A Journey Through The Margin {Permission To Speak}

Here in the margin the only plan is Christlikeness- numerous victories and countless failures are in store for those who journey here.

You can stand in the margin- but do you give yourself full permission to be there, both in body, mind and spirit? Planting your feet in the margin requires such permission, and without it you will discover nothing new and exist as a silent captive to your old and well-worn patterns of thinking.

You might fear the margin place because you do not trust it. You are not sure what it will give birth to. You have not learned that the margin is an abundant wellspring of healing and peace, beauty and creativity, rebirth and deep faith.

Creating room for margin is a great risk- unwanted emotion, memories, needs and desires may well up within you or sprout up beside you where you sit in solitude and silence.

Here in the margin place there can be discord. But is that the end of the journey?

If you know your Creator, you know there is more to come and it ends with freedom.

I know the margin place.

I thought it would breed nightmarish things, and so I was afraid. But I found that it produced a beauty and creativity that was all its own, and so I am grateful.

A great tall tree filled with wild, frantic, swinging monkeys looms great and tall above all else in this vast plain of learning here in the margin space where I find myself. It is an ambiguous place of unknowns.

Discord swings from branch to branch, jumping in strife for every need to be met, each impulse to be known, all desires to be quenched.

Discord does not have permission to speak, and so I must enter the margin and become a catalyst for Kingdom peace., bringing voice to the unspoken sufferings.

I abide here in the margin place, underneath this chaotic tyranny of wild and demanding unspoken needs which swing from branch to branch above my head.

But how did I arrive here, in this foreign space where so much work is left undone?

I started with permission.

I gave my mind permission to enter fully in a place of margin, the space in-between physical hurry and spiritual sleep.

Without permission it is possible to create margin but never fully abide within it.

As I awakened to the freedom of permitting mental margin, I found myself crawling up out of a cave…

~*~

It is a beautiful cave, but it is an ice cave- bright white, glistening, and utterly frozen. It is in a state of perpetual perfection because all things are held in place by the captivity of ice.

There is failure in perfectionism.

This is often why I fail to write.

This is why I cannot live here forever. It is my frozen Egypt.

Creating margin is parting the waters of perfectionism and journeying into the unknown.

This is why I must crawl out of this cave, out into the Son, because I cannot discover the next steps if I am trapped in the slippery cold confines of perfect silent stillness.

Not all things which glisten white and shining are an invitation to freedom.

So I crawl up, out of this gorgeous sparkling cavern full of white and pointed teeth, a gaping mouth of icy consumption. I arrive on a warm beach, with the smell of the sea and the sound of the waves arresting my frozen senses and awakening the flow of life within me.

As I stand there, shielding my eyes from the glare, grounding my feet in the warm sand, I sense an opportunity, an invitation, and a warning:

Here in the margin the only plan is Christlikeness- numerous victories and countless failures are in store for those who journey here.

The margin is not for the faint of heart- it is deeply vulnerable.

Scanning the horizon, I see only endless water in that direction- an eternity of vast open space and liquid blue. This seascape is teeming with life and vast beyond measure, and wave upon wave crash over the sand.

To my left is the gaping mouth of the ice cave. In front of me is the eternity of the ocean. To my right is an eternal expanse of open beach, with a cliffside jutting up and blocking the view of whatever is above.

I feel no curiosity just yet, only a faint sense of gratitude and an overwhelming sense of fatigue. I walk several steps away from the entrance to the cave, until the jagged frozen teeth and the icy breath do not haunt my thawing skin.

And then I sit down, quite simply, creating personal space upon the sand with my back to the cliff and my feet crossed under me, my face pointed towards the shore.

This is the next step in the journey through the margin- you must create opportunity for contemplation, holding space for connection with the Author of your journey as you wonder where to go next, because often you will find the path is unmarked and you are blazing a brand new trail.

As I rest on the sand, there is a trembling beside me and the earth itself gives birth to a massive tree which rises up beside me, so close that I can reach out and touch the rough trunk with my right hand.

This tree is massive, grand and expansive, towering up above the beach like a sentinel of glory.

It is a culmination of three types- sycamore, banyan and eucalyptus. Somehow I know this by simple observation.

The most startling thing is not the sudden appearance of the tree, but the tiny monkeys which are swinging in its branches.

They are silver and glittering- tiny monkeys with no voice, hundreds of them in the tree above me. Fluid and active but utterly silent. Completely at home but vocally suppressed.

Devoid of sound.

I blink up at them and they blink back at me, darting back and forth among the leaves.

They have no capacity to speak.

I gesture an invitation for them to come closer and several of them crawl into my lap like children.

Together we wait for the quiet of the evening to dwell together in restful sleep.

I sit beneath this sea of undulating discord here beneath a great and wide three-type tree. I am in surrender to an abiding obedience here in the place of margin.

I anticipate dusk, when all the wild monkeys will settle into sleep, here in the massive tree above my head.

I curl up with my silver monkey children and we are shrouded in the evening shade of the great tree as we watch the shades of red and gold playing out over the horizon.

A great grey wolf comes from behind the tree and sits down at my right, in the small space between myself and the trunk.

A large and swift owl flies down from the sky and lands on a low-lying branch above my left shoulder.

The monkeys point and swing.

Comforted with the owl’s wisdom that it is time to rest, and protected by the presence of the strong wolf, I close my eyes and feel the last of the sun’s rays sink into my skin as it drops below the horizon.

The only sound is that of the waves- all creatures are silent, myself included.

As I sleep, my mind becomes receptive to hope, faith, love, joy, peace and creative purpose- these are the tools I will require for the journey ahead. I had none of these within the beautiful ice cave- they are new and welcome here in this place. The Artist of my journey enables me to receive them here in the margin, here where I am poised to learn, adapt and grow.

 It is best to attain my gifts here and now, before I go on.

I wake with the sun, and the first thing I notice is that the ice cave is frozen completely over- salty waves lap against it as though it were solid and immovable rock.

The next thing I notice is that the tree is gone without a trace- and so are my silent animal friends.

I look about me, taking in the eternal sea and the endless stretch of beach. I see a pile of rocks which form a kind of ragged climbing staircase up to the clifftops above.

I would rather not make the climb, as I am discouraged by the effort it would require. But restless crustaceans come out of the sand to tickle around my bare feet.

Compelled by a hasty urgency, the past pushes until the future pulls- I make the climb. I discard the heavy winter coat which is no longer necessary and no longer serves me.

When I come to the top of the cliff after a difficult climb, I stand on the edge of a vast and massive plain.

A great forest of the same strange tree which I encountered below now stretches out before me- and the entire forest of these trees houses hundreds of the same tiny silver glittering monkeys- silent and swinging and watching and waiting.

The trees undulate with the movement of the noiseless creatures, each one with a story to tell, each one suppressed by a voice made obsolete.

I walk beneath these trees, and I am in awe of the vast number of them.

So many memories- the margin makes this discovery possible.

These silent voices of discord are greatest in the margin because all else is quiet.

Some cries are for purpose, meaning, and definition.

Others cry for love, affection, self-care, recognition.

Some of them just want to belong- security and protection are their basest need.

Some of these swinging beings demand sugar, sweets, breads, treats.

Some desire to sleep in peace, but they cannot be still because they have no voice to ask for permission.

They are all children of the past and present, and they are all part of my complete being- I do not wish them to leave because they are a part of me.

I find that my wolf and my owl guide have joined me once again, and I am comforted by Wisdom and protected by Strength.

The journey is mysterious indeed- the abstract nature of the margin place is full of curious mystery.

When I come upon the foot of a mountain, this is when I know the final trial begins…

~*~

I look up and up and up- I cannot see the top.

This is discouragement.

This is the place where your self-awareness has not met your capacity to succeed, and so it seems an impossible climb.

But here between the rocks and soil and hard-packed dirt are signs of a deep root system- at the top of this mountain must be a great tree, greater than all these others, which has dug its roots deep down into the depths of this mountain.

At first I am too weary to climb- I have journeyed a long way since I left the ice cave. From a cavern of frozen dreams to an eternal stretching sea, up a craggled cliff to the swinging forest of silent discord, and now an impossible height of root systems and hard granite.

But the wise owl and the strong wolf which have followed me this far slinks back into the forest and disappears, and then I hear the first sound since the crashing of the waves- the cry of an eagle.

It swoops down from the mountaintop, from the place above where I cannot see, and it gives a call to action which energizes my being as it glides away towards the sea.

I put my hand against the side of the mountain, find my footing and take the first step- up and up, climbing up with all my strength.

When my hands become tired I find a small ledge upon which to rest. There are some fissures in the mountainside which let out icy cool air- I realize a tunnel system must connect the internal places of this mountain to the icy cavern I left behind. I am thankful for the cooling ministrations of the past.

I feel too tired to continue the climb, and as I gaze out at the tops of the trees towards the sea beyond, I feel some of the roots moving to touch my hands where they rest upon the ground. They are energizing, giving life through their contact against my skin.

I wonder at the power of these tree roots, and find myself refreshed to continue the climb.

The hours feel like years and the days feel like an eternity, but finally, after reaching out countless times to receive life-giving strength from the roots, I reach the top.

Pulling myself up with a final gasp of victory, I catch my breath and then stand before that which awaits me here at the top.

There is nothing.

A dirt plateau with no green thing in sight.

Nothing.

I walk towards the middle, and I wonder why the margin is empty after all- it makes no sense. 

Standing there in the center of the mountaintop, I raise my eyes up to heaven and wonder out loud,

“Where does my help come from?”

And the cry of the eagle answers my call, as it comes towards me back from the sea, with three small fish in its beak. With a flurry of powerful feathers it comes to land at my feet and crys again, ear-splitting and awe-inspiring.

Swallowing its catch with three swift gulps, it eyes me closely, cocks its head and then opens its expansive wings of impressive girth. In a rhythm of music and drums the eagle beats its wings against the ground without lifting up, stirring up dust all around me, its feathers whisking rapidly against my feet.

And the same trembling which I felt beside me in the sand when I was back on the seashore, it begins again directly beneath me.

Swiftly as the eagle which now lifts off and flies upwards, the roots of the mountain are drawn up into my being through my bare feet. I raise my arms and they become branches tall and towering- this is the biggest tree on the entire island, dwarfing the forest in size and stature.

I have become grounded in the earth- but I am free in spirit.

Because just as the eagle climbs higher in the sky, so I feel myself rising up above my branches to the air above, and I am soaring in spirit with a freedom I never knew was possible.

And I see that in my branches are silent shining silver monkeys just like the thousands I have already passed. And as my spirit flies among them, they receive a voice for the very first time. And they yell out over the forest below, and the thousands of voices shout back in celebration.

I go back to visit the entrance to the ice cave and I find that it has melted open again- the insides drip with honest imperfection.

I return back to my trunk and then the wolf and the owl come to join me. They howl and hoot as they join the revelry of the Kingdom which has finally been healed within me.

All beings in this place are peaceful and happy, free at last.

Our voices sing praises to the King until dusk, when all is tranquil and at ease.

And tears come to my eyes as I thank the Author of my journey for leading me here.

Because the margin place is a call to freedom- it is here that you will give voices to the things inside which you never had time to address. It is here that you will do the deep inner work which requires introspection, forgiveness, curiosity and trust.

It is here that the Author of our journey can inspire an adventure that brings freedom and gives voice to our entire being.

It is with gratitude that I have journeyed here today- I hope to come again, many more times.

It is a sacred place, this margin space. God does His best work within us when we are still and open and give ourselves permission.

And I write this all down because I have learned that when I don’t practice creativity I become spiritually silent.

And so because of your encouragement, dear friends, I have been able to give myself permission to not only stand in the margin, but to be fully present in it, both mind, body and spirit, and to learn from the lessons the margin has to offer.

Here in the margin the only plan is Christlikeness- numerous victories and countless failures are in store for those who journey here.

I know the margin place. It is vulnerable and exposed, open to healing.

I thought it would breed nightmarish things, and so I was afraid. But I found that it produced a beauty and creativity that was all its own, and so I am grateful.

May all beings be peaceful and happy, and may the Author of our journey part the waters of our discord and lead us through to a place where we can become securely grounded in Him so that our spirits can fly free and heal our silent sufferings.

Amen and amen.

Rebecca

~*~

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The Gift Is In The Margin {Silence And Solitude}

Do not be afraid of an empty to-do list. It is in this empty space that His Spirit has the freedom to create. We are each a divine vessel of blessed imperfection, and this is best discovered in the margins of our day, the places where our hearts bleed out and our words fall short.

Dear Saddleback family- What if we stop and meet with Jesus right here and now, inviting Him into the worst and most hurried moment of our day with no agenda other than to simply sit beside Him?

We should know that God sees the small things that nobody else does, those menial tasks which make up the larger whole of our existence.

And so humility is cultivated in solitude, and grace is received in silence.

I say this because Jesus finds me in the most unlikely of places these days.

I will be driving down the highway alone and His Spirit will whisper “Moses felt exactly like you do right now when I gave him the commission to return to Egypt.” And I will feel better about my doubts, because I am reminded that doubt is Biblical. Doubt is not the opposite of faith, it is the unfolding of it as we grow up into Him. And I am humbled by the revelation.

I will be sorting laundry, a great pile of warm towels, when He will suddenly draw close and tell me “I am going to speed up your healing and come very close to you.” And I will feel better about my weaknesses, because I am reminded that they are covered in grace and part of a divine plan to heal both myself and the whole world.

I will be standing in the shower at the end of the day, questioning myself about where I may have gone wrong in the last twelve waking hours, and He will speak the words “No condemnation”. Plain and simple, powerful and true; relief and gratitude come all at once like a wave.

Yes, humility is cultivated in solitude, and peace comes on the ringing ears of a silent room.

It has been the quiet times with Him that have been the most fruitful places during this transition season of my life.

God has lovingly entered me into a time of solitude and silence because He has a lot to say. I have been rendered mute in His presence so that He can do the talking. For this I am grateful.

Pastor Rick has been teaching us that learning to slow down and leaving room for margin creates space for God to work in our daily life. I took some time off from social media and blogging to create space in my own routine for Him to speak to me, and I completely agree with what Rick has said to us:

“We must learn to slow our pace for a healthier life. Learn to be content because human nature is discontent.”

A healthier mind, body and spirit requires Sabbath- rest, silence, solitude, reflection, listening.

But who in this hurried world has time for that? To have free time is to be rendered useless in this performance-driven society.

But our pastor puts it plainly:

“If you are too busy for God, you are too busy.”

Saddleback family, you have encountered me during an interesting season of my life. I have been found by God and unbound from slavery to emotion. I have transitioned from an upheaval of mountainous emotion to a great plane of leveled learning.  I have been forced to slow down and listen to my body, my mind and my soul. I am both victorious and still learning to be so, day in and day out. It’s one piece of human nature at a time, observed, addressed and worked out within me. He is moving in the silences, the margins, and the empty “to-do” lists.

I resist at times because I don’t want to heal, I want to be healed!

But humility is cultivated best in silence and solitude and stillness. Contentment is learned in the quiet place. Healing is found in peaceful acceptance of the right now.

Philippians 4:11 (NLT)

¹¹ I have learned how to be content with whatever I have.

I have not mastered contentment myself, but God is carving out time to work on it within me. He is tunneling out a margin between my desires and my expectations, creating a space to write His own story which is becoming interwoven with mine, a chapter of grace that falls between the definite past and the unknown future.

In prayer this week, here is what I have heard Him say as I have reflected on the sermons and teachings from the past few Sundays on our campus:

“Daughter, rest now. I hear you. I love you. I want to meet with you. Don’t try to control, analyze, explain or grab onto anything. Simply present your needs to me and trust me with them. I am all around you. Trust my work. This type of healing is slow but steady. Trust me with the learning process that you are going through. You are not an exception to My story, you are a main character. Now rest and allow hope and joy to heal you. Surrender your fear, rest in trust, give your anxious thoughts to me. I am all around your mind, body and spirit. I am consuming you with love. But consumed by my love and be made new. Rest while I wash away your sins and make you new. I receive your fear, anxiety and pain as a pleasing sacrifice. I am proud of you. I am holding you. Rest because I love you. You are mind forever.” –Jesus

This is the victory for the past few weeks- I have learned not to make any decisions when I am not in a place of margin. If I don’t have the emotional capacity to slow down into silence and solitude so that I can dwell with God in peace, then I don’t have the right state of mind to make healthy choices. This is not something I have mastered, it is only something I have realized. It’s an area I need to work on. And so I need to take the time to receive His teaching and rest while He is working.

As Pastor Rick continues this sermon series about margin, I will practice conscious gratitude for all the places I find space to rest with Christ:

~I will not be ashamed of taking time for physical self-care: yoga, massage, visits to the chiropractor, taking a nap when I feel tired instead of charging ahead.

~I will embrace opportunities for better emotional health: life-coaching, process groups, inspirational workshops.

~I will make room for God to speak- meditation, sitting in silence, Scripture, journaling.

Pastor Rick made a statement which resonated deep within the confines of my journey:

“I can’t keep charging without recharging. Hurry dries up my love and keeps me from hearing God.”

I have led far too many charges in the past year, and I have pushed away God’s gift of rest.

It’s time to bring awareness to the fear of stillness.

And as I make flawed efforts to get closer to victory, I trust God to help me weave each lesson into my relationships and responsibilities of daily life.

Saddleback family, it is in the margins that we will experience breakthrough. This is about us and God and nothing else.

Do not be ashamed to have time to sit with Him. Some of the most influential teachers I have read are huge proponents of significant amounts of quiet time with God.

Jesus is coming into the deep places of brokenness within us in oder to do a true and lasting healing. He is so proud of us and the hard work we are doing to stop working so hard.

For every small step we take towards Him, He will take a flying leap towards us. He closes the gap when we create a margin.

The empty places in our schedule can become the battleground for the collision of our spirit with His. He is using everything, each piece of our daily lives to draw us closer to Him, especially the vacancies.

Friends, it is in the quite pieces of stillness where humility is cultivated. And humility is the nutrient-rich soil for blessing to be planted and grow up in abundance.

Let us all meet and commune with Him in silence and solitude this week, whatever amount you can give. He receives it all with abundant joy. He knows how much it means to each one of us to carve out time with Him. He knows what it costs to lay down our agendas, and He receives the sacrifice as a good and pleasing aroma.

As we sacrifice our time to Him, he carries our burdens away to make room for something new.

Yes, He honors our time as we honor His.

Do not be afraid of an empty to-do list. It is in this empty space that His Spirit has the freedom to create. We are each a divine vessel of blessed imperfection, and this is best discovered in the margins of our day, the places where our hearts bleed out and our words fall short.

As we create space for margin under the teaching of our pastors, may my entire Saddleback family know the blessed reception of time alone with God.

Though I sit alone with him, I am not lonely because I know that many in my church family sit there also.

And together we can each carry the gift of communion with the Spirit with us into the work of our day and apply it to the broken relationships in which we long to see breakthrough.

I love you, church. Let’s sit quietly together here in this sacred place of solitude with our Savior. Let us surrender our divine imperfections and savor our Savior as He refines us in silence.

Amen and amen.

Rebecca

~*~

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Baptism And Open Doors {Breaking Free}

This time last year I was leaning over a pool publicly baptizing someone in the name of Jesus as that church community looked on with pride and joy. It was my privilege as a community pastor there on Easter day 2017.

One year later I stand humbly beside the pool, one among the crowd, as I watch my son be baptized at a new church by the campus pastor. It was a mixture of many emotions, each of which I surrendered to God so that I could continue to break free from the past.

Life is short and each day belongs to Jesus.

My first Easter weekend at Saddleback was a blessing and I chose to focus on the present abundance rather than old grief over what has been lost. God is doing something new in my life and I want to fully engage and participate in it. I want to be mindful of the present moment rather than dwell on memories which hold me back from breaking free.

If I am not mindful of my emotional health I can easily fall back into old thought patterns, the very ones which sabotaged relationships and destroyed opportunities in my past.

This last Sunday the Easter theme Pastor Rick chose to speak on was Walking Through The Door To Freedom.

“You don’t have to be behind bars to be in prison,” said Pastor Rick.

Sometimes a prison can look like a well-worn thought pattern that can’t be broken without divine intervention.

And so we must come before our King and seek freedom.

Do you ever feel small and unfulfilled? I think this is the constant battle of the human soul, to abide in the uncomfortable places where we realize our deep lack.

To realize that nothing satisfies like Jesus, not food or social media or ministry or books or writing or music or sabotage or anger or regret.

To simply realize that we are terribly thirsty and hungry for Him.

In this way the broken pieces and weak places can become beautiful things as they gently remind us of our humble humanity which is dwelling in full dependence upon a God of loving provision.

He allows us to feel the full weight of our emptiness so that we will walk through the door of His house and come to dine at His table.

“Every experience, even the most unwelcome, if offered to Jesus, can become your gateway to joy.”

–Elisabeth Elliot

As I go into the week after Easter, my agenda is very simple- draw near to the Spirit and receive love. 

This can be done when you are busy or when you are still, whether in emotional turmoil or serenity.

It is especially important to keep the plan simple when you are recovering from a season where many things have fallen apart.

“Sometimes God has to shake your foundation to set you free,” said Rick that day.

So I reflected on Easter Sunday how last year God did this very type of shaking in my life in order to wake me up and set me on a path to freedom.

I resigned from church ministry in September of 2017 and it broke my heart worse than anything I had ever known.

Ever since then I have been afraid to serve on a ministry team again.

“Fear causes you to miss God’s plan for your life.” This was our pastor’s straightforward reminder.

And it’s very true, especially in my case.

God’s plan is to free you so He can bless you.

The freedom for me this past weekend was knowing I could step down and let someone else take my place next to my son in the baptismal and still be totally at peace with all of it.

The blessing this past Easter weekend was that it was also my first time to wear a church-team logo in six months.

I donned the black Saddleback Kids t-shirt, let all my hair down for the first time in just as many months, and I served in the kindergarten classroom just like I did before my last church ministry fell apart.

Sometimes starting all over again is an unexpected joy, and building up from what you have learned is an even greater victory.

I walked through that kindergarten classroom door on Sunday in the same way that many Saddleback members walked through the big blue door set up for rededication to God- with a desire to break free.

Romans 8:1-2

8 So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus. ² And because you belong to him, the power^[a] of the life-giving Spirit has freed you^[b] from the power of sin that leads to death.

I can break out from the prison of condemnation because even though I still have a great deal left to learn, I am declared free through the death of my old self. I can walk through the door to my true purpose and my eternal calling- to dwell with God as His beloved, and to serve His people from a place of abundant blessing.

I am free to have an entirely new mindset which carries forth from the wreckage of the past and the powerful healing of forgiveness.

“You have no idea what God wants to do in your life unless you let Him free you from the prison of unforgiveness,” Rick reminded us.

I held onto offense at myself and others for many months before I could lay down my pride, face my fear and enter into a church family again.

And out of the hard lesson has come a great blessing- on the same weekend that I joined a ministry team, my son chose to be baptized.

Had I never forgiven, I would have not been given the opportunity to witness this special moment in this special way.

“Why forgive? Because God has forgiven me, resentment makes me miserable, and I am going to need more forgiveness in the future.” When Rick preached this, I nodded in silent assent.

Certainly I will need more forgiveness in the future, first for myself and then probably for others. No church family or ministry team will ever be perfect on this side of eternity, just as I will never be without shortcomings in this lifetime.

But this week God set me free to try again. I stepped through the door to freedom in so many ways this Easter season.

So I will go forward into my new serving responsibilities with perspective, reverence, joy and awareness of my weaknesses. I do not serve as a church member, a team member, a lonely outsider or a wounded soul. Nor do I serve from a place of empty longing.

Rather, I serve as a child of God from an abundance of blessing as a beloved daughter of the King.

I walked through that kindergarten door to break free from the inner voices that say I am unworthy, incapable, insignificant or foolish. No, I will listen to that voice that says I am beloved. I will give myself grace. I will silence shame. I will embrace freedom.

 I will step right over fear and find peace and contentment on the other side, the kind that only Jesus can bring.

“Break out of prison by remembering God loves me and He has a good plan for my life,” said our pastor.

With all the gratitude I have learned so far I will go into this week after Easter as nothing more or less than a beloved child of God. I will do laundry, wash dishes, fold clothes, pick up toys and shop for groceries with a simple awareness that life is short and each day belongs to my holy and good Father who loves me and sets me free and blesses me with His goodness.

I will not be afraid of my lack, but rather I will present it to God and say to Him, “Look, Father, I don’t know what to do with this piece, but it’s uncomfortable and I want it away from me.”

And He will gladly receive my empty soul and fill it with His abundant love.

How? I’m not exactly sure, because if I knew I would be totally fulfilled already. And many days I still feel unsatisfied and longing for more. But I believe that somehow He takes my honesty and turns it into blessing through the careful weaving of His plan with my life.

I know that this past weekend God used my new church family to reveal Gods blessings in the form of new steps towards freedom from my old self.

I found joy in serving on a team again, and I found joy in my son’s baptism. I found joy in my new church family. I found joy in stepping back and allowing another pastor to baptize my son. I found joy in stepping in and serving kindergartners.

It is not the story I would have written, but it is the future I am blessed to have.

“Joy comes from seeing the complete fulfillment of the specific purpose for which I was created and born again, not from successfully doing something of my own choosing.”

–Oswald Chambers

Life is short and each day belongs to Jesus. So I will thank Him for reminding me of my humanity and lovingly responding to my need for grace.

I abide in His provision even when I remain hungry and thirsty for more, and I wait for more understanding to be given in His timing and not mine.

2 Corinthians 3:17

¹⁷ For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

And so this Easter weekend I was free to serve again in ministry and to celebrate with my tribe of Jesus-people as my son was baptized in their midst.

I am free to change, to learn, to surrender, to grow, to belong.

And He leans down and whispers the word “beloved” over me and my entire life story as I continue to walk through the new doors He opens for me.

Thank you, God, for Easter Weekend, baptism and open doors.

Amen.

Rebecca

~*~

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All The Things {It Is Finished}- Good Friday

There are two options available to us in every circumstance of every day: love or fear. That is why perfect love casts out fear, because they cannot co-exist. So what are we most afraid of?

For me, it’s the fear of not belonging.

 It’s one thing to be loved. It’s quite another thing altogether to belong.

I have found a safe place to sit and receive love. I sit and listen to the Spirit. It’s a discipline and a practice which is far from perfect, but still it brings comfort and peace.

I sit with my back to the window, so that the sunshine and the breeze come in from behind me, and I wrap myself in my favorite shawl. I sit silently without moving, listening to the birds in the trees and the wind-chimes on the patio. I hold my tea-cup of water in both hands and I dwell with myself and my God.

I try to sort through all the things that bother me, the truth and the lies. I try to find myself, my faith, my Jesus.

I listened to Henri Nouwen’s sermon on "The Life Of The Beloved". He asked his audience to consider the three main lies we tell ourselves- I am what I DO, I am what I HAVE, and I am what people SAY about me.

He asks us to remember that we are each beloved of God, and our only true identity is child of God. Nothing else defines who we are. Nothing else.

It is finished.

What are the lies I tell myself? I don’t belong, I am too much for people, I am insignificant, I am invisible, I am incapable of connection, I have no ministry, I don’t make a difference.

My logical self knows these are lies, but the emotional child inside hasn’t been convinced.

I have been watching a bird trying to repurpose an abandoned nest this week. All throughout the day she comes with things to patch and rebuild this old nest which has gone unused for several years.

I don’t know why I left it there, but for some reason I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away. Perhaps because it represented such hard work followed by failure, as the original builders were driven away by territorial neighbors. They lost their babies in the fray, and they never came back.

I watch this new bird as she is building up from the ruins, and I think about facing hardship and piecing back together that which was damaged- honoring the past while moving on into new things.

This is hard.

So I sit on that seat by the window and I dwell with my feelings, my thoughts, my spirit and my God.

Today is Good Friday.

It is finished.

That’s what I heard Pastor Rick talk about last night as I tuned into the live feed on FB. I was hoping to catch my favorite female pastor who sometimes teaches online, and when I missed her session I ended up watching the Saddleback Good Friday sermon instead:

The Job Has Been Completed! What Jesus Finished by Dying on the Cross.

The response within me was to post my heart out because I was so deeply moved- not necessarily by Pastor Rick’s words, although they were good.

I was moved by the idea that Jesus said “it is finished”.

John 19:30

When Jesus had tasted it, he said, “It is finished!” Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

What is finished?

This is what welled up in my heart as I asked myself what this meant for me this Easter season:

Looking for closure? Trying to make it turn out perfect? Ahhh, me too. Sometimes I try to force the ending of things I want to have control over- but God says "no, let Me finish it. Let me write the ending, my child. I will finish this chapter for you." That's what Good Friday reminds me about this year. There is nothing that we need to DO because it has been DONE and it is FINISHED. In my own life I struggle with finding peace and acceptance when everything is not completed how I want- things left undone will leave me unsettled. The message of Good Friday is a reminder that there will be some things which never have closure or completion in this life. BUT nothing will be left unfinished when we get to the other side and God welcomes us into eternity. Because He finished for us that which we could never complete on our own, and it encompasses EVERYTHING, including the stuff we feel is left undone. So even if something feels unfinished in this life, rest in knowing that what He has done means I don't have to DO anything except receive persuasive grace with abundant gratitude. God sees the ending of our story and the final chapter says that things which were left undone are now FINISHED in Him. Sometimes closure looks like a cross and sounds like a declaration- It Is Finished. This includes EVERYTHING, even those pieces of our journey without happy endings in this life. Thank you Jesus. Amen. #EasterAtSaddleback

This was the start of 24 hours of deep contemplation for me, a process which bled over into Good Friday.

I asked myself these questions:

~What am I most afraid of?  Not making a difference.

~What are the lies I tell myself about who I am? I am small and insignificant.

~And what was finished on Good Friday? All the things left undone. So many things.

I listened to a podcast from Fun Therapy by Mike Foster in which a woman named Annie Downs does an on-air therapy session. She talked about feelings of rejection and what it means to truly belong.

Such a powerful interview, and I cannot recommend it highly enough to my readers: Fun Therapy is an amazing listen.

The guest, Annie, talked about how we sometimes try to deal with pain by numbing out or medicating/managing the emotion instead of facing it head on.

So I asked myself another question as I sipped from my cup, there in the quiet sun on a Good Friday.

How do I medicate?

 Off the top of my head, I can answer with four things that seem most apparent:

~Eating- No I don’t have an eating disorder, but yes I can sometimes use food as comfort in order to cope. When I am sad I consume sugar like there is no tomorrow. Or I chew gum like a fiend. Or both. It has been especially noticeable the past few months- I am actively making a change in my diet (cutting candy) and gum habit (only after a meal), and the resulting struggle proves just how often I use food to make me happy.

~Cleaning- I feel the most productive and useful while I vacuum, fold laundry, make beds, clean up toys, pack lunches and wash dishes. My self worth goes up because, as Mr. Nouwen pointed out, I sometimes believe the lie that I am what I DO with my hands.

~Social Media- Sometimes this is a blessing and other times it’s a curse. When I am in a low and empty place, social media can be a way to find a quick fix for loneliness. I am trying to become more mindful of what mood I am in when I surf, and what I am seeking when I share.

~Music- My earphones and my iTunes are wonderful when I am feeling whole. But when I need to process an emotion, these can become an easy distraction from thinking too deeply. I can drown out the things I don’t want to think about. Even if it’s worship music, it can still become an idol.

I am learning to stop trying to manage the emotion and start surrendering it to Jesus.

So I find myself spending a good amount of time sitting by the window in my bedroom today, back to the sun as I contemplate Good Friday.

What is finished?

All the things left undone.

I need to teach my body that it does not need to medicate emotion, because what I need has already been accomplished for me.

What I need is already provided.

I just need to receive love today.

I smile at the pillow that sits across from me on my bed, which says “all you need is love and the beach.”

Yes, because it is finished, so all I need to do today is sit with Jesus on the shore of my tumultuous sea of thoughts and feelings and simply receive His love.

Tonight I will go and worship with my church family at Saddleback; I will lovingly take the bread and the cup. My neighbors invited me to a different Sadddleback campus than the one I serve on Sunday. But it doesn’t matter what church I find myself singing at, the emotion is always the same- I love the church and I just want to worship with my beloved tribe of Jesus people.

I go to lay down my fears, my management tools, my doubts. I surrender it all to Him once again.

I will nail all. the. things. to the cross.

And tomorrow I will go and see my son get baptized, and I will witness how God has brought such good out of such a hard season.

And I will be grateful for this Good Friday.

All the things which feel undone, the past which brings pain, that chapter is written and closed out.

There are two options available to us in every circumstance of every day: love or fear. That is why perfect love casts out fear, because they cannot coexist. So what am I most afraid of?

I am deeply afraid of not belonging.

It’s one thing to be loved. It’s quite another thing altogether to belong.

I watch the little bird on my patio as she builds up from the ruins, and I think about facing hardship and piecing back together that which was damaged- honoring the past while moving on into new things.

This is hard.

So I sit on that seat by the window and I dwell with all the things: my feelings, my thoughts, my spirit and my God.

Today is Good Friday.

And so I receive this today: I am beloved of God, and my only true identity is child of God. Nothing else defines who I am.

All the things that are still left undone and imperfect, they can have closure because Jesus said it is finished.

It is finished.

Amen.

Rebecca

~*~

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