Fruit

Sukkot is one of my favorite High Holidays on the Jewish calendar! It's about (amongst many other things) being thankful for the fruit in your life in a season where things are dying (Fall). How beautiful is that? There's a real correlation in my mind. Most times, death is required before fruit can be produced and here we are, leaves changing vibrant reds and yellows, falling to the ground and dying while we think about the fruit in our lives.
As we are in Sukkot, a time to remember how God provided for the Israelites as they wandered the desert, I am reminded of being thankful for harvest both literal and metaphorical. And while it's hard to understand a world where what's in your fridge correlates to what's in your bank account (thank you credit card company?) I can understand spiritual fruit. You don't invest, you avoid the unpleasant, you refuse to trust the Lord, you want the easy way out...and wam bam you get what you want, but it really wasn't what you wanted. And the bonus? No spiritual fruit was produced in you.

And don't get me wrong, it's easier to not have spiritual fruit produced in your character. The process of dying to self, learning to lean, and being honest with God about your true state stinks.

But when it's all said and done, we are glad we did it every time.

And since this fruit thang thang has been on my brain, and I just so happened to be in the book of Galatians, I started looking at the fruit of the spirit...and realizing how unnatural it really seems to me:

• love
• joy
• peace
• forbearance
• kindness
• goodness
• faithfulness
• gentleness
• self-control

Now before you start thinking you've got it on lock down and I'm a hot mess...I'm not talking about the really good moods and good days when everything is going right and it's easy to be some of these things. Or days when you can fake it really well. I'm talking about this being a part of my character, so much so that it seeps out naturally in my thoughts, actions, and attitudes. Because, let's be real...loving someone other than your self is entirely foreign (your whole life you are the center). That's why mothers are like super heros to me. Or goodness? Please. I can't even help myself be a hypocritical fool on the road pointing out everyones mistakes they make driving when I just practiced the same behavior 1 minute prior on the of ramp of 490. Patience? The absolute toughest for me and not in my nature. Self-control? Ha...

And it's not that I don't try, I do. In fact, most of the problem results from my effort. This is not a battle of sweat and muscling through. I will never bear these traits in my being by mere brute force. This is a hard concept to really get. But truthfully, there is more power in an open and raw dialogue with God about where you are with these things. Not covering it up, or pretending, or doing better next time, but a realization of your person; controlled by emotions, selfish, impatient, and doubtful...and letting Him see all of it.

I want these things to be woven into my character. I want to have my life be lived for others. And mostly, I want to do things and be these things when no one is looking but Jesus. Because I want Him to be my only audience and motivation.

Take a look right by that section in Galatians when you get a chance. You will see another portion dedicated to acts of the sinful nature. Whether I like to admit it often or not, I am much more familiar with those acts. Those are like dear friends at times.

During that time walking around in the desert, God was clear about something: rely on Me. Don't store up the food, don't try and turn around, don't make your own way. Just follow the fire by night and the pillar of smoke by day...and slowly, year after year, you will get there.

I just hope I don't go around in circles making a journey that should take 2 weeks, a journey that lasted 40 years.

So, be honest with Him.
But mostly be honest with yourself.
And trust that what He requires, although uncomfortable, produces what you really do want.

Happy Sukkot!
mp

Keep Walking

Well, it would do me no good to run away. There were other bears in the woods. I might meet one any time. I mights well deal with this one as with another. 

 (from Little House In The Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder)

I remember a time, not too far back, when all the things I was hoping for, fighting for, reaching towards were entirely unseen. Everything was shaking and uncertainty was the thick cloud I breathed. I remember feeling like a house, whose foundation was being ripped up and replaced. During reconstruction, everything seems scary.

I remember talking on the phone in the middle of the mess to a woman who very much is a mentor to me. She patiently reminded me of the truth and the progress that had been made even if I couldn't see a single step in front of me. I remember not being able to see, feeling totally hopeless, but knowing the only thing I could do was keep walking forward. I remember in that moment realizing what the scripture "hope in things unseen" meant and what it required. And I remember a decision I had to make; would I turn around after all this time and give up? Go back? Retreat? Or would I press forward, even though I was tired, even though I was doubting, even though I felt like I had reached my end.

I remember the Lord whispering to me about the joy in reaching the end of ourselves.

And so I kept moving. Because, what else could I do? If I stopped now, I'd never finish. And if I didn't get past this obstacle, it would only show it's face another time.

You know the feeling when you start deep cleaning and everything seems to be messier than when you started? Or when you are doing renovation and it feels like no order will ever come to that part of the house again? That was how I felt, and I was the house.

I was already in the middle of it. I had burned all the bridges and all the walls were already knocked down. Tons of energy, effort, and tears had lead me to the very place where I currently stood. Part of me knew, deep down, that what lay before me, as unseen and unsure as it seemed in that moment, had to be there.

So I kept walking.
And He kept uprooting.
And He kept fighting (for me).
And He kept whispering.
And He kept leading.
And slowly, (painfully slow) with my hand in His, He began to maneuver me around that deep forest I was in. Turning right when I thought it should be left, teaching me along the way, dodging potholes and unseen prickers, stopping to point out beautiful wildlife when I was in a rush to finish.

I didn't have a map, I didn't have the skills, I didn't even have the right shoes-but He lead me. And I think the end of myself is just what He was waiting for. Because as soon as I tired of trying and muscling my way through, as soon as I just let Him take my weak and weary hand, we were already out of the forest. And I didn't even realize I was out until He told me to take a look around. Suddenly, the familiars were gone. All those things I had assumed would always be there (the thoughts, the doubts, the fears, the habits, the mess)...were back in the woods. And there we were, standing together in a field, the sun shining, hand in hand.

"For this commandment which I command you this day is not too difficult for you nor is it far off" Deut 30:11 

And I could tell He wasn't at all surprised. In fact, it was almost as if He was grinning with a "I told you so" type of smile.

"What I have said, that I will bring about. What I have planned, that I will do" Isaiah 46:11

He took roots that were so deep and ripped them out.
He transformed ways of thinking.
He changed patterns of behavior.
He washed away lies that I believed.
He instilled truth, joy, and peace that I didn't understand.
And all I had to do was say, in a weak and unsure voice, "ok".

I could still be standing back there where He asked me to give Him my hand.Or worse, I could have turned around and walked deeper.
But He said He was going to do it...long before I even knew how much there was to do.
And He did.

And as I'm looking to the new year, and thinking back on the past 2 years, I want to cry.
He really is who He says He is.
He really does what He says He'll do.
He really finishes what He starts.
And the impossible really is made possible with Him.

And while there will be more battles to fight, more hills to climb, and more uprooting that needs to happen in the future-He has brought me out of a forest I never thought ended. (And I never want to go back)

So if you are standing in the middle of a dark (and super scary) forest and are thinking of turning around remember that it would do no good to run away. You've come too far already. If it's not this thing, it'll be another. You might as well deal with this bear now.

xoxo,
mp

"But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has?" Romans 8:24-25

"I burned the bridges, they can't be found. I paid my vows, no turning around. I am Yours. Whatever it feels like. Whatever it looks like. When I heard Your voice, when You said my name, my heart it yearned for You..."-Misty Edwards

Snapshots

This is a little late for a 9/11 post but, really, it isn't about 9/11.
A few weeks ago my housemate and I were checking out after grocery shopping. We were laughing a little because we both know my least favorite part of the grocery experience is at the end; the magazines. I really enjoy grocery shopping but I hate getting into the line-o-mags. I hate anything that's set up for impulse shopping but mostly every moral fiber in my being is animatedly opposed to everything those magazines stand for (my pontificating stops here).
 Being the complete opposite of me that my darling housemate is, (you should live with us, it get'\s pretty interesting) she starts looking through them all. I normally ignore her while she's doing this and trying to talk to me about things she's reading but this time she was showing me a picture of an article done on 9/11. It was a piece on the children who were not born yet. Their mothers were pregnant when their dads passed away on 9/11 either serving as emergency relief or workers inside the buildings. I really thought it was an interesting perspective; a snap shot of 10 years later. Here were faces of these kids; fully cognitive beings with favorite colors, first days of school and first teeth already behind them. Last I left off with them, they were babies. But their life continued and those 10 years were full of lots of experiences and moments leading up to this picture of them I was now seeing.

And it got me thinking...lots of things hold more power when they are snap shots of one season or time to another. Anything given a substantial amount of time in between really changes and adapts.
It's like loosing weight or getting older. We don't notice the few pounds or wrinkles on ourselves or the people close to us because we are an intricate part of their daily ebb and flow. Now, take the same changes on a person you haven't seen since high school and you notice the 7 pounds, the new way they part their hair, or the quirky habit they picked up along the way.

And I've spent enough time with the Lord now to know that He uses stuff like this to start getting my brain in a particular frame of mind so He can keep working out some other things He has to say...and He did.
It started with the 9/11 magazine moment and continued.

I began thinking about where I was 10 years ago when that happened. I remember sitting in keyboarding (ha!) class. I started to remember how I looked at the world, what I thought was going to happen in life, who I was dating, what was important to me then, how my family dynamics were...and I could not help but be full of gratitude and awe and how much God had shifted and changed in just 10 years. There were so many little things no one will ever know about along with really big changes and shifts that had happened throughout those 10 years. Sitting in keyboarding class, I was so clueless. Sitting at my computer now, I'm just as clueless. It's true what they say, (who is the they we always are referring to anyway? Does anyone ever wonder that) "the more you learn, the more you realize how little you know".

I was in Wegmans again a few days later (I like it there, ok!?) with a friend and I bumped into someone I talked to a few times during the summer before that. Here I was again, staring a snapshot in the face. In their mind, I was the same person that previous summer. And to me, so were they. You start back up with the person you left off with, it's natural. Sometimes you have changed a lot and they haven't, sometimes you both are very different. But seldom do you find you can start right back off where you were.  We weren't there for all the changing and growing and little moments in between in that year that separated us. But I was there for mine. I knew that that Megan was a lot different than the one standing in the cheese section. I hadn't realize all the changes that had happened or even how much progress and growth had occurred until I started talking to the snapshot friend.
It was powerful.

Fast forward two nights later and I'm cleaning out my basement. It was an all out purge session. And I came across pictures and objects galore. Old boyfriend bags (Ladies know what a boyfriend bag is. Those cheesy containers we used to keep all letters, pictures, and gifts in one relationship termination had completed), high school pictures, old family photos, (awkward age 10 stage included) vacation souvenirs, etc. I ended up spending two hours sorting through it all, throwing a lot away, staring at a lot, and realizing the distance that had been formed between those things and I.

This idea kept swirling around my brain long after.
I realized snapshots are pictures from a different time, people particular to a season, even the smell of a type of tea you used to drink during a really bad time in your life.
They all are occupants of a place we used to inhabit but have, without realizing just how far, moved out of.
Snapshots are sobering and powerful. They have the ability to remind you of how far you have come from a situation, person, time, or way of thinking. It can be negative; reminding you how far away you have slid from that person you wanted to be. It could also remind you of how faded a dream you once had has become.
But for me, this time, it's been good. I've been reminded to let myself see how much progress as been made. (I have a tendency to be incredibly ambitious and goal driven, so much so that I don't realize how far I have come from one thing before I move on to the next check-list item.)

And now, with the Jewish new year Rosh Hashanah approaching and we're all looking towards the next year to come, it's powerful to think back to the snapshots you have from previous years.

So, rummage through your snapshots.
Pull out the tea you drank last year all the time.
Go back to the park you sat at every Friday.
Facebook stalk that friend who you spent a lot of time with two years ago.
Read the book you read during that really depressing February.
And...remember.
Because chances are, you've changed a lot.
Chances are, a lot of ground has been gained.
And it's probably the very thing you thought wouldn't change.

Deut 30:11, "This commandment that I'm commanding you today isn't too much for you, it's not out of your reach."

So, L'shanah tovah! (For a good year...)

xoxo,
mp

Hold Me While it Hurts

If there's one thing that's happened this summer (besides a beautiful trip to Hawaii, Italy, loosing my job, and backpacking the Finger Lakes Trail, ha! Did all that really happen?!) ...it's a deep revelation of God the Father. I have realized my most powerful weapon is intimacy, vulnerability, and a raw nature with God.
This, however, is one of the scariest things we can do. Opening up the most ugly parts of yourself to a God who is not only unimaginably holy and good but who is also the victim of some of your own misunderstandings of His character....is a bit unnerving. But He was patient and relentless....and is beginning to show me where His power is made perfect.

And since I don't have a super great understanding of fathers, this one was tough for me. Are dads a distant and firm presence in your life? Are they monitors of moral behavior? Are they angry at you? Are they uninterested? Do you have to be strong to win their love? Do you have to win their love? Do you have to do things to fight for their attention? Of course the answer to all of these is no.

But the one question I found myself asking Him is,

"Is it possible for me to trust You completely and still cry?"

And the one thing He keeps saying is,

"Let Me hold you while it hurts".

Because, see, trusting God in a transition or tough time doesn't mean you are super strong, without emotions, and totally fine. You can still be sad, still be emotional, still need to be held...while you are still trusting in a God who's perspective is so much bigger and who knows so much more.

The lie is that we have to be strong, brave, courageous, and emotionless if we are really trusting God.

It says that if you were really trusting, you wouldn't need to be held, or hugged, or ball your eyes out on 490E on the way home like some climatic rainstorm/car scene in an indie movie.

But here is what I know to be true:
1-I trust God in this transition but what I have to let go of in order to move to the 'new thing' is painful.
2-I trust God with some desires I have placed before Him, but while I am waiting for those things to come into my life...it can be hard.

And He is saying, for both those things,

"Let me hold you while it's hurting"

So, if you're trying to be strong...just let Him hold you. Just because it hurts doesn't mean you don't trust Him.

xoxo

mp


But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not YET have, we wait for it patiently... (Romans 8:24-25)

Illusions of Control

 (Source)

"Lord, remind me how brief my time on earth will be. Remind me that my days are numbered-how fleeting my life is" Psalm 39:4 NLT

As of late, there has been this desire growing in me for a secret get-away. I want to find a mountain top, a place with an entirely different perspective of the everyday; both literally and metaphorically. A place to pray-to really get a perspective shift. Maybe a once a month sort of thing. Jesus had them. I think it's a good idea.

Prayer helps correct myopia, calling to mind a perspective I daily forget. I keep reversing roles, thinking of ways in which God should serve me, rather than vice versa. It's a way to realize my tininess and God's vastness. (Yancey)

I think without this sort of intentional shifting of our everyday, our illusions become more of what we perceive as reality. I begin to forget I don't know best, I start to think I am not so small, I want God to be manipulated by me, and truth becomes harder to identify in the midst of everything else.

More importantly (and more terrifying than anything else), is my illusions of control. Without a perspective shift, a mountain top prayer place, I begin to think I really am in control. I forget God made the moon and the heavens and that if the Milky Way galaxy were the size of the entire continent of North America, our solar system would fit in a coffee cup. (wow!) I start to crown myself queen... God even. And I'm not a good God. I don't really know much past my immediate desires and limited scope of vision. And I certainly have nothing in control. 

Phillip Yancey said it best, "I live in the daily hope of getting my life under control. At home I left a desk covered with to-do lists" study the manual for my balky printer unclog pine needles in the gutter, unstick the toilet, change snow tires, check on my sick neighbor. Maybe if I take a day off, I'll have time... On the mountain one bolt of lightning, splitting a rock on a nearby peak and exploding against my eardrums, exposes any illusion that I am ever in control. I can count on the moment before me, nothing more".

So, as I let go of my illusions I find in place of a false sense of security...a Father.
Who is good and for me.
Who has got it all under control.
Who I can blindly follow and know it will work out.
And who just wants me to be honest and raw about the me that keeps wanting to get in the way.
Because humility, the step down, makes possible God's lifting us up. By trying to be strong, I'm blocking God's power.
So cheers to stepping down (every month).
And here's to hoping I can find that perfect place!

xoxo,
mp

Manipulating God

(Picture by Mary Kate, "Tantrum")
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death" 

Proverbs 14:12

News just in; God is not provoked to change through my apoplectic attacks.  He is not a man who is easily coerced. It doesn't matter how much I don't understand, how many fits I throw, what it is that I think I know better, He will not move. He is unchanging. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And you know what? I'm glad.

Because what I'm learning is just like the verse above says, sometimes there are things I think are right, they feel right, they seem right, I want them to be right, they should be right...but in the end they will lead to heartbreak, pain, running off course, distraction, and a hot mess.

It's not that God wants to hold out on us, either. In fact, He is the giver of every good and perfect gift. He even provides us with a promise that anything we ask for in His name, we will get. But it has to be in His name. It has to be under His will, in alignment with His plan. If we ask for anything that will be good for us and for His ultimate plan to bring Himself the glory He deserves...it's ours. But how many times do we ask for things outside of this course we're on for our life? How many times have we asked for the very thing that is poison for our souls?

I am so relieved that my schemes and manipulation techniques won't work on God.

 

Imagine the disaster that would ensue if that weren't true. Picture the consequences a parent and child face when the stubborn toddler is able to frequently manipulate their parents. How much different, really, are we? God is the best Father, the most wise parent, the most patient caretaker. And He will not be manipulated. No amount of kicking and screaming, yelling and throwing tantrums, will move Him off the course He knows best.

Lately, I am so thankful for this fact.

The picture above is from the bedroom of my friend, Mary Kate. (Who, by the way, inspires me, spurs me on, sharpens me, and who Jesus lives in!) With it, the scripture Psalm 73:21-23. I like it best in the Amplified Version,

"For my heart was grieved, embittered, and in a state of ferment, and I was pricked in my heart. So foolish, stupid, and brutish was I, and ignorant; I was like a beast before You. Nevertheless I am continually with You; You do hold my right hand."

He will wait out our tantrums, He will not give in to our manipulation and fits, He will patiently discipline us and guide us, and even better, when it's all said and done...He will still be there holding our right hand.

I get this great picture in my head when I see the last part of that verse. I invision the moment after the big crying fit, you know, when it's super hard to breathe and you're taking in air at short intervalls. You're just starting to calm down...and you look down at you're right hand to see His still there. It's normally at these moments in life when you give out a sigh of relief and chuckle. You're foolish, He's patient, and you're still together.

Because, really, there is a way that seems right to us in that moment but it leads to death.
Nevertheless.

xoxo,
mp

More Like The Giving Tree

 

(Source)

Philippians 2: 3-4 "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others"

I have a lot of friends who love the book The Giving Tree. In fact, one of my girlfriends Jess even has a beautiful tattoo of it on her arm. But I need to confess something; although I realized the book stood for deep, profound, beautiful things...reading it has always infuriated me.

How terrible is that? A book about giving of yourself to the happiness of others made me angry. And you know why? I think it's because I felt sad for the tree. To me, it was weakness. Why didn't the tree stick up for itself? Tell the boy he was being selfish. Explain to the boy what was right to ask for and what was not OK. Tell him that it was one-sided and that he was cut off. And why couldn't the boy have been a better friend?  But I'm wrong.

I was reading in Philippians today and it's clear-to give all of you is right, to hold back is wrong. Self-preservation is wrong. Being closed off is wrong. The whole Bible makes that clear. For goodness sake, Jesus should NOT have given Himself like He did, right?! Imagine if He didn't do for us what we very well deserved to have not done...

It's because I have been in self-preservation mode, because I needed to take care of myself and survive, because I was looking out for me and felt like if I gave too much, everyone would take all of me, leave, and there would be nothing left. But what that's created is selfishness. Holding back from others what God has put in me to give. To hold on to your life, you lose it. To die is to gain. How could I have missed this? It's not that I didn't read it, it's that I didn't believe it. It's that I thought my way was right and that God was confused on this one. But it's the inside, outside, upside Kingdom. He will not let me give more than I am able to give, and He will sustain me.

Now, this isn't to say that you are extreme about this concept. You don't let yourself get walked all over and beaten up. You don't do it to people please or to gain affection. You do it to glorify your Father. You do it because you are to consider others above you. You do it because at the end of your life, if you self-preserved perfectly and always didn't give if someone didn't deserve it or was asking what you thought was too much...it wouldn't mean a thing.

So, God is calling me to be like this giving tree. Even if it's scary.
And to let go of this idea of survival and self-preservation, because it's not Biblical.
God will provided for all of my needs, I don't need to play that role anymore.
And maybe no one noticed, maybe it never seemed like it was like that-but God knows my inner world and heart...
So I wanted to say I'm sorry, to Him and to anyone I have held back from.
I'm sorry if I didn't compliment when I should have, or encouraged you when I should have.
I'm sorry if I didn't let you into my world when you deserved to be in there.
I'm sorry if I only got out of it what I needed and left you without what you needed.
I'm sorry if I didn't extend my forgiveness when you hurt me.
I'm sorry I didn't give.
Because I want to be about the interests of others and not just my own.

Proverbs 17:11, "He who builds a high gate invites destruction".

High gates are there for protection. Sometimes we build up our own city gates around our worlds for the same reason. Although wisdom is important, the battle is for the Lord. More destruction comes from gating everyone else out.

xoxo,
mp