deeply for my friends, and when their wounds are deep, something in me gets crazy tender. and protective. i think its good love, so im okay with it. one of my favorite memories from school is anchored in by that song. i used to volunteer with WyldLife, a middle school ministry. one night we were driving back and somehow we all fit in one car. i think spencer was driving, bmote was in there, and julia and amy were in the back seat with me. the song came on, and we realized that all of us knew it, so we turned it up as loud as the car would let us. i know that some of us usually had someone in mind, but even if we didn't, we sang and we meant it. it was such an infinite moment. after the song ended, we all just looked at each other and smiled, knowing that we had shared this crazy powerful moment together, and that afterwards it would never be the same. i think about that moment a lot and am thankful. those moments when something powerful and inexplicable has happened, and you sink down into yourself, and into the arms of the person next to you, not having words, but mutually knowing that whatever happened was something good. there were several of those moments this summer, usually in worship. when molly hit her note in how great thou art the first week of danville, or when lily got to sing on stage for it is well. when everyone fell asleep in the staff lounge, or when brandon cried and we all surrounded him. such powerful moments. my old sea soul sits with those things and i smile. one of the commandments that happens the most in the bible is to remember. God constantly tells us to remember. the bible exists because we are called to remember, to be reminded of what was, what is, and what is capable of happening. in hebrew, the word for remember is "zakar", and it is my favorite word. in english, the word is flippant, and means to recall from a previous state of forgetting. but in hebrew, it is so much deeper and so much more powerful. it means to acknowledge something in its entirety, and to know it deeply as something true. i love that. so those powerful moments and those still moments are something i remember now. and honestly, it has made all the difference.
we really do serve such a good God. who knows what he is doing. ever. evereverever. but i am thankful for what he does. when life is crazy chaotic around us, the only thing you can do is be thankful. if it is absolute madness and beyond your control, say thanks for that because you are only responsible for what is in your control. you can only do what is in your capacity. but the other side is that the Lord creates out of chaos. in the creation story, the "world" is formless and void, also translated as utter chaos, depending on your lexicon. and the Spirit of the Lord hovered over it. and look at where we are now. the beauty of life was derived from absolute nothingness. our most intimate moments of God are when we have completely surrendered in our darkest moments. so thanks for that too, because if you are in those deep waters of dark, you are on the cusp of transformation. you are the closest to God that you can be, because you are about to be catapulted into utter worship for the Lord. if everything is madness, the Lord is doing something. i do not understand the beast that is grace, but i know that once my boulders were removed from the garden, i was able to run and laugh and not trip. tending the wreckage is so hard, and so confusing, but the sweetness of the roses is immeasurably worth it.
dont know much. laugh a lot. that is my life, and i am thankful. to know that the Lord is near and dear to me. and better yet, i know that i am dear to him. and the power of knowing that is incredible. and close. and im thankful in every language that i know. the lyrics to this song remind me of those quiet moments. which obviously means its on repeat now and will continue to be on repeat for a long time. drown out the lies with truth. this new season is fun, with new friends and old, and i hope and pray that the two will be merged. God is so gracious to me.
"oh you watch me stready, you
watch me with such a quiet sincerity
and you hold me heavy, you
hold me like I was born to be held
and the Iight comes in here, yeah
morning my dear, and the restlessness of arms
and we lie here longing now
words were ours that will never be harm
'cause you are dear to me
yeah you are dear"
one day in north carolina, i will sit at BRCC and type all these bullet points in my mind but i just havent made it there yet.
currently in roswell georgia with my mentor in high school and i love it. my time at home was really sweet, but it reminded me that the more i go home, the less i consider it home. in the deepest of my trenches, my friend kay said that she was making a name for herself. for whatever reason, that phrase led to a turning point. i was going to make a name for myself. my own name, despite reputations i had between friends. i was going to follow the Lord when he allured me into the desert and spoke tenderly to me. i was going to let the Lord do a new thing, and stop trying to piece together the frayed edges of a puzzle that no longer fit together. so thats what i did. i made a name for myself. i lived from the whole of me, not just the expectations others had for me. i stopped trying to become better and instead gave myself the freedom to laugh at myself instead. and its been incredible. hard to get there, but so worth the fight.
being at home is always interesting, regardless of how home is. you spend such a significant portion of your life there and the familiarity is overwhelming. so its not hard to fall back into the same holes at home, even if you didnt have to deal with them at all while away at school. but back to the name thing. i came home and realized that tampa has nothing for me anymore. its not a bad place, its amazing. but i am removed from it and i dont want to go back. it has nothing to do with haunting memories or bitterness, but the honest reality that i am 22 and i have made a name for myself in north carolina. i have established community and i am becoming an adult there. north carolina is home right now, which is weird to say. technically, the beginning and end of every season is a transition period, but ive never felt it to the degree that i do now. i am almost an adult. i pay some of my bills and by this time next year, i will be paying all of them. i live in a house and tomorrow i am buying furniture. i will not have breaks to go home and thats okay too. i am my parents daughter, but i am also now their friend. no longer the DD but sometimes sitting in the stool with them. i know im not old, ive just barely made it past 20. but i also know that my life is different now and i am not drawn to the same things. the party doesnt interest me and the concerts are fun, but i no longer want to fight my way into the crowd, i just want to sit back and enjoy the music. i value porch time more than ever, i make boundaries, and i get up early. and i love it. this new stuff is fun, and i never thought it would be. im still passionate, but it looks so different than it did before. and for that i am thankful too.
the last few days have had some of the most incredible conversations, both with new friends and old mentors. in the last week, ive gotten coffee or lunch with 4 different teachers, all of whom were from middle school or earlier. driving back one day, i realized how blessed i was to have such incredible women in my life. i was a messy kid but i was taken care of by so many people. there have been a few male figures in my life as well, but these women have cared so deeply for me, and are still invested in my life. thursday was probably the coolest though, because my mom came to lunch with me. 2 of my old pe coaches, and my soccer coach, his wife and 2 kids came. it was a really powerful moment to be together with them, 8 years later. we all laughed and no one was older or younger, we were all the same age, making the same jokes. im also thankful that several of these women have pursued higher education. 3 of them are in doctorate programs and i love it. ive had such strong women in my life.
so obviously i think music is powerful and super beautiful. as i drove around tampa, saying goodbye to my town, i had my music cranked and my windows down. the song wounded by third eye blind came on and i smiled and fell back into my seat. the subject of the song is tough, but everything in it and behind makes it so beautiful. its one of my favorites, and when it comes on, i think my skin glows or something, idk. but there is a definitely change in me. i think i like it a lot cause its a crying out song, where you bare your soul in singing, but its not about your personal turmoil, its crying out for a wounded friend. i think about it a lot because i get that. i care deeply for my friends, and when their wounds are deep, something in me gets crazy tender. and protective. i think its good love, so im okay with it. one of my favorite memories from school is anchored in by that song. i used to volunteer with WyldLife, a middle school ministry. one night we were driving back and somehow we all fit in one car. i think spencer was driving, bmote was in there, and julia and amy were in the back seat with me. the song came on, and we realized that all of us knew it, so we turned it up as loud as the car would let us. i know that some of us usually had someone in mind, but even if we didn't, we sang and we meant it. it was such an infinite moment. after the song ended, we all just looked at each other and smiled, knowing that we had shared this crazy powerful moment together, and that afterwards it would never be the same. i think about that moment a lot and am thankful. those moments when something powerful and inexplicable has happened, and you sink down into yourself, and into the arms of the person next to you, not having words, but mutually knowing that whatever happened was something good. there were several of those moments this summer, usually in worship. when molly hit her note in how great thou art the first week of danville, or when lily got to sing on stage for it is well. when everyone fell asleep in the staff lounge, or when brandon cried and we all surrounded him. such powerful moments. my old sea soul sits with those things and i smile. one of the commandments that happens the most in the bible is to remember. God constantly tells us to remember. the bible exists because we are called to remember, to be reminded of what was, what is, and what is capable of happening. in hebrew, the word for remember is "zakar", and it is my favorite word. in english, the word is flippant, and means to recall from a previous state of forgetting. but in hebrew, it is so much deeper and so much more powerful. it means to acknowledge something in its entirety, and to know it deeply as something true. i love that. so those powerful moments and those still moments are something i remember now. and honestly, it has made all the difference.
we really do serve such a good God. who knows what he is doing. ever. evereverever. but i am thankful for what he does. when life is crazy chaotic around us, the only thing you can do is be thankful. if it is absolute madness and beyond your control, say thanks for that because you are only responsible for what is in your control. you can only do what is in your capacity. but the other side is that the Lord creates out of chaos. in the creation story, the "world" is formless and void, also translated as utter chaos, depending on your lexicon. and the Spirit of the Lord hovered over it. and look at where we are now. the beauty of life was derived from absolute nothingness. our most intimate moments of God are when we have completely surrendered in our darkest moments. so thanks for that too, because if you are in those deep waters of dark, you are on the cusp of transformation. you are the closest to God that you can be, because you are about to be catapulted into utter worship for the Lord. if everything is madness, the Lord is doing something. i do not understand the beast that is grace, but i know that once my boulders were removed from the garden, i was able to run and laugh and not trip. tending the wreckage is so hard, and so confusing, but the sweetness of the roses is immeasurably worth it.
dont know much. laugh a lot. that is my life, and i am thankful. to know that the Lord is near and dear to me. and better yet, i know that i am dear to him. and the power of knowing that is incredible. and close. and im thankful in every language that i know. the lyrics to this song remind me of those quiet moments. which obviously means its on repeat now and will continue to be on repeat for a long time. drown out the lies with truth. this new season is fun, with new friends and old, and i hope and pray that the two will be merged. God is so gracious to me.
"oh you watch me stready, you
watch me with such a quiet sincerity
and you hold me heavy, you
hold me like I was born to be held
and the Iight comes in here, yeah
morning my dear, and the restlessness of arms
and we lie here longing now
words were ours that will never be harm
'cause you are dear to me
yeah you are dear"
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
full heart
"these are the things i think about when im alone without you i wonder of your whereabouts and hope like hell youre happy where you are"
that song is in my head a lot, especially when im in my think tank.
my heart is so full and beating a lot. it is good to be here though, to feel and feel so deeply. im thankful for it.
the last few days have been a different sort of spectrum, but most that i am thankful for. transitioning away from camp and back to what my life is moving towards. life or something like it. when i am less tired and my eyes can stay awake, i will actually write down the things i want to remember, but for now i am here in this place and that is enough for me.
camp is and is not real life. it is both and neither. maybe i will never know the line between the two, but i walk the fence often. molly and lily and i have been keeping in touch by being goofy and serious, short videos and long talks. im thankful for that too.
tonight i ate dinner with kelly and lauren and it was awesome. kelly is probably getting engaged before the year ends and lauren is married. relationships are funny things. we talked about all that stuff, and talked about shame and regret and called things by their right names. we talked about what made us who we are and where some of those things started. some of the stories had a ton of shame and embarrassment but they werent heavy in the same ways. we confessed together the things that we thought about and it was so beautiful. often when it comes to shame, we steward it awkwardly and do more damage than good when someone confesses to us. christa talks a lot about being a good bearer of someones story. i hope i do that well sometimes because i think its important. when we come together and confess, it can be so powerful and so worshipful. tonight we talked about how when it comes to sin, there are 3 responses. 1 is to be vague and skate around it, more so skating around something than admitting it, writing it off as something insignificant, when that is typically not the case. the 2nd is to make a joke of something, belittling what it actually is. the third is to call the thing for what it is and just admit it. the first two look like confession, but are just shoddy attempts to satisfy some obligation. they dont allow for healing and in most cases, we prevent the other person from actually speaking into our pain, and we forfeit the healing we could receive. grace is so deep and we miss it sometimes when we only wade in the shadows. my friend lauren is wise too and she said that we also forfeit our right to minister to each other, knowing that we are a royal priesthood. that thought is so powerful. we are meant to be priests for each other and to administer healing and forgiveness. even if we cant heal or forgive the entirety of something, we would do well to reflect on that.
i keep coming back to joy and thankfulness because i see it. God is good to me. my grace runs deep. it would be easy for me to pretend that i was invested and to give you the illusion that i am present. it is much harder to genuinely live there. this whole past year has been genuine and for that i am so thankful. but in that, the process of trusting has been hard too. fears and other things. but i am so thankful, because slowly but surely, i am trusting. trust. such a light thing but such a heavy thing. it is so foreign to me in some ways, but so familiar in others. it is such a weird process and i dont get it. old wounds die hard.
ramble.
nonsensical.
this is what i know. i have great old friends. i have great new friends, and young ones, and middle aged ones. great friends in every part of the process of life. sometimes i see God in the way we move through the process. i have a good friend who is new and who is wrestling like madness. beating fists and crying out. i have another old friend is who breaking free from the chains that have held her captive for so long. and to me, they are both so beautiful, because i know something of those processes. i know that they are hard and confusing, but that their other side is so sweet. that the grace of Christ's face, holding your hands, saying, "i know. i know it is hard. i know you are confused. i know you are hurting. i know YOU. and you will be okay", is so satisfying. the wrestling is hard. such a strong metaphor. in a fight, the closest you can get to someone is wrestling. you are literally face to face, and you can feel your "opponents" breath. you know the grooves of their body, weakness and strengths. you come out of the match knowing the other side better, regardless of whether you won or lost.
this whole post doesnt even make sense. but my heart is full and it needed to go somewhere cause i have to sleep tonight. God is good. i praise God so much for my friends, old and new, because in all of them and being reminded to trust and to be okay. it is SO hard, and so challenging to not run, but i am trying to give what i have in that.
so long and goodnight.
that song is in my head a lot, especially when im in my think tank.
my heart is so full and beating a lot. it is good to be here though, to feel and feel so deeply. im thankful for it.
the last few days have been a different sort of spectrum, but most that i am thankful for. transitioning away from camp and back to what my life is moving towards. life or something like it. when i am less tired and my eyes can stay awake, i will actually write down the things i want to remember, but for now i am here in this place and that is enough for me.
camp is and is not real life. it is both and neither. maybe i will never know the line between the two, but i walk the fence often. molly and lily and i have been keeping in touch by being goofy and serious, short videos and long talks. im thankful for that too.
tonight i ate dinner with kelly and lauren and it was awesome. kelly is probably getting engaged before the year ends and lauren is married. relationships are funny things. we talked about all that stuff, and talked about shame and regret and called things by their right names. we talked about what made us who we are and where some of those things started. some of the stories had a ton of shame and embarrassment but they werent heavy in the same ways. we confessed together the things that we thought about and it was so beautiful. often when it comes to shame, we steward it awkwardly and do more damage than good when someone confesses to us. christa talks a lot about being a good bearer of someones story. i hope i do that well sometimes because i think its important. when we come together and confess, it can be so powerful and so worshipful. tonight we talked about how when it comes to sin, there are 3 responses. 1 is to be vague and skate around it, more so skating around something than admitting it, writing it off as something insignificant, when that is typically not the case. the 2nd is to make a joke of something, belittling what it actually is. the third is to call the thing for what it is and just admit it. the first two look like confession, but are just shoddy attempts to satisfy some obligation. they dont allow for healing and in most cases, we prevent the other person from actually speaking into our pain, and we forfeit the healing we could receive. grace is so deep and we miss it sometimes when we only wade in the shadows. my friend lauren is wise too and she said that we also forfeit our right to minister to each other, knowing that we are a royal priesthood. that thought is so powerful. we are meant to be priests for each other and to administer healing and forgiveness. even if we cant heal or forgive the entirety of something, we would do well to reflect on that.
i keep coming back to joy and thankfulness because i see it. God is good to me. my grace runs deep. it would be easy for me to pretend that i was invested and to give you the illusion that i am present. it is much harder to genuinely live there. this whole past year has been genuine and for that i am so thankful. but in that, the process of trusting has been hard too. fears and other things. but i am so thankful, because slowly but surely, i am trusting. trust. such a light thing but such a heavy thing. it is so foreign to me in some ways, but so familiar in others. it is such a weird process and i dont get it. old wounds die hard.
ramble.
nonsensical.
this is what i know. i have great old friends. i have great new friends, and young ones, and middle aged ones. great friends in every part of the process of life. sometimes i see God in the way we move through the process. i have a good friend who is new and who is wrestling like madness. beating fists and crying out. i have another old friend is who breaking free from the chains that have held her captive for so long. and to me, they are both so beautiful, because i know something of those processes. i know that they are hard and confusing, but that their other side is so sweet. that the grace of Christ's face, holding your hands, saying, "i know. i know it is hard. i know you are confused. i know you are hurting. i know YOU. and you will be okay", is so satisfying. the wrestling is hard. such a strong metaphor. in a fight, the closest you can get to someone is wrestling. you are literally face to face, and you can feel your "opponents" breath. you know the grooves of their body, weakness and strengths. you come out of the match knowing the other side better, regardless of whether you won or lost.
this whole post doesnt even make sense. but my heart is full and it needed to go somewhere cause i have to sleep tonight. God is good. i praise God so much for my friends, old and new, because in all of them and being reminded to trust and to be okay. it is SO hard, and so challenging to not run, but i am trying to give what i have in that.
so long and goodnight.
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