when i think about cynicism

cynicism... sarcasm that has made the greater leap towards bitterness. I have this reoccurring experience where I move to a new place an meet one, usually specifically one cynical person, sometimes a few. People who can not see the light in much and enjoy seeing the antithesis of joy.

I am drawn, like lottery winner to infomercials. I want to impress, or please, or pacify them. How do you win the admiration of a cynic? Cynicism (though not really, and I will get to that later). I had a friend recently say that she thought being cynical in the christian faith was popular because it seems smarter, to question everything, to doubt everything, to trust nothing. But it drains joy to not be able to stand on faith in those absolute truth, absolute faith moments. Not only that it drains hope, inspiration, love, and general mental and spiritual energy-this I say from experience.

So, I am working on a piece of art today- three actually, one of which might die in a fire soon- and I wonder what my cynic friend would say, what they would say to my face, what they would say behind my back. What they would think. Because aren't cynics really just bitter people walking around looking for something to dissect? So I wonder how they would dissect my art.

And that in turn caused me to consider the childhood idea that being invisible would be neat because you could see what people say about you- as narcissistic as I tend to be I assumed as a child that many people were talking about me. But what about the super power of knowing other's thoughts: ah, the true root of cynicism. To be able to validate or destroy your theories, doubts fears. To know someones true character. This would make us all cynics- don't you think.

Perhaps that's why there is only one who could bear the thoughts of us all, and after fore-knowing them all,     them    all.  He still loved us.  Loves  us.   And died for us.  Not cynically, but willingly.  Not bitterly, but in perfect peace, though anguish filled as it was.

And

Lives for us. Lives for us to have joy. To have communion with him.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, 

who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, 

despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.3Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.

Hebrews 12:..

when i think about resentment

So the last few days I have been ready for spring. Really. I am longing for spring in a way I did not expect.

Now I don't want to get to flowery here, you know how sometimes a blog goes on an on and you think of 'I love Lucy' when she imitates Ricky and goes 'blegjablah blahj' so I will simply say I love winter.

Or at least I have in the past. But this year I did not appreciate it nearly as much. I was sucked into the over abundance of negativity about the season, the icey walks, the cold mornings, the snowy roads.

And this past week- I was done- 'ok snow, GO' I have been saying in my mind. I resent this snow- deeply. I am thinking about new life, new growth, new hope of gardening and dreaming and barefoot walking, of letting my chickens peck around the woods. I am longing for spring.

It's as if I have forgotten that it will come, and that I can not will it to come at any point or affect its timing whatsoever. I just resent that it is not here - uhm, NOW.

How like my walk with the Lord. Lord, could you do this thing now that I want so much. I find that the next thing is the only thing I appreciate, the next thing is beautiful and exciting, new and satisfying. And I am completely blind to anything that might be beautiful or satisfying about the still, even cold, silence of a wintery time.

I find that I struggle. I find that I resent where the Lord has me right now. I have even talked to my husband about it, confessed to him, and to God, that I sometimes think about where else I would be if I wasn't committed to him. Wisdom spoke into my life in this place and said, 'Anna, Your husband didn't put you here, God did.' So simple right? But then I would have to face God about whether or not I am happy or not with where I am- and I'm just saying, have you ever tried to change God's mind. Go ahead, try it and get back to me. This is the area I need grace in. I want to change everyone, I want to change God. oh thank Him, thank Him that I can do neither.

And so in times when I resent, so deeply, the icy slope to my car maybe I will remember, maybe tomorrow I mean, I will remember that He has made the ice, and the slope and the winter for a purpose and I am in them for a purpose.

when i think about discipleship

Our church had a 'workday' today. Painting, disinfecting scrubbing, de-wallpapering, organizing, installing light fixtures. We had families come, handed out packets of wipes to younger kids to clean all the toys and paint brushes to the older kids to prime.

It was messy, and beautiful, and discipleship

I was talking to someone a while back about the youth group we have launched. I am not really into it. I love the kids, the games, the devotions, the leader ;) but after wanting a youth group for so long, I find I am much happier to watch teens interacting with all these different ages. To see our oldest deacon and wife showing kids where to find rags and how to remove wall paper. And to trust that there are some teens ushering kids around to organize or dust, they are being discipled practically, while discipling.

It's pretty neat to watch.

These are favorite moments in my life.

When God brings different ages together.

Our only junior high girl hanging out with a junior and senior on our retreat was another example of this, melding of growth- in different places and reaching out to each other.

I used to clean the church with Joan Bohn, she did the work really, I followed her around and talked, and talked. She would listen and be so sweet when I wanted to carry her baby around at 12 years old. She said she only had one boyfriend before she met her husband. I thought that was ridiculous, what are teenage years for if not to date?! But I always, always remembered that. And, I understand it now.

Don't get me wrong, I have no intention of putting the kabosh on youth group- but I am beginning to realize I hold other things closer to my heart. To see the Kingdom in these moments

. I had a Pastor once call them 'thin places', when the what God is doing right now, spiritually doesn't seem far away at all.

when i think your God is too big for me

You know those moments when a thought in your head is insanely witty, or humorous.... and then later you go to write it down and    -nothing... me. I have had thoughts for blogs, but lately I think too many people have too much to say. So I try to limit my blogs for when my thoughts are more ironed out, or at least re-occur to me enough that I want to share the journey. This one will be revised and hatched and re-written several times, and may never make the web (yet will still have typo-s).


I want to be different.

I love to be different.

It's becoming a pride thing how important it is to me. I am defined by it, by me- being myself, my way... my identity. 

So what happens when all the things that define me encounter God, when I realize I am trying to hold water.

Chris and I entered 'full-time' ministry just over a year ago. It's in quotes for many reasons. Am I in 'full-time' ministry if Chris is the one with the job description? Isn't every one in 'full-time' ministry? Does it count if we aren't sharing the gospel? .... really, 'full-time' ministry means.... (in most cases) 1.  we get our paycheck from christians, 2. we're poor(ish)

The post-summer camp season has been significantly difficult (gives you an idea how long ago I started this blog). Having stepped away from a summer where I did everything I thought I 'had always wanted to do', I felt empty.

... And I try to be open as wise people say, 'It's not about what you do... it's about Him (or it's about being) (or it's about love)' and I think- 'ok, how do I do that'. How does one fill emptiness by doing nothing, it would seem an action is needed.

I am not sure how to meet with God, how to encounter him. How to be grateful that his grace covers the annoying people in my life. I feel superficial when my greatest concerns are whether Chris will track salty, muddy, snow through the house and if people will like my pizza dough.  'These are the areas your blood covers?! Really?, I'm so lame'.  (I say things like this to God)

I am not sure how to encounter teens and say, 'pray bigger-than-yourself-prayers. That's when you will understand why we need God, why we need scripture' and I then turn and fume, FUME over trite things, every day things, things which when I meet God will I turn in shame as Jesus says, 'I died for that'.

But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed. (Is 53:5) 

He was wounded, crushed, forsaken  for my selfishness, my pig-headedness, my alienating perfectionism... It makes me wish I had murdered someone (though not really. but if we are being HONEST) so that I could say, 'yes, the big sins, thank you Jesus for shedding your blood for my big, horrific sins'. 

But no, my sins are more disgusting, more putrid, because I am fairly good at making them lovely. I want to move MY OWN mountains, and SAVE people with my critically-deveoloped theology, and CHANGE them- I so so want to change people, I would make a GREAT Holy Spirit. And I like the sound of that, so you see, I sympathize with Lucifer- I am evil and lost without God, I want to be Him. 

Your God is too big for me, a God who can love me.. ME? The person constantly saying, 'Jesus, thank you, but could you please move over so I can get some stuff done'. ?! 

At some point in my 'faith- walk, journey, Christian life' I started becoming Jesus... but not in the way you think, I started to really believe I am a savior, I am going into full-time ministry one day to save people ( I would think) I am needed in this world- isn't everyone so lucky to have me. 

And so these thoughts have been swirling my my head for a few months, about ministry and grace, and the 'real' me I hope no one ever sees. And I have recently found some comfort in this idea:

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. 

I have always thought the 'old that has gone' was any sin pre-'sinners prayer'. I am working on believing, on internalizing, being free in and living out that the old, is the flesh I will still fight with every day, and it is the old that is dead, though still fighting with me this moment. 

BUT God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

.... So as the doubts and anger and general sin-ingness swirl in my head I work on saying, 

not 'But, God?' and instead:

'BUT GOD'.

So that I can begin to be defined not by my differentiality... but by Him.

Mercy, yes.

Grace, yes.

Hope, oh yes.

Freedom, hopefully, by grace- soon.

Love. YES. From the one who is love, who became love in human form.

It's all to big for me. Surpassing, if you will. 

when i think feeling my faith is important

I have a corner in our back room devoted to my personal artistic mess. Lately it has been just a mess. I have wanted to paint but have not felt any inspiration, and even when I feel motivated enough to try anyway, my stuff comes out all wonky.

Chris and I also shared the unique experience of having Christmas just the two of us this year... well three, Pippin is still alive. We got up and made waffles, eggs & bacon. Opened our presents to each other, went on a winter walk, got a visit from some friends and spent the rest of the day watching movies and hanging out. It didn't feel like Christmas, not in the sense of what my idea of Christmas is, chaos, noise, impish delight, and extended family. But it was Christmas, and I had been praying that Christmas would be less about the other stuff and more about the point.

So back to my art, it doesn't feel like art.... I mean there are some moments when I think it's coming along, and then realize if anyone else saw it they would ask if I was cleaning my brushes. So tonight I made myself sit down and paint (sorry, NO pictures to follow). I spread a blanket out in the corner, forced some crimson, ocher, sage green, and a few creative sounding blues onto my disposable palate and started painting the background of a piece I have in my head, 'let there be light'. As I was trying to paint 'the beginning', the darkness- I liked the idea of swirling the reddish brownish greenish blues toward and away from my point of light. As if the darkness was fleeing the light.

{And honestly, as I try to put my thoughts together I wonder how people blog every day, and how people do that well.}

I see this collage in my head of thoughts. Light causing darkness to flee. The creation of the universe, the hope of Christ's light in my own darkness. And, of course there are a dozen other things in the collage too. But as I'm journeying along in ministry, I'm not especially overwhelmed by things feeling the way i think they should feel. It doesn't make them less real.

So I am thankful for worship songs committed to memory, which, when they come on pandora have me singing lovely harmonies and remembering a time when I 'felt' his faithfulness more than i do right now. He is still faithful, he is still near. I hold tightly to the idea that Jesus likely did not feel a spiritual high, or joy as I like to define joy, when he took my sin naked on a cross.

Despised for me, rejected for me. Drawing me first, loving me completely.

When I think I know what it takes to be a Pastor

Ah yes, so I have a catchy tag for my blogs... for the moment anyway, anyone who reads these knows I am incredibly inconsistent and may not post again for months. Just as well, too many people spout opinions and nonsense on blogs that I have decided I'd rather wait until my nonsense seems really important to post it.

A little while back I had the privilege of watching some children I care a lot about! It was a unique experience because it involved overnights and being away from my husband. And on about day 3 I figured out what it takes to be a pastor.

Heh.

So lets just make a spiritual comparison to parenting (I'm not a parent) and see where we end up.  I was watching three children, one still in diapers, two of them still 'napping'. So somewhere along the way the goal of pure entertainment and fun has to hit the reality of parameters, rules and sanity (at least some sanity). So when I don't cut breakfast waffles the right direction and two out of the three kids are crying as kid three spills milk down the front of herself and also, then, begins crying I start to wonder why God thinks this is the best method of creating a running a planet. All of us raising each other and trying so hard to do something truly, biblically, 'good' but not really getting any credit or satisfaction. So I blurt out something very loving and compassionate like, 'these waffles are fine and they are not going anywhere so you might as well try them. They taste the same, I PROMISE'. Yea, Pastors never loose their patience.

... or how about when child in diapers has pooped but doesn't want me to change him yet so that it starts to leak/osmosi-size out the pant leg. I mean really, picture that eery brownish patch growing near adorably chubby but stinky thighs- I would compare this to sin... maybe a Pastor would say, I see this in your life, it needs to change, it will harm you, and, honestly, it stinks. But we are resistant and resilient to his loving  pleas. Are we expecting him to wrestle us to the ground like I had to do with said toddler?

Or that moment when it is bed time, and I am just looking forward to watching reruns of 'say yes to the dress' but each child needs unique attention, they need to be cared for, poured into, .... changed. And in that moment I wonder if a Pastor might say, when will someone pour into me?

So as I was watching these children I thought from time to time, don't they know I want to help them, have fun with them, keep them safe. And (honestly, so much more) I thought about how much their parents live a life that does all those things. Amidst tantrums and their questioning my motive for choosing a pear for lunch snack instead of grapes I thought, I do this to my pastor... I do this to God.

(Just so you know it wasn't an awful week, this is going somewhere.)

All this to say, on our way anywhere, I would pop in Chris Tomlin or David Crowder. On the first day of our babysitting adventure the song 'Our God' started playing. I heard the sound of angels... ok I heard the sound of three kids (even the one in diapers) singing along. And as I tried to watch the road I also watched in the rearview mirror as all three did motions along with the words that magnified the greatness of God. And I wept. The presence of God in a mini-van.

Maybe this is what it takes to be a Pastor. To be willing to give everything to the point of exhaustion (and so far beyond), spiritual, emotional, physical exhaustion, watching your spiritual children question you motives, resist your guidance. To watch children you have loved with everything you have only to watch them walk away from it all. And in turn, to try to release it to the Lord.

But to also see them encounter Christ. To see moments of them learning something new, to watch an idea or concept sink in and to be blessed to witness that moment when the Kingdom of God is not so far away.

when i think i have something to say

I wrote a friend this morning who I haven't talked to lately and at one point in the message I said, 'ministry isn't as glamorous as I thought it would be.'

does anyone else struggle with this- with really thinking it should *feel like something, like we truly are 'other -worldly' and as we are here so temporarily AND therefore the laundry does't matter so much.  Well here I am, trying to figure out a life where I am VERY this-worldly, where I care about the way my laundry is folded, and how long there will be ugly wood paneling in my house, and when i will be able to say, 'God is doing this great thing and it hurts but it's so good'... and not be thinking about primer.

i struggle with my shallowness verses the things unseen, because, well- they are unseen and the stuff i want is right here on this magazine page.  I struggle with thinking i am God's gift to everyone (yes i am that arrogant) and i struggle with loving a truly wonderful humble husband because he doesn't put the toaster away.

so lately i have not been praying for anything too big- just, love. "God, give me love for..." I pray for love for the CHURCH and my church, for teens and the older cashiers at the walmart counter who take a long time but probably thought they would be retired in florida by now.

so lately i have been going to the same bank teller every time i deposit a check, talking to her during her cigarette break, and mostly just conveying to her my thankfulness that she doesn't make fun of me when i get my deposit slip wrong every time... (yes, john, i am still bad a math, even with a bachelors) and i hope she somehow sees Jesus.

it's not glamorous- but i hope it's beautiful.


"beautiful, beautiful, Jesus is Beautiful. And Jesus makes beautiful things of my life. carefully touching me, causing my eyes to see Jesus makes things of my life"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lvrOAzu5V4