Lull

Another year older, another year wiser.....oh wait. That's not really how it goes?

I've been in a lull. 

Not that a lull is a bad thing, it's just lull-ish. Quiet, with nothing really major to rock my world. It snuck on me unnoticeably, I don't know how I went from never stopping, to quietness of life, but thus I did.

So excuse my lack of writing lately, blame it on the lull.

I don't think I fit very well into what is the "Christian-world." Let me clarify that statement. By "Christian-world" I mean wonderfully hearted people trying to fit God into everything in their lives; people who are exhausted because if they aren't learning one thing, they've got to be learning another, or pushing harder to be doing better.

There is no room for lull's in that lifestyle. Here me, I don't take credit for my lull--in fact, I don't really know if I like it.
But is that because it's not a good thing, or is that because it's unfamiliar territory?

I haven't been spending much "time with God" lately, but He's still been giving me little tidbits every now and then to remind me that we're still cool.

Remember that whole ambivalence thing? Well he's like a new neighbor to me. I don't know why it is so hard for me at school, but to be honest, that life just doesn't seem like IT. I feel like there's this whole other side of life that is completely disregarded at small Christian college. Don't get me wrong, I dearly love the people I'm surrounded by at SBU (holla!!). But sometimes I just sit there and ask, "Is this it?"

Were we meant for chapel services, weekly bible studies, and constantly being told what's the best way and how God is going to show up? I don't think so.

Gawk if you must.

Those things don't initially begin badly, or even continue with bad intentions, but for me, in that environment, it has caused overload. Because I come home and talk with hurting people, cry with friends who have lived Hell, and then belly laughed with those same people when God has redeemed them.

I'm craving God to be a reality. To not be some segmented thing, some lifestyle only feasible in a small Christian school, but something that is transferrable. Something that when life leaves this lull and goes to either the pits or something great, it's still something I need. A life that when I am all alone and despondent of people to encourage me, I can be okay. A faith that allows me to experience joy to the fullest without guilt, to laugh without any regard for politeness at how wide my mouth is open. A faith that allows me to crumble under the weight of things and rest in the being of God.

I want rich faith, and I'm telling ya man, I have no idea how to get there right now. But I'm betting God wants me to have a full faith too. I don't want to pretend I have it, cuz i don't. I'm in a lull. But God is here too.

So begins Spring Break. I've got plans some days, and others I don't. I want to give God a little time to show up.

I'll let ya know how it goes.

What if....

I love reading good things.

I've been fighting with myself a lot lately, and let me tell you, I can get pretty sassy when I wanna.

I used to not do anything unless someone either did it with me, or gave me complete approval. Sad right? I was like a little puppy. In recent months, I have been telling people to just bug off and let me do my own thing my own way. But here's the thing....

Both are wrong. 

And as I'm finding that, I see my pendulum swinging faster and faster between the two, hitting both extremes, sometimes all within a few minutes. I want people to like, admire, and even want to be me (ew.) but then I want to be a totally independent woman completely not caring what anyone thinks (but still wanting people to notice that. double ew). So really, it all comes from this sick need for people to think I'm the stuff. 

Mmmm.....i bet you WISH you were me right now. (har har har)

There are many words I could use to describe how this feels, today the most accurate one is tiring. My mind is CONSTANTLY racing trying to read a situation, accommodate accordingly, then turn two minutes later and do the same thing based upon an idiotic comment I made (yet again).

And then as I was reading, C.S. Lewis caught my drift and gave me something to chew on. Well a lot to chew on.

[God] wants to bring the man to a state of mind in which he could design the best cathedral in the world, and know it to be the best, and rejoice in the fact, without being any more (or less) or otherwise glad at having done it than he would be if it had been done by another. [God] wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favour that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbour's talents--or in a sunrise, an elephant, or a waterfall. He wants each man, in the long run, to be able to recognise all creatures (even himself) as glorious and excellent things.
-The Screwtape Letters

I find myself saying, "what if" to that. Sad. That is how unfamiliar---no, how alien, how peculiar, how.......completely anomalous, the idea of being just as okay with ourselves as we are with others is.

We either exhort ourselves to the point of utter arrogance or demean ourselves to insignificance. The top or the bottom. What if it's not a totem pole? 

This looks like a million things in my life. Maybe it's not how different or similar I am, how much I think versus how much I feel, if I'm dressing "urban-enough" as opposed to cliche. It's a flowing stream of me against the world. Feeling as though I can't trust it because it's not an original thought from the wise fountain of my mind.

God calls me to enjoy Him forever. I don't find enjoyment in feeling the need to be better, think better, dress better, or write better. I find enjoyment when I shut up and let Him just do His thang (yes, I did say thang).

So, i love the 80's and 90's. But I don't need to love the 80's and 90's because everyone thinks that's goofy. I just wanna love it cuz i love it. I've loved recently being around girls who don't care. They neither mock nor admire me for it. They just hang with me and let me do my thang (there it is again).

Speaking of these girls, we had the best girl date last night. Imagine with me....Cheddar's, Borders, Potter's House (the BEST coffee shop in Springfield), and a star-lit dance party. The people around us at dinner were asking to move due to our loud, sputtering laughter. Good for them. Good for us. I enjoyed every minute of that night with those girls. Them being completely themselves, and my being completely myself, and it really not mattering to any of us. Glorious. Beautiful. Sweet. Godly.

Now that I think about it, maybe what Lewis was saying isn't a "what if" thing. I guess it's more like how, "how often" thing. The more often, the more I see God in relationships, and am able to better enjoy Him. And isn't that the end of it all----learning to enjoy God?

Word to your moms peeps.

A Quiet Day

It's a quiet day.

I love quiet days. They're slow, simple, and restful, even in the midst of reality (homework and the like).

A friend and I were driving around yesterday and we saw a homeless man. I have always been forewarned by people to not give money to "those" people based on the assumption that most homeless people will use that money to go buy more alcohol. You know what I think. So what?

I wonder how many of the people there the day Jesus fed the 5,000 that went back to their normal un-godly lives after experiencing that. I'm betting a bunch. Jesus wasn't trying to talk people into Him. He didn't need to.

All we can do is all we can do. And all I can do is hand that dude a fiver and let him know he is loved and not forgotten. What he does with that is his. And that doesn't change my view of him. God loves the alcoholic homeless people like He loves the suburban housewife like He loves the self-righteous, sarcastic, confused mess that is myself.

"The purpose of the commandment is love from a pure heart, from a good conscience, and from sincere faith."

 -1 Timothy 1:5

Okay. I had a bunch of other stuff written down before, but that was mine and then I read this and realized the Lord is much smarter than I.

When I write for myself it is bitter, wordy, and often wrong. But when I write out of Truth, it is restful.

Love from a pure heart. I don't do that. How often is what we do based upon some hidden agenda? Whether it be stuff, ego, or "Christian duty."

What is pure love?  

I could recite 1 Corinthians 13 to you. But I would probably vomit from the cliche-ness of it if I did. I think pure love is just what it says. Pure. Outside of ourselves. Love has nothing to do with me and everything to do with what is best or good for the other person/people. And not really caring if anyone notices. Recently I read Francine Rivers Mark of the Lion series. And I have never seen love so beautifully portrayed in a book. The heroine of the story didn't think of herself. Ever. It was always about the good of others and being Christ to them. 

Christ was so familiar to her, because she made that her priority. Her natural self was so evident to her because she knew definitively who Christ was in her. She saw the gap. 

I fool myself all the time into thinking that what I'm doing is Christ-like. I justify my actions because I don't have a pure heart. That is me. That is everyone. But what if I asked Christ to widen the gap between what I saw as right and what was right? Not that Satan doesn't create a facade of rightness in my justification. But maybe if I just asked God what He thought of things instead of building up walks of rationale for everything I thought or did. What if I asked for a gentler spirit to hear what He had for me rather than proving myself through my ability to know? What if I was more about Christ than me? 

To be honest, I don't even know how to do that. I am so self-consumed, so blocked off by the reality I choose to live in, so "protected" by my own basis of reason that I don't know how. But man, God wants to break through. And He will, even despite myself. How beautiful is that?

Maybe if I rest in how pure His love is for me, that will rub off. Maybe if I stopped telling Him how to show up and let Him be where He wanted to be then I wouldn't feel the need to prove myself to everyone else. 

Keep asking questions.

my new favorite word

Please excuse my absence. I've sat down every day this week to write and it just hasn't happened. Call that what you want.

I tend to pull into extremes sometimes. Lately it's been with Christianity. I've been seeing so much stuff that I hate, and so I just go the complete other direction and have been avoiding it all. It's easier that way.

But the truth of the matter is that I need God. Like NEED Him need Him. I'm just scared of what He's going to ask of me, and even more scared that I can't do it, or won't choose to. It's easier to not ask and not fail. I scream grace to failure all the time, when I'm just a big ole' baby who won't risk anything for Truth. Sad right?

This last weekend was a hard one. The scariness of pain hit me like a ton of bricks. I lost it hearing about   where some people I love are at. I just couldn't handle the reality of the weight of what they are dealing with. It was scary.

Even scarier, I realized that the god I've always known just can't handle that stuff. No wonder it freaked me out.

I think what I've come to see as True these past few months have been a major part of redeeming that. God is proving that He isn't that god. That He would kick that god's butt in a millisecond.

Last week at Redeemer, Deuteronomy was the Pentateuchal book of choice. All week I've been coming back to so many things said. Two ideas he suggested especially.

Ambivalence. He told the story from the documentary of a woman named Susanna Kaysen. In this documentary, Kaysen is in a mental rehabilitation center and is talking to her counselor and Kaysen tells the counselor her new favorite word is ambivalence. When asked what the word meant, she replied, "I don't care." Her counselor said, "now if it's going to be your new favorite word then you need to know what it means." Kaysen responded, "No, it means I don't care." Then the counselor went on to explain that it meant the opposite. Ambivalence is having two deep passions or longings that contradict each other.

My pastor continued to talk about how we have fragmented hearts. They are ambivalent. Constantly warring against two contradictory ideas. How we live life, and loving God. We choose either/or and have no concept of what it means loving God to mean really living.

Ambivalent is my new favorite word too Susanna. It is the essence of what these few months have been for me. Contradicting ideas surrounding me. What is really true? How do I find God surrounded by such simple faith? Who was I created to be? Who really is God? What does it mean to need God? Where does my passion to create fit in all this? I'm confused. My friend has described it as being stuck in a giant field. And never being able to find anything outside of this field. Sometimes I feel so trapped within ambivalence. I just pray that some day I'll land in Truth. May God show up in this and prove Himself. I need Him to.

Point two (a quote he read): "Church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints." My pastor took it a step further to say he is fearful that Redeemer is becoming a museum for sinners. Ouch. I know I've been SO so stuck on grace, and the lack of it in the church,  that I've seemed to swing too far to the other side and have disregarded the whole concept of redemption. I don't really know what that looks like.

I am ambivalent with the concept of a God that loves, redeems, is gracious, and changes and a god who wants me to read the bible, do right, and pray all the time. The latter aren't bad things, but I've got a pretty bad taste in my mouth for the connotation those hold for me I'll be honest.

I've been bitter. A lot lately. It's exhausting, but cynicism has become  close friend. My mom has always told me if God is who He says He is, then He will be able to prove Himself in the hard questions. And through my bitterness. I want God so badly. The real one. Not a platitude or a safety net. He's there, I know it, but I can't say I've found Him completely yet. I'm looking though.

I'm not saying I'm not a Christian. Hear me, I love Christ. Which is why I believe my perspective is being drastically shifted. It's Him.

I'm ending with a Timothy Keller quote read this last sunday. It made sense.

God is great, so we don't have to be in control. God is glorious, so we don't have to fear others. God is good, so we don't have to look elsewhere for comfort or approval. And God is gracious so we don't have to prove ourselves.

I want that.

Dead Goats

I know, I know, it's been 17 days since I last wrote. But if you think 'bout it, 17 days isn't that much. Maybe I'm trying to prove some philosophical point about how we are so expectant for things immediately. Or maybe I just forgot....

I rode back to school with a good friend yesterday. Usually the two hour drive is pretty boring, the same scenic fields, cows, and small po-dunk towns passing by. The mediocrity of that drive was replaced with some life-giving time talking with a friend.

It plunked (planked? plunk? had plunken?) a massive wad of thoughts into my lap, begging to be sort through.

Yesterday I was at Redeemer with my sister and her hubs (my sister wrote about Redeemer here, read it, she's incredible). Leviticus was the Pentateuch-al book they were in then, and this book is BORING. It's the book I avoid because it's all the rules the people were to follow, who wants to read about scabs and dead animals?

But as speaker-man went on, he began to talk about why this was important. Get past the whole "atonement for our sins" thing, that doesn't mean much to anyone because we're not Jewish (because I would rather write this way, I'm going to summarize what he said, I hate adding the "he said" to everything, I beg your pardon, this is not my own idea by ANY means). Back then sacrifice was watching a goat getting it's throat slit, and all the blood and gore that would come spewing out over everything. Sick right? The point of sacrifice was to be sicked out. It was to be able to look at that nasty, gutted animal and say, "that is me--oh boy" DAILY. They saw that every day, to be reminded of how much they did needed God.

Do I think I need God?

My mom introduced me to the concept of Functional Atheism a while back. In essence, it is our living day to day as if God doesn't really exist, talking up this big mantra of theology and feelings, but truthfully living as if God wasn't any part of me except for my "quiet time".

On the car ride home, Friend and I were talking about "witnessing" and how it's become a disturbing concept to us. It has become a means of showing people they need to be as good as us, to be saved so that they can have what we have. GAG. The point of even talking to people about Christ is because we NEED Him. The thought of telling someone that they need Christ to change them while I sit here and act as if He doesn't even exist in my life makes me sick. Who would want that? If I don't know how badly I need Christ in my day to day moody, arrogant, me-centeredness, then I have no reason to tell someone else they need Him.

I need Christ, and today I know it. I pray I come to know it everyday. I pray God puts some sort of dead goat in my path everyday as a serious reminder of my nasty-ness, and my absolute need for Him.

May we all come to find our need for Christ and may it come to change the core of who we are.

Something Beautiful

I would apologize for the length between blogs, but then I remember, "hey, I'm on break!" and then I don't feel so bad (name that movie).

I have been on break for exactly 28 days. During those 28 days I have slept, thought, read, created, napped, traveled, and dozed. Much of that has been with my sister. I know I have alluded to this before, but it has been a HUGE thought for me the past few days. There is something BEAUTIFUL about being invited into someone's life. Not being entertained, or prioritized, but invited. Invited to rest, hang, laugh, talk, read, sleep, play, live, breath, and BE. It is literally divine. My sister and her husband have created that for me at home, and at school I have that with my K-Life family. I will scream this until I'm blue in the face, we are called to a life of rest. Not JUST sleep and hanging, but resting in what Christ is digging into in our lives, resting in His absolute goodness despite our circumstances, resting in laughter and enjoyment, resting through grace to not have it together or to do it right. 


This week I got to enjoy the laughter and enjoyment one. My knees are black and blue due to my attempt to play ice hockey. Regardless of my physical state after this, it was a time to enjoy and laugh and accumulate an experience. I won my first game of Settlers, and then experienced the humbling of losing the very next game to the underdogs.

There is a huge part of my heart that stirs and rests simultaneously in the presence of people who I admire. I have found integrity and honor to be two of the rarest qualities to be seen in people, I know I definitely fail in those quite frequently. This week I was privileged to spend time with some people I have the utmost respect for. A married couple who are servants and love deeply without judgement. A group of guys who are more concerned about doing what is right then what is comfortable, and about being gentle men who share that same kind of love. Girls who find great joy in being who Christ created them to be rather than trying to emulate a standard. It is RESTFUL for me to be around people who are honorable. Being around these people stirs my affection for Christ, because I see Christ in them. I am honored to get to experience and enjoy these people in my life. 


I find so much pleasure in those relationships, because they are things I have previously killed in my life. 

That I may gain Christ, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.

Philippians 3:9

I was struck this morning by the two types of Righteousness Paul points out here. The first being the kind of righteousness of knowing how good of a job I did when I follow the rules. Self-righteousness. It is a gratification to KNOW I did a good job and that no one can fault my action. The type of righteousness that comes with trying to do everything right, to be the perfect one, the one everyone looks at and says, "man, they are SUCH a good Christian, I want to be more like them." I am SO guilty of this. It's righteousness in disguise, a way of judging success without actually having to be accountable to Christ. 

Then there's the second type. The type of righteousness that comes from not attempting for righteousness but attempting for Christ. It comes by faith, a coming to the end of ourselves, a desperation and need to need Christ. It comes when we allow Christ to surpass expectations, when we ditch our expectations and let Him work things out in a way that doesn't make sense, but works regardless. When it stops making sense is typically where the beauty begins. This is the righteousness I beg to overcome me. To know Christ as my need, to see the fragility of myself and the weariness that comes from trying. I beg for the familiarity of Christ's hand to come into my life so that I won't be so caught off guard when things don't seem to be "right." 

May we know Christ to be who He says He is. May we ask Him to work and ask Him to shake our false perceptions of what faith and righteousness look like and recreate them into something that points straight to rest in Him. May we find rest in Him today. May we laugh today. May we be a people who enjoy and are enjoyed because of the God we know in us, and the definable characteristics He has purposed for us to develop. May we come to delight in things and not take it all so seriously. May the lightness of trusting in Christ bless us with the opportunity to experience Him as fully as we are intended to.

My Business is to Create

"I will not reason or compare, my business is to create."

-William Blake

I find nothing more restful, more cathartic, more....effervescent than making something, or enjoying things other people have made. There is something beautiful about starting with scraps and ending with an object of appeal.

I've spent my afternoon at Starbucks, reading some, but mostly looking at blogs. My soul stirs when I do this, to see the human mind create something of such aesthetic allure with color, texture, and some hot glue. The point being nothing but the enjoyment of the finished project, the rest beauty can provide. And isn't that what it is?

Our human hearts rest in beauty. My sister has defined beauty before as, "something that draws you in." It's a transferable word. People find beauty in a myriad of areas; home decor, writing, music, quilts, nature, food, clothing, etc....but the point is, they find it. And when it's found, we cling to it. Our hearts yearn to be drawn in, for something to catch our eye.

My sister has been gnawing on this concept lately too, through a conversation with a friend, she came to this conclusion.

It is absolutely, positively, Godly to want to create, because God in essence is a creator.


I get a feeling when I look at something I, or someone else has made. The creativity, the endless possibilities the mind can come up with, resulting in appeal. I imagine that's what God felt like when He said, "it is good" in Genesis during the creation. Bleakness into roaring seas of rolling blue waves, emptiness into tall, bold, sturdy tress dressed with leaves and buds, dirt into a fleshy, soulful, passionate life.

It. Is. Good.

I have told my mom a million times over recently how much I want a house to decorate. My heart finds rest in creating a home from objects, knowing that is the place I am going to live, grow, build relationships, and rest for a time. I want that. I desire to create, to build, to fabricate. I think we all do, we just have been squelched in a society of pre-built, cookie cutter, easy basics.

May we be a people who finds rest in beauty and learns to enjoy it. May you find that place or thing or idea that excites you and may you pursue it. May we grow closer to God through creating and seeing the good in it. And may we not be doused by fear of criticism or inferiority, but grow in independence and the individuality of who Christ created us to be.