babble on

There have been only a handful of times in my life where I have felt the Holy Spirit.

I don't even know if that makes sense to any of you... or me actually. But, having felt what I have felt, and having the vocabulary that I have... that's the only way I know to describe the happening that sometimes takes place when I am in prayer.

Yesterday, sharing a devotion with one of the staff, that is what happened.

I felt completely filled with the presence of the Holy Spirit. And, like every other time in my life when this is happpened, a huge part of me panics.

It is so overwhelming. I can't tell if I'm going to float, going to fly, going to melt, or going to disappear... but I feel like something is trying to happen.

And I just don't let it.

I've never invited this to happen successfully. There isn't a trend to my prayers which evokes it. It's not something I have control over happening or not happening. It's up to God.

And yesterday, as I was praying... I felt so strongly that God was trying to pull something out of my mouth. Physically. I felt as though I were on the verge of speaking something that I had no idea meant. I felt like I didn't have control over my own mouth... but that God did.

But I didn't surrender to it.

I have never spoken in tongues. I have heard it once, and I totally believe that it's a legitimate form of worship and is from God.

I just never believed it was something I would do. Or could do. Or that God would choose to do through me.

Oh, me of little faith.

And so, whatever message was supposed to come out yesterday, I didn't allow it to.

This was awesome and terrifying at the same time.

And PS- I'm not crazy. But I guess that doesn't matter either because some people will crucify me for saying this anyway.

to the pain

Last weekend our pastor gave a sermon about this clip from The Princess Bride... and I haven't stopped thinking about it since.




To the pain.

A unique turn of phrase. We've all heard of the Prince's counter, "to the death" or "till death do us part." One in every three love songs is about a love worth dying for. Hollywood cashes in on the concept of death being the epitome of sacrifice from one person to the other (Titanic comes to mind... why didn't they just SHARE that stupid door Rose was floating on?).

But..."to the pain" is different.

Prince Humperdink is prepared to give his life in the duel; however, he is not prepared to fight to the pain... to suffer, to be disfigured, to be an outcast.

Death is an end. It's a scary end, most of the time... but still, if he dies, there is no further earthly consequence. It's his out.

But to the pain... that's terrifying.

And I feel like that's how a lot of us live our lives...

Marriage... Our vows say "till death" but we really mean until the death of the marriage... until it gets tough... until it's "to the pain..." Then we want out.

Children...same deal. We want babies... but somewhere along the line, when parenting becomes "to the pain"... we give up on them. Teachers do this, too. A lot of teachers do this especially. I know that as a high school teacher, a lot of times, it was easy to only stick with kids to the death and write them off before to the pain.

Relationships... I've lost lots of valuable friendships to the pain. Pride, fear, and insecurity kept me from pushing through the hard times and misunderstandings.

I don't want to live like that anymore.

I want to live life "to the pain."

I want to value people enough to not write them off. I want to persevere through the rough patches in marriage. I want Lilah to know that NO. MATTER. WHAT. her mother is in her corner... fighting with her to the pain.

Jesus lived this way.

Literally.

He still does.

My brain hurts from how much this makes me think.

confessions

The further I walk in my faith, the longer the road seems to be.

And I find comfort in this... in the size of God, and the room I have to grow in him.

What discourages me though, is how often I feel myself walking backwards.

I have such little confidence in myself. I have such doubt in my ability to execute my callings.

Rejection paralyzes me.

I struggle with pride.

I take things way too personally.

These admissions don't release me, but instead I fear that they label me.

And I hide behind them.

Because when it all comes down to it, I'm the biggest bully myself has ever known.

And if I can't stand up to my own persecution, I don't have a chance against the world's.

Sigh.

to suffer

Today I heard an interview with an author of a new book that discusses the idea of suffering vs. a benevolent God.

I listened to him talk about his life in the Catholic church and his life removed from Catholicism as a believer. And then I listened as he discussed that through becoming a biblical historian, he came to believe that there is no God.

To him, the accounts of the gospels are contradictions. He stated that to see them any other way is to take away from the perspective of each of the writers of them.

Also, through his research of the history of the world, he concluded that the amount of suffering that has existed since the beginning of time completely negates the proposition that there could be a God.

I heard all of this immediately after sharing a conversation with a woman at work about the very same subject.

This woman was talking about a book she was reading written by a Christian in communist Romania. The author's faith was only strengthened by the horrors he endured and the peace he felt in the midst of it. He wrote this book in three days, the first three days after he had been released from prison, only after he had sought out his torturer to forgive him face-to-face.

This woman shared with me conversations she had had with missionaries in Communist countries, places where the belief in God is forbidden. She talked about the eyes of the people, how empty they are, and what a joyless culture it is.

So... in my mind... I recapped...

One man, who presumably didn't suffer because of his faith but rather enjoyed the freedom of studying it at the greatest of lengths, concludes that because of the suffering he that he has read accounts of (and possibly seen first hand, I'm not sure), there is no God.

The other man suffered horrible atrocities for his faith in God for years, day in and day out. He also had an eye-witnessed account to others suffering as well, many who did not survive. And what he took away from the experience was an unbreakable faith.

What's the difference? How can two people draw such opposite conclusions about the same God? How can one man, who many of us would not blame for denying God, choose him, while the other with no tangible reason to do so reject him?

Something tells me that the answer is something more simple than I'd think possible.

It's experience.

The first author was a very knowledgable man. I'm sure he knows more about the bible than someone like myself. He probably has every last detail memorized, especially the ones needed to back his position on his faith (or lack there of). But, in his entire interview, I didn't hear him mention anything about experiencing God. About being tested. About God being tested in his life and failing. It just seemed like he did a lot of reading and reasoning within himself, and then he concluded what he did based on thought.

The second author may or may not be a biblical scholar. I don't know. But he lived under conditions which I couldn't be able to comprehend. He absolutely had to rely on God for every breath that he took, for his sanity, and for the ability to forgive his torturer. I'm sure throughout the years it wasn't ever easy to believe in an all loving God in heaven, but something sustained it in him. And does it make sense? Is it rational to think that through suffering unspeakable atrocities day after day for years that there is a Creator out there who truly loves you? No, it's not logical at all.

But this man still believed. He still loved after all that.

He had to have experienced something beyond himself, his own thoughts, while in that prison.

He had to have experienced God.

I'd like to think that I'm a seasoned Christian, but really, I'm not. This faith is so grand that I feel as though I'm only beginning the babysteps of the journey. And the more my understanding grows, the longer than path seems to be.

But here's something I've learned.

When I truly seek God out, the real God, not the one I make him to be (you know, the one who is supposed to answer all my prayers, give me what I want, and not expect me to pursue His will for my life, and not let me suffer at all) I find Him. I feel Him. I hear His quiet voice. He speaks to me through trusted friends. I am confirmed.

When I make demands of Him, when I ask Him to change others, when I expect Him to connect to me when I refuse to read His word, fill my mind with junk, abstain from relationships with other believers who will hold me accountable, ignore His convictions, I can't find Him. Because that god- the god of my demands- doesn't exist.

And those times that I experience Him the most are also those times when I'm suffering the most.

I guess then, when left alone with my own thoughts, I reconcile suffering as almost a necessary component for us humans to get to know God. For without it, many of us wouldn't ever reach out to Him.

We'd never have the opportunity to experience Him.

radical

What does it mean to live simply?

To go without?

To sacrifice?

What does it look like, today, for a middle-class family in the suburbs of a suffering city, to be obedient?

Where is the line between protecting my family, and loving others as Jesus called me to?

What does it actually mean to love like Jesus does? Even those who hate me. Especially those who reject it.

What is the currency rate for time? How can I equate these commodities to the best of my ability?

How do I attain the confidence to go and do?

Am I just making this harder than it has to be?