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!

Snipits of my Time Here

Time with friends that I know is genuine. Finally!
Fulfillment in the Lord. Not even desiring a relationship because my thoughts are so wrapped up in the Creator.
Beginning to feel a part of the community I left behind two years ago.
Starting to engage Lexington through service.
Seeing redemption in things broken, things I previously found to be hopeless.
This is where I am at present.
This is where the layers of false understanding fall off and are replaced with faith.
This is the time of my Eustace baptism from Asalan.
Right now life is a lot like dying.
Dying to self.
Dying to preconceptions.
Dying to what I thought I desired.
Right now life is a lot like real living.

I Want to Explore...

(1) The Underwater Sculpture Park off the coast of the West Indies. "The aim of the Sculpture Park is to create a unique space which highlights environmental processes and celebrates local culture. By creating an artificial reef of sculptures which depict Grenadian peoples and their history, the project fulfils its dual purpose of protecting the marine environment and illustrating the richness of Grenada."

(2) The Helix Hotel yet to be built which will be in Dubai.

(3) Ice Skating at Rockefeller Center in NYC. Everyone is familiar with this one. Though it may be cliche', I am totally for strapping on those skates and sailing through the bitter cold.

(4) The Cadillac Ranch Sculpture West Of Amarillo, Texas. My friend Jocelin has seen this, and after seeing it on ArtBus, I want to as well. The picture doesn't do it justice by the way. Please look this baby up!

(5) The Growing Tree Building of Sanfte Strukturen "There is something s imply amazing about growing any building – but particularly marvelous when it might take over twenty years to develop and can be the center of gatherings of over 80,000 people at a single time. The structures of Sanfte Strukturen are often the center of communities – common spaces meant to bring people together under a single living and growing roof." In other words, it's the ultimate project green!

Throwing off What Hinders

I was petting a few of our kittens the other day and thinking about when they were even smaller. Their mom was feral, and she was always trying to put them in dark environments. The kittens hated it and would crawl away the moment she wasn't looking to frolic in the sunshine. But the funny thing is that after the momma cat deserted the kittens, they would still crawl back into these awful, dark, and dirty places every night and sometimes during the day. They went back to these places because they were familiar. The kittens eyes were barely opened, and they knew their way around the dingy parts of the barn or the underpinning of the house. Even though they still hated being in darkness, they chose the familiar.

This is actually the perfect example of what we do as Christians when we hold onto the familiar sins that we cherish. After the Holy Spirit becomes a part of our lives, we are technically no longer blinded. The blindfold has been removed. But, like the apostle Saul/Paul, it takes a while for us, even after the moment of revelation occurs, to fully adapt to seeing in a world that is different than what we initially thought. I rediscovered a sin pattern this past week that has plaguing me for quite some time. I learned that though I am no longer fully blinded by the patterns of the world, I still don't quite see with God's eyes. I see with my own fallen vision, a vision that though better than before is still not fully formed.

It's funny that even after we receive the wonderful gift called Salvation we still cling to the familiar, the sins, that though comfortable are by no means beneficial.

C.S. Lewis once said,"If we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered to us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."

We are often pleased by what our lives offered before we were children of God. Though we throw away some of the sin that hinders us, we very rarely run the race to the best of ability. We give ourselves handicaps, dragging a foot or two behind us because we can't imagine a full turn around. We would often rather eat "mud pies" than experience the full vision and plan of Christ. This is because the mud pies are familiar and it takes faith to run a race that only God knows the outcome of.

We would often rather sit in the McDonald's parking lot stuffing our faces with carbs than run a race mapped out for us, a race that makes our lives have meaning, a race that with each step helps us see more fully. When we do chose to run with no inhibitions, amazing things happen. With each meter mark, a piece of the blindfold falls to the ground, and we begin to see what we have missing by taking so many water breaks and lagging behind when we should be pressing forward.

The Ramblings of a Slightly Bitter "Friend"

So, I don't mean to start griping right after I posted an encouraging note on this blog, but I have a few things I simply need to type out. Hardly anyone even reads this thing, but honestly it doesn't much matter. I've been using it to get thoughts and emotions out so that I won't go crazy this summer. So here's the thoughts that are plaguing my mind tonight...

I've been discovering that though I tend to think I have all of these great friendships, I got most of them because of connections with other people. I've been seeing that though others care about me, they care about the more interesting people to a greater degree. I'm honestly not as outgoing, crazy fun, and spontaneous as I once was. These aspects are still part of my personality, but I've also become more grounded. Grounded people are not as sought out these days. I am no longer the life of the party who must always be invited. I'm boring. Commonplace. Mature. It's funny that I never noticed that my connections to crazier folks are the things that actually bring me into the social world most of the time. I'm not saying that I desire this huge group of people to want to be a part of my life all of the time or that I need to be the center of attention. I don't. What I am saying is that a lot of my friendships that are not as valid as I once thought.

People send me emails asking for other people's addresses all of the time. People call me to get lists of other people to invite to parties. I'm the chick with the connections, but I am not the main person who others want around. They want the people I have in my back pocket around, and though this speaks highly of my choice in exciting friends...it also means that I am often not valued for me. I am valued for what I have to offer. I am discovering that this has been the case for most of my life.

People only call when they want advice. People call me when they want to have a good cry and hear some bible verses. People call me when they want a night out with a big group because they know I can make it happen. People call me when they need a job, a house, etc. because they know I won't quit until I find them what they need. People call me when they feel uncreative. I quote poets or say inspiring things on nature walks, and these things are used for paintings, pieces of literature, or an impetus to get the creative juices flowing in the first place. Being used as a vessel for God is great, but being used period is not.

Returning home to Lexington after living six and half hours away for so long has been hard as well. I know that in order to make friends you have to seek them out, and I am beginning to do so. But, I must say that it gets harder when you return home a stranger. I'm not the girl most people remember. I feel like the new girl in high school who everyone finds admirable but no one finds worthy of pursuing. Girls tell me I'm pretty, and we chat a bit. Guys look at me like they find the way I speak of God to be inspiring. But both look at me like they don't know me, don't understand me, like I am some weird new vase that they don't want to invest in. I'm good for displaying at bible studies, and I'm great for calling when things get bad. But no one ever puts flowers in me. No one ever wants me for me. No one ever seeks me out.

I know that real connections take time, but I am only here for the summer. I feel like I am pouring myself out only to be left empty over and over again. I know that God fills me up and that He works best when when we are empty. But I feel so used. Unvalued. You fill in the blank. I don't mean to ramble on and say depressing things. I suppose I just needed to vent.