Monday, December 31, 2012

The Resolutions

1) work out for 20 minutes 3 times a week.  no point in making some crazy resolution on this point.  3 times a week is better than nothing.

2) daily Bible reading.  i've gotten sloppy on this point and jan 1 is as good a time as any to fix this.

3) eat healthily and in moderation.  no need to continue being a pig.

oh life

Right now life is good.  So good, in fact, that I may as well be glowing.  I love my life, I love where it's headed, I love what I am doing and what I'm about.  I love my friends, I love my job.  Love, love, love.

However, life isn't always like that.  And it occurred to me that happiness can be so fleeting.  This feeling of being right where God wants me is something I always wish to have, but may not always have.  Life may not always be easy, life may not always be fun.

My prayer through all of it is that I would look to Jesus first.  I want Jesus to be my reason for getting up in the morning, the praise that is on my lips, and my motivation.

Sunday, December 30, 2012

2012 in Review

January:

As 2012 opened, I was hard at work on my thesis.  I was in the throes of a weight loss challenge with my youngest sister in preparation for a family vacation to Hawaii.  I went to Hawaii.  My future goals included studying abroad in Germany for the summer.  I began attending a new small group in Bellingham with a church I didn't attend.  For the first time in B-ham, I had unmarried Christian friends my age.  Probably should have worked on that earlier, although I learned so much from the friends I did have, and I love them dearly still.

Febraury:

I was a fool.  I made some major mistakes with one particular friendship, letting it become more than it should have become.  I thought about racism.  I applied to my first park service job and felt for the first time the pull to leave the city I called home.  Sister Kayla got engaged!

March:

I applied to park service job after park service job, and gave up that I'd ever get one.  I collected monopoly tickets from the local grocery store and prayed for a 25k windfall.  I planned to work at Walmart or Starbucks, depending on who'd hire me.

April:

More failures on the job front.  I got an interview for a summer job in Bellingham.  Failed to get the job even though I nearly had a masters in history and was ridiculously over-qualified and they were hiring 8 people.  Figured if I couldn't get that job it was game over for any job besides Walmart or Starbucks.  I got an interview from a job in St Marys, GA.  Googled it.  I took a school trip to Spokane.  I realized last minute that I had like two weeks before it would be too late to defend my thesis.  Hurriedly scheduled a defense date.  My advisor found out he had cancer.

May:

I was offered a job in Georgia.  I decided to move.  The emotion of it all was so intense - I was in the park service, but I was leaving the town I loved.  I was terrified.  I was at peace.  I was everything.  I reflected on the past couple years.  And I started selling off my furniture and other belongings.  Everything was getting in that car, like it or not.  I reflected on gender and stuff.  Defended thesis for a mediocre grade.

June:

Oh, June.  The month that changed my world.  I left the fairest city of them all the day of my graduation.  My car broke down an hour out of town.  I still made it home in two days.  My sister got married.  I made the move to Georgia without having a clue where I would live.  I met some people who very insanely quickly became family.  And I realized that however much I loved my new life in Georgia, I had left my heart in Bellingham.

July:

I started reading and reviewing books.  I visited churches and hated them all.  I struggled to define myself surrounded by people that didn't understand the "West Coast Me."  I decided that I should be more conservative.  Definitely less liberal.  And some other stuff happened, but I won't talk about that here......

August:

Some other stuff continued happening............   I continued missing Bellingham way too much.  My parents and youngest sister visited.  One of my best friends visited me.  As we walked on the beach in Fernandina, I was for the first time okay with being here.  I read "Inspiration and Incarnation" by Peter Enns, and it changed my life.  I read part of "Cost of Discipleship" by Dietrich Bonhoeffer and it changed my life even more.  Or at least began to change my life.

September:

I visited the beach again, this time with my friends from here.  I had a moment.  I got an accountability partner.  I once again began attending church.

October:

My aunt visited at a point in my life here where I most needed the distraction due to some other stuff happening......  We had a great time.  I did a lot of thinking this month about my faith.  God was changing my heart.

November:

I celebrated my first Thanksgiving without relatives.  I worked.  It turned out not so bad: a tourist gave me chocolate.  Obama was re-elected.  I didn't vote.  I realized I was glad I didn't vote.

December:
That other stuff happening..........began to shift........  I revealed to the world that I am a feminist.  I had a moment of panic.  Then I realized how glad I was to just be out with it.  I applied to some jobs in Alaska.  Got referred to a couple.  I celebrated my first Christmas outside of SD, a very bittersweet experience.  I turned twenty five.

It's been a year of intense changes, a year of intense emotion, a year of growth and clarity.  I still miss Bellingham with every fiber of my being (a mark, I think, of a place that I will always consider home), but I see so clearly the working of God in bringing me here, and I wouldn't change it for the world.

In 2013, I hope to get a permanent job, get a boyfriend, get engaged, and get married.  Maybe even have a baby on the way.

Just kidding.

Sort of.

I'll let you sort out the kidding and sort of.

Monday, December 24, 2012

A Reflection on Christmas

I've never really liked Christmas.  It stresses me out - decisions to be made on what gift to buy for whom, that awkward moment when a friend for whom you had not planned to give a gift gifts you, all the decorating fuss, the lack of objectively speaking good music on the radio or in church.  It all combines to make me somewhat of a "grinch."

I often rail against the secularization of Christmas, against its pollution and the destruction of the "true meaning of Christmas."  And yet, how often do I stop to consider for myself the true meaning of Christmas?  Very rarely.

Christ become man.  The God of the universe taking on flesh.  Omnipotence becoming powerless.  A revelation of the nature of God, of the nature of power, of the nature of love.  Humility and powerlessness.  This is love.  This is God.

Saturday, December 22, 2012

trilogy

#1:
You wake up this morning with your battle chosen for you - the painful task of untangling dream, emotion, and reality.  Your dreams leave your emotions disconnected and everything so confused.  Your dreams are not reality but your emotions want them to be.  Your emotions cannot be allowed to rule, because, if they are, reality will once again become a nightmare.

#2:
At some point you are confronted with a choice.  Either continue to hopelessly love another - a noble choice, to be sure - or start the arduous and uncertain work of training your brain to let go.  You are never sure which choice is noble and which profane; maybe neither, maybe both.  And maybe it's not so much about choosing between the alternatives, but about entrusting God with the choice.  Learning each day to pray "Thy will be done," and truly mean it in every sense of the word.  But it is there that it is tricky.  Because always your brain struggles against your spirit, every day your brain attempts to wrest control of your dreams.  At every turn you must pray.  "Pray without ceasing," he said.  And he really meant it.  Never is a moment of losing focus is allowable.

#3:
And so now I no longer obsess over you.  I obsess, rather, over letting you go.

Monday, December 17, 2012

It's been an emotionally draining day.  Too much thinking, too much dealing with the direct and indirect fall-out from thinking.  I'm tired and sad.  It will pass, I'm sure.  Tomorrow is a new day, it always is.

How do I love my neighbors with humility and submissiveness?

How do I remain intellectually honest while loving God above all else?

How do I learn to balance my heart and my mind?

How do I cope with my self-inflicted isolation?

God, show me the way.  May I follow You.  Only You.

the problem with politicizing piety

I have been thinking a lot today about politics and politicians and their religious beliefs.  Mike Huckabee's a good example of a Christian politician who is vocal about his Chrisitianity.  Many walk this road.  Christians want Christians in office, they want America to be a Christian nation.

Here's my problem with that.


That Christianity is a Christianity of power.  


When I claim that God has been banished from our schools, our courthouses, our legislation, and our country, I put God in a tiny little box and banish him myself.  When I fight for God to be “put back” in schools, I fight for my particular perspective to be forced on the world.  That’s not the way God works. 


God sent his Son, Jesus.  Jesus served, suffered, and died.

He didn’t do anything political.  And, believe me, many wanted a political Jesus.  After all, the Romans were in charge of the Promised Land.  They needed a Messiah, and they needed their Messiah to deliver them from their political situation.

Jesus didn’t deliver on that desire.  Instead, He loved people.  

All people.

Even the Romans.

I believe that Christians are called to follow Jesus.  To follow him into a scary place where God appears powerless.  To admit defeat, but to love God boldly nevertheless.  That is what it means to follow.  To be meek and gentle.  

Sunday, December 16, 2012

further reflections on my status as a feminist

Dear non-feminists,

Last night's post was, I do admit, a bit abrasive.  It was scary for me to be honest, and my fear at times comes out in verbal aggression.  A war of words, if you will.

I wrote what I believe.  I did not, however, write what I believe is the truth.  I'm not sure what the truth is.  I feel very pulled each way.  I feel the realities of my life as an independent women as well as the observed realities of most Christian marriages standing in stark contrast to the ideals that Christians profess about men being "the head" of women.  I've seen women lead, and I've seen them lead effectively.  I've seen women submit to men, and I've seen that to be beautiful in certain contexts as well.

I've read the Bible as God's personal letter to me in 2012 and I've read the Bible as an inspired historic document that reflects God's interactions with people in a different place and time than I.  I've danced the conservative dance, I've danced the liberal dance.  I currently find myself caught in the middle.

But certain things I do know.  One of those things is that I don't fit.  I have vastly different beliefs than my closest friends all over the country.  And for so long I've hid from that fact.  Pretended to be what I wasn't feeling.  Hid behind my knowledge of conservative culture while avoiding honestly admitting how I felt.  Compromised.

My difference is so hard to deal with, because I am the sort of person who always, always, always finds common ground with people.  If two people are fighting, I will find the common ground and point it out so that the tension can dissolve.

But the honest truth is, I want to hash this out.  I want to figure it out.  I want to be decidedly feminist or decidedly not.  I think part of that requires prayer, part of that requires time, part requires study, and part requires conversation.  Real, honest, and maybe even sometimes hard conversation.

How do I go back to the "conservative" me, though?  I feel hopelessly stuck.  Stuck in a mind that has been trained as a historian.  Stuck in a mind that rationalizes things in a very particular way.  Stuck in a mind that, quite frankly, has a very hard time relating to most of my fellow-believers.

I dunno.  I just don't know.  People tend to disagree with that which they don't understand, or with that which they fear.  I fear a world where I'm subordinate, where certain roles are expected of me, roles I can't fulfill.  I fear a world where things are abrasive, certain, and closed.  I find myself a hopeless product of the environment in which I came of age: academia.  I fear the possibility - or rather, the certainty - that all of my head knowledge is utter foolishness in the face of God.

And so I want you to know this:

I don't know.  I have no idea what God wants from me as a woman.  I have no idea how he feels about feminism.  I have no idea just how sinful I am being right now (and probably quite so).  I want you to know that I respect your opinion, no matter what it is.  I understand why you believe that men are supposed to lead women.  I understand why you believe that women and men should lead together.  And understanding both sides is what torments me.

God, forgive me.

Saturday, December 15, 2012

where i stand on being treated like a girl and gender stereoptypes and all that fun stuff

Rant to follow:

Something was said tonight.  Something that made me feel uncomfortable.  Something was said yesterday.  The day before.  Last week.  Six times last month.  It's the story of life.  People make assumptions about what it means to be a girl or what it means to be a guy.

So I'm just going to rant about a bunch of things.  I hold the following opinions loosely; I may very well be wrong on some of it.  But I'll document it nonetheless.

1.  As a girl, I am not the only one responsible for male lust.  Someone said something recently about girls going from wearing floor length skirts to shorter skirts as an example of declining morality in this country.  Part of me died inside.  Yes, I should be modest.  But so should guys.  When guys talk about how girls should dress modestly, it often just makes me feel really objectified.  And awkward, like I need to button my shirt to the neck and get out my veil.  Immediately.

2.  As a girl, I buck the trend by rarely wearing make up.  Mostly because I'm lazy.  But also just because I don't get into make up and hair straighteners and hair spray and curlers and highlights.  I don't feel as if this makes me less feminine.  It just makes me me.  I like playing nerdy board games with the guys or out-eating all the guys in the room.  I think the same standard should go for guys.  It makes me so sad and frustrated to listen to guy friends talk about things as "girly" as if that makes those things less than desirable.  So what if one aspect of your personality falls a bit short of gender stereotypes?  I, actually, am much more attracted to guys who like a few girly things here and there.  If you're a man's man, abrasive, only talk about cars, football, and girls, I will steer clear of you.  We probably won't even be friends.  And I'm the "masculine" girl!  What?  Dear boys, you do not always need to be "strong."  You can be weak every now and then.  You can listen to Taylor Swift, you can watch a chick flick.  You can find bugs gross, and you don't have to be able to lift ridiculous amounts of weight for you to be a man.  You can be you.  It's okay.

3.  I'll just get this out of the way, too, while I'm at it.  Guys, you don't need to treat me differently because I'm a girl.  Chivalry?  It can die as far as I'm concerned.  In fact, it sometimes hurts my feelings a bit when I'm not allowed to be an equal because of my gender.  I think you should treat everyone with love and concern.  Put everyone ahead of yourself.  Serve me as you serve your brothers.  I hope to be allowed to serve you, as well.

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

a testimony to the goodness of God

This post is here because I'm not always very good at talking.  When I say stuff, it doesn't come out like it sounds in my head, or I never bother to say it at all out of fear of it sounding absolutely ridiculous.  In any case, this needs to be written down anyway.  This blog post is a testament to the goodness and provision of God.  God truly deserves all of the glory for the things He has done in my heart and life and in the hearts and lives of the people He has graciously placed in my life.

This story begins in September 2011, while sitting around the table at my aunt and uncle's house in Washington state.  After that conversation, I went home and wrote this (for the full post, see this link: The End of Church):
I think the church is dying, or at least is on its way to dying. Maybe it's already dead in any real sense. After all, on what is an institution built (even if built on an entirely true creed) if its members do not love their neighbors? If its members do not long for the things of God with every breath, what is its purpose? An elaborate social networking place? A place to hang out, to be served, and to go home feeling fed? What is the point of "truth" if it does not result in sacrificial love and service to the broken?

What I'm looking for is this: A small group of individuals who meet together regularly, (but in relative secret - see Matt 6:5 for my rationale), to pursue God together. A group who is committed to each other no matter the cost. A safe place where there is no "off topic" conversation topic. A group without a paid leader, without a budget of any kind, except an offering for the sole purpose of service to the hurting, broken, and lacking. A group who shares with one another as if they were blood relatives. A group who takes discipleship seriously, who is not afraid to walk the hard road, and who always pursues the narrow and elusive path of hardship even in the easy times. A group that is composed of believers who live sacrificially, loving their neighbors more than themselves. Believers that live fully in the world, loving the tax collectors and sinners - never forgetting that what they do to the least of these, they do to Jesus. A group that does "not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing," but also does not equate "church" with "best way of meeting together." I'm looking for a place where I can love God, where I can seek Him, where I can grow in my walk with him, where I can make disciples (and be discipled), and where I can lead and serve both my brothers and sisters and the world at large. Not so I can make a difference or change the world, but because I am coming to the conclusion that life is not about winning converts to a creed but about remaining true to Christ's call to love our neighbor as we love ourselves, no matter the personal cost.
I am writing tonight to tell you about the goodness of God, of His power, and of His gracious provision and call in my life.  Because, you see, the above paragraph describes almost exactly the people I have found here in Georgia.

I moved to the middle of nowhere Georgia in June of this year.  Two days after arriving, I stumbled upon a group of people to whom I was immediately drawn.  We became friends almost instantly.  My work schedule didn't (and still doesn't) allow me to attend church, but my friends were all part of a singles' group at a church here in the area, so I began attending their Bible study on Tuesday nights.

Almost immediately, I watched my life begin to change.  By September, God was calling me in some big ways, challenging the ways I thought about what it means to follow God, challenging me to more fully surrender.  This process continues still, and it is complex and I don't yet know the end of the story.  But this I do know.

I have watched this small group change and grow.  I have watched numerous people join our number, and I have watched visible change happen in their lives as God calls them into relationship with Himself.  We study the Word together, and it is changing us.  We pray together, and it is changing us.  We serve the community together, and it is changing us.  I have never been part of a group of people in which God is so clearly moving, and it nearly moved me to tears tonight.

We are best described as a strange group.  Men and women of various ages, backgrounds, and interests.  Many of us have little in common beyond a love for Christ.  But that love binds us together.  My friends (or rather, my family) have cared for me in numerous ways over the past five months.  They have shown me the love of Christ in crazy and undeserved ways.  We spend tons of time together, and they encourage me to pass on the love I have been shown to everyone else I meet.

God is good.  To Him belongs all the glory.  I believe that He is doing great things here in my small Georgia town, and for that I am indescribably thankful.