Christmas 1989

6th or 7th grade, I think. I was just getting into magazines made for girls a few years older. They sold secret fashion ideas, healthy eating tips, makeup and perfume ads. I devoured them page by page and they left me hungry still to try out all of the new things I felt I should be emulating. 

The magazine perfume ads sometimes had sticky fold out samples that gave you a healthy dose of their scent. Well, I had my eye on a few of those perfumes. I saw the ads everywhere on my television, in the drug store and in my magazines. Perfume seemed so grown up and sexy. Wearing a certain brand felt like you were taking on a new persona. Clearly the advertising was highly effective on me.

Well, that particular year I had decided that I needed a perfume called “Navy.” Its slick ad campaign featured elegant and sophisticated women dressed in navy blue who somehow along with their deep red lips also managed to embody a casual, joyful ease in their tight-fitting clothes. How could I not want to be that? This awkward middle schooler bought in. “Navy perfume” was at the top of her Christmas wish list. 

Christmas morning came and I was thrilled to unwrap this most coveted gift. A whole bottle to douse my middle school cares away with. Now my mother was not a fan of perfumes. Scents in general really bothered her and she had pretty much banned them from the house. But she must have sensed that this one thing was really important to me. She showed me a great act of kindness even though I’m sure she suspected she would come to regret it. 

After we read the Christmas story, opened presents and had a wonderful Christmas breakfast, I snuck upstairs as quickly as I could to try out my new perfume. I thought I could probably get away with a healthy spritzing if I went up to my room and waited a bit for it to air out before coming back down. I wrenched it from its box and sprayed my neck eagerly. 

I had an awful and almost instantaneous reaction to this perfume. My head throbbed with what was at the time the worst headache I had ever had. My Christmas day was ruined. I spent the morning and early afternoon upstairs trying to wipe myself clean of it. I eventually resolved to take a shower and change my clothes. Later, I snuck some Tylenol to see if I could rid myself of the pain. Nothing worked. 

I was desperate not to let my family know that I was starting to regret this gift that my mother had made a very large exception for. So, I eventually rejoined my family, forcing myself to ignore the nausea and the headache so that it would appear all was well. It was not well. I was not well. I was utterly miserable watching Christmas movies, playing games and pretending to be happy. I never used “Navy” again. It sat on my dresser for years. 

The things we want aren’t always the things that are good for us, are they? They aren’t even always the things we like or that make us feel good? Sometimes they simply serve as a distraction, or just something to yearn for? Something someone else has that we need? An obsession. 

There are countless examples of this set up in my life. I’m guessing yours too… The relationship that I wanted so badly to work out, the car that I needed to have, the job I knew was perfect for me, the purchase I thought would change my life… yes, they all ended up the same. Regret. Wasted time. Pain. Emptiness. 

Sometimes God lets us have our way. Sometimes He lets us swirl around for a while in the shit that we thought would fill us with joy. Lessons learned? Maybe…

How long do we dance around in it pretending it doesn’t make us want to vomit? How long do we push off the regret? Do we ever acknowledge that it didn’t fill the hole that we needed it to?

So this Christmas, as I reminisce over my 1989 childhood Christmas debacle and this 2020-dumpster-fire-of-a-year, I’m going to celebrate those kinds of gifts. Uncomfortable gifts. The kind of gifts that remind me that a purchase isn’t going to make me a different person. The gifts that make me realize how much I take for granted. The gifts that cause me pain. The gifts that remind me of how incredibly brief this life is. The gifts that save me from myself.

In this backward, upside-down, nonsensical Christian faith of mine, God Almighty presented Himself as a gift to the world. Not in any sort of regal manner. But humble and dirty. With pain and with blood. 

Celebrate with me the gift of our Jesus this Christmas. Celebrate that He came down in a form that we didn’t like. A form that left a bad taste in our mouths. Celebrate the gift of repentance and redemption. Embrace the fact that you got it all wrong again on your own. The gift of goodness draped in pain awaits us in the manger.

Pendulum Swings

A long-time friend of mine has always gone for attractive women. I’ve watched him repeatedly go right for the stereotypically unintelligent, yet gorgeous ones. I never said anything to him about it but it always struck me as odd – he’s a really intelligent guy. He ended up marrying the sweetest woman years ago who fit his typical Barbie bill: stunning, loyal, but in all honesty, not the brightest of the bunch. Recently, he told me the story of how he unexpectedly fell in love with someone else. “It wasn’t her look initially,” he said. “I didn’t even really think she was that attractive at first. But she was just so smart – I could hold a conversation with her that was at my level. I’ve never been able to do that with my wife. It caught me off guard.” Over a decade after his wedding, he was questioning himself.

We’ve all seen the childhood stars go off the deep end a bit. We see them coming in like a wrecking ball. In some cases, literally swinging on a behavioral pendulum. They grow up contracted to be America’s sweetheart. Then they react and run full force into crazy-town to break that super-sweet image. Often they come back around, clean up their act, and eventually carve out their own unique and deliberate path.

Some of us seem to need to hit the wall on both sides a few times before we can see clearly to find our own way. Let’s face it, it’s not just the child stars. It’s part of our human condition. We can go to extremes in our search to find ourselves and what feels right to us.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how much of my life has been spent just swinging from one extreme to another. How much did I not want to be like that one family member? Or like that one person that hurt me? Or like the girl that they thought I was? It’s been enough to change the trajectory of my life several times. Focusing on who I didn’t want to be allowed me to avoid the very serious and intentional pursuit of the woman I wanted to become.

Many of us may feel called at times by God to something that fills us with fear and dread. Like Jonah, we know what it is to run in the opposite direction. We have a million good reasons why it makes sense to catapult our souls as far away as possible from commitment, family, a new venture, a difficult conversation, truth, rest, forgiveness…. So we bury our heads in our work, or we launch ourselves into something new or we pick up and leave because it feels right.

Maturity (Christian, or otherwise) is not achieved by taking the familiar path to avoidance time and time again. We will always feel the pull to go there. But when we hop on that pendulum ride, we are no longer in control of who we become. The challenge is to respond to pain and discomfort, but not to react.

Response is thoughtful and self-reflective. Response looks at the feelings and what lies at the root of them. Response seeks wise counsel. Response prays for truth to be made clear.

Reaction is reckless. Reaction propels us from one thing to the next to avoid pain or difficulty. Reaction rides that pendulum with no regard for where it may lead.

As I listened to my friend’s bewildered heart, I bit my lip from the tension. He saw the pendulum swinging far from where he was and it looked like the ride of a lifetime. His maturity didn’t stop the pull to someone new and exciting. But fortunately, it did allow him to pause, consider, and make a deliberate choice about who he wanted to be.

Brené Brown says that “integrity is choosing courage over comfort.” Don’t confuse what eases your pain or brings you temporary comfort and distraction for what you are called to. Our Father does provide comfort and times of rest for our weary souls here on earth. But the God who gives us strength for all things does not call us to a life of reckless pendulum swings.

Uncomfortably Numb

A few years ago, our family hosted a Ukrainian girl for the summer. She was thirteen, sweet, shy, quiet and didn’t speak a word of English. We communicated through hand gestures, a few basic Russian words and Google Translate on our cell phones. Communication took effort. So, several times a week I tried to find an American movie (one that we owned a copy of at home) that had been translated into Russian online. I would set up my laptop for her and get her the headphones. Then I would set up our television and dvd player. We always had a bunch of fun trying to sync up the Russian and English versions and start them up at the exact same time.

We typically watched movies that were appropriate for younger children. It didn’t matter, to her it was all new. The show for me however, very quickly became watching our host daughter while she became engrossed in a film. To say she became engrossed was really an understatement. This girl was entranced by almost every single movie we watched that summer. For a quiet and reserved girl, she became incredibly expressive while sitting with my laptop. She would smile widely and chuckle loudly at the funny parts. She would hold her breath and sit on the edge of her comfy chair during the tense moments. She forgot all about where she was and who she was with and she lost track of keeping up her rather detached exterior. I saw her shed tears during Disney movies.

One of the movies that we had found a Russian match online to was called “Ella Enchanted.” It’s based on a lovely children’s book by Gail Carson Levine. The movie was made in 2004 and starred a young Anne Hathaway. In the climax of the movie, the star finds herself under a spell to murder her very own love interest (the prince, of course). She is beside herself with fear and desperate to find a way out of this horrible curse. At this very crucial moment of the film, our thirteen year old friend ripped off her ear buds, slammed the laptop shut and went into the other room with tears running down her cheeks. It wasn’t just a distraught actress in a predictable Cinderella storyline. It was a terribly upset girl who could feel every moment of that horrible predicament, ridiculously fictional though it was. It took quite a bit of coaxing to convince her that (spoiler alert) everything turns out fine in the end and that she really should watch those last few minutes.

Isn’t this how we all are in our early years? Don’t most of us feel and experience and breathe so deeply when we are new? If we’ve never had a movie try to manipulate our emotions, we are unguarded and fresh to the feelings. It overwhelms us. When we haven’t been taken advantage of, we are so much more willing to give. When we haven’t been rejected countless times, we are often willing to go to any lengths.

But over time we close off the places that got hurt. We shut down the foolishly loyal parts. We learn to ignore the compassion that bubbles up. We can’t go there all of the time. It is simply too much to live with on a day-to-day basis.

And so I’ve been thinking a lot lately about going numb. Am I starting to close down my heart? It hurts to care so much and to be disappointed or heartbroken over and over. It hurts to see people that I love in pain or have them lash out at me. I ache for the friend who makes the same mistakes time and time again. The older I get, the more pain I’ve experienced.

You won’t find me rushing in to rescue and love with reckless abandon anymore. But, that’s okay – I’ve matured. There is wisdom in my experience, but how far has my pendulum swung in the opposite direction? Do I now live at the other extreme? Do I steel my heart to avoid the ups and downs of human contact? Have I become comfortably numb?

Recently though, I’ve experienced some discomfort in my callouses. I want to walk that line – the one where I wisely protect myself from needless pain, but where I am open to suffering for a cause. I want to tune out hurtful comments that are not worthy of my precious mental space, but be open to receiving constructive criticism on my own behavior. I need to hold my heart back from a foolishly dangerous place and yet not be afraid to sit with another in their pain. I want to be on that line where a youthful heart intersects with an experienced one – where I am wise as a serpent, yet innocent as a dove. I want to be wisely cautious, yet not afraid. I want a soft yet strong, gracious and pliable heart.

The Weeds in My Yearbook

My kids were digging around the other day and found a stack of my old yearbooks in my closet. I didn’t think much of it. A few days later as I was getting them ready for bed, my daughter asked me quite suddenly, “Mom, why is your yearbook picture gone?” I was confused and asked her to show me what she meant. She went into the closet and came out with the yearbook from my freshman year in high school. As I looked down at the page with my name on it, I saw the picture inked out with a pen. But, these were not just a few scribbles. There before me, in the space designated for my image, were lines and lines of painstakingly, hard-pressed, ball-point pen marks going in all directions that made it impossible to see what was underneath. This had been no half-hearted attempt. My fragile 14 year old self was clearly so heartbroken at what looked back at her that she had made a detailed and successful attempt to obliterate it from her own memory.

I’m not much of a gardener. I love the idea of gardening more than I do the actual work of it. The best I’ve been able to pull off is some containers that gradually wither in spite of my best efforts over the summer. Each spring I have large aspirations of cleaning up the yard, getting rid of the old, putting in flowers, a few veggies… I always start but I never quite get it looking ship shape. It’s the weeds. They are overwhelming to me – constant and pervasive.

We have these daylilies that have taken over a small section in front of our home. I don’t really mind them until they take over our walkway. They grow over into the path so that I have to walk in the dirt to get to my car. It bothers me. A few years ago, I decided that it was time for them to go. So, in the fall we cut them all down and did our best to dig them out. If you know anything about daylilies, you will likely know what happened the next spring. They eagerly popped back up, seemingly just as numerous as the year before. Last year, we decided to get them in the spring. At a friend’s suggestion, we pinned card board over the fresh shoots and laid piles of mulch on top of them. This worked better than our first attempt, but the lilies poked and prodded their way around the pieces and into the cracks. One day I’d find two and take care of them, the next day I’d find three more poking out from the other end. We spent our summer like this, fighting with the daylilies for our walkway. Spring is here and I’m already dealing with more of the same.

“Mommy, are my legs fat?”

I heard it as I was doing dishes and my heart stopped. I put down the dirty sponge and walked into the other room to find my daughter in a leotard, looking down at her muscular legs in distress. “Of course not! Why would you ask that?” I knew the answer before I even asked. It’s shown up, just like the weeds and the daylilies. It’s a bit earlier than I had imagined – but it has arrived.

I wanted my girls to know about the voices. I told them that they tell us that we’re not as pretty or as shapely as our friends. They whisper that our bodies aren’t quite right – that our worth is spoiled by our “problem areas.” And then I told them that we have to fight against these voices. We were created to move and to live life to the fullest in these bodies. We should celebrate what they can do for us – but, ultimately these bodies are not us. Our worth is not found in our shifting, aging bodies. I watched them carefully, wondering if they would tune me out. They didn’t. They were hanging on my every word. I asked tentatively, “Have you ever heard those kinds of voices?” I was saddened to see two pairs of wide eyes nodding immediately.

It’s distressing to see the things that have plagued you and weighed you down in your own life show up in the next generation. We try so hard as parents to create a different scenario for our children, hoping that somehow we will find the magic trick to evading the struggle. We are frantic to find the formula that produces a human being who does not fall victim to the meddlesome sprite of comparison. But some things just poke through no matter the effort. And so, I’m left with the weeds and the daylilies growing right along with the tulips, crocuses and daffodils this spring. And my dear young girls are just starting their journey of trying to blossom and flourish from amongst the weeds.

I can’t fix this. There is no vaccine to protect our children from this. The world and its values and voices and condemnations will always be whispering their siren song to our itching ears. I will tell you what I can do though: I can show them how to weed. I can get my hands filthy right along with them and show them how to battle these ever-present thoughts. I can speak truth and love into their hearts until they are strong enough to weed their own garden. I can remind them to appreciate the blooms and the beauty that is so easily looked over. And I can pray for truth to outweigh the lies.

Vanilla Girl

A few years back, someone told me that they thought I was the “least passionate person” that they had ever met. I thought about those words for a while back when they were first spoken and then again so many times, over and over again, through the years:

Really? The absolute least passion you’ve ever seen in a person, came from me?

It struck down deep into my core. It hurt. It seemed to confirm some of my biggest fears that I had about myself – that I just blended in. I had a sneaking suspicion that if I didn’t show up at a party, no one would miss me, or maybe even notice. I wondered if I were a benign, vanilla presence at any gathering.

This person was my friend. They had spent plenty of time with me and had come to this conclusion of their own accord. I’m quite sure it wasn’t meant to hurt – I honestly believe this person was just sharing an observation. But, it really knocked me off my feet.

You see, I’ve spent good long chunks of my life looking for something. I’ve tried lots of different hobbies: crafting, knitting, embroidery, pottery, cake decorating, antiquing, picking up an instrument, running, the list goes on. I think I’ve been looking for something that evokes passion from my soul. I saw it in others. I saw the light that emanated from my friends’ eyes when she eagerly tied up her running shoes prepping to head out on an evening jog. The best I could ever really muster up was a, “the sooner I get out there, the sooner it will be over,” kind-of-attitude. But, even if I found a bit of joy in these things, they never lasted long with me. I’ve never found that spark in doing things.

I’ve felt blank and plain. I’ve needed something to define me. And so as long as I can remember, I’ve always been drawn to people who were not lacking in passion. Perhaps I hoped that a bit would rub off on me. Or, maybe that I’d find my own edges in the things that ignited them. I’ve spent many an hour against the wall, watching someone else’s obsession in the name of support and friendship.

But after a while I started realizing something about my relationship to those firecrackers that I spent so much of my time around. I started noticing that I was fascinated by the people themselves – it wasn’t just their passions. It was the way they made decisions or the way that they went quiet when a certain someone walked into the room. I have spent my entire life studying people – introverts, extroverts, creative types, by-the-book types, dreamers, the bossy ones, the feelers, the workers, the nasties, the wounded animals… all kinds really.

Last year, I found myself in the introductory pages to Jen Hatmaker’s book For the Love. She writes about how she has admiration for all of her friends who are passionate about a variety of things. But, when it comes down to it, her passion is very simple – people. I had never thought about it in that way before. But, it resonated so deeply with me. It was me. I may not be very motivated to beautify my garden, scrapbook my child’s first year, try out for a play, redecorate my bedroom or become immersed in a World War II special on the History Channel. But, I am intrinsically motivated to be engaged with people.

I’m not much for small talk. I can do it well, but a little part of me aches when I do. I don’t care about the weather or your new car or your outfit. I care about you; the cut-away-all-the-pretenses you. I want to know how you really are. I don’t want to hear fake chit chat. I want to know your hopes and dreams, your struggles and triumphs, what you’re learning and what you fear. I want to laugh with you and I want to cry with you. If I can grab a moment of real in the hustle and bustle of the daily grind, my heart swells.

I am built to engage and walk alongside, to pray for and to sip tea with those that I encounter in this life. I find reflections of my God and my faith in others. I am devoted to meeting people where they are at, loving them for who they are and coming along side of them in their journey through this world. You won’t find me waking up early to get in that bit of extra hobby time, but ask me to an early morning coffee date and I will be there with a sparkle in my eye. I crave human connection in my spiritual walk and that is where I find my joy and my greatest purpose.

So, I’ve come to accept my Vanilla Girl status when it comes to opinions, hobbies and interests. I’ve got opinions – believe me. And the closer you are to me, the more you’ll know of them. But, I can be a bit bland and you may find me boring. But, if you know me well enough, you will see that I am not apathetic in the least about my relationships. My zeal is poured out over people. That is how I am wired. I will be there for you in any way that I can. I will hope for you and dream for you. I will lift you up in prayer. I will listen with care as you pour out your secrets and fears. I will laugh and cry with you. I want you to hear my story and my experiences. I want to be known and understood. I want to drive deep stakes into the uncertain ground of life with you, no matter our differences.

When this life is finally over for me, I hope that it won’t be my lack of a strong political voice or the dull look in my eyes when we talk about canning our homegrown vegetables that will stay with you. I hope that my passion for finding God through and with people will be abundantly apparent to those that know me.

Imperfect Christmas

My children carried me through this Christmas season. I mean it. They decorated our Christmas tree. They spent hours creatively wrapping their homemade presents for all of our extended family members. They made and decorated Christmas cookies (I did reluctantly supervise this endeavor). Those two sweet little Christmas elves helped us get the Christmas cards out at church (we never did mail any out this year – sorry about that). And they decorated the whole house with delightfully childish Christmas cheer.

It wasn’t my kind of perfect. It was their kind of perfect. At first I fought it a bit. I wanted those decorations to be done the way I like to do them every year. But I quickly acquiesced.  I didn’t have the time, mental energy or focus to go around fixing everything that my kids had done to the best of their ability. And really, should I? What was wrong with a completely Imperfect Christmas?

I was grumpy and overwhelmed and burdened and tired. They were light-hearted and free and hopeful and generous. They were dancing and singing to their favorite Christmas songs. I was exhausted and run down with an eye twitch that had been going on non-stop for weeks (people were starting to notice).

So there I was, rather grinchily grumbling along, feeling guilty about all that I hadn’t done for my children to make it a better holiday. And then, unexpectedly on Christmas Eve, my dear friend’s father passed away. And in that one moment, everything fell into perspective. Death does that. It reminds of us of the fragile mortality that everyone we love is draped in.

My weary heart and burdened mind were cemented into their rightful place – smack in the middle of this holiday. Yes, even my struggles belonged here at this joyous time. Every Christmas here on Earth is an Imperfect Christmas. Some day at Christmas-time (cue Stevie Wonder) there will be complete peace and joy. We will not have worries, tears or dread. But that time is not yet here. And until then, an Imperfect Christmas is all that we have. Broken ornaments lay next to our shattered dreams. Family relationships will not be all that we wish they were. People will drink too much and drive home. Loved ones will be farther than we can travel. Depression may sink in even deeper. Hope for the coming year may be hard to muster. Death interrupts. Grief shrouds.

So if you had an amazing holiday and were filled with God’s true joy, you are blessed! I’ve had many holidays that were all that I could have hoped for. But if you had a rough time this year for whatever reason, take heart in the knowledge that our God has embraced this place called Earth. He “made His dwelling among us” (John 1:14). He didn’t come down here for our Hallmark moments and our edited Facebook posts. We’re not fooling Him. He is here with us in our pain, in our struggles and in our daily grind. We don’t have to pretend or fake a smile. There is room for truth between our God and His people. There is room for our Imperfect Christmas in His arms. So let our weary hearts run willingly to Him. Let us take comfort that He came down so humbly to be with us.

God blessed me so richly through my children this Christmas. On Christmas morning, in the midst of my dirty floors and unsymmetrical tree lighting, I was reminded of what truly matters. And I savored every imperfect moment.

For My Husband

Long ago, we sat hand in hand. Our gazes lingered, our hearts felt light. Nothing was going to ruin the gift that we had been given – each other. We sat in a local Christian counseling office’s waiting room. Our pastor had asked us to get some professional premarital counseling before the wedding. So we had dutifully scheduled our six appointments in spite of a busy summer filled with wedding preparations. We weren’t afraid of counseling; we knew it would further equip us to be the best couple that we could. But as we joked about the waiting room magazine articles we suddenly found ourselves caught in the middle of another couple’s demise. They sat across from each other in the nook of the waiting room that we had occupied for the few minutes we had to kill. The husband sat next to me and the wife directly opposite. And then, they started talking. The talking was honestly more like hissing. Two mouths that had once kissed each other lovingly were now spitting hate-filled, horrible words filled with anger, resentment and bitterness at each other. They were really trying to keep it down. You could see the woman was restraining herself. They weren’t yelling. But the tone was so harsh and abrasive that you could not ignore it. They were throwing verbal knives straight for the heart. We quickly stopped our cute little inside jokes and just focused our visual attention on the magazines, pretending as if we were lost in our own thoughts.

When our counselor finally called us and we were walking back to the private room, I remember looking at my doting fiancé and asking him with a palpable anxiety, “do you think that we will ever get like that?” “Of course not,” he said back with assurance, “that’s horrible.” I breathed a sigh of relief and marched steadily on.

Now for those of you with sweet, loving and peaceful marriages – you can just carry on. Go home and kiss your spouse and bask in the delight of your beloved. God has blessed you with something simple and beautiful and something pure. I’m truly happy for you – there is no sarcasm here. But, for those of you who have found marriage to be more of a struggle… read on. It hasn’t worked out as smoothly as we planned over here.

After a few years of marriage, several years of graduate school, two small kids, a stressful job and a limited income along with debt, I unfortunately understood how it could have gotten there for that couple and for many, many others. I see how easy it is. I see so clearly how the pride and the bitterness and the resentment and the hurt add up. Our hearts can turn cold and dark so quickly.

“It takes a lotta love my friend, To keep your heart from freezing…” – David Gray

My husband and I together often function like a tornado. That’s just us, together. We are in constant motion: needing, hoping, longing, controlling, loving, chasing, running. Sometimes, seemingly by sheer luck we make it to the eye of the twister and we can just sit and be with each other in peace. Those moments are so precious and in the past ten years they have frankly been not nearly enough. We refine and spur each other on. We run after each other with remorse and we run away from the other with pride and bitterness. We start over a million times a week. But two damaged souls don’t always fit together well. There is so much striving. If we stopped to rest sometimes I’m afraid that we would give up.

Ideally of course, we wouldn’t be quite so prone to hurting each other. And, yes – we are working on that. But, for better or worse, we have so little pretense as a couple. Our hearts are on our sleeves – we don’t hide and that leads to frequent collisions. A family member famously said to us a few years back as we eagerly bickered during a holiday meal, “God forbid the two of you don’t air EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. of your feelings!” It’s actually become a humorous, classic and defining moment for us as a couple. We don’t often have to wonder what the other one thinks about a certain topic – everything is already out there. That’s just us.

And in our case, opposites attract. He’s studious, I’m practical. He’s a big-thinker, I’m a details kind of girl. I’m organized (or at least attempt to be), he’s fifteen different piles (on a good day) around the house. I’m careful to remember all of those little things, he locks his keys in his car on a regular basis. I have a listening ear, he can go on and on. He’s a spender, I’m a saver. I love my lists, he groans when I pull them out. I’m dramatic, he’s… actually, I think he might be a bit dramatic too. All of those little differences that seemed so cute and that you developed a fondness for in the beginning just seem to further irritate you as time goes on. It’s kind of like those shoes that you thought looked so cute and only pressed in just a tad at the store. Well, the more you wear them, the more irritating they get. Pretty soon all you notice when you put them on is the discomfort – you’ve stopped caring that they are cute.

So, why even bother? Why keep going if you didn’t magically get the marriage of your dreams? Why do we pick ourselves up time and time again and dust ourselves off and try it again? For my husband and me, it boils very simply down to our faith. It’s not just that he’s a pastor and that we should be a good example. Trust me, some days that’s not enough. But our faith in Christ leads us over and over again to step out in forgiveness and to pry our desperate fingers away from our selfish prizes right after we just raged and hated and jabbed and cried out in pain. God asks us to stay with “the wife [or husband] of our youth.” He asks us, as believers, over and over again not to divorce. Of course there are always exceptions and I am not going to dig into these right now (let me unequivocally say however that if you are in an abusive situation – God does not want you to be in that). But separate from abuse and adultery, He asks us to stay with a sinner, someone who will undoubtedly hurt you over and over and over again. Why would He do that?!? And in my worst moments of marital frustration, I cry out to God in that tone. I don’t understand it. But in moments of clarity, I see it. I see how God is teaching me to love and to forgive and to be humble. I see how resilient my God is in loving me time and time again after I turn away from Him. I see just how resilient my husband is in loving me over and over after my hurtful words or dismissive attitude. I see that forgiving seventy times seven is truly what is asked of me and is truly what I am offered. I know that love is not just that amazing feeling that happens in the beginning… but it is the commitment and the humility of a wounded heart to not lash out but to reach out in hope and in love.

We remain a work in progress. We fight hard and we love hard – this has literally become our motto over the years. That’s us. But, I am more grateful than I ever have been for a husband who is willing to look at his own mistakes. I’m in awe of his persistence in loving me. I’m humbled by his willingness to forgive over and over again. And when I sit and think about it, I can even love his deep thoughts, his messy piles, his overdeveloped sense of morality and his ridiculous sense of humor. I love all of that and more because it all comes with a loyal, honest heart that loves me deeper than I ever realize.

I know more of Christ’s love from your love, my husband. Thank you.

 “…if we could rise above our pettiness and love like we ain’t loved before, free on this earth as the surf that rolls and crashes on the shore.” – David Gray

Authentic Church

 

“The pressure to present ourselves as strong and spiritually ‘together’ hovers over most of us.”

 – Peter Scazzero

I’m not sure about you, but this quote resonates deeply with me. Unfortunately, I think it’s about us church folk—those of us who love Christ and have committed our lives to His care and to serving Him. Perhaps when we first started coming to church, we saw a few people that just seemed to have all of the answers. Maybe we saw one person in particular that we wished we were more like. Maybe over the years, we’ve tried to emulate the “church smiles” that we are greeted with each Sunday, maybe even when we didn’t feel like smiling on the inside. Sometimes we acted like we knew all the answers, when we really didn’t have a clue. There is something about church that causes so many of us to put up a false front. I have a sneaking suspicion that people in church leadership often feel this pressure even more so. A board member shouldn’t be struggling with sin, right? A trustee shouldn’t be tired and burned out, right? A pastor should have their act together, right?

There’s something in us that wants to see that person who seems to have all of the answers smiling serenely and praising God because we desperately want hope for our own lives. Someday we want to arrive just like that person in the front row.  And yet some days, seeing all of these false fronts only serve to make us more miserable. We start to compare our inner life to other’s external lives. Why can’t we get there? Why can’t we just get rid of that pesky sin struggle? Why can’t we feel more grateful? Why can’t we have the perfect marriage? Why can’t we keep on a budget? Why can’t we fit in? Do you see the problem there? We want to believe that we can get to this place of spiritual perfection and that our lives will follow suit and so we fake it, which in turn encourages others to fake it, which then makes so many of us miserable behind our smiles.

Now, don’t get me wrong here. I think there are real joys, hopes, friendships and blessings within the walls of most churches. I’ve seen amazing examples of grace, love, service and honesty in worship communities.  It’s not all fake smiles. In fact, I have a friend at church who answers me quite honestly each time I greet her with the all too common, “Hi. How are you?” Sometimes she lets me know that she’s having a really great week. But quite often there is a struggle, something sad that happened, something that angers her or a week full of sickness and fatigue.  I love those types of greetings – no pretense, just a little taste of the reality of her life. Isn’t that a novel idea? To answer a very personal greeting with an honest and personal answer instead of the automatic, “I’m great, how are you?” I believe that the more honest we are with ourselves, each other and our God, the more opportunity for grace, love, mercy, hope and true faith exists. The more we take off our masks and our fake smiles, the more opportunities we give for God to show up in the midst of our messes.

Look at what Paul says just a few verses after God makes it clear that He is not willing to remove Paul’s weakness:

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” 2 Corinthians 12:9

Is it possible that God meets us in a unique way in those true, raw and honest moments that we share with our Christian brothers and sisters? Perhaps His power and grace is found most clearly in those moments when we let down our guard and allow others to see our struggles, our vulnerabilities and our pain. Even those of us who are in leadership need these precious gifts that first require our own mask to be willingly set down.

Christ’s service on earth was to those who were weak, vulnerable and in need. The proud and self-sufficient turned away from Him. Let us strive to meet the vulnerability of someone taking off their mask with true love, kindness and comfort. We can truly be God’s comforting hands when we hug someone who has just shared a struggle. We can be the feet of Jesus to someone when we walk with them through something that they cannot face alone. We can be the friend that Jesus is to us when we hear, encourage and pray with our neighbor just down the church aisle.

Let us welcome weary hearts and burdens and shames to walk into church each Sunday morning along with us. This starts with us. You and me. If we want our churches to be real and authentic and to meet people where they are at, then we are that change. Bring your broken heart to church. Don’t be afraid to cry. Share your need. Cry out to God in front of others. Your freedom means their freedom.

The big secret that we all need to be reminded of is that none of us is smiling on the inside every day. This is a secret, hidden in plain sight. Every last one of us has a bad day, a bad week and sometimes even a rather nasty decade. None of us has it all together. Some of us have deep, dark, scary secrets that we haven’t told a soul. Not one of us Christians has “arrived.” We are all struggling through something, we all have sin struggles, most of us have a messy past and we are messing up in the here and now. This side of heaven, that pesky sin nature still holds on. But our Father desires that we “confess [our] sins to one another, and pray for one another so that [we] may be healed” (James 5:16).

My hope is that the church is known not only for our friendly smiles and service in our communities, but also for our vulnerability and for our weaknesses. For where our weaknesses are, there God will meet us in a big way. So, let our relationships be seasoned with honesty, grace, truth, gentleness, peace and love. Let us not shy away from our own struggles. God’s light will shine all the brighter when we expose our imperfect hearts to Him and to each other.