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Unravelling Pain: What I’ve learned from birthing babies and sciatic pain.

A few weeks ago I went to bed with some dull aching pain in my hip and woke up in the middle of the night with currents of cramping pain shooting down my leg.  If you are familiar with sciatic pain you know exactly what I’m talking about!

I suffered for a few days and could not find relief so I sucked it up and went to the chiropractor.  As it turns out, after x-rays and a subsequent MRI, I have some herniated discs in my lumbar spine that are touching the nerves and this is what had caused the pain.  Thank the Lord, the chiropractor has helped a lot (don’t worry…he’s adjusting me in a specific way to avoid further damage to the discs).

But this isn’t exactly about that.  I mean,  I’m not writing this for sympathy or advice on how to deal with herniated discs or sciatic pain or what have you.  Rather, in a more general sense, I have had some reflections on pain because of the experience.

To begin, I have a couple of disclaimers.

First, the pain I experienced those first few days before seeing the chiropractor is nothing compared to the chronic pain I know that some of you deal with. To you with chronic pain, trust me when I say that I have always admired your strength and determination.  I pray for you in a new way now.  I fully admit that I am no expert in pain, either physical or emotional.

Second, I’m going to be comparing the pain of childbirth and sciatic nerve pain and I need to start by letting you all know that I had two really fantastic birth experiences.  I don’t say that to brag, by any means, but rather to recognize that my experience may not be your experience.  I do not deny that some of you laboured for days and endured much longer than I did to hold onto that babe, nor that some of you have even experienced birth trauma, miscarriage, D&Cs and stillbirth.  I am not trying to minimize your experience.  I am merely going to be comparing my experience of the two most difficult experiences of pain I have lived through.

Getting back to the story – as I lay there with shooting pain filling my entire left leg, I found myself wishing to give birth to a thousand babies rather than experience that particular pain.  Obviously, that is physically imposible and I was hyperbolic in my delusional start.  I will say, however, that I have given birth naturally, without medication, to two babies,  and I am willing to state flat out that the sciatic pain of a few weeks ago is the worst pain I have ever felt.  Reflecting on why that was the case is what prompted my current reflections on pain.  Why was this new pain worse than my experience of childbirth?  In reality they were similar pains – muscles in a large portion of my body involuntarily clenching in a very painful way.  What made this particular pain so much more unbearable?

This is my hypothesis: pain, when it is purposeful, is ultimately bearable.  Giving birth is one of the most purposeful pains one could endure – it is towards the end of holding that tiny babe in your arms.  Or for those of you who can’t relate to that, think of training hard for a sport, or doing an Iron Man race, or climbing Everest.  All of those things require sacrifice and pain but that sacrifice and pain has a finality: being the best, the fastest, or reaching that goal or that mountain top.  It is all purpose-full pain.  Human’s can push themselves to incredible limits when that is the case.

On the other hand, when pain appears purposeless, when it seems like only pain for pain’s sake, that is where the will, the heart or the body breaks.  When that pain is not reaching towards the fulfillment of a final purpose, when it seems nonsensical, or without end…who can bear that hopelessness?  I’m sure we can all think of real-life, current situations that could fall under this category.  We know bodies and minds that have given out under such circumstances.

Yet, at the same time, we hear inspiring stories of how people have experienced the deepest and most profound physical and emotional pain, lived through the most inhumane circumstances, suffered the profoundest losses and have survived.  These stories exemplify hanging onto hope, even if only by a fingernail, and finding purpose, even if that purpose is purely to survive.

I have heard people express this platitude in Spanish, “No debes preguntar ¿por qué?  Más bien pregunta, ¿para qué?”  It translates to, “you shouldn’t ask “why” (which speaks to reason), instead ask “for what” (which speaks to purpose).  It sounds like a cliché, and I cringe to think of speaking that into the middle of someone’s painful situation, however, I do think that maybe it is true.  When we suffer, we can look into the past and ask, “why?” We can search for the reason why this thing has happened.  We can shake our fist at the heavens and demand an explanation.  There is no law against this by the way.  Lament is a perfectly appropriate way to deal with pain and loss.  The Psalms are full of lament.  But the fact remains that we may never find an answer to that question that satisfies us.  Our other response can be to look to the future, and perhaps even the present, and ask, “for what purpose?”  This question can find an answer, even if it boils down purely to survival.  But maybe it sounds like, “so we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God” (2 Corinthians 2:4), or “so that the works of God might be displayed” (John 9:3), or so that “suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope” (Romans 5:3-4). Or so that I can grow in empathy and compassion or gratitude; or no longer take things for granted; or get my priorities straight; or be a part of ushering in a better world.  

I’m going to continue chewing on this one, and I invite your thoughts and comments below.  I’ll leave you this from Hebrews 12:1-2:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses [see Hebrews 11], let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.        

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Unravelling Identity: A Parable

This past Sunday I had the absolute joy of declaring the Good News with my church family. As I prepared, God put a story on my heart. So, although it sounded much more eloquent in Spanish, I could think of no better post with which to restart my blogging than an English version of the story.

It is the story of a child.  That child is me.  That child is you.  That child is all of us.  Because of the original audience, I chose to refer to the child as a boy; however, if it helps you connect with the story, feel free to replace “the boy”, “he” and “his” with “the girl”, “she” and “her.”

I pray this story is a blessing to you.

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This is the story of a child: an orphan who lives on the street. Every day is a struggle to survive. Often he has to eat from the garbage, and at times has even ended up stealing food or money for food. He has to be strong, or at least act strong, in order to defend himself. When the rain or cold comes he has to find shelter. He always seems to have a cough; he’s always dirty; he usually is without shoes. Every day he begs on the street and does what he can, but sometimes the other street children gang up on him and steal from him, and he ends up even worse off.

One day a man arrives, well dressed and very kind. He gives the boy a sandwich and new shoes. He says he wants to be friends with the boy, and of course the boy wants that very much. The man comes a few more times to give him some toys and candy and then suggests to the boy that maybe he could come work with him. He promises to provide for all his needs as long as he follows the man’s instructions. The boy is thrilled! Finally he will have someone to look after him.

After a short time, everything turns into a nightmare. The man who was so kind and always gave him candy and affection becomes the cruelest master in the world, now with his new slave. The boy realizes that everything was a lie. Not only that, it turns out that the man has a whole gang of children under his control. He orders them to beg in the street and bring the money every day. The man threatens to kill them if they try to escape or talk to the police or do not bring him enough money. He rewards the children who inform on the other children, so none of them can trust one another.

The boy lives under a great deal of fear – of annoying the man, of not bringing him enough, of a lie of one of the other children. The man does not provide for the boy as he said he would and the boy often hits the streets hungry.  He cannot use the money he has begged for to buy food because the money will wonder why he has brought so little and get angry. And if the boy lies to the man about how much he earned that day he is afraid that one of the other children will have seen and tell the man. Many days he ends up eating from the garbage, just as before, in order to have enough money to meet the man’s demands. And escape? He can’t even imagine thinking about that.

But one day, the boy is miraculously rescued! And not only rescued, he is adopted! When he meets the father of the family, he is shocked. The father is so kind and happy, strong yet gentle. The father has many children, however the boy can see that he loves them all the same! And it seems as if nobody in the house lacks anything. There is a joy among them that he has never experienced. The boy is in the best circumstances of his life! He lives in a huge house, has new clothes and a lot of brothers and sisters, and the most amazing food he has ever tasted. And always, always, always, when the father embraces him, he feels peace and security – something so foreign to him. When he sees the father’s eyes, he sees something that he had thought only existed in stories or his dreams … love, perfect and pure.

However, as odd as it might seem, adapting to the new life that he has in the father’s house is not so easy. Although there is always food on the father’s huge table, sometimes the boy still finds himself looking for food in the garbage because he feels strange sitting at the table. He has done nothing to deserve such wonderful food. And after defending himself so long on the streets, he has a hard time trusting his new brothers and sisters. He feels that their care for him is just a hoax, and expects that at any moment they will betray him and say something to the father so that the father will reject him. So he spends a lot of time alone because he it’s better for him to reject his new siblings than to end up the one rejected. Perhaps worst of all, the boy starts receiving letters from his former owner from the streets. The man insists and insists in his messages, saying time after time that the boy is worthless, that he does not deserve to be in the father’s house, that one day the father will realize his mistake and throw him out of the house, that he shouldn’t trust the father, and all manner of things like that. The boy hides the letters in a secret place. And although they start as messages, when the man says something that the boy thinks is probable, very soon the words of the man leap from the page and become the voice in his head.

One day, a window breaks playing soccer. The boy runs to the forest at the back of the father’s property and hides. He is very afraid of what the father will do. When he hears the voice of the father calling him, he does not say anything – he even holds his breath in fear of being found. But of course the father finds him, and instead of a beating, the boy receives only a warm embrace. The father invites him to come along so that they can go repair the window together. It seems like the father still loves him. Maybe the man’s voice is not right.

Although he resists, the boy begins to get to know his brothers and sisters better. They help him find things in the house, or teach him how things are done around the house. Increasingly, he does not feel so disoriented and out-of-place in the house. And sometimes they say such nice things about the father and what he has done for them – wonderful stories that give the boy a lot of hope. Perhaps the father really is who they say he is.

The father continues to teach the boy how one ought to live in his family. He keeps inviting him to the table to eat. He continues correcting with love and a lot of patience, making the most of every opportunity to show the boy that his love is not conditional and that he will never abandon the boy. The father is always generous with his affection, and spends a lot of time with the boy, dreaming with him about his future, and who he will be, and all the things they will do together.

Now, in the presence of his father and his brothers and sisters, the man’s voice no longer sounds so correct. One day the boy dares to talk to his father about the man’s letters, and he takes them out of their secret place. His father takes his face in his hands so that the boy must look him in the eyes. And with his words and eyes full of tears he speaks truth over his boy.

You are mine, I rescued you and I paid everything so that you can belong here. You are wanted in my family. You are loved. You are a precious treasure and I choose you! There is nothing that will ever separate us. You are safe. Fear and shame no longer have a place in your life.

Then his father takes the letters and his boy’s hand and they go throw the letters in an immense bonfire.

Every day with his father the boy learns how to live in his new home. He learns how to enjoy the father’s blessings with his brothers and sisters, how to support and encourage one another. More and more the boy understands that he does not have to hide from his father when he makes a mistake – he can ask for forgiveness and, together with his father, look for a solution so that he can avoid the same mistake. He learns how to ask for his father’s help, and spend time without shame in his arms.

He is no longer just the street kid living in the father’s house. He is the father’s son, part of the family, enjoying the abundant life of his father.

 

 

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Unravelling Power: An Easter Reflection

I’ve been wrestling a lot lately with the power games we human beings play, the ways in which power is abused even in the Church (#churchtoo), the ways in which power has distorted the way we live out our calling as Image Bearers, the way power and position seduce my own soul.  So, it is no surprise to me that as I read through the accounts of Last Supper to resurrection in the gospels that the Holy Spirit is drawing my attention in new and fresh ways to how God loves to “chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful” (1 Cor. 1:27).

Take for instance the thief on the cross. I was mind-blown in the way that you can read something a million times and then one day POOM!  Think of this, the disciples themselves still don’t really get it, they have scattered, they have denied, they are hanging in the periphery, they are disillusioned and confused, and this thief condemned to death confesses his guilt and proclaims, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom” (Luke 23:42).  How in the world does this man get that Jesus’ Kingdom is not a political kingdom of this world?

Or the Roman officer, a gentile, an oppressor, despised. He worships God in the moment of Jesus’ death, exclaiming “This man truly was the Son of God” (Mark 15:39) and “Surely this man was innocent” (Luke 23:47).  Isn’t that incredible?

And there are the women, who seem to stick closer during Jesus suffering, death and burial than the majority of The Twelve.  It is to them that the news of Jesus’ resurrection is first revealed. Later it is Mary Magdalene who first sees the risen Jesus.  Totally upside-down considering that Jesus is entrusting the very first evangelist with a testimony that would not have been considered valid or trustworthy as women were not considered competent witnesses in that time.

Finally and with exclamation point emphasis we have the very example of Jesus:

Who, being in very nature God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
    and gave him the name that is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father.

Philippians 2:6-11

 

 

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Unravelling My Story: That Time I Cried Watching Wonder Woman

In honor of International Women’s Day yesterday I’m gonna go there.

When I watched Wonder Woman I bawled.  It came from a deep place and surprised me, but I did.

***SPOILER ALERT***

Diana, who has trained her entire life for war finally steps onto war-torn soil.  She is surrounded by suffering and injustice and every cell in her body is feeling the need to respond.  But those people are not the mission.  There is nothing that can be done for them.  Or so she is told repeatedly by her male colleagues.  And finally after being told no and reminded of the mission many times, she has finally had enough.  She can’t not do something and so she ignores the pleas of her colleagues, she sluffs off her cape like she sluffs off their expectations. She takes up her weapons and steps into No Man’s Land.  As she pushes in on the enemy and the others rise to follow and do battle alongside her I am struck by the beauty of the thing and I am almost ugly crying in the theatre.  I’m not even sure why. As Dan and I walk home I begin to process what it was that produced that response in me.

I believe men and women are different and that that is a gift.  I don’t necessarily believe that there are personality traits that belong to only men or only women.  For example I believe that there are gentle and nurturing men and that there are strong and ambitious women and that there is nothing wrong with that.  However, I do believe that the way a gentle and nurturing man will express those traits will likely look different than the way and gentle and nurturing woman expresses those traits and so forth.  I think this is the case because our brains and bodies work differently, we interact with our worlds differently and the social realities that form us are different (i.e. both nature and nurture make us different).  So without going to much farther down the gender theory path, because that’s not where I’m going with all this, my personal view is that men and women are different and our diversity is a gift.

So, what did I see in Wonder Woman that lead me to cry for the beauty of it?  I saw a group of warriors out to do battle against evil.  I saw the strengths of Diana and the strengths of her male counterparts.  They both had the same goal – end the war – but they approached that in different ways.  The men were focused on the mission – this is the one thing we have to do to get the job done.  And there was Diana, who absolutely could not put blinders on to the suffering she was seeing.  She was moved by what she saw and she had to do something about it.  When she made that decisive step into No Man’s Land in order to take back the town from the enemy, she was responding to a call that the men had not heard, but when they saw her leaning into her purpose they jumped up and they supported her and they decided to fight alongside her.

Dare I say that we have often characterized the “emotion” of women as a weakness, a liability, a distraction? What if we could view it as a strength?What if we released women to feel deeply, to perceive injustice with prophetic vision of how things ought to be, to be burdened and to mourn for their communities, or the communities of another, to dream of a better way and to be moved into action. What if we released women to pursue their calling with the gifts and strengths and abilities that God knit into them while they were in their mothers’ womb. And what if it wasn’t just some little side-show (how sweet!) but that we actually got behind them as they charged the darkness in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Of course we needed Steve too. We needed his focus and his drive toward the thing that he was called to. We needed his form of conviction and bravery. We needed him to fly that plane in the sky sacrificing himself for the sake of the village to which they had just brought liberty under Wonder Woman’s calling. We need him and his strengths just as much as we need her and her strengths. And while I’m advocating for women here, the broader point is this: we need one another.

Imagine if all of God’s sons and all of God’s daughters were included in the fight, armed to fight in the battle and freed to lead the charge on the hills to which He has called them. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Ephesians 6:12), and the battle is too big to leave any one of God’s soldiers untrained and unengaged and doubting that they are called to push back the darkness because someone else hasn’t already taken the first step.  I am compelled by a vision of us, men and women both, leading together in our God-given strengths and gifts and abilities and differences.

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Unravelling Abiding: Stop Using Me.

“Teach me to abide!”

So much frustration was wrapped up in those words. I had been confessing that I had been doing a lot of running and numbing instead of connecting and really feeling the inner Romans 7 struggle.

“Teach me to abide!”

The Spirit responded gently. “Stop using me.”

He showed me how I have treated abiding like a filling station: I connect in, fill up my tank with His resources, then I disconnect and run off to do my own thing, use up the resources as if they were mine until I feel empty again and need to go top up the tank again. I was using Him.

This in contrast to the metaphor of the vine and the branches in John 15. The branch doesn’t receive resources to then run off and produce its own fruit. The branch is a conduit of the resources of the vine. The vine pours its resources through the branch and then produces its fruit.

We often talk about how Jesus regularly retreated to be with the Father and I think this has falsely fed my “fill’er up” mentality when the truth of the matter is that every word Jesus spoke came from the Father and every thing He did was directed by the Father. Jesus didn’t go and plug in, download and then disconnect to get about his business. He remained connected. Could it be that when He got away with the Father it more about intimacy than business?

When my time spent with the Father is utilitarian I’m missing out on intimacy. When it is about scrounging for wisdom or answers or inspiration or power it can’t be about feasting at the Father’s table. Abiding as a conduit in the vine means that I can trust for all of God’s resources to flow through me as He sees fit so that my times of quiet in His presence could actually just simply be about being in His presence.

So what does it look like to view abiding more as a state of being by which God may pour His resources through us to produce HIS fruit? And how does this practically play out in the chaos of life?

I’m not entirely sure just yet, but I think it has implications for other things that have been on my mind lately: how to let God order my days, how to be a wise steward of finances in the midst of so much need, how to pray, how to not lose my temper when my sons pants “feel funny” and I am powerless to fix his whiny dilemma. I think it is a key to not burning out. I think it has the power to free me from of some of those graveclothes of striving and fear of man because if I am simply a conduit everything that comes out of me is not of me at all and the fruit belongs to the Vine.

And I think…well I think it must start with confession and surrender. God, forgive me for using You and abiding only long enough to fill myself up and move on with my plans.

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Unravelling Cynicism: Living in the Already/Not Yet with Prophetic Vision

There is this Robert Munsch story called The Boy in the Drawer that was a part of my Canadian childhood.  It is about this miniature boy that pesters and reeks havoc in the life of a little girl. Every time she gets mad at him and tells him to go away he grows a little.  Finally at the end of the book (spoiler alert) the little girl and her mom and dad realize that when they show love to the boy he shrinks – so they shower him with affection until he completely disappears.

I have a cynic in me that acts a lot like that little boy.  It grows and growls loud and obnoxious or it shrinks and become powerless, depending on my perspective.

Brokenness has been on prominent display in the wake of the mass shooting in Parkland, Florida: the brokenness of individuals, systems, governments and societies.  When it comes to the debate about gun control in the US, I just don’t get it.  As a Canadian I don’t get it.  As a Christian I don’t get it.  It completely boggles my mind. And as I watch people fighting and posturing and rail-roading efforts toward justice with their own self-interest the cynic in me grows and grows and grows. I am extremely pessimistic when it comes to our human systems. I know some people feel called to fight within politics, but I just can’t be one of those people; although I have convictions that affect the way I view politics, I feel an overwhelming hopelessness and cynicism on the political front.

But the cynic in me shrinks and the hope in me increases when I take my eyes off of the man-made systems and catch a vision of the Kingdom of God.  It’s like Elisha’s servant who is filled with despair as he looks out at the vast army surrounding them; it looks impossible until Elisha prays for his servants eyes to be opened and he is then able to see God’s invisible army all around (2 Kings 6:15-17).

We see this duality in the life of the prophets of the Bible all the time. They deeply mourned and even despaired of the brokenness they saw around them.  They communicated messages of gloom and destruction. There is an aspect in which knowing God’s good heart shines a big bright spotlight on all that is wrong and broken. But always, at some point, God gave the prophets a vision of what restoration looked like. He always offered hope like an olive branch. Which is why in the midst of some of the most depressing books of prophecy in the Old Testament we have some of the most compelling pictures of hope lived out and seeping into all aspects of life.

On the other side of the Old Testament prophets Jesus breaks into human suffering and suffers the brokenness right along with us, all the while pointing us to the Kingdom of God, declaring the “year of the Lord’s favour”, jubilee, restoration. Jesus said the Kingdom of God was near and He said the Kingdom of God was here. Jesus died and rose again and He sits on the throne – everything is under his feet. He invites us to live in the upside-down reality of His reign. Where love motivates rather then fear. Where serving and sacrificing is the way to impact rather than position and posturing. Where giving up ones life is the way to actually find it. Where the poor, hungry, humble, weak, grief-stricken, peace-makers and persecuted are actually the blessed ones. No matter the earthly kingdom we find ourselves in, this is the beautiful reality that Jesus calls us to live out of.

We live in this tension – the already/not yet of the Kingdom of God. We mourn the brokenness and pray fervently for His will to be done on earth as at is in heaven. And we let the vision that Jesus gives of a world permeated with the power of the gospel motivate us toward the realization of it as we cling to the promise that he will be with us always and move in the power of the Spirit, operating in God’s economy.

I love the images of jubilee and shalom in the OT, and Zechariah’s vision of the old people hanging out while the kids frolic and play. I love the vision that Jesus cast as he preached on the side of the mountain and as he prayed on his last night before his death. I love how Paul called time and again for the Church to live out unity in all of their diversity. I love how John painted a picture of every tribe and tongue and nation worshipping around the throne of Jesus. I love that in the early church people sold everything and no one had need, that the Ephesians adopted abandoned babies, and that the gospel defied all the social cast systems of that day.

And I am inspired by the vision of the Kingdom that I see as individuals, in the power of the Spirit, live it out despite the governing laws and politics around them. I have friends who are punching human slavery in the gut as they slay the power of porn addiction in their lives or bring flowers and dignity and all their care to prostitutes in red light districts in SE Asia.  I know people who put not just their money but all their resources where their mouths are, valuing human life enough to care for mothers in crisis rather than shaming them, and to foster and adopt so that there are other options.  I’ve seen those who are moving in to rough neighbourhoods rather than moving out of them; people who have committed to teach in the rough schools in rough neighbourhoods with rough kids; people who have sponsored refugees.  I have friends who work in microfinance projects and skills training so that people can leave the poverty cycle.  I have heard story after story of radical love and communities transformed – and it is almost always from the bottom up.

I look to government and broken human systems and the cynic grows, paralyzing me with fear; I look to Jesus, to His vision, to His gospel affecting every sphere of life, to his Kingdom reality lived out at a grassroots level in the lives of Spirit-filled individuals all over the globe and I have all the hope in the world!

Let’s fix our eyes on Jesus and cling to hope and follow as He calls us to live out of His kingdom reality.

 

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Unravelling My Story: My Sheep Hear My Voice

I moved to the other side of the world when I was 19. I spent almost a year in this place I came to love and it marked me in some beautiful and some terrible ways. Some of my deepest wounds and greatest growth found their way into my life in that year. Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about one of the beautiful ways.

Like any young person I was on the cusp of major life decisions and struggling with direction. One day I was reading John 10 and when I read that the sheep know the Good Shepherd’s voice and follow Him, I began to panic a little. Did I know the Shepherd’s voice?  I couldn’t confidently say that I did. I had desires and dreams but how could I be sure that they were from God? The heart is “deceitful above all things” after all (Jeremiah 17:9) and perhaps it was tricking me into believing that God was leading me in a certain direction when He wasn’t. I was in anguish.

I can think of many situations before that point in which God had spoken clearly through His Word or promptings in my heart, but in that moment, with the finger of the Accuser pointed right at me I suddenly wasn’t so sure that I recognized God’s voice. God did two beautiful things to silence the Accuser.

First, within a few days I was reading in Philippians 2 and verses 12 and 13 leaped off the page at me: “continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.”  I may not have been able to trust all that was in my heart, but I could trust in the One that was working in me, not only to act as He desired, but to will in accordance with His good pleasure.  He was working in me so that I could want what He wanted.

The second thing came a little while later.  There was this wonderful lady I knew who was dying of AIDS.  She was always the first to praise God and share about His goodness in her life in spite of the fact that she was unwell and approaching skeleton skinniness.  It seemed like such a waste that she was going to die and that we would be deprived of her example of trust and gratitude and service and all the beautiful things she embodied.  So I began to pray.  I wouldn’t say it was fervent, but as it came to mind I would ask God to heal her.  I’m not sure how long I prayed but one day, one normal, unsuspecting day, she came back with results from the blood work that was required on a regular basis and incredible news began to filter through the community: she was no longer HIV+!  God had done it! As I rejoiced in answered prayer and reflected on what had happened I felt the Spirit encouraging me. I don’t have the gift of healing, but I had heard God’s heart for this woman and when I prayed His heart back to Him, He was happy to give me the desire of mine.  Proof: I heard the Shepherd’s voice.

I’ve been thinking on these experiences a lot as I walk alongside a friend who is learning to recognize the voice of her Shepherd and as I reflect on prayer.  God planted something in me way back then and it is growing into an ever deepening desire to hear His heart, to be formed by His heart, to pray victorious warrior prayers because they align with His heart, and to see others realizing that they can hear their Shepherd’s voice too.

___

What has been your experience with hearing the Shepherd’s voice?

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Unravelling Identity: Created in the Image of God

Have you ever stopped to wonder why the good news is really good news?  I often do – because when I think of the North American Christian experience, it is often a lot more like the proverbial church coffee compared to the richest most delicious dark roast that exists on earth that were the experiences of the early followers of Jesus.  It’s like mowing down on funeral sandwiches when there is a feast spread with the most tantalizing dishes created by human tradition and imagination.

Anyone with me?

I grew up in the church. When I was 4 we were doing a family devotional that talked about being ready so that when Jesus returned we would be able to be with Him and enjoy the wonderful eternity that he has prepared for us. I decided to ask for forgiveness for my sins and ask Jesus into my heart because I loved Him and wanted to follow Him, but also because I didn’t want to miss out (hmm…just had a little aha moment there…might have to explore that in a future blog). So I accepted Jesus as my Saviour at the age of 4. I was baptized at the age of 7. I didn’t have a rebellious youth. I don’t have a dramatic rescue story or jaw-dropping before and after photos. It was hard to really capture what was so amazing about the Good News. My christian experience for most of my life had been trying really hard to avoid bad things and to do good things to please my Heavenly Father.  Not exactly compellingly good news either.  I was way too old before I started to understand how the good news affects my current reality and not just my eternal destination, when I began to understand grace and intimacy with God, when I began to clue into the fact that the same Spirit who raised Christ from the dead, that resurrection power is at work in ME! (Romans 8:11)

So this is a question that I often still ask myself…what really is so good about the good news and am I living in that reality?  Several years back Dan and I had privilege of attending a one day workshop put on by Jeff Vanderstelt. He taught us this really helpful rubric for thinking through the ramifications of the gospel and also analyzing where we are living out of false beliefs.

Who God is — What He does — Who we are in light of that — What we do.

God demonstrates who He is to us by what He does.  What He does for us ultimately informs our identity (who we are) and then we are able to live out of that identity.  So our doing comes out of our being which is defined by God and His work on our behalf.  Our behaviour can be a reflection of gospel identity or it can highlight some wrong belief about who we are or who God is.  I have thought of this often since I first heard it.

The other day I was reflecting on creation and identity and marvelling again at the gospel, the truly good news.  I was thinking through some of the ways that God created us in His image and how that impacts our identity and how we live out that identity. I was thinking about the Fall and all that Satan set out to destroy in the garden. A light went on for me that illuminated so many facets of the gospel!  When Satan deceived Adam and Eve he wasn’t just trying to trick them into eternal suffering; He was attacking his greatest enemy, God, by attempting to destroy His very image in us!  And what Jesus accomplished on the cross what not just about ensuring our eternity with him, it was about restoring His very image in us!

As I was thinking about this a new rubric formed in my mind.  It goes like this:

Who God is — How He created us in His image — How Satan sought to destroy that — What Jesus’ saving work through His death and resurrection does to restore what was broken — Who we are because of that — how we live out of this restored identity.

Here are some examples:

God is triune (communal) — He made us for community — Satan and sin brought shame which broke community between humans and God and one another — Jesus restores honor — We are adopted sons and daughters, coheirs with Christ — We live in community with God and others in the new family of Jesus.

God is present and close and speaks — He made us to enjoy His presence and hear His voice — Satan and sin broke our communion — Jesus’ death tore the veil — We are a temple of the Holy Spirit – He actually makes his dwelling in us (!!!!) — We manifest God’s presence to a world starved of communion with Him.

God is holy and good — He made us perfect and good — Satan and sin brought guilt and marred perfection — Jesus justifies us and makes us righteous again before God — We are redeemed — We reflect again God’s beauty in a broken world.

God is powerful/in control — He gave us authority — Satan usurped our authority, making us fearful slaves — Jesus rescued us from the dominion of darkness and transferred us to the Kingdom of the Son He loves — We are free, citizens of the Kingdom, ambassadors sent out with His authority — We rule again through Jesus’ authority.

God is love — He made us to be recipients of His love — Satan and sin introduced doubt and fear — Jesus demonstrates His love for us through His death on our behalf, while we were still his enemies — We are deemed worthy — We are free to receive and give love.

God is our gracious provider — He made and gave us everything that we needed — Satan introduced doubt about God’s good and gracious provision — God’s grace and provision is extended to us anew through Christ’s work on our behalf — We lack no good thing — We are blessed to be a blessing.

God is creative/life/life-giving — He breathed His life into us – Satan and sin brought death — Jesus died and rose to break the curse of death and breathe new life into us again — We are new creations, we are filled with the Spirit — We bear good fruit, we speak life, we create and celebrate beauty.

Now that, my friends, sounds like really good news.

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Unravelling Anxiety: Out of Control

Because these days I need the reminder…

I live in a place the shook violently 4 months ago. And in the shaking, something sifted to the surface that I had not been aware of in my life for a long time. Fear.

There is something about firm ground rolling and sturdy buildings twisting and creaking and clunking that changes your perception of reality. Fear, in this case, is a God-given reaction, a tool for survival, a physical hormonal response to a threat that is healthy and good. In the days and weeks after the earthquake I had physical and emotional reactions to physical stimuli that were practically reflexes – they seemed to bypass the rational processes of the brain and just happen. This is a normal part of how the body works through trauma.

Then fear gave way to anxiety. It was disconcerting to the say the least. Sure, I had been anxious before, we are all familiar with worry, but these sudden bouts of heart-pounding, near hyperventilation were far from my normal experience. Although I knew this was a normal physical response to fear triggers, I hated it, because I felt powerless. I felt out of control.

I think that is what fear and anxiety usually come down to: lack of control. We do a pretty good job, under normal circumstances, of fostering an illusion that we are in control. We actually convince ourselves that we are in control, that we can manage our realities and construct our own futures. So when something threatens this illusion, we feel fearful or anxious. When we realize that the ground can roll like water and that cement can bend and twist, our carefully managed reality is exposed for the facade that it is.

Or when we lose a job.

Or when cancer strikes.

Or when people don’t respond the way we had hoped they would.

The truth: there is always very little within our sphere of control. And that is okay because we were really actually made for dependence anyway. I like how Paul put it when he was speaking in Athens:

God intended that they [humankind] would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us. ‘For in Him we live and move and have our being.’ Acts 17:27-28

Living in dependence rather than grasping for control requires some things though. We need to trust that God is in control and we need to trust that God is good, even when circumstances seem to say otherwise. Sometimes believing those things is easy and other times we have to engage every fibre of our faith muscles. When we are living in fear or anxiety we can recognize them and receive them like the flashing red warning lights on a dashboard.  Where am I not trusting that God is in control? Where am I not trusting in His goodness and love toward me? These are opportunities to return and to rest, to have our being in Him.

One morning while I was in the thick of it God gave me a picture that has been His invitation to me ever since.  It’s not going to sound very spiritual if you know the movie, but it was imagery that captured me.  In the movie Signs there is a scene where the family is hiding/trapped in the basement and because of fear the boy is thrown into an asthma attack.  They realize they don’t have his medicine, it is upstairs beyond their reach, so the father takes the son in his lap so that his son’s back is leaning against his chest and he breathes and invites his son to rest into him, to fall into rhythm with his own deliberate and steady breath.  The son’s clenched fists as he fights for every breath eventually relax and let go of the fight he his breathing normalizes. This is what God showed me: me, in the midst of anxiety and fear that I could not control, sitting in his lap and letting His breath and his reassurance wash over me as I relaxed into His embrace and my breathing settled into His pace.

He is patient and loving and he will hold us until we can let go.

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Unravelling Identity: The One He Loves

I’ve been hanging out for awhile in John’s gospel, reading it alongside some friends.  I’ve always loved this gospel because of it’s intimacy.  I love how John refers to himself: the disciple whom Jesus loved.

In the other gospels we see a more detailed picture.  John was a fisherman who worked alongside his brother and on a team with Peter and Andrew.  Jesus referred to him and James as the “sons of thunder.”  He was a part of what people call the “inner three” who along with Peter and James were privy to some of Jesus’ greatest and most difficult moments, like the transfiguration, the healing of Jairus’ daughter and his anguish in the garden.

We are also privy to some slightly les flattering moments. He angrily wanted to call down fire from heaven to smite people who had refused to welcome Jesus in their Samaritan village. He complained to Jesus when some outsiders were casting out demons in Jesus’ name. He and James vied for special seats in heaven to the left and right of Jesus’ thrown.

But although we get a glimpse of an eager, easily-angered, perhaps power-hungry or at least positionally-striving disciple who let his special friendship with Jesus perhaps go to his head a little, we get none of that in his Gospel. We hear only of “the disciple whom Jesus loved” and he never even mentions his actual name.

And this is precisely what inspires me about my kindred spirit John.

I believe that time with Jesus began to form and inform him, that the resurrection was a turning point and that the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost revolutionized his life because all of the sudden so much made sense.  It always boggles my mind to think of all the things the early believers of Jesus had to figure out along the way with the help of the Holy Spirit.

If the John I described above,  from the other gospel accounts is more like the before picture, John’s gospel and his letters are the after picture.  What I see is a man who encountered the love of Christ in such a profound way that it completely rewrote his identity and priorities.  I see a man that took Jesus at his word when we talked about abiding and experiencing union with God. I see a man who came to understand all who Jesus said He was and discovered what that made him. I see a man who came to realize his identity, not as James’ brother, Peter’s friend, right or left-hand man, inner circle-dweller or one of the powerful elite, but simply as the one whom Jesus loved.

May our false identities have the same encounter with Jesus, I am, the Bread of Life, the Water of Life, the Gate, the Great Shepherd, that John had and may we all come to know ourselves, first and foremost as the one Jesus loves.

 

 

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