Long Day

I walked in the door half an hour ago. I've been on the go since 9:30 this morning. First getting ready to attend a wedding, then meeting a friend for lunch, then the wedding ceremony, then meeting one of my youth girls at an Asian market to buy ingredients, then cooking Thai food with ten youth girls as our first girls hang out night, in place of the Bible study that wasn't working out so well, then driving one of the girls to her friend's place for the night, on the other side of the city.

I'm exhausted. It's been a long week emotionally, relationally, and spiritually. I could use a vacation just at the moment, but in less than 12 hours I teach Sunday school. A chapter in the book we're studying that says it's about temptation, but is really about spiritual warfare. Talk about a subject that not only hits close to home lately, but one that I feel completely ill-equipped to discuss. Particularly in this setting. I grew up in the church I'm teaching in, and have only recently returned after attending elsewhere for 3 years or so. I honestly thought that spiritual warfare didn't really happen in the "developed world." I figured it was something you encountered in Thailand, or Africa, definitely not here. I'm wondering how many of the kids I'm teaching have the same sort of concept in their head.

Pray for me. I feel ill-prepared, not ready yet to face this topic, not even particularly motivated to teach. In fact, if I wasn't teaching tomorrow, I'd probably stay at home in bed, and catch up on some much needed rest. Pray that I meet Jesus as I pray and finish preparing in the morning, and as we have the worship service before I teach. Pray that every word that comes out of my mouth will be guided by him, and clear and simple, straight to the heart of the subject, and the heart of the hearers. Pray for me, because I don't think like a teacher - I don't naturally think in a way that engages learning in others, I naturally think like a preacher - I develop a thought fully, rather than pushing them to develop it on their own, and it's hard to engage a group of teenagers and young adults by preaching at them. Pray that they will be opening to broadening their conception of God by engaging this topic.

With that, I'm off to read, and slow my brain down for a little while, and then to sleep.

I almost forgot...

The other thing that I'm excited about from last night is that Rae is going to see if she can come up with a design for the tattoo I'm thinking about getting on my lower back. I described the picture of it that I have in my head, and the meanings of the various symbols, the significance to my personal and spiritual life, and she's going to see what she can do. Since I've seen Rae's drawings, that makes me happy!

Yesterday

Yesterday was a good day.

Work, was, well, dead. (This is actually not part of the “good” day.) I had nothing in particular to do, which makes for a rather long shift, staring at my computer screen and wondering how much of the day is left.

But, on my way home, I got a text message and then a phone call from Rae. I knew she was in town, but neither one of us were sure that it would work out to get together. It did.

We met for tea at the Oolong Tea House in Kensington. I hadn’t been there for tea since before Rae moved, because everyone I know drinks coffee instead of tea. So, since it was a nice night, we sat on the back porch of the tea house and started catching up. And, eventually, we got more tea to go, and wandered up 10th Street, eventually ending up walking the path around Riley Park.

It was so good to hang out again. I’ve missed that kind of honest conversation that you can only have with the best of friends. The kind you know will be reciprocated. The kind that inevitably delves into the deeper spiritual stuff of our lives. So many of the people that I have that kind of conversation with don’t live in Calgary anymore, and I miss them. I chat with lots of people, meet them for coffee dates, hang out and so on, and I’m generally always honest about where I’m at in life, but very few will reciprocate deeply, and fewer still are comfortable enough for me to share the spiritual stuff, the questions, the “odd” occurrences, and so forth. Rae and I chatted like we’d seen each other the day before, instead of sometime before Christmas. It made for great conversation as we walked in the park, enjoying one of the first really beautiful spring evenings we’ve had this year.

I also bought a tea infuser – one that will work well for a single cup of tea. So I’m sitting here this morning, drinking a lovely cup of citrus rooibos, made from great loose tea, instead of a tea bag. Smells great, tastes great, and makes me happy.

Slow Day

This is one of those days where I’m wishing I could curl up in a sunbeam on the couch in our living room. It’s finally sunny outside, and I’m sitting in the office, looking outside and wishing I was anywhere but here (with the possible exception of the dentist!) This is a slow day. Hardly any phone calls, and since our big conference is over, nothing in particular to do at my desk all day. I have some “make work” projects that my boss and I came up with yesterday as a way to fill the eight hours I’ll sit at this desk today, but nothing that particularly needs to be done, nothing with any urgency or deadline attached, and definitely nothing with any sense of purpose or accomplishment.

I’m managed a temporary escape over the lunch hour. Though I brought a bit of a lunch with me today, I was craving a fresh pita, and decided to walk to the pita place to at least get a bit of time outside now that there’s finally sun shining.

And tomorrow? Tomorrow the forecast is calling for spectacular weather. I do believe I’ll be able to wear a skirt to work!

Quiet, Shield, and Grace

Psalm 18:2
The Lord is my rock, my fortress, and my savior;
my God is my rock, in whom I find protection.
He is my shield, the power that saves me, and my place of safety

After flipping through a variety of scriptures last night (I read Obadiah, a bit of Song of Solomon, some tidbits from Isaiah...) I paused as I encountered and was drawn in by this passage. God has been speaking to me over and over again lately about Himself as my source of life, protection, safety. The word "shield" has often come up (in words from friends, and in my scripture readings), and there is a picture God gave me relating to the concept of Him as my shield, that is so powerful that I am thinking about having an artist form it into a tattoo, and having it done on my back. After reading this last night, I wrote, "Abba, I feel buffetted, surrounded, battered and weary from the struggle. I needed this tonight. I have a picture of a hollowed-out rock, a womb-like spot, warm and hidden from view, where you offer me the chance to rest and be restored. Let my heart be quiet in that space."

The sense of a quiet heart has been strong lately, catching me off guard on a regular basis. Today, on the train on the way home from work, I grabbed my journal and expressed it like this:

There is a quietness in my life lately that I don't quite understand. The usual neuroses rear their ugly heads once a month or so - usually when I'm hormonal and overly tired, and have less defenses against the irritability of daily life.

But this quietness, a sense of calm persists. And it surprises me, still, after so many years of constant turmoil under the surface.

So many days I still wake up surprised at God's healing.

May 1st, in a few short weeks, will mark a year and half since that crazy night, praying in James' car, that God intervened and healed me. The first four months or so were about the shock - waiting for the depression to return, coming to the realization of the enormity of the act of healing that God poured out on my life. The time since then has been spent rediscovering what it means to experience "normal" emotions, finding a balance of those emotions, learning to really enjoy them, experience them, bask in them.

And I still wake surprised by their intensity, but also by this quietness, the calm assurance that wasn't there before. The certainty that I am the beloved child of a God who delighted to pour his grace out over my life in an incredible act of healing and redemption.