Finding Hope

I know when Spring arrives because I start to sneeze a lot, it starts to rain off and on, and my students start to gain a new level of energy.

Likewise, I can tell when a current season in life is shifting because I start to feel differently, my emotions fluctuate, and my energy level either rise or fall.

I have been waiting for the signs of a new life season. Looking for shifts in my mind, heart, and spirit that would help connect the dots of where I’ve been to where I’m going.

I think it’s here, and I am ready.

It started with an unexpected 6 hours alone in a car. No one year old to distract me, no ability to work on school things or speech details… Just me – my tired spirit, worn down heart, and overworked mind.

Just me and the God I’ve been distancing myself from in an attempt to numb the hurts of the last two years.

He is so faithful.

From the outside, I’m sure this last season has looked pretty exciting and full of life. It was – literally. The birth of our daughter, Jemma Jane, brought about joy beyond all imagination. What people couldn’t see from the outside, though, was the doubt and fear and sadness that crept in (and stayed) after we learned that the words “church” and “safe” are not synonymous. Two decades of being raised by and literally IN the church. Two decades of giving everything I knew to give to ministry within the walls of church. Two decades of learning, growing, maturing largely as a result of time spent with church people, as a church person.

Leadership in the church is a great responsibility, one that I have always been keen to take on. Leadership, when done correctly, forces you to see things more clearly and wholly. It forces you to be on the lookout so that you can be leading well – with grace, and kindness and love. It propels you to be constantly reflecting and evaluating so that you can be the best version of yourself. For me, this constant reflection and desire to grow brought me into uncomfortable and painful conflicts with other church leaders. It brought me to a turning point, a point where I had to choose God’s clear voice over the church “home” that I was comfortable in.

When my husband and I chose to step down from leadership and away from our church, we knew it would hurt. We didn’t have any idea how much. We knew it would require sacrifice, we didn’t have any idea how much. We knew it would leave us vulnerable, we didn’t have any idea how much.

We initially told ourselves we would take three months to heal (ha!). We were pregnant at the time, and thought that the birth of our baby girl would be a representation of the birth of new things and would naturally and seamlessly allow us time to just be together, healing and processing. In some senses, this was exactly true… but the reality is that now with a 14 month old – we are still in the middle of learning to love the church again. Learning to be loved by the church again, Learning to see Christ and his vision for church again.

So, the last season has been challenging and confusing, to say the least and I have been waiting for signs of change, signs of hope. I have been waiting for hope. Hoping that hope would drop into my lap. I’m sitting in a car listening to a podcast because I am really bored and podcasts are like the new “thing” that the cool people (aka my husband and small group and everyone else I know) are doing… I turned on Christy Nockels “Beauty in the Mundane” podcast just to fill the car with noise. She had a guest named Annie F. Downs. She wrote a book that sounded interesting and she started out with this passage from Romans…

“Not only so, but we rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character, and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us.” (Romans 5:3-5 NIV).

I bought the book as soon as I got home. I read this passage again, and was challenged by Annie Down’s statement along with it that “hope is an expensive commodity, not easily won, always fought for, and the result of a process that may take some time.”

I cringed.

I read it again.

I cringed.

Hope will not just fall in my lap and take over my mind? I have been waiting. Passive aggressively avoiding conversations about Jesus or with him for that matter, because I was waiting for the moment when hope would overflow and fix my heart.

Cringe. Hope is a result of perseverance. Hope is actively fought for.

 

Dot connected: I need to choose perseverance and then trust that hope will follow in abundance.

It’s been a day since this dot was really connected. So, I mean, I’m still processing it all. It’s like the rain that came in hard last night. The bedroom was lighting up with bolts of lightning, the sky ringing with thunder, and the ground was being drenched in rain. This morning there were puddles, but the flowers have not all bloomed and the grass is still brown in some places. Spring is coming, but it takes time.

I can feel the healing of this rain soaking my innerbeing – filling me with the memory of what hope feels like. Blooms are being prepped as I type this. I know it. I ordered a second book by Rachel Held Evans titled “Searching for Sunday” with the subtitle “loving, leaving, and finding the church”. It fell into my lap and I’m guessing it’s just another piece of the puzzle. He is guiding me into new life. He is bringing me back to Himself, and I know that in doing so He is guiding me back to the church.

I need to keep processing this.

I need accountability and cheerleading because it’s so easy to fall into hopelessness, thereby forgetting to persevere which makes hope impossible.

I will persevere, I will find hope.

The Advent Process

Words are escaping me.

Today is hard, but there is no specific reason for the feeling.

Sometimes I get swept into  tidal wave of overwhelming emotion that I cannot put to words.

I find myself hurting in places I had thought were healed.

Scars from years past seem to itch and tingle as if they are wanting to be reopened.

Thoughts already processed become a tangled mess  of questions that were never answered and statements that were never made clear.

I become weary. Too tired to do much more than barely cope.

Everything I have, I wonder whether it is real. Everything I lack, I yearn for.

Down I spiral.

Down I fall.

Down I tumble.

Where is hope in the day to day trying to cope?

Where, but in the promise of an all and ever loving Savior?

Where, but in that little baby born to Mary?

Advent. Where we remember his coming as a babe wrapped in swaddling cloths.

Advent. Where we imagine that young woman who said “yes” to God, and obediently trusted His will and His plan.

Advent. Where we wonder at the Wise Men who chose to put their faith in a baby, instead of the ruler who sent them out to kill him.

Advent. Where we see Shepherds singing with Angels all in the glorious coming of that babe.

Advent. Where we long for him to come again.

Advent. Where we become aware once more of the brokenness in which we dwell, of the state of our hearts in the face of today.

It’s no wonder that my scars are begging to tell their story today. It’s no wonder that my mind is reproducing memories to be re-processed. It’s no wonder that my heart is beating wildly, yearning for something more.

This is advent.

Joy and hope and light and love… and yearning and longing and preparing for that day He comes again and makes all things right.

 

 

The Hope Of Spring

We Minnesotans are ready for Spring. My 4th graders are going absolutely stir crazy (even after a week long “spring” break), and the faculty is even more impatient for all that comes with nicer weather. The last two days have been tantalizingly warm. Yesterday’s 54 degree weather had the birds chirping, the snow melting, and the people stirring for runs, walks, and outdoor lounging.

As seasonal sadness began to creep in the last few weeks, my only hope was to marinate in the portions of scripture that explicitly state God’s goodness and promises. Sometimes I am horrified at how quickly I forget His sovereignty. I am prone to wander. My mind is prone to succumbing to fear, anxiety, and even depression rather than the hope of Spring – literally and figuratively – that is promised by our Creator.

Yesterday as the sunlight streamed in and the chatter and chirping of life resurfaced I was stirred to dig into the promise of Spring. Here is what I saw today as I enjoyed the Springlike weather with a sweet 5 year old, along with the promise God laid on my heart from Isaiah 43:15-19 and 43:1.

Thus says the Lord, who makes a way in the sea, a path in the mighty waters, who brings forth chariot and horse, army and warrior; they lie down, they cannot rise, they are extinguished, quenched like a wick:

Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old.

Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? 

I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.

Fear not for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine.

I am the Lord, your Holy One.

He cares for us. He desires to wash us clean and purify us. He has done great things, and He has more to do – do you perceive it?

I’ll admit, in the last few weeks my perception has been off, but I perceive it today. I see His faithfulness, His goodness, His kindness. I see His providence and favor in the form of sunlight streaming onto my floral sneakers, rapidly melting the snow into puddles for jumping, thawing out a child’s playground… Spring is coming. For Minnesota, and for my sometimes frozen heart.

“I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33

Abhor evil, choose goodness

Romans 12 is a chapter of the bible that I have read over and over since summer camp when I was fourteen years old. At camp we focused on the second verse, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but instead be transformed through the renewal of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve the will of God – the good, pleasing, perfect will of God.” I considered this my life verse. I clung to it. I recited it. I used it as a constant reminder that even though the choices I made were often different than the norm, God’s will was good and I needed to rest in that.

Earlier this week I was reading this chapter again with a group of women from my small group. Amid the many scribbles, underlined and highlighted verses of this chapter, one verse had remained untouched and the words hit my life hard.

“Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil, hold fast to what is good.” Romans 12:9

To abhor means to: regard with disgust and hatred, to recoil from, detest, or loathe

As we mulled this verse over, we began talking about the line that needs to be drawn between good and evil. I started to think of all of the things that I know are not “good” but I feel aren’t necessarily “evil” either. I began to justify in my head different TV shows I watch, music I sing along to, and activities I have supported because they aren’t really “evil”. I was disgusted in myself. I was disgusted at the list of media and everyday events that I have chosen to condone by foolishly deciding they were “good enough”. I realized this truth – if something is not good by God’s standard, it is evil. Our standard of evil has been set frighteningly low. It is time to rise up and change that.

God does not want you or I participating in that which is not good. We are told to hold fast – cling – to good things. It isn’t up to us to decide what is or isn’t good because the living, breathing Word of God has done that for us. We are not to cling to the same things that the world itself is glorifying. We are to regard with disgust the sexual nature of current media. We are to run in the other direction from profanity and vulgarity.

I think we get ourselves into trouble when we begin to defend anything of this world or when we fall into the trap of comparison. We all know this trap. It gets us when we are talking to our friends about listening to a certain song that is particularly raunchy, and they reply with “It’s really not that big of a deal what we listen to. Why would it be an issue to listen to a catchy secular song?”It gets us when we are watching friends consume ridiculous amounts of alcohol every night of the week and justifying our drunkenness one night with the fact that you are sober most days. It gets us when we decide we can indulge in the secular TV marathon because it’s really just a break from reality and it isn’t affecting our minds or hearts.

We want to believe that human beings are fundamentally good. We want to believe that what we do as Christians must be good, because we are primarily good ourselves. But when we believe in the Word of God, we have to step back from the cultural norms and view our decisions in light of the blood shed by Christ and the path set apart by God. We have to accept the reality of our inability to be fundamentally good. Christ is good. Completely. 100%. He didn’t shudder from sinful people when he was on earth, but he also didn’t dabble in anything remotely bad. If it wasn’t good, he did not participate in it. Through Christ we have the opportunity to represent goodness. We have the opportunity to show hope, beauty, and light. Can we really do this well if the line drawn between good and evil is so unstable and changeable based on our moods and desires? No. I do not think we can. I think Christians need to rise up and draw the line, even though it is uncomfortable and creates distinct differences.

In a beautiful and tangible way this corresponds directly with the verse that pushed me through high school and laid a foundation for many of my convictions.

“Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but instead be transformed through the renewal of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve the will of God – the good, pleasing, perfect will of God… Abhor what is evil, hold fast to what is Good.” (Romans 12:2 & 9)

Love the people in this world, because God calls us to let our love be genuine – but do not let loving the people God created translate into loving the world itself and it’s cultural norms. Recoil from the evil in your life, hold fast to the goodness laid out in the Word.