The Outside brings you Inside

Today I went on a walk.  Most days I go on a walk it’s a good idea.  This was no exception.  I walked up the hill, jumped in a few scattered puddles, and then tread down the other side.  Strangely, I had not been this way before. I cantered nearly the bottom where it begins to taper off and become flatter and then I somehow knew that I would take a right because something was around the corner.  So I walked on, and lo and behold, there was a small grove of willow trees.

I have a fondness for willow trees born out of childhood.  It probably began when I was a little girl and my family would take an occasional stroll down by the Minnehaha Parkway.  My parents were no arborists but there were a few willow trees and I think I asked what they were and found out their name.  I was drawn to them because of their resemblance to some prehistoric tree as well because at the time “The Land Before Time” was my favorite movie.  I loved that I knew what they were called.  Who can’t identify a willow tree after they have been shown one? 

Anyhow, back in Mankato, fast forward 20 some years; I climbed down a little hill to get under the grove of willow trees and waded through the water standing there from today’s rainfall.  It was a little swampy but I didn’t mind.  I had set out to go “puddle jumping” anyway.  I was mesmerized by the cool beauty of the place enveloped by a lacey fringe of willow branches.  I saw that the trees were just about the right height for climbing and so in about three minutes I was up on the bow of the tree as if it were a ship.  My rain boots slipped a little but I held steady.  As I looked around I felt my thoughts coalescing, shifting, forming and my spirit was held by the Spirit of God.  I realized that I could just sit there and be.  I could just be in that little world.   Even though the highway was not far away and a house backed up to this grove, somehow I felt sheltered and I could worship.  Yes, I am a tree hugger (and a God lover).  The Creation has marveled me since I was young. The strength and stability of trees is something so lovely.  I am grateful for clarity found in nature.  I am grateful to God for trees and the Outside that brings me Inside.

Ode to Joi

I've been grieving the death of my dear friend Joi O'Dell lately.  I don't mean to say that I wasn't grieving before but some things in my life have helped me to actively grieve her death.  It's been nearly two months since I received the jarring news and the inconceivable is beginning to feel more permanent.  Here is some of what I wrote about this:

From today, September 4:

I was given a gift of wanting to live life even when things aren't all that great.  I was given a gift of a will to live and sometimes even relish living because indeed my circumstances are delightful.  I was given a lot that isn't mine to deserve or take credit for.  I am blessed and now I am aware of it.

From September 2:

Ode to Joi

Why did you go, Joi?
No one wanted you to leave.
We all thought you were the bee's knees.  Sweet as honey, sharp as a stinger.
You were a bright light in the darkness even if that darkness overshadowed you at times.

The other night you were in my dream and I knew that it didn't make sense.  I think I asked you, "But how can you be here, aren't you dead?"  You replied (or somehow I knew), "It's okay, it's different in a dream."
So you were there and it was confusing.
But then...your suicide didn't make any sense and yet it was there (as another friend reminded me).

We know and we say; you are with the Lord.
Maybe you felt a little like Paul, torn as your mortal body fought against your spiritual one.
"For indeed, in this house we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven, inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked."
We never thought you naked.  True, your vulnerability was difficult for me sometimes.  I never could understand the depth of sadness I saw you carry.  I didn't see how you carried it so far and so long.
Yet, you had a kind of awesomeness in your vulnerability.  It's what made you love people.  It's what made others love you.
You were giving me courage to speak out my weakness and not be ashamed. You were giving me courage to honor and give to others beyond what I thought I could.  That courage you carried and gave to others; that is a rare, fragile gift.

I will never understand why you left.

If you were here now we would probably be talking now, you and me, about life and how hard some things are and yet also about the hope for the world and a vision to see things made new.  You were not perfect, but you were a saint and you had such a heart for the world.  Later, to ease things you would probably joke and make some berserkly geeky reference and laugh your lovable, quirky laugh -- snort and all.  I miss that laugh.  Then we would craft a plan to do something absolutely gleeful and probably bless others at the same time.  You were that lady.  Even when you were not doing well and could not muster it you still gave so much (and were so much) and you were (and are) a lady so beloved.  I wish you had known it deep in your bones.

I am just hoping that I can remember that you are one of many treasures (as you showed me in welcoming so many yourself).  One sweet day I'll meet you again and see you fully for who you really are and were always meant to be.  Joi: renewed: Rejoice.  We will be able to say it again and again and mean it.

And it won't be a dream; and it will make more sense than anything else ever has.

Sister

"I have a sister somewhere in Detroit.  She has black hair and small hands."

-Sufjan Steves, "Sister" from Michigan album

I have been thinking about the concept of being a "sister" lately.  It has been brought up several times recently in my life.  I read "The Cloister Walk" by Kathleen Norris last fall and was reminded of how the sisters and brothers devoted to Christ in the form of a formal vow as a part of a religious order.  I was reminded of as I experience separation from my husband this summer as he does an internship in another state and I am challenged in our relationship to relate to Chris, my husband, more in that way as well as other men.  It is a good challenge.  Also, tragically, I am reminded by a dear friend's suicide and how often it is that I can pass by people and because of busyness without truly acknowledging them and their worth.  Yet, loving people as a sister is one of the most important things one can do.  

My goal is to love others as a sister or a daughter or a mother.  I believe humanity is all related although we may not know it.  I want to be someone that respects and loves each a person and follow the Holy Spirit in the way I do it.  It seems like in our oversexualized and sometimes impersonal society it has become constant struggle to simply be a sister in another's eyes as well as my own.  Yet, if I do this I will be showing others Jesus by my presence.  Jesus himself became our "brother" so that many might come to know the Father (God).   

Some brother words about Jesus: 

 28And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. 29For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.31What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? 33Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.35Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36As it is written,

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

37No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

-Romans 8:28-39

I like to live by a railroad

I'm in a reflective mood.  I've lived near a railroad at most places where I've truly living.  I wonder if there is something true to that or if it's just a happy coincidence?

Well...I just wrote a bunch of prayer for Jesus Kitchen so now I no longer have energy for this post...so that's it.   Yeah...mayhaps I will write more later...for now, I say adieu, to you and you and you.

The Struggle against Cynicism

Today as we were driving home from the a real church's Palm Sunday service we were listening to Garrison Keillor on a Prairie Home Companion talk about all the upcoming Holy Week service's in the radio program's fictional Lake Woebegone.  He said next week was Easter Sunday when the preacher would "tell us why we believe what we think we believe."  I had to smile a little but then I realized the reason why it was funny to me is because the statement is all too relevant.  Perhaps Keillor is nodding his hat to the idea that religion is a kind of "opiate of the masses" as Karl Marx proclaimed but whether or not that is where he was going what I found in it was the disconcerting reality of struggling to believe.  In many ways, I feel it is a struggle of faith against cynicism.

I just turned 30 this past week.  I am not all that concerned about the "big 3-0" because I see age as rather irrelevant to so many other factors in my life...."age ain't nothing but a number."  People often tell me they think I am younger (I have looked younger and acted youthful often) so that's not really an issue.  Also, I feel more or less satisfied with my life to this point and the direction it's going.  However, as I've gotten older my eyes have been opened more and more to the deep sadness and injustices there are and  the "childishness" of simply believing has become harder and harder.  I want to be mature and yet "childlike" at the same time.  It's constantly a struggle though in a culture that is full of cynicism.  It's true, sometimes I feel like I am in church to have others tell me "why I believe what I think I believe."

I've blogged about this difficulty recently here and I guess I'm just acknowledging that it's still going on.  Yet, when I think of the things I tell myself I believe I also dearly want to believe them.  I think of how audaciously epic Jesus is and his words that cut to your heart.  I think of the incredibly profound and beautiful overarching story of God in the Bible.  Then I think of how mysterious all of it is and it's at once comforting and terrifying.  Part of what makes me cynical at times is when I realize that what I say I believe is not what I live.  I'm distracted by comfort.  I'm distanced from being faithful by my own fears.  So frustrating.  In the end, I guess, if I don't come home to Jesus I know I'll just be a sorry cynic drowning in my own tears.  What I need is his transcendence to break my objections.  I want to believe because if I don't believe I'm left to myself.  I am not enough and I'm certain of that.  If Jesus can "make me enough" through his Grace and Power and also save the world, well, I'm all for that.  Hope, that's what cynics want.  A hope that transforms and makes things really change on the inside and outside...and this is what I'm hoping for now.

Walks and Weather

Alright, here I am continuing with the alliteration.  You know, it ain't a half bad way to title a post.  ;o)

I just came back from a walk out in the cold, wet, *nearly* spring world.  I had on my trusty black rain boots which I purchased from Practical Goods (a treasure trove of hand-picked items from estate sales and the like in a storefront) and so with this and some English, Irish and Scottish coursing through my blood, nothing phased me.  I came alive in the plodding about up and down the hilly neighborhood.  I feel so blessed to live in neighborhood with it's own charm of older houses, some well-kept, some not so much (but nothing falling apart), many interesting Victorian inspired designs and divergent roads that go zig-zag on the hill.  I even found a little slushy path that went down through the wooded hillside with blackened brambles set against the white snow.

I realized as I was walking about that I may be one of the only ones to voluntarily (without dog, without child) go on a walk "just because."  I guess I have developed this habit because I like weather.  I was thinking of quoting one of C.S. Lewis' characters in "That Hideous Strength" but I think I'll quote the whole passage because it makes more sense that way:

"Don't you like a rather foggy day in a wood in autumn? You'll find we shall be perfectly warm sitting in the car."
Jane said she'd never heard of anyone liking fogs before but she didn't mind trying. All three got in.
"That's why Camilla and I got married, "said Denniston as they drove off. "We both like Weather. Not this or that kind of weather, but just Weather. It's a useful taste if one lives in England."
"How ever did you learn to do that, Mr. Denniston?" said Jane. "I don't think I should ever learn to like rain and snow."
"It's the other way round," said Denniston. "Everyone begins as a child by liking Weather. You learn the art of disliking it as you grow up. Noticed it on a snowy day? The grown-ups are all going about with long faces, but look at the children - and the dogs? They know what snow's made for."
"I'm sure I hated wet days as a child," said Jane.
"That's because the grown-ups kept you in," said Camilla. "Any child loves rain if it's allowed to go out and paddle about in it.” 
― C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength

Sugar and Sin

So, I should begin by stating I am doing MUCH, MUCH better.  I do think it was/is good for me to question but I want to assure you all that I actually am pretty much solid in faith now.  After a few days I wrote out a lot of the things God has done for me in my life either in a very supernatural way or a very personal way (or both).  That testimony to myself made me remember why I could trust God and the Bible (although I can't explain or phantom all that is in it).  Perhaps I need to work out things more myself but I think it was more of an emotional crisis than an intellectual one.  I have always leaned more towards emotional dealings anyway.  I welcome all your thoughts/comments on this.  Mostly I just wanted to let you know I am doing fine and feeling closer to God even in slight ambiguity.  In fact, part of what draws me to God is the Mystery.

On to "sugar and sin": the reason I decided to title this post that is because for lent (well, to be honest, I think it's kind of more of an experiment) but PARTLY for lent I've decided to try and forgo sugar.  That sounds a little easier (or harder?) than it is.  Even though I already buy minimally processed foods and mostly organic/natural foods I have already found that I've eaten sugar in salsa and bacon by accident!  Sugar is in almost everything -- even bread.  So, I'm eating Ezekiel bread right now and might make some bread with honey or get a bread from the bakery that doesn't have any sugar in it (rye?).  I don't know.  I am also trying to give up discouragement (mostly for my husband) and replace it with encouragement.  That is more of my "real" lent fast.

So far I've definitely had cravings which is partly why I'm trying to fast from sugar.  I realized I've been using it as a crutch.  I'm also curious to see if I do have more energy and feel better if I don't eat if for a while.  Well, as I said before sugar is pervasive and although I certainly don't think it's a sin to eat sugar it made me think of the Bible Study we went to earlier tonight.  We read Ephesians 4:17-5:20; here it is in full:

¹⁷ So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. ¹⁸ They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. ¹⁹ Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed.

²⁰ That, however, is not the way of life you learned ²¹ when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. ²² You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; ²³ to be made new in the attitude of your minds; ²⁴ and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

²⁵ Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body. ²⁶ “In your anger do not sin”^[d]: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, ²⁷ and do not give the devil a foothold. ²⁸ Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with their own hands,that they may have something to share with those in need.

²⁹ Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. ³⁰ And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.³¹ Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. ³² Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

5 ¹ Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children ² and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
³ But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people. ⁴ Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving.⁵ For of this you can be sure: No immoral, impure or greedy person—such a person is an idolater—has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.^[a] 6 Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of such things God’s wrath comes on those who are disobedient. ⁷ Therefore do not be partners with them.
⁸ For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light⁹ (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) ¹⁰ and find out what pleases the Lord. ¹¹ Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. ¹² It is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret.¹³ But everything exposed by the light becomes visible—and everything that is illuminated becomes a light. ¹⁴ This is why it is said:

“Wake up, sleeper,
    rise from the dead,
    and Christ will shine on you.”

¹⁵ Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, ¹⁶ making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. ¹⁷ Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. ¹⁸ Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, ¹⁹ speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, ²⁰ always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Alright, so I know that's a lot.  It's a lot and the reason I bring it up is because just reading it made me think of fasting from sugar.  Sugar is in nearly everything.  Reading through this passage made me realize sin is in nearly everything as well.  Just thinking of anger, greed or foolish talk (ok, this happens) and I'm already out.  Then I realize, it's not that I am called out to give sins I am also called to replace them with good things.  It's not so simple as not doing something as much of our culture presumes.  I like that there is a positive for every negative, so to speak.  For example, "Be careful, then, how you live-- not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity because the days are evil."  Anyway, realizing this in full it's no wonder I need the Holy Spirit!  I most definitely NEED to be "made new in the attitude of my mind; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness." -Ephesians 4:24

So, yeah, there's some food (without sugar hopefully) for thought.  Haha.  It's interesting how fasting from something or even being intentional about doing/forming a new habit really brings things into clearer focus.  It's like, oh, wow, I need God to save me from sin and recreate me into the person I really am.  Yeah.