The In-Between

We are currently church orphans. I guess that term is preferable to church shoppers, and it feels more emotionally appropriate because we left our church after discovering it was moving in a different direction from us. To be blunt, it felt like it had already left us, and we had just received the news.

This post isn't about our former church. We love our family there and the work they are doing in the name of our Savior in the city and world.

We just feel saddened.

Correction: Bob feels frustrated. I feel saddened. Deeply so. So I guess my deep sadness averaged with his frustration equals general sadness. Or irritability. I don't know. We're just grieving, okay?

When people ask if our choice to leave was a private matter, the honest answer is that it was not so much personal as it was based on personal convictions. And we recognize not everyone shares these personal convictions.

It's never easy to leave a church, and it's especially hard when there isn't a plan b. We weren't like those serial daters who identify their next prospect before they write the Dear John letter. So it would have been much easier to stay and see if things changed, making it clear we did not agree and giving disclaimers when we invited friends to church. After all, that was how we had been doing it before we learned the info that caused us to reconsider our attendance. However, our loving Daddy has our family in a path and community where that wasn't an option, given what we had learned. We knew that we were called to leave and trust that the next home would be waiting for us.

While I contemplated our current circumstance of living in-between, I began to see how our family may no longer fit in to many churches we once did. In the past, speaking from the pulpit about issues like LGBTQ rights, racism, and gender equality were a nice-to-have, but did not define where we would be planting our tushes each Sunday morning. Now, though, we are hungry for spaces that are intentional in diversity, that practice radical grace and inclusion and provide opportunities for all people.

A friend who had gone through a similar maturation in his faith once shared a faith development model with me. He pointed out that, as a person grows beyond conventional faith constructs, it can look to others like "backsliding" because it goes outside of established structures. He himself had been rebuked for his spiritual development, and he ended up leaving his faith community to find one that allowed him to keep growing.

I have been working on a project for the past year, interviewing people who have left their faith communities and listening to their stories. My friend is not alone in saying he feels closer to God than ever before but distant from the concept of church. This is where I feel like our human attempts can get in the way of divine relationship. We create rules and standards and practices to maintain order, but they can start to cloud out the Reason for gathering in the first place.

And so we have an endless flow of congregants moving from one church to the next in search of authentic community and potential for healing and/or growth.
And so we have house churches that defy the format which many are no longer responding to, welcoming the spiritually hungry with the hospitality of the home.
And so we have church orphans who are wondering if they even fit in anywhere.

As for my family, we have peace in the mourning. We have turned this into an adventure for the kiddos and are praying that we can create safe spaces for others who feel abandoned by human structures. Our prayer is that they - like we - never feel abandoned by the One who designed the Church, regardless of its flaws from mortals' interpretations.

I spent some time yesterday in nature feeling all the feels and being honest about where I am. I wrote about how I'm used to going through phases of doubt and trial, but then I know the reward that awaits me.  This one, though, is particularly puzzling. Part of that is because I recently came out of a year-long Dark Night of the Soul, which I am still piecing together...or deconstructing...or whatever it is you do with such a mind- and heart-altering season. The point is that I don't know what is waiting for me. I feel like I'm in a free-fall, and I know God is going to catch me - that isn't a question - but I have no idea where or how. Will it be underwater? Will it be on a spaceship? Seriously, that is how disoriented I am by all this.

Driving home from my respite, I tried to use voice command on my iPhone to pull up an encouraging song I'd recently heard. I tried multiple requests, but it kept pulling up some subpar instrumental rendition. I finally tried it one last time, using the name of the group. Instead of what I was requesting - "Through It All/It Is Well" - I heard the following song. I hope it will bless you, stun you, or reduce you to grateful tears as it did me.

Thick Skin and the Girl Who Doesn't Have It

“I’m not political,” I said.
“Must be nice,” she replied.

Know what’s weird about this conversation? I don’t remember with whom I was speaking. It has transcended an actual setting and characters. All I recall is that I was in a majority class - white, Christian, straight, able-bodied, whatever - and my friend was not.

This simple dialogue has taken place in various ways on more than one occasion, boring itself deeper and deeper into my psyche, each time convicting me that I enjoy privilege I have not earned.

These conversation partners would prefer to have the luxury to say, “Need I speak up on this issue? Nah, I’m good.” They do not eagerly await the opportunity to be the person who has to take a stand, to advocate on their and/or their loved ones’ behalf on controversial issues. But they do it because that is how they have earned rights - or reclaimed them, in some cases. That is how they bring attention to their plight, because a lot of the rest of us don’t get it.

I haven’t gotten it in the past, and I’d bet a fair amount of these friends would say I still don’t. But I’m learning that I don’t get it, which I’d like to think would evoke a small nod from Socrates.

These friends have absurdly thick skins from having to be the designated killjoy, saying, “This isn’t okay,” when we in the majority assume it is. So when I started watching them experience fear from different actions taking place in our country, I knew it was a big deal. I felt sad because I loved them, and, I admit, I was anxious for them, too. I kept reminding myself about the guidance in Philippians 4:6 to “be anxious for nothing,” instead taking care of such predicaments with prayer and thanksgiving; nevertheless, the stress over their struggles was pervasive.

Then a weird thing happened to me: I went into a depression. As the news piled on, each item affecting a specific person for whom I cared deeply, the rending of my heart worsened. I assumed it was a grief reaction, which it was. But that wasn’t the whole story.

I was pouring out my sorrow to one of my marginalized friends named Shai, expecting empathy from her and a brainstorming session on how to Galatians 6:2 the current immeasurable burden I believed she was facing. Instead, she shrugged. “Yeah, it’s just Tuesday for us.”*

That said it all.

I was doubled-over from a teaspoon of the reality she drinks throughout every day. 

My pale skin was too thin to handle what hers had endured during our equal lengths of stay on this planet. We had similar backstories of a difficult home life and bad relationships, but she had experience from a societal component that I could not comprehend, which thus allowed her to walk through bizarre and intense situations without crumbling.

Yes, she felt fear, but it was no greater than that which she had learned to cope with at school, in the workplace, even riding public transportation.

This feelization that I was receiving a compressed file of some of those sensations - a kind of cultural sensitivity intensive training - helped me to sit with my depression instead of fight it. In that space, I had to confess with no small amount of shame that there had been many times I had practiced a compassion borne of intellect, not heart. 

Though both are forms of compassion and share a goal of honoring another’s suffering, intellectual compassion maintains a distance. It’s like the city-dweller who visits her uncle’s farm with genuine offers to help, as long as it doesn’t mean getting dirt under her fingernails. It isn’t that she’s trying to be condescending; she just doesn’t know what farming is all about.

I do a lot of apologizing these days. I’m okay with that. That’s where I’m trying to develop my thick skin: Recognizing and owning up to how many times I’ve gotten it wrong in the past. Perhaps it’s a sign of maturity to reflect on our mistakes, take responsibility for them, and promise we’ll make even more in the future. Or maybe it’s just an indication my friends should sign a disclaimer when they agree to join my life.

Either way, to my friends who are not of my demographic, I’m sorry for the times when you’ve needed heartfelt compassion and all I had to offer you was the intellectual kind. Please forgive me for thinking I could opt out on things that directly affected you. I’m trying to put my love into action so I can be the type of good neighbor Jesus talked about in the story He told in Luke 10:25-37 - you know, the one where the hero was from a different religion and culture than His own.

To that last point, my friend Sebastien, one of my favorite humanists, asked me recently if Christianity shaped my belief in social justice. I answered with honesty: Not entirely. Because Christianity, like any belief system, has human flaws and limitations. What has most shaped my belief in social justice is Jesus. When I spend time reading about His life - words, actions, attitudes, scripture He quoted, friends He chose - I can’t help but want to live mine in a way that brings out the best in others. (Then I pray He’ll fill in the gaps when I don’t.)

So, to all of you, thank you for loving me despite my biases and shortsightedness. If it means anything, I’m depressed because I care so freakin’ much about you. When I get a thicker skin to go with my tenderized heart, let's get down to business, okay?

Freely you have received; freely give.

Matthew 10:8 (NIV)





* - Shai asked me to clarify that she can't take credit for her pithy remark, but was actually quoting Samuel L. Jackson.

My Ambivalent Fallout with a Bush: A Story of Unexpected Restoration

Last December, we had our front and back yards turned into desert landscaping. They went from being full of dirt, weeds, a big mulberry tree that pigeons pooped from, and a thorny bougainvillea, to being full of rocks, desert plants, a smaller tree that pigeons disdain, and a wispy bush with orange flowers.

We were enamored.

And then the weeds started. They got out of control. We tried to fight them, but we had to have professionals come in.

We were disappointed.

The weeds grew, and our citrus tree in back died.

We were dismayed.

The weeds grew, our citrus tree in back died, and the plants in front began to die.

We were disgruntled.

And then the beautiful soft bush that had replaced our sinister bougainvillea started to wilt.

I was disheartened.

Attempts to reach the landscaper who planted the bush yielded little result, and our gentle green plant with the orange flowers succumbed to little black dots we learned were called aphids - or the more visceral term "plant lice".

Every day, I could barely stand to look outside at the yellowed, broken carcass. I felt sickened by the sight of it. Since I wasn't comfortable with this sensation, I repackaged it into feeling livid. I felt abandoned, and that bush was evidence of it.

It's embarrassing how long it took me to realize what I was projecting onto that bush. Yes, I was angry that I could not get help for our yard and for this lovely creation that had saved my children from pricked fingers while framing our house perfectly. But it was more than that. While this disintegration of our outside yard was occurring, my reality was being inverted inside our home.

I felt neglected by my own Creator.

But I knew I couldn't let that be the end of the story. He wired me to be too stubborn to let something called plant lice win this battle.

So I declared life over our little dead bush. In doing so, I prayed that my Creator would again turn His face toward me. I reached out to an advisor who assisted me in taking bold and measured steps to get the attention of the landscaper. It worked: he immediately got to work on attending to the neglect. Today, our bush showed these signs of life:

If you look closely, you can see bright green sprouting out of the brown and yellow. It's a true visual of this song.

It's also a reflection of how I'm feeling: I have my Creator's attention, and He is bringing new life out of my former self. At last He heard; at last He delivered me.

I sought the Lord, and He answered me and delivered me from all my fears. Those who look to Him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed. This poor [wo]man cried, and the Lord heard [her] and saved [her] out of all [her] troubles.
Psalm 34:4-6 

In all this, I felt inexplicably compelled to read about how caterpillars become butterflies. We all know they crawl into a cocoon, hang out for a bit, then emerge in flight, right? I even shared one of my favorite quotes about this in a previous post.

Only it isn't true. Well, not for butterflies. For moths and other insects, yes.

But butterfly caterpillars actually harden their bodies into a chrysalis, and then their insides turn into goo. Goo! Here's where it gets even crazier: They have these things in that goo called imaginal discs that use the protein around them to grow into new shapes - legs, antennae, wings. In other words, they were carrying the precursors for their butterfly selves (Version 2.0, you could say) all along. Now that their old selves have been completely destroyed, their new selves can take shape into what they were meant to be all along!

Our Creator doesn't just have one set of 2D blueprints. His blueprints have many layers, and many dimensions. But His vision for us can only be realized when we go through those times of being dismantled, being broken, feeling neglected, crying out to Him. Every restoration story must have a before and a point of change so the after means anything.

I guess this might even require a new term. Because often the type of restoration He has in mind isn't the kind the bush experienced - returning to its previous state of flourishing - but instead into a new form like the caterpillar into the butterfly. So I'm going with a hybrid of restoration and transformation: Restormation.

Restormation is what my friend Rachel in grade school experienced when she lost her straight hair to a disease, and it grew back full and curly.

Restormation is what my friend Aubrey went through when her baby Shalom stopped growing inside her, leading Aubrey to write openly about grief and pregnancy loss to encourage other women broken by this taboo tragedy.

Restormation is what my friend Tammy proclaims as she shares her story of spiritual abuse and gender discrimination, which has strengthened her to be a strong leader and a powerful yet humble advocate for women in ministry.

Restormation is what my friends Renee and Tina and Kit and Brittney and so many many many others live every single day as they declare, "I am a new creation!" and love with the compassion of women who have accepted the reality of their childhood trauma and allowed the Healer to breathe life into the carcass of what was, encouraging countless lives and their own children in the possiblity of what can be.

Whether it's restoration or restormation, we can trust life will come in some way when we seek the Creator and Redeemer. The green will reappear, the butterfly will take flight, the broken heart will feel in new ways. Some work will always be required, and it may even feel like death at times. But our Creator installed His own special kind of imaginal discs in us. Don't you want to see what yours might become?

Where Are My Eagle Wings?

I'm working hard on CAST #2: Restoration, an event for women focusing on both brokenness & God's restorative vision for creation. My personal drama is this: I'm currently in a complicated relationship with restoration. 

As I've previously written, I recently went through a confusingly dry season of waiting & clinging.  It's been jet-black darkness at countless times, with equally innumerable false-starts of returning to daylight.

All the while, I've been holding to the hope-inflating notion that when I reach daylight there will be a tangible sense of restoration. I'm not expecting much, just the emotional equivalent of a homecoming parade. And maybe some fireworks, the kind that create shimmering hearts inside of circles and change colors.

But now that I appear to be standing in the sunshine again - grief, health issues, sleep deprivation, and family concerns relatively resolved - I still feel residual numbness. And not that tingly-numbness that your foot does to say, "Okay, okay, I'm waking up!"

Just basic, anticlimactic numbness. 

My counseling background keeps tapping me on the shoulder with, "Well, you know, you've been through some trauma recently," and, "Hey, grief takes many forms." All that is true, and I have been giving myself heaping shovelfuls of grace daily.

But shouldn't there be some kind of surge of joy upon reentry into the land of the living? Couldn't there at least be a small float or one marching band?

I waited on the Lord, Isaiah, so where are the eagle wings and superhuman running capabilities you talked about in Chapter 40, verse 31?

Then again...could it be that I am mixing up restoration with resolution? Because, come to think of it, I know a lot of folks who have seen an end to the storms in their lives, but still no rainbow.

If that is the case, how do we summon the rainbow?

Until the answer comes, you can find me sitting in gratitude in this new sunlight. Because, irrespective of the numbness, I am deeply grateful to be out of that darkness. And so I will choose to praise even when I don't feel it.

("Joy" by Page CXVI)

Snowflake Vigil: A How-To for Grief and Young Ones

I mentioned in an earlier post that I may do a "snowflake vigil" with my kiddos, all under age 4, regarding the tragic mass shooting at Pulse, a gay club in Orlando. It's critical to start an ongoing conversation with them even now about loving others, respecting all, and advocacy. If we claim to love Jesus, whose heart was all about justice, we need to also claim verses like this one: 


Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves; ensure justice for those being crushed.
Proverbs 31:8 (NLT)

I talked with my twin 18-month-old sons first, holding a piece of pink paper (it was the only color I could find) and folding it into quadrants. I talked about how good love feels, and that love helps others. I said that someone had made a bad decision that had hurt a lot of people. Each person is made by God and important to Him, so they are important to us, too. 

If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.
1 John 4:20 (NASB)

As I talked, I cut the paper. One of my boys even ripped a piece for me. I then opened it to show them the snowflake we had made, emphasizing again that each person is unique, and Mommy was sad today because these unique people were hurt by someone who was scared and did not show love toward others. "We won't let hate or fear in this house, okay?" They were squirming, so we said a prayer together for the families, and that God will help us to love and help others.

I did a snowflake with my almost-4-year-old daughter on her own, because I knew she'd want to take over the process. We talked about how it hurts when others don't like us or are mean. I repeated that everyone is created by God and loved by Him, and I told her some of the names of the people who "got hurt" by the person who made a bad decision. When I finished talking and praying with her, she wanted to make her own snowflake. We hung up all three snowflakes in our living room so we can point to them and talk about how everyone matters.

It was all very quick, but it established that we are a family who talks about things and how we can take action. It also gave me a chance to grieve these lives lost - and to let my kids see me care, because they need to know what that looks like.

Snowflake Vigil

Sadness isn't an easy feeling for us. Anger is easy because it's in motion. It helps us feel like we're doing something. But sadness has a purpose - if nothing else, 'Inside Out' should have taught us that.

Yes, we need to be angry about what happened yesterday in Orlando. I'm pissed like a bee-stung mama bear that anyone would so brutally harm my fellow beloved creations of God, that my LGBTQ brothers & sisters yet again feel victimized.

But, my friends, we still need to mourn! We must not rush past this moment to reflect on each of these unique lives lost or compromised in this tragedy.

In less than a month, we have been outraged by restrooms, a gorilla/parenting controversy, a rapist, and now this mass shooting. And all this anger eventually leads to outrage fatigue - AKA apathy & inaction. We owe it to our fellow humans today to mourn, to grieve each of their lives, to not bypass our sadness, running straight to anger and - as we flawed creatures often do - careen into hatred (no matter how we righteously justify it). Anger & action can then follow, but our hearts need to feel the weight of the loss first to guide our next steps.

Today, I will be teaching my kids to hold space for these lives, to sit with the sadness as I would want others to do for us. They're too young for candles, so maybe we'll make snowflakes and talk about loving one another. Please take time to grieve with us today.

Unsent

Dear Shawn,
It has been exactly 10 years since we met. If you hadn't left this earth that day in July, I wouldn't have realized this. I also wouldn't find myself tearing up at thoughts of eating toast at a family restaurant, or searching intensely through my CD collection for that scratched-up disc with "Trudy" scrawled on it which we found in a parking lot, deciding I absolutely must keep it.

You had been burned by a coworker; I had been burned by a workplace. We were partners on the job and cautious to engage personally. I discovered you had advocated for me to get the position, even though you hadn't known me. Screw the boundaries - that endeared you to me forever.

Advocating is what you did, who you were. You were a social worker in every cell of your body.

We worked with kids, but neither of us had any; neither of us wanted any. You succeeded in that goal. I'm deliriously happy with my failure there.

I'm going to miss you, even though we haven't seen each other in over five years. I had invited you to my birthday party when my parents still lived in Michigan; you couldn't make it because you were studying for your social work exam. Always so dedicated. I was proud of you, regardless of the outcome of that standardized test.

We talked on the phone, through the Internet and, our shared favorite, by written correspondence. I came across one in a pile the other day - a card you had written me after I had become a mother. In your characteristic fashion, you ran out of room and took your expansive, blooming printed letters onto a small stack of notes piled within it. That handwriting encapsulated my mental depiction of you: welcoming, flowing, not concerned about limits or minutiae.

You once handed me a CD by the band Keane. You'd bought it thinking it was Kanye (West) and were disappointed by the purchase. You weren't embarrassed by the mistake; you moved forward with transparency and laughter, then gave the  album to someone you thought might appreciate the music.

You gave. Without thought or pretense, you just handed things to me to keep. Many became treasures. (Keane did not.) I admired how pragmatic you were, all the while housing a sensitive heart that could tap into others' needs and address them. 

I have the ornate clock you gave for our wedding. Not on our registry, nothing I would have thought to seek out, but it's one of my favorite presents because it was gilded with careful thoughtfulness. It hasn't had batteries in it in years, but it has always held a place of prominence in our home, a beautiful reminder of the joy of unexpected gifts.

I'm endlessly grateful God brought us together for our season. You helped me recognize my caffeine dependency, I gave you a copy of 'Jesus Calling'. I'll never forget your allegation that the author, Sarah Young, was stalking you based on how timely her insights were per devotion.

We talked about life beyond small talk and clichéd philosophies. We talked experience, perception, theory, hope, and you regularly challenged me without a verbal confrontation. You were not made squeamish by the underbelly of humanity, didn't shy away from the darkness of living; it was all part of the story. All part of the richness of the discussion.

You told me about the illness while we were walking on treadmills. It was our only shared workout, but had I not moved out of state I'm certain we would have had many more. Your dad had been diagnosed, and it appeared your sister would be, too. It was troubling, but you could cope because that's what you knew how to do.

A few years later, you told me you were diagnosed. I didn't know what that meant until your communications became more disorganized, your planning less long-range. We talked on the phone, and you were approaching the final stages of grief - I had missed the first three, although you probably continued to bounce in and out of them.

It became harder to know how you were. We didn't share a friend group, so when you wouldn't return messages I didn't know what to think. I'd just pray and wait.

You were going through so much loss in your life, and I kept a distance so as not to add the stress of updating your absent friend. You chided me for that. I saved that voicemail. As long as my iPhone allows it, I'll keep it.

Your mom was the one who took over communique after you could no longer text. She was gracious and kind, despite grieving the loss of her partner and the impending loss of a daughter, both to the same black hole. She reminded me of the ladybug outfit you two picked out for my daughter when she was a newborn. It resides in a "keep-me" box, its color faded from frequent wearings.

I cried when she said you were in a coma. My kids didn't know what to make of my tears. The boys were still infants, but I sat my daughter down with the 24-piece puzzle you'd given her and explained who you were and that you would be seeing Jesus soon.

You went home to Him later that week. My daughter put the puzzle together for the first time after the news came from your mom. It was the best tribute I could imagine.

It's the holidays, when we think of those we love, and even more so those we have lost. I am approaching my birthday again, remembering the one you had to miss. I'm not sure why I'm sitting in this memory in particular, but it is an honor to have it to wrap around me because it reminds me that I wanted you there and you wanted to be there and we existed in one another's hearts. And, in the end, isn't that what true friendship is?

Thank you, Shawn, for journeying with me, sharing with me, and coaxing me out to play. Thank you for being consistently you.

By His grace & in His time,
--j