Dear PrayZchoir,
If this is a jumble of words then that's just because I'm a jumble of emotions right now. Months I've spent with you all preparing for this musical, and now tomorrow's the day. I've always seen my role in this as supporting you guys, building you up, and tomorrow I step back and let you live what you've learned.
It's funny how you don't stop learning on this side of the stage.
Sometimes it means learning that maybe what you really love isn't just writing, but students.
Sometimes it means learning that you actually enjoy the chaos a little bit, but at times you have to find a way to rein things in while still being true to your character.
Sometimes it means learning that the best way to be a leader is by serving.
Sometimes it means learning that it's really hard to write about this because putting love into words is difficult, if not impossible.
I really love you guys, choir. You have no idea. And even though I don't really say it, I hope you've seen that I do everything I can to show you. I am so proud of how you guys have worked hard and grown these past few months, and I still can't believe that I actually got to do this with you. You are all incredible, astounding, people, and I'm being completely honest when I say that I see Christ in you all.
I see His heart in the way that you care about each other (we are the church after all), the way that you've shown such kindness and grace to me, the way you work hard and keep a good attitude even when things get crazy.
I see His joy in the way that you make me laugh (all. the. time.), the way that you worship, and the way that you interact with each other.
So choir, tomorrow when you're trying to remember your lines, not knock the box of lucky charms off the stage, and sway at the same time, remember:
Christ is with us. He is in us. He has plans for this musical that are way better than anything we could dream up.
And here's the thing, the church (that's us), is the family of God. We're family. And our job on earth is to tell other people the Gospel: to invite our friends, our neighbors, our enemies, people all over the world to meet our Father, and join the family. Tomorrow, this musical is an invitation to come home, to be born again and adopted into this big, beautiful family. Which means that even when the last note is sung, the story isn't over because we've got work to do-together- and we're headed home- to Him.
We've got Him, and we've got each other. Sounds pretty sweet to me.
So, choir, let's do this. Together.
Love, Rebecca.
Saturday, April 16, 2016
Monday, February 1, 2016
From We Believe: Week 1(ish)
So, this isn't actually the first week of rehearsal, but it's the first week I've found time to write about it, so we'll call it week one anyway. In case anyone hasn't seen my obnoxious instagram posts, I wrote a play for the student choir over Christmas break called We Believe, and now I'm helping direct it.
Without giving too much away, the play is sort of about the persecuted church, and since we all know that I can't think straight without writing it down first (#WriterProbs), I decided to try and write the pre-rehearsal devotions out and post them here. The theme of the devotions is going to be the persecuted church, but I wanted to go a step further and try to put ourselves in their shoes. To ask not just who they are, but why they keep doing this secret church thing, and how they hold up under such immensely difficult circumstances.
So, for week 1(ish), the question is this:
What does "brothers and sisters in Christ" mean to the persecuted church?
I'm afraid that the Western church has become more of a club and less of a family, so I want to get down to the roots and see what we're dealing with here.
John 13 starts with a bunch of crazy stuff going on. Jesus washes the disciples' feet before they eat the Last Supper and find out that one of them (spoiler alert: it's Judas) is going to betray Jesus. All of them begin to feel that time is running out, and the words Jesus says here are nearly His last words, the last things He believes they need to know before the climax of history takes place.
Then Jesus drops a bombshell; He's leaving, and where He's going is a place they can't follow. Yikes. After all these years and all of the amazing things He's done, He's going to have to go. So what does He tell them next?
Jump to Acts, and we see an example of what Jesus was talking about. The followers of "the Way" were gathering together, sharing meals, sharing possessions, meeting regularly, participating in each other's lives. The society around them was confused, and they actually thought sketchy stuff was going on because they just couldn't understand why these people loved each other so, so much.
Fast forward to modern day, in the country of Azerbaijan.
(This story is from this post on Open Doors's website.)
There's a 15-year-old boy named Shirin living on the streets because his parents forced him to choose between Jesus and his family, and He chose Christ. A Christian man found him and took him in, and soon after his parents were arrested for drug use. Now he's witnessing to the very people that sent him away, and it's because the man that saw him considered him family when Shirin had no one.
To so many believers overseas who have stories similar to this one (and there are a ton), "brothers and sisters" takes on a whole new meaning. People give up their families for Jesus, and the church becomes family. They care for each other. They trust each other, not just to show up for Bible study, but to risk their lives to meet in secret house churches. The poor have enough because these Christians are living out the Acts church, sharing what they have for the sake of their brothers and sisters and for the sake of the Gospel.
What if our churches looked like that?
What if we stopped arguing about the color of the carpet and started encouraging each other in the faith?
What if we stopped spending all our time worrying about who's-dating-who and who-offended-who and banded together as family?
What if we started caring more about each other than about ourselves?
Isn't church as it was meant to be a picture of the Gospel? The orphans have found a home. The poor have been welcomed into the King's throne room. There's no distinction between people because we've all been redeemed and adopted by our good, good Father.
I don't know about you, but I want to love people like that.
Without giving too much away, the play is sort of about the persecuted church, and since we all know that I can't think straight without writing it down first (#WriterProbs), I decided to try and write the pre-rehearsal devotions out and post them here. The theme of the devotions is going to be the persecuted church, but I wanted to go a step further and try to put ourselves in their shoes. To ask not just who they are, but why they keep doing this secret church thing, and how they hold up under such immensely difficult circumstances.
So, for week 1(ish), the question is this:
What does "brothers and sisters in Christ" mean to the persecuted church?
I'm afraid that the Western church has become more of a club and less of a family, so I want to get down to the roots and see what we're dealing with here.
John 13 starts with a bunch of crazy stuff going on. Jesus washes the disciples' feet before they eat the Last Supper and find out that one of them (spoiler alert: it's Judas) is going to betray Jesus. All of them begin to feel that time is running out, and the words Jesus says here are nearly His last words, the last things He believes they need to know before the climax of history takes place.
Then Jesus drops a bombshell; He's leaving, and where He's going is a place they can't follow. Yikes. After all these years and all of the amazing things He's done, He's going to have to go. So what does He tell them next?
"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another:just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." (John 13:34-35)Basically, "It's time for me to get to business; don't run out on each other. Take care of each other. You're going to need these guys." On this final night, He tells them to love the church like Jesus Himself loves them. Not only that, but when everything goes down, people are going to know that these guys were with Jesus not by their cool beards or the miracles they'll do, but by the fact that they really love the people around them.
Jump to Acts, and we see an example of what Jesus was talking about. The followers of "the Way" were gathering together, sharing meals, sharing possessions, meeting regularly, participating in each other's lives. The society around them was confused, and they actually thought sketchy stuff was going on because they just couldn't understand why these people loved each other so, so much.
Fast forward to modern day, in the country of Azerbaijan.
(This story is from this post on Open Doors's website.)
There's a 15-year-old boy named Shirin living on the streets because his parents forced him to choose between Jesus and his family, and He chose Christ. A Christian man found him and took him in, and soon after his parents were arrested for drug use. Now he's witnessing to the very people that sent him away, and it's because the man that saw him considered him family when Shirin had no one.
To so many believers overseas who have stories similar to this one (and there are a ton), "brothers and sisters" takes on a whole new meaning. People give up their families for Jesus, and the church becomes family. They care for each other. They trust each other, not just to show up for Bible study, but to risk their lives to meet in secret house churches. The poor have enough because these Christians are living out the Acts church, sharing what they have for the sake of their brothers and sisters and for the sake of the Gospel.
What if our churches looked like that?
What if we stopped arguing about the color of the carpet and started encouraging each other in the faith?
What if we stopped spending all our time worrying about who's-dating-who and who-offended-who and banded together as family?
What if we started caring more about each other than about ourselves?
Isn't church as it was meant to be a picture of the Gospel? The orphans have found a home. The poor have been welcomed into the King's throne room. There's no distinction between people because we've all been redeemed and adopted by our good, good Father.
I don't know about you, but I want to love people like that.
Sunday, January 17, 2016
From Rend Collective: Choosing Celebration
When people ask me about Rend Collective, I always describe them as Irish sunshine. After seeing them for the second time at Lee tonight, I stand by that description firmly.
I discovered them with "Art of Celebration", and I was mesmerized by the way they knew how to capture joy in songs. The album literally sounded like what I imagine celebration to be. Their lyrics were real, their sound was energetic, and I'm a not-so-secret Irish fanatic (hence the Claddagh ring I got for my 18th birthday).
I was hooked, and so when "As Family We Go" was under my Christmas tree a week before I would see them perform at Passion and three weeks before they would be at Lee, I broke into my happy dance. (Not literally. I don't dance.)
As I stood in the Conn Center smiling like a kid at Disney World while they jumped around stage, the thought struck me that more than anything, I wish I had that kind of joy. I wish I believed and loved God so much that it exploded out of me.
Not to put them on a pedestal because I know that's the last thing they'd want, but I saw in them real, true, lasting joy, and I was hungry for it. I am hungry for it.
I'll say now that I'm writing this to figure it out, not because I have figured it out. I've glimpsed joy and I'm trying to find a way to hold on.
About midway through "Joy of the Lord", God dropped a verse into my heart.
When this happened my emotions reacted, but I still wasn't sure exactly what it meant. I was glad to have a clear verse of what God was trying to tell me, but I didn't know how to apply it. I don't delight in the Lord like I used to, and I don't know how to get back to that place when I'm such a different person than I was then.
Then, after several Lucky Charms jokes and a joke about how it always rains in Ireland (it always rains in Cleveland, too), one of the band members said this:
I'd heard of choosing joy before, but I'd never given it much thought. Yeah, I did Ann Voskamp's 1,000 gifts things, and that was nice, but what was the big deal? What does it mean to choose celebration?
What if delighting yourself in the Lord is choosing to celebrate what He has done and who He is?
What if it means fighting self-centeredness by choosing to seek the Lord until you're in awe of what you see?
What if it means rejoicing always, even (and especially) when it's the absolute last thing in the world you want?
And when my doubts say that it can't be that easy, I remember what Christine Caine said at Passion, that so many of us are sitting in jail cells with open doors and unlocked chains simply because we won't get up and accept that Christ has already made us free, and there's nothing for us to earn.
What if choosing celebration is giving up the right you think you have to be grumpy, or angry, or selfish, and instead remembering that Christ has paid so, so much for you to be able to choose joy. Maybe it's remembering that we have much to celebrate.
Jesus is risen. He holds the keys to death and sin and shame and every single thing that you think enslaves you. You've been made free. And free for what? A glorious purpose on earth and a beautiful inheritance in Heaven. We have the work of knowing Him and making Him known, and then when we're done, we get to go home.
Home.
We'll open our eyes truly for the first time and see the face of the One we've served and sought for so long, and we'll hopefully hear those words, "well done, my good and faithful servant." We'll get to rest. All those voices in our heads that lie to us will be silenced, once and for all, by the voice of all nations singing the praise of our Father. I've felt glimpses on earth of what Heaven must be like, and it's only a dim, distorted shadow of what the real thing must be.
So yeah, what do I really have to complain about?
I'm headed home, and I'm never alone.
That's worth celebrating.
I discovered them with "Art of Celebration", and I was mesmerized by the way they knew how to capture joy in songs. The album literally sounded like what I imagine celebration to be. Their lyrics were real, their sound was energetic, and I'm a not-so-secret Irish fanatic (hence the Claddagh ring I got for my 18th birthday).
I was hooked, and so when "As Family We Go" was under my Christmas tree a week before I would see them perform at Passion and three weeks before they would be at Lee, I broke into my happy dance. (Not literally. I don't dance.)
As I stood in the Conn Center smiling like a kid at Disney World while they jumped around stage, the thought struck me that more than anything, I wish I had that kind of joy. I wish I believed and loved God so much that it exploded out of me.
Not to put them on a pedestal because I know that's the last thing they'd want, but I saw in them real, true, lasting joy, and I was hungry for it. I am hungry for it.
I'll say now that I'm writing this to figure it out, not because I have figured it out. I've glimpsed joy and I'm trying to find a way to hold on.
About midway through "Joy of the Lord", God dropped a verse into my heart.
"Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart." (Psalm 37:4)Now, I tend to think this verse is similar to C.S. Lewis's interpretation of telling the pure in heart they will see God. David can say that if you delight in the Lord He'll give you the desire of your heart because at that point He will be the desire of your heart, so He'll give you more of Himself. He'll give you His desires, making them yours, and then He will fulfill them.
When this happened my emotions reacted, but I still wasn't sure exactly what it meant. I was glad to have a clear verse of what God was trying to tell me, but I didn't know how to apply it. I don't delight in the Lord like I used to, and I don't know how to get back to that place when I'm such a different person than I was then.
Then, after several Lucky Charms jokes and a joke about how it always rains in Ireland (it always rains in Cleveland, too), one of the band members said this:
"We realized celebration is an art. You have to choose it."Whoa.
I'd heard of choosing joy before, but I'd never given it much thought. Yeah, I did Ann Voskamp's 1,000 gifts things, and that was nice, but what was the big deal? What does it mean to choose celebration?
What if delighting yourself in the Lord is choosing to celebrate what He has done and who He is?
What if it means fighting self-centeredness by choosing to seek the Lord until you're in awe of what you see?
What if it means rejoicing always, even (and especially) when it's the absolute last thing in the world you want?
And when my doubts say that it can't be that easy, I remember what Christine Caine said at Passion, that so many of us are sitting in jail cells with open doors and unlocked chains simply because we won't get up and accept that Christ has already made us free, and there's nothing for us to earn.
What if choosing celebration is giving up the right you think you have to be grumpy, or angry, or selfish, and instead remembering that Christ has paid so, so much for you to be able to choose joy. Maybe it's remembering that we have much to celebrate.
Jesus is risen. He holds the keys to death and sin and shame and every single thing that you think enslaves you. You've been made free. And free for what? A glorious purpose on earth and a beautiful inheritance in Heaven. We have the work of knowing Him and making Him known, and then when we're done, we get to go home.
Home.
We'll open our eyes truly for the first time and see the face of the One we've served and sought for so long, and we'll hopefully hear those words, "well done, my good and faithful servant." We'll get to rest. All those voices in our heads that lie to us will be silenced, once and for all, by the voice of all nations singing the praise of our Father. I've felt glimpses on earth of what Heaven must be like, and it's only a dim, distorted shadow of what the real thing must be.
So yeah, what do I really have to complain about?
I'm headed home, and I'm never alone.
That's worth celebrating.
Thursday, December 31, 2015
To 2016: The Next Right Thing
Going into this new year, the one thing I've realized is that I have no idea how I got here. This time last year I was in such a different place and I was such a different person that I don't think I would recognize myself now. Everything I had planned changed. I changed.
Honestly, if I had the opportunity to tell 2014 me what was coming, I would have said "Good luck" and run the other way. Had I known what this year held, I probably would have freaked out and decided to build a tiny house and live in the woods (sometimes I still want to do that).
I'm going into this new year having lost so much. This has been one long year of grief and change.
Last year I would have said "but I have Christ so everything will be okay!" That's somewhat true, but it isn't what I would say now.
My relationship with God has changed drastically. And by changed drastically, I mean that I was incredibly close to Him, then incredibly angry with Him, and then that repeated for about 12 months. Lots of fun. Where I'm at now is not anywhere close to where I want to be, but it's closer than it was Monday morning, so I have hope.
I have hope because after hitting the bottom so many times I'm starting to get it- He's the only thing worth hoping in.
There came a point where I truly had nothing left, and it was there I saw Him. It was there I realized that all this time I was running, but God had never moved.
I know that's oversimplified because the fact that God is always here doesn't change how painful it is to feel like He isn't. The point, though, is that all those things I chased never once filled me up. They could mask the pain, they could make me forget, but they could never satisfy.
But I do have hope. Even though all my problems won't disappear when the clock strikes midnight, I have hope because God won't disappear either.
I don't need resolutions, because I'm fooling myself if I think I really know what's coming. I'm learning how to be okay with not knowing. All I can do is seek those "next right things" and keep moving in the right direction.
I'm slowly realizing that life is made one choice at a time. One moment at a time. The only place I'm given to encounter God is now. The only place I'm given to encounter people is now. The only place I'm given to do what's right is now.
So, yes, I have some big things coming up. I'm starting 2nd semester. I'm directing a play I wrote. I'm searching for a job. But the goal in all of those is to learn the art of just being. To "be" in a moment is to be awake, present, to risk getting out of my head and encountering someone else.
2016 is almost here. It's time to wake up. To start over. To become new-one step at a time.
Honestly, if I had the opportunity to tell 2014 me what was coming, I would have said "Good luck" and run the other way. Had I known what this year held, I probably would have freaked out and decided to build a tiny house and live in the woods (sometimes I still want to do that).
I'm going into this new year having lost so much. This has been one long year of grief and change.
Last year I would have said "but I have Christ so everything will be okay!" That's somewhat true, but it isn't what I would say now.
My relationship with God has changed drastically. And by changed drastically, I mean that I was incredibly close to Him, then incredibly angry with Him, and then that repeated for about 12 months. Lots of fun. Where I'm at now is not anywhere close to where I want to be, but it's closer than it was Monday morning, so I have hope.
I have hope because after hitting the bottom so many times I'm starting to get it- He's the only thing worth hoping in.
There came a point where I truly had nothing left, and it was there I saw Him. It was there I realized that all this time I was running, but God had never moved.
I know that's oversimplified because the fact that God is always here doesn't change how painful it is to feel like He isn't. The point, though, is that all those things I chased never once filled me up. They could mask the pain, they could make me forget, but they could never satisfy.
But I do have hope. Even though all my problems won't disappear when the clock strikes midnight, I have hope because God won't disappear either.
I don't need resolutions, because I'm fooling myself if I think I really know what's coming. I'm learning how to be okay with not knowing. All I can do is seek those "next right things" and keep moving in the right direction.
I'm slowly realizing that life is made one choice at a time. One moment at a time. The only place I'm given to encounter God is now. The only place I'm given to encounter people is now. The only place I'm given to do what's right is now.
So, yes, I have some big things coming up. I'm starting 2nd semester. I'm directing a play I wrote. I'm searching for a job. But the goal in all of those is to learn the art of just being. To "be" in a moment is to be awake, present, to risk getting out of my head and encountering someone else.
2016 is almost here. It's time to wake up. To start over. To become new-one step at a time.
Friday, December 11, 2015
From Hamlet: A Christmas Story
I'm a bit obsessed with Hamlet. I'm not a huge Shakespeare fan (bad English major, I know), but the character of Hamlet has always drawn me in. I even wrote my final English paper about it-meaning I chose to read Shakespeare for fun.
I think part of what attracts me is the tragedy of Hamlet himself. He's lost everything, including, possibly, his sanity. He's so full of pain, and something in me feels that with him. It's like when most people get involved with a good show and start to empathize with the characters, which is normal.
But I feel pain strongest. I like to write sad stories. I like sad songs. I'm not sadistic, it just feels real. Something in me knows that the emotions are real even if the stories aren't.
It's like I know that a vein of hurt runs just under the surface of this world, and when I tap into it, I find something that connects.
Hurt is not a stranger to us, to any of us. We all know pain, regardless of the fact that it's different from situation to situation. That's why my Instagram feed was flooded with #PrayForParis. That's why Chattanooga still talks about what happened last summer. No matter how strong your personal empathy is, we connect through pain.
This is not always a bad thing. It leads to support. It leads to closeness.
But too much of one thing is a bad thing. What goes in, comes out, and if all you have is tragedy coming in, it begins to mess with you. It starts wiring itself into your thoughts, and then your heart, and then your hands. It distorts your view of the world. It makes you feel like pain is all there is to feel, and anything else must be fake.
Listening to the frequency of hurt can actually cause more pain. It makes you fear that those things will happen to you. Which makes you fear loss. Which keeps you from connecting to people. Which destroys the good thing that can come from pain and makes you more selfish. I know because I've been there. I've become so accustomed to it that I begin to expect bad things to happen, which has made me into someone I never wanted to be.
So my question, then, is if there is a vein of hurt, is there also a vein of hope? If we tuned into one for too long, the only option is to find something else to fill up with. Shutting everything out makes us empty, but to be human is to feel. So where is hope found? How do we balance it out?
If you listen for hope right now, there's an obvious answer: Christmas.
Even people who refuse to step foot in a church acknowledge that Christmas is a time for peace, joy, hope. Christmas is a rest, a season of hitting pause and seeking those things that we consider make life beautiful. Family. Giving. Light.
But, as someone who has kept Christmas lights up until June, I know full well that warm feelings and gift wrap can only go so far. Memories, although good things, aren't enough to sustain it. So we have to dig deeper, to listen more closely, and find where it comes from.
Linus can give you a speech about it, but I'll give you one word: Emmanuel. God. With. Us.
We can't find hope within ourselves, no matter how many Dr. Phils and motivational cat posters you have. So we look outside ourselves, we look up. And when we look up, we see that hope is not just there, it's under our noses. Why?
Because God has stepped in.
He stepped into a stable in Bethlehem, and He's still stepping into our lives today.
He's stepping in when we have too much to do, too many responsibilities to balance and personalities to placate and He's telling us: Rest.
He's stepping in when our minds are at war with our hearts, when, as Hamlet says, "Within my heart there was a kind of fighting that would not let me sleep," and He says it again: Rest.
He's stepping in when we've looked to our family and our friends and our work and our hearts and nothing satisfies, nothing stops the pain, and He proclaims it over us: Rest.
He can proclaim Rest because He holds time, space, and every detail of every bit of existence in His hands. And when we look at what He holds we see that He already holds everything we feel like we've lost. We can rest because when we look closely, He holds us.
It sounds so simple, but rest is so hard to learn. Mike Donehey of Tenth Avenue North often says that we must fight to rest, though it sounds like a contradiction. He's right.
There will be times that everything around you and everything in you is telling you to freak out. They'll have really good reasons and sometimes they'll call it good things, like "handling it" or "just making sure everything gets done." But what does it matter if everything gets done at the cost of you coming undone?
It's in these times that we must choose rest. And sometimes that looks like saying, "I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know how this is going to work. But You know what You're doing, and it's going to be okay." It may not feel like peace; it may feel like defeat. But maybe every time we choose not to panic, but to trust, it's tapping into that vein of hope. It's learning a little better how to hear the frequency, though it may seem faint.
There's a lot of unrest in me. I can't pretend like I'm not preaching to myself. I have a whole lot of questions, and a ridiculously small amount of answers. I write this because I'm listening in, trying to find what I'm looking for.
But I've got a feeling it can be found.
I think part of what attracts me is the tragedy of Hamlet himself. He's lost everything, including, possibly, his sanity. He's so full of pain, and something in me feels that with him. It's like when most people get involved with a good show and start to empathize with the characters, which is normal.
But I feel pain strongest. I like to write sad stories. I like sad songs. I'm not sadistic, it just feels real. Something in me knows that the emotions are real even if the stories aren't.
It's like I know that a vein of hurt runs just under the surface of this world, and when I tap into it, I find something that connects.
Hurt is not a stranger to us, to any of us. We all know pain, regardless of the fact that it's different from situation to situation. That's why my Instagram feed was flooded with #PrayForParis. That's why Chattanooga still talks about what happened last summer. No matter how strong your personal empathy is, we connect through pain.
This is not always a bad thing. It leads to support. It leads to closeness.
But too much of one thing is a bad thing. What goes in, comes out, and if all you have is tragedy coming in, it begins to mess with you. It starts wiring itself into your thoughts, and then your heart, and then your hands. It distorts your view of the world. It makes you feel like pain is all there is to feel, and anything else must be fake.
Listening to the frequency of hurt can actually cause more pain. It makes you fear that those things will happen to you. Which makes you fear loss. Which keeps you from connecting to people. Which destroys the good thing that can come from pain and makes you more selfish. I know because I've been there. I've become so accustomed to it that I begin to expect bad things to happen, which has made me into someone I never wanted to be.
So my question, then, is if there is a vein of hurt, is there also a vein of hope? If we tuned into one for too long, the only option is to find something else to fill up with. Shutting everything out makes us empty, but to be human is to feel. So where is hope found? How do we balance it out?
If you listen for hope right now, there's an obvious answer: Christmas.
Even people who refuse to step foot in a church acknowledge that Christmas is a time for peace, joy, hope. Christmas is a rest, a season of hitting pause and seeking those things that we consider make life beautiful. Family. Giving. Light.
But, as someone who has kept Christmas lights up until June, I know full well that warm feelings and gift wrap can only go so far. Memories, although good things, aren't enough to sustain it. So we have to dig deeper, to listen more closely, and find where it comes from.
Linus can give you a speech about it, but I'll give you one word: Emmanuel. God. With. Us.
We can't find hope within ourselves, no matter how many Dr. Phils and motivational cat posters you have. So we look outside ourselves, we look up. And when we look up, we see that hope is not just there, it's under our noses. Why?
Because God has stepped in.
He stepped into a stable in Bethlehem, and He's still stepping into our lives today.
He's stepping in when we have too much to do, too many responsibilities to balance and personalities to placate and He's telling us: Rest.
He's stepping in when our minds are at war with our hearts, when, as Hamlet says, "Within my heart there was a kind of fighting that would not let me sleep," and He says it again: Rest.
He's stepping in when we've looked to our family and our friends and our work and our hearts and nothing satisfies, nothing stops the pain, and He proclaims it over us: Rest.
He can proclaim Rest because He holds time, space, and every detail of every bit of existence in His hands. And when we look at what He holds we see that He already holds everything we feel like we've lost. We can rest because when we look closely, He holds us.
It sounds so simple, but rest is so hard to learn. Mike Donehey of Tenth Avenue North often says that we must fight to rest, though it sounds like a contradiction. He's right.
There will be times that everything around you and everything in you is telling you to freak out. They'll have really good reasons and sometimes they'll call it good things, like "handling it" or "just making sure everything gets done." But what does it matter if everything gets done at the cost of you coming undone?
It's in these times that we must choose rest. And sometimes that looks like saying, "I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know how this is going to work. But You know what You're doing, and it's going to be okay." It may not feel like peace; it may feel like defeat. But maybe every time we choose not to panic, but to trust, it's tapping into that vein of hope. It's learning a little better how to hear the frequency, though it may seem faint.
There's a lot of unrest in me. I can't pretend like I'm not preaching to myself. I have a whole lot of questions, and a ridiculously small amount of answers. I write this because I'm listening in, trying to find what I'm looking for.
But I've got a feeling it can be found.
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