Messy

I survived the annual family vacation. It was absolutely exhausting this year. Normally, we spend a few days at a cottage, but also get some time camping. Not so this year. I didn't realize how much I counted on those days completely unlocked from electronic devices (like you don't even have cell service) - where you spend half the trip running, biking, swimming, or hiking, and the other half staring at the forest, playing boggle, and sleeping as soon as the sun disappears. :) Not to mention the fighting and screaming which was often over who got to sit next to/play with me. I seriously need an uncle to balance the equation. Ha. Just kidding. I'm pretty self-sufficient. But I would ask for prayer for my niece and nephew. I found the bible I gave my niece with it's cover completely ripped off. I feel like there's a metaphor somewhere in there. But anyway, they need so much more of the Holy Spirit... and I feel like I'm failing them as a model.

Sometimes I fear I've been erased. Post-college, I worry that I am nothing of the Christ-centered, joyful, encouraging person that I once was. I've been doing one of those life overhauls - like balancing the checkbook, only re-centering the soul. So many things crop up to steal my heart, soul, strength away from God. Honestly, when you're a nurse, you barely have time to eat, so it's hard to cultivate a mind that craves, seeks, and follows God moment by moment. And when that's your lifestyle for so long... combined with a competitive academic life and topped with social media - I feel like a ruin. I just want to curl up in someone's arms who will speak truth and love to me. And I know God is sufficient and he does just that... but sometimes I need the communal reinforcement. I've gotten better at asking for help, but I still feel like a beggar. Many of you have been wonderful, so don't feel like I'm bemoaning you. It's just that women are very rarely allowed to say they need help without sounding needy - and I'm sensitive to that. As an emotional writer, I'm careful to screen almost everything I communicate.

Anyway, as I've been advancing in my scripture reading... I've come to the thought that the bible proves life is horribly messy. It gives me peace to realize that things in this life will simply not be pure. While sin is never admirable, the amount of it in one's life will never be balanced out by holiness. Yes we flee sin, but we are never invincible. In this bloody world, it will catch up with us. The man after God's own heart was a murderer and adulterer. You can do everything right and fail miserably. I've broken from a very legalistic mindset and still struggle to remember this. There is only one way to make it through this life - lean not on your own understanding and trust your life to Jesus. Trust Jesus. Break the bread and remember. Remember.

Love to all,

Katie

Storytime: An excerpt

Perhaps helpful. Perhaps heretical... But I find the truth remains whether you call it magic or miracle. For everyone needs a little bit of impossible.

The day started off as normally as any, but then a gnat flew in from the window. It tormented her at length until suddenly she found she was hoarse from shouting at the enormous THING over her. Somehow the meddlesome memory gnat of hurt had contorted to a gruesome dragon of despair. Its ferocious fire tore at her - trying to strip her down to nothing. She gasped and choked as it poured down her lungs. There was a roaring in her ears and a faint tapping. No wait. Knocking. Was someone at the door? No matter, she couldn’t answer it with a dragon sitting on her. Were her limbs still attached? She sent a cautious thought toward her pinkie. It curled in response. With her last fiber of strength she hurled the dragon away and flung open the door. Her brother stood at the door looking very knightly and very annoyed.

“You know I can’t help you unless you open the barking door!” he howled through the roaring in her ears as he plunged his sword through the dragon’s heart and it shrunk back into a gnat. “And you also know that this is not just a physical door I’m talking about.” he added more gently, tossing the sword away and tucking her into a hug. He pressed his forehead against her and she looked up into his eyes and saw all the love of the world in them. “Goose” he said at last, “You have to learn to ask for help or we’re never going to make it. I can plunge swords into dragons all day. But you have to be able to as well.” He handed her the sword. She shuddered slightly. “I know it’s unwieldy. And I know you want all dragons to be princesses. But the truth is sometimes dragons are dragons. They want only to devour you and they will use every deception to do so.

Damn them!” He broke off viciously; and she started, not at the language, but at the blatancy since he had already done exactly that. Her eyes must have asked the question. “Damned, but free to roam” he growled. Then he shrugged. “I trust Father, and anyway the important thing is getting you trained. You cannot let yourself be overcome.” He shook her gently for emphasis. “And more importantly you do not EVER need to heave off any dragons to get to me. All you need to do is ask and I will be there. Do you understand?”

She looked at him wearily. “I thought I could…” and trailed off.

“Not without truth” She raised the sword at him. He nodded. “If you take to unraveling a lie without it, you will only become more entangled. But if you call upon the truth, you may not even need me” She made a face.

“You are the truth”

He smirked. “Precisely. You’ll have asked me for help without even trying”

“You’re impossible”

“Indubitably” he said slyly.

“Do you always have to have the last word?”

“Well, I was the first W…”

“Don’t even!” She cut him off and started to stomp away. “Impossible!”  

“Everyone needs the impossible” he said quietly. And though she huffed, she had to admit he was right.

“Fine! You win. You win every time. You cheated death. You stomped on the father of all dragons. I concede!” But her fierce grin belayed the crabbiness of the words.

For life might be full of dragons. But it was not without hope, truth, or a Savior of a brother who defied impossibility.

Scholarly ramblings about grace

On Thanksgiving, my pastor, being the pastor he is, always brings up the joy of giving. I'm pretty sure one year he pulled up some scientific studies about awesome health benefits from giving - things you can measure by looking at a brain MRI (which somehow makes me giggle... probably the doctoral student in me) Anyway, this Thanksgiving he offered to fill in the role for spiritual guidance for a few people. My starving heart capered about in great joy as I very timidly asked if I could be one of those people. I hate asking for things... not because I think it will make me look weak... but because I usually don't think I deserve them. But I dove off the cliff for this one because I could seriously feel myself wasting away and intuition/the Holy Spirit were beckoning. For 3-4 years I've been battered about between license and legalism, and I knew I needed some roots... back into the life of God I used to flourish in.

I blubbered through the first call. It's been so long since I've had anyone spiritually available to minister to me... all I wanted to do was cry in relief. Thankfully I had a terrible cold, so I hoped my poor pastor attributed most of my sniveling to that effect. I tried to pile things into a plan so that I would stay on track. *Cue Mulan soundtrack... Let's get down to business! Luckily it's my pastor we're talking about. That's why I entrusted him with being the guide to plug me back into the life of God. He gave me the verse "Are you tired, worn out, burned out from religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. (I felt like shouting with joy after that one verse) and it continued... "I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace." So he left me to ask myself, "What would it look like to take a real rest?" and "What practices if any would help you enter into the unforced rhythms of grace?" with a side admonition of "It should be something that sounds sort of fun, if not outright fun!"

The next call he managed to convince me to read a fantasy book every day as sort of a spiritual discipline and left me to meditate on John 1:1-18. Here was my brainblurb. "Word is cerebral, but grace is spirit/soulish. And grace came first, but through the Word. So Word is grace and came first, and Jesus is grace and truth. We worship in spirit and truth. Grace may come through the spirit. Jesus had the Holy Spirit on him (later verses in John). Perhaps we best experience grace through the Holy Spirit? But what does it look like practically? We follow some general guidelines for being shalomy, and trust the Spirit will enter and fill in the rest of the space with spontaneous grace and fullness? What does grace mean again in the Greek? Isn't it related to thanksgiving and charis deo... something Ann Voskamp wrote about?

"Charis" from graciousness (as gratifying) of manner or act (esp the divine influence upon the heart and its reflection the life including gratitude) God's tender sense of our misery (and here I dissolved into tears again) displays itself in his efforts to lessen and entirely remove it - efforts that are hindered and defeated only by man's continued perverseness. Grace removes guilt. Mercy removes misery. It has various uses "that which bestows or occasions pleasure, delight, or causes favorable regard"

What I remember most about the life I lived before the Zoloft debacle, before feeling like I had to constantly perform to fit in, before I wondered if it was better to fast and be miserable but be doing the "right thing" or to not fast and be miserable out of guilt that I wasn't doing anything to be closer to God like everyone else... is that I was happy with myself and I caused a lot of happiness. I think that I was born full of grace. To put it more humbly, I'm pretty certain God dumped the gift of grace on me as an infant. Even my Korean name Eunjee has grace in it! I bestowed a lot of pleasure and delight as an baby without ever trying to. My mom always had women at the grocery store coming up to her and wanting to hold me. I posted a picture of little me on facebook on a whim for "TBT" or "throw back Thursday" and I was completely astounded that I got over 60 likes. I was less surprised when I realized its because everyone needs more grace... more delight and less misery.

Anyway, this long haul to say... grace is probably more than you think it is. There is a richness missing from the traditional churchy understanding of grace. I wish everyone could share in it's truth. God tenderly senses our misery... ironically often caused by trying to please him or getting caught up in the religion of trying to do right by him... and he wants to entirely remove it! It's personal. It's mindboggling. God cares! And God is active. And God is delightful.

Please believe it.

No perfect people...

Nobody really gets it right.

I think that social media makes us think that some of us do.

But it's not true.

It's a lie.

And you know what? I really don't like the father of lies...

So I really wish you would put down your phone and computer and twitter, and facebook, and blogging, and magazines, and do two things

1) Stop comparing yourself
2) Visit someone in the flesh

Putting down all that paraphernalia is not the goal... let's not become legalistic about this and suffer under Pontius Lent (season I most hate)

The point is to get away from the things which the father of lies will easily twist into using against you.

Visiting someone in the flesh does a few things. It allows someone to know that you care about them enough to come see them. It also allows you to see their very unphotoshopped, unmadeup, crazy looking personhood and (most likely messy) surroundings. And it facilitates the real trappings of relationships... asking the hard questions, getting to the bottom of communication problems, stopping the addictions, getting constructive criticism without feeling under attack, actualizing world change, truly inquiring about someone's mental state.. etc. etc. etc.

My church's motto is this:

No Perfect People Allowed

It's a good reminder. Messiness is a prerequisite. Brokenness a gift.

Don't let the sunshine blind you. I'm a pretty flawed person. You get the beautiful and inspired thoughts most of the time... but they bleed from a broken and contrite heart which will forever be a sacrifice pleasing to God.

Bleeding hearts

The student update

Hullo!

I've been neglecting this blog terribly... as I tend to do. I go in spurts. I feel bad for the people who do come back... especially the ones I referred from my Lenten blog. It's hard for me to do too much writing because I'm in school. Therefore, I'm going to do two things. 1) I'm posting an email I sent a few weeks ago - so the people who read this blog that aren't my friends will have something new to look at (sorry if you're my friend you've probably already read the email) And 2) I'm going to refer to you my alter ego... at http://flawsonmysleeve.blogspot.com

Peace my loves!

Infectious Joy

I was talking to a lovely friend who sent me this picture...which I should probably credit to Tom Hiddleston who posted on his twitter... because that will make half of you (the female half) grin even more.

Be so happy that when others see you they become happy

It reminded me of a small but profound insight I had completely forgotten (yet again - I'm sure I've come to this epiphany multiple times before). When I was a small child, I was REALLY HAPPY. Almost nothing fazed me and people just wanted to be around me (according to my mother). I retained that quality of optimism and joy for quite a while.... but somewhere in the mix I got derailed completely. At some point, life became a wild mix of trying to make everyone else happy and change the world. I still wanted to affect people positively, but it was complicated with how to best serve them, where to give my money, what causes to support, how to act in order to make everyone happy etc. I forgot that the secret to making people happy - is to BE HAPPY YOURSELF! Part of the power of thanksgiving and joy in Christianity - is the fact that people are drawn to and transformed by joyous people. It's kind of like Martha and Mary - only applied broadly. Jesus didn't need Martha stressing about how best to serve him - he needed MARTHA. And so it is with other people. I think sometimes we can best serve others by simply being content and joyful.

This is NOT to say you can't be sad or shouldn't be concerned about the world's problems. But with the news, the internet, and social media, I think it's ten times easier to take a heavier burden on yourself than God intended. After all, he promised a light and easy yoke! So it's my personal goal to worry less about the world's problems/evil and dwell more on God's goodness in specific ways... like how the sycamore tree causes the sun to be dappled in the morning, or how achingly wonderful the strings are in a particular song, or the strength in my legs as I run, or even silly things like the fact Tom Hiddleston posts memes like that on his twitter (and I don't even like him!) Hahaha. For we are to think on the things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, praiseworthy, and excellent. Imagine what the world would be like if everyone was doing likewise?!

Joyfully yours,

Katie

Renaming required

I'm thinking of changing the blog name to "Splashes of Sunshine". It struck me today that slices are measurable and meted out... but splashes are an excess of overflow and quite unrestrained. Lately it's become rather important to me that things be uncontainable. So many of our problems come from trying to measure our worth, hoard our good things, harness the power, control the gods, etc. The more than I grow closer to the creator of the universe - the more I realize how unbounded He is and what that means. It means I can never reach the end of his love or grace or patience. It means there are no insignificant details he doesn't see. It means he wants joy and goodness for me that will have no ceasing. He doesn't get bored or tired or grumpy and I'm sometimes sure the world and me could drive him there quickly. It means he wants me to see the world with endless wonder, not cynicism. It means I don't need to worry about being wise or making a name for myself. I don't have to be on the cutting edge of discovery or writing consistently in this blog to be influential. Sometimes it seems to me the wiser people try to be, the unhappier they become - either because of the competition or the endless need to be someone Great. The best thing about being a child of God... is rest... from the need to be anything but oneself... even if that person is small, "boring", and "unimportant" in the mechanisms of the grand world. Children, before they are sullied, are completely happy with themselves and enjoy the world without regard to making meaning. While children may look foolish, they never feel foolish unless they are made to feel so. To be a child - is to do things boldly without worrying how it appears and whether it will be significant. Perhaps the most foolish thing to do - is to try to make meaning out of one's life.

Find beauty

In my absence, little has changed about the way I perceive the world, except that the urgency to find beauty in everything has only increased.

In the extended period of isolation and loneliness that has swallowed me whole and is now digesting me in all its acidity, I hold onto visions of beauty, hope, and fullness.

I've stated so very many times what an awkward stage of life I'm in. On one hand I enjoy the freedom, independence, and flexibility immensely, but oh how I long for stability, constancy, and the feeling of being tethered. I've always been a social creature. It's not that I'm any less social. While it's apparent I run less in large groups, I still see individuals on a surprisingly regular basis, and I still rack my brain to fit people I love into my schedule. But... there is a gaping hole. I don't have someone to fall back on, to drag into random adventures, to vent to, and to solve problems with. At the end of the day, I'm alone.

As a 25 year old with no apparent life-changing events occurring, no marriage, no babies, no FBI job saving the world, no cutting edge research, no memoirs of sharp wit, no marathons runs, no Olympic medals won... it's easy to feel insignificant.

So with no tether, no seeming purpose like family or world changing career (then again I am a nurse), I have to remind myself that my objective was always to know God... not to save the world. I have to learn to live with the longing for more that sometimes threatens to tear me apart, to cozy up to the loneliness that feels like a wall of suffocation, and in everything I have to find beauty and give thanks. It has to be more than obligation, it has to be faith. Giving thanks cannot be a duty, but a window to remember that everything is possible with God and He will never allow you to be stuck, stagnant, dead... at least not forever. There are times we dwell in the darkness with the seed wondering if we will ever see the light of day. February is a great month for brooding on this topic, but I can promise you that as constant as the spring comes, the days lengthen, and the flowers pop up... we will not be left in darkness. Until then, find as much beauty as you can in the frigid, isolating, darkness. Find goodness in the mess. Find the heart of gold under the rough exterior. Find the truth out of the lies. Find the light in the dark - and walk toward it. Sometimes all you can do is put one foot in front of the other and trust that something more is guiding you.

Serenity

I should be in bed, but I'm convicted of a truth that needs to be shouted from the mountain tops. YOU ARE WONDERFUL!

There's this mentality in Christianity that you are a work in progress (true), but more so - that you need to be constantly worrying about doing better, seeking God more, giving more away, having better quiet times, being more thoughtful about how you spend your time. There's another mentality that to be pleased with yourself is to be arrogant or selfish. I think that the two mentalities get all twisted up with very disastrous results. Everyone ends up obsessing over themselves in a maximally stressful mindset. Reasons why this I find this horribly disturbing?

First of all, if you can't see the good in yourself and you're always worrying about self-improvement, you are going to bring that into your relationships with others. This is NOT attractive or life-giving. I'm usually exhausted just being in the presence of these type of people.

In the second place, it isn't your responsibility to perfect you. You are God's masterpiece - His work in progress. Therefore, it's ultimately His responsibility to make you everything you were first dreamed (by Him) to be. This isn't to excuse you from all responsibility - Paul did say to aim for perfection. But he certainly didn't say "obsess over perfection" and I distinctly remember Jesus saying "Do not worry" and I see a lot of Christians worrying about how they're doing in their walk with Christ. It's distressing to me because it doesn't display the sense of serenity and life-to-the-full that Christ emulated. You are responsible for one thing - how you choose to trust and believe God. Do you believe He'll get you to where He wants you? Then live life and wait for His correction. It comes differently for different people. The problem lies in when we try to standardize what works for us onto everyone else. Maybe you need to have more consistent quiet times in order to find more life, but maybe someone else needs to stop having legalistic quiet times in order to learn that God has the grace to speak to them at any point in their daily living - not just a specific time. The point is never condemnation - but freedom and life in Christ. Someone recently shared another blog post on facebook about how God simply enjoys watching us be ourselves.

I think that author was getting at the same idea. It's not about what you can do that pleases the Lord - it's about who you are. And He created you as you are - so of course He finds that delightful! So please be glad and rejoice in the good person that God made you. Deep down - we all have particular things we are pleased about in ourselves. Enjoy those things. I promise that the joy you display will draw others to you more quickly than any display of personal improvement!

May you enjoy God's delight over you today

Free verse: Freely give

I miss you

So much so that

Yellow isolation gowns

Become my only comfort

Slipping on the sleeves

I close my eyes

Pretend

Your arms are wrapping me

Into that safe place

Where I know

Beyond a shadow

Of doubt

That

I

Am

Cherished

So know that when

I push you away

It’s because I care too much

Not because

I care so little

Or because

Of you

No

I love you

So much so that

I will hide my love away

Pack it tightly where

There is no

Air

And while

My heart starves

While my skin blanches

And I grow

Thin

I will know

That you are free to live

This life you chose

And it will give

Me joy

So

This is love

That you would give your

Life, hope, dreams,

For another

Person