Daily 5 - Year 3, Day 70

Today's Daily 5:

1. cozy boots
2. an empty office at lunch with quiet for peaceful reading
3. dinner and laughter with a good friend
4. an internal smile as I picture the thoughts that must go through the heads of anyone who decides to eavesdrop on conversations between that particular friend and I (tonight our conversation spanned the gamut from faith, church, mental health or lack thereof, work, various crises, right and left brains, and all of it done with sarcasm and irony blatantly mixed in!)
5. chocolate at the end of a long day

Until You and I Are One

It was last Saturday evening, and I found myself sitting on the floor against a wall in the library of a small Catholic retreat centre.  I'd gathered with other house church leaders for a retreat to plan, pray and dream for the coming year.

I'll be honest and say that I would have rather spent my weekend in other places, but I knew somehow that it was important that I attend, if only because I do provide leadership to one of the house churches and I felt it important for me to meet with the other leaders and get to know them a bit. So, we'd spent some time talking about hearing God speak, and now, now we were spread out across a few different rooms, listening.

I've spent years cultivating a nearly constant dialogue with Jesus, one that only seems to lag when it is suddenly forced to the center of my consciousness.  Saturday was that sort of occasion.  I sat there chafing and wrestling, fighting the distractions in the room - books, unfamiliar spaces, other people moving, breathing, kneeling, listening.  The only thing playing through my thoughts, through my listening, were some song lyrics.  Lines from Misty Edwards:

Come be the fire inside of me
Come be the flame upon my heart
Come be the fire inside of me
Until You and I are one

I was growing irritated with this incessant repetition when I felt the urging to kneel, face to the ground in a posture that has long significance in my conversations with Jesus.  I fought the urge for a bit, arguing with myself, assuming the urge was simply me trying to manufacture something (did I mention that my dialogue with Jesus flows easily until it is forced front and center, at which point it becomes stilted and I second guess it?).  Finally I knelt, and began to understand.

As I've lived in limbo for this last lengthy period of time, I've invited Jesus often into the quiet spaces as a bearer of peace.  I've spoken to him as one I trust to fix and resolve the many challenges of life I've faced.  But it's been quite some time since I've entered into the quiet spaces and felt the urge to simply beg for that love, that Jesus that I love to consume me, to set my heart afire.

Once I was on my knees, I understood.  This particular posture, one of surrender, is central to some deep promises Jesus has spoken over my life.  By entering again into that posture, by welcoming the repetitious song lyrics instead of fighting them, I was able to hear Jesus amidst the noise I'd created in obsessively worrying that this would be the time he wouldn't speak.

And so I invited him to again be the fire inside of me.  To consume my heart with love and passion for Him alone.  To consume the distractions.  And then finally, finally I was able to pray.  To admit again the struggles with life lived in limbo.  To surrender each of those things again to Him.  And to know a different peace than the one that He has constantly met me with.  It was needed, and I will remind myself of that consuming love as I continue to face the struggle with life in limbo over these coming weeks.

Daily 5 - Year 3, Day 69

Today's Daily 5:

1. Cookies for breakfast
2. laughter from a note from my former roommate
3. a beautiful glimpse of the moon still out this morning
4. re-reading the Mitford novels
5. curled up at home, in my own bed.

Daydreaming...

In seasons of limbo, when discontent strikes hard and deep, I daydream.  I think about the things I miss about a more stable living situation - showering in the same house where I sleep most nights, normal meal planning and cooking, not feeling confined to one small part of the space.  I dream about plants that fill a space - jasmine plants in every room, filling the air with their lovely scent.  Palms, Boston ferns, peace lilies, spider plants and rubber plants for their beauty and air purifying properties.  A cozy chair with cushions, an ottoman and soft blankets in which to wrap oneself while curling up to read.  I dream about coming home easily, not catching my breath and breathing a prayer for patience and grace before I open the door (or at least not doing that every. single. day.) I dream about a space with windows and sunlight, instead of a basement cave.  I dream about not having to plan and schedule things like laundry, showers, and other random tasks.

And then, in an effort to combat the discontent, I remind myself to count some blessings.

Today, as I head back to grandma's after a week of house-sitting, I'm reminding myself that I have the following to look forward to:

• access to my entire closet, instead of a suitcase for making daily wardrobe choices
• access to my entire stash of snacks, to supplement work lunches, not just what I packed to get me through the week
• being surrounded by my book collection
• curling up in my own bed.
• getting back to a regular nighttime routine, including a liturgical prayer book that I'm very much enjoying
• finding rhythm again
• access to my stash of creative supplies, tackling a couple of projects, and being free to be inspired for more
• lighting candles all around the room for warmth, atmosphere, and happy smells

Pondering

I feel very unsettled these days, and I honestly couldn't tell you if that's a good thing or not.

The retreat over the weekend left more questions than answers in my heart as we ponder moving forward.  The part of me that hates change is cringing and wanting to cry at the prospects of the need for shifts to happen in my beloved little house church.  The part of me that loves God's heart, and being a part of the places where he's working?  Well, that part of me is excited.

And those two parts of me are pretty much warring over large areas of internal heart real estate these days.

I'm finding this life lived in limbo, waiting and praying to see what steps come next, to be a life that chafes.

And so, tonight, after work, I'm heading to mom and dad's to pick up my things from house-sitting last week and grab some dinner, and then I'm heading home.  Last week was good, but crazy full. And tonight I need just a bit of quiet and rest.  And I'm going to avail myself of that as much as I can this week.  Avail myself of it, and try to sit patiently, and gracefully and with trust in the midst of the chafing and the unsettledness.