Wandering Wonders

Hello.

Recently I have been on this really random nun kick.  I just finished a book about Mother Teresa that just absolutely shook me to the core. I thought about her forty years of spiritual darkness and what it meant to have such fortitude, to have such light to give to others and yet feel complete darkness yourself… to share in the sufferings of Christ, even His death on the cross and the spiritual darkness He must have encountered when Abba turned his back on Him.  After that, I was like “well this little lady was named after Therese of Lisieux. I have heard of Theresa of Avila, but not Lisieux.  I think i am gonna read something about her.”

And so I started reading about this girl who died from tb by 24 and had lived an extremely sheltered life, having entered “nunhood” at 16 or 17.  And I thought she wasn’t anything spectacular but was rather ordinary.  Except for two things: her devotion to God and the six hours she spent every day in prayer. 

She got mad once because they were talking about having “devotions”.  She answered that they were seeking when to have and take communion, what about holy days, etc.  She then asked them, “What about the Holy Face?” Wow.  Sounds so simple…

And she would meditate on God’s love so much.  She said that if she got to heaven and she wasn’t impressed, she would act impressed so as to please Abba.  Haha.  This sounds like a really stupid thing to think.  But it’s not if you think of the heart that offered it.

I also skimmed over some biographies of renowned peacemakers and activitists. 

Right now I am reading about Dorothy Day.  Her story is crazy.  i will share more on her later.  

I think I am gonna make a list of men and women who have gone before me and have lived by faith.  I think of all the people listed in Hebrews and that there must be people that crazy today.  And that while Abraham and Sarah, Hagar and Enoch, and Abel and others were all really cool, the cloud of witnesses we are surrounded by is much, much larger!

We have Koinonia Farms, Watchman Nee, Christian Peacemakers, Elizabeth Elliot,  Dorothy Day, the Berrigan Brothers, Momma T, Martin Luther King, Jr, and a whole stinkin’ slew of missionaries and nuns and lay people and martyrs. Can you imagine being in heaven and chanting along with MLK, who’s rooting you on:  “fREE AT LAST, FREE AT LAST, THANK GOD ALMIGHTY I’M FREE AT LAST!” 

Okay, a stretch of the imagination!  But we are surrounded… by a cloud of witnesses…NOW… and they are rooting for us to LAY ASIDE everything that is entangling us right this second, and just RUN the race that Abba has put before us.  Geez.

Just a thought.  Not a very deep one, but a thought nonetheless. Hopefully the list will develop more concretely (haha!) in due time!

Hello, my little friends.

I just got back from this Hippie Festival called “PAPAfest” that was absolutely amazing.  It was weird to not shave my legs for that long or not to come in direct contact with a shower for five days.  I am glad to be back, but i am so glad I went.

When people have Jesus inside them, there’s this kindness that is almost painful to me, because I am not that nice, or kind, or good.  It was like swimming in an oasis in the middle of the desert.  And what I thought was really cool was that this was a group of about 1,000 people, primarily believers in the Lord Jesus,  were concerned about their communities and the state of international affairs and how we can be good stewards of what God has given us… including the earth. I liked how they experienced an unrest in their hearts about the political and bloody path of the nations, including our own.  And I liked how as a body, they pledged their allegiance to the kingdom of God that is both here and is to come, and did not recognize this nation as their own.

What also hit me was how intentional some of them were about intentionally living life to the fullest.  One band biked from St. Louis to that little community in Illinois, lugging their instruments behind them.  It took them eleven days! The other bands came in buses that ran off of veggie oil. I’ve always wanted to do something like that (maybe not quite as far) but have been too scared about the risk.  This one guy Lars is biking from there to Paraguay to attend the International Mennonite Conference.  It will take him six months to get there on bike. Wow.  What dedication! 

What also hit me was how young the married couples were and how dedicated the fathers were.  These fathers were amazingly intimate with their families and not in the least sense aloof.  It was like they could speak to their wives without words. And their children were happy, very happy. And the women were simply dressed, very beautifully some of them, in modest dresses that were handsewn or machine stitched by someone they knew or themselves.   We were all so very happy… i was just lucky to be there and take it all in, a great Sabbath for my soul.

I am thinking about visiting the Intentional Koinonia Community in GA… we shall see.  I have to go back to work now, but I will write more when I can… hopefully soon!  All these thoughts in my head need to be put to paper. 

I’ve been thinking and reading a whole lot.  There’s gonna be a great upheaval in my heart… here’s what I’ve been dreaming:

Abba, today, I ask that you would take me out of being comfortable and instead let me hear the cries of those who are hungry and thirsty and need clothing or someone to talk to or just hear them.  Abba, please provide hurting people today.  Let me be obedient to what you would have me do.  Abba, get rid of apathy in my heart….

There are so many things we’re responsible for.  What about blood diamonds, clothes made in sweatshops, leaving a legacy of war and violence, brutally hurting our enemies, not helping stop human trafficking in Darfur, and not knowing who needs water and food and to be adopted to live.  We are responsible for leading wasteful lives.  We have bought into the lie that what we have is what makes us.  We are under-prayed and so well-fed, we have no idea what it means to go without.

Abba, I thank you for high gas prices and that we are staggering under that weight.  Abba, I am so dependent on you. I need you to do anything- even live.  And I admit how affluent I’ve been only to waste so much.   And Abba, I am personally responsible for what I have not done.  At the end of my life, I want to hear you say, “I was hungry and you fed me… I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink. I needed clothes and you clothed me.  I needed a place to live… and you gave it to me.” 

I am so insulated.  Tear all my insulation away.  I have a peace in my heart which will protect both my mind and my heart.  And your angels go before me.  And I am loved by you and you sing over me.

I’m called to be less wasteful and to consume less, and even to save more– not to horde for myself, but to give it all away.  

Abba, show me and lead me in these things.  And when an earthquake happens and strikes China and leaves people in far worse condition than the hurricane ever left the people in New Orleans, Abba, let me not just stand here as a silent spectator, unprepared.  Abba, open my eyes.  Help me do my research into aid organizations so that when these things happen, I may know how to give, where to go, and how to help.

Please lead me to your Kosovos.  My life is so screwed up.  You know that I have given up everything and continue to give up all earthly ambitions and loves so that I may be found in you.  Abba, everything I have is yours.  Show me where to give my stuff away.  I don’t want anything and I don’t need anything but you. 

Abba, show me how to sell my car… or give it away.  Show me whether or not I should get a bike.  And Abba, I don’t care where you send me… just don’t let me stay here and remain apathetic.  I want to be on the front lines.  I already know what my calling is.

And Abba, when friends come to me with questions I can’t answer because that would mean that we would have to change the way we live in order to really believe what we say we do, I pray that I would answer them with my life and my words and and the way that I care for them and clothe them and pray for them.

And I pray that you would show us the difference between the cross of Christ and adopting American Christianity.  I pray that you would remove all earthly nationalism from who we think we are.  

Abba, let us remember what you said!  You said that we are eagerly awaiting our citizenship in heaven!  We are strangers, aliens on this earth! We’re like illegal immigrants.  We’re just working here, but placing all of our real treasure and allegience into your kingdom.  We’re more concerned with what happens in your home… a home that we are eagerly waiting to see.

Abba, let us be overcomers, and not passive defeatists.  Abba, let not our hearts grow cold.  And don’t let us justify any evil in our mind because it is our own.  Abba, cause us to stir, to wake up in the middle of the night, out of the love that we have for our nation’s enemies, and pray for their blessing and prosperity and salvation.  Let us send letters of love to their mosques, their governors, and their children. 

Let no death go ungrieved.  Send women to wail on their walls over the deaths of our enemies.  Abba, let us no longer be spectators.  I think about that woman we were all standing around the other day.  You told me to pray over her and I was flat out disobedient.  I thought I would look weird if I went up to her, put my hand on her swollen knee, and prayed for her out loud for both physical and spiritual healing.  I have sinned big time out of a spirit of timidity and not out of power or a sound mind.  I still care way too much about what happens to me and what other people think.  Abba, let me die to all that!  Let me consider everything a loss.

Abba, forgive my heart… I am called to be peculiar, a spectacle, a fragrant aroma to those who are going on to be with you even after life an offensive stench to those who are perishing without you.  Abba, at least let me live up to that… and let me not listen when people tell me to “settle down.” I’m called to overcome.  I’m called to be a light.  I’m called to death. But one thing I am not called to do is live comfortably…

Father, destroy all of satan’s works in my mind, life, heart, soul, and body.  And let that which is pure be cleansed still until all that you see is Jesus Christ. Cleanse me of my dirty, self-preserving motives… Abba, let me die, that you might live.

I love you.  May I, and those I’m surrounded by, be loosed from apathy and from caring about what happens to ourselves way too much. I pray this in the Name of the Lord Jesus, for whose sake we have both lost all and endure all things.  Abba, you are so beautiful.

The heart is a very troubling thing.  At times it rises up against both head and will.  And it aims in all directions even when your feet can only walk in one.  And life can be completely happy around you, and your heart be unstill.  Or like an untutored student, the heart can be at peace, asleep and dreaming, even in the midst of tulmultuous waves.

And so I say to her,   “Please sleep on the high shoulder of your sweet Father.  Give all your tears to Him and he’ll bottle them.  Every tear, every Word, every sigh He knows and has recorded. But not to use against you.  Instead it’s a journal kept of everything the two of you have walked through.”  

Oh peace, be still my heart, my sorrow, and my joy!  God will come and heal you with His song… the song He sings over you at night. 

I spent the last few days in Mobile, completely soaking up God’s perfect peace.  I wanted a break from it all, including the questions swirling in my head and my aching heart.  And so I decided to let go.  To die to everything.  To be completely happy and content just in knowing that He is my portion. 

I read Watchman Nee’s God’s Plan and The Overcomer while staying at Jen’s house.  it was really cool because her grandma knew Watchman Nee and used to have him over to their house at the Bible Study when he was a college student.  And to know that he died in a jail cell for what he believed in mainland China… whew.

So here’s some of the things he said (and I am probably butchering, but here goes):

How to enter the victorious life:

1) We must be fully despaired of ourselves and know ourselves so fully that we see ourselves as fit for nothing but death. We must come to the end of any life in ourselves.  For our extremity is God’s opportunity. As long as we still have life in ourselves we are not able to accept the victory of Christ. 

2) we must be completely consecrated.  There must be definite and specific consecration.

3) We must believe… that Christ has already taken gov’t over us.  Except we give Christ the highest place we will not be able to overcome.

Whew.  I have been thinking of death and being the disciple of Christ.  I thought about how Christ asks from us the very things that we do not want to give away.  These are our Isaacs and our Rachels.  And I thought about what would be the very things I would not want to give away. 

My Isaac is gone and dead, but my Rachel… that would be my flesh.  Everything I put my confidence in that Paul calls garbage.  Everything which must die so that He might live.  I must give it all away.  My plans for myself.  My pride.  My will.  And it hurts like heck.