It’s Monday again.
I’m listening to U2. “…sometimes you can’t make it on your own…” Feeling the deep truths in those words this morning.
I’m chewing gum – trident mint in the dark blue package.
(little known fact – I can’t stand mint flavor in anything except gum and toothpaste.)
My nose is itchy. They say that means that it is beginning to heal.
The itchy nose is stretching my self-discipline. The guy who pierced it lectured me about how our fingers and hands are very dirty – teeming with bacteria and so forth. “Don’t touch the piercing – that’s how you get infections!” So I’m sitting her, crinkling my nose every so often, hoping to relieve the occasional itches in that fashion.
The day after I got the piercing, I crawled out of my sleeping bag at the friend’s house I was staying at, and stumble groggily across the hall to use the bathroom. As I looked in the mirror, I wondered, “What is that thing on my face?” And then it all came back to me.
(another little known fact – because of my extremely weird vision – nearsighted in one eye and far sighted in the other – a lazy eye and astigmatism – I can see my nose at all times in the corner of my line of vision. I can now see a tiny sparkling object in my nose at all times – thus making the nose piercing the perfect constant reminder of the redemption and healing of Jesus that I’ve received).
There’s a weird atmosphere going on in the building again today. Apparently an important meeting over the weekend went poorly, lots of airing of old grudges, lots of infighting. I heard the description and thought “This is why Christians have a bad reputation. Two perfectly respectable organizations, founded on Biblical principles, doing good works both here and abroad, and there is ridiculous infighting and bearing of grudges.” There’s a lot of hurt and anger in the air today. I’m glad I wasn’t at the meeting. It’s hard to bear just the results.
A good friend is moving back to Calgary. I’m glad. Tea dates are much easier to have when you live in the same province and city.
Plans are taking shape for at least a month abroad early in the new year.
U2 is playing because I once again feel as if I’m fighting through something. U2 makes me feel as if I might just make it to the other side of the fight.
I need to get back to a routine of stretching, breathing, lighting candles and incense and slowing down.
I need to sit with a journal and sort out some thoughts, feelings, prayers from the weekend.
I need to go to the store where I purchased my camera last week and get the price adjusted.
I need to arrange a phone call with a dear friend sometime this week.
I need to sit with my budget, and figure out how long exactly I can afford to spend abroad in the new year while still covering the rent at my home here.
I need to do some prep work for hosting 24 hours of prayer in my living room this coming weekend.
I need to remember to breathe.
Monday, November 05, 2007
Question of the Day
I eat lunch with the same coworker almost every day. She loves to ask big questions about faith and life and God and scripture, and see how I respond. We call it the "question of the day".
Today, she told me at coffee break that the "question of the day" is "What does God think about euthanasia?" Cause that's a happy conversation over lunch!
Thinking and praying about how I want to respond to that one...
Wondering how some of you would respond... leave comments if you feel like telling me how you'd answer that question!
Today, she told me at coffee break that the "question of the day" is "What does God think about euthanasia?" Cause that's a happy conversation over lunch!
Thinking and praying about how I want to respond to that one...
Wondering how some of you would respond... leave comments if you feel like telling me how you'd answer that question!
Henri Nouwen on Poverty and the Church
I'm back. I have a pierced nose. I'm processing slowly. I promise pictures, and a full account of the weekend sometime soon. However, in the meantime, I have several challenging comments from Henri Nouwen on poverty and the church, and poverty in the church for you to mull over.
Going to the Margins of the Church
Those who are marginal in the world are central in the Church, and that is how it is supposed to be! Thus we are called as members of the Church to keep going to the margins of our society. The homeless, the starving, parentless children, people with AIDS, our emotionally disturbed brothers and sisters - they require our first attention.
We can trust that when we reach out with all our energy to the margins of our society we will discover that petty disagreements, fruitless debates, and paralysing rivalries will recede and gradually vanish. The Church will always be renewed when our attention shifts from ourselves to those who need our care. The blessing of Jesus always comes to us through the poor. The most remarkable experience of those who work with the poor is that, in the end, the poor give more than they receive. They give food to us.
Who Are the Poor?
The poor are the center of the Church. But who are the poor? At first we might think of people who are not like us: people who live in slums, people who go to soup kitchens, people who sleep on the streets, people in prisons, mental hospitals, and nursing homes. But the poor can be very close. They can be in our own families, churches or workplaces. Even closer, the poor can be ourselves, who feel unloved, rejected, ignored, or abused.
It is precisely when we see and experience poverty - whether far away, close by, or in our own hearts - that we need to become the Church; that is hold hands as brothers and sisters, confess our own brokenness and need, forgive one another, heal one another's wounds, and gather around the table of Jesus for the breaking of the bread. Thus, as the poor we recognise Jesus, who became poor for us.
Becoming the Church of the Poor
When we claim our own poverty and connect our poverty with the poverty of our brothers and sisters, we become the Church of the poor, which is the Church of Jesus. Solidarity is essential for the Church of the poor . Both pain and joy must be shared. As one body we will experience deeply one another's agonies as well as one another's ecstasies. As Paul says: "If one part is hurt, all the parts share its pain. And if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy" (1 Corinthians 12:26).
Often we might prefer not to be part of the body because it makes us feel the pain of others so intensely. Every time we love others deeply we feel their pain deeply. However, joy is hidden in the pain. When we share the pain we also will share the joy.
The Poverty of Our Leaders
There is a tendency to think about poverty, suffering, and pain as realities that happen primarily or even exclusively at the bottom of our Church. We seldom think of our leaders as poor. Still, there is great poverty, deep loneliness, painful isolation, real depression, and much emotional suffering at the top of our Church.
We need the courage to acknowledge the suffering of the leaders of our Church - its ministers, priests, bishops, and popes - and include them in this fellowship of the weak. When we are not distracted by the power, wealth, and success of those who offer leadership, we will soon discover their powerlessness, poverty, and failures and feel free to reach out to them with the same compassion we want to give to those at the bottom. In God's eyes there is no distance between bottom and top. There shouldn't be in our eyes either.
Going to the Margins of the Church
Those who are marginal in the world are central in the Church, and that is how it is supposed to be! Thus we are called as members of the Church to keep going to the margins of our society. The homeless, the starving, parentless children, people with AIDS, our emotionally disturbed brothers and sisters - they require our first attention.
We can trust that when we reach out with all our energy to the margins of our society we will discover that petty disagreements, fruitless debates, and paralysing rivalries will recede and gradually vanish. The Church will always be renewed when our attention shifts from ourselves to those who need our care. The blessing of Jesus always comes to us through the poor. The most remarkable experience of those who work with the poor is that, in the end, the poor give more than they receive. They give food to us.
Who Are the Poor?
The poor are the center of the Church. But who are the poor? At first we might think of people who are not like us: people who live in slums, people who go to soup kitchens, people who sleep on the streets, people in prisons, mental hospitals, and nursing homes. But the poor can be very close. They can be in our own families, churches or workplaces. Even closer, the poor can be ourselves, who feel unloved, rejected, ignored, or abused.
It is precisely when we see and experience poverty - whether far away, close by, or in our own hearts - that we need to become the Church; that is hold hands as brothers and sisters, confess our own brokenness and need, forgive one another, heal one another's wounds, and gather around the table of Jesus for the breaking of the bread. Thus, as the poor we recognise Jesus, who became poor for us.
Becoming the Church of the Poor
When we claim our own poverty and connect our poverty with the poverty of our brothers and sisters, we become the Church of the poor, which is the Church of Jesus. Solidarity is essential for the Church of the poor . Both pain and joy must be shared. As one body we will experience deeply one another's agonies as well as one another's ecstasies. As Paul says: "If one part is hurt, all the parts share its pain. And if one part is honored, all the parts share its joy" (1 Corinthians 12:26).
Often we might prefer not to be part of the body because it makes us feel the pain of others so intensely. Every time we love others deeply we feel their pain deeply. However, joy is hidden in the pain. When we share the pain we also will share the joy.
The Poverty of Our Leaders
There is a tendency to think about poverty, suffering, and pain as realities that happen primarily or even exclusively at the bottom of our Church. We seldom think of our leaders as poor. Still, there is great poverty, deep loneliness, painful isolation, real depression, and much emotional suffering at the top of our Church.
We need the courage to acknowledge the suffering of the leaders of our Church - its ministers, priests, bishops, and popes - and include them in this fellowship of the weak. When we are not distracted by the power, wealth, and success of those who offer leadership, we will soon discover their powerlessness, poverty, and failures and feel free to reach out to them with the same compassion we want to give to those at the bottom. In God's eyes there is no distance between bottom and top. There shouldn't be in our eyes either.
Friday, November 02, 2007
Heading out
I'm leaving town for the weekend, and I don't think I'm taking my laptop with me, so it'll probably be quiet around here for a few days.
Jason Upton is playing a conference in Red Deer. I've been looking forward to this all year. A whole group of us, staying at the home of some dear friends in Gull Lake, hanging out, praying and worshiping together.
I'm taking one of my youth kids along with me. Pray for us, would you please? This is a girl with some pretty big stuff going on in her life right now. Scary stuff. Hard stuff. Good stuff too. I arranged to just have her in my car on the way up. Two hours to just catch up, debrief the week a little before going into the weekend.
Pray for me, too. I tend to neglect myself in order to care for others, and the young woman I'm taking with me needs a lot of care right now. I'm really asking Jesus for the wisdom to know when to step back and allow myself to be ministered to, to receive, to go to the deep places.
I'm getting my nose pierced this afternoon. Meeting Kari in Red Deer, and the three of us (her, me, and my youth girl) are going together to the piercing place. I'm a huge fan of the whole "marker stone" concept. I like really physical things that remind me of the important God moments in my life. My bedroom is full of things like that - artwork, photos, stones, candles, and so on. I want to mark the healing that Jesus gave me two years ago with a physical reminder on my body - so I'm piercing my nose. I want to be reminded every time I look in the mirror of the work of healing and redemption that Jesus has worked in my life.
My baby brother is having surgery at this moment, and he's heavily on my mind and in my prayers. They're trying to correct a problem that has prevented him from playing his guitar for the last year. Pray for him, too, if you think of it. I'll call home from Red Deer tonight to find out how things went.
I picked up my rental car a little while ago. Red. Mazda 6. Managed to figure out how to adjust the seat up - when I first got in I thought I was going to have to sit on a pillow to do the driving today - I couldn't see over the steering wheel properly! (the many disadvantages of being 5 foot 2!)
Need to finish packing, and head out to do some errands before I pick up my youth girl and head out for the weekend!
See you Sunday or Monday!
Jason Upton is playing a conference in Red Deer. I've been looking forward to this all year. A whole group of us, staying at the home of some dear friends in Gull Lake, hanging out, praying and worshiping together.
I'm taking one of my youth kids along with me. Pray for us, would you please? This is a girl with some pretty big stuff going on in her life right now. Scary stuff. Hard stuff. Good stuff too. I arranged to just have her in my car on the way up. Two hours to just catch up, debrief the week a little before going into the weekend.
Pray for me, too. I tend to neglect myself in order to care for others, and the young woman I'm taking with me needs a lot of care right now. I'm really asking Jesus for the wisdom to know when to step back and allow myself to be ministered to, to receive, to go to the deep places.
I'm getting my nose pierced this afternoon. Meeting Kari in Red Deer, and the three of us (her, me, and my youth girl) are going together to the piercing place. I'm a huge fan of the whole "marker stone" concept. I like really physical things that remind me of the important God moments in my life. My bedroom is full of things like that - artwork, photos, stones, candles, and so on. I want to mark the healing that Jesus gave me two years ago with a physical reminder on my body - so I'm piercing my nose. I want to be reminded every time I look in the mirror of the work of healing and redemption that Jesus has worked in my life.
My baby brother is having surgery at this moment, and he's heavily on my mind and in my prayers. They're trying to correct a problem that has prevented him from playing his guitar for the last year. Pray for him, too, if you think of it. I'll call home from Red Deer tonight to find out how things went.
I picked up my rental car a little while ago. Red. Mazda 6. Managed to figure out how to adjust the seat up - when I first got in I thought I was going to have to sit on a pillow to do the driving today - I couldn't see over the steering wheel properly! (the many disadvantages of being 5 foot 2!)
Need to finish packing, and head out to do some errands before I pick up my youth girl and head out for the weekend!
See you Sunday or Monday!
Thursday, November 01, 2007
2 Years Depression Free
This is a photo from this morning. I'm loving photos of clouds lately, and, as I was walking through the park, this moment with the sun, coming through the trees and the heavy grey clouds stopped me in my tracks.
I went to my favorite park - a place that over the last year has become the place I go to think, to pray, to meet with God. I've gone there in most of the moments when I most desperately needed to process, to think, to sort things out, to journal, to pray.
I went there this morning because today, November 1, 2007, I am celebrating two years depression free. I took the day off work today, and I am celebrating with a retreat day, a day to rest, to restore, to catch up. Two years ago today, I had one of the most incredible encounters of my life, walking around a neighborhood in a blizzard, and sitting in the dark in a dear friend's car. That night, out of desperation, after seven years of depression, many of those full of moments where I quite simply wanted my life to end, I let my friend do what he'd been asking me to let him do for much of the previous year. I let my friend lead me in front of Jesus. And though we never directly asked for healing, something changed, and (though it took me three months to fully believe it) Jesus took my depression, and I've been depression free ever since.
So today, I'm celebrating. I'm hanging out with Jesus. And I started in the park. This has been a day filled with simple moments. No major, profound encounters, just the knowledge of the presence of Jesus, and a heart filled with joy.
This is me, at the park this morning. I bought a camera this week, and it has this great feature that lets me see the picture of myself I'm taking, while I'm taking it.
This is the spot, by the creek that I often sit in. It's also the spot, where, one morning about a month ago, I went wading. I built an altar in this spot about a month ago too. It's my spot - I go, I talk to Jesus there. That's what I did this morning, too. I went, I talked to Jesus. I wanted to say thank you. I threw a few stones, took a few photos, and simply soaked in the knowledge that two years ago my life looked really different.
Today is about celebrating and saying thank you. Later tonight I'm leading a Bible study, and I'll serve them my favorite cake (which I bought last night). They don't necessarily need to know what we're celebrating (though if they ask I'll tell them), but I want to celebrate.
Tomorrow I'm headed out of town for the weekend. To see Jason Upton play a conference. To be with dear friends. To get my nose pierced. To continue the celebration.
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