anyway

i find myself at a point in my life where absolutely nothing makes sense, and life as i knew it no longer exists. i've yet to decide if this is a good thing or not... however, if i truly believe that God is sovereign and good, then it follows that all the things that are happening to me are ultimately for my benefit and His glory.

as hurt keeps rolling my way, i'm trying to learn to embrace it, like Jesus did at lazarus' tomb. what did He do? He wept. He accepted the pain, allowed Himself to feel every nuance of it and lived fully in that moment. but here's the thing - He didn't stay in that moment. He embraced it, experienced it, and moved on.

well. i've got the weeping part down (much to my chagrin). the only saving grace here is that i don't just weep for me - i weep for my friends who are going through so much. at a time in my life where it would be SO much easier to harden my heart and run away, i choose to keep it open to Him and to stay put. don't get me wrong - that's a daily decision - sometimes an hourly one. here's the thing - before He brought me to the ring, before learning to walk daily with the Lord, i existed for so long with walls around my heart, and that's a not-good place to be. notice i existed, i survived - i was not living. st. ireaneus said that the glory of God is man fully alive. giving in and becoming hard and unavailable again is not the answer - it is not Life.

i've experienced the hurt. i'm trying to embrace it. i'm ready to move on. i want to live and love every moment of every day. mostly, i want to know Him. i want to experience Him full throttle. i want to rest in Him. i want to laugh with Him. i want to dance before Him. i want to weep with Him. i want to serve Him. i want to love Him with everything that i am. i want to love on my friends, to minister and to fight and to weep and to laugh and to counsel... i've been taken out, and i'm sorry for that. "not that i have obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but i press on..."

josh said sunday that he desires that anyone who walks through the doors of the ring truly know and see the love of God through His people. funny that. that's EXACTLY what drew me to the ring. i stepped into the sanctuary and saw a room full of people that openly loved Jesus and one another, and i desperately wanted to be a part of that. the sick part - the defeated part - is that i still look into that place every sunday night and desire to belong.

so where is the disconnect? what happened? why do i still feel so separate from those who love the Lord and the ring as much as i do? i really don't know. honestly. i don't know what happened along the way that caused me to remain separate and distant from those i love so much. why is it so hard to become part of the Love and the Life that i saw, and still see, in that room, in that Body? what flaw exists within me that will not allow this to happen? Lord, whatever it is, please take it away.

i've reached a point where i'm tired of being flat on my back, getting up, and getting slapped back down again. i want to fight back. i want to stand firmly in the truth of who i am in Christ. and i want the oppression to stop. i want to belong. i want to serve my Lord. only He can cause these things to come about in my life.

i realize that this post is just about as out of whack as it can get - as is my life, so there you go.

i find myself in a place where i want to be able to say, clearly, firmly and unconditionally - i love You, no matter what my life looks like, no matter what You take away, no matter what You allow to come against me, no matter what - i love You anyway.

overtaken

i experienced a moment of transcendence sunday night during worship. to say that i was not present in that gym is a completely accurate statement. my spirit was a couple of hundred miles away, on the shore of fort morgan, just before dawn - just me and the stars and the waves. overtaken by the power of His presense, i knelt on that beach and sang to Him:

open up the skies of mercy
rain down your cleansing flood
healing water, rise around us
hear our cries, Lord, let 'em rise

it's Your kindness, Lord, that leads us to repentence
Your favor, Lord, is our desire
it's Your beauty, Lord, that makes us stand in silence
Your love, Your love, is better than life

we can feel Your mercy falling
You are turning our hearts back again
hear our praises rise to heaven
draw us near, Lord
meet us here

it's Your kindness, Lord, that leads us to repentence
Your favor, Lord, is our desire
it's Your beauty, Lord, that makes us stand in silence
Your love, Your love, is better than life

-lyrics by chris tomlin

and in my spirit, as i'm wont to do, i combined songs into a medley to Him...

rain down Your love on us
rain down Your love
rain down Your grace
o and cover me

ebb

interesting how many ways the phone call we received in the lab continues to affect me. in addition to opening the wound of my dad, or perhaps better stated, more so than the opening of the wound of my dad, my eyes have been turned inward and outward, all at the same time...

that's possibly the least grammatically correct sentence i've written in a while, but it makes sense to me.

in experiencing my grief all over again through this woman's situation, i've actually become more sensitive and cognizant of the hurting around me, instead of just being consumed with my circumstance. i find that as i look around, i see with sharp clarity into the eyes of my friends, and what i see there astounds me.

i see hurt. i see suffering. i see fear. i see a desperateness that i've not seen before. when did all this happen?

i see God all over this. don't get me wrong - there have been some great victories lately, and He gets ALL the glory for them. there are just so many suffering - the strong ones, the dependable ones, the upbeat ones - the ones that have been holding me up are in need of being held up in return.

that's one of my favorite things about the Body of Christ. no one person bears the responsibility for praying, or fighting, or encouraging, or loving, or counseling, or whatever. we pour into each other - we hold each other up - the Body shifts in unending motion, as the ebb and flow of the tide.

a little grace...

jake has a great post today that goes a long way toward saying what i could not in "account" - with much more grace and love than i was able to muster...

ag

account

today was another wonderful day. i spent a total of 15 minutes at work before i got up and walked out... without saying a word to anyone. they're probably wondering what the hell's wrong with me.

well, i would be the first to admit that there is A LOT wrong with me, but the Lord is working on that. part of that process is allowing old wounds to be ripped open. yesterday, it was my dad. today, it was my embryo.

i suppose that i should catch you up on both. i lost my dad at sea in 1990. that's a story for later. after my divorce, i donated my embryo to an infertile couple. it was a blind donation, and again, a story for another time.

the words that need to be written tonight are simply this: a bad day (or a bad season) with the Lord is far better than any day without Him.

so, what prompted the walk out? stupidity. insensitivity. people talking about something that they know absolutely nothing about. in other words - npr. they had a debate today about embryonic stem cell research, and were joking about "snowflake" babies - babies born from donated embryos.

i will not get on a political or moral soapbox - at least not tonight... i will say that it's scary enough when i think about standing before my Lord one day to give an account for my life, my decisions, my words, and my actions... and i don't come close to the reach and influence they have.

For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. 35The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him. 36But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken. 37For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned. - Matthew 12:34-37

9For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living. 10You, then, why do you judge your brother? Or why do you look down on your brother? For we will all stand before God's judgment seat. 11It is written: " 'As surely as I live,' says the Lord, 'every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.' "[a] 12So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God. - Romans 14:9-12

12For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. 13Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account. - Hebrews 4:12-13

break

it's not in me to tell the whole story tonight, but i have to get some of the thoughts out of my head so that i can cry, so that i can pray, and so that i can sleep.

a woman called the lab today. she is from greece. her father is lost at sea in the indian ocean.

she is desperate, and cannot find anyone to help her. he's been missing for 2 1/2 months.

i know that level of desperation. i know her panic as time slips away and the chances for survival go away. i know the frustration and anger and sheer insanity that she is facing. i've been there, and my heart is breaking for her.

but this post is not about me. it's a plea. a request for prayer for a woman who's name i don't even know. a request for mercy from a God that i cease to comprehend.

Father, please, have mercy.

wrath

josh has been speaking on love for the past few weeks; initially on how we express our love to Him, even as He loves us. this past sunday, he began speaking about loving our neighbors - about how our love for Him should overflow into the lives around us - that there should not be a stopping point for those we are willing to love.

here's my question - what about the ones that don't, won't or can't receive love from us? what do we **realistically** do about loving them?

i ask this because i have become the object of my neighbor's wrath - literally. she thinks i'm the devil incarnate. she believes that i am brain-washing, poisoning and abusing my mom. psychologically, i realize that she is deeply depressed, deeply grieving and striking out at the world around her... and has made overt attempts at ugliness and pity, depending on her mood that day (or that hour...) it's created a horribly awkward living condition for my mom and me, and for her, as well, i'm sure.

i really don't feel like going into the whole story, and i'm not sure the details are the point. suffice it to say that we have had a verbal altercation that was brutally ugly and hurtful, and she continues to ambush my mom when i'm gone, telling her how much i suck. imagine the position that puts my mother in... it infuriates me. the sunday school answer is to love her anyway. ok, what does that look like? responding to ridiculous 'for sale' signs hung on her door? reacting to her continuous bombardment of my mom? no, i don't think so. as a matter of fact, i think the most loving thing we can do is NOT react to her antics.

here's the hardest part of all - she hates me because i'm a christian... and she claims the name of Christ. infighting is horrible and hurtful and damn it, damaging to Christ's reputation - the Bride should not be fighting amongst Herself. apparently her church let her down - did not perform to her expectations - when her husband died, and she has become a bitter, angry, abusive, controlling, desperately unhappy child of God. (let that be a warning, huh?)

so, what to do? once i allowed the Holy Spirit to talk me out of kicking her door in, i've been in "pray and wait" mode. this has been going on for 8 or 9 weeks now. katie says we need to show her tangible love. i disagree. knowing her mental state, (and you have to trust me here - she is too far gone for me to help her) i know that she desperately needs non-reaction (non-affirmation of her behavior) and professional counselling - and a whole lot of Jesus. but, do i bear some responsibility here? how do i show her Christ's love when all she does is sneer and spit?

i don't have any answers, but i do know that the God of the Universe is pursuing his child, and for whatever reason, He has me here... according to her, to make her life a living hell. she's done a good job of doing that to herself - i just happen to be the current object of her wrath. if it weren't me, it would be someone else. don't get me wrong - i am not afraid of confrontation - i would go talk to her IF i knew that He sent me, and had gone before me to prepare her heart to receive me.

one of the questions josh asked the other night pertained to the golden rule. how would i want someone to treat me (or love me) in this situation? i'm pretty sure that i would not want to be left here to rot in my self-pity and bitter rage...

in a MUCH scaled-down version of her situation, i have, over the past several months, been in a slow downward spiral of faith and trust, with the resulting improper expectations, tantrums, bitterness, hurt and the proverbial giving God the finger. heeding her situation as a serious warning, i'm drawn to seek Him out on this. more personal, i guess... a couple of months ago, in talking with my leadership, the common question they kept asking me was, "what do you need from us?" i could not give them an answer. a little farther along in the process, i know that i need (present tense) "praying down the Kingdom of Heaven, kicking some serious demon butt, hands-on" prayer. i know that my community has been praying for me, but i'm beginning to realize that it's the tangible, touchable acts of love that really speak to my heart.

in thinking about what my neighbor needs from me... what if she needs the same thing? oh, how my heart hesitates over that thought. trying to view her as my leadership viewed me, and trying to draw parallels, i see that they reached out to me to a certain extent, and then left it to me. who knows if that was that right or wrong approach? in His hands, all He cares about is that there was an approach at all... so, trying to apply this to my neighbor - how do i even begin to reach out? do i wait her out?

as hesitant as my heart is over the prospect of taking the initiative to love her tangibly, i have visions of her completely freed from her grief and rage, full of the joy of the Lord and radiant. only He can do that - in both of us. how He is going to cause that to come about, and what my role in her life is supposed to look like, only He knows at the moment. of this i am sure - He wants both of us completely free, so that we can love Him completely.

Lord, show us the way to You.

say what?

the thought has occured to me quite frequently over the past few months that we, as a community, have become quite lax when it comes to privacy.

gossip thinnly disquised as prayer requests, or checking up on someone is - you guessed it - still gossip.

if you want to know something about someone, ask them, not me or anyone else. it let's them know you're thinking about them, it makes you check your motives, it initiates conversation and fellowship - go on, give it a try.

and by all means, if there's something you want to know about me, ask ME. not my roommate, not my friends, not my family - ME. that rumor about me being unapproachable and edgy? totally without merit. i'd love to hear from you, and i'll either answer your question or tell you why i won't - either way, you'll have maintained your integrity and shown love, all at the same time.