A Hundred Different Surrenders

In the Chinese language, included in the meaning of the word crisis is the understanding of a subsequent opportunity. In the moment of crisis, one has to make a choice. To bow down beneath the weight of an event, pressure, or demand. Or to persevere and hope against hope.

God has been teaching me the lesson of "a hundred different surrenders". I look around me with longing to have the kind of character that I see around me. An honest, straightforward disposition. A giving, overflowing heart. A voice bursting with poetry. A mind full of intelligence and wisdom. A nature that knows not a stranger and reaches out for a friend. A temperament that stands strong for what is right even when alone.

I believe that contained in these sightings of mine are examples of virtue for which to strive toward, even honestly recognizing their fullness in those I know and their lack within me. I know that I could take it a step further and envy these beautiful qualities in dear friends of mine. And this is surrender #1.

Surrenders #2-50 involve my refraining from taking it upon myself to conjure up these qualities within me. Because while I can recognize, honor, and aspire to them, I cannot chase after them as if they are game to be caught and eaten. Oh no. They more like waves to swim in an endless ocean. I will never arrive to their destination. Qualities do not work that way; neither do relationships. I must submit to the process of sanctification if I hope to see anything within me worth honoring. And sanctification is the hard process of God's beating metal into something useful and lovely, the metal being my heart.

Surrenders #51-100 involve my dancing on the line where freedom and discipline meet. I think that this is the line on which God metaphorically dwells and calls us to join Him. I have this theory that people can be oversimplistically divided into two categories--those who embrace freedom and those who embrace discipline. Our personalities seem to favor one over the other (judgment versus perception in Myers-Briggs terminology). First of all, we should recognize the beauty and necessity of both and encourage the expression of each in one another. Secondly, we should allow God to show His grace through the one that we so easily express and His power through the one that we struggle to attain. I believe He is glorified in this. Lastly, we should recognize that the body of Christ is not just me or you but all of us. May the disciplined ones teach, challenge, and support the free ones, and vice versa. And in our unity, may we walk together in both. (I hope it is understood that I am not implying that disciplined people are not free, or the other way around--remember this is an oversimplification for the purpose of making a point).

Surrenders #100+ are where my dreams live. The previous surrenders don't touch these, because they are so tender and close to my heart. They are my heart. But what is funny about the previous surrenders is that in leading me through those first, God does a work of trickery (also known as wisdom and goodness). He kneads into my will an openness that is possible because of the good fruit and overflowing joy experienced in the wake of the previous surrenders.

I'm going to tell you something in all honesty, a realization that hit my consciousness straight on like a dart to a bullseye. Ten years ago, five years ago, two years ago--this is not at all where I dreamed to be. And yet I could cry with how grateful I am that I am here. It makes me want to speed the surrenders up, simply for all the wonderful places I can go. But in reality, I know that's not the point. The point is...(your patience has earned it) that we do not arrive anywhere beautiful or sacred without a hundred different surrenders preceding it. That is the way God has designed it--a delightful relationship.

So this is my story of a hundred different surrenders.

The Voice and Our Soul

A certain truth is gaining clarity for me. We have been given the right to determine who claims our souls. We can give our soul to a friend, a lover, a parent, a teacher. We know who reigns in our soul by whose voice we listen to more than any other, the voice by which we measure the truth and resonance of all others.

That is why only the Maker of souls is fit to reign in ours. The speaker of all truth is the one we should let speak the loudest within us. Otherwise, we are prone to sway haphazardly to any voice that speaks or to a voice that is fallible and {though he/she may have the best of intentions} could speak wrongly and lead us astray.

I am learning the importance of this. This is crucial for one such as I who is so impressionible and heedful of other voices. This does not preclude me from listening to the voices around me. In fact, I need the voices. I just cannot receive them all with the same weight. I have to take them all humbly and measure them against the standard of the voice of Jesus.

In this life, we walk a tightrope that is hard to define. We live in a world of hurt. But we are called to a beautiful reality of healing. It is difficult to balance the two sides of acknowledging the hurt but not resigning ourselves to it, lest we bypass the greater reality of healing and wholeness which is promised to us.

I believe that a degree of healing is possible and guaranteed this side of eternity. It may not be physical. But it is what we need more--deep soul healing. And as long as we are following the way, we will experience it through taking on the greater life of Jesus, giving up ourselves, walking in the ideals of peace, truth, hope, and love.

God is simultaneously the ultimate Realist and Romantic. He does not deny sin and evil in the world. In fact, He sees its devastating effects, which stir His just anger and break His heart for creation. But He is a Romantic too. The story of redemption and sacrificial love speak powerfully to a reality that is greater than the greatest evil. We are free to hope, believe, and love in impossible ways because of the love of Jesus. We have seen grace triumph over judgment in totality and thus can walk in the reality of grace's small victories every day.

I am in awe and know that, as long as I am in this state, there is no limit to the things that He can and will do in and through me for His glory.

Amen.

Happy Independence Day :)

1st day of internship -- epic fail

Ok, so what you are about to read is one of those things that you couldn't make up---it's just that ridiculous.

This is the day that I have been looking forward to, worrying about, working towards, and praying about for the past several months---the first day of my internship.

Potential oversight #1--Eating an unknown Vietnamese dish the night before

Potential oversight #2--Eating unwashed blackberries the morning of

Potential oversight #3--Ignoring the onsurge of nausea while driving

In a minute flat, I went from ok----to most certainly not ok.

I then assumed---and we all know what that does---that a nice hearty belch would relieve all of my gastronomic pressure. Not so.

I grabbed my paper towel, stuck it in front of my face---whew! caught and controlled.

But in the next moment, my stomach was Mount Vesuvius and the metaphorical hot lava exploded----all over me.

It was neither pretty nor aromatic.

I was running on time. I was good to go. And then Mount Vesuvius. I had to call my supervisor and tell her that I was a hot pukey mess and needed to go home, clean myself with hot lava, and change. Thankfully, she understood and didn't call me unclean or send me outside the camp.

There was apparently a big cosmic joke being played on me today. Somebody had a big laugh at my expense. I'm sure many more will after reading this. Just remember---that you might be the next victim of dramatic irony.

Ok, so it really is funny. Mount Vesuvius is certainly one way to break the ice.

The end.

No one exists in a vacuum

In t-minus 1 week, I will start my counseling practicum orientation. This is a quantum leap. And one for which I will never be ready until I am in the air with His everlasting arms beneath me. The momentum is building--like a bottle of coke that has hit the ground, I am all fizzed up with an overflow quite imminent. Step back, kids--this one will spew. I just hope what comes out is beautiful, healing, living water.

I have been struck as of late with the incoherence of my story. It's not that the details of my life are incoherent--it's that I have not taken the time to put the pieces together and interpret what God has done in my life on a grand scale. No more of this "what's your testimony?", to which I respond by looking around confusedly and mumbling something unintelligible about being 6 and asking Jesus into my heart.

There is so much more.

I am starting to see that what I learned about reality started with my family, my school, my church. And this is something that most anyone can relate to. What we understand about the world we learn from our parents and other authority figures, our little unformed minds dependent on them to establish the structure and parameters for our existence. This realization is foundational to the work that I am going into. The abuse experienced by the women and children I will be working with has become their reality, so natural for them that they do not understand that it is a deviation from the good and true standard that God has ordained, that flows from His very character. Their mistreatment has trained them to believe that they have little value; they are useless; there is no one who will protect them; they are at fault for what is done to them. They are faced with the contradiction--they have no control and yet deserve all the blame. This is deception, the birthplace of confusion, which I am coming to see as the devil's playground. Through confusion, Satan can tie us up in webs that carry us in multiple directions and leave us powerless to move. These women are confused and cannot see clearly enough to name the mistreatment for what it is--abuse.

The realization of truth charts the pathway to freedom.

It is plain for many people to see the damage abuse causes (though not everyone). What I want to bring out now is an even more unrecognizable reality---neglect. This is a reality that is easily overlooked because it is an act of omission. I mean, how can one recognize what is not done? Committed acts are tangible and observable. There is a more direct cause and effect associated with committed acts. The reason I am talking about this is because I am starting to see a pattern---a pattern that has been carried through generations. There are two sides of the coin---abuse and neglect---and both involve the absence of love. The relationships bereft of love will either be marked by harmful words and gestures or the lack of words and gestures.

And here is where I see my story and the stories of others similar to me. I have come from a Christian family. I love my parents and know they love me. I have attended both Christian school and church for most of my life. But if I look back on my childhood, I have many questions to ask myself. How did I go to church and Christian school and yet struggle through things like depression, loneliness, and isolation? Why did I feel so lost and alone? My parents were busy working people. They were there for me as much as they knew how to be. They gave me more than they had been given, that's for sure. They did not have very many friends; thus, we did not have people over to our house. Church and school were similar--there were adults in my life, but their involvement only went so far. Due to the lack, I developed a deep inner world that was full of activity but deprived of reality. I had everything on the surface I could have asked for and yet hungered within my soul for deep guidance and intimacy.

I see the virus of neglect has been transferred from families and schools and churches to the individuals that inhabit these microcosms. My childhood world was free of abuse but carried some aspects of neglect (albeit small compared to many others). And I'm not laying this charge on my parents or school or church. I am laying it on the Christian culture as a whole (while it is true of secular culture too, I can hardly expect otherwise and have no right to speak thus to the culture that does not claim otherwise). I believe my parents and others faced it too. We should never forget that the lack of love and goodness is just as potentially harmful as the acts done in opposition to love and goodness.

The biggest point I want to make is: No one exists in a vacuum. Where love and goodness are not being sown, there is ground that will be used for something---be it unwanted weeds in the form of selfishness or waywardness. But be sure of it--there is no fallow ground. There is no neutral territory. Those who are not vessels of light, truth, goodness, LOVE will be vessels of the vices that stand in opposition to them.

In childhood, I had some good seeds planted and God was faithful to grow those. We need to take seriously the seeds we are sowing into the lives of children and those around us. Just because we are not sowing bad seeds in their lives does not mean that we are not having an effect. There needs to be a mind shift---we need to see that our Christian life does not show itself in our avoidance of the bad but our embrace of the good. For that is where Christ's influence so powerfully challenges the reality of abuse and neglect. Which is love. Love that is free of evil and full of goodness.

May we be filled to the full and overflowing.

About to spew,

Ashellen

Feelings vs. reality

Flannery O'Connor is knocking my socks off right now.

From her writing, I can tell she has an ample supply of the following: Southern colloquialisms, insight, and gusto. And I must say that I fancy all of above.

Like Flannery, I am learning in starts and stops. Life does not come in clear categories or bowtie ballistics, but it does come. In your face. Now. Graceful one moment, torrential the next.

And yet, what I feel is not reality. If there's one thing that I could say has been my defining moment the past few months, it is this realization: what I feel is not reality. This is HUGE.

The reason it is HUGE is because it has enabled me to take a step back from moments of confusion, sadness, anger, apathy, moments in which I would have ordinarily labeled my life in accordance with my feelings and wallowed in discontent. It has enabled me to step back and separate the wheat from the chaff, so to speak. The real from the perceived reality. These are two separate things, and sadly, much damage is done when they are equated.

Not to say that we don't sometimes have accurate perceptions. There is a place for discernment, for being wise as serpents (and innocent as doves). But I think part of discernment is stepping back from our feelings, too---and really weighing what we're seeing. This does not mean that we discount our feelings--they have a purpose. They can tip us off when something is not quite right or is wonderful. They can be useful. They can also be misguiding. All in all, they must be faced for what they are--feelings, not reality.

I think that our feelings should not be something to fear or worship. They should be recognized as parts of us, just like the color of our hair, or size of our feet. They can be a good thing in our lives when seen in proper perspective. When given full authority, they can choke out the good and distort our view of reality.

I think that I have it on good authority to write on this subject for the following reasons:

• I am not a purely rational person that discounts the purpose and experience of feelings.
• I understand that feelings are beautiful, powerful, and have the ability to express deep parts of a person that little else can.
  
• I am myself a person that has more feelings than I know what to do with (honesty) ---In other words, I am a hot mess :)

Flannery O'Connor is a hot mess too. In my words, not hers. I don't think she would understand the label----until I had the chance to explain it to her, of course.

Just some thoughts,

Ashellen