"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket --safe, dark, motionless, airless-- it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable." - Clive Staples Lewis.
A few of my friends have been passing this quote back and forth in some of our emails, and it has caught my eye more than once over the last couple of weeks. I was simply thinking of it tonight without even reading it...thinking of how often I put up walls and put my relationships in boxes so I do not have to truly be vulnerable OR truly love people. Tonight for the first time I saw the house of a friend I've known for 7 years...I just met some of his friends...spent time hanging out on his turf, watching him do things that are a normal part of his life rather than keeping him following my plans on my turf. Sigh. I'm such a jerk. Why has it taken me 7 years to do that? When is protection good, and when should a person be vulnerable? Can a person be both safe and vulnerable at the same time? Wouldn't that be an oxymoron?
Along with these thoughts there are the few minutes--not many, of course--that remind me that I could somehow have a "normal" life if...I don't know how. But there are moments when I'm sure it is possible, and then I wonder how all of these strands will come together. Sigh again.
I don't even know what selfishness or vulnerability means right now...again, another reminder of why grace is important. But I do know that God has called us to love. And I can trust God's protection. And even if all of that is confusing and messed up and wrong, I can trust in God's redemption. :)
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Advent thoughts
O come, O come, Emmanuel
And ransom captive Israel
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.
So, in the last two days...or the last day (I'm in the middle of this strange night-day confusion that comes from working overnights several days in a row) I've had two conversations of absolute beauty...conversations of relationship and separation and hope and longing...conversations brimming over with love, with hearts' cries to know and be known...conversations of rescue and restoration...
One conversation was with an agnostic who couldn't quite accept how science and faith always came across as being opposite from each other. When I asked him about faith, he said that more important than defining and putting faith in terms and boxes he would rather grow, question, experience with love and authenticity. Moments when he experiences right relationship are moments that are spiritual to him, but the Christians around him won't buy it and say he is not blessed. "What would slapping on the label of 'Christian' really mean?" he asked...
The other conversation was with Eric, who was talking about singing "O Come, O Come Emmanuel" today and how excited he was for it. Somehow, as he passionately spoke about the exile, mourning, pain, and longing, and the call for God to come and be near, my mind was filled with flashing images and poetry, and the words from my previous conversation echoed in my mind.
Love. The authenticity that is seen when someone is mourning, groaning, crying, in exile away from their beloved. Then suddenly, brilliant flashes of light, songs of joy, a flood of peace, and the warmth of knowing that God is love...and not only loving, not only saving, but is near, is present, and will never leave us alone.
And ransom captive Israel
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel.
So, in the last two days...or the last day (I'm in the middle of this strange night-day confusion that comes from working overnights several days in a row) I've had two conversations of absolute beauty...conversations of relationship and separation and hope and longing...conversations brimming over with love, with hearts' cries to know and be known...conversations of rescue and restoration...
One conversation was with an agnostic who couldn't quite accept how science and faith always came across as being opposite from each other. When I asked him about faith, he said that more important than defining and putting faith in terms and boxes he would rather grow, question, experience with love and authenticity. Moments when he experiences right relationship are moments that are spiritual to him, but the Christians around him won't buy it and say he is not blessed. "What would slapping on the label of 'Christian' really mean?" he asked...
The other conversation was with Eric, who was talking about singing "O Come, O Come Emmanuel" today and how excited he was for it. Somehow, as he passionately spoke about the exile, mourning, pain, and longing, and the call for God to come and be near, my mind was filled with flashing images and poetry, and the words from my previous conversation echoed in my mind.
Love. The authenticity that is seen when someone is mourning, groaning, crying, in exile away from their beloved. Then suddenly, brilliant flashes of light, songs of joy, a flood of peace, and the warmth of knowing that God is love...and not only loving, not only saving, but is near, is present, and will never leave us alone.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
A new goal and end-of-semester thoughts...
Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. - 1 Cor. 13:12
It's the weekend before finals, and almost all of my journals and papers have been turned in to professors. Now the only things left are tests and presentations, but I feel such a lack of motivation that I'm typing this rather than studying the stack of textbooks next to me. :)
The semester has been...painful. There were weeks of hating myself for not being able to love other people the way that I wanted to, or make decisions the way I wanted to, or think or communicate the way that I wanted to... But there were also moments--so many more moments that were a part of every day--of joy. Laughter with Brian and Carissa. Class with Dr. B and our cohort of outreach people that I love dearly. Homework and work up at OHSCO, where there has started to be so many of us hanging out that it feels like we are all family and work with sensei back in Japan, for some reason. There were so many, many classes where I first felt like a failure and then slowly started feeling like a fighter, and then even began to feel like the teacher a little bit...I love to learn (except for science...oy :)).
Thinking about the biggest message of the semester though has brought me to thinking of the verse above from 1 Corinthians. It is by far the verse that has ministered to me the most this semester, and it is one that Dr. Dave uses frequently in choir. There is the tension of the darkness, the murkiness of the glass in the mirror and the longing brought about by the separation of two people who only see reflections rather than the real things for which they are searching. There is the secrecy, the inner hiddenness of everything behind the reflection that is crying to be let out. But even in the tension, the murkiness, the loneliness, the secrecy, there is hope in knowing that one day all of that ambiguity and uncertainty that was so difficult to be read with confidence will actually be gone, and there will be a "knowing"--a reality so deep and full and rich with relationship! The verse affirms the pain and the hope, the tension and the peace, the longing and the fulfillment...
In choir this semester we sang a song called "Crossing the Bar," with the lyrics by Alfred Lord Tennyson, and the opening words are as follows:
Sunset and evening star,And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.
I'm pretty sure that I cried through 75% of the times I was trying to sing this song, because it was so much mourning and hope twisting together in aches of pain and brilliant flashes of joy...And that is so much what my life is like right now.
But it's ok. :) Even more than that, I think it's good. Dr. Dave teaches all of us so much with his emphasis on "seeing in a glass mirror and one day seeing face-to-face"...It is those people that have the realness of life with pain and hope and relationship with God that I truly respect and want to emulate.
So I have no idea where my life is going, who I'm going to be with, or what I'm going to be doing. Well, I think it probably involves Japan and grad school. :) But...mostly, I want to be the type of person who "sees a poor reflection as in a mirror," but who also knows that one day I'll be "face-to-face" with God my Father...I want to show people that reality.
It's the weekend before finals, and almost all of my journals and papers have been turned in to professors. Now the only things left are tests and presentations, but I feel such a lack of motivation that I'm typing this rather than studying the stack of textbooks next to me. :)
The semester has been...painful. There were weeks of hating myself for not being able to love other people the way that I wanted to, or make decisions the way I wanted to, or think or communicate the way that I wanted to... But there were also moments--so many more moments that were a part of every day--of joy. Laughter with Brian and Carissa. Class with Dr. B and our cohort of outreach people that I love dearly. Homework and work up at OHSCO, where there has started to be so many of us hanging out that it feels like we are all family and work with sensei back in Japan, for some reason. There were so many, many classes where I first felt like a failure and then slowly started feeling like a fighter, and then even began to feel like the teacher a little bit...I love to learn (except for science...oy :)).
Thinking about the biggest message of the semester though has brought me to thinking of the verse above from 1 Corinthians. It is by far the verse that has ministered to me the most this semester, and it is one that Dr. Dave uses frequently in choir. There is the tension of the darkness, the murkiness of the glass in the mirror and the longing brought about by the separation of two people who only see reflections rather than the real things for which they are searching. There is the secrecy, the inner hiddenness of everything behind the reflection that is crying to be let out. But even in the tension, the murkiness, the loneliness, the secrecy, there is hope in knowing that one day all of that ambiguity and uncertainty that was so difficult to be read with confidence will actually be gone, and there will be a "knowing"--a reality so deep and full and rich with relationship! The verse affirms the pain and the hope, the tension and the peace, the longing and the fulfillment...
In choir this semester we sang a song called "Crossing the Bar," with the lyrics by Alfred Lord Tennyson, and the opening words are as follows:
Sunset and evening star,And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;
For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.
I'm pretty sure that I cried through 75% of the times I was trying to sing this song, because it was so much mourning and hope twisting together in aches of pain and brilliant flashes of joy...And that is so much what my life is like right now.
But it's ok. :) Even more than that, I think it's good. Dr. Dave teaches all of us so much with his emphasis on "seeing in a glass mirror and one day seeing face-to-face"...It is those people that have the realness of life with pain and hope and relationship with God that I truly respect and want to emulate.
So I have no idea where my life is going, who I'm going to be with, or what I'm going to be doing. Well, I think it probably involves Japan and grad school. :) But...mostly, I want to be the type of person who "sees a poor reflection as in a mirror," but who also knows that one day I'll be "face-to-face" with God my Father...I want to show people that reality.
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