We talk a lot about discovering those things that give you life. Those things that are unique to you that give you a joy that you have a hard time describing in words.

I’m an assistant. I like to make sure the coffee stays flowing & color-coding spreadsheets & filing & organizing. It’s hard to explain to others why those things are fulfilling for me. And sometimes it’s hard to explain to myself that just because I don’t always thoroughly enjoy talking with people (*gasp*) doesn’t mean I’m a bad person.

And it doesn’t mean I should completely shy away from the things that are hard (or at least the things that don’t come naturally). Those things are important to my growth as a person. But I think there’s a freedom that comes with allowing yourself to do what truly makes you happy, regardless of the way that might look to the world.

I don’t personally know John Acuff. But I often find myself passing along things I find on his site. Some of it’s funny. Some of it’s challenging. This one was interesting-and goes along with our work of helping people live into the gifts they have been created with.

http://stuffchristianslike.net/2008/06/271-being-afraid-to-use-our-gifts/

Friday night I happened to have an evening alone with my fourteen-year-old son, Alden.  Scott (my husband) and Kate (our daughter) were at a father/daughter night for the fifth grade girls.  Somehow, miraculously, Alden was not working on plans with friends by the time I got home.  So he and I set out to run some errands, rent a movie, and settle in for our own little mother/son evening.

We were almost home from Blockbuster when I ventured into what I consider to be a more grown-up conversation than we used to have.  That is, I volunteered information about my day instead of  just asking about his.  I launched in with, “Well, I’m really tired but I had a good day today.”  I went on to explain that most days I don’t get a lot of accolades for my work, but that day had been different.  A counselor has to always walk that fine line of looking for evidence that they are actually helping people, yet not depend on constant pats on the back to feel okay about themselves and their work.  There is always that knowledge that I cannot solve other people’s problems, and I had just had about a two-week run when that had been painfully clear to me.  So this day, last Friday, I had several different people tell me how much I had helped them.  I was floored.  And grateful.  And since I was hanging out with my teenager, he was the one I shared it with.

Now I have to tell you that there was a tiny bit of ulterior motive at work on my part.  I also had a little thought in the back of my mind that this could be a help to Alden.  He has had a good school year with a lot of accomplishments, but the previous evening we had attended the big 8th grade awards assembly and he didn’t get any of the big “surprise” awards that he knew he was in the running for.  I think I had some vague notion about a little life lesson for him somewhere in there — that when you get the accolades, it is really satisfying but most of the time you don’t get pats on the back for doing a good job.  I tried to explain that is why it meant a lot, because normally I don’t get a lot of that in my work and that is okay.

So I didn’t get very far before Alden said, “I’m not surprised.”

“You mean you’re not surprised that people actually find me helpful?”  Now this was a surprise, and I said so.  “I figured you and Kate wonder how I can help other people when I get so many things wrong myself.”  I mean, who knows all your flaws better than your kids?  They totally know that I struggle with my temper, especially when I haven’t had a full night’s sleep.  They see me letting my anxiety get the best of me.  They put up with me asking them multiple times every school morning whether they have their lunch and their house key, as if my asking enough times is going to insure their safety for the day.

Alden just said, “Yeah, but I don’t know how someone without problems would even be able to understand what people are going through.  It seems like you would have to have some problems yourself if you were going to be any good at helping someone else with theirs.”

Okay, I say stuff like this all the time but it really sounded different coming out of my child’s mouth.  Really?  If I was this ideal person that I wish I was, I may not have as much to offer to the people around me?  Is this what that passage in II Corinthians means?  “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”

What if we all approached our weaknesses as our strengths?  What if we faced them and then asked God and our fellow humans to put them to use?  Could it be that our best gifts are contained in those parts of ourselves that we just can’t seem to conquer?  What do you think?  What are your best and worst traits?  Are the gifts inherent in the weaknesses?

“… for when I am weak, then I am strong.”

One of my children is grounded.

A little bit ago, I had to remind my child that the plans being made did not take into consideration that grounding.  My child began talking to me like I was an enemy. So, I said, “You are talking to me like I am your enemy.” (I thought it was a profound statement that would change the course of our conversation.)

My child said, “I feel like you are my enemy.”

I wisely responded, “You should challenge those feelings.”

My child replied, “I think my feelings are right.”

There was nothing left to do (nothing I was smart enough to figure out) but to walk out of the conversation as my child tried to justify the accusation against me.

In so many other circumstances I have been able to help my child work through feelings and embrace each other in love.

Now, we are ignoring each other.  I don’t think I could continue the conversation in any productive way.  At least not right now.  I still don’t know what I would say even if I weren’t feeling so terribly hurt.
I know what I want God to do.  I want Him to convict my child; to bring the injustice of the accusation to light; to break my child’s heart and lead my child to a humble contrite apology.

This is not a made up experience being used to illustrate how we sometimes think of God as our enemy.  I wish it were.  Instead, I am a professional counselor who (at this moment) has no idea how to respond to this emotional, relational, and spiritual situation.

My one comforting thought is that this is not the first time I’ve been in this type of situation; Hurt, not knowing how to respond.  The other times?  Some ended well.  Others – not.  Yet, God remains with me.

Last week I was in a terrible car accident.  I hit black ice and spun my way down the highway for an incredibly long time.  Once I regained control of the car and was coming to a stop, I was rear-ended by another car that had lost traction also.  I did another complete circle before hitting the divider wall.  Another “forever” being out of control.  When I thought it was finally over a police car, coming to help, hit the same ice and spun out of control.  It stopped just feet short of hitting us again.  Still huge trucks and other cars were racing past us.  Each a projectile that could lose control and kill us all.

So, my question is, “If God could save us from death and injury, why didn’t He go ahead and keep our car from damage all together?”

I can’t believe that God was not involved in saving our lives.  There were a two dozen different ways we could have been killed.  So, … yes, I’m grateful.  BUT, it seems to me that after all the hard work of keeping us alive, it wouldn’t have taken much effort at all to protect us all together.  After all, the vast majority of cars traveling that section of highway did not lose control at all.

I have this same question about my sanctification.  After having sanctified and set me free from some besetting sins, why doesn’t He sanctify me entirely?  Why not completely save?

My conclusion: I will trust Him.  I will hold on to the questions loosely; knowing my brain is too small to embrace the answers even if He were to sit down face-to-face and explain them to me.  And, that’s a good answer for me.  It lets me leave the heavy burdens at His feet and move on to embracing whatever comes next.

My wife and I went to the RAIN (Beatles tribute band) concert.

I believe I now have a sense of what is like to be on an LSD trip.  The band sang “Strawberry fields forever”, with lava-flow lighting and smoke.  Their words and instruments communicated to me a profound sense of relieve (like some stress had been lifted off my shoulders), and then to a disoriented semi-gloom (a light depression), followed by a nostalgic wish to return to the original sense of relieve.  I guessed that maybe that was the kind of LSD trip the author had experienced.  I felt I shared in the experience through their music.  Which kind-of prepared me for my next new experience.

When the band sang John Lennon’s  “Imagine” I had a freedom to join in the imagining.  Always before for me the song had been a guilty pleasure; intriguing words and melody that flew in the face of my faith.  “Imagine there is no heaven …” – heresy, right?  Yet, in these moments of existential freedom, I liked what I heard.  I saw the words in a new light.  Like, “what if we weren’t all sinners and bound to betray our own highest values?”  I pictured the John Lennon who wrote “Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can” sending millions of dollars on his own comforts.  And, I hurt for him.

I realized that John could only imagine.  He was a dreamer dreaming a dream he must have known he could never even do his part to bring about.  But, OH what a wonderful dream!!!  A world with no war, no greed, no lies, manipulation, or dominating each other.

I felt glad that John was a dreamer; glad that he imagined a better world.  I want that same world, and am free to pursue it through the healing God is working in my soul.  Through Christ Jesus I am offered the joy of heaven promised and the kingdom of heaven breaking into my life.  I get to dream with hope.  I get to imagine with confidence.

Lawrence Kushner writes in God was in the Place & I, i did not know, “Ego is not thinking you’re a talented or good person.  This is only self-confidence, or, in extreme cases, ordinary conceit.  Ego is arrogance.  It is thinking that you are better than someone else.  It is making yourself big in the presence and at the expensive, of someone else.  A hermit cannot be arrogant.  An ego needs someone else, another person, one you believe to be inferior to you, in front of whom you can preen, raise your chin, and stretch your beautiful neck.”

Kushner goes on, “There is more to humility than merely how you view yourself or your ego.  Humility is a function of how you view others.  Your attention is directed outward.  Arrogance is making yourself great in the presence and at the expense of another; humility is realizing that, whatever your greatness, power, knowledge, grace, or even kindness, you are never greater than another.

Humility is built around the notion that each person is unique and, therefore, precious.  In each person there is a priceless treasure that is in no other.  Therefore, one shall honor each person for the hidden value that only this person and no one else has.  Humility is not being in the presence of people who are better than we are, but simply being in the presence of people, any people, for they are all as unique as we are.  Humility commences with the realization that no one is inferior or superior to anyone else.  This fundamental egalitarianism then matures into a willingness to give of oneself to another.  Until, finally, true humility generates a love for all creatures.

In Judaism, the most elegant and commonly practiced method for subduing the ego is a loose catalog of acts called gemilut hasidim, usually translated as deeds of loving kindness.  Acts of gemilut hasidim customarily include leaving unharvested produce in the corners of the field for the poor and the stranger, extending hospitality to wayfarers, visiting the sick, ransoming those held captive, providing clothing for the naked, feeding the hungry, dowering the impoverished bride, attending the dead to the grave, comforting mourners, showing deference to the aged.”

Kushner seems to have an unbelievable understanding of how our identity is to be firmly rooted in being an image bearer of God (Genesis 1:26-28).  Each one of us is uniquely designed and wired with specific giftings and skill-sets, which means in every one of us “is a priceless treasure that is in no other.”   This concept of being an image bearer is how we are to find our identity.  But what I would like us to focus on, is once we understand our identity as an image bearer, what that means for how we view others.

Do we also view others as image bearers?  Do we view everyone as equal solely because they are a human being, an image bearer too?  It is only when we do, that we can begin to let go of our egos (our egos that keep us thinking that we are superior to someone else) to leave a corner of unharvested produce in the field for the poor and the stranger.  It is in these ways that our egos are directly connected to our heart for justice.

I love this sermon.  It gives me goosebumps to think of Mary coming to the empty tomb, with her grief and emptiness, and hearing her name spoken by Jesus.

I would love to hear your stories of moments or days or weeks or years when you’ve come to an empty place with your grief, or disappointment, or despair … and somehow heard or felt your name spoken.

Click HERE to read the entire sermon.

Happy Easter!

Larry met his wife at the door when she returned from her time volunteering at the church.  He knew that she would have some emotions saved up from the event to “process with him”.  Often she would be angry at someone who did/didn’t do/said/didn’t say something right.  Larry had learned not to try to calm his wife or redirect her feelings.  Nothing would help her except for her to see him take on her feelings.  She needed him to feel what she felt in order to fell validated in her own feelings or to feel cared for by Larry.

Larry’s wife is a Type A codependent, and Larry had become a safe harbor for her by developing his own codependency; Type B – “It is my job to care for you.”

In counseling with Larry’s wife I have to walk a delicate line.  I provoke her anxiety by at times disagreeing with her perspectives and challenging her emotional responses.  At other times I comfort her by assuring her of the value of her thinking and feeling.  Back and forth goes our dance; Comforting and provoking, provoking and comforting.   She is never sure which she will receive from me.  When she gets frustrated with this process she will sometimes threaten to quit counseling.  I comfort her by assuring her that I would miss her and I wish she would continue.  At other times, she may say that she is ready to leave counseling due to the growth and healing she has experienced.  Then I will provoke her by stating goals I think she has yet to achieve.

In other words, I will honor any decision she makes but I will not validate her thinking and feelings when I believe they are unhealthy.  I will not play the codependent game.  Still, I will enjoy and love Larry’s wife.

One of our next goals together is for Larry’s wife to express the frustrations she has about me to me; not to Larry.  This is a scary process for Larry’s wife.   I’ve told her that I won’t talk with Larry about her frustrations with me.  Thus, frustrating both Larry and his wife and throwing a kink in their mutual codependency.

If Larry and his wife continue in counseling it will be because they see value in how I relate to them.  THEN, I can coach them further on how to change their relationship with each other.  Pray for us!

So what is it that you really want?  I know, not an appropriate question to ask during Lent, particularly at the beginning of Holy Week, when we liturgical Christians are all about fasting and penitence and identifying with the cross of Christ.  Putting aside what we want, giving up chocolate or coffee or trips to the mall, focusing on what we should want instead of what we really want.

But what is it that you really want?  I have a hunch that most of us have trouble getting down to the root of that question – and that when we do get down to what we really want, we find a deep part of ourselves and a place where we meet up with God.  Remember when Jesus said that it is harder for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle?   Well, I wonder if that isn’t because the more we are able to get what we want on the surface of things (chocolate, vacations, new clothes, big houses) – the easier it is to keep that question on the surface and never really get down underneath those surface “wants” to what we really want.

Sometimes when you’re not getting what you want, you have to dig a little deeper.  You want some new clothes?  That’s not a bad thing.  If you can just go out and get some, then that’s that and it’s taken care of.  You feel better.  But when you’re out of money and can’t just go get some, you have to sit for awhile with what you want.  What is it that you want?  Why do you want new clothes?  To feel better about yourself?  To celebrate Spring?  Aaaah … now we’re getting somewhere.

If you want to feel better about yourself, then let’s dig a little deeper yet … what might go even farther than new clothes, is learning how to love yourself, believing that you are loved by the Creator … and that may take a little more work than a trip to the mall.  Maybe you’ve never really believed you are worthy of love, or maybe you’ve worked hard to hide some nasty parts of yourself rather than face them and love them into the light.  You may need help, a guide or companion on the journey.  It may take courage to form new healthy relationships.  And who knows, along the way you may find that your old clothes feel new.  Or that you find more pizazz in the thrift stores than you did before, now that you’re taking a little more of yourself through the door.  But whatever happens with the clothes, I bet you are a little more sustained by getting down to what you really wanted and meeting God and yourself there.  Maybe that’s a little of what the Kingdom of God is.

You have a yearning to celebrate Spring?  Now that you’ve named it, find a way to do it if you can’t buy new clothes – & it will hold more meaning, not than buying clothes, but more meaning simply because of having named the desire.  Buy the new clothes if you can!  Celebrate Spring!  And having named your desire to celebrate the amazing gift of the natural cycle of seasons … you may do more than buy new clothes.  You may build more “nature time” into your week, you may join the Nature Conservancy, you might help plant a community garden in a poor neighborhood to bring a little more natural beauty to some corner of the world.  Maybe that, too, is a little of what the Kingdom of God is.

So try to ask yourself throughout the day and throughout the week — what do I want?  Make a list.  Big things, little things.  Don’t try to do anything about them yet, just notice them.  Then, before you do a thing about them, sit with that question a little longer.  Don’t let yourself go get what you want when you want it.  Ponder it.  What is it that I  really want?  Sometimes you really just want some chocolate.  Part of who you are is your physical body with all its needs and desires.  So note that you want some chocolate and either get some or don’t.  You’ve acknowledged a bit of who you are in the process.

But don’t stop there.  Keep sitting with the question.

What is it that you want?  You may or may not get it, but chances are you will get something that you need.  And that, too, will help usher the Kingdom of God into your life and probably into a bit of the world around you.

Take a chance and say what it is you want.

A lot!  As a person and as a Christian.  And as a mom.  You see, I have a daughter who competes and performs traditional Irish dance.  So St. Patrick’s Day is big for us.  Performances at least once a day this week – at the parade, at the public library, at retirement homes and the VA hospital.  Yesterday some of the dancers attended mass at a Catholic church downtown where the priest is Irish.  Their dance teacher sang The Lord’s Prayer in Gaelic.

Watching these dancers is transformative for me.  It takes every ounce of their concentration to execute the steps with precision.  They have to be aware of where the other dancers are and pay attention to their own feet and posture, keeping their hands tucked securely at their sides while they point their toes and jump and kick.  It takes about all the patience a parent can muster to get their dresses made, every skirt, cape, and sleeve hand-embroidered by a parent or grandparent or paid seamstress with the traditional Irish emblems.  Then the dresses are handed down when they are outgrown, until they are worn so thin they are coming apart.

The real beauty of all of this is that when those kids are dancing, it is about so much more than them.  They are connecting us to the history of a particular place across the world.  It is all about them and at the same time it is all about another group of people who came before them, developing a rich culture of music and dance.  Long before these dancers were born, there were people in the hills of Ireland working out these dances.  They taught them to their children, and they taught them to their children, and one of those children of children of children of children teaches those same steps to kids in Little Rock, Arkansas.  And when you watch them dance, you see the beauty of the dance itself and you also feel as if you’ve caught a glimpse of all those Irish dancers from “the old country.”

Take a look:

HERE

I love this bit of life that reminds us that we are smack in the middle of an old, old story.  We matter, just like those dancers matter.  It makes a difference when they put themselves into the dance, and spend time practicing and concentrating and making friendships with the other dancers.  The particulars of our lives matter, and it makes a difference when we work well and live well and love well.  And we also live in the context of a much larger picture, just like those dancers.  They are taking part in something that has been going on for a long, long time – and so are we.  As we work out who we are and what God is calling us to, as we go about trying to love our neighbors and ourselves, as we think and pray and work and rest and sing and dance and all those other things we do – we are stepping into that great cloud of witnesses who have gone before us.

What are the essential steps to which you are called to be faithful?  And how are you bringing your own God-given presence and style to those steps?