Looking back May 15, 2008

One year ago May 15th, I was in Boston, visiting my boyfriend who had moved her a few weeks earlier.  It was blustery cold and raining horizontally.  I was a wreck of emotions…mostly elated to be in Eric’s arms…avoiding thinking about having to be without him again for another month…and struggling to know if I should even be THINKING about moving to Boston.

But I did have a job interview on that particular trip.  One that would lead to the most horrible job I’ve ever had, and but it was at that interview where I met one of the most wonderful, expected friends I’ve made in Boston, Dasha.  And it was after that trip that I really started thinking I should consider moving away from the only home I’d ever known.  And one month after that, God swung open every large and small door there was to swing so I could feel fully affirmed in the decision I made.

And here I am, one year later.  Dasha and I are having dinner Friday night to celebrate her birthday (maybe we should stop by that Barnes and Nobles where she interviewed me for old time’s sake as well…)  The weather is beautiful: In the mid-60′s every day with alternating sun and clouds and rain…which falls vertically.  And almost every day, I’m so glad I moved here…so sad for my friends and family in Kansas…and as sure as ever that I’m right where I’m supposed to be.

If one thing has changed this year, it’s my faith.  At the time when Eric and I met, I was struggling to make my relationship between me and Jesus a relationship between me and Jesus, and not just a reflection of the relationships my friends had with Jesus.  And while, by the time I was ready to move to Boston, I had begun to find my personal rhythm with God’s Grace, it wasn’t until I got here and lived into the immense struggle of moving away from Kansas that I really found my HOME in Christ. 

It’s popular (if not over-simplified) in Christian circles to say that even if something is difficult, if it’s bringing/pushing/thrusting you closer to God, it’s probably a good and right thing.  So if that’s the criteria we’re using to judge my decision to move to Boston, then I must have REALLY made the right choice.  Because nothing in the course of my journey of faith has made me more aware of my own weakness and God’s indescribable strength…my own inability to “do” life by my own means and God’s abounding provision…my own tendency toward insecurity, anger and bitterness and God’s love and charity and grace THROUGH ME though the Holy Spirit…

Sometimes I think God gives us love songs.  They’re not always in the form of actual songs, I believe.  They can be in the form of newly delivered babies…toddlers saying Momma and Daddy for the first time…the smile of your neighborhood homeless friend because today he appears free from the chains of his addiction…friends you don’t expect to make so quickly and so easily in your new home…  However, sometimes it seems God does sing me actual love songs.  Here’s the one God is singing into my ears lately:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIfTuQMF75c

And if you’re looking for a less schmaltzy and self-important look back to a year ago, I suggest you click on Del Mundo there on the blog roll and take a look into my friend, Jessica’s journey to becoming a mother…and the love song God is singing to her…

Lenten Failure? March 18, 2008

It is the week on the Christian calendar when we reflect on and celebrate what Jesus did for me, a sinner, and for all human-kind when he died on a cross around 2,000 years ago.  Sadly, it tends to be one of the few times throughout the human calendar when we (me included!) participate in focused reflection and focused celebration around these historical events.  Leading up to this week, some Christians participate in Lent.

Here’s a good analogy for how Lent has gone for me this year: It’s as if I gave up chocolate, and then proceeded to eat through a different Hershy bar every day for the last 40 days.  I gave up obsessing about the past and projecting into the future.  (The idea, I believe, is to give up something that will be a true, daily struggle and sacrifice, and when I find myself desiring that thing, that desire will trigger my heart to surrender to its truest desire: Jesus.) 

My idea for a Lenten fast this year was to give up being anywhere except for the present in my heart and mind.  In CS Lewis’ book The Screwtape Letters, writing from the perspective of Uncle Screwtape, an assistent to the devil, to his nephew Wormwood, a novice demon, reminds us that “the Present if the point at which time touches eternity.  Of the Present moment, and of it only, humans have an experience analogous to the experience which [God] has of reality as a whole; in it alone freedom and actuality are offered them.”

Sounds like something we should all want to experience every moment throughout every day, right??  So why, if we allow ourselves to be conscious of this fact, do we find that we spend the vast majority of each day thinking on the past or projecting and trying to predict the future?!  God knows I was not able to reach any Zen-like state in my attempts to stay warmly nuzzled in God’s presence throughout each day.

But if there was any victory, it’s that I’m now aware (and want to share that awareness) of how woefully non-present I am – we all are!  And I want to move beyond the calendar-confined season of Lent in a life time commitment to discovering the only place I can truly BE: The time at which “time touches eternity.”

Rob Bell ROCKS November 29, 2007

For those of you who haven’t already checked out this prophetic voice of our generation and time in Christian history – what are you waiting for??  Rob Bell is an amazing writer, speaker, and produces incredible short films, all of which truly call readers/listeners/viewers to “God’s transforming edge.”  He has written Velvet Elvis and Sex God, and you can see trailers for his NOOMA videos at www.nooma.com.  (The East Height Nooma blog there on your right is a link to the Sunday School group at that church in Wichita where I got to see a bunch of his videos – though I won’t fee like I’ve seen enough of them until I’ve seen all of them!  Your church can order the videos and start a small group or Sunday School around watching them, too.  Just go to the NOOMA website!)  You can also listen to him preach at Mars Hill Church in Grand Rapids where he pastors on the Mars Hill podcasts on iTunes.

Eric and I got to see him speak Tuesday night in Boston on his The Gods Aren’t Angry tour.  www.godsarentangrytour.com.  He has an amazing gift for story-telling, and for making really big, hairy concepts human and real.  You can listen to him on his “Everything is Spiritual” podcasts as well.  This is really not much more than a shameless plug for an author and speaker I enjoy and respect so much.  I hope if you discover him you’ll enjoy him, too!

Home August 25, 2007

When I was getting ready to move to Boston and was all freaked out about leaving the only home I’d ever known, I felt at the time that it was God whispering Truth to me when I realized that “home” wasn’t (and isn’t) a location.  I found a lot of peace when I realized that my Home is bigger than any place, or time, or human relationship.

I’m especially grateful for that Truth right now.  I miss Wichita and everyone in it with the power of 1,000 suns.  I ache in my chest for my dog and my Katie and my mommy and my daddy.  I miss having comfortable, easy friends to hang out with, whom I don’t have to get to know and with whom I can be 100% myself.  I understand this is normal; all my friends who have moved away from places they’ve called home remind me that not only can I expect a lot of grief and sadness, but it will last a lot longer than I’d like.  I’m sure this is just the beginning.

Yet running beneath this near-depressed state I’m in is that whispered Truth.  As I struggle in my everyday language with whether to call Wichita “home” or 906 Beacon Street Apartment Three “home,” I remember that my Home transcends geopgraphy…my Home even transcends my messy human emotions and woefully inadequate human understandings. 

This is also my prayer for anyone reading this: That you would know the peace of resting in a Home that has nothing to do with the structure in which you sit, or the town in which you live, or even the relationships with which you surround yourself on this planet.