Where I'm at...

It has been an interesting sort of week, one that in reality is the culmination of a couple of months worth of things. I’ve spent a chunk of the day trying to figure out in my mind how to sum it up. I spent an hour sitting with my computer in my lap this afternoon, writing – ranting really – about the state of my life just presently. And I’m sitting here now, getting ready to clean and condense those rants into something I can put here, to frame them thoughtfully, and hopefully truthfully. So, I’m sitting here with only the light of the computer screen, and the three candles I’ve taken to lighting lately when I want to do some thinking and meditating. I’m intensely aware of my surroundings, of the noise of someone attempting a skateboard trick over and over in the parking lot across the street, of the reflections of the light from my screen onto my glasses, of the dampness of the hair at the base of my neck, because I’ve just come from laying in a hot bath to read, of the heat generated by the computer warming my thighs as it rests on my lap.

Here’s the best I can do: I’m really struggling right now. I’m feeling somewhat over my head, somewhat discouraged, somewhat angry, and just plain exhausted. And I’m tired of feeling all of these things, and I wish I could avoid them entirely, but they continue to make themselves known quite regularly.

I’m wrestling, this week in particular with some church related things. If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ll know that I made a major church switch last fall, from a church that had been my home and family for nearly three years, to the church in which I grew up, the church my dad pastors. There were lots of reasons for the switch, it was a long, complex and deeply painful decision making process, and I felt nothing but relief when it finally came to a close.

I’m not feeling that relief any more. I was always hesitant about returning to my dad’s church. It had been the source of many wounds and sore spots over the years, but, after many hours of prayer and seeking the guidance of God, and many long conversations with those I trust as friends and advisors, I went ahead.

It has been very hard. I have spent much of my life looking for a place to belong, for a sense of acceptance and community. That existed in some small extent in my previous church. It doesn’t in my dad’s church. I am volunteering with the youth, and rediscovering how different my personality is from your standard youth leader. I hate the surface things, and I hate youth events. I’ve always hated youth events – especially as a teenager. I tolerated them then, because my youth leader made a point to drive me home last, and we usually got twenty minutes or so of meaningful conversation in at the end of the night. When I was a teenager, I worked to enjoy those sorts of things, the crazy skits, the loud games, the boisterous group conversations, because I thought I was abnormal for hating them. Then, I went to university, found out that I wasn’t alone, or even abnormal, and came into my own skin a little. I vowed never to find myself pushed into those sorts of situations again – and then I became a youth leader.

I’m working to model the level of caring and relationship that so impacted me for the girls I am caring for, but it doesn’t seem to be going well. These girls actually LIKE the crazy games, and events. They’re “cool” in a way that I never was and will never actually attain. And I wonder sometimes if I will (am) actually make a difference in their lives.

The trickiest bit is that the deep longing of my heart for many years now has been to find a community of believers in which their existed a solid structure of spiritual friends, and especially of spiritual parents. I long to live in community with people who share the deep desires of my heart to seek after God, to live a life of prayer, from which stems justice and mission, to seek the voice of God, and live in obedience to what He asks. I haven’t found that. I haven’t even made friends. I am the only person attending the church in my peer group, and many of my closest friends from other places, who would fit this bill live in other cities, or are simply busy with the stuff of life. I feel at times that I am walking this journey quite alone, and I wonder if that will ever change.

And then, there is the whole issue of direction for the future. It seems that at the times in my life when I knew that Calgary was the place I was supposed to be, when I was completely settled, and unable, or no supposed to transition, there were always exciting options available. Now, as I am seeking God’s direction for the next season of my life, as I am completely convinced that it is time to make a transition, that He is calling me outwards, He is depressingly silent as to the actual direction. Doors that had been open have been closed, and things that had seemed to be imminent possibilities suddenly seem very far off.

And, that, my friends is the update. I’m actually doing okay. I’m a bit lonely, a bit frustrated, but I believe strongly that something incredible is coming. I guess I’m just getting a bit tired of waiting, and in a week when I am forced to confront more than one distressing reality at once, I get pretty tired, pretty angry, pretty frustrated with God and with humanity too.