Bringing Faith to Life
Archive for September, 2012
Go Ahead, Eat the Middle First
012 years
Why do we save the best for last?
Oh, I know. It builds tension for the big finish. It gets the audience warmed up so they can really appreciate our magic when they see it. We set them up so we can knock them out with one punch. They’re puddy in our hands. It’s about control, and we like it.
This may be true of audiences and mystery novels, but personally it’s not working for me. I mean, take eating one of those swirled sticky buns. You know, like they have at Cinnabon, that are truly (with apologies to God here but using this in the vernacular) sinful. What is the best part? Everyone knows it’s the center. Warm, juicy, sweet, buttery goo. Yep – why don’t we eat the middle first.
Okay. Kids already get this: a kid’ll eat the middle of an Oreo first and save the…
But the rest of us, the grownups, don’t we eat this in order? Starting politely from the outside, saving the “best part for last”? When we get there, are we really hungry for the bun any more? We eat it because it’s the best part and we don’t want to waste it. But what if we had started with the middle, then worked our way out …to the crunchy, hard, not so soft, not so buttery, not so gooey outside? I’ll bet we could lay that aside and skip a few calories, eh?
I’m going to take the sticky bun analogy one step further because I’m guilty of this with the rest of my spending, and not just calories. Take writing, for instance. How often I have thought, I should write that “one great story” that I have in me. But I hold off, because there’s just one, so I am saving it for last, the place we hold for the best – the finale.
But I don’t limit my withholding just to writing. I went to do a demo training with a group of coaches the other day and not many showed up. I was assured they always ran late, so we waited and time got short. The lesson plan I had went down the tubes. Finally, they began showing up. Then a youth team came over to help demo. Now I had a good group, but what would I do with them in the 15 minutes we now had? I skipped the intro stuff and cut straight to my best drills, of course. We had a great time, laughing, playing, doing soccer things. The coordinator stopped us and said, “We need to stop so there’s time to scrimmage.” And then the kicker, “unless you have a big finale.”
Nope. I didn’t. I started with the middle of the cinnamon roll. Gave them the best of what I brought, right up front, so they would have it to take home with them. Oddly enough, when I did that, the additional layers started to unfurl. Even after the scrimmage they were still asking questions. Had I started there, no one would have hung around. But now, we were getting down to the details. And it was magic.
This has me considering the story I’m holding off telling. The “one” story I’m meant to tell. I have a feeling, once I write it, there will be an ocean of stories to take its place. Or maybe there will be a sequel. Or a series. Or a…yep, there’s that human side again.
What if I gave the best part of me first to all the opportunities that came my way?
I really think God wants me to eat the middle first. I’ll figure out what to do with the crust if I make it that far.
Lacing Up cleats on Holy Ground
2The whole burning bush incident has always interested me. Moses there beyond the wilderness, his attention drawn aside by this shrub in flames, who goes to investigate only to hear the voice of God. And what does God say but, “Come no closer! Remove those sandals, you’re standing on Holy ground.” And there Moses is, standing before God, barefooted.
Yesterday’s Upper Room author, a pastor from Tennessee, gets credit for inspiring what I am thinking next. The title of his meditation: Sheep Don’t Wear Shoes. Now, true to my nature, I didn’t completely agree with what he wrote (…that sheep don’t have to remove their shoes, their feet are naked before God already, so to speak, and so they draw close). I’m not sure our footwear creates such an insurmountable barrier, but leave it to God to show me something about my sandals. I change out of them into the cleats I wear to work. When I do I am standing on Holy ground.
I am a fitness coach who works with young athletes – mostly on the soccer field. In these summer and early fall days it is warm, so I drive to my worksite wearing my sandals. But when I arrive, I take them off to change into my cleats. I usually offer a whispered prayer of my hopes for a good session or for God to be glorified in my teaching. Or I just give it all to Him in thanks that I can be there at all. (A year and a half ago I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be.) All these prayers seem hollow, constructed by me. Perhaps because they’re in my head and heart, not in my hands and feet.
But yesterday, I made my change from sandals to cleats my prayer. As I removed my sandals, I stood for a moment on the asphalt of the parking lot and thought, “this is Holy ground.” It is a place where I have turned aside to offer what God has planted in me. (I was not any more certain of what was to happen next. I am imagining Moses and I may be kindred spirits here.) Then I laced up my cleats with careful intention. I was putting on the foot-armor of God.
The sessions were fun and I believe fruitful. But as our time ran short, dark, blue-gray storm clouds gathered overhead. The girls didn’t notice, but I kept watch. And as we completed our final activity I spotted a flash in the distance. “That’s it. We’re done. There’s lightning.”
The parents and kids scurried to gather their balls and water and take off their pinnies. We thanked and bid each other quick ‘see ya next weeks.’ I looked at my watch. It was exactly, 7:00. Closing time for the session. By 7:03 all the kids were safely in their cars and on their way home. So was I. That is the beauty and majesty of treading lightly and intentionally on holy ground, it bids us come and then sends us safely along the way home.
Sips not Big Gulps Taste Best
0I really want to take life in big gulps. But God offers it to me in small sips. So I can taste and see that the Lord is good.
I would like just to have it all figured out. You know, what I’m meant to do, who I’m meant to be, how I’m meant to serve. The purpose of life for me, on a platter, please. I’d like just to drink it all down and have it settled in my tummy, readying me to take on the world. But God, in His ultimate wisdom and endless compassion says, “Wendy, this is what I have for you. This little bit.” What He doesn’t say, but I know He’s thinking is, “This is all you can handle.” I’m sure He is shaking His holy head at this.
Every now and then I get a sip that satisfies a little taste bud. A sip that has me saying, “Ah, now I know why I was meant to wait. I had to taste this and this before I could move on to the more advanced tasting group.” I would like to stop and linger over this. Enjoy the flavor, swish it around in my mouth and let it tickle my tongue like the connoisseurs do. And I think God does encourage us to celebrate these moments. He says, “Every time you drink this, remember me.”
We call it communion. I’m tempted to linger there. In that taste satisfying moment. To say, now that tasted good, may I please have some more?
Today, God reminded me that sips and not gulps are His way. Once I have tasted what I have sipped I am meant to be satisfied and move on to the next sip, the next experience, the next lesson. But take with me what I have drunk deeply of in this one, along with the comfort and God-confidence of knowing, that what I need He will provide. In it’s time.
O taste and see that the Lord is good;
Happy are those who take refuge in Him.”
Psalm 34:8
I Will Give You Rest
112 years
Rest is essential to recovery and rebuilding. You’ll get no debate from me; though, many of us treat it as a luxury rather than the necessity it is. Still, it always feels a bit self-serving when I’m resting, knowing the hard work that others are putting in. And I think that probably shines a flashlight into the dark of my problem. When I see another person kicking back and putting his feet up when I am busting my butt to get something done, I feel a bit perturbed. Perhaps, I grumble under my breath. More likely, I shout a few “Why don’t you DO something!”‘s to them. My children can tell you just how this sounds.
I’m thinking there are different kinds of rests. No, not half rests, whole rests and quarter rests. You band geeks are all alike. I mean different intentions of rest. Different ways to enter rest. I am indebted to Rob Fuquay, a pastor in NC and teacher at SOULfeast this year, for his suggestion of a new way to look at rest. He said the root of the word rest comes from “putting your weight on” something. Sit a spell and rest. Pull up a stool.
Abraham Verghese, in the Covenant of Water, brilliantly portrays the something as the “burdenstone.”
Rest, yes, but what I settle myself upon and where I choose to rest what has become heavy to me is key. Rob suggests we take the really weighty stuff and rest it on the claims of God. To trust God with it. It gives you kind of a picture of that “bearing one another’s burdens” and “lean on me.”
The… “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” ~ Matthew 11:28-30
That certainly sounds like an invitation we should accept, doesn’t it? So why the guilt? Probably because we are trying to prove to others in our world that we are pulling our own weight — to avoid their judgment and to avoid self-judgment.
Rest is something Christ offers, after we take His yoke. And, then it’s up to Him whether we ‘sit a spell’ or ‘don’t get too comfortable.’ Funny, when I force myself to rest, I feel restless; rarely do I feel rested. When I put the weight on Him, it all feels lighter.
Oh, the work doesn’t go away. It’s more like the heavy hand that had been holding me down has been lifted.
Crying foul in a fair game
112 years
When we took the kids to play tennis at nearby courts, we would always end with the “m&m game.” Each kid would take a turn rallying with us (Dad played collegiately, Mom played other sports) to see how many times they could keep the ball in play over the net. Each time “over the net” earned them one m&m. This was agreed upon ahead of time and they were excited to play.
Now, they were small and so the payout was not too large, maybe 10-12 at most. Inevitably, one kid always came away complaining, “She got more than me!” And we would reply, well you got your 7 m&m’s, right? Why does it matter that she got 12?
How is it that no matter how much I have been given, I have a hard time feeling grateful if another person has more? Especially, if the other person doesn’t deserve more. Is this just me or do other people have this problem?
People in the Bible have this problem…
I mean, take Jonah for instance, who having been rescued from three days inside a really large fish did not take kindly to God’s pardon of the Ninevites. And the workers hired early in the day who were distraught because those hired at the 11th hour got the same wages. How about that thief on the cross? He got paradise in spite of his life of crime. I wanna cry foul with the older brother who had every right to complain when dad had a welcome home party for little prodigal brother, complete with fatted calf. I guess I have not grown too far from the m&m’s.
So, today I am struggling with this. I’m picturing that day when all the nations are gathered before the Son of Man and He separates the sheep from the goats. I hope I will be selected for the sheep team. But what if, in God’s boundless compassion, God says, “Goats, you are forgiven. Join the sheep and be with me in paradise.” I’m certain I would shout, “No fair!” And there I’ll be, a perpetual goat.
Clearly, learning to hold my tongue is an eternal life skill. There is absolutely no way I will ever grow pure bred gratitude without first cornering the criticism, harnessing the hearsay and binding the bitterness.
I am truly grateful for the m&m’s I’ve been given. I’ll share. Except maybe the peanut ones.
Making the Invisible Enemy Visible
212 years
Life is a struggle. Moment by moment we are wrestling, really, grappling with difficulties, demands and demons. Invisible enemies like fear, blame, fault or remote enemies like news reports or scientific predictions haunt our waking and our sleeping.
Where are they? Am I just making this up? I don’t see any opponents. Still, I’m being thrown to the ground and getting back to my feet only to be slammed to the ground again.
Who are you, opponent? Where are you? Show yourself!
“The battle is the Lord’s,” young David said of Goliath and the Philistines. But David still had to wage it. Arm himself. Load his stones in his sling. Hurl them accurately and with force. He used his smarts and his capability to defeat a much larger, stronger opponent who he saw as defeated already.
When I give the battle over to the Lord, he exposes my enemy. It’s as if God stands above my struggle (or perhaps to the side to avoid the slosh and rough and tumble) and douses my enemy with a bucket of brightly colored paint.
In an instant, my invisible opponent takes shape. As the paint drips down, the form of the other appears. The outline, the bulk, the whole self. Honestly, it’s a relief to see it is real. And now I can see him for what he really is: a coward not a contender, and one who shrinks back from me and the army at my side.
There is no contest. This battle is the Lord’s, and I am a more than able competitor.
Blessing, Curse or Both?
112 years
by wlebolt
in Uncategorized
It was the best of me. It was the worst of me. And it’s the same thing about the same me.
Clearly, I am a pleaser. I need to please, try to please, do whatever is necessary to be pleasing. This is a…good thing, right? Class officer, valedictorian, excellent grades, scholarship athlete. I get things done for people. They can count on me. When someone needs something, my volunteer hand shoots up. I thought this was a pretty good thing until recently when I realized what a tight hold peoples’ demands had on me. Even when I wasn’t the one asked I would come to the rescue. I did stuff for other people, in order to be pleasing.
Now there is a whole long slippery slide down which one can tumble when one depends on “being pleasing” to ‘them.’ You define yourself based on how they see you. You have anxiety about being enough. And, heaven forbid, you might fail or fall short. Who would you be then? This could be a whole other set of posts. But, like it or not, I seem to have been born this way.
Yep, even in high school and college I was the naive, gullible one who would fall for things. Object of jokes and ribbing. Totally unaware when something I said had a double-entendre or something I did was totally awkward. (that’s what kids today call it. I am grateful we have a word for it now.) But I just wanted people to like me, so I went along. And I took this practice into adulthood, until I came to realize how destructive it could be and how blindly I pursued it. Then, I cursed this nature in me.
But wait. This is a nature born into me by none other than my Creator. Why would He curse me so?
Recently I have realized that gullibility is the flip side of trust. My naive nature allows me to trust when others have a hard time trusting. I can enter giving the other a clean slate where others have to clear away the dust of past-doings to get started.
So I’m thinking that maybe God didn’t make a mistake doling out the heaping helping of gullibility. He put it there so He could draw on it in situations that needed extra trust. It is a weakness in me that, when I remember to call on Him, He turns into a strength. God is clever that way, I think.
This week I am pondering these character traits that I’d give back if I had half the chance. And looking for the upside. The one that God calls on. I’m able to make a few matches but, as I’m sorting through my weakness pile, I come across several that don’t seem to have an upside. Tendencies I have and consistent behavior patterns that are destructive or paralyzing or both. I just don’t see what God was thinking when he gave me these.
God kindly showed me this: Wendy, those weaknesses that keep pulling you under, you’re held there by fear. Your fear. Fear tugs at your feet and smothers your gasps.
God didn’t put that there but it makes me blind when I’m grasping for God. Especially in that panic is the place I need faith. To call on Christ to cast out my fear. Oh, He knows I’ll have it. It’s one the big reasons I dial Him up on the help line. But banishing the fear allows the tumult to settle so I can find my way to the surface.
And wouldn’t you know, once I pop my head out, there is the upside of that character trait that I thought was my enemy. Then I can pray for it (we’re to pray for our enemies) and now it’s just a bit more friendly. At least we can have a reasonable conversation.
I’m only just starting on this journey of casting out, but so far it’s helping me see the beyond what used to be obscured. Fear is getting smaller and smaller and pleasing is becoming less and less necessary. Criticism has even become a welcome companion to construction, and editing a new found friend.
Yep – I’m not afraid of those any more. I have befriended them. And what a freeing feeling that is. God might just make a writer of me yet.
God Gives Free Refills
012 years
by wlebolt
in Uncategorized
“Save your strength for tonight!” my neighbor called after me.
I was jogging up the hill, okay struggling the last few steps at the top as I finished my relatively brief jaunt through the neighborhood. She knew I had a fitness session scheduled with area club coaches that evening, thus the “save your strength!”
This is a funny approach adults take toward activity. I hear them caution their kids about it all the time. “Don’t use up your energy.” “Rest up, you have a meet tonight.” I even saw a middle school sister tell her younger sibling, who was happily dribbling her soccer ball down the street toward the neighbor’s to catch a ride to her travel soccer practice, “Stop. You’ll get tired.”
Activity is a funny thing. People consider it a scarce resource. A limited and dose related commodity. You only get so much each day. When you’re out, you’re done. That’s funny because, in so many ways – at least for the healthy person, it’s the reverse: if you’re active you have more energy. True, you may be a bit winded right after or even sore the next day. But, given a bit of time and a regular routine, using energy gives you more of it.
I am wondering whether exercise defies the law of conservation of energy, the one that says energy can be neither created or destroyed. I imagine not. It probably just changes its form – from stored/potential energy to mechanical/kinetic energy. The more we use, the more we call on our body to make available. We just don’t know how much we have in storage until we call it up for duty.
That sounds like a lot of what makes us. The more we call on it the more resources we make ready for next time. Sort of like a cup we pour out that keeps being refilled. A cup that doesn’t quite overflow – except for the antsy, ADD types of us out there. A refillable cup. Free refills that we only get when the level goes below the line. When we’re nearly empty.
What a nice image that is: God holding a pitcher, ready to splash into my cup. Makes me want to share a bit more, be a bit less stingy and a tad less conservative in my self-resource doling. I may just throw caution to the wind and jump into the game with the kids.
After all, if energy is renewable resource, then using what I have may be just the way to make room for more. I guess giving it a try is the only way I am going to find out. No sense in holding back; it’ll just make me tired.
Finding Comfort in the Blank Spaces
012 years
I can’t do everything.
This is the dilemma I face most days. I take a look around at all that needs doing and think, “I can do that, and that, and that.” In the morning, I am very expansive. And quite undisciplined. That means that I see it all and I can do it all.
And then, I try to get started. This is where is gets tricky. Because where does one start? There is so much to do. And each thing begs me to do it, tells me I can do it, then teases me about not getting to it. By the end of the day I am beating myself up about my ineffectiveness because, “hey, you didn’t do what you could, what you said you would.”
This morning I am giving thanks for my blank pages. Be they journal or personal note or notebook paper or the margin of a book. Or, the “new post” page of my blog. (I guess even my Facebook page counts because the status box says, “What’s on your mind?”) All of them offer me space to put stuff down. To unload the intangible swimming in my brain and make it touchable. Malleable. Work-withable. The space allows me to clear up the clutter – not really by putting everything in its place but just by putting it in a place where I can recognize that it’s there. When I do that, we can have a civil conversation about whether that’s really meant for me to do:
- Now
- Today
- Ever
- Or is it someone else’s to do?
On some days it just gives shape to the swirls and pretty pictures that dance and sing somewhere up in the gray matter. Once I look at them I can decide whether they’re worth keeping and where they go.
I can’t do everything; this I know. But each thing is made of a hundred things I can do. The key is getting started on the first thing. And the key to that is knowing the first thing when you see it. Call me ditsy or mystical or just plain confused, but I’m not sure God really cares where I begin. Just that I start. Inevitably, in the midst of what I am doing, I get a sense of what’s to come next.
Or an email dings or the phone rings and my Facebook pings, and then I am back to my cluttered self. That’s when I am especially grateful for the time I gave to downloading the clutter into my blank spaces. They can hold it for a while and they kindly tell me, “We’ll be here for you attend to once you’ve satisfied your distraction and are back in business.”
They’re really very kind and forgiving, these blank spaces. They know me so well. I’m a prodigal, I guess. Daily. How kind of God to know that blank spaces would be what calls me home and settles me when I get there.
Go Beyond “You Just Have to Believe in Yourself”
3I used to get really discouraged watching athletes interviewed after their winning performances, especially the young, amateur athletes like you see on the Olympics. The news correspondent would say: “So, how did you do it? What do you recommend for all those aspiring swimmers, ball players, dancers, etc. out there?” This was inevitably their response,
“You just have to believe in yourself.”
This was discouraging, because I knew that it took incredible dedication, drive, skill, resources and probably a good bit of luck to end up where they were. I could believe in myself all I wanted to and, without these other things, I would never stand where they were standing. Belief was not enough. In fact, it felt like a lie.
Oh, they weren’t lying. I am sure they had tremendous belief in themselves and this propelled them. But so did the guy who qualified for the Olympics but didn’t make the finals and the one who finished 52nd with a personal best time by 3 seconds. So did the lady who broke all social barriers even to compete there. So did the Paralympic athletes. So did the Special Olympic athletes. They all believed in themselves to get where they got…which was not on the Olympic medal podium.
The deception, I realized, was the sampling method used by the correspondent (and my selective listening). The interviews given, and the ones I attended to were with the winners. Winners, across the board, believe in themselves. And when you ask them how they got to be winners, they’ll tell you so. But it is my error to think that believing in myself will cause me to win. Belief is not causal.
“Just believe” is a much tossed around phrase in Christian circles. As if, believing is something you do without thinking. That it is a mindless act or a desperate plan. But when the “just believe” is offered to people who are seeking in today’s world, people who subscribe to this “just believe in yourself” mantra, who reason that ‘if I believe hard enough or believe properly or with enough diligence, I will make it so,’ their belief gets misplaced. And is probably going to disappoint.
On the other hand, there are plenty of folks out there, perhaps most, who don’t believe in themselves. They don’t believe they can succeed, don’t believe they can win, and have real uncertainty about whether they’ll amount to anything. I have coached plenty. I have been one. One who, before the race is ever run, looks at opponents or reads the scouting report and thinks (maybe even says) I can’t beat him. She’s faster than me. He’s better than me. These people are the realists, one might say. But the one thing I know is, if I say I can’t do it, I am right – already. I have defeated myself before I have begun.
So, motivators the world over tell people to “fake it till you make it,” “be the person you want to become,” “act as if you’re champion and you will become one.” These coaches can’t guarantee outcomes, but they know this sort of approach gives their athletes, teams, or clients a fighting chance. They’ve figured out that defeating yourself is the first thing you have to overcome. And they know full well that in every contest all the competitors want to win, may even believe they will win, but there’s always a loser. Belief, not withstanding.
Perhaps that’s why so many of my coaching and athletic friends have trouble with believing in God or believing in Christ. Because they have competed their whole lives believing in themselves. They have, through hard work and dedication, brought about their success. But they know that belief cannot make God so. And perhaps, if they invested in that belief, they would feel responsible for that win. They don’t want to risk losing.
I have lost at plenty of things in my life so far – even things I believed in with all my heart. But of the things I have achieved, none of them can compare to the things I was sure I had lost that I turned over to God who showed me a new way to see them and a new way of winning. A way I would have never believed.