A Time For Everything

“There is a time for everything under the sun...”

That line is from my favorite Old Testament passage. I actually had never read it until one morning in Lectio Divino when we studied it and God really spoke a lot to me through it. Now as my time studying here in San Francisco comes to a close, I’m reminded of it. Being a pretty popular saying I heard it a lot growing up, but the new meaning it has now is that it gives me a peace: a peace when I’m uncertain, a peace when I’m lonely, a peace when I’m worried, and a peace when I’m panicking. There are many changes in life and many that I have gone through. When I reflect on my life I wonder that my brain can hold all my memories in. Sometimes it can’t and the memories come flooding into my thoughts and that’s a day spent mainly in silence.

Right now my room is almost stripped and my bags are packed. I still have a coat hanging in the closet but for the most part, there is nothing much to look at anymore. Tomorrow we fly to Italy. We will have a 10 hour flight, a 2 hour layover in Amsterdam and a total of 30 hours of traveling. We arrive in Italy at 8 pm Tuesday night, Italian time. It’s hard for me to believe that it is already time for Outreach. I still feel like I should be learning much more before I’m ready for ministry. But then, there is a time for everything under the sun. So I’m confident that this is God’s timing. Especially since He has supported me and enabled me to receive all the funds to take this trip. Many times it’s hard to remember just how much God has led me and been faithful in the past. My teacher from this last week put it this way: we always notice the bad things first but it takes a while to sit down and sort through them to discover the gems that are the good things.

These past 3 months have been good things. In fact they have been amazing things! I could honestly break out into a cheesy rendition of “I Left My Heart In San Francisco”! Because it’s true; through this city God has taught me to soften my heart to injustice, to see it with fresh eyes and not just as something that happens in this world and is acceptable. I’ve grown up with a lot of this stuff. Comparatively, the people on the streets around me are very rich! They aren’t starving to death. They do rather well. But they are trapped in their addictions, trapped in their cultural barriers, trapped in their broken world, and lost. For the first month I was here, it was all normal to me. There was nothing new about walking down the street and getting hackled, cat called, and told I looked d*mned fine. The only difference being it was said in English, mainly. Walking past the people sitting on the ground, stupid with drugs or alcohol and unaware of the cold or those standing on the street corners with cups held out was all normal to me. There are more here and there is more blatant drug use than I’ve seen in a while, but it just didn’t faze me.

And then I prayed. I prayed for God to break my heart over what broke His. I prayed that He would show me these people through His eyes and let me feel what He feels when I see them. The result is that this neighborhood has opened my heart. So often I found myself tearing up at the mention of the atrocities going on. And I was astounded! The reason is that I don’t cry very much. And when I do, it never lasts long. So to feel myself on the edge of tears day in and day out is a new experience for me. Whether that’s a good thing or not, I can’t say. But it is exhausting. If Lecture Phase taught me anything, it’s that my journey has only begun. I have many, many more roads to travel and lessons to learn in life. But I’ve begun to have a history, and a good one at that! My spiritual heritage is getting richer and richer. So now I’m stepping onto the new road of Italy. And I’m so excited to see what God will do! I will be very busy so updates may switch to once a month, but please be praying for me. Prayer is powerful and I could sure use a lot of it! I'll leave you with this:

"Allow your brokenness to be an opportunity for intimacy with God; not an opportunity for someone to disappoint you. If you think the right kind of people will fill voids and heal wounds, you will miss out on appreciating them and discovering why they are part of your story. I'm broken, you're broken-- we all are. But we're broken for a purpose."

Guilt and Faith

Faith.

Even though that’s only a 5-letter word, it’s powerful. And it makes a lot of us a bit apprehensive! I know it used to make me that way and in some respects it still does. Now here’s the part where I get really honest. I don’t write to sound profound and I don’t post this to glorify me in any way. If you’ve read my past posts, then you’ll know that I really don’t have it all figured out! Quite the opposite, as each day passes I’m realizing how little I truly know.

For a long time now I’ve struggled with guilt. It’s one thing for a Christian to say that we’re forgiven and it’s another to live a life that says we truly believe that. Personally I find it very easy to point the finger at people who are happy Christians. I mean really, it’s like the “Clown Effect” or something. When you see a clown you know it’s unnatural for somebody to be THAT happy. (And they’re slightly very creepy.) Well when I used to see happy Christians I thought one of two things. Either a) they are faking it and they are really miserable like the rest of us, or b) they don’t realize what Jesus really did for them and they don’t feel enough gratitude. Because I always felt unworthy of the cross and it doesn’t make logical sense to me. It still doesn’t! Why on earth would God ever allow His Son to die for me? I should be the one that was up on that cross! If I were on the cross from the moment I was born to the second I died, it still wouldn’t be enough to get me into heaven. And wow... For other people they can realize that it’s not enough and be joyful that God paid that cost for them. They can thank Jesus and then live the life He’s granted them (whether they really thank Him in their hearts is not for me to judge). But for me I just kept putting myself up on that cross.

And I told myself it was because I didn’t think I was worthy of the cross. In our society it’s very easy to cuddle ourselves. It’s easy to say, oh well you had bad things happen to you... Oh well you have a right to feel that way because of what happened to you... No. You don’t. Not if you’re a follower of Jesus you don’t! I think that’s what He meant when He said lay down your life, pick up your cross, and follow Me. Lay down that “right” that we think we have to get married, to have a decent job, to live in a nice house, to be happy, etc and follow Him. This sounds like a terrible idea! Last night I struggled with this. I knew it was coming because our teacher had all day to pound the point home. And even then I sat there listening to the worship music, talking with one of my leaders, and refusing to let go of my unbelief and pride.

Yes, unbelief and pride. In our circles of Christian life, those are almost dirty words. If you’re a Believer, why are you saying that you have unbelief in your heart? You’re a believer! But I did. My guilt was unbelief that the cross really meant what God said it does. My drive to work and prove my worth was pride that said I could be as great a servant as Jesus. And let me just say, that is tiring! I didn’t want to dig into the reasons of why I still felt guilty and why I didn’t believe God’s promise for me and it made me miserable. It’s just like Psalm 32 says, “When I kept silent, my bones became brittle from my groaning all day long. For day and night Your hand was heavy on me; my strength was drained as in the summer’s heat. Then I acknowledged my sin to You and did not conceal my iniquity. I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,’ and You took away the guilt of my sin.” Throughout each day I would notice that I would just get exhausted so quickly, it was like I had no stamina and I had just run a 10 mile race! I felt like I had spent all day pouring concrete and all I did was avoid God.

And then this morning when I woke up in the middle of a panic attack that was not an encouraging way to start the day, I had to lay there in bed and pray before I could even move. Everything in me wanted to stay in bed and cower under my warm blankets. Everything in me said to just go back and doubt God again. But then this thing called perseverance came into play. My mind told my heart to give in because experience told me it was useless, but my heart stubbornly refused (because being stubborn IS something I’m good at!) and remembered that just 10 hours before I had chosen to believe God has something better for me. And you know what happened? I got up. I went through my day. Yeah I still kind of struggled. But I didn’t get through this day on my own. Far from it, I got through with only one set of footprints in the sand; Jesus’ as He carried me because I was too weak to walk.

My feet are shaky and not used to this new path. Eventually they will grow stronger and I will be able to stand. Then I will be able to walk. I may stumble but finally, I will be able to run! And the first place I want to run is right back into Jesus’ arms. And my faith tells me that He will sustain me and carry me. Even as I stumble, even as I wait on Him. No matter what happens. Even as I have a plane ticket to Italy that says I leave in less than two weeks and I don't have all my funds yet. My faith tells me God will not abandon me. I mean I didn't even have enough for Lecture Phase and God provided for that, so why would He stop now? He won't. Above all else, He is consistent!

It’s not what you go through; it’s what you do with it.

We had a week called ‘Plumb line’ and it can’t really be categorized. We looked deep into our souls and found the ugliest parts that we were terrified of and never wanted to see the light of the day... And then we confessed them in front of our fellow students and 5 staff leaders! Talk about terrifying.

Along with that, our speaker said something that I hope to make a motto during my whole life: Humility is a willingness to be known for who you are. How many of us are really known for who we are? The honest person, the dark secrets and the things that we think isolate us from society. For many reasons I did not want this week to happen. For one, since I’ve already had so many moments of forgiving and letting go I convinced myself that I didn’t need any more of it and I would be okay now. I had worked on the really big, obvious things so I could serve God and the rest could be forgotten. Plus I still considered myself just a servant in God’s household. I wasn’t His daughter. I went to a service on Sunday afternoon with a ministry here called City Impact and the passage they talked about was the prodigal son. I’ve heard the story many times, but it had been a while since I heard it. As the man was preaching, he listed different stages that we could be in. We could be leaving with our inheritance, we could be staying to try and win our Father’s favor with work, we could be stranded in the far country, we could be journeying back, we could be walking up the road to our Father’s house or we could be getting that robe, ring, and sandals which symbolize that you are the son/daughter again.

I realized I was standing there in front of my Father and asking to return, yet refusing the robe/ring/sandals/daughterhood because I feel unworthy. I was standing there sobbing to be taken in by my Father yet unwilling to allow Him to hold me. In some ways, I still am. But I'm taking baby steps closer to Him and He is encouraging me every inch of the way!

Then this week, we learned about the cross and another point was brought up. There is nothing that Jesus did not die for. How often do we sing songs about Christ dying on the cross and all our sins being washed away and yet we still subconsciously (or even consciously) believe there are exception sins in us? Then again, maybe this is just me. (I rather doubt it though.) For many reasons, I believed I was the exception to God’s forgiveness. How could I fathom the extent He went to just to redeem me? How could I even begin to comprehend that He would never even dream of getting down off of that cross no matter how many times I do the same stupid thing? Can any of us ever truly understand how significant the cross is? It is the turning point of history; the up and up of humanity. Every time that I see a scene of the cross, no matter how great or bad the quality is, (it could even be on the stage with imaginary cross, nails, etc), I tear up. I can’t help it. I use to try to cover it up as façade that it didn’t affect me. But it does. And I’m no longer ashamed to say that. I sob to think of the pain my Lover had to endure because of the choices He knew I would make one day.

But it doesn’t end there. What a terrible story it would be if it did! We have such a hope in Christ. Hope. That word means a lot of things to me, mainly because for so many years in my depression and oppressive pain I was hopeless. I saw no joy in the world and my only hope was thinking maybe I could finally succeed in killing myself. I do not say this to get your pity, so please don’t take it that way. I remember the turning point for me recently was one night when I was really getting depressed. I was sitting in my favorite window seat, it was already dark, and my thoughts were as dark as the street the outside. Over and over in my mind I was contemplating all the ways I could relieve the despair I was feeling. I could cut, I could try to overdose somehow, or I could turn an oven on and stick my hand in.

These thoughts use to be my constant companions. I was listening to music and suddenly a worship song came on. It kind of annoyed me because I honestly didn’t want to think of Jesus at that moment. I didn’t want to try anymore, I was so tired. But it was like my fingers were lead and I just couldn’t make them move to skip the song. And then one word popped into my head. That “h” word: hope. There was a new voice battling the old familiar one in my head, and it said that I couldn’t give in because I knew the Relief now; the right Relief. After only a moment of hesitation, I jumped up and walked down to the basement where our sound system is. I plugged in my iPod and cranked up the volume until I wouldn’t have been able to hear myself speak out loud. And I let myself be overwhelmed with Light and Hope. This sounds like a rather romantic vision, but at the time I was in such strong turmoil... It’s true; I have the Light and Hope. However that does not make the fight any less real and the struggle any less challenging.

But ever since that night, when I’m struggling I know what I have to do and it’s not even second nature. It’s my first nature! Sometimes it’s hard when teams are using our basement for the weekend, or my back is hurting more than usual, but at least I’m trying now. I’m fighting. I don’t want to give up anymore, and even when I start to give in to those old familiar feelings, I have Someone who tells me: “Don’t worry, I have you.” And He is pretty great ♥