A sheep in wolf's clothing.
You can laugh at my purpose but you can't laugh it out of me. I once read you can't wise-crack your way to greatness. Though scorn and ridicule are a reality, there is a blindness by grace to their distractions.
Gentle men often have the appearance of coming in last so that the first may be last.
We often hear the phrase, “Shame on you!” or “You ought to be ashamed of yourself!” when we do something unacceptable. The truth is, we do feel ashamed, but do we learn anything? Usually not.
Think of overbearing parents who want their children to achieve well in school. If one child fails to meet the parents’ expectations, a common tool for correction is to embarrass the child in front of their siblings or other friends. For example one parent might say, “John would have made all As, but his best wasn’t good enough when it came to his science final.” While the child might study harder in the future, his shame can lead to resentment (toward his parents and school), even though that was never what the parents wanted to happen. In essence, using shame, guilt, or embarrassment for positive change can be a kiss of death.
As humans, we use shame to change behavior. Our intentions might be good, but the result is often not what we intend. Religious leaders can often use shame to gain control over their followers.
Adam and Eve felt ashamed when they realized their nakedness, but it was not God who shamed them, it was their sin. The Holy Spirit convicts, corrects, teaches, and leads us in life-giving understanding. If we want to be effective leaders, we must follow suit.
If you play with fire, you’re going to get burned. We’ve heard this phrase a thousand times, as our society teaches us to avoid the pain. Our ads give us the false idea of escapism, our conversations hide the truth, and our dreams always point to a shallow, unrealistic paradise. In essence, we rely on our own effort and do everything we can to not be burned. Self-help pop psychology allows us to approach the fire of life, and we weakly reach out our cold hands to warm ourselves. But, look at our feet! We are positioned to stand where we don’t get too close. Our distance from the heat is a reminder for how we isolate ourselves from life-giving community, and instead dwell in the coldness of our loneliness.
We are invited to a life that has no fear of fire, for we rest in the paradox of being refined by the flames, yet not being burned; where the warm hands of a Savior hold ours. We have inside us a gift which is a burning heart, and an understanding that what leads and heals us is stronger than any hell.
As humans, we are really only capable of seeing the world in 2D. Technology allows us to view objects in three dimensions, but even then we are only able to see a false reality (motion picture or computer graphics that have been recorded). But, as we move out of the natural and into the supernatural, we begin to see things beyond standard definition.
De-tick: The misconception of stewardship, especially regarding time, is that we think we need to get a lot out of a little. Expectation becomes an idol, as we measure our worth, and others’ worth, based on our predictions and timelines. Our expectations wrap around our ankles and fetter us to the clock that reminds us, falsely, that our time is almost expired.
Detox: Religion requires unattainable spiritual perfection without failure, but grace gives room for imperfection by inspiration with courage, in spite of failure. As we are being led in the knowledge of knowing a great work is being finished in us, we begin to do away with faux spirituality. Exfoliation removes the layers of our narcissistic and obsessive self-awareness.
Debrief: The arrogance of the ego points us in the direction of guilt when we engage in wrongdoing. As we move out of the illusion of perfection and into freedom, we take joy in conviction and rest in truth. We take delight in correction and resist the temptation to compartmentalize our mistakes.
When despair no longer convinces us that we are crushed and when we start to desire to desire again, we step away from seeing things as black and white, or even grey, and see truth as a colorful, multi-faceted, life-giving gift. The layers of our life are revealed in ways we never imagined, and we begin to see our story is important and not fiction. This is real-life, in-the-moment living.
Getting your but in shape. Romans 3:21
We have been steeped in a companionship that fulfills our deepest desires, but sometimes our wants confuse this cherished fellowship. As our obedience increases, however, those misguided wants emerge into intimacy. Consider a woman who is consumed with the idea of marriage. Her partner is her object of desire, but to be married is her actual desire. However, once the bond between the two becomes stronger, he becomes the desire.
We are created for deep, soulful relationships. We can be wooed by ideas or ideals, but we can only become more alive when we take the responsibility of intimacy seriously.
We hunt for the objects of our desires, but the weapons we use to get them are often what we fall in love with. This is true in the way we use the attributes we possess to form relationships. A man who uses his humor to make people laugh can often use the laughs as a form of comfort (in place of the friendships). A woman can use her beauty to attract a partner, but she can also use her beauty to distract herself from experiencing intimacy.
The hunt for the objects of our desires is an obstruction to what we really long for, and ultimately, what we really need. We must kill our expectations that lead us to a standstill. Instead, let us dance to the song of intimacy, though the beat is often unknown.
I hear the roar of the twenties. The engines are starting. The teens are parting. The flame burned the old frame.
Bring in the new. The new catalogue of creativity.
Not idly stting by, but waiting to be revealed
as high-flooten and well-heeled.
Watch out drama junkies! Drama mama is energized.
No longer pragmatized. No longer flower child
but bloomin freaking girl gone wild!
I wrote this for my daughter Sarah on her 20th birthday in 2005. Reading her blog http://sarahhartsu.blogspot.com/ today and seeing her fresh burst of creativity brought this to mind.
The temptation to drink from the fountain of youth is really an invitation to come and live. Child-like faith. Children of God. Born again. Renew. We are called to become like children, but that doesn't seem easy to do. For some, the pain of stolen adolescence lingers throughout adulthood and ruins a healthy view of what it's like to be a kid again. For others, the rush to "grow up" makes it seem nearly impossible to embrace the here-and-now perspective most children have the ability to see.
For fear of appearing needy and desperate, our request for help dies into self-sufficiency. Any attention to the matters of the heart feels dirty. Wonder turns into unhealthy skepticism and wanderlust fades into indifference. The thought of what could be is diluted with fear and judgement, but freedom and fascination are still at every corner. Do we drink or divert?
We are beckoned to become like children, not called back into our childhood. In other words, child-like, not childish. We are invited to a relationship where colors are brighter, ideas are new, anything is possible, and it's terrifying without a tender Father.
We must remember that we are not always fighting fire with fire. The opaque veil of self is something that needs to be removed daily; the Helmet of Salvation, the hope, doesn't seem to fit quite right when there is something blocking my vision and impairing my hearing.
When a spiritual problem arises, a natural reaction is to find something physical to fight it with. We hope that the pain will go away, but we are ill-equipped when using weapons that are irrelevant to the battle. Our guns backfire on us. How do we move in the direction of what we hope for if we are standing in our own way?
I can begin to lift the veil when I understand what my true hope is. If He will increase, then I will decrease. If we feel the cold breath of death blow against our necks, we can rest assured knowing that something greater, or Someone unexplainable, is filling our hearts with life, making them beat louder than bombs, and blowing us away into abundance.
Let us move forward with our hope fitting so tightly around us that the veil has nowhere to rest.
Psalm 42:7 One of the most misinterpreted and misunderstood words is grief. For the sake of us all being on the same page, we must recognize this as deep sorrow, and even more so, as a celebration. Of course, grief is usually attached to someone or something that has been lost, so the thought of grief being a celebration can be hard to comprehend.
When I'm grieving over a loss, what I'm actually doing is celebrating my understanding. It's important not to confuse grief and celebration as two opposite reactions, because the two work hand-in-hand to further understanding. This is evident in funerals that seem to be filled with smiles and laughter, just as much as tears. The pain of the loss is there, but so is the realization of how much the person meant to us.
We can rob ourselves of the understanding when we decide to grieve in the way our society expects us to. Assuming that grief is void of emotion is just as wrong as assuming emotion is void of grief. And, just as our emotions can run in unexpected patterns, so must our grief. Unfortunately, people will mistake spiritual maturity with controlled emotions, and therefore believe in an imaginary timeline for grieving, and even more so, celebrating. How many times have you felt pressure to "get over" what ever loss you experienced because you were afraid people would think you're throwing a pity party? How often do you restrain your celebration for an achievement for fear of being perceived as prideful? These are both false displays of humility.
If you want to walk the narrow road, walk with the certainty that the pain is to come with the loss, but the grief in the celebration will lead to deeper understanding. This makes it possible for there to be joy in suffering.
No longer forgetting what the other didn't say. Listening for the peace underlying the language of the heart and mind. Believing in one another in order to catch him or her doing something right and repeatedly affirming them despite evidence to the contrary. The language we have is the vehicle to understanding(discovering) this mysterious essense of who we are and what we are to do together in real time.
How often this question comes up from a headless body! I call this defining goals only of the mind rather than the heart(mind over what really matters). Not that "What's ahead?" is always the wrong question, but that it can reveal a demand to understand(plan without trust) by rebelling againt authority and conviction in real time.
The Source of directon speaks through God's word by unfolding as a dream(to imagine) or as a vision recognizing the beginning of a story wrapping in one that is already ongoing. This story(not game) allows for the opportunity to trust rather than plan or to plan as a result of trust. Very few, if any, well laid plans didn't require change through their course of execution. Yet without trust, guidence becomes illusive and disconnected expressed as "A part of me feels this, but a part of me feels that". Many seek affirmation and information at this point rather than true guidance and leadership. This badly needed(hunger for) affirmation is clothed in a cleverly disguised question of "What do I do?".
I must learn to stop running toward my agenda at this point at least long enough to take in(receive) a deep breath of life(revelation). To know myself as one who is loved as the least of these rather than as the prideful greatest is liberating. The natural tendency is to demand understanding of what's ahead based on conscious or unconscious fear of judgment. To run again(start fresh) bathed in mercy over judgment is no longer grieving the Holy Spirit that results in leaving me at the mercy of my judgmental intellect.
So what is often the culprit alongside a lack of trust? Agenda-based disobedience because of self-worship. This worship of self always does something good that requires no suffering on my part(though it often requires the suffering of others to carry it out). It even protests or fights against something that appears bad(evil) when in reality this something or somene is messing with or revealing my agenda.
The theme of refusal to suffer for others in life is driven by not letting others in close enough to truly suffer for us. A few of the many reasons for this are deep insecurity, procrastination prolonging self-hatred, and because allowing others that far in can wreck our selfish agendas.