Love Lessons

Many apologies for the lack of recent posts. Starting a doctoral program in addition to normal pastoral duties has put me a little behind in the realm of blogging. In addition, another crucial dimension has been added to my life. I've started dating a wonderful man named Joe. Poor guy, he is dating a pastor, so he may very well end up as a sermon illustration or, like today, the impetus for a blog post.

This whole relationship thing has made me think many thoughts about God. Primarily, I've realized I have no clue as to what God is thinking most days. The more I try to figure Him out, the more confused I get. This is especially true in regard to His timing. This relationship caught me completely by surprise. Yes, we did meet on the internet (christiancafe.com), so I was, at some level, looking for a relationship. However, after a few months of online dating, I had pretty much decided that it was not for me. I was discouraged and disappointed by the people I had met; some guys were really nice guys, there was just no chemistry; others were plain creepy, and I mean that in the most Christ-like way. The overall experience was disheartening. I even went hiking one day and said to God, "This is ridiculous. I give up. I am done. I am going to buy a bunch of cats and forget the idea of ever meeting a man I could possibly marry." I say that tongue in cheek, but it was actually a very painful conversation that I had with God, wondering aloud if He really cared about the deepest desires of my heart. Because, unfortunately, whenever God does not do things in my timing, in the form I think things should take, I resort to doubting Him and His care for me. I am sure this frustrates Him endlessly, yet He loves me still. That relentless love will forever amaze me, because I certainly do not deserve it.

A few days after my little tantrum with God, I got a message from Joe, and so it began...at the point when I was ready to call it quits in terms of dating--but he seemed different, special, worth my time and attention (turns out, he is better than anyone I could have dreamed up). The whole thing happened at a very busy time, as I was starting my doctoral work, and had other things on my mind--as well as having decided that marriage was just never going to happen for me. The timing is not how I would have planned it, but maybe God actually knows what He is doing, even if His plan unfolds in a different way and time than I would expect. Maybe I had to really surrender my hopes, dreams and desires to God before He could actually fulfill them in any meaningful way. Again, I have no idea what God is thinking, so I could speculate all day about why this happened when it happened. Maybe I should just be grateful and enjoy it.

Another spiritual lesson I have learned from this new relationship is how cold my heart really is toward God. I enjoy talking to Joe for hours on end. I would give up sleep to spend time with him. When I hear his voice on the phone, my heart skips a beat. If I could just stare at his handsome face for days, I would feel content. No one has ever inspired such intensity of emotion in my heart before. Yet it makes me think, do I feel this intensely for Christ? When is the last time I gave up sleep in order to read His Word? When is the last time I was giddy just to be in His Presence? When has the sound of His Voice stopped my heart? I want to love God with that kind of intensity...to seek Him with the passion of a woman in love. That is what God deserves from us.

I have this belief that all the best parts of human relationships are but a poor reflection of the relationship God wants to have with us. The intensity and passion of romantic love remind us of the intensity of God's love for us, and how He is a God who longs to be loved with every part of our heart, soul, strength and mind. He wants a relationship with us that is all-consuming, all-fulfilling, all-inspiring. Falling in love with Joe has made me want to love Jesus even more. I pray for all of us that we might love Jesus with all the intensity and beauty that He is worthy of receiving. He deserves nothing less from us.

Recognising the Voice

Many apologies for the blogging silence, dear friends. I have been in the Boston area, working on my doctoral program at Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary. I will be here throughout this coming week, as well. While I have certainly had some extra time in which to blog, I have not had much brain power left over after classes and homework. My mind is preoccupied with overly ambitious thoughts and is overwhelmed from very long days. I did, however, want to share something I read in a devotional book last night. Since my own thoughts are stagnate right now, I am borrowing from the thoughts of others (and it will probably be even more inspirational!). The following is taken from the book "The Monstatic Way: Ancient Wisdom for Contemporary Living, a Book of Daily Readings" edited by Hannah Ward and Jennifer Wild.

This devotional is entitled "Recognising the Voice" and begins with this quote:

"God is always at home. It is we who have gone out for a walk"
~Meister Eckhart

(and then the actual devotional, which happens to be in more of a poem format for this particular day)

"In the film
Dead Poets Society,
a student pretends
to get a phone call
during morning assembly.
When the phone rings,
he answers it
and tells the headmaster
that it is God calling.
I have spent
the majority of my life
waiting for that ring,
putting my life
on hold,
sitting through
sleepless nights
waiting, as if
for Godot,
but I only get
wrong numbers
or solicitors.
Each ring
I anticipate
a divine voice,
hoping beyond hope
that this time it is God,
but then it is
a lonely voice
or a distraught student
and again
I missed God,
or did I.
I wonder if maybe
I have heard
from God,
but just haven't
recognised the voice."
~Benedict Auer

Freedom

Since we are celebrating freedom this weekend, I thought I would share one of my favorite passages about the most important kind of freedom. May you find the ultimate freedom!

To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
They answered him, "We are Abraham's descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?"
Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.
~John 8:31-36

Being known

My best friend sent me an email yesterday that contained this line: "I know you better than you know yourself". She was trying to make the point that sometimes I am not always objective when the topic is me. She then spoke wonderful and beautiful truths to me--about me--that I believe because they come from her. It made me reflect on what a fulfilling experience it is to be known. Isn't that what we all long for, after all? I think that is part of being created in the image of God: the desire to know and be known.

I remember a line from a movie about C.S. Lewis called Shadowlands. In the movie, Lewis is talking about books and says, "We read to know we are not alone." I think that is the relational element which is part of our make up as humans. We want connection with others (be they real or fictional). We want to know we are not alone.

But I think we want more than that. We want to be known...just as we are...and still loved. That is the greatest gift my best friend, Jessica (and many other dear friends and family) have taught me: Just as I am, warts and all, I am loved...deeply. Most people seem to have this fear that if people knew them, really knew them, they would not be fully loved and accepted. We have bought into this myth that love (or acceptance) are dependent things...dependent on perfection...but I like Shakespeare's take on love:

"Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O no! it is an ever-fixed mark that looks on tempests and is never shaken."
~Shakespeare, from Sonnet 116

I think that is the truth of any kind of real, deep love--not just romantic love--but the kind of love we humans most long for in relationships, that "know and be known" kind of love. The beauty of it all is that God lavishes that kind of love on us every day...and sends people into our lives to remind us that we are known, and loved, just as we are. I don't know about you, but I need to be continually reminded of that. Thank you, God, for those reminders...and thank you, Jessica, for knowing me better than I know myself. It is a good thing to be known.

Time for Healing

I think we all struggle with certain issues. My roommates in seminary and I used to joke about some of the people we knew having "more issues than National Geographic". The truth is, we all have areas of brokenness and insecurity...places that need healing and renewal.

God has brought certain broken places in my soul to the surface lately. I once heard someone say that that Holy Spirit will make you aware of things when it is the right time to really deal with them--and will give you the strength to be able to fully address those things. So, when new realizations (really, epiphanies) come to me, I take those seriously...as if God is trying to get a message across to me.

The most recent revelation of God to me is that I need to let Him heal my heart. There are things I believe about myself that are not true, insecurities and fears that keep me from fully embracing God's best for my life. I call myself many names that are not true or right or good. God wants me to see myself as He sees me. There is a passage in Isaiah that speaks to me of changing what we say about ourselves to reflect the truth of what God says about us:

Isaiah 62:3-5
The Lord will hold you in his hand for all to see—
a splendid crown in the hand of God.
Never again will you be called “The Forsaken City”
or “The Desolate Land.”
Your new name will be “The City of God’s Delight”
and “The Bride of God,”
for the Lord delights in you
and will claim you as his bride.
Your children will commit themselves to you, O Jerusalem,
just as a young man commits himself to his bride.
Then God will rejoice over you
as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride.

For me, I feel God has brought certain wounds to the surface because it is time to find healing for those things. It is time to really live into my identity as a child of God, to truly see myself as a person who is loved and redeemed by the Creator of the Universe. I am not even sure how to do that exactly, but take great comfort in the fact that God knows the things I do not know. All I have to do is submit myself to Him and let Him do a work in my heart.

As I spent time in prayer today, talking with God about healing, a song kept coming back to me, specifically this line: "You are our Healer, and you know what's broken, and we're not a mystery to you". That brought me great comfort, knowing that the things which seem like a big, jumbled mess in my soul are not a mystery to God, and not beyond His healing. That line comes from a beautiful song by Watermark, called "Mended". I wish I could find the actual song to share, but I at least offer the lyrics as a source of encouragement:

"Mended" by Watermark
You repair all that we have torn apart
and You unveil a new beginning in our hearts
and we stand grateful for all that has been left behind and
All that goes before us

Chorus:
You've got all things suspended
All things connected
Nothing was forgotten
'Cause your love is perfect
You are our healer
And you know what's broken
And we're not a mystery to you

We will dance 'cause you restore the wasted years and
You will sing over all our coming fears and
We'll stand grateful for all that has been left behind
and all that goes before us

Chorus

Bridge:
Lord, you mend the breech
And you break every fetter
You give us your best, for what we thought was better
And you are to be praised
You are to be praised

Knowing God's Love

There is a Scripture passage that continues to speak to me anew, at each stage of my life:

Ephesians 3: 17-19 "Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God." (The New Living Translation)

This passage talks about experiencing God's love in a way that goes beyond mental ascent. It talks about feeling that love, knowing that love, being overwhelmed by that love, being sure of that love...a love that is so big we can never fully get our minds around it; all we can really do is live into it.

I struggle with this because I want to get my mind around it. I want it to make sense. I want God to make sense. I want to know the answers to all the mysteries of the universe. To my inquiring mind, God speaks the truth that His love is not just an intellectual exercise, it is a way of living and being in the world; it is an identity; it is a firm foundation on which to stand...not something to be dissected, but something to experience.

I limit God, trying to fit Him into my image instead of transforming into His--meaning, among many things, that I view His love as conditional, because that has been my experience of even the most freely given human love. Most of the time, I think my biggest problem is that I just don't feel worthy of God's love. Why does this God want to love me? Really, He loves me with this great big, wide, high, deep love? Why?

With all my theological training, there is still only one answer that seems correct: Because He wants to. That's it. It is not because I am worth it, for I mess up all the time. It's not because He needs me (or any of us), because the eternally existing God could make it just fine without us. He loves us simply because He chooses to...and there is nothing we can do to make Him love us any more or less than He already does.

I pray that reality--the very real depths of God's love--will find its way into your heart and become the Truth by which you determine your worth, and the worth of all those around you. May we each live into the great, big, high, wide and deep Love that sustains and holds us, most profoundly when we do not deserve it at all.