To Taylor Swift and Change, I am sorry

 April has been one of personal reflection. At the beginning of the month I wanted to end everyday with one thought and tweet it. Turns out reflecting on what that specific day has taught you, is easier said than done. One reason is if you want the thought to be real and honest and not sound manufactured, it requires you to be just that, honest. Sometimes being honest with others is hard because when we our honest with ourselves we don’t like what find. This dive into self-reflection has led me to realize that I need to concede two things.

My First is to Taylor Swift.

You are a beautiful and talented person. I have often over the last couple of years been very critical and unfairly biased to any mention of your name but I have come to realize that it was not you that I was uncomfortable with. It was myself. You sing of fairy tales, true love that last, and sugar and spice and people not nice. You are so girly and emotion filled. When I was younger I was told to “not wear my feelings on my shoulders” and through the years have developed a cynicism to things or people I deemed unrealistic, all the while harboring this girly girl person deep inside that still loves and cherishes The Little Mermaid and writes poetry about love and loss. How hypocritical and for what purpose? So I can seem more mature, realistic, or deep. Dumb. The only thing I am doing is missing out on good songs and replacing a spirit of innocence and aspiration with pride and superiority. You can be mature and deep and grown up and you can like happy endings and Taylor Swift. I know I do.

My Second is to Change.

Change and I quite frankly have had a love-hate relationship as of late. I get bored easily. I have a spirit of wanderlust and revelry, however, I also steer clear from changes I can’t control or thoroughly plan out. If the fog of change is too dense to see through to the endpoint, I dig my heels in and balk at the idea of walking through it. All the while with God putting both hands on my back and pushing me through as dirt builds up at my stubborn unmoving feet. I don’t know why I put up such a resistance when in the end I still end up on the other side of the change-fog and the only damage done is dirt residue and exhaustion from the struggle. Would it not be a lot easier to reach up and take God’s hand as he leads me through the fog? If the destination is the same, I would much rather arrive clean and at peace. 

             There are many more things the Lord has shown me as of late, but space and time restraints as well as discernment have led me to only share these two. And so here I am at the end of April with a couple of insights and self-realizations and wondering what’s next. Since I’m not sure, I think I’ll just jump in the car turn on some T-Swift and see where change takes me.

Grasshoppers

I have been a Hospice of the Pines intern for a little over a month and for the most part I have really loved the experience. I was certainly nervous at first, but I have seen the Lord so much while I have been there. Yesterday I had the opportunity to follow one of the Hospice chaplains around for the day. We went to the inpatient unit and spoke with some families and patients there and were able to pray with them. (I love praying with the clients and their families. Such a sweet time). We then decided to break for lunch and then come back for one final visit. The final visit was a home visit. The primary care giver was the patient’s daughter who was very friendly and very attentive to her ailing mother. As we sat down in the living area Brother Alex began conversing with the daughter and the patient and it was obvious that he had been to this home before and visited with them. We talked about the Lord and how the patient was doing and feeling and the conversation made a turn when the patient expressed that she sometimes worried and would get anxious. This is were I want to really start this blog because the story and the way Brother Alex spoke with this patient has really burned itself into my memory and heart. This is what happened. Brother Alex paused for a moment and then said this:

 “You know me and my younger son, we decided to go fishing the other day. So I was doing things around the house and he went to go get the equipment ready for fishing. And I kept asking him, ‘did you get this and did you remember that’. Every time the answer was ‘yes dad, of course dad’. So I said okay well let’s go and off we went. We arrived at the place where we normally fish and we got everything ready and I went to get the bait for our hooks and we couldn’t find the bait. We both looked all around and in the car and finally realized we had come fishing without bait. But I told my son that I had an idea. I told him that when I was young we would catch grasshoppers and use them for bait. Then my son asked me how we were going to find the grasshoppers because the grass was pretty high and while we could hear them we could not see them. I told him to watch me and I started walking through the grass dragging my feet and sweeping them across the ground. As I would do this, the grasshoppers would jump in the air. My son loved this and we caught probably around 50 grasshoppers for bait. We fished all afternoon and had a good time and as we were on the way home he was talking about fishing and everything he learned and so I asked him what the lesson was that he learned about the grasshoppers. He couldn’t figure out what lesson there was to be learned. He thought and he thought. So I asked him, ‘When were we able to catch the grasshoppers?’ He replied, ‘whenever they jumped to get away.’ So I said to my son ‘In Psalms the Lord says to be still and know that I Am, God. So in life when things start looking bad, or you find yourself in a scary situation, the best thing you can do is to be still and know that He is God, because sometimes in our efforts to flee the enemy, we jump right into his hands.”

He then turned to the patient and reminded her that God was always with her. That there is no challenge or fear that we have to run from, we need only be still and know that He is God. I was observing all day with the mind of a BSW student and it may seem silly but in that moment I was in awe of how God works through the abilities and the spirit of Brother Alex. The story was used to comfort and reassure the patient, but I found myself dwelling on that simple story and it’s illustration. It has certainly been a reminder that our fleshly instincts and desires are not what preserve us, but we are kept secure and safe in His hands and under His guidance through the Spirit.

To wrap it up I just want to say that I know life can be obnoxious and mean and awful sometimes. So if you find yourself dealing with this side of life right now and your finding it really hard to give thanks in all things, I would encourage you not to flee blindly from your troubles, and in such maybe flee right into the hands of a captor, but to be still and know that He is God. He is our very present help in times of trouble. 

Context

Lay me down; Lay my will aside

Cast me not from where you abide

Pull me close; Never let me go

I will trust in Your love alone.

Dark clouds gather; I hear their thunder

And lighting reaches to pull me under

But I won’t run and I won’t hide

I’ll cling steadfast to Your side

Your presence surrounds me

I feel it heavily

You take on all my burdens

Set my heart free

Oh Christ, You are my treasure

All that I need

Lover of my soul

Everything to me

When there’s sun; A picture perfect day

And context seeks credit for Your company

I will know and I will say

It is my Lord; It’s by His grace.

Your presence surrounds me

I feel it heavily

You take on all my burdens

Set my heart free

Oh Christ, You are my treasure

All that I need

Lover of my soul

Everything to me

Rain Is Coming

I sat all afternoon at the drive thru teller window and I watched as the sky changed and the wind blew progressively stronger and more frequent. The whole time I wanted nothing more than to go stand in the field that lies behind my job and let the wind envelope me. I’ve seen this on movies. Normally when this happens in movies the character wrapped in the wind is left with, what the audience can infer is, a feeling of comfort, peace, and promise of hope. I want to feel all three of those things.

When I got off I came and sat outside. As the wind blows about my hair and presses against me my mind somehow focuses and my nerves calm. I take a minute to just look around and ask God to show me how to feel and how to face what lies before me. So I watch and I wait and this is what I see …

The trees dance and I’m convinced if they could up root themselves to seek shelter from the upcoming rain, they certainly would. After all, this is what I want to do. But then again the trees need the rain like they need the sun. They take the good with the bad and they stand through it provided they are rooted in a firm and reliable foundation. I am reminded as the wind hits again that just like the trees I am anticipating a storm. I can feel it, see it, and smell it. I am afraid and I will admit to being weakened and wanting nothing more than to pull up my roots and seek shelter. But God, creator of all things, knows that I need both the rain and the sun to grow. And since I am firmly planted in Christ, He will be my strength and sustainer as the storm passes through.

It is through these great storms and trials that our perseverance is tested and our endurance tried. Will we still praise His name and lift high His crown as the rain comes down? Will the testing of our faith reveal our steadfastness or our fickleness? James says to count it all joy when you meet trials of various kinds for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And that to let steadfastness have its full effect so that we may be perfect and complete lacking nothing.  God is very much present in our times of trouble but He doesn’t remove us from our hardships or heartaches because through them WE have the chance to grow.

Even as I remember James and I’m typing this I can imagine what you’re thinking because it’s creeping up on me too. It’s thoughts like “What if I am not strong enough to go through these trials, What if I am too weak, I don’t think I can do it, I'd rather hide out and wait”. Praise God because He then reminds me of Paul in 2^nd Corinthians who wrote that he pleaded with the Lord to take away His burden and Christ said to him “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

There it is. I don’t have to fear the storms or the trials. They are necessary for the testing of my faith and production of steadfastness. And I don’t have to fear being too weak because Christ grace is sufficient and His power is made perfect in weakness. As I am finishing all this up I notice the sky has grown darker with clouds. Ominous as the surroundings are I sit here in the calm before the storm thanking Him for all the comfort, peace, and promise of hope I have in Him. Bring on the rain. 

Climb

Days like today have a way of making me want to curl up in the lap of a protector. I know that my fight is not against the flesh and bone and the physical things that my eyes can behold, but against the dark rulers and realms that go unseen. I woke up today fighting. Not a physical battle but a battle that as soon as I opened my eyes I could feel in my heart. I wish I had stopped then and prayed earnestly. Instead I busily went about preparing for my day of work and school assignments and tried to fight the fight myself.

I spent the day in war over the thoughts of my mind and stayed mostly to myself. This isn’t a problem except that I know that I have specifically been called to love on and to bring comfort and peace of mind to others and in order to do that you have to be open and inviting for others. I feel like today I failed miserably. There was even a couple of times where unprovoked I was tempted to reply harshly or even to not reply at all to someone conversing with me. Each time I would feel God’s voice clearly saying, “why, would you do that, that is not of your nature”. I would reply in my heart “but what if I am angry and what if this is just who I am“. He faithfully would reply “you are Mine and I have called you love and mercy and kindness; you were made new in Me; you have a new nature”

When I was little I would watch American Gladiators with my dad. The gladiators were huge compared to the contestants and their only goal was to thwart the efforts made by the contestants to win each challenge. One of the challenges on the show was a huge rock wall that the contestants would have to try and scale before the gladiators, after a delayed start, could catch and pull them back down.

This may be a silly and simple comparison, but in my daily climb to becoming more like Christ there are dark powers and authorities that are in pursuit of my heel. They are trying to slow me, pull me down, and keep me from the goal of living, loving, and becoming more like my Savior. They want me to believe that I am and will always be who I once was, and that I am stuck and tethered to this body and this flesh and this world. But Christ has called me to a royal priesthood. I no longer have to live that way or follow the way of the flesh I once walked in. He made me new. He has set my sight on things above. Not only that, but He himself is the power by which I make the climb.