Ephesians 3:13

"I ask you, therefore, not to be discouraged because of my sufferings for you, which are your glory." God, help me to remember this verse and others like it in this time. You are God and I am not, and I will not try to bend life in the direction I want it to go. Like the lame shampoo bottles that sport the directions: rinse, lather, repeat, I will strive to bathe myself in your word, dwell on it and believe it, and continue to read it and dwell on it until my wandering heart is clean, until I accept your will instead of my own. I cry to you...give me aid.

Watching a spider craft its web on our porch as I pet the kittens. Wondering how in the world people can say life is about survival when spiders form webs much more intricate than necessary to capture prey. When the grass is so many shades of green even though chlorophyll only need be one. When rather than simply breathing, eating, sleeping...we dance, taste, love, experience.

Men of Rock Don't Make Good Warriors

I've been thinking about the church lately. What it's capable of. What it actually does. And I discovered that one can draw a lot of parallels between the modern-day church and the Terracotta Army which lies east of Mt. Li. Qin Shi Huang had the Terracotta Army built around 200 BC. The stone soldiers' purpose was to help him rule another empire in the afterlife; the army was a form of funeral art. Now, I suppose none of use could give an answer derivative of direct sight (for none of us are dead; therefore, we have not actually witnessed Qin's army in the afterlife); however, most of us would agree that Qin's army didn't help him out that much once he kicked the dirt.

Here's the thing. We, as the church, are the Terracotta Army. We were built for great things. We were crafted to fight the good fight, to conquer evil with love, to slay our Lord's foes in order to bring The Kingdom closer to earth. Life is a beautiful, messy story of redemption, hardship, and loss; the life we live is a battlefield. The battlefield has places of level ground. Places where we can catch our breath, have fellowship with other soldiers, and prepare for future invasion. The battlefield has hills and valleys. It is filled with joys and loves; it is also filled with losses and pain. The battlefield is messy. Our God promised that life would be hard, that sacrifices were necessary, and He never said that "His will" was always in line with what we believed could bring about victory. God's story is not the Disney version of a fairytale. It often resembles the Brother's Grimm, and for this reason, is hard to accept.

Though we, the army, were crafted for great battles and though our very lives are battlefields, we honestly...day to day...don't do all that much. We are at times active, but most of the time, on the whole, we are as engaged as the stone army that sat for centuries in the ground. Even after our hearts are excavated, after they have breathed fresh air after lying under layers of dirt and darkness, we still stand...looking ready to march and yet never taking the initiative to step forward. We tell others to "keep in step with the Spirit," "feed the hungry," and "take up the cross." But that's just it. Our mouths may move, but how often do we actually follow our own advice? We are stone. We are immobile. We are apathetic. We are lazy as hell.

The modern-day church often thrives on hierarchy. Much like the Terracotta Army, the church is set up in ranks. We place pastors and music directors and nursery workers on the front lines, and we stay in the back, hoping that our "best men" will be enough and that we can stay in comfortable boxes of conformity and safety forever. We give glory to officers and generals for battles won, for communities reached when what we should be doing is bowing down in reverence to the actual victor, the one who conquered death and hell and devil.

It is also interesting that Qin specifically commanded that no two soldiers be made alike. He wanted diversity. We are all a part of the church; however, we are each different. My talents and skills and personality and spiritual gifts are not yours and vice versa. We are a body, and each part fills a different role. We are all different, yet when we are aligned with Christ, we march as one. Our faces hold diverse emotions and past experiences mark our bodies, but with the support of fellow soldiers, we march to one drum...the beat of Abba's heart.

I believe it is high time the Terracotta Army rise up and take it's place. We need to get involved. Get serious. Get to praying. Get to working. Get to ministering and teaching and preaching and serving. We need to stand, shake off the binding stone that gives us such comfort, re-embrace the flesh that can be wounded, put on the full armour of God, and march together into battle. This soldier may not be ready, but she knows a consuming fire that is!